The central question of Jewish life is not whether Judaism affirms each of our beliefs, but whether we accept the obligations that come with inheriting it.
I have to disagree with much of this. A Jew does not lose his Jewishness because he/she does not observe Halchah or even believe in God. Most Israelis would not be Jewish under these conditions. A Jew is a Jew even if ignorant of Judaism, Jewish history and Jewish culture just as an American is still an American under these circumstances.
On the other hand, a Jew who makes common cause with pur enemies, denies our peoplehood and uses the fact of his Jewishness solely as a shield to support our enemies has in a sense excommunicated himself.
I could not disagree more. I experienced my first antisemitic attacks at age 8 in a British school and from there on continuously through high school and beyond. Despite my grandparents best efforts (my parents were atheists) I never practiced Judaism nor did I have any interest in doing so. I was never visibly a Jew although returning from holidays to school with a ‘tan’ among the very, very pale majority convinced the school’s students that I was a foreigner with a ‘Jew name’.
Once I studied the Nazis as a teenager and read the Nuremberg Laws and Mein Kampf I realised religious observance was irrelevant and the only thing to do was to learn to fight, which I did until finally leaving the UK.
A Jew is a Jew if his/her mother is, end of story.
Yes, exactly. Recognition of Jewish peoplehood is key. Even someone who follows the religious stuff can be a Jewish "person" (such as NYT writers like PB), but without a sense of commitment to the well-being and future of the Jewish people it is essentially irrelevant. And in order to be a true living tradition, that tradition must be able to evolve with changing times and circumstances (I love Prof Shaye Cohen's term "deliberate misinterpretation" from his brilliant book "From the Maccabees to the Mishah," on Second Temple Judaism.
Joshua, Bravo for writing this. I was very curious as to how readers would react as this a touchy subject for many American Jews. I know because I pose questions like you have posed ( both online and at lunches and dinners). It makes many very uncomfortable or even angry ( as noted in the comments before mine was posted) .
I have noted many times that to be a Christian one must believe in Jesus ( at least my many Christian friends so tell me). And I often ask what is the Jewish counterpart to such a BELIEF system. And that of course leads to the question of where God fits into the equation ( talk about opening a can of worms). And the God question inevitably leads to.my next question: what makes a RELIGION a religion, an important question for many reasons including tax benefits? Again these questions or points often lead to consternation or even anger. As you note, I view my Jewish heritage and Jewish nature to mean any all questions raised or opinions uttered are fair game, the essence of my understanding of Judaism and Jewishness.
And in case it matters, I grew up in a Reform synagogue in a very Jewish area . And I believe in God. And I eat a lot of bagels.
So good for you. I anxiously await reading further comments and reactions and anger the next day or so. 😉
I am a Christian Zionist. I have always supported Israel. I lived there in the late 80s and it changed my life. I was the happiest that I have ever been when I lived there.
Anyone who professes to hate Israel, should visit it. The truly happiest country that I experienced. The most tolerant society and inclusive with many Arabs included.
The. Country is truly inspiring and the love is infectious. There is no country like it.
I believe that what Joshua was trying to get at was if you claim your identity as a Jew, the question is, how are you living your Judaism out in your daily life? And there are many ways to do that but the point is how are you claiming it and living it?
The title of this post was so inane I was compelled to read it. I don't know about y'all but I am really tired of preachy Jews telling me who's Jewish and who isn't. At least if you want to take on such a serious endeavour, do it with some intellectual rigour. I'll give just one example. We're given a list of social categories -- the French, Italians, Chinese etc. -- and these are supposed to be thought experiments that make the case for the 'not all Jews are Jewish' thesis. We're asked to consider whether an Italian who is ignorant of Roman culture is really Italian. The answer is YES. This person would be a culturally ignorant Italian, not a non-Italian. The examples all work against the thesis. I think those Jews who are excluded from Jewishness by Hoffman's thesis can rest easy on this Shabbat.
Who are "us Jews"? The ones that remain after your selection criteria are applied? What about those who are merely Jewish but non-Jews by your standards? Are you not also speaking to them?
The point is you take a complex issue of Jewish identity and draw simple dichotomies supported by bad analogies. That's all I'm saying. Your Substack has some great content (Vanessa Berg almost always hits a home run), but periodically, you or someone you invite gets obsessed with Jews in a divisive way. The divisiveness would be perhaps tolerable if the analysis were cutting, but these preachy posts aren't. Anyway, overall FoJ is a net plus, and I appreciate that you invite commentary from everyone.
One last point: I vaguely recall an early FoJ post by you in which you made the case that the Jews are a people, not a religion. What you said today, in m view, takes the People and divides them up. I thought it was contrary to your earlier message (if I am remembering the source correctly).
David, I think your comment helped me understand why the article unsettled me.
I've spent most of my life feeling outside the Jewish community rather than securely inside it, and I suspect that shapes how I think about questions of Jewish identity and belonging. Your distinction between being a culturally disconnected Jew and being a non-Jew resonated with me.
I ended up writing a longer reflection on outsider Jewishness, mixed identity, and belonging here.
Grazi, I think I know the post you're referring to, which I commented on at the time and which I really resonated with. However, it seems from what you wrote that you intended to point to it, and the pointer seems not to have taken. For those reading this, I highly recommend Grazi's Substack.
I hear you loud and clear Joshua. I’m sad much of the comments don’t really understand the meaning of Judaism you were attempting to portray. My grandmother, who emigrated to NYC from Hungary in 1920, was orthodox, kept kosher, kept Shabbat, sent her boys to yeshivah and had them bar mitzvahed. She tried as best as she could to maintain a Jewish home raising her eight children in a tiny over crowded lower east side tenement apartment. None of her children were as religious as she and my grandfather, yet they were all Jewish. My aunts uncles and 17 cousins were close and had major Jewish holidays together. All the people they knew were Jewish. Several of my grandparents’ siblings were holocaust survivors. In our hearts, my daughters and I are 100% Jewish and working very hard to become more Jewish than my parents were (according to your definition). We love our Judaism, however we are far removed from my grandparents’ world. We celebrate Judaism with reform, conservative, Chabad and orthodox rabbis and congregants in the USA. One of my daughters and half of my grandchildren live in Israel and are surrounded by loving secular Jews who have served in and totally support wounded soldiers’ soccer team, orphans, and the IDF, but have never attended synagogue there. Yes, we Jews have a responsibility to our people, our covenant with Gd, our magnificent and horrific history, our homeland and our people. Yes, we need to pass the love and responsibility of what Judaism is forward. I wouldn’t divide us, I’d encourage each of us to keep supporting one another, conversing, educating with facts,Torah, songs, stories and history, while debating it all. My Judaism is thinner than my grandmother’s in many ways, however my passion and depth may be stronger. Who can measure? I know she tried her best, as did my mom who was distracted by being a first generation immigrant. I am working to enhance my depth, as the world has changed and we are all spread far and wide, unless we live in a Jewish area or Israel. Even in Israel, the ultra religious and secular rarely mix. Most in the diaspora live in mixed neighborhoods, yet if our hearts, souls and minds are moving in the direction toward Judaic improvement, don’t discount us. No one is at fault for not having parents who attended synagogue or sent us to yeshiva. Many of my Jewish friends at least had Sunday school, yet have no love for Israel. 😔. Some of us are working hard to get closer to traditions even though we may have grown up without. We need to give each whatever ladder or hand they may need to be better Jews.
“My Judaism is thinner than my grandmother’s in many ways, however my passion and depth may be stronger. Who can measure? ….I am working to enhance my depth, as the world has changed and we are all spread far and wide, unless we live in a Jewish area or Israel……Most in the diaspora live in mixed neighborhoods, yet if our hearts, souls and minds are moving in the direction toward Judaic improvement, don’t discount us……Some of us are working hard to get closer to traditions even though we may have grown up without. We need to give each whatever ladder or hand they may need to be better Jews.”
Jill, apologies for ‘chopping up’ your post, but I wanted to thank you for the specifics that are the same for me. My great grandparents immigrated to England from Russia in the mid 19thc., one of their five children being my grandmother - she was the person to whom Iwas closest in my whole family, and I lived with her till I was five, saw her every day till I was eighteen, and soaked up her Jewishness… despite her non attendance at synagogue(she married a Protestant, and ended up settled in the east end of Glasgow, where I was born- my mother wasn’t observant, my father was English ‘token C of E’, and the area where we lived was a working class Protestant housing estate, all my friends were Church of Scotland aswas my education)
Nevertheless… throughout my life I had a constant thread of being Jewish: very few things in my life were constant(a lot if difficult), and that’s the one thing I clung to. I knew I was Jewish; other things would come and go, but that remained. That it took me till my 60s to start to try to find what I could do about being and doing was because my life had a lot of ups and downs. I’m now 71, and do what I can… which is not nearly as much as most observant Jews, yet it counts, because it comes from my heart and soul. As you say… I’m working hard to toget to know traditions I grew up without(though had the basics of background in my mind, some of which seems to expand very quickly once I start to look into it; I started teaching myself Biblical Hebrew last year and love the feeling and knowledge I get from it.
Health wise I’m not great… had a stroke, not a lot of concentration and I don’t get out, but I love learning and doing what I can, and gradually building on it(and keeping on reminding myself not to try to do too much at a time, as I know that rusks overload and ending up giving up)
Morning blessings in Hebrew; growing to attach the words to the meanings(my self teaching may not suit most but it works for me) Studying different translations of psalms and finding that one will resonate more, and thinking about that and figuring out why, and it’s often due to something from my very varied past and that helps me feel a bit of comfort/help sometimes, for things which happened that were very distressing. It’s a wonderful feeling, and nobody could tell me I’m not Jewish: just trying to be a better Jew in whatever way(s) I can, as you say. It came for me at the time that was right for me… never too late. I don’t berate myself for the things I can’t(yet, sometimes?) do… rather, I try to build on what I can, bit by bit, and any helping hand is most welcome.
And it helps a lot that I have some amazing online Jewish friends (of varying degrees and types of observance)who are only too happy to help me in any way they can. Some in Israel, some in the diaspora.
No apologies necessary for chopping and sharing! I love that you did that!
Yes, we are connected! My first five years I spent lots of time with my religious grandmother, as my mom was busy with my sister and brother who were 13 months apart. I hope to meet you when I’m in the UK…I love Scotland and have a daughter who lives near Manchester. If you’re free in late September, we’ll be there!
A lot of material here is good. However, the definition of Jew - Yehudi - is not “Judaism practitioner”. It means “someone from Judah”. Jews are a People from Judah. We are a religio-nation born in the Land of Israel.
The term Judaism is a German term coined in the 1800s. So then, the term Judaism /Yahadut - is derived from Jew/Yehudi. Not the other way around.
I’d like to know what it would take for a Jew to pass your “sufficiently Jewish” test?
Im a kosher food eating, Yom Kippur-fasting, rabidly Zionist agnostic Jew who plans to make aliyah. Am I a sufficiently Jewish Jew?
Most Haredim are Jewishly illiterate. Would they pass the sufficiently Jewish test? They know zero REAL Jewish history, and avoid reading Navi or Ktuvim. They really believe that Abraham, Yitzhak and Yaakov studied in the Yeshiva of Shem and Ever and composed Shacharit, Mincha and Maariv, respectively.
So many of them really believe the Amoraim knew more medicine and science than anyone today and are devoted to chumrahs and loopholes. And outside of Israel they dont really know Hebrew. And with a few notable exceptions, they are non-Zionist at best.
And the big joke is that they assume that Rabbi Akiva studied Chumash with Rashi.
.. this is the wonder of being Jewish. For centuries our centres were Torah and communities, with the Haskalah, enlightenment and emancipation starting in the late 18th century. The last 78 years has seen the miracle rebirth and flourishing of modern day Israel in its original homeland, and for that we should all be grateful and proud.
Those who wish to live a full on religious Jewish life, whether in Israel or the diaspora, good on them. Those who live with less religious laws, ‘good on them too’, so long as they are proud of being a Jew and understand the value of Israel, our homeland. Being a good and honest person is also part of the equation.
I have dual citizenship, Israeli/US. The benefits of being part of a people, a nation, or a community come with obligations. We have a broad spectrum of ways of being Jewish. In Israel, there is a multitude of different groups and cultures based on their former homes, and the culture is loud, vibrant, and filled with both conflict and love. Currently it is hard to love the governments of either Israel or the US, precisely because of our hope and expectation of something better. Joshua Hoffman doesnt specify what version of obligations he expects, I hope he is open to the contemporary rich variety of community.
Please be aware that the government of the U.K. is deeply dreadful in so many ways: I know there are problems with the ones you mention, but here there are many problems and a huge rise in antisemitism
What a treat to start my day by diving into such a lively conversation about what it means to be a Jew! Kudos to you, Joshua, for sticking around and participating after poking the hornets' nest. This is how I imagine our ancestors carried on in ancient times whenever someone put forth a strong opinion about an matter of importance that impacted everyone.
I'm most comfortable with a radical pluralism of beliefs, which is exactly what we find expressed in the Bible. I follow the dictum of the artist R.B. Kitaj: "Be some kind of Jew." The only folks who absolutely need to be excluded from the big tent are those who promote anti-Zionism and antisemitism and support our genocidal enemies.
ANYONE who claims to be a Jew is a Jew, regardless of any circumstance. No one can tell a Jew that he/she is not one. There are about 13 million Jews in the world. There are 13 million ways to be Jewish. Not one way is better than the other. The reason there are only 13 million of us and not 1.3 billion is precisely because of the dogmas of
I have to disagree with much of this. A Jew does not lose his Jewishness because he/she does not observe Halchah or even believe in God. Most Israelis would not be Jewish under these conditions. A Jew is a Jew even if ignorant of Judaism, Jewish history and Jewish culture just as an American is still an American under these circumstances.
On the other hand, a Jew who makes common cause with pur enemies, denies our peoplehood and uses the fact of his Jewishness solely as a shield to support our enemies has in a sense excommunicated himself.
I could not disagree more. I experienced my first antisemitic attacks at age 8 in a British school and from there on continuously through high school and beyond. Despite my grandparents best efforts (my parents were atheists) I never practiced Judaism nor did I have any interest in doing so. I was never visibly a Jew although returning from holidays to school with a ‘tan’ among the very, very pale majority convinced the school’s students that I was a foreigner with a ‘Jew name’.
Once I studied the Nazis as a teenager and read the Nuremberg Laws and Mein Kampf I realised religious observance was irrelevant and the only thing to do was to learn to fight, which I did until finally leaving the UK.
A Jew is a Jew if his/her mother is, end of story.
Yes, exactly. Recognition of Jewish peoplehood is key. Even someone who follows the religious stuff can be a Jewish "person" (such as NYT writers like PB), but without a sense of commitment to the well-being and future of the Jewish people it is essentially irrelevant. And in order to be a true living tradition, that tradition must be able to evolve with changing times and circumstances (I love Prof Shaye Cohen's term "deliberate misinterpretation" from his brilliant book "From the Maccabees to the Mishah," on Second Temple Judaism.
Joshua, Bravo for writing this. I was very curious as to how readers would react as this a touchy subject for many American Jews. I know because I pose questions like you have posed ( both online and at lunches and dinners). It makes many very uncomfortable or even angry ( as noted in the comments before mine was posted) .
I have noted many times that to be a Christian one must believe in Jesus ( at least my many Christian friends so tell me). And I often ask what is the Jewish counterpart to such a BELIEF system. And that of course leads to the question of where God fits into the equation ( talk about opening a can of worms). And the God question inevitably leads to.my next question: what makes a RELIGION a religion, an important question for many reasons including tax benefits? Again these questions or points often lead to consternation or even anger. As you note, I view my Jewish heritage and Jewish nature to mean any all questions raised or opinions uttered are fair game, the essence of my understanding of Judaism and Jewishness.
And in case it matters, I grew up in a Reform synagogue in a very Jewish area . And I believe in God. And I eat a lot of bagels.
So good for you. I anxiously await reading further comments and reactions and anger the next day or so. 😉
Agreement, not anger, from me: loved this piece. But again, I feel the need to say… not just American Jews. Jews everywhere in the diaspora.
I am a Christian Zionist. I have always supported Israel. I lived there in the late 80s and it changed my life. I was the happiest that I have ever been when I lived there.
Anyone who professes to hate Israel, should visit it. The truly happiest country that I experienced. The most tolerant society and inclusive with many Arabs included.
The. Country is truly inspiring and the love is infectious. There is no country like it.
I am still in love with it.
I believe that what Joshua was trying to get at was if you claim your identity as a Jew, the question is, how are you living your Judaism out in your daily life? And there are many ways to do that but the point is how are you claiming it and living it?
Precisely.
⬆️ ❤️
The title of this post was so inane I was compelled to read it. I don't know about y'all but I am really tired of preachy Jews telling me who's Jewish and who isn't. At least if you want to take on such a serious endeavour, do it with some intellectual rigour. I'll give just one example. We're given a list of social categories -- the French, Italians, Chinese etc. -- and these are supposed to be thought experiments that make the case for the 'not all Jews are Jewish' thesis. We're asked to consider whether an Italian who is ignorant of Roman culture is really Italian. The answer is YES. This person would be a culturally ignorant Italian, not a non-Italian. The examples all work against the thesis. I think those Jews who are excluded from Jewishness by Hoffman's thesis can rest easy on this Shabbat.
I'm not inventing anything new, just reminding us Jews what it means to be Jewish.
Who are "us Jews"? The ones that remain after your selection criteria are applied? What about those who are merely Jewish but non-Jews by your standards? Are you not also speaking to them?
The point is you take a complex issue of Jewish identity and draw simple dichotomies supported by bad analogies. That's all I'm saying. Your Substack has some great content (Vanessa Berg almost always hits a home run), but periodically, you or someone you invite gets obsessed with Jews in a divisive way. The divisiveness would be perhaps tolerable if the analysis were cutting, but these preachy posts aren't. Anyway, overall FoJ is a net plus, and I appreciate that you invite commentary from everyone.
One last point: I vaguely recall an early FoJ post by you in which you made the case that the Jews are a people, not a religion. What you said today, in m view, takes the People and divides them up. I thought it was contrary to your earlier message (if I am remembering the source correctly).
David, I think your comment helped me understand why the article unsettled me.
I've spent most of my life feeling outside the Jewish community rather than securely inside it, and I suspect that shapes how I think about questions of Jewish identity and belonging. Your distinction between being a culturally disconnected Jew and being a non-Jew resonated with me.
I ended up writing a longer reflection on outsider Jewishness, mixed identity, and belonging here.
Grazi, I think I know the post you're referring to, which I commented on at the time and which I really resonated with. However, it seems from what you wrote that you intended to point to it, and the pointer seems not to have taken. For those reading this, I highly recommend Grazi's Substack.
Actually, I was referring to my last Note:
https://substack.com/@grazileroysultan/note/c-271821867?r=7g976k&utm_source=notes-share-action&utm_medium=web
, which was written in response to the article we're commenting on here and that I recently restacked.
But yes, I know exactly which earlier piece you mean—I remember your comment on it. I'm so glad it resonated.
And thank you for the kind recommendation. That really means a lot. 😊
Methinks he doth protest too much…
I hear you loud and clear Joshua. I’m sad much of the comments don’t really understand the meaning of Judaism you were attempting to portray. My grandmother, who emigrated to NYC from Hungary in 1920, was orthodox, kept kosher, kept Shabbat, sent her boys to yeshivah and had them bar mitzvahed. She tried as best as she could to maintain a Jewish home raising her eight children in a tiny over crowded lower east side tenement apartment. None of her children were as religious as she and my grandfather, yet they were all Jewish. My aunts uncles and 17 cousins were close and had major Jewish holidays together. All the people they knew were Jewish. Several of my grandparents’ siblings were holocaust survivors. In our hearts, my daughters and I are 100% Jewish and working very hard to become more Jewish than my parents were (according to your definition). We love our Judaism, however we are far removed from my grandparents’ world. We celebrate Judaism with reform, conservative, Chabad and orthodox rabbis and congregants in the USA. One of my daughters and half of my grandchildren live in Israel and are surrounded by loving secular Jews who have served in and totally support wounded soldiers’ soccer team, orphans, and the IDF, but have never attended synagogue there. Yes, we Jews have a responsibility to our people, our covenant with Gd, our magnificent and horrific history, our homeland and our people. Yes, we need to pass the love and responsibility of what Judaism is forward. I wouldn’t divide us, I’d encourage each of us to keep supporting one another, conversing, educating with facts,Torah, songs, stories and history, while debating it all. My Judaism is thinner than my grandmother’s in many ways, however my passion and depth may be stronger. Who can measure? I know she tried her best, as did my mom who was distracted by being a first generation immigrant. I am working to enhance my depth, as the world has changed and we are all spread far and wide, unless we live in a Jewish area or Israel. Even in Israel, the ultra religious and secular rarely mix. Most in the diaspora live in mixed neighborhoods, yet if our hearts, souls and minds are moving in the direction toward Judaic improvement, don’t discount us. No one is at fault for not having parents who attended synagogue or sent us to yeshiva. Many of my Jewish friends at least had Sunday school, yet have no love for Israel. 😔. Some of us are working hard to get closer to traditions even though we may have grown up without. We need to give each whatever ladder or hand they may need to be better Jews.
… beautifully written .. thank you
“My Judaism is thinner than my grandmother’s in many ways, however my passion and depth may be stronger. Who can measure? ….I am working to enhance my depth, as the world has changed and we are all spread far and wide, unless we live in a Jewish area or Israel……Most in the diaspora live in mixed neighborhoods, yet if our hearts, souls and minds are moving in the direction toward Judaic improvement, don’t discount us……Some of us are working hard to get closer to traditions even though we may have grown up without. We need to give each whatever ladder or hand they may need to be better Jews.”
Jill, apologies for ‘chopping up’ your post, but I wanted to thank you for the specifics that are the same for me. My great grandparents immigrated to England from Russia in the mid 19thc., one of their five children being my grandmother - she was the person to whom Iwas closest in my whole family, and I lived with her till I was five, saw her every day till I was eighteen, and soaked up her Jewishness… despite her non attendance at synagogue(she married a Protestant, and ended up settled in the east end of Glasgow, where I was born- my mother wasn’t observant, my father was English ‘token C of E’, and the area where we lived was a working class Protestant housing estate, all my friends were Church of Scotland aswas my education)
Nevertheless… throughout my life I had a constant thread of being Jewish: very few things in my life were constant(a lot if difficult), and that’s the one thing I clung to. I knew I was Jewish; other things would come and go, but that remained. That it took me till my 60s to start to try to find what I could do about being and doing was because my life had a lot of ups and downs. I’m now 71, and do what I can… which is not nearly as much as most observant Jews, yet it counts, because it comes from my heart and soul. As you say… I’m working hard to toget to know traditions I grew up without(though had the basics of background in my mind, some of which seems to expand very quickly once I start to look into it; I started teaching myself Biblical Hebrew last year and love the feeling and knowledge I get from it.
Health wise I’m not great… had a stroke, not a lot of concentration and I don’t get out, but I love learning and doing what I can, and gradually building on it(and keeping on reminding myself not to try to do too much at a time, as I know that rusks overload and ending up giving up)
Morning blessings in Hebrew; growing to attach the words to the meanings(my self teaching may not suit most but it works for me) Studying different translations of psalms and finding that one will resonate more, and thinking about that and figuring out why, and it’s often due to something from my very varied past and that helps me feel a bit of comfort/help sometimes, for things which happened that were very distressing. It’s a wonderful feeling, and nobody could tell me I’m not Jewish: just trying to be a better Jew in whatever way(s) I can, as you say. It came for me at the time that was right for me… never too late. I don’t berate myself for the things I can’t(yet, sometimes?) do… rather, I try to build on what I can, bit by bit, and any helping hand is most welcome.
And it helps a lot that I have some amazing online Jewish friends (of varying degrees and types of observance)who are only too happy to help me in any way they can. Some in Israel, some in the diaspora.
Shabbat shalom from Scotland 🏴
Alex and cat
No apologies necessary for chopping and sharing! I love that you did that!
Yes, we are connected! My first five years I spent lots of time with my religious grandmother, as my mom was busy with my sister and brother who were 13 months apart. I hope to meet you when I’m in the UK…I love Scotland and have a daughter who lives near Manchester. If you’re free in late September, we’ll be there!
A lot of material here is good. However, the definition of Jew - Yehudi - is not “Judaism practitioner”. It means “someone from Judah”. Jews are a People from Judah. We are a religio-nation born in the Land of Israel.
The term Judaism is a German term coined in the 1800s. So then, the term Judaism /Yahadut - is derived from Jew/Yehudi. Not the other way around.
I’d like to know what it would take for a Jew to pass your “sufficiently Jewish” test?
Im a kosher food eating, Yom Kippur-fasting, rabidly Zionist agnostic Jew who plans to make aliyah. Am I a sufficiently Jewish Jew?
Most Haredim are Jewishly illiterate. Would they pass the sufficiently Jewish test? They know zero REAL Jewish history, and avoid reading Navi or Ktuvim. They really believe that Abraham, Yitzhak and Yaakov studied in the Yeshiva of Shem and Ever and composed Shacharit, Mincha and Maariv, respectively.
So many of them really believe the Amoraim knew more medicine and science than anyone today and are devoted to chumrahs and loopholes. And outside of Israel they dont really know Hebrew. And with a few notable exceptions, they are non-Zionist at best.
And the big joke is that they assume that Rabbi Akiva studied Chumash with Rashi.
I could go on but I’m going shloofn.
.. this is the wonder of being Jewish. For centuries our centres were Torah and communities, with the Haskalah, enlightenment and emancipation starting in the late 18th century. The last 78 years has seen the miracle rebirth and flourishing of modern day Israel in its original homeland, and for that we should all be grateful and proud.
Those who wish to live a full on religious Jewish life, whether in Israel or the diaspora, good on them. Those who live with less religious laws, ‘good on them too’, so long as they are proud of being a Jew and understand the value of Israel, our homeland. Being a good and honest person is also part of the equation.
Thank you, Joshua.
The arrows fall, the learned cannot help but strengthen
the yesod, the foundation.
O G-D rafaeinu v'neirafeh.
Let us kindle the light .
🕯️🕯️
Who died and made you G-d? You don’t get to decide who’s Jewish
I have dual citizenship, Israeli/US. The benefits of being part of a people, a nation, or a community come with obligations. We have a broad spectrum of ways of being Jewish. In Israel, there is a multitude of different groups and cultures based on their former homes, and the culture is loud, vibrant, and filled with both conflict and love. Currently it is hard to love the governments of either Israel or the US, precisely because of our hope and expectation of something better. Joshua Hoffman doesnt specify what version of obligations he expects, I hope he is open to the contemporary rich variety of community.
Please be aware that the government of the U.K. is deeply dreadful in so many ways: I know there are problems with the ones you mention, but here there are many problems and a huge rise in antisemitism
LOL, now you did it..,
Reverse this? Not everyone who is a Jew is Jewish. Born into but not a paid, invested member?
What a treat to start my day by diving into such a lively conversation about what it means to be a Jew! Kudos to you, Joshua, for sticking around and participating after poking the hornets' nest. This is how I imagine our ancestors carried on in ancient times whenever someone put forth a strong opinion about an matter of importance that impacted everyone.
I'm most comfortable with a radical pluralism of beliefs, which is exactly what we find expressed in the Bible. I follow the dictum of the artist R.B. Kitaj: "Be some kind of Jew." The only folks who absolutely need to be excluded from the big tent are those who promote anti-Zionism and antisemitism and support our genocidal enemies.
ANYONE who claims to be a Jew is a Jew, regardless of any circumstance. No one can tell a Jew that he/she is not one. There are about 13 million Jews in the world. There are 13 million ways to be Jewish. Not one way is better than the other. The reason there are only 13 million of us and not 1.3 billion is precisely because of the dogmas of
the author and the religious zealots who
"tell us how to be Jews" !
15m.. I guess you left some out..