Newsletter:
Vol. 5. Iss. 1
8 October2003
On Being a Real, Believing
Christian
Avramham Burg
It would be easy for me to write about the August 2003 SBS fact-finding mission to Jordan, Palestine and Israel by focusing on all the highly-placed officials, governmental and non-governmental, with which our group met. Rather, I would like to describe the August 2003 trip by focusing on a meeting we with Ruth Matar of the “Women in Green” whom we met in her home in Jerusalem. I want to describe our trip by this meeting because of all the people we met and dialoged with, I felt myself totally against and in diametric opposition to Ruth’s viewpoints more than with anyone else our group met.
In my ministry, I have learned that the best way for me to overcome intolerance, both others’ and mine, is by being in dialogue with those who I most disagree with. I have found that I am most open to growth and being better able to confront intolerance when I am open and willing to listen to those I do not agree with. That is why I chose to write about Ruth - because in our disagreements on so many things, I feel that I have found a stronger basis from which to be a better pastor, activist, servant and human being.
In what was obviously a very well rehearsed and often presented lecture, Ruth recalled her days as a girl in Germany and how she heard the glass breaking on Kristalnacht. She told of being adopted out of Germany and away from the oppression of Nazis, along with her brothers and sisters. She said that she heard the glass breaking still each and every day from being a Holocaust survivor.
Ruth also said that she still heard the glass breaking everyday at the way the Palestinians kept possession of the “Biblical Lands” that rightfully belonged to the Jews. She even went so far as to say that the Palestinian people had never been in the land because there really wasn’t even such a thing as a Palestinian people and she gave us all very fine looking maps of Ancient Israel, complete with biblical citations, to back up her point. She uttered disgust at Israeli leaders that had attempted to find peace with the Palestinian and Arab worlds, and said that she was ashamed of her support of then candidate George W. Bush because he had become no better than a Palestinian sympathizer.
As Christian leaders in America, she told us that “real believing Christians” support Israel and its five thousand year old claim to the land! To be a “real believing Christian” one must support Israel!
That is the story of most of our meeting with Ruth Matar. Why it made such an impression on me actually came in the question and answer period after her presentation. Picking up on her statement of being a Holocaust survivor and leaving Germany at age 8, I asked her what year that it was that she left for Sweden and her new family. I think I can speak for our entire delegation when I say that we were all surprised when she said, “1934.” Quickly I did the math. What I heard Ruth saying not only challenged my understanding of what it means to be a “real believing Christian” (acceptance of Jesus Christ as the son of God and Lord of our lives), but she was also distorting all that I had learned in studying “Germany Under Hitler” as a junior undergraduate student in 1978, working my way towards a minor in Contemporary World History! Ruth was rewriting the history books and redefining exactly what it means to suffer and to be a victim of oppression, intolerance and genocide!
In my younger years I might have been tempted to jump up and challenge her right then and there, but I did not. As I have aged I have learned to stop and listen to my own feelings and to listen to those who are stirring uneasy emotions deep inside of me. As I ask myself, “Why is this making me so uneasy?” I have also learned to ask, “What do I need to learn from this situation.”
As Peter Miano explains, both in person and in his writings, the one of the more helpful attitudes to have concerning conflict is to realize that belief is more important than truth. For example, the facts of Ruth Matar’s lecture are easily disputable and in many cases blatantly wrong according to recorded history. Nevertheless, for Matar, what she believes to be true, the very foundation of her belief and faith system, are what really matters. For her, the belief that ANY Jew that left Germany, either before or after the official start of WWII, is a Holocaust survivor. She also holds the belief that there is no such ethnicity or background or people known as Palestinians. These types of beliefs, as strongly held as they are, shape her memory of the events and her perception of what the future holds in store. These types of beliefs ultimately determine behavior in such individuals (and groups).
The interesting thing about this is that when it comes to the ultimate reality of the Christian Zionist belief system concerning the return of the Messiah, Jewish Zionists want their help in spreading the message of “Israel,” but they totally disagree with their theological viewpoints. In the passion of attempting to humanly hasten the return of Christ for their own causes, I feel that the Christian Zionists are blinded to the way they are being used and manipulated! If the mainstream Christian Zionists ever wake up to this manipulation I wonder how weak Jewish Zionism will become?
The Rev. Gene May is a pastor in Pensacola, FL who traveled to the Holy Land as a participant in the August fact finding mission. It was his first experience with S.B.S.
