Christians and Jews

KENDALL SOULEN'S article on the thought of my good friend Michael Wyschogrod ("God's first love," July 27) brings forth his wisdom and pertinence to Jewish-Christian understanding in our times. It also reveals the logical flaw in Wyschogrod's otherwise unassailable reasoning in his correspondence with Cardinal Jean-Marie Lustiger of Paris, a Jew who converted to Catholicism and who has, as the parlance goes, been very "good for the Jews" in his churchly position, but who was not convinced by Wyschogrod that he should observe the Torah's kosher laws.

First, the vast majority of religious Jews in the U.S. (the world's largest Jewish community) are not Orthodox. So if religious Jews in such large numbers can choose a non-Orthodox yet deeply Jewish way of practicing Torah, should not Christian Jews have the same freedom?

Second, the Catholic Church neither "prohibit[s] baptized Jews from obeying Torah nor "insist[s] that Jews retain their identity even in the church." There is no canon law one way or the other on this question. And the church officially since the Second Vatican Council (and perhaps since the rejection of Marcionism in the second century) rejects the notion that the church "has fundamentally superseded God's covenant with Israel." God's covenant with the Jews has "never been revoked by God," and will remain valid until the end of the present era in which we await the second coming and Jews await the first coming of the one Messiah of Israel and humanity. It is not then a question of the church "insisting" on or "prohibiting" these matters, but of the church acknowledging the divine right of Jews, whether baptized or Torah observant, to work out for themselves the implications of God's election of them as "the people of God."

Finally, there is a caveat to all of this, drawn from the painful history of Christian proselytizing efforts toward the Jews over the centuries. The churches must not establish particular organizations aimed at targeting the Jews for conversion. So while allowing the baptized Jews in our midst their freedom to determine their response as Christians and Jews to God's word to them, we must take great care not to fall into the trap of institutionalizing "Messianic Jewish" groups or "Jews for Jesus," which Wyschogrod's approach, albeit perhaps unwittingly, might seem to validate. These groups have furthered a gentile Christian "outreach" to the Jews that we in our time should not be fostering until a great many theological questions are better understood.

It may take generations for the issues to be resolved as we strive to purge theological triumphalism and supersessionism from our approach to Judaism. But we too are an ancient community and can well afford to take the time to finally "get it right" on what is a set of issues central not only to Jewish identity but to our own.

I suggest that the questions before the churches are more complex and nuanced than Wyschogrod gives us credit for. The ancient Catholic wisdom "make haste slowly" seems to apply here. Let us not decide just yet. Let us watch and see how the range of approaches, from that of Messianic Judaism to that of the Jewish-Christians of Israel, begins to work out. We Christians have not yet learned enough through the dialogue with the Jewish people--which began only in the wake of the Shoah--to be precluding options for future generations.

Eugene J. Fisher, Associate Director, Secretariat for Ecumenical and Interreligious Relations, U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, Washington, D. C.

Michael Wyschogrod replies:

My good friend Gene Fisher takes exception to my suggestion that Cardinal Lustiger, born a Jew and now a cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church, should lead a Torah observant life even if he chooses to remain a follower of Jesus and a cardinal. Fifteen years have now passed and Lustiger has not responded to my letter. This can be interpreted in a number of ways; one of those is that, unlike Gene Fisher, he finds the topic troubling and is unable to make a public statement about it. I continue to hope that he will address the issues. They are too important to be ignored.

1) The issue is not Orthodoxy but the Bible. The Bible forbids eating pork and kindling fire on the Sabbath, to mention just two examples. Do Lustiger and other Jewish Christians obey biblical commandments or not? Lustiger cannot be interpreted as a liberal Jew. The Roman Catholic Church does not propagate liberal religion; if Lustiger eats pork and kindles fire on the Sabbath, he must explain whether he believes that Jesus has abrogated the law and, if so, which part. While Fisher correctly points out that the church has rejected supersessionism, he does not discuss whether the church has rejected the ancient Christian teaching that Jesus has abolished the law.

Thomas Aquinas distinguishes between the moral and ceremonial parts of the Mosaic law and explains that the moral part remains in effect but that Jesus abolished the ceremonial parts. Further, he continues, to obey the ceremonial law after Jesus abolished it is to commit a mortal sin. This means that if Lustiger abstained from pork because he did not like it, he had no problem. But if he did so because God forbids pork, he is committing a mortal sin. Does Lustiger agree with this opinion? The world deserves to know what Lustiger and the church believe about this matter. Lustiger has said many times that he continues to consider himself a Jew. Fisher is right in pointing out that, unlike many converts in the past, Lustiger has been a very good influence on the Jewish-Christian dialogue in the church. But just because of this, he should not dodge the question of the law.