"Ask A Jew" Wednesday

[u/AutoModerator]

It's everyone's favorite day of the week, "Ask A (Anti-Zionist) Jew" Wednesday! Ask whatever you want to know, within the sub rules, notably that this is not a debate sub and do not import drama from other subreddits. That aside, have fun! We love to dialogue with our non-Jewish siblings.

Please remember to pick an appropriate user-flair in order to participate! Thanks!

[u/valonianfool]

I know the idea that the modern nation state of Israel is the same as the ancient Kingdom of Israel is completely ridiculous, but since religious zionists incl Christians use the argument that both the Quran and Torah mention "Israel" and agree that "the land belongs to the Jews" I still want to ask in what way ancient and premodern kingdoms and civilizations differ from modern states. 

[u/specialistsets → u/valonianfool]

"Israel" is a biblical name for Jacob, the Jewish people have been called and have called themselves "Israel" (from "Bnai Yisrael", children of Israel or Israelites in English) since long before the terms "Jew" or "Judaism" existed. Thus, the land became known in Jewish culture and thought as "Eretz Yisrael" (The Land of Israel) for thousands of years. In traditional Judaism it is considered a great mitzvah to live in the Land of Israel, which is why hundreds of thousands of non-Zionists live there today. During the British Mandate, "Eretz Yisrael" was the official Hebrew name alongside Palestine in Arabic and English. Upon declaration of statehood they chose "Medinat Yisrael", State of Israel, to mean "a state for the People of Israel in the Land of Israel".

Religious Zionists don't believe they are resurrecting or continuing an ancient "Kingdom of Israel" as there is no inherent theological significance to that. They believe that the establishment of a modern Jewish state in the Land of Israel is divinely ordained and will hasten the coming of the messiah, culminating in the rebuilding of the Temple in Jerusalem.

[u/valonianfool → u/specialistsets]

Is there any theological significance to a jewish state in historic Palestine for Christians?

[u/specialistsets → u/valonianfool]

I don't know enough about that type of Christian theology to answer. But I can definitely say that any Jewish messianic theology that relates to the Land of Israel is completely unrelated to anything Christian, and any similarities are coincidence.

[u/Adept_Thanks_6993 → u/valonianfool]

Not really

[u/valonianfool → u/Adept_Thanks_6993]

I'm asking cuz there's someone who I used to consider a friend, who I've cut off. They're a conservative christian who comforted me when I was going through a bad time so I considered them a friend, but I've always been uncomfortable with their views, they're being radicalized into the far-right.

While debating them about Palestine, one argument they gave was that "jews, christians and muslims all agree that the land belongs to the jews".

[u/loselyconscious → u/valonianfool]

No, Christian Zionism is a very new phenomenon. Christians historically believe the land used to belong to the Jews, but we lost it because we rejected Christ. Remember that Christians fought many wars to take over and even briefly controlled the Hold Land. Not once in that period did anyone even talk about giving it to the Jews. There has never been, not even in the 20th century, when Christian Zionism was a thing, a Christian country that has used Christianity as part of its official justification for supporting Israel.

[u/Thisisme8719 → u/loselyconscious]

Also to flesh that out, it wasn't even "belonging" like when we think of a modern concept of private property - eg Netanyahu talking with Jordan Peterson and alluding to Locke's idea of property rights; or a national right to the region that Ganz argues for (but even he thinks it's a limited right). It was a belief in conditional stewardship that God could grant or revoke.

[u/Adept_Thanks_6993 → u/valonianfool]

To some extent it did, for an admittedly long while. But we were never the only people there, nor did we ever hold an exclusive title. Even when we had a King and a Temple we weren't the only ones there. Our right to develop a society in Eretz Yisrael was on condition we uphold our covenant of ethical monotheism with our Creator. We were exiled because we didn't hold up our end of the bargain. If we lose sovereignty in the Holy Land again, it'll be because we didn't hold it up-again.