Judas Iscariot and the Myth of Jewish Evil

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Thousands of young Jews resisted by escaping from the ghettos into the forests. There they joined Soviet partisan units or formed separate partisan units to harass the German occupiers. Jacobs, Joseph; Broydé, Isaac (1906). "Microcosm". In Singer, Isidore; Funk, Isaac K.; Vizetelly, Frank H. (eds.). Jewish Encyclopedia. Vol.8. New York: Funk & Wagnalls. pp.544–545. Kraemer, Joel (2007). "Microcosm". In Berenbaum, Michael; Skolnik, Fred (eds.). Encyclopaedia Judaica. Vol.14 (2nded.). Detroit: Macmillan Reference. pp.178–179. ISBN 978-0-02-866097-4. Hoter ben Shlomo was a scholar and philosopher in Yemen heavily influenced by Nethanel ben al-Fayyumi, Maimonides, Saadia Gaon and al-Ghazali. The connection between the "Epistle of the Brethren of Purity" and Ismailism suggests the adoption of this work as one of the main sources of what would become known as "Jewish Ismailism" as found in Late Medieval Yemenite Judaism. "Jewish Ismailism" consisted of adapting, to Judaism, a few Ismaili doctrines about cosmology, prophecy, and hermeneutics. There are many examples of the Brethren of Purity influencing Yemenite Jewish philosophers and authors in the period 1150–1550. [33] Some traces of Brethren of Purity doctrines, as well as of their numerology, are found in two Yemenite philosophical midrashim written in 1420–1430: Midrash ha-hefez ("The Glad Learning") by Zerahyah ha-Rofé (a/k/a Yahya al-Tabib) and the Siraj al-'uqul ("Lamp of Intellects") by Hoter ben Solomon. In the 13th century, however, a mystical-esoteric system emerged which became known as "the Kabbalah". Many of the beliefs associated with Kabbalah had long been rejected by philosophers. Saadia Gaon had taught in his book Emunot v'Deot that Jews who believe in gilgul have adopted a non-Jewish belief. Maimonides rejected many texts of Heichalot, particularly Shi'ur Qomah whose anthropomorphic vision of God he considered heretical.

I don’t consider Israel an apartheid state. But its ethnic nationalism excludes many of the people under its control. Stephens notes that Israel contains almost 9 million citizens. What he doesn’t mention is that Israel also contains close to 5 million non-citizens: Palestinians who live under Israeli control in the West Bank and Gaza (yes, Israel still controls Gaza) without basic rights in the state that dominates their lives. It is an understandable impulse: let the people threatened by antisemitism define antisemitism. The problem is that, in many countries, Jewish leaders serve both as defenders of local Jewish interests and defenders of the Israeli government. And the Israeli government wants to define anti-Zionism as bigotry because doing so helps Israel kill the two-state solution with impunity. Noam Zion, Elu v'Elu: Two Schools of Halakha Face Off On Issues of Human Autonomy, Majority Rule and Divine Voice of Authority, p. 8

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Can one question their proposals? Of course. Are they antisemites? Of course not. To be sure, some anti-Zionists really are antisemites: David Duke, Louis Farrakhan and the authors of the 1988 Hamas Covenant certainly qualify. So do the thugs from France’s yellow vest movement who called Finkielkraut a “dirty Zionist shit”. Saʿadya Gaon dedicated an entire treatise, written in rhyming Hebrew, to a refutation of Ḥīwī's arguments, two fragments of which, preserved in the Cairo Geniza, have been published (Davidson, 1915; Schirmann, 1965). [14] Ḥīwī's criticisms are also noted in Abraham ibn Ezra's commentary on the Pentateuch. Sa'adya Gaon denounced Hiwi as an extreme rationalist, a "Mulhidun", or atheist/deviator. Abraham Ibn Daud described HIwi as a sectarian who "denied the Torah, yet used it to formulate a new Torah of his liking". [15] Sa'adya Gaon [ edit ] In some precincts, there’s a growing and reprehensible tendency to use the fact that many Jews are Zionists (or simply assumed to be Zionists) to bar them from progressive spaces. People who care about the moral health of the American left will be fighting this prejudice for years to come. The State of Israel may not live’ is genocidal anti-Israelism. It’s the form of hatred found in Islamist extremism that simply wants Israel gone. It can be seen in Iranian Ayatollah Khamenei’s description of Israel as a “cancerous tumour” that “will be uprooted and destroyed” or in the Hamas belief, expressed in its charter, that Israel will exist “until Islam eliminates it”. Maimonides gave instructions for how to view the evil inclination and ensuing hardships on that account:

Around 700 CE, ʿAmr ibn ʿUbayd Abu ʿUthman al-Basri introduces two streams of thought that influence Jewish, Islamic and Christian scholars: Anti-Zionism is not inherently antisemitic – and claiming it is uses Jewish suffering to erase the Palestinian experience. Yes, antisemitism is growing. Yes, world leaders must fight it fiercely. But in the words of a great Zionist thinker, “This is not the way”.

Conventional imperatives for treating Israel differently from other countries read like this: Israel is the Middle East’s only genuine democracy – it must be supported. It is surrounded by hostile regimes seeking its destruction – it must be defended. Remembering the Holocaust, Europe and America owe the Jewish people an eternal debt – it must be honoured. Davidson, Israel, ed. Sa'adya's Polemic against Hiwi Al-Balkhi: A Fragment Edited from a Genizah Ms, Texts and Studies of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. New York: The Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1915. The teachings of the Brethren of Purity were carried to the West by the Cordovan hadith scholar and alchemist Maslama al-Qurṭubī (died 964), [6] where they would be of central importance to the Jewish philosophers of Islamic Spain. One of the themes emphasized by the Brethren of Purity and adopted by most Spanish Jewish philosophers is the microcosm-macrocosm analogy. [7] From the 10th century on, Spain became a center of philosophical learning as is reflected by the explosion of philosophical inquiry among Jews, Muslims and Christians. [8] Jewish philosophy before Maimonides [ edit ] "Hiwi the Heretic" [ edit ] Little known is that Saadia traveled to Tiberias in 915CE to study with Abū 'l-Kathīr Yaḥyā ibn Zakariyyāʾ al-Katib al-Tabari (Tiberias), a Jewish theologian and Bible translator from Tiberias whose main claim to fame is the fact that Saadia Gaon studied with him at some point. He is not mentioned in any Jewish source, and apart from the Andalusian heresiographer and polemicist Ibn Hazm, who mentions him as a Jewish mutakallim (rational theologian), our main source of information is the Kitāb al-Tanbīh by the Muslim historian al-Masʿūdī (d. 956). In his brief survey of Arabic translations of the Bible, al-Masʿūdī states that the Israelites rely for exegesis and translation of the Hebrew books—i.e., the Torah, Prophets, and Psalms, twenty-four books in all, he says—on a number of Israelites whom they praise highly, almost all of whom he has met in person. He mentions Abū ʾl-Kathīr as one of them, and also Saadia ("Saʿīd ibn Yaʿqūb al-Fayyūmī"). Regardless of what we do not know, Saadia traveled to Tiberias (home of the learned scribes and exegetes) to learn and he chose Abū 'l-Kathīr Yaḥyā ibn Zakariyyāʾ al-Katib al-Tabariya. The extent of Abū ʾl-Kathīr's influence on Saadia's thought cannot be established, however. [16] As statistical evidence goes, this is hardly airtight. But it confirms what anyone who listens to progressive and conservative political commentary can grasp: younger progressives are highly universalistic. They’re suspicious of any form of nationalism that seems exclusive. That universalism makes them suspicious of both Zionism and the white Christian nationalism that in the US sometimes shades into antisemitism.

Before Israel’s creation, some of the world leaders who most ardently promoted Jewish statehood did so because they did not want Jews in their own countries. Before declaring, as foreign secretary in 1917, that Britain “view[s] with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people”, Arthur Balfour supported the 1905 Aliens Act, which restricted Jewish immigration to the United Kingdom. D. Blumenthal, "An Illustration of the Concept 'Philosophic Mysticism' from Fifteenth Century Yemen," and "A Philosophical-Mystical Interpretation of a Shi'ur Qomah Text." The coalition’s objectionable plans raise a broader, uncomfortable question for the US and Europe reaching beyond the too-familiar abuses and impunity of military occupation. In short, can Israel still be considered a reliable, law-abiding ally that shares a set of common values and standards with the western democracies? Maybe this is why governments are keeping stumm.

More people now think Israel is evil

You’d think Jewish leaders would understand this. You’d think they would understand it because many of the same Jewish leaders who call national self-determination a universal right are quite comfortable denying it to Palestinians. One reason Israel doesn’t give these Palestinians citizenship is because, as a Jewish state designed to protect and represent Jews, it wants to retain a Jewish majority, and giving 5 million Palestinians the vote would imperil that.

Stroumsa, S. (1993) 'On the Maimonidean Controversy in the East: the Role of Abu 'l-Barakat al-Baghdadi', in H. Ben-Shammai (ed.) Hebrew and Arabic Studies in Honour of Joshua Blau, Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. (On the role of Abu 'l-Barakat's writings in the resurrection controversy of the twelfth century; in Hebrew.) In Claude Lanzmann’s epic documentary, Shoah, the late Holocaust historian Raul Hilberg succinctly captures the historical evolution of anti-Jewish hatred in a pithy three-part phrase: “You may not live among us as Jews; you may not live among us; you may not live.”

Themes

Halakhic Latitudinarianism: David Hartman on the commanded life" (PDF). Etd.lib.fsu.edu. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2012-06-24 . Retrieved 2012-10-22. Baruch Spinoza founded Spinozism, broke with Rabbinic Jewish tradition, and was placed in herem by the Beit Din of Amsterdam. The influence in his work from Maimonides and Leone Ebreo is evident. Elia del Medigo claims to be a student of the works of Spinoza. Some contemporary critics (e.g., Wachter, Der Spinozismus im Judenthum) claimed to detect the influence of the Kabbalah, while others (e.g., Leibniz) regarded Spinozism as a revival of Averroism – a talmudist manner of referencing to Maimonidean Rationalism. In the centuries that have lapsed since the herem declaration, scholars [ who?] have re-examined the works of Spinoza and find them to reflect a body of work and thinking that is not unlike some contemporary streams of Judaism. For instance, while Spinoza was accused of pantheism, scholars [ who?] have come to view his work as advocating panentheism, a valid contemporary view easily accommodated by contemporary Judaism. Christianity, Judaism and other Greco-Roman cults: studies for Morton Smith at sixty", Volume 12, Part 1, Pg 110, Volume 12 of Studies in Judaism in late antiquity, by Jacob Neusner ann Morton Smith, Brill 1975, ISBN 90-04-04215-6