Talk:Jewish history

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[edit] Jewish Land?

Is there any source outside of the Old Testament that can confirm that the Israelites occupied "The Land of Israel?", because it seems to me that it is just inferred in this article (there are no citations I can see) and I'm just genuinely curious. --Nimnom 03:35, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

New discussions are usually added at the bottom. There are plenty of finds from archeological excavations such as seals, bullas, coins, as well as historical chronicles such as Merneptah Stele, etc. ←Humus sapiens ну? 09:28, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Jewish history stub:

Welcome and please use where applicable the new {{JewHist-stub}}. Thanks. IZAK 10:51, 17 Dec 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Romania

Unfortunately there's no refference to the history of Jews in Romania. Much of the community is nowadays gone but a rich history exists,which many of you might be interested to discover.Anyone up for it?


[edit] Hasmonean Dynasty Dates

What's the correct date for the rule of the Hasmonean Dynasty? The main article gives it as 140 to 37 BCE; this article says 165 to 63. A source would be preferable. --Simetrical 00:40, 12 Jan 2005 (UTC)


Why isn't this page "History of Judaism"?

Jews are a people, Judaism is a religion. This is a history of the people, not the religion. Jayjg (talk) 20:59, 4 Feb 2005 (UTC)

yeah, a people who follow a religion - judaism. believing that your lineage is special, going back to moses talking to a god on a mountain, saying that they are special people, that is a religious belief. someone saying they are jewish means they believe the religion of special lineage.

[edit] announcing policy proposal

This is just to inform people that I want Wikipedia to accept a general policy that BC and AD represent a Christian Point of View and should be used only when they are appropriate, that is, in the context of expressing or providing an account of a Christian point of view. In other contexts, I argue that they violate our NPOV policy and we should use BCE and CE instead. See Wikipedia:Neutral point of view/BCE-CE Debate for the detailed proposal. Slrubenstein | Talk 22:55, 15 May 2005 (UTC)

[edit] History of Judaism

Is there a History of Judaism page? There is a consensus arising from discussion of the History of Christianity that there is scholarly debate as to the extent of the indirect influence of Zoroastrianism on Christianity. Since the influence was indirect, via Judaism, it was agreed that a reference to this issue should be made in History of Christianity, with the different POVs as to the extent of the Zoroastrian influence being mentioned in the history of Judaism. I put the appropriate material in this article, but on reviewing the talk page, it appears that this may be the wrong article. If my additions should be moved, I would welcome having them moved, as long as they can be properly referenced in History of Christianity. Robert McClenon 15:46, 23 July 2005 (UTC)

"Of critical importance to the reshaping of Jewish tradition from the Temple-based religion it was to the traditions of the Diaspora was the development of the interpretations of the Torah found in the Mishnah and Talmud." -

Does anyone have any references, or factual proof that "the interpretations of the Torah found in the Mishnah and Talmud" reshaped Jewish tradition, and were not the actual Jewish tradition which was passed on through the generations?

[edit] Historical persecution by Jews?

Just to warn readers of this page than an entry named Historical persecution by Jews full of antisemitic spam has been created. It should be either deleted either merged with this article, allowing for a NPOV. I hope Wikipedians will react quickly to such weak attempts at revisionism. Kaliz 19:20, 18 December 2005 (UTC) Same comment for Contemporary persecution of non-Jews by Jews

  • If it existed why should it be deleted. Facts can't be POV. 12.220.47.145 17:10, 25 December 2005 (UTC)
  • There are similar articles for persecution by many different religions (Christian, Muslim, and Hindu that I know of for sure). The article appears to be relatively NPOV. Although it is tagged, and may contain some POV stuff that I just don't recognize. That article doesn't appear to be very antisemitic at all. I also don't see any attempts at revisionism, there is no references to the holocaust at all. I don't know much about ancient history (i'm a western hemisphere history buff myself) so maybe i'm just missing something here. --MateoP 18:50, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Suggestion for addition

Big fan of the "History of the Jews..." series. It is well covered. One place that is not covered, however, is Haiti. Here are a few sources to start out, if anyone is interested in writing an article (i will do so myself, eventually). Note that the article which appears in Jewish Social Studies is available on ebscohost. --MateoP 20:42, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

http://www.webster.edu/~corbetre/haiti/misctopic/ethnic/jewsinhait.htm http://www.webster.edu/~corbetre/haiti/misctopic/ethnic/jewshistory.htm http://www.webster.edu/~corbetre/haiti/misctopic/ethnic/listjews.htm

Glad you like the series. Great idea to add Haiti, it would probably best fit under History of the Jews in Latin America, which currently covers the Carribean as well. Why don't you start adding material? --Goodoldpolonius2 20:52, 22 December 2005 (UTC)
Ok, good, I wasn't aware of that article. That would be a good starting point until enough information is compiled to warrant a full article. --MateoP 01:57, 23 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Jewish WIKIVERSITY

NEW: On Wikiversity there is now a "Jewish Studies School." Will it become a "duplication" of many things on Wikipedia? What should it's goals and functions be? Please add your learned views. Thank you. IZAK 09:12, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Objection to the use of this image

I object to the use of the image containing the map of the Hasmonean Kingdom set against the background of the so-called present-day borders of Israel. The image is also being used in the articles on Hanukkah, on Maccabees, on Judas Maccabeus, on Hasmonean and on the Golan Heights. But these are not the internationally recognised borders of Israel. The image suggests that the Golan Heights, the Gaza Strip, the West Bank and East Jerusalem are integral parts of the state of Israel, whereas this is subject to international disputes. To present these borders as undisputed facts, is to lessen the quality of information provided by Wikipedia. I therefore decided to remove this image. In a (very swift) reaction by a Wikipedia administrator, he accused me of "blatant vandalism". That is absurd. I'm in the habit of using Wikipedia as a source of factual, unbiased information. Ocasionally, I make a small contribution to try to enhance the factual accuracy of an article. To enhance an article is not vandalism. It is what I thought Wikipedia was all about. There are undoubtedly many images available that could be used in these articles that depict the borders of Israel, while clearly marking the disputed Palestinian Territories and the Golan Heights as disputed entities. Why would an unbiased encyclopedia, out of of all the available options, choose an image that is provided by the Israeli Foreign Ministry? If it is Wikipedia's standard policy to discourage user participation in this agressive way, then in my view, it fails in its stated purpose. --82.215.24.131 13:34, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Change "six thousand" to "four thousand"

The Khazar conversion theory has been refuted by genetic testing of Kohanim that show no genetic link between those Kohanim from the Khazar and the rest of the Jews.

I have changed the opening "nearly six thousand years" to "nearly four thousand years". Nothing in any way meaning "Jewish history" can go back to before Abraham, by all traditional and modern systems at 1900 Before Present at the earliest. The "Six Thousand" number seems to confuse the beginings of Jewish histroy with the Hebrew calendar date.

Sukkoth 18:10, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Skipping too much

There is too much of a gap between ancient Jewish history and modern--as if the culture went directly from Moses to the modern day with no diversions. I think there has to be some more attention paid to the period between the destruction of the Temple and the modern era (1800- onwards). Too much general history is missed. The article on the History of the Jews and the Crusades is woefully inadequate, I would use as example.

Cheers to all, nonetheless: this is a good looking article.

Varangian 14:52, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Reworded for consistency

I reworded some of the phrasing here to be consistent with other parts of the article. The passage under Islamic history first states it to be a bloody one, and then calls it relatively benign compared to Europeans. Characterizing the former as ethnic cleansing does discredit to events occuring among the latter, and widespread killing of Jews in these regions did not occur. --Shlomo Mizrahi 06:31, 28 Jan 2007 (UTC)


[edit] Jewish history overview

Originally posted to Wikipedia_talk:Talk_page_guidelines

While the contents of this article are nominally correct the tone of the evil Persian and Roman Emipires singling out the Jews for cruelty is a little too much. They did this to everyone who challenged their tax base. The author(s) really are writing with a post Nazi slant that is detrimental to the quality of the article. While not an expert I know enough about Roman Imperial history to react to this choice of wording. The Jewish Messiah movements characterized by John the Baptist and Jesus son of Joseph? and Mary among others threatened the status quo of both the wealthy Jews and the Romans and as a result were ruthlessly (by modern standards) put down. To imply this was special treatment is just wrong. A purely historical Jewish history would be refreshing. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 83.254.145.206 (talk) 19:45, 4 May 2007 (UTC).

Write one then. Jake the Editor Man (talk) 22:13, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Reference problems

There are exactly 8 sources mentioned in the footnotes, and most of the article is completely unsourced. I have tagged the article with {{unreferenced}} because most of the material remains unsourced and unattributed to sources.--Sefringle 03:10, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

Hi! I think a problem here is that the article was created before footnote style sourcing got into widespread use, so most of the sources are in the "references and further reading" section, and the footnotes cover only a few additions. I believe if the "references and further reading" section is included the sources do cover the material. However, I agree moving completely to footnote-style sourcing is important to making this a high-quality article. Best, --Shirahadasha 06:40, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Copyedit needed

Kielce pogrom --HanzoHattori 10:41, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Jews in India, China, Yemen, etc.

I'm not sure how to include it, but even before the Arab period there were Jewish traders in India ( and Yemen (there was even briefly a Jewish kingdom in Yemen, although I doubt it created many conversions, likely only among the elite). Later on there were Jews in China as well. To get a complete overview of Jewish history I think this should be included, but again, I'm not sure how. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 204.52.215.67 (talk) 15:24, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] 41 years

41 years wandering in the wilderness, not 40? zafiroblue05 | Talk 14:52, 21 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Khazars

I am troubled by this edit, accompanied by the edit summary "Nothing in DNA research indicates any Mongol or Turkic ancestry in Ashkenazic Jews". It's hard to prove a negative of this sort ("nothing in DNA research...") and the claim in the summary isn't cited. I've left the edit alone, however, because there's no cite for anything in the paragraph anyway, and the Khazars article isn't very helpful in this regard either. Still, I think we can do better and I'd love to see some cleanup on this section. Any takers? :-) Isaacsf (talk) 22:56, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Disabilities (disambiguation)

Help! Apparently some think that the express "Jewish disabilities" means that there's something wrong with the Jews! --Ludvikus (talk) 15:13, 2 May 2008 (UTC))

[edit] "Shattering a 'national mythology'" about 70CE and 135CE expulsions

I'm sure there is good historical evidence for the exiles under the Roman and that information obviously belongs in the article. Nevertheless, it would appear from this Haaretz book-review that many modern historians believe the exiles did not happen. I'd like to insert the following (or something similar, at a suitable position) since it appears to be a fair representation of a significant (perhaps major) thread of modern Israeli historical understanding:

Tel Aviv University historian, Professor Shlomo Sand, under the influence of other historians who have dealt with the same issue in recent years, argues that the Roman exile of the Jewish people is actually a Christian myth - divine punishment of the Jews for having rejected the gospel of Jesus. In his book "Matai ve'ech humtza ha'am hayehudi?" ("When and How the Jewish People Was Invented?"; Resling, Hebrew, March 2008), Professor Sand sets out to prove that the Jews now living in Israel and other places in the world are not descendants of the ancient people who inhabited the Kingdom of Judea during the First and Second Temple period. He says that the Romans did not exile entire populations and physically could not have done so in any case.[1]

  1. ^ When and How the Jewish People was invented? Book Review (Hebrew). Haaretz 21st March 2008. Verified 9th May 2008.

Can anyone see any objection to the insertion of such a passage, or see an objection to the phrasing I've used? PRtalk 18:57, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

I have no opinion on the content itself, as I am unfamiliar with the subject. However, I think the "under the influence of other historians who have dealt with the same issue in recent years" is a direct quote from the book review and sounds like weasel wording to me. I also question using a book as the source of any material by quoting it indirectly from a review of the book, but I'm not sure what the policy is on that.  Frank  |  talk  14:04, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
The very source you used for this edit says "in his new book he deals with periods that he had never researched before, usually relying on studies that present unorthodox views of the origins of the Jews. " (My emphasis) . Sounds like WP:UNDUE, or even WP:FRINGE. Canadian Monkey (talk) 18:43, 12 May 2008 (UTC)