When You Want to Have Your Middle-Eastern Blood Sacrifice Cult and Your Aesir Too
There’s a guy on Substack feeling very aggrieved that those evangelical American Christians keep calling their kids Old Testament names instead of, say, Hrothgar and Freya. He wrote a lot of words about needing to get that Hebrew mindset out of the true faith which, he believes, all the ancient Northern Europeans had intuited from the start.
Well heck if it makes him feel better to think so…
But still I was laughing, because as my Ukrainian very Jewish ancestors began migrating to New York City and acculturating themselves as much as was reasonable to do, they picked good old Anglo-Saxon names for themselves, and later their American-born children, like Ethel and Harry. Not to even mention that my great-great grandfather, back in the old country, had the middle name Wolf. And one of his daughters had the Yiddishized version of a Spanish name—and I ended up with that one.
With people screaming antisemitism! at the least excuse to do so, I’d rather not do so myself, but washing the Jew and Judea out of Jesus seems to me a little contrary even to the New Testament which that guy accepts as truth.
The thing with all religions, they’re inseparable from the cultures that birthed them. You can Play-Doh them into any form you like to disassociate them from their origins, and squash in what suits your taste better. But every new iteration, it’s like homeopathy, insisting the essential element remains even though you’ve diluted it so many times it ain’t really still likely to be there.
And then on the other hand, Elon Musk names his latest offspring X and people cite that as a sure sign of his insanity..... the shit people waste their time on.....what’s next? A list of government non offensive approved names???
I attended private, Lutheran schools for my K-12 indoctrination. The weird thing was the mix of teachers, ranging from “normal,” as you might find in public school, to young earth creationists, to hard-boiled antisemites like Martin Luther himself. I was taught officially, in a classroom, that Jewish people were going to hell unless they snapped out of it and accepted Jesus.
I had catechism and was confirmed in 8th grade. That grade and age (13) are when I first remember thinking, ”This does not make sense.” The problem was that they had done too good a job teaching English and history. I loved to read and write. My parents were also not devout, though we went to church every Sunday. But that was the first time I made my own decision that I was being taught falsely. I was lied to. That precipitated my 33-year struggle with God. But from reading the Bible versus what teachers and pastors told me, with a growing knowledge of history, I knew deep in my soul they were all wrong—going back to Martin Luther because he was indeed an OG antisemite. Like for real, and of course, used broadly in early Nazi ideology formation.
Jesus was a radical Jew. I believe that message was clear, although who knows what has been doctored through the ages. The news was that one needed... nothing from others to have that one-on-one spiritual relationship. No church is required. His disciples were confused by what he meant, especially when he told them to keep living as Jews. But Jesus was pretty anti-authoritarian and likely just wanted to reform the faith.
However, it went down; the ideas got him killed. From there, the entire institution is an authoritarian human creation. Sacraments, symbolism, all of it. It just seems plain and simple to me. I think the truth carries Christianity much closer to Judaism than Christians are willing to accept.