Contemporary American Christian Attitudes to Israel Based on the Scriptures

Introduction

THE LAST THIRTY YEARS HAVE witnessed a proliferation of literature linking scriptural texts to specific contemporary geopolitical realities. This has been especially the case regarding the Middle East and markedly, the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict. New scholarship concerning the culture of fundamentalism has given rise to a clearer understanding of the dynamics by which people claiming to be traditionalists, nonetheless utilize normative religious texts in highly innovative ways that find expression in specific forms of political activity. ¹ Within the Middle East, such activity is visible both in fundamentalist Islamic movements and in various forms of right-wing religious Judaism. In both of these instances, non-traditional use of religious texts provides a rationale for claims to the land that bring both communities into conflict, as well as serving as a rationale for political activity to press these claims forward. Thus, right wing religious Zionists have used "proof texts" drawn from the Hebrew Scriptures to justify the creation and expansion of settlements in the Occupied Territories while Islamists have rooted territorial claims in Koranic texts.

On the other hand, left wing secular Israeli academics have argued that the absence of archaeological evidence for narratives such as the sojourn in Egypt or the Exodus require a rethinking of some of the nation's foundational myths. Thus, emphasis ought to be placed on inherent belonging to the Land rather than claims rooted in conquest. A positive result, in the mind of one such scholar, is that "The feeling of nativeness among members of the younger generation of Israelis is free of the need to 'justify' the existence of the State of Israel on the basis of divine promises." ²

Little attention, however, has been paid to the variety of Christian biblical interpretations that drive the way Christians view such questions as the place of the contemporary State of Israel in God's providence, how the Palestinian Question is to be understood, and the role of both external and indigenous Christians in Middle Eastern politics. This lack is understandable, given that most Christians are only indirectly actors within regional politics. Even in the case of Palestinian Christians, their numbers are so small that the political influence they exert, at least directly, is minimal.

However, the indirect character of Christian influence ought not to obscure its importance in the dynamics of contemporary politics in Israel/Palestine. Especially in the case of American Christians, the pressure they are capable of exerting upon national governments is not to be underestimated. Moreover, the financial resources that Christian groups provide both to Israeli settlements and the tourist economy on the one hand, and to Palestinian Christian churches on the other, constitute important, albeit indirect, influences on situations in both Israel proper and the Territories. ³ For both political and economic reasons, then, an understanding of the ways in which such groups use particular theological understandings rooted in Scripture to develop their denominational policies about the contemporary State of Israel and the question of Palestine are highly relevant to a comprehensive understanding of the religious element in contemporary geopolitics in the region.

Like Jewish ones, Christian outlooks are rooted in theological positions that, in turn, are frequently founded on biblical texts. An examination of such perspectives plausibly could utilize several modes of categorization. One would be to look at various Christian groups in terms of their place on the liberal/conservative political spectrum. Denominations such as the Southern Baptist Convention, for example, are demonstrably more conservative in their secular political positions than are liberal groups like the Episcopal or Presbyterian Churches. The difficulty with this taxonomy is that it fails to speak directly to the biblical/theological issues that lie at the heart of the question. Another would be to assess Christian groups based on their theological perspectives. Here, critical issues would be how they understand the end-times and, as a result, their view of Jews and Judaism in this...