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matan4il · 5 months

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Judaism is a native religion and identity, so like all indigenous religions, it has ALWAYS sanctified the bond between the tribe and its ancestral land:

* Jews, no matter where around the world we are, pray in the direction of the Hebrew Temple in Jerusalem.

* Israel, Jerusalem, and Zion are mentioned in the Hebrew Bible hundreds of times, often in connection to the importance of the bond between the land and the Jewish people.

* The Hebrew calendar and Jewish holidays are based on the agricultural year as experienced in the Land of Israel. For example, we celebrate Shavu'ot, the Jewish festival of the harvest, during the Hebrew month of Sivan, which is roughly around the Gregorian month of June. In Australia, June is the rainiest month of the year, with severe temperature drops, absolutely not the right time for the harvest. But Australian Jews still celebrate Shavu'ot at the same time as all other Jews, around June. Because we ALL honor and preserve the agricultural cycle of our ancestors in Israel.

* Many Jewish prayers express a desire to return to Israel, for example with the phrase, "Next year in Jerusalem."

Here's a greeting card, drawn at Linz, a Nazi concentration camp in Austria, which was turned into a DP (displaced persons) camp at the end of the war. The card features the above three Hebrew words (you can see the freed prisoners of the camp on the left, heading towards a land with palm trees on the right, with one of the buildings having a Star of David on top):

* The holiest site for Jewish people in the entire world is the thousands of years old Temple Mount in Jerusalem, where the Jewish temple stood, in Israel.

* Several Jewish holidays explicitly celebrate the Zionist notion, meaning the importance of the bond between the Jews and the Land of Israel. Hanukkah is a celebration of the native Jews fighting off the Greek occupying forces, and re-establishing Jewish sovereignty in Israel, and the freedom from religious persecution this allowed Jews, by re-dedicating the Hebrew Temple in Jerusalem to Jewish worship, after it was defiled by the Greeks (including by re-lighting the Temple Menorah). Passover celebrates the deliverance of the Jews from Egypt, and the start of their journey back home, to their ancestral land in Israel, with the Passover meal ceremony including thanking God for bringing Jews back to Israel, and for building the Temple in Jerusalem for them.

* The language of the Jewish people is Hebrew, which is the last Canaanite language, the last of the languages spoken by the native peoples of Israel. Hebrew is specifically tied to the geography of Israel. For example, in the Bible, the Hebrew word for "west" is also the Hebrew word for "sea," because Israel's western border is the Mediterranean Sea. Similarly, the Hebrew word for "south" is also the Hebrew name of the desert that makes up the southern part of Israel, the Negev. Every Jewish language, which developed in the diaspora (such as Yiddish and Ladino), features words borrowed from Hebrew.

Here's an Israeli poster made in 1949, honoring "Sea Day" and featuring a part of a biblical verse (Genesis 28, verse 14): "And your seed shall be as the sand of the earth, and you will spread to the sea and to the east, to the north and to the Negev, and blessed in you and in your seed will be all the families of the Earth."

* Among the 613 Jewish mitzvahs, religious decrees that Jews must observe, one explicitly states that whenever possible, Jews should strive to live on their ancestral land in Israel. This is called in Hebrew, "mitzvat yishuv Eretz Yisrael."

* Among the 613 mitzvahs, there are 26 mitzvahs that can only be observed while living in the Land of Israel. These are called in Hebrew, "mitzvot ha'tluiot ba'aretz."

* Jewish homes have included for centuries a decorative piece hung on the eastern wall, and called "mizrach" (the Hebrew word for "east"), because that was the direction of Israel to most Jews. It usually included a biblical verse in Hebrew, often one that either mentions the east, Israel or Jerusalem, and also illustrations of Jerusalem or Israel.

Here's an 18th or 19th century mizrach from Germany:

* In Jewish synagogues, especially in Europe, the eastern wall was the most important one, because it was the one facing Israel. This wall was called, "kotel ha'mizrach" which means in Hebrew "the wall of the east."

* Oh, but the word "kotel" refers specifically to the walls of the Temple Mount. For example, the Western Wall, the only one of the Temple Mount's four walls accessible to Jews for centuries (and therefore the plaza in front of it became the second holiest place to Jews, after the Temple Mount itself) is called in Hebrew, "ha'kotel" (the wall). So why would a synagogue wall be referred to as "kotel" as well? Because every Jewish synagogue is called "mikdash me'at," a lesser temple. Every Jewish synagogue is a reminder and placeholder for the destroyed Jewish Temple in Jerusalem.

* Accordingly, many Jewish synagogues feature reminders of the Beit Ha'Mikdash (the Hebrew Temple). For example, this holy ark, from a synagogue in Romania, which survived the Holocaust, and is today presented at Yad Vashem (Israel's national Holocaust museum), includes two pillars on its sides, a reminder of the Temple in Jerusalem's pillars believed to have been build by King Solomon. The holy ark's pillars are named exactly like the Temple's two pillars, Boaz and Yachin. This holy ark also features two hands, they're meant to be the high priest's, while he's performing the priestly blessing, an ancient Jewish ceremony that was conducted on the steps of the Temple in Jerusalem.

* In fact, over the centuries, one of the most prominent Jewish symbols is the menorah, which is a reflection of the candelabra eternally lit in the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem.

The Temple Menorah being stolen by the occupying Romans, as seen on the Titus Arch in Rome:

The menorah as incorporated into jewelery, as a Jewish symbol, goes back thousands of years:

* For centuries, Jews created Jewish art and culture, which expressed Zionist longing. For example, the Sephardi doctor, philosopher and poet Rabbi Yehuda Ha'Levi writes what is maybe the most famous of the "Zion poems" while living in Islamic-occupied Spain: "My heart is in the East, and I am at the end of west / How shall I taste what I eat, and how should it be an enjoyable taste? / How shall I repay my vows and commitments, while / Zion is in the ropes of Edom, and I am in the bonds of Arabia? / It would be easy for me to leave all of the good of Spain, just like / It would be precious to me to witness the ashes of a ruined temple."

* In 1140, Rabbi Yehuda Ha'Levi finally fulfilled his wish, and boarded a ship for the Land of Israel. We don't know what happened to him, but the phrasing in a Hebrew letter, written by Jews who knew him, and found in Egypt, implies that he was murdered. For almost 2,000 years, it was dangerous for Jews to try and return to Israel, and it certainly wasn't possible on the scale of a national movement. Jews knew it was dangerous. And yet for centuries, despite that, individual Jews like Rabbi Yehuda Ha'Levi persisted in attempting this return. This is a part of Jewish history. It's not just that there was a small number of Jews, who managed to remain in Israel despite the repeated expulsions and massacres of Jews from our land, it's also that there was a small number of Jews who dared attempt the return to Israel continuously, over centuries, and neither of these things would have happened had Judaism not been Zionist. Always.

* For centuries, every Jewish wedding includes a part, where the groom recites an oath of loyalty and longing for Jerusalem. The text itself is taken from the Bible, from the second part of Psalms 137: "If I forget you, Jerusalem, let my right hand forget itself, let my tongue be glued to the roof of my mouth if I do not remember you, if I do not raise Jerusalem at the height of my joy."

* For centuries, every Jewish wedding included a symbolic reminder of the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, and our ancestors' following expulsion from the Land of Israel, by breaking a cup made of glass.

* For centuries, many Jewish homes featured an unfinished patch, as a similar reminder. I'm a secular Jew, but my real life bestie is religious, and her house has a hole in the eastern wall, intentionally left there.

* In fact, the destruction of the Temple, and the following expulsion of the Jewish people from Israel, is SUCH a traumatic and significant event for the Jewish faith, that there is a religious national day of mourning every year, on the ninth day of the Hebrew month of Av (the date when Jews believe the first Temple was destroyed in Jerusalem by the Babylonian occupiers, and the second one, re-built after an expulsion and return of the Jews from Babylon to their native land, was destroyed by the Roman occupiers), when Jews fast.

* Ethiopian Jews, who were probably the most disconnected Jewish community along the centuries, have a special holiday, called Sigd. This name is derived from the Hebrew word for worship or prostration, "sgida." It features asking God to return them to Israel. Since the state of Israel has helped the Ethiopian Jewish community to return to this land, starting in 1982, it has become a part of Sigd to celebrate it specifically in Jerusalem.

The Ethiopian Jewish community celebrating Sigd in Jerusalem:

* In fact, the three major Jewish holidays, other than Yom Kippur, are also called "the three pilgrimages" ("shloshet ha'regalim"), because while the Temple stood in Jerusalem, they included all Jews coming there to celebrate the holiday together. These three holidays are Sukkot, Pesach (Passover) and Shavu'ot.

Here's a piece of art depicting Jews in antiquity, coming from all over Israel to the Temple in Jerusalem for sholoshet ha'regalim:

* The Hebrew Bible itself expresses the Jewish Zionist longing, the desire of the Jews to return to their ancestral land no matter what, after they were expelled by the Babylonians from Israel, the same desire that drove their return from their first exile, as recorded in the Bible, and supported by historical documents and archaeological finds. Here's the first part of Psalms 137:

Upon the rivers of Babylon, there we sat, and we wept, as we remembered Zion. On willows there we hung our harps, because there our captors asked us for songs, and our tormentors for joy. "Sing to us from the song of Zion!" How shall we sing God's song on foreign soil?

and here's the craziest thing about this list: there's a good chance I forgot some stuff.

This is posted in honor of the first candle of Hanukkah tonight, and the many Tumblr antisemites, who distort Jewish identity and history by claiming Zionism is incompatible with or has nothing to do with Judaism, people who in the name of anti-Zionism celebrated the biggest massacre of Jews since the Holocaust, who ignore Jews pointing out that anti-Zionism is inherently antisemitic, who prove it by going out of their way to deny Jewish native rights, and who think posting "Happy Hanukkah to my Jewish followers!" (as if Hanukkah isn't a Zionist holiday) covers up their antisemitism.

Happy Jewish sovereignty in Israel holiday to all who celebrate Hanukkah! I hope you really enjoy its foods! xoxox

(for all of my updates and ask replies regarding Israel, click here)

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spacelazarwolf · 9 months

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109 years ago today, leo frank, an innocent american jewish man, was lynched.

in 1913, leo frank was arrested for the murder of mary phagan. despite evidence that he was at home at the time of the murder, the jury decided in just four hours that he was guilty and the judge sentenced him to death. all of frank's appeals were rejected. protests erupted outside the governor's mansion when the governor decided to commute frank's sentence from death to life imprisonment, and on august 17th, 1915, a group of 25 men kidnapped frank from the prison hospital where he was recovering from an attempt on his life, drove him 100 miles to mary phagan's hometown, and lynched him. there are several photos of the lynching.

though frank is the only known jewish victim of lynching in america, antisemitism was baked into the nation's history in numerous other ways. during the trial, the prosecuting attorney framed him as a sexual pervert who was both a homosexual and preyed on young girls. this is not the first time a jewish man has been framed as a sexual predatory because of his jewishness. it was simply the culmination of centuries of antisemitism that still persists to this day. (content warning for antisemitic caricatures and one graphic photo of the lynching of leo frank)

leo frank was proven innocent after his death, though many people still insist he was guilty, particularly white supremacists.

a musical called parade about the trial and tragic death of leo frank was written by jewish composer jason robert brown and jewish playwright alfred uhry. it premiered in 1988 and was revived in 2023 on broadway, starring jewish actors ben platt and micaela diamond, where neo nazis protested outside the theatre, claiming the show was "glorifying a pedophile."

as of writing this, tomorrow is the first day of elul, the last month in the jewish calendar culminating in the high holy days, the holiest days of the jewish year. every year, synagogues see an increase in negative attention and antisemitism from their wider communities. we start to receive more hostile phone calls and emails, threats of violence, and this year there was a swatting campaign targeting at least 26 jewish institutions. we are supposed to be using this time to reflect and make amends with the people we've hurt, and instead so much of our time and energy had to go toward ensuring we can even safely walk into our communal spaces.

i don't have the answer for how to fix this or what you as a gentile should do. antisemitism is thousands of years old, and it's not going to stop because some well meaning people on tumblr read all the articles linked in this post. all i know is that jews all over the world are terrified and so, so tired.

#jewish #jumblr #antisemitism

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cyarskj1899 · 7 months

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G’mar Chatimah Tova! I wish my fellow Jewish people in Michigan and all over the world a meaningful Yom Kippur.

Tonight marks the beginning of Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar. On Yom Kippur, Jewish communities atone for their sins and cleanse ourselves by fasting and prayer. As the sun goes down may we all able to find forgiveness and find ourselves forgiving others. I wish all those observing an easy and meaningful fast and May we all be sealed in the Book of Life.

#yom kippur #jewblr #jewish holidays

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cyarsk52-20 · 8 months

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JEWISH

What is Rosh Hashanah and how is it celebrated?

Rosh Hashanah, meaning "head of the year" in Hebrew, is the celebration of the Jewish New Year. It’s commemorated with prayers, food and gatherings.

By Danielle Abreu • Published 6 hours ago •Updated 5 hours ago

Rosh Hashanah is a two-day holiday celebrating the Jewish New Year and kicks off the start of the Jewish High Holiday season. Here’s everything you need to know about this important holiday celebrated by people around the world.

The two-day holiday known as Rosh Hashanah kicks off the beginning of the Jewish "High Holidays," a ten-day period of repentance and reflection that culminates with Yom Kippur, also known as the Day of Atonement, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar.

But what exactly is Rosh Hashanah and how is it celebrated? Here's everything you need to know:

What is Rosh Hashanah?

Rosh Hashanah, meaning "head of the year" in Hebrew, is the celebration of the Jewish New Year. During Rosh Hashanah, Jewish people around the world ask God for forgiveness for mistakes they’ve made over the past year and remind themselves not to repeat those mistakes in the coming year.

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What is Yom Kippur?

Yom Kippur comes on the last of the 10 days of repentance that began with Rosh Hashanah. The day is usually observed with fasting and extended time in deep prayer, before ending with the sounding of a "shofar," a trumpet made from a ram's horn.

When is Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur 2023?

Rosh Hashanah is observed on the first day of the month of Tishrei on the Hebrew calendar, which falls in September or October on the Gregorian calendar, the calendar commonly used throughout the world.

This year in 2023, Rosh Hashanah begins at sunset on Friday, Sept. 15, and ends at sunset on Sunday, Sept. 17. Yom Kippur will begin next week on the evening of Sunday, Sept. 24, and ends the evening of Monday, Sept. 25.

How is Rosh Hashanah celebrated?

Rosh Hashanah observances include special foods, traditions and mitzvahs, or commandments, and celebrations can vary from family to family. Many people attend services at a temple or synagogue, where a special service is held with messages of hope and atonement in the new year.

A hollowed-out ram’s horn, called a shofar, is blown during services to awake any spiritual slumber and remind worshipers to return to God and reflect on their sins.

Another important part of Rosh Hashanah is Tzedakah, or giving back to those in need. The belief is that by carrying out good deeds, God will notice these efforts and bless them with a fruitful new year.

Some Jewish families toss bread crumbs into bodies of water to symbolize the discarding of their sins, a tradition that dates back centuries.

APR 15, 2022

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Biden Welcomes Hosts Reception to Mark Jewish American Heritage Month

What Do People Eat During Rosh Hashanah?

Fish is a traditional meal at Rosh Hashanah as it symbolizes fertility and abundance. Some people will eat the head of the fish to express the desire to be leaders and not followers in the year.

Many Jewish families also eat challah bread and apples dipped in honey, symbolizing the sweet hopes for the New Year.

Some families will also eat pomegranate fruit as its many seeds represent the many blessings in the coming year.

What Are Rosh Hashanah Greetings?

Because Rosh Hashanah celebrates the Jewish New Year, the most common greeting is "Happy New Year." The equivalent in Hebrew is "Shanah tovah," (pronounced shah-NAH toe-VAH) which literally means "good year."

Shanah tovah is the condensed version of a longer greeting L’shana tovah u’metukah, which means “for a good and sweet year.”

You can also say "chag sameach" (pronounced KHAHG sah-MEY-akh) which means "happy festival," the Hebrew equivalent of Happy Holidays."

This article tagged under:

JEWISHROSH HASHANAHYOM KIPPUR

SHANA TOVA to my fellow Jewish people around the country and the world

#Rosh Hashanah #jewish #elul #jewish holidays #high holidays #yom kippur #what you need to know #jewblr #forgiveness #heal #trust #understanding #honesty #believe #forgiveness of sins #forgiveness quotes #apples and honey #Sweet new year

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eretzyisrael · 7 months

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G’mar chatima tovah 5784

Tonight we usher in the holiest day in the Jewish calendar. It is a day of personal soul searching and repentance, which we are told seals our fates for the year ahead.

If we have repented and prayed in earnest (and made things right with our fellow human beings, and given charity), by the time the Gates of Repentance close, we can rejoice that we will have been forgiven.

We unconditionally forgive anyone who may have wronged us during this year, and we ask forgiveness for anyone we may have wronged as well.

May you be sealed in the book of life for a happy and healthy New Year.

We will return Monday night.

#Yom Kippur #Judaism #Jewish #Jumblr

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jazuthevulcanprincess · 3 months

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So, I havent seen many posts going around talking about this, and I had never heard of it before yesterday when I learned of it from a youtube video.

But I need yall to know about what is called the Samson Protocol or Samson Option

This is a Israeli Military protocol where, is Israel is threatened with non-existence in any capacity, they will use the nukes they may or may not have (as they carefully avoid confirming it politically) to wipe out the threat to the nation.

This gagged me so hard. They are serious about it too I firmly believe it as tbe only modern day nuclear alert issues was by Israel in the 1973 Yom Kippur War where they authorized 13 nukes to be used if the US would not come to their aid.

Its debated if they actually had the nukes but. Cmon. I don't wanna call their bluff.

This is devastating to think about in its implications for the Palestinians and Palestinian liberation and return. I feel like this nuke issue is why most of the middle east is not taking firm decisive mitary action against Israel, that and the whole US mitary is backing them.

Since I don't believe Zionists will give up their home for Jews without significant force, and since force threatens nuclear war, I do feel a bit hopeless about the future. How will Israel ever be held accountable for their crimes if they can just nuke anyone who disagrees with them?

#samson protocol #samson option #israel #zionism #palestine #israel palestine conflict #israel palestine war #nuclear war #military #intifada #nakba #this is just the worst news ive heard #who let them have nukes?????#what tje fuck why do we live in the worst timeline #for real how are Palestinians supposed to be liberated and israel dissolved when they can nuke whoever whenever

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pargolettasworld · 7 months

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The traditional "CNN explains the concept of Jews" article actually isn't terrible this time. Aside from an awkward "the holiest day of the year for people who practice Judaism" at the beginning, the author settles down and actually uses the word "Jews," which is nice. A few more points off for thinking that "because the Jewish calendar is lunar, therefore Jewish days begin at sunset," of course. The Jewish calendar is technically lunisolar, and days begin at sunset because of some wording in Genesis.

But then, points earned for "This isn’t a time for true punishment, but rather a time for uninterrupted reflection," and a final paragraph about how to greet people for Yom Kippur, which I suspect is actually something that the common-or-garden CNN audience member might be interested in knowing.

#judaism

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kamianya-ttv · 7 months

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A Yom Kippur thread on teshuva, repentance, and apologies.

I wrote this awhile ago on twitter, and it’s still very relevant:

So. Teshuvah. Repentance. Literally "returning"

What does this mean? What does it look like? And why am I talking about this on main, not just to my fellow Jews?

There's been a lot of conversation about apologies and about taking accountability for hurting people/making mistakes. This has been especially prevalent in streaming spaces lately (when I wrote this last year), both with creators and game companies/developers.

This means I've been thinking a lot about all of this, as we go into the holiest day of the Jewish calendar, focused on exactly this.

So what does it mean to repent? Why is the word for it "return"? And why do I feel this template is so important?

So to start with, Teshuvah has three main steps:

1) Regret

2) Confession

3) Committing to not repeating the sin

Note: sin in Judaism is complicated, but is not really the same as sin in Christianity.

Short form on sin in Judaism is three terms:

Chet = mistake

Avaira = Transgression, crossing a line, going too far

Avon = Iniquity, more serious than a mistake or line cross, but still not a "you are damned to hell" type of thing

So lets look at the steps to Teshuvah, one by one.

1) Regret

To do Teshuva you need to regret the actions you did and harm you have done. This means understanding what you did, and actively genuinely accepting the fact that you did something wrong.

2) Confession

This means a few things. You need to be able to articulate what you did wrong. Part of this is the apology. I'll get to a good apology later, but a core piece is that you are apologizing with accountability, and that the person you hurt may not forgive you.

Importantly, you can not be apologizing in order to get forgiveness. And your teshuvah must continue whether or not the person forgives you.

3) Committing to not repeating the sin.

This is extremely important, and really the key part of teshuvah, of returning. It is not teshuvah to make the mistake, go through steps 1 and 2, and then repeat the same mistake. This means active work.

Step 3 requires true understanding of what you did (also key to steps 1 and 2) and figuring out how to keep from repeating it. Depending on what it was, it may mean self reflection, reading, talking with people, watching relevant videos, etc. But again, the key part is that work and doing your utmost to grow and move on and not repeat it.

Which can be hard! Teshuvah can be hard!

All of this requires being willing to listen and hear and change.

To me, this is all really important, & a big piece of how I try to live my life. It's also what I look for in others.

We're human, we make mistakes. How you deal with those mistakes is so key. When we're here, in this public space, especially if we have any level of platform. We have to be ready to accept it when we fuck up.

I truly believe the steps of teshuvah are the steps needed. I also believe that these are the pieces of a proper apology.

An apology in this light:

Here's what I did wrong, here's me taking accountability and accepting I hurt people, here's how I commit to fixing my mistake/not making that mistake again.

Again, it also must be an apology because you are acknowledging wrong, not because you are feeling pressed into it, not to get people off your back, not to appease. It must be made with the awareness you may not be forgiven, and committing to continue the work no matter what.

There's another key part to Yom Kippur that I think is little known but I think is important. Which is acknowledgement of communal mistakes. Over Yom Kippur we have a lot of confessions, and a lot takes the form of "WE have done A, WE have done B.” This is an important conversation and I plan to write a post on this later, but I also think that it's part of what should be on our minds. I think it aligns with understanding privilege and societal complicity.

So, that's all for now, But I have more Yom Kippur thoughts coming.

#yom kippur #judaism #repentance #teshuva #long post #apologies

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hedgewitchgarden · 5 months

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Not only is the term "Judeo-Christian" inaccurate, it's also antisemitic and Islamophobic.

The idea of Judeo-Christianity, and “Judeo-Christian values,” is a relatively new one, borne out of World War II and the Cold War. It is a term that has been adapted by many Christians and American political leaders in an attempt to talk about the “shared values” between the Jewish and Christian religions — but in reality, it erases Jewishness and excludes people of other faith backgrounds, particularly Muslims.

Why are we talking about it now?

On November 29, Dr. David Samadi, a contributor to the conservative Newsmax network, tweeted, “Our churches must reopen. We need to pray at this time of the year. It is the holiest time in the Judeo-Christian calendar. If we can have Walmart, Cotsco, liquor stores, strip clubs and supermarkets we can have churches.”

Quickly, many pointed out that the “Judeo-Christian calendar” is absolutely not a thing. Hanukkah, which is what we can assume he was referring to, is not the holiest time of the year for Jews — that’s reserved for a period called the “High Holidays” (also called the “High Holy Days,” the 10 days spanning Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur). Also, Jews notably use a lunar calendar rather than the Gregorian solar one; it’s kind of our whole deal.

Soon, many began to point out not only is the term “Judeo-Christian” inaccurate, but has antisemitic roots, as well. Let’s get into it, shall we?

Where did the term Judeo-Christian come from?

Before the 20th century, there was no conception of Judeo-Christianity, especially in the United States. In the 1930s, it became a political term. We’ll get to that in a second, but first it’s important to note that the term Judæo Christian actually first referred to Jewish converts to Christianity.

It was first used in a letter from Reverend Alexander McCaul, a guy who is known for being a missionary to the Jews. (Aiming to specifically convert Jews: antisemitic!) Here’s what he writes:

“From all I can see there is but one way to bring about the object of the Society, that is by erecting a Judæo Christian community, a city of refuge, where all who wish to be baptized could be supplied with the means of earning their bread.”

Baptizing Jews, oof.

But that is not how the term is really understood today, so let’s move on…

How did Judeo-Christian emerge as a political term in the United States?

It all started in the 1930s with the rise of Hitler in Germany. As historian James Loeffler notes in The Atlantic, “A European émigré, the German liberal theologian Paul Tillich, was among the first to use the phrase, warning in 1933 that the ‘Protestant church in Germany has on the whole fallen under the spell of Hitlerism … [the] Jewish-Christian tradition [must fight] totalitarianism.'”

After the United States entered World War II in 1941, the phrase “Judeo-Christian” really took off. And Judeo-Christianity, the idea that Jewish and Christian traditions hold sacred similar values and traditions, came to define America itself and its global responsibility. Historian Jonathan Sarna writes in American Judaism: A History that interfaith groups popularized the term to define America in “more inclusive religious terms” so as to combat antisemitism and anti-Catholicism. The term was meant to include America’s “three faiths”: Protestantism, Catholicism, and Judaism, and became a way to signal a fight against fascism.

But when the phrase really took off was after World War II, in the context of the Cold War. The Cold War, for those who are unfamiliar, was the period of tension/rivalry/sometimes actual war between the U.S. and its allies and the Soviet Union from around 1947 to 1991. The U.S. viewed it as a fight between democracy and communism.

Alright, tell me about “Judeo-Christianity” and the Cold War.

In the context of the Cold War, American leaders used the concept of a shared religious heritage to define America’s role in the world.

For President Harry Truman and other American leaders, the Cold War became a fight between freedom of faith and democracy versus “Godless” communism. Truman, then, recognized that appealing to vague religious values would unite America against its Cold War enemies, because, as he said in his 1948 State of the Union Address, “We are a people of faith.” (Notably, when Truman talked about “faith”, it didn’t exactly include Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs, Native Americans, or the many other religious/faith groups that made up — and still make up! — the United States.)

Under the presidency of Dwight D. Eisenhower, the idea of “Judeo-Christianity” became fully enmeshed in American political discourse. Judeo-Christian values, Eisenhower asserted, guided America in its mission to spread liberty, democracy, peace, and tolerance. In Eisenhower’s own words, from 1952: “Our form of government has no sense unless it is founded in a deeply felt religious faith, and I don’t care what it is. With us of course it is the Judeo-Christian concept, but it must be a religion that all men are created equal.”

On the flip side, in a 1954 letter, Eisenhower actually cautioned his brother against the term “Judaic-Christian” heritage: “You speak of the ‘Judaic-Christian heritage.’ I would suggest that you use a term on the order of ‘religious heritage’—this is for the reason that we should find some way of including the vast numbers of people who hold to the Islamic and Buddhist religions when we compare the religious world against the Communist world.”

Yet, he did not do so publicly. American leaders — Truman, Eisenhower, and John F. Kennedy — invoked the idea of Judeo-Christianity during the early Cold War to unify Americans behind the mission of defending freedom and democracy worldwide.

And, fun fact, this directly ties into the history of America’s relationship with Israel, which you can read all about here.

How did the term evolve?

Well, it quickly began to be used by all sides of the political spectrum.

In Letter from a Birmingham Jail, Martin Luther King, Jr. wrote in 1963:

One day the South will know that when these disinherited children of God sat down at lunch counters, they were in reality standing up for what is best in the American dream and for the most sacred values in our Judaeo Christian heritage, thereby bringing our nation back to those great wells of democracy which were dug deep by the founding fathers in their formulation of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence.

Judeo-Christianity became a shorthand to signal morality, godliness, anti-communism, democracy, and more.

Soon, Judeo-Christianity became a way of Christianity to absorb Judaism in a way, erasing the very real differences that keep the two religions separate.

As Warren Zev Harvey notes in “The Judeo-Christian Tradition’s Five Others,” “The liberal ecumenical campaign on behalf of the term ‘Judeo-Christian tradition’ was successful in the United States beyond all expectations. Indeed, for many Jews, it was too successful. Far too successful! The differences between Judaism and Christianity were being forgotten. Judaism was beginning to be seen as a Christian sect that had one or two idiosyncrasies — like preferring the menorah to the Christmas tree, or the matzah to the Easter egg.”

Say it with us: Not Great. Soon, the very progressives who championed the use of the term a decade earlier as a means for Jewish inclusion in mainstream American culture began to campaign against it.

Notably, Arthur Cohen’s 1969 essay, “The Myth of the Judeo-Christian Tradition,” became a key document in refuting the idea of “Judeo-Christianity.” (You can read his full essay here, in Commentary Magazine.) Cohen writes, simply: “The Judeo-Christian tradition is a construct… What is omitted is the sinew and bone of actuality, for where Jews and Christians divide, divide irreparably, is that for Jews the Messiah is yet to come and for Christians he has already come. That is irreparable.”

But the term had already gained ground.

How is “Judeo-Christian” used in modern times?

After the al-Qaeda terrorist attack on September 11, 2001, “Judeo-Christian” became an Islamophobic dogwhistle.

Let’s run through some examples, shall we?

In 2002, the prominent evangelist Franklin Graham said, “The god of Islam is not the same god of the Christian or the Judeo-Christian faith. It is a different god, and I believe a very evil and a very wicked religion.”

This isn’t true: As one of the Abrahamic religions (which includes Islam, Judaism, and Christianity), the God of Islam, Allah, is indeed the same God that revealed himself to Abraham in the Hebrew Bible.

In 2006, Republican representative Virgil Goode wrote an op-ed in USA Today titled “Save Judeo-Christian values,” decrying Muslim Rep.-elect Keith Ellison’s decision “to use the Quran in connection with his congressional swearing-in.” He writes, “I believe that if we do not stop illegal immigration totally, reduce legal immigration and end diversity visas, we are leaving ourselves vulnerable to infiltration by those who want to mold the United States into the image of their religion, rather than working within the Judeo-Christian principles that have made us a beacon for freedom-loving persons around the world.”

Your Islamophobia is showing, Virgil.

The term is not exclusive to the U.S., nor solely used in an anti-Muslim backlash to 9/11; right-wing British politician Nigel Farage, for example, said in 2015 following the Charlie Hebdo attacks in Paris, “We’re going to have to be a lot braver and a lot more courageous in standing up for our Judeo-Christian culture.”

What about the Trump administration and “Judeo-Christianity”?

“We are stopping cold the attacks on Judeo-Christian values,” President Trump said in October 2017. “We’re saying ‘Merry Christmas’ again.” I don’t have to point out the irony here that Christmas is not a Jewish holiday, do I?

Trump’s chief strategist, Steve Bannon, “has for some time been an evangelist for ‘the Judeo-Christian West,'” an article in the National Catholic Reporter notes. Bannon, remember, co-founded the far-right news platform Breitbart. As Bannon told the Economist in 2017, “I want the world to look back in 100 years and say, their mercantilist, Confucian system lost. The Judeo-Christian liberal West won.”

As Beth Daley wrote in the Conversation at the time of Trump’s 2017 speech, Trump’s “‘Judeo-Christian values’ are about protecting Christmas, and about protecting Christians – at the exclusion of others… It seems, then, that the idea of Judeo-Christian values excludes both Jews and Muslims. The phrase tacitly excludes Jews by subsuming Judaism into Christianity, and it explicitly excludes Muslims in its use in anti-immigration rhetoric.”

Well said.

What about some tweets on the topic?

Well, since you asked…

just a reminder, too, that "Judeo-Christian" isn't a thing and was invented by Christians in cold war time in order to assert Christian hegemony. — Dianna E. Anderson (@diannaeanderson) November 29, 2020

“Christian” thought leaders only invoke “Judeo” when they are up to some shady shit. — Michael Green (@andmichaelgreen) November 29, 2020

Tl;dr?

Judeo-Christian values was a political term invented to unify Americans against “godless” communism during the Cold War, and has more recently been weaponized against both Muslims and Jews. It’s not a real thing. Bye!

#religion #us politics #political terms #weaponized terms

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