As many of you are surely aware, the United States is Israel's most generous benefactor, and that aid comes in various forms: money, loan guarantees, trade treaties, military equipment and pregnant cows, the last of which is without a doubt the most dangerous for the region.
My fear of these cows is not due to my Wisconsin upbringing (well, alright, mostly not) in the same way that Southern Conservatives' support for Israel is not due to an overwhelmingly Jewish Texas Republican caucus. Rather, both have quite a bit to do with fundamentalist theologies of the Apocalypse.
While it would be impossible to distill thousands of years of theology into a few paragraphs, let me summarize the relevant essentials. For Jews, the messianic arrival requires, among other things, the rebuilding of the Temple on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem that was destroyed by the Romans in A.D. 70, from which the Messiah will serve as high priest and reign as King of Israel.
The Apocalypse for fundamentalist Christians bears similarities, with (at the end of it) Jesus returning to earth to reign over 1,000 years of peace. That is only the end of the story, though. As described in the annotations of the influential and fundamentalist Scofield Reference Bible, the Apocalypse begins with "true Christians" being raptured -- immediately transported to heaven -- and thus avoiding the following seven years of tribulation. In those years, a false messiah -- the Antichrist -- will appear and gather an army, only to be defeated by a returned Jesus at the Battle of Armageddon, at which all but 144,000 Jews will die, the remainder accepting Jesus. Only then does the aforementioned peace commence.
Or so the story goes.
For all this to occur, however, there are three necessary preconditions: a restored nation of Israel, a Jerusalem in Israeli hands and a rebuilt Temple. Only the last remains unfulfilled, and this is where the cows enter the picture.
Rebuilding the Temple wouldn't be easy. Many recognize that the Dome of the Rock and the Al-Aqsa Mosque -- two of the holiest buildings in Islam -- would need to be demolished to clear space. Fewer people realize, however, that those rebuilding the Temple would need to be purified with the ashes of a 3-year-old red heifer "free from every blemish and defect and on which no yoke has ever been laid," as dictated by the Book of Numbers, Chapter 19.
These red heifers pose more of a logistical difficulty in bringing about the End of Days than do the Muslim holy sites, as there have already been four plots, all foiled by the Israeli government, to blow them up. The appearance of the biblically prescribed cow would unquestioningly bring more attempts to destroy these sites and, along with them, all-out war.
It just so happens that a coalition of fundamentalist Israeli Jews and fundamentalist American Christians are getting into the cattle-breeding business. Rev. Clyde Lott of Mississippi, Pentecostal minister and cattle rancher, along with two other evangelical ministers, have established the Canaan Land Restoration of Israel, Inc. to collaborate with the extremist Jewish Temple Institute in breeding Red Angus heifers. Such efforts nearly achieved success in 1997 and 2002, but both animals subsequently became disqualified by white hairs. The work, however, continues.
If it were only the work of ranchers, this may not be so worrying. However, politicians at all levels of our government possess these same beliefs and are putting the theology to practice.
President Bush's reluctance to pursue the peace process in the region has finally given way to sanity, but a coalition of congressional Republicans are fighting efforts to pursue alternate peace plans, such as the so-called Geneva Accord. Typifying these fundamentalist Christians, and chief among them, is House Majority Leader Tom DeLay.
Those of us for whom religion is more about faith and fellowship than fire and brimstone and who read the Bible as if metaphor and symbolism were not beyond the reach of God's literary ability should be frightened by the leadership of those like Tom DeLay.
Politicians who make End Times the goal too easily ignore the risks and long-term ramifications of government actions. These beliefs encourage a hostile policy toward the Muslim world and even full-out holy war because, after all, Armageddon is necessary.
And of course, believing that you're soon to be whisked away to heaven, leaving others to reap the whirlwind, doesn't encourage one to evaluate the long-term consequences of government actions, foreign or domestic.
Religion has its proper place in the public square, just not in the town hall -- especially when it dictates a disastrous course for global stability. While there ought to be no religious test for office, and while we should continue to support Israel -- the only democracy in the region -- the goal should be peace, not Armageddon. Political leaders attempting to accomplish the latter should be voted out, and November provides just the opportunity.
Oh, and also, let's leave the cows at home.
Kevin Collins is a sophomore political science major from Milwaukee, Wis. ...And Justice For All appears on Mondays.
