Christianity, the Puritans and Anti-Semitism

 I was taught in elementary school, and it has been confirmed by later reading, that the Puritans left England for Holland in search or "religious freedom" -- the right to worship God in their own way.  The Dutch were tolerant, and let the Puritans worship as they pleased, but the Puritans became dissatisfied with Dutch tolerance as it seemed to give their children the wrong idea about religious tolerance.

The Puritans decided to leave tolerant Holland for New England, where they could impose their own form of religion.  The Puritans would not tolerate any version of Christianity other than their own, and ruthlessly punished, persecuted or banished anyone who deviated from it.  The Salem witch trials were apparently a result of such Puritan intolerance.  In short, the Puritans imposed a religious state.

An article from the Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C. traces the history of antisemitism beginning with passages in the Bible which identify "the Jews" as responsible for the death of Christ, and goes on to note that early church fathers, including St. Augustine, condemning the Jews.  It discussed the fraught relationship between Jews and the kingdoms of Christian Europe, were Jews are allowed, tolerated and subsequently persecuted, forced to convert or expelled.  It also notes that in Muslim Spain, Jews rose to positions of responsibility and power, but forced to convert to Christianity or were banished when Christians retook Spain in the Reconquista, and that even people of Jewish ancestry, who had converted to Christianity generations before, were persecuted by the Spanish Inquisition.

So when we get to North America, we have Jews fleeing the antisemitism of Europe, nevertheless, into a Christian land.  As Ronald Reagan said, the US is a "Christian country."  But that means that the US is an antisemitic country, since antisemitism is essentially a Christian prejudice.  The rest of the world seems either to have accepted the presence of Jews or were ignorant of them.  The US seems to have a negative attitude or barely tolerated Jews.

And now if we add a newly resurgent Christian Nationalism which seems to be a kind of modern Puritanism, the rise of antisemitic behavior in the US is not a surprise.  Conservative or Christian Nationalist Christians may claim sympathy for Jews, but only so long as Jews are oriented towards Israel, and do not try to become part of the US power structure.