Unification Church and antisemitism

While many of the members of the Unification Church take a generally pro-Jewish, pro-Israel stance, the church has been a subject to criticism for alleged antisemitism because of its teachings concerning the Jews in the Old and New Testaments.
The main areas of dispute focus on:
*How Unification theology evaluates Jewish preparation to receive the Messiah in the Old Testament and the New Testament; and
*How the Unification concept of "indemnity" relates the Crucifixion to the Holocaust.
Rabbi A. James Rudin has said that there is a pattern of "unrelieved hostility to the Jewish people" in Moon's Divine Principle, including stereotypes and notions of collective guilt long condemned by mainstream Christian denominations.
Charges of anti-semitism relate to church doctrine, rather than discriminatory hiring practices or the exclusion of Jews from organizational positions of leadership. Some well-known church members, including Mose Durst and Lee Shapiro, are ethnically Jewish. There are also Jewish people employed in church related organizations including the Washington Times (which has been accused of having a pro-Israel bias) and the Unification Theological Seminary.
Unificationist views
Members of the Unification Church consider the church to be both pro-Israel and pro-Jewish and disagree that the church's teachings should be regarded by anyone as antisemitic. Church leaders repeatedly asked for discussions with Jewish leaders who raised the charge of antisemitism in 1976, and after getting no response took out full-page newspaper ads to call attention to the church's pro-Jewish and pro-Israeli stance. In the ad Sun Myung Moon was quoted as saying:
In the course of their history the people of Israel and Korea have experienced suffering and persecutions by neighboring enemies and expanding imperialistic powers.
As a son of the Korean people, living in this blessed by God land of America, I extend to you, Jewish Brethren, my hand of friendship and wish to state the principles which are guiding the activities of our Movement, especially those regarding the problems and difficulties confronting the Jews of the World and Israel at this crucial juncture of our common human history.
1. The Unification Movement categorically condemns anti- Semitism, the most hideous, abject and cruel form of hatred. We regard the murder of six million Jews in Europe the result of political short-sightedness and lack of moral responsibility on the part of Germany's political and religious leaders, and statesmen from among other nations, in the period between the Two World Wars.
Ignoring the basic teachings of the Scriptures, they acted too late to block Hitler's ascent to power, they postponed the action for his downfall, and they did nothing to rescue the victims who were the captives of his satanic plans and designs.
Only a unified front of all Christian and Jewish forces, inspired by the principles of the Divine Commandments and guided by the concept of human brotherhood, would have been able to prevent the Holocaust, the implementation of the "Final Solution," -- a Cain-inspired action, carried out by the Nazis between 1933 and 1945.
2. The Unification Movement recognizes the divine and natural right of the Jewish people to physical survival and preservation of its specific religious traditions, the marks of its distinctive historical entity. These fundamental human rights must be secured everywhere, especially for Jews living in the lands of the Diaspora.
3. The Unification Movement regards the Land of Israel as a haven for the Holocaust survivors and sanctuary for all those individual Jews who are trying to escape physical persecution and religious, racial or national oppression. The demand for free emigration--the undeniable and inalienable right of every human being--must become the stated policy of the United States in her dealings with foreign countries, and particularly in her relations with the Soviet Union.
4. The Unification Movement, in its efforts to resolve conflicts among nations and harmonize antagonistic social- economic and political interests, will work toward the creation of political conditions necessary for an acceptable accommodation between the Arabs and Jews, and to achieve a genuine and lasting peace in the Middle East, one of the most important corners of the world.
5. The Unification Movement believes that religious and free people throughout the world must cooperate in building a spiritual and organizational unity among nations which will be capable to contain Soviet imperialism, which continues to inflict hardship and suffering upon its own people and is spreading the poison of hatred and dissension among nations of the world, with the ultimate purpose of political global subjugation and enslavement.
6. The Unification Movement is grateful to God, to His true and righteous prophets and saints of our common spiritual tradition who prepared the foundations on which we stand and organize our struggle. We consider ourselves to be the younger brother of our Jewish and Christian brethren, all of whom are children of our Heavenly Father. We regard it as our duty to respect and serve the elder sons of our Father, and it is our mission to serve Judaism and Christianity by promoting Love and Unity among all the children of God.
7. The Unification Movement teaches the Principle and strives toward the establishment of a Unified World Family of Nations guided by the concepts of Unity and Brotherhood expressed in the Divine Commandments, the foundations of our common spiritual heritage. It is our conviction that we must unite in order to attain this Divine and Sublime Historical Objective.
Critical views
The Unification Church is accused of traditional Christian forms of theological antisemitism.
Blame for the crucifixion
The church's views on Jewish responsibility for the crucifixion of Jesus are considered by some to be antisemitic. The head of the church, Sun Myung Moon, has called on Jewish people to repent for the crucifixion. Historically, charges of deicide (which literally means "the killing of a god") have been the most powerful warrant for antisemitism by Christians.
Blame for the Holocaust
Several authoritative statements by Moon about the Holocaust appear in Jewish eyes to place the blame for it mostly on the Jews themselves, as divine retribution for the crucifixion, which is another classic antisemitic idea.
The Rudin report
According to Jews and Judaism in Rev. Moon's Divine Principle, a report issued by the American Jewish Committee (AJC) in 1976, "every time Rev. Moon mentions Jews or Israelites he portrays them collectively as reprobate, with evil intentions."
The controversy raised by the AJC centers on passages found in Divine Principle, the church's theology textbook. Rabbi A. James Rudin, Assistant Director of the Interreligious Affairs Department of the American Jewish Committee, wrote:
*An analysis of this document reveals an orientation of almost unrelieved hostility toward the Jewish people, exemplified in pejorative language, stereotyped imagery, and accusations of collective sin and guilt.
*Whether he is discussing the "Israelites" of the Hebrew Bible or the "Jews" as referred to in writings of the New Testament period, Moon portrays their behavior as reprobate, their intentions as evil (often diabolical), and their religious mission as eclipsed.
*There are over 36 specific references in Divine Principle to the Israelites of the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament); each one is pejorative. For example, the "faithlessness" of the Israelites is mentioned four times on a single page (p. 330).
Passages in Moon's talks
In a sermon delivered on March 2, 2003, Moon said:
*"To recreate Israel, the church and the state must become one as Cain and Abel. Instead they became one with Rome and captured and killed Jesus. They united with Rome. Who are the Jewish members here, raise your hands! Jewish people, you have to repent. Jesus was the King of Israel. Through the principle of indemnity Hitler killed 6 million Jews. That is why. God could not prevent Satan from doing that because Israel killed the True Parents. Even now, you have to determine that you will repent and follow and become one with Christianity through Rev. Moon."
In this passage, Moon clearly calls on Jews to repent and join his movement.
He also seems to assert that the Jews were responsible for the death of Jesus, and that this was the cause of the Holocaust. Blaming Jews for the death of Jesus, and asserting that the Holocaust was in some sense divine retribution, are classic antisemitic ideas.
Unificationists, however, maintain that it is not that simple: it was Roman soldiers who actually crucified Jesus, and the church condemns the Holocaust. This leaves a puzzle for theologians, having to do with the church's little-understood teaching of "indemnity" -- but clearly drawing a line of causation between the Jews' alleged guilt for killing Christ, and what the UC, to many, seems to view as a subsequent payback in the Nazi Holocaust.
General speculation of this "line of causation" assert that the Jews, since they were in a position with the ability to protect Jesus from being crucified by the Romans, had to pay "indemnity", not in the sense that Hitler would come along and cause the Holocaust, but that if something like the Holocaust were to happen God could not come to the rescue of the Jews but, rather, had to, in a sense, let it happen just as the Jews had let the crucifixion happen.
Controversy
Jewish people and Unificationists and their critics, including many Jews, disagree on two major points:
#Whether it is "antisemitic" to regard Jews, ancient or modern, as bearing any degree of responsibility for the crucifixion of Jesus
#Whether the church is "blaming" the Holocaust on Jews (i.e., whether the church considers it to be divine retribution)

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