Part 2

_The Jew is prejudiced against the Bible._ When he uses that term, he does not mean what the ordinary person means. Therefore, he does what he can to destroy public honor of the Book, unless it be an occasion where a President has been inaugurated, when it will run through the Jewish press like a strong breeze that once more has a Christian statesman ignored the Christian Bible and turned to the Jewish Bible. It is rather a trifling matter to mention; its significance comes solely from the light it throws on the Jewish attitude. It is not a trifling thing in Jewry, as the country will probably be made aware if any future President should be sworn in with, say, the Sermon on the Mount open before him.

And yet, even here, we observe a strange paradox. A Jewish authority says: “The Jew is a paradox. He is at once an idealist and a materialist. He is parsimonious and extravagant. He is courageous and cowardly. He is modest and vulgar. He is persistent and yielding. He is peaceful and warlike”——and so on. And though the Jew opposes the Bible in the schools, he never misses a chance to put it there, with the Jewish trade-mark. He quotes the Psalms—“We wrote them.” He quotes Isaiah—“We Jews did that.”

Most people sit open-mouthed at these glorious authors of Scripture and do not know how to answer. It is time the Churches began to learn what to say to the Jewish taunts—“We gave you your god;” “We gave you your bible;” “We gave you your savior.” Perhaps it is also time that the Jews themselves considered how long the boast will stand the usage they are giving it.

In any case the literature which the Jews wrongfully claim as their own production, is rather far distant in time to justify its being used as a mantle of glory for the political rabbis, the discredited theatrical and movie magnates, and the violent penmen of the Jewish press. Rather too distant in time! We, the race that confronts the Jews, have done somewhat more recent work; for example, the Declaration of Independence and the Emancipation Proclamation, not to mention the psalms and pronouncements of the great American prophets that have lifted up the world.

So, the Jew is very willing that the Bible should be in the schools, provided it is not what he calls “the Christian Bible.” Listen to this:

“Hebrew is to be taught in the Chicago high schools. Students who include this language in their course are to receive the credit now allowed for the study of other classical languages. Of infinite value in the training of the mind are the wonderful narratives of Genesis, and boys and girls will find the history of Israel under the Judges much more appealing than Caesar’s bridge over the Rhine.”

The people of New Jersey thought so, too; they believed that a reading from this ancient book every day would mean much to the general culture of the pupils. But what did the paper just quoted say about it? It called the cultivated Bible appreciators of New Jersey “soul-snatching enthusiasts” and raised a mighty yell about “the forcible conversion of Jewish children,” although it was provided that Jewish or any other children should be excused from the reading if desired. Another mighty yell about excusing the children all on account of the tyranny of reading the Christian Bible in the schools—regardless of the fact, which every public school teacher knows, that no class of children is oftener out of school for religious reasons than are the Jews.

Truly, these people are a paradox. They are not fair. They are constituted so that they cannot see the other side of anything. For a time they actually do convince the secularists that everything public should be secularized down to the last notch of atheistic demand. Non-Jews are fair. They are willing to see the other people’s point of view. When it was said to us that the “Merchant of Venice” was a cruelty upon Jewish school pupils, we said, without investigation, “Out goes the Merchant, then!” We discovered later that the Jewish children liked and appreciated that play better than any other group. Brander Matthews helped us discover that.

And so when they said, “Reading the Bible is sheer proselytizing; it isn’t fair,” the non-Jew, who wanted to prove that he is fair and unprejudiced above all things else (a weakness the Jews know how to manipulate), said, “Well, then, out goes the Bible!” And it went out. Very well! What next? “You must abolish Christmas, too.” “You must not keep Easter—the Jews don’t like it.” “It is anti-Semitic to observe Good Friday.” In other words, to please the sensitive Jewish natures we must eradicate from Christian civilization all that is Christian in it.

In the meantime what transpires? Having induced “fair-minded” non-Jews to do all these things—and every one above enumerated has been done over and over again at Jewish demand—the Jews then proceeded to sow Judaism on the fields thus denuded of Christianity. “No religion in the institutions of the State”—yet in every state university last year there were, and in every state university this year there probably will be, courses of lectures delivered by Jewish rabbis—the lectures delivered in the colleges themselves—propagandizing the youth of the non-Jews with Judaistic religion, ethics, and economics. That is what the so-called Jewish “Chautauqua” exists for. It is not a Jewish “Chautauqua”; it is Jewish propaganda in public educational institutions.

That is the repayment the Jews have made for our “fair-mindedness.” Their demand for complete secularization is merely their preparation of the soil for their carefully organized sowing of the seed of Judaism. And non-Jews permit it to continue, for there is nothing they fear so much as that their opposition will be regarded as “religious prejudice.”

The Jew glories in religious prejudice, as the American glories in patriotism. Religious prejudice _is_ the Jews’ chief expression of their own true patriotism. It is the only well-organized, active and successful form of religious prejudice in the country because they have succeeded in pulling off the gigantic trick of making not their own attitude, but any opposition to it, bear the stigma of “prejudice” and “persecution.” That is why the Jew uses these terms so frequently. He wants to label the other fellow first. That is why any investigation of the Jewish Question is so quickly advertised as anti-Semitism—the Jew knows the advantage of labeling the other man; wrong labels are most useful.

This does not by any means exhaust the list of headlines describing the various avenues in which the expression of virulent Jewish religious prejudice and persecution is found. But it exhausts the space allotted to these articles each week. Therefore, the subject will be concluded next week.

It is not a pleasant subject. Religious prejudice is just as unpleasant to write about as it is to experience in any other way. It is totally contrary to the genius of the American and the Anglo-Saxon. We have always regarded religion as a matter of conscience. To believe as he will is part of every man’s fundamental liberty. To interfere with force to change anyone’s belief is exceedingly stupid.

Holding these hereditary principles, one chooses to study that active stream of influence in American life which is known as the Jewish stream, and immediately upon doing so, one finds himself classed with the bigots and torturers of other times.

It is now time to show that the cry of “bigot!” is raised mostly by bigots. There _is_ a religious prejudice in this country, there _is_, indeed, a religious persecution, there _is_ a forcible shoving aside of the religious liberties of a majority of the people, and this prejudice and persecution and use of force is Jewish and nothing but Jewish.

This is the answer to the cry of “religious persecution,” and we shall make it so complete and definite that a repetition of the cry against students of the Jewish Question will automatically mark the criers as either too ignorant or too vicious for consideration.

XLIV. Are the Jews Victims or Persecutors?

“Half of Christendom worships a Jew; the other half worships a Jewess.”—Jewish editorial.

“If the gospel story is correct, Judas was a pretty decent sort of a fellow. It was only _after he had become a convert to Christianity that he became that which has made his memory an accursed thing for nineteen hundred years_.”—Jewish editorial.

“Our land is frequently called a Christian nation. No doubt the majority of our citizens believe this. No less an authority than Justice Brewer of the Supreme Court so expressed himself in 1892. But the statement is clearly false.... _This is not a Christian nation. In inspiration, at least, it is a Hebrew nation_, for the Constitution which we now enjoy traces back to the Hebrew Commonwealth.”—Jewish editorial.

(From the minutes of a meeting of the Committee on Families of the New York Board of Child Welfare.)

Mr. Hebbard: “That is one of the things I have in mind, that a widow brings deliberately into her home a nameless child and the inevitable consequence of that is that her legitimate children are always thereafter pointed out.”

Miss Sophie Irene Loeb: “As far as nameless children are concerned, _Christ himself was a nameless child_. Let us get away from nameless children.”

Dr. Dirvoch: “I think where there are three or four children in a home and a little stranger enters that home without a father, you are corrupting the morals of those legitimate children by permitting them to remain in such surroundings.”

Miss Loeb: “I say to you that this committee, if it takes such an attitude as that, is one hundred years behind the times.”

Mr. Cunnion: “Anything against purity is immoral.”

Miss Loeb: “_What has that to do with the question of purity? Was the mother of Christ pure?_”

Mr. Cunnion: “_Certainly._”

Miss Loeb: “_He had no name!_”

Mr. Cunnion: “_You can’t bring that in here. We believe he was conceived without sin._”

Mr. Menehan (to Miss Loeb): “_That is very wrong to make that statement._”—Cited in letter of complaint to Mayor Hylan.

“The intimate relation of church and state in the great non-sectarian United States of America received direct demonstration on August 12 (1913), when a deputy sergeant-at-arms of the Senate was hurriedly sent out to get a preacher of any old denomination to open the Senate with prayer. The session opening an hour earlier than usual, the regular chaplain was not at hand, but with still two minutes to spare the deputy returned in an automobile, hurried to the Vice President’s office and introduced the Rev. Dr. C. Albert Homas, of Canonsburg, Pennsylvania, to Mr. Marshall just in time for the Vice President to lead the way into the Senate chamber to open the session at 11 o’clock, and once again the Union was saved. We shudder to think what might have happened if no preacher had been captured in time to open the session with prayer!”—Jewish editorial.

“President Wilson in his inaugural address said: ‘The firm basis of the Government is justice, not pity.’ This is sound Jewish doctrine as laid down by Moses and the Prophets in contradistinction to the doctrine of love, as attributed to Jesus. This coming from so good a churchman as President Wilson might be a little surprising were it not that it is a well-known fact that whenever our Christian brethren want to talk to reasoning men they go to the Old Testament for their inspiration.”—Jewish editorial.

“President Wilson at his inaugural gave another instance of the well-known fact that in solemn moments when they need comfort and inspiration, Christians turn to the Old Testament and not to the New. So President Wilson, when he kissed the bible after taking the inaugural oath, selected the passage, Psalm 46.”—Jewish editorial.

“Reference has frequently been made in these columns to a number of addresses made by the late Isaac M. Wise at the celebration in honor of his 80th birthday anniversary in the course of which he predicted _that in a quarter of a century from that date (1899) there would be practically nothing left in Protestant Christianity of a belief in the divinity of Jesus Christ_ or the distinctive dogmas of Christianity, and that all Protestant Christians by whatever name they called themselves, _would be substantially Jews in belief_. To any one who notes the signs of the times it is apparent that this prophecy is being rapidly fulfilled.... _The Jesus superstition_ and the _fantastic dogmas built upon his supposed divine origin_, die but slowly, but that they are dying is nevertheless apparent.”—Jewish editorial.

The subject of this article is “Religious Prejudice and Persecution—Are the Jews Victims or Persecutors?” A study of history and of contemporary Jewish journalism shows that Jewish prejudice and persecution is a continuous phenomenon wherever the Jews have attained power, and that in neither action nor word has any disability placed upon the Jew equaled the disabilities he has placed and still contemplates placing upon non-Jews. It is a rather startling reversal of all that we have learned from our Judaized histories, but nevertheless it seems to be the truth.

Attention is once more called to the fact that the Jews themselves are not raising the cry of “religious persecution” here or elsewhere, but they are allowing their “Gentile fronts” to do it for them—just as they have not denied the statements made in this series (among themselves they freely admit most of them) but let “Gentile fronts” do it for them. The Jews would not be averse to raising the cry of “religious persecution” perhaps, (provided they could make it stand) were they not afraid that it would call attention to their own persecuting activities. But their “Gentile fronts” have brought that upon them.

There is no Christian church that the Jews have not repeatedly attacked.

_They have attacked the Catholic Church._ This is of special interest just now when Jewish agents are doing their utmost to arouse Catholic sentiment in their favor by circulating charges which these agents personally know to be false. THE DEARBORN INDEPENDENT has perfect confidence in the information which Catholic leaders may have on the Jewish Question. On this subject the Catholic priesthood is not misled.

Examples of this attack are numerous. “Half of Christendom worships a Jewess,” is not a statement but a slur, flung by Jewish men who say in the ritual of morning prayer: “Blessed art thou, O Lord our God, King of the Universe, _who hast not made me a woman_.” The Talmudists’ discussions of the Virgin Mother are often vile. The Christian festivals, whose preservation is due to the Catholic custom and conscience, are all attacked by Jews.

_The American Israelite_, whose great prestige in American Jewry is due to its having been founded by Rabbi Isaac M. Wise, _opposed the establishment of Columbus Day_ and berated Governor Hughes for signing the law making it a holiday in New York. The act that established it deserved “the contempt of thinking men.” Why? Is not the discovery of America a memorable event? Yes, but Columbus was a Catholic! However, in recent months the Jews are proving him to have been a Jew, so we may expect some day to see Columbus Day insisted upon with Jewish rites.

The _Catholic Columbian_ made editorial reference to the increasing Jewish influence on the American press, in these words: “Jewry is getting its grip on the news of this country as it is on Reuter’s and the Havas agency in Europe.”—A perfectly polite and true observation.

But the Jewish editorial thunderer came back—“The _Columbian_, in its sneaking Jesuitical way, does not mention the fact that these (the Jewish) papers are the very cleanest in the country. The _Columbian_ cannot point to a single daily owned by one of its co-religionists that begins to compare with the above papers.”

The sweet spirit here evidenced is very significant today when an appeal is being made to create a strong pro-Jewish Catholic sentiment.

If there is in the world any extra-ecclesiastical undertaking by Catholics which has won the undivided approval of the Christian world as _the Passion Play of Oberammergau_ has done, the present writer does not know what it is. Yet in a volume entitled “_A Rabbi’s Impressions of the Oberammergau Passion Play_,” Rabbi Joseph Krauskopf, D.D., of Philadelphia, has stigmatized that notable production as reeking with falsehoods and vicious anti-Semitism. In the rabbi’s eyes, of course, it is, for to him the entire Christian tradition is a poisonous lie. The whole fabric of Christian truth, especially as it concerns the person of Christ, are “the hallucinations of emotional men and hysterical women.”

“Thus,” says the rabbi (p. 127) “was invented that cruel story, that has caused more misery, more innocent suffering, than any other work of fiction in the range of the whole world’s literature.” And thus the simple peasants of Oberammergau, presenting the Catholic faith in reverent pageant, are labeled anti-Semites.

These are not isolated instances. Antagonism to the Catholic Church rung throughout Jewish literature. The Jewish attitude was summed up in an editorial in the _Jewish Sentinel_ of November 26, 1920, as follows: “_Our only great historical enemy, our most dangerous enemy, is Rome in all its shapes and forms, and in all its ramifications. Whenever the sun of Rome begins to set, that of Jerusalem rises._” These, however, are matters well known to Catholic leaders.

In their turn the other Christian denominations have been attacked. When the _Methodist Church_ put on the great pageant entitled “_The Wayfarer_,” Rabbi Stephen S. Wise played critic and made the solemn and silly statement that had he been a South Sea Islander (instead of the itinerant platform performer which he is) his first impulse, after seeing “The Wayfarer,” would have been to rush out into the street and kill at least three Jews. It says a great deal, perhaps, for the channel in which Rabbi Wise’s impulses run, but the tens of thousands of Methodists who saw “The Wayfarer” will not be inclined to attribute such a criticism to the spirit of tolerance which Rabbi Wise so zealously counsels the Christians to observe.

_The Episcopal Church also_ has felt the attack of the Jews. Recently the Jewish press raised a clamor that the Episcopal Church was not competent to teach Americanism in our cities because it held that Christianity and good citizenship were synonymous. And when the Episcopal Church made provision for mission work among the Jews, the torrent of abuse that was poured out gave a very vivid picture of what the Jewish mind naturally turns to when aroused. This abuse is not reproduced here because of its excessive violence and disrespect. It is similar to that which is heaped upon all attempts to explain Christianity to the Jews. “What would the Gentiles do if we sent Jewish missionaries to them?” ask the violent editors. Any Gentile can answer that—nay, even the Jews themselves can answer that. In the first place, the Jews do not want to teach their religion to Gentiles because there is a Talmudical restriction against it; Talmudically the Gentiles are not good enough to mingle with the religious matters of the Jews. In the second place, the Jews do send missionaries everywhere, not to spread Jewish religious principles, but propaganda favoring the Jews as a race and people, as is done in our colleges through the so-called “Jewish Chautauqua.” In the third place, let there be produced one Jewish missionary, who has ever received anything but a considerate reception wherever he has appeared.

The Jews are bitter against all Christian denominations because of the conversion of numerous Jews to them. A large number of Jews have become Catholics; one of the _Knights of Columbus’_ most useful lecturers against the menace of radical socialism is a converted Jew. It is so also with the _Presbyterian Church_ which has been the most recent victim of Jewish vituperation. But only upon the Catholic Church has the Jew poured more wrath and malediction than he has poured upon _Christian Science_. The Christian Science church has attracted large numbers of Jewish converts. Some of them have become very active, devoted members of that form of faith. Scores of columns and pages have been devoted to their denunciation in Jewish newspapers, magazines and books. Christian Science is a peculiar anathema to the Jew.

Where then is the religious prejudice? Search through the publications of all the churches named, and you cannot find in all their history so much of the spirit of prejudice and persecution as you can find expressed in the Jewish press in one single day. Jewry reeks with such prejudice. In politics, education, social functions, public holidays, literature and newspapers, they see everywhere traces of “Christological manifestations” and cry them down.

_No public man has ever given public evidence of his Christian faith without rebuke from the Jews._ Mr. Bryan, Mr. Marshall, Mr. Taft, Mr. Wilson, two of them Presidents, one of them Vice President, and the other Secretary of State, have all been called to task from time to time for their sins in this respect. Mr. Marshall is a devout man, whose faith is real to him, and he speaks very naturally about it at times. He has, therefore, been attacked oftener in the Jewish press than has any other public man of recent times. Nothing is more ludicrous to the Jewish press than a Vice President of the United States openly confessing that he is an “idolater,” that is, a worshipper of the dead Jewish imposter whom the Christians ignorantly call “Christ.” To Mr. Marshall’s honor, be it said, he never apologized, he never begged to withdraw his public statements. Neither did William J. Bryan, whose lecture “The Prince of Peace” contained statements in honor of Christ which brought him into conflict with Jewish spokesmen everywhere, and whose remarks about missions after a trip around the world were savagely attacked by Jews. Mr. Bryan did not apologize either. Mr. Taft was promptly called down on several occasions for using forms of the word “Christian,” which were particularly offensive to the Jewish press because they had advertised far and wide during the Taft campaign that Mr. Taft was practically a Jew in his belief in that he had abandoned all the distinctive Christian doctrines pertaining to Christ. After his lapses in which he used the term “Christian” approvingly, it was explained on his behalf (1) that he was accommodating himself to the audience, and (2) that he used the term as a synonym for civilization! But isn’t it significant that the name of Christ should be an integral part of the very name of the highest civilization? Mr. Taft was a true liberal, liberal enough to tolerate Christian orthodoxy. And that was a rather weak spot, as far as the Jews’ estimate of him went.

Mr. Wilson, while President, was very close to the Jews. His administration, as everyone knows, was predominantly Jewish. As a Presbyterian elder, Mr. Wilson had occasional lapses into the Christian mode of thought during his public utterances, and was always checked up tight by his Jewish censors. In 1914, speaking before the American University at Washington, he said:

“That is the reason why scholarship has usually been most fruitful when associated with religion, and _scholarship has never been, so far as I can at this moment recall, associated with any religion except the religion of Jesus Christ_.”

That was terrible. So terrible that Herman Bernstein was chosen to administer the castigation.

And Mr. Wilson made proper reparation: