The Jews Again
by modestinus
Rorate Caeli, in its questionable “wisdom,” has decided to make use of Bishop Hilarion Alfayev’s condemnation of the Catholic Church’s decision to modify the Good Friday prayer for the Jews to advance its own polemic against the contradiction of a Catholic prelate allowing the parishes of his diocese to be used by the Orthodox, but not the Catholic Society of St. Pius X. This usage, of course, demonstrates once again the myopia of the R.C. “crowd.”
The decision to revise the Good Friday prayer for the Jews is not, as some maintain, a “modernist” invention of the Church, but rather began during the reign of Pope Pius XII. (A fuller overview of the changes can be found at Wikipeida here.) Bishop Hilarion’s critique of the most recent change to the prayer, instituted by Pope Benedict XVI, is little more than an extension of the Russian Orthodox Church’s longstanding anti-Semitism — one that has nothing to do with Judaism as a religion and everything to do with the Jews as a people. As any Orthodox (or ex-Orthodox) ought to know, the hymnography of Holy Saturday Matins (typically sung on the evening of Holy Friday) amounts to little more than a shifting of the blame for the Crucifixion from the sins of mankind writ large to the specific sin of the Jews. Of all of the hymns of the Orthodox Church, these are — to say the least — the most vacuous, contemptible, and antithetical to the missionary spirit of Christianity that one can find among those with valid Apostolic succession. Fr. Alexander Schmemann, in his journals, lamented at the emptiness and, indeed, the ignorance of these hymns, and yet it should come as no surprise that many Orthodox in traditional Orthodox lands uphold them as valid expressions of Christian doctrine. Others have called for them to be removed from the liturgy altogether, citing that the Triodion from which they are taken is of relatively recent vintage and that the hymns deserve nothing close to the veneration of, say, the ancient canon of St. Andrew of Crete or the hymns composed by St. John of Damascus.
It is important to remember that the Orthodox polemic against the Jews is a blight on their otherwise magnificent history, just as the persecution of Jewish populations in Europe over the centuries is a blight on the Catholic Church — particularly to the extent that churchmen ordained such actions. Bishop Bernard Fellay has recently clarified the distinction between Judaism as a religion and the Jewish people — yet it is a distinction which, sadly, is still lost on some of the leaders of the Orthodox Church. But that is something for the Orthodox to eventually work out. In the meantime, Catholics — even traditionalists — should be wary of leveraging Orthodox critiques that emanate from doctrinaire anti-Semitism for their own purposes. It took the Catholic Church centuries to come to grips with its complicity in atrocities committed against men who, like you and I, are made in the image and likeness of God. We, as Catholics, should be proud of that fact and pray that our estranged brethren in the East do the same.
I should point out that the distinction between “Judaism as a religion and Jews as a people,” while so dear to the heart of certain Christians, is entirely lost on Jews.
In the forthcoming spring 2013 issue of LOGOS: A Journal of Eastern Christian Studies, we have a long article discussing anti-Semitism in the Russian Church written with great care and detail by a respected scholar of Russian theology, Robert Slesinski. Stay tuned.
Hilariously, I know a not particularly pleasant Russian Orthodox priest who is suspicious of Met. Hilarion because … some of his ancestors were Jews.
Gabriel,
Do you happen to know what hymns Eastern Catholics use for Holy Saturday Matins?
Like anything with the Eastern Catholics, the answer is, “It depends.” I know some have cut them out altogether, and others use a different version of the Triodion than what is used by the contemporary Greek and Russian Orthodox churches. (Though that changed, I think, when Rome ok’d the Eastern Catholics to “rediscover” their tradition by, ironically, using liturgical books that were codified after many of them had joined the Catholic Church in the 15th-17th Centuries.) I actually don’t own an Eastern Catholic Triodion (by any of the groups who would use them), so I couldn’t say for sure.
Regardless, I didn’t say that Hilarion himself is an anti-Semite. But I think it’s daft to read his words in isolation from the orientation of the church he represents as a leading hierarch (and certainly one of the most visible to the West). There’s no doubt that the form of the Good Friday Prayer in the Latin West which was eventually altered by Pope Pius XII (and then others) carried more than “theological significance.” The gestures (or lack thereof) which followed its recitation was indicative of the larger polemic against the Jews (as a people) that, sadly, took root in the West for many centuries. I don’t know why any Catholic should have compunction that this form of “prayer” was eradicated. Why a bishop of the Russian Church should interject himself in the matter is, given Russia’s own sad history, questionable to say the least.
Thank you for the response about the Eastern Catholic practice.
“Regardless, I didn’t say that Hilarion himself is an anti-Semite.”
No, and I didn’t say you said it. I said you implied it. I assume this response means that you don’t think he is, and that is good.
As for the rest, I personally have no interest whatsoever in a back-and-forth about the liturgical texts (or gestures, or the hierarchs) of my Church or yours, so I will bow out here.
Deacon Jeremiah, can’t answer for Gabriel…I have no clue myself, but I highly doubt that any Eastern Catholic liturgical prayer or hymn vilifies the Jews. Easter Catholicism is not completely autonomous; it must abide by Vatican directives in sensitive matters like this.
Ms. Kamer,
You are almost certainly correct, but highly I doubt that “the Vatican” reads the texts in question as uncharitably as Gabriel has here. Thus, I would not be at all surprised to learn that Russian Catholics use the same texts as Russian Orthodox.
I would be surprised, however, if the Vatican agrees with the preposterous implication that Metropolitan Hilarion Alfeyev is an anti-Semite, doctrinaire or otherwise.
An excellent metric for whether a given liturgical text is antisemitic or not is to try reading it out loud to a group of young Jewish kids, say middle school students. If you see surprise, or hurt, or confusion, or anger on their faces, guess what? You have your answer. Living in an all-Jewish environment for a while changes your perspective, as it would with any minority group. Just as women have the final word on what’s sexist, and black people get the last word on whether something is racist, so should Jewish reaction determine our assessment of antisemitism. That’s something larger than theology: it’s courtesy.
“Just as women have the final word on what’s sexist, and black people get the last word on whether something is racist, so should Jewish reaction determine our assessment of antisemitism.”
Apply such a criterion to questions such as the legalization of same-sex pseudogamy or, for that matter, and see what absurdity results and has resulted.
Yes, I would indeed trust a gay man or woman to be able to hear resonances of hatred and homophobia in someone else’s speech that might be closed to me, just as I will be alive to currents of sexism that you will not, and a black friend will hear something different than I might. It is a fairly basic lesson to heed closely and with respect the counsel of minority or oppressed groups when it comes to the ways in which we speak of them and to them.
Dr. Tighe,
I had considered writing something similar, but the “metric” suggested seemed so obviously and immediately absurd that I thought the author must be joking or trolling. On the off chance that “Fabula Rasa” was being serious and not attempting a parody of liberal Catholics, there is probably not enough common ground for a fruitful discussion.
On reflection, though I cannot of course speak for them, it seems to me that devout Jews (at least on the Conservative-Orthodox spectrum) would rightly not want to see such a metric applied, mutatis mutandis, to their own religious and liturgical texts.
As a woman, I must agree with Fabula here.
I do find it ironic that the Orthodox, who routinely bash the Catholic liturgy up one side and down the other, would take umbrage merely because someone has pointed out lingering anti-Semitic overtones in a few Orthodox liturgical texts.
Do the Orthodox do nothing wrong? Ever?
Must be nice.
Meanwhile, as I said, I agree with Fabula. Yes, minorities can and do take victimization too far, but this does not obviate the fact that sexism, racism, and anti-Semitism DO exist. And that the offended parties are far better judges of said occurrences than the offenders. (Just ask any corporate HR person, who will gladly inform you that “harassment” and “discrimination” are defined by the victim, not the perpetrator.)
Ms. Kamer,
I don’t know whether you are still following this thread, but it took me a while to decide how (or if) I should respond. I am Orthodox, but I am not “the Orthodox” and I don’t claim to speak for the Church as a whole or any other individual Orthodox Christian.
“As a woman, I must agree with Fabula here.”
You are a woman and you agree with Fabula. But being a woman doesn’t necessitate that you agree. I know women (one of them as about as well as you can know another person) who would disagree quite strongly with the point as stated, and this is part of the problem with Fabula Rasa’s “metric.” I don’t think traditional Orthodoxy or Catholicism (or, for that matter, Judaism) has anything to gain from the sort of discourse in which the “taking of offense” (especially by children in one of the most “sensitive” periods of their development!) is used as a conversation stopper, in claiming the moral high ground, or (even worse) in arrogating to oneself an exclusive knowledge or understanding of the world. And it is of course not the case that all those of a particular historically (or currently) oppressed group will share the same opinion about any particular matter anyway.
I say this as a northerly Southerner/southerly Midwesterner for whom “niceness” is highly valued cultural trait. I don’t like to offend people and generally go out of my way not to—this involves a certain “sensitivity” to the very real injustices that have existed and do exist in our world. This does not change the fact that corporate HR departments have rather different purposes from those of churches, so much so that the relevance of the one to the other is questionable, particularly in the present context.
I said I have no desire for a back-and-forth concerning our respective liturgical texts, and this remains true. I personally have great respect for your usus antiquior and don’t recall ever having “bashed” it in public or private. As for the Ordinary Form, I do think it has its problems, but here I am simply accepting the judgment of Roman Catholics whose scholarship and opinions I respect. I have read almost nothing by Orthodox scholars concerning this matter.
I had no point of reference for evaluating the Roman Mass as I experienced it as a child (post-Vatican II), and did not come away from it with any sort of negative emotional response. (I have never attended a traditional Latin Mass, so I also have no sentimental attachment to the Extraordinary Form.) It will be for the episcopate and the liturgists of your Church to determine whether the current Ordinary Form is a brief historical anomaly, a developmental stage in your liturgy, or the “new norm” until the Lord comes.
But as an Orthodox deacon (with no influence on the liturgical rubrics and texts of my own Church, let alone yours) I consider all of that basically none of my concern or business, apart from what you might call an “academic” interest.
The Funeral or Requiem of Our Lord (since that is what is sung on Friday evenings before Easter) is one of the most beautiful poetic-and-musical masterpieces ever designed. All Lenten and Easter services in general are particularly deep and beautiful. The Jews did kill Christ, it is a historical fact; anti-Semitism however, seems to imply that all Jews who ever lived were present at Golgotha, and also conveniently ignores that Christianity teaches forgiveness, not revenge… If people pervert and misinterpret even the Holy Scriptures to their own destruction (2 Peter 3:16), why should they not also pervert and misinterpret the text of holy and beautiful hymns? Are the hymns greater than the Scriptures? Or greater even than Christ Himself, Who was also disfigured by many blows and hits? But that is not God’s problem, nor the Bible’s, nor the songs’, but of the disturbed minds that “see” such things where there are none there. Furthermore, Russians have been Orthodox for over 1,000 years, but anti-Semitism was unknown to them until the 1700s, when the Westernizing reforms of Peter the Great took place (they adopted many good things from the West, but also a few bad things: and pogroms unfortunately were among them).