Pat…I am so impressed with how you understand the issues. I really appreciate your writings, opinions and efforts. Thank-you for being a true friend, someone who cares enough to keep asking “why?”
Pat, thank you so much for your Substack. I've appreciated your fierce allyship and you bravely speaking out for us. I think a discussion group would be good. I'm always looking for community and new connections. Thank you for lifting the paywall.
Pat, I am impressed with how your writings consistently uncover and explore more layers in a very layered subject. You provide both depth and nuance. I vote for a book.
As a former progressive and ethnic Jew, I am deeply grateful for your voice and willingness to be an ally and to try to understand the shape shifting antisemitism virus
Pat, let me thicken some ice for you. As a Jew, I can say that you are pretty spot on in identifying the intricacies of Jewish identity. There is even a debate among Jews about it - we love debates (I just perpetrated a stereotype, didn't I?) That duality of relgion and peoplehood is, however, unique and would be interesting to explore.
When it comes to antisemitism though, what I want is simply others to stop wanting to eliminate Jews and their only state. It baffles me how only 0.2% of worlds population can be a target for so much hate
Our continued existence stands for something intolerable to those who hate us: that despite continuous brutal oppression we continue to thrive. The Left hates us because we are proof that hard work pays off and that people can overcome oppression, and that disrupts their narrative that the system is inescapably oppressive. The Right hates us because...something to do with killing a Rabbi??
I liked how Now Tishby described Jews explaining the meaning of most of our holidays: "...they tried to kill us, it didn't work, oh well, lets eat". May it is this satirico-cynical realism that keeps us alive. Although sometimes I feel that Sholom Aleikhem said it best through the words of Tevye the Milkman: "God, I know we are your chosen people. But once in a while could ypu choose somebody else?" I guess it is an all or nothing kind of deal🤣
Thank you for removing the paywall. Since (like most people) my funds are limited, I can't afford to be a paid subscriber for all of the writers I read. Limiting posts or the ability to comment does not give me the incentive to become one. I appreciate your kindness, and that I will now see the full fruits of your labor. Take care.
Pat, how do we clone you? How is it that you understand all of this and articulate it so clearly, and so many of us don’t have a single non-Jewish person in our lives who shows any curiosity or attempt to understand who we are? They’d rather run with their firmly rooted misconceptions than learn something.
A big yes to conversations, and maybe a way to invite in the people who most need to be a part of them. And if you’re contemplating a book, I back you up 100%.
Your message made my morning. Thank you! (I’ve got a few family members who would recoil at the cloning idea, though!) I am open to doing anything folks would enjoy.
Germany was already a racial terror state when the Barmen Synod met. Clergy attending Barmen would have been required to document their “Aryan” descent to retain their positions. Pastors could no longer baptize or fellowship with Jewish converts. Ministers with even a fraction of Jewish blood could be excommunicated.
In the most blatant way, Jews stopping being Jewish does not stop antisemitism.
The Jews and those who join them are in reality, Israelites. This is a nation called out by the Creator Gd. Last I checked the Tanakh, it is so. He gave land, set boundaries, and stated it was theirs in perpetuity. If one has an issue with the Jews, perhaps they should take it up with the Creator of Israel. Once antisemitism is taken up, that person really has an issue with the One you set aside the land and the people. And that makes it spiritual.
Technically speaking, the term "Jew" is inappropriate. It derives from the Tribe of Judah, whose lands were later termed Judea. Recall there were eleven other tribes. All tribes were eventually dispersed, with many retaining faith and culture. Not all were from Judah. Thus, Israelite is the more accurate term, leading us back to spiritual foundations.
The crux of the matter is we chews don't fit THEIR daffy-nitions...
Those that don't fit their daffynitions deserve neither a country nor a race--white? not white?--nor a religion--b/c many of us are secular more or less but even secular joos don't rock n' roll the same way as secular Christians... In brief, they cannot make us "FIT" inta their NORMS. Some say Joos are a fiction! We don't exist (yes I hear this--that there are no "real" joos--but they THEY wanna define us per "their reality"). See, it's existential...
Truly, we're a gemeinsam --an "overall thing" that we know but others cannot define for us.
We are not just "bagels & lox" (which speaks ta the concept of us bein' a joke) nor are we all streimel-wearin' / shaidel sportin' weirdos-- We are (not only) a faith (within which vast variations), a tribe, a "kulcha," a race, a world-view (which also varies), a set of values (must be educated, must play piano or violin, must SAVE the world, must SPEAK UP, we must DEBATE), a work ethic, and a cuisine (what joo hates food?)-- All in giant KitchenAid Mixer and this does NOT JIBE with those that wanna define us.
Unless we are defined, critical theory will not woik/woke/werk. Unless we are defined, the haters cannot so easily erase us. Unless we are defined they cannot take away from us Israel or our personal property fer that matter... The Nazis of course did a good chob of it definin' us by race / genetics alone which led them ta take our property AND our lives. Even those that shouted out they were no longer jooish didn't fare well...as we know. Even those from USSR who knew nuthin' about their heritage got treated like the contents of a doggie bag an' fled to come to Brooklyn as refuseniks. So joos are always joos for the most part...good ones, bad ones,even rotten ones (lol) An' even those that say they are not joos--are "discovered" by those that say we are. Whatever works in "their" favor seems to be how they define us.
But now everyone EXCEPT us joos (we have no problem knowin' who we are) wants ta put us square pegs in their round hole. Phooey! Phooey on them an' their dictionary daffynitions. We don't fit.
YET. We ALL know who we ARE, even when we disagree (when do we NOT disagree?! lol) we know who we are to the point that we can identify fakers, schtoonks among us, an' those who pretend to be joos an' ain't. We often look like each other (folks who say there is no jooish genetics don't accept this but it's troo! 14 studies show that we are all related). If you find a Hasid in NYC 'round about Succhis time they will call you out in streets and they KNOW -- joos don't proselytize or talk ta non-joos but they approach joos 'round this time ta cajole us inta coming to temple. It's crazy but they are SO good at knowin' us--no matter how we dress or look--that they kin spot us walkin' past the main library in NYC an' tell us ta come to temple (oy). I used ta respond in French that they were mistaken lol. Everyone tells me "but you don't look..." but the Hasidim they know. Funny. So how can we not exist--however we poorly try ta define ourselfs for OTHERS--when any Hasid over the age of 13 kin pick us out (easy).
Yes we are funny, yes we are no joke. I'm grateful fer ya Pat Johnson for tryin' ta point out all of this. Bottom line is people like things neat, tidy, in little boxes an' we don't fit--into boxes, into the imaginary daffynition of what constitutes a "people" or a "religion" or a "nation." They tell us that the "rules say" we cannot have Israel. When did there become some authority that defines "who gits ta be a country an' who doesn't" ? I missed out on them rules... When do we git "rights?" by their "rules" that defines who deserves "rights" (which apply to noble Palestinians... but not us joos) Go figger... I cannot.
1. You can't stop being Jewish by not believing in Judaism. If you have the blood. no one will let you forget it. To wit, hoards of Jewish atheists experience antisemitism. The Spanish and Portuguese Inquisitions tortured and killed Jewish converts to Catholicism for four hundred years because they just couldn't be *sure" how sincere the conversions were.
2. If you read Jewish history, you'll notice there has been a joyous rape-fest and massacre of Jews pretty much every 50 years for the past 2000 years. This has primarily been in Europe but there were also hundreds of years of it all over the Middle East. This means that Jewish blood gets watered down. For the most part, Jews have lived in closed communities, precisely because of the periodic orgies of Jewish rapes and murders. So, for instance, when my parents were dating and my father brought my mother home, my grandfather commented, "She looks like a Polish gentile," and it was an observation that she didn't get that face through a love match. She got it through decades of Saturday night pogroms in which the people in the next town would get liquored up and then come into the shtetl to rape and murder, with government approval. Are we a race? Enough to be killed for it, that's good enough for me.
3. Assimilation. When I moved to Maine, I was about as assimilated as it's possible to get and still people acted as if I had the letters JEW pulsing in neon on my forehead, without my saying a word. They would raise it in conversation. They would make a big deal about serving pork. They would casually drop the gospel fact that Jews are responsible for all the evil on the face of the earth. If you have the blood, you're a Jew, end of story, and no one will let you forget it. Let's remember the Dreyfus affair, the perfect French officer who happened to be Jewish who got strung up on a false charge. Let's consider the Jews in the US right now who are so assimilated many of them know absolutely nothing about their history, their religion or even their culture, but the calls for their death are at every university and all over social media. Assimilation does not protect you. Hiding does not protect you.
Assimilated Jews aren't clannish. They often have very little or nothing to do with other Jews and as Jews are isolated. Because they usually don't know Jewish history or Israeli history or Palestinian history, they don't have the facts at the tip of their tongue when confronted by the outrageous lies with which social media and the mainstream news are awash. They don't know what to say, they don't know how to defend themselves.
The only thing to do is to learn everything there is to know about Judaism, Jewish history, Israeli history, everything Jewish, and keep going deeper and deeper. You find more and more to love and to be proud of. The 50-year cycle of murder sends Jews back to the synagogue, back to each other's company, where they don't have to worry about being hated for their blood.
4. Yes it's possible to convert to Judaism. By custom, rabbis make it *extremely* difficult to become a Jew. That's probably because once you convert, your progeny *in perpetuity* can be hunted for Jewish blood. Because of the periodic purges of Jews, if you've converted, either you or some of your progeny are going to marry other Jews because you go to them for safety. It's only a matter of time before your line looks as Jewish as the rest. Are we a race? Yeah we are, with occasional additions, and these additions are good because otherwise we get too inbred, we get diseases from the inbreeding, and the additions strengthen the race.
If I had the power I'd make you an honourary Jew, but instead, I'll designate you a mensch, which is an honour in our culture.
I think you're onto something here. Jew hatred is complex and Janus-faced. Jews aren't understood...even we don't understand ourselves, so how could we expect others to understand us?? We're ambiguous as a people, and that ambiguity allows us to be mythologised, and it creates space for non-Jews to impute onto us any characteristic they want. Usually, it's the ultimate sin or crime of the time: socialist, capitalist, nomad, bacillus, and now, colonist. It's why Jew hatred is so violent and vitriolic, we're always cast in the most vile role. Not surprisingly, what is attributed to us is usually the evil that those doing the attributing are guilty of. It's white middle class people with European heritage who are accusing Jews of precisely what they, in fact, are. Hey Canadian/American Jihadists: most of my people were running for their lives escaping pogroms while your people were slaughtering Indigenous people on Turtle Island. Who's the colonist, exactly?
The other truth you uncover here is the 'stop being Jews' point. Bang on. The Christian bible is an advancement of the Torah, they say, and the Quran, well, the absolutely final word of G-d. How dare you Jews stick to your original texts! Stop being Jews, i.e., convert to the true word of the Father, or Allah. Jews don't have a mediator to engage with G-d, we have to figure it out for ourselves. We have no desire to impose our beliefs on others, to convert others. And it works for us, our ambiguity and direct engagement with the lack of certainly that lies at the core of our faith really works. Sadly, that terrifies a lot of people because it affords us a freedom that scares the crap out of authoritarian approaches to religion.
Thank you so much! And, yes -- antisemitism is often (almost always?) a projection of what non-Jews hate in themselves. Thank you vfor reading and for your wisdom.
Pat…I am so impressed with how you understand the issues. I really appreciate your writings, opinions and efforts. Thank-you for being a true friend, someone who cares enough to keep asking “why?”
Thank YOU Shelley!
Pat, thank you so much for your Substack. I've appreciated your fierce allyship and you bravely speaking out for us. I think a discussion group would be good. I'm always looking for community and new connections. Thank you for lifting the paywall.
Thanks for your kind words Tami!
Pat, I am impressed with how your writings consistently uncover and explore more layers in a very layered subject. You provide both depth and nuance. I vote for a book.
Thanks Catherine for your kind words of support!
As a former progressive and ethnic Jew, I am deeply grateful for your voice and willingness to be an ally and to try to understand the shape shifting antisemitism virus
Pat, let me thicken some ice for you. As a Jew, I can say that you are pretty spot on in identifying the intricacies of Jewish identity. There is even a debate among Jews about it - we love debates (I just perpetrated a stereotype, didn't I?) That duality of relgion and peoplehood is, however, unique and would be interesting to explore.
When it comes to antisemitism though, what I want is simply others to stop wanting to eliminate Jews and their only state. It baffles me how only 0.2% of worlds population can be a target for so much hate
Yes, Maxim! All of this theorizing may be entertaining, but how about people IRL stop being haters!? That’s the point, really, isn’t it?!
debatin' is not a stereotype--it's genetics (I think we all have the PIA gene!)
Our continued existence stands for something intolerable to those who hate us: that despite continuous brutal oppression we continue to thrive. The Left hates us because we are proof that hard work pays off and that people can overcome oppression, and that disrupts their narrative that the system is inescapably oppressive. The Right hates us because...something to do with killing a Rabbi??
I liked how Now Tishby described Jews explaining the meaning of most of our holidays: "...they tried to kill us, it didn't work, oh well, lets eat". May it is this satirico-cynical realism that keeps us alive. Although sometimes I feel that Sholom Aleikhem said it best through the words of Tevye the Milkman: "God, I know we are your chosen people. But once in a while could ypu choose somebody else?" I guess it is an all or nothing kind of deal🤣
Sorry *Noa Tishby.
Thank you for removing the paywall. Since (like most people) my funds are limited, I can't afford to be a paid subscriber for all of the writers I read. Limiting posts or the ability to comment does not give me the incentive to become one. I appreciate your kindness, and that I will now see the full fruits of your labor. Take care.
Thank you for your kind words!
Pat, how do we clone you? How is it that you understand all of this and articulate it so clearly, and so many of us don’t have a single non-Jewish person in our lives who shows any curiosity or attempt to understand who we are? They’d rather run with their firmly rooted misconceptions than learn something.
A big yes to conversations, and maybe a way to invite in the people who most need to be a part of them. And if you’re contemplating a book, I back you up 100%.
Your message made my morning. Thank you! (I’ve got a few family members who would recoil at the cloning idea, though!) I am open to doing anything folks would enjoy.
Quote from https://www.radixmagazine.com/2024/09/17/the-barmen-declaration-and-the-roots-of-antisemitism-in-the-german-protestant-church/
THE “PRESENT SITUATION” IN 1934 GERMANY
Germany was already a racial terror state when the Barmen Synod met. Clergy attending Barmen would have been required to document their “Aryan” descent to retain their positions. Pastors could no longer baptize or fellowship with Jewish converts. Ministers with even a fraction of Jewish blood could be excommunicated.
In the most blatant way, Jews stopping being Jewish does not stop antisemitism.
Actually, it's just the opposite. If the antisemite would stop being who they are, there would be no antisemitism.
The Jews and those who join them are in reality, Israelites. This is a nation called out by the Creator Gd. Last I checked the Tanakh, it is so. He gave land, set boundaries, and stated it was theirs in perpetuity. If one has an issue with the Jews, perhaps they should take it up with the Creator of Israel. Once antisemitism is taken up, that person really has an issue with the One you set aside the land and the people. And that makes it spiritual.
Technically speaking, the term "Jew" is inappropriate. It derives from the Tribe of Judah, whose lands were later termed Judea. Recall there were eleven other tribes. All tribes were eventually dispersed, with many retaining faith and culture. Not all were from Judah. Thus, Israelite is the more accurate term, leading us back to spiritual foundations.
The crux of the matter is we chews don't fit THEIR daffy-nitions...
Those that don't fit their daffynitions deserve neither a country nor a race--white? not white?--nor a religion--b/c many of us are secular more or less but even secular joos don't rock n' roll the same way as secular Christians... In brief, they cannot make us "FIT" inta their NORMS. Some say Joos are a fiction! We don't exist (yes I hear this--that there are no "real" joos--but they THEY wanna define us per "their reality"). See, it's existential...
Truly, we're a gemeinsam --an "overall thing" that we know but others cannot define for us.
We are not just "bagels & lox" (which speaks ta the concept of us bein' a joke) nor are we all streimel-wearin' / shaidel sportin' weirdos-- We are (not only) a faith (within which vast variations), a tribe, a "kulcha," a race, a world-view (which also varies), a set of values (must be educated, must play piano or violin, must SAVE the world, must SPEAK UP, we must DEBATE), a work ethic, and a cuisine (what joo hates food?)-- All in giant KitchenAid Mixer and this does NOT JIBE with those that wanna define us.
Unless we are defined, critical theory will not woik/woke/werk. Unless we are defined, the haters cannot so easily erase us. Unless we are defined they cannot take away from us Israel or our personal property fer that matter... The Nazis of course did a good chob of it definin' us by race / genetics alone which led them ta take our property AND our lives. Even those that shouted out they were no longer jooish didn't fare well...as we know. Even those from USSR who knew nuthin' about their heritage got treated like the contents of a doggie bag an' fled to come to Brooklyn as refuseniks. So joos are always joos for the most part...good ones, bad ones,even rotten ones (lol) An' even those that say they are not joos--are "discovered" by those that say we are. Whatever works in "their" favor seems to be how they define us.
But now everyone EXCEPT us joos (we have no problem knowin' who we are) wants ta put us square pegs in their round hole. Phooey! Phooey on them an' their dictionary daffynitions. We don't fit.
YET. We ALL know who we ARE, even when we disagree (when do we NOT disagree?! lol) we know who we are to the point that we can identify fakers, schtoonks among us, an' those who pretend to be joos an' ain't. We often look like each other (folks who say there is no jooish genetics don't accept this but it's troo! 14 studies show that we are all related). If you find a Hasid in NYC 'round about Succhis time they will call you out in streets and they KNOW -- joos don't proselytize or talk ta non-joos but they approach joos 'round this time ta cajole us inta coming to temple. It's crazy but they are SO good at knowin' us--no matter how we dress or look--that they kin spot us walkin' past the main library in NYC an' tell us ta come to temple (oy). I used ta respond in French that they were mistaken lol. Everyone tells me "but you don't look..." but the Hasidim they know. Funny. So how can we not exist--however we poorly try ta define ourselfs for OTHERS--when any Hasid over the age of 13 kin pick us out (easy).
Yes we are funny, yes we are no joke. I'm grateful fer ya Pat Johnson for tryin' ta point out all of this. Bottom line is people like things neat, tidy, in little boxes an' we don't fit--into boxes, into the imaginary daffynition of what constitutes a "people" or a "religion" or a "nation." They tell us that the "rules say" we cannot have Israel. When did there become some authority that defines "who gits ta be a country an' who doesn't" ? I missed out on them rules... When do we git "rights?" by their "rules" that defines who deserves "rights" (which apply to noble Palestinians... but not us joos) Go figger... I cannot.
1. You can't stop being Jewish by not believing in Judaism. If you have the blood. no one will let you forget it. To wit, hoards of Jewish atheists experience antisemitism. The Spanish and Portuguese Inquisitions tortured and killed Jewish converts to Catholicism for four hundred years because they just couldn't be *sure" how sincere the conversions were.
2. If you read Jewish history, you'll notice there has been a joyous rape-fest and massacre of Jews pretty much every 50 years for the past 2000 years. This has primarily been in Europe but there were also hundreds of years of it all over the Middle East. This means that Jewish blood gets watered down. For the most part, Jews have lived in closed communities, precisely because of the periodic orgies of Jewish rapes and murders. So, for instance, when my parents were dating and my father brought my mother home, my grandfather commented, "She looks like a Polish gentile," and it was an observation that she didn't get that face through a love match. She got it through decades of Saturday night pogroms in which the people in the next town would get liquored up and then come into the shtetl to rape and murder, with government approval. Are we a race? Enough to be killed for it, that's good enough for me.
3. Assimilation. When I moved to Maine, I was about as assimilated as it's possible to get and still people acted as if I had the letters JEW pulsing in neon on my forehead, without my saying a word. They would raise it in conversation. They would make a big deal about serving pork. They would casually drop the gospel fact that Jews are responsible for all the evil on the face of the earth. If you have the blood, you're a Jew, end of story, and no one will let you forget it. Let's remember the Dreyfus affair, the perfect French officer who happened to be Jewish who got strung up on a false charge. Let's consider the Jews in the US right now who are so assimilated many of them know absolutely nothing about their history, their religion or even their culture, but the calls for their death are at every university and all over social media. Assimilation does not protect you. Hiding does not protect you.
Assimilated Jews aren't clannish. They often have very little or nothing to do with other Jews and as Jews are isolated. Because they usually don't know Jewish history or Israeli history or Palestinian history, they don't have the facts at the tip of their tongue when confronted by the outrageous lies with which social media and the mainstream news are awash. They don't know what to say, they don't know how to defend themselves.
The only thing to do is to learn everything there is to know about Judaism, Jewish history, Israeli history, everything Jewish, and keep going deeper and deeper. You find more and more to love and to be proud of. The 50-year cycle of murder sends Jews back to the synagogue, back to each other's company, where they don't have to worry about being hated for their blood.
4. Yes it's possible to convert to Judaism. By custom, rabbis make it *extremely* difficult to become a Jew. That's probably because once you convert, your progeny *in perpetuity* can be hunted for Jewish blood. Because of the periodic purges of Jews, if you've converted, either you or some of your progeny are going to marry other Jews because you go to them for safety. It's only a matter of time before your line looks as Jewish as the rest. Are we a race? Yeah we are, with occasional additions, and these additions are good because otherwise we get too inbred, we get diseases from the inbreeding, and the additions strengthen the race.
If I had the power I'd make you an honourary Jew, but instead, I'll designate you a mensch, which is an honour in our culture.
I think you're onto something here. Jew hatred is complex and Janus-faced. Jews aren't understood...even we don't understand ourselves, so how could we expect others to understand us?? We're ambiguous as a people, and that ambiguity allows us to be mythologised, and it creates space for non-Jews to impute onto us any characteristic they want. Usually, it's the ultimate sin or crime of the time: socialist, capitalist, nomad, bacillus, and now, colonist. It's why Jew hatred is so violent and vitriolic, we're always cast in the most vile role. Not surprisingly, what is attributed to us is usually the evil that those doing the attributing are guilty of. It's white middle class people with European heritage who are accusing Jews of precisely what they, in fact, are. Hey Canadian/American Jihadists: most of my people were running for their lives escaping pogroms while your people were slaughtering Indigenous people on Turtle Island. Who's the colonist, exactly?
The other truth you uncover here is the 'stop being Jews' point. Bang on. The Christian bible is an advancement of the Torah, they say, and the Quran, well, the absolutely final word of G-d. How dare you Jews stick to your original texts! Stop being Jews, i.e., convert to the true word of the Father, or Allah. Jews don't have a mediator to engage with G-d, we have to figure it out for ourselves. We have no desire to impose our beliefs on others, to convert others. And it works for us, our ambiguity and direct engagement with the lack of certainly that lies at the core of our faith really works. Sadly, that terrifies a lot of people because it affords us a freedom that scares the crap out of authoritarian approaches to religion.
Thank you so much! And, yes -- antisemitism is often (almost always?) a projection of what non-Jews hate in themselves. Thank you vfor reading and for your wisdom.