This weekend the historic Beth Israel Congregation in Jackson, Mississippi was burned and destroyed.
 |
| A photo of the burned synagogue, Beth Israel Congregation |
The suspect was caught on camera and soon arrested: a Catholic Christian student and athlete by the name of Spencer Pittman.
Pttman confessed to his father and to authorities that he burned the synagogue "because of its Jewish ties", and called it "the synagogue of Satan", quoting Revelation 2:9 and Revelation 3:9 from the New Testament.
Pittman's social media accounts are filled with Bible quotes and baseball photos.
Not exactly the kind of person you'd expect to burn a synagogue.
We've seen plenty of antisemitic vitriol and violence from the progressive left, often disguised as anti-Zionism from secular progressives or their Islamic allies. But here we have a young man who, from all appearances, is a politically conservative and committed Christian.
One must wonder, how does a person who quotes the book of Psalms, written by a Jew, or the book of II Corinthians, also written by a Jew, become a Jew hater? How can a person quote Revelation, written by a Jew, as a reason for burning a synagogue?
The answer is yet to be seen, but my suspicion lies firmly on the rising antisemitism of the conservative, right-wing in America. It's the kind of Jew-hating garbage promulgated by Tucker Carlson, Candace Owens, and the larger groyper movement on the right.
So did the New Testament inspire this attack?
A misunderstanding of it did.
Pittman is echoing a misreading of Revelation's "synagogue of Satan" to mean "all Jews are the synagogue of Satan." Revelation 2 and 3 speaks to "those who claim they are Jews but they are not; the synagogue of Satan".
What does that phrase actually mean? Scholars have suggested some possibilities.
One possibility is, this referred to a Christian group in the 1st century who claimed to be Jews but were of gentile lineage (Rev 3:9). Rome had allowed for Jewish exemption from worship of the Roman gods, but no such exemption existed for non-Jews. Thus, some early non-Jewish Christians claimed to be Jewish but were not.
Other Christian scholars suggest it had to do with a dispute between the local Christian and Jewish community in Smyrna. First Fruits of Zion has an in-depth explanation.
Whatever the true meaning, it's clear the verses don't support what antisemites claim: that God is asserting all Jews belong to Satan. Such a view contradicts nearly the entire Bible.
What can be learned from this arson attack by a young devoted Christian man?
- Theology matters. Sometimes it's easy to think that "what you believe" is mostly theoretical, but in reality, what is in the mind and heart comes out in actions.
- Antisemitism is cancerous. It is destroying young minds like Pittman, making the Lion of Judah and King of the Jews to be an antisemite. It is fracturing the Republican Party in the US and the conservative movement broadly.
- Antisemitism is demonic. A young man who is happy and active and by all appearances succeeding in life commits a violent hate crime, burning the very Torah scrolls that are the foundation of his Bible? This is irrational and does not rationally follow. I think the best explanation for such hatred is spiritual. It is the same spirit of Ramses, Balak, Nebuchadnezzar, Haman, Antiochus Epiphanes, the Emperor Titus, Hadrian, Constantine, Muhammed, Hitler, Hamas, Hezbollah, and thousands of others throughout history who have tried and failed to wipe out the people of Israel.