An American rabbi congratulated the Catholic Church for its
steps to come closer to the Jewish people, and lamented that there has not been
a similar effort by the Jews.
Rabbi Jack Bemporad, director of the Center for Interreligious Understanding of
Englewood, New Jersey, pointed to the 2001 document of the Pontifical Biblical
Commission entitled "The Jewish People and Their Sacred Scriptures in the
Christian Bible."
Rabbi Bemporad participated in a conference last week at the invitation of the
Christian-Jewish Documentation and Information Service, at the Pro Unione Roman
center of the Franciscan Friars of the Atonement. He called the pontifical
document "courageous and stimulating, and a great step forward in understanding
between Christians and Jews."
"What is lacking is a Jewish text that thanks the Catholic Church for its
position," he said. In this connection, the rabbi lamented that Judaism
has not issued any official text comparable to the Second Vatican Council's
declaration "Nostra
Aetate, 1998's "We
Remember: A Reflection on the Shoah," or so many other official
Catholic texts on the Jewish question.
According to Rabbi Bemporad, the declaration "Dabru Emet," the
document often presented as a response of the Jews to Catholic affirmations,
"is not an official document."
"I myself could not sign it because I am in disagreement on fundamental
points," he said.
The rabbi offered a Jewish response to the document of the Pontifical Biblical
Commission, which begins with a prologue by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, in which
the Vatican official explains that this text "may offer important help for
renewed understanding between Christian and Jews."
Although the Reformed rabbi said he was pleased with the text, he admitted he
disagreed with two aspects: First, what he deemed ignorance of the rabbinical
interpretation of the biblical texts; second, the use of the Qumran texts.
For Rabbi Bemporad, "to use these Dead Sea texts, of which I am personally
skeptic, and reject the rabbinical interpretation endorsed by Judaism is like
approaching Christianity while forgetting the Gospels and using instead
apocryphal texts like the Gospel of Thomas, not recognized canonically."
Lastly, the rabbi acknowledged that there is a lack of knowledge of Jesus and
of Christianity in general among Jews. However, in the Reformed rabbinical
schools, such as New York's Hebrew College, Christianity is studied. He himself,
who has been a professor at this center, is an enthusiast of Jesus' parables,
which he described as "marvelous."
Father James Puglisi, director of the Pro Unione Center, said that Rabbi
Bemporad is a leading U.S. contributor to Judeo-Christian relations.