Irenaeus and Israel

It's amazing that Irenaeus could accept the adversus judaeus theology. Yet these notions eventually gave rise to the horrors of Christian anti-Semitism in the centuries that followed.

By TONY ROZZINI
Oil painting of ‘Cain and Abel’ by Titian, 1544 (photo credit: Wikipainting.org)
Oil painting of ‘Cain and Abel’ by Titian, 1544
(photo credit: Wikipainting.org)
After Justin Martyr, the second “Church father” to consider in regard to the emergence of Christian anti- Semitism in the pre-Nicean era is Bishop Irenaeus, who lived from 135- 202 CE and served as bishop of Lyons.
Irenaeus is noted for his work Adversus Haereses (“Against Heresies”). Written in response to the heretic Marcion, he tried to prove the continuity of the two Testaments and that the God of the Old is also the God of the New. In Book 4, Chapter 4, he deals with the relationship between Jews and Gentiles.
By the third century, the adversus judaeus theology has set in firmly in the Church. We stand amazed at how intelligent men like Irenaeus could accept such bigoted ideas. Yet these notions took root within the Church and eventually gave rise to the horrors of Christian anti-Semitism in the centuries that followed. Irenaeus offers us a chance to dissect some of these ideas and learn that someone can say many good things, but often it is the few bad things they say which have the greatest consequence.
As you read Irenaeus, you find the Jew is often associated with “Christ killers.” The “Christ-killing Jews” was a favorite expression of his. By the third century, this is how many in the Church looked upon Jews. Did they not remember that Jews wrote the Bible, the New Testament as well as the Old; that they started the first churches, and that Paul and even Jesus himself were Jews? 
Judaism is the first of the heresies denounced by Irenaeus. Their synagogues “are conventicles of heretics” (4:18, 4).
In a list of doctrinal errors, Irenaeus places the Jewish “heresy” first: “If any one preaches the one God of the law and the prophets, but denies Christ to be the son of God, he is a liar, even as also is his father the devil, and is a Jew falsely so called, being possessed of mere carnal circumcision” (4: 6).
Note that all Jews (along with all other heretics) are “sons of the devil” and not really Jews at all. Of course, the divine prophets of the Old Testament were exempt from this. They were not real Jews for “they lived according to Jesus Christ.” Jerusalem and the land of Israel also are taken from the Jews in Irenaeus’s writings. They have no right to them.
“But that the administration of [the Jews] was temporary, Esaias says: ‘And the daughter of Zion shall be left as a cottage in a vineyard, and as a lodge in a garden of cucumbers.’ And when shall these things be left behind? Is it not when the fruit shall be taken away, and the leaves alone shall be left, which now have no power of producing fruit?” (4:4).
The “fruit” is the Church, while Israel and Jerusalem are the leaves that are left, which have no more reason to exist. Once more we see that Israel’s divestment of her land and holy city in Christian thought has very ancient origins.
However, Irenaeus reaches his zenith in chapter 18, when he decrees rites and sacrifices as totally useless. It was not God who wanted them; they were tolerated due to the hard hearts of the Jews. When he considers the sacrifices of Cain and Abel, he sees the sacrifice of Abel as the sacrifices of the Church, while the rejected Cain is Israel.

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“...[T]hey had in themselves jealousy like to Cain; therefore they slew the just one, slighting the counsel of the Word, as did also Cain.” (4:18, 3) 
Once more we note the Christ-killing theme. It was done in the spirit of Cain. So Israel is compared to Cain, Esau and all the negative figures of the Old Testament. The Cain theme will later be taken up by Augustine. Cain was forced to wander the Earth with no rest; this would also be the destiny of the Jews, according to many Church fathers.
Rev. Anthony Rozinni is a pastor and Bible school teacher in Italy whose studies for a Master’s degree included extensive reading about the Church Fathers. This is the latest in his series on the rise of anti-Semitism in the early Church.