“And for slanderers let there be no hope, and let all wickedness perish in a moment; let all your enemies be speedily cut off, and uproot and crush and cast down the insolent, speedily in our days. Blessed are you, O Lord, who crushes enemies and humbles the insolent.”

The wording of the prayer is not set in stone and can differ among congregations and sects within Judaism. Some use the word “traitors”, meaning anyone who has left Judaism to embrace another religion.

The prayer is called the eighteen benedictions, but there are in fact nineteen, because this one was added in the late first century AD. There is very good evidence to suggest that it (the 12th) was originally directed against Christians, and some early manuscripts actually employ the word “Nazarenes.”

The attitude of this prayer is a classic example of the difference between law and grace. The less than glorious history of Christian relations with Jews is, from the Christian side, an example of what happens when the fullness of the revelation of grace and truth becomes truncated.

The reference in the older prayer to the veil covering the heart is an allusion to St Paul’s teaching in 2 Cor 3:7-4:6. Likewise, the thought of the newer prayer is also Pauline, and neither can be abandoned. In regard to the question of the Jews and the Gospel, a balance needs to be maintained between their current rejection of it and why this is part of God’s plan, and its end result, so beautifully expressed by St Paul in Romans 10-11.