Please Turn the Page
Since the very purpose of the Committee on the Christian Approach to the Jews was evangelism, one might wonder why, as late as 1947, there should have been any need for a separate commission at the Basle conference to deal with "Church and Evangelism." And yet there was, for the simple reason that the charge continued to be made--and not only by Jews--that it was illegitimate, if not un-Christian, for Jews to be targeted for conversion. As a consequence, it was necessary constantly to clarify the missionary imperative of the Church, especially its imperative to preach for conversion to Jews. Moreover, the parish approach, which emphasized the role of the Church, as contrasted with religious missionary societies, required a thorough understanding of the ecclesiastical imperative of the Jewish mission.
At the Basle meeting it fell to Hans Kosmala, who earlier had theologically demolished the idea of a Hebrew Christian Church, to set forth the definitive explication of the centrality of evangelism. After citing the usual New Testament passages that mandate mission and mission to the Jews specifically--e.g., Acts 13:46, Romans 1:16--he summarized the position of those who opposed evangelisation of Jews:
There may be sense in evangelising the heathen, in bringing to them, together with the Christian faith, great moral ideas and the blessings of our Western civilization--although some of those blessings may be of a very questionable kind. But the Jews have no need of all that. They are a highly civilised people, they have a considerable share in the achievements of the Western world and have an active interest in social and international progress, justice and peace. The Jewish ethical code is as good and perhaps even better than that of the Christian, because it is less idealistic, it is more practical and does not demand the "impossible". After all, it was the Jewish people who gave the world the Decalogue, which has become the corner-stone of all civilisation; they conceived the idea of the One God, which has been adopted by Christianity; their sacred scriptures are part of the Christian Bible. Christianity is merely a daughter-religion of Judaism. What can the daughter teach her mother?Those are some of the questions we have often been asked not only by Jewish people, but also by many Christians who, following the trends of modern thought, were greatly impressed by Jewish arguments.
Kosmala's argument then outlined what Christianity is not. It is not, first, a civilization or mode of culture, even though he had to admit that Christianity is "one of the strongest civilising forces in the world." Second, Christianity is not exhausted in any sort of new morality--"the power of Christianity does not lie in its incomparable ethics." Third, Christianity is not defined by a set of doctrines, for "even if we defined Christianity as a set of doctrines, revealed or derived from revelations, we would not yet penetrate into its essence. Even less is it an idealistic philosophy in the garb of a religious creed. If Christianity were only a system of philosophy, or of theology, or of ethics, however comprehensive and highly developed, it would be hardly worth the trouble to propagate Christianity any more than to disseminate the principles of other religious systems of high standing. That would merely be a matter of personal outlook or taste."
What, then, is Christianity? "The sole and all-absorbing contents of Christianity is Christ." But "Christ is not the founder of a new religion....Christ's Gospel is...something quite different from all existing religions. It addresses everyone personally. It is by its very nature a Gospel to all mankind. No one is excluded from it, no one can be exempted. Either it is God's word to all mankind, or it is no Gospel at all and, therefore, not worth preaching.
"There is just one more fact, we must keep in mind. Christ, according to his own words, 'is not come to destroy, but to fulfill.' In Him is not only the religion of Moses and the prophets fulfilled, but likewise also the yearning of all mankind." This assertion was supported by quotations from Isaiah 42 and 49. "The prophets of Israel knew that the office of the Messiah would not be restricted to Israel, but that God would give His Servant also 'for a light to the Gentiles'....The religious tradition of Israel in its highest perfection is fulfilled in Christ. The Church as the fellowship of those who believe and proclaim the Gospel (Mark 1:15) has therefore the right to assume Israel's spiritual title. This, however, does not affect the right of the Jewish people to call themselves Israel according to the flesh."
Of perhaps more interest than Kosmala's traditional presentation of supersessionist Christianity, couched as it was in a Barthian theological framework, was his description of Judaism and what "Judaism" believes and does not believe. It was a description that the missionaries found useful and, indeed, necessary, for it clearly differentiated Judaism and Christianity and made Christianity beyond any doubt the superior faith. Christianity was universal while Judaism was tribal:
Judaism as the religion of the descendants of Abraham (or rather of Jacob-Israel) is not the fulfillment of the prophetic expectation of "God's salvation unto the end of the earth". Judaism concerns itself with the Jewish people only. It is the religion of one particular people in the world, and for that people only. Some understanding of the separateness of the Jewish people is necessary for our understanding of the Gospel and its impact on the Jewish people.Judaism divides mankind into Israel and the Gentile world. The Jew does believe that all men descend from Adam and that they are all alike created in the image of God. But it does not follow from this acknowledgment that he also believes the Gentiles and Israel are equals before God. God has selected Abraham and his seed, now represented by the Jewish people, and has separated them from the rest of mankind, He has made them God's children and endowed them with special privileges.
There is more: "Judaism hardly recognises sin and guilt as a barrier between God and man. Jews do not deny that they commit definite sins, and they confess them on their Day of Atonement; but that sin and guilt as such injure them and spoil their relation to God, this they cannot understand. Why? Because they believe that, in contra-distinction to the nations of the earth, they have already been accepted by God through their being partners in the covenant which God made with Abraham and his seed. We will now realise that Judaism as the religion of the Jewish people can have no message for the rest of mankind. The Jew knows, not by any theological considerations but by his physical reality, that Israel's election and privileges can never be shared by the world. We will further realise that the Gospel of Christ is no daughter-religion of Judaism, but the key-stone of God's history with mankind since Adam. It is for this reason that the Gospel must be preached to every creature."
Kosmala thus spelled out what he considered to be principal differences between Judaism and Christianity in terms of world view and religious self-understanding. His conclusion from this analysis was that Jews cannot tolerate religious tolerance: "Individual Jews may have been eager advocates of tolerance during the past two hundred years, but the idea of religious liberty is not of Jewish origin....Judaism expects, on the one hand, regard for the exclusive nature of its religion, which must not be affected or injured by any missionary approach. On the other hand, it is, by virtue of this very nature, not vitally interested in religious freedom as interpreted today....Christianity, however, or what we understand of it, the Gospel of Christ, presupposes the religious freedom of the individual; it must needs proclaim and even guarantee that freedom."
The problem, however, is that the Church and Christians have not always acted in accordance with their stated principles. They have failed to approach the Jew in the full confidence of the freedom of the gospel. "We Christians have grown faint-hearted and many of us have yielded to the questions and arguments hurled at us by Jews and nominal Christians alike." In other words, Kosmala charged Christians with succumbing to the blandishment of Jews and acquiescing in Jewish, instead of Christian, presuppositions.
With Hans Kosmala's address as backdrop, the IMCCAJ at Basle approved the report of its Commission on Church and Evangelism. Following an introductory paragraph in which it reiterated the conviction that evangelism is of the essence of the Church and that to "exempt the Jews is to rob them of their rightful heritage," the report concurred with Kosmala that the "Gospel of Christ is not inconsistent with freedom of conscience, but presupposes it and guarantees it, and whatever methods of evangelism are used must never violate the sacredness of personality and must be morally beyond reproach."
The report did not, however, follow his insight that Christianity is essentially different from Judaism. Indeed, there were others who specifically disagreed about the status of Christianity vis-à-vis Judaism, as, for instance, Frederick J. Forell, who wrote in News Sheet just prior to the Basle conference that "Our message must be that Israel really survives in the church; that that innate urging of the Jewish heart to conquer the world is fulfilled in the church which, historically, is the daughter of the synagogue; the God of Israel the God of the world; the King of Israel is the Lord of the Church; the holy book of Israel is the Bible of the Christians; the founders of the church, the writers of the New Testament (with the exception of St. Luke) were all Jews." That understanding continued to appeal to the members of the IMCCAJ and so their report relied on the long-standing missionary axiom that the "Gospel in its fullness is the fulfillment of the highest beliefs and hopes of ancient Israel. As Paul emphasized the sharing of the Jews with the Gentiles, we would emphasize the readiness of the Gentiles to respond by cordially inviting the Jews to share with us what we have discovered of the richness of Christ." When all was said and done, evangelization of Jews was the service of the Church to the Jewish people, the service of offering them the possibility of becoming fulfilled Jews.
A new element, however, appeared in this Church and Evangelism report that requires specific attention because it highlights a tension within the Christian community over the central thesis of the IMCCAJ. "We feel very strongly," the report declared, "that kindness and friendship movements, while necessary and valuable in themselves, are insufficient, unless leading to evangelism."
Response to the "Goodwill Movement"
Conrad Hoffmann called the attention of the 1947 conference to the problem--perhaps threat is a more accurate word--of the "tolerance and inter-faith activities [that] have gained popularity in many circles." Such activities, the Director warned,
in spite of all that may be done to the contrary, seem to weaken the religious convictions, particularly of the Protestants, as to the essential necessity of Jesus Christ for all mankind, and seem to raise doubt as to the affirmation that Jesus Christ is God's answer to the whole world's need, of the Jew as well as of the Gentile. Moreover, there are Rabbis who protest against some of the interfaith activities, on the plea that they weaken the religious convictions of Jews as to the uniqueness of Judaism, which they maintain has been the means of the preservation of Israel through the many centuries of persecution.
This latter comment almost certainly was made with reference to a paper delivered by Rabbi Morton M. Berman, which had been published in the proceedings of the Central Conference of American Rabbis in 1946 and subsequently re-published in News Sheet immediately following the Basle meeting. Berman had written that the "increasingly frequent effort to prove Judaism and Christianity to be basically alike removes for many Jews who can only think of Judaism as a religion and nothing else any reason for the perpetuation of their inheritance....The damage resulting from a misdirected good-will movement which has produced the new Judeo-Christian religion of benevolentism lies not only in its inducement of the loss of the sense of the unique distinctive character of Judaism, the damage lies also in the excessive expenditure of time, energy, and zeal that go into such a movement."
In his own address at Basle, Hans Kosmala quoted "a Christian minister in London" as telling him that "it is an impudence of the Church to evangelise the Jews" and yet another clergyman as inquiring of him, ""What actually is the message which the Church pretends to have for the Jews?" These were Christians, sometimes derogated as "nominal Christians," who were participant in, or at least attracted by the positions espoused by the "Goodwill Movement."
In 1928 the National Conference of Christians and Jews had been formed in the United States, specifically to combat the anti-Catholicism of a presidential campaign in which a Roman Catholic, Alfred E. Smith, was a major party candidate. Teams of Protestants, Catholics, and Jews were sent about the country to speak at schools, churches, and civic organizations to demonstrate that the three principal branches of "Judeo-Christian" religion could stand together against intolerance and prejudice. It was not until 1942, however, that this "movement" reached Europe in the public formation of the (British) Council of Christians and Jews (1 October) "with the aim of combating religious and racial intolerance and promoting mutual understanding and cooperation." Led by its secretary, Methodist minister William W. Simpson, the CCJ enlisted prominent Jewish and Christian clerics--including the Chief Rabbi of Britain and the Archbishop of Canterbury--to its cause, which during the war years took on deadly urgency.
At the end of the war, Simpson and others came to the conclusion that cooperation of Christians and Jews across national boundaries was required to meet the challenge of antisemitism, which had by no means been stamped out by the defeat of the Nazi armies. Thus an international conference, organized by Simpson with the cooperation of Dr. Everett Clinchy, president of the (US) National Conference of Christians and Jews, was held at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, from 30 July to 6 August 1946 on the theme "Freedom, Justice, and Responsibility." Chaired by a former president of Vassar College, significant figures such as Hermann Maas of Germany, Alan Paton, and Leo Baeck, one-time rabbi in Berlin and survivor of Terezin but by that time resident in Britain, were present.
The report in News Sheet about this meeting quoted significant portions of the conference's "Fundamental Postulates of Judaism and Christianity in Relation to Human Order," among them these sentences: "Man's recognition of himself and of his neighbours as children of God should issue in a charity and righteousness which, while but imperfectly embodied in the form and laws of organised society, work constantly to transform them into an ever more adequate expression. We, therefore, Christians and Jews alike, call upon all who share the religious convictions and the ethical standards here set out to co-operate for the realization of this ideal." About which the News Sheet editor, reflecting the all but universal opinion of the missionaries to Jews, commented: "The absence of any reference to Jesus Christ as a factor or influence in the establishment of right human relationships, is surprising and disturbing. Modern men as men of all ages need the interpretation of God that comes through Jesus Christ, for victorious living as an individual as well as a social being."
The Oxford conference called for another, emergency, conference "to deal specifically with the problem of antisemitism in Europe" that should be convened "at the earliest possible moment." This conference, again sponsored by the British and American CCJs, was held the next year (30 August 1947) at Seelisberg in Switzerland, where a statement entitled simply "An Address to the Churches," which ever after has been known as the "Ten Points of Seelisberg," was approved by the Christians present (albeit with the advice and counsel of their Jewish colleagues).
In the preface to the "Ten Points" the framers of the statement emphasized that it was specifically addressed by Christians to the churches in "the firm hope that they will be concerned to show their members how to prevent any animosity towards the Jews which might arise from false, inadequate or mistaken presentations or conceptions of the teaching and preaching of the Christian doctrine, and how on the other hand to promote brotherly love towards the sorely-tried people of the old covenant." These and many of the ten points themselves proved to be fighting words for the theologians of the missionary societies.
When the IMCCAJ met at Stockholm in 1948, the Rev. J. H. Grolle "was very emphatic in his statement of the inadequacy of the Goodwill Movement and maintained that the Church must ever insist on her prerogative to include the Jews as all others in her program of evangelism and mission." And at the 1949 enlarged meeting of the Committee in Edinburgh, Hans Kosmala, having had ample time to study the report from the Seelisberg conference, launched a major attack on the "goodwill approach."
Kosmala stated his thesis in the first sentence of his address: "The Christian approach is evangelistic, the Goodwill approach is non-evangelistic." This was not a slip of the tongue, for Kosmala genuinely considered evangelism to be an intrinsic part of Christianity's essence and, therefore, the Goodwill Movement could not be Christian, even though many "nominal" Christians were engaged in it and thought it more Christian than the efforts of the missionaries. Among these latter was W. W. Simpson, secretary of the Council of Christians and Jews, whom Kosmala cited as remarking that "there is no fundamental opposition between the Goodwill Movement and the evangelistic approach," something, Kosmala, the clear-sighted missionary, could not embrace: "These remarks cannot be accepted as legitimate statements of Goodwill policy; for no Jewish member of the movement could honestly subscribe to them. There is in fact nothing in the aims of the CCJ which would admit of such construction....'Tolerance' and 'Goodwill' as understood and practised by the Goodwill Movement, precludes evangelism, and so long as Christianity indulges in evangelistic activities among Jews, the movement's policy will inevitably be anti-evangelistic." And in that he was correct.
He then went on to amplify what he had said at Basle about what he considered to be Jewish intolerance of religious freedom. "The Christian concept of religious liberty," he said, "is based on the integrity of individual man. The Jewish concept of tolerance is based on the integrity and separateness of the Jewish people....It is erroneous to think that evangelism is inconsistent with religious liberty. Any person to whom the Gospel is preached is free either to accept it or to reject it. On the other hand, the negation of evangelism is, for the Christian, the negation of religious liberty: he is then no longer free to act as a Christian."