Christ at the Checkpoint 2012, Dr Jim West & pro-Nazi theology

Meet Dr Jim West, Adjunct Professor of Biblical Studies at the Quartz Hill School of Theology and Pastor of Petros Baptist Church, Petros, Tennessee:

He is supportive of the Christ at the Checkpoint 2012 conference, which is likely to be full of antisemitism, racism and replacement theology. He is also a fan of Stephen Sizer.

Christ at the Checkpoint 2012 will be hosted by Bethlehem Bible College. Raed Salah supporters Stephen Sizer and Ben White are due to speak there. Sizer is listed as an organiser.

Bethlehem Bible College has a worrying track record on antisemitism. They sent lecturer Alex Awad to represent the college, and share a platform with Hitler-admirer and Holocaust denier Frederick Tobin in Indonesia. Stephen Sizer also attended this conference in Indonesia, as did Iranian Holocaust denier and Faurisson admirer Jawad Shabarf.

Christ at the Checkpoint 2012 has a Facebook page and a Twitter page.

Here is what CATC tweeted recently:

A blog post from @drjewest on why he’s supporting the Christ at the Checkpoint 2012 conference http://wp.me/pLvic-a6q

Christ at the Checkpoint 2012 also issues a request for its supporters to follow Dr West on Twitter.

Dr West’s blog post accuses Christian Zionists of being heretics. Dr West has previously written that Jews and Christian Zionists are co-conspiring to produce “the sickest sorts of behaviors” in Israel.On Israel selling arms to Argentina during the Falklands, he wrote:

If hatred of Jews is antisemitism, Jewish hatred of Brits must be antibriticism. I wonder how many antibritites there are in Israel. […] It’s high time for Jews the world over to denounce antibriticism. That sort of ethnic hatred is intolerable in today’s world. It has no place here among the decent.

You can see already, why Christ at the Checkpoint organisers are interested in his writings. But there’s more. Here is Dr West on Martin Luther. Whilst he appears to denounce the work in his first paragraph, West then reveals his hand:

Luther didn’t hate the Jews- even when he wrote his tirade.  He hated falsehood. And he hated falsehood whether it was found in Rome or Wittenberg. Those poorly informed historical ignoramuses who repeatedly denounce Luther as an anti-semite are simply wrong.  They know nothing of Luther nor anything of the history of the Church.  All they know is their own biases and prejudices.

Here are some excerpts from Luther’s tirade against the Jews, On the Jews and their Lies:

 

Did I not tell you earlier that a Jew is such a noble, precious jewel that God and all the angels dance when he farts?

I shall give you my sincere advice:

First to set fire to their synagogues or schools and to bury and cover with dirt whatever will not burn, so that no man will ever again see a stone or cinder of them. […] Second, I advise that their houses also be razed and destroyed. For they pursue in them the same aims as in their synagogues. Instead they might be lodged under a roof or in a barn, like the gypsies. This will bring home to them that they are not masters in our country, as they boast, but that they are living in exile and in captivity, as they incessantly wail and lament about us before God. […] I advise that safe­conduct on the highways be abolished completely for them. […]

I commend putting a flail, an ax, a hoe, a spade, a distaff, or a spindle into the hands of young, strong Jews and Jewesses and letting them earn their bread in the sweat of their brow, as was imposed on the children of Adam (Gen 3[:19]}. For it is not fitting that they should let us accursed Goyim toil in the sweat of our faces while they, the holy people, idle away their time behind the stove, feasting and farting, and on top of all, boasting blasphemously of their lordship over the Christians by means of our sweat. No, one should toss out these lazy rogues by the seat of their pants.

My essay, I hope, will furnish a Christian (who in any case has no desire to become a Jew) with enough material not only to defend himself against the blind, venomous Jews, but also to become the foe of the Jews’ malice, lying, and cursing, and to understand not only that their belief is false but that they are surely possessed by all devils.

Here is Jim West on the theologian Kittel: Gerhard Kittel: Was He The Nazi Devil So Many Presume?

He writes:

Let’s be fair for a moment. Kittel was a jerk. A completely disgusting human being. Wagner was a jerk too who ran out on his creditors and lived like a vagabond beggar. Does that mean his music has no value? Are people’s works so intricately connected with their personalities that we can’t value their good contributions while damning their bad? Are we really willing to throw the baby out with the bathwater?

This strikes me as odd – Kittel is politically well-known for joining the Nazis, and well-known theologically for his racialist antisemitism. Outside the Nazi party, Kittel’s theological writings mostly focused on the evil of the Jews. Alan Steinweiss observes in Studying the Jew: Scholarly Antisemitism in Nazi Germany [pp.69-70]:

“Kittel was innovative in anchoring theological and religious differences in the divergent racial developments of Jewish non-Germans. […] As a rhetorical device, Kittel suggested four possible approaches for dealing with the Jews: extermination, Zionism, assimilation, and guest status. Kittel dismissed the option of extermination on practical rather than moral grounds. […] Kittel contributed his lecture and booklet on “The Jewish Question” at a time when the exclusion of Jews from German professions was not merely the subject of theological discussion, but a work in progress. In later years, the Nazi regime implemented similar purges in the fields of medicine and law, both of which, in Kittel’s characterisation, had been “over-flooded” with greedy, unscrupulous Jewish practicioners.”

James Lehman, providing an overview of Theologians Under Hitler for theNorthwest Center for Holocaust, Genocide and Ethnocide Education writes:

Gerhard Kittel came from a very prestigious and scholarly family.  Prior to the war, Kittel was a professor of New Testament theology and a leading scholar in the field of Judaism and its relation to early Christianity.  It was this relationship with Judaism that led Kittel to become the theological expert on the “Jewish Question.”  Kittel joined the Nazi party in 1933 with the hopes that a religiously based anti-Jewish policy would prevail over radical and vulgar racism.After the end of the war, Kittel claimed that he was innocent, that he began disagreeing with and denouncing the Nazi party and Hitler at the onset of the war.  However, there is no evidence of any criticism from Kittel.  He did not even stand up for the Church when the Nazi party condemned the churches; rather, he demanded that the church must respond to the historical hour of the German people.  In fact, Kittel’s scholarship made the extermination of the Jews theologically respectable.

How then, is there anything we can gain from Kittel’s theological scholarship – outside of his membership of the Nazi party – given that Kittel’s theology was largely driven by his antisemitism?

More pertinently, why is Christ at the Checkpoint 2012 delving into the sewers of Jim West’s blog – just to find some affirmation for their anti-Israel theology conference?

At the previous Checkpoint conference in 2010, speakers suggested that Jews had no Jewish blood, that jihadists have “every right” to attack people in other countries, and that it must look to Muslims, as if Jews were behaving like they did in Mohammed’s day, “repeating the hostile behaviour of Jews many centuries earlier towards the Prophet.”

However, the Checkpoint 2012 organisers appear to feel that, if they invite speakers like Richard Harvey to the conference, then they don’t have to deal with questions over antisemitism:

Unconvincing.

Brother Andrew and Stephen Sizer at Christ at the Checkpoint 2010: Violent jihad has “every right” to attack the West

Rev. Stephen Sizer, and Dutch missionary Brother Andrew, in conversation at the last Christ at the Checkpoint conference.

Stephen Sizer: We need a Christian jihad.

Brother Andrew: That’s what Paul says, I’ve fought a good jihad. 2nd Timothy. I was speaking at Hamas university, and all the Hamas leaders were there. It was a very, very great occasion, for me and for them! At the end of it I said, I am not demanding for a dialogue with you Muslims, but at any time, anywhere, I want a dialogue with Muslims, what kind of person does the book produce? Your book, my book. That’s what I want to talk about.

[…]

Stephen Sizer: “[…] Paul says, I have fought the good jihad.

[…]

When we talk about Christian jihad, we’re not talking about violence or changing a political system. We’re talking about the way of Christ, the way of the cross.

Brother Andrew: Even in Islam they have two types of jihad. One jihad you fight against your own evil desires in your own heart. Especially the Sufis are doing that. But then there’s the other jihad. That’s a relatively new thing. Because of the increasing antagonism that it gets from the West. So now they’re more and more to determined to hit us back. And they have every right to do so.”

Sizer: Yeah. So we have much in common with fundamentalist Islam! You’ve been called a fundamentalist, I know, by Muslims, because you believe in the Bible.

Brother Andrew: “Yeah I still see the man at the university. I said, you’re the fundamentalist, I said to the Hamas leader, he said, no, either you follow Christ you go all the way, [but] most people stop half-way, and that he said makes you a fundamentalist.”

Bear in mind: this is a conference claiming to oppose violent fundamentalist and apocalyptic theology within Christianity.

Bang goes that argument.

Friends of Raed Salah: The C of E-backed “Amos Trust” and the blood libel

How will Archbishop Rowan Williams react, to the growing support for a racist antisemite who believes in the blood libel, in the Church of England?

In late June, the houses of Parliament hosted a “Save Jerusalem Campaign“, with Raed Salah scheduled as the guest speaker. The event was afforded much credibility, due to its venue, and also due to the fact that several Labour MPs were in support.

Reverend Dr Stephen Sizer, a director of the Amos Trust, was Raed Salah’s official photographer in London.

Amos Trust director and founder, Garth Hewitt was in attendance. Garth Hewitt is the canon of St. George’s Church in Jerusalem, and he thinks anti-Zionist Jews are like Biblical prophets.

Here is Amos Trust’s Ben White, who manages their Just Peace for Palestinecampaign:

The “Save Jerusalem” event was supposed to host Sheikh Raed Salah, theracist, extremist hate preacher who funds Hamas.

Raed Salah has claimed that Jews baked “the blood of children” into their “holy bread”, which is the ancient and vicious blood libel. As Haaretzreported,

During the speech at the February 16, 2007 protest in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Wadi Joz, Salah accused Jews of using children’s blood to bake bread.

We have never allowed ourselves to knead [the dough for] the bread that breaks the fast in the holy month of Ramadan with children’s blood,” he said. “Whoever wants a more thorough explanation, let him ask what used to happen to some children in Europe, whose blood was mixed in with the dough of the [Jewish] holy bread.”

When Salah was detained by British authorities, following the Home Secretary’s decision to ban him, the Amos Trust – as well as Ben White and Stephen Sizer in personal capacities, signed a declaration which said of Salah:

The arrest appears to be the result of an orchestrated libellous campaign in the right-wing, pro-Israel media and bears all the marks of a political rather than a legal measure to curb freedom of speech. The arrest of such a high-profile and well-respected Palestinian leader will, inevitably, damage relations between the Muslim community and other sections of British society.

Sheikh Salah is renowned for his non-violent approach to the protection of Palestinian rights in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories. Home Secretary Theresa May has clearly succumbed to pressure from the pro-Israel Lobby in Britain to prevent Sh. Salah from being able to give a first-hand account of the discrimination faced by the so-called “Israeli-Arab” community; Israel’s Palestinian citizens who constitute 20% of the total population in the state.

Rather than condemning Salah’s blood libel, the Amos Trust teamed up with Raed Salah, portraying him as a man who will help to save Jerusalem. By signing this letter, the Amos Trust framed the arrest of Raed Salah, essentially as a Jewish conspiracy against a peace-loving man.

Stephen Sizer of the Amos Trust then paid Salah a visit, along with his congregant Tony Gratrex – who oversees Reading PSC and thinks the Jewscontrol the media.

Yet the Amos Trust’s campaigning on Palestine has widespread backing in the church.

The Amos Trust counts, among the organisations pledging support, theMethodist Church, the World Council of Churches, and two Anglican missions: The Church Mission Society (CMS), and USPG: Anglicans in World Mission.

Anglican churches across England raise money for CMS and USPG. Furthermore, Archbishop Rowan Williams is the Patron of CMS and thePresident of USPG.

Thankfully, the Archbishop clearly condemns the blood libel.

On Holocaust Memorial Day earlier this year, the Christian Post reported Archbishop Rowan Williams’ words. Then, he drew a clear link between the blood libel, the mass murder of Jews, and the religious-flavoured antisemitism that led to the Holocaust:

Williams noted that events in medieval Britain, such as the blood libel case against Jews following the mysterious death of William of Norwich in the 12th century or King Edward’s expulsion of all Jews from England were “almost completely lost to public awareness.”

“If the stories are not told over and again, we lose the memory of those who suffered and we risk losing something that protects our humanity,” he said.

Having recognised the terrible evil of the blood libel, Rowan Williams must persuade his mission charities to rescind their endorsement of the Amos Trust.

Friends of Sabeel UK has an office in the Church Mission Society building

Friends of Sabeel UK (FOSUK) is the network of Sabeel supporters in the UK.

Sabeel is a Christian theology outfit based in Jerusalem, and its founder Naim Ateek says things like this at Easter:

In this season of Lent, it seems to many of us that Jesus is on the cross again with thousands of crucified Palestinians around him. It only takes people of insight to see the hundreds of thousands of crosses throughout the land, Palestinian men, women, and children being crucified. Palestine has become one huge golgotha. The Israeli government crucifixion system is operating daily. Palestine has become the place of the skull.”

And this at Christmas:

“At this Christmas time, when we remember the message of peace and love that came down from God to earth in the birth of Jesus Christ, our celebrations are marred by the destructive powers of the modern day “Herods” who are represented in the Israeli government.”

Delightful.

One of Friends of Sabeel UK’s patrons is Ibrahim Hewitt, who FOSUKdescribe as:

coordinator of the Palestine relief organisation Interpal

Hewitt is an extremist and a promoter of antisemitism, and his charitysupports Hamas. In his role with Interpal, he has met with Ismail Haniyeh in Gaza.

Another patron listed is Manuel Hassassian. Hassassian has also defended the firing of rockets into Israeli civilian areas, supported Taleban rule in Afghanistan, and has praised Hezbollah as saviours of Arabs – this in spite of Sabeel’s repeated commitment to non-violence.

Another FOSUK patron is Jenny Tonge, who pushed the lie about Israelis harvesting organs in Haiti.

On the contact page for Friends of Sabeel UK, we now read:

Coordinator: Anne Clayton
Office: CMS
Watlington Road
Oxford
OX4 6BZ

Phone:(+44)1865 787419

(+44)1865 787420

Email:info@friendsofsabeel.org.uk

FOSUK have previously invited Hamas supporter David Halpin to address their meeting. Halpin has claimed that Hamas is being literally crucified by Israel.

Anne Clayton is the coordinator of Friends of Sabeel UK.

This is what she says about Naim Ateek, and her time living in Jerusalem:

“We were fortunate to work with and to know Naim Ateek and his wife Maha, among other great people there. Their example of Godly leadership and commitment to justice with peace was a challenge that inspired us and helped us to keep our focus”

She is speaking alongside Stephen Sizer at the Quaker House, in Plymouth, next month. Sizer is the former Vice Chair of Friends of Sabeel UK.

Anne Clayton’s office is at the Church Mission Society (CMS), which is the mission wing of the Church of England. Archbishop Rowan Williams is a patron of CMS.

As CMS has now provided FOSUK with an office, it looks like antisemitism has made its nest in the Church of England.

Head of Sabeel, Naim Ateek: “today, whether we like it or not, it’s Israel that is on top of any country in the world”

Watch from 03:50:

Naim Ateek gave recommendations to the Christ at the Checkpoint 2010 conference.

Christ at the Checkpoint 2012 organiser: evil Pharaoh “the messiah of modern Israel”

Alex Awad is on the organising committee the Christ at the Checkpoint 2012.

This is what he says about Israelis:

 I knock at the doors of God’s mercy and pray because Pharaoh, the messiah of modern Israel, is hardening his heart and the leaders of the Western world are clasping their hands in his bloody hands.

Remember, Pharaoh is the enemy of the Jewish people, as remembered at Passover every year.

Christ at the Checkpoint 2012 organisers share platform with Holocaust denier

Christ at the Checkpoint 2012 organiser Alex Awad has a track record of preaching anti-Zionism around the world. Most notoriously, in May 2008, Awad attended the Voice of Palestine 60th Nakba Conference hosted in Jakarta, Indonesia.

Here is a picture of Awad (far-right) with Holocaust denier Fred Tobin (second-from-left):

You can read conference-attendee and Holocaust-denier Fred Tobin’s account of events in Jakarta here. You can see the aims of the Voice Of Palestine conference here. According to Tobin’s report, Awad advocated a one-state solution, as did others at the event.

Also in attendance was Ayatollah Khomeini’s daughter Zahra Mostafavi from Iran, who has previously urged children to become suicide bombers.  Fellow Checkpoint 2012organiser Stephen Sizer also spoke at this conference.

You can see a list of speakers, including representatives from Hamas and Hezbollah, here. You can see photos of Awad at the conference here and here alongside, among others, Neturei Karta Jews Dovid Weiss and Aharon Cohen.

According to the Voice of Palestine website, Awad was representing the Bethlehem Bible College at this event.

The website Kesher Talk has previously highlighted the controversy surrounding Bethlehem Bible College and the Awad family, and cites Alex Awad and brother Bishara (himself President of the college) as having said:

“Palestinian Christians view Israel, and not Arafat, as the problem.”

And here for more about the Awad family’s views on Arafat.

It is worth noting that Alex Awad blames Israel for suicide bombings, and claims:

“When we fight for a piece of land, we use religion to rally people, to excite people to build zeal among the people so they will help accomplish a goal. Religion is used in the conflict, but it’s about land. The Muslim is fighting the Jew because of what the Jew took by force.”

One blogger reviewing Alex Awad’s book Palestinian Memories wrote:

“While Alex Awad has no problem detailing many instances of injustice committed by Israelis against Christians, he completely denies that there are any injustices committed by Muslims. Alex Awad has allowed his hate of Israelis to affect biblical worldview.”

Awad’s writing is used approvingly by the Amos Trust, who were recently criticised in the press for manipulating Christmas to advance a political agenda. Awad himself frequently writes articles critical of Israel and Zionism.

Whilst the faculty at Bethlehem Bible College are busy asking questions of Israel, it seems they have a lot to answer to themselves.

Paper at Christ at the Checkpoint 2010: Netanyahu has no Jewish blood

Here is Palestinian Lutheran priest Mitri Raheb speaking at Christ in the Checkpoint 2010:

Actually, Israel represents Rome of the Bible, not the people of the land. And this is not only because I’m a Palestinian. I’m sure if we were to do a DNA test between David, who was a Bethlehemite, and Jesus, born in Bethlehem, and Mitri, born just across the street from where Jesus was born, I’m sure the DNA will show that there is a trace. While, if you put King David, Jesus and Netanyahu, you will get nothing, becauseNetanyahu comes from an East European tribe who converted to Judaism in the Middle Ages. I said that I would be pushing a bit the envelope but so far you are surviving. I’m glad for that.And being born just across the street from where Jesus was born, I always loved to say that most probably one of my grand, grand, grand, grandmas used to babysit for Jesus.

It is a myth that Jews aren’t really Jews by blood, and it is absurd to suggest Palestinian Arabs have more common DNA with the Biblical Israelites than Israeli Jews today do.

So why does Raheb make this unsubstantiated claim?

I think we know why.

I wonder how the Messianic Jews attending Christ At The Checkpoint 2012 will respond to these outrageous claims. I hope they will respond assertively.

Paper at Christ at the Checkpoint 2010: Jews behaving like they did in Mohammed’s day

What is the value of this statement?

Anti-Zionist author Colin Chapman speaking in 2010, at Christ at the Checkpoint:

The early biographies of the Prophet show that he had a very difficult relationship with the three large Jewish tribes in Medina. He probably hoped and expected that they would recognize him as a prophet in the line of the OT prophets and was no doubt disappointed when they refused to recognize him and actively plotted against him, even siding with the pagan Meccans. Some of the harshest verses in the Qur‟an are directed towards the Jewish people; for example: „You will find the most hostile people to the believers to be the Jews and the polytheists …‟ (3:64; cf 4:155; 5:64; 5:82-83). For centuries Jews and Christians lived relatively peacefully under Islamic rule throughout the Middle East and North Africa as dhimmis. But what seems to have happened is that the bad experience of Palestinian Muslims with Zionist immigrants after 1880 has reminded them of Muhammad‟s bad experience with the Jews of Medina, encouraging them to apply the harsh verses about Jews in the Qur‟an to Israeli Jews today. It must seem to Palestinian Muslims as if Jews of the modern period were simply repeating the hostile behaviour of Jews many centuries earlier towards the Prophet.

Christ at the Checkpoint 2012 organiser: “People admired Shehadeh’s ability to stand up to the Israelis”

The yeshiva massacre of 2008 at Mercaz HaRav:

The 8:45 p.m. shooting at the yeshiva in the Kiryat Moshe neighborhood broke a two-year lull in terror in the capital and sent students scurrying for cover from a hail of gunfire – a reported 500-600 bullets – that lasted for several minutes.

“There were horrendous screams of ‘Help us! Help us!'” recounted Avrahami Sheinberger of the ZAKA emergency rescue service, one of the first to respond to the scene. “There were bodies strewn all over the floor, at the entrance to the yeshiva, in various rooms and in the library.”

The teenage victims:

Arabs believe the act was planned by Mohamed Shehadeh:

IDF forces located and killed terrorist Muhammad Shehadeh and three other senior terrorists, aged 35 to 48, in the Palestinian Authority-controlled city of Bethlehem Wednesday.

Arab sources said Shehadeh was the mastermind behind the deadly terror attack on the Merkaz HaRav Yeshiva in Jerusalem a week ago. Israeli security officials flatly denied the claim.

When Shehadeh was assassinated, Christ at the Checkpoint 2012 organiser Sami Awad said:

‘People admired Shehadeh’s ability to stand up to the Israelis,’

Is planning the murder of teenagers, something that Sami Awad considers “standing up to the Israelis“?

Why does Awad not comment on the “peace” and “justice” of murdering eight teenagers, instead dwelling on how he was popularly “admired”?

I find it incredible, that Christian and Messianic leaders are willing to participate in the Christ at the Checkpoint conference, without a greater awareness of who is organising proceedings.