Talk:Jew/Archive 4

Contents

1 Ethnicity box 2 non-exclusive ethnic group 3 Habiru 4 Delete "Ethnic Jews" page 5 "Jews of Africa" 6 User:RK says this article is "too long" 7 Opening definition of "Jew" 8 Google search for "Jew" 9 Chabad/Lubavitch external links 10 Treatment of Jews by Muslims 11 Good Samaritan 12 Clarified Reform position on patrilineal descent 13 Usage nitpicking 14 "Jew" as an insult 15 Some recent questionable edits

Ethnicity box

That thing is a HIDEOUS EYESORE, as well as taking up a ridiculous amount of space at the top of the article. Can anything be done to make this thing less obnoxious? - David Gerard 11:56, 6 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I agree fully, why is this "box" necessary at all??? All the information is stated clearly in the article and it actually creates the mis-impression that the small "sub groups" are more important than they are in reality, when they are basically totally irrelevant in the greater scheme of things in many ways. IZAK 12:46, 6 Jun 2004 (UTC)

This sort of thing can be put into a table in the body of the article - David Gerard 13:03, 6 Jun 2004 (UTC)

This is standard under Wikipedia:WikiProject Ethnic Groups. This one ends up being uncommonly large, because the picture on Jews is so complicated. I would strongly suggest that it be edited down rather than removed. If people think it is, in general, a bad idea, it should probably be taken up in the relevant WikiProject. For whatever it is worth, this is about the 25th article it has been added to over the course of about three months, and to the best of my knowledge the first where anyone has objected to it. -- Jmabel 05:48, Jun 8, 2004 (UTC)

The data is useful and relevant - the presentation is problematic in this article because it's a huge burnt-orange blob at the top of the article taking up too much width. I suggest that in this particular article it could be presented otherwise, e.g. as a section, with an HTML comment in the text explaining why this was done - David Gerard 11:07, 8 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I think that is reasonable, since this article doesn't follow Wikipedia:WikiProject Ethnic Groups at all. By the way, it might be worth someone having a look at Wikipedia:WikiProject Ethnic Groups and Wikipedia:WikiProject Ethnic Groups Template: I suspect there would be a lot of relevant ideas for extending and improving the present article. -- Jmabel 16:46, Jun 8, 2004 (UTC)

• Jmabel:Since YOU are the creator of Wikipedia:WikiProject Ethnic Groups it would seem that you have your own "axe to grind" in your unrelenting drive to eventually squeeze this article on Jew into YOUR criteria and views on "ethnicity". I suspect that is why you ask that "someone" do it for you so that this way you would avoid taking all the flack that would ensue were you to do it on your own arbitrarily. In the meantime you nonchalantly introduce the "box" and "formulae" such as at Wikipedia:WikiProject Ethnic Groups Template: Hoping that everyone (via a few "someones") will "fall for your bait" and just do your manipulative intellectual bidding. So PLEASE cut out the efforts you are expanding ever so subtly to swing the "Jew" article YOUR way in your determination to create an absolute SCHISM (or "divorce")---for lack of better words--- between JEWS and JUDAISM, which go together. (Only for the purposes of management of information was the subject matter of Jew dealt with separately from Judaism, it was not meant as a signal to rip the two apart body, limb, and soul, as the underlying connection and essense is understood to always remain.) You cannot just reduce the Jewish people to a "Semitic" sub-group as per your example on Wikipedia:WikiProject Ethnic Groups no different to other similar groups of "13-15 million people". You would NOT be doing either the Jews or anyone else a favor were you to succeed as you would only in effect be neutering and negating the unusual uniqueness of the Jews and their totally out-of-proportion significance to the human race, world history, and and most of all religion which you do not seem to value as much as you aspire to seek out obscure "tribal" connections to the Jews who have virtually no real or meaningful connections with the Jews as both a nation or a culture. You are "defining ethnicity down" to the "lowest common denominators", when this article is MORE about ethnicity in the sense of NATIONALITY from the Greek ethnos which means NATION, and not mere vague "TRIBES" or "SECTS" to be studied by sociologists and academic statisticians alone. This is NOT an article about Jewish genetics ! --->If that is what interests you then fill that up with all the type of details you seem to find important ! For the sake of fairness to the impartial readers of Wikipedia, the issues revolving around Jew are far weightier and are of a profounder nature than you would make it appear were you to have your way in the end using YOUR definitions of "ethnicity" which do not always match with JEWISH views of "ethnicity". IZAK 06:57, 9 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I leave it to readers of the previous comment to determine who has an axe to grind and who is trying to build an NPOV encyclopedia. I did, indeed, initiate Wikipedia:WikiProject Ethnic Groups, and am probably the main person focused on it, though I am far from the only participant, as you can easily verify by looking at the relevant pages. Absolutely, the Jews are an ethnos, but one where the question of who is and is not part of that ethnos is more than typically contentious, and therefore should form a significant portion of such an article: consider your own recent argument about the Karaites. I am certainly not trying to turn this into "an article about Jewish genetics." Ethnicity and nationality are not simply matters of genetics. They are equally a matter of culture and identity. If this article is not where to take up these matters, where do you think they should be? And what exactly should be the topic of this article (as against the topic of Judaism)? And if you feel that this article should not be the one its own introduction currently says it is, then I suspect we (all) should discuss that matter on its merits. -- Jmabel 07:59, Jun 9, 2004 (UTC)

The Jew article is basically fine, I am not criticizing it, even though it describes things with which I do not personally agree, yet for the sake of presenting things as they are, I do not attempt to tamper with most of it, provided they are truthful and fit into standard definitions of the subject. The arguments I presented about the Karaites were not "mine" I did not invent them or conjure them up. I was conveying the classical view of that movement and its adherents as it has been maintained for centuries by almost all scholarly opinions in Jewish learning. What I was objecting to was the writer's presentation of them as being more significant or influential than they are when in fact all they are is just a tiny fringe group that has long ago seen the end of its own following/s. The writer also sought to project Karaites as Jews, when in fact there have always been many sects of Karaites and some of them have insisted adamantly that they are NOT Jews. YOU say: "Ethnicity and nationality are not simply matters of genetics. They are equally a matter of culture and identity. If this article is not where to take up these matters, where do you think they should be?" shows that you do not give enough credence to the root soil from which Jews grew as a nation, which is not mere "ethnicity and culture" but almost purely from their religious roots in their faith in Judaism. Again I say, the need to talk about Jew as distincty from Judaism is not to say that from here on forwards the Jew is "divorced" from Judaism (thereby creating a "SCHISM" between the two) and let the ethnic and cultural debate and definitions reign supreme. On the contrary, as this article shows (and I did NOT write the Reform or Conservative and many other views at all), debating the status, DEFINITIONS, the ethnicity of Jews is largely done within the parameters of how the different religious streams, Reform Judaism, Conservative Judaism, Orthodox Judaism, and how in the internal debates in the State of Israel both a "Jew" and "Judaism" is defined, which is what the article does do (...until now at least...). What you are attempting to do is to go outside these bounds and bring in new criteria that would fly in the face of anything accepted thus far. So, the place for this? It's right here, on the "TALK" page where it belongs, as any and all changes on the Jew page are obviously taken very seriously and monitered by many people on Wiki out of a desire to create a balanced NPOV. (By the way, once you start getting into those little ethnic groups from Africa etc which have a pathetic handful of people, you may as well start little sections about "The Jews of Moscow" or the "Jews of California" or the "Jews of Hollywood" or "Jews of Britain" etc where SIGNIFICANT numbers live/d...where will it end...?) IZAK 10:26, 9 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Let's look at a couple of possibilities here. There is currently an article called Ethnic Jews. (There are also articles on many Jewish groups that I imagine we can all agree are ethnicities in the usual sense -- major groups like the Ashkenazi and Sephardi, smaller groups like the Romaniotes, etc. -- but I think those are not a point of controversy here.) My own feeling has been that the article Ethnic Jews is something of a mess. Up till now, my own expectation was to clean up the material and move it back here. However, perhaps that is where we should take up -- comprehensively -- the issue of Jewishness as an ethnicity, and perhaps some material in the present article should be moved to there. If so, though, it is necessary that we agree upon exactly what is the scope of the current article, in an unusual (and, as far as I know, unique in Wikipedia) ground between ethnicity and religion. -- Jmabel 17:13, Jun 9, 2004 (UTC)

I think the box is extremely helpful, rather than having to read through several paragraphs to get basic information, its all in one obvious place to view in an instant. - Jake11

I've just put the infobox after the intro, not before. This then puts it in the white space opposite the table of contents. Looks okay here in 640 pixels wide, 800 pixels wide and 1280 pixels wide. Ignoring the content itself, what do y'all think of the placement? - David Gerard 13:26, 16 Jun 2004 (UTC)

non-exclusive ethnic group

• Jmabel:It is not just a "Wikipedia" phenomenon, but the definition of just who is and isn't a Jew is a maddening topic that's been around for thousands of years and we are not about to put the issue to rest here, whichever way you slice things. To define Jews as members of an "ethnicity" is an arbitrary assumption that we work with here, but in reality because Jews have been spread over all the continents and have lived among all the racial groups and within hundreds of varying non-Jewish ethnicities so that many of them have even become EXTERNALLY identifiable with their host non-Jewish ethnicities and cultures. This article on Jew starts off by saying: "A Jew is either a follower of a certain religion (Judaism) or a member of a certain ethnicity (adj. Jewish). Judaism is a complex combination of a religion and a non-exclusive ethnic group". This last-mentioned item takes note of and links to another one paragraph link/article : "A non-exclusive ethnic group is an ethnic group with a means for people from other ethnic groups to obtain ethnic status within it. Possibly the first such group documented in history was that of the Habiru. Others have included the Jews and the Cossacks, but in modern times sovereign countries like the USA, may also be proposed as attempts to establish a new ethnic identity." So this itself makes it difficult to define Jews in pure "ethnic" terms. Of course the bottom-line reason that Jews are so open to others joining them is beacause it is Judaism itself, which based on the Torah's commands welcomes and accepts converts who then instantly lose their previous ethnic and cultural connections and become accepted Jews. The reverse also works, as Jews leave the fold, and given enough time and efforts at eradicating their links with Judaism, become part of a different culture, ethnicity and religion, as happened with the evolutions of the early Jewish Christians moving away from first Judaism and finally away from any ethnic and cultural links to Jews themselves. This is not an easy subject to fit into a "box" of any kind. IZAK 02:25, 10 Jun 2004 (UTC)

"the definition of just who is and isn't a Jew is a maddening topic that's been around for thousands of years" Interesting that here "thousands of years" must refer to debates over the ethnic identities of the Mandaeans (surprised?) and Karaites, (in the question of who is and isn't an israelite then the topic is certainly wider including Samaritans) but otherwise, the debate only really began in the 1800s. Zestauferov 17:03, 8 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Habiru

Jmabel:Since the non-exclusive ethnic group link mentions the Habiru (who together with the Cossacks , the USA and Jews are lumped together in what was called a Melting pot society in the good ol' USA--although I doubt the "Cossacks" were as welcoming as the US immigration officials on Ellis Island...) it's worth seing what that paragraph/link says: "Habiru and the Hebrew: When the Tell el-Amarna archives were translated, some scholars eagerly equated these Apiru with the Biblical Hebrews (`BRY in the consonant-only Hebrew script). Besides the similarity in the names, the description of the Apiru as nomadic and semi-nomadic tribes attacking cities in Canaan seemed to fit the Biblical account of the conquest of that land by Hebrews under Joshua except that the Habiru core was originally Hurrian not Hebrew. Scholarly opinion remains divided on this issue. Many scholars still think that the Hapiru were a component of the later peoples who inhabited the kingdoms ruled by Saul, David, Solomon and their successors in Judah and Israel. If the Habiru were the proto-Hebrews, a Hurrian origin would offer strong support for this since many Hurrian cultural themes appear in the bible. Many Biblical proper names (individual, group and place names, as well as the popular -ya name-ending) that have no satisfactory Semitic etymology, can be demonstrated to perhaps descend from Anatolian or North Syrian (Hurrian) onomastics testifing that these names may have entered Hebrew directly from Hurrian. For example, David is explained from Dudya (beloved of Ya where Ya is the Hurrian divinity) a Hurrian Habiru name later used as Solomon's coronation epithet and many of David's wandering Hebrews also possess Hurrian Habiru names (e.g. Nihiri). There have been also theories relating the Habiru to the Biblical personages of Eber and Abraham. However most scholars agree that these theories are based purely on religious beliefs and are without historical foundation." So here again we see the already very early difficulty in defining the Jews/Hebrews as eitherbeing part of or NOT being part of even something that sounds so "Hebraic" as "Habiru"/"Hebrew". This ties in with the broader issue of whether Jews do or don't really fit into the Semitic people, as the "so-called "habirus" weren't "Semites" and as later Jews from Poland or Germany often times were more blond than the Germans, and the Falashas are as African as any other of Africa's people, likewise with the Jews of India who seem more Indian than "semitic". Which leads us back to the bottom-line common denominator that it is Judaism that defines the Jew. IZAK 02:46, 10 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Werll said. It is Judaism that defines a Jew. That is exactly what I've been saying all along IZAK. ;-)Zestauferov 16:40, 8 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Delete "Ethnic Jews" page

Jmabel: The Ethnic Jews page is literally a CRACKPOT page and should simply be DELETED at this point. It was created by someone who wanted to "protest" the way the Jew page represented "converts" and this is what it says on Talk:Ethnic Jews : "This page is created in response to the lack of NPOV on the Jew page. Zestauferov 17:18, 11 May 2004 (UTC) The Jew page claims to be about the Ethnicity but due to emmotional sensitivity neglects consciously neglects to mention the certain categories of Ethnic Jews, while attempting to give the impression that Reform & Reconstructionist Jews are within the Legitimater Beit Din system. This page should be deleted if sufficient ammendments are made to the Jews page from the information contained herein." That writer has his own discombobulated "vocabulary" and esoteric "terminology" that no-one but he understands. So just remove it, as it's not worthy of your or anyone's attention. IZAK 02:02, 10 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I agree that their were serious problems with that page. However, I took a stab at rewriting it. Since so many Jews no longer practice Judaism, yet self-identity as "Jewish", it seems that their may be room for a serious article on this subject. I have seen some articles in Jewish journals on this issue. RK 15:20, Jun 10, 2004 (UTC)

I agree too and since I was the one who created it I think that my authority is best on this issue. It was created as a protest to the Reform bias on the current page, but RK saw to it that the Reform bias has taken over that page too. Anyway it is useless now and was not very clear when I started it either, so, DELETE! :-)Zestauferov 16:32, 8 Jul 2004 (UTC)

"Jews of Africa"

IZAK does have a point about not overemphasizing tiny groups (although I think he would want to narrow this farther than I would). He brings up the Jews of Africa as an example, so I thought we might look minutely at how they are handled in the article.

I assume that the three brief mentions of the approximately 90,000-100,000 Jews (mostly Ashkenazi) living in South Africa are uncontroversial, but if someone finds those controversial please do speak up.

Other than that, actually, I agree with IZAK that we have a bit much, but I gather he would want to cut more than I. Currently we have:

1. A mention of "Various African Jews" in the list of significant populations, saying that there are an estimated 10,000 Jews in Africa (excluding South Africa). I wouldn't mind losing that, as long as one link to African Jew remains in the article: it leads in turn to about a dozen articles on various populations not discussed in the present article.
2. A mention that the term "'Sephardic'...denote[s] Spanish and North African location." I assume this is uncontroversial.
3. A mention that "Oriental or 'Mizrahi' Jews (edut hamizrach)...lived in the Middle East and North Africa...". I assume this is uncontroversial.
4. A mention of the Falasha of Ethiopia. I think the relatively recent rcognition of the Falasha by the state of Israel makes them worth mentioning. In fact, it might merit a sentence or two somewhere in the article, precisely to point out that the recognition or non-recognition of particular groups by the Israeli government does change over time. That might be more useful than their inclusion in a list.
5. A mention of the Maghrebim. I know very little about them or even exactly who qualifies as Maghrebim. I'm not sure it is anything more than a subset of [Oriental Jews]]. If it is just a subset of that, I think it should be dropped.
6. A mention of the Abayudaya (of Uganda -- who I believe are the only people in this list whose status as Jews is questionable) "and other small African Jewish populations." I'd happily drop the singling out of the Abayudaya, and simply mention "small African Jewish populations." I don't think the Abayudaya are particularly notable.
7. A mention that some Sephardi "migrat[ed] to North Africa and the Middle East where they were assimilated into the Oriental Jews." I assume this is uncontroversial.
8. A mention that most of France's Jews today are "immigrants or refugees from North African and Arab lands." I assume this is uncontroversial.
9. An external link to a site that is mostly about the various small groups of African Jews, but which also contains information about the diasporas in Asia and Latin America. Some of its inclusions for Africa are controversial, but it is quite factual about the existence of the controversies. I gather from earlier discussion that this is uncontroversial, but we reached consensus to include it, and I stand by that decision: it's a link to a rather encyclopedic site.

-- Jmabel 17:38, Jun 9, 2004 (UTC)

It's been four days and no one has commented. If I don't hear otherwise in another 48 hours I'm going to assume (1) I can delete what I've said is not notable and (2) the rest of this is uncontroversial among people active in working on this page. -- Jmabel 23:38, Jun 13, 2004 (UTC)

I have now edited accordingly. I hope we have put this issue to rest. -- Jmabel 18:21, Jun 16, 2004 (UTC)

User:RK says this article is "too long"

Why does User:RK decide that this article is "too long" when so many users would like to make it even LONGER??? What don't I get???IZAK 05:10, 10 Jun 2004 (UTC)

We have always spun off separate topics into free-standing articles, when the free-standing section becomes very large. This is not really about facts or points of view. That is merely how most of our articles came into being. This mechanism has been done many times before in our articles on Judaism, Christianity, Islam, etc. I don't have any special objection to this text staying in the "Jew" article, but if everything stays, there are serious length and readability problems. RK

It seems that we have no choice but to move a lot of text now. The Jew article, in its previous form, had grown to twice the normal length: Anytime anyone tried to edit this article, they got automatic warning messages from the Wikipedia. Anything over 32 kb becomes problematic for many people to edit with their web browsers. This article was twice that length. RK 15:08, Jun 10, 2004 (UTC)

You misunderstand that warning - it does not mean that the article cannot be 32KB. It means that no section of the article should exceed 32KB. Sections can be individually edited, so the total length of the article doesn't really matter. Since this article is already broken into sections, there is no issue here. Also, it should be noted that the size limit on editing affects something absurd like .5% of the web. Most everyone uses a browser that can handle that. I'm reverting your changes back to the full length article, therefore. Snowspinner 16:54, Jun 10, 2004 (UTC)

You are still missing the point of Wikipedia - this is a hypertext encyclopedia, where we use hyperlinks to bring the reader from one article to another. We completely destroy the point of this if we jam every single topic, in detail, onto the same page. We can stick every single topic about Judaism on the "Jew" page, every single topic about Christianity on the "Christian" page, etc., but this ends up being hard to read. RK

I disagree. I think that hyperlinks are harder to follow, because the reader is inclined to jump off in multiple directions at once. I think that a well-ordered article with a clear table of contents can readily triple or quadruple the 32 KB limit without becoming unreadable - certainly, it can double it with no problems. But I think that once you move content to a spin-off article, that content becomes harder and harder to find. Content should generally be easily findable on the first page that someone hits looking for that content. Snowspinner 17:36, Jun 10, 2004 (UTC)

I've just written a summary of Conversion to Judaism and put it in as a paragraph. The practice I've seen on a lot of articles is to say "Main article: whatever" and then write a paragraph or two (no more!) overview of whatever. The summary must be as absolutely concise as is reasonable, of course.

I realise our 32KB limit is technical, but as a guard against rambling I think it does wonders for the quality and organisation of the writing - David Gerard 19:30, 10 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I agree with David. RK

Opening definition of "Jew"

Leaning again on the best short lesson in journalism I know, which I received from my City Editor more decades ago than I like to think about: "assume the reader knows nothing," I'm going to clarify the opening sentence. The current one is flawed several ways: (1) the use of "either/or" makes the two definitions mutally exclusive; (2) In the broadest sense, you could call Jews an "ethnicity," but this is dubious, a completely secular Jew who denies this connection (including some famous people) are still regarded as Jews (Robert Moses, Karl Marx, Bobby Fischer); (3) on the same tack, in many cases Jews are more similar to the local non-Jewish population in both physical appearance and culture than they are to Jews in other communities and (4) "Jew" is often externally defined.

Full disclosure: I used Britanica to help form the concept in as few words as possible. -- Cecropia | Talk 18:58, 10 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I am moving this new paragraph here for clarification:

Although certain Jewish groups accept or impose a religious test in determining which individual may be a Jew, the term is often partly defined by the social or political views of the non-Jewish community.

Which groups are these, and what are their religious tests? Orthodox Judaism has its own list of beliefs that they think that all Jews should believe; however even if someone rejects all of these beliefs Orthodoxy still accepts that person as a Jew. The same is true for non-Orthodox branches of Judaism.

Israel defines who is a Jew for their purposes. Religious Jews define who is a Jew (as in the Matriarchal lineage issue). Hitler defined who was a Jew, without distinguishing between matriarchal, patriarchal, or practice. Remember, this is an encyclopedia article explaining to the wide world what the term "Jew" means. I believe there is no formal hierarchy that can specify what constitues a Jew is all cases.

No, the State of Israel does not impose a religious test in determining which individual may be a Jew, even though certain Jewish groups may wish that this were so. The same is true for religious Jews with regards to the matriarchal lineage issue; that has nothing to do with any kind of test for Judaism. That issue (lineage) already is discussed in this article at length. Why make vague allusions to it, when the issue is already discussed in the article? Finally, Adolph Hitler was a Jew-murderer. How can you say that he is part of the Jewish community, and that he has something to do with how Jews determine who is a Jew? RK

I didn't intend to say Hitler was part of the Jewish community. I'm trying to say that consideration of who Jews are cannot be subjected to analysis of how religious Jews feel about it. The title of this article is "Jew," not "Jews as a religion." I am not making "vague allusions." Wikipedia style is set forth a brief and concise definition in the first paragraph or two, and then discuss it in the meat of the article. The original single paragraph was vague and inaccurate.

The only generally accepted commonality is that a Jew is a person who, religious or not, has at least one Jewish parent or has formally converted to the Jewish religion, traceable to the ancient Jewish people, themselves descendants of the Hebrews of the Old Testament.

This is not generally accepted. This point of view is rejected by Orthodox and Conservative Judaism, and by much of Reform Judaism outside of the USA. All these groups hold that in order to be considered Jewish, one must be born not just of at least one Jewish parent, but also that the Jewish parent must be the mother. The identity of the father is not relevant. (And, of course, they also accept people who convert to Judaism.) RK 20:02, Jun 10, 2004 (UTC)

What you are describing is what Jewish religious groups say a Jew is, but it does not describe who will be considered a Jew in society. I think we have a core disagreement here, so please tell me how you would modify the excised paragraph. -- Cecropia | Talk 20:58, 10 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I don't understand why you are changing the topic. Look at your original paragraph... "Although certain Jewish groups accept or impose a religious test..." You were the one talking about Jewish groups. Why have you suddenly switched to how gentiles define Jews? RK

I am not trying to change the topic. My wording should have been more precise. "Although certain Jewish groups accept or impose a religiously-defined test..." If someone says that a person with only a Jewish father raised Jewish is not Jewish, willing to attend synagogue but a person with only a Jewish mother is Jewish, even if s/he is an atheist, that is a religious test.

There is no rule that covers how all non-Jewish societies determine who Jews are. They usually just accept that someone is a Jew if their local Jewish community accepts someone as a Jew. I don't think that gentile Americans have any rules as such; they just think that if someone says that they are a Jew, then that person is a Jew. Of course, we could have a section on how certain gentile groups, such as Russians and Germans, set apart and made their own identifications of "who is a Jew". When gentile societies made such rules, it usually was for the purposes of persecution. That would be better discussed in the articles on anti-semitism. RK 22:18, Jun 10, 2004 (UTC)

I agree with your point that Gentile societies define "Jew" to a person's detriment, but my point is that, when a person reading this article wants to know what a "Jew", s/he shouldn't come away believing what a rabinical interpreter says a Jew is. It's more complicated than that. On the other hand I take issue with your statement "They [Gentiles] usually just accept that someone is a Jew if their local Jewish community accepts someone as a Jew." Noone evers asks who the community thinks is a Jew, any more than if a person told me he was a Catholic, that I would ask the parish priest if he was or wasn't. If someone told me he was Jewish, I would simply accept that, if he said he was "half-Jewish" (and I have been told that many times) I would assume one Jewish parent. I am told that by Jewish law it is impossible to be "half-Jewish." -- Cecropia | Talk 23:12, 10 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Google search for "Jew"

This page (minus the talk bit) is now the first hit when searching google for the word jew (http://www.google.com/search?q=jew). Google's explanation: [1] (http://www.google.com/explanation.html)

Much better that those jewwatch.com twits. -Nickls 16:44, 13 Jun 2004 (UTC)

thank god --Jew 20:47, 14 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Chabad/Lubavitch external links

What is with the continual efforts to add multiple Chabad/Lubavitch external links to the article? I haven't seen anyone argue a reason there should be more than one, they just keep adding 'em. This time, I took the liberty of deleting, as others have done in the past. -- Jmabel 23:49, Jun 14, 2004 (UTC)

• Jmabel: The answer is simple: You are dealing with fanatical "Messianists" known as the Meshichistim and they are splattering links to the MESSIANIC sections of Chabad all the time (as if this will help the Rebbe get up from the dead sooner.) The ONLY decent "MAINSTREAM" Chabad link that should be here is: http://www.chabad.org/ IZAK 03:29, 15 Jun 2004 (UTC)

thet is NOT true you cen not decide for all Lubavitch Hassidim. chabad.org is a site of a small group that ashamed of weat the Rebbe telld us. chabad.net is a site that represents chabad by the rebbe of Chabad Lubavitch. --Chabad 23:17, 12 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Treatment of Jews by Muslims

This recent (anonymous) addition goes strongly against most of what I have ever heard, and cites no sources. I don't claim expertise on this, so I leave it to someone else to edit or delete, but I do note that no sources at all or cited for something that goes against most of what I have ever read about Islam in the Middle Ages. It is hard to reconcile this with the high positions to which Jews at time rose in (for example) the Muslim kingdom cenetered at Toledo. -- Jmabel 03:17, Jun 16, 2004 (UTC)

"In addition to the above examples, one must review the historical record of the destruction and persecution of the Jewish communities throughout the Islamic Empire. As the empire expanded during the centuries, the status of the non-Muslim communities remained precarious and subject to dhimmi laws. The Jewish communities were not second class citizens, they were not considered to be citizens of the larger community at all. Repressive measures against their persons occured with regularity as the Muslim majority massacred them with impunity. There was no protection under the laws and the word of a Muslim was sufficient to subject any Jew to harsh punishment."

Good Samaritan

I've just removed a reference to the Good Samaritan parable in the "Samaritans and Christians" section. I think the author misunderstands the parable (understandable if he's Jewish - even some Christians miss the point). He states that "the Samaritans were a suspicious cult that practiced secret forbidden rites, rejecting rabbinic Judaism" - this view (or rather, a less specific "Samaritans were bad people") is also taken by the Christian version, the point of the parable being that even "bad people" can do good deeds. Thus a differing view of Samaritans in general does not exist between Christianity and Judaism.

Additionaly, the Samaritans rejected all forms of Judaism (The sect of the Saducees, the Essenes,etc.) that were around at that time, not just Rabbinical Judaism.--Yoshiah ap 22:03, 17 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Clarified Reform position on patrilineal descent

The Reform position on "patrilineal descent" was inaccurately presented. For more details see this link: http://www.shamash.org/lists/scj-faq/HTML/faq/18-index.html Jayjg 18:12, 18 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Usage nitpicking

To begin an article with

Dog describes an animal that barks.

is not as good, to say the least, as to begin with

A dog is an animal that barks.

And if one must write about the word dog rather than about the animal itself, one should italicize the word. That is the reason for my recent edit of the opening sentence of this article. Michael Hardy 23:06, 18 Jun 2004 (UTC)

• Hey, what's with the "Dog"-"dog" example with regards to "Jew"??? You could have used an example in better taste like "Boy"-"boy" or "Girl"-"girl"!!! Have you forgotten that it was the Nazis that would put up signs saying "No Jews and dogs allowed". For crying out loud man, you could have used a better example here. Makes you think doesn't it...? IZAK 17:26, 20 Jun 2004 (UTC)
  • Actually those exact same signs were in the US South not so many years ago. They didn't mention "Negroes" because they were supposed to know better than to enter a "white" establishment, sign or no. I doubt Michael Hardy means any harm.

However, this raises the issue of objectification. Until after mid-century,it was not uncommon to describe a Jewish or black woman as a "Jewess" or "Negress." I knew one very proud Jewish woman who self-described that way, but you would never use a term like that today—it's like describing the female of an animal. Times and language, meaning and intent change. -- Cecropia | Talk 17:38, 20 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Cecropia: I am not sure what you mean to say. That the South also had signs like "No Jews and dogs" allowed only makes my point even more pertinent that Hardy should NOT have used the word "dog" as an example for "Jew" on a page such as this which requires extreem sensitivity to the subject. Furthermore with regards to "objectification" you are not quite right, whilst the word "Jewess" has fallen out of usage (so has "matinee idol" and drive-in theater") the words "Jew", "Jews", and "Jewish" are still very much around and HOW they are used can still arouse lots of strong negative and positive emotions in both the subject and object of the words' intent. IZAK 18:17, 20 Jun 2004 (UTC)

IZAK: I am saying that I believe Michael meant no harm, and it is very difficult to converse with people in an open fashion if you have to "walk on eggs." I think it may have been better to say that "using 'dog' is an unfortunate comparison because that has been used by such as Nazis as a pejorative against Jews." As to the use of the term Jew itself, I think it should be altered or deemphasized since, even in a nonpejorative sense, it has been used to separate Jews from general society: in Germany, if you were Chistian, you were a "German," if you were Jewish, you were a "Jew." Same in Poland and how many others countries I don't know. -- Cecropia | Talk 19:35, 20 Jun 2004 (UTC)

"Jew" as an insult

I deleted this paragraph from the intro:

Paradoxically, as a pejorative, the appellation Jew is sometimes used in cultures where prejudice exists against Jews to describe a non-Jew (gentile) who has so-called "negative qualities" that the culture falsely attributes to Jews, which is often rooted in unconscious anti-Semitism.

I don't think a paragraph describing the use of the word "Jew" as an insult belongs in the intro paragraph, which should be describing what a Jew IS, not the crass semantic habits of a few anti-Semites. Put this paragraph in the page on anti-Semitism or further down in the article if you insist, but not in the intro. Mbeki 00:28, 19 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Some recent questionable edits

I'm not going to carefully sort out who made what edits -- I don't want this to get ad hominem -- but there have been some small but significant recent edits that deserve discussion and possibly reversion. I am listing them here as an aid to that discussion. (This is not an exhaustive list of recent edits. A few others seemed either simply correct, or clearly harmless.) Feel free to intersperse subordinate bullet points. -- Jmabel 22:32, Jun 26, 2004 (UTC)

I agree with your basic complaint. There is far too much opinion in the article in general. The problem is we are all clinging to the idea that Jew means the same thing to all of us at the end of the day because none of us wants to admit that there arew in truth different categories of Jew in the world today. Hence the objective and encyclopaedic value of the article is reduced. I am afraid we may need some pure agnostics without any religious or cultural/ethnic prejudice to monitor this article to ensure all relevant facts are presented without one POV coming to dominate. Categorization. This article is in desperate need of a massive clean-up. (Zestauferov 04:16, 27 Jun 2004 (UTC))

• The introductory paragraph previously said "...a member of a continuous non-national cultural tradition..." This has been changed to "...a member of a continuous national cultural tradition..." (emphasis mine)

The Jews are a nation in diaspora. We respect the authorities of the countries which allow us to enjoy citizenship, but our nation is the Jewish nation first and foremost. At least that is one POV.Zestauferov 04:16, 27 Jun 2004 (UTC)

• "largely homogenous but..." added before "non-exclusive ethnic group.

I fail to see the point of this edit. It does not strike me as particularly true. -- Jmabel 22:32, Jun 26, 2004 (UTC)

I agree with you. Genetic research has proven only our Kohanim families are homogenous. The rest of us are as closely related to Palestinians and Syrians as are about 60% of all Europeans.Zestauferov 04:16, 27 Jun 2004 (UTC)

• "In an ethnic sense, the Jews are members of the people, or 'nation', that traces its ancestry..." became "In an ethnic sense, the Jews (along with the Samaritans) are members of the people, or nation of Israel, that traces its ancestry..." (emphasis mine)

Again, an insertion of what seems a specifically nationalist view (which it seems to me should be discussed rather than adopted blindly). Also, I'm not sure why the Samaritans deserve to be singled out here: there are, as I understand it, less than a thousand surviving Samaritans. -- Jmabel 22:32, Jun 26, 2004 (UTC)

Right if we mention Samaritans we have to mention all the peoples who like Jews are "members of the people, or nation" in question.Zestauferov 04:16, 27 Jun 2004 (UTC)

• "In some places in the Talmud, the word Israel(ite) refers to..." became "The word Israel(ite) refers to..."

I think the reference to the Talmud should be restored: in other contexts, Israelite has other meanings. It seems to me that this edit adds nothing and makes for a less relevant, less accurate statement. -- Jmabel 22:32, Jun 26, 2004 (UTC)

I agree with you.Zestauferov 04:16, 27 Jun 2004 (UTC)

• "The term 'Israelite', has also been appropriated by various non-Jewish groups, for example the Rastafarians, who claim descent from the tribes of Israel," was edited to say, "for example the Samaritans, Karites (sic) and Rastafarians".

Besides the misspelling of "Karaites", this radically changes the meaning of the paragraph. The Rastafarians are an example of people with no documentable claim to descent from the Tribes of Israel, who have made such a claim and appropriated the term "Israelite". The Samaritans and Karaites have not "appropriated" that term: as far as I know, no one denies that they have as good a claim on descent from the Tribes of Israel as the Asheknazi or the Sephardi. -- Jmabel 22:32, Jun 26, 2004 (UTC)

I agree. But I have heard that the Rastafarians do descend from Ethiopians with some israelite connection. On the other hand it would be impossible to list all the social groups and sub-groups in the world which consider themselves israelite in some way or another.Zestauferov 04:16, 27 Jun 2004 (UTC)

• "The commonly-used terms Ashkenazi... and Sephardic... refer both to a religious and an ethnic division," was edited to the ungrammatical "The commonly-used terms Ashkenazi... and Sephardic... refer both to a relgious division." Also, similarly, the word "ethnic" was dropped from "Jews have historically been divided into four major ethnic groups".

Besides the grammatical issue, I can't imagine the basis on which someone denies that the Ashkenazim and Sephardim form separate ethnic groups. I would simply revert this. Do others agree? -- Jmabel 22:32, Jun 26, 2004 (UTC)

I agree with you.Zestauferov 04:16, 27 Jun 2004 (UTC)

• In the section "Jewish languages", "Arabic" was edited to "Judeo-Arabic".

Does anyone have any documentation that Jews historically spoke a different Arabic than their Muslim and Christian neighbors? If not, this should be reverted. -- Jmabel

I agree with you.Zestauferov 04:16, 27 Jun 2004 (UTC)

• Similarly (same section), "...smaller Jewish populations spoke their respective local languages" became "...smaller Jewish populations spoke 'Judeo' versions of their respective local languages."

I think this is plain silly. The Gruzim speak perfectly normal Georgian. French Jews speak perfectly normal French. I speak perfectly normal American English, probably with a Yiddicism now and then, but I know New York Puerto Ricans just as likely to use a Yiddicism! Can we just revert this? -- Jmabel 22:32, Jun 26, 2004 (UTC)

I agree with you.

• A remark was added to a list about Sorbs converting to Judaism.

I wouldn't be surprised if some did, just like some American Protestants have, but was there enough of a conversion to belong here in a list with Khazars, Edomites, and Ethiopians, and Yemeni Arabs? (This is not a rhetorical question: maybe there were, but I've never heard of it, and no documentation is provided). -- Jmabel 22:32, Jun 26, 2004 (UTC)

Perhaps this has something to do with explaining influences in Yiddish? If so it has been added in the wrong way.Zestauferov 04:16, 27 Jun 2004 (UTC)

• "...Samaritans do not consider themselves, nor call themselves, Jews. This is because they believe they are of tribes other than Judah," was edited to "...they commonly refer to themselves as 'Samaritan Israelites' as oppossed to 'Jewish Israelites'. This is because they believe they are of the northern Israelite tribes."

I understand they believe they are descended from Ephraim don't they? Anyway the argument is stupid because Jew is an English designation of disputed origin and samaritans do not use English terms to designate themselves.Zestauferov 04:16, 27 Jun 2004 (UTC)

The changes were made by an anonymous poster with the IP address 212.235.83.195, who seems to identify with Samaritans in some way. I've reverted most of them, I might have missed a couple. I didn't mess with the Judeo language changes because Jews in the respective countries did speak various version of Judeao-Arabic etc. However, I don't know to what extent these languages were spoken vs. the wider local languages, or how different the languages were from the local languages. Here's a webpage which discusses the various Jewish languages spoken: http://www.jewish-languages.org/languages.html, and this one discusses Judeo-Georgian http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=JGE Jayjg 05:57, 27 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I think that, when dealing with a poster who's contributions have mostly been bad and possibly vandalous activity, it's better to err on the side of removal until verified. The changes are not that hard to reinsert if we decide we want them after soem investigation, but until then let's stay with the version of the article that's less questionable. That is, go ahead and revert some more. Snowspinner 06:01, Jun 27, 2004 (UTC)

Is there a simple way of reverting edits, rather than having to copy them one by one? Jayjg 16:13, 27 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Wikipedia:How to revert a page to an earlier version. ALso please read the relevant rules for justification. -- Cecropia | Talk 16:49, 27 Jun 2004 (UTC)

The problem here is that there were some intervening good edits. -- Jmabel 17:40, Jun 28, 2004 (UTC)

That's a pain, but sometimes, if you look over the good changes, you can make note of the good edits, revert the page, then restore the non-vandal edits. It's a judgment call which way is less work. -- Cecropia | Talk 18:20, 28 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Turns out Wikipedia has an article on Judeo-Arabic as well at Judeo-Arabic_language Jayjg 16:27, 28 Jun 2004 (UTC)