In the second half of the twentieth century, many Jews and Christians began to understand their relationship to one another in a radically new way. Previously each had looked at the other’s faith as a kind of heresy, a false teaching incompatible with the truth upheld in one’s own tradition. Now theologians from both sides looked for ways to combat the heritage of mutual enmity and contempt.

Some propounded an attractive new perspective called dual-covenant theology. According to this view, God had established distinct covenantal bonds with the Jewish people and the Christian Church, and had called each to follow its own separate path through history. Jews and Christians should respect one another’s faith, and recognize that each had an equally valid connection to God and mission in the world.

While dual-covenant theology improved the overall climate of Jewish-Christian relations, it could not win the adherence of Jews and Christians who were deeply rooted in their faith traditions. Spiritually-grounded Jews could not view God’s covenant with Israel as anything but the center of history and of God’s dealings with all creation. There was another covenant —but it was the universal covenant with Noah, under which all humanity lived, and it did not elevate its participants to the unique status enjoyed by the descendants of Jacob, Rachel, and Leah.