- ADL Letter to The New York Times Magazine
-
- March 12, 2003 Letter to the Editor The New York Times
Magazine
-
- To the Editor: We are concerned that Mel Gibson's cinematic
attempt to portray the suffering of Jesus and the crucifixion in his new
film, "The Passion," could call up a dangerous anti-Semitic canard
that has for centuries been used to validate the persecution and wanton
killing of Jews. ("Is the Pope CatholicÖEnough?" Mar. 9)
-
- The centuries-old charge of deicide against Jews, simply
put, that "the Jews killed Christ," has been discredited by history
and unequivocally rejected by the Roman Catholic Church in the 1965 Vatican
proclamation, "Nostra Aetate." Yet the deicide charge against
Jews still has staying power among fringe movements and even in some mainstream
segments of the Catholic Church. A film graphically portraying the life
of Christ, one that aims to lay the blame for the death of Christ "where
it belongs" - code words for deicide - could turn back the clock on
decades of interfaith work toward mutual respect and understanding, work
that has been championed by Pope John Paul II and prominent Jewish and
Catholic leaders.
-
- Just what is "the truth" that Gibson wishes
to tell? Christian Scriptures themselves relate conflicting accounts of
the death of Jesus. The truth is always in the eye of the beholder. The
danger is that an old-style retelling of Christ's passion, given the imprimatur
of a high-profile and iconic Hollywood celebrity like Mel Gibson, could
serve as a toxic recipe for religious hatred.
-
- Sincerely, Abraham H. Foxman > National Director >>
-
- Reply from Robert Countess to Abe the FOX-man at the
ADL:
-
- Dear Abe and the New York Times:
-
- Mr. Foxman made a glaring admission in his propaganda
screed when he stated that "Truth is always in the eye of the beholder."
-
- What he ERRED in omitting is that HIS truth is ALWAYS
in HIS EYE as Director of the ADL and thus is truth skewed toward protecting
HIS agendum of spinning news stories so as to protect HIS ideology that
Jews are ALWAYS the eternally persecuted by the [Talmudically driven concept
of] subhuman Goyim, with Jews NEVER being personally responsible for what
they have negatively experienced at the hands of these subhumans.
-
- Therefore, readers of the NYT have been presented once
again with a twisted picture of reality.
-
- Abe's attacks on the Gospels cannot be allowed to go
unchallenged by a few of us Christians who have that rare expertise in
New Testament Greek language and textual study. His blatant attack does
not stand up to a careful scrutiny of the relevant texts.
-
- What Abe seeks to do is to REVISE the texts and their
clear message SO THAT THE TEXTS EITHER CONTRADICT THEMSELVES OR ELSE THEY
SUPPORT HIS OWN SPINNING.
-
- Example: the Gospels do NOT place the contemporaneous
BLAME for the crucifixion of Jesus on every single distributed Jew in/around
the year A.D. 29. Rather, they place the blame on the Jewish LEADERS--the
Abe Foxman types of A.D. 29, shall we say?--who met together in the High
Priest Caiaphas' palatial mansion, informally, since the evening was a
Passover type of special sabbath. This Sanhedrin-ist meeting was NOT a
full 71 member official meeting, yet was held in order to examine the arrested
Jesus, an arrest apparently instigated by these Jewish Pharisees and Scribes
and Lawyers and Sadducees who HATED Jesus and His teaching and His upsetting
of their Temple "get-rich" money-changing scam and his upsetting
[physically and violently!] their "Wall Street-esque"] euro-dollar-franc-mark-ruble
tables in the Outer Court of the Temple itself precinct.
-
- To be sure, these LEADERS had much at stake in their
dominating the masses of illiterate and ignorant and nescient "Jews."
Jesus was a religious and economic threat to their vested interests and
Jesus HAD TO BE STOPPED.
-
- When the texts report that the Sanhedrinists brought
false witnesses, whose alleged eyewitness testimony conflicted with each
other [Mark 14:56], I am reminded of the Jewish show-trial of John Demjanjuk
in the specially arranged theater [a theater!] in Jerusalem in the 1980s
when several alleged eyewitnesses were sworn to tell Foxman's "truth"
["always in the eye of the beholder"] that this Cleveland autoworker,
retired, was "Ivan the Terrible" who genocided Jews with diesel
exhaust in Treblinka gas chambers to the tune of several hundred thousands.
-
- University of California Irvine Professor Elizabeth Loftus
[nee the Jewess Beth Fishman of Brooklyn] witness memory expert admitted
in chapter nine of her book WITNESS FOR THE DEFENSE [St. Martin's Press]
that she refused to help the Demjanjuk defense because of her Jewish commitment
to the [Sanhedrinist] interests of Israel. The Jerusalem--where Jesus was
also condemned in a show-trial in A.D. 29 or so--show-trial saw similar
Jewish eyewitnesses contradict each other and the historical evidence;
and the Israeli Supreme Court under the glare of international media had
little alternative but to release Demjanjuk, even though "Sanhedrinist"
Harvard Professor of Law Alan Dershowitz stated that Demjanjuk should not
have been released since HE WAS NO DOUBT GUILTY OF SOMETHING !!!
-
- Foxman's "truth" is ALWAYS self-serving, that
is, there is NO objective and fixed TRUTH but only TRUTH for narrowly-defined
Judeo ethnic-centered GOALS.
-
- For readers who wish to explore this in gruesome detail,
I suggest Professor Kevin MacDonald's brilliant trilogy that begins with
A PEOPLE THAT SHALL DWELL ALONE [Praeger] and concludes with the recent
paperback edition THE CULTURE OF CRITIQUE with its devastating PREFACE
of 93 pages. This amazing trilogy leaves NO doubt that Judeo ethno-centric
shenanigans are harmful to the masses of subhuman Goy peoples over whom
the Foxman-Caiaphas ilk run roughshod either OFTEN or PERENNIALLY.
-
- Saying all this opens me to ADL smears of familiar kitsch-type
"anti-Semitism" shouts from the Oi-veying minority in our midst,
but then I must always remember what my Jewish friend [and a truly righteous
JEW, unlike the perfect hypocrite Foxman (and yes, I must admit that NO
ONE is perfect!] Dr. Alfred Lilienthal said at the National Press Club
building over a decade ago: "Bob, you must remember that an anti-Semite
used to be someone who hated Jews; now an anti-Semite is someone that Jews
hate."
-
- Al was correct then and is still correct now.
-
- Jesus, if He were to hold a press conference at the NPC
in D.C. today, and expose the Sanhedrin and Talmud and the ADL of B'nai
B'rith types of our day for what they are--nefarious organizations that
don't give a fig, as we say, for the Truth of Abrahamic religion--would
be denounced on CNN and other Jewish owned or dominated media outlets as
a "self-hating Jew" or worse and worthy of deportation to Siberia
or Iraq, but more likely to Israel for a new show-trial [without Professor
Loftus to help His defense team!]. Then, I would anticipate in my scenario
that Jesus would be hanged like Adolf Eichmann [since gassing might be
difficult to arrange in a single evening] and buried carefully so that
a garden tomb might not have a large round stone that could be conveniently
rolled away and thus a resurrection story to be spread.
-
- In conclusion, NYT readers deserve a fuller picture of
what lies behind the Foxman and Rabbi Hier animus of hatred for Mel Gibson's
UNCONTROLLED-by-Jews-movie on the last 12 hours of Jesus' arrest, torture,
sham trial, condemnation, transfer to Pilate for Roman legal condemnation,
and then crucifixion, and burial. Readers deserve to SEE the Gibson movie
for themselves and as FoxNews loudly proclaims hundreds of times a week,
"We Report. You Decide." ["Inquiring Minds" want to
know why Foxman seeks to control THIS movie rather than Hollywood sex films
or Time-Warner gangsta rap music videos and CDs instead.]
-
- Foxman is indeed afraid. He has a solid basis for his
fear since the Gibson movie may well represent the Gospels in their power
and clarity. But I submit as an expert in NT Greek that Jews in general
have no need to fear anything at all. Jews need to read the Gospels for
themselves and SEE that Pharisees et alia of the Foxman-Hier-Wiesel-Berenbaum
types [mutatis mutandis] were the Jews who framed Jesus and condemned Him
to death and pressured, even bribed the pagan Pilate [he needed impetus
to affix his signature to the death warrant since he had no interest in
Talmudic charges of blasphemy and related religious conundrums] to sign
off in approval of their extermination of the hated Jesus of Nazareth.
-
- Mel "Braveheart" Gibson just might do the World
a great service with his film in that the movie could initiate a long overdue
open discussion of what has historically been called "the Jewish Problem"
[or by Th. Herzl "the Jewish Question"]. MacDonald's scholarly
trilogy is wonderfully framed but MUCH too scholarly for the average reader.
But a Hollywood type film with blood and gore and torture and screams of
pain and hate and subterfuges and hypocrisy unbounded by Jewish religionist
overseers? THAT is the medium with the message for movie goers in 2003.
-
- Little wonder Abe and his ilk want to either REVISE it
or STOP it.
-
- Only time will tell if the pre-film publicity will increase
attendance or if the Jewish threats will lead "Braveheart" himself
to back down and offer Congressman James Moran-like groveling apologies
[for telling the truth].
-
- Was there a "Deicide"? That is, was Jesus God
and did humans kill Him? This is a question of both historical and theological
parameters.
-
- If the eventual outworkings of TIME and if there is a
Heaven and all associated with Eschatology in Christian [Catholic, Orthodox,
Protestant varieties] beliefs is shown to substantiate that Jesus was the
Son of God as in the Trinity concept, THEN indeed there was in/around A.D.
29 a Deicide.
-
- That takes care of both the historiographical and theological
concerns.
-
- On the other hand, the general theology of Christianity
holds that every human being was personally, though not contemporaneously,
responsible for the death of Jesus the Christ since all are sinners [Romans
3:23]. Thus, Jews and Goyim are responsible as sinners. And if Jesus died
FOR sinners, THEN each and every Jew and Goy is called upon to repent and
accept personally the efficacy of the Atonement for THEIR sins. There is,
therefore, NO special guilt for Jews then or today. Both Jews and Gentiles
stand on the same level ground at the foot of the Cross alike in both their
guilt and their opportunity for salvation.
-
- Unless Foxman and his little band of hatemongers repent
and accept Jesus as their personal Savior from sin, THEN Christian theology
[regardless of Vatican II] pronounces him and his band to be indeed guilty.
-
- Is there any more that really needs to be said from the
Christian viewpoint? Perhaps the time is at hand with Easter week this
April 13-20th for Abe and his fellows to attend services and listen to
Bach's PASSION CHORALE "O Sacred Head Now Wounded" and Handel's
"Messiah" and other great musical arrangements of the Christian
Church. Would Abe and his band be moved to repentance by these? I have
no crystal ball to predict the resultant response, but I do predict that
such an ecumenical attendance COULD improve Jewish-Christian relations
enormously. After all, Foxman and his fellows are ALWAYS trying to get
Gentiles to attend synagogues on Friday evenings in order to SHOW the "T-word"--TOLERANCE.
-
- Perhaps Mel Gibson's efforts might lead to a "putting
the shoe on the other foot" for a change!
-
- "Braveheart" just might go down in the history
books for bringing about a turn of events that Billy Graham just never
could accomplish with his crusades.
-
- Sincerely,
-
- Robert H. Countess, Ph.D. Ancient Greek boblbpinc@earthlink.net
28755 Sagewood Circle Toney, AL 35773 USA Phone (256) 232-4940 Cell (256)
653-7598 Fax (256) 232-4940
-
-
- Comment
- From Kim Evans
- 3-19-3
-
- Hello Jeff
-
- I have just finished reading the post 'Controversy Over
Gibson's New Film
- "The Passion".
-
- Growing up in a Roman Catholic family and attending a
Catholic school as a
- child, I was taught that the "Jews" were responsible
for the murder of JC.
- I used to question the Sister's about the stories/fairytales
in the bible.
- I was considered, by them, a trouble-maker and made to
pay dearly, caning,
- detention, the writing of many, many lines for small
occurrences like
- forgetting a book or running in the playground. I think
I was being
- punished for not being Catholic enough by questioning
the Sister's about
- the bible.
- When I turned 17 I decided to renounce all religion as
it seemed to be more
- of a burden than a pleasure, I have not looked back since.
-
- As I have read on your site in previous postings, that
now, in Europe it is
- illegal to say/think that the holocaust never occurred.
- Why is it that when people say/deny/question atrocities
that have occurred
- in other religions they are not castigated for being
anti-Catholic,
- anti-Moslem, anti-Gnostic, anti-Yada-Yada-Yada, and made
to feel that they
- are committing a crime?
-
- It seems to me as soon as something negative is said
about the Jewish
- religion they say you are anti-Semitic instead of having
open debate about
- what is being said. I suppose that it is easier to throw
up the
- anti-Semitic card than to debate the issue's and prove
their point via the
- facts.
- Regards
- Kim
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