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Sun, 29 Dec 2024 Feature Article

Was Jesus Antisemitic

Was Jesus Antisemitic

People of African and Jewish ancestry share in common an aversion to the mildest of extra-group criticism. Blacks and Jews also have a common history of suffering which has made members of both groups very thin skinned even in the face of legitimate and much needed critiques. Blacks are often accused of waving the race card while Jews invoke the Holocaust when attacked.

It goes without saying that no group of people or nation of people are above reproof. Paul, the great systematic theologian of the apostolic Christian age reminds us that there is none righteous for all have deviated from the right path. The Jewish and Christian doctrine of the fall of man underscores the idea that all nationalities and ethnicities can be called to task and asked to rise to a higher moral and ethical platform.

Uncritically listening to the propagandists for the state of Israel, one would think that the nation of Israel is simply tying to live at peace with its neighbors in Gaza, the West Bank, and Lebanon. Israeli and Western propaganda conveniently fails to mention the original sin of genocide and ethnic cleansing that got the whole Israeli state show on the road.

The Nakba or forceful removal of Palestinians from their land by Jews in 1948 constitutes the backstory for all the violence that reached a recent zenith on October 7, 2023. The world is right in its condemnation of the brazen Palestinian attack against the state of Israel on October 7, 2023. The world minus the US and some of its allies is also correct in condemning the disproportionate use of force employed by the state of Israel against the people of Gaza.

The state of Israel, the United States, New Zealand, Australia, and apartheid South Africa were all settler colonial states that engaged in genocide and ethnic cleansing enroute to nationhood. Europeans bullied their way to supremacy in the United States, New Zealand, and Australia. The Black majority of South Africa were successful in their bid to unseat Caucasian rule. Time will tell whether the Palestinian people will also succeed in reversing the Nakba and regain control of their ancestral land.

Perhaps one of the most ridiculous developments that ensued after the launch of the Israeli aggression in Gaza was the passing of a resolution by US lawmakers that equated criticism of the state of Israel with antisemitism. This US resolution sought to stymie all criticism of the actions of the state of Israel as it prosecuted its aggressive and destructive attacks against the people of Gaza.

The bizarre nature of the US resolution against criticism of the state of Israel stems from the reality that many of the backers of the resolution claim to be Bible believing Christians. It truly is mind boggling how anyone who reads the Bible can arrive at a position that the nation of Israel should not be critiqued and challenged for its moral and ethical failures.

Jesus the Christ was as Jewish as it gets but he certainly did not share the same opinion as the conservative Christian who backed the resolution that sought to inoculate the state of Israel from criticism. Jesus pulled no punched when dealing with the Jews of his day. His epithet of whited sepulchers to describe his Jewish detractors is as powerful today as it was when first spoken.

Jesus called the Jewish leaders of his day hypocrites who pretended to love God but whose nefarious actions were calculated to turn people away from God. They were robbers of the poor whose teachings made people seven times worse than they were prior to embracing the teachings. Jesus got to the heart of the Jewish spiritual malaise by stating that they were blind to the most important virtues, namely, justice, mercy, and faith.

In the gospel which bears the name of John, Jesus dropped an inter-continental-missile with a nuclear warhead on his Jewish detractors. Jesus told the Jewish leaders that for all their talk about God and religion they were nothing more than children of the Devil. In case anyone missed out on this death blow to the Jewish leaders, Jesus augmented his words in the book of Revelation by calling some Jews the synagogue of Satan.

It is not hard to imagine why many of the Jewish leaders of the first century CE did warm to the message of Jesus. They no doubt placed Jesus in the camp of extreme anti-Semites. Clearly, the modern state of Israel and many of its Christian conservative apologists are following in the footprints of those whose father was the Devil according to Jesus. Jesus and all his followers who call for justice, mercy, and faith are as unwelcome today as they were when the Jewish mob cried out for the blood of the best hope for the Jewish nation.

Lenrod Nzulu Baraka is the founder of Afro-Caribbean Spiritual Teaching Center and the author of The Grand Failure: How Christianity Became a Force for Evil in the World.

Lenrod Nzulu Baraka
Lenrod Nzulu Baraka, © 2024

Lenrod Nzulu Baraka is a graduate of the University of the Southern Caribbean with a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Religion and History. He is the author of several books including Piarco Affair, The Black Paradigm, Echoes of the Ancestors, The Rebirth of Black Civilization, Oreos Coconuts and Negrope. More Lenrod Nzulu Baraka (aka Leonard R. Phillips) is a native of the Caribbean island of Barbados. HIs hobbies include reading, writing, travelling and meeting interesting people. He describes himself as an Afrocentric Freethinker with a Black Christocentric bias. Lenrod has a great sense of humor and enjoys watching and reading anything that is funny. He favorite genres of music include reggae, calypso and easy listening. His favorite Black artistes are Bob Marley, Peter Tosh and the Mighty Sparrow. He is also an eternal fan of Phil Colins. He will read anything by Tom Sharpe, Stephen King or Malachi Martin Column: Lenrod Nzulu Baraka

Disclaimer: "The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect ModernGhana official position. ModernGhana will not be responsible or liable for any inaccurate or incorrect statements in the contributions or columns here." Follow our WhatsApp channel for meaningful stories picked for your day.

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