Latest / UK Column Radio / Christian Zionism- Its origins, goals, and influence – with Stephen Sizer

Transcript

Christian Zionism- Its origins, goals, and influence – with Stephen Sizer · UK Column Radio

0:06
Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to UK column viewers and listeners. Thank
0:10
Speaker 1: you very much for joining me today. And I have
0:13
Speaker 1: a very special guest, gentlemen that I had the pleasure
0:17
Speaker 1: of talking to a few evenings ago that was a
0:20
Speaker 1: little off the record and get to know each other
0:23
Speaker 1: a little bit better discussion, and I'm delighted to say
0:28
Speaker 1: that's led to the fact that I can bring my
0:30
Speaker 1: guest on today. And my guest is Reverend Dr steven Siser,
0:36
Speaker 1: and we're going to be talking about the subject of
0:39
Speaker 1: Christian Zionism. And I'm going to say to the audience
0:43
Speaker 1: that I have particularly been looking forward to this discussion because,
0:48
Speaker 1: as somebody I consider myself to be a Christian, I
0:52
Speaker 1: have never claimed to know a huge amount about scripture.
0:56
Speaker 1: I know there are many people that are great, are
0:59
Speaker 1: much better read than I am. However, in recent months
1:05
Speaker 1: we've seen some really quite extraordinary reactions from our audience,
1:10
Speaker 1: particularly from people who will tell us that they're Christians.
1:15
Speaker 1: That the present upheaval in the Middle East has clearly
1:19
Speaker 1: caused a lot of people to be not only anxious,
1:23
Speaker 1: but in some ways quite quite motivated with events taking
1:28
Speaker 1: place in the Middle East. And I was stunned to
1:31
Speaker 1: be told on more than one occasion that I could
1:35
Speaker 1: not criticize Israel. I couldn't criticize any of the military operations.
1:42
Speaker 1: I couldn't criticize the death and destruction because Israel was
1:48
Speaker 1: taking that action, and as a Christian, I could not
1:51
Speaker 1: criticize Israel. Now, I'd never encountered this particular I've never
1:59
Speaker 1: encountered this particular response from Christians before. I was quite
2:05
Speaker 1: puzzled about it. I reflected on it a great deal,
2:09
Speaker 1: and I'm very pleased to say that today I'm going
2:12
Speaker 1: to get the opportunity to learn from Reverend Dr steven
2:18
Speaker 1: Siser and his research, and I am looking forward to
2:21
Speaker 1: learning a great deal from him. Now, I'm just going
2:24
Speaker 1: to say before I bring him on screen, that is
2:29
Speaker 1: he was formerly where he was formerly Vicar of Christ Church,
2:34
Speaker 1: Virginia Water in Surrey for twenty years until his retirement
2:39
Speaker 1: in twenty seventeen, and as we're going to hear in
2:42
Speaker 1: a minute, due to his research and work, he ultimately
2:46
Speaker 1: was censored by the church. More on that in due course.
2:50
Speaker 1: But on a positive note, I want to say that
2:52
Speaker 1: he's heavily involved, still heavily involved in lots of organizations.
2:58
Speaker 1: So he's founder and director of the Peacemaker Trust, Convivincia Alliance,
3:05
Speaker 1: his chair of that organization. He's chair of the Israel
3:10
Speaker 1: Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions, Bishop's chaplain to the Right
3:15
Speaker 1: Reverend Ria Abu l Assal, the retired Anglican bishop in Jerusalem,
3:22
Speaker 1: and there's a great deal more. So I'm going to say, Stephen,
3:26
Speaker 1: welcome to UK column.
3:28
Speaker 2: It's a delight to be with you, Brian, thank you
3:30
Speaker 2: for inviting me.
3:32
Speaker 1: Well, as I've already said, thank you for being here,
3:35
Speaker 1: I've really set the scene, Stephen, and I talked to
3:38
Speaker 1: you about this when we spoke privately on the phone,
3:42
Speaker 1: because I can say that I've found some of the
3:45
Speaker 1: pushback from our audience when we've tried to report some
3:49
Speaker 1: of what I regard as horrors in the Middle East.
3:52
Speaker 1: I've found the pushback from some members of the Christian
3:55
Speaker 1: audience to be quite extraordinary. I am happy to say
3:59
Speaker 1: that I've found some of them to be unbelievably cold
4:03
Speaker 1: and callous in their response. But what I learned very
4:06
Speaker 1: quickly was that they felt justified in behaving in this
4:12
Speaker 1: way due to their beliefs and all interpretations of Scripture,
4:19
Speaker 1: which led them to believe that effectively, it's Christians we
4:24
Speaker 1: couldn't criticize Israel. Now you've been studying Christian Zionism for
4:30
Speaker 1: a long time. I know you're very learned on this
4:32
Speaker 1: and you've produced a lot of papers. But I wonder
4:35
Speaker 1: whether you can give us a little overview about that subject,
4:40
Speaker 1: Christian Zionism, its origins, goals and influence. This is clearly
4:46
Speaker 1: a very important ideology, particularly as we see the Middle
4:50
Speaker 1: East events in twenty twenty four.
4:53
Speaker 2: I'll be pleased to I mean, Christian Zionism is Christian
4:58
Speaker 2: support for Zionism. Basically, Zionism is the historic conviction among
5:08
Speaker 2: some Jewish people that they would desire to be restored
5:13
Speaker 2: to the land that they'd lived in thousands of years ago, Palestine.
5:19
Speaker 2: So it gave rise to the Zionist movement in the
5:21
Speaker 2: eighteen eighties onwards among Jewish emigrats in Eastern Europe Russia
5:27
Speaker 2: who were suffering from the programs, and really developed in
5:34
Speaker 2: the twentieth century. But what most people don't realize is
5:37
Speaker 2: that Zionism as a political conviction was undergirded and preceded
5:48
Speaker 2: by a Christian movement. Although the word Zionism wasn't coined
5:53
Speaker 2: until the eighteen eighties. Prior to that, the terminology was
5:58
Speaker 2: restoration restorationism restoring the Jews to Palestine, and this was
6:05
Speaker 2: a Christian conviction that really began in the eighteen tens
6:10
Speaker 2: eighteen twenties, particularly in the light of the conflict that
6:15
Speaker 2: had gone on for one hundreds of years between Britain
6:17
Speaker 2: and France trying to control the Middle East within our
6:20
Speaker 2: two empires. And so Christian Zionism preceded Jewish Zionism by
6:28
Speaker 2: at least fifty years, facilitated Jewish Zionism because you have
6:33
Speaker 2: to remember that without the dominant Christian powers in Europe,
6:38
Speaker 2: Zionism as a political aspiration would have been about as
6:42
Speaker 2: successful as the as the Kurdish desire for independence and
6:48
Speaker 2: sovereignty over their land, or the Armenians. So it was
6:53
Speaker 2: preceded by Christian Zionism, was facilitated by Christian Zionists like Balfour, Lord,
6:59
Speaker 2: Shaftsbi and others in the nineteenth century early twentieth and
7:03
Speaker 2: today is dominated by Christians. So when you use the
7:07
Speaker 2: word Zionism today, it's synonymous with supremacism, with racism, with
7:14
Speaker 2: ethnic cleansing with genocide. It's a colonial a settler colonial project.
7:20
Speaker 2: But nine out of town Zionists in the world are Christians.
7:26
Speaker 2: You know, there are I don't know, six eight million
7:29
Speaker 2: Zionist Jews, but there are at least two hundred million
7:32
Speaker 2: self confessing Christian Zionists. So it's predominantly a Christian heresy.
7:37
Speaker 2: Any form of Christian nationalism is a heresy. And when
7:40
Speaker 2: you add to that settler colonialism and supremacism were youse
7:45
Speaker 2: superior to others, then it becomes a very toxic, almost
7:51
Speaker 2: cultic belief system.
7:54
Speaker 1: Thank you for that. If I come back here, this
7:57
Speaker 1: is in reading your books and maybe the this is
8:00
Speaker 1: a good place to introduce them to the audience because
8:04
Speaker 1: my knowledge for the interview today is going to be
8:07
Speaker 1: based on this. We'll bring up I'll hold the book
8:09
Speaker 1: up and then we'll bring it up on screen. So
8:12
Speaker 1: this is Christian Zionism. That's a pretty thick book that
8:17
Speaker 1: you've written. Our viewers can see that a little bit better.
8:21
Speaker 1: And the second one that I've been reading is Zion's
8:26
Speaker 1: Christian Soldiers, which is slimmer. And you kindly told me
8:31
Speaker 1: when we were speaking that this smaller version was designed
8:37
Speaker 1: to almost be a summary of your earlier work to
8:42
Speaker 1: make the subject easier for people. I'll let you comment.
8:46
Speaker 1: Just wanted to addswer that that when I was reading
8:50
Speaker 1: this big book, I'm not entirely finished, but I'm about
8:54
Speaker 1: ninety percent through. I was absolutely fascinated to read this
8:59
Speaker 1: history about the start of the Zionist movement buried within Christianity.
9:06
Speaker 1: You've mentioned Balfour, and of course there are many other
9:09
Speaker 1: big names that the average Christian in the West would
9:13
Speaker 1: associate with the Zionist movement, but without getting too deep
9:18
Speaker 1: into the history, I was fascinated to see when you
9:21
Speaker 1: were talking about an organization in London working with then
9:28
Speaker 1: famous lay preachers to help instill this belief system. Can
9:34
Speaker 1: you tell us a little bit more about that that
9:36
Speaker 1: slightly earlier history.
9:39
Speaker 2: Yes, I mean you find individual Christian leaders convince that
9:43
Speaker 2: the Scriptures mandated to the return of the Jews to
9:46
Speaker 2: Palestine and spoke about it in their commentaries and so on.
9:50
Speaker 2: But as a movement, it began in the eighteen eighteen
9:53
Speaker 2: oh nine approximately with what became known as the London
9:57
Speaker 2: jew Society, and it was a group of Christians convinced
10:01
Speaker 2: for humanitarian reasons that they cared for Jewish people who
10:04
Speaker 2: were suffering in the East End of London and other
10:07
Speaker 2: areas of Britain, but particularly in Europe from there were
10:11
Speaker 2: fleeing persecution, and therefore there was a desire to show
10:14
Speaker 2: Christian compassion to refugees emigrates. But alongside that was the
10:19
Speaker 2: conviction that the Jews remain God's chosen people, were destined
10:25
Speaker 2: to control much of the Middle East from Egypt to Iraq,
10:30
Speaker 2: and that it was the destiny of the Church to
10:32
Speaker 2: help facilitate that movement. Alongside that, it kind of coincided
10:40
Speaker 2: with Britain's desire to expand its empire, defeat the French,
10:46
Speaker 2: and control the trade routes to Africa and India which
10:50
Speaker 2: passed through Palestine. It's the bridge between Europe, Asia and Africa.
10:55
Speaker 2: So this conviction of what I would call it manifest destiny,
11:00
Speaker 2: Britain's manifest estiny was to help the Jews back to
11:04
Speaker 2: the land of Palestine so that they would assist Britain
11:08
Speaker 2: to further its colonial interests. It's exactly what the US
11:11
Speaker 2: is doing in the Middle East today. The US is
11:14
Speaker 2: in the Middle East because it wants Israel as a
11:16
Speaker 2: compliant partner to control the Arab states, secure the oil,
11:22
Speaker 2: and maintain US supremacy, particularly in that part of the world.
11:27
Speaker 2: So it was a coalition, if you like, or a
11:30
Speaker 2: confluence of two rivers, one political, one religious, naive and misguided,
11:37
Speaker 2: which led to numerous organizations that were dedicated to helping
11:42
Speaker 2: the Jews back to the land of Palestine.
11:45
Speaker 1: If I remember, by reading correctly from your book, that
11:49
Speaker 1: these earlier individuals and organizations, it seems to me that
11:55
Speaker 1: they operated more or less autonomously in the big ben
12:00
Speaker 1: They then began to link up with other light minded groups.
12:03
Speaker 1: But it was only later that particular individuals in this
12:09
Speaker 1: Christian movement, and we are particularly talking within the UK,
12:14
Speaker 1: and then late later you stress that the big expansion
12:18
Speaker 1: in America. But these individuals were largely acting autonomously or
12:24
Speaker 1: within small light minded groups. But then one of two
12:28
Speaker 1: people seemed to be able to leap the divide and
12:32
Speaker 1: get political interest. And then when that political interest inside
12:38
Speaker 1: the UK began to grow, this is where the movement
12:46
Speaker 1: as a whole really began to gain strength and power.
12:51
Speaker 2: That's correct. What I neglected to emphasize was that at
12:55
Speaker 2: the beginning of the nineteenth century, you see rise of
13:01
Speaker 2: millennialism a particular I call it PMT pre millennial tension,
13:07
Speaker 2: the idea that Christ is returning, the end of the
13:10
Speaker 2: world is coming. You know, you had the Revolutionary War
13:15
Speaker 2: in America. You know, Britain was seen as the Antichrist.
13:19
Speaker 2: Then you had the French and the British. Napoleon for example,
13:23
Speaker 2: Napoleon Bonaparte was the first world ruler in two thousand
13:26
Speaker 2: years to promise the Jews a homeland because he needed
13:29
Speaker 2: the Jewish bankers to back his war against the British.
13:33
Speaker 2: Britain needed the same bankers to back them against the French.
13:37
Speaker 2: So there's a lot of speculation about the return of
13:41
Speaker 2: Christ the end of the world. The early nineteenth century.
13:44
Speaker 2: It gave rise to the Mormons that you have were
13:47
Speaker 2: witnesses the Seventh Day Adventures and many of the millennial cults.
13:51
Speaker 2: And this is why it became so popular. You know,
13:54
Speaker 2: people were reading their newspaper in the one hand about
13:57
Speaker 2: war in this part of the world, and they were
13:58
Speaker 2: reading their Bible the way they were guided to read
14:01
Speaker 2: it and putting the two together, thinking that they were
14:05
Speaker 2: the final generation. That's how it became popularized. The individuals
14:11
Speaker 2: that stand out for me were John Nelson Darby, who
14:14
Speaker 2: founded the Brethren. He developed a way of reading the Bible.
14:18
Speaker 2: You know, you have the Old Testament and New Testament,
14:20
Speaker 2: you have the Hebrew scriptures and Christian and the coming
14:25
Speaker 2: of Crisis in the middle of the two. Well, he
14:28
Speaker 2: kind of did the same thing on every page of
14:30
Speaker 2: the Bible. Either this passage was about the Jews. This
14:33
Speaker 2: passage was about the Church and anything in the scriptures
14:38
Speaker 2: that had not been fulfilled literally like the rebuilding of
14:42
Speaker 2: Ezekiel's temple or Jerusalem under Jewish sovereignty. If things had
14:47
Speaker 2: not taken place. Literally, he put them into the future.
14:51
Speaker 2: So you stacked up all of these prophecies that had
14:55
Speaker 2: to come true before Christ returned. And again this helped
14:58
Speaker 2: fuel expectation among naive, ignorant, illiterate Christians. D. L. Murdy
15:07
Speaker 2: was one of the popular evangelists in the States convinced
15:10
Speaker 2: of this theology, and then Cyrus Schofield, people may not
15:16
Speaker 2: have heard of, put these ideas alongside the text of
15:21
Speaker 2: scripture and it became known as the Schofield Reference Bible,
15:26
Speaker 2: and it became the most popular study Bible in the
15:31
Speaker 2: world by the nineteen fifties. Nineteen sixties, and what it
15:35
Speaker 2: really did was it made the notes equal to the scriptures.
15:41
Speaker 2: You know, to save time reading the Bible, all you
15:43
Speaker 2: got to do is read a few notes to understand,
15:46
Speaker 2: as they saw it, how to read the Bible. This
15:49
Speaker 2: is how it became popular. And in the twentieth century
15:53
Speaker 2: the movement was dominated by what we would call radio
15:56
Speaker 2: evangelists or television evangelists. People sitting at home, you know,
16:01
Speaker 2: in their rural settings in the States, listening to the
16:03
Speaker 2: television or listening to the radio to get their religious
16:08
Speaker 2: religious beliefs, if you like many of the most influential
16:15
Speaker 2: Christian leaders in America today, Benny Hinn, Rodney Howld Brown,
16:20
Speaker 2: John Hagy. You know, these individuals have an audience of
16:26
Speaker 2: millions of people on a weekly basis through radio, through television,
16:32
Speaker 2: and they are pushing this line that Israel is central
16:35
Speaker 2: to God's purposes in our generation. The sad thing is
16:40
Speaker 2: it has so little biblical basis at all. You mentioned
16:44
Speaker 2: my two books that the first one, Christian Zionism road
16:48
Speaker 2: Map to Arm Again, was really an attempt to understand
16:51
Speaker 2: the movement as a whole. So we looked at the
16:54
Speaker 2: history of the movement it's theology and its political agenda.
16:58
Speaker 2: Because it's political agenda is where it gets scary, seriously scary.
17:05
Speaker 2: So that was my thesis, my PhD thesis. The second book,
17:09
Speaker 2: Zion's Christian Soldiers, is it's not really a summary of
17:13
Speaker 2: the earlier books. It's a read, an attempt to read
17:16
Speaker 2: the Bible again and deconstruct Christian Zionism. It's like a
17:21
Speaker 2: I call it like a hot air balloon. How many
17:23
Speaker 2: pins do you need to burst a balloon? Well, I'll
17:25
Speaker 2: give you seven. Anyone will do.
17:27
Speaker 1: So.
17:27
Speaker 2: The book has got seven chapters and each of them
17:30
Speaker 2: is like a pin that bursts the balloon of hot air,
17:33
Speaker 2: which is all that Christian Zionism is. So it's an
17:36
Speaker 2: attempt to inoculate Christians from this celtic heretical theology.
17:43
Speaker 1: I want to move deeper into this question of about
17:48
Speaker 1: how people interpret the Bible, but before we do that,
17:51
Speaker 1: I think this would be a good place to be
17:53
Speaker 1: saying to our audience that as a result of your work,
17:58
Speaker 1: deep research is still research, huge amount of biblical research.
18:07
Speaker 1: This has cost you a lot, This has cost you
18:09
Speaker 1: your career within the church. And just before I was
18:15
Speaker 1: settling down for the interview. I was just looking at
18:18
Speaker 1: a couple of headlines that were in the press back
18:21
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty three, and of course the BBC was
18:25
Speaker 1: in there with a big headline. It said a Church
18:27
Speaker 1: of England priest who shared quote virulently apologies that anti
18:35
Speaker 1: Semitic unquote material has been barred from ministry for twelve years.
18:40
Speaker 1: And a pretty brutal article about you. No bones about it,
18:48
Speaker 1: you're an anti Semite, You've been barred from working in
18:53
Speaker 1: the church for twelve years, I think it was, and yeah,
18:58
Speaker 1: you're a thoroughly nasty. There were other reports as well.
19:04
Speaker 1: Obviously the main newspaper has picked it up. I think
19:07
Speaker 1: The Times All the Telegraphers was another one. But just
19:12
Speaker 1: tell the audience how this attack came about and how
19:18
Speaker 1: you've you've been forced to try and defend yourself. You've
19:21
Speaker 1: done proper PhD research into this subject, but that's cost
19:27
Speaker 1: you your career and caused you to be censored by
19:30
Speaker 1: the church. How did that happen?
19:32
Speaker 2: Well? I liken it to football, and you know, if
19:36
Speaker 2: you're watching a football match, if a player cannot win
19:40
Speaker 2: the ball and the opponent is about to score a goal,
19:44
Speaker 2: what do they do they try and bring the opponent down,
19:48
Speaker 2: they foul the opponent, they go for the legs rather
19:50
Speaker 2: than the ball. And so I'm not the only one.
19:56
Speaker 2: Many others have addressed the whole subject. Designer critique it
20:00
Speaker 2: theologically try to challenge Christians to recognize as a heresy.
20:06
Speaker 2: And the standard operating procedure, if you like of Zionists
20:11
Speaker 2: is to allege antisemitism. You must hate Jews, you must
20:17
Speaker 2: you must be prejudiced toward Jews if you criticize Israel. Again,
20:20
Speaker 2: this is a misnomer. It's untrue. You know, criticizing a
20:25
Speaker 2: state for racism isn't anti semitic, It isn't racist in itself.
20:31
Speaker 2: I bore all forms of racism, anti Semitism, is Lamophobia.
20:36
Speaker 2: You know, it's sinful, it's evil, and we must repudiate
20:41
Speaker 2: any theology, any political system that denigrates one people group
20:46
Speaker 2: because of their color, their religion, their race, whatever. But
20:51
Speaker 2: it began for me about twenty years ago a group
20:53
Speaker 2: of Zionists Christians who did not like the way I
20:56
Speaker 2: was challenging their theology and to write anonymous articles about me.
21:04
Speaker 2: And then they set up a website Seismic Shock, play
21:08
Speaker 2: on my name and they were writing stuff virtually every
21:11
Speaker 2: day criticizing me for visits I was making to the
21:14
Speaker 2: Middle East in Christian ministry terms, reaching out to Muslims,
21:18
Speaker 2: reaching out to groups in Palestine calling for basic human
21:24
Speaker 2: rights for Palestinians, for example. And then they began to
21:30
Speaker 2: try and isolate me from organizations I was working with,
21:38
Speaker 2: and that led to a first complaint against me in
21:41
Speaker 2: the Church of England about twelve years ago. That was
21:44
Speaker 2: dismissed my bar bishop. He said, just sit down with
21:47
Speaker 2: these people and find a way forward conciliation, which is
21:51
Speaker 2: what we did. We agreed a form of words and
21:55
Speaker 2: I promised to get my website and documents fact checked.
22:00
Speaker 2: And they agree that they've come to me if they
22:02
Speaker 2: had a problem, rather than going to the press, which
22:04
Speaker 2: is the way their standard operating procedure is to do that.
22:09
Speaker 2: And then they made a second complaint against me about
22:12
Speaker 2: five years ago, which is the one you're referring to,
22:16
Speaker 2: alleging antisemitism. They gave twelve examples where they thought I
22:22
Speaker 2: had was demonstrating antisemitic behavior people I'd met with. All
22:28
Speaker 2: of the sources were secondhand, some of them were anonymous,
22:33
Speaker 2: which would be inadmissible in a court of law, but
22:36
Speaker 2: in an ecclesiastical court you can get away with anything.
22:40
Speaker 2: The final conclusion was, and this was a statement from
22:44
Speaker 2: my barrister, Christian Barrister, is that the central message arising
22:48
Speaker 2: from the tribunal is that the well documented accusations of
22:52
Speaker 2: repeated antisemitic behavior made over more than a decade have
22:57
Speaker 2: been dismissed. That was actually correct. Only one allegation of
23:03
Speaker 2: anti Sabinism has been found to have substance and that
23:07
Speaker 2: was dealt with quickly and effectively nine years earlier at
23:12
Speaker 2: the time by the Bishop of Guildford, which the Board
23:16
Speaker 2: of Deputies accepted at the time. So again this was
23:19
Speaker 2: double jeopardy and that one incident. What it was was
23:23
Speaker 2: I posted an article on Facebook for three days about
23:28
Speaker 2: nine to eleven and it was called Israel did it
23:31
Speaker 2: nine eleven and I'd only put it up there to
23:34
Speaker 2: promote discussion. I didn't agree with the article. I don't
23:37
Speaker 2: believe Israel was behind nine to eleven, but that was
23:39
Speaker 2: deemed anti semitic, you know. Fifteen I apologized for having
23:45
Speaker 2: posted it on my website, on my Facebook for three days,
23:48
Speaker 2: took it down straight away and it was done and
23:51
Speaker 2: dusted but it was regurgitated if you like, in this
23:55
Speaker 2: in this more recent complaint. But most what's important of all,
24:01
Speaker 2: and this is really where no one has been able
24:03
Speaker 2: to challenge me on my barristers said it is significant
24:08
Speaker 2: and not one word or statement from doctor Siza has
24:12
Speaker 2: been shown to be anti Semitic. There are none. And
24:16
Speaker 2: then the expert witness on anti sumitis are not my
24:19
Speaker 2: tribunal professor Anthony Lherman, who's a world leading expert on
24:24
Speaker 2: anti Submitism. He was disgusted at the outcome of the tribunal.
24:30
Speaker 2: He said this, and he is Jewish. This disgraceful miscarage
24:34
Speaker 2: of justice against someone who has never uttered a word
24:37
Speaker 2: of hate against the Jews will be a permanent stain
24:41
Speaker 2: on the Church of England and the Board of Deputies.
24:45
Speaker 2: So basically I was given a twelve year suspension, although
24:50
Speaker 2: I'm already retired, so it's a suspension from being able
24:53
Speaker 2: to take services in an Anglican church on the basis
24:58
Speaker 2: of three things they found me guilty of. One was
25:01
Speaker 2: this article which i'd posted for three days nine years
25:05
Speaker 2: earlier and had been dealt with. Another was I'd met
25:10
Speaker 2: with a leader, an Islamic leader who was linked to
25:15
Speaker 2: his Bala in southern Lebanon, and at that occasion I'd
25:19
Speaker 2: pleaded with him to release the Israeli captives. And the
25:23
Speaker 2: third was an interview I had in Australia. Had gone
25:27
Speaker 2: out in the UK around midnight and no one was
25:29
Speaker 2: listening to it, and they said I was not sufficiently
25:34
Speaker 2: contrite over things I'd said on previous occasions. So it
25:38
Speaker 2: was incredibly subjective. They were clutching at straws. But it's
25:44
Speaker 2: having got my head. Any other clergyman is going to
25:47
Speaker 2: think twice. David Miller, you may know, is an academic
25:50
Speaker 2: from Bristol University. He was censured and lost his job.
25:55
Speaker 2: They've got one academic. They've done the same with other
25:59
Speaker 2: political lead is Jeremy Corbyn for example. You know, you
26:03
Speaker 2: take you get the head of a political leader, an academic,
26:07
Speaker 2: a clergyman, and everyone else stays quiet. So in a
26:10
Speaker 2: sense it's a form of how can I put it
26:16
Speaker 2: censorship exactly? It's censorship. But irony is that when you
26:21
Speaker 2: feel free, sorry, when you know they took away the
26:24
Speaker 2: one thing I didn't need. You know, I don't particularly
26:27
Speaker 2: want to do services at eight o'clock in the morning
26:29
Speaker 2: in country parishes on a cold, cold winter's morning. You know,
26:34
Speaker 2: there's nothing they could take away from me that I
26:36
Speaker 2: care about, and it's actually free to me to be
26:40
Speaker 2: more active in campaigning for human rights for Jews as
26:44
Speaker 2: well as Muslims as well as Christians, particularly in the
26:47
Speaker 2: Middle East.
26:48
Speaker 1: Yes, I've used the word censorship, but I think that's
26:52
Speaker 1: exactly what it is. We're seeing more and more censorship
26:55
Speaker 1: coming in academia, and in fact, over recent weeks, one
26:59
Speaker 1: of our valued correspondence, Diane Rasmus and mcaddy, has come
27:06
Speaker 1: under this form of attack herself because she's dared to
27:11
Speaker 1: speak out on a range of subjects on the UK column.
27:15
Speaker 1: But the university is now absolutely going for her with
27:19
Speaker 1: charges which could result in her losing her job. So
27:23
Speaker 1: we're seeing this happen across the board. But in this
27:27
Speaker 1: case you were faced with it, particularly because of your
27:32
Speaker 1: work and your efforts in relation to Christianity and Israel.
27:39
Speaker 1: If we come back to the Bible, and I'll again
27:44
Speaker 1: qualify it by saying that when I started to get
27:47
Speaker 1: interested in the Bible myself, I can remember a friend
27:52
Speaker 1: saying to me, but the thing is, Brian, you need
27:54
Speaker 1: to understand which Bible you are reading. And it had
27:57
Speaker 1: never occurred to me before that comment that I had
28:00
Speaker 1: to be careful about what biblical version I was reading.
28:06
Speaker 1: And for a lot of reasons, I suppose I've stayed
28:10
Speaker 1: focused on the King James. But I'm aware and that
28:16
Speaker 1: there are errors in the King James Bible. These are acknowledged.
28:21
Speaker 1: It's a shame we haven't got Alex Thomson, another friends
28:25
Speaker 1: and correspondents here, because he does a lot of work
28:29
Speaker 1: in relation to Biblical translations. But we have to accept
28:33
Speaker 1: that whatever Bible we have is going to have some
28:37
Speaker 1: actual mistakes in translation. We'll call those foundational mistakes. But
28:42
Speaker 1: we then also get into the arena that we have
28:44
Speaker 1: different versions of the Bible, as you've described with Schofield,
28:49
Speaker 1: where a whole spin is woven into the Biblical text
28:54
Speaker 1: itself by taking historic text as in James, and making
29:01
Speaker 1: it in a more readable modern form. The choice of
29:04
Speaker 1: words and phrases can drastically alter the meaning that was
29:09
Speaker 1: originally attended in the scriptures. So I had to learn
29:12
Speaker 1: all this myself. I'm sure many people will be saying
29:16
Speaker 1: that shows your ignorance, Brian, but I'm happy to take
29:19
Speaker 1: that comment. But at least I did pick up on it.
29:23
Speaker 1: But what I have been shocked at is the attacks
29:27
Speaker 1: coming in from the Christian community to the UK column
29:31
Speaker 1: for daring to say, well, we think that Israel is
29:34
Speaker 1: wrong in prosecuting the war in the Middle East in
29:38
Speaker 1: the way it is is. People are absolutely locked into
29:43
Speaker 1: the belief system created by their interpretation of the scriptures,
29:50
Speaker 1: and it's black and white. They won't shift, they won't.
29:56
Speaker 1: I even said, in response to one particularly unpleasant email,
30:00
Speaker 1: are you saying to me that if Jesus Christ was
30:03
Speaker 1: stood with you watching the slaughter and carnage unfold in Gaza,
30:09
Speaker 1: he would be saying it's okay because the Israelis are
30:12
Speaker 1: doing it. And of course I didn't get a response
30:16
Speaker 1: to that email, but I've had to really be quite
30:20
Speaker 1: strong in responding to some people because their comments have
30:23
Speaker 1: been horrible. So my question to you is, what's your
30:27
Speaker 1: explanation for the reason that people seem to become so
30:32
Speaker 1: deeply locked into scripture. They seem to forget the key
30:37
Speaker 1: messages of love your God, love one another, and love
30:42
Speaker 1: your enemies. This seems to be a pretty simple, ununderstandable
30:46
Speaker 1: message in the Bible, but a lot of Christians. The
30:50
Speaker 1: deeper they get into their interpretation, the more happy they seem.
30:55
Speaker 2: We can explain it in a number of ways without
30:58
Speaker 2: denigrating individuals belief system necessarily. Bertram Russell once said most
31:03
Speaker 2: people would rather die than think, and most people do.
31:07
Speaker 2: And if we apply that, my observation as a pastor
31:12
Speaker 2: over thirty five years or years is that it is
31:17
Speaker 2: easier to take our belief systems prepackaged than to think
31:27
Speaker 2: it through for ourselves. It's like you go shopping and
31:31
Speaker 2: increasingly you can buy meals prepared for you, so all
31:36
Speaker 2: you want to do is buy your shepherd's pie and
31:40
Speaker 2: stick it straight in the oven and eat it, rather
31:43
Speaker 2: than buy the raw materials, prepare it, cook it, and
31:47
Speaker 2: it's normally much healthier than the packaged meals. So in
31:52
Speaker 2: many ways, people's theology their belief system is packaged for them,
31:57
Speaker 2: either because they've read a book or because they believe
32:01
Speaker 2: what the pastor says. And what one of the most
32:03
Speaker 2: dangerous things we can do as Christians is believe what
32:05
Speaker 2: we're told, rather than reading the Bible for ourselves and
32:10
Speaker 2: allowing God's Spirit to help us to understand it. So
32:14
Speaker 2: books like commentaries and even my books are there to
32:17
Speaker 2: help understanding, not replace it. And so the people you've
32:23
Speaker 2: described to who've been hostile towards UK column, I interpret
32:28
Speaker 2: that as a kind of a brittleness. And you know,
32:31
Speaker 2: when something is brittle, it may be it may be
32:34
Speaker 2: made of iron, it may be very hard, but it's brittle.
32:37
Speaker 2: And if it's brittle, it's weak. Many people's theology is
32:42
Speaker 2: very brittle, and they get defensive when you challenge it
32:46
Speaker 2: because they haven't thought it through for themselves. You're taking
32:51
Speaker 2: their baby away from them. You know, it's you know,
32:53
Speaker 2: it's the umbilical cord. You know, they get threatened. So
32:57
Speaker 2: it's a sign of immaturity. It's a sign of brittleness.
33:02
Speaker 2: If people cannot engage, it's ironic. You know, you would
33:06
Speaker 2: think that Zionists would be queuing up to debate me.
33:09
Speaker 2: They don't. They don't want to debate me. You have
33:12
Speaker 2: to ask, why can.
33:13
Speaker 1: I qualify that when you say Zionists, do you mean
33:17
Speaker 1: Christian Zionists?
33:19
Speaker 2: Yes, because the majority of Zionis are Christians. They overwhelm
33:23
Speaker 2: the majority. Nine out of ten Zionis in the world
33:25
Speaker 2: are Christians, not Jews. You know, ironically, most of the
33:30
Speaker 2: people have defended me at my tribunal were Jews, Jews
33:35
Speaker 2: who are anti Zionists, who realize that that Christianity in
33:40
Speaker 2: its settler colonial form in the Middle East is not
33:42
Speaker 2: a friend of the Jewish people. But to go back
33:45
Speaker 2: to the theology people Christians, many many Christians don't read
33:50
Speaker 2: the Bible for themselves. They'll read a simple book that will,
33:54
Speaker 2: you know, that will will suggest that the end of
33:56
Speaker 2: the world is coming, Jesus are coming back, and these
33:59
Speaker 2: things things have got to take place before he comes back.
34:02
Speaker 2: So my question is, was the coming of Jesus the
34:06
Speaker 2: fulfillment of the Old Testament promises God made to the Jews,
34:12
Speaker 2: or the postponement fulfillment or postponement? And for many Christian Zionists,
34:17
Speaker 2: the coming of Jesus as Plan B because Israeli's Plan
34:22
Speaker 2: A israelis central of the God's purposes. The fundamental mistake
34:27
Speaker 2: they make is to draw a line from Genesis to
34:30
Speaker 2: today and say israelis Israel, is israelis Israel, Jews, Jews, Jews, Jews,
34:36
Speaker 2: when it's a total nonsense that the Hebrew scriptures themselves
34:42
Speaker 2: talk about the Jewish people not as an ethnic group
34:47
Speaker 2: descended from Abraham but as the people of God made
34:52
Speaker 2: up of many nationalities, we've got to deconstruct the way
34:57
Speaker 2: we use words. So Israel again, Zionists like to think
35:02
Speaker 2: Israel is Israel is Israel, Abraham Isaac Jacob, Joseph, twelve
35:06
Speaker 2: Tribes of Israel. Israel today is the descendants of the
35:09
Speaker 2: twelve Tribes of Israel. Therefore they inherit the promises God
35:12
Speaker 2: made to Abraham. It's not what the Bible says, you know.
35:18
Speaker 2: The Bible insists that the promises God made to Abraham
35:23
Speaker 2: are fulfilled through Jesus, not through Israel. The Bible emphasizes
35:28
Speaker 2: that the people of God in the Old Testament was
35:31
Speaker 2: inclusive of all nations, just as the Church today is
35:37
Speaker 2: inclusive all nations. You know, occasionally you walk into a
35:40
Speaker 2: church today and they're all white, they're all middle class.
35:43
Speaker 2: You know, they're all retired, and you have to think
35:46
Speaker 2: they do not reflect the community within which that church exists.
35:50
Speaker 2: They are not the church. They're a small part of
35:53
Speaker 2: the church. So I'll just give you a couple of examples.
35:56
Speaker 2: This is what I mean by bursting the balloon. Let
36:00
Speaker 2: me just give you one example. Zionists insist that the
36:04
Speaker 2: promises God made to Abraham apply to Israel exclusively today.
36:10
Speaker 2: It's not what the Bible says. I'll give you one example,
36:13
Speaker 2: just one verse is enough to burst a balloon in
36:17
Speaker 2: the New Testament. In Paul's letters to the Galatians, all
36:21
Speaker 2: was a rabbi, he was a Jew. He wrote this.
36:25
Speaker 2: The promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed.
36:28
Speaker 2: Scripture does not say and to seeds meaning many people,
36:33
Speaker 2: but to your seed, meaning one person who is Christ.
36:38
Speaker 2: If you belong to Christ, then you are abraham seed
36:42
Speaker 2: and heirs according to the promise, meaning people who believe
36:46
Speaker 2: in Jesus inherit the promises God made to Abraham. Not
36:51
Speaker 2: a secular state of people in Israel today. Another helpful
36:59
Speaker 2: way to understand and this Brian, is if I old
37:05
Speaker 2: to have two cups here. If this is sprite, you
37:11
Speaker 2: know clear sprite, sprite as a drink, it's a clear liquid.
37:17
Speaker 2: And this is coke. This is coke. The Zionists like
37:23
Speaker 2: to claim that they have exclusive claims on the promises
37:27
Speaker 2: of the Bible about identity, about land. But what happens
37:32
Speaker 2: if you sorry, this is brown, this is clear. What
37:38
Speaker 2: happens if you add coke to sprite? It changes the color.
37:46
Speaker 2: You can't go back to sprite once you've added coke.
37:50
Speaker 2: So in the same way, ethnic purity is not something
37:57
Speaker 2: that the scriptures teach. Let me give you one example
38:01
Speaker 2: of that. One verse again Esther eight, verse seventeen. In
38:06
Speaker 2: every province and in every city to which the edict
38:09
Speaker 2: of the King came, there was joined Land or some
38:12
Speaker 2: other Jews beasting and celebrating. That's the beast of Purim
38:16
Speaker 2: when they celebrate their deliverance from their enemies in the
38:19
Speaker 2: time of Esther. But then verse seventeen says and many
38:23
Speaker 2: people of other nationalities became Jews. Now what does that mean.
38:29
Speaker 2: It means that many other nationalities, other ethnic groups, other colors,
38:36
Speaker 2: other races became Jews, i e. A mixing of the
38:44
Speaker 2: ethnic communities, just as you and I, if we did
38:46
Speaker 2: our DNA, we would find that we're five percent Spanish,
38:50
Speaker 2: ten percent Italian, three percent Viking, whatever, everyone is of
38:55
Speaker 2: mixed race. So the idea that the Jews today are
39:00
Speaker 2: the inheritance of the promises God made to Israel in
39:03
Speaker 2: the Old Testament is nonsense, because the Jews of the
39:07
Speaker 2: time of Esther, certainly the time of Christ and today
39:11
Speaker 2: were made up of many nationalities. So it's an acceptance
39:16
Speaker 2: within the people of God is on the basis of faith,
39:20
Speaker 2: not race. Faith not race. Do you get the difference.
39:26
Speaker 2: Zionists think it's on racial grounds. The scriptures teach it's
39:31
Speaker 2: on the basis of faith trust in the One True God,
39:34
Speaker 2: and all who trust in Him are welcomed into the
39:37
Speaker 2: People of God.
39:39
Speaker 1: I think excellent explanation. I enjoyed that very much as
39:45
Speaker 1: you were talking through that. In my head is all
39:51
Speaker 1: of the various views on what we're dealing with when
39:56
Speaker 1: we talk about the Middle East and the problems around.
39:59
Speaker 1: We've got Israel, which can be regarded as the nation state,
40:09
Speaker 1: it can be regarded as the wider name for the
40:13
Speaker 1: Jewish community. Then we have Zionists, we have Zionism itself.
40:23
Speaker 1: You correct me if I've got this wrong where we
40:26
Speaker 1: are talking about I think under I have thought until
40:30
Speaker 1: now that Zionism we are more talking about God's Kingdom
40:37
Speaker 1: in relation to the people that that involves. We've got
40:43
Speaker 1: political Zionism or Zionist Israel, which is a political concept.
40:48
Speaker 1: It's not a it's not even a biblical concept. It's
40:52
Speaker 1: something completely different. And yet we have Christians today that
40:57
Speaker 1: don't even think about trying to pull these various descriptors apart.
41:04
Speaker 1: They just fixate on the fact that Israel is Zionism,
41:09
Speaker 1: is the political state and we must support that political
41:13
Speaker 1: state otherwise we are as somebody said, Brian, if you
41:18
Speaker 1: criticize Israel, you'll go to help.
41:22
Speaker 2: It's total nonsense. You know, criticizing a state is not
41:29
Speaker 2: synonymous with racism. You know, you rightly through you know
41:34
Speaker 2: identify these three three concepts. They are very different. Not
41:42
Speaker 2: all Jews as Zionists, and only half of all Jews
41:46
Speaker 2: in the world identify with Israel or live in Israel.
41:52
Speaker 2: Most Zionists in the world are Christians, not Jews, and
41:57
Speaker 2: Israel is a secular state made up of Muslims, Christians
42:03
Speaker 2: and Jews, so they are not synonymous, and that's the problem.
42:08
Speaker 2: Zionism conflates the three and people like the Board of
42:13
Speaker 2: Deputies here in Britain like to conflate them, and the
42:18
Speaker 2: Israeli leadership emphasizes that all Jews around the world are Israelis,
42:26
Speaker 2: that Israel is a Jewish state, so they want to
42:30
Speaker 2: they want to conflate these because it's then very convenient
42:34
Speaker 2: that criticism of Israel is deemed as anti Semitism criticism
42:38
Speaker 2: of Jews. So you know, we should respect Judaism as
42:43
Speaker 2: a religion, we should protect Jewish people from racism. But
42:48
Speaker 2: we can oppose Israel as a settler colonial system that's
42:54
Speaker 2: practicing apartheid, and we can call for Boycott's investments and
42:58
Speaker 2: sanctions as a way of bringing it to its senses.
43:03
Speaker 2: You know, at the end of the day, Israel's got
43:04
Speaker 2: to decide it's going to share the land or is
43:08
Speaker 2: it going to share citizenship. Two states means sharing the land,
43:13
Speaker 2: the one state means sharing citizenship. But it won't do either.
43:17
Speaker 2: It won't give up the occupied territories, it won't give
43:22
Speaker 2: equal rights to Palestinians, and therefore it is an apartheid
43:25
Speaker 2: state and that's why we must oppose it implacably.
43:28
Speaker 1: With that of the BacT in our minds. I want
43:32
Speaker 1: to say that as part of my journey to understand
43:35
Speaker 1: more about what was actually happening around Israel and trouble
43:39
Speaker 1: in the Middle East, I have made over recent months
43:44
Speaker 1: quite a big effort to try and have some dialogue
43:47
Speaker 1: with Jewish people, and probably one of the first things
43:52
Speaker 1: that I did together with Mike Robinson, who who I
43:55
Speaker 1: worked with obviously very closely with the UK columnies. We
43:58
Speaker 1: took ourselves up to Lund for the first very big
44:03
Speaker 1: Palestine pro Palestine demonstration, and we decided that the best
44:08
Speaker 1: way to deal with reporting was to split up and
44:14
Speaker 1: to take ourselves in through a crowd of thousands and
44:18
Speaker 1: thousands of people with a very different look to them.
44:23
Speaker 1: Because there were young people in small groups, there were
44:27
Speaker 1: family groups, there were groups of older people. There were
44:34
Speaker 1: also groups of young men, and I say that because
44:37
Speaker 1: some of them looked, I'm going to say, pretty tough.
44:41
Speaker 1: We decided we'd split up and we'd walk in through
44:45
Speaker 1: that big crowd, and we'd talked to people, and I
44:48
Speaker 1: took some recorded interviews, and I have to say that
44:51
Speaker 1: everybody I met but they were a little bit fascinated
44:55
Speaker 1: as to who I was. But they responded to me
44:58
Speaker 1: very well, and I got some very nice little audio
45:02
Speaker 1: clips about why they were there and what their concerns were.
45:05
Speaker 1: But where I'm coming to is that when we got
45:07
Speaker 1: into the middle of that pro Palestine crowd, I was
45:12
Speaker 1: very surprised to see a little group of people together
45:17
Speaker 1: under a big banner which said Jews for Peace, and
45:22
Speaker 1: I was intrigued I went up to them and asked
45:25
Speaker 1: them a little bit about who they were, and one
45:29
Speaker 1: man was kind enough to say that he would give
45:31
Speaker 1: me a little interview. But of course one of the
45:33
Speaker 1: things I said is here you are, as Jews in
45:36
Speaker 1: the middle of this huge crowd. How are you finding people?
45:40
Speaker 1: Are you not frightened? And the instant reply was that
45:45
Speaker 1: people around us have been utterly lovely. And it was
45:49
Speaker 1: my You know again, people can criticize and say, well,
45:53
Speaker 1: you're very naive, Brian, but this was my first personal
45:56
Speaker 1: experience of being with both Jews and Palestinians or Arabs whatever.
46:03
Speaker 1: The exact nature of that big crowd was Muslims, and
46:09
Speaker 1: here were Jewish people who were there calling for peace
46:13
Speaker 1: in the Middle East and completely relaxed about being in
46:18
Speaker 1: the midst of that type of crowd. And following on
46:23
Speaker 1: from that, that's when I tried to engage with other
46:26
Speaker 1: people in the Jewish community to see what their opinions were,
46:31
Speaker 1: not only about the war in the Middle East, but
46:34
Speaker 1: also how they felt about the Zionist state of Israel.
46:38
Speaker 1: Were they happy with their own government? But what I
46:41
Speaker 1: discovered was that although people would speak to me off
46:46
Speaker 1: the record, they didn't want to speak to me on
46:50
Speaker 1: the record. And this wasn't This wasn't as a result
46:53
Speaker 1: of their concerns over the style of UK column reporting,
46:58
Speaker 1: or perhaps their perception we were against Israel. They wouldn't
47:05
Speaker 1: talk because they were clearly frightened of their own government.
47:11
Speaker 1: And I was really stunned to learn the extent of this.
47:16
Speaker 1: And before I hand over to you, I just had
47:18
Speaker 1: one other bit. I eventually watched a really fascinating interview
47:24
Speaker 1: between two rabbis in America. One was an American, one
47:29
Speaker 1: was actually British about to become a naturalized American. But
47:35
Speaker 1: they were talking about the fact that they considered themselves
47:39
Speaker 1: to be American citizens, and they were being faced with
47:44
Speaker 1: agents of the Israeli state coming to America, coming into
47:51
Speaker 1: the schools where they operated, and telling young Jewish teenagers
47:59
Speaker 1: that they weren't really American. Israel was there not only
48:05
Speaker 1: as their home, but that the Israeli defense forces were
48:09
Speaker 1: there to protect them as Jews. And I was just
48:14
Speaker 1: fascinated in the conversation that these two rabbis were really
48:18
Speaker 1: outraged that Israel should have the affront, the state of
48:23
Speaker 1: Israel should have the affront to come into America in
48:27
Speaker 1: order to recruit people away from their accepted identity of
48:33
Speaker 1: being American as their nationality and Jewish in their faith.
48:41
Speaker 1: Grateful for your thoughts.
48:43
Speaker 2: If we just deal with that first one. Assimilation is
48:46
Speaker 2: the greatest threat Desigonism and racial purity. There was a
48:52
Speaker 2: series of adverts around Israel a couple of years back.
48:57
Speaker 2: You know, lose a cat or a dog. You put
49:01
Speaker 2: a picture of the cat or a dog on a
49:03
Speaker 2: post and you stick it on the lamp posts in
49:06
Speaker 2: some countries when children have gone missing. I've seen them
49:09
Speaker 2: in the States. Children have gone missing, they've got involved
49:12
Speaker 2: in drugs, or they're just not You'll find posters on
49:16
Speaker 2: the lampposts of young people with their name missing. Well.
49:21
Speaker 2: In Israel, there was a political campaign recently a few
49:25
Speaker 2: years ago where they put anonymous pictures of young people
49:29
Speaker 2: on it missing, but they weren't missing. They had married Gentiles,
49:35
Speaker 2: they had assimilated, they were willing to live in America,
49:41
Speaker 2: in Britain. And that's the greatest threat to Zionism because
49:44
Speaker 2: Zionism needs racial purity, and it needs to maximalize the
49:48
Speaker 2: number of Jews who live in Israel, minimize the number
49:51
Speaker 2: of Palestinians living in Israel, because that's the demographic time bomb.
49:56
Speaker 2: We've got the same in Northern Ireland, you know, with
49:58
Speaker 2: with Catholic now a majority in Northern Ireland, it's inevitable
50:04
Speaker 2: that Northern Ireland will will be united with Era with
50:09
Speaker 2: Ireland at some point in the future. That kind of
50:14
Speaker 2: demographic time bron is what's troublesome to many Zionists. I've
50:21
Speaker 2: been on a number of those demos. I'm going to
50:24
Speaker 2: want the one on the thirtieth November, and i'm because
50:27
Speaker 2: I'm chair of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions, which
50:30
Speaker 2: is an Israeli organization. I'm not Jewish, but they welcome
50:35
Speaker 2: non Jews to assist. We are part of what's owned
50:41
Speaker 2: the Jewish Bloc and there are at least ten Jewish
50:45
Speaker 2: organizations in the UK that participate in these demonstrations and
50:51
Speaker 2: they are given pride of place at the front of
50:54
Speaker 2: the march. And it's a very moving occasion when the
50:58
Speaker 2: Jewish Bloc is welcomed into the march. You've got a
51:04
Speaker 2: Jewish Voice for Peace, Jewish Network for Palestine, the Israeli
51:09
Speaker 2: Committee as House Demolitions. Those are three matura kata is
51:15
Speaker 2: an ultra Orthodox Jewish organization that's anti Zionist. So there
51:21
Speaker 2: are many, many anti Zionist Jews who participate in these
51:25
Speaker 2: demonstrations because they know that what Zionism is doing in
51:29
Speaker 2: Palestine is leading to anti Semitism, is exacerbating tensions with
51:39
Speaker 2: Muslims and with Christians and other ethnic groups. So I
51:44
Speaker 2: would encourage you and encourage listeners to come along and
51:47
Speaker 2: engage with our Jewish friends who are anti Zionists and
51:50
Speaker 2: listen to them and understand why they are so vociferous
51:54
Speaker 2: in opposing Israeli genocide in Gaza, the expansion into Elevenin
52:00
Speaker 2: in Syria, and so on. The greater Israel embraces their
52:06
Speaker 2: aspiration is to expand Israel into much of the Middle East. Today.
52:11
Speaker 1: Yes, now again, my learning process was at one stage
52:18
Speaker 1: came across this sort of division within Israel itself because
52:23
Speaker 1: I didn't realize the extent of unhappiness amongst particularly Orthodox Jews,
52:31
Speaker 1: to the political policies of the Israeli Zionist state. And
52:39
Speaker 1: it was only following this through that I came to
52:44
Speaker 1: understand some of the horrific violence which the State of
52:48
Speaker 1: Israel had unleashed on its own people who dared challenge
52:52
Speaker 1: its policies. And I can't remember the individual's name, but
52:56
Speaker 1: an Orthodox Jew who put up a YouTube video talking
53:02
Speaker 1: about his experiences that the moment he was speaking out
53:06
Speaker 1: about the government in Israel itself, he was hounded and
53:11
Speaker 1: followed and threatened and unpleasant things happened. But eventually he
53:17
Speaker 1: was allowed to leave the country. That's an interesting statement.
53:21
Speaker 1: He was allowed to leave the country. He went to
53:24
Speaker 1: live in Holland, where he continued his activities, and eventually
53:29
Speaker 1: he had a raid on his flat in Holland by
53:33
Speaker 1: individuals he strongly believes were connected to the Israeli state
53:37
Speaker 1: and Mossad and horrific physical violence. And when I read this,
53:45
Speaker 1: I thought, my goodness, you got so much to learn
53:47
Speaker 1: about what's actually happening inside the Israeli state itself. But
53:52
Speaker 1: of course, although Western media doesn't show it, there are
53:57
Speaker 1: now increasing clips, particularly on social media or the wider Internet,
54:04
Speaker 1: showing protests against net and Yahoo, or the Israeli government,
54:09
Speaker 1: or indeed religious groups, Jewish religious groups within Israel who
54:15
Speaker 1: were challenging the policies, and clearly some of them do
54:22
Speaker 1: not want to serve in the Israeli defense forces and
54:27
Speaker 1: protests where Jews are clearly saying, well, what we're doing
54:32
Speaker 1: is not Jewish because thou shalt not kill. I remember
54:36
Speaker 1: this being said very clearly by an Orthodox Jew in
54:41
Speaker 1: one of the video clips. So we're onto a particular
54:46
Speaker 1: thing there because we have members of the Jewish community,
54:50
Speaker 1: recognizing their own teachings, are saying thou shalt not kill.
54:54
Speaker 1: And certainly Christians should understand this message. We should be
54:59
Speaker 1: agreeing over the need to stop the violence in the
55:03
Speaker 1: Middle East, shouldn't.
55:04
Speaker 2: With very definitely, very definitely yes. Within within Jewish society,
55:09
Speaker 2: Israeli society, you have a spectrum of Jewish perspectives. You
55:15
Speaker 2: have the most most Jews in Israel are secular. Within
55:20
Speaker 2: the religious community, you have the anti Zionist Jews. They
55:27
Speaker 2: tend to be the ultra Orthodox because they believe only
55:31
Speaker 2: the Messiah, only God can bring in the kingdom. The
55:34
Speaker 2: king kingdom requires a king, and therefore they will not
55:38
Speaker 2: participate in a secular state. And they're clearly a threat,
55:44
Speaker 2: and that's why they're far right within the government wants
55:46
Speaker 2: to force them to serve in the army. But then
55:50
Speaker 2: you do have religious Zionists, and they are particularly prevalent
55:57
Speaker 2: among the settlements the illegal Jews only settlements in the
56:02
Speaker 2: occupied Palestinian territories where much of the violence occurs. They
56:06
Speaker 2: are driven by a religious conviction of supremacism. They are
56:12
Speaker 2: the chosen people, they have a right to the land,
56:15
Speaker 2: and the Palestinians are the Philistines. They are the inferior
56:22
Speaker 2: racist that must be exterminated. So you've got these tensions
56:27
Speaker 2: within Israeli society exacerbated by interference, if you like, or
56:32
Speaker 2: influence from particularly from the United States and their Christian
56:39
Speaker 2: Christian backers, if you like, who see the Jews as
56:44
Speaker 2: part of their view of the future. Gersh And Gorenburg
56:49
Speaker 2: is a Jewish academic. He wrote a book called The
56:53
Speaker 2: End of Days. He said, the problem for us Jews
56:55
Speaker 2: is that we're act three in your four act play,
57:00
Speaker 2: meaning come you know that the War of Armageddon, we
57:04
Speaker 2: Jews get exterminated and new Christians end up being the winners.
57:09
Speaker 2: So there is some cynicism among some Jews as to
57:13
Speaker 2: why Christians are so supportive of Israel. It's partly eulogizing
57:18
Speaker 2: romanticizing the Jewish people, which is not healthy, but it's
57:23
Speaker 2: also in some sense is driven by anti Semitism, wanting
57:27
Speaker 2: to get rid of the Jews from Britain and America
57:29
Speaker 2: because we want we want the land for ourselves. It's
57:32
Speaker 2: Christian nation. The Jews can go and live in Palestine.
57:35
Speaker 2: So there's a range of a mixture of convictions that
57:40
Speaker 2: lead to the complexity of what we see in the
57:44
Speaker 2: Middle East today. Having said all of that, it is
57:47
Speaker 2: crystal clear and simple that what we're witnessing is apartheid,
57:53
Speaker 2: genocide and ethnic cleansing, and we must oppose it. We
57:57
Speaker 2: must find peaceful, non violent ways to resisted and challenge
58:01
Speaker 2: are and governments and big business who are benefiting from
58:07
Speaker 2: what's happening in Palestine today.
58:09
Speaker 1: Absolutely agree with that. What else comes into my mind, though,
58:14
Speaker 1: is that we will call ourselves the ordinary people are
58:18
Speaker 1: faced with a political elite, elite who are openly declaring
58:24
Speaker 1: their support for Zionist Israel, and they're openly saying that
58:31
Speaker 1: if members of the population stray too far away from
58:37
Speaker 1: what they consider acceptable criticism, we're being anti Semitic and
58:43
Speaker 1: you're likely to get a visit from the police. So
58:46
Speaker 1: we've got it's now Keir Starmer's government, but this was
58:52
Speaker 1: the same under David Cameron. Who said publicly that his
58:55
Speaker 1: belief in Israel was quote unshakable, and I said at
58:59
Speaker 1: the time, the problem with this is that no man
59:02
Speaker 1: can have two masters. Deliberately using that quote, and if
59:07
Speaker 1: his belief in Israel was unshakable, it meant that the
59:12
Speaker 1: United Kingdom came second in his mind to Israel itself.
59:19
Speaker 1: And in addition to that, we have to I think
59:23
Speaker 1: we have to consider the fact that we've got these
59:27
Speaker 1: very powerful lobbying groups in UK friends of Israel for
59:31
Speaker 1: both the Conservatives and the Labor Party. And these are
59:37
Speaker 1: immensely powerful lobbying groups who seem to be able to
59:43
Speaker 1: direct our elected government to their cause over and above
59:49
Speaker 1: anything we might think is right and proper, such as
59:53
Speaker 1: peace in the Middle East. How do we deal with
59:57
Speaker 1: these immensely powerful Jewish fact lobbying groups. They're at work
1:00:03
Speaker 1: here in the UK and also particularly in the US.
1:00:07
Speaker 1: More so, maybe I think.
1:00:09
Speaker 2: We have to be clear in our convictions as to
1:00:12
Speaker 2: what's right and what's wrong. Apartheid is wrong, Treating people
1:00:17
Speaker 2: as inferior because of their color ethnic group is wrong.
1:00:22
Speaker 2: It's always wrong, and therefore we must remain firm in
1:00:29
Speaker 2: our convictions and face the consequences. You know, the first
1:00:33
Speaker 2: time I was accused of being anti Semitic, it was
1:00:35
Speaker 2: like I'd had the words you know, six six six
1:00:37
Speaker 2: tattooed on my forehead. You know, it felt incredibly embarrassing,
1:00:41
Speaker 2: incredibly upsetting. But the more times you're accused of something
1:00:48
Speaker 2: you know isn't true and something your Jewish friends say
1:00:52
Speaker 2: is not true, the less impact it has on you.
1:00:55
Speaker 2: The more you know, it wears off. And I think
1:01:00
Speaker 2: we've got to have those convictions, what we think is right,
1:01:04
Speaker 2: what we think is wrong, and be consistent and live
1:01:07
Speaker 2: them out and refuse to play the game. Refuse to
1:01:12
Speaker 2: be silent or motivated by fear. You said. You know,
1:01:16
Speaker 2: some folk on that demo unwilling to go on the record.
1:01:19
Speaker 2: It's fear and fear paralyzers. Fear paralyzers. Nine out of
1:01:24
Speaker 2: ten things that we're afraid I've never happened anyway. You know,
1:01:28
Speaker 2: we need to be proactive. Boycott is really good. Boycott
1:01:32
Speaker 2: companies profiting from the occupation in the West Bank, the settlements,
1:01:37
Speaker 2: you know, people like McDonald's, Coca Cola, companies that are
1:01:44
Speaker 2: selling products into the settlements, profiting from them. We need
1:01:48
Speaker 2: to boycott them. But it must be done in non
1:01:54
Speaker 2: violent ways. Just give you one example. We saw last
1:01:58
Speaker 2: weekend the Tel Aviv football team mccabee and the violence
1:02:05
Speaker 2: we saw in Amsterdam at the weekend. It was the
1:02:10
Speaker 2: Israeli newspapers flagged up before the football match that Mossad
1:02:15
Speaker 2: agents would be there to protect Israeli footballers football supporters.
1:02:23
Speaker 2: The initial press coverage covered the fact that the day
1:02:28
Speaker 2: before the football match, Israeli football fans ran Riot were
1:02:35
Speaker 2: making anti Muslim statements, anti Palestinian statements, were attacking individuals.
1:02:43
Speaker 2: When after the football match you see the Western media
1:02:48
Speaker 2: cutting those stories out and majoring on the small number
1:02:53
Speaker 2: of Israeli citizens who were injured in the aftermath. This
1:02:59
Speaker 2: coming we can the same football team is playing in
1:03:04
Speaker 2: Paris and the news media is already broadcasting the fact
1:03:11
Speaker 2: that at least one Israeli politician on the far right
1:03:14
Speaker 2: is going to be speaking in Paris before the football match.
1:03:18
Speaker 2: So we expect, sadly there to be violence. So I
1:03:24
Speaker 2: suppose what I'm saying is we need to be proactive.
1:03:27
Speaker 2: We need to be clear in our convictions and to
1:03:30
Speaker 2: stick to our convictions and not allow those who criticize
1:03:34
Speaker 2: us to intimidate or silence us.
1:03:37
Speaker 1: Okay, thank you for that. Well, this one comes into
1:03:40
Speaker 1: my head, and of course it's an appropriate time to
1:03:43
Speaker 1: ask the question. It's a difficult one, so we see
1:03:48
Speaker 1: see how you get on. But of course, we are
1:03:51
Speaker 1: about to have Donald Trump as the next president of
1:03:58
Speaker 1: the United States, and certainly in his campaigning is election campaigning,
1:04:04
Speaker 1: he has shown that he is absolutely committed to support
1:04:10
Speaker 1: for Israel. And I'm going to say everything that I
1:04:14
Speaker 1: see and what I've interpreted is that means military support
1:04:19
Speaker 1: to enable Israel to continue their war. And in addition, sorry,
1:04:28
Speaker 1: so President Trump comes in against the backdrop of this
1:04:32
Speaker 1: hugely powerful Israeli Zionist lobby, even be it Christian Zionist
1:04:40
Speaker 1: lobby in America, how would you what would you have
1:04:47
Speaker 1: to say to the American the genuine American Christians. I'm
1:04:51
Speaker 1: choosing my words very carefully here. How do we get
1:04:55
Speaker 1: genuine Christian people to see through the smoke and mirrors
1:05:00
Speaker 1: as to what's going on?
1:05:03
Speaker 2: Well, if I was speaking to Christian friends of America,
1:05:07
Speaker 2: it would be to say, sadly, you're going to read
1:05:08
Speaker 2: what you sew. They elected Donald Trump and they will
1:05:14
Speaker 2: have to take the responsibility for the consequences. Donald Trump
1:05:20
Speaker 2: actually subscribes to what I'm called transactionalism. He sees everything
1:05:25
Speaker 2: in terms of business deals, not ethics, not right and wrong,
1:05:29
Speaker 2: not morals. So ironically we may find that Trump is
1:05:36
Speaker 2: not the greatest friend of Israel. He will view what's
1:05:42
Speaker 2: happening in the Middle East in terms of business deals,
1:05:46
Speaker 2: in terms of profit, and he will put America first.
1:05:50
Speaker 2: He's already indicated to Netta Yahoo that he wants Israel
1:05:55
Speaker 2: out of Gaza before his inauguration in January, so I
1:06:02
Speaker 2: don't although he has demonstrated total support for Israel, as
1:06:07
Speaker 2: every U as politician has to to survive, and he has,
1:06:12
Speaker 2: you know, in his time, recognize the annexation of the
1:06:17
Speaker 2: Syrian Golen Heights, recognize the annexation of Jerusalem, moved the
1:06:21
Speaker 2: US embassy to Jerusalem. He has done everything nessa who
1:06:26
Speaker 2: wants him to. But then again Biden has as well.
1:06:31
Speaker 2: So of the two, Trump is the wild card. He
1:06:36
Speaker 2: will make decisions that will not conform to necessarily to
1:06:42
Speaker 2: what is in Israel's best interests. So we have to
1:06:46
Speaker 2: wait and see. But I know that our own Prime Minister,
1:06:49
Speaker 2: Kissed Arma, has been in France with Macron to discuss
1:06:53
Speaker 2: how they are going to handle Donald Trump. Nessina is
1:06:57
Speaker 2: very good at smoothing feathers, and he will be nurturing nurturing.
1:07:07
Speaker 2: Trump's pride is vanity, is ego in the hope that
1:07:13
Speaker 2: the US will continue to supply Israel with the weapons
1:07:18
Speaker 2: it needs to continue its wars in Gaza and Lebin
1:07:21
Speaker 2: and Syria and elsewhere. But whether Trump will will fulfill
1:07:27
Speaker 2: Netti Yahoo's expectations, there's another matter.
1:07:31
Speaker 1: It's been fascinating so far, and my goodness, there's a
1:07:34
Speaker 1: lot more I could ask you, but a general comment
1:07:39
Speaker 1: on Christianity is under huge pressure in the United United
1:07:44
Speaker 1: Kingdom and indeed in the West. It might it might
1:07:47
Speaker 1: be on a much better base in African countries, but
1:07:53
Speaker 1: it's clear to me that that Christianity is under attack,
1:07:58
Speaker 1: and people belief in the scriptures, their belief in a
1:08:04
Speaker 1: loving God is definitely under attack. Some years ago, I
1:08:11
Speaker 1: just bring this on the screen. I don't know whether
1:08:13
Speaker 1: I mentioned it to you the other night, but I
1:08:16
Speaker 1: started to read this book. It's called False Dawn, The
1:08:20
Speaker 1: United Religion's Initiative, Globalism and the Quest for a One
1:08:25
Speaker 1: World Religion, written by a man called Lee Penn, it's
1:08:30
Speaker 1: very detailed. It's got a lot of footnotes. But in
1:08:32
Speaker 1: the book, what he's describing is the weakening down of Christianity,
1:08:39
Speaker 1: the blending together of a number of different faiths in
1:08:44
Speaker 1: order to create a mixture which is which is going
1:08:51
Speaker 1: to be acceptable to a one world global political system. Sorry,
1:08:56
Speaker 1: that's a bit of a mouthful, but it's a fascinating book. Essentially,
1:09:00
Speaker 1: it's explaining some of the breakdown that we see in
1:09:05
Speaker 1: Christian faith, be it here in UK or in other
1:09:09
Speaker 1: Western countries or the US. You've obviously been a member
1:09:15
Speaker 1: of the Church of England. Correct me if I'm wrong,
1:09:19
Speaker 1: But congregations have fallen, there's a falling away of faith.
1:09:24
Speaker 1: What do you think has caused this and what would
1:09:27
Speaker 1: you like to see happen to get people re engaged
1:09:32
Speaker 1: with a positive spirituality.
1:09:36
Speaker 2: I think my observation would be to go back to
1:09:40
Speaker 2: Jesus Christ and the early Church and acknowledge that Jesus
1:09:46
Speaker 2: told his twelve disciples most of them are fishermen. Maybe
1:09:53
Speaker 2: been a literate, They were artisans. They were the skill
1:09:58
Speaker 2: with their hands, They had basic knowledge of how to fish.
1:10:04
Speaker 2: One was a tax collector, couple were revolutionaries, zealops. He
1:10:12
Speaker 2: told them to go into all the world to make
1:10:13
Speaker 2: disciples of all nations. There were twelve, and the Church
1:10:19
Speaker 2: today is a consequence of their obedience to that call.
1:10:22
Speaker 2: All of them, apart from John the Apostle John, all
1:10:26
Speaker 2: of them died as martyrs. Significant proportion of the early
1:10:31
Speaker 2: Church were martyred under the Roman Empire, who saw Christians
1:10:36
Speaker 2: as atheists because they didn't believe in the gods, the
1:10:40
Speaker 2: Roman gods. So I don't have any anxiety over the
1:10:49
Speaker 2: future of the Church or its viability, because the true Church,
1:10:54
Speaker 2: the Church of Jesus Christ, is alive and well and growing.
1:10:59
Speaker 2: You've alluded to the fact that it's growing in other countries,
1:11:03
Speaker 2: perhaps faster than it is in Britain. The churches that
1:11:07
Speaker 2: accept the Bible as the word of God, who teach
1:11:10
Speaker 2: the scriptures faithfully, who share the good News of Jesus
1:11:14
Speaker 2: with those who wish to hear, are growing. In the UK,
1:11:18
Speaker 2: those churches are growing. It doesn't matter what the denomination is.
1:11:22
Speaker 2: The established churches, the churches that are major on doing
1:11:26
Speaker 2: things right and doing the right things, that major on formalism,
1:11:31
Speaker 2: liturgies and services and so on. They may be in
1:11:35
Speaker 2: decline and Therefore, the temptation, as you've said with that book,
1:11:40
Speaker 2: to find a commonality with other religions leads to a
1:11:46
Speaker 2: dilution of our convictions, leads to a dumbing down on
1:11:51
Speaker 2: what we are taught to believe in scripture. So I've
1:11:54
Speaker 2: got no illusions it's going to happen. It is happening.
1:11:56
Speaker 2: It's happening in every generation. And those who are faithful
1:11:59
Speaker 2: to Jesus and seek to follow him will be persecuted.
1:12:03
Speaker 2: He promised that, blessed are you when you are persecuted,
1:12:09
Speaker 2: because they did the same to me. So we should
1:12:11
Speaker 2: expect opposition as Christians, but we should be gentle and
1:12:18
Speaker 2: respectful of others. You know, people don't care how much
1:12:23
Speaker 2: you know until they know how much you care. And
1:12:26
Speaker 2: so the first step in sharing our faith is to
1:12:29
Speaker 2: show by our words and our deeds that we care
1:12:33
Speaker 2: for people who are particularly in need, who are vulnerable. So, yeah,
1:12:40
Speaker 2: the church, maybe in the formal church, the established churches
1:12:43
Speaker 2: may be in decline, but the Church of Jesus Christ
1:12:46
Speaker 2: is growing.
1:12:48
Speaker 1: Stephen, thank you very very much for that. It's been
1:12:53
Speaker 1: an absolutely fascinating journey through what I know is an
1:12:56
Speaker 1: incredibly deep subject. And see that with the depth of
1:13:01
Speaker 1: your own work, but we've ended on I think a
1:13:04
Speaker 1: very positive note there, and I just hope that this
1:13:08
Speaker 1: interview will stimulate some of our Christian viewers, whether they're
1:13:15
Speaker 1: members of the UK column or that they're going to
1:13:18
Speaker 1: hear this in a detached environment worldwide, but this will
1:13:22
Speaker 1: stimulate them to think in greater detail about what this
1:13:27
Speaker 1: whole issue of the trouble in the Middle East and
1:13:30
Speaker 1: Christian Zionism is and ultimately let's get the violence stopped
1:13:37
Speaker 1: as soon as possible. This seems to me to be
1:13:41
Speaker 1: the key message.
1:13:43
Speaker 2: Thank you, Thank you, Brian. Just to give a plug,
1:13:46
Speaker 2: I want to read the books you've alluded to my books.
1:13:50
Speaker 2: You can access them freely from our website, Stephensaza dot com.
1:13:55
Speaker 2: Just go on the top menu and look under books
1:13:58
Speaker 2: and you can access the books in various languages, lots
1:14:02
Speaker 2: of articles resources like the one I alluded to about
1:14:07
Speaker 2: the seven Biblical Answers. And if people want to know
1:14:10
Speaker 2: more about myself or the challenge as I've faced, they
1:14:15
Speaker 2: can go to look under friends and they'll be able
1:14:19
Speaker 2: to read what friends have actually said about me and
1:14:24
Speaker 2: some of those who've supported me, even bishops and archbishops
1:14:28
Speaker 2: who supported me through my trials and tribulations. I was
1:14:33
Speaker 2: on the phone today to Bishop Ria in Jerusalem, who's
1:14:37
Speaker 2: been one of his chaplains, and he's always been very supportive.
1:14:42
Speaker 2: So yeah, if folk want to know more Stevensizer dot com,
1:14:46
Speaker 2: look under the books or look under the other resources
1:14:49
Speaker 2: are all freely available, and find out more about this conviction,
1:14:54
Speaker 2: this belief system, and how we can easily deconstruct it.
1:14:59
Speaker 1: Thank you much, Brian, yep, Stephen, thank you. We'll ensure
1:15:03
Speaker 1: that all that detail is in the show notes, which
1:15:06
Speaker 1: will be in the video. So I'm going to say
1:15:08
Speaker 1: thank you very very much indeed for joining me