people than Christians are among themselves.” SulpiciusrnSeverus wrote: “Now everything has gone astray as the result ofrndiscords among bishops. Everywhere, one can see hatred,rnfavours, fear, jealousy, ambition, debauchery, avarice, arrogance,rnsloth: there is general corruption everywhere.”rnThe Jewish people were the first to suffer from Christianrnmonotheism. The causes of Christian anti-Semitism,rnwhich found its first “justification” in the Gospel of John (probablyrnwritten under the influence of Gnosticism, and to whichrnmany studies have been devoted) lie in the proximity of the Jewishrnand Christian faiths. As Jacques Sole notes: “One persecutesrnonly his neighbors.” Only a “small gap” separates Jewsrnfrom Christians, but as Nietzsche says, “the smallest gap is alsornthe least bridgeable.” During the first centuries of the Christianrnera anti-Semitism grew out of the Christian claim to be thernsuccessor of Judaism, and bestowing on it its “truthful” meaning.rnFor Christians, “salvation is of the Jews” (John 4:22), butrnit is only Christianity that can be verus Israel. Hence the expressionrnperfidi, applied to the Jews until recently by thernChurch in prayers during Holy Friday—an expression meaningrn”without faith,” and whose meaning is different from the modernrnword “perfidious.”rnThe origins of modern totalitarianismrnare not difficult torntrace. In a secular form, they arerntied to the same radical strains ofrnintolerance whose religious causesrnwe have just examined.rnSaint Paul was the first to formulate this distinction. Withrnhis replacement of the Law by Grace, Paul distinguished betweenrnthe “Israel of God” and the “Israel after the flesh” (IrnCorinthians 10:18), which also led him to oppose circumcision:rn”For he is not a Jew, which is one outwardly; neither is that circumcision,rnwhich is outward in the flesh: But he is a Jew, whichrnis one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in thernspirit, and not in the letter; whose praise is not of men, but ofrnGod” (Romans 2:28-29). Conclusion: “For we are the circumcision”rn(Philippians 3:3). This argument has, from the Christianrnpoint of view, a certain coherence. As Claude Tretmontantrnsays, if the last of the nabis from Israel, the rabbi Yohushua ofrnNazareth, that is to say Jesus, is really a Messiah, then the vocationrnof Israel to become the “beacon of nations” must be fullyrnaccomplished, and the universalism implied in this vocationrnmust be put entirely into practice. Just as the Law that hasrncome to an end with Christ (in a double sense of the word) isrnno longer necessary, so has the distinction between Israel andrnother nations become futile as well: “There is neither Jew norrnGreek” (Galatians 3:28). Consequently, universal Christianityrnmust become verus Israel.rnThis process, which originated in the Pauline reform, hasrnhad a double consequence. On the one hand, it has resulted inrnthe persecution of Jews who, by virtue of their “genealogical”rnproximity, are represented as the worst enemies of Christianity.rnThey are the adversaries who refuse to “convert,” who refuse tornrecognize Christianity as the “true Israel.” As Shmuel Triganornnotes, “by projecting itself as the new Israel, the West has givenrnto Judaism a de facto jurisdiction, albeit not the right to be itself.”rnThis means that the West can become “Israelite” to thernextent that it denies Jews the right to be Israelites. Henceforth,rnthe very notion of “Judeo-Christianity” can be defined as arndouble incarceration. It imprisons “the Christian West,” whichrnby its own deliberate act has subordinated itself to an alien “jurisdiction,”rnand which by doing so denies this very same jurisdictionrnto its legitimate (Jewish) owners. Furthermore, it imprisonsrnthe Jews who, by virtue of a religion different from theirrnown, are now undeservedly caught in the would-be place ofrntheir “accomplishment” by means of a religion which is notrntheir own. Trigano further adds: “If Judeo-Christianity laid thernfoundations of the West, then the very place of Israel is also thernWest.” Subsequently, the requisites of “Westernization” mustrnalso become the requisites of assimilation and “normalization,”rnand the denial of identity. “The crisis of Jewish normality is therncrisis of the westernization of Judaism. Therefore, to exit fromrnthe West means for the Jews to turn their back to their ‘normality,’rnthat is, to open themselves up to their otherness.” Thisrnseems to be why Jewish communities today criticize the “Westernrnmodel,” only after they first adopt their own specific historyrnof a semi-amnesiac and semi-critical attitude.rnIn view of this. Christian anti-Semitism can be rightly describedrnas neurosis. As Jean Blot writes, it is because of its “predispositionrntoward alienation” that the West is incapable ofrn”fulfilling itself or rediscovering itself.” And from this sourcernarises anti-Semitic neurosis. “Anti-semitism allows the anti-rnSemite to project onto the Jew his own neuroses. He calls himrna stranger, because he himself is a stranger, a crook, a powerfulrnman, a parvenu; he calls him a Jew, because he himself is thisrnJew in the deepest depth of his soul, always on the move, permanentlyrnalienated, a stranger to his own religion and to Godrnwho incarnates him.” By replacing his original myth with thernmyth of biblical monotheism, the West has turned Hebraismrninto its own superego. As an inevitable consequence, the Westrnhad to turn itself against the Jewish people by accusing them ofrnnot pursuing the “conversion” in terms of the “logical” evolutionrnproceeding from Sinai to Christianity. In addition, thernWest also accused the Jewish people of attempting, in an apparentrn”deicide,” to obstruct this evolution.rnMany, even today, assume that if Jews were to renounce theirrndistinct identity, “the Jewish problem” would disappear. Atrnbest, this is a naive proposition, and at worst, it masks a consciousrnor unconscious form of anti-Semitism. Furthermore,rnthis proposition, which is inherent in the racism of assimilationrnand the denial of identity, represents the reverse side of thernracism of exclusion and persecution. In the West, notesrnShmuel Trigano, when the Jews were not persecuted, theyrn”were recognized as Jews only on the condition that they firstrnceased to be Jews.” Put another way, in order to be accepted,rnthey had to reject themselves; they had to renounce their ownrnOther in order to be reduced to the Same. In another type ofrnracism, Jews are accepted but denied; in the first, they are ac-rn22/CHRONICLESrnrnrn