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Are the Jews/Judaism a race or a religion ?

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mikecartwright
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14 Jul 2011, 12:42 am

Are the Jews/Judaism a race or a religion ?

Philologos
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14 Jul 2011, 1:14 am

Define "race"

Define "religion"

Who exactly in your system is / is not a Jew?

What exactly in your system counts as Judaism?

Is my once significantly other Alix included as a Jew because she married a Jew and took her kids to the services? Are Samaritans Jews? Are Messianic Jews practising Judaism?

Give please a little meat.

Kraichgauer
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14 Jul 2011, 5:06 am

I think it's a matter of opinion. In modern Western civilization, where culture is more important than what tribe you belong to, you usually hear how Jews are adherents of the Judaic religion, rather than representing a separate gene pool. This is the view of many Jews today.
But there is then both Testaments of the Bible, which more often than not portrays ancient Jews (Hebrews) as a race. Gentile converts were treated as red headed step children, and it was the Apostle Paul who had to emphasize that there was no longer a reason why Jews had to remain a separated race since Christ came.
There are Antisemites today who not only claim that Jews are a different race, but even deny that they are Caucasian! There are also some very conservative Jews, as well, who see themselves as a separate race - one government official in Israel resigned after a Canadian woman who converted to Judaism in later life had been allowed to be called a Jew, and not a convert after immigrating to Israel. It's also true that Jews more often than not have the DNA virtually identical to Palestinians, Lebanese, and Syrians, despite the fact that Jews had lived in Europe for two thousand years. On top of that, while there are some Jews who are indistinguishable from other European types, others clearly look like their people had originated in the Middle East.

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

ruveyn
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14 Jul 2011, 5:17 am

mikecartwright wrote:

Are the Jews/Judaism a race or a religion ?

There are Caucasian Jews, Black Jews, "Asiatic" Jews. Jews with dark hair, fair hair, red hair, blue eyes, brown eyes, green eyes. Tall, short, slender and fat. Muscular and corpulent.

You tell me.

Now I will tell you. Judaism is a religion and a culture. And once a Jew has been "programmed" from childhood he is very likely to remain Jewish in his thinking and feeling. He may become less observant or even unobservant of the Commandments be he will remain Jewish. Part of the "programming" is becoming stiff-necked. Which if God "chose" the Jews as His people is why He chose the Jews. That stiff-neck intransigence. It will be the death of us, but it is part of what we are.

Very few Jews have deceived themselves that the Messiah has come and will come again (something the prophets never said, by the way). If a Jew believes in a Messiah then he is still waiting and perhaps he is hoping.

ruveyn

Kraichgauer
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14 Jul 2011, 6:09 am

ruveyn wrote:

mikecartwright wrote:

Are the Jews/Judaism a race or a religion ?

There are Caucasian Jews, Black Jews, "Asiatic" Jews. Jews with dark hair, fair hair, red hair, blue eyes, brown eyes, green eyes. Tall, short, slender and fat. Muscular and corpulent.

You tell me.

Now I will tell you. Judaism is a religion and a culture. And once a Jew has been "programmed" from childhood he is very likely to remain Jewish in his thinking and feeling. He may become less observant or even unobservant of the Commandments be he will remain Jewish. Part of the "programming" is becoming stiff-necked. Which if God "chose" the Jews as His people is why He chose the Jews. That stiff-neck intransigence. It will be the death of us, but it is part of what we are.

Very few Jews have deceived themselves that the Messiah has come and will come again (something the prophets never said, by the way). If a Jew believes in a Messiah then he is still waiting and perhaps he is hoping.

ruveyn

I can't believe I actually forgot about African and Asiatic Jews! I guess I'm just too Eurocentric. :cry:

:cry:

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

you_are_what_you_is
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14 Jul 2011, 7:08 am

Religion.

I'm pretty skeptical of the notion of 'race' in general.

.

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visagrunt
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14 Jul 2011, 12:50 pm

We are both of those things, and more.

The OED wrote:

nation, n.

I. A people or group of peoples; a political state.
1.

a. A large aggregate of communities and individuals united by factors such as common descent, language, culture, history, or occupation of the same territory, so as to form a distinct people. Now also: such a people forming a political state; a political state. (In early use also in pl.: a country.)
...
c. A group of people having a single ethnic, tribal, or religious affiliation, but without a separate or politically independent territory.
Freq. used of the Jewish people in the Diaspora.

We are a nation. This is the first definition of nation that appears in the OED and very clearly applies to Jews, whether religiously observant or otherwise.

The OED wrote:

race n. 6

I. A group of people, animals, or plants, connected by common descent or origin.
In its widest sense the term includes all descendants from an original stock, but may also be limited to a single line of descent or to the group as it exists at a particular period.
1.

a. A group of people belonging to the same family and descended from a common ancestor; a house, family, kindred.

b. A tribe, nation, or people, regarded as of common stock. In early use freq. with modifying adjective, as British race, Roman race, etc.

c. A group of several tribes or peoples, regarded as forming a distinct ethnic set.

d. According to various more or less formal systems of classification: any of the major groupings of mankind, having in common distinct physical features or having a similar ethnic background.
In early use usually applied to groups of people with obviously distinct physical characteristics such as skin colour, etc. An influential early system was that of J. F. Blumenbach De Generis Humani Varietati Nativa (1775), which, on the basis of skin colour and conformation of the head, divided the human species into five races, the American, Caucasian, Ethiopian, Malay, and Mongolian, and assigned them qualitative ranking. A similar division into six was proposed by Goldsmith (cf. quot. 1774). In particular contexts (e.g. former European colonies or areas of the United States) adherents of a theory of race have freq. applied only a simple two-term distinction (such as ‘black’ and ‘white’).

Now frequently used more generally to denote groups of different cultural or ethnic origin, in which context it sometimes merges with sense 1c. In recent years, the associations of race with the ideologies and theories that grew out of the work of 19th-cent. anthropologists and physiologists has led to the word often being avoided with reference to specific ethnic groups. Although it is still used in general contexts, it is now often replaced by terms such as people(s), community, etc.

We are a race.

It is interesting to note that the first reference to race in connection with skin colour dates back only to the late 18th century, whereas the word has been used in its other senses since the mid-16th century.

The OED wrote:

religion, n.
4.

a. A particular system of faith and worship.

We are a religon.

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Kraichgauer
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14 Jul 2011, 3:08 pm

But what about converts to Judaism? Are they ever considered part of your race, or just religious converts?

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

RedHanrahan
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14 Jul 2011, 4:06 pm

ruveyn wrote:

mikecartwright wrote:

Are the Jews/Judaism a race or a religion ?

There are Caucasian Jews, Black Jews, "Asiatic" Jews. Jews with dark hair, fair hair, red hair, blue eyes, brown eyes, green eyes. Tall, short, slender and fat. Muscular and corpulent.

You tell me.

Now I will tell you. Judaism is a religion and a culture. And once a Jew has been "programmed" from childhood he is very likely to remain Jewish in his thinking and feeling. He may become less observant or even unobservant of the Commandments be he will remain Jewish. Part of the "programming" is becoming stiff-necked. Which if God "chose" the Jews as His people is why He chose the Jews. That stiff-neck intransigence. It will be the death of us, but it is part of what we are.

Very few Jews have deceived themselves that the Messiah has come and will come again (something the prophets never said, by the way). If a Jew believes in a Messiah then he is still waiting and perhaps he is hoping.

ruveyn

Judaism is a religion and the idea of 'Jews' defining themselves as a 'race' is bogus, the fact that the extremists play on this to justify their own seperatism and to fend off responsibility for it's darker manifestations on the grounds of people being racist towards them is quite sad.

Lets put it this way I was raised Catholic, it was handed down from one generation to the next and generally follows patrilinear decent [where there is marriage outside the faith], I was raised in the Irish tradition of catholicism as my genes are predominantly Irish. Does this make me 'racially' a 'catholic'? - well obviously not. Does it's Irish tradition make me Irish and give me some claim to Catholic Ireland when my relatives left in 1863? - well obviously not.

However orthodox a European Jew is a European [racially] Jew [religiously], simple as that all other claims are bogus.

peace j

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MarketAndChurch
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14 Jul 2011, 4:44 pm

To OP:

You are a Jew whatever you believe if you are born one from Jewish Parents.

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visagrunt
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14 Jul 2011, 4:56 pm

RedHanrahan wrote:

Judaism is a religion and the idea of 'Jews' defining themselves as a 'race' is bogus, the fact that the extremists play on this to justify their own seperatism and to fend off responsibility for it's darker manifestations on the grounds of people being racist towards them is quite sad.

Utter nonsense. Jews have been defined as a "race" by Christians since the Middle Ages, if not before.

The use of the word race to identify a distinct cultural or ethnic group long predates the use of the word to identify people by the colour of their skin.

Lets put it this way I was raised Catholic, it was handed down from one generation to the next and generally follows patrilinear decent [where there is marriage outside the faith], I was raised in the Irish tradition of catholicism as my genes are predominantly Irish. Does this make me 'racially' a 'catholic'? - well obviously not.[/quote]

Actually, that's exactly what it makes you. Read the OED definitions of the word if you are in some doubt about that the word means.

Quote:

Does it's Irish tradition make me Irish and give me some claim to Catholic Ireland when my relatives left in 1863? - well obviously not.

Well, now you're mixing your issues. You are racially and ethnically Irish--but that does provide you with a claim to Irish citizenship unless you fall within the class of persons entitled to make such a claim. The fact that you have no legal claim arising from your Irish patrimony does not mean that you cease to be able to identify yourself in a meaningful way as Irish.

Quote:

However orthodox a European Jew is a European [racially] Jew [religiously], simple as that all other claims are bogus.

peace j

You presume much. I am a Jew not because I am religious--indeed, I have no faith in a supernatural deity. I am a Jew because Jewish Law says that I am a Jew. I was born to a Jewish mother, and that makes me a Jew. There is no qualification of conscience required in Jewish Law. Furthermore, I identify myself as a Jew and I share that identity with every other Jew on the planet. That identity has nothing to do with shared beliefs, but has everything to do with shared heritage.

I am not yet prepared to accept what I perceive to be a hypocritical offer of "peace," because I see nothing peaceful in your rejection of my identity.

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RedHanrahan
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14 Jul 2011, 5:12 pm

@ visagrunt

'Nonsense'? Perhaps you are cofusing the concept of 'race' [genetic grouping] and 'nation' [cultural grouping], how do you fit the black Jews of Ethiopia into your reasoning, they are definately a different racial group to the polish Jew however they may possibly be fitted into the concept of a Jewish 'nation' as they share some cultural values, personally I would call them two seperate but similar cultural groupings.

I stand by my reasoniong.

As for your claims I am racially catholic? come on now who is talking 'nonsense'? Catholicism is a religion which is a cultural artifact, not a racial or genetic trait. I am a mongrel of mixed race including Australian Aborigional, yet because of my nation of birth and cultural tradition have no claim to it any more than any of the others, I am by definition of mixed race and culturally a New Zealander - my nation, a place with various cultural influences including polynesian.

If you choose to define yourself as Jewish based on your matrilineal line well whatever blows your hair back, I still think for a secular person of European decent to claim their race as Jewish rather than European is bogus, you may be culturally Jewish/? [whichever European tradition you come from] but racially you are just a European simple as that.

peace j

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blauSamstag
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14 Jul 2011, 5:30 pm

Yes.

Because you can be a mexican who's ancestors were converted to judaism by spanish jews, and Israelis would tell you that you are not a "real jew".

Kraichgauer
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14 Jul 2011, 5:41 pm

blauSamstag wrote:

Yes.

Because you can be a mexican who's ancestors were converted to judaism by spanish jews, and Israelis would tell you that you are not a "real jew".

My maternal Grandmother's maiden name was Abramovske, and yet her people had never in family memory thought of themselves as anything other than Prussian Lutherans. Despite the telling surname of my Grandmother's family, I have never had any inkling of counting myself among Abraham's tribe.

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

blauSamstag
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14 Jul 2011, 5:49 pm

Kraichgauer wrote:

blauSamstag wrote:

Yes.

Because you can be a mexican who's ancestors were converted to judaism by spanish jews, and Israelis would tell you that you are not a "real jew".

My maternal Grandmother's maiden name was Abramovske, and yet her people had never in family memory thought of themselves as anything other than Prussian Lutherans. Despite the telling surname of my Grandmother's family, I have never had any inkling of counting myself among Abraham's tribe.

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

And yet, there are jews who would inform you that if your mother was a jew, you are in fact a jew whether you like it or not.

blauSamstag
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14 Jul 2011, 5:56 pm

Kraichgauer wrote:

blauSamstag wrote:

Yes.

Because you can be a mexican who's ancestors were converted to judaism by spanish jews, and Israelis would tell you that you are not a "real jew".

My maternal Grandmother's maiden name was Abramovske, and yet her people had never in family memory thought of themselves as anything other than Prussian Lutherans. Despite the telling surname of my Grandmother's family, I have never had any inkling of counting myself among Abraham's tribe.

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

And yet, there are jews who would inform you that if your mother was a jew, you are in fact a jew whether you like it or not.

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