In the 1920s, a Protestant Christian movement emerged in Germany that embraced many of the nationalistic and racial aspects of Nazi ideology. When the Nazis rose to power in 1933, the so-called “German Christians” (German: Deutsche Christen) pushed to remove Christian clergy with Jewish heritage, created a new national "Reich Church," and supported a Nazified version of Christianity.1
The German Christians’ effort to purge Christian doctrine of any connections to Jews and the traditions of Judaism led to the creation of the Institute for the Study and Eradication of the Jewish Influence on German Church Life in 1939.2 The Institute sought to eliminate the Old Testament (the Hebrew Bible), portray Jesus as a so-called “Aryan” instead of a Jew, and reorient Protestant worship and theological education. It employed theologians and biblical scholars such as Professor Walter Grundmann,3 as well as pastors and church officials.
The institute also published the so-called Message of God—a "de-judaized" edition of the New Testament—in 1940.4 The passages of The Message of God that are featured here give glimpses into the types of changes this volume made to the Bible. Designed as a replacement for the traditional German translation of the Bible by Martin Luther, The Message of God eliminates the Old Testament completely and presents sections of the New Testament reworked into a single narrative. The editors aimed to remove positive references to Jews in the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, downplay the autobiographical details of the apostle Paul, who was a Jew, and highlight the anti-Jewish themes found in the Gospel of John. The genealogies linking Jesus to the Old Testament, found in Matthew and Luke, were taken out of the text. All references to Jesus as the fulfilment of Old Testament prophecy were also omitted. The edition does not completely hide the Jewish identity of Jesus, Paul, and other New Testament figures—but it downplays or eliminates these references.
The section of The Message of God presented here is based on a passage from the Gospel of John, Chapter 4. This segment is often referred to as the story of "the women at the well" or "Jesus and the woman of Samaria.” The woman recognizes Jesus as a prophet, and Jesus explains to her that he is the Messiah. Deleted from the original Biblical passage is the line “Salvation comes from the Jews.” The term “Messiah” is also changed to “the Promised One.”
By the end of 1941, 200,000 copies of The Message of God had been sold or distributed. The Institute made efforts to give copies to German soldiers, young people, and congregations across Germany. However, the extent of its use in regular church life is not known. Paper shortages in Germany during World War II prevented further printings of the volume.