ABSTRACT
How should we Christians read the passion of Jesus after the Holocaust? How do we face that story now when we see within it roots that enabled if not caused such terrible evil?Anything said by one Jewish group against any or all other ones in that first century was a fight within the family of Judaism, a strife of options within an ancient people, land, and tradition under the pressure of Greek cultural internationalism and Roman military imperialism. As the name-calling and story-mongering of one group inside become the inheritance of another group outside, the ground was prepared by rhetorical invective, dismissive rejection, and demonized disdain so that, in the awful fullness of time, genocidal action becomes not just possible but almost inevitable. How-now, after that-do we Christians read the passion and consider it good news?
