The Man of Faith and Religious Dialogue

Theologically, Nostra Aetate opened the door to new thinking not merely about Jews, but about how Catholics should understand Judaism. In a remarkable exegetical move that required rejecting the plain meaning of Paul’s Epistle to the Romans 11—and prior Catholic doctrine—Nostra Aetate affirmed the continuing validity of God’s biblical covenant with the Jewish people[24]:

Jews still remain most dear to God because of their fathers, for He does not repent of the gifts He makes nor of the calls He issues.

A strict reading of this statement might yield a salutary claim about Jews alone, and not their covenant with God, i.e. Judaism. Moreover, Nostra Aetate explicitly presents the Church as “the new people of God.” One could continue to cling to the doctrine of supersessionism as meaning that the Jewish covenant is no longer valid. Pope John Paul II foreclosed this logical possibility, however, in an explicit statement of 1980 that later became official doctrine when it was incorporated into “Notes”:

Jews are the people of God of the Old Covenant, which has never been revoked by God. ….The Permanence of Israel is a historic fact to be interpreted within God’s design. It remains a chosen people.”

The Pope’s words imply that “The Permanence of Israel” is a positive theological value, not merely a neutral fact of history. In other words, it is God’s design that Israel ’s chosenness has not been cancelled or superseded. This reading can be ‘explosive’ for traditional Christian theology. How far reaching are the implications? Does it mean that for Jews, Judaism is the highest fulfillment of God’s design, much as Christianity is the highest fulfillment for the rest of humanity? If so, does Judaism have the same power of saving grace as does Christianity? Does it follow that attempts to convert Jews no longer are necessary or even desirable in fact and in theory? Is Christianity universal for all except Jews who remain in the covenant of Abraham?

Allow me to map out three distinct positions that try to answer these questions. Following the “trajectory” of recent Church statements about Judaism, a number of American Catholic theologians have gone just that far by answering “yes” to these questions. In their August 2002 paper, “Reflections on Covenant and Mission ,”[25] they asserted that Judaism is salvific for Jews and that campaigns that target Jews for conversion to Christianity are no longer theologically acceptable in the Catholic Church. In effect they have proclaimed that Judaism is in some way theologically equal to Christianity.

This caused controversy in the United States and Rome , for other Catholic theologians were by no means prepared to grant equivalent legitimacy to Judaism. Cardinal Walter Kasper, an ardent supporter of Catholic-Jewish theological dialogue, who as President of the Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews is the highest Vatican authority in charge of Catholic-Jewish relations, has equivocated on whether Judaism is salvific for Jews in the way that Christianity is for Christians. In a speech in Montevideo Uruguay in July 2001 as well as in a speech at Boston College in November 2002 he stated that Judaism was in fact “salvific” for Jews.[26] Tellingly, this important statement was omitted from the official transcript of his Montevideo speech. Perhaps he had gone too far for some in Rome—and even for himself, for he later distanced himself from the position espoused in “Reflections on Covenant and Mission,” announcing that that paper did not represent his position. Perhaps he is still working out a more refined formulation of his thoughts on this matter. Most importantly, however, Cardinal Kasper has consistently renounced any attempt at proselytizing Jews to Christianity—both in fact and theory. In both Jerusalem and Boston he argued forcefully that Christianity must approach Judaism with equality and respect for “differences” and that there is “no mission to the Jews,” either in dialogue or outside of it. There is only “mission with the Jews.” In his own words:

There is dialogue with Jews; no mission in the proper sense. Dialogue implies personal commitments and witness of one’s own conviction and faith. Dialogue communicates one’s faith and at the same time requires profound respect for the conviction and faith of the partner. It respects the difference of the other and brings mutual enrichment.[27]

The third and less equivocal position is held by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, prefect for the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith at the Vatican . He adamantly rejects the notion of theological equality or pluralism. He denies any limitation on the “unicity and universality of the salvific mission of Jesus,” or any implication that Christianity is not the highest fulfillment of God’s word to all on earth: “The Sinai covenant is indeed superseded.”[28] Yet as Professor David Berger has so ably demonstrated[29], Cardinal Ratzinger maintains that theological unification (i.e. the conversion of Jews to Christianity) is “hardly possible within our historical time, and perhaps not even desirable.”[30] In other words, Cardinal Ratzinger is an eschatological supersessionist, maintaining that the replacement of Judaism with Christianity will not take place in our lifetimes before the eschaton (“aharit ha-yamim”). If so, Cardinal Ratzinger’s form of supersessionism should play no part in the dynamic of pre-messianic relations. This means that it should pose neither a threat to Jews today, nor to Catholic-Jewish dialogue that respects the profound theological differences between Judaism and Christianity.

As I read the Catholic documents, faithful Catholics are called upon to appreciate the theological richness and value of Judaism that Jews believe and practice today. One recent example of this is the 2002 Pontifical Biblical Commission document, “The Jewish People and Their Sacred Scriptures in the Christian Bible,” whose preface was written by Cardinal Ratzinger. It recognizes that Jewish Sacred Scriptures (Tanakh) are the word of God and therefore of the highest value for Catholics. Moreover, it admits that the traditional Jewish (i.e. non-Christological) understanding of Scriptures is a legitimate one from which Christians have much to learn.[31] This is quite telling of the transformation, for it indicates that in dialogue the Church is striving to understand Jews “by what essential traits they define themselves in light of their own religious tradition,” and that “dialogue demands respect for the other as he is; above all respect for his faith and religious convictions …(and for) maintaining the strictest respect for religious liberty” as per official Vatican guidelines.[32] This is the very opposite of what R. Soloveitchik feared and resisted, namely that dialogue would per force be an exercise in which Christians view Jews as “objects of observation” in order make Judaism a “satellite in [Christianity’s] orbit” (p. 21), i.e. to deny the intrinsic value of Judaism itself.

Traditional Jews should find neither difficulty nor discomfort with Cardinal Ratzinger’s eschatological supersessionism. And to the disciples of R. Soloveitchik, it should sound familiar. It is a near exact parallel orthodoxy of Rav Soloveitchik’s eschatological convictions presented in Confrontation:

Only a candid, frank and unequivocal policy reflecting our unconditional commitment to God….believing with great passion in the ultimate truthfulness of our views, praying fervently for and expecting confidently the fulfillment of our eschatological vision when our faith will rise from particularity to universality will impress our peers of the other faith community. (p. 25)

Rav Soloveitchik, too, believed that the truthfulness of his faith will spread universally at the end of time.[33] Thus, we arrive at an important (and comforting) divine paradox: Cardinal Ratzinger’s supersessionism forms not a dialogical threat, but a protector of the right of Jews to articulate their own creed. When dialogue is conducted with equal rights and respect, the “Orthodoxy” of Catholic faith logically entails the validity of Orthodox Jews expressing their own parallel dreams and convictions.

Whatever the proper trajectory of current Catholic thought regarding supersessionism—be it the wide arc of the American Catholic theologians or the more acute angle of Cardinal Ratzinger’s position—the most important facts for Catholic-Jewish dialogue and Rav Soloveitchik’s legitimate concerns are that today there is no Catholic missionary organization for Jews, and that conversion has no place in the contemporary Catholic approach to dialogue with Jews. Again, in the words of Cardinal Kasper:

Dialogue implies witness of my deepest faith, a witness which proposes but by no means imposes one’s own faith; on the contrary, it implies respect for every other conviction and every other faith… In dialogue Jews give witness of their faith and Christians give account of the hope they have in Jesus Christ.

In 1964, barely two decades separated Jews from the centuries of Christian contempt that culminated in the European Holocaust. The wounds were still raw. Whatever theological or philosophic issues stood in the way of rapprochement with Christendom, the Jewish people were in no existential condition to overcome the problematics of the past. Indeed, the Jewish people had then yet to come to grips with the full impact of the Holocaust for themselves and with the full implications of the permanence of the State of Israel. Lastly, I might add, the traditional religious community was uncertain of its fate and ability to withstand the onslaught of modern values and sociology. In other words, it was a time of internal healing of the Jewish people, introspection for the community and guardedness for Orthodoxy. In this state of existential and historical pain, R. Soloveitchik alludes to the problems of dialogue for Jews at his time:

Non-Jewish society has confronted us throughout the ages in a mood of defiance, as if we were part of the subhuman objective order separated by an abyss from the human.… As long as we were exposed to such a soulless impersonal confrontation on the part of non-Jewish society, it was impossible for us to participate to the fullest extent in the great universal confrontation between man and the cosmic order, Heaven knows that we never encouraged the cruel relationship which the world displayed toward us. (pp. 19-20)

We have not been authorized by our history, sanctioned by the martyrdom of millions, to even hint to another faith community that we are mentally ready to revise historical attitudes, to trade favors pertaining to fundamental matters of faith and to reconcile “some” differences. (p. 25)

It is now forty years later, and as in all human relationships, timing is critical. Perhaps we still cannot make theological or moral sense of the Shoah in greater retrospect, but our historical and existential position has changed. The wounds of the Holocaust are still with us, yet we have begun to rehabilitate ourselves physically and spiritually.

The survival of State of Israel has gone far in leveling the playing field between Christianity and the Jewish people.

Israel

gives the Jewish people a sense of pride, reality and potency. We are no longer exilic “ghosts,” as Pinsker maintained. We have political gravitas that gives us spiritual confidence and that forces the Church to dignify our presence. And in

Israel

itself where Jews are the majority culture and Christianity is a marginal religion, there is no longer a Jewish sense of inferiority or disadvantage when dealing with the

Vatican

. Perhaps this is why the Israeli Rabbinate has already decided to engage in theological dialogue with Vatican officials, without the fear present in the American Orthodox rabbinate.

Christianity is no longer our aggressive physical or ideological enemy, Jews and Christians face the same mortal threat from radical Islam, and perhaps the Jewish people is better able to relate to those Christian faithful who display no triumphalist posture toward us. R. Soloveitchik speaks of two separate problems: “trading favors on matters of faith” and “revising historical attitudes.” Faith is precious, and must never be sacrificed on the altar of social acceptance or Western etiquette—and any such demand by others to do so is the paragon of disrespect. Historical attitudes towards Christendom are quite another matter. Here there is no timeless standard of “correct.” Of course, some Jews may feel that the pain is still too great for venturing out into the world, but many feel otherwise. Ultimately this is a matter of subjective judgment, and there is no objective method to determine whether it is too soon to redeem the past by attempting to build a better future through positive engagement with the Christian world.

Rav Soloveitchik and the RCA were correct in rejecting any “debate of private religious commitment.” All argumentation, disputation and attempted refutation of faith are zero-sum games between antagonists, and they are exercises that Jews must shun. This position was true in 1964 and is true today. Yet a different concept of dialogue has emerged. It focuses on the phenomenological expression of one’s spiritual experience and convictions in the presence of others committed to mutual respect and forswearing proselytizing motive. It does not attack the logical grounds of faith. Some categorize it as the expression of a religious anthropology.[35] It would seem that such a conception would satisfy Rav Soloveitchik’s conditions for theological engagement, namely, (1) acknowledgement of the Jewish people as a vital faith community, (2) non-negotiability of the Jewish commitment to God, (3) mutual respect and non-interference in the faith of the other, and (4) agreement that each community “has the right to live, create, and worship God in its own way, in freedom and dignity.” I see no reason why Jews who venture into theological dialogue with others should not lay down these as pre-conditions, and no reason why, given the transformation in the “Catholic frame of reference,” the Church should not agree to them.

If we follow Cardinal Kasper’s understanding, dialogue is not at all the antagonistic confrontation of Jacob and Esau of which Rav Soloveitchik spoke in 1964, but an expression of natural human needs for sharing, for catharsis of one’s deepest religious beliefs, and for spiritual clarification with understanding and empathic listeners. I believe this is in fact what occurred that afternoon in Brighton when R. Soloveitchik first presented “Lonely Man of Faith” to faithful Catholic and Jews. None of the objections presented in “Confrontation” applied to that special event, nor, I believe, do they obtain in current theological dialogue that is conducted with authentic yet respectful frames of reference.

The loss of one third of our people in the Shoah, the security of

Israel, assimilation, anti-Semitism, and the alienation of so many Jews from their spiritual heritage weigh heavily upon the Jewish people today. With these issues that imperil our survival still raging, should Jews add theological dialogue with Christians to our already crowded list of religious challenges? Confronting the religious “other” is surely a difficult and problematic task. Even when permissible, why divert our limited energies from these internal survivalist goals?

For religious Jews there are objective and subjective answers to these questions. In making an eternal covenant with us, God demands that the Jewish people strive for more than survival. The Torah asks us to bear testimony to God’s presence and His authority on earth. Like our forefathers Abraham and Jacob, we are no less charged “to call the name of the Lord”[36] and make known God’s name wherever we can. “Calling the name of the Lord,” is not a common phrase in the lexicon of religious Jews, but that does not mean that it is not a central mitzvah in our lives. The important imperative of “Kiddush ha-Shem” (sanctification of God’s Name) may be the rabbinic formulation of this biblical charge. God has challenged us to not be a mute people, or as Rav Soloveitchik phrased it, “to be a message-bearing people, charged with krygma,”[37] i.e. a charismatic people that articulates its faith. We are destined to be more than a sect, more than a historical curiosity relegated to a footnote in human history. We are bidden to be a people who “teach righteousness and justice” to the world[38] and who influence the great drama of history. As God proclaimed through Isaiah, “You are my witnesses.” This is the meaning of the election of

Israel

and the very raison d’etre of our faith.

How can we “call the name of the Lord” today? The post-modern secular culture that engulfs all of us is skeptical, positivist, anthropocentric and autonomy-driven in its essence. It ridicules the concept of objective truth. It sees the human being as a material or exclusively biological phenomenon, one with little hope of self-transcendence or contact with eternity. Because the modern person creates his ‘reality’ via a Cartesian proclamation of “cogito” or a Nietzschian assertion of will, he is denied a natural rooted-ness in tradition or a world greater than himself. Our culture adores moral utilitarianism and axiological relativism. And now, religious fanaticism has become so common, that for many it is difficult to distinguish between religious legitimacy and idolatry that manifests itself in violence and extremism.

All religions have been traumatized by modern and post-modern culture, and each traditional Jew today stands as a “lonely man of faith” in the face of predominant Western thinking. In our cultural milieu, how can we “call the name of the Lord?” We must speak seriously about our fundamental conviction in Torah min ha-shamayim, that our holy texts come from a transcendent authority Who is the Creator of heaven and earth and not some anonymous sage of antiquity. But who will listen to Jews of faith when we proclaim our commitment to an ageless tradition that claims us a priori, one that we cannot cavalierly dismiss when it is at odds with popular culture? Who will believe that Jews live in covenant with God because The Divine chose the Jewish people for a sacred mission, and who understands us when we discuss our ethical commitments based upon the metaphysical axiom that each person is created in God’s Holy Image and therefore all human life has intrinsic sanctity? To whom can we express our conviction that human history will be redeemed at the end of time, even though “natural” historical analysis seems to undermine any warranted belief in moral progress? And finally, as R. Soloveitchik so eloquently put it, who will appreciate our religious trials and dilemmas, the meaning of our spiritual challenges that derive from our commitment to infuse the world with holiness through a creed that has no technical potential, that cannot be evaluated by rules of formal logic or be measured by functional utilitarian society?[39]

My experience is that once we leave the safe intimacy of our synagogues, religious Catholics who have renounced triumphalism and accepted what Pope John Paul II has called their “shared spiritual patrimony with Judaism” are among the few who understand Jewish religious and spiritual dilemmas. Although they function in distinct and sometimes radically different categories, members of both faiths face the same loneliness and many similar problems that arise from striving to live a hallowed tradition and struggling to find God in the post-modern world.

As indicated, Jews have a religious task to give testimony, to express the truths of our faith and the dilemmas of our spiritual experience. R. Soloveitchik felt existentially and spiritually compelled to express himself on these matters: “All I want is to follow the advice given by Elihu the son of Berachel of old who said, ‘I will speak that I may find relief,’— for there is redemptive quality for an agitated mind in the spoken word.” [40] In a more recent work, he put it this way: ”The Torah’s message is the translation of the numinous into the kerygmatic, the translation of the non-sensical and absurd into the vernacular of the teleological and rational. The Torah aims to discover caritas in majestas, kindness in beauty and familiarity in strangeness.”[41] Can we not attempt to express these religious impulses with Christians who share our quest for eternity, who relate to us as subjects, who acknowledge the permanent differences between us and who sense our spiritual loneliness?

Perhaps this is what R. Soloveitchik believed we could, and attempted to do so when he revealed his inner spiritual life as a “lonely man of faith” to Catholic and Jews alike in Brighton . This assumption also helps explain the purpose of Part I of “Confrontation.” Part II was sufficient to articulate the dangers and set the policy for interfaith discussion. What did R. Soloveitchik wish to achieve in the philosophic Part I, which outlines three levels of existence? The first is the natural, “non-confronted” man, who sees himself as indistinct from the natural order, the “is,” and knows no moral norms, the “ought.” Clearly, this is the pagan of antiquity and the hedonistic, power-driven aesthete of our time. The second level is the reflective man, who feels confronted by an objective order standing in opposition to himself and thus discovers his identity as a singular “I.” He senses the disparity between reality and perfection, between fact and value, and recognizing his power as a knower, he exploits his intellect as an instrument of conquest over his environment. He lives a life of power-relations; he relates to others in Sartre-like fashion, as vanquished objects, not personal subjects. He knows no true communication, only the depersonalized relationship of Adam to the beasts of the field, as found in Genesis, chapter one. The third level is redemptive man who forgoes domination and thereby achieves human relationships with others as equals. In the process of approaching Eve as a peer and helpmate, Adam of Genesis chapter two discovers in-depth communication, his human identity and God. Though Adam and Eve remain distinct and retain their independent existential integrities, together they achieve a spiritual community with God.

To whom is this philosophic excursus addressed? Its invocation of two Adam ‘types’ echoes Christian scriptures[42], its typological reading of holy texts is a classic Catholic exegetical technique, and its celebration of ‘the word’ as a mysterious creative—almost cosmic—force[43] also calls to mind the ‘logos’ of the New Testament. For R. Soloveitchik, who was au courant with Christian theology, surely these are not coincidences. Evidently R. Soloveitchik wrote Part I with Christian theologians in mind.[44] He clearly viewed traditional Christianity with its historic drive to conquer Judaism and depersonalize Jews as functioning on the second level of being. If so, then it may be that R. Soloveitchik was inviting the Church to ascend to the third level of existence by recoiling from its posture of domination vis-a-vis Judaism and its historic treatment of Jews as objects of contempt and to consider treating Jews as dignified subjects. If he could not have predicted the revolution started by Nostra Aetate, perhaps he was able to dream of its possibility. Such an elevated level of existence would enable in-depth communication and comradeship, although not “existential union” or dissolution of the profound differences between Jews and Christians. When two faith communities meet each other as redemptive communities, dialogue is logically possible and even spiritually desirable.

I have argued that for the last forty years the Catholic Church has undergone a profound transformation regarding Jews and Judaism, a transformation from R. Soloveitchik’s second to third level of existence. This transformation continues, but it may now be sufficiently developed to allow Jews and Catholics, like Adam and Eve, to begin forging a subject-to-subject relationship as faith community to faith community.[45]

Some final caveats are necessary: Because of our troubled history and disparate theologies, Jewish-Christian theological dialogue is filled with pitfalls and problems. To guard against them, we should exercise care and explicitly agree on the preconditions and protocols of dialogue before beginning the precarious journey. Dialogue also does not progress linearly, and it is likely that Jews and Christians will experience both forward movement and withdrawal, as R. Soloveitchik was so found of describing the spiritual life. Lastly, traditional Jews are largely unfamiliar with dialogue and few are trained in theology. Therefore we need to proceed slowly, meticulously, and with consummate honesty.

Theological dialogue is no experience for those who lack deep conviction or pride in their faith, for those who have little knowledge of their sacred traditions, or for those who have political or social goals that eclipse theological integrity. Such persons will only achieve a polite “trading of favors” or a dangerous synchretism that both Judaism and the Church must resist. As Abraham Heschel said, “the first prerequisite of interfaith dialogue is faith”—to which I would add that the second prerequisite is religious knowledge and the third, spiritual integrity.

The above caveats are critical to Jews wishing to defend their ancient faith, and cannot be minimized. Nevertheless, if my analysis is correct the prime issue for religious Jews is not whether they should engage in theological dialogue, but who should participate, how the dialogue should be structured, what should be the pace of the dialogue and what are fruitful subjects that do not threaten the integrity of each’s convictions. If Jews and Christians take the necessary precautions and approach interfaith dialogue with religious strength and spiritual humility, they can both, ”call the name of the Lord.”[46] When they do so, they help create a world in which God is present, a world closer to the eschatological dream described by R. Soloveitchik’s great spiritual teacher, Maimonides:

In that time there will be neither war, nor jealousy, nor rivalry. But goodness will pervade the earth. The entire world will be involved in the knowledge of God, as it is said, “The earth will be filled with the knowledge of God as waters cover the sea.” (Isaiah 9:11)[47]

[1] Interestingly, the community accepted this “resistance” to theological debate, but largely ignored R. Soloveitchik’s counsel for better interfaith understanding and communication on ethical, social, scientific and political issues, which he viewed as “desirable and even essential.” (1966 RCA Statement)

[2] The Fall of 2003 is less than 40 years since the publication of “Confrontation,” but given R. Soloveitchik’s well-known perfectionist impulses that prevented him from going on record with anything not well thought-out and fully edited, it is reasonable to assume that he formulated the thesis of “Confrontation” well before its public delivery.

[3] David Hartman appears to accord “Confrontation” with halakhic status in Love and Terror in the God Encounter ( Woodstock , VT : Jewish Lights 2001) p. 132.

[4] Iggerot Moshe, Yoreh Deah #43, March 1967. For an excellent comparative analysis of the two opinions, see David Ellenson, “A Jewish Legal Authority Addresses Jewish-Christian Dialogue: Two Responsa of Rabbi Moshe Feinstein,” American Jewish Archives Journal, LII, Nos. 1&2 (2000), pp. 113-128.

[5] Ibid.; Ellenson, pp. 121, 123-125.

[6] Hartman, p. 138; David Singer and Moshe Sokol, “Joseph Soloveitchik: Lonely Man of Faith,” Modern Judaism 2, no. 3 pp. 227-272.

[7] Teshuvot ha-Rambam #364 (Blau)

[8] See Walter Wurzburger, “Rav Joseph B. Soloveitchik as Posek of Post-Modern Orthodoxy” Tradition 29:1, Fall 1994 p. 16, and Shalom Carmy, “His Master’s Voice,” First Things 104 (June/July 2000) pp. 68-71. Both writers fail to identify the seminary, but Rav Soloveitchik’s daughter, Dr. Atarah Twersky, has verified that it was St. John’s, which was the only Catholic seminary in Brighton at that time.“ The Lonely Man of Faith” lecture later was published in Tradition, Summer 1965, pp. 5-67.

[9] See Halakhic Man, translated by Lawrence Kaplan (Jewish Publication Society: Philadelphia 1983) pp. 110-117, and Yitzchak Twersky, “The Rav,” Tradition, 30:4 (Summer 1996) p. 31.

[10] R. Soloveitchik often rhapsodized about Song of Songs and The Book of Psalms, seeing their poetry as essential expressions of authentic religious experience. See Worship of the Heart, edited by Shalom Carmy (KTAV: Jersey City , NJ , 2003) pp. 61-68.

[11] I thank Professor Lawrence Kaplan for pointing this out.

[12] See Gilbert Dahan, The Christian Polemic Against the Jews in the Middle Ages (University of Notre Dame: Notre Dame, Indiana 1991) pp. 36-37.

[13] “Confrontation”, p. 21

[14] This distinction also eliminates the alleged “Achilles heel” of the essay raised by his critics, namely that Rav Soloveitchik implied that ethical, social and political issues were part of a secular order, and therefore interfaith dialogue could proceed in those areas without invoking theology. For the faithful Jew, this is impossible, for how can one discuss Jewish ethics without utilizing its axiomatic premise, that human beings are created in God’s Image, and without reference to its end point or summum bonum, i.e. the messianic era, both of which are theological to their core? (see “Confrontation”, note 8, p. 24.) The distinction between disputation and dialogue allows Jews and Catholics to confer and cooperate on ethical issues of human dignity, respect and welfare precisely because they both hold dear these theological principles.

[15] I speak of Catholic “frame of reference” and Catholic-Jewish dialogue because R. Soloveitchik was responding to an overture from the Vatican for dialogue. Some of “the doctrinal argument” analysis may apply, mutatis mutandis, to Protestant churches, but the appropriateness of theological dialogue must be examined individually for each Protestant church based on each church’s doctrinal posture regarding Jews and Judaism.

[16] Mary Boys, Has God Only One Blessing? (Paulist Press: New York 2000) p. 248. See also pp. 247-266.

[17] This paper attempts only a brief overview of the Church positions on these issues. For fuller analysis see, In our Time: The Flowering of Jewish-Catholic Dialogue, edited by Eugene Fisher and Leon Klenicki (Paulist Press: New York 1990) and Boys, pp. 245-278.

[18] Guidelines (Preamble) and Notes VI, 26.

[19] Papal statements in Fall 1990 and Winter 1991, cited in Vatican City: Pontifical Council on Christian Unity: Information Service no. 75, 4:172-178; Papal address in Hungary, August 16, 1991, cited in Origins 21, no. 13, September 5, 1991, p. 203.

[20] Among the best sourcebooks for this are Phillip Cunningham, Educating for Shalom (Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press 1995) and Cunningham, Proclaiming Shalom, (Collegeville, MN: The Liturgical Press 1995), Boys, pp. 245-278, and Within Context (Silver Burdett and Ginn: Morristown, NJ 1987).

[21] Statement of the German Catholic Bishops on the 50th Anniversary of the Liberation of the Auschwitz ; 27 January, 1995 . Declaration of Repentance by The Roman Catholic Bishops of France , September 30, 1997 . Both statements can be found at .

[22] Has God Only One Blessing? p. 248. See also p. 250.

[23] “Kol Dodi Dofek”, reprinted in Theological and Halakhic Responses on the Holocaust, Bernhard H. Rosenberg editor (RCA: New York, 1992) pp. 70-71.

[24] I am grateful to Professor Philip Cunningham for pointing out this exegetical boldness to me.

[25] Consultation of the National Council of Synagogues and The Bishops Committee for Ecumenical and Interreligious Affairs, United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. August 12, 2002 , found on http://www.bc.edu/research/cjl/meta-elements/texts/documents/interreligious/ncs_usccb120802.html.

[26] Address of November 6, 2002 found at http://www.bc.edu/research/cjl/meta-elements/texts/articles/Kasper_6Nov02.html.

[27] Paper delivered at 17^th meeting of the International Catholic-Jewish Liaison Committee, New York , NY , May 1, 2001 , p. 3.

[28] Many Religions, One Covenant, trans. by Graham Harrison (Ignatius: San Francisco 1999) pp. 70-71.

[29] “On Dominus Iesus and the Jews,” paper at 17^th meeting of the International Catholic-Jewish Liaison Committee, New York , May 1, 2001

[30] Many Religions, One Covenant, p. 109.

[31] II, A, 7 - x22.

[32] Guidelines, IV,1 and Introduction, 1.

[33] This statement can be understood at least three ways. The first, that the particularistic and nationalistic elements of Judaism will fall away and be replaced by universalizable elements, echoes traditional Christian replacement theology of Judaism. It is inconceivable to me that Rav Soloveitchik would ever countenance such an idea. The second, that in the eschaton all humanity will recognize the truth of Judaism and adopt current Jewish practices and creed, is a more likely reading, but one that finds no normative consensus in biblical or classical rabbinic sources. The third—and I believe most likely—interpretation, is that humanity will accept the pre-Sinaitic Abrahamic religion, namely belief in the one Creator of heaven and earth Who is a transcendent authority, Who insures a moral order (reward and punishment), and Who continues to relate to human beings. This is what Maimonides may have meant when he referred to, ”dat emet” (true religion) in his discussions of the messianic age and is certainly akin to R. Menachem Ha-Meiri’s conception of valid religion (“dat”).

[34] “The Jewish-Christian Dialogue: Foundation, Progress and Difficulties,” Lecture in Jerusalem, November 21, 2001, found at

[35] Hartman, Fear and Terror in the God Experience, pp.155-157. See also Hartman, A Living Covenant (Free Press: New York 1985) pp.21-40.

[36] Genesis 12:8; 13:4; 22:33 ;28:16

[37] Worship of the Heart, pp. 73-86

[38] Genesis, 18:19

[39] Lonely Man of Faith, p. 8.

[40] Ibid.

[41] Worship of the Heart, p. 85.

[42] Romans 5 and I Corinthians 15.

[43] pp. 14-15.

[44] This nexus is strengthened by the fact that R. Soloveitchik developed the double Adam typology more fully in “Lonely Man of Faith” to an interfaith audience.

[45] Religious thinkers have done much work recently regarding the evolving concept, purpose, dynamics, and topics of interfaith theological dialogue. Much still remains to be explored regarding Jewish opinion in these areas. The present paper, however, is confined to explicating the justification for interfaith dialogue and the preconditions that would render it acceptable to traditional Jews.

[46] This follows the halakhic position of R. Menachem Ha-Meiri, the tosafist Rabbeinu Tam found in B.T. Sanhedrin 63b, s.v. “assur”, and the 17th century authority, R. Shabbetai ben Meir Ha-Kohen (Shakh) found in Yoreh De’ah 151:7, who all maintained that when Christians speak of God, they have in mind the one Creator of heaven and earth.

[47] End Mishneh Torah, Laws of Judges 12:5. Maimonides is well known to have ruled that Christian trinitarianism is beyond the pale of legitimate theology, but given R. Soloveitchik’s statements about positive relations with Christians and his appearances at Christian institutions, it is likely that he agreed with other rabbinic authorities who reject Maimonides’ position. See Ellenson, pp. 117-121.

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[21] Statement of the German Catholic Bishops on the 50th Anniversary of the Liberation of the Auschwitz ; 27 January, 1995 . Declaration of Repentance by The Roman Catholic Bishops of France , September 30, 1997 . Both statements can be found at .