Any discussion of the attitude of the Protestant churches to the Zionist movement and the establishment of the State of Israel should take into consideration Christian theology as it relates to the Jewish people and Judaism. The church traditionally believed that the destruction of the Second Temple in Jerusalem in 70 CE and the subsequent Jewish exile was a divine punishment for the crucifixion of Jesus and the refusal by the Jews to accept his redemption. Christians believed that the Jewish people were destined to wither away and be replaced by Christians. Even modern Protestant groups persistently upheld the theological...

Canadians suffered badly during the Great Depression of the 1930s, but the churches suffered even more. Ministers’ salaries decreased, churches fell deeply into debt, and congregations were closed, particularly on the prairies. Hardship produced sometimes irrational or dangerous reactions. Disappointment in the existing political, social, and economic system led some people to look to Europe for radical solutions, and leftand right-wing social movements flirted with fascist or communist ideas.¹ Others lost their faith in Europe, developing nativist and isolationist tendencies instead. The outcome of these responses to the difficult situation was xenophobia, with its companions – racism and antisemitism. Strong anti-alien...

The formation of the United Church of Canada on 10 June 1925, after decades of consultation and negotiation, was the first of its kind in modern Western society. Political, economic, and evangelical considerations led to this union of the Methodist, Presbyterian, and Congregational churches in Canada. It was a bold and unique action. A strong liberal point of view and an emphasis on the social gospel were characteristics of the new body, which became the largest Protestant denomination in Canada, in 1941 embracing 2,204,875 members and adherents.¹ The terms of union of the three different denominations did not require unanimous...

Claris E. Silcox (1888–1961), a renowned Canadian clergyman and journalist, campaigned extensively during the Nazi era for the lifting of immigration restrictions in order to allow the admission of refugees from Nazism. He was one of the most outspoken clergymen who openly supported the cause of Jewish refugees. In recognition of his pro-Jewish views, he was named director of the Canadian Conference of Christians and Jews, a position in which he served from 1940 to 1946. After World War II, however, Silcox became a strong anti-Zionist. He considered the Balfour Declaration (which promised the Jews a national homeland in...

Claris E. Silcox was not alone among clergy and intellectuals who had actively supported the case of Jewish refugees during the Nazi era and who nevertheless opposed the Zionist idea. Americans such as the Reverend Harry Emerson Fosdick, minister of Riverside Drive Church in New York City, and Dorothy Thompson, the well-known journalist, also followed such a path. As well, in the United Church of Canada there were ministers who had helped Jewish refugees during the Holocaust but “were not sympathetic with Zionism, on historical or religious grounds,” recalled Angus J. MacQueen, a former moderator.¹

A characteristic United Church leader...

The attitude of the United Church to the Zionist ideal and to the establishment of the State of Israel was not clear-cut. While the approach of the great majority was negative, partially for theological reasons, there were also supporters, particularly after the Holocaust, who called for a haven for the Jewish people. A.E. Prince, a historian at the University of Toronto, argued in theUnited Church Observerthat “Zionism is an unhappy and disastrous denial of the finest prophetic traditions of Judaism.” The “aggressive” concept of Zionism, set in motion by Theodor Herzl, was like a “putting back of the...

The attitude of the United Church to the State of Israel inevitably involved it with the Jewish community in Canada. In the 1960s and 1970s, Canadian Jews constituted a mixture of old-timers and newcomers, of whom many were Holocaust survivors. For them, Israel was the emotional centre of Jewish existence. Canadian Jewry was affectionately committed to Israel, more than its American or European counterparts. With the exception of the Orthodox minority, many had abandoned Judaism as a religious discipline, and their identification with Israel was a substitute for their loss of faith. “The State of Israel is something tangible and...

Both before and during the Six Day War the general press in Canada reported widely on events, while theUnited Church Observerremained silent. Then in August 1967, two months after the war ended, its editorial was entitled “Christians Must Be Free to Criticize Jews.” Apparently disregarding the events of May–June that year, when Egyptian president Abdel Nasser had closed the Strait of Tiran and expelled the UN peace force from Sinai, the editorial said: “While Arab threats to destroy Israel must be condemned, … it must be remembered that the provocations and threats were not all from one...

The debate between A.C. Forrest and the United Church, on the one hand, and the Jewish community, on the other, reached its climax in 1972–73. While Jewish leaders criticized his arguments through editorials, articles, and letters to the Toronto newspapers, several angry individuals wrote him uncomplimentary letters. Forrest felt personally beleaguered. He was particularly disappointed that members of his own church were among his critics. But the more he was criticized, the more adamant he became. He was determined to fight back and not to change his course. His eagerness to publish anti-Zionist material drove him to cross the...

After the agreement with B’nai Brith in May 1973, a truce was reached between the United Church and the Canadian Jewish community. Each side made great efforts to cool the atmosphere and initiate dialogue. However, the church made no official commitment to curb the editorial freedom of theObserver.Forrest, a proud fighter, was deeply hurt by criticism from colleagues in his own church, and he was determined to show that he would not yield to the “Zionists,” Jewish or Christian. Therefore he continued, though less frequently, to publish material on the Arab-Israeli crisis, with his usual anti-Israeli tone. The...

After our examination of the attitude of the United Church of Canada to the Holocaust and to the Middle East, it is interesting to investigate the position of its fellow Protestant church, the Anglican Church of Canada, regarding these subjects. How did the Anglican Church respond to the rise of Nazism, the persecution of Jews in Germany, and the refugee problem? What role did it take in efforts to change the restrictionist policy of the Canadian government? What has been the approach of the Anglican Church in the last decades towards teaching and remembering the Holocaust? And how did church...

In the twentieth century the Presbyterians and the Baptists in Canada were small denominations compared to the United and the Anglican churches. While those churches had global interests, the smaller groups were mainly preoccupied with internal church matters and did not concern themselves with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.¹

The Presbyterian Church in Canada had both Scottish and American roots. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries it had suffered from sectionalism and division. However, in 1875 all branches of Canadian Presbyterism united, adopting the name of the Presbyterian Church in Canada. The union was followed by five decades of growth, so that...

The earliest Baptists were a product of the sixteenth-century Protestant Reformation. They opposed the baptism of infants and instead required adult believers to be baptized upon profession of faith. They believed in the liberty of the soul and in personal freedom to interpret the Scriptures. Each congregation constituted a fellowship of believers who had experienced a spiritual conversion. Local churches were independent in religious, as well as in administrative, matters. This congregationalist character, where individual churches are self-governing and have theological independence, contributed to divisiveness and schisms which prevented the establishment of one national church. Accordingly, Canadian Baptists are divided...