Carbon monoxide was a real problem in coal mines in the nineteenth century, and being odourless it could kill without warning. But a canary would show signs of distress well before a human would begin to feel its effects, offering miners the chance to escape before it was too late.
A regulation was made in 1911, therefore, that miners should “use two small caged birds each time they went down a mine.” And so “a canary in the coal mine” entered the English language as a warning of potential danger.
And through the centuries waves of anti-semitism have operated the same way, as similar warnings of poison in the air. History has repeatedly shown the connection between Jews being picked on and a society that’s becoming toxic. And many historians have made that connection, openly calling the persecution of Jews the “canary in the coal mine.”
And history reveals why it happens too. Jews have proven to be useful scapegoats when a society is falling apart, or as an easy way for power hungry thugs with nefarious plans to rile up a mob to distract attention away from what they’re really up to – as did the Nazis leading up to World War 2.
But why Jews? Because one thing Jews have been known for all through their history, no matter what country they’ve lived in, is their reverence for the God of the Old Testament. For over three thousand years, despite pogroms and holocausts, and even brutal persecutions by other religions, including Christianity, Jews have tenaciously hung on to God and what they believe he called them to do.
So it’s not surprising it doesn’t go down well in a society like ours that believes the only way we can save ourselves from catastrophe – or create a utopian world – is by human ingenuity. Perish the thought in our progressive society, therefore, that God might be a source of wisdom or, as Jews believe, that it’s only by obeying a supernatural God that the human race has a future at all.
It was inevitable, then, that another round of anti-semitism would spread like toxic fumes in a coal mine. But this time it’s been rapidly expanding around the world, sucking mobs of people into its vortex of madness. But it’s all very much justified in the minds of those who see the only solution to the Palestine problem being the eradication of the nation of Israel.
The very existence of Israel today, therefore, is under threat. So, next blog: “Is it our Christian duty to support the nation of Israel?”
Buck To Basics 