Rabbi Eugene Korn, a Bergenfield resident who gives lectures about Judaism and Jewish/Christian Relations around the world, is the American director of the Center for Jewish-Christian Understanding and Cooperation in Israel, founded by Rabbi Shlomo Riskin.
In an interview with JLBC, he said, “We must do what we can to make our future much more secure than our past, and we can do that by fostering understanding and good relations with Christians around the world.”
One way to accomplish that is by educating people about the Christian and Jewish faiths, along with other religions. To that end, the rabbi has edited two books published just last year, Covenant and Hope and Jewish Theology and World Religions.
Covenant and Hope was a report on the results of a research program about the biblical covenant sponsored by the center. “We asked 15 Jewish and Christian thinkers to examine what the covenant means for their respective religious lives,” said Korn. Like the other thinkers, he wrote a chapter about different rabbinic attitudes toward Christianity throughout history. It was recently translated into Hebrew and is now being translated into Italian for use by rabbis in Israel and Italy.
He also wrote, The Jewish Connection to Israel, the Promised Land: A Brief Introduction for Christians.
“It’s a very readable, popular book. I tell every Christian to buy one copy and every Jew to buy two copies—one to give to their Christian neighbor, and one to read themselves so they can learn more about Israel in Jewish tradition,” Korn says.
Korn’s interest in the Jewish-Christian interfaith relations began in the 1990s when he was a research fellow at the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem. He attended a seminar on contemporary theology where he met pious and learned Christians who chose to live among the Jewish people in Jerusalem so that they could become better Christians.
Members of the third Abrahamic faith, the Muslims, have not been included in Korn’s work because he finds that maintaining an in-depth two-way conversation with Christians is “difficult enough because it involves overcoming tremendously heavy historical baggage.”
According to Korn, for close to 1,900 years Jews were in a “theological duel to the death with Christianity. That’s a tremendous legacy that needs to be overcome.” As a member of the IJCIC delegation to Rome, Korn experienced a thaw in relations with the Vatican. “Now there is an obvious warm sense of friendship and a desire for us to help each other as much as possible.”
Korn travels around the country giving lectures at universities, synagogues and seminaries. He visits Israel four or five times a year and will soon visit Milan, Melbourne, Madrid, and Canada to teach and lecture
In addition to experience in interfaith work, Korn teaches aspects of traditional Judaism (he has smichah from the Israeli rabbinate) and general philosophy—he has a Ph.D. in moral philosophy from Columbia University. He did his undergraduate studies at Yeshiva University.
One point he makes to the Jewish community is that there are three main different groups of Christians—Roman Catholics, Evangelical Protestants, and mainline liberal Protestants—and Jews must relate and talk to each group differently. “We tend to lump all of them together, but that’s not accurate or helpful,” Korn says.
In addition to his interfaith work at the Center in Israel and previously at Sacred Heart University and the Anti-Defamation League, Rabbi Korn has been heavily involved in studying the intersection of ethics and halakhah. He served as a Judaic Scholar at the JCC and the Federation of MetroWest, and for 13 years was the editor of The Edah Journal—A Forum for Modern Orthodox Discourse, and its successor journal, Meorot.
As a long time Bergen County resident and one of the pioneers of the Teaneck Orthodox Community, Korn believes that religious Jews have a responsibility to talk to the world.
“This is what the Torah means when it asks Abraham to be a blessing to all the families of the earth, when it commands Jews at Sinai to be a kingdom of priests and when Isaiah challenges Jews to be a light to the nations.”
Some Christians, Korn says, are tied to the old world and wish to continue the antagonism and polemic of the old world that the Church no longer supports, but these people are on the fringe.
“Overwhelmingly, the church is looking for Jews to teach them authentic traditional Judaism,” Korn maintains. “As Pope Francis recently proclaimed, ‘No real Christian can be an antisemite.’ Jews should appreciate that.”
Korn hopes to write a book about Tzelem Elokim (the image of God) in Jewish tradition. The book has been a long-time dream of his, but is not yet in the works. “But I hope to put it on paper as soon as possible.”
By Aliza Chasan
