{"id":18,"date":"2009-04-13T00:30:36","date_gmt":"2009-04-13T00:30:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/kingdomofpriests\/2009\/04\/more-on-how-christians-invented-zionism.html"},"modified":"2009-04-13T00:30:36","modified_gmt":"2009-04-13T00:30:36","slug":"more-on-how-christians-invented-zionism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/2009\/04\/more-on-how-christians-invented-zionism.html","title":{"rendered":"More on How Christians Invented Zionism"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Rabbi Gil Student, who writes the always fascinating and learned <a href=\"http:\/\/hirhurim.blogspot.com\/\">Hirhurim<\/a> blog, drops by to comment on my assertion that <a href=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/kingdomofpriests\/2009\/04\/happy-easter-to-my-christian.html#comments\">Christians invented Zionism<\/a>. He points to a book that attributes early proto-Zionist thoughts and deeds to the students of the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/gp\/product\/0195305787\/sr=8-1\/qid=1156121478\/ref=pd_bbs_1\/002-7957879-5672013?ie=UTF8\">Vilna Gaon<\/a>, who himself lived between\u00a0<span class=\"Apple-style-span\">1720 and 1797<\/span>.<\/p>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Even if you were willing to grant that the Gaon&#8217;s students counted as true Zionists &#8212; in the sense of calling for setting up a full-service Jewish state in the land of Israel prior to the coming of the Messiah &#8212; and I find that hard to believe, but even so, Christians still have us beat.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<div>In his book\u00a0<span class=\"Apple-style-span\" style=\"font-style: italic\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Power-Faith-Fantasy-America-Present\/dp\/0393058263\">Power, Faith, and Fantasy<\/a><\/span>, Michael Oren traces the Christian Zionist intellectual trend back a century before the Vilna Gaon was born. Reviving Jewish statehood, writes Oren:<\/div>\n<div>\n<div><\/div>\n<blockquote class=\"webkit-indent-blockquote\"><p>was neither new nor unique to American Protestantism. Evocations of the idea can be found in Sir Henry Finch&#8217;s 1621 treatise,\u00a0<span class=\"Apple-style-span\" style=\"font-style: italic\">The World&#8217;s Great Restauration, or, The Calling of the Jews<\/span>, as well as in the poems of John Milton and the philosophy of John Locke. En route to the New World, the Puritans took the concept with them to Holland, where they petitioned the Dutch government to &#8220;transport Izraell&#8217;s sons and daughters&#8230;to the Land promised their forefathers&#8230;for an everlasting Inheritance.&#8221;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<blockquote class=\"webkit-indent-blockquote\"><p><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Rabbi Gil Student, who writes the always fascinating and learned Hirhurim blog, drops by to comment on my assertion that Christians invented Zionism. He points to a book that attributes early proto-Zionist thoughts and deeds to the students of the Vilna Gaon, who himself lived between\u00a01720 and 1797. Even if you were willing to grant&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":72,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-israel"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>More on How Christians Invented Zionism - Kingdom of Priests<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/2009\/04\/more-on-how-christians-invented-zionism.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"More on How Christians Invented Zionism - Kingdom of Priests\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Rabbi Gil Student, who writes the always fascinating and learned Hirhurim blog, drops by to comment on my assertion that Christians invented Zionism. He points to a book that attributes early proto-Zionist thoughts and deeds to the students of the Vilna Gaon, who himself lived between\u00a01720 and 1797. Even if you were willing to grant&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/2009\/04\/more-on-how-christians-invented-zionism.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Kingdom of Priests\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2009-04-13T00:30:36+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"David Klinghoffer\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"More on How Christians Invented Zionism - Kingdom of Priests","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/2009\/04\/more-on-how-christians-invented-zionism.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"More on How Christians Invented Zionism - Kingdom of Priests","og_description":"Rabbi Gil Student, who writes the always fascinating and learned Hirhurim blog, drops by to comment on my assertion that Christians invented Zionism. He points to a book that attributes early proto-Zionist thoughts and deeds to the students of the Vilna Gaon, who himself lived between\u00a01720 and 1797. Even if you were willing to grant&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/2009\/04\/more-on-how-christians-invented-zionism.html","og_site_name":"Kingdom of Priests","article_published_time":"2009-04-13T00:30:36+00:00","author":"David Klinghoffer","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/2009\/04\/more-on-how-christians-invented-zionism.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/2009\/04\/more-on-how-christians-invented-zionism.html","name":"More on How Christians Invented Zionism - Kingdom of Priests","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/#website"},"datePublished":"2009-04-13T00:30:36+00:00","dateModified":"2009-04-13T00:30:36+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/#\/schema\/person\/6e6734f7e172e24221264a565e8f4454"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/2009\/04\/more-on-how-christians-invented-zionism.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/2009\/04\/more-on-how-christians-invented-zionism.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/2009\/04\/more-on-how-christians-invented-zionism.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"More on How Christians Invented Zionism"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/","name":"Kingdom of Priests","description":"David Klinghoffer","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/#\/schema\/person\/6e6734f7e172e24221264a565e8f4454","name":"David Klinghoffer","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/285\/28517f740f5d348f010a20178619ea6cx96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/285\/28517f740f5d348f010a20178619ea6cx96.jpg","caption":"David Klinghoffer"},"description":"David Klinghoffer is an author and senior fellow in the Religious, Liberty & Public Life program at the Discovery Institute. His writing has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, the National Review, the Weekly Standard, and the Jewish Forward. A California native, he currently lives on Mercer Island, Washington, with his wife and five children.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/author\/dklinghoffer"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/72"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/kingdomofpriests\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}