Judaism

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Judaism

Draft from Religions of the World: A Critical Introduction by Leslie Dorrough Smith and
Steven Ramey (Equinox Publishing, forthcoming)

Scholars often spend considerable time talking about how to define the boundaries of Judaism
because of the sheer diversity of perspectives held by those who call themselves Jews. The
many types of people that the category Judaism is used to describe, however, poses a challenge
to several of the most popular assumptions about religion -- namely, that it should describe a
particular type of belief, and more specifically, belief in supernatural entities.

Consider that many of the world’s Jews see themselves as ethnically or culturally Jewish but
may not accept Judaism as a religion. For many such people, their Jewish identity does not
involve some definable statement of religious belief. Some Jewish groups refuse to recognize
another person as Jewish (including Jewish converts to the religion) unless that person’s
mother was also a Jew (a relationship known as matrilineal descent) on the grounds that
biology is one of the most central markers of Jewish identity. To complicate things even
further, people of Jewish ancestry or cultural background are often counted as Jewish by most
Jews if they identify as atheists or non-religious people but will not be counted by some if they
convert to another religion (particularly a monotheistic one like Christianity or Islam). The case
of Judaism, then, shows us that people use the term to describe a community of considerable
diversity, but they often limit the diversity that they recognize under that label. This focus on a
selective diversity is a typical feature of all groups as they negotiate with whom and what they
wish to be identified.

The classic story that is told about the Jewish tradition often starts with the ancient figure of
Abraham, who is called by God to form a covenant, or binding promise, with Abraham’s
people, the Hebrews (later called the Israelites). The covenant obligated the Hebrews to follow
the ways of God; in turn, God promised to provide protection to the Hebrews and their
descendants as well as provide a land of both stability and prosperity. This land is referred to
across time as Canaan, Zion, and later Israel. Modern Jews trace their ancestry to this group
and to the country of Israel today. God’s commands to the Israelites are laid out in a document
called the Torah, which comprises the beginning of a larger text known as the Hebrew Bible or
Tanakh. Many of the stories that punctuate the Tanakh reveal God’s commands as well as the
Israelites’ successes and failures in following them. Across the Hebrew Bible, various patriarchs
who follow Abraham continue this covenantal legacy in leading the Israelites. Various prophets,
or spokespersons for God, similarly warn about what will happen to the Israelites if they fail to
follow God’s ways. After this period, centuries of commentary were (and continue to be)
written by teachers called rabbis that reflect on the significance of these events for Jews across
time. One of the most noteworthy documents in this regard is the Talmud, which provides
detailed commentary on how to interpret the Torah, and thus how Jewish life should be lived.
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What various communities that identify as Jewish do with these stories, and even whether they
grant them authority at all, are questions with myriad answers. In the broadest strokes, the
majority of those who identify as Jews live in Israel (just under 7 million) and the US (just over 7
million), as of 2022. Even though these are roughly the same figures, those who identify as
Jews comprise around 75% of the population of Israel but only about 2% of the United States.
Jews also live all across the world, displaying a diversity that is not just geographic but also
ethnic and social. In this chapter, we examine some of the most popular ways of thinking about
Judaism and Jewish identity, organized in the following four representations: Judaism as a
tradition of texts; Judaism as a modern religious institution; Judaism as an ethnic identity; and
Judaism as a means of cultural impact.

Timeline
c. 1800 BCE: Abraham is born
c. 1300 BCE: Moses delivers the Israelites from Egyptian slavery
c. 1010 BCE: Institutionalization of monarchy with King David
c. 960 BCE: First temple is built under King Solomon
586 BCE: First temple is destroyed by Babylonians
c. 516 BCE: Second temple is built
167 BCE: Maccabean Revolt begins
70 CE: Second temple is destroyed by the Romans
c. 200 CE: Mishnah is compiled
c. 500 CE: Babylonian Talmud completed
1095 CE: Crusaders start their massacre of Jews as they attempt to conquer the Holy Land
1565 CE: Shulkhan Aruch (authored by Joseph Caro) is published
c. 1740s CE: Enlightenment spreads across Europe
c. 1800 CE: Reform Judaism emerges
c. 1820 CE: Orthodox Judaism emerges
1897 CE: Zionism officially emerges as a social movement
1912 CE: Conservative Judaism emerges through the founding of Jewish Theological Seminary
1935 CE: Mordecai Kaplan publishes Judaism as a Civilization, starting Reconstructionist
Judaism
1939-1945 CE: The Holocaust
1948 CE: Establishment of the state of Israel
1967 CE: The Six Day War
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Representation 1: Judaism as a tradition of texts


Judaism is often described as a tradition rooted deeply in history, which is communicated
primarily through its texts. The text often considered the origin point of the Jewish story is the
Hebrew Bible, which is a collection of books composed primarily in Hebrew that provide
ancestral stories, important themes and life lessons, and guidelines for righteous living. The
term Tanakh is an acronym that indicates the book’s three parts: the Torah, also called the
Pentateuch, references the first five books; Nevi’im, or the prophetic accounts, comprises the
middle section; and Ketuvim, which ends the volume, is made up of assorted stories and
writings. While the term Torah (or “law”) refers to the first five books, it is also used to speak
broadly about the whole corpus of Jewish teachings (and thus is also often used
interchangeably with the phrase “Hebrew Bible”). Traditionalist Jews often claim that the Torah
was written by Moses, a patriarch of the Hebrews, whom they claim provided a verbatim
recording of God’s divine commands.

The book of Genesis, the first book of the Pentateuch, begins with several creation narratives.
In the first, God creates the world and all that is in it across six days and rests on the seventh.
In the second installment of creation, presented as a stand-alone story, we learn about the first
humans, named Adam and Eve, who are given a bountiful garden to live in. God dictates to
them only one restriction: not to eat fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
When they break this rule, God banishes them from the garden to live a life of pain and labor.
This is followed by another story of a great flood that God sends to the earth to kill all wicked
humans. Only God’s faithful servant, Noah, and his family are saved from the flood, as are two
of every animal on the earth.

Two major themes prominent in Jewish storytelling have already emerged at this point: the
cycle of exile/return, and ethical monotheism. Exile refers to being cast out of one’s home, and
Adam and Eve’s removal from the garden portends many other stories in the Hebrew Bible
where the Hebrews are forced from their home and must engage in a long quest to return to it.
If monotheism refers to the recognition of one god, ethical monotheism is the idea that people
must not just acknowledge the power or existence of one god but also live by that god’s rules.

A third major theme – covenant – develops more fully as the story turns to the patriarchs of the
Hebrews. Covenant refers to a binding promise between two parties in which both sides are
accountable to the other. In this case, the Hebrews must obey God’s commandments, and God
will protect and care for them. Abraham was the first person called by God in the Hebrew Bible
and the one to whom the initial covenant was made. In this sense, Abraham is often regarded
as the first patriarch or father of Judaism. Another major character who appears later in the
Hebrew Bible is Moses. While Moses is famous for his leadership in several major stories in the
Torah, including delivering the Israelites from Egyptian slavery, he is perhaps most famous for
receiving the Torah from God on Mt. Sinai. In this story, the Torah refers to specific rules for
living, which include the Ten Commandments. Although God promised the Israelites their own
land, according to the Hebrew Bible, God made them wander in the desert for forty more years
because of their acts of disobedience.
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Subsequent books in the Hebrew Bible address important developments across several
centuries after the Israelites arrive in Canaan, including the rise of a monarchy (to include kings
such as Saul, David, and Solomon) and the building of the temple. The temple was considered
the most holy place where the power of God dwelled, and the Israelites conducted ritual
sacrifices there to please God. At this point in time, the most important rituals of ancient Israel
took place at the temple site. With these developments also came the era of the prophets,
who were spokespersons for God who encouraged the people to return to God’s rules for
rightful living. If they failed, the prophets warned that God would allow them to be conquered
and exiled.

Indeed, the kingdom of the Israelites was divided and conquered several times. After the
temple was destroyed in 586 BCE, the Israelites began a long process that shifted away from
temple-centered ritual sacrifice and towards a more portable religious practice. Even though
they rebuilt the temple some 70 years later (inaugurating an era often called the Second
Temple Period), this shift continued, as their religion increasingly emphasized texts and
teachers. People also developed synagogues – that is, local places of worship, teaching, and
prayer where people gathered regularly. After the temple was destroyed a second time by
Roman forces (in 70 CE), the diaspora occurred – the scattering of Jews away from Israel and,
eventually, across the world. The emphasis on texts helped maintain a coherent Jewish identity,
just as texts remain the centerpiece of Jewish practice for many observant Jews today. This
developing emphasis on texts signaled the emergence of rabbinic Judaism, a term designating a
change in Jewish traditions towards the intellectual authority of the rabbi (or teacher) and
away from the ritual purity of the temple priest.

To create a tradition based on texts, though, Jewish communities gave substantial attention to
questions of how to apply such texts to social life. Rabbinic leaders developed another textual
source incredibly important to Judaism, the Talmud. The result of several centuries of
commentary and thought, the Talmud has become the central Jewish text interpreting the
Torah. The Talmud has two main parts, the Mishnah and the Gemara. The Mishnah is the
written version of oral law (sometimes called Oral Torah), which traditionalists claim was
recited orally by God to Moses while they met on Mt. Sinai. It can be best described as a
parallel series of commands and commentary meant to be used alongside the Torah in order to
provide more detailed guidance about the law’s applications. The Gemara provides early
rabbinic commentary and debates on the Mishnah, including advice on how to interpret its
rules for daily living. Different versions of the Talmud developed over time, although the
Babylonian Talmud, compiled around 500 CE, is used most widely today, enhanced with further
commentaries on the Mishnah and Gemara typically printed in the margins.

While there are many different interpretations and outcomes that can be gleaned from these
texts, many Jews believe that the Talmud details the 613 commandments (or mitzvot)
referenced in the Torah. Nevertheless, the Talmud remains a complicated document. Starting
in the Middle Ages, Jewish scholars (including figures like Moses Maimonides (1138-1204) and
Joseph Caro (1488-1575)) created from the Talmud various legal codes that distilled possible
interpretations into a more accessible format. Later writers wrote even more commentaries
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on these legal codes, allowing rabbis to consult multiple generations of documents and
opinions to help them determine halakah, or religious law. Whether to take these
conversations and their recommendations for righteous living as binding to modern Jews or see
them as the practices of their ancestors alone is one of the central dividing markers among
those who identify as Jews today.

Analysis of Judaism as a tradition of texts


This representation positions texts as an important authority for virtually all Jews, if not a
central part of their Jewish identity. For some who identify as Jews, both things are true. But for
many other Jews (if not the majority), the role that a text plays in their lives is quite different
than this representation imagines.

To start, let’s consider what many Jews think about texts and their Jewish identity today.
Surveys that have addressed this question, such as a recent one conducted by the Pew
Foundation, find that only 15% of American Jews consider observing Jewish law as a vital part
of their personal sense of Judaism. Rather, the majority of American Jews report that the most
important markers of Judaism for them include remembering the Holocaust, maintaining high
personal moral standards, and working for social justice or activist causes. The exception to this
lies with Orthodox Jews, whose identity is often closely tied to observance of the law (and thus
the texts containing it). Nevertheless, it is important to note that for a large number of Jews,
engaging a text is simply not a major part of their Jewish identity.

Yet for those Jews who do consider texts central, how they engage them (and their explanation
for doing so) may be quite different than some might expect. This is important because a
Christocentric bias common in the World Religions Paradigm (WRP; see Introduction) often
presents a religious group’s texts as an all-encompassing, final authority that offers a singular
message focused around beliefs. Yet, to many Jewish groups, texts are often regarded as
important not necessarily because they tell one what to believe or think but because they tell
one what to do. In this sense, many Jews argue against calling Judaism a faith (a common term
often used in place of the word “religion”) since the focus across many sectors of Jewish
tradition is on orthopraxy (correct practice) rather than orthodoxy (correct doctrine, or
conformity of belief). For some who identify as Jewish, a major part of orthopraxy is expressing
respect for the text by debating its meaning with others who identify as Jews rather than
claiming that the text can be interpreted in only one way. The various commentaries contained
in the Talmud demonstrate this interest in dialogue, as they present historical debates and
competing interpretations.

Still yet, this representation leaves out other influential texts. For instance, the Zohar is a book
of mystical teachings about the Torah that is part of a larger Jewish mysticism movement called
Kabbalah. The Torah, according to the Kabbalah movement, contains esoteric (hidden)
knowledge that requires a special understanding (such as found in the Zohar) to uncover. One
of the most famous kabbalists is Isaac Luria (1534-1572), whose interpretation of the Zohar is
among the most commonly embraced today. From his engagement with the Zohar, Luria
speculated about the nature of supernatural entities, promoted the idea of reincarnation, and
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discussed messianism, which is the idea of a savior figure whose arrival will perfect the world.
The idea of messianism was particularly attractive to many Jews who were experiencing
persecution during the European Middle Ages. While Jewish groups today have various, even
mixed, feelings about Kabbalah, several groups have adapted its teachings, particularly certain
Hasidic groups (a branch of Orthodox Judaism) who see themselves as continuing Luria’s legacy.

Another Christocentric presumption pertinent to this situation is a preference for printed or


written texts. Many who identify as Jews see orality, or the oral transmission of certain stories
or ideas, as having just as much importance as a written document. As earlier mentioned, the
concept of the Oral Torah, later written down in the Talmud, solidifies the importance of the
spoken word within many interpretations of Jewish tradition. For many Jews today, the
importance of storytelling for both personal and group history cannot be overstated. This
includes central stories from the Torah that have helped frame Jewish culture and living and
substantial collections of folklore amassed within certain Jewish ethnic groups, such as the
Yiddish tales of Eastern European Jews told across the 18th and 19th centuries.

Focusing on texts as a critical part of Judaism, then, can serve different functions depending on
who is crafting that representation. Emphasizing the physical, textual aspects of the Jewish
tradition confirms the WRP idea that a religion is defined by its books. This idea often leads
people to assume that Orthodox Jews are more “proper” or “authentic” since they tend to
focus on the authority of written texts to determine the binding nature of the halakha. Other
perspectives on texts, however, render them important mainly as historical artifacts or sources
of cultural heritage or promote oral storytelling as a form of culture-building.

Case Study: The Abrahamic Tradition


One of the most globally impactful ways of thinking about the Torah has been the concept of
the Abrahamic Tradition. If you’ve heard this term before, chances are great that it’s been used
in a political or national context to emphasize unity between religiously diverse populations,
especially in a time of crisis or tension. The idea in its present usage specifically unites the
members of three different religious groups – Jews, Christians, and Muslims – as they each
emphasize the figure of Abraham.

As just discussed, most who identify as Jews regard Abraham as the first patriarch of Judaism,
or the ancestor to whom God spoke to form the covenant. Christians often make a similar claim
but add that the covenant tradition that started with Abraham culminated in the person of
Jesus; thus ultimately, to Christians, Abraham supported the development of Christianity. For
Muslims, the prophet Muhammed is understood as a relative of Ishmael, Abraham’s firstborn
son, and thus the tie to Abraham (also considered a prophet in Islam) legitimizes the prophecies
of God, as communicated through Muhammad.

Scholar Aaron Hughes, in his book entitled Abrahamic Traditions: On the Uses and Abuses of
History, shows that there is little evidence that the Abrahamic Tradition concept refers to a
stable historical reality. Rather, the label has been created and used in different ways across
time in order for the members of these various religious groups to negotiate their relationships
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with each other. For instance, Hughes notes, Christians and Muslims traced themselves to the
figure of Abraham in ancient times but did so as a way to separate themselves from both
contemporary Jews and each other. Early Christians drew upon the stories of the faith of
Abraham to use Abraham as a role model for how one should have faith in (and convert to the
religion of) Jesus. Similarly, early Muslims saw Abraham as the recipient of God’s “true”
message that they claimed both Jews and Christians later corrupted.

But in more contemporary times, the idea of an Abrahamic tradition has been used in just the
opposite way. Hughes argues that people use it to suggest that the members of these three
groups have something important and positive that ties them together. Most notably, the term
was revived in the latter part of the twentieth century as a way to reckon with a series of global
political crises, including the Holocaust, ongoing tensions in the Middle East, the ending of
European colonial powers, and more recently, 9/11. In each of these moments, appealing to
the idea of an Abrahamic tradition has allowed otherwise fractured social groups to see
themselves as related family rather than sworn enemies. By emphasizing ideas such as faith,
peace, ethics, and a monotheistic God, a multitude of politicians, civil servants, and scholars
have promoted the idea that these three traditions have been and continue to be committed to
identical goals.

As functionalist scholars, we are interested in the ways that certain representations of a


religious tradition are used to impact social life. It is interesting to see how such widely popular
ideas have been both developed and then naturalized within the communities that put them to
use, even when these interpretations have been very different and even contradictory. The
idea of the Abrahamic tradition allows us to see how several different groups can draw upon
one idea but implement it in a wide variety of ways.

Representation 2: Judaism as a Modern Religious Institution


Another prominent way that Judaism is represented emphasizes how Jews and others have
created institutions in which they foster both community and Jewish identity. The story of how
the different denominations, or branches, of Judaism have evolved into what they are today is
very complicated, involving different ethnic and philosophical outlooks, different attitudes
towards how one should implement Jewish teachings, and different responses to modern life.

Much of this discussion revolves around the significance of halakha, or Jewish law, which is a
code of ethics and tradition that is often interpreted at the community level. Although halakha
sets out parameters for everything from gender roles, to dress, to how and when one may
work, one of its most well-known elements concerns food, also known as kosher laws. Deciding
whether a food is kosher (or ritually acceptable) is based on a number of factors. In the case of
meat and other animal-based products, the species of animal that is being consumed, how it
has been prepared, and how it is combined with other types of food are all important. For
example, mammals that live on land must have a split hoof and chew their cud to be considered
kosher. This makes beef acceptable, for instance, but pork unacceptable, since pigs have a split
hoof but do not chew their cud. Aquatic animals are fine so long as they have scales and fins,
making salmon a kosher food but shellfish unacceptable. Kosher guidelines also determine the
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method of slaughtering animals and other aspects of food production, and they also prohibit
mixing foods, specifically consuming dairy and meat products at one meal. For instance, most
observant Jews will not eat cheeseburgers, and they may wait a designated period of time to
eat ice cream after a meal containing meat. As you should expect, however, people who
identify with Judaism have different interpretations and adhere to kosher guidelines to varying
degrees.

Another well-known aspect of Jewish law is the Sabbath. The Sabbath (also called Shabbat) is a
weekly observance that runs from sundown on Friday through sundown on Saturday. During
Shabbat, observant Jews do not work or even engage in many common types of domestic labor.
Instead, the weekly observance is set apart from the regular routine and promotes rest and
contemplation. In many observant Jewish families, a visit to the synagogue for a Shabbat
service precedes a shared meal where they light candles and recite certain prayers. These
practices, though, raise the question of what counts as “work.” Some Jews consider work to
include even some of the most basic daily functions – such as driving or using any type of
electronic appliance – and thus these things are often forbidden. Other Jews take these more
as recommendations, not strict rules, and still others disregard these specific rules altogether.

Indeed, the debate over whether halakha must be interpreted literally and followed very
precisely has been a major factor distinguishing the various branches of Judaism from one
another. These debates relate to the larger question of whether Jews should assimilate to or
remain apart from the larger cultures in which they live. Some Jews argue that God commands
a very precise way of living, while others argue that God’s concern for the world is much more
flexible. However, even those communities that view the law as binding and specific have
developed certain practices to make modern life more convenient while still recognizing the
authority of the law. For example, observant Jews have used technology to help them maintain
their commitment to abstain from certain types of work on the Sabbath. For some, flipping an
electrical switch counts as work, since they understand initiating a spark of electricity as
something like starting a fire, which is specified as work in the Talmud. Therefore, Sabbath
elevators in some buildings automatically stop at every floor so that people can use the
elevator without having to push any buttons. Similarly, many modern kitchen appliances today
(such as ovens, stovetops, and refrigerators) have a Sabbath setting that allows the appliance to
maintain its most basic functions without the user having to use a switch for the appliance to
operate.

Many of the divisions that demarcate modern Judaism today emerged in 18-19th century
Europe, when questions about the degree to which Jews should assimilate with the larger
culture emerged in Jewish communities. These questions stemmed in great part from the
intellectual movement known as the Enlightenment, which started in the mid- 18th century. At
this time, many people began to question the relationship between religion, reason, and the
modern world. This way of thinking spread rapidly and led to many of the liberal democracies
that we know today, including their notion of a freedom of religion or conscience.
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The rationale behind the emergence of Reform Judaism in the 19th century was to present a
type of Judaism that adapted to an increasingly modernized life. The Reform movement views
halakha's importance as more historical, non-binding, and/or interpreted in ways compatible
with modern life. It is largely an American movement and is distinctive for its focus on gender
equity (ordaining female rabbis and embracing gender neutral language in ritual and textual
interpretation), in contrast to other movements which uphold strict gender norms that divide
men and women. Many in Reform congregations acknowledge the Torah as a product of
ancient history and use its lessons to create a more moral and just world today. As a result,
many Reform groups emphasize social justice issues as a way of expressing Jewish identity and
place far less importance on other identity markers such as kosher rules and strict Sabbath
observances, among others.

Image: Multi-racial Reform Jewish family with female rabbi

Source: https://urj.org/what-we-believe/what-is-reform-judaism

The branch of Judaism that often sees itself as practicing traditional Judaism is called Orthodox.
The Orthodox movement took shape in the 19th c., largely as a response to the emergence of
the Reform movement. The label “Orthodox,“ though, functions like an umbrella term,
encapsulating a wide array of opinions about precisely how one should live in a predominately
non-Jewish world. What unites the variety of Orthodox movements is the belief that strict
observation of halakha is a binding Jewish obligation, since the Torah and Talmud, in their view,
are divinely revealed authorities. Most Orthodox Jews describe their practices as following
halakha more literally and, thus, continuing ancient Judaism. These movements are associated
most frequently with distinctive types of dress, language, and gender role divisions, although
some Orthodox Jews – often called Modern Orthodox – may wear the dress of and live within
the broader culture.
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Despite this, the term Orthodox is most often associated with those groups who most clearly
move away from mainstream culture. For instance, the Haredim (sometimes also known as
“ultra-Orthodox”) live as separately as possible from others to avoid cultural influence from the
outside world, and adopt specific dress, food, and cultural practices, though these vary from
one Haredi community to another. The Haredim see themselves as the inheritors of the
rabbinic tradition of serious textual study. In the United States, for instance, some Haredi Jews
manage to separate from the broader society to such a degree that many know very little
English even though they were born in the U.S. One sub-set of Haredim, Hasidic Jews, express
this ultra-Orthodox identity in specific ways; they are often known for their distinctive dress,
including men’s black suits and hats. They place great importance in certain charismatic
leaders, called Rebbe (a term for rabbi), who are seen by many as having a direct connection to
God. These rebbe, therefore, speak with almost divine authority. In the U.S. and Israel, the
number of Jews who identify as Orthodox comprise a minority among Jews, though Orthodox
Judaism retains status as the official or legal Judaism of Israel.

A third movement has attempted to strike a middle ground between Orthodox and Reform
Judaisms. Called Conservative Judaism, this movement became institutionalized in the early
20th century. Many who align themselves with the Conservative movement hold two ideas in
tension: change is needed on occasion to keep halakha relevant in the modern world, yet
traditional Jewish practices are important. Simply put, they agreed that some loosening of the
rules was desirable but thought the Reform movement had taken things too far. Unlike the
Reform movement, those in the Conservative movement continued to see halakha as a binding
authority. For this reason, for example, many Conservative Jews still follow kosher dietary
practices and observe Shabbat and the Jewish holiday cycle even as they often embrace things
like gender equality. In the American context, in fact, Reform and Conservative congregations
often share many commonalities and frequently work together.

The fourth and final denomination of Judaism is called Reconstructionism, and it emerged as a
separate movement in the early 20th century. The movement’s founder, Rabbi Mordecai
Kaplan (1881-1983) rejected the idea that the Torah and Talmud were divinely inspired
documents but thought that they should still be taken seriously. Much like the Reform
movement, Reconstructionists tend to think of halakha not as a binding set of unchanging laws
but as an evolving combination of tradition and culture which they celebrate and explore as
both individuals and communities. In many Reconstructionist groups, they talk about God less
as a personal being and more as a concept aligned with self-knowledge and more progressive
political ideals of equity and justice. Reconstructionism emphasizes the rejuvenation of Jewish
life and culture by embracing certain traditional practices where the individual sees fit while
also encouraging much innovation in Jewish practice and ritual. This focus on freedom of
conscience means that individuals from the community, not just rabbis, may also have input
into what the tradition means and are free to interpret it for themselves, as well. Like Reform
Judaism, Reconstructionism tends to be politically progressive, supporting gender equity and
the LGBTQ community as well as many larger issues of social justice.
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There is no single, overarching authority that structures how all Jews live or even think about
the Jewish tradition. Nevertheless, the denominations of Judaism offer certain patterns of
living and approaches to Jewish identity. For situations where a question of halakha remains in
question, many contemporary websites and books on Judaism advise the reader to consult with
their individual rabbi, since the rabbi is viewed as the final arbiter of the matter. In this sense,
when a person converts to Judaism, the expectation is that that person will take on the customs
of the immediate Jewish community with which they identify.

Analysis of Judaism as a Modern Religious Institution


The above representation focuses on the institutional, theistic (a term that indicates a belief in
God) branches of Judaism; however, as we will shortly discuss, many communities that identify
as Jewish unite around a series of shared experiences that fall outside of institutional (not to
mention theistic) identities. So why is there often a focus on formal institutions? Once again,
this is one of the functions of the World Religions Paradigm (WRP), which presumes that the
best way to describe how religion works in the world is to focus on its formal branches and
theistic forms. As we’ve mentioned elsewhere in this text, our argument is not that this is a
false way to view religion. Rather, it is a limited view that can only describe certain types of
Jewish affiliation.

For instance, it is possible to describe some communities that identify as both religious and
Jewish as existing outside of the three classic theistic denominations. Consider the havurah
(meaning “fellowship” or “friend”) movement, which began in the late 1960s as an expression
of many counter-cultural sentiments popular in the U.S. at that time. Participants sought to
interject a revolutionary vibe into what many regarded as a stuffy, suburban Judaism that,
proponents claimed, needed to throw off hierarchical structures. Havurah groups – usually
quite small – formed that were independent from recognized Jewish groups, with the group’s
agenda (whether sharing prayer, meals, or simply socializing) determined by the members
themselves. Self-identifying havurah movements exist today, often marketing themselves as
non-denominational forms of Judaism that operate as highly participatory, democratic
structures. Some denominational institutions, though, have adopted certain haruvah practices,
such as the formation of small, interest-based social groups for members.

In some cases, Jewish communities have formed specifically because they left one of the three
branches mentioned above. One group, which sometimes calls itself ex-Orthodox or “Off the
Derech” (meaning “off the path,” often abbreviated as OTD) Jews, includes those who have left
Orthodox Jewish communities. While the rationale for leaving these communities varies among
those who identify as OTD Jews, many claim to have experienced abuse or mistreatment within
the community or describe a disconnect between the claims of Orthodox Judaism and the
rational mindset that is common in modern life today. For some OTD Jews, their Jewish identity
is reinforced when they affiliate with other, more progressive Jewish groups, such as Reform
Jews. However, because the life experiences of many OTD are so different from many Reform
Jews – including things like their past observation of halakha, knowledge of Hebrew, and
possible limited formal education, etc. -- they often don’t fit neatly within the norms of existing
groups.
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While the groups we’ve just mentioned identify as religiously Jewish (even if in somewhat non-
traditional ways), others consider themselves unaffiliated from traditional religion altogether.
The Jewish tradition has a significant history of those who identify both as Jews and either
atheists, secularists, or humanists. From the 19th c. forward, for instance, many European
Jewish intellectuals were influenced both by Enlightenment rationalist ideas promoting reason
as an intellectual guide and the pressures of assimilation that many Jews experienced as they
immigrated to predominantly non-Jewish cultures. While these influences were prominent in
the development of Reform and Reconstructionist forms of Judaism, as mentioned above, in
other cases groups developed who identified their Judaism as a cultural and/or ethical
orientation, not a religious one. These more secular ways of thinking have also been influential
in the emergence of movements that defined Judaism as centering on political activism that
reflects Jewish values of equality, fighting for the downtrodden, and the preservation of
Judaism’s future, in all of its forms. We will consider the impact of these movements later in
this chapter.

But undoubtedly, the Holocaust was one of the most catalyzing events of the 20th century. That
trauma forced many who identify as Jews to consider how to think about Jewish identity and
community in the aftermath of the genocide of nearly six million Jews. While some
traditionalist Jews argued that the failure of Jews to live up to God’s commandments was the
reason for the Holocaust, the majority of prominent Jewish figures (including famous thinkers
such as Elie Wiesel, Irving Greenberg, and Emil Fackenheim) strongly disagreed. Wiesel, for
example, went so far as to argue that God had failed the Jews. Fackenheim is now famous for
arguing that a new mitzvot should be added to the traditional 613 laid out in the Torah. This
614th mitzvot, he argued, would require Jews to preserve Judaism in all of its forms so as to
deny Hitler a posthumous victory. As this suggests, some see their participation in practices that
they associate with being Jewish as an act of remembrance of those who were killed, both
those known personally as family members and those unnamed. In this sense, the Holocaust
has provided another perspective through which many Jews think about their connection to
other Jews and their unity against anti-semitic acts. Many Jews argue that post-Holocaust
Judaism should be focused on Jews setting aside their differences and accepting other Jews
universally.

Those who associate Judaism with the major denominational branches are likely to be those
who find community within them, who think about religion in more organized, institutional
forms, or who view religion through the WRP lens. As the preceding examples demonstrate,
however, a substantial number of those who identify as Jews do not limit the significance or
symbols of their Jewish identity to institutional forms or their interpretation of halakha.
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Case Study: An Inclusive Mikvah Ritual

Source: jwa.org

A mikvah is a special type of bath that is part of ritual life for many who identify as Jews. People
participate in mikvah for a variety of reasons, but it is predominantly used by observant Jews as
a ritual that signals a type of transition from one symbolic state to another. For instance, it is
common for brides to partake in a mikvah before their weddings, and across many Jewish
groups (including even progressive groups, such as Reform Jews), a mikvah is part of the
conversion process. Many Jews engage in mikvah before major holidays as a statement of
purification in preparation for what are considered the holiest days of the year.

But by far, the most common use of mikvah is associated with married, cis-sexual Orthodox
Jewish women. Because menstrual blood is understood by many observant Jews as
contaminating and impure, women from these groups will often visit the mikvah monthly at a
set time after their period has ended. Engaging in the mikvah then renders them ritually pure
so that they can resume sexual relations with their partner.

In the past, some Jews critiqued the institution of mikvah as a ritual contributing to an overall
misogyny, which they considered inconsistent with the egalitarian values often discussed in
Jewish circles. Their concern, more directly, was that the natural function of many women’s
bodies should not be considered impure. Others, however, have worked to reinvent the mikvah
and use it for different purposes. Even though it is common to think of rituals as having some
sort of ancient or unchanging quality, like any other feature of social life, rituals can be changed
and adapted by the communities that create them.

In one case, the re-invention of mikvah provides a powerful example of how a renovated ritual
can be used to create a sense of community and belonging for historically disenfranchised
groups. Scholar S. J. Crasnow has studied the way that transgender Jews have used the mikvah
ritual as a means of recognizing their gendered experiences as well as affirming their Jewish
identity through re-working established ritual practices. While more traditional mikvah sites
may ban transgender Jews from engaging in the ritual altogether, others include them without
considering which aspects of the mikvah experience may feel isolating or unwelcoming. For
instance, the presence of a transphobic mikvah attendant (who oversees the ritual to ensure it
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is performed correctly) or the standard blessings that reinforce cis-centric, transphobic ideas
may marginalize transgender Jews who want to participate.

Certain mikvah sites, however, have openly embraced ritualistic innovation, employing newer
blessings that acknowledge the experience of trans Jews while still appealing to traditional
imagery and elements that they associate with Judaism. For instance, mikvah blessings that
accompany the ritual bath may assert that people of all bodies or genders are reflections of the
image of God or discuss transition and change as part of God's design for humans. Crasnow’s
research provides an excellent example of how people can use a traditional ritual in new and
innovative ways to create a sense of empowerment, acceptance, and community belonging.

Representation 3: Judaism as an ethnic identity


The fact that Jewish identity does not necessarily imply a certain type of religious commitment
means that other ways of thinking about Judaism have informed both self- and group-
identification. One of the most popular representations of Judaism for the past 150-200 years
has focused on ethnic (that is, cultural) aspects of Jewish identity.

The question of how to live out Jewish practices and values as a minority in countries with little
traditional Jewish infrastructure was a persistent issue for many observant Jews. Fleeing
persecution and economic hardship across the centuries, many Jews chose to shed those
aspects of their Jewish identity that caused them to stand out from the non-Jewish majority,
particularly in areas of food, dress, and lifestyle. In this way, in many Western countries
religious Jews could continue to practice Judaism within the confines of synagogues but
otherwise shed their cultural distinctiveness. This meant that, for many Jews, the experience of
immigration involved the privatization of their Jewish identities. For others who were not
attached to the religious aspects of Judaism, however, cultural practices such as food, language,
and holidays were vitally important to maintain, as they signified their identity as Jews, passed
down from one generation to another. Many of the following elements that comprise Jewish
cultural identity may be embraced by virtually anyone who identifies as Jewish, whether or not
they find religious significance in these practices.

The two largest ethnic groups comprising Jews today are Ashkenazi, who hail from
Germany/Eastern Europe, and Sephardi, who migrated from Spain/Portugal/North African
countries. Smaller groups are numerous, including Mizrahi Jews of Middle Eastern descent and
Ethiopian Jews, an identity that refers to their ancestry, not their current nationality, as most
Ethiopian Jews live in Israel today. From these regions many of the customs associated with
Judaism arose, including distinctive forms of dress, specific languages, and various food and
holiday practices. For instance, Yiddish, a mixture of Hebrew and German, was a common
language for many European Jews across the 18th and 19th century and still persists as an
important language for many Jews in the U.S., Europe, Russia, and Israel today. Yiddish
provided a common cultural or ethnic identity for Eastern European Jews who lived in many
different nations and who tended to see their Jewish identity as more important than their
national citizenship, which was regularly threatened by anti-Semitic persecution. Since Jews
continually lacked a homeland (until recently), having a common language in Yiddish provided
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an important shared cultural experience for those who trace their heritage to Eastern Europe.
Many Jews of this region, in fact, referred to their Jewish identity as “Yiddishkeit” (something
close to “Jewishness”), highlighting the powerful role Yiddish played in building social solidarity.

Certain foods are also considered Jewish by observers today, and an endless number of
cookbooks and websites discuss the very robust world of Jewish cooking and food. Throughout
the 19th century most European Jews kept kosher, but once many of them immigrated, it was
harder to maintain a kosher lifestyle. In this sense, maintaining the centrality of Jewish foods
themselves was important to group identity. Many of the most famous foods include braided
challah bread, gefilte fish, matzo ball soup, latke (potato pancakes) and bagels, all of which
continue to be associated with Judaism today. But one of the reasons why these foods are
considered Jewish is the role that they played in marking Jewish holidays, which constitute
another major folkway associated with Jewish life.

The Jewish holiday system follows a lunar calendar and celebrates religious narratives that
define identity-building moments in Jewish history. The Jewish calendar starts with Rosh
Hashanah, or the New Year, and is known for the sounding of the shofar, or ram’s horn. Apples
and honey are one popular dish eaten then, which symbolize the hopes for a sweet new year.
This is followed shortly by Yom Kippur (or Day of Atonement), a period of self-denial and
reconciliation with others who one may have harmed. Many Jews consider Yom Kippur to be
the holiest day of the year. Sukkot (also called the Feast of Booths) is a fall harvest festival that
remembers the 40 years that the Israelites wandered in the desert after being enslaved in
Egypt, before they reached the promised land of Canaan. In the winter, Hanukkah (the Feast of
Dedication) celebrates a Jewish rebellion against their oppressors. In this story, a Jewish family
called the Maccabees rededicated a temple defiled by their Greek colonizers and through a
miracle were able to keep a menorah lit for eight days when it contained only one day’s worth
of oil. The lighting of the menorah is used to commemorate this holiday, and the eating of fried
foods (such as latkes and jelly-filled donuts) symbolizes the miracle of the oil.

In late winter/early spring of the Jewish calendar, the holiday of Purim commemorates when
Queen Esther saved Jews from the wicked leader Haman. It is a time of costumes, celebration,
storytelling, and a special cookie – called hamantaschen – named after the villain of the story.
Next is Pesach, or Passover, which remembers the period of Egyptian slavery and liberation
under the leadership of Moses. The Passover seder, or ritual meal, features specific dishes
symbolic of the time in Egypt, including a dish of bitter herbs meant to remind the participant
of the bitterness of slavery. The holiday of Shavuot (sometimes also called the Feast of Weeks)
occurs seven weeks after Passover, and it commemorates the giving of the Torah to the Jewish
people. Dairy products are often featured during this time.
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Image (Passover seder plate)

Source: wikipedia.org

While there are other holidays that many Jews celebrate, this list recognizes the most
traditional holidays, although that does not mean that everyone who celebrates them is a
traditional or observant Jew. Many secular Jews celebrate some or all of these holidays as part
of their cultural affiliation with Judaism, even though their interpretation of the holidays may
be different than that of their religious counterparts. The same is true of many of the life cycle
rituals that many Jews recognize. Jewish parents often welcome the birth of a baby boy with a
brit milah, a ceremony where young boys are circumcised and named. Traditionally, these
ceremonies occurred only for boys. But with increasingly innovative forms of Judaism
becoming mainstream, a newer tradition provides a similar ceremony for girls, called a brit bat,
in many groups.

Upon reaching adolescence, a similar configuration of rituals occurs as young Jewish people
demonstrate their commitment to the Jewish community. The bar mitzvah (which literally
means “son of the commandment”) is a coming-of-age ceremony, celebrated at adulthood (for
boys, at age 13). The boy reaching adulthood recites a series of blessings in Hebrew and
provides commentary on the passages he has just recited. The boy (also called a bar mitzvah)
prepares extensively for this event, after which he is considered an adult. As with the brit bat, a
parallel ceremony for girls has developed, called the bat mitzvah (“daughter of the
commandment”), and is often performed at age 12. There is not a series of established
expectations for a girl’s bat mitzvah in the same way that there is for a boy’s bar mitzvah.
Nevertheless, for many progressive groups today the format is similar.
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In terms of clothing, most Jews around the world simply dress in a style that is consistent with
their larger culture. But for more conservative Jewish groups, dress signals an observance of the
law. There are many different types of dress that some Jews wear as a sign of their affiliation
with their community or their understanding of Biblical commandments. The garb of various
types of Orthodox Jews is usually the most distinctive. Orthodox men, for instance, are often
known for wearing black suits and hats; Hasidic men, in particular, sometimes wear a tall,
round, brimless hat made of fur called a shtreimel. It is also common for many Orthodox men
to wear payot, or long sidelocks of hair that are often curled. This uncut lock is based on a
commandment from the Torah (Leviticus 19:27) that specifically prohibits cutting this section of
hair. Orthodox communities, though, have different rules and expectations for specifically how
one’s payot are to be displayed. For women in more observant communities, it is not only
standard to wear clothing that fully covers their bodies, but it is also common to cover their hair
after they are married, although the nature of the covering (a scarf, hat, or wig, for instance)
varies depending on the customs of the community.

Image: payot, yarmulke, shtreimel

Source: https://www.brooklynunpluggedtours.com/why-do-hasidic-jewish-men-have-curls-
orthodox

It is not only observant Jews who wear distinctive dress on certain occasions. Jewish men from
most communities will wear a kippah (the traditional skullcap-style head covering, also called a
yarmulke) when they are attending a synagogue service or during holiday celebrations. In
some progressive groups, women wear them, as well. Similarly, the prayer shawl, or tallit, is
commonly worn by Jewish men during prayer, although in recent years women have begun to
wear them in some groups as they pray. It is now common in certain circles to gift a bat mitzvah
her own tallit.
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Efforts to preserve language, foods, holidays, dress, and other rituals demonstrate the
significance of how shared life experiences can shape a group’s experience and perception of
themselves as a community. Of course, there is no single way that all Jews speak, eat, or dress.
Regardless, these modes of ethnic identity have had a substantial impact on the way that
Judaism is understood in a larger cultural context.

Analysis of Judaism as an ethnic identity


Many people who identify as Jewish may especially relate to this representation since, as earlier
mentioned, a large proportion of Jews in the world today regard themselves as secular or
atheists. While there is no single way that a secular-identifying Jew might think about or
practice these various cultural elements, the way one conforms to many of the norms of the
Jewish tradition – whether interpreted as religious or not -- is often through shared practices
rather than shared doctrines or beliefs. In this way, many secular Jews may still engage in
specific rituals or norms for various reasons. They may have emotional attachments to the
practices, they may want to show their pride in their Jewish heritage by participating, or they
may view the practices as important family traditions, all without seeing the practices as
commanded by a divine being. Thus, even though the representation above may highlight
certain religious aspects of Jewish cultural identity (such as the supernaturally-involved stories
behind many of the holidays), this does not mean that all or even most Jews necessarily
interpret those stories in a literal or even supernatural way.

Another issue with the previous representation is the specific cultures that the representation
places at center-stage in discussions of Jewish ethnic identity. The version of Jewish culture
demonstrated above highlights a largely Eurocentric (that is, European-centered)
conceptualization, and it remains the prominent image of Jews held by many Westerners.
However, looking at Jewish identity through this lens alone provides only a limited view that
hides many of the biases that go on both outside of and within Jewish communities.

One such major bias today that occurs both within and outside of Jewish communities is
Ashkenormativity. This label describes a type of privilege that regards the cultural practices and
experiences of Ashkenazi Jews (that is, those descended from the Jewish populations of Central
and Western Europe) as the default or normative Jewish experience. Consider that the
descriptions of traditional Jewish dress and many of the foods described above reflect the
cultural forms of mainly Ashkenazi Jews. Focusing only on Ashkenazi culture overlooks the
substantial cultures in North African, Middle Eastern, Indian, and Iberian regions that also
identify as Jewish. For instance, the clothing ideals of Hasidic Jews that they often regard as
“unchanging tradition” are actually traceable to particular European styles from the eighteenth
century. Classifying this simply as “tradition” hides the historical context in which the style
emerged, which was not the period of Abraham or the Talmud. When it comes to food, the
cuisine prepared by many Sephardic Jews (descended from Spain, Portugal, and North Africa)
reflect those cultural contexts and became influential in the development of the Spanish “mini-
plates” known today as tapas. Sopapillas (fried bread puffs often filled with honey) remain a
common Sephardic Hanukkah treat, in contrast to the Ashkenazi tradition of eating donuts.
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Similarly, the Indian Jewish community traditionally eats onion pakora (a deep-fried, battered
vegetable fritter) in its Hanukkah celebrations.

Moreover, much attention has been given to Yiddish as “the” Jewish language, but it is not
universally spoken by most people who identify as Jews. Nor is Hebrew (the language of the
Torah) universally known by all Jews. In many communities it is understood as a more academic
language, except in Israel, where modern Hebrew is the nation’s official language. Most Jews
simply speak the language of the culture in which they reside. It is also important to point out
that other mixed languages like Yiddish have been developed by specific Jewish communities.
Ladino is a composite language of some Sephardic Jews, and Jewish Malayalam is a similar
language that some Jews in southern India use. Language, as mentioned above, is a
tremendously important means of self- and group-identification, leading various Jewish groups
to debate whose language is seen as acceptable.

For example, people who identify as Mizrahi Jews often speak Arabic, which is somewhat
predictable since they trace their heritage to the Middle East. As a result, though, the
government of Israel’s decision to remove Arabic as an official language in 2018 generated
significant, ongoing controversy. This legal action occurred, in part, because the Israeli
government wanted to reinforce the Jewish nature of the state, which they identified with the
Hebrew language (a presumption of the Ashkenazi elite). By extension, this move also
downplayed the rights that Palestinians (often non-Jewish residents of the same land, who
disproportionately speak Arabic) had to claim the land and culture as their own. But in so doing,
many Mizrahi Jews argued that the government decision revealed the manner in which anyone
who wasn’t Ashkenazi held second-class status.

A closely related conversation to the focus on ethnicity centers on race. It is important to point
out that the terms race and ethnicity are not synonymous, but they co-exist in overlapping
ways. In this context, race refers to certain human biological features that various societies use
to organize people into different groups and lend meaning to human social interactions;
ethnicity refers to human cultural practices that do the same. Scholars who study race and
ethnicity often remark that both concepts are constructed, which means that they do not refer
to a stable biological or social reality. Rather, they are categories that people have used to label
each other to promote specific social agendas. Moreover, the use of these categories also
changes as human interests change. For example, in the U.S., people who identified as Jews
(including those of European heritage) were not classified as “white” until fairly recently. These
distinctions are particularly important to remember in terms of modern Jewish history, as Hitler
(falsely) claimed that all Jews shared common biological features which he believed were
inferior to that of the non-Jewish European populace.

The conflicts over whether and how to think about Jewish race and ethnicity take on another
dimension when we consider that many Jews of color are often marginalized or experience
discrimination due, again, to Ashkenormativity and the often-racial dimensions that accompany
it. For instance, Black Ethiopian Jews have recently undertaken public activism in Israel to
highlight the ways in which they experience racial discrimination; often this has occurred at the
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hands of their white Jewish counterparts. Black Jews have also been subject to police brutality
in ways largely not experienced by the white Jewish population. The Mizrahi Jews mentioned
earlier have also been the targets of similar types of discrimination. In general, the socio-
economic outcomes of both of these groups in Israel are markedly worse than of those
identified as Ashkenazi, which indicates the ways in which Ashkenazi identity is seen as ideal.
Similarly, American Jews of color often report that they hold second-class status in American
Jewish communities.

Image: Black Ethiopian Jews protest police brutality in Israel

Source: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2015/5/19/ethiopian-jews-hold-protest-in-tel-aviv-
against-racism

This representation of Judaism as an ethnic identity particularly resonates with those Jews who
do not hold any particular religious commitments but who may nevertheless think about their
Judaism through a more cultural lens. At the same time, the ethnic dimensions of Judaism are a
core part of Jewish identity for religious Jews, as well. What is important for us to note is that
the major narratives defining this representation have tended to normalize one particular
Jewish ethnic group’s practices, the Ashkenazi, and therefore to center the experiences of
European Jews. This analysis raises the question of how one gauges “legitimate” Jewish
identity, but we must remember that that question is an insider’s debate without an objective
answer. As functionalists, we focus primarily on the fact that, from a social perspective,
legitimacy is a shifting target. Who meets it at any given point in time is a direct reflection of
which groups control the social narrative or representation at hand, and what purpose are they
using it to fulfill.
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Case Study: Jewish wig industry and social media


In many groups that identify with Orthodox Judaism, women customarily cover their hair after
they get married. The rationale for this comes from biblical passages that describe a covered
head as the norm for righteous women. Some rabbis argue that marriage is the time when a
woman should start covering her hair because hair is understood as part of her sexual allure.
Therefore, once she is married, showing her hair to anyone but her husband is ervah, or
nakedness. For many observant women there are multiple choices on how to carry out this
commandment. Although the standard hair covering for women varies (including anything
from a hat, scarf, or turban), many women whom we identify as Ashkenazi choose a wig, also
called a sheitel, that they wear over their natural hair.

The question of how one’s wig should look has created considerable controversy in many
Orthodox groups. An entire league of Orthodox social media influencers (mainly on Instagram)
have successfully changed the way that many women, both within and outside of Orthodox
Jewish communities, think about wigs. In past decades, the longstanding stereotype of an
Orthodox woman’s sheitel has been a boxy, dark, unnatural looking wig; some rabbis advocate
this look so that it is clear that one is not displaying their natural hair and therefore is properly
modest. But the wig industry has changed its production and marketing for a number of
reasons outside of Jewish influences. For instance, more celebrities are using wigs, and perhaps
as a result, a larger portion of the general public is in the market for a wig, whether due to
health-related hair loss or simply aesthetic reasons.

As a result, many younger women who identify as Orthodox and were raised in the age of
Instagram are demanding wigs that not only look like their natural hair but that also reflect the
latest hairstyles and colors worn by their non-Orthodox counterparts, including everything from
highlights to messy buns to ponytails with a natural swing. There are even websites where one
can rate one’s wig as a way to let others know about the quality and consumer experience,
which makes sense as wigs come at a considerable price; high quality wigs often cost several
thousand dollars (USD).

As more choices have made it possible to buy a more specialized wig, the way that many
Orthodox women discuss their wigs has also shifted. In addition to meeting the demands of
their communities, many contemporary Orthodox women describe their wigs as a means of
self-expression not to mention ease, since wigs make it possible to never have a “bad hair day.”
But this has also led to critique from certain corners of the observant Jewish community, where
some ultra-Orthodox rabbis argue that if wigs look too real, too stylish, or are too long, then
they don’t perform their intended function (that is, modesty). Many Orthodox influencers have
responded that beauty and modesty are two different things and have used their platform to
push against these interpretations. Some influencers and sheitelmachers (wig-makers) even
argue that highly fashionable wigs encourage more Jewish women to become Orthodox.
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Image: Zelda Hair local news coverage

Source: https://bronx.news12.com/brooklyn-wig-shop-provides-women-a-fashionable-way-to-
express-themselves-40233212

The wig industry, as displayed through the lives of female Orthodox influencers, offers a great
example of the tensions between ethnic distinction and social conformity. Social media has
heightened this tension by marketing more fashion-forward wigs at the same time that it has
given observant women a highly public venue to display how they conform to the aesthetic
norms of their communities. As discussed in the above representations, many who identify as
Jews across time have attempted to maintain a balance between these two positions.

Representation 4: Judaism as a means of cultural impact


It is commonly said that, while Judaism is the smallest of the world’s most prominent religions,
it is also one of the most culturally influential. In some cases, speakers who say this are really
emphasizing the political weight of Christians and Muslims (two of the largest religious groups
today), since both of these groups usually trace the origins of their religious traditions to God’s
relationship with the Jews. Nevertheless, Jews have had a tremendous impact on Western and
world cultures for a wide variety of reasons outside of being the origin point for other religious
groups. To understand certain elements of Jewish cultural impact, however, we also need to
recognize the power of anti-Jewish prejudices that have existed since virtually the beginning of
recorded history and the ways Jews have responded to these types of persecution. Beyond
discussing this history of prejudice, this section will address some of the most well-known ways
that Jews have impacted the cultures in which they have lived, including their political activism
regarding the state of Israel, their work to combat anti-Semitism (including the role of the
Holocaust) and to promote civil rights more broadly, and their impact on Western popular and
intellectual cultures.

The story of Jewish oppression is extremely old. When Jews lived under Roman rule in the early
centuries of the common era in Palestine (an older name for the region that today includes the
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country of Israel), they generally experienced some level of state tolerance. That ended when
the Roman empire became officially Christian in the late 4th century. By this time, several major
Christian thinkers had begun to promote the idea that the Bible portrayed the Jews as
responsible for the death of Jesus. This created a situation where varying degrees of hostility
towards Jews became the norm. For instance, during the Middle Ages, Jews were often seen as
an enemy to Christianity and were killed, forced to convert, rounded up into ghettos, and
denied legal status afforded to other citizens. Ideas like blood libel abounded; this is the false
claim that Jews murdered Christian children in order to use their blood for religious rituals. The
Spanish Inquisition of the late 15th century was one of various events where rulers espousing
Christianity forcibly converted, tortured, and killed those identified by authorities as Jews. Jews
were formally expelled from Spain in 1492.

Christians continued to use the death of Jesus to justify their animosity towards Jews, and some
Christians thought that the superiority of Christianity meant that Christians would replace Jews
as God’s “chosen people,” a theory inspired by Catholic theologian St. Augustine. They thus
explained away Jewish persecution by arguing that Jews were supposed to suffer to show
others the superiority of Christianity, an approach called the negative witness model. As Jews
repeatedly experienced these forms of discrimination across the centuries, they fled or were
forced from one land to another. Eventually, the largest concentrations of Jews before World
War II resided in the region we know today as Europe. Thus immigration and cultural
assimilation have long been a part of Jewish life, and Jews have often played a substantial role
in activist movements designed to fight the types of social oppression that impacted them as
well as the members of other groups.

One noteworthy example is the emergence of Jewish socialism. Socialism refers to a system of
labor production where a group of workers own and control the resources and goods
produced; the goal of such a system is to promote equality and fairness rather than concentrate
wealth or power in the hands of any one individual. The cultural context of 18th century Europe
that gave root to this movement included both the Enlightenment and French Revolution,
which together promoted the questioning of authority (particularly of the powerful and/or
wealthy), the use of reason and rationality, and the notion of basic human rights. It was not
until the 19th century, however, that Jewish socialism was born. Jews who supported socialist
movements were often living in mainstream society and were secular-educated. The socialist
movement promised not just a working environment but also a society where one’s race or
ethnicity would be inconsequential since all people would have equal status.

What was particularly Jewish about Jewish socialism is a question with many answers. Scholars
often point to several ways of thinking about socialism that connect with elements of Jewish
thought. Some argue that the messianic impulse behind some Jewish philosophy – where a
savior figure establishes a utopian society – was one important factor in Jewish support for this
movement. Jewish ethical ideals promoting fairness and equality also potentially positioned
many Jews for involvement. But one certain factor was simply that Jews had a long history of
experiencing discrimination due to both their religion and ethnic identity, and some argue that
this alone is likely the most powerful factor influencing many to join this movement.
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Similar sentiments were behind the rise of Zionism, the name given to a movement promoting
the creation of a homeland for Jews. While the term can be used quite generally to refer to
Jewish self-determination, since the 19th century it mainly has referred to the establishment of
a specific geographic state where Jews would have majority status and thereby escape the cycle
of persecution. Conversations about the establishment of a homeland have gone on for
centuries, but the modern Zionist movement is often associated with political activist Theodor
Herzl (1860-1904), who imagined a place where Jews could live free of harassment. Members
of the Zionist movement often alluded to biblical stories of a return to Canaan and the
exile/return cycle of the Bible in their campaigns to realize their utopian vision. Despite these
religious allusions, for most activists this was a secular movement that offered Jews a way to
recognize and live out their Jewish identities without having to hold any formal religious
commitments.

Zionism did not receive overwhelming support from Jewish communities, however, until the
genocide of Jews in the Holocaust during World War II. Although we’ve alluded to the
Holocaust several times in this chapter, a brief overview of historical events is warranted. Led
by Adolf Hitler in 1939, Germany entered World War II under the guise of attempting to expand
territory for living space for the German people. Hitler’s plan presumed that the German
people were both physically and culturally superior – a “master race” -- when compared to
many of the citizens of Central and Eastern Europe, whom he planned to kill or deport to other
lands. The period after World War I had been a disaster for Germany. Nevertheless, Hitler was
able to rally support for Germany’s expansion by deflecting attention away from its political
leaders’ own earlier failings and onto the Jews. Among other allegations, Hitler claimed that
Jews had financially hijacked the nation. Influenced by stories like this, the Nazi regime
stripped Jews of their citizenship and legalized their murder. Nearly a third of the world’s Jews
died in the Holocaust (including two-thirds of those who lived in Europe).

The Holocaust accelerated the realization of a Jewish homeland. In response to the Jewish
genocide, in 1948 the United Nations created the state of Israel using part of the region of
Palestine (which the Jews also identified as their ancestral home of Canaan, or Zion). The
arrangement was that the land would be divided in two, with Jews retaining control over one
portion (called Israel) and Arab Palestinians (predominantly but not exclusively Muslim)
controlling the other. The Palestinians rejected this plan that took a portion of their land, and a
war began that resulted in an Israeli victory. Another extremely significant conflict broke out in
1967, called The Six Day War, which resulted in another Israeli victory and control over not just
Jerusalem, but the Western Wall (the remnant of the temple destroyed by the Romans in 70
CE), and a mosque that is extremely important to most Muslims. The Israelis also forcibly took
control over land that had previously been set aside for Palestinians in the original arrangement
creating Israel, and in kind, the Palestinian forces retaliated with violence. These were not the
only conflicts in this era, but they were among the most significant.

This is but a thumbnail sketch of the events behind the tremendous tensions that exist today
concerning what is often called the Middle East crisis. It is fair to say that many conflicts
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emanating from that region have some connection back to ill-will over the Israel/Palestine
divide. Many predominately Muslim countries in the region continue to think that the creation
of Israel was deeply unjust because it involved taking the country of Palestine from its
inhabitants and giving it to another group of people. They often understand this as a form of
religious discrimination and Western imperialism designed to weaken Islam. On the other hand,
many Jews see the formation of the state of Israel as one of the only ways they can experience
life without anti-Semitism in a land that they believe was given to them by God. The Holocaust
was decisive proof that Jews were not safe, even in the modern age.

Beyond Zionism, many Jewish organizations have also been at the forefront of fighting
discrimination for other minority populations whose civil rights have been threatened as well as
for Jews. One of the most well-known organizations is the Anti-Defamation League (or ADL).
The ADL began in the early 20th century in the midst of intense anti-Semitic tensions in
American society, which compounded the anti-immigrant discrimination that most American
Jews also experienced. The ADL provides legal and educational programming to fight anti-
Semitism and promotes Holocaust-related education. However, like many Jewish social justice
organizations today, the ADL is committed to platforms such as women’s and LGBTQ+ rights
and working against racism as well as religious and political extremism. While many Orthodox
Jews tend to be more politically conservative, most others (and specifically Jews who live in the
West) tend to support more liberal political and social causes, in great part because of their
own experiences with discrimination and minority status. Many American Jews, in general,
tend to identify involvement with social justice issues as a key feature of their Jewish identity.
In this way, the concerns over equity and fairness that characterized many Jewish movements
of a century ago are still present today.

Finally, we would be remiss if we did not mention the tremendous impact that Jews as
individuals have had in shaping many aspects of Western cultures. While there is not space to
give this topic thorough attention, a few of the following names may suggest a sense of their
popular and intellectual impact. For instance, Albert Einstein and Sigmund Freud are hardly the
only Jewish figures associated with the development of the sciences, for over one-fifth of the
Nobel Prizes in science have been awarded to people who identify as Jews since the 20th
century. Jews also began the major motion picture studios (including Universal, Paramount,
and Metro Goldwyn Mayer) that contributed to the development of Hollywood as we know it
today. Some of the most important women’s and human’s rights advocates have also been
Jews, including Emma Goldman, a radical political thinker in the early 20th century, politician
Bella Abzug, writer and activist Betty Friedan, and U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader
Ginsburg. A large number of the world’s most important philosophers and thinkers have also
identified as Jewish, including Theodor Adorno, Hannah Arendt, Walter Benjamin, and more
contemporarily Judith Butler, Noam Chomsky, and Peter Singer, to name a few.
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Image: Ruth Bader Ginsburg

Source:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Bader_Ginsburg#/media/File:Ruth_Bader_Ginsburg_2016_
portrait.jpg

It is quite clear, then, that even in the face of countless moments of discrimination, Jews have
been very influential in shaping major currents of Western culture across virtually every realm
of social life.

Analysis of Judaism as a means of cultural impact


This particular representation of Judaism can be used in a number of different, and possibly
conflicting, ways. While the representation above emphasizes how many who identify as Jews
have defended human rights, preserved their identities, and positively affected their societies,
virtually all of the examples of Jewish cultural impact cited above have been used by anti-
Semitic groups to delegitimize and harm people whom they identify as Jews.

For example, one longstanding (and false) anti-Semitic claim is that Jews secretly control many
world governments and political movements and thus are more powerful than they appear to
be. This was invoked in response to both Jewish socialism and Zionism and is still present today
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in many forms. Another conspiracy theory is known as Holocaust denial. Proponents falsely
assert that either the Holocaust did not happen or Jews exaggerate its death toll for their own
gain. One argument is that the Holocaust was a hoax perpetuated by Jews to secure power over
Israel. Still another such theory, even more commonly heard today, is that Jews control all of
Hollywood and American media and thus have the power to effectively brainwash large
portions of the global population. While we don’t typically focus on conspiracy theories and
other falsehoods in this analysis section, it is important that we address such phenomena as we
analyze the ways people put religion to use. Much like Nazi propaganda, these conspiracy
theories function to blame Jews and Jewish religion for whatever societal problem the
conspiracist wants to explain away.

While the above representation is generally positive towards the many communities that
identify as Jewish, it also has its own distortions. It generalizes that all Jews agree about the
status of the state of Israel as the official Jewish homeland. Although Jews as a whole disagree
about the political destiny of Israel, virtually all agree that Jews should experience self-
determination and a life free of discrimination. Some Jews think that critiquing the Israeli
government’s treatment of the Palestinians is itself an anti-Semitic act and that the entirety of
the land should be under Jewish control, while others support the self-determination of both
Palestinians and Jews. But in some cases, groups of Jews disagree with the idea of Zionism
altogether. One of the most radical examples of this are the Neturei Karta, an ultra-Orthodox,
anti-Zionist Israeli group (also present in the US) that claims that only God can establish the
state of Israel through the messiah. Therefore, they view the establishment of the modern state
of Israel as a form of blasphemy. While some Orthodox Jews share aspects of this position, the
Neturei Karta are unusual, as they have openly supported the positions of anti-Zionist countries
(such as Iran). Most pointedly, the Neturei Karta have argued that Jews who support the Zionist
movement have profited off of the Holocaust for their own gain; ironically, this idea is very
close to the false theory of holocaust denial often supported by anti-Semitic and neo-Nazi
groups.

Members of the Neturei Karta are considered so extremist that their positions are debunked by
the ADL (mentioned above). As functionalists, this is a particularly interesting situation to
analyze. On the one hand, the post-Holocaust conceptualization of Judaism has caused many
Jews to stand firm by the idea that they must embrace all other people who identify as Jews,
and thus at least acknowledge this group. On the other hand, the Neturei Karta are so outside
of the mainstream (and openly align themselves with groups that many Jews regard as the
enemy) that this causes tremendous conflict in Jewish circles regarding exactly who can and
should be called a Jew.

The Neturei Karta also pushes us to consider the rationale and interests of other Jewish groups
who question Zionism. For many decades after the Holocaust, Zionism was simply seen as the
common-sense position of most mainstream Jews. But some groups of younger Jews, in
particular, have begun to question the treatment of the Palestinians by the Israeli government.
They identify the treatment of Palestinians as a form of discrimination inconsistent with values
that they identify as Jewish. Younger Jews also tend to be involved in other forms of activism
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that their elders have been less likely to embrace, such as environmentalism, trans rights, and
critiques of Ashkenormativity and the racism that often accompanies those perspectives.

Debates like this display how many contemporary individuals who identify with Judaism think
about their social engagement and fight for political and social justice. The changing nature of
this activism reflects the changing nature of society. Together these things show us how ideas
about Jewish identity and Jewish values can be used to accomplish a wide variety of social
outcomes.

Case Study: Jewish Humor


We can discover a lot of things about a culture by looking at the types of humor that it creates
as well as how and when it uses that humor. Jewish humor tends to have certain traits that
directly reflect many of the experiences of Jews and Jewish immigrants. Cultural observers
often note that Jewish humor is strongly influenced by the experiences of anti-semitism, the
Holocaust, and social marginalization more generally. This includes the continuing legacy of
discrimination that European and other Jews experienced across the 19th and 20th centuries.
Living daily with stereotypes that rendered them inferior, dangerous, and unpatriotic has
informed their cultural ideas and self-perceptions.

Many Jewish comedians dealt with this mistreatment by honing in on these differences and
poking fun at themselves, resulting in the self-deprecating tenor of much Jewish comedy today.
For instance, the hit American TV Show The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel is centered on the life of an
American Jewish stand-up comedian (played by actress Rachel Brosnahan). In the show, Maisel
not only uses jokes making fun of Jews in her comedy scripts, but the series itself draws upon
various stereotypes, such as the greedy Jewish entrepreneur (played by Jewish comedian Kevin
Pollak) and the nagging Jewish mother (played by Jewish American actress Caroline Aaron).
Jewish humor also includes a steady stream of comedy about the distinctives of Jewish culture,
turning the experience of difference and marginalization on its ear. In the 1960s, American
Jewish comedian Lenny Bruce was famous for a comedy sketch called “Jewish vs. Goyish,”
where he compared cultural practices that he identified as Jewish with those of non-Jews (or
“goys,” which today is considered a slur in certain contexts). While he used this humorous
exaggeration to talk about things like food and lifestyle (calling pumpernickel bread “Jewish”
and white bread “goyish,”), he also applied this in ways that defied traditional labeling: “If you
live in New York or any other big city, you are Jewish. It doesn’t matter even if you’re Catholic;
if you live in New York, you’re Jewish. If you live in Butte, Montana, you’re going to be goyish
even if you’re Jewish.”

As an important form of social critique, Jewish comedy has also specialized in confronting
horrific and controversial issues, including the Holocaust. One of American Jewish comedian
Mel Brooks’s most famous films, The Producers (1967), is about a corrupt Broadway producer
who creates a musical praising Adolf Hitler (which features dancing SS guards). More recently,
Jewish German comedian Shahak Shapira highlighted increasingly anti-semitic and far-right
activism in Germany in a project called Yolocaust. Shapira analyzes (and shames) the practice of
tourists taking selfies at Holocaust sites like Auschwitz, among other tourist acts (“Did you know
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Auschwitz has 4.5 stars on TripAdvisor?”). Comedy has also been an important outlet for
political change, as in the case of Israeli comedienne Noam Shuster-Eliassi. Shuster-Eliassi has
used her background as a Jewish peacekeeping activist to fight for equality for Palestinians in
Israeli society. To accomplish this, she often makes jokes about how she is single as an inroad
to discuss her activism: “You know, I care about the political causes, but I’m 31 and single, so, I
go to the demonstrations mainly to look for a date.”

Many of the famous names in Hollywood comedy across the 20th century were Jews, including
the Marx Brothers, George Burns, Sid Caesar, Rodney Dangerfield, Joan Rivers, Gilda Radner,
and Billy Crystal. Whether their Jewish identity played a prominent role in their humor was very
individualized, however. Since the 1990s, scriptwriters have been including more Jewish
characters into their work in ways that acknowledge their Judaism but do not turn them into
caricatures. Jewish humorists such as Americans Larry David, Jerry Seinfeld, Sarah Silverman,
and Jon Stewart, alongside Canadians Eugene and Daniel Levy, are examples of highly popular
figures who have produced work that includes a more subtle, yet consistent, thread of humor
that we can identify as Jewish.

This does not mean, however, that Jewish comedy has ceased to be controversial. British
comedian Sasha Baron Cohen, for instance, has developed the fictional character of Borat,
whom he has played in a variety of media (including feature length films). Borat is depicted as a
journalist from Kazakhstan and the humor generated by the character comes from the fact that
he holds a number of deeply offensive viewpoints (including vocal anti-semitism). In one
noteworthy portrayal, Borat sings a very anti-Semitic song in a bar in Arizona in front of a live
audience of non-actors who, we are led to believe, do not know that he is acting. He
encourages the patrons gathered there to sing the clearly offensive lyrics with him and they do
so without hesitation. While there is debate over whether the patrons understood that the
performance was satire, it was sufficiently controversial to cause various groups to critique
Cohen. They were concerned that his brand of satire could actually cause more harm than
good. For his part, Cohen has responded that no matter the degree of knowledge the audience
had, their willingness to sing along shows how prejudices and hatred are often perpetuated not
just by powerful figures, but by average people who choose inaction.

Conclusion
The various representations of Judaism presented in this chapter demonstrate not just the lack
of a single thing called “Judaism” but, more to the point, the degree to which WRP stereotypes
oversimplify how religious claims change and operate across time. Judaism is an excellent case
study in the inadequacies of the WRP, as people who identify as Jews themselves often push
against the notion that to be Jewish involves texts, doctrines, or statements about a
supernatural essence or being. Popular attitudes about religion also presume that it is
something clearly separate from politics. Yet Jewish communities have provided considerable
evidence of the inseparability of culture, politics, and religion, since the changing cultural
experiences of many who identify as Jews directly inform both their political and religious
responses. The growing presence of Jews who are critical of the Israeli government's treatment
of Palestinians reveals how concepts like “Jewish values” can be reworked in different cultural
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contexts for different social ends. In short, those who identify with Judaism as a movement
have shown how they can use its concepts in infinitely creative ways.

Discussion Questions
1. Many Jews identify as ethnically Jewish but not religiously Jewish. With this in mind,
respond to the argument that it is possible to fully separate ethnic and religious
identities. Do you believe this is possible? Provide evidence from this chapter.
2. How has anti-semitism shaped Jewish identity across time? Identify at least two
examples from this chapter.
3. What conclusions can we draw from the four case studies in this chapter about how
various interpretations of Judaism have changed in the face of larger cultural changes?
4. How is Ashkenormavitity similar to some of the power dynamics in the culture where
you live? How is it different?

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