The Rise of the “New Christian Left”
In the 1950s the mainline Church was generally viewed as part of the establishment and its members were generally associated with the Republican Party. However, from the 1960s onward there was a decline in mainline identification with the GOP.7 More dramatically, in the 1960s mainline clergy and organizations began to play a major role in progressive causes including opposition to the Vietnam War, fair housing, and civil rights. These actions were rooted in the social gospel tradition, which had been very influential in the early part of the twentieth century.8 They also reflected the growing influence of liberation theology.9 Liberation theology began to develop among Catholic intellectuals in Latin America in the early 1970s. It demands that the church concentrate on liberating the people of the Third World from poverty and oppression. It contends that the Third World has been victimized by colonialism, imperialism, and multinational corporations, which have placed it in a situation of dependency to the U.S. and its First World allies. These ideas run parallel to those of the postcolonial ideology of the New Left, which emerged at about the same time. Indeed, liberation theology consciously drew on Marxism. A leading American exponent of liberation theology was Robert McAfee Brown who declared: “What my nation did in Vietnam was not an exception to US foreign policy, but an example of it.”10 Liberation theology also inspired mainline opposition to U.S. intervention in Nicaragua in the early 1980s. Left-liberalism remains dominant within the mainline clergy and among mainline political activists, but since the mid-1980s the mainline has devoted fewer resources to political action at the national level. Instead, mainline clergy have prioritized local social welfare projects, for example, running soup kitchens and clothing centers for the poor. Still, the mainline does not ignore political issues. The political issues most regularly addressed by the clergy were race and civil rights and the environment.11
The Ideological and Political Divide within the Mainline
While the clergy and national bureaucracies that lead political campaigns have shifted leftward since the 1960s, a majority of the mainline laity has remained moderate or conservative.12 Between 1989 and 2008 around half of the clergy identified as Democrats and liberals, while around a third identified as Republicans and conservatives.13 In contrast, between 1992 and 2011 about a third of the white mainline public identified as conservative, about a fifth as liberal, and the rest as moderates. In the same period about half of the mainline public identified with or leaned toward the Republicans, while the percentage identifying with or leaning toward the Democrats ranged from about a third to about 45 percent.14 These divisions also found expression on some big foreign policy issues. Thus, while two-thirds of the mainline clergy opposed the 2003 Iraq War, a majority of the white mainline public was moderately supportive.15 A similar divide within the mainline is apparent regarding the Arab-Israeli conflict.
The Mainline Public and the Arab-Israeli Conflict: Pro-Israel
On the one hand, the mainline public is less pro-Israel than the evangelical public; on the other hand, they are more pro-Israel than mainline political activists. The mainline public has been broadly supportive of Israel, though at a slightly lower level than the average for the American public as a whole. Indeed, while both evangelicals and mainliners sympathize with Israel over the Palestinians; the pro-Israel margin has been about 20 percentage points higher for evangelicals. Regarding attitudes toward U.S. policy, there is a divide, with a majority of evangelicals preferring to side with Israel and viewing support for Israel as a very important foreign policy goal, while a majority of the mainline public prefer a neutral policy to the conflict; nor do they view support for Israel as a very important goal (see Tables 5.1–5.4).
Table 5.1. Sympathize with Israel over the Palestinians (%)
* * *
(Pre 9/11) 20012003200620092012
General public 40 41 52 49 50
Mainline 35 34 44 48 47
Evangelicals 54 55 64 70 67
* * *
Data from Pew Research Center17
Table 5.2. Percentage Agreeing “The U.S. Should Support Israel over the Palestinians”
* * *
1996200020042008
General public 30 29 36 40
Mainline 28 28 33 40
Evangelicals 36 39 54 55
* * *
Data from National Survey of Religion and Politics18
Table 5.3. Percentage Agreeing “Protecting Israel Should Be a Very Important Goal of U.S. Foreign Policy,” 2011
* * *
Mainline 34
Evangelicals 64
* * *
Data from Pew Research Center19
Table 5.4. “What Should the U.S. Do If Israel Attacks Iran’s Nuclear Program?” (%)
* * *
2012Support IsraelNeutralOppose Israel
Mainline 42 51 2
Evangelicals 64 32 1
* * *
Data from Pew Research Center20
Nonetheless, throughout the 2000s, whereas mainline institutions became increasingly hostile to Israel, the mainline public became increasingly pro-Israel, with the ratio by which they sympathized with Israel over the Palestinians rising from 2:1 to 4:1.16 The level of mainline public support for America taking Israel’s side in the conflict was highest among theological traditionalists, where it formed a majority, and lowest among modernists, a clear majority of whom rejected the proposition. Nonetheless, between 1992 and 2008, the preference for Israel increased across the board among traditionalists, centrists, and modernists by very similar margins.22 Yet at the very time support for Israel was on the rise among the mainline, mainline institutions were moving in the opposite direction, toward a policy of divestment from Israel. An indication of the gap between the mainline laity, the clergy, and the political activists in this regard was apparent over the 2004 Presbyterian divestment resolution. For mainline political activists divestment was a central cause, and they succeeded in getting the divestment resolution passed by a massive majority of 431–62 in the General Assembly. Yet only a slim majority of pastors favored the resolution. It was not a priority for them; indeed, Israel ranked only tenth on a list of sixteen major issues addressed regularly by mainline clergy.23 In contrast, a clear plurality of lay members opposed divestment (see Table 5.5).
Table 5.5. Presbyterian Attitudes toward the 2004 Divestment Resolution (%)
* * *
Pro-DivestmentAnti-DivestmentMargin
Lay Presbyterians 28 42 −14
Pastors 48 43 +5
General Assembly 87 13 +74
* * *
Data from Presbyterian Church (USA) Research Services21
Clearly, the policy of the Presbyterians on Israel was being driven by something other than the general will of its members. In fact, it stemmed primarily from the political activism of a relatively small group, who were more active and more committed on the issue than anyone else in the mainline. The historical foundation of this approach and its contemporary character are examined below.
The Historical Roots of Mainline Approaches to the Arab-Israeli Conflict
Mainline Anti-Zionism
Traditional Anti-Jewish Theology
Early Christians believed that because Christianity grew out of Judaism, Jews would recognize it as their own. When this did not happen, it led to the development of an anti-Jewish literature, Adversos Judeos, or “teachings of contempt.” In the Middle Ages, contempt became demonization – as the Jews were presented as an active force for evil.24 Mainline anti-Zionism was also informed by St Augustine’s replacement theology, according to which the covenant between God and Israel was replaced by the covenant between God and the “new Israel” – the Church – as divine punishment for rejecting Jesus. According to Augustine, the Jewish people were destined to survive but not to thrive, as evidence of its “perfidy.”25 For this reason, according to the mainline theologian Roy Eckhardt:
The entire movement to re-establish the Jewish p
eople in their ancient homeland … has been a traumatic experience from which the collective Christian psyche has never entirely recovered. How presumptuous for Israel to be “reborn” in clear violation of Christian eschatology!26
Prior to 1948 this anti-Jewish theology was a major source of mainline anti-Zionism.27 The Jewish people represented a special case to be judged by a different measure from other peoples. This double standard was consciously applied to Zionism. For example, a 1933 editorial in the leading mainline magazine, the Christian Century, opined:
The Christian mind has never allowed itself to feel the same concern for Jewish suffering that it has felt for the cruelties visited upon the Armenians, the Boers, the people of India, American slaves or the Congo Blacks. Christian indifference to Jewish suffering has for centuries been rationalized by the tenable belief that such sufferings were the judgment of God upon the Jewish people for their rejection of Jesus.28
The editorial went on to urge it readers to reject the idea that all Jews should be held responsible for the crucifixion. But at the same time it asserted that nationalist Jews were responsible, as it explained:
He was crucified because he had a program for Israel which ran counter to the cherished nationalism of Israel’s leaders.
Mainline Protestantism was not concerned with an all-out assault on nationalism per se, but rather focused its opposition on the Jewish national movement – Zionism. Only the Jewish national movement was singled out for demonization. Anti-Zionists in the Christian Century railed against Jewish communal distinctiveness, which was juxtaposed against Christian universalism. Against this background, in the 1930s the Christian Century constantly compared Zionism to Nazism, arguing that the two ideologies shared a “privileged race mentality.”29
Mainline Missionaries and Arab Nationalism
In the nineteenth century, especially after the American Civil War, American missionaries were sent to the Middle East, mainly by the Presbyterians and the Congregationalists. By 1900, twenty-five thousand students were enrolled in American missionary educational institutions in the Middle East.30 Among the institutions founded was the Syrian Protestant College in 1866, which was renamed the American University of Beirut (AUB). Having failed to convert many Muslims, the missionaries focused instead on trying to instill American ideals in the form of a secular Arab patriotism that would transcend the religious divide between Muslims and Christians. Indeed, the Syrian Protestant College played an important role in the development of Arab nationalism, as recognized by its leading ideologue, George Antonius.31
Many American missionaries in the Middle East and their descendants became active supporters of Arab nationalism and opponents of Zionism. For example, Howard Bliss, the president of the Syrian Protestant College, lobbied for Arab nationalism and against Zionism at the Versailles peace conference. In a similar vein, the 1919 King-Crane Commission appointed by President Woodrow Wilson came out against a Jewish state in Palestine, favoring instead the creation of a large Arab/Syrian Republic. Charles R. Crane was a Presbyterian trustee of Robert College, another missionary institution in the Middle East. Antonius dedicated his book The Arab Awakening to Crane. Crane was also a rabid anti-Semite with an intense admiration for Hitler, who once proposed to the Mufti of Jerusalem32 that he prepare an anti-Jewish campaign with the Vatican.33
Some of the children and grandchildren of American missionaries entered the State Department’s Bureau of Near East Affairs – for example, Allen Dulles, the grandson of a Presbyterian missionary, who as a young diplomat promoted an anti-Zionist stance.34 Dulles went on to become the first director of the CIA, which funded the anti-Israel American Friends of the Middle East, founded in 1951 and headed by Dorothy Thompson, the daughter of a Methodist minister. Its board included figures such as Daniel Bliss, the head of the AUB. They all regarded American support for the creation of Israel as a tragic mistake.35
The existence of such anti-Zionism among American Protestants was not confined to missionaries in the Middle East. Although American Protestant public opinion as a whole was supportive of the creation of the State of Israel, significant elements of the mainline clergy were actively anti-Zionist. From the Balfour Declaration until the mid-1940s, the Christian Century reflected this view. The rise of Nazism changed things somewhat so that by the early 1940s mainline Christian clergy were divided over Israel. Still, major figures such the former and then current presidents of Union Theological Seminary, Henry Sloan Coffin and Henry Van Dusen, remained anti-Zionist.
Mainline Pro-Zionism: Niebuhr, Christian Realism and the Holocaust
Yet there were also pro-Zionist mainline theologians. The most important of these was Reinhold Niebuhr, the most influential theologian in America in the 1940s and 1950s. Niebuhr helped found the pro-Zionist Christian Council for Palestine in 1942 that later merged into the American Christian Palestine Committee, which by 1946 had the support of 3000 American clergymen. In the 1950s and 1960s this organization was more effective within the mainline than the anti-Israel organization, American Friends of the Middle East.
In his early years, Niebuhr was part of the social gospel movement, and was active in the pacifist Fellowship of Reconciliation. However by the mid-1930s Niebuhr had become a harsh critic of the social gospel and pacifism. He argued that the messianic dream of universal perpetual peace and brotherhood can never be fully realized on earth because of the limits of human nature. At the same time, Niebuhr rejected the conservative position that preached only otherworldly salvation. While it was impossible to achieve absolute justice on earth, that did not absolve Christians from seeking a more limited proximate form of justice.36 In this vein, Niebuhr actively campaigned against racial discrimination, in favor of American involvement in World War II (against the position of the Federal Council of Churches), and in favor of Zionism and Israel.
Unlike evangelicals, Niebuhr’s support for Zionism was grounded in moral and political considerations, not a literal reading of the Bible. The rise of Nazism, the West’s impotence, and its refusal to accept mass Jewish immigration pushed Niebuhr to look for a solution. This led him away from binationalism toward support for Jewish sovereignty. Theologically he continued to stress a universalist message and he continued to promote equal rights for individual Jews in liberal societies. However, his moral and political realism led to him to be skeptical that anti-Semitism would every fully disappear, and he viewed the Holocaust as evidence regarding the limitations of the democratic creed’s ability to prevent evil.37 But Niebuhr went further – he supported Zionism not only to save individual Jews but also to promote the right of the Jews to survive and flourish as a collective. Niebuhr rebuked his liberal anti-Zionist colleagues who advocated Jewish assimilation for “implicitly making collective extinction the price of provisional tolerance.”38 Writing in the early 1940s Niebuhr declared:
The Jews have a right to a homeland. They are a nation … They have no place where they are not exposed to the perils of minority status … The fact that the Arabs have a vast hinterland and the Jews have nowhere to go establishes the relative justice of their cause … Arab sovereignty over a portion of the debated territory must undoubtedly be sacrificed.39
It is important to note two things here. First, that as per his moral realism, Niebuhr aspired only to relative justice; and second, that this involved support for a Jewish state in only part of Palestine, because the Arabs also had legitimate interests that needed to be taken into account. Indeed, while Niebuhr supported Israel’s preemptive strike in 1967 and was exhilarated by its victory, he hoped that the U.S. would subsequently take an active role in pursing peace. After Niebuhr’s death in 1971, his protégé, the theologian Roy Eckhardt, defended Israel and the right of the Jewish people to exist as a sovereign nation, along with a few other mainline theologians such as Franklin Littell, who felt an especially strong commitment to Israel in the wake of the Holocaust.
The Mainline and Israel, 1949–1999
Following the Holocaust, th
e mainline churches came to accept the creation of Israel, primarily for humanitarian reasons. Nonetheless, the new State of Israel received overwhelmingly negative coverage within the Christian Century even before Israel’s victory in the Six Day War, which Henry Van Dusen castigated as “the most violent, ruthless aggression since Hitler’s blitzkrieg.”40 Following the Six Day War, the mainline increasingly adopted far more pro-Arab positions than mainstream Americans. In 1980 the main umbrella organization of mainline American churches, the National Council of Churches (NCC), endorsed the establishment of a PLO state alongside Israel, at a time when most Israelis and American Jews opposed the idea. At the same time the NCC called on the PLO to recognize “Israel as a sovereign state and its right to continue as a Jewish state,” though that section passed the 250-person body by a majority of only nine votes.41 A few years later, in the wake of the first intifada, there was an upsurge in official mainline criticism of Israel combined with calls to make U.S. aid to Israel contingent upon freezing settlement construction.42 The rise of the Oslo process dampened down these voices. It was only when the peace process collapsed in 2000 that mainline hostility exploded.
The Arab_Israeli Conflict Page 18
