What do Christians and Jews have in common? Some of the answers are obvious: the Bible-especially the Ten Commandments, the Psalms, the historical and prophetic writings; the belief that God revealed Himself to and through the Jewish people to the human race for all time, and that at a future date He will reveal Himself again through the Messiah. Other answers are less obvious and more painful to enumerate.

It has often been said that while the ugly tale of Christian persecution of the Jews is almost unknown to most Christians, to most Jews it is the only portion of Christian history they are familiar with. Jews nevertheless acknowledge that there have been "righteous Gentiles" over the centuries who risked their lives to protect Jews and spare them from catastrophe, especially during the Holocaust.

The righteous Gentile story is an important one. It shows that many Christians throughout history have gone against the prevailing Christian prejudice against Jews at great personal risk. But it also reveals that many Christians never accepted a powerful doctrine of the Christian church espoused by both Roman Catholicism and Protestantism.

This was the doctrine sometimes called "supercessionism," at other times more loosely called "replacement theology." At the risk of over-simplifying, this doctrine has held that, since the time of Jesus, every biblical prophetic reference to Israel and to the Jews should be interpreted as referring symbolically to the Christian church rather than literally to the Jews or the land of Israel.

In other words, according to replacement theology, Zionism, the belief among many Christians and most Jews that God will summon back His people to the land He originally gave them, is not valid.

It is hard to square this view with key passages of both the Old and the New Testaments. In Genesis I7:7-8, God promises to Abraham the whole land of Canaan as an "everlasting possession" in an "everlasting covenant." In prophecies about the end times in both Ezekiel (38:16) and Joel (3:8), God speaks of the land of Israel as "My land."

In Romans II, Paul makes it dear not only that God has not rejected the Jews, but that His call on their lives is as unchanged as it was during Abraham's day. God's gifts and His call are "irrevocable," Paul says (v. 29).

The Puritans in England and America in the 17th century believed intensely that there would be a "restoration" of the Jewish people to their original final homeland. Later, many outs individual Christians also shared view, leading to a powerful Christian support for Zionism at the end of the I9th century and during the early 20th century.

Is all this mere happenstance, or is God really at work in history, es in the unfolding history of the Middle East in these days?

If He is, then Christians should pray earnestly for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the negotiations between his government and the Palestinian authority over who should control which parcel of land currently under Israel's control in the territories conquered during the 196 7 Six D War. The Palestinians have said that the price of their willingness to live in peace with Israel is the handing over of large amounts of Israeli-held land.

But how much is enough? It is easy, for outside observers, including the US government, to grumble over Israel's quibbling about giving up g percent or 13 percent of the land and to say that Israel should "take risks" for peace. But how many American home owners would "take risks" negotiating their property line with neighbors who had said they wanted the entire estate?

Many American Jews are impatient with Netanyahu, believing that he should compromise with the Palestinians much more than he does. Christians who believe in God's covenant with both the Jewish people and the land of Israel, however, may be among the best American friends he has. In the long run, perhaps they also may turn out to have been righteous Gentiles.