User:Karl Dickman/Projects/Jewish Persecution merger

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[edit] Ancient persecution of non-Jews by Jews

The Jewish people have been victimized by anti-Semitism and religious persecution throughout history. There are also a number of claims that Jews, in turn, have persecuted or oppressed some groups. With all such accounts — whether documenting the alleged early practises of Jews, Christians, or Muslims — the validity of the material is treated skeptically by modern historians, with the stories often viewed as partial or fabricated. In addition, during the period between the destruction of the ancient Jewish kingdoms and 1948, Jews did not have a state or any substantial self-rule; thus insofar as Jews showed rancor toward other groups it was generally anomalous and isolated and did not rise to the level of systematic persecution.

For information about the interaction between Judaism and other religions in the modern state of Israel, see Religion in Israel.

1 Ancient persecution of non-Jews by Jews
- 1.1 Ancient Judaism and other religions
- 1.2 See also
2 Contemporary persecution of non-Jews by Jews

[edit] Ancient Judaism and other religions

Religious persecution

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In post-exilic Judaism, after the Babylonian captivity, concern for tradition led to tensions between Jews and Samaritans. There is a claim that under the Hasmonean king John Hyrcanus, the Samaritan temple at Mount Gerizim was destroyed and the Idumeans were subjected to forced conversion to Judaism. The problem with this claim is that forced conversion is against one of the central tenets of Judaism. Furthermore, if the Samaritans were Jewish (which most of them were) then there would be no need to the convert them.

Further conflicts arose when Israel came under the control of the Roman empire. In this context, the Christian New Testament describes persecution of early Christians by the Romano-Jewish authorities. It is not known to what extent these persecutions, if they occurred at all, were essentially motivated by imperial politics, rather than religion.

During the Bar Kochba rebellion of 135, Christians, who were considered a Jewish sect at the the time, collaborated with the Romans in an attempt to wipe out any vestige of traditional Judaism and allow the Christians to take over as the dominant Jewish sect. The result was the slaughter of close to a million Jews in the valley of Beitar. According to Talmudic accounts, there was so much Jewish blood that the fields in the area did not need to be fertilized for many years to come. The view of the Jewish people in the eyes of the Romans decreased so much that it was at that point that the Christians broke off and started their own religion.

According to an account by early Christian leader John of Ephesus, Dhu Nuwas was a Jewish king in pre-Muslim Yemen. John of Ephesus' account, reproduced by a number of medieval historians, details that Dhu Nuwas came to power, persecuted Christians in his realm, and massacred Christian communities in Najran in about 524; ostensibly as retaliation for Byzantine persecutions of the Jews. [1] According to Muslim tradition, he was the person cursed in the Qur'an for burning believers alive (Quran 85:4-8). According to many historical sources Dhu Nuwas's campaign against Ethiopia was wrongly painted by the Ethiopian propaganda machine as a Jewish religious, anti-Christian act. It should be noted that Dhu Nuwas's troops were a combination of Jews, pagans, and Christians.

Much of the Christian writing about alleged Jewish oppression needs to be read with an eye to its intended audience and its intended effect. At the time of Khosrau II's sack of Jerusalem in 614, Antiochus Strategos was a monk at the monastery (lavra) of St Sabas in Jerusalem, according to whose account, Jews took the opportunity to persecute the Christians. [2] This may also be a vivid libel against the Jews of Jerusalem that takes its literary cues from the hagiographic tradition and invented parallels with Scripture. Such kind of propaganda was often designed to inflame anti-Semitism.

In Ethiopia, Queen Gudit, who allegedly persecuted Christians around 970 and helped bring down the Kingdom of Aksum, is said in Ethiopian chronicles to have been Jewish, though some modern scholars have cast doubt on this, suggesting that she may have been a pagan. [3] [4] [5]

[edit] See also

[[Category:Religious persecution]] [[Category:Historical revisionism (political)]]

[edit] Contemporary persecution of non-Jews by Jews

Religious persecution

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By victimized group:

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[edit] Contemporary Judaism

Reference to the war of extermination of the ancient Israelites against the Amalekites does play a certain role in contemporary Judaism. It figures among the 613_mitzvot as the command to "wipe out the descendants of Amalek" (Deut. 25:19, paralleling the similar call to destroy the Canaanite nations, Deut. 20:17–16). The vast majority of Jews believe Amalek and other similar peoples cannot presently be identified, and that the commandment is presently observed by improvement of character in the areas in which the Amalekites were deficient (e.g. Rabbi Y. Hutner, "Pachad Yitzchak" Purim ch. 1).

[edit] The modern state of Israel

Modern Israel allows freedom of religion for all religious communities, both in law and in practice, as Freedom House reports: "Freedom of religion is respected. Each community has jurisdiction over its own members in matters of marriage, burial, and divorce." Christians in Jerusalem's Old City complain of frequent spitting attacks by Jewish yeshiva students. One local Armenian Apostolic bishop declared in October 2004 that such attacks occurred at least once a week. [6] In May 2003, Israeli government officials destroyed a newly-built Bedouin mosque in the village of Tal el-Malah after villagers defied a government ban on building a mosque to serve the local 1,500 Muslims. The nearest mosque was more than 12 kms away. Permission has been denied for Muslims to build mosques in other Bedouin villages. [7]

Israel was founded to provide a national home, safe from persecution, to the Jewish people. Although Israeli law explicitly grants equal civil rights to all citizens regardless of religion, ethnicity, or other heritage, it gives preferential treatment in certain aspects to individuals who fall within the criteria mandated by the Law of Return.

The criteria set forth by the Law of Return is controversial. It differs from halacha (Jewish religious law) in that it disqualifies individuals who are ethnically Jewish but who converted to another religion; and also in that it grants immigrant status to individuals who are not ethnically Jewish but are related to Jews.

While the Law of Return is directly concerned with non-citizens, certain Israeli laws have used the phrase "persons who would have benefited from the Law of Return had they been outside the borders of Israel" in order to define which citizens of Israel will benefit from different programs. [8]

Israel is sometimes accused of acts of persecution against Palestinians, although even critics of Israel do not see the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the Arab-Israeli conflict as being primarily religiously motivated. While these conflicts may use religious overtones or rhetoric, they are generally considered military and political struggles.