This article was first published
by Jewish Ideas Daily (www.jewishideasdaily.com) and is reprinted with
permission.The religious values of presidents seldom satisfactorily explain their attitudes
toward the Jews.
Franklin Roosevelt’s Episcopalian faith could not have
foretold his hard-hearted policies during the Holocaust. Harry Truman and Jimmy
Carter, both Baptists, went in opposite directions, with Truman quick to grant
Israel diplomatic recognition and Carter conspicuous in his anti-Israelism. Who
knows to what extent Barack Obama’s affiliation with the United Church of Christ
provides any insight into his administration’s erratic, often disquieting
policies toward Jerusalem? Still, it is hard to disregard completely the
religious and moral values of the leading presidential candidates.
The
narrowing of the Republican nomination field to Mitt Romney and Someone Else has
made barely a ripple in Israel to date.
Israel’s media dutifully covered
Romney’s complaint that Obama has been too quick to chasten the Jewish state and
his pledge to make Israel his first foreign destination if
elected.
However, should Romney capture the nomination, Israelis, as
Americans have done, will probably find themselves getting a crash course on his
Mormon faith.
They might begin at the strikingly handsome campus of the
Jerusalem Center of Brigham Young University, run by the Mormons (more properly,
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latterday Saints) and situated on the slopes of
the Mount of Olives. On the campus, Sunday evening classical concerts and
Thursday night jazz divertimentos take place in a congenial auditorium offering
panoramic Jerusalem views. But the well-bred Mormon students and staff do not
draw much attention – and that is the way everyone likes it.
It was in
1841, within a few decades of its founding by Joseph Smith in New York State,
that the Church dispatched Apostle Orson Hyde to Jerusalem on a fact-finding
tour. But only with the city’s liberation in 1967 did the Church begin routinely
sending believers to the Holy Land for religious studies. Mormonism was last
spotlighted in Israel in 1985, when Brigham Young University first sought to
establish a presence there. It drew vociferous hostility from the ultra-Orthodox
because of the Mormons’ earlier missionary activities in Israel. But the
facility had the support of the late mayor Teddy Kollek and then-prime minister
Shimon Peres; and after Church authorities pledged in writing not to engage in
missionary activities in Israel, the campus opened in 1988.
Nowadays, 160
students can be accommodated at the Jerusalem campus (it closed for six years
during the second intifada because of safety concerns). There is every reason to
believe the Mormons have honored their commitment to “show Israeli Jews what the
Church is about by example rather than by proselytizing.” Mormons see themselves
as Christians, although to the consternation of Christian fundamentalists, some
of them identify Jesus with the God of the Hebrew Bible and hold a schismatic
view of the Trinity in which God the Father, Jesus, and the Holy Ghost are three
distinct deities. Like Christian Zionists, Mormons believe that the Jewish
return to the Land of Israel is a precursor to the second coming of the
Christian messiah.
Mormon theology is particularly philo-Semitic. The
faithful consider their Church part of the House of Israel. They deem themselves
spiritual descendants of the Israelite tribe of Ephraim – which escaped
Babylonian captivity by migrating to North America around 586 BCE, though their
civilization disappeared around 400 CE (The Book of Mormon has the tribe fleeing
Jerusalem prior to the Babylonian conquest.) Mormons believe their scripture,
revealed to Smith by an angel, contains writings by ancient prophets including
Lehi, whom God commanded to lead those Israelites to America.
Mormons
attribute significance to the Jewish calendar. Many of their spiritual
milestones parallel Jewish festivals. There are also dietary laws: Eating meat
is restricted, while alcohol, tobacco and coffee are prohibited.
The
cross does not commonly adorn Mormon houses of worship.
But in some ways,
Mormons are unique. Polygamy has been forbidden since 1890; but unlike either
Christians or Jews, Mormons believe that the canon remains open and God still
communicates directly with the righteous.
And Mormonism is emphatically a
missionary faith. Romney was almost killed while a missionary in France, in a
bizarre traffic accident involving a head-on collision with a vehicle driven by
a Catholic priest. To this day, Mormons take what will strike some Israelis as
an unnerving delight in converting American Jews.
Moreover, in a rite
that drew Jewish ire, the Church once engaged in virtual baptisms of Jews
murdered in the Shoah in order to allow their souls salvation. Once Mormons
learned of the depth of Jewish objections to this practice, they agreed to stop
it (and they generally have, with some recent controversial
aberrations).
None of this should present a problem for Jews comfortable
with their Judaism. Theologically, Jews tend to be libertarian about other
faiths; politically, by September 2011, a third of Jewish voters were disposed
to vote for Romney over Obama.
What might this mean for the pragmatic
Romney? Utah State University historian Philip Barlow argues that Romney’s faith
might inform but would not determine his Mideast policies: “His character was in
part shaped by Mormonism, but one only needs to compare Romney, Jon Huntsman,
and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to note that Mormons are not made from
cookie cutters.”
Regarding Romney’s profession of friendship to Israel,
Barlow points out that “Mormons’ history, popular culture, and theology really
do give them a sense of regard for Israel’s role in history and world affairs,
and a sense" – from the Mormons’ perspective – “of shared identity.”
As a
former governor, Romney has no real foreign policy track record. How does he
understand the Islamist threat to Western values? What are his thoughts on Prime
Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s approach to a two-state solution? Does he back
President George Bush’s 1967-plus approach to Israel’s boundaries? Much remains
to be revealed.
Other presidents have entered the White House with an
innate sympathy for Israel only to see their policies towed in the opposite
direction. But in the course of the unfolding presidential campaign, Americans –
and, from afar, Israelis – will learn something of the Mormon Romney’s politics,
values, and understanding of the world.
This article was first published
by Jewish Ideas Daily (www.jewishideasdaily.com) and is reprinted with
permission.