Bachman's Fundamentalist Idiocy Totally Mischaracterises Traditional Christianity

Editor's NOTE:

The statements made by Minnesota Congresswoman Michelle Bachmann are typical of the total misunderstanding of Traditional (Roman Catholic) Christianity that characterizes most Fundamentalist Protestant "Christians."

Protestantism in general but especially Fundamentalist Protestant "Christianity" represents a bizarre adulteration (a sect really) of Traditional Christianity that is more akin to parts of ancient Judaism [without the animal sacrifice] than Christianity. It fails to recognize the way in which Jesus Christ fulfilled the Mosaic Law of Justice in part through the addition of the higher virtue of Mercy or Love (e.g. the woman he saved from stoning for committing adultery) and as such is overly Old Testament focused in an improper way.

As a result, Protestant Fundamentalist's believe that modern Israel which came into existence in 1948 is the "new Israel" destined to be protected for all time by God. This is not the case. The Church that Christ started (the pre-Vatican II Roman Catholic Church) is the "new Israel" according to Traditional Christian teaching. For similar reasons, "Christian" Fundamentalists believe that Armageddon is imminent and that they will be removed from the Earth before it begins. This belief is the result of a modern yet bizarre theory without Traditional Scriptural hermeneutical support referred to as the Rapture.

So-called "Christian" Fundamentalist's who believe they have a duty to support modern Israel no matter what she does are horribly mistaken in thinking that they may do so based on Traditional Christian teaching. Here is Congresswoman Bachmann demonstrating that she is as ill-informed about Christian teaching as she is about American history and geography.

--Dr. J. P. Hubert   


Bachmann: America ‘Cursed’ By God ‘If We Reject Israel’


By Andy Birkey

February 08, 2011 "Minnesota Independent" -- At a Republican Jewish Coalition event in Los Angeles last week, Rep. Michele Bachmann offered a candid view of her positions on Israel: Support for Israel is handed down by God and if the United States pulls back its support, America will cease to exist.

The Republican Jewish Coalition is the same organization that recently hired former Sen. Norm Coleman. Bachmann’s appearance on Feb.1 is part of a whirlwind of national events for Bachmann in February. Next up: she’s keynoting the Take Back Washington North Dakota event in Bismarck this Friday night.

Here’s a transcript of some of her remarks at the RJC event:

I am convinced in my heart and in my mind that if the United States fails to stand with Israel, that is the end of the United States . . . [W]e have to show that we are inextricably entwined, that as a nation we have been blessed because of our relationship with Israel, and if we reject Israel, then there is a curse that comes into play. And my husband and I are both Christians, and we believe very strongly the verse from Genesis [Genesis 12:3], we believe very strongly that nations also receive blessings as they bless Israel. It is a strong and beautiful principle.

Right now in my own private Bible time, I am working through Isaiah . . . and there is continually a coming back to what God gave to Israel initially, which was the Torah and the Ten Commandments, and I have a wonderful quote from John Adams that if you will indulge me [while I find it] . . . [from his February 16, 1809 letter to François Adriaan van der Kemp]:

"I will insist that the Hebrews have done more to civilize men than any other nation. If I were an atheist, and believed in blind eternal fate, I should still believe that fate had ordained the Jews to be the most essential instrument for civilizing the nations. If I were an atheist of the other sect, who believe or pretend to believe that all is ordered by chance, I should believe that chance had ordered the Jews to preserve and propagate to all mankind the doctrine of a supreme, intelligent, wise, almighty sovereign of the universe, which I believe to be the great essential principle of all morality, and consequently of all civilization."

. . . So that is a very long way to answer your question, but I believe that an explicit statement from us about our support for Israel as tied to American security, we would do well to do that.

Christian Zionism: Dispensationalism And The Roots Of Sectarian Theology

A History of Dispensational Approaches

By Rev. Steven Sizer

12/20/2000 "ICH" Dispensationalism is one of the most influential theological systems within the universal church today. Largely unrecognised and subliminal, it has increasingly shaped the presuppositions of fundamentalist, evangelical, Pentecostal and charismatic thinking concerning Israel and Palestine over the past one hundred and fifty years.

John Nelson Darby is regarded as the father of dispensationalism and its prodigy, Christian Zionism. It was Cyrus. I. Scofield and D. L. Moody, however, who brought Darby’s sectarian theology into mainstream evangelical circles. R. C. Sproul concedes that dispensationalism is now ‘...a theological system that in all probability is the majority report among current American evangelicals.’

...Clarence Bass makes this assessment of dispensationalism:

No part of historic Christian doctrine supports this radical distinction between church and kingdom. To be sure they are not identical; but dispensationalism has added the idea that the kingdom was to be a restoration of Israel, not a consummation of the church... In the light of this principle, it is legitimate to ask whether dispensationalism is not orientated more from the Abrahamic Covenant than from the Cross. Is not its focus centred more on the Jewish kingdom than on the Body of Christ? Does it not interpret the New Testament in the light of Old Testament prophecies, instead of interpreting those prophecies in the light of the more complete revelation of the New Testament?

Whether intentionally or otherwise, dispensationalism is being used today to give theological justification to what the United Nations regards as racism and the denial of basic human rights; supporting the ethnic-cleansing of Palestinians from their historic lands; endorsing the building of Jewish settlements in the Occupied Territories; inciting religious fanaticism by supporting the rebuilding of a Jewish Temple on Mount Moriah; dismissing moderate Jewish opinion willing to negotiate land for peace; and advocating an apocalyptic eschatology likely to become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

It is therefore not surprising that among the indigenous Christians of the Holy Land especially, dispensationalism is regarded as a dangerous heresy, an unwelcome and alien intrusion, advocating an exclusive Jewish political agenda and undermining the genuine ministry of justice, peace and reconciliation in the Middle East. MORE...