September 10, 2024 • 51 mins
In this episode of Church Potluck: A Smorgasbord of Christian Curiosity, Rabbi Albert Slomovitz shares his journey from chaplaincy to interfaith scholar, offering insights on bridging Jewish-Christian relations. The conversation explores how contextual knowledge and interpretation, such as Midrash, can clarify difficult biblical passages for both faiths. Through examples like the "eye for an eye" passage and the portrayal of Jewish people in Passion plays, the episode highlights the value of interfaith dialogue for fostering mutual understanding, while moments of humor remind listeners of the importance of cultural sensitivity in combating prejudice.
The views expressed on Church Potluck are solely those of the participants and do not represent any organization.
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
All right.
So, Rabbi, it looks likethey've got a busy day ahead for
you here at Berry College.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
Oh, absolutely A lot of things going on, all right.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
Well, that's good, but we get to be the first.
We get the first crack at you.
Yes, yes, yes, although this iskind of the second crack
because of all the grass blowingout there that they were just
doing all the leaf blowing.
Well, welcome everyone toChurch Potluck, where we are
serving up a smorgasbord ofChristian curiosity.
I'm your host, dale McConkie,sociology professor and United
(00:43):
Methodist pastor, and you knowthere are two keys to a good
church potluck plenty of varietyand engaging conversation.
And this is exactly what we tryto do here on Church Potluck
sitting down with friends andsharing our ideas on a variety
of topics from a variety ofacademic disciplines and a
variety of Christian andreligious traditions.
I have just a two-personpodcast today.
(01:07):
Usually we have some sidekicksand some extra voices on, but
just two people today.
It is time to introduce ourguest, rabbi Albert Slomovitz.
Yay, good to have you on thepodcast, rabbi, thank you.
So let's see, I'm going to gothrough your credentials and
then you can add to them here.
So you are the founder of theChristian.
I'm sorry, you are founder ofthe Jewish Christian Discovery
(01:29):
Center.
Right, you are author of A NewLook at Rabbi Jesus, jews and
Christians Finally Reconnected.
You are a chaplain, like I hadbeen for nine years.
You are a chaplain for the Navyand also for law enforcement.
What type of law enforcementwere you?
Cub County Police?
Oh, very nice, very nice.
And you've got lots of fancydegrees and you've taught at
Kennesaw State and you've gotquite an impressive array.
(01:51):
What other kinds of thingswould you like to add about
yourself?
Speaker 2 (01:53):
First of all, I'm retired from the Navy Okay, too
old to do that and I've writtena few other books.
One is about the SupremeSupreme Court in Racism, oh, wow
.
And the other one is called theFighting Rabbis, which is a
history of rabbis in the USmilitary for the whole history
up to Desert Storm, desertShield.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
Oh, very sweet.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
And I've authored some children's books.
Speaker 1 (02:15):
That's part of your at the Jewish Christian
Discovery Center connected tothat project Right, very nice.
Why don't you tell us aboutyour children's books real
quickly?
Speaker 2 (02:30):
If I could take a step back.
Sure, and, by the way, it'sgreat to be on Barry today,
great, beautiful college.
I have two backgrounds thatsort of came together about 10
years ago.
I have my military backgroundand that was fascinating because
there were only a handful ofrabbis in.
I was in the Navy at that time.
So inevitably people would comeup to us and say they looked at
our insignia and say what isthat?
And first it had Hebrew.
It was supposed to be thelittle tablets of the Ten
(02:51):
Commandments, and then itchanged to Roman numerals.
But it was very unique, notseen that often.
So once we said we were rabbis,people had all sorts of
questions for us and I was askedquestions in the oddest
situations.
I was once in a gym changingclothes with the other fellows
and there'd been a Marinecaptain whom I knew, and so we
(03:12):
just exercised together.
I forgot what we did, but wewere changing and he said Rabbi,
can I ask you a question?
I said sure.
He said what do the Jewsbelieve about Jesus?
Now, at that point the rest ofthe locker room got very silent.
So we were literally dressed andundressed, and I did respond to
(03:33):
him and we can get into some ofthat later.
But the interesting thing wasthat I discovered in the
military that people had nevermet a knowledgeable Jewish
person, certainly not a rabbiand once they got to know you
and you got to know them andthey felt comfortable, then they
asked the questions and so thatsort of set me up for what was
(03:56):
coming.
At the same time I was able toattend Loyola University of
Chicago.
We were assigned in Chicago andI earned two degrees.
One was my second master's ininterfaith relations and the
second one was my doctorate inAmerican history.
And I put those two thingstogether, the military
background and sort of theacademic background.
(04:17):
And then I looked at the worldand saw all the prejudice and
anti-Semitism.
So I found it.
I wrote a book, the one youmentioned, a New Look at Rabbi
Jesus, jews and Christians,finally Reconnected, because I
wanted to show people howsimilar we were.
That's the whole point of allthis, that once we discover that
Jews and Christians, that weare related, I would say then
(04:42):
it's hard to be prejudiced.
You mentioned your cousinbefore.
Then it's hard to be prejudiced.
You mentioned your cousinbefore.
It's hard to be prejudicedagainst someone who you're
literally related to.
If that's your cousin or yourbrother, whatever you might
disagree, but you're not goingto go hating a lot on that
person.
So that's sort of the goal.
And so in the midst of that,I've written some books for
(05:02):
children and we have four booksthat are printed and beautifully
illustrated, I might add.
They really are quiteattractive.
We found a lady's name is RemyBryant.
She's down in Atlanta and thebooks were.
It's a whole world.
First I wrote the original bookand then the children wanted to
do activities, for example,wanted to do activities, for
(05:29):
example coloring, and I'mshowing it.
I know this is a podcast, butthere are pictures and then
there are word puzzles in theback for the kids to play with.
And then we had a request for aSpanish translation.
Each original book generatedtwo other books.
We actually have a video whichI will show.
I have a lecture later thatvideo with actors and directors
and producers and all that, aseven-minute video which I think
(05:51):
I showed when I lectured at theTemple recently.
Speaker 1 (05:55):
Yes, I had the honor of listening to your
presentation at Rod F Shalom.
About what?
Speaker 2 (06:03):
several months ago I don't remember exactly how far
back, but Right.
So that is sort of the genesisof all this that I found myself
in a unique position, from themilitary background, the
academic background, to be ableto speak with some authority
about why we're related.
And so the Jewish ChristianDiscovery Center has been going
on for six years now, and we'refinding that there's a tidal
(06:25):
wave of prejudice that we'retrying to push back a little bit
on.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
I wasn't going to go to the prejudice right off the
bat, but let's go ahead and dothat, because we have had an
outbreak in some sense ofprejudice.
Or maybe it's not an outbreak,maybe it's always been there,
but it's been much more visiblein the last several months.
Speaker 2 (06:49):
I could speak to that , or you could speak to that in
terms of some of the things thathave been happening just right
here in our own little northernGeorgia.
Yeah, I must say it's justdisconcerting in a way.
I agree Because the example Igive is that Judaism is the
mother of Christianity, gavebirth to Christianity, the
Jewishness of Jesus,Christianity gave birth to
Christianity, the Jewishness ofJesus.
I'm actually finishing up acurriculum for Sunday school
(07:10):
kids that I put together with aCatholic educator and a Baptist
minister, Rabbi, priest andminister.
Speaker 1 (07:15):
I was going to say there's a joke in there
somewhere.
Speaker 2 (07:18):
Right, and the name of the book is the Jewish Life
of Jesus, and we start with hiscircumcision, his bris, we call
it, and all the way through hisdeath.
And so there's, every aspect ofJesus's life was a Jewish one,
one would think.
And again, the weird thingabout how my brain operates is
that I'm doing two things atonce.
(07:39):
The history side of me iswanting to make sure that I can
verify what I say on the otherside, and the other side is the
interface side, so I'm not justsort of saying, yeah, jesus is
Jewish, believe it, I can provethat.
So I go back and forth and itis unnerving and very much
(07:59):
unsettling.
Listen, if you disagree with thepolicy of a government any
government we'll say Canada.
So I disagree with the Canadiangovernment about, let's say,
something, environmental, I sayyes, I vehemently disagree with
that decision.
However, I don't turn aroundand say, oh, and, by the way, I
hate all Canadians.
I mean that's illogical.
(08:20):
So if you disagree with thegovernment policy, say so and
write.
Nobody writes letters anymore.
Send an email to yourrepresentatives in Congress, the
president, whatever you want.
But to somehow merge that intoprejudice against everyone,
that's the part that'sunsettling to me.
(08:41):
So I started this six years agoand, yes, anti-semitism existed
, but I didn't think it was onsort of this level.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
Yeah, I 100% agree with you that we should be
emphasizing the Jewishbackground and the Jewish life
of Jesus.
Last episode we had on ChurchPotluck, we talked about the
video series called the Chosen.
Speaker 2 (09:02):
Right, I'm familiar with that.
Speaker 1 (09:03):
You're familiar with that, and one of the things that
I really emphasized in thatpodcast was just how wonderful
it was, that's in terms of allthe video representations of
Jesus I've ever seen.
That's one of the most Jewishones, and they took time to go
back into the Jewish culture andsome of the reasons.
So have you found that to be agood, positive step, or were
(09:24):
there things about that youfound problematic?
What were your experiences.
Speaker 2 (09:25):
No, I like their approach.
I really do.
And what's interesting is thatin my context, I do a lot of
visiting to churches and in mychaplaincy work I had friends
who were ministers of all sortsLutheran, methodist, catholic,
whatever and so once you gobeyond the titles and you get
into them as people, there'sthis really basic interest,
(09:49):
don't forget, for Jesus.
We know him in the scripturesas a baby, as a child, and then
within a little bit he's a grownman.
That's right.
By the way, the example isMoses in Exodus.
He's a baby raised in the houseof Pharaoh, then he's a young
man.
The tradition gaps, thechildhood, adolescence and all
that.
So what I do is I fill that in.
(10:11):
Where did he live?
What were the influences in hislife?
How was he educated?
And people.
When I start talking about that, I think that people are going
to say, oh, too much information.
But I've never had that.
I've had people say to me oh,we're glad you're doing this
because we don't know.
No one's ever told us what thatis.
(10:32):
So you're helping us by fillingin those gaps.
Speaker 1 (10:41):
And I think that there are so many things in the
Christian scriptures in the NewTestament that you can't
understand without that contextor at least it's very difficult
and it just seems there are somany things that are said that
just seem very out of place andodd, unless you understand the
cultural context of the time.
Speaker 2 (10:53):
Oh, absolutely.
I mean, when I studiedundergraduate I went to Columbia
University.
In the Jewish TheologicalSeminary they have what's called
a joint program.
So I remember one day I signedup for a class, a Bible class,
at Columbia.
So I walk in the classroom andon the old blackboards again
we're dating ourselves.
But it said Acadian,mesopotamian, babylonian.
(11:15):
And so I kind of said out loudoh, I'm in the wrong class
because I'm here to study Bible.
And the instructor said, no,you're in the right class, but
if you're going to study Abrahamand Sarah, you study the world
in which they lived, which makes100% common sense.
If someone's studying today, ifI'm writing a book about 2024, I
(11:36):
have to talk about the internetand artificial intelligence and
things like that.
I guess I could write itwithout it, but if I made a
reference to it, everyone wouldsay, of course, but if it's
going to be 200 or 300 yearsfrom now, I have to have a
little asterisk about exactlywhat that was and what was going
on.
So yes, and that's kind of thesad part for me, that sometimes
(12:01):
some of the Christian friends Imeet will say we just study the
Bible alone and withoutcommentary, without that larger
context, and that's where we getin trouble.
That's where we get in trouble.
There's a number of stories inthe Scriptures that if they're
not interpreted for people, thenthey may misunderstand them.
(12:23):
I mean the Hebrew Bible, theChristian Bible, the same thing,
and one of the examples I giveis Exodus 21.
Eye for an eye, tooth for tooth,hand for hand, I mean the Bible
says you exact revenge.
However, for us, when we'rereading the Bible, in the bottom
of the page there's commentaryand the rabbis say no, it says
(12:45):
it, but it doesn't mean that.
What it means is you compensatepeople If you injure somebody
and they're out of work, or painand suffering, that sort of
thing.
So you clearly, if somebodycuts you off in traffic, you
don't have the right to ziparound and cut them off.
It's just not how society goes.
Speaker 1 (13:02):
I had also heard one commentator say that is also
meant to be a restriction, aneye for an eye, that you do not
do anything more than what hadbeen done for you, but the idea
that you can really see this andassume that it means one thing.
But there's much more nuancethere and you need to know the
context.
Speaker 2 (13:19):
In the Jewish context , what we call it is midrash,
which is wrestling with the text, or understanding the text, and
I want to give people that'swhat I'm going to say in my
lecture today.
I want to give people thefreedom to do that.
Just to take a verse in theBible, because if it's not
explained in a way, listen, mybook is a commentary to the book
(13:41):
of Matthew, so it's sort ofunusual for a rabbi to be doing
commentary, but I had theacademic background from Loyola
and history whatever.
But Matthew was a Jewish bookwritten for the Jewish community
, but Jesus was Jewish.
I mean, it's all a Jewishaffair.
But if you don't understand it,there's the scene with Pontius
Pilate where he's asking who doyou want to crucify Jesus?
(14:05):
Or, by the way, it's notBarabbas, it's Bar Abbas.
If I have time, I'll mentionthat.
But part of that story thecrowd allegedly says his blood
be upon us and upon our children.
Okay, tell me what that means,because I once had somebody ask
me was the Holocaust God'spunishment, god's fulfillment of
(14:29):
that verse?
I'm shaking my head in disgustafter that, Right right, but
this was a young man who didn'tknow any better and never had
someone explain it to him orgive him any possible other
explanation.
So, yes, so the Bible obviouslyis wonderful, but we have to
understand it in its context.
(14:50):
If not, I think we're doing adisservice to ourselves,
honestly.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
What do you think are some of the biggest and most
consistent misunderstandingsthat Christians have in the
conversations you've had withthem?
Speaker 2 (15:08):
in the conversations you've had with them.
Gosh, it really depends, I'dsay.
The good news is that peoplehave questions.
The bad news is that sometimesthe questions are very
elementary.
A quick example we were seeingabout three years ago.
There was a group of peoplewhen the Braves opened their new
stadium down in Cobb County.
We're the group that werelooking at the stadium.
Okay, fine, wonderful.
So we're having lunch and I'msitting across from a man and he
(15:30):
says I'm a deacon at my church.
I said great.
I said I'm a rabbi, so we'lltalk business.
We're conversing a little bitand then he says to me in a kind
of serious voice you know, Inever figured out what do you
people do when you go toservices?
And I was quiet for a minute.
I was taken aback by that I saidwe get together, we pray, we
(15:52):
talk, we eat, we leave.
Speaker 1 (15:54):
I mean basically whatever you do, it's a church
potluck.
Except it's a synagogue potluck.
Speaker 2 (16:01):
I'm sort of you know, whacking myself in the head.
Here's a grown man.
He was like 55, 60.
If you're a deacon of yourchurch you're like wow, I mean,
that's a big deal.
People look to you and sayyou're well-versed and you know
the rituals of the church.
And for him to kind of comeover the top and again in a
million years only because hewas sitting with me by chance
and we're just having thisbanter back and forth.
(16:23):
He felt comfortable enough tosay what do you all do?
Now I could have said likeLeviticus, bring your animals,
we'll sacrifice your animals.
I mean, I don't know what.
I could have said anything andhe would have said, okay, but
wow.
So in many ways we're just atthat point of beginning to learn
about each other, without evengoing to the traditional
(16:47):
prejudice against Jews and allthat, just sort of even before
that.
If you're asking me what we do,come, go to a service, and
that's sort of the sadness thatthe interesting part about this
is.
In the military you had muchmore access to Jewish services
and Protestant services andCatholic services and Muslim
(17:08):
services, whatever, becausewe're all in the same complex.
So all the chaplains it's likebeing in university, you had
people next to you, so we talkedall the time and I ended up
being a senior chaplain at NavalAir Station, pensacola on my
last tour and I was responsiblefor everyone's religious freedom
.
So we had to make sure thatevery group had what they needed
(17:29):
, and I would go around andoften speak, and so we just had
this great environment oflearning and studying together,
and sometimes the chaplainswould come to me and say we're
reading this verse for ourservice this Sunday.
What do you think about it?
So we had that experience.
Speaker 1 (17:44):
Oh very nice, Very nice.
Speaker 2 (17:45):
But once you get out then you find that people are
much more isolated.
In that effect it's one church,one synagogue and you kind of
focus on your needs and growingthat building and people lose
sight of the larger society orthe larger possibilities of
dealing with some of theseinterfaith issues.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
Very interesting.
I love that imagery of everyonegetting there and still holding
on to their own faith, buthaving that opportunity to
interact with one another and tolearn and grow from that, I
really like that.
That's my understanding.
Oh, I'm sorry, go ahead.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
I was going to say I've learned also, the more I'm
in this business, the more iteven strikes me more the
connections that I once I was atCatholic Church and somehow we
got onto the confessional.
We're just talking.
So I said to one of the priestsI said, father, what is the
basis of confessional?
The confessional?
And he had a big smile on hisface.
(18:41):
I said why are you smiling?
He said we took it from you.
So why didn't we took it fromyou?
I said what do you mean?
Took it from us?
He said no.
He said it's based on the TenCommandments and the Ten
Commandments and we put our sins, we use that as a framework and
that's the confessional.
I didn't know that.
Okay, so that reinforces mybasic belief of how connected we
(19:03):
are.
But we go through life notknowing that.
So that sort of we lose by notsitting together and looking at
the same text and saying, oh,you see, let's say the suffering
servant in Isaiah this way, butthere's a possibility of seeing
it another way.
That doesn't detract, believewhat you want, but at least know
(19:25):
that somebody else could see itdifferently.
And life goes on.
Speaker 1 (19:29):
Yeah, yeah, very nice , very nice.
Hey, let's play a game show.
Okay, all right.
So this game show we're goingto call it, is it Kosher?
All right, so you tell me I'mgoing to say a few things and
you're going to tell me whetherthis is something acceptable
(19:50):
that Christians do or somethingthat we should be careful about
or worried about.
Okay, all right, is it kosher?
First question is it kosher?
Using the word kosher for agame show, is there anything
sacred about the word kosher?
And this is diminishing it byno, no.
Speaker 2 (20:04):
Kosher means clean.
Yeah, that'd be okay.
Yeah, what's going on in theworld?
You can call it kosher.
Speaker 1 (20:11):
Yay, all right, I got that one right.
All right, I'm real curious tosee your answer on this one.
Is it kosher to call someone aJew?
Speaker 2 (20:18):
these days, I have noticed a very conscious
decision I made long ago not tosay that because of the
potential of it beingmisinterpreted.
That sort of.
There's a fine line to that.
I think people would preferJewish.
I'm a Jewish person.
Speaker 1 (20:33):
Yeah, that's what I have been trying to do on a very
consistent basis, because ofthe possibility of the way it
has been used.
Speaker 2 (20:40):
Yeah, I mean if you would say I love Jews, okay,
fine, but unfortunately I waswith someone again years ago in
the military that just bought acar.
When you go to Okinawa, japan,we're in Okinawa, you turn cars
over, so you're on the islandfor as long as you are.
You buy a car to get around andthen when you leave, you just
(21:02):
sell it to the next person.
That's background and, by theway, it's shift, and it's shift
with your left hand, so thedriver's seat's on the other
side.
Too much information.
So, at any rate, I was talkingto somebody.
He said, yeah, I bought a car.
So of course your question ishow much?
And he said I drew them down.
And five seconds later, twoseconds later, I kind of stopped
(21:23):
, like okay, because my brain isjust, I know this guy, he's a
good guy, but should I saysomething?
And then his face turned red,he caught what he had done.
No, I didn't mean it.
I didn't mean it.
I said okay, but I mean we justkind of left it like that
because I couldn't say, oh,you're absolved.
But so when you say the word Jew, unfortunately and I don't
(21:45):
think people, yeah, they don'tmean that I hate Jewish people
and I want them to die, blah,blah, blah, but nevertheless I
don't need an insult, you know.
I mean just say I bargainedthem down, but that feeds into
Jews and money and Jews andpower and all that and Jews
control.
So it's just something weshould.
(22:06):
I'm very cautious about thewords I speak and the language I
use, and so I think it's fairto say to people really, can you
eliminate that please?
Or say it another way, becausejust flip it to yourself.
I mean I wouldn't say I mess itas somebody down or something
like that.
I mean really, or whatever.
So it's just, it's not helpful.
(22:28):
So, yeah, if you can say Jewishanother way or Jew another way,
do that.
Speaker 1 (22:31):
Great, thank you.
And a little side note to ouraudience.
If you hear some thumping andsome background noise, rabbi
Slumovitz, I'm sorry.
Rabbi Slumovitz is a veryexpressive talker and so he's
using his hands and he's hittingthe table sometimes, and so
this is just so.
That's exactly so.
When you hear that noise.
This is him being enthusiasticin his conversation, so take
those noises as good things thathe's having.
(22:52):
We're alive, that's right, Allright, so we'll go ahead and
thank you very much for youranswer there.
So the next thing is it kosherChristian passion plays.
Historically, the Passion playsabout the last seven days of
Jesus' life.
Very often have historicallyhad the characterization of very
often being hateful towardJewish people and blaming the
(23:15):
Jewish people are stilluncomfortable with that, with
those because of the historicalconsequence if they're done in a
more proper way these days.
Do you have any opinion orthought on that?
Speaker 2 (23:31):
Yes, great question.
By the way, I'll try not to tap.
Speaker 1 (23:33):
Oh, it's okay if you do.
Now the folks know what's goingon.
Speaker 2 (23:36):
I think that's an area of concern.
My wife and I went to see JesusChrist Superstar a few years
ago at Cobb County and there'sone scene where it's like I
alluded to before, that thecrowd is saying crucify him.
And I whispered to my wife thisis where we get in trouble.
So, yeah, I mean again, allthese scenes have to be
(23:56):
understood in context.
What's going on?
As an author myself, this iswhat the Jesuits I mean, it's
great, I'm a rabbi with Jesuitcredentials.
But the Jesuits taught me tolook at the books from the
perspective of the authors.
What are they trying to do?
In the Christian scriptures, orthe Jewish scriptures for that
matter, they're trying to make apoint to follow Jesus.
Okay, we get that.
(24:17):
So, yeah, there has to beprotagonists and antagonists,
etc.
But what's always amazed me isthat you would think that the
Christians would process okay,god chose Jesus and this is
Jesus's life, so all this ispart of the divine plan.
Like the parallel would bePharaoh In Exodus.
(24:41):
It says a number of times Godhardened Pharaoh's heart.
You would think one plaguewould be enough, all the water
blood, okay, and then a secondplague.
I mean, really there's a lot ofplagues going on and you would
think the Egyptians would say toPharaoh what Enough already,
let us go.
Let them go because the cattleare dying.
There's lies, I mean, whateverit is, but God hardened
(25:04):
Pharaoh's heart, so you have togo through this whole cycle.
So I think in many ways thefunction of Pharaoh is like the
function of any antagonist inthe story just to build up
emotions and heighten the story.
Think for a second If Moses andAaron had gone to Pharaoh time
(25:27):
number one and said you know,let our people go.
And there was silence for aminute and Pharaoh said okay,
have a nice day.
Well then you don't have anExodus story, you don't have a
crossing of the Red Sea beingpursued by the Egyptians, you
don't have Mount Sinai, youdon't have all that.
So the story needs to have thisbuilt-in drama.
But I always wondered whyChristians didn't just say this
(25:47):
was all part of the divine planand whatever is happening on
earth.
In fact, there is a gospelcalled Gospel of Judas.
I'm sure you're familiar withit, Written around the year.
It's in my book.
I'm pushing the book a littlebit, that's all right.
It's written around the year120.
It's on a papyrus.
It was found in Egypt a littlebit.
It's written around the year120.
It's on a papyrus.
It was found in Egypt.
(26:07):
It's called the Gospel of Judas,where Judas and Jesus are
having a conversation and Jesusis saying to Judas you're my
number one disciple.
And Judas says why?
Because Jesus says you'reletting me go of my earthly body
and then I'm taking my place inheaven next to God, so you're
doing exactly what I asked you.
And then, and this is the keypoint here Judas says back to
(26:28):
Jesus and again, I'm not makingthis up, this is an actual
document that's been translated.
Judas says to Jesus how willpeople perceive me?
And Jesus says look at the sky,look at the night sky.
You're my brightest star.
And this is 120.
So this is like peopleconceivably a few generations
from the original event.
(26:49):
So they're seeing Judas in atotally different light and I
wish more of that would occur.
I wish more people would seeJudas like that.
But it always struck me as justbeing so odd that if this was
God's plan in the beginning,then all this is supposed to
happen like it's supposed tohappen, and everyone's an actor
(27:12):
doing their part.
So why would you take some ofthe actors and say ah, we're
blaming you, but the wholeessence, as far as I see it, of
Christianity is the death andthe resurrection, and I mean
this lovingly.
If Jesus lives to be 100 anddies in his sleep, let's say
okay, good, but you don't getthe drama of the resurrection
(27:36):
which all the Gospels portray.
Yeah.
So, unfortunately, by tellingthe story without any sort of
again context or way tounderstand it, people do come
back and that's really hard.
How do you defend against that?
People say the Jews killedJesus.
No, were there some people whodisagreed with him?
Sure, are there some people whodisagree today with priests,
(28:00):
ministers and rabbis?
Yeah, so that's not unusual.
But to have that as the basisof a relationship, that's pretty
bad.
Speaker 1 (28:10):
Yeah, I agree with that.
And another way that I look atit as well, when I read the
scriptures, I have no sense ofJewish people as a whole having
this kind of hatred at all forJesus.
And you do have that one scene.
But even that one scene veryclearly makes it clear that the
leadership, the establishment atthe time was the one that was
fomenting the anger.
And, yes, it seems that Jesuswas a prophet who was speaking
(28:32):
out very harshly against theleadership of the time.
The Jewish leadership, just as,in my mind, the Christian
leadership of today, deserves tobe criticized for that.
But that doesn't mean that allthe American people deserve that
kind of, or all Christiansdeserve that kind of criticism.
So I've never understood thatleap to anti-Semitism.
Speaker 2 (28:51):
It's horribly unfortunate because, again,
jesus was Jewish and so when Ivisited Auschwitz which again a
horrible experiencetheoretically he would have been
one of the victims.
I mean he's Jewish, so he wouldhave been there and his family
would have been there.
I spoke at a church recentlyand I gave out some of the
(29:14):
children's books that I'mtapping You're fine and I told
them that Jesus is Jewish.
We have a big program forHanukkah Christmas.
I give kids menorahs, littleplastic menorahs and stars of
David to put on their Christmastree.
Kids love it.
So I was speaking at church andone of the kids says to me Jesus
was Jewish.
I said yes, so he raises hishand.
He said so what were Joseph andMary?
(29:35):
What religion?
I said, okay, think about it.
A second.
He said oh, they were Jewishtoo.
I said yeah, I mean it's like afamily.
I mean sometimes family look, Ihave kids, I have grandkids.
Not everyone gets along 100% ofthe time, but sometimes you
have family arguments, but it'sstill family at the end of the
day.
So sometimes people say thingsthey don't mean, they apologize,
(30:06):
and so if we could see thisonly as a family, then it would
be eliminated.
But unfortunately we're dealingwith centuries of teachings
that Christianity replacedJudaism.
It's called supersession.
Speaker 1 (30:13):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (30:13):
Big word, but that's what it means, and so we're
still, in some ways, I'd saythat some of the clergy is
getting better because we sayHebrew Bible, christian Bible,
jewish scriptures, hebrewscriptures, whatever.
But we're starting to realizethat after Vatican II— Pope John
Paul II yeah Nostradate, ohsorry the Catholic Church in
(30:34):
1965 says that they'rerecognizing Judaism as a valid
religion, which took 1906 yearsOkay.
But what we say is that we'recovenanted.
Just like Christians arecovenanted with God, so are we.
So there's two covenants withGod.
So we really have to get onthat level of equality and just
(30:54):
say, yeah, you see God this way,we see God this way.
But let's talk about all theconnections we have.
And that's the, again.
The saddest part about this isthat we don't see the
connections.
And I must say to my Christianfriends, even within the
Christian world there's a lot ofdissension about who's a real
Christian, who's not a Christian.
(31:15):
Oh, 100%.
And so I'll visit somebody andsay, hey, you guys.
And I'll mention Loyola.
I'll say, oh, I have a Catholicbackground.
And people say, oh, catholics,a Catholic background.
And people say, oh, catholics.
I say, what do you mean?
Oh, catholics, oh, they're notreally Christian.
I say, whoa, whoa, whoa.
I'm not talking about that.
I said if you're a Protestant,you come from the church, you
come from the Catholic church,that's your history.
And then, of course, the churchcomes from Judaism.
(31:37):
So we're going to start bysaying we have no connection,
we're separated.
Then it's going to be hard tomake that connection.
Speaker 1 (31:50):
Well, Rabbi Slomovitz , thank you so much for playing,
Is it, Kosher?
I wanted to finish up here andwe'll give you the last word, so
you can finish up any way thatyou want.
But just having a conversationa little bit about some of the
more difficult points, I reallyappreciate your effort to find
(32:13):
the commonality, find the commonhistory, find the connectedness
, but there are some aspects ofChristian theology that would
seem to be in stark contrastwith Judaism, and so I'm just
curious to get your take onthese.
And you know, the most obviousone would be the fact that Jesus
was not just a human but he wasalso divine, that he was God
incarnate, and that seems to befor most Jews, I would imagine
(32:35):
you know a proclamation too farright, that it crosses the line
and that kind of outside of therealm of Judaism.
So where is the commonconnection?
Or how should Jewish people andChristians be understanding
that together?
Speaker 2 (32:48):
I have a great answer .
A few weeks ago I was at awedding reception or sort of an
engagement reception, and one ofthe people was Jewish, one was
not, and one of the relatives ofthe non-Jewish person said I
hear you're a rabbi.
I said yes.
So he said I have a questionfor you.
He said I've been raised mywhole life that we're waiting
(33:11):
for the second coming of Jesus.
I said okay.
And he said I know for theJewish people you're waiting for
the Messiah to come like firsttime.
I said correct.
So he said which is it?
And I said you know, I'll takeeither one.
I'll take either one Because weknow from Isaiah, chapter 11,
that when the Messiah comes and,by the way, this is a big deal,
(33:40):
I mean, when the Messiah comes,it's supposed to be a time of
peace and the lion will lie withthe lamb, etc.
If there's a coming again andit's connected to Jesus and
that's what it is and it's timeof peace, hooray.
And he loved that.
We're both waiting, and so Ijust want to put that off to the
side and say, yeah, jewishpeople look at Jesus as a rabbi,
(34:02):
a prophet.
Even Messiah means anointed.
There were other peoplepreviously, so just not the
Messiah.
Right, right and again.
Picture yourself in Jerusalem.
Pick an early decade 30, 40, 50.
Jesus is killed by the Romans,but the Romans are still there
(34:23):
and the persecution is gettingworse because they're tightening
their grip.
So if we were alive, then I'mputting on my history hat for a
second.
I teach history at KennesawState and I ask my students to
try and see history in real time.
In real time, whatconversations were they having?
Was Jesus the Messiah?
The Romans are still killingpeople, and now they're killing
(34:44):
early Christians.
At that time they were saying Iguess not, because if you look
out our door they're the Romanlegions and they're still
killing people, or the temple isdestroyed in the year 70.
So I think it's legitimate tohave a conversation about were
the criteria for the Messiah metat that time?
(35:06):
Was it a time of peace?
Was it not?
Listen, believe what you want.
I mean believe.
But that doesn't mean that wetake the belief and whack
somebody over the head with it.
That's the thing.
From the Jewish perspective, wesay, yeah, we're waiting for
the Messiah.
Okay, you think the Messiahcame, is coming again.
Okay too.
Let's say somebody says hecomes once a century.
(35:29):
Okay, good, I mean it's allgood, it doesn't matter.
It doesn't matter as long as ifa tree falls in my yard, my
neighbors come and help me, orif a tree falls in my neighbor's
yard that I go and say what doyou need?
So in a way, it's sort ofparadoxical that you have a
belief that, instead of justbeing a belief, it's used as a
(35:52):
sort of negative force againstsomeone else.
You'll give me a time frame,but I'll tell you a quick story.
Grandmother was at home and wehad a visiting nurse to take
care of grandmother.
And she comes in and she looksat the wall I have Jewish stuff
and she says oh, what is that?
I said Hebrew, I'm a rabbi.
And then I explained to her Iwas a Navy chaplain.
(36:13):
End of the day she walks outand she says can I say a prayer?
Like I'm going to go home andsay a prayer.
So I figure, oh, that's sweet,you're going to say a prayer for
my grandmother it's actually mywife's grandmother and she says
no.
I said what are you going topray for?
She says I'm praying for you.
I said, ok, good health and allthat.
(36:34):
She says, no, you're godless.
And I said what she said yeah,if you don't believe in Jesus,
you have no belief, like nothingcounts.
And I said, well, I'm out.
I said I'm a rabbi, jesus wascalled a rabbi and I said some
of the prayers.
He said I say some of the sameprayers.
I pray to God, I believe in Godvery much.
(36:56):
And wow, I said I'm okay.
But the fact that she feltcompelled first of all to say
this to me but she was going topray for me because I didn't
believe exactly one way, that'skind of what we have to ask
ourselves Is this at the end ofthe day, is that what our belief
(37:20):
is, that we're so focused andsure that this is our belief?
But what about when I was inOkinawa?
We had Shinto and Confucius andall sorts of people, indigenous
Okinawan beliefs.
I never went to them and said,okay, all this is trash.
No, in fact, the Japanese aresort of multi-believers that
(37:42):
missionaries would come to theirhome and say you want to be a
Baptist?
Yeah, you want to be aMethodist, yes, you want to be
Lutheran.
So they said yes to everythingand it's okay in their mind.
But I never come over the topand say, because you don't
believe this way, you'reunacceptable.
That's, I think, where we wantto talk about?
What do we believe, what doesit mean?
(38:03):
And at the end of it all, it'ssort of ironic again that when I
was doing the book of Matthewand Jesus is asked all the time
give us the bottom line he goesback to what he learned in
Leviticus love your neighbor asyourself.
Okay, anchor yourself there,place yourself there, but don't
come to somebody's house and sayI'm praying for you because
(38:24):
you're godless Pretty bad, no,that's about as upfront as I've
heard.
Speaker 1 (38:29):
But there is that part of the conservative wing,
the evangelical wing,fundamentalist wing of
Christianity that says this haseternal consequences.
Right that, your right beliefabout who Jesus is does have
this eternal consequence.
And I imagine that Jewishpeople very often have maybe not
that dramatic of an experience,but have very often experiences
(38:49):
of Christians wanting to savethem.
And that might be coming from agood place, but I'm sure it
comes over as a rather it couldbe hostile or very dismissive.
Yeah, I don't know how many.
Speaker 2 (38:59):
I always imagine, like, what are people in their
living room?
If you go and put a camera infront of them and you say, hey,
what do you believe about this?
Or that they're going to benice.
But I always think about, ifsomebody's sitting in their
living room just by themselves,what do they believe?
And even if you don't believethat, I don't know, because I
think the mistake we make iswe're selling too much.
(39:22):
I think we're selling salvation, we're just giving the store
away and without saying anything, if I say, if you come to my
church, there's a place inheaven for you, then without
saying anything else, you'reimplicitly you're implying that
oh those people are not so ready, and sometimes it's not
implicitly either.
(39:42):
Yeah, you know, know.
So, yeah, send me to hell.
Okay.
People always ask me.
They say I was on.
I was speaking at kenesaw awhile ago and somebody says
where do jewish people go whenthey die?
I said everyone knows that,miami, you have to go back to
florida or boca.
I'd say boca, we moved up north.
But you know, like I don'tworry about that.
(40:04):
I mean, there's a belief inJudaism that God judges us in
some sort of amorphous place,but that's a God issue, that's
not a people issue, so I don'tworry about that.
The Jewish faith says we're veryexistential, like, if you see
poverty, help people.
If you see an issue, deal withit.
And you're doing it, for, likethis world, you're not focused
(40:26):
on the afterlife, which nobodyknows about.
Yeah, but if you're tellingpeople, as children you know,
believe this way and this iswhat you get, then I think that
it's incumbent upon the clergyto really say but what about our
neighbors down the block whoare not like us?
That, I think, is fair todiscuss.
(40:50):
And do you really want to say,unfortunately, we love you but
you're going to hell?
That sort of thing?
I mean really.
I mean, come on To me.
In my book I have a parableabout Jesus and I have him
crying.
And he's crying and he says ineffect, I meet him at a park
bench and I'm not sure who it is, but he says my children have
messed it up.
My children have not gotten themain message here.
(41:11):
So we just live in aparadoxical world that religions
end up separating people whenthey should be binding them
together.
Speaker 1 (41:20):
Under this rubric of that was a very nice way to
conclude, so I think we couldstop there, but I want to give
you the last word.
Is there anything that wehaven't said that needs to be
said?
I want you to give the webaddress for your organization,
but anything else that you wantto say before we wrap this up?
Speaker 2 (41:35):
Yeah, first of all, wonderful interview.
Thank you so much and, by theway, you can give me my prizes
for winning whatever I won inyour contest on the way out.
No, I mean listen, you canGoogle the Jewish Christian
Discovery Center.
Speaker 1 (41:50):
Look for the video the Magical Encounter.
Is there a dash between Jewishand Christian in the—?
No, Okay.
Speaker 2 (41:54):
Like I said, google the Jewish Christian Discovery
Center.
The website is therabbijesuscom, but you can find us out Now.
I guess I just want to end in asimple message Ask questions,
just ask questions.
That's a quintessential Jewishphilosophy and I wish people
(42:15):
would do more of that and not beso accepting, because the
accepting can lead you in placesthat are not healthy for good,
honest, spiritual interchanges.
There was a time in historycalled the Golden Age of Spain,
8th through 12th centuries,where priests, ministers, rabbis
, imams—there were noministers—priests, rabbis, imams
(42:38):
sat together like we're sittingtogether, and they were
studying a medieval philosophyand quoting Aristotle and
quoting Plato and Socrates highlevel.
So if you're having lunch withan imam and a priest and a rabbi
, what are you going to say atyour Sabbath service whenever
that is?
Oh, this week I had lunch withso-and-so.
(43:00):
It's going to be high-level,recognition of each other
getting along and that's sort ofhow I think most people want to
live.
Just live in that sense of Ihave a neighbor, I'm a good
neighbor, that sort of thing.
But I will say that, be awarethat prejudice is quite
(43:21):
tenacious, it is quite powerfuland I think we underestimate its
power, and I would remindpeople that ignorance can easily
bleed over into prejudice, andnot knowing about some of the
contexts we're talking about caneasily have people slipping,
even without really knowing it,into prejudice.
(43:42):
So when I say ask questions, Imean ask questions, push your
ministers.
I don't like to hear this, butpush your ministers and say to
them really or what are theconsequences of what you're
saying to me?
And study, frankly, learn.
Jesus didn't live in a bubble,he lived in a world and, yes, he
was a child and I guess he felland he bled and he whatever,
(44:07):
and he yelled, he screamed, Imean he was a kid.
And so study.
And then I think the more youstudy, the more you enhance your
faith.
Speaker 1 (44:15):
Rabbi, I really appreciate your chaplain's heart
.
You can see that chaplainaspect of who you are as a rabbi
coming out in all of this and Ithank you very much.
And I like that very last linetoo, that ignorance leads to
prejudice.
I think that's a very powerfulline.
So I want to thank you so muchfor being on the podcast.
Speaker 2 (44:32):
My pleasure, I'll give you a bang.
All right, there you go.
Speaker 1 (44:36):
I like that very much .
Thank you, sir.
Thank you, I want to thank ouraudience today and Cousin David.
I hope you thought this was agood episode.
Maybe not as funny as you wouldlike, but I had a good time
with Rabbi Slomovitz.
I want to thank our audiencefor sitting around the table
with us today.
I hope that we have given yousome food for thought and
something to chew on.
But we aren't done yet.
(44:56):
We probably will have a veryshort little bit of leftovers
because Rabbi Slomovitz has toget over to his presentation,
but you might hear us talking alittle bit afterward.
But thank you so much.
This has been Church Potluck.
See you next time.
All right, we're done and we'restill recording, though Usually
(45:23):
we just debrief a little bitAnything you want to say.
But I just want to thank youvery much.
I thought that was a goodconversation and I think our
audience will like it a lot.
Speaker 2 (45:32):
I hope so.
I mean, you just don't hearthings like this too much.
So it's nice to have theopportunity to do that.
Speaker 1 (45:39):
I loved what you said about said about in the
military, how everybody'srubbing elbows together, and so
how could you not have moreempathy and more understanding
in that kind of a context?
Speaker 2 (45:56):
It's always ironic that people from the outside
look at the military andwhatever their perception is it
was mine too like marching andfollowing orders and all that.
But once you get on the insideeven for a rabbi, we had an
enormous amount of freedombecause we are contracted.
I don't know Methodists, youguys have a bishop that sends
you to a place.
So for us we're contracted withlike a local synagogue, but in
the military.
And so if you're with a localsynagogue, that synagogue's sort
(46:20):
of your boss, you have acontract with them.
Board your directors.
The military they just sent youto a place and they said, okay,
like, do your job.
And you have no board ofdirectors because you're working
for the government.
And you know, if I wanted tocome into a base and say I don't
like this prayer book, I wantanother one, they'd say, fine,
(46:45):
let's order it or whatever.
Whatever you want to do, and Ialways had.
I never had a rabbi as a bossat a priest or minister.
So they said to me we don'tunderstand the intricacies of
your service, just do it, don'tcause problems, you know, take
care of your people.
It was sort of ironic that youhad all that freedom to be like,
okay, do what I want.
It's awesome.
And I did have people who saidto me early on you said you're
in the military, you were achaplain.
Speaker 1 (47:05):
No, I was a chaplain here at Berry for nine years.
Wonderful.
Speaker 2 (47:08):
So you get it.
I had people I'd go to rabbinicconventions and people would
say, well, how much are youmaking Whatever?
And they said, oh, we're makingmore in our congregation.
I said, okay, good for you.
I run into those people now andthey say to me I envy you.
I say why?
They said you retired at 20years.
I was 48 when I left the Navy.
(47:28):
But my retirement I've beengetting my retirement ever since
, and so that worked out well.
But just having that that mostpeople wouldn't think that you
would have so much freedom.
I arrived at the Naval Academyas the second rabbi in its
history, Wow.
And so we developed Holocaustprograms, trips to Israel, I was
(47:49):
teaching Hebrew and history atthe academy, and so all those
were like a tabula rasa just goin and do what you want
Fantastic.
So it was something that peoplewouldn't anticipate.
Yeah, even now riding with thecops, sometimes they'll say
you're here.
I've had this question I'vealways wanted to ask while we do
this traffic stop yeah, okay,whatever.
Speaker 1 (48:10):
Yeah, that's good work.
I don't need to go, but I justwant to let you know very
quickly my father-in-law is Navyand when he retired he became
civilian and worked at Pensacolaas the overseer of the junior
ROTC program all over the nation.
Speaker 2 (48:25):
Okay, what was your father-in-law's name?
Speaker 1 (48:26):
Hans Krucke.
When was he in?
About 80 now, so he was induring the 60s.
Speaker 2 (48:34):
He was down near Cuba during the—.
When did he retire, oh?
Speaker 1 (48:35):
you know what I want to say.
It was somewhere in the 90s orearly, early, early 2000ss and
he was a.
Navy chaplain?
No, not a chaplain.
He oversaw the, but he was inPensacola so I don't know which
base you were at, but he spenthis whole civilian career
coordinating the junior ROTCprogram for the Navy.
Speaker 2 (48:52):
Okay, I mean I had two tours at Pensacola.
One was called CNET, which isthe civilian headquarters, and
the other one was, as I said,senior chaplain at NAS.
But I love the military.
As somebody said to me when Iwas joining, it's great as long
as no one's shooting at you.
Which I came in post-Vietnamand I came in 79.
(49:14):
I got out 99 before 9-11.
Except for Desert Shield,desert Storm and I was at the
Naval Academy, it was a time ofpeace.
Speaker 1 (49:26):
I'm glad I wasn't in it wartime.
I have a friend past friend whoserved as a military chaplain
for a while.
Maybe I will try to get youguys together and do another
podcast on being militarychaplains.
And I also like how you switchyour back between your yarmulke
and your—we didn't really talkabout that on the podcast
because it's visual but you'reswitching between yarmulke and
your naval hat in between.
(49:47):
That's cool.
Speaker 2 (49:48):
The switch which I talk about a little bit in the
book is that imagine and youwould appreciate this as a
sociologist, I mean, imagine I'mdoing academic history, so I'm
at Loyola and I'm trying to getmy PhD in American history and,
of course, history.
You need primary sources, Imean, you need sources.
So whatever you're going toassert historically, you have to
(50:09):
prove you just can't say theCivil War began in Fort Sumter
in Charleston, south Carolina,april 1861.
Now you can say, oh, it began inTampa, whatever.
But no, we can prove that toyou.
And then I walk a few hundredyards.
They call it Institute ofPastoral Studies, where they're
talking about Matthew and themiracles of Matthew.
You don't have to prove it, youjust have to believe it.
(50:31):
And making that switch betweenthose two, and so what I try to
do is blend it.
Speaker 1 (50:36):
That's cool, that's very cool.
Now, if you could point me,next to where I'm going.
Speaker 2 (50:42):
That'd be appreciated .
All right.
So, Rabbi, it looks likethey've got a busy day ahead for
you here at Berry College.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
Oh, absolutely A lot of things going on, all right.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
Well, that's good, but we get to be the first.
We get the first crack at you.
Yes, yes, yes, although this iskind of the second crack
because of all the grass blowingout there that they were just
doing all the leaf blowing.
Well, welcome everyone toChurch Potluck, where we are
serving up a smorgasbord ofChristian curiosity.
I'm your host, dale McConkie,sociology professor and United
(00:43):
Methodist pastor, and you knowthere are two keys to a good
church potluck plenty of varietyand engaging conversation.
And this is exactly what we tryto do here on Church Potluck
sitting down with friends andsharing our ideas on a variety
of topics from a variety ofacademic disciplines and a
variety of Christian andreligious traditions.
I have just a two-personpodcast today.
(01:07):
Usually we have some sidekicksand some extra voices on, but
just two people today.
It is time to introduce ourguest, rabbi Albert Slomovitz.
Yay, good to have you on thepodcast, rabbi, thank you.
So let's see, I'm going to gothrough your credentials and
then you can add to them here.
So you are the founder of theChristian.
I'm sorry, you are founder ofthe Jewish Christian Discovery
(01:29):
Center.
Right, you are author of A NewLook at Rabbi Jesus, jews and
Christians Finally Reconnected.
You are a chaplain, like I hadbeen for nine years.
You are a chaplain for the Navyand also for law enforcement.
What type of law enforcementwere you?
Cub County Police?
Oh, very nice, very nice.
And you've got lots of fancydegrees and you've taught at
Kennesaw State and you've gotquite an impressive array.
(01:51):
What other kinds of thingswould you like to add about
yourself?
Speaker 2 (01:53):
First of all, I'm retired from the Navy Okay, too
old to do that and I've writtena few other books.
One is about the SupremeSupreme Court in Racism, oh, wow
.
And the other one is called theFighting Rabbis, which is a
history of rabbis in the USmilitary for the whole history
up to Desert Storm, desertShield.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
Oh, very sweet.
Speaker 2 (02:12):
And I've authored some children's books.
Speaker 1 (02:15):
That's part of your at the Jewish Christian
Discovery Center connected tothat project Right, very nice.
Why don't you tell us aboutyour children's books real
quickly?
Speaker 2 (02:30):
If I could take a step back.
Sure, and, by the way, it'sgreat to be on Barry today,
great, beautiful college.
I have two backgrounds thatsort of came together about 10
years ago.
I have my military backgroundand that was fascinating because
there were only a handful ofrabbis in.
I was in the Navy at that time.
So inevitably people would comeup to us and say they looked at
our insignia and say what isthat?
And first it had Hebrew.
It was supposed to be thelittle tablets of the Ten
(02:51):
Commandments, and then itchanged to Roman numerals.
But it was very unique, notseen that often.
So once we said we were rabbis,people had all sorts of
questions for us and I was askedquestions in the oddest
situations.
I was once in a gym changingclothes with the other fellows
and there'd been a Marinecaptain whom I knew, and so we
(03:12):
just exercised together.
I forgot what we did, but wewere changing and he said Rabbi,
can I ask you a question?
I said sure.
He said what do the Jewsbelieve about Jesus?
Now, at that point the rest ofthe locker room got very silent.
So we were literally dressed andundressed, and I did respond to
(03:33):
him and we can get into some ofthat later.
But the interesting thing wasthat I discovered in the
military that people had nevermet a knowledgeable Jewish
person, certainly not a rabbiand once they got to know you
and you got to know them andthey felt comfortable, then they
asked the questions and so thatsort of set me up for what was
(03:56):
coming.
At the same time I was able toattend Loyola University of
Chicago.
We were assigned in Chicago andI earned two degrees.
One was my second master's ininterfaith relations and the
second one was my doctorate inAmerican history.
And I put those two thingstogether, the military
background and sort of theacademic background.
(04:17):
And then I looked at the worldand saw all the prejudice and
anti-Semitism.
So I found it.
I wrote a book, the one youmentioned, a New Look at Rabbi
Jesus, jews and Christians,finally Reconnected, because I
wanted to show people howsimilar we were.
That's the whole point of allthis, that once we discover that
Jews and Christians, that weare related, I would say then
(04:42):
it's hard to be prejudiced.
You mentioned your cousinbefore.
Then it's hard to be prejudiced.
You mentioned your cousinbefore.
It's hard to be prejudicedagainst someone who you're
literally related to.
If that's your cousin or yourbrother, whatever you might
disagree, but you're not goingto go hating a lot on that
person.
So that's sort of the goal.
And so in the midst of that,I've written some books for
(05:02):
children and we have four booksthat are printed and beautifully
illustrated, I might add.
They really are quiteattractive.
We found a lady's name is RemyBryant.
She's down in Atlanta and thebooks were.
It's a whole world.
First I wrote the original bookand then the children wanted to
do activities, for example,wanted to do activities, for
(05:29):
example coloring, and I'mshowing it.
I know this is a podcast, butthere are pictures and then
there are word puzzles in theback for the kids to play with.
And then we had a request for aSpanish translation.
Each original book generatedtwo other books.
We actually have a video whichI will show.
I have a lecture later thatvideo with actors and directors
and producers and all that, aseven-minute video which I think
(05:51):
I showed when I lectured at theTemple recently.
Speaker 1 (05:55):
Yes, I had the honor of listening to your
presentation at Rod F Shalom.
About what?
Speaker 2 (06:03):
several months ago I don't remember exactly how far
back, but Right.
So that is sort of the genesisof all this that I found myself
in a unique position, from themilitary background, the
academic background, to be ableto speak with some authority
about why we're related.
And so the Jewish ChristianDiscovery Center has been going
on for six years now, and we'refinding that there's a tidal
(06:25):
wave of prejudice that we'retrying to push back a little bit
on.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
I wasn't going to go to the prejudice right off the
bat, but let's go ahead and dothat, because we have had an
outbreak in some sense ofprejudice.
Or maybe it's not an outbreak,maybe it's always been there,
but it's been much more visiblein the last several months.
Speaker 2 (06:49):
I could speak to that , or you could speak to that in
terms of some of the things thathave been happening just right
here in our own little northernGeorgia.
Yeah, I must say it's justdisconcerting in a way.
I agree Because the example Igive is that Judaism is the
mother of Christianity, gavebirth to Christianity, the
Jewishness of Jesus,Christianity gave birth to
Christianity, the Jewishness ofJesus.
I'm actually finishing up acurriculum for Sunday school
(07:10):
kids that I put together with aCatholic educator and a Baptist
minister, Rabbi, priest andminister.
Speaker 1 (07:15):
I was going to say there's a joke in there
somewhere.
Speaker 2 (07:18):
Right, and the name of the book is the Jewish Life
of Jesus, and we start with hiscircumcision, his bris, we call
it, and all the way through hisdeath.
And so there's, every aspect ofJesus's life was a Jewish one,
one would think.
And again, the weird thingabout how my brain operates is
that I'm doing two things atonce.
(07:39):
The history side of me iswanting to make sure that I can
verify what I say on the otherside, and the other side is the
interface side, so I'm not justsort of saying, yeah, jesus is
Jewish, believe it, I can provethat.
So I go back and forth and itis unnerving and very much
(07:59):
unsettling.
Listen, if you disagree with thepolicy of a government any
government we'll say Canada.
So I disagree with the Canadiangovernment about, let's say,
something, environmental, I sayyes, I vehemently disagree with
that decision.
However, I don't turn aroundand say, oh, and, by the way, I
hate all Canadians.
I mean that's illogical.
(08:20):
So if you disagree with thegovernment policy, say so and
write.
Nobody writes letters anymore.
Send an email to yourrepresentatives in Congress, the
president, whatever you want.
But to somehow merge that intoprejudice against everyone,
that's the part that'sunsettling to me.
(08:41):
So I started this six years agoand, yes, anti-semitism existed
, but I didn't think it was onsort of this level.
Speaker 1 (08:48):
Yeah, I 100% agree with you that we should be
emphasizing the Jewishbackground and the Jewish life
of Jesus.
Last episode we had on ChurchPotluck, we talked about the
video series called the Chosen.
Speaker 2 (09:02):
Right, I'm familiar with that.
Speaker 1 (09:03):
You're familiar with that, and one of the things that
I really emphasized in thatpodcast was just how wonderful
it was, that's in terms of allthe video representations of
Jesus I've ever seen.
That's one of the most Jewishones, and they took time to go
back into the Jewish culture andsome of the reasons.
So have you found that to be agood, positive step, or were
(09:24):
there things about that youfound problematic?
What were your experiences.
Speaker 2 (09:25):
No, I like their approach.
I really do.
And what's interesting is thatin my context, I do a lot of
visiting to churches and in mychaplaincy work I had friends
who were ministers of all sortsLutheran, methodist, catholic,
whatever and so once you gobeyond the titles and you get
into them as people, there'sthis really basic interest,
(09:49):
don't forget, for Jesus.
We know him in the scripturesas a baby, as a child, and then
within a little bit he's a grownman.
That's right.
By the way, the example isMoses in Exodus.
He's a baby raised in the houseof Pharaoh, then he's a young
man.
The tradition gaps, thechildhood, adolescence and all
that.
So what I do is I fill that in.
(10:11):
Where did he live?
What were the influences in hislife?
How was he educated?
And people.
When I start talking about that, I think that people are going
to say, oh, too much information.
But I've never had that.
I've had people say to me oh,we're glad you're doing this
because we don't know.
No one's ever told us what thatis.
(10:32):
So you're helping us by fillingin those gaps.
Speaker 1 (10:41):
And I think that there are so many things in the
Christian scriptures in the NewTestament that you can't
understand without that contextor at least it's very difficult
and it just seems there are somany things that are said that
just seem very out of place andodd, unless you understand the
cultural context of the time.
Speaker 2 (10:53):
Oh, absolutely.
I mean, when I studiedundergraduate I went to Columbia
University.
In the Jewish TheologicalSeminary they have what's called
a joint program.
So I remember one day I signedup for a class, a Bible class,
at Columbia.
So I walk in the classroom andon the old blackboards again
we're dating ourselves.
But it said Acadian,mesopotamian, babylonian.
(11:15):
And so I kind of said out loudoh, I'm in the wrong class
because I'm here to study Bible.
And the instructor said, no,you're in the right class, but
if you're going to study Abrahamand Sarah, you study the world
in which they lived, which makes100% common sense.
If someone's studying today, ifI'm writing a book about 2024, I
(11:36):
have to talk about the internetand artificial intelligence and
things like that.
I guess I could write itwithout it, but if I made a
reference to it, everyone wouldsay, of course, but if it's
going to be 200 or 300 yearsfrom now, I have to have a
little asterisk about exactlywhat that was and what was going
on.
So yes, and that's kind of thesad part for me, that sometimes
(12:01):
some of the Christian friends Imeet will say we just study the
Bible alone and withoutcommentary, without that larger
context, and that's where we getin trouble.
That's where we get in trouble.
There's a number of stories inthe Scriptures that if they're
not interpreted for people, thenthey may misunderstand them.
(12:23):
I mean the Hebrew Bible, theChristian Bible, the same thing,
and one of the examples I giveis Exodus 21.
Eye for an eye, tooth for tooth,hand for hand, I mean the Bible
says you exact revenge.
However, for us, when we'rereading the Bible, in the bottom
of the page there's commentaryand the rabbis say no, it says
(12:45):
it, but it doesn't mean that.
What it means is you compensatepeople If you injure somebody
and they're out of work, or painand suffering, that sort of
thing.
So you clearly, if somebodycuts you off in traffic, you
don't have the right to ziparound and cut them off.
It's just not how society goes.
Speaker 1 (13:02):
I had also heard one commentator say that is also
meant to be a restriction, aneye for an eye, that you do not
do anything more than what hadbeen done for you, but the idea
that you can really see this andassume that it means one thing.
But there's much more nuancethere and you need to know the
context.
Speaker 2 (13:19):
In the Jewish context , what we call it is midrash,
which is wrestling with the text, or understanding the text, and
I want to give people that'swhat I'm going to say in my
lecture today.
I want to give people thefreedom to do that.
Just to take a verse in theBible, because if it's not
explained in a way, listen, mybook is a commentary to the book
(13:41):
of Matthew, so it's sort ofunusual for a rabbi to be doing
commentary, but I had theacademic background from Loyola
and history whatever.
But Matthew was a Jewish bookwritten for the Jewish community
, but Jesus was Jewish.
I mean, it's all a Jewishaffair.
But if you don't understand it,there's the scene with Pontius
Pilate where he's asking who doyou want to crucify Jesus?
(14:05):
Or, by the way, it's notBarabbas, it's Bar Abbas.
If I have time, I'll mentionthat.
But part of that story thecrowd allegedly says his blood
be upon us and upon our children.
Okay, tell me what that means,because I once had somebody ask
me was the Holocaust God'spunishment, god's fulfillment of
(14:29):
that verse?
I'm shaking my head in disgustafter that, Right right, but
this was a young man who didn'tknow any better and never had
someone explain it to him orgive him any possible other
explanation.
So, yes, so the Bible obviouslyis wonderful, but we have to
understand it in its context.
(14:50):
If not, I think we're doing adisservice to ourselves,
honestly.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
What do you think are some of the biggest and most
consistent misunderstandingsthat Christians have in the
conversations you've had withthem?
Speaker 2 (15:08):
in the conversations you've had with them.
Gosh, it really depends, I'dsay.
The good news is that peoplehave questions.
The bad news is that sometimesthe questions are very
elementary.
A quick example we were seeingabout three years ago.
There was a group of peoplewhen the Braves opened their new
stadium down in Cobb County.
We're the group that werelooking at the stadium.
Okay, fine, wonderful.
So we're having lunch and I'msitting across from a man and he
(15:30):
says I'm a deacon at my church.
I said great.
I said I'm a rabbi, so we'lltalk business.
We're conversing a little bitand then he says to me in a kind
of serious voice you know, Inever figured out what do you
people do when you go toservices?
And I was quiet for a minute.
I was taken aback by that I saidwe get together, we pray, we
(15:52):
talk, we eat, we leave.
Speaker 1 (15:54):
I mean basically whatever you do, it's a church
potluck.
Except it's a synagogue potluck.
Speaker 2 (16:01):
I'm sort of you know, whacking myself in the head.
Here's a grown man.
He was like 55, 60.
If you're a deacon of yourchurch you're like wow, I mean,
that's a big deal.
People look to you and sayyou're well-versed and you know
the rituals of the church.
And for him to kind of comeover the top and again in a
million years only because hewas sitting with me by chance
and we're just having thisbanter back and forth.
(16:23):
He felt comfortable enough tosay what do you all do?
Now I could have said likeLeviticus, bring your animals,
we'll sacrifice your animals.
I mean, I don't know what.
I could have said anything andhe would have said, okay, but
wow.
So in many ways we're just atthat point of beginning to learn
about each other, without evengoing to the traditional
(16:47):
prejudice against Jews and allthat, just sort of even before
that.
If you're asking me what we do,come, go to a service, and
that's sort of the sadness thatthe interesting part about this
is.
In the military you had muchmore access to Jewish services
and Protestant services andCatholic services and Muslim
(17:08):
services, whatever, becausewe're all in the same complex.
So all the chaplains it's likebeing in university, you had
people next to you, so we talkedall the time and I ended up
being a senior chaplain at NavalAir Station, pensacola on my
last tour and I was responsiblefor everyone's religious freedom
.
So we had to make sure thatevery group had what they needed
(17:29):
, and I would go around andoften speak, and so we just had
this great environment oflearning and studying together,
and sometimes the chaplainswould come to me and say we're
reading this verse for ourservice this Sunday.
What do you think about it?
So we had that experience.
Speaker 1 (17:44):
Oh very nice, Very nice.
Speaker 2 (17:45):
But once you get out then you find that people are
much more isolated.
In that effect it's one church,one synagogue and you kind of
focus on your needs and growingthat building and people lose
sight of the larger society orthe larger possibilities of
dealing with some of theseinterfaith issues.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
Very interesting.
I love that imagery of everyonegetting there and still holding
on to their own faith, buthaving that opportunity to
interact with one another and tolearn and grow from that, I
really like that.
That's my understanding.
Oh, I'm sorry, go ahead.
Speaker 2 (18:19):
I was going to say I've learned also, the more I'm
in this business, the more iteven strikes me more the
connections that I once I was atCatholic Church and somehow we
got onto the confessional.
We're just talking.
So I said to one of the priestsI said, father, what is the
basis of confessional?
The confessional?
And he had a big smile on hisface.
(18:41):
I said why are you smiling?
He said we took it from you.
So why didn't we took it fromyou?
I said what do you mean?
Took it from us?
He said no.
He said it's based on the TenCommandments and the Ten
Commandments and we put our sins, we use that as a framework and
that's the confessional.
I didn't know that.
Okay, so that reinforces mybasic belief of how connected we
(19:03):
are.
But we go through life notknowing that.
So that sort of we lose by notsitting together and looking at
the same text and saying, oh,you see, let's say the suffering
servant in Isaiah this way, butthere's a possibility of seeing
it another way.
That doesn't detract, believewhat you want, but at least know
(19:25):
that somebody else could see itdifferently.
And life goes on.
Speaker 1 (19:29):
Yeah, yeah, very nice , very nice.
Hey, let's play a game show.
Okay, all right.
So this game show we're goingto call it, is it Kosher?
All right, so you tell me I'mgoing to say a few things and
you're going to tell me whetherthis is something acceptable
(19:50):
that Christians do or somethingthat we should be careful about
or worried about.
Okay, all right, is it kosher?
First question is it kosher?
Using the word kosher for agame show, is there anything
sacred about the word kosher?
And this is diminishing it byno, no.
Speaker 2 (20:04):
Kosher means clean.
Yeah, that'd be okay.
Yeah, what's going on in theworld?
You can call it kosher.
Speaker 1 (20:11):
Yay, all right, I got that one right.
All right, I'm real curious tosee your answer on this one.
Is it kosher to call someone aJew?
Speaker 2 (20:18):
these days, I have noticed a very conscious
decision I made long ago not tosay that because of the
potential of it beingmisinterpreted.
That sort of.
There's a fine line to that.
I think people would preferJewish.
I'm a Jewish person.
Speaker 1 (20:33):
Yeah, that's what I have been trying to do on a very
consistent basis, because ofthe possibility of the way it
has been used.
Speaker 2 (20:40):
Yeah, I mean if you would say I love Jews, okay,
fine, but unfortunately I waswith someone again years ago in
the military that just bought acar.
When you go to Okinawa, japan,we're in Okinawa, you turn cars
over, so you're on the islandfor as long as you are.
You buy a car to get around andthen when you leave, you just
(21:02):
sell it to the next person.
That's background and, by theway, it's shift, and it's shift
with your left hand, so thedriver's seat's on the other
side.
Too much information.
So, at any rate, I was talkingto somebody.
He said, yeah, I bought a car.
So of course your question ishow much?
And he said I drew them down.
And five seconds later, twoseconds later, I kind of stopped
(21:23):
, like okay, because my brain isjust, I know this guy, he's a
good guy, but should I saysomething?
And then his face turned red,he caught what he had done.
No, I didn't mean it.
I didn't mean it.
I said okay, but I mean we justkind of left it like that
because I couldn't say, oh,you're absolved.
But so when you say the word Jew, unfortunately and I don't
(21:45):
think people, yeah, they don'tmean that I hate Jewish people
and I want them to die, blah,blah, blah, but nevertheless I
don't need an insult, you know.
I mean just say I bargainedthem down, but that feeds into
Jews and money and Jews andpower and all that and Jews
control.
So it's just something weshould.
(22:06):
I'm very cautious about thewords I speak and the language I
use, and so I think it's fairto say to people really, can you
eliminate that please?
Or say it another way, becausejust flip it to yourself.
I mean I wouldn't say I mess itas somebody down or something
like that.
I mean really, or whatever.
So it's just, it's not helpful.
(22:28):
So, yeah, if you can say Jewishanother way or Jew another way,
do that.
Speaker 1 (22:31):
Great, thank you.
And a little side note to ouraudience.
If you hear some thumping andsome background noise, rabbi
Slumovitz, I'm sorry.
Rabbi Slumovitz is a veryexpressive talker and so he's
using his hands and he's hittingthe table sometimes, and so
this is just so.
That's exactly so.
When you hear that noise.
This is him being enthusiasticin his conversation, so take
those noises as good things thathe's having.
(22:52):
We're alive, that's right, Allright, so we'll go ahead and
thank you very much for youranswer there.
So the next thing is it kosherChristian passion plays.
Historically, the Passion playsabout the last seven days of
Jesus' life.
Very often have historicallyhad the characterization of very
often being hateful towardJewish people and blaming the
(23:15):
Jewish people are stilluncomfortable with that, with
those because of the historicalconsequence if they're done in a
more proper way these days.
Do you have any opinion orthought on that?
Speaker 2 (23:31):
Yes, great question.
By the way, I'll try not to tap.
Speaker 1 (23:33):
Oh, it's okay if you do.
Now the folks know what's goingon.
Speaker 2 (23:36):
I think that's an area of concern.
My wife and I went to see JesusChrist Superstar a few years
ago at Cobb County and there'sone scene where it's like I
alluded to before, that thecrowd is saying crucify him.
And I whispered to my wife thisis where we get in trouble.
So, yeah, I mean again, allthese scenes have to be
(23:56):
understood in context.
What's going on?
As an author myself, this iswhat the Jesuits I mean, it's
great, I'm a rabbi with Jesuitcredentials.
But the Jesuits taught me tolook at the books from the
perspective of the authors.
What are they trying to do?
In the Christian scriptures, orthe Jewish scriptures for that
matter, they're trying to make apoint to follow Jesus.
Okay, we get that.
(24:17):
So, yeah, there has to beprotagonists and antagonists,
etc.
But what's always amazed me isthat you would think that the
Christians would process okay,god chose Jesus and this is
Jesus's life, so all this ispart of the divine plan.
Like the parallel would bePharaoh In Exodus.
(24:41):
It says a number of times Godhardened Pharaoh's heart.
You would think one plaguewould be enough, all the water
blood, okay, and then a secondplague.
I mean, really there's a lot ofplagues going on and you would
think the Egyptians would say toPharaoh what Enough already,
let us go.
Let them go because the cattleare dying.
There's lies, I mean, whateverit is, but God hardened
(25:04):
Pharaoh's heart, so you have togo through this whole cycle.
So I think in many ways thefunction of Pharaoh is like the
function of any antagonist inthe story just to build up
emotions and heighten the story.
Think for a second If Moses andAaron had gone to Pharaoh time
(25:27):
number one and said you know,let our people go.
And there was silence for aminute and Pharaoh said okay,
have a nice day.
Well then you don't have anExodus story, you don't have a
crossing of the Red Sea beingpursued by the Egyptians, you
don't have Mount Sinai, youdon't have all that.
So the story needs to have thisbuilt-in drama.
But I always wondered whyChristians didn't just say this
(25:47):
was all part of the divine planand whatever is happening on
earth.
In fact, there is a gospelcalled Gospel of Judas.
I'm sure you're familiar withit, Written around the year.
It's in my book.
I'm pushing the book a littlebit, that's all right.
It's written around the year120.
It's on a papyrus.
It was found in Egypt a littlebit.
It's written around the year120.
It's on a papyrus.
It was found in Egypt.
(26:07):
It's called the Gospel of Judas,where Judas and Jesus are
having a conversation and Jesusis saying to Judas you're my
number one disciple.
And Judas says why?
Because Jesus says you'reletting me go of my earthly body
and then I'm taking my place inheaven next to God, so you're
doing exactly what I asked you.
And then, and this is the keypoint here Judas says back to
(26:28):
Jesus and again, I'm not makingthis up, this is an actual
document that's been translated.
Judas says to Jesus how willpeople perceive me?
And Jesus says look at the sky,look at the night sky.
You're my brightest star.
And this is 120.
So this is like peopleconceivably a few generations
from the original event.
(26:49):
So they're seeing Judas in atotally different light and I
wish more of that would occur.
I wish more people would seeJudas like that.
But it always struck me as justbeing so odd that if this was
God's plan in the beginning,then all this is supposed to
happen like it's supposed tohappen, and everyone's an actor
(27:12):
doing their part.
So why would you take some ofthe actors and say ah, we're
blaming you, but the wholeessence, as far as I see it, of
Christianity is the death andthe resurrection, and I mean
this lovingly.
If Jesus lives to be 100 anddies in his sleep, let's say
okay, good, but you don't getthe drama of the resurrection
(27:36):
which all the Gospels portray.
Yeah.
So, unfortunately, by tellingthe story without any sort of
again context or way tounderstand it, people do come
back and that's really hard.
How do you defend against that?
People say the Jews killedJesus.
No, were there some people whodisagreed with him?
Sure, are there some people whodisagree today with priests,
(28:00):
ministers and rabbis?
Yeah, so that's not unusual.
But to have that as the basisof a relationship, that's pretty
bad.
Speaker 1 (28:10):
Yeah, I agree with that.
And another way that I look atit as well, when I read the
scriptures, I have no sense ofJewish people as a whole having
this kind of hatred at all forJesus.
And you do have that one scene.
But even that one scene veryclearly makes it clear that the
leadership, the establishment atthe time was the one that was
fomenting the anger.
And, yes, it seems that Jesuswas a prophet who was speaking
(28:32):
out very harshly against theleadership of the time.
The Jewish leadership, just as,in my mind, the Christian
leadership of today, deserves tobe criticized for that.
But that doesn't mean that allthe American people deserve that
kind of, or all Christiansdeserve that kind of criticism.
So I've never understood thatleap to anti-Semitism.
Speaker 2 (28:51):
It's horribly unfortunate because, again,
jesus was Jewish and so when Ivisited Auschwitz which again a
horrible experiencetheoretically he would have been
one of the victims.
I mean he's Jewish, so he wouldhave been there and his family
would have been there.
I spoke at a church recentlyand I gave out some of the
(29:14):
children's books that I'mtapping You're fine and I told
them that Jesus is Jewish.
We have a big program forHanukkah Christmas.
I give kids menorahs, littleplastic menorahs and stars of
David to put on their Christmastree.
Kids love it.
So I was speaking at church andone of the kids says to me Jesus
was Jewish.
I said yes, so he raises hishand.
He said so what were Joseph andMary?
(29:35):
What religion?
I said, okay, think about it.
A second.
He said oh, they were Jewishtoo.
I said yeah, I mean it's like afamily.
I mean sometimes family look, Ihave kids, I have grandkids.
Not everyone gets along 100% ofthe time, but sometimes you
have family arguments, but it'sstill family at the end of the
day.
So sometimes people say thingsthey don't mean, they apologize,
(30:06):
and so if we could see thisonly as a family, then it would
be eliminated.
But unfortunately we're dealingwith centuries of teachings
that Christianity replacedJudaism.
It's called supersession.
Speaker 1 (30:13):
Yes.
Speaker 2 (30:13):
Big word, but that's what it means, and so we're
still, in some ways, I'd saythat some of the clergy is
getting better because we sayHebrew Bible, christian Bible,
jewish scriptures, hebrewscriptures, whatever.
But we're starting to realizethat after Vatican II— Pope John
Paul II yeah Nostradate, ohsorry the Catholic Church in
(30:34):
1965 says that they'rerecognizing Judaism as a valid
religion, which took 1906 yearsOkay.
But what we say is that we'recovenanted.
Just like Christians arecovenanted with God, so are we.
So there's two covenants withGod.
So we really have to get onthat level of equality and just
(30:54):
say, yeah, you see God this way,we see God this way.
But let's talk about all theconnections we have.
And that's the, again.
The saddest part about this isthat we don't see the
connections.
And I must say to my Christianfriends, even within the
Christian world there's a lot ofdissension about who's a real
Christian, who's not a Christian.
(31:15):
Oh, 100%.
And so I'll visit somebody andsay, hey, you guys.
And I'll mention Loyola.
I'll say, oh, I have a Catholicbackground.
And people say, oh, catholics,a Catholic background.
And people say, oh, catholics.
I say, what do you mean?
Oh, catholics, oh, they're notreally Christian.
I say, whoa, whoa, whoa.
I'm not talking about that.
I said if you're a Protestant,you come from the church, you
come from the Catholic church,that's your history.
And then, of course, the churchcomes from Judaism.
(31:37):
So we're going to start bysaying we have no connection,
we're separated.
Then it's going to be hard tomake that connection.
Speaker 1 (31:50):
Well, Rabbi Slomovitz , thank you so much for playing,
Is it, Kosher?
I wanted to finish up here andwe'll give you the last word, so
you can finish up any way thatyou want.
But just having a conversationa little bit about some of the
more difficult points, I reallyappreciate your effort to find
(32:13):
the commonality, find the commonhistory, find the connectedness
, but there are some aspects ofChristian theology that would
seem to be in stark contrastwith Judaism, and so I'm just
curious to get your take onthese.
And you know, the most obviousone would be the fact that Jesus
was not just a human but he wasalso divine, that he was God
incarnate, and that seems to befor most Jews, I would imagine
(32:35):
you know a proclamation too farright, that it crosses the line
and that kind of outside of therealm of Judaism.
So where is the commonconnection?
Or how should Jewish people andChristians be understanding
that together?
Speaker 2 (32:48):
I have a great answer .
A few weeks ago I was at awedding reception or sort of an
engagement reception, and one ofthe people was Jewish, one was
not, and one of the relatives ofthe non-Jewish person said I
hear you're a rabbi.
I said yes.
So he said I have a questionfor you.
He said I've been raised mywhole life that we're waiting
(33:11):
for the second coming of Jesus.
I said okay.
And he said I know for theJewish people you're waiting for
the Messiah to come like firsttime.
I said correct.
So he said which is it?
And I said you know, I'll takeeither one.
I'll take either one Because weknow from Isaiah, chapter 11,
that when the Messiah comes and,by the way, this is a big deal,
(33:40):
I mean, when the Messiah comes,it's supposed to be a time of
peace and the lion will lie withthe lamb, etc.
If there's a coming again andit's connected to Jesus and
that's what it is and it's timeof peace, hooray.
And he loved that.
We're both waiting, and so Ijust want to put that off to the
side and say, yeah, jewishpeople look at Jesus as a rabbi,
(34:02):
a prophet.
Even Messiah means anointed.
There were other peoplepreviously, so just not the
Messiah.
Right, right and again.
Picture yourself in Jerusalem.
Pick an early decade 30, 40, 50.
Jesus is killed by the Romans,but the Romans are still there
(34:23):
and the persecution is gettingworse because they're tightening
their grip.
So if we were alive, then I'mputting on my history hat for a
second.
I teach history at KennesawState and I ask my students to
try and see history in real time.
In real time, whatconversations were they having?
Was Jesus the Messiah?
The Romans are still killingpeople, and now they're killing
(34:44):
early Christians.
At that time they were saying Iguess not, because if you look
out our door they're the Romanlegions and they're still
killing people, or the temple isdestroyed in the year 70.
So I think it's legitimate tohave a conversation about were
the criteria for the Messiah metat that time?
(35:06):
Was it a time of peace?
Was it not?
Listen, believe what you want.
I mean believe.
But that doesn't mean that wetake the belief and whack
somebody over the head with it.
That's the thing.
From the Jewish perspective, wesay, yeah, we're waiting for
the Messiah.
Okay, you think the Messiahcame, is coming again.
Okay too.
Let's say somebody says hecomes once a century.
(35:29):
Okay, good, I mean it's allgood, it doesn't matter.
It doesn't matter as long as ifa tree falls in my yard, my
neighbors come and help me, orif a tree falls in my neighbor's
yard that I go and say what doyou need?
So in a way, it's sort ofparadoxical that you have a
belief that, instead of justbeing a belief, it's used as a
(35:52):
sort of negative force againstsomeone else.
You'll give me a time frame,but I'll tell you a quick story.
Grandmother was at home and wehad a visiting nurse to take
care of grandmother.
And she comes in and she looksat the wall I have Jewish stuff
and she says oh, what is that?
I said Hebrew, I'm a rabbi.
And then I explained to her Iwas a Navy chaplain.
(36:13):
End of the day she walks outand she says can I say a prayer?
Like I'm going to go home andsay a prayer.
So I figure, oh, that's sweet,you're going to say a prayer for
my grandmother it's actually mywife's grandmother and she says
no.
I said what are you going topray for?
She says I'm praying for you.
I said, ok, good health and allthat.
(36:34):
She says, no, you're godless.
And I said what she said yeah,if you don't believe in Jesus,
you have no belief, like nothingcounts.
And I said, well, I'm out.
I said I'm a rabbi, jesus wascalled a rabbi and I said some
of the prayers.
He said I say some of the sameprayers.
I pray to God, I believe in Godvery much.
(36:56):
And wow, I said I'm okay.
But the fact that she feltcompelled first of all to say
this to me but she was going topray for me because I didn't
believe exactly one way, that'skind of what we have to ask
ourselves Is this at the end ofthe day, is that what our belief
(37:20):
is, that we're so focused andsure that this is our belief?
But what about when I was inOkinawa?
We had Shinto and Confucius andall sorts of people, indigenous
Okinawan beliefs.
I never went to them and said,okay, all this is trash.
No, in fact, the Japanese aresort of multi-believers that
(37:42):
missionaries would come to theirhome and say you want to be a
Baptist?
Yeah, you want to be aMethodist, yes, you want to be
Lutheran.
So they said yes to everythingand it's okay in their mind.
But I never come over the topand say, because you don't
believe this way, you'reunacceptable.
That's, I think, where we wantto talk about?
What do we believe, what doesit mean?
(38:03):
And at the end of it all, it'ssort of ironic again that when I
was doing the book of Matthewand Jesus is asked all the time
give us the bottom line he goesback to what he learned in
Leviticus love your neighbor asyourself.
Okay, anchor yourself there,place yourself there, but don't
come to somebody's house and sayI'm praying for you because
(38:24):
you're godless Pretty bad, no,that's about as upfront as I've
heard.
Speaker 1 (38:29):
But there is that part of the conservative wing,
the evangelical wing,fundamentalist wing of
Christianity that says this haseternal consequences.
Right that, your right beliefabout who Jesus is does have
this eternal consequence.
And I imagine that Jewishpeople very often have maybe not
that dramatic of an experience,but have very often experiences
(38:49):
of Christians wanting to savethem.
And that might be coming from agood place, but I'm sure it
comes over as a rather it couldbe hostile or very dismissive.
Yeah, I don't know how many.
Speaker 2 (38:59):
I always imagine, like, what are people in their
living room?
If you go and put a camera infront of them and you say, hey,
what do you believe about this?
Or that they're going to benice.
But I always think about, ifsomebody's sitting in their
living room just by themselves,what do they believe?
And even if you don't believethat, I don't know, because I
think the mistake we make iswe're selling too much.
(39:22):
I think we're selling salvation, we're just giving the store
away and without saying anything, if I say, if you come to my
church, there's a place inheaven for you, then without
saying anything else, you'reimplicitly you're implying that
oh those people are not so ready, and sometimes it's not
implicitly either.
(39:42):
Yeah, you know, know.
So, yeah, send me to hell.
Okay.
People always ask me.
They say I was on.
I was speaking at kenesaw awhile ago and somebody says
where do jewish people go whenthey die?
I said everyone knows that,miami, you have to go back to
florida or boca.
I'd say boca, we moved up north.
But you know, like I don'tworry about that.
(40:04):
I mean, there's a belief inJudaism that God judges us in
some sort of amorphous place,but that's a God issue, that's
not a people issue, so I don'tworry about that.
The Jewish faith says we're veryexistential, like, if you see
poverty, help people.
If you see an issue, deal withit.
And you're doing it, for, likethis world, you're not focused
(40:26):
on the afterlife, which nobodyknows about.
Yeah, but if you're tellingpeople, as children you know,
believe this way and this iswhat you get, then I think that
it's incumbent upon the clergyto really say but what about our
neighbors down the block whoare not like us?
That, I think, is fair todiscuss.
(40:50):
And do you really want to say,unfortunately, we love you but
you're going to hell?
That sort of thing?
I mean really.
I mean, come on To me.
In my book I have a parableabout Jesus and I have him
crying.
And he's crying and he says ineffect, I meet him at a park
bench and I'm not sure who it is, but he says my children have
messed it up.
My children have not gotten themain message here.
(41:11):
So we just live in aparadoxical world that religions
end up separating people whenthey should be binding them
together.
Speaker 1 (41:20):
Under this rubric of that was a very nice way to
conclude, so I think we couldstop there, but I want to give
you the last word.
Is there anything that wehaven't said that needs to be
said?
I want you to give the webaddress for your organization,
but anything else that you wantto say before we wrap this up?
Speaker 2 (41:35):
Yeah, first of all, wonderful interview.
Thank you so much and, by theway, you can give me my prizes
for winning whatever I won inyour contest on the way out.
No, I mean listen, you canGoogle the Jewish Christian
Discovery Center.
Speaker 1 (41:50):
Look for the video the Magical Encounter.
Is there a dash between Jewishand Christian in the—?
No, Okay.
Speaker 2 (41:54):
Like I said, google the Jewish Christian Discovery
Center.
The website is therabbijesuscom, but you can find us out Now.
I guess I just want to end in asimple message Ask questions,
just ask questions.
That's a quintessential Jewishphilosophy and I wish people
(42:15):
would do more of that and not beso accepting, because the
accepting can lead you in placesthat are not healthy for good,
honest, spiritual interchanges.
There was a time in historycalled the Golden Age of Spain,
8th through 12th centuries,where priests, ministers, rabbis
, imams—there were noministers—priests, rabbis, imams
(42:38):
sat together like we're sittingtogether, and they were
studying a medieval philosophyand quoting Aristotle and
quoting Plato and Socrates highlevel.
So if you're having lunch withan imam and a priest and a rabbi
, what are you going to say atyour Sabbath service whenever
that is?
Oh, this week I had lunch withso-and-so.
(43:00):
It's going to be high-level,recognition of each other
getting along and that's sort ofhow I think most people want to
live.
Just live in that sense of Ihave a neighbor, I'm a good
neighbor, that sort of thing.
But I will say that, be awarethat prejudice is quite
(43:21):
tenacious, it is quite powerfuland I think we underestimate its
power, and I would remindpeople that ignorance can easily
bleed over into prejudice, andnot knowing about some of the
contexts we're talking about caneasily have people slipping,
even without really knowing it,into prejudice.
(43:42):
So when I say ask questions, Imean ask questions, push your
ministers.
I don't like to hear this, butpush your ministers and say to
them really or what are theconsequences of what you're
saying to me?
And study, frankly, learn.
Jesus didn't live in a bubble,he lived in a world and, yes, he
was a child and I guess he felland he bled and he whatever,
(44:07):
and he yelled, he screamed, Imean he was a kid.
And so study.
And then I think the more youstudy, the more you enhance your
faith.
Speaker 1 (44:15):
Rabbi, I really appreciate your chaplain's heart
.
You can see that chaplainaspect of who you are as a rabbi
coming out in all of this and Ithank you very much.
And I like that very last linetoo, that ignorance leads to
prejudice.
I think that's a very powerfulline.
So I want to thank you so muchfor being on the podcast.
Speaker 2 (44:32):
My pleasure, I'll give you a bang.
All right, there you go.
Speaker 1 (44:36):
I like that very much .
Thank you, sir.
Thank you, I want to thank ouraudience today and Cousin David.
I hope you thought this was agood episode.
Maybe not as funny as you wouldlike, but I had a good time
with Rabbi Slomovitz.
I want to thank our audiencefor sitting around the table
with us today.
I hope that we have given yousome food for thought and
something to chew on.
But we aren't done yet.
(44:56):
We probably will have a veryshort little bit of leftovers
because Rabbi Slomovitz has toget over to his presentation,
but you might hear us talking alittle bit afterward.
But thank you so much.
This has been Church Potluck.
See you next time.
All right, we're done and we'restill recording, though Usually
(45:23):
we just debrief a little bitAnything you want to say.
But I just want to thank youvery much.
I thought that was a goodconversation and I think our
audience will like it a lot.
Speaker 2 (45:32):
I hope so.
I mean, you just don't hearthings like this too much.
So it's nice to have theopportunity to do that.
Speaker 1 (45:39):
I loved what you said about said about in the
military, how everybody'srubbing elbows together, and so
how could you not have moreempathy and more understanding
in that kind of a context?
Speaker 2 (45:56):
It's always ironic that people from the outside
look at the military andwhatever their perception is it
was mine too like marching andfollowing orders and all that.
But once you get on the insideeven for a rabbi, we had an
enormous amount of freedombecause we are contracted.
I don't know Methodists, youguys have a bishop that sends
you to a place.
So for us we're contracted withlike a local synagogue, but in
the military.
And so if you're with a localsynagogue, that synagogue's sort
(46:20):
of your boss, you have acontract with them.
Board your directors.
The military they just sent youto a place and they said, okay,
like, do your job.
And you have no board ofdirectors because you're working
for the government.
And you know, if I wanted tocome into a base and say I don't
like this prayer book, I wantanother one, they'd say, fine,
(46:45):
let's order it or whatever.
Whatever you want to do, and Ialways had.
I never had a rabbi as a bossat a priest or minister.
So they said to me we don'tunderstand the intricacies of
your service, just do it, don'tcause problems, you know, take
care of your people.
It was sort of ironic that youhad all that freedom to be like,
okay, do what I want.
It's awesome.
And I did have people who saidto me early on you said you're
in the military, you were achaplain.
Speaker 1 (47:05):
No, I was a chaplain here at Berry for nine years.
Wonderful.
Speaker 2 (47:08):
So you get it.
I had people I'd go to rabbinicconventions and people would
say, well, how much are youmaking Whatever?
And they said, oh, we're makingmore in our congregation.
I said, okay, good for you.
I run into those people now andthey say to me I envy you.
I say why?
They said you retired at 20years.
I was 48 when I left the Navy.
(47:28):
But my retirement I've beengetting my retirement ever since
, and so that worked out well.
But just having that that mostpeople wouldn't think that you
would have so much freedom.
I arrived at the Naval Academyas the second rabbi in its
history, Wow.
And so we developed Holocaustprograms, trips to Israel, I was
(47:49):
teaching Hebrew and history atthe academy, and so all those
were like a tabula rasa just goin and do what you want
Fantastic.
So it was something that peoplewouldn't anticipate.
Yeah, even now riding with thecops, sometimes they'll say
you're here.
I've had this question I'vealways wanted to ask while we do
this traffic stop yeah, okay,whatever.
Speaker 1 (48:10):
Yeah, that's good work.
I don't need to go, but I justwant to let you know very
quickly my father-in-law is Navyand when he retired he became
civilian and worked at Pensacolaas the overseer of the junior
ROTC program all over the nation.
Speaker 2 (48:25):
Okay, what was your father-in-law's name?
Speaker 1 (48:26):
Hans Krucke.
When was he in?
About 80 now, so he was induring the 60s.
Speaker 2 (48:34):
He was down near Cuba during the—.
When did he retire, oh?
Speaker 1 (48:35):
you know what I want to say.
It was somewhere in the 90s orearly, early, early 2000ss and
he was a.
Navy chaplain?
No, not a chaplain.
He oversaw the, but he was inPensacola so I don't know which
base you were at, but he spenthis whole civilian career
coordinating the junior ROTCprogram for the Navy.
Speaker 2 (48:52):
Okay, I mean I had two tours at Pensacola.
One was called CNET, which isthe civilian headquarters, and
the other one was, as I said,senior chaplain at NAS.
But I love the military.
As somebody said to me when Iwas joining, it's great as long
as no one's shooting at you.
Which I came in post-Vietnamand I came in 79.
(49:14):
I got out 99 before 9-11.
Except for Desert Shield,desert Storm and I was at the
Naval Academy, it was a time ofpeace.
Speaker 1 (49:26):
I'm glad I wasn't in it wartime.
I have a friend past friend whoserved as a military chaplain
for a while.
Maybe I will try to get youguys together and do another
podcast on being militarychaplains.
And I also like how you switchyour back between your yarmulke
and your—we didn't really talkabout that on the podcast
because it's visual but you'reswitching between yarmulke and
your naval hat in between.
(49:47):
That's cool.
Speaker 2 (49:48):
The switch which I talk about a little bit in the
book is that imagine and youwould appreciate this as a
sociologist, I mean, imagine I'mdoing academic history, so I'm
at Loyola and I'm trying to getmy PhD in American history and,
of course, history.
You need primary sources, Imean, you need sources.
So whatever you're going toassert historically, you have to
(50:09):
prove you just can't say theCivil War began in Fort Sumter
in Charleston, south Carolina,april 1861.
Now you can say, oh, it began inTampa, whatever.
But no, we can prove that toyou.
And then I walk a few hundredyards.
They call it Institute ofPastoral Studies, where they're
talking about Matthew and themiracles of Matthew.
You don't have to prove it, youjust have to believe it.
(50:31):
And making that switch betweenthose two, and so what I try to
do is blend it.
Speaker 1 (50:36):
That's cool, that's very cool.
Now, if you could point me,next to where I'm going.
Speaker 2 (50:42):
That'd be appreciated .
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