Jewish
History, Jewish Religion:
The
Weight of Three Thousand Years
By
Professor Israel Shahak
Foreword by
Gore Vidal
1.
A Closed
Utopia?
2.
Prejudice and
Prevarication
3.
Orthodoxy and
Interpretation
4.
The Weight of
History
5.
The Laws
against Non-Jews
6.
Political
Consequences
Notes and
References
Index
Foreword:
Sometime in
the late 1950s, that world-class gossip
and occasional historian, John F.
Kennedy, told me how, in 1948, Harry S.
Truman had been pretty much abandoned by
everyone when he came to run for
president. Then an American Zionist
brought him two million dollars in cash,
in a suitcase, aboard his whistle-stop
campaign train. 'That's why our
recognition of Israel was rushed through
so fast.' As neither Jack nor I was an
antisemite (unlike his father and my
grandfather) we took this to be just
another funny story about Truman and the
serene corruption of American politics.
Unfortunately, the hurried recognition
of Israel as a state has resulted in
forty-five years of murderous confusion,
and the destruction of what Zionist
fellow travellers thought would be a
pluralistic state - home to its native
population of Muslims, Christians and
Jews, as well as a future home to
peaceful European and American Jewish
immigrants, even the ones who affected
to believe that the great realtor in the
sky had given them, in perpetuity, the
lands of Judea and Sameria. Since many
of the immigrants were good socialists
in Europe, we assumed that they would
not allow the new state to become a
theocracy, and that the native
Palestinians could live with them as
equals. This was not meant to be. I
shall not rehearse the wars and alarms
of that unhappy region. But I will say
that the hasty invention of Israel has
poisoned the political and intellectual
life of the USA, Israel's unlikely
patron.
Unlikely, because no other minority in
American history has ever hijacked so
much money from the American taxpayers
in order to invest in a 'homeland'. It
is as if the American taxpayer had been
obliged to support the Pope in his
reconquest of the Papal States simply
because one third of our people are
Roman Catholic. Had this been attempted,
there would have been a great uproar and
Congress would have said no. But a
religious minority of less than two per
cent has bought or intimidated seventy
senators (the necessary two thirds to
overcome an unlikely presidential veto)
while enjoying support of the media.
In a sense, I rather admire the way that
the Israel lobby has gone about its
business of seeing that billions of
dollars, year after year, go to make
Israel a 'bulwark against communism'.
Actually, neither the USSR nor communism
was ever much of a presence in the
region. What America did manage to do
was to turn the once friendly Arab world
against us. Meanwhile, the
misinformation about what is going on in
the Middle East has got even greater and
the principal victim of these gaudy lies
- the American taxpayer to one side - is
American Jewry, as it is constantly
bullied by such professional terrorists
as Begin and Shamir. Worse, with a few
honorable exceptions, Jewish-American
intellectuals abandoned liberalism for a
series of demented alliances with the
Christian (antisemtic) right and with
the Pentagon-industrial complex. In 1985
one of them blithely wrote that when
Jews arrived on the American scene they
'found liberal opinion and liberal
politicians more congenial in their
attitudes, more sensitive to Jewish
concerns' but now it is in the Jewish
interest to ally with the Protestant
fundamentalists because, after all, "is
there any point in Jews hanging on
dogmatically, hypocritically, to their
opinions of yesteryear?' At this point
the American left split and those of us
who criticised our onetime Jewish allies
for misguided opportunism, were promptly
rewarded with the ritual epithet
'antisemite' or 'self-hating Jew'.
Fortunately, the voice of reason is
alive and well, and in Israel, of all
places. From Jerusalem, Israel Shahak
never ceases to analyse not only the
dismal politics of Israel today but the
Talmud itself, and the effect of the
entire rabbinical tradition on a small
state that the right-wing rabbinate
means to turn into a theocracy for Jews
only. I have been reading Shahak for
years. He has a satirist's eye for the
confusions to be found in any religion
that tries to rationalise the
irrational. He has a scholar's sharp eye
for textual contradictions. He is a joy
to read on the great Gentile-hating Dr
Maimonides.
Needless to say, Israel's authorities
deplore Shahak. But there is not much to
be done with a retired professor of
chemistry who was born in Warsaw in 1933
and spent his childhood in the
concentration camp at Belsen. In 1945,
he came to Israel; served in the Israeli
military; did not become a Marxist in
the years when it was fashionable. He
was - and still is - a humanist who
detests imperialism whether in the names
of the God of Abraham or of George Bush.
Equally, he opposes with great wit and
learning the totalitarian strain in
Judaism. Like a highly learned Thomas
Paine, Shahank illustrates the prospect
before us, as well as the long history
behind us, and thus he continues to
reason, year after year. Those who heed
him will certainly be wiser and - dare I
say? - better. He is the latest, if not
the last, of the great prophets.
-
Gore Vidal
CHAPTER
1
A
Closed Utopia?
THIS
BOOK, although written in English and
addressed to people living outside the
State of Israel, is, in a way, a
continuation of my political activities
as an Israeli Jew. Those activities
began in 1965-6 with a protest which
caused a considerable scandal at the
time: I had personally witnessed an
ultra-religious Jew refuse to allow his
phone to be used on the Sabbath in order
to call an ambulance for a non-Jew who
happened to have collapsed in his
Jerusalem neighbourhood. Instead of
simply publishing the incident in the
press, I asked for a meeting which is
composed of rabbis nominated by the
State of Israel. I asked them whether
such behavior was consistent with their
interpretation of the Jewish religion.
They answered that the Jew in question
had behaved correctly, indeed piously,
and backed their statement by referring
me to a passage in an authoritative
compendium of Talmudic laws, written in
this century. I reported the incident to
the main Hebrew daily, Ha'aretz, whose
publication of the story caused a media
scandal.
The results of the scandal were, for me,
rather negative. Neither the Israeli,
nor the diaspora, rabbinical authorities
ever reversed their ruling that a Jew
should not violate the Sabbath in order
to save the life of a Gentile. They
added much sanctimonious twaddle to the
effect that if the consequence of such
an act puts Jews in danger, the
violation of the Sabbath is permitted,
for their sake. It became apparent to
me, as drawing on Talmudic laws
governing the relations between Jews and
non-Jews, that neither Zionism,
including its seemingly secular part,
nor Israeli politics since the inception
of the State of Israel, nor particularly
the policies of the Jewish supporters of
Israel in the diaspora, could be
understood unless the deeper influence
of those laws, and the worldview which
they both create and express is taken
into account. The actual policies Israel
pursued after the Six Day War, and in
particular the apartheid character of
the Israeli regime in the Occupied
Territories and the attitude of the
majority of Jews to the issue of the
rights of the Palestinians, even in the
abstract, have merely strengthened this
conviction.
By making this statement I am not trying
to ignore the political or strategic
considerations which may have also
influenced the rulers of Israel. I am
merely saying that actual politics is an
interaction between realistic
considerations (whether valid or
mistaken, moral or immoral in my view)
and ideological influences. The latter
tend to be more influential the less
they are discussed and 'dragged into the
light'. Any form of racism,
discrimination and xenophobia becomes
more potent and politically influential
if it is taken for granted by the
society which indulges in it. This is
especially so if its discussion is
prohibited, either formally or by tacit
agreement. When racism, discrimination
and xenophobia is prevalent among Jews,
and directed against non-Jews, being
fueled by religious motivations, it is
like its opposite case, that of
antisemitism and its religious
motivations. Today, however, while the
second is being discussed, the very
existence of the first is generally
ignored, more outside Israel than within
it.
Without a discussion of the prevalent
Jewish attitudes to non-Jews, even the
concept of Israel as 'a Jewish state',
as Israel formally defines itself,
cannot be understood. The widespread
misconception that Israel, even without
considering its regime in the Occupied
Territories, is a true democracy arises
from the refusal to confront the
significance of the term 'a Jewish
state' for non-Jews. In my view, Israel
as a Jewish state constitutes a danger
not only to itself and its inhabitants,
but to all Jews and to all other peoples
and states in the Middle East and
beyond. I also consider that other
Middle Eastern states or entities which
define themselves as 'Arab' or 'Muslim',
like the Israeli self-definition as
being 'Jewish', likewise constitute a
danger. However, while this danger is
widely discussed, the danger inherent in
the Jewish character of the State of
Israel is not.
The principle of Israel as 'a Jewish
state' was supremely important to
Israeli politicians from the inception
of the state and was inculcated into the
Jewish population by all conceivable
ways. When, in the early 1980s, a tiny
minority of Israeli Jews emerged which
opposed this concept, a Constitutional
Law (that is, a law overriding
provisions of other laws, which cannot
be revoked except by a special
procedure) was passed in 1985 by an
enormous majority of the Knesset.
By this law no party whose programme
openly opposes the principle of 'a
Jewish state' or proposes to change it
by democratic means, is allowed to
participate in the elections to the
Knesset. I myself strongly oppose this
constitutional principle. The legal
consequence for me is that I cannot
belong, in the state of which I am a
citizen, to a party having principles
with which I would agree and which is
allowed to participate in Knesset
elections. Even this example shows that
the State of Israel is not a democracy
due to the application of a Jewish
ideology directed against all non-Jews
and those Jews who oppose this ideology.
But the danger which this dominant
ideology represents is not limited to
domestic affairs. It also influences
Israeli foreign policies. This danger
will continue to grow, as long as two
currently operating developments are
being strengthened: the increase in the
Jewish character of Israel and the
increase in its power, particularly in
nuclear power. Another ominous factor is
that Israeli influence in the USA
political establishment is also
increasing. Hence accurate information
about Judaism, and especially about the
treatment of non-Jews by Israel, is now
not only important, but politically
vital as well.
Let me begin with the official Israeli
definition of the term 'Jewish',
illustrating the crucial difference
between Israel as 'a Jewish state' and
the majority of other states. By this
official definition, Israel 'belongs' to
persons who are defined by the Israeli
authorities as 'Jewish', irrespective of
where they live, and to them alone. On
the other hand, Israel doesn't
officially 'belong' to its non-Jewish
citizens, whose status is considered
even officially as inferior. This means
in practice that if members of a
Peruvian tribe are converted to Judaism,
and thus regarded as Jewish, they are
entitled at once to become Israeli
citizens and benefit from the
approximately 70 per cent of the West
Bank land (and the 92 per cent of the
area of Israel proper), officially
designated only for the benefit of Jews.
All non-Jews ( not only all
Palestinians) are prohibited from
benefiting from those lands. (The
prohibition applies even to Israeli
Arabs who served in the Israeli army and
reached a high rank.) The case involving
Peruvian converts to Judaism actually
occurred a few years ago. The
newly-created Jews were settled in the
West Bank, near Nablus, on land from
which non-Jews are officially excluded.
All Israeli governments are taking
enormous political risks, including the
risk of war, so that such settlements,
composed exclusively of persons who are
defined as 'Jewish' (and not 'Israeli'
as most of the media mendaciously
claims) would be subject to only
'Jewish' authority.
I suspect that the Jews of the USA or of
Britian would regard it as antisemitic
if Christians would propose that the USA
or the United Kingdom should become a
'Christian state', belonging only to
citizens officially defined as
'Christians'. The consequence of such
doctrine is that Jews converting to
Christianity would become full citizens
because of their conversion. It should
be recalled that the benefits of
conversions are well known to Jews from
their own history. When the Christian
and the Islamic states used to
discriminate against all persons not
belonging to the religion of the state,
including the Jews, the discrimination
against Jews was at once removed by
their conversion. But a non-Jew
discriminated against by the State of
Israel will cease to be so treated the
moment he or she converts to
Judaism.This simply shows that the same
kind of exclusivity that is regarded by
a majority of the diaspora Jews as
antisemitic is regarded by the majority
of all Jews as Jewish. To oppose both
antisemitism and Jewish chauvinism is
widely regarded among Jews as a
'self-hatred', a concept which I regard
as nonsensical.
The meaning of the term 'Jewish' and its
cognates, including 'Judaism', thus
becomes in the context of Israeli
politics as important as the meaning of
'Islamic', when officially used by Iran,
or 'communist' when it was officially
used by the USSR. However, the meaning
of the term 'Jewish' as it is popularly
used is not clear, either in Hebrew or
when translated into other languages,
and so the term had to be defined
officially.
According to Israeli law a person is
considered 'Jewish' if either their
mother, grandmother, great-grandmother
and great-great-grandmother were
Jewesses by religion; or if the person
was converted to Judaism in a way
satisfactory to the Israeli authorities,
and on condition that the person has not
converted from Judaism to another
religion, in which case Israel ceases to
regard them as 'Jewish'. Of the three
conditions, the first represents the
Talmudic definition of 'who is a Jew', a
defintion followed by Jewish Orthodoxy.
The Talmud and post-Talmudic rabbinic
law also recognise the conversion of a
non-Jew to Judaism (as well as the
purchase of a non-Jewish slave by a Jew
followed by a different kind of
conversion) as a method of becoming
Jewish, provided that the conversion is
performed by authorised rabbis in a
proper manner. This 'proper manner'
entails for females, their inspection by
three rabbis while naked in a 'bath of
purification', a ritual which, although
notorious to all readers of the Hebrew
press, is not often mentioned by the
English media in spite of its undoubted
interest for certain readers. I hope
that this book will be the beginning of
a process which will rectify this
discrepancy.
But there is another urgent necessity
for an official definitionof who is, and
who is not 'Jewish'. The State of Israel
officially discriminates in favour of
Jews and against non-Jews in many
domains of life, of which I regard three
as being most important: residency
rights, the right to work and the right
to equality before the law.
Discrimination in residency is based on
the fact that about 92 per cent of
Israel's land is the property of the
state and is administered by the Israel
Land Authority according to regulations
issued by the Jewish National Fund
(JNF), and affiliate of the World
Zionist Organization. In its regualtions
the JNFdenies the right to reside, to
open a business, and often to work, to
anyone who is not Jewish, only because
he is not Jewish. At the same time, Jews
are not prohibited from taking residence
or opening businesses anywhere in
Israel. If applied in another state
against the Jews, such discriminatory
practice would instantly and justifiably
be labelled antisemitism and would no
doubt spark massive public protests.
When applied by Israel as a part of its
'Jewish ideology', they are usually
studiously ignored or excused when
rarely mentioned.
The denial of the right to work means
that non-Jews are prohibited officially
from working on land administered by the
Israel Land Authority according to the
JNF regulations. No doubt these
regulations are not always, or even
often, enforced but they do exist. From
time to time Israel attempts enforcement
campaigns by state authorities, as, for
example, when the Agriculture Ministry
acts against 'the pestilence of letting
fruit orchards belonging to Jews and
situated on National Land [i.e., land
belonging to the State of Israel] be
harvested by Arab labourers', even if
the labourers in question are citizens
of Israel. Israel also strictly
prohibits Jews settled on 'National
Land' to sub-rent even a part of their
land to Arabs, even for a short time;
and those who do so are punished,
usually by heavy fines. There is no
prohibitions on non-Jews renting their
land to Jews. This means, in my own
case, that by virtue of being a Jew I
have the right to lease an orchard for
harvesting its produce from another Jew,
but a non-Jew, whether a citizen of
Israel or a resident alien, does not
have this right.
Non-Jewish citizens of Israel do not
have the right to equality before the
law. This discimination is expressed in
many Israeli laws in which, presumably
in order to avoid embarressment, the
terms 'Jewish' and 'non-Jewish' are
usually not explicitly stated, as they
are in the crucial Law of Return.
According to that law only persons
officially recognised as 'Jewish' have
an automatic right of entry to Israel
and of settling in it. They
automatically receive an 'immigration
certificate' which provides them on
arrival with 'citizenship by virtue of
having returned to the Jewish homeland',
and with the right to many financial
benefits, which vary somewhat according
to the country from which they
emmigrated. The Jews who emigrate from
the states of the former UUSR receive
'an absorption grant' of more than
$20,000 per family. All Jews immigrating
to Israel accordingthis law immediately
acquire the right to vote in elections
and to be elected to the Knesset -- even
if they do not speak a word of Hebrew.
Other Israeli laws substitute the more
obtuse expressions 'anyone who can
immigrate in accordance with the Law of
Return' and 'anyone who is not entitled
to immigrate in accordance with the law
of Return'. Depending onthe law in
questionm benefits are them grantedto
the first category and systematically
denied to the second. The routine means
for enforcing discrimination in everyday
life is the ID card, which everyone is
obliged to carry at all times. ID cards
list the official 'nationality' of a
person, which can be 'Jewish', 'Arab',
'Druze' and the like, witah the
significant exception of 'Israeli'.
Attempts to force the Interior Minister
to allow Israelis wishing to be
officially described as 'Israeli', or
even as 'Israeli-Jew' in their ID cards
have failed. Those who have attempted to
do so have a letter from the Ministry of
the Interior stating that 'it was
decided not to recognise an Israeli
nationality'. The letter does not
specify who made this decision or when.
There are so many laws and regulations
in Israel which discriminate in favour
of the persons defined in Israel as
those 'who can immigrate in accordance
with the Law of Return' that the subject
demands seperate treatment. We can look
here at one example, seemingly trivial
in comparison with residence
restrictions, but nevertheless important
since it reveals the real intentions of
the Israeli legislator. Israeli citizens
who left the country for a time but who
are defined as those who 'can immigrate
in accordance with the Law of Return'
are eligible on their return to generous
customs benefits, to receive subsidy for
their children's high school education,
and to receive either a grant or a loan
on easy terms for the purchase of an
apartment, as well as other benefits.
Citizens who cannot be so defined, in
other words, the non-Jewish citizens of
Israel, get none of these benefits. The
obvious intention of such discriminatory
measures is to decrease tje number of
non-Jewish citizens of Israel, in order
to make Israel a more 'Jewish' state.
The
Ideology of 'Redeemed' Land
Israel also
propagates among its Jewish citizens an
exclusivist ideology of the Redemption
of Land. Its official aim of minimizing
the number of non-Jews can be well
perceived in this ideology , which is
inculcated to Jewish schoolchildren in
Israel. They are taught that it is
applicable to the entire extent of
either the State of Israel or, after
1967, to what is referred to as the Land
of Israel. According to this ideology,
the land which has been 'redeemed' is
the land which has passed from
non-Jewish ownership to Jewish
ownership. The ownership can be either
private, or belong to either the JNF or
the Jewish state. The land which belongs
to non-Jews is, on the contrary,
considered to be 'unredeemed'. Thus, if
a Jew who committed the blackest crimes
which can be imagined buys a piece of
land from a virtuous non-Jew, the
'unredeemed' land becomes 'redeemed' by
such a transaction. However, if a
virtuous non-Jew purchases land from the
worst Jew, the formerly pure and
'redeemed' land becomes 'unredeemed'
again. The logical conclusion of such an
ideology is the expulsion, called
'transfer', of all non-Jews from the
area of land which has to be 'redeemed'.
Therefore the Utopia of the 'Jewish
ideology' adopted by the State of Israel
is a land which is wholly 'redeemed' and
none of it is owned or worked by
non-Jews. The leaders of the Zionist
labour movement expressed this utterly
repellent idea with the greatest
clarity. Walter Laquer a devoted
Zionist, tells in his History of Zionism1
how one of these spiritual fathers, A.D.
Gordon, who died in 1919, 'objected to
violence in principle and justified self
defence only in extreme circumstances.
But he and his friends wanted every tree
and bush in the Jewish homeland to be
planted by nobody else except Jewish
pioneers'. This means that they wanted
everybody else to just go away and leave
the land to be 'redeemed' by Jews.
Gordon's successors added more violence
than he intended but the principle of
'redemption' and its consequences have
remained.
In the same way, the kibbutz, widely
hailed as an attempt to create a Utopia,
was and is an exclusivist Utopia; even
if it is composed of atheists, it does
not accent Arab members on principle and
demands that potential members from
other nationalities be first converted
to Judaism. No wonder the kibbutz boys
can be regarded as the most militaristic
segment of the Israeli jewish society.
It is this exclusivist ideology, rather
than all the 'security needs' alleged by
Israeli propaganda, which determines the
takeovers of land in Israel in the 1950s
and again in the mid-1960s and in the
Occupied Territories after 1967. This
ideology also dictated official Israeli
plans for 'the Judaizition of Galilee'.
This curious term means encouraging Jews
to settle in Galilee by giving them
financial benefits. (I wonder what would
be the reaction of US Jews if a plan for
'the Christianization of New York' or
even only of Brooklyn, would be proposed
in their country.) But the Redemption of
the Land implies more than regional
'Judaization'. In the entire area of
Israel the JNF, vigorously backed by
Israeli state agencies (especially by
the secret police) is spending great
sums of public money in order to
'redeem' any land which non-Jews are
willing to sell, and to preempt any
attempt by a Jew to sell his land to a
non-Jew by paying him a higher price.
Israeli
Expansionism
The main
danger which Israel, as 'a Jewish
state', poses to its own people, to
other Jews and to its neighbors, is its
ideologically motivated pursuit of
territorial expansion and the inevitable
series of wars resulting from this aim.
The more Israel becomes Jewish or, as
one says in Hebrew, the more it 'returns
to Judaism' (a process which has been
under way in Israel at least since
1967), the more its actual politics are
guided by Jewish ideological
considerations and less by rational
ones. My use of the term 'rational' does
not refer here to a moral evaluation of
Israeli policies, or to the supposed
defence or security needs of Israel -
even less so to the supposed needs of
'Israeli survival'. I am referring here
to Israeli imperial policies based on
its presumed interests. However morally
bad or politically crass such policies
are, I regard the adoption of policies
based on 'Jewish ideology', in all its
different versions as being even worse.
The ideological defence of Israeli
policies are usually based on Jewish
religious beliefs or, in the case of
secular Jews, on the 'historical rights'
of the Jews which derive from those
beliefs and retain the dogmatic
character of religious faith.
My own early political conversion from
admirer of Ben-Gurion to his dedicated
opponent began exactly with such an
issue. In 1956 I eagerly swallowed all
of Ben-Gurion's political and military
reasons for Israel initiating the Suez
War, until he (in spite of being an
atheist, proud of his disregard of the
commandments of Jewish religion)
pronounced in the Knesset on the third
day of that war, that the real reason
for it is 'the restoration of the
kingdom of David and Solomon' to its
Biblical borders. At this point in his
speech, almost every Knesset member
spontaneously rose and sang the Israeli
national anthem. To my knowledge, no
zionist politician has ever repudiated
Ben-Gurion's idea that Israeli policies
must be based (within the limits of
pragmatic considerations) on the
restoration of the Biblical borders as
the borders of the Jewish state. Indeed,
close analysis of Israeli grand
strategies and actual principles of
foreign policy, as they are expressed in
Hebrew, makes it clear that it is
'Jewish ideology', more than any other
factor, which determines actual Israeli
policies. The disregard of Judaism as it
really is and of 'Jewish ideology' makes
those policies incomprehensible to
foreign observers who usually know
nothing about Judaism exept crude
apologetics.
Let me give a more recent illustration
of the essential difference which exists
between Israeli imperial planning of the
most inflated but secular type, and the
principles of 'Jewish ideology'. The
latter enjoins that land which was
either ruled by any Jewish ruler in
ancient times or was promised by God to
the Jews, either in the Bible or - what
is actually more important politically -
according to a rabbinic interpretation
of the Bible and the Talmud, should
belong to Israel since it is a Jewish
state. No doubt, many Jewish 'doves' are
of the opinion that such conquest should
be deferred to a time when Israel will
be stronger than it is now, or that
there would be, hopefully, a 'peaceful
conquest', that is , that the Arab
rulers or peoples would be 'persuaded'
to cede the land in question in return
for benefits which the Jewish state
would then confer on them.
A number of discrepant versions of
Biblical borders of the Land of Israel,
which rabbinical authorities interpret
as ideally belonging to the Jewish
state, are in circulation. The most
far-reaching among them include the
following areas within these borders: in
the south, all of Sinai and a part of
nothern Egypt up to the environs of
Cairo; in the east, all of Jordan and a
large chunk of Saudi Arabia, all of
Kuwait and a part of Iraq south of the
Euphrates; in the north, all of Lebanon
and all of Syria together with a huge
part of Turkey (up to lake Van); and in
the west, Cyprus. An enormous body of
research and learned discussion based on
these borders, embodied in atlases,
books, articles and more popular forms
of propaganda is being published in
Israel, often with state subsidies, or
other forms of support. Certainly the
late Kahane and his followers, as will
as influential bodies such as Gush
Emunim, not only desire the conquest of
those territories by Israel, but regard
it as a divinely commanded act, sure to
be successful since it will be aided by
God. In fact, important Jewish religious
figures regard the Israeli refusal to
undertake such a holy war, or even
worse, the return of Sinai to Egypt, as
a national sin which was justly punished
by God. One of the more influential Gush
Emunim rabbis, Dov Lior, the rabbi of
Jewish settlements of Kiryat Arba and of
Hebron, stated repeatedly that the
Israeli failure to conquer Lebanon in
1982-5 was a well-merited divine
punishment for its sin of 'giving a part
of Land of Israel', namely Sinai, to
Egypt.
Although I have chosen an admittedly
extreme example of the Biblical borders
of the Land of Israel which 'belong' to
the 'Jewish state', those borders are
quite popular in national-religious
circles. There are less extreme versions
of Biblical borders, sometimes also
called 'historical borders'. It should
however be emphasized that within Israel
and the community of its diaspora Jewish
supporters, the validity of the concept
of either Biblical borders or historical
borders as delineating the bordrers of
land which belongs to Jews by right is
not denied on grounds of principle,
except by the tiny minority which
opposes the concept of a Jewish state.
Otherwise, objections to the realisation
of such borders by a war are purely
pragmatical. One can claim that Israel
is now too weak to conquer all the land
which 'belongs' to the Jews, or that the
loss of Jewish lives (but not of Arab
lives!) entailed in a war of conquest of
such magnitude is more important than
the conquest of the land, but in
normative Judaism one cannot claim that
'the Land of Israel', in whatever
borders, does not 'belong' to all the
Jews. In May 1993, Ariel Sharon formally
proposed in the Likud Convention that
Israel should adopt the 'Biblical
borders' concept as its official policy.
There were rather few objections to this
proposal, either in the Likud or outside
it, and all were cased on pragmaic
grounds. No one even asked Sharon where
exactly are the Biblical borders which
he was urging that Israel should attain.
Let us recall that among those who call
themselves Leninists there was no doubt
that history follows the principles laid
out by Marx and Lenin. It is not only
the belief itself, however dogmatic, but
the refusal that it should ever be
doubted, by thwarting open discussion,
which creates a totalitarian cast of
mind. Israeli-Jewish society and
diaspora Jews who are leading 'Jewish
lives' and organised in purely Jewish
organisations, can be said therefore to
have a strong streak of totalitarianism
in their character.
However, an Israeli grand strategy, not
based on the tenets of 'Jewish
ideology', but based on purely strategic
or imperial considerations had also
developed since the inception of the
state. An authoriative and lucid
description of the principles governing
such strategy was given by General
(Reserves) Shlomo Gazit, a former
Military Intelligence commander.--
According to Gazit,
"Israel's main task has not changed
at all [since the demise of the
USSR] and it remains of crucial
importance. The geographical
location of Israel at the centre of
the Arab-Muslim Middle East
predestines Israel to be a devoted
guardian of stability in all the
countries surrounding it. Its [role]
is to protect the existing regimes:
to prevent or halt the processes of
radicalization, and to block the
expansion of fundamentalist
religious zealtory.
For this purpose Israel will prevent
changes occuring beyond Israel's
borders [which it] will regard as
intolerable, to the point of feeling
compelled to use all its military
power for the sake of their
prevention or eradication."
In other words, Israel aims at imposing
a hegemony on other Middle Eastern
states. Needless to say, according to
Gazit, Israel has a benevolent concern
for the stability of the Arab regimes.
In Gazit's view, by protecting Middle
Eastern regimes, Israel performs a vital
service for 'the industrially advanced
states, all of which are keenly
concerned with guaranteeing the
stability in the Middle East'. He argues
that without Israel the existing regimes
of the region would have collapsed long
ago and that they remain in existence
only because of Israeli threats. While
this view may be hypocritical, one
should recall in such contexts La
Rochefoucault's maxim that 'hypocrisy is
the tax which wickedness pays to
virtue'. Redemption of the Land is an
attempt to evade paying any such tax.
Needless to say, I also oppose root and
branch the Israeli non-ideological
policies as they are so lucidly and
correctly explained by Gazit. At the
same time, I recognize that the dangers
of the policies of Ben-Gurion of Sharon,
motivated by 'Jewish ideology', are much
worse than merely imperial policies,
however criminal. The results of
policies of other ideologically
motivated regimes point in the same
direction. The existence of an important
component of Israeli policy, which is
based on 'Jewish ideology', makes its
analysis politically imperative. This
ideology is, in turn based on the
attitudes of historic Judaism to
non-Jews, one of the main themes of this
book. Those attitudes necessarily
influence many Jews, consciously or
unconciously. Our task here is to
discuss historic Judaism in real terms.
The influence on 'Jewish ideology' on
many Jews will be stronger the more it
is hidden from public discussion. Such
discussion will, it is hoped, lead
people take the same attitude towards
Jewish chauvinism and the contempt
displayed by so many Jews towards
non-Jews (which will be documented
below) as that commonly taken towards
antisemitism and all other forms of
xenophobia, chauvinism and racism. It is
justly assumed that only the full
exposition, not only of antisemitism,
but also of its historical roots, can be
the basis of struggle against it.
Likewise I am assuming that only the
full exposition of Jewish chauvinism and
religious fanaticism can be the basis of
struggle against those phenomena. This
is especially true today when, contrary
to the situation prevailing fifty or
sixty years ago, the political influence
of Jewish chauvinism and religious
fanaticism is much greater than that of
antisemitism. But there is also another
important consideration. I strongly
believe that antisemitism and Jewish
chauvinism can only be fought
simultaneously.
A Closed
Utopia?
Until such
attitudes are widely adopted, the actual
danger of Israeli policies based on
'Jewish ideology' remains greater than
the danger of policies based on purely
strategic considerations. The difference
between the two kinds of policies was
well expressed by Hugh Trevor-Roper in
his essay 'Sir Thomas More and Utopia'
3
in which he termed them Platonic and
Machiavellian:
-
"Machiavelli at least apologized for
the methods which he thought
necessary in politics. He regretted
the necessity of force and fraud and
did not call them by any other name.
But Plato and More sanctified them,
provided that they were used to
sustain their own Utopian
republics."
In a
similiar way true believers in that
Utopia called the 'Jewish state', which
will strive to achieve the 'Biblical
borders', are more dangerous than the
grand strategists of Gazit's type
because their policies are being
sanctified either by the use of religion
or, worse, by the use of secularized
religious principles which retaim
absolute validity. While Gazit at least
sees a need to argue that the Israel
diktat benefits the Arab regimes,
Ben-Gurion did not pretend that the
re-establishment of the kingdom of David
and Solomon will benefit anybody except
the Jewish state.
Using the concepts of Platonism to
analyse Israeli policies based on
'Jewish ideology' should not seem
strange. It was noticed by several
scholars, of whom the most important was
Moses Hadas, who claimed that the
foundations of 'classical Judaism', that
is, of Judaism as it was established by
talmudic sages, are based on Platonic
influences and especially on the image
of Sparta as it appears in Plato.4
According to Hadas, a crucial feature of
the Platonic political system, adopted
by Judaism as early as the Maccabean
period (142-63 BC), was 'that every
phase of human conduct be subject to
religious sanctions which are in fact to
be manipulated by the ruler'. There can
be no better definition of 'classical
Judaism' and of the ways in which the
rabbis manipulated it than this Platonic
definition. In particular, Hadas claims
that Judaism adopted what 'Plato himself
summarized [as] the objectives of his
program', in the following well-known
passage:
- "The
principle thing is that no one, man
or woman, should ever be without an
officer set over him, and that none
should get the mental habit of
taking any step, whether in earnest
or in jest, on his individual
responsibility. In peace as in war
he must live always with his eyes on
his superior officer... In a word,
we must train the mind not to even
consider acting as an invidual or
know how to do it." (Laws, 942ab)
If the word
'rabbi' is substituted for 'an officer'
we will have a perfect image of
classical Judaism. The latter is still
deeply influencing Israeli-Jewish
society and determing to a large extent
the Israeli policies.
It was the above quoted passage which
was chosen by Karl Popper in The Open
Society and Its Enemies as describing
the essence of 'a closed society'.
Historical Judaism and its two
successors, Jewish Orthodoxy and
Zionism, are both sworn enemies of the
concept of the open society as applied
to Israel. A Jewish state, whether based
on its present Jewish ideology or, if it
becomes even more Jewish in character
than it is now, on the principles of
Jewish Orthodoxy, cannot ever contain an
open society. There are two choices
which face Israeli-Jewish society. It
can become a fully closed and warlike
ghetto, a Jewish Sparta, supported by
the labour of Arab helots, kept in
existence by its influence on the US
political establishment and by threats
to use its nuclear power, or it can try
to become an open society. The second
choice is dependent on an honest
examination of its Jewish past, on the
admission that Jewish chauvinism and
exclusivism exist, and on an honest
examination of the attitudes of Judaism
towards the non-Jews.
CHAPTER
2
Prejudice and Prevarication
THE
FIRST DIFFICULTY in writing about
this subject is that the term 'Jew' has
been used during the last 150 years with
two rather different meanings. To
understand this, let us imagine
ourselves in the year 1780. Then the
universally accepted meaning of the term
'Jew' basically coincided with what the
Jews themselves understood as
constituting their own identity. This
identity was primarily religious, but
the precepts of religion governed the
details of daily behavior in all aspects
of life, both social and private, among
the Jews themselves as well as in their
relation to non-Jews. It was then
literally true that a Jew could not even
drink a glass of water in the home of a
non-Jew. And the same basic laws of
behavior towards non-Jews were equally
valid from Yemen to New York. Whatever
the term by which the Jews of 1780 may
be described - and I do not wish to
enter into a metaphysical dispute about
terms like, 'nation' and 'people'1
- it is clear that all Jewish
communities at that time were separate
from the non-Jewish societies in the
midst of which they were living.
However, all
this was changed by two parallel
processes - beginning in Holland and
England, continuing in revolutionary
France and in countries which followed
the example of the French Revolution,
and then in the modern monarchies of the
19th century: the Jews gained a
significant level of individual rights
(in some cases full legal equality), and
the legal power of the Jewish community
over its members was destroyed. It
should be noted that both developments
were simultaneous, and that the latter
is even more important, albeit less
widely known, than the former.
Since the
time of the late Roman Empire, Jewish
communities had considerable legal
powers over their members. Not only
powers which arise through voluntary
mobilization of social pressure (for
example refusal to have any dealing
whatsoever with an excommunicated Jew or
even to bury his body), but a power of
naked coercion: to flog, to imprison, to
expel - all this could be inflicted
quite legally on an individual Jew by
the rabbinical courts for all kinds of
offenses. In many countries - Spain and
Poland are notable examples - even
capital punishment could be and was
inflicted, sometimes using particularly
cruel methods such as flogging to death.
All this was not only permitted but
positively encouraged by the state
authorities in both Christian and Muslim
countries, who besides their general
interest in preserving 'law and order'
had in some cases a more direct
financial interest as well. For example,
in Spanish archives dating from the 13th
and 14th centuries there are records of
many detailed orders issued by those
most devout Catholic Kings of Castile
and Aragon, instructing their no less
devout officials to co-operate with the
rabbis in enforcing observance of the
Sabbath by the Jews. Why? Because
whenever a Jew was fined by a rabbinical
court for violating the Sabbath, the
rabbis had to hand nine tenths of the
fine over to the king - a very
profitable and effective arrangement.
Similarly, one can quote from the
responsa written shortly before 1832 by
the famous Rabbi Moshe Sofer of
Pressburg (now Bratislava), in what was
then the autonomous Hungarian Kingdom in
the Austrian Empire, and addressed to
Vienna in Austria proper, where the Jews
had already been granted some
considerable individual rights.2
He laments the fact that since the
Jewish congregation in Vienna lost its
powers to punish offenders, the Jews
there have become lax in matters of
religious observance, and adds: 'Here in
Pressburg, when I am told that a Jewish
shopkeeper dared to open his shop during
the Lesser Holidays, I immediately send
a policeman to imprison him.'
This was the
most important social fact of Jewish
existence before the advent of the
modern state: observance of the
religious laws of Judaism, as well as
their inculcation through education,
were enforced on Jews by physical
coercion, from which one could only
escape by conversion to the religion of
the majority, amounting in the
circumstances to a total social break
and for that reason very impracticable,
except during a religious crisis.3
However,
once the modern state had come into
existence, the Jewish community lost its
powers to punish or intimidate the
individual Jew. The bonds of one of the
most closed of 'closed societies', one
of the most totalitarian societies in
the whole history of mankind were
snapped. This act of liberation came
mostly from outside; although there were
some Jews who helped it from within,
these were at first very few. This form
of liberation had very grave
consequences for the future. Just as in
the case of Germany (according to the
masterly analysis of A.J.P. Taylor) it
was easy to ally the cause of reaction
with patriotism, because in actual fact
individual rights and equality before
the law were brought into Germany by the
armies of the French Revolution and of
Napoleon, and one could brand liberty as
'un-German', exactly so it turned out to
be very easy among the Jews,
particularly in Israel, to mount a very
effective attack against all the notions
and ideals of humanism and the rule of
law (not to say democracy) as something
'un-Jewish' or 'anti-Jewish' - as indeed
they are, in a historical sense - and as
principles which may be used in the
'Jewish interest', but which have no
validity against the 'Jewish interest',
for example when Arabs invoke these same
principles. This has also led - again
just as in Germany and other nations of
Mitteleuropa - to a deceitful,
sentimental and ultra-romantic Jewish
historiography, from which all
inconvenient facts have been expunged.
So one will
not find in Hannah Arendt's voluminous
writings, whether on totalitarianism or
on Jews, or on both,4
the smallest hint as to what Jewish
society in Germany was really like in
the 18th century: burning of books,
persecution of writers, disputes about
the magic powers of amulets, bans on the
most elementary 'non-Jewish' education
such as the teaching of correct German
or indeed German written in the Latin
alphabet. Nor can one find in the
numerous English-language 'Jewish
histories' the elementary facts about
the attitude of Jewish mysticism (so
fashionable at present in certain
quarters) to non-Jews: that they are
considered to be, literally, limbs of
Satan, and that the few non-satanic
individuals among them (that is, those
who convert to Judaism) are in reality
'Jewish souls' who got lost when Satan
violated the Holy Lady (Shekhinah or
Matronit, one of the female components
of the Godhead, sister and wife of the
younger male God according to the
cabbala) in her heavenly abode. The
great authorities, such as Gershom
Scholem, have lent their authority to a
system of deceptions in all the
'sensitive' areas, the more popular ones
being the most dishonest and misleading.
But the
social consequence of this process of
liberalization was that, for the first
time since about AD 200,
6
a Jew could be free to do what he liked,
within the bounds of his country's civil
law, without having to pay for this
freedom by converting to another
religion. The freedom to learn and read
books in modern languages, the freedom
to read and write books in Hebrew not
approved by the rabbis (as any Hebrew or
Yiddish book previously had to be), the
freedom to eat non-kosher food, the
freedom to ignore the numerous absurd
taboos regulating sexual life, even the
freedom to think - for 'forbidden
thoughts' are among the most serious
sins - all these were granted to the
Jews of Europe (and subsequently of
other countries) by modern or even
absolutist European regimes, although
the latter were at the same time
antisemitic and oppressive. Nicholas I
of Russia was a notorious antisemite and
issued many laws against the Jews of his
state. But he also strengthened the
forces of 'law and order' in Russia -
not only the secret police but also the
regular police and the gendarmerie -
with the consequence that it became
difficult to murder Jews on the order of
their rabbis, whereas in pre-1795 Poland
it had been quite easy. 'Official'
Jewish history condemns him on both
counts. For example, in the late 1830s a
'Holy Rabbi' (Tzadik) in a small Jewish
town in the Ukraine ordered the murder
of a heretic by throwing him into the
boiling water of the town baths, and
contemporary Jewish sources note with
astonishment and horror that bribery was
'no longer effective' and that not only
the actual perpetrators but also the
Holy Man were severely punished. The
Metternich regime of pre-1848 Austria
was notoriously reactionary and quite
unfriendly to Jews, but it did not allow
people, even liberal Jewish rabbis, to
be poisoned. During 1848, when the
regime's power was temporarily weakened,
the first thing the leaders of the
Jewish community in the Galician city of
Lemberg (now Lvov) did with their newly
regained freedom was to poison the
liberal rabbi of the city, whom the tiny
non-Orthodox Jewish group in the city
had imported from Germany. One of his
greatest heresies, by the way, was the
advocacy and actual performance of the
Bar Mitzvah ceremony, which had recently
been invented.
Liberation from Outside
In the last
150 years, the term 'Jew' has therefore
acquired a dual meaning, to the great
confusion of some well-meaning people,
particularly in the English-speaking
countries, who imagine that the Jews
they meet socially are 'representative'
of Jews 'in general'. In the countries
of east Europe as well as in the Arab
world, the Jews were liberated from the
tyranny of their own religion and of
their own communities by outside forces,
too late and in circumstances too
unfavorable for genuine internalized
social change. In most cases, and
particularly in Israel, the old concept
of society, the same ideology -
especially as directed towards non-Jews
- and the same utterly false conception
of history have been preserved. This
applies even to some of those Jews who
joined 'progressive' or leftist
movements. An examination of radical,
socialist and communist parties can
provide many examples of disguised
Jewish chauvinists and racists, who
joined these parties merely for reasons
of 'Jewish interest' and are, in Israel,
in favor of 'anti-Gentile'
discrimination. One need only check how
many Jewish 'socialists' have managed to
write about the kibbutz without taking
the trouble to mention that it is a
racist institution from which non-Jewish
citizens of Israel are rigorously
excluded, to see that the phenomenon we
are alluding to is by no means uncommon.7
Avoiding
labels based on ignorance or hypocrisy,
we thus see that the word 'Jewry' and
its cognates describe two different and
even contrasting social groups, and
because of current Israeli politics the
continuum between the two is
disappearing fast. On the one hand there
is the traditional totalitarian meaning
discussed above; on the other hand there
are Jews by descent who have
internalized the complex of ideas which
Karl Popper has called 'the open
society'. (There are also some,
particularly in the USA, who have not
internalized these ideas, but try to
make a show of acceptance.)
It is
important to note that all the
supposedly 'Jewish characteristics' - by
which I mean the traits which vulgar
so-called intellectuals in the West
attribute to 'the Jews' - are modern
characteristics, quite unknown during
most of Jewish history, and appeared
only when the totalitarian Jewish
community began to lose its power. Take,
for example, the famous Jewish sense of
humor. Not only is humor very rare in
Hebrew literature before the 19th
century (and is only found during few
periods, in countries where the Jewish
upper class was relatively free from the
rabbinical yoke, such as Italy between
the 14th and 17th centuries or Muslim
Spain) but humor and jokes are strictly
forbidden by the Jewish religion -
except, significantly, jokes against
other religions. Satire against rabbis
and leaders of the community was never
internalized by Judaism, not even to a
small extent, as it was in Latin
Christianity. There were no Jewish
comedies, just as there were no comedies
in Sparta, and for a similar reason.8
Or take the love of learning. Except for
a purely religious learning, which was
itself in a debased and degenerate
state, the Jews of Europe (and to a
somewhat lesser extent also of the Arab
countries) were dominated, before about
1780, by a supreme contempt and hate for
all learning (excluding the Talmud and
Jewish mysticism). Large parts of the
Old Testament, all nonliturgical Hebrew
poetry, most books on Jewish philosophy
were not read and their very names were
often anathematized. Study of all
languages was strictly forbidden, as was
the study of mathematics and science.
Geography,9
history - even Jewish history - were
completely unknown. The critical sense,
which is supposedly so characteristic of
Jews, was totally absent, and nothing
was so forbidden, feared and therefore
persecuted as the most modest innovation
or the most innocent criticism.
It was a
world sunk in the most abject
superstition, fanaticism and ignorance,
a world in which the preface to the
first work on geography in Hebrew
(published in 1803 in Russia) could
complain that very many great rabbis
were denying the existence of the
American continent and saying that it is
'impossible'. Between that world and
what is often taken in the West to
'characterize' Jews there is nothing in
common except the mistaken name.
However, a
great many present-day Jews are
nostalgic for that world, their lost
paradise, the comfortable closed society
from which they were not so much
liberated as expelled. A large part of
the Zionist movement always wanted to
restore it - and this part has gained
the upper hand. Many of the motives
behind Israeli politics, which so
bewilder the poor confused western
'friends of Israel', are perfectly
explicable once they are seen simply as
reaction, reaction in the political
sense which this word has had for the
last two hundred years: a forced and in
many respects innovative, and therefore
illusory, return to the closed society
of the Jewish past.
Obstacles to Understanding
Historically
it can be shown that a closed society is
not interested in a description of
itself, no doubt because any description
is in part a form of critical analysis
and so may encourage critical 'forbidden
thoughts'. The more a society becomes
open, the more it is interested in
reflecting, at first descriptively and
then critically, upon itself, its
present working as well as its past. But
what happens when a faction of
intellectuals desires to drag a society,
which has already opened up to a
considerable extent, back to its
previous totalitarian, closed condition?
Then the very means of the former
progress - philosophy, the sciences,
history and especially sociology -
become the most effective instruments of
the 'treason of the intellectuals'. They
are perverted in order to serve as
devices of deception, and in the process
they degenerate.
Classical
Judaism
10
had little interest in describing or
explaining itself to the members of its
own community, whether educated (in
talmudic studies) or not.11
It is significant that the writing of
Jewish history, even in the driest
annalistic style, ceased completely from
the time of Josephus Flavius (end of
first century) until the Renaissance,
when it was revived for a short time in
Italy and in other countries where the
Jews were under strong Italian
influence.12
Characteristically, the rabbis feared
Jewish even more than general history,
and the first modern book on history
published in Hebrew (in the 16th
century) was entitled History of the
Kings of France and of the Ottoman
Kings. It was followed by some histories
dealing only with the persecutions that
Jews had been subjected to. The first
book on Jewish history proper
l3
(dealing with ancient times) was
promptly banned and suppressed by the
highest rabbinical authorities, and did
not reappear before the 19th century.
The rabbinical authorities of east
Europe furthermore decreed that all
non-talmudic studies are to be
forbidden, even when nothing specific
could be found in them which merits
anathema, because they encroach on the
time that should be employed either in
studying the Talmud or in making money -
which should be used to subsidize
talmudic scholars. Only one loophole was
left, namely the time that even a pious
Jew must perforce spend in the privy. In
that unclean place sacred studies are
forbidden, and it was therefore
permitted to read history there,
provided it was written in Hebrew and
was completely secular, which in effect
meant that it must be exclusively
devoted to non-Jewish subjects. (One can
imagine that those few Jews of that time
who - no doubt tempted by Satan -
developed an interest in the history of
the French kings were constantly
complaining to their neighbors about the
constipation they were suffering from
...) As a consequence, two hundred years
ago the vast majority of Jews were
totally in the dark not only about the
existence of America but also about
Jewish history and Jewry's contemporary
state; and they were quite content to
remain so.
A
Totalitarian History
There was
however one area in which they were not
allowed to remain self-contented - the
area of Christian attacks against those
passages in the Talmud and the talmudic
literature which are specifically
anti-Christian or more generally
anti-Gentile. It is important to note
that this challenge developed relatively
late in the history of Christian-Jewish
relations - only from the 13th century
on. (Before that time, the Christian
authorities attacked Judaism using
either Biblical or general arguments,
but seemed to be quite ignorant as to
the contents of the Talmud.) The
Christian campaign against the Talmud
was apparently brought on by the
conversion to Christianity of Jews who
were well versed in the Talmud and who
were in many cases attracted by the
development of Christian philosophy,
with its strong Aristotelian (and thus
universal) character.14
It must be
admitted at the outset that the Talmud
and the talmudic literature - quite
apart from the general anti-Gentile
streak that runs through them, which
will be discussed in greater detail in
Chapter 5 - contain very offensive
statements and precepts directed
specifically against Christianity. For
example, in addition to a series of
scurrilous sexual allegations against
Jesus, the Talmud states that his
punishment in hell is to be immersed in
boiling excrement - a statement not
exactly calculated to endear the Talmud
to devout Christians. Or one can quote
the precept according to which Jews are
instructed to burn, publicly if
possible, any copy of the New Testament
that comes into their hands. (This is
not only still in force but actually
practiced today; thus on 23 March 1980
hundreds of copies of the New Testament
were publicly and ceremonially burnt in
Jerusalem under the auspices of Yad
Le'akhim, a Jewish religious
organization subs subsidized by the
Israeli Ministry of Religions.)
Anyway, a
powerful attack, well based in many
points, against talmudic Judaism
developed in Europe from the 13th
century. We are not referring here to
ignorant calumnies, such as the blood
libel, propagated by benighted monks in
small provincial cities, but to serious
disputations held before the best
European universities of the time and on
the whole conducted as fairly as was
possible under medieval circumstances.15
What was the
Jewish - or rather the rabbinical -
response? The simplest one was the
ancient weapon of bribery and
string-pulling. In most European
countries, during most of the time,
anything could be fixed by a bribe.
Nowhere was this maxim more true than in
the Rome of the Renaissance popes. The
Edigio Princeps of the complete Code of
Talmudic Law, Maimonides' Mishneh Torah
- replete not only with the most
offensive precepts against all Gentiles
but also with explicit attacks on
Christianity and on Jesus (after whose
name the author adds piously, 'May the
name of the wicked perish') - was
published unexpurgated in Rome in the
year 1480 under Sixtus IV, politically a
very active pope who had a constant and
urgent need for money. (A few years
earlier, the only older edition of The
Golden Ass by Apulcius from which the
violent attack on Christianity had not
been removed was also published in
Rome.) Alexander VI Borgin was also very
liberal in this respect.
Even during
that period, as well as before it, there
were always countries in which for a
time a wave of anti-Talmud persecution
set in. But a more consistent and
widespread onslaught came with the
Reformation and Counter Reformation,
which induced a higher standard of
intellectual honesty as well as a better
knowledge of Hebrew among Christian
scholars. From the 16th century, all the
talmudic literature, including the
Talmud itself, was subjected to
Christian censorship in various
countries. In Russia this went on until
1917. Some censors, such as in Holland,
were more lax, while others were more
severe; and the offensive passages were
expunged or modified.
All modern
studies on Judaism, particularly by
Jews, have evolved from that conflict,
and to this day they bear the
unmistakable marks of their origin:
deception, apologetics or hostile
polemics, indifference or even active
hostility to the pursuit of truth.
Almost all the so-called Jewish studies
in Judaism, from that time to this very
day, are polemics against an external
enemy rather than an internal debate.
It is
important to note that this was
initially the character of
historiography in all known societies
(except ancient Greece, whose early
liberal historians were attacked by
later sophists for their insufficient
patriotism!). This was true of the early
Catholic and Protestant historians, who
polemicized against each other.
Similarly, the earliest European
national histories are imbued with the
crudest nationalism and scorn for all
other, neighboring nations. But sooner
or later there comes a time when an
attempt is made to understand one's
national or religious adversary and at
the same time to criticize certain deep
and important aspects of the history of
one's own group; and both these
developments go together. Only when
historiography becomes - as Pieter Geyl
put it so well - 'a debate without end'
rather than a continuation of war by
historiographic means, only then does a
humane historiography, which strives for
both accuracy and fairness, become
possible; and it then turns into one of
the most powerful instruments of
humanism and self-education.
It is for
this reason that modern totalitarian
regimes rewrite history or punish
historians.16
When a whole society tries to return to
totalitarianism, a totalitarian history
is written, not because of compulsion
from above but under pressure from
below, which is much more effective.
This is what happened in Jewish history,
and this constitutes the first obstacle
we have to surmount.
Defense Mechanisms
What were
the detailed mechanisms (other than
bribery) employed by Jewish communities,
in cooperation with outside forces, in
order to ward off the attack on the
Talmud and other religious literature?
Several methods can be distinguished,
all of them having important political
consequences reflected in current
Israeli policies. Although it would be
tedious to supply in each case the
Beginistic or Labour-zionist parallel, I
am sure that readers who are somewhat
familiar with the details of Middle East
politics will themselves be able to
notice the resemblance.
The first
mechanism I shall discuss is that of
sereptitious defiance, combined with
outward compliance. As explained above,
talmudic passages directed against
Christianity or against non-Jews
l7
had to go or to be modified - the
pressure was too strong. This is what
was done: a few of the most offensive
passages were bodily removed from all
editions printed in Europe after the
mid-16th century. In all other passages,
the expressions 'Gentile', 'non-Jew',
'stranger' (goy, eino yehudi, , nokhri)
- which appear in all early manuscripts
and printings as well as in all editions
published in Islamic countries - were
replaced by terms such as 'idolator',
'heathen' or even 'Canaanite' or
'Samaritan', terms which could be
explained away but which a Jewish reader
could recognize as euphemisms for the
old expressions.
As the
attack mounted, so the defence became
more elaborate, sometimes with lasting
tragic results. During certain periods
the Tsarist Russian censorship became
stricter and, seeing the above mentioned
euphemisms for what they were, forbade
them too. Thereupon the rabbinical
authorities substituted the terms 'Arab'
or 'Muslim' (in Hebrew, Yishma'eli -
which means both) or occasionally
'Egyptian', correctly calculating that
the Tsarist authorities would not object
to this kind of abuse. At the same time,
lists of Talmudic Omissions were
circulated in manuscript form, which
explained all the new terms and pointed
out all the omissions. At times, a
general disclaimer was printed before
the title page of each volume of
talmudic literature, solemnly declaring,
sometimes on oath, that all hostile
expressions in that volume are intended
only against the idolators of antiquity,
or even against the long-vanished
Canaanites, rather than against 'the
peoples in whose land we live'. After
the British conquest of India, some
rabbis hit on the subterfuge of claiming
that any particularly outrageous
derogatory expression used by them is
only intended against the Indians.
Occasionally the aborigines of Australia
were also added as whipping-boys.
Needless to
say, all this was a calculated lie from
beginning to end; and following the
establishment of the State of Israel,
once the rabbis felt secure, all the
offensive passages and expressions were
restored without hesitation in all new
editions. (Because of the enormous cost
which a new edition involves, a
considerable part of the talmudic
literature, including the Talmud itself,
is still being reprinted from the old
editions. For this reason, the above
mentioned Talmudic Omissio,ts have now
been published in Israel in a cheap
printed edition, under the title
Hesronot Shas.) So now one can read
quite freely - and Jewish children are
actually taught - passages such as that
l8
which commands every Jew, whenever
passing near a cemetery, to utter a
blessing if the cemetery is Jewish, but
to curse the mothers of the dead
19
if it is non-Jewish. In the old editions
the curse was omitted, or one of the
euphemisms was substituted for
'Gentiles'. But in the new Israeli
edition of Rabbi Adin Steinsalz
(complete with Hebrew explanations and
glosses to the Aramaic parts of the
text, so that schoolchildren should be
in no doubt as to what they are supposed
to say) the unambiguous words 'Gentiles'
and 'strangers' have been restored.
Under
external pressure, the rabbis
deceptively eliminated or modified
certain passages - but not the actual
practices which are prescribed in them.
It is a fact which must be remembered,
not least by Jews themselves, that for
centuries our totalitarian society has
employed barbaric and inhumane customs
to poison the minds of its members, and
it is still doing so. (These inhumane
customs cannot be explained away as mere
reaction to antisemitism or persecution
of Jews: they are gratuitous barbarities
directed against each and every human
being. A pious Jew arriving for the
first time in Australia, say, and
chancing to pass near an Aboriginal
graveyard, must - as an act of worship
of 'God' - curse the mothers of the dead
buried there.) Without facing this real
social fact, we all become parties to
the deception and accomplices to the
process of poisoning the present and
future generations, with all the
consequences of this process.
The Deception Continues
Modern
scholars of Judaism have not only
continued the deception, but have
actually improved upon the old
rabbinical methods, both in impudence
and in mendacity. I omit here the
various histories of antisemitism, as
unworthy of serious consideration, and
shall give just three particular
examples and one general example of the
more modern 'scholarly' deceptions.
In 1962, a
part of the Maimonidean Code referred to
above, the so-called Book of Knowledge,
which contains the most basic rules of
Jewish faith and practice, was published
in Jerusalem in a bilingual edition,
with the English translation facing the
Hebrew text.20
The latter has been restored to its
original purity, and the command to
exterminate Jewish infidels appears in
it in full: 'It is a duty to exterminate
them with one's own hands.' In the
English translation this is somewhat
softened to: 'It is a duty to take
active measures to destroy them.' But
then the Hebrew text goes on to specify
the prime examples of 'infidels' who
must be exterminated: 'Such as Jesus of
Nazareth and his pupils, and Tzadoq and
Baitos
21
and their pupils, may the name of the
wicked rot'. Not one 'word of this
appears in the English text on the
facing page (78a). And, even more
significant, in spite of the wide
circulation of this book among scholars
in the English-speaking countries, not
one of them has, as far as I know,
protested against this glaring
deception.
The second
example comes from the USA, again from
an English translation of a book by
Maimonides. Apart from his work on the
codification of the Talmud, he was also
a philosopher and his Guide to the
Perplexed is justly considered to be the
greatest work of Jewish religious
philosophy and is widely read and used
even today. Unfortunately, in addition
to his attitude towards non-Jews
generally and Christians in particular,
Maimonides was also an anti-Black
racist. Towards the end of the Guide, in
a crucial chapter (book III, chapter 51)
he discusses how various sections of
humanity can attain the supreme
religious value, the true worship of
God. Among those who are incapable of
even approaching this are:
- "Some
of the Turks [i.e., the Mongol race]
and the nomads in the North, and the
Blacks and the nomads in the South,
and those who resemble them in our
climates. And their nature is like
the nature of mute animals, and
according to my opinion they are not
on the level of human beings, and
their level among existing things is
below that of a man and above that
of a monkey, because they have the
image and the resemblance of a man
more than a monkey does."
Now, what
does one do with such a passage in a
most important and necessary work of
Judaism? Face the truth and its
consequences? God forbid! Admit (as so
many Christian scholars, for example,
have done in similar circumstances) that
a very important Jewish authority held
also rabid anti-Black views, and by this
admission make an attempt at
self-education in real humanity? Perish
the thought. I can almost imagine Jewish
scholars in the USA consulting among
themselves, 'What is to be done?' - for
the book had to be translated, due to
the decline in the knowledge of Hebrew
among American Jews. Whether by
consultation or by individual
inspiration, a happy solution' was
found: in the popular American
translation of the Guide by one
Friedlander, first published as far back
as 1925 and since then reprinted in many
editions, including several in
paperback, the Hebrew word Kushi,,:,
which means Blacks, was simply
transliterated and appears as
'Kushites', a word which means nothing
to those who have no knowledge of
Hebrew, or to whom an obliging rabbi
will not give an oral explanation.22
During all these years, not a word
has been said to point out the initial
deception or the social facts underlying
its continuation - and this throughout
the excitement of Martin Luther King's
campaigns, which were supported by so
many rabbis, not to mention other Jewish
figures, some of whom must have been
aware of the anti-Black racist attitude
which forms part of their Jewish
heritage.23
Surely one
is driven to the hypothesis that quite a
few of Martin Luther King's rabbinical
supporters were either anti-Black
racists who supported him for tactical
reasons of 'Jewish interest' (wishing to
win Black support for American Jewry and
for Israel's policies) or were
accomplished hypocrites, to the point of
schizophrenia, capable of passing very
rapidly from a hidden enjoyment of rabid
racism to a proclaimed attachment to an
anti-racist struggle - and back - and
back again.
The third
example comes from a work which has far
less serious scholarly intent - but is
all the more popular for that: The Joys
of Yiddish by Leo Rosten. This
light-hearted work - first published in
the USA in 1968, and reprinted in many
editions, including several times as a
Penguin paperback - is a kind of
glossary of Yiddish words often used by
Jews or even non-Jews in
English-speaking countries. For each
entry, in addition to a detailed
definition and more or less amusing
anecdotes illustrating its use, there is
also an etymology stating (quite
accurately, on the whole) the language
from which the word came into Yiddish
and its meaning in that language. The
entry Shaygets - whose main meaning is
'a Gentile boy or young man - is an
exception: there the etymology
cryptically states 'Hebrew Origin',
without giving the form or meaning of
the original Hebrew word. However, under
the entry Shiksa - the feminine form of
Shaygets - the author does give the
original Hebrew word, sheqetz (or, in
his transliteration, sheques) and
defines its Hebrew meaning as 'blemish'.
This is a bare-faced lie, as every
speaker of Hebrew knows. The Megiddo
Modern Hebrew-English Dictionary,
published in Israel, correctly defines
shegetz as follows: 'unclean animal;
loathsome creature, abomination
(colloquial - pronounced shaygets)
wretch, unruly youngster; Gentile
youngster'.
My final,
more general example is, if possible,
even more shocking than the others. It
concerns the attitude of the Hassidic
movement towards non-Jews. Hassidism - a
continuation (and debasement!) of Jewish
mysticism - is still a living movement,
with hundreds of thousands of active
adherents who are fanatically devoted to
their 'holy rabbis', some of whom have
acquired a very considerable political
influence in Israel, among the leaders
of most parties and even more so in the
higher echelons of the army.
What, then,
are the views of this movement
concerning non-Jews? As an example, let
us take the famous Hatanya, fundamental
book of the Habbad movement, one of the
most important branches of Hassidism.
According to this book, all non-Jews are
totally satanic creatures 'in whom there
is absolutely nothing good'. Even a
non-Jewish embryo is qualitatively
different from a Jewish one. The very
existence of a non-Jew is essential',
whereas all of creation was created
solely for the sake of the Jews.
This book is
circulated in countless editions, and
its ideas are further propagated in the
numerous 'discourses' of the present
hereditary Fuhrer of Habbad, the
so-called Lubavitcher rabbi, M.M.
Schneurssohn, who leads this powerful
world-wide organization from his New
York headquarters. In Israel these ideas
are widely disseminated among the public
at large, in the schools and in the
army. (According to the testimony of
Shulamit Aloni, Member of the Knesset,
this Habbad propaganda was particularly
stepped up before Israel's invasion of
Lebanon in March 1978, in order to
induce military doctors and nurses to
withhold medical help from 'Gentile
wounded'. This Nazi-like advice did not
refer specifically to Arabs or
Palestinians, but simply to 'Gentiles',
goyim.) A former Israeli President,
Shazar, was an ardent adherent of
Habbad, and many top Israeli and
American politicians - headed by Prime
Minister Begin - publicly courted and
supported it. This, in spite of the
considerable unpopularity of the
Lubavitcher rabbi - in Israel he is
widely criticized because he refuses to
come to the Holy Land even for a visit
and keeps himself in New York for
obscure messianic reasons, while in New
York his anti-Black attitude is
notorious.
The fact
that, despite these pragmatic
difficulties, Habbad can be publicly
supported by so many top political
figures owes much to the thoroughly
disingenuous and misleading treatment by
almost all scholars who have written
about the Hassidic movement and its
Habbad branch. This applies particularly
to all who have written or are writing
about it in English. They suppress the
glaring evidence of the old Hassidic
texts as well as the latter-day
political implications that follow from
them, which stare in the face of even a
casual reader of the Israeli Hebrew
press, in whose pages the Lubavitcher
rabbi and other Hassidic leaders
constantly publish the most rabid
bloodthirsty statements and exhortations
against all Arabs.
A chief
deceiver in this case, and a good
example of the power of the deception,
was Martin Buber. His numerous works
eulogizing the whole Hassidic movement
(including Habbad) never so much as hint
at the real doctrines of Hassidism
concerning non-Jews. The crime of
deception is all the greater in view of
the fact that Buber's eulogies of
Hassidism were first published in German
during the period of the rise of German
nationalism and the accession of Nazism
to power. But while ostensibly opposing
Nazism, Buber glorified a movement
holding and actually teaching doctrines
about non-Jews not unlike the Nazi
doctrines about Jews. One could of
course argue that the Hassidic Jews of
seventy or fifty years ago were the
victims, and a 'white lie' favoring a
victim is excusable. But the
consequences of deception are
incalculable. Buber's works were
translated into Hebrew, were made a
powerful element of the Hebrew education
in Israel, have greatly increased the
power of the blood-thirsty Hassidic
leaders, and have thus been an important
factor in the rise of Israeli chauvinism
and hate of all non-Jews. If we think
about the many human beings who died of
their wounds because Israeli army
nurses, incited by Hassidic propaganda,
refused to tend them, then a heavy onus
for their blood lies on the head of
Martin Buber.
I must
mention here that in his adulation of
Hassidism Buber far surpassed other
Jewish scholars, particularly those
writing in Hebrew (or, formerly, in
Yiddish) or even in European languages
but purely for a Jewish audience. In
questions of internal Jewish interest,
there had once been a great deal of
justified criticism of the Hassidic
movement. Their mysogynism (much more
extreme than that common to all Jewish
Orthodoxy), their indulgence in alcohol,
their fanatical cult of their hereditary
'holy rabbis' who extorted money from
them, the numerous superstitions
peculiar to them - these and many other
negative traits were critically
commented upon. But Buber's sentimental
and deceitful romantization has won the
day, especially in the USA and Israel,
because it was in tune with the
totalitarian admiration of anything
'genuinely Jewish' and because certain
'left' Jewish circles in which Buber had
a particularly great influence have
adopted this position.
Nor was
Buber alone in his attitude, although in
my opinion he was by far the worst in
the evil he propagated and the influence
he has left behind him. There was the
very influential sociologist and
biblical scholar, Yehezkiel Kaufman, an
advocate of genocide on the model of the
Book of Joshua, the idealist philosopher
Hugo Shmuel Bergman, who as far back as
1914-15 advocated the expulsion of all
Palestinians to Iraq, and many others.
All were outwardly 'dovish', but
employed formulas which could be
manipulated in the most extreme
anti-Arab sense, all had tendencies to
that religious mysticism which
encourages the propagation of
deceptions, and all seemed to be gentle
persons who, even when advocating
expulsion, racism and genocide, seemed
incapable of hurting a fly - and just
for this reason the effect of their
deceptions was the greater.
It is
against the glorification of inhumanity,
proclaimed not only by the rabbis but by
those who are supposed to be the
greatest and certainly the most
influential scholars of Judaism, that we
have to struggle; and it is against
those modern successors of the false
prophets and dishonest priests that we
have to repeat even in the face of an
almost unanimous opinion within Israel
and among the majority of Jews in
countries such as the USA Lucretius'
warning against surrendering one's
judgement to the declamations of
religious leaders: Tantuii: religio
potuit suadere malorum - 'To such
heights of evil are men driven by
religion.' Religion is not always (as
Marx said) the opium of the people, but
it can often be so, and when it is used
in this sense by prevaricating and
misrepresenting its true nature, the
scholars and intellectuals who perform
this task take on the character of opium
smugglers.
But we can
derive from this analysis another, more
general conclusion about the most
effective and horrific means of
compulsion to do evil, to cheat and to
deceive and, while keeping one's hands
quite clean of violence, to corrupt
whole peoples and drive them to
oppression and murder. (For there can no
longer be any doubt that the most
horrifying acts of oppression in the
West Bank are motivated by Jewish
religious fanaticism.) Most people seem
to assume that the worst totalitarianism
employs physical coercion, and would
refer to the imagery of Orwell's 1984
for a model illustrating such a regime.
But it seems to me that this common view
is greatly mistaken, and that the
intuition of Isaac Asimov, in whose
science fiction the worst oppression is
always internalized, is the more true to
the dangers of human nature. Unlike
Stalin's tame scholars, the rabbis - and
even more so the scholars attacked here,
and with them the whole mob of equally
silent middlebrows such as writers,
journalists, public figures, who lie and
deceive more than them - are not facing
the danger of death or concentration
camp, but only social pressure; they lie
out of patriotism because they believe
that it is their duty to lie for what
they conceive to be the Jewish interest.
They are patriotic liars, and it is the
same patriotism which reduces them to
silence when confronted with the
discrimination and oppression of the
Palestinians.
In the
present case we are also faced with
another group loyalty, but one which
comes from outside the group, and which
is sometimes even more mischievous. Very
many non- Jews (including Christian
clergy and religious laymen, as well as
some marxists from all marxist groups)
hold the curious opinion that one way to
'atone' for the persecution of Jews is
not to speak out against evil
perpetrated by Jews but to participate
in 'white lies' about them. The crude
accusation of 'antisemitism' (or, in the
case of Jews, 'self-hate') against
anybody who protests at the
discrimination of Palestinians or who
points out any fact about the Jewish
religion or the Jewish past which
conflicts with the 'approved version'
comes with greater hostility and force
from non-Jewish 'friends of the Jews'
than from Jews. It is the existence and
great influence of this group in all
western countries, and particularly in
the USA (as well as the other
English-speaking countries) which has
allowed the rabbis and scholars of
Judaism to propagate their lies not only
without opposition but with considerable
help.
In fact,
many professed 'anti-stalinists' have
merely substituted another idol for
their worship, and tend to support
Jewish racism and fanaticism with even
greater ardor and dishonesty than were
found among the most devoted stalinists
in the past. Although this phenomenon of
blind and stalinistic support for any
evil, so long as it is 'Jewish', is
particularly strong from 1945, when the
truth about the extermination of
European Jewry became known, it is a
mistake to suppose that it began only
then. On the contrary, it dates very far
back, particularly in social-democratic
circles. One of Marx's early friends,
Moses Hess, widely known and respected
as one of the first socialists in
Germany, subsequently revealed himself
as an extreme Jewish racist, whose views
about the 'pure Jewish race' published
in 1858 were not unlike comparable bilge
about the 'pure Aryan race'. But the
German socialists, who struggled against
German racism, remained silent about
their Jewish racism.
In 1944,
during the actual struggle against
Hitler, the British Labor Party approved
a plan for the expulsion of Palestinians
from Palestine, which was similar to
Hitler's early plans (up to about 1941)
for the Jews. This plan was approved
under the pressure of Jewish members of
the party's leadership, many of whom
have displayed a stronger 'kith and kin'
attitude to every Israeli policy than
the Conservative 'kith and kin'
supporters of Ian Smith ever did. But
stalinistic taboos on the left are
stronger in Britain than on the right,
and there is virtually no discussion
even when the Labor Party supports
Begin's government.
In the USA a
similar situation prevails, and again
the American liberals are the worst.
This is not
the place to explore all the political
consequences of this situation, but we
must face reality: in our struggle
against the racism and fanaticism of the
Jewish religion, our greatest enemies
will be not only the Jewish racists (and
users of racism) but also those non-Jews
who in other areas are known - falsely
in my opinion - as 'progressives'.
CHAPTER
3
Orthodoxy and Interpretation
THIS
CHAPTER is devoted to a
more detailed description of the
theologico-legal structure of classical
Judaism.1
However, before embarking on that
description it is necessary to dispel at
least some of the many misconceptions
disseminated in almost all
foreign-language (that is, non-Hebrew)
accounts of Judaism, especially by those
who propagate such currently fashionable
phrases as 'the Judeo-Christian
tradition' or 'the common values of the
monotheistic religions'.
Because of
considerations of space I shall only
deal in detail with the most important
of these popular delusions: that the
Jewish religion is, and always was,
monotheistic. Now, as many biblical
scholars know, and as a careful reading
of the Old Testament easily reveals,
this ahistorical view is quite wrong. In
many, if not most, books of the Old
Testament the existence and power of
'other gods' are clearly acknowledged,
but Yahweh (Jehovah), who is the most
powerful god,2
is also very jealous of his rivals and
forbids his people to worship them.3
It is only very late in the Bible, in
some of the later prophets, that the
existence of all gods other than Yahweh
is denied.4
What
concerns us, however, is not biblical
but classical Judaism; and it is quite
clear, though much less widely realized,
that the latter, during its last few
hundred years, was for the most part far
from pure monotheism. The same can be
said about the real doctrines dominant
in present-day Orthodox Judaism, which
is a direct continuation of classical
Judaism. The decay of monotheism came
about through the spread of Jewish
mysticism (the cabbala) which developed
in the 12th and 13th centuries, and by
the late 16th century had won an almost
complete victory in virtually all the
centers of Judaism. The Jewish
Enlightenment, which arose out of the
crisis of classical Judaism, had to
fight against this mysticism and its
influence more than against anything
else, but in latter-:lay Jewish
Orthodoxy, especially among the rabbis,
the influence of the cabbala has
remained predominant.5
For example, the Gush Emunim movement is
inspired to a great extent by
cabbalistic ideas.
Knowledge
and understanding of these ideas is
therefore important for two reasons.
First, without it one cannot under-
stand the true beliefs of Judaism at the
end of its classical period. Secondly,
these ideas play an important
contemporary political role, inasmuch as
they form part of the explicit system of
beliefs of many religious politicians,
including most leaders of Gush Emunim,
and have an indirect influence on many
Zionist leaders of all parties,
including the zionist left.
According to
the cabbala, the universe is ruled not
by one god but by several deities, of
various characters and influences,
emanated by a dim, distant First Cause.
Omitting many details, one can summarize
the system as follows. From the First
Cause, first a male god called 'Wisdom'
or 'Father' and then a female goddess
called 'Knowledge' or 'Mother' were
emanated or born. From the marriage of
these two, a pair of younger gods were
born: Son, also called by many other
names such as 'Small Face' or 'The Holy
Blessed One'; and Daughter, also called
'Lady' (or 'Matronit', a word derived
from Latin), 'Shekhinah', 'Queen', and
so on. These two younger gods should be
united, but their union is prevented by
the machinations of Satan, who in this
system is a very important and
independent personage. The Creation was
undertaken by the First Cause in order
to allow them to unite, but because of
the Fall they became more disunited than
ever, and indeed Satan has managed to
come very close to the divine Daughter
and even to rape her (either seemingly
or in fact - opinions differ on this).
The creation of the Jewish people was
undertaken in order to mend the break
caused by Adam and Eve, and under Mount
Sinai this was for a moment achieved:
the male god Son, incarnated in Moses,
was united with the goddess Shekhinah.
Unfortunately, the sin of the Golden
Calf again caused disunity in the
godhead; but the repentance of the
Jewish people has mended matters to some
extent. Similarly, each incident of
biblical Jewish history is believed to
be associated with the union or disunion
of the divine pair. The Jewish conquest
of Palestine from the Canaanites and the
building of the first and second Temple
are particularly propitious for their.
union, while the destruction of the
Temples and exile of the Jews from the
Holy Land are merely external signs not
only of the divine disunion but also of
a real 'whoring after strange gods':
Daughter falls closely into the power of
Satan, while Son takes various female
satanic personages to his bed, instead
of his proper wife.
The duty of
pious Jews is to restore through their
prayers and religious acts the perfect
divine unity, in the form of sexual
union, between the male and female
deities.6
Thus before most ritual acts, which
every devout Jew has to perform many
times each day, the following
cabbalistic formula is recited: 'For the
sake of the [sexual] congress7
of the Holy Blessed One and his
Shekhinah... ' The Jewish morning
prayers are also arranged so as to
promote this sexual union, if only
temporarily. Successive parts of the
prayer mystically correspond to
successive stages of the union: at one
point the goddess approaches with her
hand- maidens, at another the god puts
his arm around her neck and fondles her
breast, and finally the sexual act is
supposed to take place.
Other
prayers or religious acts, as
interpreted by the cabbalists, are
designed to deceive various angels
(imagined as minor deities with a
measure of independence) or to
propitiate Satan. At a certain point in
the morning prayer, some verses in
Aramaic (rather than the more usual
Hebrew) are pronounced.8
This is supposed to be a means for
tricking the angels who operate the
gates through which prayers enter heaven
and who have the power to block the
prayers of the pious. The angels only
understand Hebrew and are baffled by the
Aramaic verses; being somewhat
dull-witted (presumably they are far
less clever than the cabbalists) they
open the gates, and at this moment all
the prayers, including those in Hebrew,
get through. Or take another example:
both before and after a meal, a pious
Jew ritually washes his hands, uttering
a special blessing. On one of these two
occasions he is worshiping God, by
promoting the divine union of Son and
Daughter; but on the other he is
worshiping Satan, who likes Jewish
prayers and ritual acts so much that
when he is offered a few of them it
keeps him busy for a while and he
forgets to pester the divine Daughter.
Indeed, the cabbalists believe that some
of the sacrifices burnt in the Temple
were intended for Satan. For example,
the seventy bullocks sacrificed during
the seven days of the feast of
Tabernacles9
were supposedly offered to Satan in his
capacity as ruler of all the Gentiles,10
in order to keep him too busy to
interfere on the eighth day, when
sacrifice is made to God. Many other
examples of the same kind can be given.
Several
points should be made concerning this
system and its importance for the proper
understanding of Judaism, both in its
classical period and in its present
political involvement in Zionist
practice.
First,
whatever can be said about this
cabbalistic system, it cannot be
regarded as monotheistic, unless one is
also prepared to regard Hinduism, the
late Graeco-Roman religion, or even the
religion of ancient Egypt, as
'monotheistic'.
Secondly,
the real nature of classical Judaism is
illustrated by the ease with which this
system was adopted. Faith and beliefs
(except nationalistic beliefs) play an
extremely small part in classical
Judaism. What is of prime importance is
the ritual act, rather than the
significance which that act is supposed
to have or the belief attached to it.
Therefore in times when a minority of
religious Jews refused to accept the
cabbala (as is the case today), one
could see some few Jews performing a
given religious ritual believing it to
be an act of worship of God, while
others do exactly the same thing with
the intention of propitiating Satan -
but so long as the act is the same they
would pray together and remain members
of the same congregation, however much
they might dislike each other. But if
instead of the intention attached to the
ritual washing of hands anyone would
dare to introduce an innovation in the
manner of washing,11
a real schism would certainly ensue.
The same can
be said about all sacred formulas of
Judaism. Provided the working is left
intact, the meaning is at best a
secondary matter. For example, perhaps
the most sacred Jewish formula, 'Hear 0
Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is
one', recited several times each day by
every pious Jew, can at the present time
mean two contrary things. It can mean
that the Lord is indeed 'one'; but it
can also mean that a certain stage in
the union of the male and female deities
has been reached or is being promoted by
the proper recitation of this formula.
However, when Jews of a Reformed
congregation recite this formula in any
language other than Hebrew, all Orthodox
rabbis, whether they believe in unity or
in the divine sexual union, are very
angry indeed.
Finally, all
this is of considerable importance in
Israel (and in other Jewish centers)
even at present. The enormous
significance attached to mere formulas
(such as the 'Law of Jerusalem'); the
ideas and motivations of Gush Emunim;
the urgency behind the hate for non-Jews
presently living in Palestine; the
fatalistic attitude towards all peace
attempts by Arab states - all these and
many other traits of Zionist politics,
which puzzle so many well-meaning people
who have a false notion about classical
Judaism, become more intelligible
against this religious and mystical
background. I must warn, however,
against falling into the other extreme
and trying to explain all zionist
politics in terms of this background.
Obviously, the latter's influences vary
in extent. Ben-Gurion was adept at
manipulating them in a controlled way
for specific ends. Under Begin the past
exerts a much greater influence upon the
present. But what one should never do is
to ignore the past and its influences,
because only by knowing it can one
transcend its blind power.
Interpretation of the Bible
It will be
seen from the foregoing example that
what most supposedly well-informed
people think they know about Judaism may
be very misleading, unless they can read
Hebrew. All the details mentioned above
can be found in the original texts or,
in some cases, in modern books written
in Hebrew for a rather specialized
readership. In English one would look
for them in vain, even where the
omission of such socially important
facts distorts the whole picture.
There is yet
another misconception about Judaism
which is particularly common among
Christians, or people heavily influenced
by Christian tradition and culture. This
is the misleading idea that Judaism is a
'biblical religion'; that the Old
Testament has in Judaism the same
central place and legal authority which
the Bible has for Protestant or even
Catholic Christianity.
Again, this
is connected with the question of
interpretation. We have seen that in
matters of belief there is great
latitude. Exactly the opposite holds
with respect to the legal interpretation
of sacred texts. Here the interpretation
is rigidly fixed - but by the Talmud
rather than by the Bible itself.12
Many, perhaps most, biblical verses
prescribing religious acts and
obligations are 'understood' by
classical Judaism, and by present-:lay
Orthodoxy, in a sense which is quite
distinct from, or even contrary to,
their literal meaning as understood by
Christian or other readers of the Old
Testament, who only see the plain text.
The same division exists at present in
Israel between those educated in Jewish
religious schools and those educated in
'secular' Hebrew schools, where on the
whole the plain meaning of the Old
Testament is taught.
This
important point can only be understood
through examples. It will be noted that
the changes in meaning do not all go in
the same direction from the point of
view of ethics, as the term is
understood now. Apologetics of Judaism
claim that the interpretation of the
Bible, originated by the Pharisees and
fixed in the Talmud, is always more
liberal than the literal sense. But some
of the examples below show that this is
far from being the case.
(1) Let us
start with the Decalogue itself. The
Eighth Commandment, Thou shalt not
steal' (Exodus, 20:15), is taken to be a
prohibition against 'stealing' (that is,
kidnapping) a Jewish person. The reason
is that according to the Talmud all acts
forbidden by the Decalogue are capital
offenses. Stealing property is not a
capital offense (while kidnapping of
Gentiles by Jews is allowed by talmudic
law) - hence the interpretation. A
virtually identical sentence - 'Ye shall
not steal' (Leviticus, 19:11) - is
however allowed to have its literal
meaning.
(2) The
famous verse 'Eye for eye, tooth for
tooth' etc. (Exodus, 21:24) is taken to
mean 'eye-money for eye', that is
payment of a fine rather than physical
retribution.
(3) Here is
a notorious case of turning the literal
meaning into its exact opposite. The
biblical text plainly warns against
following the bandwagon in an unjust
cause: thou shalt not follow a multitude
to do evil; neither shalt thou speak in
a cause to decline after many to wrest
judgment' (Exodus, 23:2). The last words
of this sentence - 'Decline after many
to wrest judgment' - are torn out of
their context and interpreted as an
injunction to follow the majority
(4) The
verse 'Thou shalt not seethe a kid in
his mother's milk' (Exodus, 23:19) is
interpreted as a ban on mixing any kind
of meat with any milk or milk product.
Since the same verse is repeated in two
other places in the Pentateuch, the mere
repetition is taken to be a treble ban,
forbidding a Jew (i) to eat such a
mixture, (ii) to cook it for any purpose
and (iii) to enjoy or benefit from it in
any way.13
(5 ) In
numerous cases general terms such as
'thy fellow', 'stranger', or even 'man'
are taken to have an exelusivist
chauvinistic meaning. The famous verse
'thou shalt love thy fellow14
as thyself (Leviticus, 19:18) is
understood by classical (and present-day
Orthodox) Judaism as an injunction to
love one's fellow Jew, not any fellow
human. Similarly, the verse 'neither
shalt thou stand against the blood of
thy fellow' (ibid., 16) is supposed to
mean that one must not stand idly by
when the life ('blood') of a fellow Jew
is in danger; but, as will be seen in
Chapter 5, a Jew is in general forbidden
to save the life of a Gentile, because
'he is not thy fellow'. The generous
injunction to leave the gleanings of
one's field and vineyard 'for the poor
and the stranger' (ibid., 9-10) is
interpreted as referring exclusively to
the Jewish poor and to converts to
Judaism. The taboo laws relating to
corpses begin with the verse 'This is
the law, when a man dieth in a tent: all
that come into the tent ... shall be
unclean seven days' (Numbers~, 19:16).
But the word 'man' (adam) is taken to
mean 'Jew', so that only a Jewish corpse
is taboo (that is, both 'unclean' and
sacred). Based on this interpretation,
pious Jews have a tremendous magic
reverence towards Jewish corpses and
Jewish cemeteries, but have no respect
towards non-Jewish corpses and
cemeteries. Thus hundreds of Muslim
cemeteries have been utterly destroyed
in Israel (in one case in order to make
room for the Tel-Aviv Hilton) but there
was a great outcry because the Jewish
cemetery on the Mount of Olives was
damaged under Jordanian rule. Examples
of this kind are too numerous to quote.
Some of the inhuman consequences of this
type of interpretation will be discussed
in Chapter 5.
(6 )
Finally, consider one of the most
beautiful prophetic passages, Isaiah's
magnificent condemnation of hypocrisy
and empty ritual, and exhortation to
common decency. One verse (Isaiah, 1:15)
in this passage is: 'And when ye spread
forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes
from you; yea, when ye make many
prayers, I will not hear: your hands are
full of blood.' Since Jewish priests
'spread their hands' when blessing the
people during service, this verse is
supposed to mean that a priest who
commits accidental homicide is
disqualified from 'spreading his hands'
in blessing (even if repentant) because
they are 'full of blood'. It is quite
clear even from these examples that when
Orthodox Jews today (or all Jews before
about 1780) read the Bible, they are
reading a very different book, with a
totally different meaning, from the
Bible as read by non-Jews or
non-Orthodox Jews. This distinction
applies even in Israel, although both
parties read the text in Hebrew.
Experience, particularly since 1967, has
repeatedly corroborated this. Many Jews
in Israel (and elsewhere), who are not
Orthodox and have little detailed
knowledge of the Jewish religion, have
tried to shame Orthodox Israelis (or
right-wingers who are strongly
influenced by religion) out of their
inhuman attitude towards the
Palestinians, by quoting at them verses
from the Bible in their plain humane
sense. It was always found, however,
that such arguments do not have the
slightest effect on those who follow
classical Judaism; they simply do not
understand what is being said to them,
because to them the biblical text means
something quite different than to
everyone else.
If such a
communication gap exists in Israel,
where people read Hebrew and can readily
obtain correct information if they wish,
one can imagine how deep is the
misconception abroad, say among people
educated in the Christian tradition. In
fact, the more such a person reads the
Bible, the less he or she knows about
Orthodox Judaism. For the latter regards
the Old Testament as a text of immutable
sacred formulas, whose recitation is an
act of great merit, but whose meaning is
wholly determined elsewhere. And, as
Humpty Dumpty told Alice, behind the
problem of who can determine the meaning
of words, there stands the real
question: 'Which is to be master?'
Structure of the Talmud
It should
therefore be clearly understood that the
source of authority for all the
practices of classical (and present-day
Orthodox) Judaism, the determining base
of its legal structure, is the Talmud,
or, to be precise, the so-called
Babylonian Talmud; while the rest of the
talmudic literature (including the
so~called Jerusalem or Palestinian
Talmud) acts as a supplementary
authority.
We cannot
enter here into a detailed description
of the Talmud and talmudic literature,
but confine ourselves to a few principal
points needed for our argument.
Basically, the Talmud consists of two
parts. First, the Mishnah - a terse
legal code consisting of six volumes,
each subdivided into several tractates,
written in Hebrew, redacted in Palestine
around AD 200 out of the much more
extensive (and largely oral) legal
material composed during the preceding
two centuries. The second and by far
predominant part is the Gemarah - a
voluminous record of discussions on and
around the Mishnah. There are two,
roughly parallel, sets of Gemarah, one
composed in Mesopotamia ('Babylon')
between about AD 200 and 500, the other
in Palestine between about AD 200 and
some unknown date long before 500. The
Babylonian Talmud (that is, the Mishnah
plus the Mesopotamian Gemarah) is much
more extensive and better arranged than
the Palestinian, and it alone is
regarded as definitive and
authoritative. The Jerusalem
(Palestinian) Talmud is accorded a
decidedly lower status as a legal
authority, along with a number of
compilations, known collectively as the
'talmudic literature', containing
material which the editors of the two
Talmuds had left out.
Contrary
to the Mishnah, the rest of the Talmud
and talmudic literature is written in a
mixture of Hebrew and Aramaic, the
latter language predominating in the
Babylonian Talmud. Also, it is not
limited to legal matters. Without any
apparent order or reason, the legal
discussion can suddenly be interrupted
by what is referred to as 'Narrative'
(Aggadah) a medley of tales and
anecdotes about rabbis or ordinary folk,
biblical figures, angels, demons,
witchcraft and miracles.15
These narrative passages, although of
great popular influence in Judaism
through the ages, were always considered
(even by the Talmud itself) as having
secondary value. Of greatest importance
for classical Judaism are the legal
parts of the text, particularly the
discussion of cases which are regarded
as problematic. The Talmud itself
defines the various categories of Jews,
in ascending order, as follows, The
lowest are the totally ignorant, then
come those who only know the Bible, then
those who are familiar with the Mishnah
or Aggadah, and the superior class are
those who have studied, and are able to
discuss the legal part of the Gemarah.
It is only the latter who are fit to
lead their fellow Jews in all things.
The legal
system of the Talmud can be described as
totally comprehensive, rigidly
authoritarian, and yet capable of
infinite development, without however
any change in its dogmatic base. Every
aspect of Jewish life, both individual
and social, is covered, usually in
considerable detail, with sanctions and
punishments provided for every
conceivable sin or infringement of the
rules. The basic rules for every problem
are stated dogmatically and cannot be
questioned. What can be and is discussed
at very great length is the elaboration
and practical definition of these rules.
Let me give a few examples.
'Not doing
any work' on the sabbath. The concept
work is defined as comprising exactly 39
types of work, neither more nor less.
The criterion for inclusion in this list
has nothing to do with the arduousness
of a given task; it is simply a matter
of dogmatic definition. One forbidden
type of 'work' is writing. The question
then arises: How many characters must
one write in order to commit the sin of
writing on the sabbath? (Answer: Two).
Is the sin the same, irrespective of
which hand is used? (Answer: No).
However, in order to guard against
falling into sin, the primary
prohibition on writing is hedged with a
secondary ban on touching any writing
implement on the sabbath.
Another
prototypical work forbidden on the
sabbath is the grinding of grain. From
this it is deduced, by analogy, that any
kind of grinding of anything whatsoever
is forbidden. And this in turn is hedged
by a ban on the practice of medicine on
the sabbath (except in cases of danger
to Jewish life), in order to guard
against falling into the sin of grinding
a medicament. It is in vain to point out
that in modern times such a danger does
not exist (nor, for that matter, did it
exist in many cases even in talmudic
times); for, as a hedge around the
hedge, the Talmud explicitly forbids
liquid medicines and restorative drinks
on the sabbath. What has been fixed
remains for ever fixed, however absurd.
Tertullian, one of the early Church
Fathers, had written, 'I believe it
because it is absurd.' This can serve as
a motto for the majority of talmudic
rules, with the word 'believe' replaced
by 'practice'.
The
following example illustrates even
better the level of absurdity reached by
this system. One of the prototypes of
work forbidden on the sabbath is
harvesting. This is stretched, by
analogy, to a ban on breaking a branch
off a tree. Hence, riding a horse (or
any other animal) is forbidden, as a
hedge against the temptation to break a
branch off a tree for flogging the
beast. It is useless to argue that you
have a ready-made whip, or that you
intend to ride where there are no trees.
What is forbidden remains forbidden for
ever. It can, however, be stretched and
made stricter: in modern times, riding a
bicycle on the sabbath has been
forbidden, because it is analogous to
riding a horse.
My final
example illustrates how the same methods
are used also in purely theoretical
cases, having no conceivable application
in reality. During the existence of the
Temple, the High Priest was only allowed
to marry a virgin. Although during
virtually the whole of the talmudic
period there was no longer a Temple or a
High Priest, the Talmud devotes one of
its more involved (and bizarre)
discussions to the precise definition of
the term 'virgin' fit to marry a High
Priest. What about a woman whose hymen
had been broken by accident? Does it
make any difference whether the accident
occurred before or after the age of
three? By the impact of metal or of
wood? Was she climbing a tree? And if
so, was she climbing up or down? Did it
happen naturally or unnaturally? All
this and much else besides is discussed
in lengthy detail. And every scholar in
classical Judaism had to master hundreds
of such problems. Great scholars were
measured by their ability to develop
these problems still further, for as
shown by the examples there is always
scope for further development - if only
in one direction - and such development
did actually continue after the final
redaction of the Talmud.
However,
there are two great differences between
the talmudic period (ending around AD
500) and the period of classical Judaism
(from about AD 800). The geographical
area reflected in the Talmud is
confined, whereas the Jewish society
reflected in it is a 'complete' society,
with Jewish agriculture as its basis.
(This is true for Mesopotamia as well as
Palestine.) Although at that time there
were Jews living throughout the Roman
Empire and in many areas of the Sassanid
Empire, it is quite evident from the
talmudic text that its composition -
over half a millennium - was a strictly
local affair. No scholars from countries
other than Mesopotamia and Palestine
took part in it, nor does the text
reflect social conditions outside these
two areas.
Very little
is known about the social and religious
conditions of the Jews in the
intervening three centuries. But from AD
800 on, when more detailed historical
information is again available, we find
that the two features mentioned above
had been reversed. The Babylonian Talmud
(and to a much lesser degree the rest of
the talmudic literature) is acknowledged
as authoritative, studied and developed
in all Jewish communities. At the same
time, Jewish society had undergone a
deep change: whatever and wherever it
is, it does not include peasants.
The social
system resulting from this change will
be discussed in Chapter 4. Here we shall
describe how the Talmud was adapted to
the conditions - geographically much
wider and socially much narrower, and at
any rate radically different - of
classical Judaism. We shall concentrate
on what is in my opinion the most
important method of adaptation, namely
the dispensations.
The Dispensations
As noted
above, the talmudic system is most
dogmatic and does not allow any
relaxation of its rules even when they
are reduced to absurdity by a change in
circumstances. And in the case of the
Talmud - contrary to that of the Bible -
the literal sense of the text is
binding, and one is not allowed to
interpret it away. But in the period of
classical Judaism various talmudic laws
became untenable for the Jewish ruling
classes - the rabbis and the rich. In
the interest of these ruling classes, a
method of systematic deception was
devised for keeping the letter of the
law, while violating its spirit and
intention. It was this hypocritical
system of 'dispensations' (heterirn)
which, in my view, was the most
important cause of the debasement of
Judaism in its classical epoch. (The
second cause was Jewish mysticism, which
however operated for a much shorter
period of time.) Again, some examples
are needed to illustrate how the system
works.
(1) Taking
of interest. The Talmud strictly forbids
a Jew, on pain of severe punishment, to
take interest on a loan made to another
Jew. (According to a majority of
talmudic authorities, it is a religious
duty to take as much interest as
possible on a loan made to a Gentile.)
Very detailed rules forbid even the most
far-fetched forms in which a Jewish
lender might benefit from a Jewish
debtor. All Jewish accomplices to such
an illicit transaction, including the
scribe and the witnesses, are branded by
the Talmud as infamous persons,
disqualified from testifying in court,
because by participating in such an act
a Jew as good as declares that 'he has
no part in the god of Israel'. It is
evident that this law is well suited to
the needs of Jewish peasants or
artisans, or of small Jewish communities
who use their money for lending to
non-Jews. But the situation was very
different in east Europe (mainly in
Poland) by the 16th century. There was a
relatively big Jewish community, which
constituted the majority in many towns.
The peasants, subjected to strict
serfdom not far removed from slavery,
were hardly in a position to borrow at
all, while lending to the nobility was
the business of a few very rich Jews.
Many Jews were doing business with each
other.
In these
circumstances, the following arrangement
(called heter 'isqa - 'business
dispensation') was devised for an
interest- bearing loan between Jews,
which does not violate the letter of the
law, because formally it is not a loan
at all. The lender 'invests' his money
in the business of the borrower,
stipulating two conditions. First, that
the borrower will pay the lender at an
agreed future date a stated sum of money
(in reality, the interest in the loan)
as the lender's 'share in the profits'.
Secondly, that the borrower will be
presumed to have made sufficient profit
to give the lender his share, unless a
claim to the contrary is corroborated by
the testimony of the town's rabbi or
rabbinical judge, etc, - who, by
arrangement, refuse to testify in such
cases. In practice all that is required
is to take a text of this dispensation,
written in Aramaic and entirely
incomprehensible to the great majority,
and put it on a wall of the room where
the transaction is made (a copy of this
text is displayed in all branches of
Israeli banks) or even to keep it in a
chest - and the interest-bearing loan
between Jews becomes perfectly legal and
blameless,
(2) The
sabbatical year. According to talmudic
law (based on Leviticus, 25)
Jewish-owned land in Palestine16
must be left fallow every seventh
('sabbatical') year, when all
agricultural work (including harvesting)
on such land is forbidden. There is
ample evidence that this law was
rigorously observed for about one
thousand years, from the 5th century BC
till the disappearance of Jewish
agriculture in Palestine. Later, when
there was no occasion to apply the law
in practice, it was kept theoretically
intact. However, in the 1880s, with the
establishment of the first Jewish
agricultural colonies in Palestine, it
became a matter of practical concern.
Rabbis sympathetic to the settlers
helpfully devised a dispensation, which
was later perfected by their successors
in the religious zionist parties and has
become an established Israeli practice.
This is how
it works. Shortly before a sabbatical
year, the Israeli Minister of Internal
Affairs gives the Chief Rabbi a document
making him the legal owner of all
Israeli land, both private and public.
Armed with this paper, the Chief Rabbi
goes to a non-Jew and sells him all the
land of Israel (and, since 1967, the
Occupied Territories) for a nominal sum.
A separate document stipulates that the
'buyer' will 'resell' the land back
after the year is over. And this
transaction is repeated every seven
years, usually with the same 'buyer'.
Non-zionist
rabbis do not recognize the validity of
this dispensation,17
claiming correctly that, since religious
law for- bids Jews to sell land in
Palestine to Gentiles, the whole
transaction is based on a sin and hence
null and void. The zionist rabbis reply,
however, that what is forbidden is a
real sale, not a fictitious one!
(3) Milking
on the sabbath. This has been forbidden
in post- talmudic times, through the
process of increasing religious severity
mentioned above. The ban could easily be
kept in the diaspora, since Jews who had
cows of their own were usually rich
enough to have non-Jewish servants, who
could be ordered (using one of the
subterfuges described below) to do the
milking. The early Jewish colonists in
Palestine employed Arabs for this and
other purposes, but with the forcible
imposition of the Zionist policy of
exclusive Jewish labor there was need
for a dispensation. (This was
particularly important before the
introduction of mechanized milking in
the late 1950s.) Here too there was a
difference between zionist and
non-zionist rabbis.
According to
the former, the forbidden milking
becomes permitted provided the milk is
not white but dyed blue. This blue
Saturday milk is then used exclusively
for making cheese, and the dye is washed
off into the whey. Non-zionist rabbis
have devised a much subtler scheme
(which I personally witnessed operating
in a religious kibbutz in 1952). They
discovered an old provision which allows
the udders of a cow to be emptied on the
sabbath, purely for relieving the
suffering caused to the animal by
bloated udders, and on the strict
condition that the milk runs to waste on
the ground. Now, this is what is
actually done: on Saturday morning, a
pious kibbutznik goes to the cowshed and
places pails under the cows. (There is
no ban on such work in the whole of the
talmudic literature.) He then goes to
the synagogue to pray. Then comes his
colleague, whose 'honest intention' is
to relieve the animals' pain and let
their milk run to the floor. But if, by
chance, a pail happens to be standing
there, is he under any obligation to
remove it? Of course not. He simply
'ignores' the pails, fulfills his
mission of mercy and goes to the
synagogue. Finally a third pious
colleague goes into the cowshed and
discovers, to his great surprise, the
pails full of milk. So he puts them in
cold storage and follows his comrades to
the synagogue. Now all is well, and
there is no need to waste money on blue
dye.
(4) Mixed
crops. Similar dispensations were issued
by zionist rabbis in respect of the ban
(based on Leviticus, 19:19) against
sowing two different species of crop in
the same field. Modern agronomy has
however shown that in some cases
(especially in growing fodder) mixed
sowing is the most profitable. The
rabbis invented a dispensation according
to which one man sows the field length-
wise with one kind of seed, and later
that day his comrade, who 'does not
know' about the former, sows another
kind of seed crosswise. However, this
method was felt to be too wasteful of
labor, and a better one was devised: one
man makes a heap of one kind of seed in
a public place and carefully covers it
with a sack or piece of board. The
second kind of seed is then put on top
of the cover. Later, another man comes
and exclaims, in front of witnesses, 'I
need this sack (or board)' and removes
it, so that the seeds mix 'naturally'.
Finally, a third man comes along and is
told,'Take this and sow the field,'
which he proceeds to do.18
(5) Leavened
substances must not be eaten or even
kept in the possession of a Jew during
the seven (or, outside Palestine, eight)
days of Passover. The concept 'leavened
substances' was continually broadened
and the aversion to so much as seeing
them during the festival approached
hysteria. They include all kinds of
flour and even unground grain. In the
original talmudic society this was
bearable, because bread (leavened or
not) was usually baked once a week; a
peasant family would use the last of the
previous year's grain to bake unleavened
bread for the festival, which ushers in
the new harvest season. However, in the
conditions of post-Talmudic European
Jewry the observance was very hard on a
middle-class Jewish family and even more
so on a corn merchant. A dispensation
was therefore devised, by which all
those substances are sold in a
fictitious sale to a Gentile before the
festival and bought back automatically
after it. The one thing that must be
done is to lock up the taboo substances
for the duration of the festival. In
Israel this fictitious sale has been
made more efficient. Religious Jews
'sell' their leavened substances to
their local rabbis, who in turn 'sell'
them to the Chief Rabbis; the latter
sell them to a Gentile, and by a special
dispensation this sale is presumed to
include also the leavened substances of
non-practising Jews.
(6)
Sabbath-Goy. Perhaps the most developed
dispensations concern the 'Goy (Gentile)
of Sabbath'. As mentioned above, the
range of tasks banned on the sabbath has
widened continually; but the range of
tasks that must be carried out or
supervised to satisfy~ needs or to
increase comfort also keeps widening.
This is particularly true in modern
times, but the effect of technological
change began to be felt long ago. The
ban against grinding on the sabbath was
a relatively light matter for a Jewish
peasant or artisan, say in
second-century Palestine, who used a
hand mill for domestic purposes. It was
quite a different matter for a tenant of
a water mill or windmill one of the most
common Jewish occupations in eastern
Europe. But even such a simple human
problem' as the wish to have a hot cup
of tea on a Saturday afternoon becomes
much greater with the tempting samovar,
used regularly on weekdays, standing in
the room. These are just two examples
out of a very large number of so-called
'problems of sabbath observance'. And
one can state with certainty that for a
community composed exclusively of
Orthodox Jews they were quite insoluble,
at least during the last eight or ten
centuries, without the 'help' of
non-Jews. This is even more true today
in the 'Jewish state', because many
public services, such as water, gas and
electricity, fall in this category.
Classical Judaism could not exist even
for a whole week without using some
non-Jews.
But without
special dispensations there is a great
obstacle in employing non-Jews to do
these Saturday jobs; for talmudic
regulations forbid Jews to ask a Gentile
to do on the sabbath any work which they
themselves are banned from doing.19
I shall describe two of the many types
of dispensation used for such purposes.
First, there
is the method of 'hinting', which
depends on the casuistic logic according
to which a sinful demand becomes
blameless if it is phrased slyly. As
rule, the hint must be obscure', but in
cases of extreme need a 'clear' hint is
allowed. For example, in a recent
booklet on religious observance for the
use of Israeli soldiers, the latter are
taught how to talk to Arab workers
employed by the army as sabbath-Goy. In
urgent cases, such as when it is very
cold and a fire must be lit, or when
light is needed for a religious service,
a pious Jewish soldier may use a 'clear'
hint and tell the Arab: 'It is cold (or
dark) here'. But normally an 'obscure'
hint must suffice, for example: 'It
would be more pleasant if it were warmer
here'20
This method of 'hinting' is particularly
repulsive and degrading inasmuch as it
is normally used on non-Jews who, due to
their poverty or subordinate social
position, are wholly in the power of
their Jewish employer. A Gentile servant
(or employee of the Israeli army) who
does not train himself to interpret
'obscure hints' as orders will be
pitilessly dismissed.
The second
method is used in cases where what the
Gentile is required to do on Saturday is
not an occasional task or personal
service, which can be 'hinted' at as the
need arises, but a routine or regular
job without constant Jewish supervision.
According to this method - called
'implicit inclusion' (havla'ah) of the
sabbath among weekdays - the Gentile is
hired 'for the whole week (or year)',
without the sabbath being so much as
mentioned in the contract. But in
reality work is only performed on the
sabbath. This method was used in the
past in hiring a Gentile to put out the
candles in the synagogue after the
sabbath-eve prayer (rather than
wastefully allowing them to burn out).
Modern Israeli examples are: regulating
the water supply or watching over water
reservoirs on Saturdays.21
A similar
idea is used also in the case of Jews,
but for a different end. Jews are
forbidden to receive any payment for
work done on the sabbath, even if the
work itself is permitted. The chief
example here concerns the sacred
professions: the rabbi or talmudic
scholar who preaches or teaches on the
sabbath, the cantor who sings only on
Saturdays and other holy days (on which
similar bans apply), the sexton and
similar officials. In talmudic times,
and in some countries even several
centuries after, such jobs were unpaid.
But later, when these became salaried
professions, the dispensation of
'implicit inclusion was used, and they
were hired on a 'monthly' or 'yearly'
basis. In the case of rabbis and
talmudic scholars the problem is
particularly complicated, because the
Talmud forbids them to receive any
payment for preaching, teaching or
studying talmudic matters even on
weekdays.22
For them an additional dispensation
stipulates that their salary is not
really a salary at all but 'compensation
for idleness' (dmey batalah). As a
combined result of these two fictions,
what is in reality payment for work done
mainly, or even solely, on the sabbath
is transmogrified into payment for being
idle on weekdays. Social Aspects
ofDispensations Two social features of
these and many similar practices deserve
special mention.
First, a
dominant feature of this system of
dispensations, and of classical Judaism
inasmuch as it is based on them, is
deception - deception primarily of God,
if this word can be used for an
imaginary being so easily deceived by
the rabbis, who consider themselves
cleverer than him. No greater contrast
can be conceived than that between the
God of the Bible (particularly of the
greater prophets) and of the God of
classical Judaism. The latter is more
like the early Roman Jupiter, who was
likewise bamboozled by his worshipers,
or the gods described in Frazer's Golden
Bough.
From the
ethical point of view, classical Judaism
represents a process of degeneration,
which is still going on; and this
degeneration into a tribal collection of
empty rituals and magic superstitions
has very important social and political
consequences. For it must be remembered
that it is precisely the superstitions
of classical Judaism which have the
greatest hold on the Jewish masses,
rather than those parts of the Bible or
even the Talmud which are of real
religious and ethical value. (The same
can be observed also in other religions
which are now undergoing revival.) What
is popularly regarded as the most 'holy'
and solemn occasion of the Jewish
liturgical year, attended even by very
many Jews who are otherwise far from
religion? It is the Kol Nidrey prayer on
the eve of Yom Kippur - a chanting of a
particularly absurd and deceptive
dispensation. by which all private vows
made to God in the following year are
declared in advance to be null and void.23
Or, in the area of personal religion,
the Qadish prayer, said on days of
mourning by sons for their parents in
order to elevate their departed souls to
paradise - a recitation of an Aramaic
text, incomprehensible to the great
majority. Quite obviously, the. popular
regard given to these, the most
superstitious parts of the Jewish
religion, is not given to its better
parts.
Together
with the deception of God goes the
deception of other Jews, mainly in the
interest of the Jewish ruling class. It
is characteristic that no dispensations
were allowed in the specific interest of
the Jewish poor. For example, Jews who
were starving but not actually on the
point of death were never allowed by
their rabbis (who did not often go
hungry themselves) to eat any sort of
forbidden food, though kosher food is
usually more expensive.
The second
dominant feature of the dispensations is
that they are in large part obviously
motivated by the spirit of profit. And
it is this combination of hypocrisy and
the profit motive which increasingly
dominated classical Judaism. In Israel,
where the process goes on, this is dimly
perceived by popular opinion, despite
all the official brainwashing promoted
by the education system and the media.
The religious establishment - the rabbis
and the religious parties - and, by
association, to some extent the Orthodox
community as a whole, are quite
unpopular in Israel. One of the most
important reasons for this is precisely
their reputation for duplicity and
venality. Of course, popular opinion
(which may often be prejudiced) is not
the same thing as social analysis; but
in this particular case it is actually
true that the Jewish religious
establishment does have a strong
tendency to chicanery and graft, due to
the corrupting influence of the Orthodox
Jewish religion. Because in general
social life religion is only one of the
social influences, its effect on the
mass of believers is not nearly so great
as on the rabbis and leaders of the
religious parties. Those religious Jews
in Israel who are honest, as the
majority of them undoubtedly are, are so
not because of the influence of their
religion and rabbis, but in spite of it.
On the other hand, in those few areas of
public life in Israel which are wholly
dominated by religious circles, the
level of chicanery, venality and
corruption is notorious, far surpassing
the 'average' level tolerated by
general, non-religious Israeli society.
In Chapter 4
we shall see how the dominance of the
profit motive in classical Judaism is
connected with the structure of Jewish
society and its articulation with the
general society in the midst of which
Jews lived in the 'classical' period.
Here I merely want to observe that the
profit motive is not characteristic of
Judaism in all periods of its history.
Only the platonist confusion which seeks
for the metaphysical timeless 'essence'
of Judaism, instead of looking at the
historical changes in Jewish society,
has obscured this fact. (And this
confusion has been greatly encouraged by
zionism, in its reliance on 'historical
rights' ahistorically derived from the
Bible.) Thus, apologists of Judaism
claim, quite correctly, that the Bible
is hostile to the profit motive while
the Talmud is indifferent to it. But
this was caused by the very different
social conditions in which they were
composed. As was pointed out above, the
Talmud was composed in two well-defined
areas, in a period when the Jews living
there constituted a society based on
agriculture and consisting mainly of
peasants - very different indeed from
the society of classical Judaism.
In Chapter 5
we shall deal in detail with the hostile
attitudes and deceptions practiced by
classical Judaism against non-Jews. But
more important as a social feature is
the profit- motivated deception
practiced by the rich Jews against poor
fellow Jews (such as the dispensation
concerning interest on loans). Here I
must say, in spite of my opposition to
marxism both in philosophy and as a
social theory, that Marx was quite right
when, in his two articles about Judaism,
he characterized it as dominated by
profit-seeking - provided this is
limited to Judaism as he knew it, that
is, to classical Judaism which in his
youth had already entered the period of
its dissolution. True, he stated this
arbitrarily, ahistorically and without
proof. Obviously he came to his
conclusion by intuition; but his
intuition in this case - and with the
proper historical limitation - was
right.
CHAPTER
4
The
Weight of History
A
GREAT DEAL
of nonsense has been written in the
attempt to provide a social or mystical
interpretation of Jewry or Judaism 'as a
whole'. This cannot be done, for the
social structure of the Jewish people
and the ideological structure of Judaism
have changed profoundly through the
ages. Four major phases can be
distinguished:
(1) The
phase of the ancient kingdoms of Israel
and Judah, until the destruction the
first Temple (587 BC) and the Babylonian
exile. (Much of the Old Testament is
concerned with this period, although
most major books of the Old Testament,
including the Pentateuch as we know it,
were actually composed after that date.)
Socially, these ancient Jewish kingdoms
were quite similar to the neighboring
kingdoms of Palestine and Syria; and -
as a careful reading of the Prophets
reveals - the similarity extended to the
religious cults practiced by the great
majority of the people.1 The ideas that
were to become typical of later Judaism
- including in particular ethnic
segregationism and monotheistic
exclusivism - were at this stage
confined to small circles of priests and
prophets, whose social influence
depended on royal support.
(2) The
phase of the dual centers, Palestine and
Mesopotamia, from the first 'Return from
Babylon' (537 BC) until about AD 500. It
is characterized by the existence of
these two autonomous Jewish societies,
both based primarily on agriculture, on
which the 'Jewish religion', as
previously elaborated in priestly and
scribal circles, was imposed by the
force and authority of the Persian
empire. The Old Testament Book of Ezra
contains an account of the activities of
Ezra the priest, 'a ready scribe in the
law of Moses', who was empowered by King
Artaxerxes I of Persia to 'set
magistrates and judges' over the Jews of
Palestine, so that 'whosoever will not
do the law of thy God, and the law of
the king, let judgment be executed
speedily upon him, whether it be unto
death, or to banishment, or to
confiscation of goods, or to
imprisonment:2 And in the Book of
Neherniali - cupbearer to King
Artaxerxes who was appointed Persian
governor of Judea, with even greater
powers - we see to what extent foreign
(nowadays one would say 'imperialist')
coercion was instrumental in imposing
the Jewish religion, with lasting
results.
In both
centers, Jewish autonomy persisted
during most of this period and
deviations from religious orthodoxy were
repressed. Exceptions to this rule
occurred when the religious aristocracy
itself got 'infected' with Hellenistic
ideas (from 300 to 166 BC and again
under Herod the Great and his
successors, from 50 BC to AD 70), or
when it was split in reaction to new
developments (for example, the division
between the two great parties, the
Pharisees and the Sadduceans, which
emerged in about 140 BC). However, the
moment any one party triumphed, it used
the coercive machinery of the Jewish
autonomy (or, for a short period,
independence) to impose its own
religious views on all the Jews in both
centers.
During most
of this time, especially after the
collapse of the Persian empire and until
about AD 200, the Jews outside the two
centers were free from Jewish religious
coercion. Among the papyri preserved in
Elephantine (in Upper Egypt) there is a
letter dating from 419 BC containing the
text of an edict by King Darius II of
Persia which instructs the Jews of Egypt
as to the details of the observance of
Passover.3 But the Hellenistic kingdoms,
the Roman Republic and early Roman
Empire did not bother with such things.
The freedom that Hellenistic Jews
enjoyed outside Palestine allowed the
creation of a Jewish literature written
in Greek, which was subsequently
rejected in toto by Judaism and whose
remains were preserved by Christianity.4
The very rise of Christianity was
possible because of this relative
freedom of the Jewish communities
outside the two centers. The experience
of the Apostle Paul is significant: in
Corinth, when the local Jewish community
accused Paul of heresy, the Roman
governor Galho dismissed the case at
once, refusing to be a 'judge of such
matters';5 but in Judea the governor
Festus felt obliged to take legal
cognizance of a purely religious
internal Jewish dispute.6
This
tolerance came to an end in about AD
200, when the Jewish religion, as
meanwhile elaborated and evolved in
Palestine, was imposed by the Roman
authorities upon all the Jews of the
Empire.7
(3) The
phase which we have defined as classical
Judaism and which will be discussed
below.
(4) The
modern phase, characterized by the
breakdown of the totalitarian Jewish
community and its power, and by attempts
to reimpose it, of which Zionism is the
most important. This phase begins in
Holland in the 17th century, in France
and Austria (excluding Hungary) in the
late 18th century, in most other
European countries in the middle of the
19th century, and in some Islamic
countries in the 20th century. (The Jews
of Yemen were still living in the
medieval 'classical' phase in 1948).
Something concerning these developments
will be said later on.
Between the
second phase and the third, that of
classical Judaism, there is a gap of
several centuries in which our present
knowledge of Jews and Jewish society is
very slight, and the scant information
we do have is all derived from external
(non-Jewish) sources. In the countries
of Latin Christendom we have absolutely
no Jewish literary records until the
middle of the 10th century; internal
Jewish information, mostly from
religious literature, becomes more
abundant only in the 11th and
particularly the 12th century. Before
that, we are wholly dependent first on
Roman and then on Christian evidence. In
the Islamic countries the information
gap is not quite so big; still, very
little is known about Jewish society
before AD 800 and about the changes it
must have undergone during the three
preceding centuries.
Major Features of Classical Judaism:
Let us
therefore ignore those 'dark ages', and
for the sake of convenience begin with
the two centuries 1000-1200, for which
abundant information is available from
both internal and external sources on
all the important Jewish centers, east
and west. Classical Judaism, which is
clearly discernible in this period, has
undergone very few changes since then,
and (in the guise of Orthodox Judaism)
is still a powerful force today.
How can that
classical Judaism be characterized, and
what are the social differences
distinguishing it from earlier phases of
Judaism? I believe that there are three
such major features.
(1)
Classical Jewish society has no
peasants, and in this it differs
profoundly from earlier Jewish societies
in the two centers, Palestine and
Mesopotamia. It is difficult for us, in
modern times, to understand what this
means. We have to make an effort to
imagine what serfdom was like; the
enormous difference in literacy, let
alone education, between village and
town throughout this period; the
incomparably greater freedom enjoyed by
all the small minority who were not
peasants - in order to realize that
during the whole of the classical period
the Jews, in spite of all the
persecutions to which they were
subjected, formed an integral part of
the privileged classes. Jewish
historiography, especially in English,
is misleading on this point inasmuch as
it tends to focus on Jewish poverty and
anti-Jewish discrimination. Both were
real enough at times; but the poorest
Jewish craftsman, peddler, land-lord's
steward or petty cleric was immeasurably
better off than a serf. This was
particularly true in those European
countries where serfdom persisted into
the 19th century, whether in a partial
or extreme form: Prussia, Austria
(including Hungary), Poland and the
Polish lands taken by Russia. And it is
not without significance that, prior to
the beginning of the great Jewish
migration of modern times (around 1880),
a large majority of all Jews were living
in those areas and that their most
important social function there was to
mediate the oppression of the peasants
on behalf of the nobility and the Crown.
Everywhere,
classical Judaism developed hatred and
contempt for agriculture as an
occupation and for peasants as a class,
even more than for other Gentiles - a
hatred of which I know no parallel in
other societies. This is immediately
apparent to anyone who is familiar with
the Yiddish or Hebrew literature of the
19th and 20th centuries.9
Most
east-European Jewish socialists (that
is, members of exclusively or
predominantly Jewish parties and
factions) are guilty of never pointing
out this fact; indeed, many were
themselves tainted with a ferocious
anti-peasant attitude inherited from
classical Judaism. Of course, Zionist
'socialists' were the worst in this
respect, but others, such as the Bund,
were not much better. A typical example
is their opposition to the formation of
peasant co-operatives promoted by the
Catholic clergy, on the ground that this
was 'an act of antisemitism'. This
attitude is by no means dead even now;
it could be seen very clearly in the
racist views held by many Jewish
'dissidents' in the USSR regarding the
Russian people, and also in the lack of
discussion of this background by so many
Jewish socialists, such as Isaac
Deutscher. The whole racist propaganda
on the theme of the supposed superiority
of Jewish morality and intellect (in
which many Jewish socialists were
prominent) is bound up with a lack of
sensitivity for the suffering of that
major part of humanity who were
especially oppressed during the last
thousand years - the peasants.
(2)
Classical Jewish society was
particularly dependent on kings or on
nobles with royal powers. In the next
chapter we discuss various Jewish laws
directed against Gentiles, and in
particular laws which command Jews to
revile Gentiles and refrain from
praising them or their customs. These
laws allow one and only one exception: a
Gentile king, or a locally powerful
magnate (in Hebrew paritz, in Yiddish
pooretz). A king is praised and prayed
for, and he is obeyed not only in most
civil matters but also in some religious
ones. As we shall see Jewish doctors,
who are in general forbidden to save the
lives of ordinary Gentiles on the
Sabbath, are commanded to do their
utmost in healing magnates and rulers;
this partly explains why kings and
noblemen, popes and bishops often
employed Jewish physicians. But not only
physicians. Jewish tax and customs
collectors, or (in eastern Europe)
bailiffs of manors could be depended
upon to do their utmost for the king or
baron, in a way that a Christian could
not always be.
The legal
status of a Jewish community in the
period of classical Judaism was normally
based on a 'privilege' - a charter
granted by a king or prince (or, in
Poland after the 16th century, by a
powerful nobleman) to the Jewish
community and conferring on it the
rights of autonomy - that is, investing
the rabbis with the power to dictate to
the other Jews. An important part of
such privileges, going as far back as
the late Roman Empire, is the creation
of a Jewish clerical estate which,
exactly like the Christian clergy in
medieval times, is exempt from paying
taxes to the sovereign and is allowed to
impose taxes on the people under its
control - the Jews - for its own
benefit. It is interesting to note that
this deal between the late Roman Empire
and the rabbis antedates by at least one
hundred years the very similar
privileges granted by Constantine the
Great and his successors to the
Christian clergy.
From about
AD 200 until the early 5th century, the
legal position of Jewry in the Roman
Empire was as follows. A hereditary
Jewish Patriarch (residing in Tiberias
in Palestine) was recognized both as a
high dignitary in the official hierarchy
of the Empire and as supreme chief of
all the Jews in the Empire.10 As a Roman
official, the Patriarch was vir
illustris, of the same high official
class which included the consuls, the
top military commanders of the Empire
and the chief ministers around the
throne (the Sacred Consistory), and was
out-ranked only by the imperial family.
In fact, the Illustrious Patriarch (as
he is invariably styled in imperial
decrees) out-ranked the provincial
governor of Palestine. Emperor
Theodosius I, the Great, a pious and
orthodox Christian, executed his
governor of Palestine for insulting the
Patriarch.
At the same
time, all the rabbis - who had to be
designated by the Patriarch - were freed
from the most oppressive Roman taxes and
received many official privileges, such
as exemption from serving on town
councils (which was also one of the
first privileges later granted to the
Christian clergy). In addition, the
Patriarch was empowered to tax the Jews
and to discipline them by imposing
fines, flogging and other punishments.
He used this power in order to suppress
Jewish heresies and (as we know from the
Talmud) to persecute Jewish preachers
who accused him of taxing the Jewish
poor for his personal benefit.
We know from
Jewish sources that the tax-exempt
rabbis used excommunication and other
means within their power to enhance the
religious hegemony of the Patriarch. We
also hear, mostly indirectly, of the
hate and scorn that many of the Jewish
peasants and urban poor in Palestine had
for the rabbis, as well as of the
contempt of the rabbis for the Jewish
poor (usually expressed as contempt for
the 'ignorant'). Nevertheless, this
typical colonial arrangement continued,
as it was backed by the might of the
Roman Empire.
Similar
arrangements existed, within each
country, during the whole period of
classical Judaism. Their social effects
on the Jewish communities differed,
however, according to the size of each
community. Where there were few Jews,
there was normally little social
differentiation within the community,
which tended to be composed of rich and
middle~lass Jews, most of whom had
considerable rabbinical-talmudic
education. But in countries where the
number of Jews increased and a big class
of Jewish poor appeared, the same
cleavage as the one described above
manifested itself, and we observe the
rabbinical class, in alliance with the
Jewish rich, oppressing the Jewish poor
in its own interest as well as in the
interest of the state - that is, of the
Crown and the nobility.
This was, in
particular, the situation in pre-1795
Poland. The specific circumstances of
Polish Jewry will be outlined below.
Here I only want to point out that
because of the formation of a large
Jewish community in that country, a deep
cleavage between the Jewish upper class
(the rabbis and the rich) and the Jewish
masses developed there from the 18th
century and continued throughout the
19th century. So long as the Jewish
community had power over its members,
the incipient revolts of the poor, who
had to bear the main brunt of taxation,
were suppressed by the combined force of
the naked coercion of Jewish 'self-rule'
and religious sanction.
Because of
all this, throughout the classical
period (as well as in modern times) the
rabbis were the most loyal, not to say
Zealous, supporters of the powers that
be; and the more reactionary the regime,
the more rabbinical support it had.
(3) The
society of classical Judaism is in total
opposition to the surrounding non-Jewish
society, except the king (or the nobles,
when they take over the state). This is
amply illustrated in Chapter 5.
The
consequences of these three social
features, taken together, go a long way
towards explaining the history of
classical Jewish communities both in
Christian and in Muslim countries.
The position
of the Jews is particularly favorable
under strong regimes which have retained
a feudal character, and in which
national consciousness, even at a
rudimentary level, has not yet begun to
develop. It is even more favorable in
countries such as pre-1795 Poland or in
the Iberian kingdoms before the latter
half of the 15th century, where the
formation of a nationally based powerful
feudal monarchy was temporarily or
permanently arrested. In fact, classical
Judaism flourishes best under strong
regimes which are dissociated from most
classes in society, and in such regimes
the Jews fulfill one of the functions of
a middle class - but in a permanently
dependent form. For this reason they are
opposed not only by the peasantry (whose
opposition is then unimportant, except
for the occasional and rare popular
revolt) but more importantly by the
non-Jewish middle class (which was on
the rise in Europe), and by the plebeian
part of the clergy; and they are
protected by the upper clergy and the
nobility. But in those countries where,
feudal anarchy having been curbed, the
nobility enters into partnership with
the king (and with at least part of the
bourgeoisie) to rule the state, which
assumes a national or protonational
form, the position of the Jews
deteriorates.
This general
scheme, valid for Muslim and Christian
countries alike, will now be illustrated
briefly by a few examples.
England, France and Italy
Since the
first period of Jewish residence in
England was so brief, and coincided with
the development of the English national
feudal monarchy, this country can serve
as the best illustration of the above
scheme. Jews were brought over to
England by William the Conqueror, as
part of the French-speaking Norman
ruling class, with the primary duty of
granting loans to those lords, spiritual
and temporal, who were otherwise unable
to pay their feudal dues (which were
particularly heavy in England and more
rigorously exacted in that period than
in any other European monarchy). Their
greatest royal patron was Henry II, and
the Magna Carta marked the beginning of
their decline, which continued during
the conflict of the barons with Henry
III. The temporary resolution of this
conflict by Edward I, with the formation
of Parliament and of 'ordinary' and
fixed taxation, was accompanied by the
expulsion of the Jews.
Similarly,
in France the Jews flourished during the
formation of the strong feudal
principalities in the 11th and 12th
centuries, including the Royal Domain;
and their best protector among the
Capetian kings was Louis VII (1137-80).
notwithstanding his deep and sincere
Christian piety. At that time the Jews
of France counted themselves as knights
(in Hebrew, parashim) and the leading
Jewish authority in France, Rabbenu Tam,
warns them never to accept an invitation
by a feudal lord to settle on his
domain, unless they are accorded
privileges similar to those of other
knights. The decline in their position
beings with Philip II Augustus,
originator of the political and military
alliance of the Crown with the rising
urban commune movement, and plummets
under Philip IV the Handsome, who
convoked the first Estates General for
the whole of France in order to gain
support against the pope. The final
expulsion of Jews from the whole of
France is closely bound up with the firm
establishment of the Crown's rights of
taxation and the national character of
the monarchy.
Similar
examples can be given from other
European countries where Jews were
living during that period. Reserving
Christian Spain and Poland for a more
detailed discussion, we remark that in
Italy, where many city states had a
republican form of power, the same
regularity is discernible. Jews
flourished especially in the Papal
States, in the twin feudal kingdoms of
Sicily and Naples (until their
expulsion, on Spanish orders, circa
1500) and in the feudal enclaves of
Piedmont. But in the great commercial
and independent cities such as Florence
their number was small and their social
role unimportant.
The Muslim World
The same
general scheme applies to Jewish
communities during the classical period
in Muslim countries as well, except for
the important fact that expulsion of
Jews, being contrary to Islamic law, was
virtually unknown there. (Medieval
Catholic canon law, on the other hand,
neither commands nor forbids such
expulsion.)
Jewish
communities flourished in the famous,
but socially misinterpreted, Jewish
Golden Age in Muslim countries under
regimes which were particularly
dissociated from the great majority of
the people they ruled, and whose power
rested on nothing but naked force and a
mercenary army. The best example is
Muslim Spain, where the very real Jewish
Golden Age (of Hebrew poetry, grammar,
philosophy etc) begins precisely with
the fall of the Spanish Umayyad
caliphate after the death of the de
facto ruler, al-Mansur, in 1002, and the
establishment of the numerous ta'ifa
(faction) kingdoms, all based on naked
force. The rise of the famous Jewish
commander-in-chief and prime minister of
the kingdom of Granada, Samuel the Chief
(Shmu'el Hannagid, died 1056), who was
also one of the greatest Hebrew poets of
all ages, was based primarily on the
fact that the kingdom which he served
was a tyranny of a rather small Berber
military force over the Arabic-speaking
inhabitants. A similar situation
obtained in the other ta'ifa
Arab-Spanish kingdoms. The position of
the Jews declined somewhat with the
establishment of the Almoravid regime
(in 1O86-9O) and became quite precarious
under the strong and popular Almohad
regime (after 1147) when, as a result of
persecutions, the Jews migrated to the
Christian Spanish kingdoms, where the
power of the kings was still very
slight.
Similar
observations can be made regarding the
states of the Muslim East. The first
state in which the Jewish community
reached a position of important
political influence was the Fatimid
empire, especially after the conquest of
Egypt in 969, because it was based on
the rule of an Isma'ili-shi'ite
religious minority. The same phenomenon
can be observed in the Seljuk states -
based on feudal-type armies, mercenaries
and, increasingly, on slave troops
(mamluks) - and in their successor
states. The favor of Saladin to the
Jewish communities, first in Egypt, then
in other parts of this expanding empire,
was based not only on his real personal
qualities of tolerance, charity and deep
political wisdom, but equally on his
rise to power as a rebellious commander
of mercenaries freshly arrived in Egypt
and then as usurper of the power of the
dynasty which he and his father and
uncle before him had served.
But perhaps
the best Islamic example is the state
where the Jews' position was better than
anywhere else in the East since the fall
of the ancient Persian empire - the
Ottoman empire, particularly during its
heyday in the 16th century.11 As is well
known, the Ottoman regime was based
initially on the almost complete
exclusion of the Turks themselves (not
to mention other Muslims by birth) from
positions of political power and from
the most important part of the army, the
Janissary corps, both of which were
manned by the sultan's Christian-born
slaves, abducted in childhood and
educated in special schools. Until the
end of the 16th century no free-born
Turk could become a Janissary or hold
any important government office. In such
a regime, the role of the Jews in their
sphere was quite analogous to that of
the Janissaries in theirs. Thus the
position of the Jews was best under a
regime which was politically most
dissociated from the peoples it ruled.
With the admission of the Turks
themselves (as well as some other Muslim
peoples, such as the Albanians) to the
ruling class of the Ottoman empire, the
position of the Jews declines. However,
this decline was not very sharp, because
of the continuing arbitrariness and non-
national character of the Ottoman
regime.
This point
is very important, in my opinion,
because the relatively good situation of
Jews under Islam in general, and under
certain Islamic regimes in particular,
is used by many Palestinian and other
Arab propagandists in a very ignorant,
albeit perhaps well-meaning, way. First,
they generalize and reduce serious
questions of politics and history to
mere slogans. Granted that the position
of Jews was, on average, much better
under Islam than under Christianity -
the important question to ask is, under
what regimes was it better or worse? We
have seen where such an analysis leads.
But,
secondly and more importantly: in a
pre-modern state, a 'better' position of
the Jewish community normally entailed a
greater degree of tyranny exercised
within this community by the rabbis
against other Jews. To give one example:
certainly, the figure of Saladin is one
which, considering his period, inspires
profound respect. But to~gether with
this respect, I for one cannot forget
that the enhanced privileges he granted
to the Jewish community in Egypt and his
appointment of Maimonides as their Chief
(Nagid) immediately unleashed severe
religious persecution of Jewish
'sinners' by the rabbis. For instance,
Jewish 'priests' (supposed descendants
of the ancient priests who had served in
the Temple) are forbidden to marry not
only prostitutes12 but also divorcees.
This latter prohibition, which has
always caused difficulties, was
infringed during the anarchy under the
last Fatimid rulers (circa 113080) by
such 'priests' who, contrary to Jewish
religious law, were married to Jewish
divorcees in Islamic courts (which are
nominally empowered to marry
non-Muslims). The greater tolerance
towards 'the Jews' instituted by Saladin
upon his accession to power enabled
Maimonides to issue orders to the
rabbinical courts in Egypt to seize all
Jews who had gone through such forbidden
marriages and have them flogged until
they 'agreed' to divorce their wives.13
Similarly, in the Ottoman empire the
powers of the rabbinical courts were
very great and consequently most
pernicious. Therefore the position of
Jews in Muslim countries in the past
should never be used as a political
argument in contemporary (or future)
contexts.
Christian Spain
I have left
to the last a discussion of the two
countries where the position of the
Jewish community and the internal
development of classical Judaism were
most important - Christian Spain14 (or
rather the Iberian peninsula, including
Portugal) and pre-1795 Poland.
Politically,
the position of Jews in the Christian
Spanish kingdoms was the highest ever
attained by Jews in any country (except
some of the ta'ifas and under the
Fatimids) before the 19th century. Many
Jews served officially as Treasurers
General to the kings of Castile,
regional and general tax collectors,
diplomats (representing their king in
foreign courts, both Muslim and
Christian, even outside Spain),
courtiers and advisers to rulers and
great noblemen. And in no other country
except Poland did the Jewish community
wield such great legal powers over the
Jews or used them so widely and
publicly, including the power to inflict
capital punishment. From the 11th
century the persecution of Karaites (a
heretical Jewish sect) by flogging them
to death if unrepentant was common in
Castile. Jewish women who cohabited with
Gentiles had their noses cut off by
rabbis who explained that 'in this way
she will lose her beauty and her
non-Jewish lover will come to hate her'.
Jews who had the effrontery to attack a
rabbinical judge had their hands cut
off. Adulterers were imprisoned, after
being made to run the gauntlet through
the Jewish quarter. In religious
disputes, those thought to be heretics
had their tongues cut out.
Historically, all this was associated
with feudal anarchy and with the attempt
of a few 'strong' kings to rule through
sheer force, disregarding the
parliamentary institutions, the Cortes,
which had already come into existence.
In this struggle, not only the political
and financial power of the Jews but also
their military power (at least in the
most important kingdom, Castile) was
very significant. One example will
suffice: both feudal mis- government and
Jewish political influence in Castile
reached their peak under Pedro I, justly
nick-named the Cruel. The Jewish
communities of Toledo, Burgos and many
other cities served practically as his
garrisons in the long civil war between
him and his half-brother, Henry of
Trastamara, who after his victory became
Henry II (1369~79).15 The same Pedro I
gave the Jews of Castile the right to
establish a country-wide inquisition
against Jewish religious deviants - more
than one hundred years before the
establishment of the more famous
Catholic Holy Inquisition.
As in other
western European countries, the gradual
emergence of national consciousness
around the monarchy, which began under
the house of Trastamara and after ups
and downs reached a culmination under
the Catholic Kings Ferdinand and
Isabella, was accompanied first by a
decline in the position of the Jews,
then by popular movements and pressures
against them and finally by their
expulsion. On the whole the Jews were
defended by the nobility and upper
clergy. It was the more plebeian
sections of the church, particularly the
mendicant orders, involved in the life
of the lower classes, which were hostile
to them. The great enemies of the Jews,
Torquemada and Cardinal Ximenes, were
also great reformers of the Spanish
church, making it much less corrupt and
much more dependent on the monarchy
instead of being the preserve of the
feudal aristocracy.
Poland
The old
pre-1795 Poland - a feudal republic with
an elective king- is a converse example;
it illustrates how before the advent of
the modern state the position of the
Jews was socially most important, and
their internal autonomy greatest, under
a regime which was completely retarded
to the point of utter degeneracy.
Due to many
causes, medieval Poland lagged in its
development behind countries like
England and France; a strong feudal-type
monarchy - yet without any parliamentary
institutions - was formed there only in
the 14th century, especially under
Casimir the Great (1333-70). Immediately
after his death, changes of dynasty and
other factors led to a very rapid
development of the power of the noble
magnates, then also of the petty
nobility, so that by 1572 the process of
reduction of the king to a figure head
and exclusion of all other non-noble
estates from political power was
virtually complete. In the following two
hundred years, the lack of government
turned into an acknowledged anarchy, to
the point where a court decision in a
case affecting a nobleman was only a
legal license to wage a private war to
enforce the verdict (for there was no
other way to enforce it) and where feuds
between great noble houses in the 18th
century involved private armies
numbering tens of thousands, much larger
than the derisory forces of the official
army of the Republic.
This process
was accompanied by a debasement in the
position of the Polish peasants (who had
been free in the early Middle Ages) to
the point of utter serfdom, hardly
distinguishable from outright slavery
and certainly the worst in Europe. The
desire of noblemen in neighboring
countries to enjoy the power of the
Polish pan over his peasants (including
the power of life and death without any
right of appeal) was instrumental in the
territorial expansion of Poland. The
situation in the 'eastern' lands of
Poland (Byelorussia and the Ukraine) -
colonized and settled by newly enserfed
peasants - was worst of all.16
A small
number of Jews (albeit in important
positions) had apparently been living in
Poland since the creation of the Polish
state. A significant Jewish immigration
into that country began in the 13th
century and increased under Casimir the
Great, with the decline in the Jewish
position in western and then in central
Europe. Not very much is known about
Polish Jewry in that period. But with
the decline of the monarchy in the 16th
century - particularly under Sigismund I
the Old (150645) and his son Sigismund
II Augustus (154872) - Polish Jewry
burst into social and political
prominence accompanied, as usual, with a
much greater degree of autonomy. It was
at this time that Poland's Jews were
granted their greatest privileges,
culminating in the establishment of the
famous Committee of Four Lands, a very
effective autonomous Jewish organ of
rule and jurisdiction over all the Jews
in Poland's four divisions. One of its
many important functions was to collect
all the taxes from Jews all over the
country, deducting part of the yield for
its own use and for the use of local
Jewish communities, and passing the rest
on to the state treasury.
What was the
social role of Polish Jewry from the
beginning of the 16th century until
1795? With the decline of royal power,
the king's usual role in relation to the
Jews was rapidly taken over by the
nobility - with lasting and tragic
results both for the Jews themselves and
for the common people of the Polish
republic. All over Poland the nobles
used Jews as their agents to undermine
the commercial power of the Royal Towns,
which were weak in any case. Alone among
the countries of western Christendom, in
Poland a nobleman's property inside a
Royal Town was exempt from the town's
laws and guild regulations. In most
cases the nobles settled their Jewish
clients in such properties, thus giving
rise to a lasting conflict. The Jews
were usually 'victorious', in the sense
that the towns could neither subjugate
nor drive them off; but in the frequent
popular riots Jewish lives (and, even
more, Jewish property) were lost. The
nobles still got the profits. Similar or
worse consequences followed from the
frequent use of Jews as commercial
agents of noblemen: they won exemption
from most Polish tolls and tariffs, to
the loss of the native bourgeoisie.
But the most
lasting and tragic results occurred in
the eastern provinces of Poland -
roughly, the area east of the present
border, including almost the whole of
the present Ukraine and reaching up to
the Great-Russian language frontier.
(Until 1667 the Polish border was far
east of the Dnieper, so that Poltava,
for example, was inside Poland.) In
those wide territories there were hardly
any Royal Towns. The towns were
established by nobles and belonged to
them - and they were settled almost
exclusively by Jews. Until 1939, the
population of many Polish towns east of
the river Bug was at least 90 per cent
Jewish, and this demographic phenomenon
was even more pronounced in that area of
Tsarist Russia annexed from Poland and
Icnown as the Jewish Pale. Outside the
towns very many Jews throughout Poland,
but especially in the east, were
employed as the direct supervisors and
oppressors of the enserfed peasantry -
as bailiffs of whole manors (invested
with the landlord's full coercive
powers) or as lessees of particular
feudal monopolies such as the corn mill,
the liquor still and public house (with
the right of armed search of peasant
houses for illicit stills) or the
bakery, and as collectors of customary
feudal dues of all kinds. In short, in
eastern Poland, under the rule of the
nobles (and of the feudalized church,
formed exclusively from the nobility)
the Jews were both the immediate
exploiters of the peasantry and
virtually the only town-dwellers.
No doubt,
most of the profit they extracted from
the peasants was passed on to the
landlords, in one way or another. No
doubt, the oppression and subjugation of
the Jews by the nobles were severe, and
the historical record tells many a
harrowing tale of the hardship and
humiliation inflicted by noblemen on
'their' Jews. But, as we have remarked,
the peasants suffered worse oppression
at the hands of both landlords and Jews;
and one may assume that, except in times
of peasant uprisings, the full weight of
the Jewish religious laws against
Gentiles fell upon the peasants. As will
be seen in the next chapter, these laws
are suspended or mitigated in cases
where it is feared that they might
arouse dangerous hostility towards Jews;
but the hostility of the peasants could
be disregarded as ineffectual so long as
the Jewish bailiff could shelter under
the 'peace' of a great lord.
The
situation stagnated until the advent of
the modern state, by which time Poland
had been dismembered. Therefore Poland
was the only big country in western
Christendom from which the Jews were
never expelled. A new middle class could
not arise out of the utterly enslaved
peasantry; and the old bourgeoisie was
geographically limited and commercially
weak, and therefore powerless. Overall,
matters got steadily worse, but without
any substantial change.
Internal
conditions within the Jewish community
moved in a similar course. In the period
1500-1795, one of the most
superstition-ridden in the history of
Judaism, Polish Jewry was the most
superstitious and fanatic of all Jewish
communities. The considerable power of
the Jewish autonomy was used
increasingly to stifle all original or
innovative thought, to promote the most
shameless exploitation of the Jewish
poor by the Jewish rich in alliance with
the rabbis, and to justify~ the Jews'
role in the oppression of the peasants
in the service of the nobles. Here, too,
there was no way out except by
liberation from the outside. Pre-1795
Poland, where the social role of the
Jews was more important than in any
other classical diaspora, illustrates
better than any other country the
bankruptcy of classical Judaism.
Anti-Jewish Persecutions
During the
whole period of classical Judaism, Jews
were often subjected to persecutions17 -
and this fact now serves as the main
'argument' of the apologists of the
Jewish religion with its anti-Gentile
laws and especially of Zionism. Of
course, the Nazi extermination of five
to six million European Jews is supposed
to be the crowning argument in that
line. We must therefore consider this
phenomenon and its contemporary aspect.
This is particularly important in view
of the fact that the descendants of the
Jews of pre-1795 Poland (often called
east-European Jews' - as opposed to Jews
from the German cultural domain of the
early 19th century, including the
present Austria, Bohemia and Moravia)
now wield predominant political power in
Israel as well as in the Jewish
communities in the USA and other
English-speaking countries; and, because
of their particular past history, this
mode. of thinking is especially
entrenched among them, much more than
among other Jews.
We must,
first, draw a sharp distinction between
the persecutions of' Jews during the
classical period on the one hand, and
the Nazi extermination on the other. The
former were popular movements, coming
from below; whereas the latter was
inspired, organized and carried out from
above: indeed, by state officials. Such
acts as the Nazi state- organized
extermination are relatively rare in
human history, although other cases do
exist (the extermination of the
Tasmanians and several other colonial
peoples, for example). Moreover, the
Nazis intended to wipe out other peoples
besides the Jews: Gypsies were
exterminated like Jews, and the
extermination of Slavs was well under
way, with the systematic massacre of
millions of civilians and prisoners of
war. However, it is the recurrent
persecution of Jews in so many countries
during the classical period which is the
model (and the excuse) for the zionist
politicians in their persecution of the
Palestinians, as well as the argument
used by apologists of Judaism in
general; and it is this phenomenon which
we consider now.
It must be
pointed out that in all the worst
anti-Jewish persecutions, that is, where
Jews were killed, the ruling elite - the
emperor and the pope, the kings, the
higher aristocracy and the upper clergy,
as well as the rich bourgeoisie in the
autonomous cities - were always on the
side of the Jews. The latter's enemies
belonged to the more oppressed and
exploited classes and those close to
them in daily life and interests, such
as the friars of the mendicant orders.18
It is true that in most (but I think not
in all) cases members of the elite
defended the Jews neither out of
considerations of humanity nor because
of sympathy to the Jews as such, but for
the type of reason used generally by
rulers in justification of their
interests - the fact that the Jews were
useful and profitable (to them), defense
of 'law and order', hatred of the lower
classes and fear that anti-Jewish riots
might develop into general popular
rebellion. Still, the fact remains that
they did defend the Jews. For this
reason all the massacres of Jews during
the classical period were part of a
peasant rebellion or other popular
movements at times when the government
was for some reason especially weak.
This is true even in the partly
exceptional case of Tsarist Russia. The
Tsarist government, acting
surreptitiously through its secret
police, did promote pogroms; but it did
so only when it was particularly weak
(after the assassination of Alexander II
in 1881, and in the period immediately
before and after the 1905 revolution)
and even then took care to contain the
break~down of 'law and order'. During
the time of its greatest strength - for
example, under Nicholas I or in the
latter part of the reign of Alexander
III, when the opposition had been
smashed - pogroms were not tolerated by
the Tsarist regime, although legal
discrimination against Jews was
intensified.
The general
rule can be observed in all the major
massacres of Jews in Christian Europe.
During the first crusade, it was not the
proper armies of the knights, commanded
by famous dukes and counts, which
molested the Jews, but the spontaneous
popular hosts composed almost
exclusively of peasants and paupers in
the wake of Peter the Hermit. In each
city the bishop or the emperor's
representative opposed them and tried,
often in vain, to protect the Jews.19
The anti-Jewish riots in England which
accompanied the third crusade were part
of a popular movement directed also
against royal officials, and some
rioters were punished by Richard I. The
massacres of Jews during the outbreaks
of the Black Death occurred against the
strict orders of the pope, the emperor,
the bishops and the German princes. In
the free towns, for example in
Strasbourg, they were usually preceded
by a local revolution in which the
oligarchic town council, which protected
the Jews, was overthrown and replaced by
a more popular one. The great 1391
massacres of Jews in Spain took place
under a feeble regency government and at
a time when the papacy, weakened by the
Great Schism between competing popes,
was unable to control the mendicant
friars.
Perhaps the
most outstanding example is the great
massacre of Jews during the Chmielnicki
revolt in the Ukraine (1648), which
started as a mutiny of Cossack officers
but soon turned into a widespread
popular movement of the oppressed serfs:
'The unprivileged, the subjects, the
Ukrainians, the Orthodox [persecuted by
the Polish Catholic church] were rising
against their Catholic Polish masters,
particularly against their masters'
bailiffs, clergy and Jews.20 This
typical peasant uprising against extreme
oppression, an uprising accompanied not
only by massacres committed by the
rebels but also by even more horrible
atrocities and 'counter-terror' of the
Polish magnates' private armies,21 has
remained emblazoned in the consciousness
of east-European Jews to this very day -
not, however, as a peasant uprising, a
revolt of the oppressed, of the real
wretched of the earth, nor even as a
vengeance visited upon all the servants
of the Polish nobility, but as an act of
gratuitous antisemitism directed against
Jews as such. In fact, the voting of the
Ukrainian delegation at the UN and, more
generally, Soviet policies on the Middle
East, are often 'explained' in the
Israeli press as 'a heritage of
Chmielnicki' or of his 'descendants'.
Modem Antisemitism
The
character of anti-Jewish persecutions
underwent a radical change in modern
times. With the advent of the modern
state, the abolition of serfdom and the
achievement of minimal individual
rights, the special socio-economic
function of the Jews necessarily
disappears. Along with it disappear also
the powers of the Jewish community over
its members; individual Jews in growing
numbers win the freedom to enter the
general society of their countries.
Naturally, this transition aroused a
violent reaction both on the part of
Jews (especially their rabbis) and of
those elements in European society who
opposed the open society and for whom
the whole process of liberation of the
individual was anathema.
Modern
antisemitism appears first in France and
Germany, then in Russia, after about
1870. Contrary to the prevalent opinion
among Jewish socialists, I do not
believe that its beginnings or its
subsequent development until the present
day can be ascribed to 'capitalism'. On
the contrary, in my opinion the
successful capitalists in all countries
were on the whole remarkably free from
antisemitism, and the countries in which
capitalism was established first and in
its most extensive form - such as
England and Belgium - were also those
where antisemitism was far less
widespread than elsewhere.22
Early modern
antisemitism (1880-1900) was a reaction
of bewildered men, who deeply hated
modern society in all its aspects, both
good and bad, and who were ardent
believers in the conspiracy theory of
history. The Jews were cast in the role
of scapegoat for the breakup of the old
society (which anti-semitic nostalgia
imagined as even more closed and ordered
than it had ever been in reality) and
for all that was disturbing in modern
times. But right at the start the
antisemites were faced with what was,
for them, a difficult problem: how to
define this scapegoat, particularly in
popular terms? What is to be the
supposed common denominator of the
Jewish musician, banker, craftsman and
beggar - especially after the common
religious features had largely
dissolved, at least externally? The
'theory' of the Jewish race was the
modern antisemitic answer to this
problem.
In contrast,
the old Christian, and even more so
Muslim opposition to classical Judaism
was remarkably free from racism. No
doubt this was to some extent a
consequence of the universal character
of Christianity and Islam, as well as of
their original connection with Judaism
(St Thomas More repeatedly rebuked a
woman who objected when he told her that
the Virgin Mary was Jewish). But in my
opinion a far more important reason was
the social role of the Jews as an
integral part of the upper classes. In
many countries Jews were treated as
potential nobles and, upon conversion,
were able immediately to intermarry with
the highest nobility. The nobility of
15th century Castile and Aragon or the
aristocracy of 18th century Poland - to
take the two cases where intermarriage
with converted Jews was widespread -
would hardly be likely to marry Spanish
peasants or Polish serfs, no matter how
much praise the Gospel has for the poor.
It is the
modern myth of the Jewish 'race' - of
outwardly hidden but supposedly dominant
characteristics of 'the Jews',
independent of history, of social role,
of anything - which is the formal and
most important distinguishing mark of
modern antisemitism. This was in fact
perceived by some Church leaders when
modern antisemitism first appeared as a
movement of some strength. Some French
Catholic leaders, for example, opposed
the new racist doctrine expounded by E.
Drumont, the first popular modern French
antisemite and author of the notorious
book La France Jui"e (1886), which
achieved wide circulation.23 Early
modern German antisemites encountered
similar opposition.
It must be
pointed out that some important groups
of European conservatives were quite
prepared to play along with modern
antisemitism and use it for their own
ends, and the antisemites were equally
ready to use the conservatives when the
occasion offered itself, although at
bottom there was little similarity
between the two parties. 'The victims
who were most harshly treated [by the
pen of the above-mentioned Drumont] were
not the Rothschilds but the great nobles
who courted them. Drumont did not spare
the Royal Family ... or the bishops, or
for that matter the Pope.24
Nevertheless, many of the French great
nobles, bishops and conservatives
generally were quite happy to use
Drumont and antisemitism during the
crisis of the Dreyfus affair in an
attempt to bring down the republican
regime.
This type of
opportunistic alliance reappeared many
times in various European countries
until the defeat of Nazism. The
conservatives' hatred of radicalism and
especially of all forms of socialism
blinded many of them to the nature of
their political bedfellows. In many
cases they were literally prepared to
ally themselves with the devil,
forgetting the old saying that one needs
a very long spoon to sup with him.
The
effectiveness of modern antisemitism,
and of its alliance with conservatism,
depended on several factors.
First, the
older tradition of Christian religious
opposition to Jews, which existed in
many (though by no means all) European
countries, could, if supported or at
least unopposed by the clergy, be
harnessed to the antisemitic bandwagon.
The actual response of the clergy in
each country was largely determined by
specific local historical and social
circumstances. In the Catholic Church,
the tendency for an opportunistic
alliance with antisemitism was strong in
France but not in Italy; in Poland and
Slovakin but not in Bohemia. The Greek
Orthodox Church had notorious
antisemitic tendencies in Romania but
took the opposite line in Bulgaria.
Among the Protestant Churches, the
German was deeply divided on this issue,
others (such as the Latvian and
Estonian) tended to be antisemitic, but
many (for example the Dutch, Swiss and
Scandinavian) were among the earliest to
condemn antisemitism.
Secondly,
antisemitism was largely a generic
expression of xenophobia, a desire for a
'pure' homogeneous society. But in many
European countries around 1900 (and in
fact until quite recently) the Jew was
virtually the only 'stranger'. This was
particularly true of Germany. In
principle, the German racists of the
early 20th century hated and despised
Blacks just as much as Jews; but there
were no Blacks in Germany then. Hate is
of course much more easily focused on
the present than on the absent,
especially under the conditions of the
time, when mass travel and tourism did
not exist and most Europeans never left
their own country in peacetime.
Thirdly, the
successes of the tentative alliance
between conservatism and antisemitism
were inversely proportional to the power
and capabilities of its opponents. And
the consistent and effective opponents
of antisemitism in Europe are the
political forces of liberalism and
socialism - historically the same forces
that continue in various ways the
tradition symbolized by the War of Dutch
Independence (1568-1648), the English
Revolution and the Great French
Revolution. On the European continent
the main shibboleth is the attitude
towards the Great French Revolution -
roughly speaking. those who are for it
are against antisemitism; those who
accept it with regret would be at least
prone to an alliance with the
antisemites; those who hate it and would
like to undo its achievements are the
milieu from which antisemitism develops.
Nevertheless, a sharp distinction must
be made between conservatives and even
reactionaries on the one hand and actual
racists and antisemites on the other.
Modern racism (of which antisemitism is
part) although caused by specific social
conditions, becomes, when it gains
strength, a force that in my opinion can
only be described as demonic. After
coming to power, and for its duration, I
believe it defies analysis by any
presently understood social theory or
set of merely social observations - and
in particular by any known theory
invoking interests, be they class or
state interests, or other than purely
psychological 'interests' of any entity
that can be defined in the present state
of human knowledge. But this I do not
mean that such forces are unknowable in
principle; on the contrary, one must
hope that with the growth of human
knowledge they will come to be
understood. But at present they are
neither understood nor capable of being
rationally predicted - and this applies
to all racism in all societies.25 As a
matter of fact, no political figure or
group of any political color in any
country had predicted even vaguely the
horrors of Nazism. Only artists and
poets such as Heine were able to glimpse
some of what the future had in store. We
do not know how they did it; and
besides, many of their other hunches
were wrong.
The Zionist Response
Historically, zionism is both a reaction
to antisemitism and a conservative
alliance with it - although the
Zionists, like other European
conservatives, did not fully realize
with whom they were allying themselves.
Until the
rise of modern antisemitism, the mood of
European Jewry was optimistic, indeed
excessively so. This was manifested not
only in the very large number of Jews,
particularly in western countries, who
simply opted out of classical Judaism,
apparently without any great regret, in
the first or second generation after
this became possible, but also in the
formation of a strong cultural movement,
the Jewish Enlightenment (Hashalah),
which began in Germany and Austria
around 1780, was then carried into
eastern Europe and by 185O-70 was making
itself felt as a considerable social
force. I cannot enter here into a
discussion of the movement's cultural
achievements, such as the revival of
Hebrew literature and the creation of a
wonderful literature in Yiddish.
However, it is important to note that
despite many internal differences, the
movement as a whole was characterized by
two common beliefs: a belief in the need
for a fundamental critique of Jewish
society and particularly of the social
role of the Jewish religion in its
classical form, and the almost messianic
hope for the victory of the 'forces of
good' in European societies. The latter
forces were naturally defined by the
sole criterion of their support for
Jewish emancipation.
The growth
of antisemitism as a popular movement,
and the many alliances of the
conservative forces with it, dealt a
severe blow to the Jewish Enlightenment.
The blow was especially devastating
because in actual fact the rise of
antisemitism occurred just after the
Jews were emancipated in some European
countries, and even before they were
freed in others. The Jews of the
Austrian empire received fully equal
rights only in 1867. In Germany, some
independent states emancipated their
Jews quite early, but others did not;
notably, Prussia was grudging and tardy
in this matter, and final emancipation
of the Jews in the German empire as a
whole was only granted by Bismarck in
1871. In the Ottoman empire the Jews
were subject to official discrimination
until 1909, and in Russia (as well as
Romania) until 1917. Thus modern
antisemitism began within a decade of
the emancipation of the Jews in central
Europe and long before the emancipation
of the biggest Jewish community at that
time, that of the Tsarist empire.
It is
therefore easy for the Zionists to
ignore half of the relevant facts,
revert to the segregationist stance of
classical Judaism, and claim that since
all Gentiles always hate and persecute
all Jews, the only solution would be to
remove all the Jews bodily and
concentrate them in Palestine or Uganda
or wherever.26 Some early Jewish critics
of zionism were quick to point out that
if one assumes a permanent and
ahistorical incompatibility between Jews
and Gentiles an assumption shared by
both zionists and antisemites! - then to
concentrate the Jews in one place would
simply bring upon them the hatred of the
Gentiles in that part of the world (as
indeed was to happen, though for very
different reasons). But as far as I know
this logical argument did not make any
impression, just as all the logical and
factual arguments against the myth of
the 'Jewish race' made not the slightest
difference to the antisemites.
In fact,
close relations have always existed
between Zionists and antisemites:
exactly like some of the European
conservatives, the Zionists thought they
could ignore the 'demonic' character of
antisemitism and use the antisemites for
their own purposes. Many examples of
such alliances are well known. Herzl
allied himself with the notorious Count
von Plehve, the antisemitic minister of
Tsar Nicholas II;27 Jabotinsky made a
pact with Petlyura, the reactionary
Ukrainian leader whose forces massacred
some 100,000 Jews in 1918-21;
Ben-Gurion's allies among the French
extreme right during the Algerian war
included some notorious antisemites who
were, however, careful to explain that
they were only against the Jews in
France, not in Israel.
Perhaps the
most shocking example of this type is
the delight with which some Zionist
leaders in Germany welcomed Hitler's
rise to power, because they shared his
belief in the primacy of 'race' and his
hostility to the assimilation of Jews
among 'Aryans'. They congratulated
Hitler on his triumph over the common
enemy - the forces of liberalism. Dr
Joachim Prinz, a Zionist rabbi who
subsequently emigrated to the USA, where
he rose to be vice-chairman of the World
Jewish Congress and a leading light in
the World Zionist Organization (as well
as a great friend of Golda Meir),
published in 1934 a special book, Wir
Juden (We, Jews), to celebrate Hitler's
so- called German Revolution and the
defeat of liberalism:
The meaning
of the German Revolution for the
German nation will eventually be
clear to those who have created it
and formed its image. Its meaning
for us must be set forth here: the
fortunes of liberalism are lost. The
only form of political life which
has helped Jewish assimilation is
sunk.28
The victory
of Nazism rules out assimilation and
mixed marriages as an option for Jews.
'We are not unhappy about this,' said Dr
Prinz. In the fact that Jews are being
forced to identify them- selves as Jews,
he sees 'the fulfillment of our
desires'. And further:
We want
assimilation to be replaced by a new
law: the declaration of belonging to
the Jewish nation and Jewish race. A
state built upon the principle of
the purity of nation and race can
only honored and respected by a Jew
who declares his belonging to his
own kind. Having so declared
himself, he will never be capable of
faulty loyalty towards a state. The
state cannot want other Jews but
such as declare themselves as
belonging to their nation. It will
not want Jewish flatterers and
crawlers. It must demand of us faith
and loyalty to our own interest. For
only he who honors his own breed and
his own blood can have an attitude
of honor towards the national will
of other nations.29
The whole
book is full of similar crude flatteries
of Nazi ideology, glee at the defeat of
liberalism and particularly of the ideas
of the French Revolution~a and great
expectations that, in the congenial
atmosphere of the myth of the Aryan
race, Zionism and the myth of the Jewish
race will also thrive.
Of course,
Dr Prinz, like many other early
sympathizers and allies of Nazism, did
not realize where that movement (and
modern antisemitism generally) was
leading. Equally, many people at present
do not realize where zionism - the
movement in which Dr Prinz was an
honored figure - is tending: to a
combination of all the old hates of
classical Judaism towards Gentiles and
to the indiscriminate and ahistorical
use of all the persecutions of Jews
throughout history in order to justify
the zionist persecution of the
Palestinians.
For, insane
as it sounds, it is nevertheless plain
upon close examination of the real
motives of the zionists, that one of the
most deep-seated ideological sources of
the Zionist establishment's persistent
hostility towards the Palestinians is
the fact that they are identified in the
minds of many east-European Jews with
the rebellious east-European peasants
who participated in the Chmielnicki
uprising and in similar revolts - and
the latter are in turn identified
ahistorically with modern antisemitism
and Nazism.
Confronting the Past
All Jews who
really want to extricate themselves from
the tyranny of the totalitarian Jewish
past must face the question of their
attitude towards the popular anti-Jewish
manifestations of the past, particularly
those connected with the rebellions of
enserfed peasants. On the other side,
all the apologists of the Jewish
religion and of Jewish segregationism
and chauvinism also take their stand -
both ultimately and in current debates -
on the same question. The undoubted fact
that the peasant revolutionaries
committed shocking atrocities against
Jews (as well as against their other
oppressors) is used as an 'argument' by
those apologists, in exactly the same
way that the Palestinian terror is used
to justify the denial of justice to the
Palestinians.
Our own
answer must be a universal one,
applicable in principle to all
comparable cases. And, for a Jew who
truly seeks liberation from Jewish
particularism and racism and from the
dead hand of the Jewish religion, such
an answer is not very difficult.
After all,
revolts of oppressed peasants against
their masters and their masters'
bailiffs are common in human history. A
generation after the Chmielnicki
uprising of the Ukrainian peasants, the
Russian peasants rose under the
leadership of Stenka Ryazin, and again.
one hundred years later, in the Pugachev
rebellion. In Germany there was the
Peasant War of 1525, in France the
Jacquerie of 1357-8 and many other
popular revolts, not to mention the many
slave uprisings in all parts of the
world. All of them - and I have
intentionally chosen to mention examples
in which Jews were not targets - were
attended by horrifying massacres, just
as the Great French Revolution was
accompanied by appalling acts of terror.
What is the position of true
progressives - and, by now, of most
ordinary decent educated people be they
Russian, German or French - on these
rebellions? Do decent English
historians, even when noting the
massacres of Englishmen by rebellious
Irish peasants rising against their
enslavement, condemn the latter as
'anti-English racists'? What is the
attitude of progressive French
historians towards the great slave
revolution in Santo Domingo, where many
French women and children were
butchered? To ask the question is to
answer it. But to ask a similar question
of many 'progressive' or even socialist'
Jewish circles is to receive a very
different answer; here an enslaved
peasant is transformed into a racist
monster, if Jews profited from his state
of slavery and exploitation.
The maxim
that those who do not learn from history
are condemned to repeat it applies to
those Jews who refuse to come to terms
with the Jewish past: they have become
its slaves and are repeating it in
Zionist and Israeli policies. The State
of Israel now fulfills towards the
oppressed peasants of many countries -
not only in the Middle East but also far
beyond it - a role not unlike that of
the Jews in pre-1795 Poland: that of a
bailiff to the imperial oppressor. It is
characteristic and instructive that
Israel's major role in arming the forces
of the Somoza regime in Nicaragua, and
those of Guatemala, El Salvador, Chile
and the rest has not given rise to any
wide public debate in Israel or among
organized Jewish communities in the
diaspora. Even the narrower question of
expediency - whether the selling of
weapons to a dictatorial butcher of
freedom fighters and peasants is in the
long term interest of Jews - is seldom
asked. Even more significant is the
large part taken in this business by
religious Jews, and the total silence of
their rabbis (who are very vocal in
inciting hatred against Arabs). It seems
that Israel and Zionism are a throw-back
to the role of classical Judaism - writ
large, on a global scale, and under more
dangerous circumstances.
The only
possible answer to all this, first of
all by Jews, must be that given by all
true advocates of freedom and humanity
in all countries, all peoples and all
great philosophies- limited though they
sometimes are, as the human condition
itself is limited. We must confront the
Jewish past and those aspects of the
present which are based simultaneously
on lying about that past and worshiping
it. The prerequisites for this are,
first, total honesty about the facts
and, secondly, the belief (leading to
action, whenever possible) in
universalist human principles of ethics
and politics.
The ancient
Chinese sage Mencius (4th century BC),
much admired by Voltaire, once wrote:
This is why
I say that all men have a sense of
commiseration: here is a man who
suddenly notices a child about to
falI into a well. Invariably he will
feel a sense of alarm and
compassion. And this is not for the
purpose of gaining the favor of the
child's parents or of seeking the
approbation of his neighbors and
friends, or for fear of blame should
he fail to rescue it. Thus we see
that no man is without a sense of
compassion or a sense of shame or a
sense of courtesy or a sense of
right and wrong. The sense of
compassion is the beginning of
humanity, the sense of shame is the
beginning of righteousness, and
sense of courtesy is the beginning
of decorum, the sense of right and
wrong is the beginning of wisdom.
Every man has within himself these
four beginnings, just as he has four
limbs. Since everyone has these four
beginnings within him, the man who
considers himself incapable of
exercising them is destroying
himself.
We have seen
above, and will show in greater detail
in the next chapter how far removed from
this are the precepts with which the
Jewish religion in its classical and
talmudic form is poisoning minds and
hearts.
The road to
a genuine revolution in Judaism - to
making it humane, allowing Jews to
understand their own past, thereby
re-educating themselves out of its
tyranny - lies through an unrelenting
critique of the Jewish religion. Without
fear or favor, we must speak out against
what belongs to our own past as Voltaire
did against his:
Écrasez
l'infâme!
CHAPTER
5
The Laws
Against Non-Jews
AS
EXPLAINED in Chapter 3,
the Halakhah, that is the legal system
of classical Judaism - as practiced by
virtually all Jews from the 9th century
to the end of the l8th and as maintained
to this very day in the form of Orthodox
Judaism - is based primarily on the
Babylonian Talmud. However, because of
the unwieldy complexity of the legal
disputations recorded in the Talmud,
more manageable codifications of
talmudic law became necessary and were
indeed compiled by successive
generations of rabbinical scholars. Some
of these have acquired great authority
and are in general use. For this reasons
we shall refer for the most part to such
compilations (and their most reputable
commentaries) rather than directly to
the Talmud. It is however correct to
assume that the compilation referred to
reproduces faithfully the meaning of the
talmudic text and the additions made by
later scholars on the basis of that
meaning.
The earliest
code of talmudic law which is still of
major importance is the Misbneh Tarab
written by Moses Maimonides in the late
12th century. The most authoritative
code, widely used to date as a handbook,
is the Shulhan 'Arukh composed by R.
Yosef Karo in the late 16th century as a
popular condensation of his own much
more voluminous Beys Yosef which was
intended for the advanced scholar. The
Shulhan 'Arukh is much commented upon;
in addition to classical commentaries
dating from the 17th century, there is
an important 20th century one, Mishnab
Berurab. Finally, the Talmudic
Encyclopedia - a modern compilation
published in Israel from the 1950s and
edited by the country's greatest
Orthodox rabbinical scholars - is a good
compendium of the whole talmudic
literature.
Murder and Genocide
ACCORDING TO
THE JEWISH religion, the murder of a Jew
is a capital offense and one of the
three most heinous sins (the other two
being idolatry and adultery). Jewish
religious courts and secular authorities
are commanded to punish, even beyond the
limits of the ordinary administration of
justice, anyone guilty of murdering a
Jew. A Jew who indirectly causes the
death of another Jew is, however, only
guilty of what talmudic law calls a sin
against the 'laws of Heaven', to be
punished by God rather than by man.
When the
victim is a Gentile, the position is
quite different. A Jew who murders a
Gentile is guilty only of a sin against
the laws of Heaven, not punishable by a
court.1
To cause indirectly the death of a
Gentile is no sin at all.2
Thus, one of
the two most important commentators on
the Shulhan Arukh explains that when it
comes to a Gentile, 'one must not lift
one's hand to harm him, but one may harm
him indirectly, for instance by removing
a ladder after he had fallen into a
crevice .., there is no prohibition
here, because it was not done directly:3
He points out, however, that an act
leading indirectly to a Gentile's death
is forbidden if it may cause the spread
of hostility towards Jews.4
A Gentile
murderer who happens to be under Jewish
jurisdiction must be executed whether
the victim was Jewish or not. However,
if the victim was Gentile and the
murderer converts to Judaism, he is not
punished.5
All this has
a direct and practical relevance to the
realities of the State of Israel.
Although the state's criminal laws make
no distinction between Jew and Gentile,
such distinction is certainly made by
Orthodox rabbis, who in guiding their
flock follow the Halakhah. Of special
importance is the advice they give to
religious soldiers.
Since even
the minimal interdiction against
murdering a Gentile outright applies
only to 'Gentiles with whom we [the
Jews] are not at war', various
rabbinical commentators in the past drew
the logical conclusion that in wartime
all Gentiles belonging to a hostile
population may, or even should be
killed.6
Since 1973 this doctrine is being
publicly propagated for the guidance of
religious Israeli soldiers. The first
such official exhortation was included
in a booklet published by the Central
Region Command of the Israeli Army,
whose area includes the West Bank. In
this booklet the Command's Chief
Chaplain writes:
When our
forces come across civilians during
a war or in hot pursuit or in a
raid, so long as there is no
certainty that those civilians are
incapable of harming our forces,
then according to the Halakhah they
may and even should be killed...
Under no circumstances should an
Arab be trusted, even if he makes an
impression of being civilized ... In
war, when our forces storm the
enemy, they are allowed and even
enjoined by the Halakhah to kill
even good civilians, that is,
civilians who are ostensibly good.7
The same
doctrine is expounded in the following
exchange of letters between a young
Israeli soldier and his rabbi, published
in the yearbook of one of the country's
most prestigious religious colleges,
Midrashiyyat No'am, where many leaders
and activists of the National Religious
Party and Gush Emunim have been
educated.8
Letter from
the soldier Moshe to Rabbi Sbipn 'on
Weiser '
With God's
help, to His Honor, my dear Rabbi,
'First I
would like to ask how you and your
family are. I hope all is well. I
am, thank God, feeling well. A long
time I have not written. Please
forgive me. Sometimes I recall the
verse "when shall I come and appear
before God?'9
I hope, without being certain, that
I shall come during one of the
leaves. I must do so.
'In one
of the discussions in our group,
there was a debate about the "purity
of weapons" and we discussed whether
it is permitted to kill unarmed men
- or women and children? Or perhaps
we should take revenge on the Arabs?
And then everyone answered according
to his own understanding. I could
not arrive at a clear decision,
whether Arabs should be treated like
the Amelekites, meaning that one is
permitted to murder [sic ] them
until their remembrance is blotted
out from under heaven,10
or perhaps one should do as in a
just war, in which one kills only
the soldiers?
'A
second problem I have is whether I
am permitted to put myself in danger
by allowing a woman to stay alive?
For there have been cases when women
threw hand grenades. Or am I
permitted to give water to an Arab
who put his hand up? For there may
be reason to fear that he only means
to deceive me and will kill me, and
such things have happened.
'I
conclude with a warm greeting to the
rabbi and all his family. - Moshe.'
Reply of.
Shun 'on Weiser to Moshe
'With the
help of Heaven. Dear Moshe,
Greetings.
'I am
starting this letter this evening
although I know I cannot finish it
this evening, both because I am busy
and because I would like to make it
a long letter, to answer your
questions in full, for which purpose
I shall have to copy out some of the
sayings of our sages, of blessed
memory, and interpret them.11
'The
non-Jewish nations have a custom
according to which war has its own
rules, like those of a game, like
the rules of football or basketball.
But according to the sayings of our
sages, of blessed memory, [ ... ]
war for us is not a game but a vital
necessity, and only by this standard
must we decide how to wage it. On
the one hand .... ] we seem to learn
that if a Jew murders a Gentile, he
is regarded as a murderer and,
except for the fact that no court
has the right to punish him, the
gravity of the deed is like that of
any other murder. But we find in the
very same authorities in another
place [ ... that Rabbi Shim'on used
to say: "The best of Gentiles - kill
him; the best of snakes dash out its
brains."
'It
might perhaps be argued that the
expression "kill" in the saying of
R. Shim'on is only figurative and
should not be taken literally but as
meaning "oppress" or some similar
attitude, and in this way we also
avoid a contradiction with the
authorities quoted earlier. Or one
might argue that this saying, though
meant literally, is [merely] his own
personal opinion, disputed by other
sages [quoted earlier]. But we find
the true explanation in the Tosalot.12
There [ .... ] we learn the
following comment on the talmudic
pronouncement that Gentiles who fall
into a well should not be helped
out, but neither should they be
pushed into the well to be killed,
which means that they should neither
be saved from death nor killed
directly. And the Tosafot write as
follows:
"And if
it is queried [because] in another
place it was said The best of
Gentiles - kill him, then the answer
is that this [saying] is meant for
wartime." [ ... ]
'According to the commentators of
the Tosafot, a distinction must be
made between wartime and peace, so
that although during peace time it
is forbidden to kill Gentiles, in a
case that occurs in wartime it is a
mitzvah [imperative, religious duty]
to kill them.[...]
'And
this is the difference between a Jew
and a Gentile: although the rule
"Whoever comes to kill you, kill him
first" applies to a Jew, as was said
in Tractate Sanhednn [of the
Talmud], page 72a, still it only
applies to him if there is [actual]
ground to fear that he is coming to
kill you. But a Gentile during
wartime is usually to be presumed
so, except when it is quite clear
that he has no evil intent. This is
the rule of "purity of weapons"
according to the Halakhah - and not
the alien conception which is now
accepted in the Israeli army and
which has been the cause of many
[Jewish] casualties. I enclose a
newspaper cutting with the speech
made last week in the Knesset by
Rabbi Kalman Kahana, which shows in
a very lifelike - and also painful -
way how this "purity of weapons" has
caused deaths.
'I
conclude here, hoping that you will
not find the length of this letter
irksome. This subject was being
discussed even without your letter,
but your letter caused me to write
up the whole matter.
'Be in
peace, you and all Jews, and [I hope
to] see you soon, as you say. Yours
- Shim'on.
Reply of
Moshe to R. Shun 'on Weiser
'To His
Honor, my dear Rabbi,
'First I
hope that you and your family are in
health and are all right.
'I have
received your long letter and am
grateful for your personal watch
over me, for I assume that you write
to many, and most of your time is
taken up with your studies in your
own program.
'Therefore my thanks to you are
doubly deep.
'As for
the letter itself, I have understood
it as follows:
'In
wartime I am not merely permitted,
but enjoined to kill every Arab man
and woman whom I chance upon, if
there is reason to fear that they
help in the war against us, directly
or indirectly. And as far as I am
concerned I have to kill them even
if that might result in an
involvement with the military law. I
think that this matter of the purity
of weapons should be transmitted to
educational institutions, at least
the religious ones, so that they
should have a position about this
subject and so that they will not
wander in the broad fields of
"logic", especially on this subject;
and the rule has to be explained as
it should be followed in practice.
For, I am sorry to say, I have seen
different types of "logic" here even
among the religious comrades. I do
hope that you shall be active in
this, so that our boys will know the
line of their ancestors clearly and
unambiguously.
'I
conclude here, hoping that when the
[training] course ends, in about a
month, I shall be able to come to
the yeshivah [talmudic college].
Greetings - Moshe.'
Of course,
this doctrine of the Halakhah on murder
clashes, in principle, not only with
Israel's criminal law but also - as
hinted in the letters just quoted - with
official military standing regulations.
However, there can be little doubt that
in practice this doctrine does exert an
influence on the administration of
justice, especially by military
authorities. The fact is that in all
cases where Jews have, in a military or
paramilitary context, murdered Arab
non-combatants - including cases of mass
murder such as that in Kafr Qasim in
1956 - the murderers, if not let off
altogether, received extremely light
sentences or won far-reaching
remissions, reducing their punishment to
next to nothing.13
Saving of Life
THIS SUBJECT
- the supreme value of human life and
the obligation of every human being to
do the outmost to save the life of a
fellow human - is of obvious importance
in itself. It is also of particular
interest in a Jewish context, in view of
the fact that since the second world war
Jewish opinion has - in some cases
justly, in others unjustly - condemned
'the whole world' or at least all Europe
for standing by when Jews were being
massacred. Let us therefore examine what
the Halakhah has to say on this subject.
According to
the Halakhah, the duty to save the life
of a fellow Jew is paramount.14
It supersedes all other religious
obligations and interdictions, excepting
only the prohibitions against the three
most heinous sins of adultery (including
incest), murder and idolatry.
As for
Gentiles, the basic talmudic principle
is that their lives must not be saved,
although it is also forbidden to murder
them outright. The Talmud itself~~
expresses this in the maxim 'Gentiles
are neither to be lifted [out of a well]
nor hauled down [into it]'. Maimonides16
explains:
"As for
Gentiles with whom we are not at war
... their death must not be caused,
but it is forbidden to save them if
they are at the point of death; if,
for example, one of them is seen
falling into the sea, he should not
be rescued, for it is written:
'neither shalt thou stand against
the blood of thy fellow'17
- but [a Gentile] is not thy
fellow."
In
particular, a Jewish doctor must not
treat a Gentile patient. Maimonides -
himself an illustrious physician - is
quite explicit on this; in another
passage18
he repeats the distinction between 'thy
fellow' and a Gentile, and concludes:
'and from this learn ye, that it is
forbidden to heal a Gentile even for
payment...'
However, the
refusal of a Jew - particularly a Jewish
doctor - to save the life of a Gentile
may, if it becomes known, antagonize
powerful Gentiles and so put Jews in
danger. Where such danger exists, the
obligation to avert it supersedes the
ban on helping the Gentile. Thus
Maimonides continues: ' ... but if you
fear him or his hostility, cure him for
payment, though you are forbidden to do
so without payment.' In fact, Maimonides
himself was Saladin's personal
physician. His insistence on demanding
payment - presumably in order to make
sure that the act is not one of human
charity but an unavoidable duty - is
however not absolute. For in another
passage he allows Gentile whose
hostility is feared to be treated 'even
gratis, if it is unavoidable'.
The whole
doctrine - the ban on saving a Gentile's
life or healing him, and the suspension
of this ban in cases where there is fear
of hostility - is repeated (virtually
verbatim) by other major authorities,
including the 14th century Arba'ah
Turirn and Karo's Beyt Yosef and Shulhan
'Arukh.19
Beyt Yosef adds, quoting Maimonides:
'And it is permissible to try out a drug
on a heathen, if this serves a purpose';
and this is repeated also by the famous
R. Moses Isserles.
The
consensus of halakhic authorities is
that the term 'Gentiles' in the above
doctrine refers to all non-Jews. A lone
voice of dissent is that of R. Moses
Rivkes, author of a minor commentary on
the Shulhan Arukh, who writes.20
Our sages
only said this about heathens, who in
their day worshipped idols and did not
believe in the Jewish Exodus from Egypt
or in the creation of the world ex
nihilo. But the Gentiles in whose
[protective] shade we, the people of
Israel, are exiled and among whom we are
scattered do believe in the creation of
the world ex nihilo and in the Exodus
and in several principles of our own
religion and they pray to the Creator of
heaven and earth ... Not only is there
no interdiction against helping them,
but we are even obliged to pray for
their safety.
This
passage, dating from the second half of
the 17th century, is a favorite quote of
apologetic scholars.21
Actually, it does not go nearly as far
as the apologetics pretend, for it
advocates remov~ing the ban on saving a
Gentile's life, rather than making it
mandatory as in the case of a Jew; and
even this liberality extends only to
Christians and Muslims but not the
majority of human beings. Rather, what
it does show is that there was a way in
which the harsh doctrine of the Halakhah
could have been progressively
liberalized. But as a matter of fact the
majority of later halakhic authorities,
far from extending Rivkes' leniency to
other human groups, have rejected it
altogether.
Desecrating the Sabbath to Save Life
DESECRATING
THE SABBATH - that is, doing work that
would otherwise be banned on Saturday -
becomes a duty when the need to save a
Jew's life demands it.
The problem
of saving a Gentile's life on the
sabbath is not raised in the Talmud as a
main issue, since it is in any case
forbidden even on a weekday; it does
however enter as a complicating factor
in two connections.
First, there
is a problem where a group of people are
in danger, and it is possible (but not
certain) that there is at least one Jew
among them: should the sabbath be
desecrated in order to save them? There
is an extensive discussion of such
cases. Following earlier authorities,
including Maimonides and the Talmud
itself, the Shulhan Arukh
22
decides these matters according to the
weight of probabilities. For example,
suppose nine Gentiles and one Jew live
in the same building. One Saturday the
building collapses; one of the ten - it
is not known which one - is away, but
the other nine are trapped under the
rubble. Should the rubble be cleared,
thus desecrating the sabbath, seeing
that the Jew may not be under it (he may
have been the one that got away)? The
Shulhan 'Arukh says that it should,
presumably because the odds that the Jew
is under the rubble are high (nine to
one). But now suppose that nine have got
away and only one - again, it is not
known which one - is trapped. Then there
is no duty to clear the rubble,
presumably because this time there are
long odds (nine to one) against the Jew
being the person trapped. Similarly: 'If
a boat containing some Jews is seen to
be in peril upon the sea, it is a duty
incumbent upon all to desecrate the
sabbath in order to save it.' However,
the great R. 'Aqiva Eiger (died 1837)
comments that this applies only 'when it
is known that there are Jews on board.
But ... if nothing at all is known about
the identity of those on board, [the
sabbath] must not be desecrated, for one
acts according to [the weight of
probabilities, and] the majority of
people in the world are Gentiles.23
Thus, since there are very long odds
against any of the passengers being
Jewish, they must be allowed to drown.
Secondly,
the provision that a Gentile may be
saved or cared for in order to avert the
danger of hostility is curtailed on the
sabbath. A Jew called upon to help a
Gentile on a weekday may have to comply
because to admit that he is not allowed,
in principle, to save the life of a
non-Jew would be to invite hostility.
But on Saturday the Jew can use sabbath
observance as a plausible excuse. A
paradigmatic case discussed at length in
the Talmud
24
is that of a Jewish midwife invited to
help a Gentile woman in childbirth. The
upshot is that the midwife is allowed to
help on a weekday 'for fear of
hostility', but on the sabbath she must
not do so, because she can excuse
herself by saying: 'We are allowed to
desecrate the sabbath only for our own,
who observe the sabbath, but for your
people, who do not keep the sabbath, we
are not allowed to desecrate it.' Is
this explanation a genuine one or merely
an excuse? Maimonides clearly thinks
that it is just an excuse, which can be
used even if the task that the midwife
is invited to do does not actually
involve any desecration of the sabbath.
Presumably, the excuse will work just as
well even in this case, because Gentiles
are generally in the dark as to
precisely which kinds of work are banned
for Jews on the sabbath. At any rate, he
decrees: 'A Gentile woman must not be
helped in childbirth on the sabbath,
even for payment; nor must one fear
hostility, even when [such help
involves] no desecration of the
sabbath.' The Shulhan 'Arukh decrees
likewise.25
Nevertheless, this sort of excuse could
not always be relied upon to do the
trick and avert Gentile hostility.
Therefore certain important rabbinical
authorities had to relax the rules to
some extent and allowed Jewish doctors
to treat Gentiles on the sabbath even if
this involved doing certain types of
work normally banned on that day. This
partial relaxation applied particularly
to rich and powerful Gentile patients,
who could not be fobbed off so easily
and whose hostility could be dangerous.
Thus, R.
Yo'el Sirkis, author of Bayit Hadash and
one of the greatest rabbis of his time
(Poland, 17th century), decided that
'mayors, petty nobles and aristocrats'
should be treated on the sabbath,
because of the fear of their hostility
which involves 'some danger'. But in
other cases, especially when the Gentile
can be fobbed off with an evasive
excuse, a Jewish doctor would commit 'an
unbearable sin' by treating him on the
sabbath~. Later in the same century, a
similar verdict was given in the French
city of Metz, whose two parts were
connected by a pontoon bridge. Jews are
not normally allowed to cross such a
bridge on the sabbath, but the rabbi of
Metz decided that a Jewish doctor may
nevertheless do so 'if he is called to
the great governor': since the doctor is
known to cross the bridge for the sake
of his Jewish patients, the governor's
hostility could be aroused if the doctor
refused to do so for his sake. Under the
authoritarian rule of Louis XIV, it was
evidently important to have the goodwill
of his intendant; the feelings of lesser
Gentiles were of little importance.26
Hokhrnat
Shloinoh, a 19th century commentary on
the Shulhan 'Arukh, mentions a similarly
strict interpretation of the concept
'hostility' in connection with the
Karaites, a small heretical Jewish sect.
According to this view, their lives must
not be saved if that would involve
desecration of the sabbath, 'for
"hostility" applies only to the heathen,
who are many against us, and we are
delivered into their hands .. But the
Karaites are few and we are not
delivered into their hands, [so] the
fear of hostility does not apply to them
at all.'27
In fact, the absolute ban on desecrating
the sabbath in order to save the life of
a Karaite is still in force today, as we
shall see.
The whole
subject is extensively discussed in the
responsa of R. Moshe Sofer - better
known as 'Ilatam Sofer' - the famous
rabbi of Pressburg (Bratislava) who died
in 1832. His conclusions are of more
than historical interest, since in 1966
one of his responsa was publicly
endorsed by the then Chief Rabbi of
Israel as 'a basic institution of the
Halakhah'.28
The particular question asked of Ratam
Sofer concerned the situation in Turkey,
where it was decreed during one of the
wars that in each township or village
there should be midwives on call, ready
to hire themselves out to any woman in
labor. Some of these midwives were
Jewish; should they hire themselves out
to help Gentile women on weekdays and on
the sabbath?
In his
Tesponsum,29
Hatam Sofer first concludes, after
careful investigation, that the Gentiles
concerned - that is, Ottoman Christians
and Muslims - are not only idolators
'who definitely worship other gods and
thus should "neither be lifted [out of a
well] nor hauled down",' but are likened
by him to the Amalekites, so that the
talmudic ruling 'it is forbidden to
multiply the seed of Amalek' applies to
them. In principle, therefore, they
should not be helped even on week- days.
However, in practice it is 'permitted'
to heal Gentiles and help them in labor,
if they have doctors and midwives of
their own, who could be called instead
of the Jewish ones. For if Jewish
doctors and midwives refused to attend
to Gentiles, the only result would be
loss of income to the former - which is
of course undesirable. This applies
equally on weekdays and on the sabbath,
provided no desecration of the sabbath
is involved. However, in the latter case
the sabbath can serve as an excuse to
'mislead the heathen woman and say that
it would involve desecration of the
sabbath'.
In
connection with cases that do actually
involve desecration of the sabbath,
Hatam Sofer - like other authorities -
makes a distinction between two
categories of work banned on the
sabbath. First, there is work banned by
the Torah, the biblical text (as
interpreted by the Talmud); such work
may only be performed in very
exceptional cases, if failing to do so
would cause an extreme danger of
hostility towards Jews. Then there are
types of work which are only banned by
the sages who extended the original law
of the Torah; the attitude towards
breaking such bans is generally more
lenient.
Another
responsuin of Hatam Sofer~O deals with
the question whether it is permissible
for a Jewish doctor to travel by
carriage on the sabbath in order to heal
a Gentile. After pointing out that under
certain conditions traveling by horse-
drawn carriage on the sabbath only
violates a ban imposed 'by the sages'
rather than by the Torah, he goes on to
recall Maimonides' pronouncement that
Gentile women in labor must not be
helped on the sabbath, even if no
desecration of the sabbath is involved,
and states that the same principle
applies to all medical practice, not
just midwifery. But he then voices the
fear that if this were put into
practice, 'it would arouse undesirable
hostility,' for 'the Gentiles would not
accept the excuse of sabbath
observance,' and 'would say that the
blood of an idolator has little worth in
our eyes'. Also, perhaps more
importantly, Gentile doctors might take
revenge on their Jewish patients. Better
excuses must be found. He advises a
Jewish doctor who is called to treat a
Gentile patient out of town on the
sabbath to excuse himself by saying that
he is required to stay in town in order
to look after his other patients, 'for
he can use this in order to say, "I
cannot move because of the danger to
this or that patient, who needs a
~doctor first, and I may not desert my
charge"
With such an
excuse there is no fear of danger, for
it is a reasonable pretext, commonly
given by doctors who are late in
arriving because another patient needed
them first.' Only 'if it is impossible
to give any excuse' is the doctor
permitted to travel by carriage on the
sabbath in order to treat a Gentile.
In the whole
discussion, the main issue is the
excuses that should be made, not the
actual healing or the welfare of the
patient. And throughout it is taken for
granted that it is all right to deceive
Gentiles rather than treat them, so long
as 'hostility' can be averted.31
Of course,
in modern times most Jewish doctors are
not religious and do not even know of
these rules. Moreover, it appears that
even many who are religious prefer to
their credit - to abide by the
Hippocratic oath rather than by the
precepts of their fanatic rabbis.32
However, the rabbis' guidance cannot
fail to have some influence on some
doctors; and there are certainly many
who, while not actually following that
guidance, choose not to protest against
it publicly.
All this is
far from being a dead issue. The most
up- to-date halakhic position on these
matters is contained in a recent concise
and authoritative book published in
English under the title Jewish Medical
Law.33
This book, which bears the imprint of
the prestigious Israeli foundation
Mossad Harav Kook, is based on the
responsa of R. Eli'ezer Yehuda
Waldenberg, Chief Justice of the
Rabbinical District Court of Jerusalem.
A few passages of this work deserve
special mention.
First, 'it
is forbidden to desecrate the sabbath
... for a Karaite.'34
This is stated bluntly, absolutely and
without any further qualification.
Presumably the hostility of this small
sect makes no difference, so they should
be allowed to die rather than be treated
on the sabbath.
As for
Gentiles: 'According to the ruling
stated in the Talmud and Codes of Jewish
Law, it is forbidden to desecrate the
Sabbath - whether violating Biblical or
rabbinic law - in order to save the life
of a dangerously ill gentile patient. It
is also forbidden to deliver the baby of
a gentile women on the Sabbath.'35
But this is
qualified by a dispensation: 'However,
today it is permitted to desecrate the
Sabbath on behalf of a Gentile by
performing actions prohibited by
rabbinic law, for by so doing one
prevents ill feelings from arising
between Jew and Gentile.'36
This does
not go very far, because medical
treatment very often involves acts
banned on the sabbath by the Torah
itself, which are not covered by this
dispensation. There are, we are told,
'some' halakhic authorities who extend
the dispensation to such acts as well -
but this is just another way of saying
that most halakhic authorities, and the
ones that really count, take the
opposite view. However, all is not lost.
Jewish Medical Law has a truly
breathtaking solution to this
difficulty.
The solution
hangs upon a nice point of talmudic law.
A ban imposed by the Torah on performing
a given act on the sabbath is presumed
to apply only when the primary intention
in performing it is the actual outcome
of the act. (For example. grinding wheat
is presumed to be banned by the Torah
only if the purpose is actually to
obtain flour.) On the other hand, if the
performance of the same act is merely
incidental to some other purpose
(melakhah seh'eynah tzrikhah legufah)
then the act changes its status - it is
still forbidden, to be sure, but only by
the sages rather than by the Torah
itself. Therefore: In order to avoid any
transgression of the law, there is a
legally acceptable method of rendering
treatment on behalf of a gentile patient
even when dealing with violation of
Biblical Law. It is suggested that at
the time that the physician is providing
the necessary care, his intentions
should not primarily be to cure the
patient, but to protect himself and the
Jewish people from accusations of
religious discrimination and severe
retaliation that may endanger him in
pa,~rticular and the Jewish people in
general. With this intention, any act on
the physician's part becomes an act
whose actual outcome is not its primary
purpose' ... which is forbidden on
Sabbath only by rabbinic law.37
This
hypocritical substitute for the
Hippocratic oath is also proposed by a
recent authoritative Hebrew book.38
Although the
facts were mentioned at least twice in
the Israeli press,39
the Israeli Medical Association has
remained silent.
Having
treated in some detail the supremely
important subject of the attitude of the
Halakhah to a Gentile's very life, we
shall deal much more briefly with other
halakhic rules which discriminate
against Gentiles. Since the number of
such rules is very large, we shall
mention only the more important ones.
Sexual Offenses
SEXUAL
INTERCOURSE between a married Jewish
woman and any man other than her husband
is a capital offense for both parties,
and one of the three most heinous sins.
The status of Gentile women is very
different. The Halakhah presumes all
Gentiles to be utterly promiscuous and
the verse 'whose flesh is as the flesh
of asses, and whose issue [of semen] is
like the issue of horses'40
is applied to them. Whether a Gentile
woman is married or not makes no
difference, since as far as Jews are
concerned the very concept of matrimony
does not apply to Gentiles ('There is no
matrimony for a heathen'). Therefore,
the concept of adultery also does not
apply to intercourse between a Jewish
man and a Gentile woman; rather, the
Talmud41
equates such intercourse to the sin of
bestiality. (For the same reason,
Gentiles are generally presumed not to
have certain paternity.)
According to
the Talmudic Encyclopedia:
42
'He who has carnal knowledge of the wife
of a Gentile is not liable to the death
penalty, for it is written: "thy
fellow's wife"43
rather than the alien's wife; and even
the precept that a man "shall cleave
unto his wife"44
which is addressed to the Gentiles does
not apply to a Jew, just there is no
matrimony for a heathen; and although a
married Gentile woman is forbidden to
the Gentiles, in any case a Jew is
exempted.'
This does
not imply that sexual intercourse
between a Jewish man and a Gentile woman
is permitted - quite the contrary. But
the main punishment is inflicted on the
Gentile woman; she must be executed,
even if she was raped by the Jew: 'If a
Jew has coitus with a Gentile woman,
whether she be a child of three or an
adult, whether married or unmarried, and
even if he is a minor aged only nine
years and one day - because he had
willful coitus with her, she must be
killed, as is the case with a beast,
because through her a Jew got into
trouble'45
The Jew, however, must be flogged, and
if he is a Kohen (member of the priestly
tribe) he must receive double the number
of lashes, because he has committed a
double offense: a Kohen must not have
intercourse with a prostitute, and all
Gentile women are presumed to be
prostitutes.46
Status
ACCORDING TO
THE HALAKHAH, Jews must not (if they can
help it) allow a Gentile to be appointed
to any position of authority, however
small, over Jews. (The two stock
examples are commander over ten soldiers
in the Jewish army' and 'superintendent
of an irrigation ditch'.) Significantly,
this particular rule applies also to
converts to Judaism and to their
descendants (through the female line)
for ten generations or 'so long as the
descent is known'.
Gentiles are
presumed to be congenital liars, and are
disqualified from testifying in a
rabbinical court. In this respect their
position is, in theory, the same as that
of Jewish women, slaves and minors; but
in practice it is actually worse. A
Jewish woman is nowadays admitted as a
witness to certain matters of fact, when
the rabbinical court 'believes' her; a
Gentile - never.
A problem
therefore arises when a rabbinical court
needs to establish a fact for which
there are only Gentile witnesses. An
important example of this is in cases
concerning widows: by Jewish religious
law, a woman can be declared a widow -
and hence free to remarry - only if the
death of her husband is proven with
certainty by means of a witness who saw
him die or identified his corpse.
However, the rabbinical court will
accept the hearsay evidence of a Jew who
testifies to having heard the fact in
question mentioned by a Gentile
eyewitness, provided the court is
satisfied that the latter was speaking
casually ('goy mesiah left tummd) rather
than in reply to a direct question; for
a Gentile's direct answer to a Jew's
direct question is presumed to be a lie.47
If necessary, a Jew (preferably a rabbi)
will actually undertake to chat up the
Gentile eyewitness and, without asking a
direct question, extract from him a
casual statement of the fact at issue.
Money and Property
(1) Gifts.
The Talmud bluntly forbids giving a gift
to a Gentile. However, classical
rabbinical authorities bent this rule
because it is customary among
businessmen to give gifts to business
contacts. It was therefore laid down
that a Jew may give a gift to a Gentile
acquaintance, since this is regarded not
as a true gift but as a sort of
investment, for which some return is
expected. Gifts to 'unfamiliar Gentiles'
remain forbidden. A broadly similar rule
applies to almsgiving. Giving alms to a
Jewish beggar is an important religious
duty. Alms to Gentile beggars are merely
permitted for the sake of peace. However
there are numerous rabbinical warnings
against allowing the Gentile poor to
become 'accustomed' to receiving alms
from Jews, so that it should be possible
to withhold such alms without arousing
undue hostility.
(2) Taking
of interest. Anti-Gentile discrimination
in this matter has become largely
theoretical, in view of the dispensation
(explained in Chapter 3) which in effect
allows interest to be exacted even from
a Jewish borrower. However, it is still
the case that granting an interest-free
loan to a Jew is recommended as an act
of charity, but from a Gentile borrower
it is mandatory to exact interest. In
fact, many - though not all - rabbinical
authorities, including Maimonides,
consider it mandatory to exact as much
usury as possible on a loan to a
Gentile.
(3) Lost
property. If a Jew finds property whose
probable owner is Jewish, the finder is
strictly enjoined to make a positive
effort to return his find by advertising
it publicly. In contrast, the Talmud and
all the early rabbinical authorities not
only allow a Jewish finder to
appropriate an article lost by a
Gentile, but actually forbid him or her
to return it.48
In more recent times, when laws were
passed in most countries making it
mandatory to return lost articles, the
rabbinical authorities instructed Jews
to do what these laws say, as an act of
civil obedience to the state - but not
as a religious duty, that is without
making a positive effort to discover the
owner if it is not probable that he is
Jewish.
(4)
Deception in business. It is a grave sin
to practice any kind of deception
whatsoever against a Jew. Against a
Gentile it is only forbidden to practice
direct deception. Indirect deception is
allowed, unless it is likely to cause
hostility towards Jews or insult to the
Jewish religion. The paradigmatic
example is mistaken calculation of the
price during purchase. If a Jew makes a
mistake unfavorable to himself, it is
one's religious duty to correct him. If
a Gentile is spotted making such a
mistake, one need not let him know about
it, but say 'I rely on your
calculation', so as to forestall his
hostility in case he subsequently
discovers his own mistake.
(5) Fraud.
It is forbidden to defraud a Jew by
selling or buying at an unreasonable
price. However, 'Fraud does not apply to
Gentiles, for it is written: "Do not
defraud each man his brother";49
but a Gentile who defrauds a Jew should
be compelled to make good the fraud, but
should not be punished more severely
than a Jew [in a similar case].'50
(6) Theft
and robbery. Stealing (without violence)
is absolutely forbidden - as the Shulhan
'Arukh so nicely puts it: 'even from a
Gentile'. Robbery (with violence) is
strictly forbidden if the victim is
Jewish. However, robbery of a Gentile by
a Jew is not forbidden outright but only
under certain circumstances such as
'when the Gentiles are not under our
rule', but is permitted 'when they are
under our rule'. Rabbinical authorities
differ among themselves as to the
precise details of the circumstances
under which a Jew may rob a Gentile, but
the whole debate is concerned only with
the relative power of Jews and Gentiles
rather than with universal
considerations of justice and humanity.
This may explain why so very few rabbis
have protested against the robbery of
Palestinian property in Israel: it was
backed by overwhelming Jewish power.
Gentiles in the Land of lsrael
IN ADDITION
TO THE GENERAL anti-Gentile laws, the
Halakhah has special laws against
Gentiles who live in the Land of Israel
(Eretz Yisra'el) or, in some cases,
merely pass through it. These laws are
designed to promote Jewish supremacy in
that country.
The exact
geographical definition of the term
'Land of Israel' is much disputed in the
Talmud and the talmudic literature, and
the debate has continued in modern times
between the various shades of zionist
opinion. According to the maximalist
view, the Land of Israel includes (in
addition to Palestine itself) not only
the whole of Sinai, Jordan, Syria and
Lebanon, but also considerable parts of
Turkey.51
The more prevalent 'minimalist'
interpretation puts the northern border
'only' about half way through Syria and
Lebanon, at the latitude of Homs. This
view was supported by Ben~Gurion.
However, even those who thus exclude
parts of Syria-Lebanon agree that
certain special discriminatory laws
(though less oppressive than in the Land
of Israel proper) apply to the Gentiles
of those parts, because that territory
was included in David's kingdom. In all
talmudic interpretations the Land of
Israel includes Cyprus.
I shall now
list a few of the special laws
concerning Gentiles in the Land of
Israel. Their connection with actual
zionist practice will be quite apparent.
The Halakhah
forbids Jews to sell immovable property
- fields and houses - in the Land of
Israel to Gentiles. In Syria, the sale
of houses (but not of fields) is
permitted.
Leasing a
house in the Land of Israel to a Gentile
is permitted under two conditions.
First, that the house shall not be used
for habitation but for other purposes,
such as storage. Second, that three or
more adjoining houses shall not be so
leased.
These and
several other rules are explained as
follows: ... 'so that you shall not
allow them to camp on the ground, for if
they do not possess land, their sojourn
there will be temporary.'52
Even temporary Gentile presence may only
be tolerated 'when the Jews are in
exile, or when the Gentiles are more
powerful than the Jews,' but when the
Jews are more powerful than the Gentiles
we are forbidden to let an idolator
among us; even a temporary resident or
itinerant trader shall not be allowed to
pass through our land unless he accepts
the seven Noahide precepts,53
for it is written: 'they shall not dwell
in thy land'54
that is, not even temporarily. If he
accepts the seven Noahide precepts, he
becomes a resident alien (ger toshav)
but it is forbidden to grant the status
of resident alien except at times when
the Jubilee is held [that is, when the
Temple stands and sacrifices are
offered]. However, during times when
Jubilees are not held it is forbidden to
accept anyone who is not a full convert
to Judaism (ger tzedeq).55
It is
therefore clear that - exactly as the
leaders and sympathizers of Gush Emunim
say - the whole question to how the
Palestinians ought to be treated is,
according to the Halal,;hah, simply a
question of Jewish power: if Jews have
sufficient power, then it is their
religious duty to expel the
Palestinians.
All these
laws are often quoted by Israeli rabbis
and their zealous followers. For
example, the law forbidding the lease of
three adjoining houses to Gentiles was
solemnly quoted by a rabbinical
conference held in 1979 to discuss the
Camp David treaties. The conference also
declared that according to the Halakhah
even the 'autonomy' that Begin was ready
to offer to the Palestinians is too
liberal. Such pronouncements - which do
in fact state correctly the position of
the Halakhah - are rarely contested by
the Zionist 'left'.
In addition
to laws such as those mentioned so far,
which are directed at all Gentiles in
the Land of Israel, an even greater evil
influence arises from special laws
against the ancient Canaanites and other
nations who lived in Palestine before
its conquest by Joshua, as well as
against the Amalekites. All those
nations must be utterly exterminated,
and the Talmud and talmudic literature
reiterate the genocidal biblical
exhortations with even greater
vehemence. Influential rabbis, who have
a considerable following among Israeli
army officers, identify the Palestinians
(or even all Arabs) with those ancient
nations, so that commands like 'thou
shalt save alive nothing that breatheth'56
acquire a topical meaning. In fact, it
is not uncommon for reserve soldiers
called up to do a tour of duty in the
Gaza Strip to be given an 'educational
lecture' in which they are told that the
Palestinians of Gaza are 'like the
Amalekites'. Biblical verses exhorting
to genocide of the Midianite57
were solemnly quoted by an important
Israeli rabbi in justification of the
Qibbiya massacre,58
and this pronouncement has gained wide
circulation in the Israeli army. There
are many similar examples of
bloodthirsty rabbinical pronouncements
against the Palestinians, based on these
laws.
Abuse
UNDER THIS
HEADING I would like to discuss examples
of halakhic laws whose most important
effect is not so much to prescribe
specific anti-Gentile discrimination as
to inculcate an attitude of scorn and
hatred towards Gentiles. Accordingly. in
this section I shall not confine myself
to quoting from the most authoritative
halakhic sources (as I have done so far)
but include also less fundamental works,
which are however widely used in
religious instruction.
Let us begin
with the text of some common prayers. In
one of the first sections of the daily
morning payer, every devout Jew blesses
God for not making him a Gentile.59
The concluding section of the daily
prayer (which is also used in the most
solemn part of the service on New Year's
day and on Yom Kippur) opens with the
statement: 'We must praise the Lord of
all ... for not making us like the
nations of [all] lands ... for they bow
down to vanity and nothingness and pray
to a god that does not help.'60
The last clause was censored out of the
prayer books. but in eastern Europe it
was supplied orally, and has now been
restored into many Israeli-printed
prayer books. In the most important
section of the weekday prayer - the
'eighteen blessings' - there is a
special curse, originally directed
against Christians, Jewish converts to
Christianity and other Jewish heretics:
'And may the apostates'61
have no hope, and all the Christians
perish instantly'. This formula dates
from the end of the 1st century, when
Christianity was still a small
persecuted sect. Some time before the
14th century it was softened into: 'And
may the apostates have no hope. and all
the heretics62
perish instantly', and after additional
pressure into: 'And may the informers
have no hope, and all the heretics
perish instantly'. After the
establishment of Israel. the process was
reversed, and many newly printed prayer
books reverted to the second formula,
which was also prescribed by many
teachers in religious Israeli schools.
After 1967, several congregations close
to Gush Emunim have restored the first
version (so far only verbally, not in
print) and now pray daily that the
Christians may perish instantly'. This
process of reversion happened in the
period when the Catholic Church (under
Pope John XXIII) removed from its Good
Friday service a prayer which asked the
Lord to have mercy on Jews, heretics
etc. This prayer was thought by most
Jewish leaders to be offensive and even
antisemitic.
Apart from
the fixed daily prayers, a devout Jew
must utter special short blessings on
various occasions, both good and bad
(for example, while putting on a new
piece of clothing. eating a seasonal
fruit for the first time that year,
seeing powerful lightning, hearing bad
news, etc.) Some of these occasional
prayers serve to inculcate hatred and
scorn for all Gentiles, We have
mentioned in Chapter 2 the rule
according to which a pious Jew must
utter curse when passing near a Gentile
cemetery, whereas he must bless God when
passing near a Jewish cemetery. A
similar rule applies to the living;
thus, when seeing a large Jewish
population a devout Jew must praise God,
while upon seeing a large Gentile
population he must utter a curse. Nor
are buildings exempt: the Talmud lays
down63
that a Jew who passes near an inhabited
non-Jewish dwelling must ask God to
destroy it, whereas if the building is
in ruins he must thank the Lord of
Vengeance. (Naturally, the rules are
reversed for Jewish houses.) This rule
was easy to keep for Jewish peasants who
lived in their own villages or for small
urban communities living in all-Jewish
townships or quarters. Under the
conditions of classical Judaism,
however, it became impracticable and was
therefore confined to churches and
places of worship of other religions
(except Islam).64
In this connection, the rule was further
embroidered by custom: it became
customary to spit (usually three times)
upon seeing a church or a crucifix, as
an embellishment to the obligatory
formula of regret.65
Sometimes insulting biblical verses were
also added.66
There is
also a series of rules forbidding any
expression of praise for Gentiles or for
their deeds, except where such praise
implies an even greater praise of Jews
and things Jewish. This rule is still
observed by Orthodox Jews. For example.
the writer Agnon, when interviewed on
the Israeli radio upon his return from
Stockholm, where he received the Nobel
Prize for literature, praised the
Swedish Academy, but hastened to add: 'I
am not forgetting that it is forbidden
to praise Gentiles, but here there is a
special reason for my praise' - that is,
that they awarded the prize to a Jew.
Similarly,
it is forbidden to join any
manifestation of popular Gentile
rejoicing, except where failing to join
in might cause 'hostility' towards Jews,
in which case a 'minimal' show of joy is
allowed.
In addition
to the rules mentioned so far, there are
many others whose effect is to inhibit
human friendship between Jew and
Gentile. I shall mention two examples:
the rule on 'libation wine' and that on
preparing food for a Gentile on Jewish
holy days.
A religious
Jew must not drink any wine in whose
preparation a Gentile had any part
whatsoever. Wine in an open bottle, even
if prepared wholly by Jews, becomes
banned if a Gentile so much as touches
the bottle or passes a hand over it. The
reason given by the rabbis is that all
Gentiles are not only idolators but must
be presumed to be malicious to boot, so
that they are likely to dedicate (by a
whisper, gesture or thought) as
'libation' to their idol any wine which
a Jew is about to drink. This law
applies in full force to all Christians,
and in a slightly attenuated form also
to Muslims. (An open bottle of wine
touched by a Christian must be poured
away, but if touched by a Muslim it can
be sold or given away, although it may
not be drunk by a Jew.) The law applies
equally to Gentile atheists (how can one
be sure that they are not merely
pretending to be atheists?) but not to
Jewish atheists.
The laws
against doing work on the sabbath apply
to a lesser extent on other holy days.
In particular, on a holy day which does
not happen to fall on a Saturday it is
permitted to do any work required for
preparing food to be eaten during the
holy days or days. Legally, this is
defined as preparing a 'soul's food'
(okhel nefesh); but 'soul' is
interpreted to mean 'Jew', and 'Gentiles
and dogs' are explicitly excluded.67
There is, however, a dispensation in
favor of powerful Gentiles, whose
hostility can be dangerous: it is
permitted to cook food on a holy day for
a visitor belonging to this category,
provided he is not actively encouraged
to come and eat.
An important
effect of all these laws - quite apart
from their application in practice - is
in the attitude created by their
constant study which, as part of the
study of the Halakhah, is regarded by
classical Judaism as a supreme religious
duty. Thus an Orthodox Jew learns from
his earliest youth, as part of his
sacred studies, that Gentiles are
compared to dogs, that it is a sin to
praise them, and so on and so forth. As
a matter of fact, in this respect
textbooks for beginners have a worse
effect than the Talmud and the great
talmudic codes. One reason for this is
that such elementary texts give more
detailed explanations, phrased so as to
influence young and uneducated minds.
Out of a large number of such texts, I
have chosen the one which is currently
most popular in Israel and has been
reprinted in many cheap editions,
heavily subsidized by the Israeli
government. It is The Book of Education,
written by an anonymous rabbi in early
14th century Spain. It explains the 613
religious obligations (mitzvot) of
Judaism in the order in which they are
supposed to be found in the Pentateuch
according to the talmudic interpretation
(discussed in Chapter 3). It owes its
lasting influence and popularity to the
clear and easy Hebrew style in which it
is written.
A central
didactic aim of this book is to
emphasize the 'correct' meaning of the
Bible with respect to such terms as
'fellow', 'friend' or 'man' (which we
have referred to in Chapter 3). Thus
§219, devoted to the religious
obligation arising from the verse 'thou
shalt love thy fellow as thyself', is
entitled: 'A religious obligation to
love Jews', and explains:
To love
every Jew strongly means that we should
care for a Jew and his money just as one
cares for oneself and one's own money,
for it is written: 'thou shalt love thy
fellow as thyself' and our sages of
blessed memory said: 'what is hateful to
you do not do to your friend' ... and
many other religious obligations follow
from this, because one who loves one's
friend as oneself will not steal his
money, or commit adultery with his wife,
or defraud him of his money, or deceive
him verbally, or steal his land, or harm
him in any way. Also many other
religious obligations depend on this, as
is known to any reasonable man.
In §322,
dealing with the duty to keep a Gentile
slave enslaved for ever (whereas a
Jewish slave must be set free after
seven years), the following explanation
is given:
And at the
root of this religious obligation [is
the fact that] the Jewish people are the
best of the human species, created to
know their Creator and worship Him, and
worthy of having slaves to serve them.
And if they will not have slaves of
other peoples, they would have to
enslave their brothers, who would thus
be unable to serve the Lord, blessed be
He. Therefore we are commanded to
possess those for our service, after
they are prepared for this and after
idolatory is removed from their speech
so that there should not be danger in
our houses,68
and this is the intention of the verse
'but over your brethren the children of
Israel, ye shall not rule one over
another with rigor',69
so that you will not have to enslave
your brothers, who are all ready to
worship God.
In §545,
dealing with the religious obligation to
exact interest on money lent to
Gentiles, the law is stated as follows:
'That we are commanded to demand
interest from Gentiles when we lend
money to them, and we must not lend to
them without interest,' The explanation
is:
And at the
root of this religious obligation is
that we should not do any act of mercy
except to the people who know God and
worship Him; and when we refrain from
doing merciful deed to the rest of
mankind and do so only to the former, we
are being tested that the main part of
love and mercy to them is because they
follow the religion of God, blessed be
He. Behold, with this intention our
reward [from God] when we withhold mercy
from the others is equal to that for
doing [merciful deeds] to members of our
own people.
Similar
distinctions are made in numerous other
passages. In explaining the ban against
delaying a worker's wage (§238) the
author is careful to point out that the
sin is less serious if the worker is
Gentile. The prohibition against cursing
(§239) is entitled 'Not to curse any
Jew, whether man or woman. Similarly,
the prohibitions against giving
misleading advice, hating other people,
shaming them or taking revenge on them
(§§240, 245, 246, 247) apply only to
fellow-Jews.
The ban
against following Gentile customs (§262)
means that Jews must not only 'remove
themselves' from Gentiles, but also
'speak ill of all their behavior, even
of their dress'.
It must be
emphasized that the explanations quoted
above do represent correctly the
teaching of the Halakhah. The rabbis
and, even worse, the apologetic
'scholars of Judaism' know this very
well and for this reason they do not try
to argue against such views inside the
Jewish community; and of course they
never mention them outside it. Instead,
they vilify any Jew who raises these
matters within earshot of Gentiles, and
they issue deceitful denials in which
the art of equivocation reaches its
summit. For example, they state, using
general terms, the importance which
Judaism attaches to mercy; but what they
forget to point out is that according to
the Halakhah 'mercy' means mercy towards
Jews.
Anyone who
lives in Israel knows how deep and
widespread these attitudes of hatred and
cruelty to towards all Gentiles are
among the majority of Israeli Jews.
Normally these attitudes are disguised
from the outside world, but since the
establishment of the State of Israel,
the 1967 war and the rise of Begin, a
significant minority of Jews, both in
Israel and abroad, have gradually become
more open about such matters. In recent
years the inhuman precepts according to
which servitude is the 'natural' lot of
Gentiles have been publicly quoted in
Israel, even on TV, by Jewish farmers
exploiting Arab labor, particularly
child labor. Gush Emunim leaders have
quoted religious precepts which enjoin
Jews to oppress Gentiles, as a
justification of the attempted
assassination of Palestinian mayors and
as divine authority for their own plan
to expel all the Arabs from Palestine.
While many
zionists reject these positions
politically, their standard
counter-arguments are based on
considerations of expediency and Jewish
self-interest, rather than on
universally valid principles of humanism
and ethics. For example, they argue that
the exploitation and oppression of
Palestinians by Israelis tends to
corrupt Israeli society, or that the
expulsion of the Palestinians is
impracticable under present political
conditions, or that Israeli acts of
terror against the Palestinians tend to
isolate Israel internationally. In
principle, however, virtually all
zionists - and in particular 'left'
zionists - share the deep anti-Gentile
attitudes which Orthodox Judaism keenly
promotes.
Attitudes to Christianity and Islam
IN THE
FOREGOING, several examples of the
rabbinical attitudes to these two
religions were given in passing. But it
will be useful to summarize these
attitudes here.
Judaism is
imbued with a very deep hatred towards
Christianity, combined with ignorance
about it. This attitude was clearly
aggravated by the Christian persecutions
of Jews, but is largely independent of
them. In fact, it dates from the time
when Christianity was still weak and
persecuted (not least by Jews), and it
was shared by Jews who had never been
persecuted by Christians or who were
even helped by them. Thus, Maimonides
was subjected to Muslim persecutions by
the regime of the Almohads and escaped
from them first to the crusaders'
Kingdom of Jerusalem, but this did not
change his views in the least. This
deeply negative attitude is based on two
main elements.
First, on
hatred and malicious slanders against
Jesus. The traditional view of Judaism
on Jesus must of course be sharply
distinguished from the nonsensical
controversy between antisemites and
Jewish apologists concerning the
'responsibility' for his execution. Most
modern scholars of that period admit
that due to the lack of original and
contemporary accounts, the late
composition of the Gospels and the
contradictions between them, accurate
historical knowledge of the
circumstances of Jesus' execution is not
available. In any case, the notion of
collective and inherited guilt is both
wicked and absurd. However, what is at
issue here is not the actual facts about
Jesus, but the inaccurate and even
slanderous reports in the Talmud and
post-talmudic literature - which is what
Jews believed until the 19th century and
many, especially in Israel, still
believe. For these reports certainly
played an important role in forming the
Jewish attitude to Christianity.
According to
the Talmud, Jesus was executed by a
proper rabbinical court for idolatry,
inciting other Jews to idolatry, and
contempt of rabbinical authority. All
classical Jewish sources which mention
his execution are quite happy to take
responsibility for it; in the talmudic
account the Romans are not even
mentioned.
The more
popular accounts - which were
nevertheless taken quite seriously -
such as the notorious Toldot Yesbu are
even worse, for in addition to the above
crimes they accuse him of witchcraft.
The very name 'Jesus' was for Jews a
symbol of all that is abominable, and
this popular tradition still persists.70
The Gospels are equally detested, and
they are not allowed to be quoted (let
alone taught) even in modern Israeli
Jewish schools.
Secondly,
for theological reasons, mostly rooted
in ignorance, Christianity as a religion
is classed by rabbinical teaching as
idolatry. This is based on a crude
interpretation of the Christian
doctrines on the Trinity and
Incarnation. All the Christian emblems
and pictorial representations are
regarded as 'idols' - even by those Jews
who literally worship scrolls, stones or
personal belongings of 'Holy Men'.
The attitude
of Judaism towards Islam is, in
contrast, relatively mild. Although the
stock epithet given to Muhammad is
'madman' ('meshugga'), this was not
nearly as offensive as it may sound now,
and in any case it pales before the
abusive terms applied to Jesus.
Similarly, the Qur'an - unlike the New
Testament - is not condemned to burning.
It is not honored in the same way as
Islamic law honors the Jewish sacred
scrolls, but is treated as an ordinary
book. Most rabbinical authorities agree
that Islam is not idolatry (although
some leaders of Gush Emunim now choose
to ignore this). Therefore the Halakhah
decrees that Muslims should not be
treated by Jews any worse than
'ordinary' Gentiles. But also no better.
Again, Maimonides can serve as an
illustration. He explicitly states that
Islam is not idolatry, and in his
philosophical works he quotes, with
great respect, many Islamic
philosophical authorities. He was, as I
have mentioned before, personal
physician to Saladin and his family, and
by Saladin's order he was appointed
Chief over all Egypt's Jews. Yet, the
rules he lays down against saving a
Gentile's life (except in order to avert
danger to Jews) apply equally to
Muslims.
CHAPTER
6
Political Consequences
THE
PERSISTENT ATTITUDES of
classical Judaism toward non-Jews
strongly influence its followers,
Orthodox Jews and those who can be
regarded as its continuators, Zionists.
Through the latter it also influences
the policies of the State of Israel.
Since 1967, as Israel becomes more and
more 'Jewish', so its policies are
influenced more by Jewish ideological
considerations than by those of a coldly
conceived imperial interest. This
ideological influence is not usually
perceived by foreign experts, who tend
to ignore or downplay the influence of
the Jewish religion on Israeli policies.
This explains why many of their
predictions are incorrect.
In fact,
more Israeli government crises are
caused by religious reasons, often
trivial, than by any other cause. The
space devoted by the Hebrew press to
discussion of the constantly occurring
quarrels between the various religious
groups, or between the religious and the
secular, is greater than that given any
other subject, except in times of war or
of security-related tension. At the time
of writing, early August 1993, some
topics of major interest to readers of
the Hebrew press are: whether soldiers
killed in action who are sons of
non-Jewish mothers will be buried in a
segregated area in Israeli military
cemeteries; whether Jewish religious
burial associations, who have a monopoly
over the burial of all Jews except
kibbutz members, will be allowed to
continue their custom of circumcising
the corpses of non-circumcised Jews
before burying them (and without asking
the family's permission); whether the
import of non-kosher meat to Israel,
banned unofficially since the
establishment of the state, will be
allowed or banned by law. There are many
more issues of this kind which are of a
much greater interest to the Israeli-
Jewish public than, let us say, the
negotiations with the Palestinians and
Syria.
The attempts
made by a few Israeli politicians to
ignore the factors of 'Jewish ideology'
in favor of purely imperial interests
have led to disastrous results. In early
1974, after its partial defeat in the
Yom Kippur War, Israel had a vital
interest in stopping the renewed
influence of the PLO, which had not yet
been recognized by the Arab states as
the solely legitimate representative of
the Palestinians. The Israeli government
conceived of a plan to support Jordanian
influence in the West Bank, which was
quite considerable at the time. When
King Hussein was asked for his support,
he demanded a visible quid pro quo. It
was arranged that his chief West Bank
supporter, Sheikh Jabri of Hebron, who
ruled the southern part of the West Bank
with an iron fist and with approval of
then Defense minister Moshe Dayan, would
give a party for the region's notables
in the courtyard of his palatial
residence in Hebron. The party, in honor
of the king's birthday, would feature
the public display of Jordanian flags
and would begin a pro-Jordanian
campaign. But the religious settlers in
the nearby Kiryat-Arba, who were only a
handful at the time, heard about the
plan and threatened Prime Minister Golda
Meir and Dayan with vigorous protests
since, as they put it, displaying a flag
of a 'non-Jewish state' within the Land
of Israel contradicts the sacred
principle which states that this land
'belongs' only to Jews. Since this
principle is accepted by all zionists,
the government had to bow to their
demands and order Sheikh Jabri not to
display any Jordanian flags. Thereupon
Jabri, who was deeply humiliated,
canceled the party and, at the Fez
meeting of the Arab League which
occurred soon after, King Hussein voted
to recognize the PLO as the sole
representative of the Palestinians. For
the bulk of Israeli-Jewish public the
current negotiations about 'autonomy'
are likewise influenced more by such
Jewish ideological considerations than
by any others.
The
conclusion from this consideration of
Israeli policies, supported by an
analysis of classical Judaism, must be
that analyses of Israeli policy-making
which do not emphasize the importance of
its unique character as a 'Jewish state'
must be mistaken. In particular, the
facile comparison of Israel to other
cases of Western imperialism or to
settler states, is incorrect. During
apartheid, the land of South Africa was
officially divided into 87 per cent
which 'belonged' to the whites and 13
per cent which was said officially to
'belong' to the Blacks. In addition,
officially sovereign states, embodied
with all the symbols of sovereignty, the
so-called Bantustans, were established.
But 'Jewish ideology' demands that no
part of the Land of Israel can be
recognized as 'belonging' to non-Jews
and that 110 signs of sovereignty, such
as Jordanian flags, can be officially
allowed to be displayed. The principle
of Redemption of the Land demands that
ideally all the land, and not merely,
say, 87 per cent, will in time be
'redeemed', that is, become owned by
Jews. 'Jewish ideology prohibits that
very convenient principle of
imperialism, already known to Romans and
followed by so many secular empires, and
best formulated by Lord Cromer: 'We do
not govern Egypt, we govern the
governors of Egypt.' Jewish ideology
forbids such recognition; it also
forbids a seemingly respectful attitude
to any 'non-Jewish governors' within the
Land of Israel. The entire apparatus of
client kings, sultans, maharajas and
chiefs or, in more modern times, of
dependent dictators, so convenient in
other cases of imperial hegemony, cannot
be used by Israel within the area
considered part of the Land of Israel.
Hence the fears, commonly expressed by
Palestinians, of being offered a
'Bantustan' are totally groundless. Only
if numerous Jewish lives are lost in
war, as happened both in 1973 and in the
1983-5 war aftermath in Lebanon, is an
Israeli retreat conceivable since it can
be justified by the principle that the
sanctity of Jewish life is more
important than other considerations.
What is not possible, as long as Israel
remains a 'Jewish state', is the Israeli
grant of a fake, but nevertheless
symbolically real sovereignty, or even
of real autonomy, to non-Jews within the
Land of Israel for merely political
reasons. Israel, like some other
countries, is an exclusivist state, but
Israeli exclusivism is peculiar to
itself.
In addition
to Israeli policies it may be surmised
that the 'Jewish ideology' influences
also a significant part, maybe a
majority, of the diaspora Jews. While
the actual implementation of Jewish
ideology depends on Israel being strong,
this in turn depends to a considerable
extent on the support which diaspora
Jews, particularly US Jews, give to
Israel. The image of the diaspora Jews
and their attitudes to non-Jews, is
quite different from the attitudes of
classical Judaism, as described above.
This discrepancy is most obvious in
English-speaking countries, where the
greatest falsifications of Judaism
regularly occur. The situation is worst
in the USA and Canada, the two states
whose support for Israeli policies,
including policies which most glaringly
contradict the basic human rights of
non-Jews, is strongest.
US support
for Israel, when considered not in
abstract but in concrete detail, cannot
be adequately explained only as a result
of American imperial interests. The
strong influence wielded by the
organized Jewish community in the USA in
support of all Israeli policies must
also be taken into account in order to
explain the Middle East policies of
American Administrations. This
phenomenon is even more noticeable in
the case of Canada, whose Middle Eastern
interests cannot be considered as
important, but whose loyal dedication to
Israel is even greater than that of the
USA In both countries (and also in
France, Britain and many other states)
Jewish organizations support Israel with
about the same loyalty which communist
parties accorded to the USSR for so
long. Also, many Jews who appear to be
active in defending human rights and who
adopt non-conformist views on other
issues do, in cases affecting Israel,
display a remarkable degree of
totalitarianism and are in the forefront
of the defense of all Israeli policies.
It is well known in Israel that the
chauvinism and fanaticism in supporting
Israel displayed by organized diaspora
Jews is much greater (especially since
1967) than the chauvinism shown by an
average Israeli Jew. This fanaticism is
especially marked in Canada and the USA
but because of the incomparably greater
political importance of the USA, I will
concentrate on the latter. It should,
however, be noted that we also find Jews
whose views of Israeli policies are not
different from those held by the rest of
the society (with due regard to the
factors of geography, income, social
position and so on).
Why should
some American Jews display chauvinism,
some-times extreme, and others not? We
should begin by observing the social and
therefore also the political importance
of the Jewish organizations which are of
an exclusive nature: they admit no
non-Jews on principle. (This exclusivism
is in amusing contrast with their hunt
to condemn the most obscure non-Jewish
club which refuses to admit Jews.) Those
who can be called 'organized Jews', and
who spend most of their time outside
work hours mostly in the company of
other Jews, can be presumed to uphold
Jewish exclusivism and to preserve the
attitudes of the classical Judaism to
non-Jews. Under present circumstances
they cannot openly express these
attitudes toward non-Jews in the USA
where non-Jews constitute more than 97
per cent of the population. They
compensate for this by ex- pressing
their real attitudes in their support of
the 'Jewish state' and the treatment it
metes to the non-Jews of the Middle
East.
How else can
we explain the enthusiasm displayed by
so many American rabbis in support of,
let us say, Martin Luther King, compared
with their lack of support for the
rights of Palestinians, even for their
individual human rights? How else can we
explain the glaring contradiction
between the attitudes of classical
Judaism toward non-Jews, which include
the rule that their lives should not be
saved except for the sake of Jewish
interest, with the support of the US
rabbis and organized Jews for the rights
of the Blacks? After all, Martin Luther
King and the majority of American Blacks
are non-Jews. Even if only the
conservative and Orthodox Jews, who
together constitute the majority of
organized American Jews, are considered
to hold such opinions about the
non-Jews, the other part of organized US
Jewry, the Reform, had never opposed
them, and, in my view, show themselves
to be quite influenced by them.
Actually the
explanation of this apparent
contradiction is easy. It should be
recalled that Judaism, especially in its
classical form, is totalitarian in
nature. The behavior of supporters of
other totalitarian ideologies of our
times was not different from that of the
organized American Jews. Stalin and his
supporters never tired of condemning the
discrimination against the American or
the South African Blacks, especially in
the midst of the worst crimes committed
within the USSR. The South African
apartheid regime was tireless in its
denunciations of the violations of human
rights committed either by communist or
by other African regimes, and so were
its supporters in other countries. Many
similar examples can be given. The
support of democracy or of human rights
is there- fore meaningless or even
harmful and deceitful when it does not
begin with self-critique and with
support of human rights when they are
violated by one's own group. Any support
of human rights in general by a Jew
which does not include the support of
human rights of non-Jews whose rights
are being violated by the 'Jewish state'
is as deceitful as the support of human
rights by a Stalinist. The apparent
enthusiasm displayed by American rabbis
or by the Jewish organizations in the
USA during the 1950s and the 1960s in
support of the Blacks in the South, was
motivated only by considerations of
Jewish self-interest, just as was the
communist support for the same Blacks.
Its purpose in both cases was to try to
capture the Black community politically,
in the Jewish case to an unthinking
support of Israeli policies in the
Middle East.
Therefore,
the real test facing both Israeli and
diaspora Jews is the test of their
self-criticism which must include the
critique of the Jewish past. The most
important part of such a critique must
be detailed and honest confrontation of
the Jewish attitude to non-Jews. This is
what many Jews justly demand from
non-Jews: to confront their own past and
so become aware of the discrimination
and persecutions inflicted on the Jews.
In the last 40 years the number of
non-Jews killed by Jews is by far
greater than the number of the Jews
killed by non-Jews. The extent of the
persecution and discrimination against
non-Jews inflicted by the 'Jewish state'
with the support of organized diaspora
Jews is also enormously greater than the
suffering inflicted on Jews by regimes
hostile to the~ Although the struggle
against antisemitism (and of all other
forms of racism) should never cease, the
struggle against Jewish chauvinism and
exclusivism, which must include a
critique of classical Judaism, is now of
equal or greater importance.
Notes and References
Notes and References: Chapt. 1,
2,
3,
4,
5,
6
Chapter 1:
A Closed
Utopia?
1 Walter
Laquer, History of Zionism Schocken
Publishers, Tel Aviv, 1974, in Hebrew.
2 See
Yedioth Ahronot, 27 April 1992.
3 In Hugh
Trevor-Roper, Renaissance Essays,
Fontana Press, London, 1985.
4 See Moses
Hadas, Hellenistic Culture, Fusion and
Diffusion, Columbia University Press,
New York, 1959, especially chapters VII
and XX.
Back to Top
Chapter 2:
Prejudice and Prevarication
1 The Jews
themselves universally described
themselves as a religious community or,
to be precise, a religious nation. 'Our
people is a people only because of the
Torah (Religious Law)'-this saying by
one of the highest authorities, Rabbi
Sa'adia Hagga'on who lived in the 10th
century, has become proverbial.
2 By Emperor
Joseph II in 1782.
3 All this
is usually omitted in vulgar Jewish
historiography, in order to propagate
the myth that the Jews kept their
religion by miracle or by some peculiar
mystic force.
4 For
example, in her Origins of
Totalitarianism, a considerable part of
which is devoted to Jews.
5 Before the
end of the 18th century, German Jews
were allowed by their rabbis to write
German in Hebrew letters only, on pain
of being excommunicated, flogged, etc.
6 When by a
deal between the Roman Empire and the
Jewish leaders (the dynasty of the Nesi
'im) all the Jews in the Empire were
subjected to the fiscal and disciplinary
authority of these leaders and their
rabbinical courts, who for their part
undertook to keep order among the Jews.
7 I write
this, being a non-socialist myself. But
I will honor and respect people with
whose principles I disagree, if they
make an honest effort to be true to
their principles. In contrast, there is
nothing so despicable as the dishonest
use of universal principles, whether
true or false, for the selfish ends of
an individual or, even worse, of a
group.
8 In fact,
many aspects of orthodox Judaism were
apparently derived from Sparta, through
the baneful political influence of
Plato. On this subject, see the
excellent comments of Moses Hadas,
Hellenistic Culture, Fusion and
Diffusion, Columbia University Press,
New York, 1959.
9 Including
the geography of Palestine and indeed
its very location. This is shown by the
orientation of all synagogues in
countries such as Poland and Russia:
Jews are supposed to pray facing
Jerusalem, and the European Jews, who
had only a vague idea where Jerusalem
was, always assumed it was due east,
whereas for them it was in fact more
nearly due south.
10
Throughout this chapter I use the term
'classical Judaism' to refer to
rabbinical Judaism as it emerged after
about AD 800 and lasted up to the end of
the 18th century. I avoid the term
'normative Judaism', which many authors
use with roughly the same meaning,
because in my view it has unjustified
connotations.
11 The works
of Hellenistic Jews, such as Philo of
Alexandria, constitute an exception.
They were written before classical
Judaism achieved a position of exclusive
hegemony. They were indeed subsequently
suppressed among the Jews and survived
only because Christian monks found them
congenial.
12 During
the whole period from AD 100 to 1500
there were written two travel books and
one history of talmudic studies - a
short, inaccurate and dreary book,
written moreover by a despised
philosopher (Abraham ben-David, Spain,
c. 1170).
13 Me'or
'Eynayi'n by 'Azarya de Rossi of
Ferrara, Italy, 1574,
14 The best
known cases were in Spain; for example
(to use their adopted Christian names)
Master Alfonso of Valladolid, converted
in 1320, and Paul of Santa Marja,
converted in 1390 and appointed bishop
of Burgos in 1415. But many other cases
can be cited from all over west Europe.
15 Certainly
the tone, and also the consequences,
were very much better than in
disputations in which Christians were
accused of heresy - for example those in
which Peter Abelard or the strict
Franciscans were condemned.
16 The
stalinist and Chinese examples are
sufficiently well known. However, it is
worth mentioning that the persecution of
honest historians in Germany began very
early. In 1874, H. Ewald, a professor at
Goettingen, was imprisoned for
expressing 'incorrect' views on the
conquests of Frederick II, a hundred
years earlier. The situation in Israel
is analogous: the worst attacks against
me were provoked not by the violent
terms I employ in my condemnations of
Zionism and the oppression of
Palestinians, but by an early article of
mine about the role of Jews in the slave
trade, in which the latest case quoted
dated from 1870. That article was
published before the 1967 war; nowadays
its publication would be impossible.
17 In the
end a few other passages also had to be
removed, such as those which seemed
theologically absurd (for example, where
God is said to pray to Himself or
physically to carry out some of the
practices enjoined on the individual
Jew) or those which celebrated too
freely the sexual escapades of ancient
rabbis.
18 Tractate
Berakhot, p. 58b.
19 'Your
mother shall be sore confounded; she
that bare you shall be ashamed...',
Jeremiah, 50:12.
20 Published
by Boys Town, Jerusalem, and edited by
Moses Hyamson, one of the most reputable
scholars of Judaism in Britain.
21 The
supposed founders of the Sadducean sect.
22 I am
happy to say that in a recent new
translation (Chicago University Press)
the word 'Blacks' does appear, but the
heavy and very expensive volume is
unlikely, as yet, to get into the
'wrong' hands. Similarly, in early 19th
century England, radical books (such as
Godwin's) were allowed to appear,
provided they were issued in a very
expensive edition.
23 An
additional fact can be mentioned in this
connection. It was perfectly possible,
and apparently respectable, for a Jewish
scholar of Islam, Bernard Lewis (who
formerly taught in London and is now
teaching in the USA) to publish an
article in Encounter, in which he points
out many passages in Islamic literature
which in his view are anti-Black, but
none of which even approaches the
passage quoted above. It would be quite
impossible for anyone now, or in the
last thirty years, to discuss in any
reputable American publication the above
passage or the many other offensive
anti-Black talmudic passages. But
without a criticism of all sides the
attack on Islam alone reduces to mere
slander.
Back to Top
Chapter 3:
Orthodoxy and Interpretation
1 As in
Chapter 2, I use the term 'classical
Judaism' to refer to rabbinical Judaism
in the period from about AD 800 up to
the end of the 18th century. This period
broadly coincides with the Jewish Middle
Ages, since for most Jewish communities
medieval conditions persisted much
longer than for the west European
nations, namely up to the period of the
French Revolution. Thus what I call
'classical Judaism' can be regarded as
medieval Judaism.
2 Exodus,
15:11.
3 Ibid.,
20:3-6.
4 Jeremiah,
10; the same theme is echoed still later
by the Second Isaiah, see Isaiah, 44.
5 The
cabbala is of course an esoteric
doctrine, and its detailed study was
confined to scholars. In Europe,
especially after about 1750, extreme
measures were taken to keep it secret
and forbid its study except by mature
scholars and under strict supervision.
The uneducated Jewish masses of eastern
Europe had no real knowledge of
cabbalistic doctrine; but the cabbala
percolated to them in the form of
superstition and magic practices.
6 Many
contemporary Jewish mystics believe that
the same end may be accomplished more
quickly by war against the Arabs, by the
expulsion of the Palestinians, or even
by establishing many Jewish settlements
on the West Bank. The growing movement
for building the Third Temple is also
based on such ideas.
7 The Hebrew
word used here - yihud, meaning
literally union-in-seclusion - is the
same one employed in legal texts
(dealing with marriage etc.) to refer to
sexual intercourse.
8 The
so-called Qedusbab Sblisbit (Third
Holiness), inserted in the prayer Uva
Letzion towards the end of the morning
service.Numbers, 29. 9-10 The power of
Satan, and his connection with non-Jews,
is illustrated by a widespread custom,
established under cabbalistic influence
in many Jewish communities from the 17th
century. A Jewish woman returning from
her monthly ritual bath of purification
(after which sexual intercourse with her
husband is mandatory) must beware of
meeting one of the four satanic
creatures: Gentile, pig, dog or donkey.
If she does meet any one of them she
must take another bath. The custom was
advocated (among others) by Shn'et
Musar, a book on Jewish moral conduct
first published in 1712, which was one
of the most popular books among Jews in
both eastern Europe and Islamic
countries until early this century, and
is still widely read in some Orthodox
circles.
11 This is
prescribed in minute detail. For
example, the ritual hand washing must
not be done under a tap; each hand must
be washed singly, in water from a mug
(of prescribed minimal size) held in the
other hand. If one's hands are really
dirty, it is quite impossible to clean
them in this way, but such pragmatic
considerations are obviously irrelevant.
Classical Judaism prescribes a great
number of such detailed rituals, to
which the cabbala attaches deep
significance. There are, for example,
many precise rules concerning behavior
in a lavatory. A Jew relieving nature in
an open space must not do so in a
North-South direction, because North is
associated with Satan.
12
'Interpretation' is my own expression.
The classical (and present-day Orthodox)
view is that the talmudic meaning, even
where it is contrary to the literal
sense, was always the operational one.
13 According
to an apocryphal story, a famous 19th
century Jewish heretic observed in this
connection that the verse Thou shalt not
commit adultery' is repeated only twice.
'Presumably one is therefore forbidden
to eat adultery or to cook it, but
enjoying it is all right.'
14 The
Hebrew re'akha is rendered by the King
James Version (and most other English
translations) somewhat imprecisely as
'thy neighbor'. See however II Samuel,
16:17, where exactly the same word is
rendered by the King James Version more
correctly as 'thy friend'.
15 The
Mishnah is remarkably free of all this,
and in particular the belief in demons
and witchcraft is relatively rare in it.
The Babylonian Talmud, on the other
hand, is full of gross superstitions.
16 Or, to be
precise, in many parts of Palestine.
Apparently the areas to which the law
applies are those where there was Jewish
demographic predominance around AD
150-200.
17 Therefore
non-zionist Orthodox Jews in Israel
organize special shops during sabbatical
years, which sell fruits and vegetables
grown by Arabs on Arab land.
18 In the
winter of 1945-6,1 myself, then a boy
under 13, participated in such
proceedings. The man in charge of
agricultural work in the religious
agricultural school I was men attending
was a particularly pious Jew and thought
it would be safe if the crucial act,
that of removing the board, should be
performed by an orphan under 13 years
old, incapable of being, or making
anyone else, guilty of a sin. (A boy
under that age cannot be guilty of a
sin; his father, if he has one, is
considered responsible.) Everything was
carefully explained to me beforehand,
including the duty to say, 'I need this
board,' when in fact it was not needed.
19 For
example, the Talmud forbids a Jew to
enjoy the light of a candle lit by a
Gentile on the sabbath, unless the
latter had lit it for his own use before
the Jew entered the room.
20 One of my
uncles in pre-1939 Warsaw used a subtler
method. He employed a non-Jewish maid
called Marysia and it was his custom
upon waking from his Saturday siesta to
say, first quietly, 'How nice it would
be if' - and then, raising his voice to
a shout, '... Marysia would bring us a
cup of tea!' He was held to be a very
pious and God fearing man and would
never dream of drinking a drop of milk
for a full six hours after eating meat.
In his kitchen he had two sinks, one for
washing up dishes used for eating meat,
the other for milk dishes.
21
Occasionally regrettable mistakes occur,
because some of these jobs are quite
cushy, allowing the employee six days
off each week. The town of Bney Braq
(near Tel-Aviv), inhabited almost
exclusively by Orthodox Jews, was shaken
in the 1960s by a horrible scandal. Upon
the death of the 'sabbath Goy' they had
employed for over twenty years to watch
over their water supplies on Saturdays,
it was discovered that he was not really
a Christian but a Jew! So when his
successor, a Druse, was hired, the town
demanded and obtained from the
government a document certifying that
the new employee is a Gentile of pure
Gentile descent. It is reliably rumored
that the secret police was asked to
research this matter.
22 In
contrast, elementary Scripture teaching
can be done for payment. This was always
considered a low-status job and was
badly paid.
23 Another
'extremely important' ritual is the
blowing of a ram's horn on Rosh
Hashanah, whose purpose is to confuse
Satan.
Back to Top
Chapter 4:
The
Weight of History
1 See, for
example, Jeremiah, 44, especially verses
15-19. For an excellent treatment of
certain aspects of this subject see
Raphael Patai, The Hebrew Goddess, Ktav,
USA, 1967.
2 Ezra,
7:25-26. The last two chapters of this
book are mainly concerned with Ezra's
efforts to segregate the 'pure' Jews
('the holy seed') away from 'the people
of the land' (who were themselves at
least partly of Jewish descent) and
break up mixed marriages.
3 W.F.
Albright, Recent Discoveries in Bible
lands, Funk & Wagnall, New York, 1955,
p.103.
4 It is
significant that, together with this
literary corpus, all the historical
books written by Jews after about 400 BC
were also rejected. Until the 19th
century, Jews were quite ignorant of the
story of Massadah and of figures such as
Judas Maccabaeus, now regarded by many
(particularly by Christians) as
belonging to the 'very essence' of
Judaism.
5 Acts,
18:15.
6 Ibid., 25.
7 See note 6
to Chapter 2.
8 Concerning
the term 'classical Judaism' see note 10
to Chapter 2 and note 1 to Chapter 3.
9 Nobel
Prize winners Agnon and Bashevis Singer
are examples of this, but many others
can be given, particularly Bialik, the
national Hebrew poet. In his famous poem
My Father he describes his saintly
father selling vodka to the drunkard
peasants who are depicted as animals.
This very popular poem, taught in all
Israeli schools, is one of the vehicles
through which the anti-peasant attitude
is reproduced.
10 So far as
the central power of the Jewish
Patriarchate was concerned, the deal was
terminated by Theodosius II in a series
of laws, culminating in AD 429; but many
of the local arrangements remained in
force.
11 Perhaps
another characteristic example is the
Parthian empire (until AD 225) but not
enough is known about it. We know,
however, that the establishment of the
national Iranian Sasanid empire brought
about an immediate decline of the Jews'
position.
12 This ban
extends also to marrying a woman
converted to Judaism, because all
Gentile women are presumed by the
Halakhah to be prostitutes.
13 A
prohibited marriage is not generally
void, and requires a divorce. Divorce is
nominally a voluntary act on the part of
the husband, but under certain
circumstances a rabbinical court can
coerce him to 'will' it (kofin oto 'ad
she yyomar rotzeh ani).
14 Although
Jewish achievements during the Golden
Age in Muslim Spain (1002-1147) were
more brilliant, they were not lasting.
For example, most of the magnificent
Hebrew poetry of that age was
subsequently forgotten by Jews, and only
recovered by them in the 19th or 20th
century.
15 During
that war, Henry of Trastamara used
anti-Jewish propaganda. although his own
mother, Leonor de Guzman, a high
Castilian noblewoman, was partly of
Jewish descent. (Only in Spain did the
highest nobility intermarry with Jews.)
After his victory he too employed Jews
in the highest financial positions.
16 Until the
18th century the position of serfs in
Poland was generally supposed to be even
worse than in Russia. In that century,
certain features of Russian serfdom,
such as public sales of serfs, got worse
than in Poland but the central Tsarist
government always retained certain
powers over the enslaved peasants, for
example the right to recruit them to the
national army.
17 During
the preceding period persecutions of
Jews were rare. This is true of the
Roman Empire even after serious Jewish
rebellions. Gibbon is correct in
praising the liberality of Antonius Pius
(and Marcus Aurelius) to Jews, so soon
after the major Bar-Kokhba rebellion of
AD 132-5.
18 This
fact, easily ascertainable by
examination of the details of each
persecution, is not rein~remarked upon
by most general historians in recent
times. An honorable exception is Hugh
Trevor-Roper, The Rise of Christian
Europe, Thames and Hudson, London, 1965,
pp.173-4. Trevor-Roper is also one of
the very few modern historians who
mention the predominant Jewish role in
the early medieval slave trade between
Christian (and pagan) Europe and the
Muslim world (ibid., pp.92-3). In order
to promote this abomination, which I
have no space to discuss here,
Maimonides allowed Jews, in the name of
the Jewish religion, to abduct Gentile
children into slavery; and his opinion
was no doubt acted upon or reflected
contemporary practice.
19 Examples
can be found in any history of the
crusades. See especially S. Runciman, A
History of the Crusades, vol I, book 3,
chap 1, 'The German Crusade'. The
subsequent defeat of this host by the
Hungarian army, 'to most Christians
appeared as a just punishment meted out
of high to the murderers of the Jews.'
20 John
Stoyc, Europe Unfolding 1 648~8,
Fontana, London, p.46.
21 This
latter feature is of course not
mentioned by received Jewish
historiography. The usual punishment for
a rebellious, or even 'impudent' peasant
was impalement.
22 The same
can be observed in different regions of
a given country. For example, in
Germany, agrarian Bavaria was much more
antisemitic than the industrialized
areas.
23 'The
refusal of the Church to admit that once
a Jew always a Jew, was another cause of
pain for an ostentatious Catholic like
Drumont. One of his chief lieutenants,
Jules Guérin, has recounted the disgust
he felt when the famous Jesuit, Père du
Lac, remonstrated with him for attacking
some converted Jews named Dreyfus.' D.W.
Brogan, The Development of Modern
France, vol 1, Harper Torchbooks, New
York, 1966, p.227.
24 Ibid..
25 Let me
illustrate the irrational, demonic
character which racism can sometimes
acquire with three examples chosen at
random. A major part of the
extermination of Europe's Jews was
carried out in 1942 and early 1943
during the Nazi offensive in Russia,
which culminated in their defeat at
Stalingrad. During the eight months
between June 1942 and February 1943 the
Nazis probably used more railway wagons
to haul Jews to the gas chambers than to
carry much needed supplies to the army.
Before being taken to their death, most
of these Jews, at least in Poland, had
been very effectively employed in
production of equipment for the German
army. The second, rather remote, example
comes from a description of the Sicilian
Vespers in 1282: 'Every Frenchman they
met was struck down. They poured into
the inns frequented by the French and
the houses where they dwelt, sparing
neither man nor woman nor child ... The
riots?s broke into the Dominican and
Franciscan convents, and all the foreign
friars were dragged out and told to
pronounce the word ciciri, whose sound
the French tongue could never accurately
reproduce. Anyone who failed in the test
was slain.' (S. Runciman, The Sicilian
Vespers, Cambridge University
Press,1958, p. 215.) The third example
is recent: in the summer of 1980 -
following an assassination attempt by
Jewish terrorists in which Mayor Bassam
Shak'a of Nablus lost both his legs and
Mayor Karim Khalaf of Ramallah lost a
foot - a group of Jewish Nazis gathered
in the campus of TeI-Aviv University,
roasted a few cats and offered their
meat to passers-by as 'shish-kebab from
the legs of the Arab mayors'. Anyone who
witnessed this macabre orgy - as I did -
would have to admit that some horrors
defy explanation in the present state of
knowledge.
26 One of
the early quirks of Jabotinsky (founder
of the party then led by Begin) was to
propose, in about 1912, the creation of
two Jewish states, one in Palestine and
the other in Angola: the former, being
poor in natural resources, would be
subsidized by the riches of the latter.
27 Herzl
went to Russia to meet von Plehve in
August 1903, less than four months after
the hideous Kishinev pogrom, for which
the latter was known to be responsible.
Herzl pro- posed an alliance, based on
their common wish to get most of the
Jews out of Russia and, in the shorter
term, to divert Jewish support away from
the socialist movement. The Tsarist
minister started the first interview (8
August) by observing that he regarded
himself as 'an ardent supporter of
zionism'. When Herzl went on to describe
the aims of zionism, von Plehve
interrupted: 'You are preaching to the
converted'. Amos Elon, Herzel, 'Am
'Oved, 1976 pp.415-9, in Hebrew.
28 Dr
Joachim Prinz, Wirjuden, Berlin, 1934,
pp. 150-1.
29 Ibid.,
pp. 154-5.
30 For
example see ibid., p. 136. Even worse
expressions of sympathy with Nazism were
voices by the extremist Lohamey Herut
Yisra'el (Stern Gang) as late as 1941.
Dr Prinz was, in zionist terms, a
'dove'. In the 1970s he even patronized
the US Jewish movement Breira, until he
was dissuaded by Golda Meir.
Back to Top
Chapter 5:
The Laws
Against Non-Jews
1
Maimonides, Mishneh Torah, 'Laws on
Murderers' 2, 11; Talmudic Encyclopedia,
'Goy'.
2 R. Yo'el
Sirkis, Bayit Hadash, commentary on Beyt
Josef, yoreh De'ah' 158. The two rules
just mentioned apply even if the Gentile
victim is ger toshav, that is a
'resident alien' who has undertaken in
front of three Jewish witnesses to keep
the 'seven Noahide precepts' (seven
biblical laws considered by the Talmud
to be addressed to Gentiles).
3 R. David
Halevi (Poland, 17th century), Turey
Zahav" on Shulhan 'Arukh, 'Yoreh De'ah'
158.
5 Talmudic
Encyclopedia, 'Ger' (= convert to
Judaism).
6 For
example, R. Shabbtay Kohen (mid 17th
century), Siftey Kohen on Shulhan
'Arukh, 'Yoreh De'ah, 158: 'But in times
of war it was the custom to kill them
with one's own hands, for it is said,
"The best of Gentiles - kill him!"'
Siftey Kohen and Turey Zahay (see note
3) are the two major classical
commentaries on the Shulhan 'Arukh.
7 Colonel
Rabbi A. Avidan (Zemel), 'Tohar
hannesheq le'or hahalakhah' (= 'Purity
of weapons in the light of the
Halakhah') in Be'iqvot milhemet yom
hakkippurim - pirqey hagut, halakhah
umehqar (In the Wake of the Yom Kippur
War - Chapters of Meditation, Halakhah
and Research), Central Region Command,
1973: quoted in Ha'olam Hazzeh, 5
January 1974; also quoted by David
Shaham, 'A chapter of meditation',
Hotam, 28 March 1974; and by Amnon
Rubinstein, 'Who falsifies the
Halakhah?' Ma'ariv", 13 October 1975.
Rubinstein reports that the booklet was
subsequently withdrawn from circulation
by order of the Chief of General Staff,
presumably because it encouraged
soldiers to disobey his own orders; but
he complains that Rabbi Avidan has not
been court-martialled, nor has any rabbi
- military or civil - taken exception to
what he had written.
8 R. Shim'on
Weiser, 'Purity of weapons - an exchange
of letters' in Niv" Hammidrashiyyah
Yearbook of Midrashiyyat No'am, 1974,
pp.29-31. The yearbook is in Hebrew,
English and French, but the material
quoted here is printed in Hebrew only.
9 Psalms,
42:2.
10 'Thou
shalt blot out the remembrance of Amalek
from under heaven', Deuteronomy, 25:19.
Cf. also I Samuel, 15:3: 'Now go and
smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all
that they have, and spare them not; but
slay both man and woman, infant and
suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass.'
11 We spare
the reader most of these rather
convoluted references and quotes from
talmudic and rabbinical sources. Such
omissions are marked [...]. The rabbi's
own conclusions are reproduced in full.
12 The
Tosafot (literally, Addenda) are a body
of scholia to the Talmud, dating from
the 1 lth-13th centuries.
13 Persons
guilty of such crimes are even allowed
to rise to high public positions. An
illustration of this is the case of
Shmu'el Lahis, who was responsible for
the massacre of between 50 and 75 Arab
peasants imprisoned in a mosque after
their village had been conquered by the
Israeli army during the 1948-9 war.
Following a pro forma trial, he was
granted complete amnesty, thanks to
Ben-Gurion's intercession. The man went
on to become a respected lawyer and in
the late 1970s was appointed Director
General of the Jewish Agency (which is,
in effect, the executive of the zionist
movement). In early 1978 the facts
concerning his past were widely
discussed in the Israeli press, but no
rabbi or rabbinical scholar questioned
either the amnesty or his fitness for
his new office. His appointment was not
revoked.
14 Shulhan
'Arukh, 'Hoshen Mishpat' 426.
15 Tractate
'Avodah Zarah, p. 26b.
16
Maimonides, op. cit., 'Murderer' 4, 11.
17
Leviticus, 19:16. Concerning the
rendering 'thy fellow', see note 14 to
Chapter 3.
18
Maimonides, op. cit., 'Idolatry' 10,
1-2.
19 In both
cases in section 'Yoreh De'ah' 158. The
Shulhan 'Arukh repeats the same doctrine
in 'Hoshen Mishpat' 425.
20 Moses
Rivkes, Be'er Haggolah on Shulhan
'Arukh, 'Hoshen Mishpat' 425.
21 Thus
Professor Jacob Katz, in his Hebrew book
Between Jews and Gentiles as well as in
its more apologetic English version
Exclusiveness and Tolerance, quotes only
this passage verbatim and draws the
amazing conclusion that 'regarding the
obligation to save life no
discrimination should be made between
Jew and Christian'. He does not quote
any of the authoritative views I have
cited above or in the next section.
22
Maimonides, op. cit., 'Sabbath' 2,
20-21; Shulhan 'Arukh, 'Orab Hayyim'
329.
23 R 'Aqiva
Eiger, commentary on Shulhan 'Arukh,
ibid. He also adds that if a baby is
found abandoned in a town inhabited
mainly by Gentiles, a rabbi should be
consulted as to whether the baby should
be saved.
24 Tractate
Avodah Zarah, p. 26.
25
Maimonides, op. cit., 'Sabbath' 2, 12;
Shulhan 'Arukh, 'Orah Hayyim' 330. The
latter text says 'heathen' rather than
'Gentile' but some of the commentators,
such as Turey Zahav, stress that this
ruling applies 'even to Ishmaelites',
that is, to Muslims, 'who are not
idolators'. Christians are not mentioned
explicitly in this connection, but the
ruling must a fortiori apply to them,
since - as we shall see below - Islam is
regarded in a more favorable light than
Christianity. See also the responsa of
Hatam Sofer quoted below.
26 These two
examples, from Poland and France, are
reported by Rabbi I.Z. Cahana
(afterwards professor of Talmud in the
religious Bar-Ilan University, Israel),
'Medicine in the Halachic post-Talmudic
Literature', Sinai, vol 27, 1950, p.221.
He also reports the following case from
19th century Italy. Until 1848, a
special law in the Papal States banned
Jewish doctors from treating Gentiles.
The Roman Republic established in 1848
abolished this law along with all other
discriminatory law against Jews. But in
1849 an expeditionary force sent by
France's President Louis Napoleon
(afterwards Emperor Napoleon III)
defeated the Republic and restored Pope
Pius Ix, who in 1850 revived the
anti-Jewish laws. The commanders of the
French garrison, disgusted with this
extreme reaction, ignored the papal law
and hired some Jewish doctors to treat
their soldiers. The Chief Rabbi of Rome,
Moshe Hazan, who was himself a doctor,
was asked whether a pupil of his, also a
doctor, could take a job in a French
military hospital despite the risk of
having to desecrate the sabbath. The
rabbi replied that if the conditions of
employment expressly mention work on the
sabbath, he should refuse. But if they
do not, he could take the job and employ
'the great cleverness of God-fearing
Jews.' For example, he could repeat on
Saturday the prescription given on
Friday, by simply telling this to the
dispenser. R. Cahana's rather frank
article, which contains many other
examples, is mentioned in the
bibliography of a book by the former
Chief Rabbi of Britain, R. Immanuel
Jakobovits, Jewish Medical Ethics,
Bloch, New York, 1962; but in the book
itself nothing is said on this matter.
27 Hokhmat
Shlomoh on Shulhan 'Arukh, 'Orah Hayyim'
330, 2.
28 R.
Unterman, Ha'aretz, 4 April 1966. The
only qualification he makes - after
having been subjected to continual
pressure - is that in our times any
refusal to give medical assistance to a
Gentile could cause such hostility as
might endanger Jewish lives.
29 Hatam
Sofer, Responsa on Shulhan 'Arukh,
'Yoreh De'ah' 131.
30 Op. cit.,
on Shulhan 'Arukh, 'Hoshen Mishpat' 194.
31 R. B. Knobelovitz in The Jewish
Review (Journal of the Mizrachi Party in
Great Britain), 8 June 1966.
32 R.
Yisra'el Me'ir Kagan - better known as
the 'Hafetz Hayyim - complains in his
Mishnah Berurah, written in Poland in
1907: 'And know ye that most doctors,
even the most religious, do not take any
heed whatsoever of this law; for they
work on the sabbath and do travel
several parasangs to treat a heathen,
and they grind medicaments with their
own hands. And there is no authority for
them to do so. For although we may find
it permissible, because of the fear of
hostility, to violate bans imposed by
the sages - and even this is not clear;
yet in bans imposed by the Torah itself
it must certainly be forbidden for any
Jew to do so, and those who transgress
this prohibition violate the sabbath
utterly and may God have mercy on them
for their sacrilege.' (Commentary on
Shulhan 'Arukh, 'Orah Hayyim' 330.) The
author is generally regarded as the
greatest rabbinical authority of his
time.
33 Avraham
Steinberg MD (ed.), Jewish Medical Law,
compiled from Tzitz Eli 'ezer (Responsa
of R. Eli'ezer Yehuda Waldenberg),
translated by David B. Simons MD, Gefen
& Mossad Harav Kook, Jerusalem and
California, 1980.
34 Op. cit.,
p. 39. Ibid., p.41.
35 Ibid., p.
41.
36 The
phrase 'between Jew and gentile' is a
euphemism. The dispensation is designed
to prevent hostility of Gentiles towards
Jews, not the other way around.
37
Ibid.,p.412;my emphasis.
38 Dr Falk
Schlesinger Institute for Medical
Halakhic Research at Sha'arey Tzedeq
Hospital, Sefer Asya (The Physician's
Book), Reuben Mass, Jerusalem, 1979.
39 By myself
in Ha'olam Hazzeh, 30 May 1979 and by
Shullamit Aloni, Member of Knesset, in
Ha'aretz, 17 June 1980.
40 Ezekiel,
23:20.
41 Tractate
Berakhot, p. 78a.
42 Talmudic
Encyclopedia, 'Eshet Ish' ('Married
Woman').
43 Exodus,
20:17.
44 Genesis,
2:24.
45
Maimonides, op. cit., 'Prohibitions on
Sexual Intercourse' 12; 10; Talmudic
Encyclopedia, 'Goy'.
46
Maimonides, op. cit., ibid., 12, 1-3. As
a matter of fact, every Gentile woman is
regarded as N.Sh.G.Z. - acronym for the
Hebrew words niddah, shifhah, goyah,
zonah (unpurified from menses, slave,
Gentile, prostitute). Upon conversion to
Judaism, she ceases indeed to be niddah,
shifhah, goyah but is still considered
zonah (prostitute) for the rest of her
life, simply by virtue of having been
born of a Gentile mother. In a special
category is a woman 'conceived not in
holiness but born in holiness', that is
born to a mother who had converted to
Judaism while pregnant. In order to make
quite sure that there are no mix-ups,
the rabbis insist that a married couple
who convert to Judaism together must
abstain from marital relations for three
months.
47
Characteristically, an exception to this
generalization is made with respect to
Gentiles holding legal office relating
to financial transactions: notaries,
debt collectors, bailiff~ and the like.
No similar exception is made regarding
ordinary decent Gentiles, not even if
they are friendly towards Jews.
48 Some very
early (1st century BC) rabbis called
this law 'barbaric' and actually
returned lost property belonging to
Gentiles. But the law nevertheless
remained.
49
Leviticus, 25:14. This is a literal
translation of the Hebrew phrase. The
King James Version renders this as 'ye
shall not oppress one another';
'oppress' is imprecise but 'one another'
is a correct rendering of the biblical
idiom 'each man his brother'. As pointed
out in Chapter 3, the Halakhah
interprets all such idioms as referring
exclusively to one's fellow Jew.
50 Shulhan
'Arukh, 'Hoshen Mishpat' 227.
51 This view
is advocated by H. Bar-Droma, Wezeh Gvul
Ha'aretz (And This Is the Border of the
Land), Jerusalem, 1958. In recent years
this book is much used by the Israeli
army in indoctrinating its officers.
52
Maimonides, op. cit., 'Idolatry' 10,
3-4.
53 See note
2.
54 Exodus,
23:33.
55
Maimonides, op. cit., 'Idolatry' 10, 6.
56
Deuteronomy, 20:16. See also the verses
quoted in note 10.
57 Numbers
31:13-20; note in particular verse 17:
'Now there- fore kill every male among
the little ones, and kill every woman
that hath known man by lying with him.'
58 R. Sha'ul
Yisra'eli, 'Taqrit Qibbiya Le'or
Hahalakhah' (The Qibbiya incident in the
light of the Halakhah'), in Hattorab
Wehammedinah, vol 5, 1953/4.
59 This is
followed by a blessing 'for not making
me a slave'. Next, a male must add a
blessing 'for not making me a woman',
and a female 'for making me as He
pleased'.
60 In
eastern Europe it was until recent times
a universal custom among Jews to spit on
the floor at this point, as an
expression of scorn. This was not
however a strict obligation, and today
the custom is kept only by the most
pious.
61 The
Hebrew word is meshummadim, which in
rabbinical usage refers to Jews who
become 'idolators', that is either pagan
or Christians, but not to Jewish
converts to Islam.
62 The
Hebrew word is minim, whose precise
meaning is 'disbelievers in the
uniqueness of God'.
63 Tractate
Berakhot, p. 58b.
64 According
to many rabbinical authorities the
original rule still applies in full in
the Land of Israel.
65 This
custom gave rise to many incidents in
the history of European Jewry. One of
the most famous, whose consequence is
still visible today, occurred in 14th
century Prague. King Charles IV of
Bohemia (who was also Holy Roman
Emperor) had a magnificent crucifix
erected in the middle of a stone bridge
which he had built and which still
exists today. It was then reported to
him that the Jews of Prague are in the
habit of spitting whenever they pass
next to the crucifix. Being a famous
protector of the Jews, he did not
institute persecution against them, but
simply sentenced the Jewish community to
pay for the Hebrew word Adonay (Lord) to
be inscribed on the crucifix in golden
letters. This word is one of the seven
holiest names of God, and no mark of
disrespect is allowed in front of it.
The spitting ceased. Other incidents
connected with the same custom were much
less amusing.
66 The
verses most commonly used for this
purpose contain words derived from the
Hebrew root shaqetz which means
'abominate, detest', as in Deuteronomy,
7:26: 'thou shalt utterly detest it, and
thou shalt utterly abhor it; for it is a
cursed thing.' It seems that the
insulting term sheqetz, used to refer to
all Gentiles (Chapter 2), originated
from this custom.
67 Talmud,
Tractate Beytzah, p. 21a, b; Mishnah
Berurah on Shulhan 'Arukh, 'Orah Hayyim'
512. Another commentary (Magen Avraham)
also excludes Karaites.
68 According
to the Halakha, a Gentile slave bought
by a Jew should be converted to Judaism,
but does not thereby become a proper
Jew.
69
Leviticus, 25:46.
70 The
Hebrew form of the name Jesus - Yeshu -
was interpreted as an acronym for the
curse may his name and memory be wiped
out', which is used as an extreme form
of abuse. In fact, anti-zionist Orthodox
Jews (such as Neturey Qarta) sometimes
refer to Herzl as 'Herzl Jesus' and I
have found in religious zionist writings
expressions such as 'Nasser Jesus' and
more recently 'Arafat Jesus.'
INDEX
for:
Jewish History,
Jewish Religion:
The
Weight of Three Thousand Years
by
Professor Israel Shahak
TOPICS
adultery,
capital offense, 87
Aggadah, talmudic Narrative, 39
agriculture, 41, 43;
Jewish
contempt for, 42,53;
mixed crops, 44-5
al-Mansur,
caliph of Spain, 57
Alexander VJ Borgia, Pope, 21
Aloni, Shulamit, 27
Amalekites, 84;
law on
murder of, 77, 113n;
Palestinians identified with, 91-2
antisemitism, 2,103;
alliance
with zionism, 71-2;
modern,66-9
apartheid, Jewish ideology compared
with, 100
Apuleius, The Golden Ass, 21
Arab League, meeting at Fez,100
Arab mayors, attempted assassination
(1980), 112n
Arabs, as enemies, 77;
exploitation of labor of, 5, 96,
see also Islam; Muslims Arba 'ah
Turim,
on saving of life, 81
Arendt, Hannah, on Jewish history, 16
army Sec Israeli army
Artaxerxes I, King, 50
Australia, 23, 24
Austrian Empire, Jewish Enlightenment
in, 70;
Jews in,
15;
and modern Judaism, 51;
serfdom in, 53;
under Metternich, 17
Babylonian exile, return from(537 BC),
50
Bar Mitzvah ceremony, 17
Bayit Hadash, 83
Begin, Menachem, 35
Ben-Gurion, David, 12;
alliance
with French antisemites, 71;
Jewish ideology of, 8-9, 35
Bergman, Hugo Shmuel, philosopher, 28
Beyt Yosef, codification of talmudic
law, 75;
on saving
of life, 81
Bible, biblical borders of Israel, 9-10;
interpretation of, 36-8;
Kingdoms of Old Testament, 50;
New Testament to be burnt, 21, 98;
polytheism in, 32
Bismarck, Otto von, 70
Black Death, 65
Blacks, racism against, 25, 106n;
US
organized Jews' support for, 102
Book of Education, The, 94-5
Book of Knowledge (Maimonidean Code),
24-5
books, anathematized, 18
Bratislava (Pressburg), Jews in,15
bribery, use of, 17,21
British Labor Party, 30
Buber, Martin, Hassidic apologist, 27
cabbala (mysticism), spread of, 32-3,
lO7n
Canaanites,23, 91
Canada, support for Israel,101
capital punishment, within Jewish
communities, 14-15, 17
capitalism, and modern antisemitism,
66-7
Casimir the Great, of Poland, 61,62
Castile see Spain Catholic church, and
alliance with antisemitism, 68
cemeteries, blessings and curses on,
234,93;
violation
of, 378
characteristics, Jewish, and modern
antisemitism, 18-19, 67
Charles W of Bohemia, Holy Roman
Emperor, 117-18n
chauvinism, Jewish, 11-12,103
child labor, exploitation of Arab, 96
Chmielnicki revolt (Ukraine
1648),66,72,73
Christian clergy, as 'friends of the
Jews', 29-30
Christianity, and campaign against
Talmud, 20-2;
Jewish
hatred of, 92-3,97,98;
lack of racism in, 67;
persecution of Jews, 97; and
records of Jewish history, 52;
rise of, 51
class, and effect of dispensations,
48,49;
within
Jewish communities, 55
classical Judaism, 74, 105n, 106n;
decay of
monotheism m, 324;
effect of dispensations on, 42,
47-8;
major social features of, 52-6;
Platonic influence on, 12-13;
profit motive in, 49;
repressive nature of, 19-20,
see also Orthodox Judaism; zionism
clergy, Christian, as 'friends of the
Jews', 29-30
clergy, Jewish, powers and exemption
from taxes, 54-5;
restrictions on marriage, 59
Code of Talmudic Law (Editio Pn'nceps),
21
conservatism, alliance with
antisemitism, 68, 69,70,71
conspiracy theory of history, and modern
antisemitism, 67
Constitutional law, against opposition
to 'Jewish state', 3
conversion from Judaism, 20, 105n, 117n;
as escape,
15
conversion to Judaism, and definition of
Jewish, 4-5;
and
entitlement to settle in Israel, 34;
of women, 5, 1 16n
Creation, by First Cause, 33
Cromer, Lord, on imperialism,100
crusades, and persecution of Jews, 65
curses, against buildings, 93;
against
Christians, 92-3, 117n;
on graveyards, 24;
on infidels, 24-5,93;
prohibition against, 96;
spitting, 1 17-18n
Cyprus, Israel's claims to, 9, 90
Daughter (Shekhinah), and union with
Son, 33-4
Dayan, Moshe, 100 Decalogue, talmudic
interpretation of, 36-7
deception in business, 89
democracy, lacking in State of Israel,
2, 3
Deutscher, Isaac, socialist, 53
diaspora, Jews of the,
influence
of Talmudic laws on, 2;
uncritical support for Israel,
101-2,
see also USA
dispensations (heterim), 42-7;
and
deception of God, 47, 48;
for holy days, 94;
profit motive in, 4~9;
social aspects of, 47-9,
see also Sabbath
divorce, 110n
doctors, employed by rulers, 534;
and Gentile
wounded (Israeli army), 27,28;
and saving of life on Sabbath, 40,
81-7, 115n
Dreyfus affair, 68
Drumont, E., La France Juive, 67, 68
Egypt, claims of Israel to, 9;
Jews in, 51
Eiger, Aqiva (Rabbi), 82
emancipation of Jews, and rise of
antisemitism, 70;
within
civil states, 14, 15-17, 66
England, Jewish community in medieval,
56;
legal
rights for Jews in, 14
English Revolution, 69
excuses, for not desecrating Sabbath,
82-3, 84, 85,
see also
dispensations
Ezra, Book of, 50
Fatimid empire, and Jews in Egypt, 58,59
'fellow', interpretation of, 37, 95,
117n
First Cause, Creator, 33
'forbidden thoughts', 16, 19
formula, significance of, 35
France, Jewish community in medieval,
56-7;
legal
rights for Jews in, 14;
and modern antisemitism, 66, 67~,
71;
and modern Judaism, 51
fraud, against Gentiles, 89
French revolution, 14, 15, 69, 73
Galilee, 'Judaization' of, 8
Gaza Strip, 91-2
Gazit, Shlomo, General, 11, 12
Gemarah, discussions of Mishnah, 39
Gentiles, 70, 81;
and
authority over Jews, 88;
duty to oppress, 96;
fictitious sales to, 434, 45;
gifts to, 88-9;
kings excepted from laws against,
534;
in Land of Israel, 90-2:
murder by, 76;
murder of, 76;
praise of forbidden, 93;
presumed contamination of wine and
food by, 94;
as resident aliens, 91, 112n;
saving life of, 1, 80-1, 82, 86;
sexual offenses and status of women,
87-8, 116n;
as slaves, 95
geography, study of forbidden, 18, 19,
105n
Germany, Buber's Hassidic eulogies
published in, 28;
Jewish
Enlightenment in, 70;
Jewish society in 18th century,
15-16;
and modem antisemitism, 66, 67, 669;
Peasant War (1525), 73;
persecution of historians, 105n,
see also Nazis gifts, as investment,
88
Golden Age, Jewish, in Muslim Spain,
57-8, 110n
Gordon, A.D., 7
Gospels, banned in schools, 98
Greek Orthodox Church, and antisemitism,
68
grinding, banned on Sabbath, 40,45-6
Gush Emunim, and biblical borders of
Israel, 9;
cabbalistic
traditions of, 32, 35;
on Islam, 98;
and oppression of Gentiles, 96;
prayers against Christianity, 92-3;
and treatment of Palestinians, 91
Gypsies, Nazi extermination of, 64
Habbad movement, 27
Hadas, Moses, on Platonic influences,
12-13
Hafetz Hayyim (Rabbi Yisra'el Me'ir
Kagan), 1 15n
Hagga'on, Sa'adia (Rabbi),104n
Halakhah (legal system of classical
Judaism), 75;
and
Israel's criminal law, 79;
on Muslims, 98;
on saving of life, 80
hands, ritual washing of, 34
Hassidic movement, attitude to non-Jews,
26-8
Hatanya, Habbad movement text, 27
Hellenism, influence of, 51
Henry II (of Trastamara and Castile),60,
110n
Herzl, Theodor, alliance with von
Plehve, 71, 112n
Hesronot Shas edition of Talmudic
Omissions, 23
Hess, Moses, Jewish racist, 30
Hippocratic Oath, 85, 86
historiography, and nationalism,22
history, Jewish ignorance and fear of,
17, 18, 19-20, 109n;
Jewish need
to confront,734;
and totalitarianism, 22, 105n
History of the Kings of France, 19-20
Hitler, Adolf, zionist approval of, 71-2
Hokhmat Shlomob, 19th-century
commentary, 83
Holland,censorship of talmudic
literature,21;
legal
rights for Jews in, 14;
and modern Judaism, 51;
War of Dutch Independence(
156~1648),69
Holocaust, the, 64, 111n
holy days, laws against work on, 94, see
also Sabbath
hostility against Jews, avoidance of,
laws on money and property, 88-9;
and murder,
76;
and popular rejoicing, 93;
and saving of life, 76,82-3, 85-6
houses, lease of, 90-1;
sale of to
Gentiles, 90
human rights, and attitude to non-Jews,
101-2
humor, Jewish sense of, 18
Hungary, serfdom in, 53
Hussein, King, of Jordan, 100
identity cards, 6
immigration laws, Law of Return, 6;
residency
rights, 5
imperialism, Lord Cromer's
formula,
100
interest on loans, dispensation for
taking, 42-3, 89;
to
Gentiles, 89, 95-6
intermarriage, in Spain and Poland, 67,
110n
Iraq, claims of Israel to, 9
Islam, attitude of Judaism to, 98;
forbids
expulsion of Jews, 57;
lack of racism in, 67,
see also Arabs; Muslims Israel,
ancient kingdom of, 50
Israel, Land of (as defined in Talmud),
laws
against Gentiles in, 90-2
Israel Land Authority, 5
Israel, State of, citizenship, 4, 6;
dangers
posed by, 2-3, 8;
defined as a Jewish state, 24;
discrimination against non-Jews,
5-6, 234;
dominated by east-European Jews, 64;
laws on murder, 7~9;
religious basis of policies, 1-2,
8-9, 99;
restoration of biblical borders,
9-10;
role in Middle East, 11, 73;
uncritical support for, 102
Israeli army, doctors and Gentile
wounded, 27,28;
and
religious laws on murder of
Gentiles, 76-9, 1 13n;
and Sabbath observance, 46
Israeli Medical Association, 87
Isserles, Moses (Rabbi), 81
Italy, anti-Jewish laws in, 115n;
Jews in medieval, 19,57
Jabotiasky, -, pact with Petlyura, 71
Jabri, Sheikh, of Hebron, 100
Jacquerie revolt (1357~),73
Jesus, talmudic misinterpretation of,
97-8;
talmudic
precepts against, 21;
as term of abuse, 118n
Jewish communities, in 18th century,
14-15;
autonomous
powers of, 54, 60, 62;
between talmudic and classical
periods, 41-2;
liberated by modern states,
15-16,66;
as middle class in feudal countries,
534,56
Jewish Enlightenment(Haskalah), 32,70
Jewish ideology, continuing chauvinism
of, 17-18;
imperialism
prohibited by, 100-1;
influence of, 11-12, 99,
see also classical Judaism; Judaism
Jewish Medical Law, 85-6 Jewish National
Fund (JNF), 5, 7, 8
Jews, categories defined by Talmud,
3940;
defined in
1780,14;
defined in Israeli law, 4-5, 109n;
social position in eastern Europe,
534
Jordan, claims of Israel to, 9, 90;
relations
with State of Israel, 99-100
Judah, ancient kingdom of, 50
Judaism, attitude to Islam, 98;
gap in
knowledge of (AD 200-800), 52;
hatred of Christianity, 97~;
historical phases of, 50-2,
see also classical Judaism; Gush
Emunim; mysticism; Orthodox Judaism
Kafr Qasim, mass murder at 79
Karaites (heretical sect), 60;
ban on
saving life of, 83,85-6
Karo, Rabbi Yosef, Beyt Yosef, 75
Kaufman, Yehezkiel, 28
kibbutz, exclusivism of, 7, 17
King, Martin Luther, Jewish support for,
26, 102
kings, exceptions to laws against
Gentiles, 534
Kiryat-Arba, 100
Kohens (priestly tribe), 87-8
Koran see Qur'an Kushites (Kushim),
transliteration of Blacks, 25
Kuwait, claims of Israel to,9
labor movement, zionist, and redeemed
land, 7
Lahis, Shmu'el, amnesty for, 1 13-14n
land, ownership of, 34,5;
redemption
of, 78,11, 100;
sale of to Gentiles, 43, 90
Law of Return, 6
laws, 'of heaven', 75,
see Talmud
learning
see scholarship leavened substances,
dispensations for, 45
Lebanon, Israel's claims to, 9, 10,90
Lemberg (Lvov), rabbi poisoned in, 17
liberalization, see emancipation of Jews
liberalism, and antisemitism, 69;
zionist
hostility to, 71-2
Likud Party, and restoration of biblical
borders, 10
Lior, Dov (Rabbi), 10
lost property, belonging to Gentiles,
89, 116n
Lvov see Lemberg
Maccabean period (142-63 BC), 13
Machiavelli, 12
Maimonides, Moses, Guide to the
Perplexed, 25;
Mishneh
Torah, 21,24-5,75;
Muslim persecution of, 97;
physician to Saladin, 59, 98;
racism of, 25;
on saving of life, 80
Marx, Karl, on Judaism, 49
marxists, as 'friends of the Jews', 30
meat and milk, injunction against
mixing, 37
medicine see doctors; midwives
Meir, Golda, Prime Minister,71, 100
Mencius (Chinese sage), 74
mercy, interpretation of, 96
Mesopotamia, ancient kingdom of, 41,50
Metz (France), 83
Middle East, State of Israel's role in,
11,73
Midianites, Biblical exhortations
against, 92
Midrashiyyat No'am college, 77
midwives, for Gentiles, on Sabbath,
82-3,85;
in Turkey,
84
milking on Sabbath, dispensations for,
44
Mishnah, legal code of Talmud,39
Mishnah Berurah, modern codification of
talmudic law, 75, 118n
Mishneh Torah (Maimonides' codification
of talmudic law), 21,75;
and work on
Sabbath, 84
mixed crops, dispensation for sowing,
44-5, 108n
monotheism, in Judaism, 324
More, Sir Thomas, 12
Moses, incarnation as Son, 33
Moshe (soldier), letters to rabbi, 77-9
murder, of Gentiles,76;
of Jews,
75,76
Muslim countries, Jews in medieval, 57-9
Muslims, and contamination of wine by,
94
mysticism, attitude to non-Jews, 16;
and
deception, 269;
Hassidism, 2~8,
see also cabbala; Gush Emunim
Napoleon III, Emperor of France, 115n
nationalism, and historiography, 22
Nazis, extermination of Jews, 64, 11 in;
Jewish,
112n
New Testament, public burning of, 21,98
Nicaragua, Israeli role in, 73
Nicholas I, of Russia, 16-17
Noahide precepts, 91, 112n
non-Jews, 'friends of the Jews', 29-31;
in Jewish
mysticism,16;
and redeemed land, 7;
used for work on Sabbath,44, 45-7,
see also Gentiles
Occupied Territories, Israeli regime in,
2;
land
'redemption' in, 8
Old Testament, and ancient kingdoms, 50
organizations, exclusiveness of Jewish,
102
Orthodox Judaism, 13,32;
corrupting
influence of, 48-9,
see also classical Judaism; zionism
Ottoman Empire, Jews in, 58-9, 70
Palestine, ancient kingdom of, 41, 50;
British
Labor party plans for, 30;
PLO, 99-100
Palestinians, religious duty to expel,
91-2,96;
zionist
hostility to, 29, 72
papacy, liberalism of, 21;
and
persecution of Jews, 65-6
Parthion Empire, 110n
Patriarch, Jewish, in Roman Empire,
54-5, 110n
Paul, St, 51
payment, for work on Sabbath, 47
peasants, absent from classical Judaism,
52-3;
Jewish
contempt for, 42, 72, 109n;
oppression by Jews in Poland, 63;
State of Israel's oppression of, 73
Pedro I, of Castile, 60
Pentateuch, talmudic interpretations of,
37
persecution of Jews, 64-6,97, 110n
Persian Empire, 50,51
Peruvian tribe, converted to Judaism, 34
Petlyura, -' pact with Jabotinsky, 71
Pharisees, 51
Philo of Alexandria, 105n
Plato, 12-13, 104-5n
Plehve, Count von, alliance with
Herzl,71, 112n
PLO (Palestine Liberation
Organization),99-100
pogroms, in Tsarist Russia, 65
Poland, dispensation on interest-taking,
42-3;
Jewish
communities in, 14,17,55, 614;
Royal Towns, 62;
serfdom in, 53, 110n;
treating Gentiles on Sabbath, 83
Popper, Karl, The Open Society and Its
Enemies, 13,18
popular movements, and opposition to
Jews, 60-1,64, 65-6;
racism not
a factor in, 73
Portugal, 59, see also Spain
Prague, crucifix on bridge, 117-18n
prayers, against Gentiles, 92-3, 117n;
morning,
for union of Son and Daughter, 34;
superstitious use of, 48;
to propitiate Satan, 34
Pressburg (Bratislava), Jews in, 15
priests see clergy
primary intention, and ban on work on
Sabbath, 86
Prinz, Dr Joachim, and ideology of
racial purity, 71-2
profit motive, in dispensations, 469
Protestantism, and alliance with
antisemitism, 68
Prussia, emancipation of Jews in, 70;
serfdom in, 53
Pugachev rebellion, Russia, 73
'purity of weapons', 78, 79, 113n
Qibbiya massacre, 92
Qur'an, not condemned by Judaism, 98
rabbinical courts, Gentile witnesses in,
88;
of
Jerusalem, 1;
powers of, 14-15
racial purity, ideology common to Nazism
and zionism, 71-2
racism, against non-Jews, 2, 69;
irrationality of, 11 1-12n;
pro-Jewish among non-Jews, 29-31
Reformation, intellectual honesty in, 21
Religions, Ministry of (State of
Israel), 21
religious fanaticism, dangers of, 29
religious toleration, in early Judaism,
50-1
Richard I, King of England, 65
ritual, importance of, 35, 107n
Rivkes, Moses (Rabbi), liberalism of, 81
robbery (with violence), of Gentiles, 90
Roman Empire, Jewish religious
toleration in, 51,110n;
legal
position of Jewry in, 54-5
Romania, emancipation of Jews in' 70
Rosten, Leo, The Joys of Yiddish, 26
Russia, censorship of talmudic
literature, 21, 23;
emancipation of Jews in, 70;
persecution of Jews in, 65;
serfdom in, 53,73, 110n
Ryazin, Stenka, rebellion of Russian
peasants, 73
Sabbath, dispensations for milking on,
44;
saving of
life on, 81-7;
Talmud's definitions of work
forbidden on, 40-1, 84;
use of telephone on, 1,
see also dispensations
Sabbath-Goy, dispensations for, 45-7,
108-9n
sabbatical year, dispensation for, 434,
108n
Sadduceans,51, 106n
Saladin, toleration of Jews, 59, 98
Satan, propitiation of, 34;
role of,
33, 107n
Saudi Arabia, claims of Israel to, 9
saving of life, 80-1, 114n;
on Sabbath,
81-7
Schneurssohn, M.M. (Rabbi), 27
scholars, deception by, 24-6
scholarship, religious textbooks, 94-5;
restricted
in classical Judaism, 18, 19-20,
105n, 109n,
see also history
Scholem, Gershom, 16n
schools, Gospels banned in, 98;
Talmudic
omissions taught in, 234 </DL>
Seljuk empire, 58
serfdom, in eastern Europe, 52-3;
in
Poland,61, ll0n;
in Russia, 53, 73, 110n
sexual offenses, Halaldiab law on, 87-B
Sharon, Arid, 10
Shaygets (sheqetz),
definition
of, 26, 118n
Shazar, President, Habbad supporter, 27
Shekhinah see Daughter
Shevet Musar, on moral conduct, 107n
Shmu'el Hannagid, of Granada, 57-8
Shulban 'Arukh, codification of talmudic
law, 75;
on saving
of life, 81,82
Sicilian Vespers (1282), 111-12n
Sinai, claimed by State of Israel,
9,10,90
Sirkis, Yo'el (Rabbi),Bayit Hadash, 83
Sixtus W, Pope, 21
slave revolutions, 73
slave trade, Jewish role in, 111n, 105n
slaves, Gentile, 95, 105n
Slavs, Nazi extermination of, 64
socialism, and antisemitism, 69
socialists, racism of Jewish, 30, 53
Sofer, Moshe (Rabbi) ('Hatam Sofer'),
15;
responsa,
83-5
Son (Holy Blessed One), and union with
Daughter, 33-4
South Africa, Bantustans in 100;
and human
rights, 103
Spain, Jewish Golden Age, 57-8, 110n
Jews in,
14-15, 59-61, 105n;
massacre of Jews (139n),65-6
Stalin, Joseph, 103
Steinsalz, 'Adin (Rabbi), 24
Strasbourg, persecution of Jews, 65
Suez War (1956), 8-9
superstition, 110n;
of Polish
Jews, 63 </DL>
Syria, ancient kingdom of, 50;
claimed by
State of Israel, 9, 90
Tabernacles, feast of, 34
Talmud, Babylonian, 39,41, 75
Talmud, Jerusalem (Palestinian), 39
Talmud and talmudic law, attacks on
Christianity, 20-1, 234, 106n;
Christian
attacks on, 20-2;
exhortations to genocide, 91;
and interpretation of Bible, 36-8;
and profit motive, 49;
on saving of life, 80;
structure of, 3942,
see also Mishneb Torah; Shulhan
'Arukh
Talmudic Encyclopedia, 75
talmudic literature, 39;
censorship
of, 21,
see also Aggadah; Gemarah; Mishnah;
Talmud
Talmudic Omissions, 23
tax collectors, Jews as, 60, 62
taxation, Jewish clergy exempt from, 54
technology, effect on Sabbath
observance, 45-6
Temples,building and destruction of, 33
theft, talmudic interpretation of,
36-7,90
Theodosius I, Emperor, 54
Toldot Yehsu, on Jesus, 98
Torah see Mishneb Torah
Torquemada, Tomas de, Inquisitor, 61
totalitarianism, and deception, 29;
in
Israeli-Jewish community, 10,103
travel, on Sabbath, 84-5
Trevor-Roper, Hugh,
'Sir Thomas
More and Utopia', 12;
The Rise of Christian Europe, 110-un
</DL>
Turkey, claims of Israel to, 9, 90;
midwives
in, 84
Ukraine, Chmielnicki revolt (1648),66,
73
universities, disputations in, 21, 105n
USA, and Buber's works on Hassidism, 28;
Israeli
influence in, 3;
non-Jewish 'friends of the Jews',
30;
predominance of east- European Jews,
64;
support for Israel, 101;
translation of Maimonides' Guide to
the Perplexed, 25
USSR, and human rights, 103;
immigrants
from, 6
virgin, Talmud's definition of, 41
wages, delaying,96
Waldenberg, Eli'ezer Yehuda (Rabbi), 85
washing, of hands, 34, 107n;
ritual
bathing, 107n
Weiser, Shim'on (Rabbi), letters to
soldier Moshe, 77-9
West Bank, land restricted to Jews, 34;
oppression
of Palestinians, 29;
and relations with Jordan, 100
women, midwives, 82-5;
status of
Gentile, 87-8, 116n;
status of Jewish, 88
work, types defined in Talmud, 40
work, right to, discrimination against
non-Jews, 5
World Zionist Organization,5
xenophobia, and antisemitism, 68
Ximines, Cardinal, Inquisitor, 61
Yad Le'akhimorganisation 21
Yemen,Jews in, 52
Yiddish, inaccuracy of glossary of, 26;
literature
in, 70
Yom Kippur War, 99
zionism, alliance with antisemitism,
71-2;
and hatred
of peasants, 53;
influence in State of Israel, 13,
51, 99;
influences on, 1-2, 35; and laws
against Gentiles, 90-1;
nostalgia for closed society, 19;
and political expediency, 97;
as response to antisemitism, 69-71,
see also classical Judaism; Orthodox
Judaism
