The Grim Reality of Anti-Semitism in Christian America

Does American Christianity have an anti-Semitism problem? Given this country's theological tendencies, it very well might. 

The recent mass shooting at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh shows just how lethal, dangerous, and outright terrifying anti-Semitism can be. But like many prejudices these days, anti-Semitism is often pervasively entrenched at the implicit level. Practically no Americans will commit acts of violence against adherents of Judaism, yet (hopefully) anomalous atrocities on the scale we witnessed last Saturday are at least made possible in an environment of tacit and silent biases that accumulate at the societal, systemic level. 

Among the chief causes of implicit anti-Semitism is the American Christian fixation that the Bible is always right. Over half of America's 1.5 million Protestants believe that Christian Scripture is the literal word of God, and thus should be taken as an exclusive truth. Conversely, just 5% of Buddhists and 11% of Jews would say the same of their scriptures. There is something unique to American Protestantism that so many believe that the Bible must be true in all times and places. For this vast swath of American Christians, those who stand against the scriptures can be nothing but categorically wrong. 

Pew Research: 2017 Religious Landscape Survey - Interpreting Scripture

Taking the Bible "literally" is problematic, especially when your scripture effectively vilifies a religious minority. Nowhere is this more evident than the Gospels, where the "Jews" are cast as the antagonists who carry out Jesus' demise (see John 20:19, and even more troubling, Matthew 27:25). If I take the Bible literally, what choice do I have but to conclude that the group that crucifies Jesus in Matthew and John is in fact an enemy of the Christian faith?

American Christians need to acknowledge that a literal reading of the scriptures presents serious problems for understanding Judaism. These problems foster implicit biases towards Judaism's adherents, just as they taint of our understanding of God. If the same God who promises to be the liberator and savior of the Hebrew people somehow revokes his promise when Jesus (who was, of course, a Jew) comes around, is this really a God worth following? 

The atrocity of the Tree of Life shooting should cause all American Christians to reflect on their implicit assumptions and explicit beliefs about Judaism, and its relationship to the Jesus movement. For no matter how literally or figuratively one reads the Bible, a societal view that understands Christianity to be more advanced or somehow superior to Judaism can only lead to tragedy.

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@ryanpanzer is not a member of the National Rifle Association. He thinks scripture is worth reading, and that the way we read it matters. 

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