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Holy Week and the Jews

By R. R. Purdy

Once again this Holy Week, I have been deeply disturbed by what our liturgy does to the Jews.

I love Holy Week. Even when as a parish priest I found it very tiring, with the round of special services and sick communions and Easter Sunday looming as the most important day of the year, I nevertheless was tremendously energized and moved by it. It encapsulates the whole of our faith experience.

And therein lies the rub. For that faith experience, as expressed in John’s Gospel and sometimes in our liturgies, blames the Jews for Jesus’ death.

Jesus is a Jew. His disciples were all Jews. The apostles were Jews. The infant Church for the first decades was mostly Jewish. How then does John’s gospel point the finger at "the Jews," and at the Pharisees in particular, for planning and bringing about his execution?

It is clear to me that Jesus had opposition among his own people. I would expect that, given the nature of religious feeling and the volatile divisions amongst Judaism in his day. Debate was strong, feelings ran high, and Jesus, who was in reality so close to the Pharisees in method and goals, would have been involved in that fierce debate.

The Sadducees would have been against him because he was so close to the Pharisees. The High Priestly families and scribes and Levites of the Temple oligarchy, and the totally different Herodian underlings of the Roman rulers, opposed him because he was a threat to their peace and security.

But he had much support too. Certainly from the common people, but even among the Pharisees and religious lawyers and those with money and power, there were some who were sympathetic to his teaching.

And it was the Romans who crucified him. However much the gospel writers try to paint Pilate as a weak but well-intentioned figure, however much the political opponents amongst Jesus’ own people instigated his arrest — the crucifixion was a Roman execution of a political threat.

Why then does John’s gospel lump all "the Jews" as his betrayers?

When this gospel was written, possibly 30-40 years after the Roman destruction of the Temple and Jerusalem, the split between synagogue and the followers of Jesus had become quite deep and hostile. More and more Gentiles were becoming Christian, and the Church was changing from a Jewish sect into a new, world-encompassing religion. The Pharisees, who in Jesus’ time had been a lay reform movement with moral authority but no political power, had begun to fill the vacuum left by the Romans and to build what eventually became Rabbinic Judaism.

And the author of John sees the real but natural opposition to Jesus in the second decade in the light of this new, hardened antagonism of the last decades of the century.

How then can we deal with John’s gospel, which forms the centre of our Holy Week liturgies? There are several options.

The first and most common is to simply read the gospel without comment, as is. But this causes great distress to the informed hearer, and leaves the uninformed, and especially children, clearly thinking that "the Jews" caused Jesus’ death. In this post-Holocaust era, I can hardly imagine a greater injustice and more thoughtless disregard for the truth.

A more helpful option would be to read as is, but to preface every reading with a clear, official reminder, written by the parish priest or even by the bishop, that we know now that "the Jews" were not responsible for the crucifixion, and we regret the centuries of prejudice and violent hatred this Johannine interpretation has caused.

The problem with this is that such statements can be disruptive to the flow of liturgy, and many worshipers do not really hear them. So another option, one that I used consistently when in charge of parish liturgy, is to edit the text before it is read in a way that makes it less offensive. So "the Jews" might become "the people" and the "scribes and Pharisees" become "the religious authorities." There are problems with this, but at least it does not continually remind listeners of a prejudice which was not true.

The most honest option — but there are problems with this too — is simply to leave out the offensive passages.

Perhaps we could have some discussion of this in the diocese, and some guidance from our bishop?

The prayers of the liturgy too can sometimes be offensive. In obedience to the House of Bishops we no longer use the collect on Good Friday praying for the conversion of the Jews. But other options of Good Friday worship can cause distress. I think this is not deliberate and intentional but accidental and thoughtless.

The "Reproaches" are an example.

"Oh, my people, what have I done unto you?
How have I offended you? Answer me?
I led you out of Egypt, from slavery to freedom, but you led your Saviour to the cross."
"What more could I have done for you?
I planted you as my fairest vine, but you yielded only bitterness;
when I was thirsty you gave me vinegar to drink, and you pierced your Saviour’s side with a lance."

Now I know this echoes the style of the Hebrew prophets, and could be interpreted in a very Jewish way as if it were us, modern Christians, who actually participated in the Exodus and the crucifixion. But that is not the way most worshipers would hear it. They would understand it clearly as God blaming the Jews for the death of his Son.

Our faith has always proclaimed that Jesus died for our sins and the sin of the world. That means both "to save us from sin" and "because of our sin." We, all of humanity including modern Christians, are responsible for his death. To continue to blame a particular people for his death is a contradiction of our most basic faith. And when that contradiction has become the basis of centuries of prejudice, hatred and violence against that particular people, then a terrible injustice is being done which must be offensive to the heart of God.

I am not pleading for a new interpretation of Scripture. I am pleading for a more thoughtful action in favour of historical truth and justice.

Let us, in the future, plan our Holy Week worship to speak powerfully of "human sin" and God’s grace, and free our Jewish "elder cousins" from the burden of misplaced blame.