India and Israel Against Islamic Terror

The Foundations of

Anti-Semitism
Before we describe the Jewish history in the early half of the

twentieth century, it is time to pause and focus upon the clash

between Judaism and Christianity, in particular and other states

and religions in general. The second part has been adequately

covered in our narrative thus far, but some points are worth

mention.
The persecution of the Jews in Egypt and under the CraecoRoman

Empire has been described earlier. This was basically

founded on a mistrust of the Jews by the pagans who believed

in polytheism which was not in consonance with the Jewish

theology of monotheism. However, the growth of resentment

and suspicion of Christians against the Jews could not be so

easily explained. The divide between Judaism and the teachings

of Jesus has been explained earlier. Though Jesus differed from

the jews and their rigid observance of Judaism only in matters

of details his firebrand disciple, Paul, his sharp tongue and loud

denunciations did much to widen the chasm. The

misunderstanding of his teachings by his Gentile successors,

deliberate or unconscious, resulted in a big cleavage between

Judaism and Christianity difficult to bridge. Once the Church

rejected the Old Testament in its totality, acceptance of Jesus by
•*• nT,D 4 THE FOUNDATIONS OF ANTI-SEMITISM 85
CHAP’” •»
ws became impossible, leading to bitter periods of hostility

between the two in the early days of Christianity. This mutual

hatred was exacerbated in the following two millennia described

earlier in the book.
It should, therefore, cause no surprise that even Shakespeare,

the greatest English playwright, created a Jew stereotype in

Shylock, the money lender who demanded his pound of flesh

from his debtor. The idea came from an episode between two,

knights, both Christians, one of whom was the creditor and had

demanded a pound of flesh without any blood from the debtor

knight. The legend dates back to 13th century. The substitution

of the Jew for the Christian creditor was made later in a medieval

poem in England after which the Jews were expelled from the

realm in 1290. Marlowe, one source of this legend, puts the Jew

in Malta, a big ship-magnet whose purpose in life was to kill

Christians and gain wealth and power. The character along with

a mix of Tamerlane out of Faust has portrayed the Jew as a

poisonous liar, traitor, usurer and intriguer. Shylock of

Shakespeare though no hero, is no villain either. While Marlowe

calls him Barabbas-a loaded name, Shakespeare names him

Shylock, whose aim in life is wealth for its own sake, and is

parasitic.
We will revert to the first part shortly after mentioning the

common struggle of Judaism and Sanatan Hinduism, based on

Vedic culture, with other religions. With the brief exception of

sundry nomad marauders from the Northwest, such as the Huns,

Shakas, Mongols and the Turks upto the tenth century, the real

and sustained cultural and religious invasion soaked in blood

came from Islam from the eleventh century onwards. Thereafter,

under the British rule it was a resistance to the Christian

proselytisation under the patronage of British Imperial

Government, closely coordinated with cultural invasion through

English language, and activities of the Christian missionaries who

strived to baptise the fringe sections of Hindu society such as the

tr’bals ancj lower classes. Of the two, the Islamic invasion

Was more violent and widespread, with the result that

today Islam claims 14 percent of the total Indian
86 INDIA AND ISRAEL
CHAPTER <4
population while the other minorities together count for just 2 ’3

percent. The survival of the predominant Hindu majority culture

speaks volumes about the power, endurance, universalityy

versatility and durability of the Hindu thought. As against thiss’

the Jews were exposed to aggression from almost all pagarri

states and cultures of the Middle-East till the cultural and politicaal

conquest of the Greeks and the Romans. These have been vveH]

documented earlier. The clash with Christianity came mainHy

after the death of Jesus, the influence of his teachings and true

Christian hatred.
Common to all European countries, the Jews suffered not

only on the ground of religion but Christian greed and politicaal

expediency of the ruling kings and lords. In common with true

Hindus, the Jews suffered throughout the tenth century at thee

hands of Islam and its fanatic followers. Both the cultures weree

the victims of Islamic doctrine interpreted from the Holy Qurarn

over the world and divided into two clear domains. The ome

belonging to the faithful Dar-ul-lslam the benign one; and thce

unbelievers termed as ’Kafirs’ constitute the second part, callecd

Darul-Harab. Islam enjoins on its faithful to extend the limits of

’Darul-lslam’ as far as possible and consummate a duty ordainecd

by Allah by annihilation of Dar-ul-Harab and its subsequent

merger into Dar-ul-lslam. It thus follows as a natural corollary/

from the tenets of Islam that it lies on the faithful to constantly/

wage a religious war called Jehad on the Kafirs. Temporary truces^,

treaties, compromises and expediencies notwithstanding,thee

ultimate aim shall always remain the annihilation of the Kafiirs

and the consummation of Dar-ul- Islam. Thus though the Hinduss

suffered mainly at the hands of Islam and to a lesser degrete

from Christians, the Jews with a minimalistic population confined

to the small land of Palestine and spread in driblets in thee

Western world suffered from almost every state.
The origin of the fundamental differences between Jews and

Christians may be traced to the teachings of Jesus Himself. Manvy

of the sayings attributed to Him in the gospels are neither fully/

authenticated nor free from the prejudices of memory and

intention. While there was substance in the denunciation oM
^^ ,, THE FOUNDATIONS OF ANTI-SEMITISM 87

CHAPTER 4
levvish teachers, discrepancies arose with time and the

*° s taken up by Jesus were largely ignored. Jesus attacked the

’iTrisees but his greatest predecessor was the Pharisee Hillel.

, a study by later day scholars it is clear that there was

rdly any difference between the first century Judaism and the

’cture in the New Testament of the Talmudic teachings a hundred

ears later. Many of the facts in the New Testament need

revalidation with the possibility that the picture of the Jews’in the

fourth gospel may be a total invention. Jesus denounced not the

soul of Judaism but what appeared to Him to be ”pessima”

since it was ”corruptio optimi”. But as pointed earlier, it was the

fanaticism of the Pharisees and their insistence on details and

rituals that kept the Jews going through troubled centuries. This

phenomenon is not exclusive to the Jews but will be found in

almost all religions. The Pharisees in common with the Jewish

teachers everywhere insisted the whole of Israel to know Torah

in order to fulfill their mission before God. Though the final

authority of Torah is unquestioned there was more democracy

in Jewish culture, thought and practice than even with the Creeks.

It was not merely a Law or slavish observance of rituals. It was

more than that. Torah was to the Jews what Christ is to the

Christians. It was a divine ordinance to man to fulfill His will,

revealing as it did the life of the Holy community and the Jewish

nation and the duty of every individual to fulfill God’s purpose

on a rational and intellectual basis which was ”redemptive” in

nature. Torah was not merely a scribe but the soul of Judaism

and a covenant and spiritual fulfillment of the Jews. The aversion

of Jesus to the Pharisees rose from his views that they obscured

the direct relationship between man and Cod against the tenets

of Torah. But Jesus overreached himself when he said that the

letter of Torah itself would obscure this relationship, and his

followers a century later saw Torah as a dead prescription rejected

by Jesus.
Accidentally discovered in 1947 near the Dead Sea some

manuscripts dating back to the first century B.C uncannily point

to the fact that Jesus and his Christianity were the outcome of

an earlier sect, possibly the Essenes of pre-Christian era. The
88 INDIA. AND ISRAEL
CHA(>TER 4
script of these texts is remarkably similar to those preached K

Jesus. There was a mention of impending fall of the Sons ^f

Darkness, the Kittim (probably the Romans) at the hands of th°

leaders of this new sect. The origin of Jesus and John the Bap^

is also traced to this sect. The Dead Sea’s scrolls have much jn

common with Christian theology and sources of the lMevv

Testament. This Jewish sect possibly was the forebear of the later

day Christianity. There is a hot debate going on at present on

the synergy between the Old Testament, the Masoretic texts and

the theory of the coming of a Messiah. One of the Scrolls was

an original version of the Book of Isaiah, depicting the diversity

of religious experience in the days of Jesus. Thus on the evidence

of these Scrolls, Jesus either belonged to the Essenes, or was the

promised Messiah. The rapid spread of Christianity thereafter

owes largely to the mighty efforts of Saul of Tarsus re-incarnated

as Paul of the New Testament.
Now we skip the centuries of history and come to the new

challenge to Judaism through Islam and their Prophet

Mohammed. The founder of Islam, born in 570 A.D., did not

count for much till in his fortieth year. He started seeing visions

of angel Gabriel commanding him to proclaim his faith in his

Allah. Not very successful initially with the Meccans, in fact

ridiculed by them, he somehow managed to gather about a

hundred followers around him. Further, to evade his growing

enemies aiound, he left Mecca for Medina in 622 A.D., the

year of the flight called ’Hegira’, which became the starting’year

of the Mohammedan calendar. He found more success thiere

with Khazraj tribe but little response from the Jews. Building his

religion on the foundation of the Biblical seers and prophets, he

preached his new faith. Proud of his descent from Ishrriael

through Abraham, he started the practice of turning in prayer

towards Jerusalem, respecting Jewish customs and even imitating

their hairstyle to identify more closely with them. The Jews

however, could not be won over, and scoffed at his pompous

and blasphemous pretensions. Without any monetary help from

the Jews or the Christians, and to save his starving flock, he

turned to plunder, and started looting caravans. He justified his
,, . THE FOUNDATIONS OF ANTI-SEMITISM 89

CHAPTER 4
• s as a punishment to the idolaters. In fact, he attacked the

aC ’ ans even during Ramzan, the sacred month when no fighting

Ca permitted, and his ruthlessness and dishonourable actions

Trfher frightened the pagans. But for this Mohammed readily

oduced a justification through his revelations. At the battle of

Radr in 624 A.D. with his followers he attacked his former

townsmen and won a decisive victory; feeding his followers from

the booty and returned to Medina a hero. Mohammed now

completely broke away from the hated Jews and inspired by his

revelations started reviling the race. Attacking one Jewish tribe

after another, he defeated almost all the Jews in battle and

would have slaughtered them to a man but for the intervention

of Abdullah, a converted Jew. As usual, the booty of the 700

Medina men was distributed among the faithful, thereby sending

a strong signal that the rewards of Islam are for this world too.

Defeated roundly once again by the Meccans at Uhud he sought

to retrieve his fortune by plundering the remaining wealthy Jews

of Banu Nadir near Medina. The lack of unity amongst the

Jewish tribes led to their rout. Here again, Mohammed broke

the sacred practice of the desert by cutting down the date-palms

outside the village, an act of vandalism even more shocking than

the attack on unarmed caravans during the sacred month. Here

again, a convenient revelation to Mohammed justified this

outrage.
Leaving here the details of Mohammed’s life and the

expansion of Islam soon thereafter towards north into the present

day Middle East, eastward upto Afghanistan and westward along

the Northern coast of Africa right upto the southern part of

Spain, we shall now come to a brief development of Jewish

history from the tenth century onwards. Persecution of the Jews

’n England, Europe and eastwards upto Russia is well

documented. However, within this period of darkness, the Jews

enjoyed a very brief spell of peace and flourished in Southern

Spain during the reign of Abd Ar Rahman and his dynasty. Most

of the Jews during this period had converted to Islam to avoid

Persecution, while secretly harbouring their zeal for their own

religion. The benevolent statesmanship of Ibn Shaprut and Samuel
90 INDIA AND ISRAEL
CHAPTER 4
Ibn Nagdela, the sublime poetry of Judah Halevi and Ibn Gabirol

works of Ibn Ezra and the philosophy of Maimonides, were the

high water-mark of this era. But the situation radically changed

from the onset of 14th century and the Jews barley managed to

survive, while their genius slowly dried up. Around the sunshine

of the Jews in the Moslem areas of Andalusia in Spain, the rest

of Christian Europe remained a world of darkness and oppression

only partly explained by the barbarity of the times. Exploited by

the church, crushed by the nobles, harassed under economic

restrictions, and hemmed in by an alien faith, outside the pale

of civilization, the Jews held out living at the mercy of their

rulers. Except for a brief flicker of Talmudic renaissance in the

Rhine area in the eleventh century, there was no respite. They

were destroyed by the crusaders in the name of God, while the

popes and the princes invented new methods of torture and

harassment. The Talmud was condemned and burnt publicly.

One by one, every Christian country robbed the Jews, drove

them to despair and expelled them to nowhere. Zunz in his

famous statement described the horrors of Medieval Jews thus:
”If there be an ascending scale of suffering, Israel has reached

its highest degree. If the duration of afflictions, and the

patience with which they are borne ennoble, the Jews may

vie with the aristocracy of any land. If a literature which

owns a few classical tragedies is deemed rich, what place

should be assigned to a tragedy which extends over fifteen

centuries in which the poets and actors were also the heroes?”
For a short while, the Jews enjoyed a respite against

oppressions, euphemistically described as the Golden Age in

Moslem Spain. Although the Jews were totally assimilated in the

Moslem Kingdom of Spain for a period of 250 years under the

Omayyad dynasty, they still retained their native intelligence and

thirst for knowledge. They became high officials in the court of

Abd-Ar-Rahim and produced many men of learning; prominent

among these are Hasli, Moses and Ben Ened in the 10th century.

Samuel Ibn Nagdela became the Vizir in the time of Badrs who

succeeded Habus, the other patron of Samuel. Jewish poets of

this age were Judah Haloce and Salmon Ibn Gabriel. The genius
•” „ 4 Tm FOUNDATIONS OF ANTI-SEMITISM 91