This is the season of the year when hope is rekindled and resolutions are made to do better than in the past. It is not easy to be optimistic nowadays when one looks at the world realistically and watches all the natural as well as man-made disasters unfold. Nevertheless, giving in to despair and/or resentment does not solve problems it only makes them worse.

Let us, therefore, separate the natural disasters such as hurricanes and now the devastating tsunami, over which we have no control, from the man-made ones that are our responsibility.  Nature’s upheavals may well become worse because our climate is changing. We don’t know the cause for certain. We don’t know how much is due to industrial pollution and what is the role of a wobbling earth, changes of solar emissions or a shifting of magnetic poles. But that does not absolve us from the duty to study our climate and take prudent rather than excessive action. Inasmuch as natural catastrophes are likely to become increasingly costly it would behoove us to husband our financial resources to be able to meet the demand when it arises.

Prudence and foresight ought to be the key words that allow us to meet the challenges nature as well as our politicians create. They are the antidote to fear with which those who are in power over our lives in the economic and military sense try to rule us. We are being told, for instance, that we are confronted with mortal danger to our way of life by an evil ruthless enemy and unless he is defeated, regardless of the cost to ourselves and others, civilization as we know it will perish. Some authors even prophecy as the goal of Islamist revolutionaries the creation of a United Islamic Republic of America. This is not my fantasy; I read it in the pages of the conservative Jewish publication Commentary. It is an old axiom that you can rule people, like donkeys, with carrots and sticks. When there are not enough carrots to go around then you have to frighten them into submission. Remarkably enough this has worked for millennia and puts into question the theory of the perfectibility of the human race as a whole rather than merely of some few gifted individuals.

We are currently living in a truly paradoxical age. One the one hand we want to spread secular democracies around the world and on the other hand we are doing this in the name of protecting our Judeo-Christian heritage. What is even more astonishing is that these policies are promoted and enacted by people who regard themselves as “born again Christians.” With other words, from our President on down, these individuals believe that they have found Christ in their lives who has saved them from evil and it is their duty to now bring this good news to the rest of the world regardless whether the world wants it or not. But who is this Christ or personal Jesus they have taken to heart and why did he get himself crucified?

I am not about to engage in theological speculations about unprovable assumptions so let us look instead at comparative religion and history as recorded in the holy books. This is a wholesome enterprise because it shows how the American people are being misled by skillful propaganda. Furthermore, many of the people who are doing so are acting in good faith and are simply not aware of the profound differences between the Jewish and the Christian religion which are patched over under the term Judeo-Christian. I have discussed some of these differences in The Moses Legacy but this is a book that tends not be read. I shall, therefore, attempt to profile here the essential distinctions between the teachings of Moses and those of Jesus. This is not merely a theoretical exercise but involves choices by what principles we intend to live our lives.

Moses, as he comes across in the Pentateuch (the first five books of the Bible ascribed to Moses), is relatively easy to understand. He took a diverse group of people who had lived in Egypt, united them under a single God and in the name of that God gave them a law code that set them apart from all other nations. The laws were designed to create a warrior ethos that would allow a numerically inferior group to overcome the people living in the country which they were to conquer and occupy. For the natives of the land no mercy was to be shown. They had to be exterminated in toto because their customs would deflect the immigrants from the worship of the true God to whom alone they were responsible. Thus, there was to be no fraternization, no sharing of meals and, of course, no intermarriage.  The conquerors were to live in a world of Israelites ruled by Israelites for the benefit of Israelites. Under those circumstances the Lord would shower blessings upon them but if they reneged on the contract with the Lord, which they had entered into at Sinai, supposedly voluntarily, severe long lasting punishment including the expulsion from the land would follow. Since Moses’ laws were stringent, backsliding was to be expected and this is why the most terrible calamities that would befall them in that case were listed in Deuteronomy, which is essentially a summation of the first four books. Moses ruled by fear and the last verses of Deuteronomy make this quite clear. It is stated that there has not been a prophet in Israel like Moses “whom the Lord knew face to face; in all the signs and the wonders, which the Lord sent him to do in the land of Egypt, to Pharaoh, and to all his servants, and to all his land; and in all the mighty hand, and in all the great terror, which Moses wrought [emphasis added] in the sight of all Israel [Dt XXXIV 10-12].”

The Israelites or Jews as they were later called were people like everybody else. They could neither live up to the lofty admonitions nor were they capable of exterminating all their enemies and were, therefore, conquered and dispossessed twice from their land. Now they are engaged in a repeat performance in Palestine. Since their leadership has apparently not drawn the appropriate lessons from the past failures this experiment may well end up the same way as the previous two. Whenever one disregards the rights of others and attempts to remake an existing society into one’s own image one is asking for trouble. This is the lesson that has not yet sunk in but pertains equally to the leadership of Israel as well as to some Jews in the Diaspora.

This is what we know about Moses: a thoroughly autocratic, even tyrannical, flesh and blood ruler of a reluctant people. Now, how about Jesus? Here the situation is considerably more complex because we don’t have one account of his life but four, which differ in a number of details. Furthermore, the gospel of John is mainly a theological document, which takes Jesus out of the realm of humanity and places him into that of the divine.  But let us again leave theology aside and concentrate on the essence of Jesus’ teachings.

We don’t know for certain what Jesus said and what the evangelists have put into his mouth. Since he spoke, in all probability, Aramaic rather than Hebrew, Greek or Latin and no written publication of his is extant we are dealing with translations of translations. All of us who have played silent mail as children know what can come out under those circumstances. This problem was attacked by a group of academics, the so-called Jesus Seminar, who met ever so often and discussed what words that have been ascribed to Jesus he might actually have uttered. Their final report entitled:  The Five Gospels. What did Jesus really say? was published in 1993.

The seminar consisted of 76 eminent professors from North American and European religious colleges who devised a rigorous scientific protocol where the words attributed to Jesus by the gospel writers could be graded for presumed authenticity. Each gospel, including that of Thomas, was examined and a color code was assigned to every one of Jesus’ sentences. A colloquial way to define the words for authenticity as proposed by one member was: red for, “That’s Jesus!,” pink for, “Sure sounds like Jesus,” grey, “Well, maybe,” and black for, “There’s been some mistake.” A vote was cast by each member of the seminar and a probability score was assigned to each color: Greater than 75 percent for red, between 50 and 75 percent to pink, between 26 and 50 percent for grey, and 25 percent or less for black. When the scores were tallied it was found that of the more than 1500 passages only 90 received a red or pink score, and only 10 were unequivocally placed into the red column! I have a feeling that even the members of the seminar may have been surprised at the outcome of this academic exercise.

What does this tell us about Jesus? The answer seems to be that he lives in the minds of beholders; but even so a minimalist consensus is achievable. Regardless of the academicians’ scientific problems what do we, ordinary people, associate the Christian way of life with? I believe that it deals with love, forgiveness, repentance and sacrifice of self for others. Furthermore, and this is the essential difference to Judaism, these virtues are to be extended not only to members of one’s ethnic or national group but to everyone we come into contact with. St. Paul’s doctrine: In Christ there is “not Jew nor Greek, not slave nor free, not male and female [Galatians 3:28];” did away not only with national and class distinctions but also repudiated the Jewish national concept of separateness. If we are all one then we have to truly treat each other as members of one family where when one falls ill all feel the pain and come to each others’ help. The parable of the Good Samaritan was the illustration where Jesus broke with Jewish tradition which had limited the concept of “neighbor” to members of the tribe. Thus, there are fundamental differences in the authentic (biblical) Jewish and Christian view of the relationships that should govern our conduct to “the other.”

Although the Jewish rituals were demanding they were not in conflict with basic human nature. An eye for an eye, namely retribution for ills that have been suffered, is infinitely easier than letting bygones be bygones. Deuteronomy is quite specific. For instance: the tribe of Amalek that did not let the wandering Hebrews pass through the land, but attacked them, has to be held in perpetual dishonor. The slight must never be forgotten (XXV: 19]. A malicious murderer who has escaped to a city of refuge needs to be tracked down. “No pity” shall be shown and he has to be placed “into the hand of the avenger of blood that he may die [XIX 12-13].” Vengeance is, therefore, not only sanctioned but encouraged and this keeps the cycle of revenge and counter-revenge going. This is not only ancient history but explains, what others may regard as, the fanatical obsession with past Nazi war crimes towards Jews and the continued reprisals against Palestinian suicide attacks.

Jesus, who grew up in a milieu of intense civil and religious strife, saw that violence and resultant retribution only perpetuate violence and without forgiveness there can never be peace in this world. He found himself, however, not only in direct conflict with Jewish orthodoxy but also of human nature. A “Father forgive them, for they know not what they do” uttered when nailed to a cross is not part of it. This requires a degree of other-worldliness hardly any one of us is capable of. So does the exhortation to not only love our neighbor but also our enemy, to do good to those who hate us and pray for those who abuse us. Nevertheless this is the only authentic Christian message and those “Christians” who preach and practice vengeance, for the 9/11 tragedy for instance, do not act in accordance with Jesus’ teachings.

Precisely because the Christian message is more difficult it should be followed to the extent we are indeed capable of. Muscle is strengthened by exercise and spiritual muscle is no exception to that rule. Of all the demands the Christian religion places on us “Love your enemy” is surely the most difficult to follow. But let us not be trapped by semantics. As mentioned earlier the sayings of Jesus represent translations of translations. We don’t know the word he used for love, but we do know the word that occurs in the original Greek New Testament and subsequently in the Latin Vulgate. Our language has become impoverished because we no longer distinguish between erotic love, the love of family members towards each other, and the love for music or any other artistic enterprise. The Greeks did and they had several words for what is now lumped under a single one. The word agapao, which was used in the biblical context, denoted not only the love for family but also the concept of esteem. The same applied to the Latin diligete. What this means is that Christians are not necessarily ordered to hug and kiss Osama bin Laden for instance, but we are to see him as a fellow human being, albeit misguided. We can ask ourselves: what does this man really want? and what can he teach us in regard to our own shortcomings? Under those circumstances progress is possible. It is foreclosed when we simply regard him as an evil monster whose actions are beyond comprehension and if he were to be caught and done away with our problems would be solved.

As long as we adhere to this what may be called Old Testament ideation we will stumble from one disaster to the next because our actions, determined by righteous anger, will provoke equal anger on part of those whom we harm in our pursuit of a goal as elusive as instant secular democracy in Iraq. It is not the end that justifies the means; it is the means we employ which determine the outcome of whatever we do. Breaking down doors in the middle of the night and terrifying Iraqi families may be in the interest of finding suspected insurgents but is hardly the way to bring us good will in the long run. Shock and awe is apparently still the motto and our leadership seems to be oblivious to the fact that although you can shock somebody with brute force that doesn’t mean he will be awed by it and will willingly do whatever you want him to. The ill-will the battle for Fallujah has created and is still creating among the former inhabitants of this currently uninhabitable city is likely to simmer for a good long time. We believe that if we just give them money to rebuild their destroyed homes that will solve the problem. It is not likely to in that part of the world where the same tribal loyalties as in Israel hold sway. Blood needs to be washed away by blood is the law and our failure to understand this fundamental doctrine will be the reason why our Iraqi experiment in nation building on secular democratic principles is likely to fail.

The current issue of Time magazine has our President once again as “Person of the Year” on its front cover. There is also extensive reporting about him and what is called the “Bush dynasty” in the inside pages. Although slightly cautious the overall tone is one of approval. I happen to see him differently and after 9/11 I couldn’t help being reminded of Goethe’s Faust. There is a scene where Mephistopheles appears in Faust’s study and when asked by Faust who he is he said, “I am a part of that force which forever desires evil and yet creates good.” With our President it seems to be the opposite. I believe that he truly desires to do good but the means that are employed create evil. Does he know or care how many innocent Iraqis we have killed, maimed, deprived of their homes and livelihoods or that as a result of our liberation of Iraq from a secular dictatorship he seems to be paving the way for a religious one? As The Christian Science Monitor reported recently, Christian families are beginning to leave their country because they are afraid of a Muslim resurgence. This is the tragedy of our time: good Christians pursue noble goals with means that come out of the Old Testament rather than the New. A truly Christian foreign policy, which places the wishes of others on the same level as ours and subsequently achieves a mutually agreeable solution, would truly be a first in human affairs. This may be an impossible dream but it needs to at least be put on the table. Precisely because it is the most difficult thing to do, because it goes against human selfishness, it needs to be worked towards on a case by case basis.

We are being told that the President reads the Bible on Sundays. My only wish is that he would devote himself to the study of the New rather than the Old Testament because there is an additional aspect of the Jesus story which can transcend sectarian and personal strife. Christians are taught to regularly recite “The Lord’s prayer.” I have a suggestion which can even be turned into a New Year’s resolution for anyone. We do not need to regard the sentences contained in the prayer simply as a request to the Deity but as commandments how to treat each other! 

Non-Christians might want to delete the introductory statement of, “Our Father who is in heaven” but, “hallowed be thy name” can be applied. It can be taken as a request not to slander each other, call each other names we don’t want to have applied to ourselves, and refrain from using Jesus’ name as an expletive. The words, “Thy kingdom come” order us to create circumstances on this very earth of ours where help is gladly extended to everyone who is in need, where suffering is reduced to its bare minimum and where we abstain from actions that will produce it. “Thy will be done,” when confronted with a reasonable request and it is in our power to grant it we should do so. “Give us this day our daily bread,” we should see to it that the hungry are indeed being fed; but in addition when Jesus used the word bread he also meant spiritual sustenance. This is what we frequently fail to give to each other. Not only our bodies but our souls require nourishment and we should provide it. “Forgive us our trespasses” is surely something we can and should do. “Lead us not into temptation” is perhaps today the most urgent in our secular capitalistic society. We are being bombarded by promises of instant gratification of most of our desires. Advertisements on billboards, radio, TV, the Internet that play on our greed and sexual urges are only one part. The entire “entertainment industry” tends to be geared now towards emotional, especially sexual, gratification. There is active incitement of our baser qualities to the neglect of the intellectual and spiritual needs of the human being. Neither you nor I can change the industry but we can change the emotional climate in our families and we can make every effort to protect our children from this barrage of falsehood. “Deliver us from evil” follows from the foregoing. Let us carefully consider our actions not only in respect to the hoped for outcome but how the means we employ will impact on others. If this had been done by our leadership we would not be faced with the current daily tragedies to innocent families of Iraqis as well as those of U.S. troops.

In these perilous times lip service to Jesus’ words will no longer suffice, we must take the message to heart including, “Fear not!” In regard to “loving” our enemies the first order of business ought to be to reduce their numbers rather than increase them by ill considered actions. As to those who are determined to harm us we should take them as individuals and examine their personal motives and capabilities rather than lump them under amorphous names such as the Taliban or al Qaeda. In regard to these people we don’t even know how many there are who want to harm us rather than establish religious regimes in their own countries. It is up to those countries how to deal with them. We ought not to be the sheriff of the world where “My will be done” rules. The Cold War strategies where we defended ourselves against nations are currently inapplicable because we deal with probably quite small groups of individuals who may or may not have state support. To use those strategies i.e. reliance on superior military power, is not only fruitless but counterproductive.

For our “Christian” leadership to deserve that name it would have to abandon the old ways of tit for tat and the reliance on fear to maintain power. Instead we should engage in selfless cooperation with the peoples of the rest of the world. There ought to be no favorites but impartial justice towards all and for those nations whose leadership violates international law the United Nations is the appropriate forum to settle disputes. The money we save on useless military expenditures could be set aside not only to restore fiscal balance and domestic programs but also to create a fund for the inevitable natural disasters that are bound to occur in the future.

Unless we follow the road, as shown in the New rather than the Old Testament, Jesus will have died in vain as a deluded idealist. The theology that has grown around the person of Jesus need not deter us. He is honored in the Koran as well as in Buddhist literature and it is now up to us to grant him the stature he deserves. When we truly do what Jesus asked us to, as expressed in the Lord’s Prayer, everybody will benefit. You will tell me that what I have proposed here is not likely to ever come to pass. I know that it won’t for the people who currently are in power but we can adopt these suggestions as our personal New Year’s resolution.