Is British-Israelism Racist?

A fairly common accusation leveled at believers of British-Israelism (the belief that the lost ten tribes of Israel can be found among the Anglo-Saxon peoples of Northwestern Europe, North America, Australia, South Africa, and New Zealand) is that it is a fundamentally racist idea. It is understandable that some would leap to this conclusion, considering that such modern Israelites could lay claim to being "God's chosen people" and heirs to the spectacular physical promises God made to Abraham. Not a long step away is the seemingly logical conclusion that other ethnic groups just do not measure up, and those of a weak and prejudicial nature could carry this to the point of snubbing, abusing, or persecuting individuals of these supposedly lesser ethnicities.

Sadly, some advocates of British-Israelism have done just this, shining a bad light on other believers who do not share their racially motivated hatred and violence. Among these are fringe groups linked to the Identity Movement and Aryan and Neo-Nazi factions. These wrongheaded toughs take out their spite predominantly on blacks and Jews, but also on Asians, Hispanics, and generally anyone who is not as pure-blooded as the skinheads declare they themselves are.

Their anti-Semitism is ironic in the fact that Jews are just as much Israelites as they claim to be. How do they justify this? By asserting that the Jews are not who they say they are! They maintain that there is precious little Jewish blood in modern Jewry and that they are instead descended from either Esau or Ashkenaz, son of Gomer, son of Japheth (thus, the "real" reason they are called Ashkenazi Jews), or that they have been totally mongrelized due to their worldwide conspiracy to control everything from banking to industry to government. They lean heavily on the fraudulent Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion, and they even subvert Scripture to their cause (for instance, the book of Obadiah and Revelation 2:9; 3:9), granting them an air of legitimacy, which in reality is a total sham.

However, the irrationality of a handful of kooks does not—or should not—malign the majority of sincere believers who base their understanding and practice on true biblical principles. God Himself gives Israelites little room to take excessive pride in their election and certainly no permission to abuse and persecute other peoples. His reasons for His choice of Israel are listed in Deuteronomy 7:6-8:

For you are a holy people to the LORD your God; the LORD your God has chosen you to be a people for Himself, a special treasure above all the peoples on the face of the earth. The LORD did not set His love on you nor choose you because you were more in number than any other people, for you were the least of all peoples; but because the LORD loves you, and because He would keep the oath which He swore to your fathers, the LORD has brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you from the house of bondage, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.

God did not choose Israel because of anything they had going for them—in fact, they were a small, insignificant people. He chose them because He loved them, and that love has its basis in His relationship with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Most Israelites have lucked into God's blessing, as it were, by being born of Israelite stock; they have done nothing to deserve what God has bountifully given. Their receipt of the blessings is based solely on God fulfilling the promises He made to the Patriarchs.

However, it carries a price: They are bound by their "lucky birth" to be a model nation to the rest of the world of God's way of life. In this regard, Israel has largely failed, and thus God has given them up to war, exile, perversity, and forgetfulness. Today, the vast majority of Israelites have no idea who they are and what God requires of them. Those who do know understand that this knowledge does not exalt them over other people but burdens them with heavy responsibilities to live according to God's commands. Notice Deuteronomy 10:12-16:

And now, Israel, what does the LORD your God require of you, but to fear the LORD your God, to walk in all His ways and to love Him, to serve the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and to keep the commandments of the LORD and His statutes which I command you today for your good? Indeed heaven and the highest heavens belong to the LORD your God, also the earth with all that is in it. The LORD delighted only in your fathers, to love them; and He chose their descendants after them, you above all peoples, as it is this day. Therefore circumcise the foreskin of your heart, and be stiff-necked no longer.

Because of Israel's rejection of God, He is now working with select individuals whom He calls, makes a New Covenant with, and converts to His way of life. To these He gives His Spirit, and they become His witnesses among the nations. But God is not finished with the Israelites, and it is mainly to them that the gospel of the Kingdom of God is preached as a witness against them (see Matthew 10:5-7). When Jesus returns and sets up His Kingdom, He will require Israel to fulfill the job they originally covenanted with Him to do (see, for example, Ezekiel 44:10-14). Then they will truly know that with great gifts come great responsibilities, not superiority.

Vision of America's Future?

A storm broke over Charlotte on Thursday, but not the kind that brings wind and rain. A political storm, brewing for years under the surface, erupted when County Commissioner Bill James fired off an email to 1,200 recipients concerning the rising problems within Mecklenburg County. Had he left it at that, James' email would have just been another missive from a perennially cranky conservative commissioner. However, James had the audacity and the political stupidity to point the finger of blame at the urban black community in Charlotte. Bill James is white.

In the offending paragraph, he wrote:

Most people know why CMS [Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools] can't teach kids within the urban black community. They live in a moral sewer with parents who lack the desire to act properly. That immorality impacts negatively the lives of these children and creates an environment where education is considered "acting white" and lack of education is a "plus" in their world. (View the full text of his email here.)

Oh, boy.

Expectedly, the black community here in the Queen City has publicly branded James as a racist and demanded his resignation. He has been soundly condemned by local radio, television, and newspapers as insensitive, outrageous, a crackpot, out of touch, an egomaniac, drawing attention to himself (again), and many other similar names and descriptions. Even most of his Republican colleagues have shaken their heads, tsked, and put their condemnation of his sentiments on the record. James has retorted with, "If Bill Cosby can say it, so can I."

Yet, important figures in the black community—albeit a minority of them—have, while condemning his outspokenness, have agreed that urban blacks are plagued with problems of crime, gangs, illegitimacy, unemployment, drugs, and apathy, particularly in terms of education. One Baptist minister, a black man, voiced his agreement on a local morning radio show, saying that he believed that all of these problems had their roots in the rampant fatherlessness among African-Americans, citing a statistic that three-quarters of babies born to black women are illegitimate. He called upon the churches, schools, governments, and communities to band together to demand responsibility from black men.

Lost in the heat of the racial divide is reality. These problems do exist, and they need to be dealt with to avoid greater problems down the road. However, every special-interest group involved has its turf to defend and will not back down if it means diminishing or losing its funding and influence (for instance, the school system, NAACP, social services, etc.). The churches have little affect on morality due to their compromise with biblical standards. Local government, dependent in many ways on federal monies designated to "fix" these problems, has a vested interest in perpetuating them, not to mention the political power they hold as a result of pandering to minorities. And, like the rest of the country, the black community itself is terribly divided religiously, politically, and culturally. No solution will meet with across-the-board approval.

The urban black community is not alone. Similar problems are already affecting Latinos and whites across the nation due to their members' involvement in and acceptance of the attitudes and immorality inherent in the pop culture, which has been heavily influenced by the liberal, secular claptrap that has produced this crisis among urban blacks. And because no one will accept the draconian solutions that are necessary to solve this dilemma, it will continue to spread to other groups. In other words, it is coming to a community near you.

The Baptist minister is on the right track; young men and boys have to be taught personal responsibility—and not just males, but females too. People have to learn from an early age that their actions always produce consequences. As the apostle Paul writes in Galatians 6:7-8, "Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. For he who sows to his flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows to the Spirit will of the Spirit reap everlasting life." To put it into practical terms, if a person behaves responsibly, good results will follow, but if he behaves irresponsibly, he can expect grief.

This principle always applies. And the only way it will work to solve this problem is if individuals resolve both to live by it and teach their children to live by it as well.

I am not holding my breath (see II Timothy 3:1-5 to understand why)—and I am an optimist.

Do Americans Value Liberty?

This weekend, Americans will celebrate—with cookouts, picnics, parades, and fireworks—the 228^th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence from England on July 4, 1776, the commonly accepted beginning of the United States. At the time, the Colonies were already engaged in war with the Mother Country, blood had been spilled on both sides, costly sacrifices had been made, and heels had been dug in so that the stakes had become, as Patrick Henry had so eloquently declared, "Give me liberty or give me death!"

Though American forces won few battles during the Revolution, they won the war, exhausting the British forces through guerrilla tactics and the help of their French ally. In the end, America's ragtag forces had defeated the most powerful army on earth at the time, but it had cost a great many lives and destroyed cities, estates, farms, and businesses. To them, however, this was the price of freedom, and they willingly paid it.

In 1812, the next generation was called to do the same against the same foe. Then for successive generations there were Indian wars to fight, a war against Mexico, the bloody Civil War, war with Spain, both World Wars, Korea, Vietnam, and now the Gulf Wars. Americans have taken up arms in the cause of human liberty here at home and all over the world, believing that freedom is an inalienable right of all mankind, not just of Americans. With Thomas Jefferson, they have believed, "The God who gave us life, gave us liberty at the same time."

Liberty is a precious and rare blessing in the annals of humankind. Most societies, even among those considered to be free, have granted liberty only to certain classes of people based on birth, wealth, or merit rather than bestowing it universally, regardless of class. America was the first nation that attempted such a radical concept, enshrining it in its founding documents as a goal for future generations to strive to attain. Though its perfect application has never been achieved, it has provided a guiding light, a high ideal, over the past two centuries.

To many in America, it appears as if the events of the Revolution and the Founding are ancient history and thus irrelevant. They have grown up in an era in which freedom has been passively accepted as a birthright rather than cherished as a treasured gift or costly won on a bloody field. Younger Americans have been spoiled by the sacrifices of preceding generations, and for this reason, they do not realize the responsibilities freedom imposes. As the cliché runs, "Freedom is not free."

In this regard, a quotation often attributed to Thomas Jefferson (though actually from the pen of his contemporary, John Philpot Curran) is appropriate: "The condition upon which God hath given liberty to man is eternal vigilance [frequently condensed as, 'The price of liberty is eternal vigilance,' a concept Jefferson echoed in his own writings]." This form of the quotation makes three things clear: 1) God is the source of true liberty; 2) God has granted liberty to men; and 3) man's responsibility to continue receiving liberty is to be awake and aware while on guard.

Against what? The context of the quotation deals with indolence—laziness—in the face of encroaching bondage. The warning is against apathy and lack of effort to restrain the forces, primarily in the realm of ideas, that threaten to reduce or eliminate human liberty. This is a necessary warning because, though most people would rise up in righteous anger against sudden totalitarianism, these same people tend to give their freedoms away piecemeal for security, bread and circuses, and promises of future reward.

In post-9-11 America, do Americans value liberty enough to stand guard over it against the approach of tyranny? Some do—the ones who have read the history and documents of the Founding Fathers and realize how rare and precious it is to live in a society where each individual is free to fashion his own life. Yet, the percentage of such people is shrinking year by year, as the older generation dies and progressive ideas influence the younger generations to give up liberty for high-sounding but enslaving concepts like income redistribution, diversity, multiculturalism, no child left behind, universal health care, and free college education. And even many of the older people, becoming fearful in their twilight years, are quick to trade their freedoms for security from terrorists and bill collectors.

Perhaps the most telling sign that Americans are willing to let their liberties slip away is the nation's level of immorality. The Bible is very clear that sin enslaves and destroys (John 8:34; Romans 6:6, 16), while God's way of life liberates (Psalm 119:45; Luke 4:18; II Corinthians 3:17; Galatians 5:1, 13). It is for this reason that the nation's second President, John Adams wrote, "The preservation of liberty depends upon the intellectual and moral character of the people."

As we celebrate the anniversary of American independence this weekend, we should consider how valuable liberty is—both physical and spiritual—and how far we would be willing to go to secure and preserve it.