What Jews look like, photos of the appearance of women and men, distinctive characteristics of Jewish nationality. Who are the Jews and where did they come from?

European Jew, African Jew, Arab Jew. Jews are a multiracial community.

INTRODUCTION

Jews are not a nationality or a people, they are not an “ethnic” group, nor anything else related to genetics, except that Jews are a religion and only a religion, for the simple reason that Jews have a conversion.

What is Giyur? Conversion is a religious ceremony during which absolutely any person, of absolutely any nationality and skin color, can become a Jew. Yes, yes, Jewish. Yesterday I was ordinary, but today I went through a ceremony and became “God’s chosen one.”

We were told for so long and so persistently that Jews are supposedly a “nationality” that we began to believe in it so strongly that even now, with complete confidence, we can safely assume that the majority, after reading these lines: will raise an eyebrow and they will say yes, but... And a list of points will begin to which I can readily give answers and that is why I will have to write further, because generally speaking, after the word “giyur”, the entire explanation could be completed. There is a conversion, period. All. Yesterday I was not a Jew, today I converted and became a Jew. Yesterday I was not a Buddhist, today I was initiated and became a Buddhist, or a Christian through baptism, or a Muslim, or simply a member of the flying saucer sect from Sirius…. or who has enough imagination for the number of existing religious sects and other esoteric trends in the World today.

Let's add a few words here. Ask yourself: can a Chinese become a black man, and a Russian become an Uzbek? No, they can't. Because nationality is something that cannot be changed in any way as your own face, which is given to you once and for the rest of your life. This is what is given by birth, how we differ genetically from each other. But all these people can easily become Jews, and all that is required for this is just to undergo the religious rite of Giyur. All! Isn't it simple!?

There are Jews from Europe, and there are also Ethiopians.

The first, as a rule, objections that arise with this statement are the following: yes, but among Jews, after all, Jewishness is transmitted through the female line. And a person born from a Jewish mother automatically becomes a Jew, which means that Jewishness is a “nationality.”

Jewishness, transmitted through the mother, lies in one single condition - the need for the woman raising a child, no matter what kind, to be Jewish herself, not by blood, we are not talking about blood here at all, but by content. So that she has all the skills and worldview of Judaism, which she herself will further teach her child. All. And nothing more. If any woman, for example, undergoes conversion and then gives birth to a child or simply adopts someone, then her children will automatically be considered “pure-blooded Jews.”

Why a woman, you ask, why not a man? Yes, because it is the woman who raises children, it is the woman who lays all the foundations of the child’s worldview from his earliest years.

This is precisely why and only why Jews consider “completely theirs” only those who were raised with absolute certainty as Jews. It's stronger and more reliable. After all, when a person undergoes conversion, it is easier and faster for a person to return to his normal state. After all, even among Jews there is an expression that out of three Jewish sons, one will leave. Where do you think he will “go”? He will not go anywhere in the literal sense of the word, but he may well move away from the ideas and principles of Judaism; one of the three may sooner or later begin to soberly assess the situation and simply stop agreeing with all the ideas of Jewish “God’s chosenness,” for example. By the way, almost absolutely any adherent of one or another religious cult suffers from such a disease, here the similarities are certainly present, all of them, not looking at the variety of names of their sects and religions, somewhere deep down in their souls, quietly believe that they are “the chosen ones” "God. Special, not like other people. The only difference here is that most of them are ashamed to admit it and declare it openly, while Jews are not at all ashamed to do this.

Intro source: Livejournal: adonaris.livejournal.com.

Caucasian-type Jew, African-type Jew, Japanese Jews.
There are mountain (Caucasian) Jews, there are Chinese Jews, there are Bukharian Jews.

JEWS ARE A MULTIRACIAL COMMUNITY

Photo source: The most beautiful Jewish women in the world, top-anthropos.com, 06/03/2014.

National religion of the Jews and the most important attribute their self-awareness is Judaism, therefore in many languages ​​of the world there is no distinction between the concepts of “Jew” and “Jew,” but in Russian, Jew denotes nationality, and Jew denotes religion.

Pictured in order of placement:

01. Tahounia Rubel / Tahounia Rubel - Israeli model, winner of the Israeli version of the show “Big Brother”. Born on February 20, 1988 in Ethiopia, at the age of three, she and her family, among 14,325 Ethiopian Jews, were taken to Israel as part of the military Operation Solomon.

02. Yityish Aynaw - Israeli model, Miss Israel 2013. Born in Ethiopia. Belongs to the Ethiopian Jews. She moved to Israel at the age of 12, where she became the first black girl to win the Miss Israel title.

03. Amanda Peet (born January 11, 1972, New York, USA) is an American actress. Her mother Penny Levy is Jewish. Amanda Peet is married to an American screenwriter and producer Jewish origin David Benioff, who is the creator of the famous series “Game of Thrones”.

04. Ali (Alice) MacGraw / Ali MacGraw - American actress. Born April 1, 1939 in New York. Her father had Scottish and Hungarian roots, and her mother was Jewish (she hid her nationality from her husband). One of Ali MacGraw's most famous roles is the Jewish girl Brenda Patimkin in the film "Goodbye, Columbus" (1969), dedicated to the life of American Jews.

05. Melanie Laurent / Mélanie Laurent - French actress, director, singer. Born on February 21, 1983 in Paris into a Jewish family.

06. Moran Atias / Moran Atias - Israeli actress and model. She was born on April 9, 1981 in Haifa (Israel) into a family of Moroccan Jews. Moran has a younger sister, Shani, who is also on this list.

07. British actress Rachel Weisz / Rachel Weisz. Born in London on March 7, 1970. Rachel's father, inventor George Weiss (Jewish by nationality), was from Hungary, and Rachel's mother, psychotherapist Edith Ruth, was born in Vienna. Edith Ruth was not a pure-blooded Jew, because... She also had Italian and Austrian roots and was raised Catholic, but then converted to Judaism.

08. Marilyn Monroe / Marilyn Monroe (June 1, 1926, Los Angeles - August 5, 1962) - American actress and singer. Birth name: Norma Jeane Mortenson. Father unknown, mother had Irish and Scottish roots. Marilyn Monroe converted to Judaism on July 1, 1956. The reason for her adoption of the Jewish religion was her third marriage to the writer Arthur Miller, a Jew by nationality. After the divorce and until her death, Monroe did not renounce Judaism, although, according to contemporaries, she did not attend the synagogue because she believed that then her religious life would turn into a public spectacle. Arthur Miller's brother believed that Monroe's acceptance of Judaism was superficial. As for Monroe’s attitude towards Christianity, it was rather negative, because at one time its guardians were Protestant fundamentalists.

09. Elina Avraamovna Bystritskaya - an outstanding Soviet and Russian theater and film actress, People's Artist of the USSR. In 1999, in a newspaper survey TVNZ"Elina Bystritskaya was recognized as "the most beautiful woman of the passing century." Born on April 4, 1928 in Kyiv in a Jewish family.

10. Lisa Bonet / Lisa Bonet - American actress. Born November 16, 1967 in San Francisco. Her father is African American and her mother is Jewish. Lisa Bonet's first husband was American singer Lenny Kravitz, whose pedigree is exactly the opposite: his father is Jewish, his mother is African-American.

NOW QUOTES FROM THE IDEOLOGISTS OF JEWISM THEMSELVES

“Jewishness is not a nationality. This is a metaphysical community of people who carry a specific mission, called upon to become an instrument for the fulfillment and implementation of Divine providence.” There is evidence that this definition by Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz was published in the International Jewish Newspaper.

Thus, the rabbi points out that a Jew is a bearer of a certain worldview, just as a Christian is a bearer of a Christian worldview, a communist is a bearer of a communist worldview, an Islamist is a bearer of an Islamist one, etc. It follows that criticism of Jews is not a criticism of nationality, but a criticism of the views and worldview of which they are the bearer.

“A Jew is a person whose mother is Jewish. Or someone who has undergone conversion (the process of accepting the Jewish faith and all the laws of Jewish life). From here it follows, by the way, that it is impossible to determine belonging to our people by last name and even by last name, first name and patronymic,” says Rabbi Eliyahu Essas on one of the Jewish sites (evrey.com, 03/04/2004)

Definition from the audio lecture by Efim Svirsky “What is a Jew”: “The most common stereotype in Russia is that a Jew is a nationality. The nation emerged several hundred years ago. The commonality of this, everything, the other. They had no common territory, no language, no common economy and culture. We see that we are not a nation. We do not fit the definition of a nation. If you ask an American, he will say that Jew is a religion. If Jew is a religion, then anyone can become a Jew. You can become a Jew. Jewishness is a religion, but there is one problem. A person born from a Jewish mother is also a Jew. Not even religious or even opposed to the Torah. Therefore, Jewishness is not only a religion. The Jew is a unique group. If you are from your mother, then you are Jewish. But on the other hand, you can join this group.” ( Efim Svirsky – founder and director of the Institute of Jewish Spiritual Therapy, is also director educational programs Russian department in “Esh HaTorah”, an international Jewish educational organization, dealing with the philosophy and practice of Judaism. He is familiar to hundreds of thousands of people from his weekly radio broadcasts to more than a million Russian-speaking Jews in Israel and Russia. In addition, he is known for numerous appearances on TV in Russia, Israel, North America, as well as author’s pages in popular newspapers in the USA and Canada - reports the website torahealing.com).

Another news: Tel Aviv University professor, historian Shlomo Sand assures that there is no such nation as the Jews, and the expulsion of Jews from their historical homeland is nothing more than a myth to justify the creation of the state of Israel. The historian in his book “When and How You Became Jews” writes that there was no Jewish people as such, but there were groups of people who professed Judaism.”

Writes Alexey Yatskovsky, alex.ourera.org: As for the very concept of “Jew,” it is not national, but religious term. The only criterion on the basis of which a person can be called a Jew is the confession of Judaism. This is exactly how this concept was defined by Rabbi Mordechai Kaplan (on whose doctrines the State of Israel was founded) in the 1936 book “Judaism as Civilization,” and this is how this concept is interpreted in encyclopedias. The American Encyclopedia Groliers, for example, says the following: “The concept of Jew includes a mixture of various racial, ethnic and national elements. Jews are people united by a religion called Judaism. A person becomes a Jew by converting to Judaism.” No, gentlemen, there is no such nationality! Because even in the state of Israel itself, Jews are considered to be representatives of not only different nationalities, but also different races.

ANYONE CAN BE A JEW

Source: “It’s wonderful to be a Jew!” says the rabbi of the Irkutsk synagogue. 11/21/2002, newsbabr.com (Irkutsk)

– So it turns out that anyone can become a Jew?

- Yes. By accepting Judaism, a person becomes a Jew by nationality. When they say that the Jewish community is closed and does not allow anyone in, this is not true. Some of the greatest Jewish sages were not Jews by birth. And Jews have the most respectful attitude towards a person who has converted to Judaism. But Judaism does not strive for mass participation; Jews do not want to convert everyone to their religion.

ANOTHER TESTIMONY

Screenshot from evrey.com.

SCIENTISTS HAVE DECIDED THAT THE ANCIENT JEWS WERE BLACKS

Ancient inhabitants of Judea and kingdoms of israel they resembled Africans in appearance, scientists from Tel Aviv University said. Russian specialists also took part in this study.

While studying skulls found in the Dead Sea area, a group of anthropologists led by Yair Ben-David managed to reconstruct the appearance of the ancient inhabitants of Israel. In particular, the appearance of a man from the Hellenistic period and a woman from the Roman period were restored.

It became clear that the woman had a convex upper lip and a full lower lip, as well as a nose with a low and wide bridge, which is characteristic of representatives of the Negroid race. The man's appearance was much more reminiscent of the Mediterranean subgroup of the Caucasian race.

The researchers concluded that the woman was also white, although she had distinct characteristics of the inhabitants of the African continent, the Israeli Cursor reports, citing the specialized scientific publication Anthropoligischer Anzeiger.

JEWS NEVER EXISTED, BUT THERE WERE PEOPLE WHO PRACTICED JUDAISM,
ISRAELI HISTORIAN BELIEVES

Tel Aviv University professor and historian Shlomo Sand assures that there is no such nation as the Jews, and the expulsion of Jews from their historical homeland is nothing more than a myth to justify the creation of the state of Israel.

The historian in his book “When and How You Became Jews” writes that there were no Jewish people as such, but there were groups of people who professed Judaism, the website MigNews.com reports.

Sand also claims that the expulsion of the Jews is a fiction. He explains that the Romans, in principle, did not resort to expelling conquered peoples, and with the arrival of the Arabs, according to him, most of the Jews converted to Islam and assimilated into society. He concludes that modern Palestinians are descendants of those same assimilated Jews.

Sand does not deny the migration of Jews to Babylon, but argues that in most cases it was voluntary.

The historian also makes the contradictory conclusion that the Jews spread their religion among their neighbors, citing a quote from the book of Esther. Sand also cites previous research conducted in Israel that has not received public discussion. He describes in detail the kingdom of Judah in the southern Arabian Peninsula and the Jewish barbarians in North Africa. In his opinion, the Jewish community of Spain (Sephardim) grew out of Arabs who converted to Judaism, who conquered Spain from Christian Europeans.

The Ashkenazis, from the scientist’s point of view, are the descendants of the Khazar Kaganate, who went north. Sand emphasizes that Yiddish became a mixture of the Khazar dialect, which was brought by merchants, and German.

The existence of communities professing Judaism among all races and on all continents led Sand to believe that most of the generally accepted historical truths about the history of the Jewish people were the invention of the founders of Zionism, who came up with a number of dogmas bordering on racist theses.

Israel must abandon the phrase “Jewish Democratic State” and become a state for all, he concludes.

THE JEWS SPEAK. CAUSES OF ANTI-SEMITISM

In his book Antisemitism in ancient world. Attempts to explain it in science and its causes" (Petrograd, 1922) professor ancient history, Jew Solomon Lurie wrote: “... If wherever Jews appear, anti-Semitism immediately breaks out (Mommsen, Rom. Gesch. V, 519), and if anti-Semitism is a completely “peculiar phenomenon” that has no parallels in relation to the Greeks and the Romans to other national groups (Wilcken, Zum alex. Antisemitismus, 783), then, obviously, we should look for the cause of anti-Semitism in the Jews themselves. (...) As I already said, I definitely join that group of scientists who, based at least on the fact that wherever Jews appear, anti-Semitism flares up, conclude that anti-Semitism did not arise as a result of any temporary or random reasons, but due to certain properties that are constantly inherent in the Jewish people. Therefore, it is necessary to reject the explanation of anti-Semitism by random economic, religious or political conjunctures.”

Judaism is an antisocial element par excellence... It is not among the peoples who have accepted Jews into their midst that one must look for the cause of Jewish suffering, but among the Jews themselves. Here is an explanation of the question of where the eternal hatred of Jews comes from. Dr. JACOB FROMEYER /1865 - 1910/ Jewish writer.

The Jewish question still exists. There is no point in denying it. The Jewish question exists in all places where Jews live in significant numbers. Where it exists, the Jews bring it with them during their wanderings. It goes without saying that we move to places where we are not persecuted, but where our presence causes persecution. Theodor Herzl /1860 – 1904/ founder of the World Zionist Organization. From the book “The Jewish State”.

Today, being a Jew in Russia is prestigious. 2002

A group of participants in the preliminary meeting for the convening of the All-Russian Jewish Congress in Petrograd.

US President (as of 2016) Barack Obama, Viktor Andreevich Yushchenko (third President of Ukraine from 2005 to 2010),
Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin, President of Russia (as of 2016)

WHO ARE ANTISEMITES?

JEWS are a people settled in many countries of the Eastern and Western Hemisphere. Their self-name in Hebrew sounds like Yehudim. In Yiddish, Jews call themselves Ayid.

There are also more ancient self-names yisrael, beney-yisrael (“Israelites”, “sons of Israel”). Jews are most numerous in the Middle Eastern state of Israel (5.7 million people) and in the United States (5.3 million).

There is also a certain percentage of the Jewish population in most European countries, Canada, Russia, Argentina, Australia, Brazil, South Africa and Mexico. The total number of Jews in the world is about 13.4 million. Thanks to such a vast geography of settlement, a number of ethnic groups arose among the people. The main ones are Ashkenazim and Sephardim.

Among others, we can mention Arab Jews, Persian, Georgian, Mountain, Indian Jews, Romaniots, Crimeans, Italians (Romim). There are also groups of crypto-Jews. In the past, their ancestors were forcibly converted to Christianity or Islam, but crypto-Jews continued to partly practice Judaism and retained elements of traditional Jewish culture.

The ancient language of the Jews is Hebrew, part of the Afroasiatic language family(Semitic branch). Over the years, it has ceased to be used as a colloquial language. Modern Jews speak the languages ​​of their countries of residence. There are also several Hebrew dialect languages. The most common of these is Yiddish, which arose in the 10th to 12th centuries based on German but using the Hebrew square script. In the 19th century, a movement arose among Jews to revive the Hebrew language. By now, it has once again become a spoken language for several million people, mostly residents of Israel.

By religion, the majority of the people are Jewish. It should be noted that Judaism does not distinguish between religious and national affiliation. Thus, in their eyes, a non-Christian who converts to Judaism becomes a Jew; and a Judaist who converts to another religion ceases to be perceived as a Jew. Judaism includes several movements, differing in greater or lesser degrees of orthodoxy.

The formation of the Hebrew people occurred in the 2nd millennium BC. The beginning of the 1st millennium dates back to the consolidation of the people, the formation of statehood, and the emergence of Judaism as, in fact, the world's first monotheistic religion.
Later, the state of the Jews split into the Kingdom of Israel and the Kingdom of Judah. By the middle of the 1st millennium BC, these countries were conquered by Assyria and Babylon. Judea later regained its independence. In the period before its conquest by the Romans, Jewish diasporas managed to emerge in other Mediterranean countries.

After the collapse of the Roman Empire, Judea became independent again. This lasted until its conquest by the Arabs in 638. Then the state actually ceased to exist. Jews remained to live in Palestine, but in small numbers. Others joined foreign diasporas. However, the dream of returning to Israel persisted among them and was supported by Judaism.

Germany and Eastern Europe became the center of Jewish diasporas beginning in the 10th century. In almost all countries of residence, Jews were deprived of their rights; protests against them, attacks, and looting of property were not uncommon. IN Western Europe repressive measures were lifted earlier, which contributed to better assimilation of Jews with local residents.

IN Eastern Europe, including in Russia, this process has dragged on. At the end of the 19th century, a unifying movement called Zionism arose. His goal was the return of the people to Palestine. Many Jews did migrate to their ancestral lands. A real tragedy, which suspended the development of the people, was the Holocaust carried out by Nazi Germany. About 6 million Jews became its victims. After the defeat of Germany and the end of World War II in Palestine, the State of Israel was founded by a UN decision.

The national costume of the Jews includes a prayer shawl with tassels, a long robe, a caftan, and a cloak. The head is covered with a cap called a kippah or yarmulke. Men have long beards and sidelocks - strands of hair descending from the temples. Married women traditionally wore a wig on their heads. The food of the Jews was influenced by the religious tradition of kashrut. She forbade mixing milk and meat, and prescribed eating only the meat of ruminants and poultry killed in a special way. In the folk art of Jews, song and dance genres are developed, there are Hasidic songs and dramatic performances. Religious themes are often used in fairy tales and parables.

In modern Israel, agriculture and industrial production. Unusual form of organization Agriculture are kibbutzim. This is the name given to communities that live according to the rules of joint farming, common use property.

Jews are aliens. According to various sources, they flew to Earth either from Mars, or from the constellation Scorpio, or from asteroid No. 1181, which is sometimes called Lilith. There seems to be no topic of discussion among people that does not involve Jews. Apparently, theories about aliens could not do without them.

Where did the Jews actually come from? The most widespread document on Earth that covers this issue is the Bible, but the facts presented in it are not considered reliable. Let's turn to a more objective source, for example, to, naturally, to the extent that history itself claims to be objective.

What does history say about the Jews?

It is curious that, despite all the confrontations between science and religion, historical research in this area, as a rule, is carried out based on biblical texts, and, oddly enough, not at all in order to refute them.

On a purely scientific basis, confirmed by archaeological, anthropological, linguistic and other research, the following is known today.

The Mesopotamia region was truly the cradle of earthly civilization. All development processes took place here earlier and faster than in other regions. Animal husbandry, agriculture, and manufacturing first appeared in Mesopotamia. The first cities arose here and metal was first discovered. There really were the cities of Ur and Harran, as well as cities whose names are consonant with the names of Abraham's ancestors - Falig (Peleg), Sarugi (Segug), Nahor (Nachor) and Turaki (Terah). In this territory there was originally one language, which from about the 14th century. BC. began to divide into many dialects.

Jews are one of the peoples of the Semitic group. Their ancestors are considered to be the Amorites, among whom proper names were common - Abram, Isaac, Jacob, as well as the names of his sons. In the first half of the 18th century. BC. in the territory of Upper Mesopotamia, as a result of the wars that took place there, strict administrative rule was introduced in an attempt to subjugate the tribal unions living on these lands. Some Amorite tribes refused to carry out the duties prescribed to them, and went west beyond the Euphrates. These tribes began to be called Ibrim - “passed over”, in the singular Ibri, which later transformed into Ivri. These were the first Jews.

Jewish genetics

Recent studies conducted at American universities have once again confirmed the biblical version of the origin of the Jews. According to these studies, 5 thousand years ago there were no peoples in their modern sense. In the 2nd millennium BC. Arabs and Jews represented a single genotype in the male line, then they separated. All three main ethnic groups that exist today – Sephardim, Mizrahi and Ashkenazim – are genetically similar to each other and descend from common Middle Eastern roots. As you can see, the earthly origin of the Jews is completely justified and scientifically confirmed.

Jewish question

Then why are Jews always singled out from the general mass, so much so that someone begins to see them as aliens, and why does Jewish topics arouse such keen interest, without exaggeration, among the entire world community? This question is as ancient as the Jews themselves, but one thing can always be traced in it - humanity is so interested in Jews that it constantly demands and expects something from them.

Today no one doubts that any person, like any nation, has its own specific function in this world. And the answer to the eternal question can be found if you try to determine it from this perspective. By the way, this is not so difficult to do - in the Bible this mission is spelled out in literally every chapter.

The Chosenness of the Jews

Nowadays it is difficult to even imagine Jews as... This is a multitude of ethnic groups that are different in language, mentality and skin color; it is simply impossible to bring them under any definition of a people.

But there is something that has united all these different and dissimilar people for thousands of years - this is faith in the One Creator, who gave people the Torah, faith in the unity of the Universe, which is built on love for one’s neighbor.

And the Jews also have one memory, common to all. The memory of standing under Mount Sinai. When people, having completely surrendered themselves to the will of the Almighty, rallied their souls and destinies together, and became like one person with one heart. This was the birth of the people.

Today the world is rapidly entering new, still unknown, forms of its development, and the time is coming when the people of Israel, the state of unity received at Sinai and now forgotten, must revive within themselves again and pass it on to all humanity. It is in this, and in nothing else, that his function lies, and it is for this that he was once chosen.

Semyon Shoikhet

A person inexperienced in religious knowledge may ask the question: for what merits did the Jews acquire a privileged position in the eyes of God? To do this, you need to turn to religious texts.

In the Torah (Book of Breishit, chapter 12:1-3) God says to Abraham: “Get out of your country, from your kindred and from your father’s house to the country that I will show you. And I will make you a great nation, and I will bless you, and I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.”

The very concept of the chosenness of the Jewish people was first voiced approximately 1300 years BC (500 years from the time of Abraham) on Mount Sinai by Moses, who conveyed the words of God: “So speak to the House of Jacob, and tell the children of Israel... If you will obey Me and keep My covenant, then you will be My chosen one out of all nations” (Exodus 19:3-6).

According to Judaism, a Covenant was concluded between God and the Jewish people, which can be interpreted both as a blessing and as a huge responsibility that rests on the Jews. Orthodox publicist Sergei Khudiev writes that God's election differs from man's. If we choose for something, then to God it is an act of pure, freely given grace, which is not associated with any merit.

This idea is conveyed by the Bible, which emphasizes that the Jews were chosen not for merit, but in order to save all humanity. According to the Old Testament, the pagan peoples were unable to accept the incarnate God, and therefore the people of Israel had to prepare them for the coming of the Messiah.

Archpriest Dmitry Smirnov clarifies this issue. The Lord, in his opinion, did not choose the Jewish people. God chose Abraham. While many representatives of the human race were mired in pagan cults of worshiping a whole host of gods and deities, Abraham was faithful to the one God - the creator of all things on earth. And only later was chosenness related to the whole people.

Not elected, but appointed

Upon careful reading of the Bible, you will notice that the word “God’s chosen” does not accurately convey the meaning of the relationship between God and the Jewish people, reflected in holy scripture. “I have formed this people for Myself,” it is said on the pages of the Old Testament (Is. 43:21). It turns out that the people are not chosen by God, but created by God.

As one rabbi wittily remarked about the chosenness of his people: “Jews did not participate in the elections, no one elected them, they were simply appointed.”

The Apostle Paul says that the Jewish Old Testament law is “a teacher for Christ” (Gal. 3:24). This strange word becomes clear if we establish its Greek basis. The original Greek contains the word “pedagogon”, but it is not equivalent to the word teacher, which is close to us. In the ancient world, a teacher was a slave who closely monitored the child so that he got to school on time, did not play pranks and did not waste his energy.

Likewise, the Law of Moses, which the Jews were entrusted to implement, in its true sense does not so much teach as it warns. It is no coincidence that among the 613 commandments of the Pentateuch there are 365 prohibitions and 248 commands. The original mission of the chosen people of the Jews was to warn other peoples from abusing dangerous beliefs.

One of the attributes of the pagan cults practiced in Canaan, Phenicia or Carthage was such a terrible rite as infant sacrifice, confirmed by modern archeology. In these circumstances, Joshua’s orders to scorch the land of Canaan no longer seem so terrible from people whose religious minds had become so clouded that they sacrificed their own firstborn to their god.

“Fanaticism is tolerated in the Bible - in the face of pagan extremes, it is a lesser evil than indifference,” notes Russian theologian and philosopher Andrei Kuraev in this regard.

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Thousands of years have passed since those distant times. Are the people of Israel still forced to fulfill their mission? In the New Testament era, many deprived the Jews of this creative role. The Apostle Paul, endowing Christianity with universalism, contrasted the saving Gospel with the outdated Law. The Christian Saint interpreted Judaism as a “passed stage,” thereby diminishing the theological significance of Judaism in New Testament times.

In 2010, Middle Eastern bishops meeting at the Vatican passed a resolution demanding that Israel stop using the Bible to justify injustices against Palestinians. “The rights to the 'Promised Land' are no longer the privilege of the Jewish people. Christ abolished this right. The Chosen People are no more,” the Vatican resolution stated.

For Jews, such a statement became another reason to declare that the idea of ​​​​God's chosenness was adopted and transformed by Christianity. According to the concept of medieval theologians, the mission of Israel ended with the birth of Jesus Christ in its midst. “Israel in the flesh” was now the Christian Church.

Perhaps the numerous troubles that befell the Jewish people with the advent of the Christian era are evidence that Israel’s mission is over? In the 19th century, the Russian saint Theophan the Recluse expressed his interpretation of this theological question: “Whoever God has chosen will punish him for correction, will deprive him of His mercy for a while, but will not completely reject him.”

One of the documents of the World Council of Churches of Protestant Communities for 1988 states that the Covenant between G-d and the Jewish people remains in force. Anti-Semitism, like any teaching that condemns Judaism, must be rejected.

Compensation for humiliation

All the complexity and inconsistency of the issue of God's chosenness in modern world lies in the dilemma: dogmatically the Jewish people remain the chosen people of God, but how should this manifest itself in real life, except for declaration, no one can explain.

In the eyes of the anti-Semitic part of the public, God's chosenness of Jews is expressed in their disdainful and arrogant attitude towards other peoples, in the privileged possession of rights and opportunities that are not given to mere mortals.

Stepping away from anti-Semitic rhetoric, one can try to understand what the special status of modern Jewry is. The famous translator of the Koran, Valeria Prokhorova, writes that “after a slave existence in Egypt, the sons of Israel became free, received abundant lands and prosperity, each of them was like a king.”

This aspect was also considered by the philosopher Nikolai Berdyaev: “There is a Jewish conceit that irritates. But it is psychologically explainable: this people was humiliated by other peoples and they compensate themselves with the consciousness of being chosen and their high mission.”

The desire to gain self-esteem after many years of deprivation and humiliation was imprinted in genetic memory Jewish people and was expressed in gaining protection, including through a sense of superiority and the achievement of status and wealth.

Andrei Kuraev sees a prophetic pathos in Jews, repeating “we are responsible for everything.” Quite often one has to notice, writes Kuraev, that an ethnic Jew who has become Orthodox priest, becomes a man of the “party” and extremes. He cannot limit himself simply to the circle of his parish or monastic duties. He needs to “save Orthodoxy.”

Interfaith conflict

The Russian writer Yakov Lurie, explaining the Jewish phenomenon, noted that the issue here is not the Old Testament or nationality. “It is something intangible and elusive as a whole,” Lurie writes, “it is an extract from all elements that are fundamentally hostile to the moral and social order established on Christian principles.”

Really, modern idea God's chosenness of Jewry can also be explained through a conflict with Christianity. After all, Christianity, in fact, applied those rights and responsibilities of God’s chosen people, which Moses presented to Israel, to itself - “once not a people, but now the people of God” (1 Pet. 2:10).

One of the preachers of Jewish nationalism in Russia, Sergei Lezov, sees the anti-Semitism of Christianity in the fact that it has “usurped Israel’s claims” to the exclusivity of its relationship with God. At the same time, fighters against anti-Semitism go further and demand that Christian peoples, in repentance for the crimes of pagan German Nazism, adopt a view of Israel as a people that still preserves its chosenness of God in absolute uniqueness.

For the Protestant theologian Oscar Kuhlman, there are two understandings of national messianism, between which there is an impassable line: does the chosen people exist in order to serve all of humanity, or so that all of humanity, having come to its senses, serves him.

Covenant under duress

The Talmud says that when the Jewish people stood at the foot of Sinai, God announced to them that if they refused to recognize Him, He would order the mountain to cover the entire Jewish camp with its mass, and the Jews, out of fear, against their will, feignedly agreed to serve Jehovah. The Law of Moses was therefore a great bondage for the Israelites (Shabbat 88:1).

If we were called to court, says Rabbi Solomon Yarhi, and asked why we do not adhere to what was told to us at Sinai, then we could answer that we do not want to know what was imposed on us by force. So, should the Covenant received by the Jews under duress be considered valid?

God-fighting motives were noted back in the days of the first Patriarchs. It is no coincidence that when Jacob was blessed, he received the name Israel - “He who wrestles with God.” “You have fought with God, and you will overcome men” (Gen. 32:27,28), the Creator admonished him.

The desire for freedom also manifested itself in the heirs of Jacob. They were interested in everything that the Torah prohibited. This is how Kabbalah arose - preaching magic and astrology and denying the One Personal God-Creator. The pagan doctrine of transmigration also found a place in the house of Israel.

Jews created a religion of self-deification, says Andrei Kuraev about Kabbalah. They finally gave in to the desires of their hearts, which the Prophets had forbidden them to do. The Prophets are gone, and the Grace of God is gone. "Jerusalem! Jerusalem! you who kill the prophets and stone those who are sent to you! how many times have I wanted to gather your children together, as a bird gathers its chicks under its wings, and you did not want to! “Behold, your house is left to you empty,” Christ addressed the children of Israel (Matthew 23:37).

Israel, for whom the Covenant turned out to be a heavy burden, giving in to temptations secret knowledge, has largely abandoned God’s chosenness. Christianity values ​​Israel's historical mission more highly than Israel itself, wrote Catholic theologian and French Cardinal Henri de Lubac. – Israel exists not for its own sake, but for the sake of all humanity.

Henri de Lubac compared the Jews to the eldest son, who in a famous parable did not want the Father to accept his younger brother. Israel gave Christ to the world, but they themselves did not notice it. As a result, according to the theologian, when, at the end of its providential mission, Israel desired to maintain its privileges, it became a usurper.