Review and Analysis: Rome and Jerusalem; The Vatican's Policy Towards toward the Jewish State by Julian Schvindlerman

Book Title: Rome and Jerusalem; The Vatican's Policy Towards toward the Jewish State

Author: Julian Schvindlerman 

 

My Personal Expectation with this Book ( Basically why I Picked it up.): I actually bought this book at my  local super market and I was drawn to it like a moth to a flam, when I saw on the cover, that who seems to be Benedict XVI  standing at the Western Wall/ Wailing Wall and I read the title and I thought to myself  "oh boy" I'm a Catholic and I know the my Church hasn't been to best of friend's to the Jewish People, so it's another book which will make me question my faith, yupy.  and I must add I always wanted to read in detail the role of the Vatican during the second world war, which played a questionable balancing act.

Central Thymes and Concepts, that interested me as the reader:

Author establishes that the Shoa is the culmination of 16 centuries of Christian intolerance,and after that  Catholic  Church has tried to Christianize the Shoa, presenting the religious institution was also  a victim evading its responsibility.

The Jewish State was born in 1948 but It took the Vatican 45 years to establish diplomatic ties when 1994 the two States established diplomatic relations.

The book comes out swinging establishing that founding fathers of the Church demonized the Jewish people, forgetting that Jesus  and his apostils were Jewish the Torah was the base of their teachings.

But the crucifixion of Christ became the base of the accusation against the Jewish people by the Christians, new testament presents the Jewish people as Jesus s killer.

 

For the author Christianity never tried to replace the Jewish people as the chosen ones in the eyes of God, but established themselves directly and exclusively as the new chosen ones. 

 

The term Zionism was coined in 1885 by Nathan Birnbaum, basically establishing that the Jewish people were a minority in exile, that felt disenchantment  with nationalist movements of the nineteenth century and in  the uncomfortable because they could find their place in Europe. They were a people that had a national and religious identity but were far away from their homeland.  

The Dreyfus case, in France that was a turning point for many Jewish people establishing the new mindset that  they would never stop being outsiders, Alfred Dreyfus was  high ranked military officer who was accused of treason for  spying for the Germans and was stripped of all of his merits and sent to prison, but was really being discriminated because he was Jewish. This case polarized the French people especially it Jewish community that found there place in the country questioned. Over time there was a strong debate all over Europe between the secular and emancipated Jews and nationalist, but the push for a home land grew stronger. Honestly I had never heard of this case till I read about it in this book, then it started to pop up all over the place in  my studies.

The Balfour declaration 1917, is  where the British  establish the  possibility of creating a national homeland for the Jewish people in Palestine, and they had been toying with the idea for a long time back in 1905 they offered to establish a Jewish homeland in the territory of what is now Uganda. Now especial important to know this because it debunks  Anti-Semitic idiots that argue that some group of ultra powerful Jewish people caused the Second World War so they could create the Israel, when the birth of Israel was a very long evolution that started after the first world war.  The book establishes that before and during the second world war, even though the British played a fundamental role in the creation in creating of the Jewish State they valued more there alliance the Arabs, and wanted to create a bi national State with a Arab majority. 

  Now the British  establish the  possibility of creating a national homeland for the Jewish people in Palestine, and they had been toying with the idea for a long time, all the  back in 1905 they offered to establish a Jewish homeland in the territory of what is now Uganda. Now especial important to know this because it debunks  Anti-Semitic idiots that argue that some group of ultra powerful Jewish people caused the Second World War so they could create the State of Israel, when the birth of Israel was a very long evolution that that really started to take shape after the first world war.  But the book establishes that before and during the second world war, even though the British played a fundamental role in the creation in creating of the Jewish State they valued more there alliance the Arabs, and wanted to create a bi national State with a Arab majority.

Author establishes that during the XIX century the Vatican was a enemy of nationalism and Judaism (¿?¿, to my knowledge the Church never explicitly had a  policy agianst the Jewish people and the book can't seem to find one but the book uses the word enemy with out citing where they get it), so the combination of the two in Zionism would inevitably attracted their attention. Now  Church itself was in crisis the French revolution of 1789, gave birth to many political movements the openly clashed with the Church was literally losing territories left and right. The Pope's had a hard time in accepting modernity and liberalism, to the point that the Pope Pio IX declared himself infallible, appealed to dogma to confront basically the world( I must acknowledge this is a real good point) , while Garibaldi finishing his unification of Italy Pio IX auto exiled himself in the Vatican, the next three Popes : Leon XIII, Pio X and Benedict XV, where prisoners of the Vatican till Pio XI made a deal with Mussolini, in the form of the treaty of Letran, which gave birth to the State of the Vatican in 1929.

Nationalism had taken 100% of its territories, but Jewish nationalism presented a singular problem on a theological and political level, the return of the Jewish people to their homeland went against dogma  that they were punished and dispersed for not recognizing Jesus as the son of God, but the book completely omits that this was a shared point of view with  many Christian  denominations not only to the Catholic Church. But the fact that they were going to establish themselves in the. Now for the Vatican Holy land in Jewish hand meant another loss not only territorial but spiritual. 

When Theodor Herzl the founder of World Zionist Organization meets with Pope Pio X, the pontiff establish his position relative to The creation of a Jewish State saying: we cannot help this movement. We cannot stop Jewish people from going to Jerusalem, but we cannot ever approve it. The land of Jerusalem, even if it was not always sacred, it is sanctified by the life of Jesus Christ. As head of the Church I cannot say anything different the Jewish people have not recognized our savior, there for we will not recognize the Jewish People's nation, not even in the form of secular State.

Benedict XV had a different vision compared Pio X, he sustained the need of the reconstruction of Judea, implicitly recognizing the link between the Jewish people and the holy land, and saying that they would be good neighbors . 

 

Nazi paganism tried to undermined the Catholics authority, position on who can be baptized, marriage and who is Catholic, was a major menace to the racists beliefs of the Nazi's. When Hitler visited Rome to meet with Mussolini, protocol establishes that he should have requested a audience with the Pope which he didn't, which was a political slap in the face for the Vatican. 

Pope XII had a strong interest that the German people he didn't want them to be treated like criminals, and felt it was needed to exonerate them so he opposed the United States plans to purge the Nazi influence in  its society, to pave the way for a western style democracy, but this plan had the obligation the each citizen had the obligation to fill a form explaining what they had done politically during the war, that were. Check by the US authorities, to see if they had to be  tried to the tribunals , and what the German Catholic Church did was emitting certificates that validated the innocents of these people. Author also accuses that  Mexico, Cuba and Argentina (No mention of Brazil)  were pressured by the Vatican to hide the War criminals, and the author affirm that Peron actually didn't have problems to receive them painting him as a straight up anti Semitic, historically isn't the case.

  

During the Second Vatican Concilium, proceeded by John XXIII  produced  the declaration Nostra Aetate that marked a theological change to the Church's dogma towards the Jewish people relieving them the guilt of Christ's death from then and now ( it's sort of  more complicated than that, but it's what you can infer from  the original text).

The book presents the reader  with  the official teachings of the Church which establishes that Christian sinners are more culpable than the Jewish people that are responsible for Jesus's death. It sort of funny that it not in the debate of this book that the Jewish people were partially responsible Jesus's, the Romans were the just as or even more responsible,  one must not forget that crucifixion was a Roman form of exetution/punishment.

 

In 1993 in a dual declaration between Israel and the Vatican, the church promises to actively fight anti-Semitism.

 

In the year 2000 the Pope  visited  Israel and at the Wailing Wall John Paul II inserted a note asking for forgiveness from the Jewish people.

 

Pope receives  Kurt Josef Waldhein the president of Austria, who had a shadowy past with the Nazi's and was suspect to have comited crimes during the war, but for the author for the Vatican  it was more of a priority to maintain good relations with the most Catholic nation in Europe ( author exaggerates his point, Poland is the most Catholic Nation of Europe) over being respectful to the victims of the Shoa. A year later  John Paul visited Waldhein in Austria and in 1994 made him a Papal Knight, for his efforts in fomenting peace. Honestly I don't understand what drove the Pope on this issue becuase the man was pretty cuestionable.

The fact that Benedict XVI lifted the ex-communion of  four Lefebvrits bishops, had been excommunicated by John Paul in 1998  being part of the ultra conservative priest Fraternity of Saint Pio X, that opposed the second Vatican Concilium, caused unrest in the Jewish community, because for example  one of their more prominent  members Richard Williamson was openly  anti-Semitic and didn't believe that the Holocaust took place, defined the Jewish people as the enemies of Christ.

 

John Paul II definitively establishes the political and theological acceptance of the Jewish State.

The Good and Interesting  stuff that I didn't know that blew my mind:

• Not  much is known about the relationship between the early Church and the people of Jewish faith the book mentions the first direct contact with Pope Sylvester I during the IV century.
• I found this fascinating that the singe of the cross that Christians habitually do, actually comes from a Jewish practice much the same but it wasn't a crosses but the T for Torah. When Christians adopted this custom rabbinical Judaism abandoned it.
  
  

  • Author mentions that in 1939 Hitler receives Khalid Beg al-Qarqani personal representative of the Saudi monarch , where he was informed of the German policy to expel the  Jewish people, and he  replied satisfactorily tell the Adolf that the prophet had done the same. 
    

    • Interesting to see very the complex  web relations that the Vatican had during the first decades of the XX century.
      • Studding whole  the debate of the creation of Israel, one can really see the exclusive and excluding nature that religions. For example The author cites a church official defending  the position against the creation of a Jewish State arguing that it is more sacred for Christians than for Jews.

   
   

The Bad:

• It takes the book 125 page to get into the main topic. 
• Book bombards you with information with little analysis, it shows you that the writer get lazy at moments and just wants to add pages to the book. 
• The book makes the accurate observation that the Vatican actually is two distinct entities: one is the State of the Vatican City and the other is the Holy Sea, now that the first is a purely political and administrative entity while the second dedicates itself to the moral and spiritual  activities, and  both are the ruled by the Pope. Now the author at moments get these two entities mixed up at moments when reclaiming certain moral obligations referred to certain international political issues related to Israel.
  
  

  • The author does presents the Arabs in a real bad light any time he can, objectivity goes out the window when this subject pops up.   
  • Author comes out swinging establishing that Europe during that time of the Second World War  had a Catholic majority?¿?¿ ( note the author doesn't  give any statistics to prove that affirmation, I would  say it had a Christian majority). The  Nazi's where  born and educated like Catholics, the genocide was planned by Catholic and executed in Catholic lands ( again  to my knowledge even thought Germany had and has an important Catholic population it considered a Protestant country, so Christians planned and executed the Shoa, not exclusively Catholics.
    
    
    
    

    Pope XII had a strong interest that the German people he didn't want them to be treated like criminals, and felt it was needed to exonerate them so he opposed the United States plans to purge the Nazi influence in  its society, to pave the way for a western style democracy, but this plan had the obligation the each citizen had the obligation to fill a form explaining what they had done politically during the war, that were. Check by the US authorities, to see if they had to be  tried to the tribunals , and what the German Catholic Church did was emitting certificates that validated the innocents of these people. Author also accuses that  Mexico, Cuba and Argentina (No mention of Brazil)  were pressured by the Vatican to hide the War criminals, and the author affirm that Peron actually didn't have problems to receive them painting him as a straight up anti Semitic, historically isn't the case.

    
    

    Book has issues differentiating Christians in general and Catholics.

    
    

    Book really goes the  extra mile in nitpicking, for example the book's criticisms Benedict XVI when he made a reference towards the Holocaust saying in English which isn't his mother tongue that millions of Jewish people were killed during the Shao, so the author has an issue with the word killed, instead of murdered and that he didn't say 6 million, but in the same statement he said that their suffering  cannot be ever denied or reduced, so from my point of view it's a idiomatic issues not a explicit political omittion. But like that there are many cases where the author interpretation is to inclined to find any error that the book losses objectivity.

     
    
    

    
    

The Debatable:

In 1929 in the Lateran Treaty  is where Italy recognizes the Vatican as a independent State, so following the sub title of this book officially  the book should start from this point, because you it would cover the Shoa and the evolution and birth of Israel as a State in 1948,  but the book goes way back to the early days of Christianity all the way up to the twentieth  century, I enjoyed all the extra info but it's not contemplated by the title, and the author dwells a lot here.

The author does presents the Arabs in a real bad light any time he can, with some stinging historical facts like there was a Nazi presence in Palestine, they had their offices in Haifa, and they incited  Arabs to cause trouble, contraband weapons and sabotage British activities. Then book also mentions that in 1939 Hitler receives Khalid Beg al-Qarqani personal representative of the Saudi monarch , where he was informed of the German policy to expel the  Jewish people, and he  replied satisfactorily tell the Adolf that the prophet had done the same.

The 29 of November of 1947 the UN established the partition of Palestine in to two States, one for the Jewish people and one for the Arabs, the Arabs immediately responded in attacking. 

Way where Adolf Hitler, Heinrich Himmler, Rudolf Hoess or Joseph Goebbels never excommunicated? So  look up and could find anything on the subject but I can say they were not model Catholics at all,  Hitler even though born Catholic he wasn't a practicing Catholic, Himmler also born Catholic and  while a Nazi he wanted to replace Christianity with pagan beliefs that he shared with Hitler. Goebbels also born Catholic clashed openly with Church officials to reduce the influence of the Catholic church in Germany. Even thought the author is right about their religion they by far not representative of their faith because they openly opposed the Church.

 

Me Pio XI personally despised anti-Semitism, and is cited in saying : aren't we all Semitic. But when Kristallnatch came around he didn't condemn it publicly. In 1939 Pio XII became the new  head of the Church, and author mention that he never used the Jewish or Judaism and he didn't sign the Allies  Declaration against the Jewish extermination in 1942.In a radio transmission the 24 of December 1942  in his sermon he did make a brief mention to the Holocaust without explicitly mention the Jewish people. He only referenced the Holocaust publicly two other times. Now the author will establish that during the SWII the Vatican prioritized it material interest over its moral obligations, the Pope acted like a politician than a moral leader. What motivated Pio XII to be mediator of the post war peace, protect the integrity of Vatican city, fear of losing German Catholics and indifference towards the Jewish people in general. From my point of view if the Pope would have protested head on against the Axis, the Vatican would be only a memory  now, and heads of State normally try not to put gigantic bulleyes on their territories, we know that Hitler had no sympathy for the Catholic Church. I think the Pope chose the lesser of two colossal evils, the man was back against the wall, but until the Vatican open it Archives of that time we will note know the whole story off what made him do what he did.

 

We know and the book also explains the Church took in Jewish people on the run, even the papal residency of Castel Gandolfo and the Vatican itself they, he  even used his own room. But the author sustains it wasn't a established Church policy, he didn't order it there is no written evidence. We history give us are certain individuals in the Church like Angelo Roncalli, Giuseppe Burzio, Andrea Cassulo... that played a very important role in saving Jewish lives, but  it was always as a personal issue.

Now Pio XII post war image was good, even some Jewish politicians praised his actions during the Shoa, the author of the book establishes that  soft position of some key Jewish political figure is because they didn't want to start a fight with the Catholic Church, and they need to work with them to resolve many of their post war problems, like finding many Jewish or fens that ended up in The care of Catholic families or institutions. So the author establishes that it ok that Jewish political figures can be pragmatic but not the Catholic church this moral double standard will persist during the rest of the book. Note I think it was totally logical what these Jewish leaders did even if they had a bone to pick with the Pope.

 

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From the author's point of view the Beatification of Pio XII is a way to try to auto absolve the Church itself from it actions during the war, while Beatification of Pio IX from  a Jewish perspective was questionable that wasn't to kind to the Jewish population in Rome. But Beatification of Edith Stein a nun that died in Auschwitz that was born Jewish, this provoked the Israeli ambassador  to formally protest the election. Choosing of a Jewish apostate was considered religiously offensive, while the Church wanted to portray her as a model of conciliation between faiths. . 

Author doesn't  like the parallelism the John Paul II does between the Jewish lives lost in Auschwitz and the crucifixion of Christ, presenting the Jewish people as means to clean the sins of man, but from my point of view  the Pope is elevating the Jewish people in religious and historic level for his flock to understand this communities importance, the concpt of never again is very present in the discourse of both sides.

When the book mentions the historically Christians viewed the fall of the Jewish people and the destruction of the temple as a sign that God had abandon the Jewish people, but this is over simplifying the first Christian viewed themselves as Jewish, they distanced themselves for political reasons to evade the wraith of Rome after the Zealot revolt (Reza Aslan's Zealot he covers  this moment in history very well).

Overall:

 

In 1994  the Vatican and Israel establish diplomatic ties  the book actually should start from this point on or change the title like "Roman Catholic Church and its relationship with the Jewish People" this adjusts itself much better for what we get in the book. Also the  book uses the term Rome and Jerusalem ¿why?, does the Vatican recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital?

This book has it's faults and I had to fact check a ton of stuff and there is more to go, I enjoyed it and it has a interesting perspective so I'll give it 6 out of 10