Bartholomew's Notes

“With the financial help of Moon, he is planning something”

Asia News reports on a statement by the Roman Catholic Korean Bishops’ Conference:

The former Archbishop of Lusaka, Emmanuel Milingo, “is a danger for South Korea’s Catholics, who must avoid him and above all not become involved in his activity, clearly condemned by the Universal Church”.

…A source in Seoul told AsiaNews: “Since he allied himself to the Unifi[cation] Church…Milingo has considered Korea as excellent hunting grounds…[H]e also married a native of Seoul, Maria Sung, who has pushed him to carry out apostolate work among Koreans. On many occasions the former archbishop has tried to contact us, but has never received an answer. Now we know that, with the financial help of Moon, he is planning something, but we don’t quite know what”.

Apparently Milingo has spent most of 2007 in South Korea. UCAN has further details:

Father Peter Pai Young-ho, secretary general of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Korea, told UCA News Sept. 12 that…the excommunicated archbishop fraternizes with Catholics and visits Catholic institutions as though he still holds episcopal office. “It was reported that he has shown himself in Catholic archbishop’s attire and held prayer meetings with local Catholics in several shrines in the country,” the church official reported.

“The shrine authorities, who did not recognize him, welcomed him, thinking he was a foreign archbishop visiting Korea,” Father Pai added.

Earlier this month, Milingo contacted the Times of Zambia to refute claims that he had joined the Unification Church, and to complain about the way the Roman Catholic church had suppressed his God-given healing powers (“because they considered me a mere poor black guy”):

In his correspondence with the Times via email, Archbishop Milingo says he has not become a Moonist but states that Reverend Moon referred to him as a “unique person and a gift from God to humanity.”

“It is a lie that Milingo has become a Moonist. Neither will such a fact satisfy Rev. Moon that Milingo becomes a Moonist. But if Milingo is thrown away from his cradle of faith, someone who understands who Milingo is picks him up as the Daughter of Pharaoh in Egypt saved the baby Moses thrown in the river Nile.

“Not even a wee bit of my Catholic Faith has accepted an inkling of change in my Catholic beliefs,” Archbishop Milingo said.

However, the piece ends with a possible Freudian slip:

“God loves everyone with his defects. Don’t judge,” Archbishop Milingo said.

Milingo’s statement to the Times comes several months after he gave a lecture in Korea, in which he said that:

“Looking at True Parents’ life and his current achievements I realized that this person is the messiah sent by God.”

And if his Catholic beliefs have not changed, it is rather odd that he was quoted a year ago as saying that he had travelled to Korea

“to join the many Catholics and Catholic married priests who are in the Unification movement”

So what exactly might Milingo be “planning”? Perhaps we can find a clue in his 2002 account, when he temporarily split from Moon (and Maria Sung) and returned to the Catholic Church:

…the Moonies had plans: to found a well-financed parallel Catholic Church in Africa, autonomous from Rome, with its own hierarchy headed by Milingo. “I would not have gone along with the plan,” says Milingo.

Given the amount of bizarre flip-flopping since then, that last sentence shouldn’t be taken as authoritative.

(And in related Moon news: Portfolio has a profile of Kahr Arms, a gun manufacturer run by Moon’s son, while Ed Brayton is currently exploring Moon’s activities in Michigan)

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Arutz Sheva reports on allegations that Christian Zionist groups in Israel have missionary intentions:

Ze’ev Shtieglitz of the anti-missionary Lev L’Achim organization has presented evidence of actual missionary activity by ICEJ [the International Christian Embassy] to the Chief Rabbinate. “For instance,” he recently told Arutz-7, “ICEJ Liaison Officer Doron Schneider is the head of the Messianic Jewish community in Maaleh Adumim… Dr. George Giacumakis, the one-time Chairman of the Board of Trustees of ICEJ, has said straight out that it is hoped, through various ‘friendship’ organizations with Jews, and by giving financial and political support to Israel, that Jews will start showing interest in Christianity.”

Lev L’Achim is apparently distinct from Yad L’Achim, an anti-missionary group that featured on this blog here.

The report focuses particularly on a quote from David Pawson (emphasis in report):

“One day the people of Israel as a whole will become Messianic Jews…  Prayer for Israel is not enough; preaching is also necessary. The church’s silence over the holocaust was bad enough; her silence about hell would be a worse betrayal… True lovers of Israel will speak on behalf of Jews to Christians and on behalf of Christ to Jews…We cannot help but be missionaries, and I have discovered that some Jews despise us if we pretend not to be…”

Further:

…Jack Hayford, was one of 1,100 Christian Zionists and Messianic Jews who took part in the Road to Jerusalem conference in California last year.  He spoke there of “helping the church understand what God’s doing among Jews today and how to relate to it.”  Co-speakers at that Road to Jerusalem event were co-founder Rev. Raleigh Washington — who said, “when a Jewish person recognizes that Jesus is his messiah, he becomes a Jew who has now found his messiah” — and Rev. Mike Bickle of Kansas City, Mo., who used the phrase “unsaved Jews” and said a Satan-like leader “will be required to exterminate the Jewish race.”

The result of all this is that the Chief Rabbinate Council’s Committee for the Prevention of Missionary Work in the Holy Land has now announced that it is forbidden for Jews to participate in Christian Zionist events, particularly the Feast of Tabernacles, which is usually addressed by high-profile Israeli politicians.

This is a controversy that has been running for some time, and the Rabbinate told Jews not to attend a Christian Allies Caucus event in May. One Christian Zionist leader, Janet Parshall, complained in March that Israel’s attitude was

“We’ll take your aid, your support and your tourist dollars, but we won’t take your Jesus.” Christians should not have to “choose between the cross or Israel,” the American evangelical says.

However, Christian Zionist organisations have been cautious to avoid causing offence, which is why Lev L’Achim’s “evidence” against the ICEJ is rather lame. Indeed, some Christian Zionists have avoided the subject altogether, despite Pawson’s blunt formulation of Christian exclusivity – that non-Christian Jews face a worse fate than the Holocaust, namely, hell itself. For Christian Zionists who believe that the end of nigh, the impending return of Jesus paradoxically means that converting the Jews is less urgent, since many of those living now be converted miraculously. One quote attributed to John Hagee (I haven’t been able to track down the source, although someone has spammed it over numerous blogs) is that he and a Rabbi associate

“…both know that one day when we’re dancing in the streets of Jerusalem together, one of us will have to seriously reevaluate our beliefs.”

Hagee has also at times apparently made statements supportive of “dual covenant” theology (at other times he has denied it). Christian exclusivity is problematic as regards Judaism, since, unlike Islam or paganism, Judaism was salvific before the coming of Jesus. Where does this leave God’s covenant with the Jews? The “dual covenant” concept means that Judaism and Christianity remain equally valid today, and therefore Jews who follow Judaism do not need to be converted to Christianity (although what this means for non-Jewish converts to Judaism remains murky). Some have seen this as a way forward for Jews and Christian Zionists, and there was an attempt last year to ascribe this belief to Jerry Falwell – which Falwell denied vehemently.

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Frontpage magazine turns to theology with an essay by conservative Israeli-American scientist Michael Anbar. Anbar explains why Christians ought to be opposed to “Palestinian” (his scare-quotes) sovereignty over Arab areas of Jerusalem. As well as giving strategic reasons, he argues that:

Like in Judaism, Jerusalem is central to Christianity, which expects Jesus to reappear in Jerusalem. This belief makes every Christian a Zionist. Conquest of the Holy City by Muslims should be, therefore, as devastating to believing Christians as it would be to religious Jews.

How exactly an all-powerful being returning to earth at the end of time would be inconvenienced by Arab non-Christians, rather than Jewish non-Christians, running part of the city is not explained. Further,

The fall of Jerusalem would have far-reaching theological implications. Notwithstanding the recent reconciliation of Christians and Jews, frustrated Christians might accuse all Jews for having willfully given up the Holy Land, after God has helped them to regain it. It could than result in unprecedented misojudaism (hatred of Jews) by religious Christians. The worldwide Jewish remnants of the new impending catastrophe will not be supported and consoled, but scolded and despised by frustrated religious Christians. Christians might also accuse the Jews for the onslaught of Islam on Christianity that will not fail to take place following the fall of Jerusalem.

This was also an argument made by Herb Zweibon of Americans for a Safe Israel in 2004, in relation to the West Bank. One wonders how Christian Zionists react to the claim that the only reason that they don’t hate Jews is because they admire the expansionism of the Israeli right.

Anbar, apparently, is

Professor of Biophysics and Chairman of Dept. of Biophysical Sciences, Sch. of Medicine, Univ. of Buffalo (1977-2002, now retired). Previously, he was professor at the Weizmann Institute of Science and Deputy Director of the Soreq Nuclear Research Institute, in Israel.

He also founded OmniCorder Technologies, now known as Advanced BioPhotonics Inc.

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A bit of dry humour from “His Disgrace” Anglican Bishop Nolbert Kunonga, in an interview for the Zimbabwe Herald. Kunonga has announced his intention to secede from the Province of Central Africa over the issue of homosexuality, despite the fact that the Province has taken a stand against it (emphasis added):

Q: How do you respond to the view that your withdrawal was strategically planned to coincide with Archbishop Malango’s retirement, particularly assertions that you want to form your own province in which you will be Archbishop?

A: Oh, it was not planned, it was not done to coincide with the retirement (of Archbishop Malango). It is not even my ambition to become the Archbishop of any province. We stand by the scriptures, we stand by the will of God, it does matter when this comes in.

It so happens that it coincides with Archbishop Malango’s retirement, but it has nothing to do with my ambitions because when deacons become bishops and bishops become archbishops, we are elected. It is a matter of power and you cannot be sure that you become archbishop in the process because elections can go anywhere. So it has nothing to do with that.

Kunonga, as I’ve blogged before, is a major beneficiary of Mugabe – in return for describing the dictator as “more merciful than God” in the run-up to the 2002 election, he was rewarded with two farms that had been appropriated by Mugabe’s militia (and which are now reportedly being mismanaged). Kunonga also boasts of baptising children “in the Zanu-PF way”. In March, Malango suggested that Kunonga might like to distance himself from Mugabe – despite the fact that the Archbishop had previously stepped in to stop a corruption prosecution against him.

So, is it the case that ecclesiastical “elections can go anywhere” in Zimbabwe? When Kunonga became Bishop in 2000, not everyone thought so:

Anglican supporters of Zimbabwe’s ruling Zanu-PF party were on Thursday accused of breaking church canonic law to block the election as the new Bishop of Mashonaland of a prominent white critic of Robert Mugabe’s human rights record…Supporters of the election of Timothy Neill, 47, vicar general of the diocese, want to nullify the alleged last-minute nomination on December 22 of a theologian, Reverend Norbert Kunonga…

“I have put this in the hands of lawyers. I have told Archbishop Bernard Malango that the process was a disgrace,” said Neill. “The church has to set a moral tone for the nation. If the church conducts its business in the same way that Zanu-PF does, then there is no hope.”… Kunonga, a theology lecturer at Africa University, Mutare, could not be reached on Thursday for comment but Bishop Sebastien Bakare of Bulawayo described the allegations of electoral impropriety as “very serious”. “There is no way the counting could have been rigged,” said the bishop.

Supporters of Neill said Kunonga was not among three approved, short-listed candidates put before 21 electors who met in the Zimbabwean midlands city of Gweru on December 22. They allege canonic law was breached by intense lobbying for Kunonga and by circulation of a highly defamatory letter accusing Neill, one of the short-listed three, of racism. Neill was prominent in an April 1 march by human rights activists that was attacked by ex-guerrillas while police looked on. In October, he helped launch a new pressure group demanding Mugabe’s resignation as an essential first step towards ending corruption, Zimbabwean participation in the Congo civil war, and the violence by “war veterans” that has claimed 40 lives since February…

Of course, other elections in the country have also had remarkably predictable results.

One Kunonga supporter is journalist Caesar Zvayi, the Herald’s political editor (see here for a hostile profile):

Bishop Kunonga only has two “crimes,” the first is defeating a whiteman, Timothy Neill, to head a white Church; and the second is “abusing” his position in a white church, to fight for the dignity of the blackman…Bishop Kunonga was attacked in the local opposition and western right wing media for refusing to join the bandwagon of narrow minded hypocrites who always parrot baseless claims of alleged lawlessness, land grab, corruption and so on that the western world makes about Zimbabwe.

A rather more critical assessment of Kunonga’s election and reign can be found in a recent posting to the blog Takudzwa, which is run by Masiiwa Ragies Gunda of the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Zimbabwe.

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…or maybe not

On the anniversary of 9/11, Charles Colson uncovers a conspiracy:

But as a Muslim convert to Christianity notes, we have more to worry about than violent attacks. We should be just as concerned about the quiet inroads Islam is making in Western societies.

Dr. Patrick Sookhdeo, who was born into a Muslim family, is now an Anglican priest living in England.

…To Sookhdeo, the signs are not good. He notes that a book “published in 1980 by the Islamic Council of Europe gives instructions for how Muslim minorities are to work towards achieving domination of European countries through a policy of concentration in geographical areas.”

In England and France, this has already begun.

But what book is this? Here’s Sookhdeo himself, writing in 2005:

In 1980 the Islamic Council of Europe published a book called Muslim Communities in Non-Muslim States which clearly explained the Islamic agenda in Europe. When Muslims live as a minority they face theological problems, because classical Islamic teaching always presupposed a context of Islamic dominance; hence the need for guidance on how to live in non-Muslim states. The instructions given in the book told Muslims to get together and organise themselves with the aim of establishing a viable Muslim community based on Islamic principles. This is the duty of every individual Muslim living within a non-Muslim political entity. They should set up mosques, community centres and Islamic schools. At all costs they must avoid being assimilated by the majority. In order to resist assimilation, they must group themselves geographically, forming areas of high Muslim concentration within the population as a whole. Yet they must also interact with non-Muslims so as to share the message of Islam with them. Every Muslim individual is required to participate in the plan; it is not allowed for anyone simply to live as a “good Muslim” without assisting the overall strategy. The ultimate goal of this strategy is that the Muslims should become a majority and the entire nation be governed according to Islam. (M. Ali Kettani “The Problems of Muslim Minorities and their Solutions” in Muslim Communities in Non-Muslim States (London: Islamic Council of Europe, 1980) pp.96-105)

Not all Muslims would support this action plan. The more secularized are happy to become integrated within the majority society…it is not hard to recognize the different stages of the Islamic Council of Europe’s strategy being put into practice within today’s Europe…Sweden’s third largest city, Malmø, is effectively ruled by violent gangs of Muslims…

Sookhdeo’s “discovery” has been reposted widely since then as evidence of a “Protocols”-type conspiracy; a poster to one site presents the first paragraph I cited as being a direct quote from Kettani’s essay, which it’s not.

Actually consulting the book – a collection of essays derived from a 1978 conference –  itself is difficult. It is long out-of-print, and unavailable through either Amazon or Google Books. However, I had a bit of free time yesterday and tracked down a copy to a public library in London. I had time only to browse the book as a whole, but I did manage to read the Kettani essay, which I noted that Sookhdeo refrained from quoting directly. Having seen the text first-hand, I have to conclude that Sookhdeo is a scaremongering demagogue who has misrepresented the book for his own purposes and indulged in shameful quotemining.

Firstly, it should be noted that the book has a global context: as well as Muslim immigrants in the West, it deals with historic Muslim minorities in places like India, and with locations where Muslims have to deal with hostility – particularly the USSR. Some of the material in the book is arguable – there is a defence of Muslim Personal Law for Muslims in India, and the way the authors contrast Islam’s universal values with the “ethnic religions” of Judaism and Hinduism is problematic. However, the essays do not speak with a monolithic voice, and, while the perspective is conservative, the tone, although slightly preachy, is moderate. Here’s what Kettani (who was the Special Advisor on Muslim Minorities to the General Secretary of the Islamic Conference, Jeddah) actually writes:

Once a Muslim finds himself in a non-Muslim environment it becomes his Islamic duty to get organized with other Muslims…Islam is a ‘social religion’ in the sense that a person cannot become a Muslim unless he actively cares about his Muslim brothers…The organization should not be an elitist gathering consisting only of those who are the ‘best’ Muslims. (97-98)

To Sookhdeo, this becomes

Every Muslim individual is required to participate in the plan; it is not allowed for anyone simply to live as a “good Muslim” without assisting the overall strategy.

Is the Rev Sookhdeo also indifferent as to whether Christians ought to come to church, or to socialise together? And by adding “not allowed”, of course, Sookhdeo hints at some kind of coercion – which is not suggested in the essay.

Kettani also has some negative things to say about assimilation, although it’s clear from the context he means assimilation as complete dissolution into the majority way of life:

It is the “Organization” of the Muslim minority that can help it resist the different assimilative trends. In order to be able to do so, the community should have, geographically speaking, some area of concentration…Moreover, social interaction between Muslims should be kept as a maximum all the time, not only at the mosque, but also by exchange of visits by families [etc]… (103)

As a practice to maintain a minority identity, this is hardly sinister or even surprising. Of course Muslims don’t want their children abandoning their heritage – and the same is true of members of most minority groups (particularly religious groups) anywhere. To paint this as some sort of covert “strategy” is unwarranted. Kettani also writes that:

Islamically, it will not harm the Muslim community to absorb the characteristics that are not contrary to Islamic principles. Some of these characteristics are: the learning of the language of the majority;…the wearing of its dress, if it does not violate the decency of dress advocated by Islam; and the absorption of minor social habits that are Islamically unobjectionable. (102-103)

Not exactly enthusiastic, but again unexceptionable. One statement Sookhdeo could have made something of follows:

Muslims should continue to believe that Islam is the only true religion and that all other religions, as stated in the Holy Qur’an, will be rejected by the Creator. (103)

But I suppose many Christians think the same thing about their religion, so Sookhdeo discretely passes this by. Instead, he fixes on the following:

However, Islamically, a Muslim community cannot be enclosed in a ghetto-like mentality. It should be capable of interacting with members of the non-Muslim community so as to fulfil its duty of da’wah…A Muslim community should try to move from a position of mere defensive concerns, and try to spread the message of Islam outside the community. If successful, such a community would grow constantly in influence and numbers as to become a majority community in course of time. (103-104)

The Christian Sookhdeo finds it a bad sign that Kettani believes his religion to be true and would like to see more people follow it. Kettani also argues that Muslims should seek official recognition as an “entity” – pointing out that various groups enjoy official status in particular countries, such as Jews and Roman Catholics in Sweden.

In all, Kettani’s essay is somewhat limited in outlook – but it’s far from being the kind of sinister and conspiratorial document which Sookhdeo would have us believe it to be. And as for this being “the Islamic Council of Europe’s strategy”, that is simply untrue if you look at the book as a whole. Another essay, by Syed Z. Abedu, is more progressive. He calls for:

A total reconstruction of our mental attitudes and social behaviour…There is nothing wrong in emphasising in what ways we are different, or what is unique about us. But we also need sometimes to focus on our common humanity. (25)

…[the Muslim minority’s] destiny is, to a considerable extent, interwoven and interlocked with that of their countrymen. (26)

Abedu also takes a more liberal line on the validity of other religions (35). Sookhdeo, however, doesn’t feel the need to include any of this in his “analysis”, since that would undermine his scaremongering purpose.

Ismail R. Faruqi, meanwhile, suggests that just as non-Muslims in Muslim states have certain obligations, but also rights, the same should be true in the non-Muslim world:

The principle is that just as dhimmis have to submit to and support the Islamic state, of which they have covenanted to be members, the Muslim minority ought to submit to and support the alien state in which they have taken residence. (60-61)

Of course, from a modern secular perspective this again has limitations, but once more we can see that this is a long way from the false impression created by Sookhdeo, who has concocted a silly conspiracy theory designed to spread fear and resentment of Muslim communities based on an obscure and unremarkable book published nearly thirty years ago. For Sookhdeo’s cheerleader Chuck Colson, the moral of the story is doubtless that Americans should be fearful of Europe and of immigrants, and should re-assert Christianity as the culture of the USA. However, he’s not the only one to have been inspired by Sookhdeo’s essay; the website of the far-right British National Party also tells its readers about the sinister book “published in 1980 by the Islamic Council of Europe.” (1)

But even if Sookhdeo had managed to find a text truly preaching separatism and hostility toward the majority community (and doubtless such works exist somewhere), what exactly would that prove anyway? We know why minority communities usually tend to congregate together: to protect cultural and religious heritage, to maintain kinship links, and because such communities offer networks of support which make life easier. To see the existence of Muslim communities as some kind of “strategy” to “achieve dominion” (Colson’s term) is both paranoid and sociologically illiterate.

This blog has covered the negative consequences of Islamic extremism on numerous occasions, and I consider the phenomenon to be a subject of urgent public enquiry. I’ve also been supportive of critical investigations that some have tried to dismiss as “Islamophobia”. However, efforts to understand the growth and baneful influence of Islamism are not helped by disinformation and distortion such as that in which Sookhdeo indulges.

(1) bnp.org.uk/columnists/chairman2.php?ngId=27

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Remember Larry Caldwell? I blogged him in July 2005, a few months after he announced plans to sue his children’s school:

California parent Larry Caldwell has filed a civil rights lawsuit in federal court against the Roseville Joint Union High School District and school officials alleging that his constitutional rights to free speech, equal protection and religious freedom were violated in the course of his year-long effort to improve the teaching of evolution in his district. “I tried to exercise my basic rights as a citizen to propose a new idea, and school officials responded by suspending normal procedures, publicly attacking my personal religious beliefs, and even threatening to sue me to stop me from speaking out,” reported Caldwell. “These are tactics you’d expect in a banana republic, not the state of California.”…

Inevitably, the cause was picked up by WorldNetDaily. Caldwell’s proposed “improvement” to the syllabus was a video of Jonathan Wells’ Icons of Evolution and materials by Cornelius Hunter, whose book Darwin’s God argues that Darwin’s theories were derived from his religious needs. By focusing solely on these critiques, Caldwell could claim that he was not seeking to promote intelligent design or other forms of Creationism, and (somewhat to my surprise) both he and Hunter left irritated comments on this blog when I explored the religious context to their campaign.

Two-and-a-half years later, however, the courts have rejected Caldwell’s claims of persecution. For some reason, the Discovery Institute, which gave publicity to the case and posted online relevant documents, has not yet updated its site with the denouement; Religion Cause, however, has the details:

In Caldwell v. Roseville Joint Union High School District, 2007 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 66318 (ED CA, Sept. 7, 2007), a California federal district court dismissed claims by intelligent design activist Larry Caldwell that he was unconstitutionally denied access to various forums to promote his “Quality Science Education” proposals…In granting summary judgment to the school district, the court emphasized that “this case is not about whether a theory of intelligent design can or should be included in the science curriculum…. Rather, this case is about whether Larry Caldwell was denied access to speak in various fora or participate in certain processes because of his actual or perceived religious beliefs.”

Caldwell’s “Quality Science Education for All” website is now “Currently Under Re-Construction”.

UPDATE: Ed Brayton has more.

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Joseph Farah goes off the deep end:

While the Muslim zealots who administer the Temple Mount continue to excavate the site without a thought or care as to the integrity of the most sacred ground in Judaism, not to mention an archaeological treasure trove, the Israeli political elite is secretly working out a “final solution” for what they consider a troublesome, burdensome stone in their shoe.

Farah calls this an “unholy alliance” of

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Israeli President Shimon Peres, most of the rest of the Israeli political elite and the sworn enemies of the Jewish state, those who would finish the work of Adolph Hitler if they ever got the chance.

Olmert, Peres and the inner sanctum of the Israeli political elite fear the Temple Mount. They always have. In fact, ever since Israel captured the site in June 1967, fools like Olmert and Peres have been skulking about trying to figure out a way to rid themselves and their country of it.

…Because they know if it remains in the possession of the Jewish people long enough, the Jewish people will obey their G-d and rebuild the Temple. This would be unthinkable to the Israeli political elite. They believe the Israeli government is the one, true G-d of the Israeli people. The Israeli political elite does not recognize the G-d of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. They do not recognize the G-d who gave the Jewish people the land deed for their nation. They do not recognize the G-d who promised the Jewish people would be restored to the land. And they do not recognize the G-d who restored them to the land after 1,800 years in exile.

This is actually a repudiation of mainstream religious Jewish thought, which has long argued that the building of the Temple will be an eschatological event undertaken by the Messiah. David Bleich’s Contemporary Halakhic Problems explains (p. 246):

The rebuilding of the Bet ha-Mikdash itself is precluded until the coming of the Messiah. Rashi, in his commentary on Sukkah 41a and Rosh ha-Shanah 30a, states that the third Temple will not be a human artifact but shall miraculously appear as a fully built edifice. According to Rashi’s opinion, the verse “The sanctuary, O Lord, which Thy hands have established” (Exod. 15:17) refers to the future Bet ha-Mikdash. Rambam, on the other hand, enumerates the building of the Bet ha-Mikdash as one of the 613 commandments…However. He states explicitly that this Bet ha-Mikdash will be rebuilt only with the advent of the Messiah himself. Not only will the Temple be built by the Messiah, but this construction will serve as substantiation of the messianic claim.

A footnote adds:

Rashi’s view is implicit in the nahem prayer of the minhah service for the Ninth of Ab: “For Thou, O Lord, didst consume it [the Temple] with fire and through fire wilt Thou in future rebuild it.” The text of the prayer is based upon the Jerusalem Talmud, Berakhot 4:3.

Maimonides’s (“Rambam’s”) perspective provides some wriggle-room for those who want to take matters into their own hands, but only a fringe of Jewish fundamentalists have chosen this route – although egged on by thousands of Christian Zionists (as I blogged here). Further, the Chief Rabbinate of Israel warns pious Jews not to enter the site of the Temple Mount at all, due to its holiness. So, Farah’s claim that the Temple has not been rebuilt simply due to the atheism of Israel’s “political elite” is just not true. Is Farah a blundering fool who can manage affectatons like writing “G-d” while remaining ignorant of the religious traditions of a group that he claims to champion, or is he a calculating liar seeking to whip up the apocalyptic fervour of his Christian fundamentalist readership?

Of course Olmert and Peres “fear” Jewish religious fanatics taking over the area, for two rather obvious reasons – firstly, it would cause considerable international strife, and secondly, it would pitch Israel towards an ultra-orthodox theocracy. Neither problem bothers Farah, though, because Christian Zionists like him don’t give a damn about actual Jewish lives. Further conflict in the Middle East is inevitable, not just because Muslims are evil to the core, but because God, acting like some kind of puppet-master, has future wars planned out in advance. And Israel ought to be theocratic because Jews should fit the sentimental stereotype of Christian Zionist fantasy.

But what of the actual “excavations” (in fact, the digging of a trench to lay some cables) which have provoked Farah’s wrath? There is indeed cause for concern – the waqf’s track record in these matters is not encouraging, and its bizarre denial that there was ever a biblical Temple on the site suggests that any work undertaken will be done recklessly. It is also interesting to note that a petition against allowing the work to continue includes the archeologist Israel Finkelstein, who can hardly be accused of having a religio-nationalist agenda. However, there is some hypocrisy here. Back to WorldNetDaily, and a report by Aaron Klein:

Rabbi Chaim Richman, director of Israel’s Temple Institute, was among those on the Mount last month…He told WND he attempted to take pictures of the damage the bulldozers are allegedly wrecking on the wall, but his digital camera was confiscated by Israeli police at the direction of Waqf officials…Richman charged the Waqf was “trying to erase Jewish vestiges from the Temple Mount.”

Klein, who always whitewashes his Israeli far-right contacts, fails to tell us that Richman is also involved with the “Sanhedrin”, a Kahanist theocratic organization founded in 2005, to the excitement of Christian Zionists like Hal Lindsey (as I blogged at the time). Again at WND, Lindsey argued that some of those involved believed that a new temple could be built on the site without damaging the Dome of the Rock:

The second theory (which I am convinced is the most accurate) is that the Temple was built north of the Dome of the Rock. Dr. Asher Kaufman developed this theory, using certain archeological evidences that he found before the Muslim’s [sic] destroyed them… The Temple can be rebuilt and stand alongside the Dome of the Rock without disturbing it. And since the outer court, also known as the Court of the Gentiles, is given to the Gentiles in this period just before the Messiah comes, it infers that there would be a Gentile building there, i.e., the Dome of the Rock.

How such a building – which would require access for thousands of visitors and animals, plus drainage for the blood from all the animal sacrifices – could operate without “disturbing” the adjacent structures is not explained; and at any rate, this is a minority view among Richman’s associates. According to the Sanhedrin website (square brackets in original):

The majority of the committee support the idea that the site is where the Dome of the rock. The steering committee of the Sanhedrin sat as a subcourt [earlier this year] and the majority vote [of the judges based on a detailed presentation of evidence by the architects, archaeologists and historians ruled that the current evidence most convincingly indicates] that the exact place is the where Dome of the Rock currently stands.

It goes without saying, of course, that the new structure has to be on the site of the original. Chaim Richman is also the co-author of several books with Rabbi Yisrael Ariel, who is also a Sanhedrin member and Temple Institute director. Timothy Weber’s On the Road to Armageddon gives us some background to Richman’s colleague and collaborator (pp. 260-61):

Ariel is a doer who is not afraid to justify violence in the achievement of his ends. During the mid- and late 1980s, he was the leader of Tzfiyah (“expectation”), a right-wing group organized to support members of the Jewish underground who had been jailed after their attempt to blow up the Dome of the Rock. Ariel was furious that some members of the Gush Emunim had condemned the actions of the underground. He argued that “thou shalt not kill” applied only to killing fellow Jews, not non-Jews…he condemned all Jews who did not support the building of the third temple and declared that since Christians and Muslims were idolators, they should not be allowed to live in Israel [sourced from Gershom Gorenberg, End of Days].

So, while Farah denounces Israeli leaders for failing to protect the remains currently being uncovered by the waqf, he is willing to puff a group which wants to destroy another ancient structure on the site – and which despises his own Christian religion.

Farah ends darkly:

Olmert and Peres and the rest of those unprincipled cowards and wolves in sheep’s clothing have sold out their own people. They are now bed partners with the Islamo-fascist fanatics they have entrusted with the holiest site in all Judaism, not to mention Western Civilization’s richest archaeological treasure.

Let me make a little prediction: No matter how hard Olmert and Peres work in conjunction with the Muslims to destroy the Temple Mount, it will never come to pass.

In fact, I will predict that their actions will lead to a rising chorus among Jews in Israel and around the world to rebuild the Temple.

And let me make “a little prediction” of my own. I lived in Jerusalem in 1993-94, and I remember seeing dozens of right-wing fly-posters showing Yitchak Rabin’s head placed above a Nazi uniform. The consequence, of course, was that Rabin ended up being murdered by an Israeli fanatic. Should the same fate befall Olmert or Peres in revenge for their plans for a “final solution” and links to “Islamo-fascists” and “those who would finish the work of Adolph Hitler”, I predict that Farah and Klein will follow the example of a certain non-Jewish Biblical figure, and wash their hands of responsibility.

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Bizarre scenes in Florida, where a mayor decided to show that the community supported his anti-gay policies by inviting a representative of a religious group dressed in military fatigues to address the press at city hall:

A group of Christian clergymen flocked to the side of [Fort Lauderdale] Mayor Jim Naugle on Tuesday, saying the depth of sexual sin in Broward County necessitates an old-fashioned spiritual revival.

The African-American church representatives said the gay community misunderstands Naugle’s stance toward them. He is here to help, they said.

…Elder Mathes Guice of the Koinonia Worship Center in Pembroke Park said the county tourist council’s marketing targeted to gay visitors “led the spiritual community on a collision course with Satan.”

Naugle has been the subject of considerable derisory comment for several weeks, since he unveiled plans for an expensive toilet:

While trying to make a case for spending what would turn into $500,000 for a single seater toilet, Jim argued that there needed to be a private single toilet at the beach so two gays could not fit in it and have sex. Jim called it a crisis.

What he didn’t count on was that a reporter would track down his claims that this had become a serious problem in our community, and report that it wasn’t. As a matter of fact, the police, after an exhaustive search, could only come up with eight cases since 2005. Instead of drawing attention to serious problems, the mayor has now had multiple press conferences to talk about toilet sex. How sad!

But what about Mathes Guice and those uniforms? Pam Spaulding notes he’s an elder at the Koinonia Worship Center & Village, which has a web presence on My Space. An audio message there uses a lot of the “spiritual warfare” language typical of the conservative Christian “men’s movement” (see this essay by Jeff Sharlet for an overview), but aimed specifically at African-Americans (there are a number of US churches that cater to the needs of black Americans; Barack Obama is associated with one, to the outrage of conservatives). The senior pastor of Koinonia is Eric H. Jones, who is himself a Broward County mayor, of the City of West Park:

Mayor Jones currently serves as Senior Pastor at Koinonia Worship Center & Village which he founded in 1979. Prior to that position, he was General Manager of Continental Blood Components from 1984 to 1987 and Quality Control Supervisor of North American Biological from 1974 to 1985.

Guice and other members of the church apparently patrol the neighbourhood in their military outfits, as reported in the Broward Times in June:

The men’s ministry of the Carver Ranches-based Koinonia Worship Center will begin canvassing the drug-infested neighborhoods and crime-riddled streets of Deerfield Beach, starting this weekend. Dressed in camouflaged military fatigues, Deacon Mathes Guice, and other members of the ministry, will join the Rev. Nathaniel Knowles and other pastors there to begin the process to address crime and violence in the city.

According to a note from one of Naugle’s opponents, published by Spaulding, they also appear to have branched out into security:

I’ve never heard to this group before, the ones in military dress. They concern me a great deal. When I entered City Hall yesterday evening to observe the press conference the Mayor had called with them. Two of them escorted me from the front doors on the north side of the building to the elevators and then stood and took up ‘posts’ in the elevator lobby.

A commentator to Spaulding’s website notes some further details about Guice:

Yahoo people search turned up one Mathes Guice in FL, age 61. A Mathes Guice received an acknowledgment of 15 years service to the Broward Co. Sheriff’s Office in 2004 (pdf). Someone by this name was also VP of the Ft Lauderdale NAACP and apparently has also been active in working to re-integrate ex-convicts back into society via a tax-exempt organization…

The commentator also found this announcement:

If you have a felony criminal record, you cannot get a job, or even obtain a license to cut hair, until you have had your rights restored. Rev. Eric Jones is collaborating with the Broward Public Defender’s Office, State Rep. Perry E. Thurston, Jr., the Broward State Attorneys Office, and a number of other organizations to hold the Broward Redemption Workshop. The workshop will assist those who need their rights restored. It will take place at Jones’ church, Koinonia Worship Center…

Public Christian statements against homosexuality are the in thing just now; I blogged on a rally in Uganda a couple of weeks ago, while Protestant Christians in Ukraine are currently planning a march supporting “criminal penalties for homosexual propaganda and popularization”.

(Hat tip: Dispatches from the Culture Wars)

Name variation: Mathis Guice

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Following on from my last entry, the AFP reports:

The head of a major Middle Eastern development company flew to North Korea Wednesday, and a South Korean report said he may be looking at investment opportunities.

Mohamed Alabbar, chairman of Emaar Properties based in the United Arab Emirates, used his own plane for the trip from South Korea, an education foundation official said.

…The official, from the Sun Moon Education Foundation run by the Unification Church, said Alabbar flew to Pyongyang after receiving an honorary doctorate in law from Sun Moon University in South Korea.

During his first trip to the communist state he was to visit a world peace centre and a hotel, which are run by South Korea’s Tongil business group founded by Unification Church leader Sun Myung Moon.

This was not the first honorary degree for Alabbar; he also has one from his alma mater, Seattle University:

A graduate of the Albers School of Business and Economics, Alabbar has gone on to a career of great distinction. He is chairman of the Dubai-based Emaar Properties, which has developments in Dubai as well as joint ventures and projects in India, Egypt, Turkey, Morocco, Syria, Pakistan, Tunisia and Saudi Arabia. In less than five years, Emaar has become one of the world’s most valuable companies.

…Under Alabbar’s leadership, Emaar invests significantly in education throughout the Middle East and North Africa region as well as India. He also has an influential role in the government of Dubai. “In business, philanthropy and civic life, Mohamed is a true leader,” says Fr. [Stephen] Sundborg. “It will be a great sight to watch him accept this honor from his alma mater.”

Moon’s business links with North Korea go back several years. A 1998 International Herald Tribune report noted that

The Unification Church is using an invitation for its song-and-dance troupe Little Angels to perform in the North as an opportunity to talk about investment, church officials said Friday. The group is to arrive in Pyongyang on Saturday, led by Pak Bo Hi, right-hand man of the Unification Church’s founder, the Reverend Sun Myung Moon, and a controversial figure here who risked imprisonment in Seoul by attending the funeral of North Korean leader Kim Il Sung in 1994.

The Unification Church, whose Tongil Group ranks about 35th in size among South Korean conglomerates, appears to have Seoul’s permission to discuss possible investments with North Korea. Tongil, which means “unification” in Korean, owns factories and a chain of small stores in the South.

In 2000, the Tribune reported a deal with Fiat to operate in the country:

The project culminates years of effort on the part of Mr. Moon, his church and Tongil to enter the largely untapped North Korean market. Mr. Moon, despite a previous record of anti-communism, met North Korea’s former leader, Kim Il Sung, in Pyongyang in 1991.

…But Mr. Moon appears to have gained a special niche in the North through frequent expression of a desire for reunification of the peninsula through peaceful means.

“We must find a love that will benefit both sides,” he said in Seoul last week, adding that it was “heaven’s desire that North Korea and South Korea can be united.” His Unification Church “is an organization you can deal with,” said Aidan Foster-Carter, a specialist on Korea at Leeds University in England, explaining why North Korean leaders were willing to deal with Mr. Moon’s organization.

“Lots of anti-communists have changed their minds.”

Moon’s involvements in North Korea are also explored in this 2005 essay by Rory O’Connor.

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From Interfax:

Former Byelorussian Parliamentary Speaker Stanislav Shushkevich has said that he has nothing to do with the Church of Unification of Sun Myung Moon, but that he does agree with some of its principles.

“As for the church established by Moon, I have never had anything to do with it. But I find the principles that it professes and that I know of attractive,” he told Interfax on Monday…”It is true that I have met Sun Myung Moon, but in relation to his active secular life, not along religious lines,”

Shushkevich’s links to Moon had been featured in a local TV documentary; doubtless, this was at the behest of the dictator Lukashenko, who has been trying to discredit Shushkevich for years (Belarus takes a hard line against minority religions, and the Unification Church is banned. In return, Lukashenko enjoys the unqualified endorsement of the Orthodox Church, as I blogged here). However, the idea that Moon as an “active secular life” distinct from his religious activities is a bit of a stretch. Here’s Shushkevich and Moon in 2006:

The Opening Ceremony for the Cheon Jeong Gung [a Unificationist museum] was held at Cheon Jeong Gung on Mt. Cheonseong in Chung Pyung world village on June 13, 2006…This ceremony was the event to put an end to God’s pain and suffering, that all humankind has been dreaming of for a long time. It was a day that the whole spirit world were dancing in joy. It was a ceremony of victory, happiness, and hope.

…Around 300 representatives and leaders from around the world (including some former presidents, Members of Parliament and Peace Ambassadors) participated in the Congratulatory Banquet for the Cheon Jeong Gung Entrance together with True Parents and True Children.

Dr. Thomas Walsh, International Secretary-General of IIFWP as the MC gave the opening remarks which were followed by the offering of flowers to True Parents by Mr. and Mrs. Stanislav Shushkevich, former Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of Belarus. This was followed by the Cake Cutting by True Parents.

Archbishop George A. Stallings [see my blog entry here – RB] offered an Invocation where many people from different religious backgrounds prayed and became one in heart.

Hyun-jin nim spoke to the participants. At first he read from True Father’s speech titled: ‘The Mission of the Clan Messiah in the Revolutionary Era after the Coming of Heaven’…. His words mostly welcomed the participants as they all cheered loudly and with warm applause, repeating loudly the words that Hyun-jin nim said, ‘Hallelujah’, ‘Hallelujah, God!’, ‘Hallelujah, True Parents!’, and ‘Hallelujah, Cheon Il Guk!’.

Shushkevich is also an enthusiast of Moon’s plan for an inter-religious council at the UN. And just two months ago:

Former President of Belarus and member of the [United Federation for Peace] Presiding Council HE Stanislav Shushkevich was among those offering congratulations to the 1,634 couples participating in the July 5 World Peace Blessing celebrated in Cheonan Korea by Father and Mother Moon. It was an entirely festive and happy moment, with thousands of well-wishers in attendance as the couples – some newlywed and others rededicating their unions – exchanged rings and recited vows of peace and fidelity.

…Dr. Shushkevich added a personal note of thanks for Rev. Moon’s committed work to oppose communism, efforts which eventually laid the seeds for the break up of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s. “I had the privilege to be at the World Peace Blessing in 1992, when I was still head of state of Belarus,” he explained, “At that time we were so happy because of our new found freedoms. But looking back now fifteen years later I can say that freedom alone is not enough: we must have strong families and a strong moral structure if our nations are to prosper.”

The accompanying picture shows Shushkevich wearing some kind of ceremonial stole.

Shushkevich has also worked to promote Moon in Lithuania:

His Excellency Stanislav Shushkevich, the former President of Belarus, introduced UPF Founder Father Moon to the 500 delegates who had assembled at the Palace Forum in central Vilnius. He recalled Dr. Moon’s lifelong service for the cause of peace, praised his accomplishments in strengthening marriage and family, acknowledging that divorce, family breakdown and youth alienation were rampant in the former Soviet republics.

…Father Pavel Paulilius offered the invocation, underscoring the need for spiritual values and the importance of respect and cooperation among people of all faiths.

Of course, Shushkevich is far from being the only politician to have accepted a role in Moon’s plans. I looked at a few others recently.

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