First Things RSS Feed - David G. Dalin https://www.firstthings.com/author/david-g-dalin en-us Copyright 2025 First Things. All Rights Reserved. ft@firstthings.com (The Editors) ft@firstthings.com (The Editors) Mon, 20 Jan 2025 16:55:12 -0500 https://d2201k5v4hmrsv.cloudfront.net/img/favicon-196.png First Things RSS Feed Image https://www.firstthings.com/rss/author/david-g-dalin 60 John Paul II and the Jews https://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2007/12/john-paul-ii-and-the-jews https://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2007/12/john-paul-ii-and-the-jews Tue, 04 Dec 2007 00:00:00 -0500 More than any other pope, John Paul II was the twentieth century’s greatest papal friend and supporter of the Jewish people. Indeed, John Paul II’s extraordinary relationship with the Jews was an important chapter in the historic legacy of his pontificate, which has had profound implications for Catholic¯Jewish relations in our time.

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]]> Hitler’s Mufti https://www.firstthings.com/article/2005/08/hitlers-mufti https://www.firstthings.com/article/2005/08/hitlers-mufti Mon, 01 Aug 2005 00:00:00 -0400 In his 2004 book The Return of Anti-Semitism , Gabriel Schoenfeld declared that “the ancient and modern strands of anti-Semitism” have been “successfully fused today” in the Muslim world, “and from there the hatred of Jews receives its main propulsion outward.” In the 2003 Never Again? The Threat of the New Anti-Semitism , Abraham Foxman added, “Virulent anti-Semitism is widespread throughout the Arab Middle East . . . . Anti-Semitism is tolerated or openly endorsed by Arab governments, disseminated by the Arab media, taught in [Muslim] schools and universities, and preached in mosques. No segment of [Islamic] society is free of its taint.” And in the 1999 Semites and Anti-Semites , Bernard Lewis concluded, “Classical anti-Semitism is an essential part of Arab intellectual life at the present time.”

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]]> Pius XII and the Holocaust: Understanding the Controversy and Popes and Politics: Reform, Resentment, and the Holocaust https://www.firstthings.com/article/2002/08/pius-xii-and-the-holocaust-understanding-the-controversy-and-popes-and-politics-reform-resentment-and-the-holocaust https://www.firstthings.com/article/2002/08/pius-xii-and-the-holocaust-understanding-the-controversy-and-popes-and-politics-reform-resentment-and-the-holocaust Thu, 01 Aug 2002 00:00:00 -0400 The ongoing debate about Pope Pius XII (Eugenio Pacelli) and his actions (or lack of actions) in response to the Holocaust has gained intensity over the past few years. Books defending the pontiff by Ronald J. Rychlak, Pierre Blet, Margherita Marchione, and Ralph McInerny have been matched by others that seek to castigate him. Susan Zuccotti’s Under His Very Windows: The Vatican and the Holocaust in Italy is an unremitting attack on Pius, while John Cornwell’s  Hitler’s Pope, Garry Wills’ Papal Sin , and James Carroll’s Constantine’s Sword go further—to treat Pius’ supposed failings as an indication of the pathologies that permeate the Catholic Church as a whole. In the anti-papal diatribe he published in the January 21, 2002 issue of the New Republic (“What Would Jesus Have Done?”), Daniel Jonah Goldhagen took this strategy to a new level, seamlessly weaving together vicious attacks on the Pope and blatant anti-Catholicism (see Rychlak’s reply to Goldhagen in FT, June/July 2002).

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]]> Still Strangers https://www.firstthings.com/article/1993/11/still-strangers https://www.firstthings.com/article/1993/11/still-strangers Mon, 01 Nov 1993 00:00:00 -0500 Jews in Christian America: The Pursuit of Religious Equality
by naomi w. cohen
oxford university press, 300 pages, $39.95

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