A protest over statements alleged to be anti-Semitic in a Roman Catholic version of the New Testament, distributed to Catholics in the armed forces, has been wired to President Roosevelt, it was announced today by Kenneth Leslie, chairman of the Protestant Text Book Commission to Eliminate anti-Semitic Statements in American Textbooks.
Mr. Leslie directed the President’s attention to a footnote in the version which, he declared, “is bound to make serious trouble and cause disunity.” The book referred to by the committee was printed by the United States government printing office in Washington, under the direction of the chief of chaplains, and it is understood to have been widely distributed to forces overseas.
The footnote quoted by Mr. Leslie in the wire reads: “The Jews are the synagogue of Satan.” This, he added, is “quite at variance with the text on the same page.” The expression, Mr. Leslie said, is a typical anti-Semitic statement from the fascist and anti-Semitic dictionary of Charles E. Coughlin. On another page of the version appears the subhead: “Israel’s Fall the Gentile’s Salvation.”
Denial that the two statements reflect anti-Semitism was expressed by a Catholic authority, who added that he thought it was unwise at this time to provoke a controversy. He pointed out that both statements are included in the St. James version of the Bible and that the “synagogue of Satan” (Revelation 2:8-9) refers solely to the synagogue at Smyrna and not to the entire race.
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
