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Zionism;: The dream and the reality; a Jewish critique;
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325 pages, Paperback
Published January 1, 1974
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About the author
Gary V. Smith
32 books4 followersGary V. Smith is professor of Christian Studies at Union University in
Jackson, Tennessee. Prior to Union, Dr. Smith taught Old Testament and Hebrew at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Kansas City Missouri from
1998-2004. For two years he served as the Interim Academic Dean at the
Seminary.
Prior to coming to Midwestern, Dr. Smith taught Old Testament and Hebrew at Bethel Theological Seminary in St Paul, Minnesota from 1983-1998. Prior to coming to Bethel Dr. Smith taught Old Testament and Hebrew at Winnipeg Theological Seminary from 1973-1983. For two years he was the Interim Dean of the Seminary.
Dr. Smith did undergraduate work at Wheaton College and received his Bachelor of Arts in Anthropology in 1965, the Master of Arts from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in 1968, and his Doctor of Philosophy from Dropsie College for Hebrew and Cognate Languages in Philadelphia in 1973. He has completed academic research in Jerusalem, Israel and in Cambridge,
England.
Dr. Smith’s areas of expertise include the Old Testament Prophets, especial Amos and Isaiah,
plus the books of Ezra, Nehemiah, and Esther. He is a member of the Evangelical Theological
Society, the Institute for Biblical Research, and the Society of Biblical Literature.
Dr. Smith and his wife Susan live in Jackson, Tennessee. They have two children and five
grandchildren.
Jackson, Tennessee. Prior to Union, Dr. Smith taught Old Testament and Hebrew at Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Kansas City Missouri from
1998-2004. For two years he served as the Interim Academic Dean at the
Seminary.
Prior to coming to Midwestern, Dr. Smith taught Old Testament and Hebrew at Bethel Theological Seminary in St Paul, Minnesota from 1983-1998. Prior to coming to Bethel Dr. Smith taught Old Testament and Hebrew at Winnipeg Theological Seminary from 1973-1983. For two years he was the Interim Dean of the Seminary.
Dr. Smith did undergraduate work at Wheaton College and received his Bachelor of Arts in Anthropology in 1965, the Master of Arts from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in 1968, and his Doctor of Philosophy from Dropsie College for Hebrew and Cognate Languages in Philadelphia in 1973. He has completed academic research in Jerusalem, Israel and in Cambridge,
England.
Dr. Smith’s areas of expertise include the Old Testament Prophets, especial Amos and Isaiah,
plus the books of Ezra, Nehemiah, and Esther. He is a member of the Evangelical Theological
Society, the Institute for Biblical Research, and the Society of Biblical Literature.
Dr. Smith and his wife Susan live in Jackson, Tennessee. They have two children and five
grandchildren.
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
April 22, 2024
AN EXCELLENT SELECTION OF ESSAYS OFFERING SOME CRITICISM OF ZIONISM, AND MORE
Editor Gary V. Smith wrote in the ‘Introductory Note’ of this1974 book, “All political movements perpetuate their myths. Political Zionism (Jewish secular nationalism) is no exception. It also utilizes basic myths to justify its goals and to legitimize its actions. One of the most profound propaganda ‘successes’ of the Zionist movement is the popularization of equating obligations to Zionism with Judaism… this synonymous treatment … has erroneously advertised the impression that political Zionism is an intrinsic core of Judaism… The very core of political Zionism is ethnic and territorial in orientation. Its advocates therefore boast that the ‘establishment’ of the nation-state is a prime ‘victory’ for Judaism… In the endeavor to promote the Zionist idea, the critical distinction between the traditional ‘love of Zion’ and the restoration of the ‘Jewish’ state has been clouded and bent toward secular designs… The ‘founding fathers’ of political Zionism did not share the religious fervor of devout Jews; their desire for a Jewish homeland … was primarily a secular quest patterned after the nationalism of nineteenth-century Europe…” (Pg. 11-13)
“It is not too surprising then that representatives of religious Zionism initially attacked the tenets of secular, political Zionism wherever its message spread… Opposition to Zionism from Orthodox leaders stressed the distinction between religion and politics… Although many Orthodox Jews … still maintain their hostility to the secular nationalism of the ‘Jewish’ state… overt opposition involving public activism … serves only as an irritation to the officers of the Zionist State and to Diasporan Zionists who have come to accept the ‘centrality of Israel’ as the basis for modern Jewish loyalties and allegiance… The primary concern in this Reader is… with a broad critique of the degeneration of Zionism … and an examination of the more destructive elements both implicit and explicit within the Jewish nationalist movement.” (Pg. 13-17)
Martin Buber wrote in his 1921 essay ‘Nationalism,’ “what part does Jewish nationalism play at the present time? … We have equipped Jewish nationalism with an armor we did not weld, with the awareness of a unique history, a unique situation, a unique obligation, which can be conceived only from the supernational standpoint and which---whenever it is taken seriously---must point to a supernational sphere. In this way we hoped to save Jewish nationalism from the error of making an idol of the people. We have not succeeded. Jewish nationalism is largely concerned with being ‘like unto all the nations,’ with affirming itself in the face of the world without affirming the world’s reciprocal power.” (Pg. 65)
Hannah Arendt wrote in ‘The Jewish State Fifty Years After---Where have Herzl’s Politics Led?’ (1946), “things in it that Herzl’s own contemporaries would have called utopian now actually determine the ideology and policies of the Zionist movement; while those of Herzl’s practical proposals for the building of a Jewish homeland, which must have appeared quite realistic fifty years ago, have had no influence whatsoever… Herzl proposed … that [we] would build a state with ‘Relief by Labor’---that is, by paying … charity rates for forced full-time work… paid in goods instead of wages. Herzl was also determined to suppress all ‘opposition’ in case of lack of gratitude on the part of the people to whom the land would be given. All this sounds only too familiar. And it is altogether to the honor of the Jewish people that… Palestinian reality has turned out to be almost the opposite of what Herzl dreamt.” (Pg. 67)
Ahad Ha’Am wrote in his 1920 essay, ‘After the Balfour Declaration,’ “‘To facilitate the establishment in Palestine of a National Home for the Jewish people'---that is the text of the promise given to us by the British Government. But that is not the text suggested to the government by the Zionist spokesmen. They wished it to read: ‘the reconstitution of Palestine as the National Home of the Jewish people.’… the allusion to the fact that we are about to Rebuild our OLD national home was dropped, and at the same time the words ‘constitution of Palestine as the national home’ were replaced by ‘establishment of a national home in Palestine.’” (Pg. 85)
He continues, “When… the British government promised to facilitate the establishment IN PALESTINE of a national home for the Jewish people---and not… the reconstitution of Palestine as the national home of the Jewish people---that promise meant two things… in the first place recognition of the historic right of the Jewish people to build its national home in Palestine, with… assistance from the British Government; and it meant … a negation of the power… to override the right of the present inhabitants and to make the Jewish people ruler in the country.” (Pg. 87)
Morris S. Lazaron wrote in his 1944 essay, ‘Palestine: The Dream and the Reality,’ “We have attempted the impossible… We have tried to unite the utterly opposite. We have accepted the ‘folkist’ basis of Jewish life, but we have insisted that we are followers of a universal religion. It cannot be done! We are either a people entitled to all the attributes of nationhood, including a state, or we are a religious community. We cannot be both.” (Pg. 105)
The book quotes James F. Warburg’s1959 address to a U.S. Jewish congregation, “nothing could be more tragic than to witness the creation of a Jewish state in which the non-Jewish minorities are treated as second-class citizens---in which neither a Jew’s Christian wife nor theIr children can be buried in the same cemetery as their father. It is one thing to create a much-needed refuge for the persecuted and oppressed. It is quite another thing to create a new chauvinistic nationalism and a state based in part upon medieval theocratic bigotry and in part upon the Nazi-exploited myth of a Jewish race.” (Pg. 131)
Georges Friedmann wrote in his 1965 essay, ‘Jews and the State of Israel,’ “The State of Israel is becoming a nation in the full sense of the term, including … nationalism. But it is not reasonable to conclude from this that the citizens of Israel are Jews ‘because they recognize themselves as a separate people which is creating its own history.’ In fact, the majority of them reject the principal cultural trait that … held together the communities of the Diaspora… religious observance, which was considered the basis of Jewish life. There is no Jewish nation. There is an Israeli nation… The Israeli State is creating an imperious national community that is conscious of itself, but does not include in that consciousness belonging to a ‘Jewish people.’” (Pg. 137)
The 1967 essay by Jakob Petuchowski states, “While the first reaction of traditional Judaism to modern Zionism was negative, since it regarded Zionism as a sinful interference on the part of man with the long-range plans of God, we may be reasonably sure that, in many circles, Zionism was able to ‘cash in’ on the Jewish messianic hope… the fact remains that, when the state was established in 1948, a member of the Rabbinical Court of London… sounded the shofar---traditionally regarded as a signal of Messiah’s arrival.” (Pg. 147)
Peter Buch wrote in his 1969 essay, “The highly advertised kibbutzim represent a small section of the economy and still smaller section of the population. They are reserved only for the relatively few families enrolled who must share a common ideological and political outlook… While some naïve members and supporters appear to hold the preposterous notion that these communal settlements will chart the way to communism, the kibbutzim do not influence the overall nature of Israeli society nor its foreign policy, even though their dedicated and disciplined membership carry out tasks of land reclamation and defense that no other section of the population can, or will.” (Pg. 179)
Elmer Berger wrote in a 1971 essay, “There is a religious Zionism… this Zionism holds that, in God’s own time and in His own way, when man is ready for the millennium, Jews will be returned to Palestine and Zion shall shine forth again as the place from where all mankind shall hear the word of the Lord… this prophetic vision has nothing… in common with the Zionism which came to Palestine more than half a century ago and, with more help from Britain and the United States than from God, built a Zionist state called Israel.” (Pg. 231)
Maxime Rodinson wrote in his 1968 essay, “Israel and the Arabs,’ “The Israelis have rights, certainly. An abstract judgment would grant them the right to live within the framework of the institutions which they have established… the great works which they have accomplished and the sufferings they have endured may be added to that right. But … they cannot be said to have a historic right to a piece of territory because some of their ancestors supposedly inhabited it two thousand years ago… they ought to recognize that they have done a considerable wrong to another people, by depriving them of rights at least as great as their own… The wrong done to the Arabs by the Israelis is very real. However, it is only too common throughout history. Innumerable violations of rights of this nature have taken place since the beginnings of human society… The Arabs, in their history, have made conquests on an infinitely greater scale and wronged many another nation… No one can without hypocrisy judge himself or his community to be free of such reflexes.” (Pg. 275-277)
This book will be of great interest to those seeking ‘alternative’ Jewish perspectives on Israel and the Palestinians.
Editor Gary V. Smith wrote in the ‘Introductory Note’ of this1974 book, “All political movements perpetuate their myths. Political Zionism (Jewish secular nationalism) is no exception. It also utilizes basic myths to justify its goals and to legitimize its actions. One of the most profound propaganda ‘successes’ of the Zionist movement is the popularization of equating obligations to Zionism with Judaism… this synonymous treatment … has erroneously advertised the impression that political Zionism is an intrinsic core of Judaism… The very core of political Zionism is ethnic and territorial in orientation. Its advocates therefore boast that the ‘establishment’ of the nation-state is a prime ‘victory’ for Judaism… In the endeavor to promote the Zionist idea, the critical distinction between the traditional ‘love of Zion’ and the restoration of the ‘Jewish’ state has been clouded and bent toward secular designs… The ‘founding fathers’ of political Zionism did not share the religious fervor of devout Jews; their desire for a Jewish homeland … was primarily a secular quest patterned after the nationalism of nineteenth-century Europe…” (Pg. 11-13)
“It is not too surprising then that representatives of religious Zionism initially attacked the tenets of secular, political Zionism wherever its message spread… Opposition to Zionism from Orthodox leaders stressed the distinction between religion and politics… Although many Orthodox Jews … still maintain their hostility to the secular nationalism of the ‘Jewish’ state… overt opposition involving public activism … serves only as an irritation to the officers of the Zionist State and to Diasporan Zionists who have come to accept the ‘centrality of Israel’ as the basis for modern Jewish loyalties and allegiance… The primary concern in this Reader is… with a broad critique of the degeneration of Zionism … and an examination of the more destructive elements both implicit and explicit within the Jewish nationalist movement.” (Pg. 13-17)
Martin Buber wrote in his 1921 essay ‘Nationalism,’ “what part does Jewish nationalism play at the present time? … We have equipped Jewish nationalism with an armor we did not weld, with the awareness of a unique history, a unique situation, a unique obligation, which can be conceived only from the supernational standpoint and which---whenever it is taken seriously---must point to a supernational sphere. In this way we hoped to save Jewish nationalism from the error of making an idol of the people. We have not succeeded. Jewish nationalism is largely concerned with being ‘like unto all the nations,’ with affirming itself in the face of the world without affirming the world’s reciprocal power.” (Pg. 65)
Hannah Arendt wrote in ‘The Jewish State Fifty Years After---Where have Herzl’s Politics Led?’ (1946), “things in it that Herzl’s own contemporaries would have called utopian now actually determine the ideology and policies of the Zionist movement; while those of Herzl’s practical proposals for the building of a Jewish homeland, which must have appeared quite realistic fifty years ago, have had no influence whatsoever… Herzl proposed … that [we] would build a state with ‘Relief by Labor’---that is, by paying … charity rates for forced full-time work… paid in goods instead of wages. Herzl was also determined to suppress all ‘opposition’ in case of lack of gratitude on the part of the people to whom the land would be given. All this sounds only too familiar. And it is altogether to the honor of the Jewish people that… Palestinian reality has turned out to be almost the opposite of what Herzl dreamt.” (Pg. 67)
Ahad Ha’Am wrote in his 1920 essay, ‘After the Balfour Declaration,’ “‘To facilitate the establishment in Palestine of a National Home for the Jewish people'---that is the text of the promise given to us by the British Government. But that is not the text suggested to the government by the Zionist spokesmen. They wished it to read: ‘the reconstitution of Palestine as the National Home of the Jewish people.’… the allusion to the fact that we are about to Rebuild our OLD national home was dropped, and at the same time the words ‘constitution of Palestine as the national home’ were replaced by ‘establishment of a national home in Palestine.’” (Pg. 85)
He continues, “When… the British government promised to facilitate the establishment IN PALESTINE of a national home for the Jewish people---and not… the reconstitution of Palestine as the national home of the Jewish people---that promise meant two things… in the first place recognition of the historic right of the Jewish people to build its national home in Palestine, with… assistance from the British Government; and it meant … a negation of the power… to override the right of the present inhabitants and to make the Jewish people ruler in the country.” (Pg. 87)
Morris S. Lazaron wrote in his 1944 essay, ‘Palestine: The Dream and the Reality,’ “We have attempted the impossible… We have tried to unite the utterly opposite. We have accepted the ‘folkist’ basis of Jewish life, but we have insisted that we are followers of a universal religion. It cannot be done! We are either a people entitled to all the attributes of nationhood, including a state, or we are a religious community. We cannot be both.” (Pg. 105)
The book quotes James F. Warburg’s1959 address to a U.S. Jewish congregation, “nothing could be more tragic than to witness the creation of a Jewish state in which the non-Jewish minorities are treated as second-class citizens---in which neither a Jew’s Christian wife nor theIr children can be buried in the same cemetery as their father. It is one thing to create a much-needed refuge for the persecuted and oppressed. It is quite another thing to create a new chauvinistic nationalism and a state based in part upon medieval theocratic bigotry and in part upon the Nazi-exploited myth of a Jewish race.” (Pg. 131)
Georges Friedmann wrote in his 1965 essay, ‘Jews and the State of Israel,’ “The State of Israel is becoming a nation in the full sense of the term, including … nationalism. But it is not reasonable to conclude from this that the citizens of Israel are Jews ‘because they recognize themselves as a separate people which is creating its own history.’ In fact, the majority of them reject the principal cultural trait that … held together the communities of the Diaspora… religious observance, which was considered the basis of Jewish life. There is no Jewish nation. There is an Israeli nation… The Israeli State is creating an imperious national community that is conscious of itself, but does not include in that consciousness belonging to a ‘Jewish people.’” (Pg. 137)
The 1967 essay by Jakob Petuchowski states, “While the first reaction of traditional Judaism to modern Zionism was negative, since it regarded Zionism as a sinful interference on the part of man with the long-range plans of God, we may be reasonably sure that, in many circles, Zionism was able to ‘cash in’ on the Jewish messianic hope… the fact remains that, when the state was established in 1948, a member of the Rabbinical Court of London… sounded the shofar---traditionally regarded as a signal of Messiah’s arrival.” (Pg. 147)
Peter Buch wrote in his 1969 essay, “The highly advertised kibbutzim represent a small section of the economy and still smaller section of the population. They are reserved only for the relatively few families enrolled who must share a common ideological and political outlook… While some naïve members and supporters appear to hold the preposterous notion that these communal settlements will chart the way to communism, the kibbutzim do not influence the overall nature of Israeli society nor its foreign policy, even though their dedicated and disciplined membership carry out tasks of land reclamation and defense that no other section of the population can, or will.” (Pg. 179)
Elmer Berger wrote in a 1971 essay, “There is a religious Zionism… this Zionism holds that, in God’s own time and in His own way, when man is ready for the millennium, Jews will be returned to Palestine and Zion shall shine forth again as the place from where all mankind shall hear the word of the Lord… this prophetic vision has nothing… in common with the Zionism which came to Palestine more than half a century ago and, with more help from Britain and the United States than from God, built a Zionist state called Israel.” (Pg. 231)
Maxime Rodinson wrote in his 1968 essay, “Israel and the Arabs,’ “The Israelis have rights, certainly. An abstract judgment would grant them the right to live within the framework of the institutions which they have established… the great works which they have accomplished and the sufferings they have endured may be added to that right. But … they cannot be said to have a historic right to a piece of territory because some of their ancestors supposedly inhabited it two thousand years ago… they ought to recognize that they have done a considerable wrong to another people, by depriving them of rights at least as great as their own… The wrong done to the Arabs by the Israelis is very real. However, it is only too common throughout history. Innumerable violations of rights of this nature have taken place since the beginnings of human society… The Arabs, in their history, have made conquests on an infinitely greater scale and wronged many another nation… No one can without hypocrisy judge himself or his community to be free of such reflexes.” (Pg. 275-277)
This book will be of great interest to those seeking ‘alternative’ Jewish perspectives on Israel and the Palestinians.
Displaying 1 of 1 review