THE OLDEST HATRED

For the past seven years I have had the honour of ministering to Jewish survivors of the Holocaust in Sydney and Melbourne; elderly citizens who migrated to Australia after World War 2. Using my music to bring some joy into their lives and build bridges of friendship, it has been an experience that has impacted me deeply. And in spite of the fact that it has been 88 years since that tragic series of world events, the physical and psychological scars remain.

One dear lady told my wife Kathy and I of her experience when, as a young girl in Poland, the Gestapo came to the door of her home. She hid under the bed. Then she heard gunshots in the street outside. Then, when all was quiet, she cautiously looked for her parents. She realised that they were gone. She would never see them again. Neighbours hid her in the roof of their house and gave her bread and water to avoid detection until the war was over.

Another lady who attends my music programs approaches me at the end of our time together and leans on my shoulder crying, “My family, my family….”. (murdered in the Holocaust). The songs often evoke emotions and memories of long ago. And yet at the same time have a cathartic effect and build a powerful bond between us.

And then at another Jewish aged care facility where I conduct my music programs, vandals painted swastikas on the wall out the front. This caused great grief to the residents and their families. Yes, sadly, the oldest hatred is still with us. 

To quote PBS News, 

“The Anti-Defamation League, which tracks anti-Semitic behavior nationwide, found 2,717 incidents in 2021. That's a 34 percent rise from the year before and averages out to more than seven anti-Semitic incidents per day.”

And here in Australia we should not think that we are immune from such evil. Our nation earned the dubious honour of a mention in the Jerusalem Post (20th April, 2022):

“The total figure (in Australia in 2021 consists of 272 anti-Semitic attacks (physical assault, verbal abuse, harassment, vandalism, graffiti) and 175 threats.” (That’s for one year!)

“We remember” is the slogan we are encouraged to publish on Holocaust Remembrance Day (Yom HaShoah) in an effort to keep the memory of this horrific chapter of history alive. How easily we forget as once more antisemitism rears its ugly head. And, on the other hand, how many are completely ignorant of what occurred around 80 years ago. It breaks my heart all the more knowing many people for whom this was (and is still) a lived experience. 

Why the Jews? Why God’s Covenant people?

In every age, under the reign of tyrants, attempts to wipe out the Jewish people have loomed large as stains of the pages of history . And, of course, since the founding of the Jewish State in 1948 there have been similar attempts to annihilate Israel as a Nation.

There were a number of Levites that King David assigned as worship leaders in the tabernacle choir. According to 1 Chronicles 6:31-32 Asaph was one of these men. He felt deeply moved in his heart by the anti-Semitism of his day some 3,000 years ago. He cried out to God concerning this threat in one of the most prophetically significant Psalms, Psalm 83…

3. “They have taken crafty counsel against Your people,

And consulted together against Your sheltered ones.

4. They have said, ‘Come, and let us cut them off from being a nation,

That the name of Israel may be remembered no more.’ “

We see Psalm 83 played out many times throughout the course of history. And you would think that by now we would have learned our lesson with so much talk about reconciliation and universal respect and brotherhood of Man. But this, the oldest hatred still seems to be permissible.

But those (especially those who call themselves “Christians”) who also express hatred of the Jewish people and the Nation of Israel seem not to realise that they are, in the words of Moses, “the apple of GOD’S eye.” (Deut. 32:10), and that the Land is HIS Land!

Satan, God’s enemy, has had a vendetta against the descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob since the time of the patriarchs themselves. Ultimately, he is the origin of this bitter contempt of the Jews.

So, as we might look in horror at historical footage of the events of the Holocaust, we must look inside ourselves, and there hopefully see that if we are Christians, a Jew lives inside of us. The Root of Jesse, the Son of David, Jesus Christ, Yeshua ha Mashiach, is our Lord and Saviour and He calls to reach out in love to His brethren, His people, and show the love He has demonstrated towards us. 

As the ancient Rabbi Shaul, the Apostle Paul, says in Romans 1:16,

“For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek.”