The Body and the Blood: The Holy Land at the Turn of a New Millennium: A Reporter's Journey [Hardcover]

Charles M. Sennott (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 16, 2001

This journalistic pilgrimage seeks out the forgotten people of the Holy Land-its Christians-and shows how their dwindling numbers offer a sober lesson in understanding the modern Middle East. . Retracing the path of Jesus' life at the turn of a new millennium, award-winning journalist Charles M. Sennott finds a region riven by political revolt, religious conflict, apocalyptic prophecies and the quest for Jerusalem-just as it was 2,000 years ago. The Body and the Blood is Sennott's journalistic pilgrimage through the Holy Land from Nazareth and Bethlehem to Egypt and Lebanon and finally Jerusalem itself, during a gripping a year that was also a critical turning point in the future of the region. Sennott's journey weaves through the local Christian communities of the Middle East, a population which is disappearing dramatically in the land where the faith began. Where a century ago Christians represented as much as 20 percent of the population of what is today Israel, the West Bank and Gaza, now they comprise less than 2 percent of the total population. Historians and demographers fear that within two more generations, native Christianity could virtually disappear in the Holy Land. Timely and moving, firmly grounded in the troubled history of the region, The Body and the Blood dares to ask questions of the spirit as well as of politics. Two thousand years after Jesus' birth, is there a place for his followers in the land he called home? Has the West fatally misunderstood, even abandoned, the Christians of the Middle East? And most provocatively, could Christianity help answer the riddle of peace in the region? Sennott's elegiac, controversial book is sure to spark national, and international, discussion.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

As The Body and the Blood begins, it is raining bullets in the Via Dolorosa. Braving war zones, often on a daily basis, journalist Charles Sennott spent the year 2000 retracing the path of Jesus' life, from Bethlehem to Emmaus, to write about the Holy Land's Christians. His goal was "to open a window for Western Christians into the Middle East conflict, to encourage them to think about the realities of this land, and about what it means if the living presence of Christianity here should wither and die." On his journey, Sennott encounters many salty characters and strange scenes, which he describes with effective economy: "In one Jerusalem parish, there were not enough young Christian men left to carry a casket at a funeral." Sennott, The Boston Globe's Middle East bureau chief, believes that Christianity has traditionally "provided a kind of leavening in the Middle East, a small but necessary ingredient acting as a buffer between the Arab world's broad Islamic resurgence and the strands within Israel of a rising, ultranationalist brand of Judaism." His book is not merely a political travelogue, however. He also makes Middle Eastern Christianity relevant to the everyday lives of Western readers, by showing that Palestinian- Israeli conflicts are rooted in the same social and spiritual conflicts that shaped Jesus' ministry. --Michael Joseph Gross

From Library Journal

The Boston Globe's Middle East bureau chief takes the reader along on what he calls a journalistic pilgrimage, using the path traveled by Jesus to structure a vivid sketch of the often-overlooked Christian communities in the Holy Land. These communities are dwindling rapidly and are frequently caught in the middle of the numberless divisions and antagonisms of the region. Sennott provides some brief religious and geographical histories and then moves on to the stories of people he encounters in his travels and work. His focus is on Christian groups, but he inevitably expands the account to provide a much wider view of the Middle East and its violent conflicts. The book is rich in detail, conversations, and incidents that provide a feel for the dangers and complexities of current daily life in Israel and the surrounding areas. This is also a personal work, as Sennott brings his own religious convictions and family life into the story. Highly recommended for public and academic libraries. Stephen Joseph, Butler Cty. Community Coll., PA
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 512 pages
• Publisher: PublicAffairs; 1st edition (October 16, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1891620959
• ISBN-13: 978-1891620959
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 6.4 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.3 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #601,601 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent and important book on the modern Middle East, February 28, 2005

By 

Tim F. Martin (Madison, AL United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Body and the Blood: The Middle East's Vanishing Christians and the Possibility for Peace (Paperback)

_The Body and the Blood_ by Charles M. Sennott is an excellent, important, and timely book, one of the best I have ever read on the modern Middle East. In this work he sought to do three things; one, tour the lands that Jesus visited as chronicled in the New Testament, describing what these locales are like today, two, report the problems of the indigenous Christians of the Middle East, and three, to discuss their role in the region.

The Christian presence in the lands Jesus lived in is unfortunately a diminishing one and Sennott was keen to document the historical, economic, political, and religious reasons for this ongoing exodus. In some ways the history of Christians in the Holy Land has always been one of emigration; nearly all of the apostles emigrated, fearing reprisals not only from Rome but also from such Jewish groups as the Sadducees. In the intervening centuries Christians have generally been a minority in the region, except perhaps during a brief period under the Byzantine Empire (in the fifth and sixth centuries).

While small, the Christian presence has endured until the 20th century, where particularly in the latter part of the century (and the early years so far of this century) it has been running the real risk of dying out completely in many areas. According to the census data kept by the Ottoman Empire, the Christian population in 1914 was 24% of what we could call today Israel/Palestine, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and Turkey; today it is no more than 5%. In British ruled Palestine it was as much as 20% of the population (though some put the figure at 13%), while today in Israel/Palestine it is less than 2%. About 35% of the total Christian population of Israel/Palestine (about 60,000 out of 700,000 total) were among those refugees who fled the fighting in 1948 and were not permitted by Israel to return. The Coptic Church in Egypt - one of the oldest in Christendom, tracing its roots back to Saint Mark the Evangelist, said to have arrived in Egypt in A.D. 60 - is steadily declining as well. The Copts number in 2000 about 5 million, or 6% of Egypt's population of 70 million; in the early 1970s there were 4 million but a bigger percentage of the population at around 12%. In early 20th century Jordanian Christians were 13% of the population; in 2000 they are only 2%. Lebanon has gone from in 1932 a 51.2% Christian population to a 25% one today.

Why have Christians emigrated in such large numbers or otherwise declined as a percentage of the overall population? There are many factors and the author was quick to point out that the reasons for leaving were not always religious in nature. Generally Christian communities have a lower birthrate, while in many areas Muslims have soaring birthrates. In some areas there has been a steady rate of conversion to Islam, generally among young women and as a result of marriage to Muslims.

War has played a big factor in emigration, with in particular Palestinian Christians leaving in waves with each major Arab-Israeli conflict and many thousands of Maronite Christians leaving Lebanon in the fifteen years of civil war (from 1975 to 1990 850,000 Christians fled the country).

The Christians, whether Copts in Egypt, Palestinian Christians, or Maronite Christians in Lebanon, generally had higher levels of education and were wealthier and were therefore better able to move, had more to lose in regional conflicts (such as the many Israeli crackdowns on Palestinian travel and trade with Israel, economically crippling to many Christian-owned businesses), and had to face resentment and jealousy from less well-off Muslim neighbors. Further, they generally had much stronger ties to the West, with Western churches in Europe, North America, and Australia (along with already resident immigrant communities in those nations) often times actively encouraging their emigration. In addition, as more and more of a particularly Christian family immigrated to a particular locale, the pressure mounted on those that remained to join their relations overseas.

However, religion can and does play a role in Christian emigration, and the very fact that Christians are leaving only serves to exacerbate the situation in the Middle East. Christians in Palestine, Egypt, and Lebanon were an important secular and moderating influence in those areas. A minority, the Christians as leaders and as individuals did not emphasis religious differences or indeed religion at all, but instead often promoted unifying traits, whether bloodline among individual families or simply by being Arab. Their very existence and role in the economic and in particular the political life of the nations they inhabited served to promote a sense of pluralism and secular government, a factor working against (particularly in recent years) an increasing "climate of intolerance," whether radical Islamic (particularly in Lebanon with Hezbollah, Egypt, and among the Palestinians) or religiously Zionist. With Christian emigration pluralism and secular governments face an uncertain future.

The increasing role of radical, highly religious Islam has sundered many once mixed Christian-Muslim communities everywhere from Upper Egypt to the West Bank, with Christians futilely pointing out common ties and interests, pleas unheard by angry youths stirred up by radical Muslim clerics, their hatred whipped up against "infidels" and "Crusaders" despite the fact that the indigenous Christians had in general been in the region for millennia and that often tribes and families had both Christian and Muslim branches; suddenly a neighbor your knew all your life was "the enemy." Sometimes this growing divide was encouraged by Israel, whether accidentally by giving preferential treatment to the often better educated, wealthier, and less combative Christians or deliberately by seeking to fracture Palestinians in a divide and rule strategy among Christians and Muslims. Other times the Christians did this to themselves, as the Maronite Christians of Lebanon, eager and greedy to stay in power, would ally with one outside group after another (such as France or Israel) against Muslim factions in their own country.

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Required reading., November 9, 2002

By 

Charlie Perkins (Georgetown, KY United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Body and the Blood: The Holy Land at the Turn of a New Millennium: A Reporter's Journey (Hardcover)

If you believe that Israel is justified in its treatment of Palestinians, whether for reasons of security, entitlement or revenge, or if you believe that all Palestinians are culpable, this will be a difficult book. While the fear and anger behind the Israeli' reaction is understandable, neither they nor we can disregard the needs of the Palestinians or our obligation toward all humans.

Sennott will not allow you to dismiss the Palestinians. Their story cannot be overlooked, nor their treatment continue without loss of our own humanity. Sennott makes clear that the villains of this story are not the people, Jew or Palestinian, whether Christian or Muslim, but those seeking to maintain or gain power; those who have forgotten their religious heritage and merely co-opt that heritage for political purposes. He questions the message and motives of the religious leaders whose livelihood is provided by governments or political organizations. He notes the disconnection between indigenous Christians and their denominations.

The parallels between events and motivations today and those faced by Jesus 2000 years will frighten and alarm while providing insight into both the Middle East and our own lives.

You may question his journalistic impartiality. But, he is at least as critical of the Palestinian Authority as the Israeli government. His thesis is that the faiths so deeply invested in this troubled area, particularly Christianity with its tradition of non-violence and forgiveness as prerequisite to healing, are essential to the resolution of an otherwise insurmountable conflict.

You will be moved by this story. You must read it. You will also find in its message, whether Sennott intended it or not, disturbing questions about our culpability in the escalating violence and hatred. [e.g., Our government advised Israel to quickly quash the non-violent demonstrations initiated in the Christian Palestinian community because of the power of such movements; and the monetary support given by U.S. fundamentalist Christian groups to Zionist groups believing that provocation of violence would bring on the second coming of Christ.]

Read this book.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Very interesting and enlightening book, June 19, 2005

By 

Narut Ujnat "Exchanger1" (San Diego, CA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Body and the Blood: The Middle East's Vanishing Christians and the Possibility for Peace (Paperback)

I picked up this book because of my interest in the subject. I am not so much interested in the religious aspects (although Jerusalem and it's basis in three faiths is always fascinating), as I was in how the conflict between the Arabs and Israelis has poisoned an entire region. After all Christianity was born in this area. As the author points out, many people don't understand how Christians can be challenged by the ongoing situation in the Middle East. The dwindling Christian population of Jerusalem is just one example. I had not really thought of this tertiary effect of the Arab-Israeli conflict because US news tends to be "very "go-go" with the hurly-burly of idiots parading around, making explosives of the real or imaginary, detonating them with the passion of their idiocy, and yet, ignoring the gentle, thoughtful people who are the true makers of society"
As the author points out, Christians and Jews alike lived in the region for a millenia without (largely) rancor. Today, with radical Muslim cleric and their talk of the Crusaders and Jews in the mosques, young radicalized and sometine hopeless Arabs believe the mind poison and feel rage even against their Arab neighbors who have a different religious background. The author also points out the growing radicalization of Orthodox Israelis combining nationalism and religion in a mirror of the Muslims around them. It is an explosive mix (pun intended). The fate of Lebanon with the Maronite Christian population dwindling is telling in of itself. Prior to 1975, many thought Lebanon to be the model of a cosmopolitan Arab state. It was once thought Lebanon would become the pathfinder for the recognition of Israel. This book makes clear just how much Lebanese society has changed.

The author discusses the takeover of the Bethelehem Church of the Manger (where Jesus was believed to have been born). This event was shocking because it seemed to indicate that the Arab-Israeli conflict had spilled over into Christianity's most revered spots.

The book is well-written. Like a book of another generation still worth reading (Thomas Friedman's From Beirut to Jerusalem) this book will give the reader a spot on report from the region regarding not just Christians in peril, but in the larger sense the current situation of the Middle East. To me the Christians in the book are the prism of innocence, if you will, who have no stake in the political battle and yet are overwhelemed by the entire scene of madness. From this prism, you are allowed to glimpse the Arab-Israeli conflict in all its madness.

It is too bad the author could not go to Iraq and visit with the Chaldean Christians who are being terroized by the unstable situation in Iraq. Generations ago, the Iraqi Jews were sacked, and now the Chaldeans are being run out as well.

If you have any interest in the Middle East, whether from the purely political perspective, or you have an interest in Christianity in a time of conflict, or you wish an interesting perspective of what is going on in the Middle East from a different and unique perspective, this is a good book to read. I won't say it is 'fair and balanced,' but in my book your job as reader is to decipher for yourself where you stand on issues as part of good critical reading.

All in all, worth reading.