NEW DANISH BIBLE REFLECTS REPLACEMENT THEOLOGY
Paul argues: ‟Has God cast away his own people、Israel?”‟By no means!”Nevertheless, anti-Israel ideologies still exists in Christendom and they have been on the rise...
I ask then: did God reject his people? By no means! I am an Israelite myself, a descendant of Abraham, from the tribe of Benjamin. God did not reject his people, whom he foreknew. Don’t you know what Scripture says in the passage about Elijah – how he appealed to God against Israel: ‘Lord, they have killed your prophets and torn down your altars; I am the only one left, and they are trying to kill me’? And what was God’s answer to him? ‘I have reserved for myself seven thousand who have not bowed the knee to Baal.’ So too, at the present time there is a remnant chosen by grace. And if by grace, then it cannot be based on works; if it were, grace would no longer be grace.
What then? What the people of Israel sought so earnestly they did not obtain. The elect among them did, but the others were hardened, 8 as it is written: ‘God gave them a spirit of stupor, eyes that could not see and ears that could not hear, to this very day.’ …
I do not want you to be ignorant of this mystery, brothers and sisters, so that you may not be conceited: Israel has experienced a hardening in part until the full number of the Gentiles has come in, and in this way all Israel will be saved. As it is written: ‘The deliverer will come from Zion; he will turn godlessness away from Jacob. And this is my covenant with them when I take away their sins.’
As far as the gospel is concerned, they are enemies for your sake; but as far as election is concerned, they are loved on account of the patriarchs, for God’s gifts and his call are irrevocable. Just as you who were at one time disobedient to God have now received mercy as a result of their disobedience, so they too have now become disobedient in order that they too may now receive mercy as a result of God’s mercy to you. For God has bound everyone over to disobedience so that he may have mercy on them all. ROMANS 11: 1- 8, :25-32.
In Romans 9-11, the Apostle Paul addressed the concerns that the Jewish people had regarding Gentile sinners turning to the Lord through grace, while the Jews were seemingly cast aside and forgotten. Paul gives an answer to the question of how Israel is to be restored and blessed as the prophets had predicted.
Paul explored God’s dealings with Israel in the past, the present and the future, successively in these three chapters. ‘Has God cast away his own people?” “By no means!” Paul’s own experience of miraculous salvation by Christ proved this.
He went on to reassure the Jews that as in Elijah’s day, God had reserved seven thousand faithful Israelites unto Himself, pointing to the existence of a remnant according to the election of grace.
In Chapter11, Paul clearly teaches that whether Jew or Gentile, all alike are saved on the same principle of grace and the promises made to the patriarchs and to David will be fulfilled. Israel will be blinded in part, but only until the work of God among the nations is completed.
This passage is at odds with the idea that the people of Israel have been replaced by the Church, although such anti-Israel ideologies have been on the rise.
This passage is at odds with the idea that the people of Israel have been replaced by the Church, although such anti-Israel ideologies have been on the rise.
24NYT.dk, a Danish news service, reported on 19 April that the Danish Bible Society just published a revised translation of the New Testament, “Bible 2020”.
The article headed ‘New Danish Bible translation purges Israel’ puts it:
A new official translation of the Bible into Danish arouses wonder among religious people. The Danish “Bible Society”, which is responsible for the translation, has cleansed the New Testament – which in the new edition is called “The New Agreement” of the word “Israel”. According to Jan Frost, who has read the new edition, it applies both when the land of Israel and when the people of Israel are mentioned. Israel is otherwise mentioned in this way in the New Testament more than 60 times. Mr. Frost states in a video posted on YouTube that the word ‘Israel’ is only used once in the “Bible 2020”, which is the name of the new edition. In all other passages, the word ‘Israel’ is either replaced with ‘Jews’, ‘the land of the Jews‘ or not replaced with an alternative term at all. The translators of the new edition, according to Jan Frost, offer the explanation, that the land of Israel in biblical times was not identical to present Israel. But the same logic is not applied by the translators when the land of Egypt is mentioned. This land is also called ‘Egypt’ in the new edition of the Bible. On social media, several users are furious at the radical change of such a central element of the New Testament, and a widespread criticism suggests a suspicion that Israel has been removed for political reasons.
There have been many responses to such an extraordinary move, one of which is by christiansfortruth.com. The article appeals to the Danish people with an ironic closing comment:
‘Of course today’s political entity known as “Israel” is not identical to the ancient land of Israel, but then again, today’s Jews are not legitimately related to the ancient Israelite people. And to translate all references to Israel as “Jews” advances this false equation. …The Israelite people originally was comprised of 12 tribes, with the tribe of Judah being only one small fraction. Christ made it clear in no uncertain terms that He came only for the Lost Sheep of the House of Israel (Matthew 15:24), so this new translation must claim that He came only for the lost sheep of the house of the Jews? …Completely eliminating ‘Israel’ from the New Testament turns Christ into a liar, but it also advances the Jewish myth that only today’s “Jews” remain from all the 12 tribes of Jacob-Israel. And the Dan-ish people, who are named after the Tribe of Dan, must never know that they are indeed living, breathing descendants of those Israelites whom Christ came to redeem. That deception, no doubt, is at the heart of this new “translation” of the so-called “New Agreement”’ (Underline added).
According to BIN, Rabbi Tuly Weisz, the founder of Israel365, an organization that promotes the significance of the Land of Israel to the nations, strongly disagreed with the approach of the Danish Bible society:
This translation of the New Testament is an important reminder that replacement theology is not a problem of the past …Some segments of Christianity still have a replacement theology problem. The notion that Israel can be scrubbed from the Bible is as ridiculous as removing ‘God’ from the Bible. …Israel became synonymous with his descendants, the Children of Israel, and the land God promised to them. The word “Israel” appears over 2,200 times in the Torah, Writings, and Prophets. It is also interesting to note that “Jerusalem” and its alternative Hebrew name “Zion” appear 850 times in the Old Testament. (Underline added).
BIN also puts it:
Christian replacement theology, also called supersessionism, holds that the Christian Church has succeeded the Israelites as the definitive people of God. Supersessionism requires reading the term Israel, referring to either the people or the land, as an allegory for the Christian Church. It should be noted that the Danish Bible Society is run by the Evangelical Lutheran Church, a strong proponent of supersessionism.
Concerning the “replacement theology”, it is founded on a very flimsy premise. There is little biblical support for it, and I continue to be amazed that it still exists in Christendom.