Talk:Eastern Orthodoxy and Judaism

Request for help

This article currently deals exclusively with positive relations consistent with church teaching and with official statements and dialogue. It would be nice if someone with knowledge (or experience) could write a bit on some of the nastiness in our history, perhaps even discussing the thorny topic of Orthodox Christians who act contrary to the faith in the name of the faith. --Basil 19:16, December 23, 2010 (UTC)

I have no idea if this is true or not but I have a Greek Jewish friend who said that during WWII the Greek Jews were sending their children to a Metropolitan or Bishop for safe keeping, and that he instead handed them over to the Nazis to ship to the concentration camps. I have also heard second-hand unflattering comments from another Metropolitan this time of Jerusalem who said Israelis were Nazis. Obviously this was told in confidence and when repeated the person was off guard and tried to back pedal pretty fast. I guess these cases are impossible to verify but might suggest a difference between the official stance and the personal opinions of some leading church figures. Apparently there was also a fight between Orthodox and Armenian clergy in the sanctuary of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem in which the Israeli army had to intervene to split up the different factions. This was widely reported in the Israeli press and even appeared on youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ryA_RPiSPRw Hobnob 15:03, June 27, 2011 (UTC)

Article in the LA Times on Anti-Semitism in Greece http://articles.latimes.com/2011/feb/21/world/la-fg-greece-anti-semitism-20110221 What's different in Greece is the level of tolerance for anti-Semitism. "There is zip, zilch, zero reaction to any semblance of anti-Semitism," said human rights activist Panayotes Dimitras, "leaving the door wide-open for extremists to come in and exploit this phobic society, more so now, in this time of crisis." Some critics fault the country's Jewish organizations for shunning quick public reaction to attacks; others point to the attitude of some church prelates and to Greece's failure to come to terms with its once-multicultural identity and harrowing past. Hobnob 15:47, June 30, 2011 (UTC)

Here is the wikipedia article on the Pogroms in the Russia Empire. Again it seems Russian Orthodox priests were involved. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Jewish_pogroms_in_the_Russian_Empire The issue of pogroms arose sometime after the Pale of Settlement was created by the Russian government trying to eradicate Jews from the country unless they would convert to Christian Orthodox (compare to Religious segregation)... There was a well laid-out plan for the general massacre of Jews on the day following the Orthodox Easter. The mob was led by priests, and the general cry, "Kill the Jews," was taken up all over the city. Hobnob 15:55, June 30, 2011 (UTC)