Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, August 1987, pages 15-16

Religion and the Middle East

By the Rev. L. Humphrey Walz

WCC Leaders Visit Mideast Constituents

A team of top figures in the World Council of Churches (WCC) has just completed a two-part visit to its 13 denominational affiliates in the Middle East, cradle of Christianity. General Secretary Emilio Castro, Middle East Services Secretary Ghassan Rubeiz, and International Affairs Director Ninan Kishy were joined in this venture by specialists in Christian publications, missions, and congregational life. On May 7 the members left Geneva for a month of conferences and conversations in Cyprus, Syria, Jordan, Israel, the occupied territories, and in Egypt, whose six million Copts comprise half of the total Christian population in the Middle East. The delegation's main purpose was to express solidarity with the churches of the region and to learn about Middle East Christians. The participants, however, responded frankly to approaches by journalists, government officials, and others regarding WCC positions on Middle Eastern political, economic, and social issues. The WCC has backed most UN resolutions on the Arab-Israeli, Lebanese, and Iraq-Iran conflicts. It supports the right of Palestinian self-determination, the recognition and security of Israel within its pre-June 5, 1967 borders, and the integrity and sovereignty of Lebanon. Regarding Jerusalem, it resists any tendency to minimize the unique significance of the Holy City to Christian, Muslim, or Jew. Among the delegation's hosts were Coptic Pope Shenouda and the three co-presidents of the Middle East Council of Churches: His Holiness Karakin II of the Armenian Apostolic Church, His Beatitude Ignatios IV of the Antiochian Church, and President-Bishop Samir Kafity of the Episcopal Archdiocese of Jerusalem and the Middle East.

Religion in the 1987 Zionist Elections

In mid-May, at an over-all cost of $1.5 million, nine competing American Zionist "slates" mailed 900,000 ballots to garner their shares of votes for the 152 US delegates—approximately a fourth of the total—to the December 1987 World Zionist Congress in Jerusalem. With 200,000 replies expected, the final tally, due by summer's end, will give a sense of the direction the Congress will set for the World Zionist Organization for the next four or five years.

The July issue of the Washington Report carried Andrea Barron's account of the meaning of these elections for American Jews. I have concentrated here on the religious-related contents of the nine slates of candidates.

The views of the contending parties were varied and often contradictory. Since the rival platforms in their entirety are available from the American Zionist Federation, 515 Park Ave., New York, NY 10022, here I will quote only the planks referring to "religion" in one sense or another.

The Tehiya-Herut and Friends of Labor Israel slates were primarily dedicated to supporting one or the other of the two chief partner-rivals in the present Israeli coalition government. Tehiya-Herut pledged to unite "Jews of all religious and ethnic backgrounds...in support of Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir's program of social justice as Israel faces the critical challenges of today." Friends of Labor Israel, on the other hand, backed Shimon Peres in uniting and guaranteeing the rights of all Jews, including Israel's "secular, Reconstructionist, Conservative, or Reform movements...to express their Judaism in the manner they choose." While Friends of Labor Israel spoke up for "the civil rights of all Israel's minorities," it also advocated "discontinuing allocation of funding to religious institutions" with an anti-Zionist orientation.

In varying degrees, Hadassah, the Zionist Organization of America (which is linked with Israel's Washington lobby and the United Israel Appeal), Students for Israel, and the Religious Zionist Movement rallied behind Tehiya-Herut (which supported Shamir), through the Zionist Organization of America slate added advocacy of "religious freedom and respect" for "all branches of Judaism." The Religious Zionist Movement slate claimed that its brand of nationalistic religion "is the sole hope for bridging polarized Israeli society and was the only unifying force on the horizon in Israel's future."

The newly-formed organization for Conservative Judaism, MERCAZ, and the Association for Reform Zionists of America, ARZA, were made up of American Jews whose counterparts in Israel have considerably less official status or privilege than do the Orthodox. MERCAZ supported "attaining religious rights for our (Conservative) rabbis, synagogues and institutions in Israel" and wanted freedom to offer "a viable alternative for the people of Israel." It also sought "a representative voice for the Conservative movement in the decisions and operations of the World Zionist Organization and the Jewish Agency." ARZA made similar appeals on behalf of the equally downgraded reform movement. It pleaded for "religious rights and full equality for all Jews in Israel" and "equitable funding for Reform and Conservative religious institutions in Israel." It also protested "the intolerance that leads to the disruption of Reform synagogue services in Jerusalem."

Only the Progressive Zionist List slate called for full religious status to Israel's non-Jews. It opted for "complete separation of religion and state in Israel as the best means of ensuring that no one sector of the Jewish community can impose its will on other sectors through the power of the State." It appealed for the spirit of "pluralism, equality, and justice" in developing peace with the Palestinians and neighbor states. It also called for an end to "all World Zionist Organization involvement in the West Bank and Gaza Strip."

Presbyterian General Assembly Meeting

At the recent 199th Presbyterian (USA) General Assembly in Biloxi, MS, a major agenda item was a 34-page paper presented by a special task force on "A Theological Understanding of the Relationship Between Christians and Jews." While the 650 lay and clergy commissioners found much in it to commend, they could not accept, unaltered, its 12-paragraph Section 6 claiming "the continuity and irrevocability of God's promise of land to the people of Israel" primarily and unconditionally.

Finding this contrary to the Bible as a whole and incompatible with earlier denominational statements to foster Middle East peacemaking, they modified some of it and replaced the rest of it with an equally detailed section including: "The State of Israel is a geopolitical entity not to be validated theologically," and "Land is where a people can live and be a light to the nations."

The Rev. L. Humphrey Walz, DD, a retired Associate Executive of the Presbyterian Synod of the Northeast and a founding editor of the Link, is active in Christian-Jewish and Christian-Muslim dialogues.