Hello Dan, this story may interest some of you guys:
Monday, December 27, 1999
ISRAEL
Academics see need for more study of Jesus
ABRAHAM RABINOVICH in Jerusalem
The time has come for Israeli students to learn about Jesus as an historical figure, say a growing number of Israeli academics.
"He was the most famous Jew in the world and students must be taught who he was," said Professor Michael Harsegor, who has recently discussed Jesus on his popular weekly radio programme on history.
Professor Harsegor's comments, made with an eye to Christmas celebrations and the dawn of a new millennium, appeared to strike a chord with other academics and educators.
Students arriving at university were "totally ignorant" about Jesus, said Professor Aviad Kleinerg of Tel Aviv University's history department. Learning about the founding of Christianity would not only provide them with knowledge about one of the most important events in history, he said, but would give them a better understanding of their own Jewish identity.
In the Israeli school curriculum, Jesus is mentioned only briefly in sixth-grade courses on early Christianity. In school tours around the country, students are regularly taken past some of the holiest sites in Christendom but are told virtually nothing about them.
The instinctive reticence on the subject by educational authorities is probably a reflection of the efforts made over the centuries either to convert the Jews to Christianity or to punish them for his crucifixion. Israel's consuming struggle during the past half century to re-establish itself as a Jewish state in the Middle East was probably also a factor.
A number of academics, however, believe the country is now sufficiently mature for dispassionate inclusion of Jesus in the school curriculum.
"Students have a huge gap in their education," said Professor Guy Stroumza, chairman of the Centre for Study of Christianity at Hebrew University.
"Jesus was a unique figure in Western culture and in the land of Israel during the political ferment of the first century."
The proposal to expand on Jesus in the school curriculum is likely to encounter opposition from ultra-Orthodox Jewish circles should it gather steam, because of extreme sensitivity about anything even remotely suggestive of missionary activities.
The Education Ministry's chief supervisor for the teaching of history, Michael Yaron, said the limited number of hours available for history teaching made it impossible to expand Jesus' place in the curriculum.
"Considering the number of hours we have, I would not eliminate other subjects in order to add this subject," he said.
scmp.com |
