Written by Daniel Goldberg, Th.D., D.D.

Modern-day Iran, which is situated east of Iraq beyond the Tigris River, boasts a long and colorful history. Biblically, it is the same Persian Empire that Cyrus the Great established in 550 bc, after Babylonia surrendered to Cyrus (Ezra 1:3-5) in the time of the exile of the Jewish people in that region. The reign of Darius the Mede (522-468 bc) marked the zenith of the Persian Empire (Daniel 5:31).

How ironic it is that the Persians lent their support to a Jewish return to their homeland in the time of Ezra and Nehemiah, given the present animosity between these two ancient peoples.

Written by Dr. Robert Vasholz

From the time the Church triumphed over the paganism of the Roman Empire and assumed the mantle of worldly political power, the dark shadow of anti-Semitism has been its lasting shame. This deadly shadow has hovered above the terrible deeds of the Crusaders, the Inquisition, the pogroms and the horrors of the Nazi Holocaust. What is the basis of this horrifying hatred? Does anti-Semitism spring from the New Testament itself?

In a quest for the roots of anti-Semitism, many authors have asserted that texts of the New Testament are “tainted with anti-Jewish allegations.” The Gospel of John has often been singled out as particularly guilty. The foremost reason is John’s frequent use of the term “the Jews”-many times in hostile or confrontational settings.

The Gospel accounts of Jesus’ arrest, trial, torture, execution and resurrection have gripped the souls of countless millions throughout the centuries. It is understandable that they have been remembered and dramatized by the Church. One of the most famous of these “reenactments” has been the Passion Play at the Bavarian village of Oberammergau.

Just as every drama must have its hero, so too every drama must have its villain. The obvious hero of the Gospels is Jesus. Who are the foremost villains of the Passion Play? For centuries, the villains have been the Jewish people.

The Scripture cannot state it more unambiguously than God’s promise to Abraham and his descendants in Genesis 12:3 – “I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse him who curses you; And in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”

In the final analysis, anti-Semitism is more destructive to those who practice it than to those who bear the brunt of it. Hard as it may be to contemplate the anguish of Jewish people who have suffered such cruelty at the hands of their enemies throughout the centuries, it is even more frightening to consider the eternal judgment courted by those who are determined to hate what God Himself loves. As the character Yakov Bok in Bernard Malamud’s award-winning novel The Fixer observes as he reads the New Testament his guards have given him, “If you want to be an anti-Semite, you must first hate Jesus Christ.”

Our Hands Are Stained With Blood by Michael Brown
(Shippensburg: Destiny Image, 2002)

This is a well-documented overview of the painful history of the Jewish people and the institution of the Church. From the early strains of anti-Semitism in the writings of the “Church Fathers” through the Crusades, the Inquisition, the Holocaust and even into current attitudes, Dr. Brown sets down the heartbreaking tale of Jewish maltreatment at the hands of the Church. Alongside of this, he builds a case, primarily based on Romans chapters 9-11, of the stance the Church should take toward the Jewish people.