Ezekiel 33 (11-12-2019)
The fact that Jews fought alongside Muslims against the Crusaders complicated the matter. But read about the People's Crusade that took place just months before the first Church sanctioned crusade to reconquer Jerusalem. It involved about 100,000 men, mostly commoners, rallied by a charismatic priest and they massacred communities of Jews while on their way through Europe to the Holy Land. Local bishops tried to stall the attacks on Jews but were mostly unsuccessful and the result is referred to as "the first holocaust".
People's Crusade - Wikipedia
Ezekiel 33 (11-12-2019)
It's clear that anti-semitism was, at least in areas of Europe, quite popular among the common people throughout the middle ages. But the idea that Christians in general have "blood on their hands" because Christians centuries ago persecuted Jews is a theological idea, not a historical one. In the Bible the guilt of the fathers was transferred to their children only if the children actually participated in their fathers' sins.
Mat 23:29 "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! Because you build the tombs of the prophets and [m]adorn the monuments of the righteous, 30 and say, 'If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.'
31 "Therefore you are witnesses against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets. 32 Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers' guilt. 33 Serpents, brood[n] of vipers! How can you escape the condemnation of hell? 34 Therefore, indeed, I send you prophets, wise men, and scribes: some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from city to city, 35 that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar. 36 Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.
The blood of those persecuted by the forefathers of the Pharisees wouldn't come upon them because they failed to "repent of the sins of former generations" as some suggest that we should do in relation to anti-semitism, slavery, racism and so on. It would come upon them only because they themselves participated in the actions of their forefathers and continued them.
Our reputation as "the Christian Church" is perhaps stained in the minds of modern Jews and we have work to do in terms of making it clear what Christianity is really about but using the term "blood on our hands" is going too far, it's theologically faulty and it may even serve to reinforce an impression of a modern church that resembles the situation from the middle ages.
This whole topic smacks of modern culture reparations. I dont have blood on my hands for something done thousands of years ago. I refuse to carry it.
Ezekiel 33 (11-12-2019), John (11-11-2019)
On the Jews fighting alongside Muslims against the Crusaders. I'm quoting from jewishvirtuallibrary.org
"In July 1099, after a five-week siege, the knights of the First Crusade and their rabble army captured Jerusalem, massacring most of the city's non-Christian inhabitants. Barricaded in their synagogues, the Jews defended their quarter, only to be burnt to death or sold into slavery."
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After the overthrow of the Crusaders by a Muslim army under Saladin (1187), the Jews were again accorded a certain measure of freedom, including the right to live in Jerusalem."
So it seems that the Muslims treated the Jewish inhabitants better than the Christians did. Which is often what happened to inhabitants of other religions until World War I when the area became ethnically cleansed to a much larger degree.
Ezekiel 33 (11-12-2019)
Ezekiel 33 (11-12-2019)
I know some Messianics that do well in this. They pretty much condemn those that arent adhering to festivals and sabbaths. One couple I had in my office per their request, wanted to have me read a stack of files on why they believe. She was a fanatic about kosher diet. Finally, I leveled at her asking if her diet was a matter of righteousness. She danced off into her health and the junk in all other foods. I asked her again and she begrudgingly said "no". Well ok then, let me eat shrimp, lobster and ribs without condemnation.
They really can be a condescending bunch to be around.
Ezekiel 33 (11-12-2019)