Israel in the Bible

The present situation in Palestine is raising contrasting feelings. Reading the letters you published last Sunday, it seems as if war has not entered Palestine only, but our own hearts too. And you know... war is not a time for nuances: you just see good people on your side and horrible enemies on the other.

I am against the occupation of Palestinian land by the Israeli settlers, against any kind of terrorism and against anti-Semitism. As Christians I think that we should not support one people against the other, but pray and help that both peoples may learn to live in peace side by side and form, as the only possible solution of the actual conflict, two different and independent states.

Mr O`Cock (The Sunday Times, April 14) says that Israel has a right on Palestine because of the everlasting covenant God made with it, and that the actual "conflict is not so much about Jews and Palestinians, but about the Kingdom of God". The rest of the letter seems to say that the Palestinian resistance to Israel is part of a Satanic conspiracy to destroy Israel and not allow "God`s Word to be fulfilled."

In this perspective, I do not see any space for a Palestinian state. Instead, what I see is a partisan understanding of the situation by making of the Palestinians` fight only an attempt to destroy Israel (which is not true any longer), and of Israel the instrument of God to prepare the coming of God`s kingdom. I really wonder if God needs this war and all these sufferings, to establish His kingdom of love and justice!

Despite the good intentions of Mr O`Cock, and his sincere love for both Israelis and Palestinians, I find his thesis tragic. The worst that can happen in a war is to make it a holy war and convince contenders that they are fighting in the name of God.

This is one of the reasons why the Palestinian situation is becoming worse: in both parties there are people who think that the war they are fighting is not just the human consequence of historical and social tragedies that they should try to overcome with reciprocal understanding, but the will of God.

In this perspective, trying to understand the other`s reasons seems totally useless: you have just to defeat your enemy and praise your God. So the Jewish fundamentalists, convinced as they are that God gave that land only to them, try to chase the Palestinians, and the Palestinian young terrorists offer their life convinced that Allah will receive them in Paradise.

On their part, some fundamentalist Christians come and say to the Jewish people, "Please, go back to Palestine and conquer that land, destroy the Mosque of Omar, rebuild the Temple, because we need all this for the Kingdom of God to come. Do this and we will pray for you and we will support you. God will help you to convince the Palestinians and all the Arabs to renounce what they believe are their rights and offer you to lead them because you represent God`s will."

If the thesis that Israel has a right on the land because of God`s promise, it would mean that Israel should not just conquer the actually contested land of Palestine, but all the region going from the border of Egypt to the River Euphrates, all Syria and part of other Muslim countries included (Gen 15:18).

Praying for this would not mean praying for the kingdom of God, but only for a third world war. In front of such ideas, I am happy only because I know that God has nothing to do with them. Please, let`s not make God responsible of our own human responsibilities! If a war is the sign of madness, a religious war is the total death of reason, and Christians should never follow this path.

I am a Christian, and I deeply honour the Bible and its prophecies as coming from God. So I am not criticising the Bible, but a wrong understanding of this wonderful book. I suggest the following guidelines to better understand what the Bible says on this issue:

1. God loves Israel and all the other peoples and wishes they learn to live in peace with each other.

2. Most prophecies regarding the restoration of Israel must be understood in their historical context. That in Jeremiah 30:3, for instance, does not point to the restoration of Israel in 1948, as Mr O`Cock says, but to the return from the Babylonian captivity in 538/37 after Cyrus conquered Babylon (Esdra 1:1).

3. The Old Testament eschatological prophecies about Israel must be considered in a Christian perspective since Jesus himself says that all the (Old Testament) Scriptures point to him (John 5:39). These prophecies are accomplished in the Christian Church, in a spiritual way, till when the kingdom of God will be fully installed at the coming of Jesus (Mat 24:30,31). The apostle Paul says that once Christ has come, there is no longer any difference between Jews and other peoples.

For him, whoever receives Christ becomes part of "Abraham`s seed, and heirs according to the promise" (Gal 3:28,29). As the apostle says, in front of God, not just the physical

lineage makes of a man an heir of Abraham, but God`s promise received in faith (Rom 9:6-8,30,31). As a consequence, as Mr O`Cock says, we cannot believe that the Church has taken the place of Israel. Instead, I say, we should believe that the true Israel has just enlarged its borders by including both Jews and Gentiles who receive Christ as the promised Messiah.

4. The New Testament, when correctly read, never points to the political restoration of Israel as part of God`s plan, but to their spiritual conversion to Christ. This doesn`t mean that the State of Israel has no right to exist. It just means that the question should be considered in a historical and political perspective, not religious.

Instead of accusing others, we Christians should be aware that if the Jews were forced to go back to Palestine and create the conditions for the existing conflict, it isn`t only because of their faith in God`s promises, but mainly because of the intolerance they suffered from people who defined themselves Christians but who didn`t know what Christ`s teaching was. If we wish to create a better world, where everybody may feel everywhere at home, we should learn to see in the others, however different they may be, not enemies but people we can understand and love.

5. Christ said, "Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth" (Matthew 5:5). The Christian hope is accomplished through the non-violent way of love, justice and grace. For this, Christians should pray and work, not for a conquest of the land that is made through violence and death.