There’s a very interesting argument by Benedict XVI in his new book, Jesus of Nazareth: Holy Week: From the Entrance into Jerusalem to the Resurrection.
When in Matthew’s account the “whole people” say: “His blood be on us and on our children” (27:25), the Christian will remember that Jesus’ blood speaks a different language from the blood of Abel (Heb 12:24): it does not cry out for vengeance and punishment; it brings reconciliation. It is not poured out against anyone; it is poured out for many, for all. “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God … God put [ Jesus] forward as an expiation by his blood” (Rom 3:23, 25).
The part about Jesus blood “speak[ing] a different language” than Abel’s blood struck me as a very beautiful and creative interpretation. I haven’t seen that done before. Benedict continues:
Just as Caiaphas’ words about the need for Jesus’ death have to be read in an entirely new light from the perspective of faith, the same applies to Matthew’s reference to blood: read in the light of faith, it means that we all stand in need of the purifying power of love which is his blood. These words are not a curse, but rather redemption, salvation. Only when understood in terms of the theology of the Last Supper and the Cross, drawn from the whole of the New Testament, does this verse from Matthew’s Gospel take on its correct meaning. (187)
There’s a swiggle mark in the margin of my book at this point, with the note: “Eh. I don’t know what I think of this, esp. considering it was the Christians who made it a curse for the Jews.”
So, I’m wondering, what do you all think of it? I am uneasy about it because (1) it implies that the real root of Christian violence against Jews is simply faulty biblical interpretation (an amateur’s mistake!), not something like, you know, hatred; (2) to take this verse, which was definitely meant as polemic against the Jews and which has justified so much evil, and to say that the Jews unknowingly meant it, albeit in a way that neither they themselves nor Christians until Benedict understood, makes me cringe. I’m having trouble articulating it, but it’s something along the lines of claiming that the Jews were actually asking to be superseded. And yet that claim is made all the time–for instance, at virtually every Christian worship service that includes lectionary readings from Isaiah or the other prophets. So why does this particular claim, about “his blood be on us an our children,” seem (to me at least) way more problematic?
What do you guys think?
[...] started as a comment on Sonja’s post below, regarding Benedict’s interpretation of long-lethally line in the Gospel of Matthew, [...]
[...] of Women In Theology has two posts on Pope Benedict 16′s book about Jesus. Also, Bridget reflects on its impact potential for Jewish-Christian [...]
I don’t think Ratzinger is right at all about Matthew’s intention, but I also don’t think you say this phrase was intended as a polemic against “the” Jews, but against certain Jews. The author of Matthew himself was Jewish, and since there was no normative Judaism at that point, this was an intra-Jewish conflict, and a polemic against Jews who did not accept Jesus as a Messiah. If that is the backdrop, it doesn’t seem to me gentile Christians have much of a place in the conversation, inasmuch as we are “grafted” onto the tree, without the standing within Israel to make any claim.
But I don’t think it’s a facile claim to say that the real root of Christian violence against Jews are biblical misinterpretations. Most of the history of theology is just that – a reading of the story, and application. You can see the beginnings of this mistake in Justin Martyr, and in a host of early Christian texts. Readings just seem to me to highlight the reader’s perspective, and it is no more clear to say “hatred” is the reason for the violence than a misreading of texts.
Thanks for the comment, Austin. Yes, by saying that the phrase was intended as a polemic against “the” Jews, I meant “certain Jews,” since, as you point out, there was definitely no normative Judaism at that time and this was an intra-Jewish conflict. I was trying to make the point that it was originally intended as a “curse,” not a “blessing,” but I should have been more careful with my phrasing.
And thanks, too, for the critique on misinterpretation vs. hatred as the reason for violence against Jews. On second thought, I would say that both are equally facile explanations. Hatred doesn’t come from nowhere, and it’s certainly not isolated from socially constructive acts like reading/interpretation. But likewise, readings are never done by people whose minds are blank slates. Interpretation of any text can’t be said to be a true “starting point” for anything; there’s always a fore-understanding. I offered “hatred” as a counter-explanation because I wanted to emphasize the moral culpability of some, not all, historical Christians; it seemed to me that Ratzinger had “intellectualized” the history of Christian anti-Judaism (and here I mean the last twenty centuries, not just the first century) to the point that moral agency, and moral responsibility, were obscured. Concepts like culpable ignorance aside, I think there is something that is lost when discussions of oppressed groups and their oppressors are carried out mainly from the standpoint of whether or not the oppressors had misunderstood the true nature of those they oppressed. The line, “It was all just a misunderstanding!” springs to mind for me. I also had in the back of my mind Benedict’s remarks last year that the real cause of the Third Reich was atheism. Yes, it is totally valid to say that such evil really is, at bottom, an abandonment of God, but man that is not the way to say it. There are a million other things to say first before you boil it all down to “atheism.” Ratzinger’s discussion of the Matthew verse seemed like a similar instance of tone-deaf “boiling down.”
(I don’t want to dismiss completely Ratzinger’s characteristic focus on truth versus falsehood as the root of all societal ills. There are very beautiful theologies, and not just “gnostic” ones, that would explain all of salvation history in terms of ignorance and knowledge, and I don’t see anything wrong with them. I think, though, that a German pope who’s come under fire in the past for things pertaining to Jewish-Christian relations ought, in the context of a chapter on the Jews, Pilate, and the death of Jesus, to switch gears and “play up” the historical culpability of Christians, and some strands of Christian theology, for violence against Jews.)
P.S.–Amen on the Justin Martyr point. On several pages of the book, I scribbled “Justin!” into the margins. On several points, Ratzinger’s theology is identical to Justin’s.
I think Benedict’s take on the phrase is different than what was intended, and though I suppose it’s meant to be conciliatory, it sounds to me more like a weird kind of co-option.
Maybe not so much related, but it reminds me of an article I saw by James Carroll – Enter Christianity
[...] on Jewish-Christian relations While we’re sort of on the topic of Jewish-Christian relations, a wonderful lecture (about three years old?) from the [...]
“And yet that claim is made all the time–for instance, at virtually every Christian worship service that includes lectionary readings from Isaiah or the other prophets.”
Are you suggesting that the prophets of old didn’t expect a savior to come and change things? Or that it was always intended for there to be two separate groups following Jesus?
Hi, the mrs.–
Historically, no, Israel’s prophets were not expecting Jesus. They were speaking to their own particular circumstances, and their words had meaning apart from Jesus. Whether they were expecting “a savior to come and change things” depends on what you mean by “savior” and “change things.”
I’m not sure what you mean about “two separate groups following Jesus.” What I am saying is that supersessionism (the claim that Christianity replaces Judaism and that Judaism is now obsolete) is very problematic, especially given the history of Christian violence against Jews, but that it is also woven very deeply into Christian texts, theology, and worship in less conspicuous ways.
I understand the term “supersessionism, ” now, and agree that’s pretty much the underlying assumption inside church doctrine (whether spoken/taught or not). I don’t think the Jews were asking for it, and like how the professor in the video you posted recently specifically that “Matthew said” it.
I have always understood that the prophets were continuously pointing to a time when a savior would come. I continue to use that particular word because I can think of no other! John the Baptist says, “Are you the one they spoke of?” Obviously it wasn’t Jesus as we know him that they were waiting for, but weren’t they waiting for someone/messiah/savior?
Hi Bonnie,
Not all of the prophets seem to have been waiting for someone/a messiah/a savior; many of them simply were busy criticizing society as it was and having direct encounters with God. The fact that we (Christians) tend to think of the prophets as a homogeneous group whose main occupation was predicting/waiting for a messiah/savior is really a result of the influence Christian theology has had on how we read Jewish scriptures. In the first few centuries of the common era, as Christians were trying to find ways to talk about Jesus, explain who he was, what God had done through him, and how all of this “fit” with what God had done with Israel, they often turned to the Jewish scriptures in an attempt to “find” hidden references to Jesus. By interpreting the prophets, as well as other parts of the bible (i.e., the Old Testament) as referring to Christ, these Christian theologians painted a picture of Judaism that most real Jews would not have recognized. They painted a picture of a Judaism that was incomplete, that more than anything wanted and lacked a savior, and that should have disappeared once that savior showed up. In other words, they “invented” a Judaism whose fulfillment was nothing other than Jesus Christ. But this is a theological perspective on Judaism and its writings, not an accurate description of what Judaism was actually like historically.
Amy-Jill Levine discusses this in her book, The Misunderstood Jew, part of which is online as a Google Book: http://books.google.com/books?id=0a0HchZsD_cC&lpg=PP1&dq=the%20misunderstood%20jew&pg=PA56#v=onepage&q&f=false
PS: Me llamo Bonnie. sure does look funny being called ” the mrs.” ; )
[...] music. And the obvious answer to that is, “We always already have.” I’ve wondered about this too, and I wonder if my discomfort with white congregations singing non-white music is [...]