How to start that difficult conversation

I want to talk about difficult conversations. Conversations that could put decades of valuable Christian/Jewish interfaith dialogue in jeopardy. It's risky I know, but I think the stakes have become too high to shy away from it any longer.

Jewish communities receive lessons in Israel advocacy from our leadership, who seem to think the solution to Israel's growing isolation can be resolved with nothing more than better presentation skills. Meanwhile, Christian communities are morally paralysed by fear of causing offence to a people they spent so many centuries persecuting.

But it's time to stop the Jewish moral denial and the Christian moral paralysis. With so much ethical common ground, why not both stand on it for a change and see what happens.

And who knows, through challenging the current no-go-area consensus on Israel, it could take us all to somewhere more dynamic, truthful and powerful in interfaith relations.

But with all that Israel advocacy training taking place in our synagogues, I feel like my Christian friends need some insider guidance on how to get this conversation going.

So what follows is the Micah's Paradigm Shift Online Guide to Starting that Difficult Conversation on Israel with your Jewish neighbours, friends, colleagues, and local communities.

Feel free to adapt the following to your local circumstances and understanding.

Stage one: Bridge building

This is where you begin, setting out all that you can agree on. You should create some good will and calm nerves before getting to the more tricky part of the conversation.

The Jewish connection to The Holy Land through its scripture, history and religious traditions is strong and without question.

The foundation that Judaism has given to the development of Christianity and the sacredness of Jewish scripture in Christian teaching cannot and should not be denied.

Christian culpability in Jewish suffering over many centuries has had catastrophic consequences and in recent decades has led to a fundamental reassessment of Christian teaching and theology.

This turnaround in Christian understanding explains why we are so hesitant and reluctant to criticise the actions of Israel.

We can see how important the modern State of a Israel has become in Jewish self-understanding and communal identity.

We understand the very real Jewish fears around the resurgence of anti-Semitism in Europe. The vandalism of synagogues and Jewish cemeteries and the physical attacks are real and frightening.

We must work together to challenge racism and discrimination wherever it appears....that must be the lasting lesson of the Holocaust.

In Israel and Palestine both sides also deserve to live in peace and security.

Terrorism is not the answer although its causes must be understood without being condoned.

There is a long and complicated history to the conflict that stretches back more than 100 years. The narratives of both sides need to be learnt and understood and integrated into an agreed understanding of history.

After such a tragic relationship over thousands of years, Christians cannot allow new divisions to arise to push Christianity and Judaism apart.

But the situation in Israel/Palestine must be discussed openly and without inhibitions on either side. A mature dialogue is called for. We have a shared ethical tradition to uphold. This is a moment of truth for both sides.

At this point you should feel like things are going pretty swimmingly. Lots of nodding of heads and relief among the Jewish contingent that you are not out to convert them. Time to pour out the tea and break open the digestives.

But what comes next will be a lot more difficult.

Stage two: The objections

Now you need to be ready for some strong objections and challenges. And this is where some robustness and resilience will come in very handy.

Expect a version of the following to be thrown at you. This is where the bridge you have just constructed is in danger of getting demolished.

We thank you for all of the points you have made and agree entirely.

Thank you for recognising our 5,000 year unbroken connection to the land of Israel.

After so many decades of understanding and reconciliation we do not want to see that good work undermined. We want to share with you and explain our religious customs and practices. As people of faith we have much in common.

You must understand though that Israel's safety and security is central to our concerns. Many of us have relatives there, many of us visit often. Some in our community have relatives who found Israel their only safe haven after the Holocaust.

In our weekly Sabbath service we pray both for Her Majesty the Queen, and her government, and also for the well-being of the State of Israel. When we hear of atrocities in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv we mourn for the victims, they are our brothers and sisters.

Believe us, we want peace as much as you do. But if you don't live there it is hard for you to understand. We all see on the news what a difficult neighbourhood the Middle East can be.

And we must ask you, 'Why are you picking on Israel?' Why not criticise countries like Syria or North Korea where they treat their people with contempt and barbarity. Why aren't you criticising Hamas who want to wipe Israel off the map and murder all of its Jews - haven't you read their charter! Why aren't you condemning Islamic State and Boko Haram? Surely they deserve your wrath more than Israel does.

Israel treats women with respect and complete equality, and you can live an openly gay life without fear. How many Middle East countries can say that?

Why are you attempting to delegitimise the existence of the only Jewish state in the world? There are 20 Arab States by the way. We only have the one place that we can truly call home.

You are forgetting that it takes 'two to tango' and there is no partner for peace on their side. Until they renounce terrorism how can we trust them? You must have seen the stabbings and car driver murders of the last few weeks? This is what Israel is up against every day.

And we are utterly dismayed that you think to boycott Jews. Have you really forgotten the Holocaust so quickly? The Nazis started with boycotts too. And we all know where it ended.

You may mean well but you really don't understand and your naivety fills us with horror.

You may be not be anti-Semitic but your views have plenty of supporters who clearly are. By talking about Israel in the way that you do, you allow others the space to promote their anti-Semitism.

Your great teacher once said: 'Let he who is without sin cast the first stone' .That would seem like very wise words for the Church to heed, especially when it comes to Israel and the Jewish people.

 By all means, have another biscuit! You're looking slightly pale.

You may have to pick yourself up off the floor at this point. We have reached the low point in the difficult conversation. However, if you've made good use of these notes you will be more than ready with a response.

Stage three: The rebuttal

This is where you remember why you became enraged and passionate about the situation in Israel/Palestine in the first place. It's also the moment when you risk all of that interfaith work that's gone on in the recent past. But don't worry, just be determined to take things onto a whole new level of relationship.

Off you go with something like the following.

We hear what you are saying and we understand your concerns. We are grateful for your frankness in expressing your position. It's important for us to hear you say it, face to face.

And now we must ask that you listen to us too, so that we can begin an honest dialogue.

We have questions to put to you as well.

You are right, you need to go there to understand what is happening. You need to travel to the Occupied Palestinian Territories as some of us have done. You need to see what an occupation looks like close up, each day of the week, for men, women and children. What does it mean to have your land confiscated, building permits denied, water supplies restricted, access to your farm land taken away, your crops burnt, your olive trees destroyed.

These things have nothing to do with Israeli security and safety.

They are the reality of occupation and colonisation of somebody else's land. And this has been happening for more than 50 years in a place that both Christians and Jews consider Holy and where we too have brothers and sisters suffering and dying because of this conflict.

As Christians how could we possibly not be concerned? As British/American Christians, with our country's long political involvement in the region, we feel doubly responsible and have even greater reason to care about the land and all of its people.

Yes, there is an unbroken connection between the Jewish people and the land of Israel stretching back across millennia. But are you really using your scripture, history and festival celebrations to justify a Jewish domination of the land that places Jewish rights above all others that have lived peacefully there for many centuries? Isn't that the kind of religious fundamentalism that all of us want to guard against?

You know that Israel has complete jurisdiction over 60% of the West Bank and operates a different legal apparatus for Palestinians than it does for Jews. At the very least, there is a serious democratic deficit which many people have described as a form of Apartheid. You may not like that word, with all of its past associations. By all means, help us to find a more accurate description.

In Israel itself we see legislative and institutional discrimination against Palestinians on issues of marriage, land purchase, municipal development, educational and employment opportunities. This hardly lives up to the high ideals of Israel's Declaration of Independence and it is certainly in breach of the letter and spirit of Britain's Balfour Declaration.

But what is really surprising, to us, is why you are not shouting about these things too?

This is happening in your name. It is justified as for the good of the Jewish State and the Jewish people. What shocks us is your acquiescence, your lack of protest. Please help us to understand why you have not done more to stop this happening?

If you really support a two-state solution, explain to us why your leadership never speaks out on Settlement expansion? Tell us why your rabbis are not preparing the community outside of Israel for Jerusalem to be a shared capital city?

You are right too that there are other states and other regimes that behave in far worse ways. But they do not claim to be democracies. They do not wish to be perceived as aligned politically, economically and culturally with Europe and North America. The world imposes sanctions and boycotts against North Korea. Our airforce is currently bombing Islamic State. When Russia backs Ukrainian separatists attempting to take over the Crimea, there is an international crisis.

We are not comparing Israel with Islamic State or North Korea. Neither do we think Israel is to blame for all the problems that beset the Middle-East today. However, the Palestinians' long call for their rights to be recognised is clearly a powerful recruiting tool for Islamic State. And should we really make Boko Haram or President Assad the only benchmark for unacceptable behaviour?

We are not picking on Israel unfairly. What is unfair is how much Israel is allowed to get away with.We hear plenty of stern words of rebuke from America, Britain and the EU but never see any real political or economic pressure. We would love to see Israelis and Palestinians sitting down to negotiate. You are right 'it takes two to tango' but we would ask you to consider which side is refusing to dance.

This is a very unequal conflict. One side has a powerful economy, superpower support, and one of the strongest armies in the world. The other side has none of these things.
Any student of history knows that those with power and territory very rarely relinquish it without considerable pressure being brought to bear. And those that suffer oppression will always resist.

We can understand your concern about the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement. We see this very differently though.

The Palestinians have tried to draw world attention to their situation for nearly seventy years. They have tried hi-jackings, assassinations, kidnappings, suicide bombings and stone throwing. We do not condone any of this. But BDS is a peaceful and legal tactic to create international pressure for change. How can we deny them this protest? This has nothing to do with the Nazis or the Holocaust. BDS is a protest in support of human rights. It is a legitimate tactic that is appropriate for this situation. BDS is not a campaign in opposition to peaceful negotiation it is designed to make a just settlement more likely.

Tell us what signs you see of government led progress on this issue? We believe you can have a positive influence in shifting the impasse. We believe that we can as well.

Finally, can Israel afford to be so choosy about who it will talk to? Hamas, in disregard of its wretched charter, has long accepted the 1967 Israeli borders. And if it is so extreme and fundamentalist why is it happy to form a coalition with the secular Fatah party which long ago recognised the State of Israel. To us Israel looks like the partner refusing to dance.

None of this makes the Palestinians all angels. But for us the question must be who are the oppressed and who are the oppressors?   

We want to work with our Jewish neighbours and our Muslim neighbours to bring a just and peaceful solution to all the people of Israel and Palestine. They deserve nothing less. Together we should be emboldening the leadership of each of our communities to speak out against injustice in the name of the traditions that we each claim to honour.

Please tell us how you think we can work together. But if we cannot work together, we will work alone. We believe this is too important to allow local sensitivities to cloud our judgement of what needs to be done.

In the past, too many Christians have turned their heads and crossed over the road rather than confront injustice when it was in plain view. For our faith to remain true to its best traditions and at all relevant in the world, we cannot behave like that again today or in the future. We are not casting the first stones but we are trying to walk in the footsteps of ‘our teacher’.

Thank you allowing us to set out our position. Now let's begin to talk about the future. As you say, we are a people of faith and we have much in common.

And there you can pause for breath and gulp down some tea. I'm hoping your Jewish partners in the dialogue will also want to take a moment to re-group.

I'm probably making this sound easier than it will be in reality. In the short-term it may feel like you are damaging important local relationships for little gain. In the long-term though it could be that you are building the foundations of a future Jewish-Christian dialogue that is richer and stronger than anything that has gone before.

So, the moment of truth starts here.

Good luck with starting your difficult conversations!

How the UK's Jewish leadership killed off the two-state solution

In the last month it's become clear that the UK's Jewish leadership, despite its constant mantra, has no interest in promoting a two-state solution to the Israel/Palestine conflict. At least not in a way that has the slightest practical significance.

We may hear the consistent rhetoric that claims to support compromise and bilateral negotiation but in reality our public representatives now look as thoroughly intransigent as Israel's right-wing coalition government.

And if that's the case we have a serious problem on our hands. It's a problem that leads directly to the increase in anti-Semitic attacks on our streets and it's undermining local community dialogue with our Christian and Muslim neighbours.

The lack of credible independence from the Israeli government and the abdication of the role of critical Jewish friend to Israel is not doing the Jewish community in UK, or the State of Israel, or its standing among the family of nations, any good whatsoever.

The latest evidence for the abandonment of honest support for two-states is the behaviour shown during the run-up and aftermath of the House of Commons vote to recognise the Palestinian state earlier this month (13 October).

Before looking at what happened at Westminster, it's worth revisiting the best research we have on the attitude of UK Jews to the conflict.

According to the most recent polling data (2010) carried out by the Institute for Jewish Policy Research, UK Jews hold the following views about Israel.

• Two-thirds (67%) favour giving up territory for peace with the Palestinians
• Almost three-quarters (74%) are opposed to the expansion of existing settlements in the West Bank
• A large majority (78%) favours a two-state solution to the conflict with the Palestinians
• A clear majority (55% against 36%) consider Israel to be ‘an occupying power in the West Bank

So UK Jews are thoroughly dovish on the key issues.

And remember, this survey was carried out just a year after Operation Cast Lead, which was the last time Israel carried out a major assault on Gaza comparable to what took place this summer. The 2010 poll found that 72% agreed or strongly agreed that the military action that Israel carried out in Gaza was a legitimate act of self-defence. However, despite that perception of the where blame lay, just over half (52%) thought that Israel should still negotiate with Hamas.

Now I don't expect Israel's official lobbyists in the UK, such as BICOM, the Zionist Federation, We Believe in Israel and the Friends of Israel party political bodies to do anything other than Jerusalem's bidding. They long ago chose to position themselves as Israel's defenders right or wrong, so why should they take account of UK Jewish public opinion. They are entitled to do their political work.

But what of The Board of Deputies, the Jewish Leadership Council and the religious denominations, in particular the United Synagogue (which employs Britain's Chief Rabbi) and Reform Judaism. If they really believe in achieving the two-state solution they are going about it in a way guaranteed to frustrate its already very slim prospect of ever happening.

Rather than use their influence as representatives of world Jewry, our religious and communal leaders have thrown their lot in with the Israel hard-liners and are disregarding the more conciliatory position of much of the Jewish community.

On current form, it would be easier to openly slip a prayer for Gaza's dead children into a crevice of the Wailing Wall than to find an Israel policy gap between the UK Zionist lobby and our religious and communal leadership.

So how did we see this Israeli take-over of UK Jewish communal affairs played out this month?

In the two weeks leading up to vote in the House of Commons my email inbox become full of requests from Israel lobby groups, as well as from the Board, JLC, United Synagogue and Reform Judaism, to write to my MP, urging them to oppose any motion that did not tie recognition to the successful completion of a peace process between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. In other words, Israel, and only Israel, gets to decide when the Palestinians deserve their right to self-determination and who should be their representatives in those negotiations.

Judging by the frantic efforts to mobilise Jewish constituents, you would have thought MPs were voting on a motion to de-recognise the State of Israel rather than supporting a purely symbolic act that would place the Palestinians on a (slightly) more level playing field in any future talks.

In the end, the amended motion favoured by our Jewish leadership did not get Commons support. However, an additional clause, put forward by the former Labour Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, was accepted by the motion's sponsors. So on the night here's what our MPs, who chose to turn up, overwhelmingly voted to support:

This House believes that the Government should recognise the state of Palestine alongside the state of Israel, as a contribution to securing a negotiated two state solution.

But even this non-binding statement of evenhandedness turned out to be totally unacceptable to our communal leadership.

The Board's President Vivian Wineman wrote the following day:

"This resolution and amendment, however well-intentioned it may be, is a most unfortunate and misguided development...This is bad news as it gives fuel to Palestinian rejectionism. This would only contribute to the delegitimisation campaign against Israel, with the Palestinians using international courts, pushing for boycotts and other activities which the vast majority of British politicians oppose."

Is it just me, or does that sound like a massive over reaction?

I suspect John Kerry will have a different view on where the rejectionist behaviour is coming from and would be delighted to find out from Mr. Wineman where exactly the "negotiations" are taking place.

And did you notice the sudden leap to "boycotts" and "international courts", the two Palestinian tactics that put such horror into the hearts of the Jewish establishment. So the warning to our legislators from our Jewish leadership is: give the Palestinians an inch and they will take a mile. The Board's position does not strike me as one predisposed to the kind of political compromise that will underpin a two-state solution.

And Mr. Wineman had more to say:

"The only way forward is negotiation, and not being derailed by those who seek to block a meaningful peace process...After all unilateral moves have not contributed to the peace process".

Was there anything in the Commons motion that called for anything other than negotiations?

And while the Board of Deputies is condemning "unilateral moves" did it have anything to say about the announcement in August of Israel's unilateral appropriation of 1,000 acres of land belonging to five Palestinian villages on the West Bank? Or did I miss that press release?

Meanwhile, the Jewish Leadership Council chose to issue a joint statement with the Zionist Federation and BICOM along almost identical lines to the Board of Deputies. It makes you wonder if we really need all of these organisations when there is so little to distinguish their positions on such a central issue of Jewish concern.

So what should a commitment to a two-state solution look like from our communal and religious leadership, especially if they were genuinely concerned about the ever-growing democratic deficit on both sides of the 1967 Green Line?

Well, if they were serious about promoting two states, I would expect to hear from Vivian Wineman regular calls for an end to the illegal occupation of the West Bank. I would look forward to Simon Johnson of the Jewish Leadership Council criticising the expansion of the Settlements as undermining political confidence in a peace process. I would welcome the Chief Rabbi, Ephraim Mirvis, preparing the Jewish community for the idea of a shared Jerusalem. And Reform Judaism would be asking how Jewish ethics aligns with discrimination on house building and water access in the 60% of the West Bank which Israel controls completely.

If our leadership were truly committed to justice and reconciliation through two states, we would be seeing other activity too. There would be important community based educational work to co-ordinate and support. Decades of denial that Israel has the slightest culpability in the Israel/Palestine impasse would be confronted and discussed. A little less Israel advocacy training and a whole lot more unbiased history teaching would encourage a communal environment ready to press Israel to get serious about negotiations.

In truth though, I suspect it is all far too late in the day.

And if the chances of a two-state solution really have died, then our Jewish leadership can share some of the blame for killing it off. For years they could have spoken out and influenced governments of every shade in Jerusalem, raising the legitimate concerns of the Jewish diaspora. But they chose not to. Instead they opted to mimic the same belligerency that is taking us to a political and moral dead end.

In the meantime, land will continue to be stolen. Israeli soldiers will continue to arrest and shoot dead Palestinian children with impunity and Israelis will be outraged when all of this prompts a counter reaction.

And closer to home, interfaith relations with Christians and Muslims will falter and stumble and anti-Israel motivated attacks against Jews and Jewish property will rise because we have done nothing to counter the perception that 21st century Zionism, Judaism and the views of the UK Jewish community are all one and the same thing.

Next year we have a general election in the UK. The Board of Deputies has already published its 'manifesto' aimed at influencing candidates' attitudes on issues of Jewish concern. Once again it declares a UK Jewish commitment to a two-state solution. If I were a would-be MP for the next UK parliament, I would be asking the Jewish religious and communal leadership to spell out exactly what they have done to encourage the two-state outcome they claim to be so wedded to.

Micah meets...Mark Braverman

This month the Jewish American writer and Israel/Palestine activist, Mark Braverman, publishes his second book 'A Wall in Jerusalem'. It follows 'Fatal Embrace' in 2010 which quickly established Braverman as an important new voice in the Israel/Palestine debate. Below you can read Braverman's first interview to mark the new book's publication given exclusively to Micah's Paradigm Shift.

Braverman, who has deep family roots in Israel, has developed what he describes as a 'calling' to speak to the Church in a spirit of Christian teaching that sees Jesus as a radical Jew rebelling against the Jewish establishment and the Roman occupation of first century Palestine. In his new book he successfully straddles Jewish and Christian theological thinking to create a shared dialogue of justice and compassion. Braverman is determined to articulate a Christian approach to Palestinian solidarity that counters evangelical Christian Zionism while remaining rooted in the teaching of Jesus. He also challenges the phenomenon of Christian post-Holocaust guilt that leads to a reluctance by the Church to confront Israeli injustice against the Palestinian people for fear of disturbing Jewish-Christian interfaith dialogue.

'A Wall in Jerusalem' is full of personal stories and the voices of Christian and Jewish, scholars and activists. Braverman's own story of his journey to an awareness of the Palestinian cause is as compelling as any in the book. For me the book holds many moments of great clarity including the insight that the Palestinian story has become not just 'their narrative' but the defining narrative of Israelis and the Jewish Diaspora too.

Whether you are new to the issues or familiar with them you will find 'A Wall in Jerusalem' an exceptionally rewarding and inspiring read.

An interview with Mark Braverman



MICAH'S PARADIGM SHIFT: In this book, more than in Fatal Embrace, it feels as if your primary audience are Christians grappling with what to think about Israel/Palestine. You talk about the difficulties you have experienced in raising the whole debate within synagogues but the warm welcome you have received in many churches. Have you given up on raising awareness within your own Jewish Community?

MARK BRAVERMAN: Awareness continues to increase in the Jewish community, but I see this as a separate issue from the mobilization of the churches as a grassroots force for changing government policy in the US and among its Western allies. There are Jewish journalists, academics, and now even rabbis who are raising their voices, and grassroots Jewish peace groups such as Jewish Voice for Peace in the U.S. who are doing very important work with the Jewish community as well as presenting an alternative to those Jewish institutional voices who defend Israel against all criticism and claim to speak for all Jews. I simply have another calling, which is to speak to the churches.

MPS: What does that 'calling' look like? What's the core message you want to put across to Christians and the Church?

MB: One of the points that I make repeatedly to my Christian audiences – and I am not aware of other Jews who make this point – is that they must, as Christians, and as church organizations, move ahead as Christians and as the church in the movement to liberate Palestinians and Jewish Israelis from the scourge of apartheid in our time. The interfaith project to reconcile Christians and Jews for thousands of years of anti-Jewish persecution at the hands of the church continues to be important – but this is a different matter.

MPS: So what is it about the on-going interfaith reconciliation project that creates a Christian barrier to engaging with the Israel/Palestine debate?

MB: If Christians allow themselves to be held back from this human rights cause because they are being told that this is betrayal of their “friendship” with the Jewish people, if they figure that they must wait for the Jewish community to come around before they can feel comfortable taking on the cause of Palestinian rights, or embracing BDS, for example, then they will wait too long. So part of my point in working only with the churches is to drive home this distinction – the church must put its own house in order with respect to the Palestinians, and I have accepted, for now, the assignment to be a Jewish voice urging it to do so. But I am very clear that I this does not mean that Christians cannot move forward on this without a Jew walking beside them. I am fond of saying that I am willing to do so for now, but that I pray for the day that Christians do not need a Jew’s permission to act as faithful Christians in this matter.

MPS: At times, and I think you acknowledge yourself in the book, it feels like here is a Jew giving Christians a lecture on how to rediscover their own Christian mission and the role model that Jesus set for them in first century Roman occupied Palestine. That must be an interesting position to have found yourself in?

MB: Well, it’s quite wonderful for me because meeting the Palestinian Christians, in particular the people of Sabeel, and the authors of the Kairos Palestine document, has allowed me to discover Jesus of Nazareth and to embrace him as a Jewish reformer. The parallels of our current situation to the first Century I find very compelling. I think it’s an opportunity for the Church, as it seems to have to do in every generation, to discover the core meaning of the gospels, which is to work for social justice, for compassion for the vulnerable and the oppressed.

MPS: And where do you think that takes the Jewish attitude to Jesus?

MB: I think it’s an opportunity for Jews to discover that same Jesus, who, if he were to turn up in Jerusalem today, would speak truth to the power to the Jewish establishment of our times just as he did to the Jewish monarchy and Temple establishment of long ago.

MPS: I'm not sure most Jews are ready to embrace Jesus as a radical Jewish reformer with a message for Judaism today. It's a viewpoint that must leave you isolated from the mainstream Jewish community?

MB: People ask me if I feel lonely or isolated – making the assumption that I am alienated from the Jewish community. My answer is that it is quite the opposite. I feel a part of a broader, larger community now, and it includes people of all faiths and persuasions. So it’s been quite liberating and gratifying for me. I think Jesus would have approved – his message had to do with stepping out of the tribal and into the universal.

MPS: Do you think that as a Jew, saying the critical things you do about Zionism, you are giving Christians the permission to think differently about Israel and break free of the post Holocaust feeling of guilt they may have towards the Jewish people? 

MB: Yes but as I said before I think Christians need to move beyond needing that permission. It’s appropriate to feel horror, sadness and shame about the sins of the church – but guilt is not a good motivator. I think that what we have come to call guilt over the Nazi Holocaust has resulted in the embrace of Zionism by the Christian West, and I think that this is why Israel has been allowed to get away with its crimes, historic and current. Besides the tragedy this represents for the Palestinians, this is bad, not good for the Jews. I don’t need your guilt offering, I say to Christians. I need you to be good followers of Jesus and work for justice and compassion. Call my people to account, but not for our sake, but for the sake of your consciences and for the good of humankind.

MPS: How has your sense of Jewish identity changed as a result of your engagement with the cause of the Palestinian people? You say in the book that it feels the most Jewish thing you have ever done.

MB: I am in the company of tens of thousands of Jews who feel as I do – that Jewish identity today is about embracing the Palestinian cause, just as we were taught as children in synagogue and Hebrew school to stand up for the oppressed because we were slaves in the land of Egypt. My father, who was active in the Anti-defamation League of B’nai Brith, taught me back in the 1960s that working for racial equality in the U.S. was the core of being a Jew. That holds now for the Palestinian cause. Even more so, perhaps, because we are responsible for their suffering. We need to mourn for our past losses and suffering, but move on from our preoccupation with our own victimhood and do something about how we have now become the victimizers. That is the most important component of Jewish identity today. To be Jewish today means to understand that the Nakba is our story as well.

MPS: In the book you go to some length to 'join up the dots' between the mission of Jesus, the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s, South Africa under Apartheid and Israel/Palestine today. Your key texts appear to be the Gospels, Martin Luther King's Letter from Birmingham Jail and the Kairos document produced by the dissenting South African churches in the mid 1980s. Can you foresee a 'tipping point', as we did with Civil Rights and Apartheid, where consciousness of Israel/Palestine leads to a fundamental shift in global opinion?

MB:Yes, and we may be approaching this point. Look at the New York Times piece by Ian Lustick from September 14 (check out my latest blog posting). I also believe that, regardless of timing, it is inevitable. As MLK Jr. said, the arc of history is long, but it bends toward justice. Desmond Tutu and the Palestinian Kairos authors also talk of hope – even as things get worse, the inevitability of a just resolution is there, because the current situation is unsustainable. And, as the South Africans discovered, things can move faster than expected. I would not be surprised to see this happen with Israel and Palestine. Israel is digging in deeper and deeper, moving rapidly toward domestic racist policies that to many feels like a turn toward fascism. As this continues, it only makes the end seem closer – an “end,” I hasten to say, that does not mean the destruction of Israel, but a new beginning for all its citizens.

MPS: You have described yourself as a retired ('recovering') professional psychologist, with that hat on, how hard do you think it will be for communities on all sides (Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Israeli, Palestinian) to break free of the rigid narratives that we use to define ourselves and the world around us?

MB: Hard for some perhaps but I feel strongly that the impulse for health is stronger. It is not good to live behind a wall, and that separation wall is as much psychological as it is physical. Israeli Jews who have crossed to the other side of the wall have discovered that the Palestinians are not the hateful enemies they were told they were. Remove the wall and those narratives begin to deconstruct themselves naturally. I am a one-stater because I believe that it is the natural outcome – Jews and Palestinians can live together harmoniously, in fact I think that give the opportunity they will create a wonderful, diverse society together.

MPS: Finally, when we met over the summer, you told me that all of us involved in the movement to bring justice and peace to the Holy Land were punching above our weight. What did you mean by that?

MB: You know I’m not sure the metaphor is the best. Individually, we each do our best and I think we are doing quite well using the gifts we have. The movement, perhaps, can be said to be outnumbered and under-resourced, certainly compared to the opposition, which is connected to the structures of government and religious establishments. But individually and collectively we have a power that the other side, with all its money and institutional support does not have – we are on the side of justice. The other side knows that as well. Which is why it is fighting so hard – bringing out the big guns, so to speak. The prophets spoke with the authority of absolute principles they said came from God. So did Jesus. And he started with 12 followers…. Do we say that Elijah or Jesus were punching above their weight? It sounds absurd, even wrong to say so.

But maybe I don’t understand the expression. Maybe it supposed to mean: if you are ready for the fight, you go into the ring even if the odds or the rules say you will lose.

Interview conducted via email between 31 October and 1 November 2013  

In the US you can buy the book here from Tuesday 5 November and in the UK it can be pre-ordered here for release on Monday 21 November.

Jewish nationalism, Christian theology and the demise of interfaith dialogue

Right now, decades of progress on Jewish-Christian interfaith dialogue is unraveling. What had been a period of unprecedented advancement has been halted and replaced by (Christian) frustration and (Jewish) anger.

Interfaith relations now seem to exist only as part of the established hierarchy of formal Jewish and Christian communal structures. The realms of acceptable debate are securely locked down, confined to domestic issues and the sharing of religious practice. Any serious challenge by Christians or Jews to the status quo on Israel is considered firmly out of bounds.

So what's happened and what can be done to get back on track and establish a mature, open and honest interfaith conversation that doesn't fall apart as soon as Israel or the Palestinians get mentioned?

Here, I want to examine how distorted presentations of Christian theology and fossilised views of Judaism have become part of the new and disturbing dynamic of Jewish-Christian interaction.

Stifling honest debate

Over the last few years, it's become clear that a favourite method of criticising Christian intervention in the Israel/Palestine debate is to accuse Christians of using 'replacement theology' to deny Jewish claims to the 'Promised Land'. Replacement theology is a strain of traditional Church teaching that has been thoroughly discredited through the process of Jewish-Christian dialogue but which has now been given a new lease of life by those wishing to use it as a blunt instrument to stifle an honest debate about a genuine injustice.

It's becoming a rather tiresome sequence of events. American Presbyterians, Quakers, Methodists and Anglicans have all been fed through the mangle on this. Usually, it ends up with accusations of anti-Semitism on the grounds of attacking the very heart of modern Jewish identity.

Most recently, it's been the Church of Scotland with its Assembly's adoption of: The inheritance of Abraham? A report on the ‘promised land’. The Jewish communal response was reported in the UK's Jewish Chronicle on 24 May: “Scottish Jews have condemned the Church of Scotland’s decision to approve a controversial report on Israel, calling it an unacceptable attack on Judaism."

But is the Christian critique of the modern State of Israel really ‘replacement theology’ or is the real candidate for replacing Jewish heritage and spiritual understanding to be found elsewhere?

What I believe we are seeing is a deliberately distorted presentation of Christian thinking along with a partial reading of Jewish history and a fossilised view of Judaism itself. All of which serves to divert attention from an urgent call for universal justice that can be found loud and clear in both the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament.

A short history of replacement theology

'Replacement theology' (sometimes called 'supercessionism' or 'fulfillment' theology) derives from the idea that God's expanded Covenant, through Jesus, embraces the whole world rather than one particular people in one particular place. The expanded Covenant can either be viewed as a positive sharing of Jewish values with the rest of humanity or a doctrine that renders Judaism, and its 'Old' Testament, obsolete. It was the latter understanding that led to a long and poisonous history of Church teaching that had murderous implications and created fertile ground for the Nazi's near genocide of European Jewry during the Second World War.

The last seventy years have witnessed great strides by Christian theologians who have challenged this interpretation of New Testament scripture, understanding Judaism as the crucible of Christianity with its own, on-going, unique relationship to God. In turn this has led to a blossoming of Christian-Jewish dialogue.

Until now that is.

Today we see the conflict over Israel/Palestine undoing much good work and all for the sake of protecting Jewish nationalist interests.

The Church of Scotland's report provides the most recent case study of the 'replacement theology' accusation being deployed to close down debate.

'The inheritance of Abraham' charts the Christian understanding of ‘Land’ and ‘Covenant’ using scripture to demonstrate that the original 'Promise' to Abraham should no longer be considered grounds for exclusive Jewish control of the Holy Land. The report draws on the New Testament's interpretation of 'Israel' as being, not just the Jews, but all people of God, while the 'Promise' of the 'Land' becomes a metaphor for the creation of the 'Kingdom of God' in all parts of the world.

This is the moment when defenders of the modern State of Israel call 'foul'. The attempt to universalise the meaning of 'Land' 'Promise' and 'Israel' is seen as once again calling into question the legitimacy of Judaism. The argument has traction (particularly among Christians involved in the communal establishment version of interfaith dialogue) for the very reason that Zionism has been immensely successful in conflating itself with Judaism.

It works like this: If you call into question the Biblical foundation of Jewish claims to the Holy Land, then you undermine the right of Jews today for national self-determination in their historic homeland. Universalising the Covenant means attacking a central element of historic and modern Jewish identity (or at least the Zionist conception of it). So, the Church of Scotland, and others, quickly find themselves accused of jeopardising decades of post-Holocaust interfaith reconciliation.

An evolving Jewish understanding

One reason why this attack on Christian theology is so wrong-headed, from a Jewish perspective, is that it fails to recognise Judaism's own development both within Biblical scripture and across two thousand years of diaspora living.

The truth of the matter is, we Jews have been 'replacing' or at least ‘developing’ our theology of 'Promise', 'Land' and 'Covenant' for the last three millennia.

This evolution in Jewish thinking was happening throughout the Biblical period and long before the New Testament brought a further layer of (Jewish) understanding to the meaning of the human relationship with God.

In Hebrew scripture we move from the family/tribal God of Genesis to the people's God of Exodus to the God who sets moral conditions on his gifts in Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. Propriety of the Land clearly becomes conditional on faithfulness to God and the upholding of his law.

The idea that Judaism is a portable religion rooted in faith and ethical action, gained further momentum with the writings of the Prophets. When Micah asks famously: "What does the Lord require of you?" The answer was not the blood of thousands of rams killed for Temple sacrifice but instead a core commitment to: act justly, love kindness and walk humbly with our God.

The genius of the Jewish Diaspora

The Jewish story and the Jewish conception of the Covenant did not stop with the closing chapters of the Hebrew Bible. The Jewish relationship to God and to the Land continued to evolve across two millennia of rabbinic thinking and the continuing development of Jewish spirituality. Our rabbis replaced Temple sacrifice with prayer, study and ethical action and the understanding that living on the Land was not integral to the practice of Judaism or Jewish identity. Living in the Diaspora was never second class Judaism.

Jewish teaching saw 'Exile' as a metaphysical construction, a theological distancing from the Almighty that had led to a physical dislocation. Exile involved a continuing effort directed at spiritual renewal and return to God. The physical return to the 'Land of Israel' was a distant, indefinitely postponed, messianic future, firmly in God's hands and not ours.

But then came Zionism. A late 19th century variant of middle European ethnic nationalism that successfully weaved a traditional connection to the Land, expressed religiously through festivals and prayer, into a political and colonial project. The upshot has been the creation of a Jewish State that, by its very nature, must privilege its Jewish inhabitants to the detriment of the indigenous Palestinian population and all other non-Jews.

Zionists like to jump back two thousand years as if the whole diaspora experience was a mere detour, a temporary distraction from nationalism, rather than a miraculous achievement of cultural and religious development.

If you are looking for a ‘replacement theology’ that undermines Jewish tradition and religious understanding, and skews Jewish ethics as a result, then look no further than Zionism.

A new path for dialogue

For Christian-Jewish dialogue to have a future it has to challenge what Marc Ellis has described as the 'ecumenical deal' that agrees to take all criticism of the State of Israel off the table. It also has to dismiss claims of 'replacement theology' as a deliberate political tactic (a theological 'red herring') that ignores Judaism's own historic development and its core value of justice. Christian-Jewish interfaith relations will become morally atrophied if Christians feel they must silence themselves on the behaviour of the State of Israel to its own minority citizens and those whose land it continues to occupy.

Jews and Christians enjoy tremendous common ground and can build on their shared understanding of a universal God concerned for all of his creation and who demands of us that we love our neighbour and pursue an agenda of justice. Anything done in the name of Christianity or Judaism that is an affront to that calling must be clearly identified or else both traditions are fatally undermined.

Christian partners in Jewish dialogue must acknowledge the very real connection of Judaism with the Holy Land through Jewish prayer, festivals and sacred mythology. On that basis, Israel should be seen as a 'homeland' of Jewish heritage. But that doesn't mean accepting that Zionism is integral to Judaism or that the Jewish population of Israel has the right to create exclusive rights for itself and deny human rights to others.

The return to Jewish nationalism has led the Jewish people down an ethical cul-de-sac. The history that has taken us to this point needs to be understood and acknowledged but the rightness of its outcome must be challenged. To navigate our way out will require a brave dialogue with the Palestinians that turns Israel from a 'Jewish Democracy' to a 'Human Democracy'. Meanwhile, we need sympathetic Christian partners who will help us to reclaim the very values that their own faith is built upon.

Notes from a road-crossing, border-walking, inter-faithing Jew.

This blog post began life as a talk given at Manchester Cathedral at the end of last November when I was asked to be a 'conversation partner' for the writer, speaker, activist, and public theologian Brian McLaren. Brian was on UK tour organised by the Greenbelt festival to promote his latest book 'Why did Jesus, Moses, the Buddha, and Mohammed Cross the Road?'

Around 150 people gathered on a chilly Friday evening in the Cathedral's regimental chapel to hear Brian talk about the challenges of sustaining a strong Christian identity in a multi-faith world. My role was to give a non Christian response to Brian's comments and for us to take questions together afterwards. Thankfully, local singer-songwriter Jasmine Kennedy was also there to bring some respite from the talking heads.

Brian is a lovely, unassuming and highly engaging man as I discovered over a brief pre-event meal. He also turned out to know, or be acquainted with, some of the major influencers on my thinking including Rabbi Michael Lerner, Marc H. Ellis and Mark Braverman.

What follows is a slightly edited, in places slightly expanded, and generally polished up version of what I had to say that evening. It's about the merits of religious pluralism and more specifically Christian-Jewish relationships...in particular my own.

Think of it as deep background for the production of Micah's Paradigm Shift. Your comments are most welcome. Please share this post with anyone you feel it may be helpful to.

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Friday 30 November 2012, Manchester, UK

When Paul Northup, the Director of Greenbelt, asked if I would be Brian's conversation partner for tonight, my first reaction was: what right would I have to stand here and say anything to you?

I'm not a rabbi, I hold no position of authority within the Jewish community, I've not written a book on the subject, I don't even sit on any interfaith dialogue committees.

But then I remembered that I was taking for granted something which most people will see as quite unusual.

Faith in the journey

My wife, Anne, and I have been involved in Christian-Jewish dialogue for the past 25 years since we first met as students, here in Manchester in the mid 1980s. Actually, we don't really call it interfaith dialogue. We just talk about 'stuff' that's important to us.

Neither of us would have guessed all those years ago (when both of us were questioning our respective beliefs and upbringing) that by now Anne would be a Church of England priest while I would be using social media to defend Judaism's ethical tradition against the narrow focus of modern Jewish nationalism.

Anne and I have both been on something of a spiritual journey during all of these years. And throughout that journey each of us has found guidance, nourishment and inspiration in each other's faith traditions and through the very process of having to look closely at our own religious heritage.

Through all of this Anne has remained Christian and I have remained Jewish with both of us feeling more affirmed and secure in our respective commitments than we were a quarter of a century ago.

Although interfaith marriage is not the subject of Brian's book, I think Anne and I bring some validity to Brian's assertion that interfaith encounter and dialogue does not inevitably lead to a weakening of identity and commitment. In fact the reverse can happen even if the understanding of your own faith changes along the way.

Anne and I don't claim to have all of the answers to Christian-Jewish dialogue, far from it. In fact, not having all of the answers turns out to be an important place to get to when you are having inter-religious conversations. The really important thing is simply listening to each other without feeling defensive about our respective traditions. Without denying differences of emphasis and interpretation, we have consciously chosen to emphasise the interconnections between Judaism and Christianity rather than the points of disagreement and departure.

Throughout twenty-five years together, each of us has learnt to walk along borders, travel to a religious foreign land, occasionally negotiate hostile territory, and often take on a role of ambassador from a neighbouring kingdom. Don't worry there have been plenty of laughs along the way too. When it comes to religious institutions, of every variety, God clearly has a sense of humour!

Together, we have had to find our way through various religious rites of passage starting with our wedding in a Quaker Meeting House in the Lake District in 1992 (there's a lot to be said for a service based on silence when you're trying to keep both families happy!) Circumcision, baptism and priesthood have all had to be worked through along with our understanding and celebration of the annual cycle of religious festivals.

Each Friday night we sit down together with our four children in our kitchen and we light sabbath candles and share bread and wine to welcome in the Jewish Sabbath. Sometimes we are all so fractious and tired that this simple ceremony requires considerable effort from all of us. But nobody wants to give it up. It brings us together at the end of the week, with prayers that allow us to pause, give thanks, and think about the lives of others we have encountered or news we have heard about.

Location also plays its part too in the manner of our Jewish observance. Since the nearest synagogue is 80 miles away, Judaism makes itself at home in our family. Fortunately, or perhaps I should say deliberately, Judaism works well around the kitchen table.

Praying in a foreign language

Each Sunday we are at the large parish church that serves the market town of Kendal in Cumbria where Anne has been Curate for the last 18 months. After attending Church of England services regularly for the last fourteen years, I have learnt how to worship in a setting different to that in which I grew up with and with words and music I once found alienating and even threatening and certainly uncomfortable with. I have discovered how not to let specific liturgy or theological conceptions trip me up. I sometimes think of it as praying in a foreign language.

For me, all religious language is just our flawed attempt to put into words things that in the final reckoning defy the perfect human articulation. Sometimes the words work and sometimes they don't. Sometimes the same words work one week but not the next. And that feels like a good thing to me.

If nobody has the ultimate form of words then perhaps we can just accept that we are all straining to reach the same things, dealing with the same concerns, and responding, with varying degrees of success, to the meaning of our existence.

So, a church, rather than a synagogue, has now become my regular worshipping community. I sit with my companions on a religious journey, a continuing pilgrimage of faith and hope that looks to find modern purpose in ancient wisdom. Our religious minds may be wired up slightly differently but these days that feels to me like detail and not substance. My Jewish studies continue, thanks largely to the Internet and books that keep me plugged in to Judaism and Jewish community concerns that I can then share with the rest of the family.

The Carpenter and the Cross

Despite all my talk of commonality, I suspect you are still wondering what my view is on that toughest of all issues for Jewish-Christian dialogue - the status of that first century, itinerant, radical preacher from Galilee and the cross on which he was crucified.

How can one person's symbol of forgiveness, redemption and salvation be another's constant reminder of two thousand years of violence and oppression on European and Middle Eastern soil? There has been a high cost to the Church's past imperial might and its teaching of significant aspects of Christian doctrine. None of this can be glossed over or forgotten about just because in our post-modern Western European environment the Church has now fallen on hard times.

At the level of Christian leadership and amongst post-war Christian theologians there has been much acknowledgement and atonement for Christianity's other 'original sin' - the blood libel against the Jewish people. The progress that has been made in the last seventy years is an amazing achievement in such a relatively short space of time. However, I'm not sure how much of this historical understanding and theological adjustment has filtered down to pew level. For the average church goer in the UK, I suspect Christianity is seen as an almost entirely innocent force throughout its history and a religion that has been more often the victim than the victimiser.

Meanwhile, Jews are acutely and painfully aware of their historic relationship with Christianity. In fact, our self-perception of eternal victimhood has been pretty much perfected. The mis-match of self-perception leads to a great deal of misunderstanding and explains the underlying suspicion, even hostility, that many Jews feel towards Christianity.

Christianity, of course, does not own the patent when it comes to concocting dangerous cocktails that mix faith with power. In the same period during which Christian-Jewish relations have seen such improvement, there has been a parallel story developing that has taken Jews from the very nadir of their suffering to a new and disastrous destination that has seen the oppressed become the oppressor.

There isn't the time here to talk about the the relationship between the Holocaust and the State of Israel. It's complicated and involves a great deal of history, politics, theology, and the on-going collective trauma of both Jews and Palestinians. It is utterly tragic that the Palestinians have paid the price for crimes committed on Christian European soil. On a rather more modest scale, we Jews are now busy making all the same mistakes as imperial Christianity did and using theology and history to justify our actions.

But back to the carpenter from Nazareth who I do not believe should be held personally responsible for all that has gone on in his name.

On a trip to Israel and the West Bank, I remember sitting in the Church of the Beatitudes in Galilee, where Jesus is believed to have given the Sermon on the Mount (a rather brilliant statement of radical first century Jewish thought). I remember thinking what a tragedy it was that Jesus was 'persona non grata' in Judaism.

Here's a Jewish teacher, in my view, steeped in Judaism trying to take it onto the next religiously evolutionary level of spirituality and God-centred understanding. The rabbis who emerged out of the post Roman period were trying to do the very same thing, allowing prayer and ethical action to take the place of Temple sacrifices. The sorry relationship between the parent religion and its offspring has meant Jesus doesn't get the recognition he merits as a late, great Jewish prophet.

As for being the Son of God...well that all depends on what you understand by 'Son of God' I suppose. And rising from the dead on the third day? For me it's religious poetry and sacred myth, which is not to underplay its importance or value to Christian thinking and living. I would characterise much of the Hebrew bible in the same way but that does not detract from its power and wisdom or its merits as a guide to living and worship. Sacred myth is a seriously underrated way of understanding what it is to be human.

Conflicted Religious Identity Syndrome

Brian's book presents creative challenges to many aspects of traditional Christian thinking that show how centuries old doctrine can become enriched, rather than impoverished, through dialogue with other faiths. Brian also recognises that dialogue between those within the same faith is no small matter either.

In Judaism in the UK, the fault lines run between the different denominations, with Orthodox rabbis refusing to share platforms with Reform or Liberal rabbis because they question their Jewish authenticity. So we have a shrinking community (apart from the ultra-Orthodox) battling hard to make itself even smaller. And I thought we were meant to be a smart people!

For me, one of the most interesting chapters in Brian's book is about how individuals can find themselves in profound disagreement with aspects of their own tradition particularly when they see theology or ideology or community politics being used to oppress those either inside or outside of the faith. Brian has a snappy name for those of us suffering from this condition: Conflicted Religious Identity Syndrome (CRIS).

My own form of this syndrome, as you will have worked out by now, is in relation to the Jewish community's official establishment position on Israel. I don't want us to get side tracked by this issue tonight but if I tell you that my blog is called 'Micah's Paradigm Shift' and the sub title is: 'Act justly, love mercy, walk humbly. Rescuing the Hebrew Covenant one blog post at a time' then I hope you begin to get the idea of where I'm coming from. I take a highly critical stance on Zionism based on an understanding of the universalistic strain of Judaism and a belief in human rights which owes just about everything to Jewish ethics. Sign up for email updates by the way.

The naive school of religious plurality

I guess you can begin to see that my experience leads me to favour religious plurality as a way of understanding the world. You might to call this the 'Naive' school of theology, but to me, everything points to the need for, and indeed the desirability of, difference in religious thought and expression.

Why do we have 100s of species of Amazonian frog? Why do trees, flowers, birds come in such abundant and magnificent variety? Why are faces, fingerprints, personalities each unique? The planet clearly favours diversity. In fact it thrives on it. So if creation is so predisposed to difference why should this end at the doors to our religious institutions? Why do we insist on creating rigid codes and narrow dogmas when it comes to expressing faith?

If there is one bit of heritage I could happily throw overboard it would be all exclusive claims to election and choseness that deny another people their humanity unless they sign up on the dotted line to one set of terms and conditions. Judaism, Christianity and Islam all face the issue of evolving their respective beliefs to deal with the 'other' on truly equal terms in every respect.

There is no denying that we all share are the same anxieties, the same questioning nature, the same wonder, amazement, and, as the great 20th century Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel would say, 'embarrassment at being alive'. By the way, right after you finish Brian's book I'd recommend Heschel's essay 'No Religion is an Island' for an inspiring statement on the necessity and value of interfaith dialogue.

Crossing over and crossing back

Thinking about the title of Brian's book and its invitation to cross over roads, I suppose that I have crossed over the road to see what is on the other side.

I do not claim to have understood everything that I have found in Christianity. I have learnt to interpret the local language rather than feel threatened by it. I'm happy with my children growing up in a faith different to my own because I've stopped thinking that this is some kind of competition to capture the most souls. I am delighted that they feel at home in a community that fully accepts them and is giving them a perspective that will help guide them through whatever life brings. Hearing my children begin to wrestle with the big questions presented by a religious commitment is itself awe inspiring. At a time when consumerism is triumphant, it feels good to be a part of a community that worships something beyond personal acquisition.

At the same time I see how our children value their Jewish inheritance and how that part of their lives is creating a further dimension to their understanding of the world. They are remarkably unconfused by all of this. We underestimate our ability to live comfortably with multiple cultural identities.

Having crossed over the road to take a look at what is going on somewhere else, I still recognise that it's the same road - even if the street furniture looks a bit different. I am still confident that the road is heading in the same direction - to the Kingdom of God or the Promised Land or the Mountain Top or indeed the recognition of God in the very messy and complicated here and now.

I can see that Anne and I will keep talking about all this 'stuff' for the rest of our lives. I have become a road-crossing, border-walking, inter-faithing kind of Jew. That is, at times, a challenging and occasionally regretful path to have taken. But that is the price of the ticket. On balance, I find that the gains far outweigh the losses.

As much as I value heritage and tradition, tribes with flags no longer interest me...if they ever did. Roads are there to be walked and there to be crossed. If I get to meet Moses, Jesus, Mohammed and the Buddha along the way then the privilege is all mine.