Ha'aretz, September 13, 1999
Baptists call on followers to pray for Jews to convert
B'nai B'rith: 'Effrontery and arrogance'
By Nitzan Horowitz, Ha'aretz Correspondent
WASHINGTON - The Southern Baptist Church, the largest Protestant movement
in the United States, has called on its followers to pray for the conversion of Jews to
Christianity during the Jewish high holidays. This call has elicited angry responses from
American Jewish groups.
B'nai B'rith issued a statement saying that the call for the conversion of
Jews "is not merely insensitive, but hostile." Richard Heideman, the
organization's president, said that "the arrogance in such a call is plain to any
Jewish person ... It contradicts the legitimacy of Judaism and its continuity."
In a letter to Dr. Jerry Rankin, director of the International Mission
Board of the Southern Baptists, Heideman wrote that "you have the right to your
religious beliefs - but with that comes the obligation to respect the right of others to
their religious beliefs. That includes Jews and Muslims, whom you also reportedly have
targeted, and Hindus and Buddhists, with whom you plan to 'intercede.' But 'intercession'
with believers in other faiths is really interference."
Heideman also noted in his letter that "in recent decades the Roman
Catholic Church has acknowledged Judaism as a living religion of continuing scriptural
authenticity. We urge the Southern Baptist Convention to do likewise."
B'nai B'rith mounted a protest two years ago against the Southern
Baptists' renewed emphasis on proselytizing Jews, including its support for the Jews for
Jesus missionary campaign. Heideman is confident that the latest effort by the Southern
Baptists to "complete" Jews by leading them to Jesus will fail, as have previous
ones.
He explained in his letter to Rankin that "Jews believe the Torah,
the Hebrew Bible, is complete in and of itself. Those who believe in the Torah, in God's
words to the people of Israel, are Jews. Complete Jews. As Jews, we await the coming of
the messiah, a human messenger of God, not the second coming of a messiah with divine
attributes."
His letter goes on to argue that those who believe that the Hebrew Bible
needs to be completed by the New Testament are not "completed Jews" but are
simply Christians.
"Jews are not some lesser category of Christians in need of
'completion' or conversion any more than the followers of Jesus are incomplete Muslims, in
need of the 'final revelation' of the Koran."
Heideman concluded his letter by saying that "while you misguidely
pray for our conversion, we will be praying on Yom Kippur, our Day of Atonement, for
forgiveness and for the opportunity to better follow God's word, the Torah, next year. As
we do so, we will not have the effrontery to beseech God to convert the believers of other
religions."
The Southern Baptist movement has considerable political influence in the
United States. President Bill Clinton is a Southern Baptist.
(c) copyright 1999 Ha'aretz. All Rights Reserved
Source:
http://www3.haaretz.co.il/eng/scripts/article.asp?id=55852&mador=1
