Tuesday, December 02, 2008

[jews] why this historical hatred for them


When it comes to Judaism, I don't claim any real knowledge and so this article is in the nature of learning rather than presenting any point of view.

Aisha Siddiqa Qureshi, which does not sound a Jewish name to me, wrote:

Whether they realize it or not, people are and have always been willing to hate the Jews for one simple reason: they gave the world the concept of an objective right and wrong.

In a time of universal barbarism and cruelty, the ancient Hebrews were the first to adopt for themselves the six values essential for civilized existence: the sanctity of life, education, family, social responsibility, equality before the law, and peace.

As a Christian reading a possibly Muslim piece on the Jews, I can't really comment on that quote. It's pretty clear though that the Jews are hated, always have been and always will be. I don't believe it is because they killed Jesus - that's an excuse for a predisposition already there.

It's easy to see why Muslims would hate them, easy to see why the hidden power would hate them:

"The Jews historically fought against the occult. See Deuteronomy and the Old Testament for how God through the Jewish people tried to cleanse the land of the occult groups that were operating there, such as those who worshiped Baal, Ashtarte, and other Canaanite and Babylonian gods."

What I couldn't quite get until I read an article on it was that there was an apparent split in Jewry in the 17th and 18th centuries, when people like Sabbatai Zevy and Jacob Frank put forward doctrines which gave a different slant to the Kabbalah and turned much of the moral framework on its head.

Further, it promoted western "secular humanism and reason" rather than Judaic precepts. In a people who were already not sure of their identity, these ideas could well have fallen on fertile ground.

This explains a lot - why one of the Rothschilds was escorted across the border by a high ranking Nazi, why that family has a seat among the thirteen, why Madonna, given her shaky moral compass, could embrace the Kabbalah and do that Christ mockery in Russia, why the Jews could be so led astray, so fickle, when Moses went up on the mountain, came down and saw his people worshipping a golden image in his absence.

The problem seems to be in the question, "What is a Jew?" Rabbi Daniel Lapin's answer also throws light on the conundrum:

Many of my Christian friends have expressed bewilderment upon hearing of self-described Jewish atheists. That is because becoming a Christian, as I understand it, requires a purposeful decision to embrace Christ. Thus any Christian professing atheism, knows that he has adopted a philosophy incompatible with his former faith.
However, many secularized Americans with Jewish ancestors, though unsure of exactly what their Jewishness means, nonetheless are convinced that their Jewish identity imposes no philosophical limitations. Somehow, their Jewishness is something other than having to do with God; therefore it is perfectly compatible with atheism.

Jewishness, therefore, is not universally seen as a "oneness" with G-d, unlike Christianity and Islam. It allows certain behaviour to fester and take hold, behaviour a Muslim would see as demonic and an average Christian as puzzling. In short - there is a portion of Judaism seeing it as a racial and national identity and the others seeing it as one of the monotheistic religions.

Therefore the "hatred for the Jews" is seemingly hatred for one chunk of the population referring to itself as Jewish. The other portion suffer for this and have done since time immemorial.

I don't profess to know about this topic, as I stated at the beginning but I would certainly like to know the truth of the matter.

6 comments:

  1. Paul Johnson's History of the Jews blames the Greeks. But it did occur to me that he might have been keen to divert blame from the Roman Catholic church, which presumably must be to blame for the old Irish anti-semitism (the only part of his Irish upbringing which my otherwise loveable grandfather didn't shake off).

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  2. Because they are G-d's chosen people. Simple really :)

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  3. Anti-semitism is not helped by the criminal actions of the Nazraelis

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  4. A question I asked myself for most of my life, succinctly answeared by dating a Jewish woman for three years.

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  5. As immigrants in Europe they made convenient scapegoats. I've just finished a biography of Edward I - At the time (1200s), Christians were forbidden from lending money with interest while the Jews were not. That led to a lot of resentment. Political persecution also allowed the nobility to borrow money and not pay it back.

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  6. Hmmm. Disparate views here. I also had a "Jewish connection" at one time and that was interesting.

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