50 Things You're Not Supposed To Know: Religion Read Free Page A

viciousness of their attacks. Martin Luther, for example, when he first gave birth to the Protestant movement harshly criticized Catholics for how mean they had been toward Jews. But when he realized that Jews were not any more eager to convert to his interpretation of Christianity than they had been to convert to Catholicism, Luther had a fit. He eventually penned a treatise going by the less than politically correct title of On the Jews and Their Lies , in which he advocated setting on fire Jewish synagogues, stealing all their wealth, prohibiting rabbis to teach on pain ofdeath, and enslaving Jews … yeah, even a drunken Mel Gibson couldn't top this. Incidentally, about 400 years after Luther was done spitting his venom, Hitler's Nazi minions faithfully adopted Luther's program as part of their “final solution.” The Holocaust itself, in fact, can hardly be explained without considering the Christian anti-Semitism preached for centuries throughout Europe. By driving a wedge between church and state and emphasizing individual rights, the Enlightenment had seemed to offer hope to Jewish people but, as the Holocaust made painfully clear, you can't undo such long-standing hatred in just a few decades.
     
    So, the obvious question is: why do the spiritual descendants of those who persecuted Jews are now so infatuated with Israel? The answer is simple. Actually, no, I take that back. Once you understand it, it's quite simple, but the path to get there is less than straightforward. Simple is definitely not the right word, for the answer is so bizarre as to be funny.
     
    The seeds of the fundamentalist love for Israel were planted just around the time when the 19th century was giving way to the 20th. Back then, new interpretations of one of the most complicated books of the Bible (the book of Revelation) were becoming fashionable among conservative Christians. The book of Revelation is no cakewalk to decode. Written at a time when early Christians suffered terribly under the yoke of the Roman Empire, the book ofRevelation is a weirdly symbolic revenge fantasy in which the author gloats at the thought of unbelievers drowning in rivers of blood at the end of times. So, the fact that these new interpretations promised shedding light on this text and offering a new window on the true essence of Christianity attracted much attention. What does this have to do with the modern state of Israel? After all, it hadn't been yet created at this time. Well, the new interpretation of these apocalyptic prophecy went something like this: in order for Jesus to come back, Israel needs to exist, the Temple in Jerusalem needs to be reconstructed, and Israel's enemies need to stage a massive attack against it. So—the Christian fundamentalist thinking went—if we want Jesus to show up in the neighborhood again, we need to support the nation of Israel. If this sounds like less than a newly found love for Jews by conservative Christians, it's because it's not. In this view, Jews are only to be supported in order to act as bait for their enemies, thereby triggering Jesus's return. Once this happens, some Jews will see the light and convert, while the others will die the horrific death that awaits all unbelievers. Ok, under these premises, perhaps even Mel Gibson can learn to love Jews.

05 SEX, SAKE AND ZEN
     
    Most Westerners who become fascinated with Zen Buddhism are intrigued with its reputation as an anti-authoritarian, freedom-loving,individualistic tradition. Books by excellent writers like Alan Watts popularized an image of Zen as a very relaxed, go-with-the-flow type of religion. But even a brief visit to a typical Zen temple is enough to make us painfully aware of the difference between hype and reality. Life in real Zen temples, in fact, is often so structured, regimented and heavily regulated as to quickly dispel the romanticism created by much of the literature about it. Far from being a hippie rendition of Buddhism, Zen discipleship