Abstract
Do we not hear echoes of Jules Isaac, and perhaps of his spiritual soulmate, Charles Péguy, in the following passages of article 4 of Nostra aetate?
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24 April 2019
The original version of this book was revised. Imprecisions have been corrected and the index backfilled with missing page references where relevant
Notes
- 1.
Willebrands, “Christians and Jews: A New Vision,” 229.
- 2.
Reference is made to the Table of Correspondences set out in Appendix.
- 3.
Ovey N. Mohammed, “Jewish-Catholic Relations: From Nostra Aetate to the Present,” in Jews and Catholics Together: Celebrating the Legacy of Nostra Aetate: A Symposium Held in Toronto 10 November 2005, ed. Michael Attridge (Ottawa: Novalis, St. Paul University, 2007), 54.
- 4.
Stransky, “The Genesis of Nostra Aetate: An Insider’s Story,” 52–3.
- 5.
Gregory Baum, Is the New Testament Anti-Semitic? A Re-Examination of the New Testament, new rev. ed. (Glen Rock, NJ: Paulist Press, 1965), 347–48.
- 6.
Ibid., 34.
- 7.
Introduction to Ruether, 3–4.
- 8.
Correspondence to the author dated 11 February 2014.
- 9.
While the official Church has accepted the historical-critical method of interpreting the scriptures (in Pius XII’s 1943 encyclical, Divino Afflante Spirito), the Church has yet to acknowledge, according to Baum, that damaging cultural prejudices and hostile reactions to outsiders are to be found in the New Testament as in the Old. However, argues Baum, “[Divino Afflante Spirito and Vatican II] opened the door to methods of biblical studies that lead to these insights.” Even under the most progressive of assumptions, however, it is difficult to square Baum’s point of view with the key Vatican II affirmation in 3:11 of Dei Verbum (“Therefore, since everything asserted by the inspired authors or sacred writers must be held to be asserted by the Holy Spirit, it follows that the books of Scripture must be acknowledged as teaching firmly, faithfully and without error that truth which God wanted put in the sacred writings for the sake of our salvation”). It is true that the caveat, “for the sake of our salvation,” is understood as teaching that the Bible is not without error in the sense that certain Protestant denominations claim it is. The Pontifical Biblical Commission in its Document on the Interpretation of the Bible in the Church issued 21 September 1993 stipulates:
Fundamentalism is right to insist on the divine inspiration of the Bible, the inerrancy of the Word of God, and other biblical truths included in its fundamental points. But its way of presenting these truths is rooted in an ideology that is not biblical, whatever the proponents of this approach might say. For it demands an unshakeable adherence to rigid doctrinal points of view and imposes, as the only source of teaching for Christian life and salvation, a reading of the Bible that rejects all questioning and any kind of critical research…In what concerns the Gospels, fundamentalism does not take into account the development of the gospel tradition, but naively confuses the final stage of this tradition (what the evangelists have written) with the initial (the words and deeds of the historical Jesus)…Its relying upon a non-critical reading of certain texts of the Bible serves to reinforce political ideas and social attitudes that are marked by prejudices – racism, for example – quite contrary to the Christian gospel...Finally, in its attachment to the principle “Scripture alone,” fundamentalism separates the interpretation of the Bible from the Tradition, which, guided by the Spirit, has authentically developed in union with Scripture in the heart of the community of faith…The fundamentalist approach is dangerous, for it is attractive to people who look to the Bible for ready answers to the problems of life….Without saying as much in so many words, fundamentalism actually invites people to a kind of intellectual suicide. It injects into life a false certitude, for it unwittingly confuses the divine substance of the Biblical message with what are in fact its human limitations.
Nonetheless, according to The New Jerome Biblical Commentary, by 3:11 of Dei Verbum,
Clearly Vatican II intended to recapitulate traditional teaching on inspiration. The text refers to four NT passages often cited in the history of the church’s long discussion on inspiration, esp. 2 Tim 3:16 and 2 Pet 1:19-21. At a relatively late stage of the conciliar discussion on inspiration and in response to an intervention By Dom B.C. Butler, 2 Tim 3:16-17 was incorporated so that there could be no mistaking how the council fathers understood the doctrine of the inspiration of the Scriptures and what they considered its purpose to be. They intended to recapitulate the teaching of the (NT) Scriptures themselves.
- 10.
La NEF (no. 48, November 1948: 158–160).
- 11.
Isaac, Jésus et Israël, 562.
- 12.
Isaac, “Soixante-Dix-Neuf lettres de Jules Isaac à F. Lovsky,” 299–300.
- 13.
Ibid., 331.
- 14.
In correspondence to the author dated 11 November 2014, Gregory Baum wrote, “My formulation that the shadow of sin lies even on the Bible is a reference to cultural prejudices and hostile reactions to non-threatening outsiders found in the Scriptures.”
- 15.
Jean Daniélou, Dialogue with Israel (np: Helicon Press, Inc., 1968), 61.
- 16.
Isaac, Jésus et Israël, 358, footnote 1.
- 17.
Related to the author at a meeting with Fr. Thomas Stransky in Totowa, New Jersey, on 17 May 2016.
- 18.
Isaac, Jésus et Israël, New Revised Ed., 61.
- 19.
Philippians, 2:9-11.
- 20.
Simon, Les Premiers Chrétiens, 38–39. Simon cites Acts, 2:46–47 in support of his contention that the first Jewish Christians were observant Jews.
- 21.
Isaac, Jésus et Israël, New Revised Ed., 170.
- 22.
Démann: 22.
- 23.
Madaule, “La Tragédie juive et le mystère d’Israël,” 14.
- 24.
Baum, The Jews and the Gospel, 2.
- 25.
Quoted in Kaspi, Jules Isaac, 249–50.
- 26.
Isaac, Expériences de ma vie. Péguy, 103.
- 27.
Isaac, “Soixante-Dix-Neuf lettres de Jules Isaac à F. Lovsky,” 326.
- 28.
Quoted in Kaspi, Jules Isaac, 251.
- 29.
de Provenchères: 33.
- 30.
Daniel Isaac, Jean-Claude Isaac, “Note des fils de Jules Isaac,” Cahiers de l’Association des amis de Jules Isaac, no. 3 (1981): 65.
- 31.
Quoted in Kaspi, Jules Isaac, 249.
- 32.
Levinas: 372-73.
- 33.
Quoted in Charmet: 522.
- 34.
Willebrands, “Christians and Jews: A New Vision,” 222.
- 35.
Louise-Marie Nietz, N.D.S., “Histoire de la Déclaration ‘Nostra Aetate,’” Sens, revue de l’Amitié Judéo-Chrétienne de France 5 (May 1996): 190.
- 36.
de Provenchères: 31.
- 37.
Introduction to Ruether, 4.
- 38.
Stransky, “The Foundation of the Secretariat for Promoting Christian Unity,” 72.
- 39.
Ibid. Stjepan Schmidt in the English translation of his biography of Augustin Bea, published under the title, Augustin Bea: the Cardinal of Unity (New Rochelle, NY, New City Press, 1992), purported to quote extracts from this document, including its fourth paragraph.
- 40.
Archivio Segreto Vaticano, Concilium Vaticanum II, Box 1452, Secretariatus ad Christianorum Unitatem Fovendam. English translation by Francesca Cadeddu, PhD, Fondazione per le Scienze Religiose Giovanni XXIII, Bologna, and John Borelli, PhD, Georgetown University, Washington, DC. Thanks also to Claire Maligot (Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes) who clarified the last words in pencil and confirmed that the document is a photocopy of the original that is housed in the Munich Jesuit Archives.
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Tobias, N.C. (2017). The Rest of the Backstory. In: Jewish Conscience of the Church. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-46925-6_13
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