Anyone who doubts a cause and effect relationship between Christian replacement theology and Christian anti-Judaism will find the writings of Melanie Phillips to be illuminating, challenging and distressing, especially for the Christian. As a British journalist, author, social commentator, and graduate in English from Oxford University, her regular column in the Daily Mail has forthrightly addressed many political and social issues. Other writings have also appeared in the Guardian, Observer, Sunday Times, and Spectator. She received the Orwell Prize for journalism in 1996. Her Jewish perspective is particularly relevant with regard to the topic at hand.
More recently Phillips has authored Londonistan through a New York publisher. Although she had previously published in the United Kingdom, like D. Selbourne's The Losing Battle with Islam (New York: Prometheus, 2005), the political climate of British publishing made it necessary to publish her work in the United States.1 The coining of the title Londonistan is described with chilling clarity.
The London bombings [of July 2005] revealed a terrible truth about Britain, something even more alarming and dangerous to America's long-term future than the fact that foreign terrorists had been able to carry out the 9/11 attacks on U.S. soil in 2001. They finally lifted the veil on Britain's dirty secret in the war on terrorism—that for more than a decade, London had been the epicenter of Islamic militancy in Europe. Under the noses of successive British governments, Britain's capital had been turned into “Londonistan”—a mocking play on the names of such state sponsors of terrorism as Afghanistan—and become the major European center for the promotion, recruitment and financing of Islamic terror and extremism. Indeed it could be argued that it was in London that al-Qaeda was first forged from disparate radical groups into a global terrorist phenomenon. During the 1980s and 1990s, despite repeated protests from other countries around the world, Londonistan flourished virtually without public comment at home—and, most remarkably of all, with no attempt at all to combat it by the governmental and intelligence agencies that were all too aware of what was happening. Incredibly, London has become the hub of European terror networks.2
The author goes on to document the cowering response of the United Kingdom to the modern invasion of Islamic culture. Through intimidation, such as with the complaint of giving religious offence to Muslims and the threat of being charged with Islamophobia, multicultural paralysis has resulted, especially within governmental and educational agencies. This has led to a related rise in open anti-Semitism, but especially within the Muslim community.
Walk down the Edgware Road, in the heart of London's Arab district, and you will find on open display in bookshop after bookshop copies of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion and Mein Kampf, books devoted to Holocaust denial and vilification of Israel, cartoons depicting George W. Bush wearing a skullcap with the Star of David on it, and countless other texts and images defaming both Israel and the Jewish people.3
Yet is not this merely the reflection of a small extremist minority? If this were so, then why is there such a wide distribution of this racist slander within Muslim communities? And why is there no outrage from an offended nation? Why is there mainly silence from the wider religious non-Muslim and Muslim communities? In the heart of England,
the murderous rage against Israel, expressed by one Muslim organization after another, is greeted with indifference. Despite the plethora of antisemitic materials on sale in bookshops, there are virtually no prosecutions because the prosecuting authorities believe these would not be “in the public interest”—in other words, they are afraid of a Muslim backlash.4
The reaction of the mainstream Christian community and even many evangelicals, but especially within the Church of England, has been one of increasingly vociferous anti-Judaism that at the same time has been cringing, almost servile, in its accommodation of Muslim influence. So Phillips included a chapter aptly titled, “On Their Knees before Terror.” It is especially concerned with the response of the Church of England that partly stems from the effects of social liberalism on Christianity.
The Church stopped trying to save people's souls and started trying instead to change society. It signed up to the prevailing doctrine of the progressive class that the world's troubles were caused by poverty, oppression and discrimination. Miracles were replaced by Marx. …Absorbing the prevailing utilitarianism which preached the creed of lifestyle choice, the Church came to believe that it too was in the business of delivering the greatest happiness to the greatest number. So it went with the flow of permissiveness, supporting the liberalizing of abortion, homosexuality and divorce.5
As a result, multiculturalism moved into the religious arena, resulting in the naive, welcome embrace of animated Islam by means of the ecumenical cliché of interfaith relations in company with ready Christian self-abasement. As a result,
It is, perhaps, no surprise therefore that the Church [of England] should have taken the side of the Palestinian Arabs in the Israel/Arab impasse. A letter to the prime minister about the Iraq war, from the archbishops of Canterbury and York backed by every diocesan, suffragan and assistant bishop in the Church of England, showed how deeply the Church's views about Iraq were dominated by the issue of Israel, which they approached solely from the perspective of Arab and Muslim opinion. There was no mention in this letter of the rights of Israel or the Jews as the principal victims of annihilatory aggression and prejudice.6
With this development of Muslim and Palestinian sympathies in mind, at the expense of former historic loyalties with Israel, Phillips recounted her surprising discovery of the essential reasons for the heightening of tensions between Jews and Christian in Britain. At that time (February 16, 2002), she wrote an article in the Spectator with the justifiably provocative title, “Christians who hate the Jews.” Here we are not dealing merely with a theological, or even an eschatological, nuance that readily admits the legitimacy of opposing opinions. There is, rather, an impending unethical maelstrom of growing proportions that threatens to transfer shame from the twentieth to the twenty-first century. Perhaps the most incredible feature of this movement, known for its replacement theology or supercessionism, which disgraces the Jewish people and thus generates Christian anti-Judaism, is the claim that its theology is based on the person of Jesus Christ, the quintessential Jew. However, let us now consider the circumstances whereby Phillips was quite shocked to be advised as to the essential roots of the escalating conflict between Christianity and Israel:
It was one of those sickening moments when an illusion is shattered and an ominous reality laid bare. I was among a group of Jews and Christians who met recently to discuss the churches’ increasing public hostility to Israel. The Jews were braced for a difficult encounter. After all, many British Jews (of whom I am one) are themselves appalled by the destruction of Palestinian villages, targeted assassinations and other apparent Israeli overreactions to the Middle East conflict. But this debate never took place. For the Christians said that the churches’ hostility had nothing to do with Israel's behavior towards the Palestinians. This was merely an excuse. The real reason for the growing antipathy, according to the Christians at that meeting, was the ancient hatred of Jews rooted deep in Christian theology and now on widespread display once again.
A doctrine going back to the early Church fathers, suppressed after the Holocaust, had been revived under the influence of the Middle East conflict. This doctrine is called replacement theology. In essence, it says that the Jews have been replaced by the Christians in God's favor, and so all God's promises to the Jews, including the land of Israel, have been inherited by Christianity. Some evangelicals, by contrast, are ‘Christian Zionists’ who passionately support the State of Israel as the fulfillment of God's Biblical promise to the Jews. But to the majority who have absorbed replacement theology, Zionism is racism and the Jewish state is illegitimate.7
So when she heard with frightening honesty such a revelation, this Jewish writer learned that the spirit of Augustine lives on. And well might a Christian seriously consider attempting to place himself in her shoes and contemplate the shuddering distress that such an awakening might bring about. Phillips then explained how she and her Jewish companions inquired whether they may possibly have misunderstood what they had been told:
The Jews at the meeting were incredulous and aghast. Surely the Christians were exaggerating. Surely the Churches’ dislike of Israel was rooted instead in the settlements, the occupied territories and Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. But the Christians were adamant. The hostility to Israel within the Church is rooted in a dislike of the Jews. Church newspaper editors say they are intimidated by the overwhelming hostility to Israel and to the Jews from influential Christian figures, which makes balanced coverage of the middle east impossible. Clerics and lay people alike are saying openly that Israel should never have been founded at all. One church source said what he was hearing was a “throwback” to the visceral anti-judaism of the middle ages.8
As further proof of this insidious development, Phillips related a conversation she had with Andrew White, canon of Coventry cathedral and the Archbishop of Canterbury's representative in the Middle East who is heavily engaged in trying to promote dialogue and peace between Israelis and Palestinians.
He says of attitudes in the church: “These go beyond legitimate criticism of Israel into hatred of the Jews. I get hate mail calling me a Jew-lover and saying my work is evil.” The reason, he says, is that Palestinian Christian revisionism has revived replacement theology. “This doctrine was key in fanning the flames of the Holocaust, which could not have happened without 2,000 years of anti-Jewish polemic”, he says. After the Holocaust the Vatican officially buried the doctrine, the current Pope affirming the integrity of the Jewish people and recognizing the State of Israel. But according to White, the doctrine is “still vibrant” within Roman Catholic and Anglican pews. “Almost all the churches hold to replacement theology”, he says. The catalyst for its re-emergence has been the attempt by Arab Christians to reinterpret Scripture in order to de-legitimize the Jews’ claim to the land of Israel. This has had a powerful effect upon the churches.9
As corroboration of what had been told to her by Christians, Phillips cited the writings of Naim Ateek and Stephen Sizer, variously mentioned in chapters 3–7. She provides even more detail in this regard in Londonistan, including the following assessment of Colin Chapman's Whose Promised Land?
His version of replacement theology is based on the premise that the existence of Israel has to be justified. It does not. To single out Israel's existence in this way is without precedent in the world and is itself evidence of prejudice. Moreover, replacement theology is not just a form of anti-Zionism; it directly attacks Jewish religion, history and identity. At the same time, Chapman's history grossly downplays the extent of Arab violence against the Jews in the decades of Jewish immigration to Palestine before the State of Israel was created. His conclusion that Zionism was an innate deception and that violence was always implicit is a baseless slur, as is the confusion of Jewish self-determination with racism.10
Overall, the implications here for Christians who take their Bible authoritatively and seriously are enormous. Here is plainly exposed regression into a shameful past that might well foreshadow similar tragic results in the future. Just suppose the surrounding Arab nations were eventually successful, with the subtle nod of approval from Europe and indirect assistance from Christian sympathizers, in their quest for pushing the Jewish population into the Mediterranean and the elimination of the State of Israel. What crocodile tears would then be expressed among the forums of the nations, including formal international declarations of disapproval? It would probably then be suggested that anyjewish remnant either be treated as dhimmis under domination within a new Muslim state, or that they be transported to a remote part of Africa. What joy would also be celebrated among the Arab conquerors! Would not there also be heightened hope for the acceleration of Muslim expansionism? But what of the Christian advocates of replacement theology, with all of its subtle variations? What would they say? While deploring another Holocaust, yet inwardly there would be feelings that their supercessionist eschatology had been vindicated. Surely once again God had spoken in judgment! And there would also be suggestions as to how another future State of Israel, certainly within the Middle East, might be avoided, and that with supposed biblical justification. What a bitter, anti-Judaic prospect this whole scenario presents.
But I am persuaded of something far better, and this I believe to be explicitly declared throughout the panorama of Scripture. At its root will be the constraint of love for the Jews, in all their distress, much of which is the fruit of their own disobedient ways. Nevertheless, we remain debtors to the Hebrew race because of the legacy of the Scriptures, Jesus the Son of God, and the Christian church. Consequently, like Paul, while regarding them as “enemies” because of their aversion to Jesus as the Christ, yet they remain “loved” for the sake of God's irrevocable promise made to them through Abraham (Rom 11:28). Until the end of this age when the Lord Jesus will return, we are to offer the Jews unrelenting love and support, including the use of every opportunity to commend to them Jesus as the Jewish Savior. We look forward to the glorious day when the Jews shall ultimately inherit because God promised, “I will pour out a spirit of grace and prayer on the house of David and the residents of Jerusalem, and they will look at Me whom they pierced” (Zech 12:10 ) and “On that day Yahweh will become king over all the earth—Yahweh alone, and His name alone” (Zech 14:9).
1. ”Terrified publishers won't print truth about Islam, says author [Selbourne],” London Daily Telegraph, 12/13/2005.
2. M. Phillips, Londonistan (New York: Encounter Books, 2006), x-xi.
7. M. Phillips, “Christians who hate the Jews,” Spectator (Feb 16 2002): 1. Cited July 2007. Online: http://www.spectator.co,uk.