This volume sheds light on the transformed post-Holocaust relationship between Catholics and Jews. Once implacable theological foes, the two traditions have travelled a great distance in coming to view the other with respect and dignity. Responding to the horrors of Auschwitz, the Catholic Church has undergone a “reckoning of the soul,” beginning with its landmark document Nostra Aetate and embraced a positive theology of Judaism including the ongoing validity of the Jewish covenant. Jews have responded to this unprecedented outreach, especially in the document Dabru Emet. Together, these two Abrahamic traditions have begun seeking a repair of the world. The road has been rocky and certainly obstacles remain. Nevertheless, authentic interfaith dialogue remains a new and promising development in the search for a peace.

This book gives a critical assessment of Paul van Buren's contribution to the Jewish-Christian dialogue, and attempts an original contribution of its own. The main body of the work is concerned with van Buren's 'A Theology of the Jewish-Christian Reality', a systematic rethinking of Christianity vis-a-vis Judaism in a Post-Holocaust world. The premise on which van Buren's rethinking of Christianity rests is that the covenant between God and the Jewish people is eternal. The author suggests an alternative theory which overlaps with the relationship between Judaism and Christianity.

Chs. 1-3 are based on the Sherman Lectures delivered in Manchester, November 1987. Discusses Christian and Jewish readings of the Old Testament after the Holocaust, noting that it is apparently still too early for thinkers of either religion to cope with the subject. Criticizes Christian (especially German) theologians who continue to teach that Israel's "spiritual children" (Christian believers) have replaced the "flesh-and-blood children" (present-day Jewry). Christians reading the Old Testament fear that the Jews may still be the Chosen People; it was this fear that drove the Nazis to exterminate the Jews. After the Holocaust, Jews must question many statements of the Bible: that God never slumbers; that salvation always comes; that the dry bones will rise and live. The dead cannot be replaced, even by the new life in the State of Israel. What has been resurrected perhaps is hope, but a hope infused by doubt. Jews may yet praise divine Goodness, in the hope that in praising they may awaken it from its slumber.

This text develops the work of Jewish scholarship to discern resonances between central Christian and Jewish beliefs. Offering fresh approaches to contentious and sensitive issues, it argues that God's basic covenant is not with either Judaism or Christianity, but with humanity.

Williamson challenges churches and theologians to become aware of the inherited ideology of anti-Judaism that has distorted their teaching, even on such key matters as Jesus, the Scriptures, the church, and God, and suggests a radical, constructive alternative to the "teaching of contempt".

Jews in Dialogue discusses Jewish post-Holocaust involvement in interreligious and intercultural dialogue in Israel, Europe, and the United States. The essays within offer a multiplicity of approaches and perspectives (historical, sociological, theological, etc.) on how Jews have collaborated and cooperated with non-Jews to respond to the challenges of multicultural contemporaneity. The volume’s first part is about the concept of dialogue itself and its potential for effecting change; the second part documents examples of successful interreligious cooperation. The volume includes an appendix designed to provide context for the material presented in the first part, especially with regard to relations between the State of Israel and the Catholic Church.

This work provides the texts and translations of three ancient Jewish-Christian dialogues: The Dialogue of Athanasius and Zacchaeus (Greek, 4th c.); The Dialogue of Simon and Theophilus (Latin, 5th c.); and The Dialogue of Timothy and Aquila (Greek, 6th c.). This is the first published translation of each of these texts.