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I was going to post this a few days ago, but didn't have time and then Bethany House came out with their gross statement and I decided to save this post for today, so we can end the week on a high note!
When I contacted Bethany House and RWA, I did not contact RT* or Library Journal, even though the book was very favorably reviewed in both places (it was a Top Pick for RT and it got a coveted star from LJ). Not because I didn't want to, but unlike Bethany House and RWA, I have bridges to burn at RT and LJ. (So, full disclosure, I review both for RT and for LJ's sister publication, School Library Journal.) I reached out to people I know and trust at both organizations to seek advice on how best to handle the situation (Should I email the editor-in-chief? The reviews editor? My editor and have her pass it on? etc.)
I got a lot of support and advice, and sat down to craft my emails. Within an hour of contacting Library Journal I had a response that the person I contacted takes the matter seriously, but key people to the conversation are out of the office, so they need to wait. Totally valid and I look forward to seeing what happens.
While I was still crafting my email to RT, my former editor forwarded me an email that had been sent out to their reviewers who cover Inspirational Romance. It is not an official response from RT, but does show they take the issue seriously and is an example of what you SHOULD do in this situation. With permission, I'm posting it here:
Hi inspirational reviewers,
I wanted to reach out to you because of a 2014 inspirational romance that's been getting a lot of attention. You might've heard, but For Such a Time by Kate Breslin was nominated for two RITA awards and received rave reviews from Library Journal — and from us.
For Such a Time's critical acclaim has been a source of great pain for many in the romance community. For those of you who don't know, the central plot involves a blonde, blue-eyed Jewish woman who falls in love with a Nazi commandant who is in charge of a concentration camp. The heroine's appearance allows her to conceal her ancestry and grow close to the SS officer.
This is problematic on many levels. That the heroine's non-"Jewish" appearance saves her is deeply troubling: it essentially — and somewhat insidiously — valorizes not looking "Jewish" without examining the anti-Semitism inherent in that assessment.
But the most painful: For Such a Time casts a Nazi officer — who's presumably overseen the systematic murder of a number of Jews — as a romantic hero. Even viewing this in the most generous light, granting such a character redemption and a happily-ever-after is — at best — hugely insensitive. This book is set against the monstrous historical backdrop of so many lives being brutally extinguished. We're talking about a time when Jews were fleeing their homes in terror, families were separated, children were murdered and buried in mass graves. Let that sink in for a second.
One of the most moving and wrenching moments of my life was when I went to the Josefov, the historically Jewish district in Prague. In the Pinkasova synagogue, there's an exhibit dedicated to children's drawings from Terezin. Terezin was a camp in the Czech Republic where Jews were held before being sent to their deaths at Auschwitz and Treblinka. The children there, mostly orphans, were given art lessons — they drew their homes, they drew what they imagined Israel to be like, they drew what they saw in their dreams. As you might expect, none of those children ever made it home.
When an author chooses to set a story during World War II, right in the thick of one of the most soul-crushing examples of genocide in human history, she takes on a huge responsibility. As does the publisher who sells and distributes her book. As do the people who read and review it. The reason I'm addressing this with you all is that I believe there is a certain lacuna in the publishing industry, particularly in the inspirational/Christian market. I don't say this pejoratively, but merely as a statement of fact: the Christian fiction market is narrow and insular. Because it is written almost exclusively by and for Christians, it's born out of an inherently limited perspective — one that isn't as finely attuned to the struggles of non-Christians as it could or should be.
It raises the question: What can we, as staff of this magazine, do? What can we offer? Empathy. Sensitivity. A conscious effort to broaden our own perspectives.
We gave For Such a Time a Top Pick review, which can't be undone. I'm not here to censor or wrist-slap your ratings and reviews. But I am asking you to strive for a greater awareness when you read and review, especially where it concerns Christian handling of non-Christian religions, history and identity.
To that end, when you have time, here are two posts about For Such a Time and RWA's decision to honor it, from Sarah Wendell of Smart Bitches and from our own reviewer, Jennifer Rothschild, both of whom are Jewish:
http://sarahwendell.tumblr.com/post/125859299894/letter-to-the-rwa-board-regarding-for-such-a-time
http://www.jenrothschild.com/2015/08/an-open-letter-to-bethany-house-and-rwa.html
It would mean a lot to me if you would read both.
Thanks for your time.
See everyone? That's how you do it! You look at the issue head on and confront it. You don't dismiss the people hurt, you listen to them, and you take steps to do better next time.
Easier said than done, but it makes such a difference.
Such a difference.
It's amazing how a little bit of real compassion and respect can do.
*For those following this story who aren't part of Romancelandia, RT is a big romance magazine (it used to be called
Romantic Times) We're not talking about Russian State Media.
Links to Amazon are an affiliate link. You can help support Biblio File by purchasing any item (not just the one linked to!) through these links. Read my full disclosure statement.
Yes, I'm still talking about this. It still needs to be talked about. Yesterday, a Jewish community in San Antonio woke up to find their cars and homes had been covered with Anti-Semitic graffiti.
Yesterday, Bethany House responded to the criticism in the most tone-deaf statement ever. I'm going to copy the whole thing here so you don't have to click over:
Bethany House Publishers is saddened by the offense some have taken at the novel For Such a Time by Kate Breslin. We respect and honor the Jewish faith, and this novel, inspired by the redemptive theme of the biblical book of Esther, was intended to draw on our common faith heritage.
Breslin reframes the Esther story in a Nazi transit camp during the Holocaust and portrays a courageous Jewish woman who by God's strength saved fellow Jews from death, and in so doing awakened the conscience of a man thought to be beyond redemption. She wrote this carefully researched story with respect for the Jewish people and their history. It was neither the author nor publisher's wish to offend, but rather to depict how one person can choose to put the lives of others ahead of her own and shine God's light into darkness.
For Such a Time has garnered favorable reviews from readers in many markets. The book was a finalist for several literary awards including two in the Romance Writers of America RITA® awards for "best first book" and "inspirational romance" categories.
Bethany House Publishers supports Kate Breslin and her writing. We have heard from many readers who are moved by this portrayal of courage, and we hope it continues to provide inspiration to others in the spirit of the author's intent.
Jim Parrish
Executive VP and Director
Bethany House Publishers
Division of Baker Publishing Group
They are saddened that people fighting for the right to safely worship recognized their book as part of the problem. They're not sorry about anything. They're just really sad. Our hurt and anger hurt their feelings. Our feelings don't matter, just theirs.
Because, they respect and honor the Jewish faith! (Just not actual Jewish people). Breslin did not write this book with respect for the Jewish people and their history. You do not respect a history by changing it. You do not respect a history by repeating the lie that blond hair and blue eyes would save you from the Holocaust. You do not respect the Jewish people when you have your character convert to Christianity. You do not respect the Jewish people when you use them and their history as props and plot points for your religious message. Because that's what Breslin respected with her book, her own religious world view. Not that of the Jewish faith.
I get that the author and publisher didn't mean to offend, BUT THEY DID. And they need to address that.
And hey, remember RWA's non-response? The problem with it being a Finalist that they just didn't address? Bethany House is using that as a shield. (RWA likes us, why don't the Jews?) Who could have seen that one coming? (Oh wait, everyone. Everyone saw that coming.)
For an article in Newsweek (don't read that article. It's bad.) Breslin provided a statement:
I have previously stated in posts and interviews on social media that my inspiration for For Such A Time was borne from a compassion for the Jewish people, as in reading from the Book of Esther I realized how they have suffered at the hands of one society or another throughout history. It was my intent to write a book that told a more modern-day story of a courageous Jewish woman who, through strength and faith in her God, used her situation to try to save some of her beloved people—much in the way Esther saved hers. And like that Biblical queen’s influence with King Xerxes, through her brave and sacrificial actions, she helped to bring one man to a sense of conscience, prompting him to join in the attempt to save her people. I am heartsick and so very sorry that my book has caused any offense to the Jewish people, for whom I have the greatest love and respect.
She doesn't get it. She really doesn't get it, but you know what? She says she's sorry her words caused offense. She has great love and respect for the Jewish people. And compassion. Which is why she thinks "Jewess" is a good word to use. It's why she thinks images of Auschwitz with a Mother Theresa quotation are a great way to market her book about Theresienstadt .
She also co-opts Purim for her marketing, because COMPASSION AND LOVE AND RESPECT
(if she ever takes those tweets down,
screen grabs here)
But then again,
she thought Holocaust Remembrance Day was a GREAT time to promote her book that redeems Nazis.
Feel the respect and love? I don't. I feel used and co-opted for her message. There is no respect here.
(But according to Anne Rice,
I'm not allowed to voice my concerns about this, because that's the same as murdering someone for fun and spectacle.)
The take away from all this? When it comes to the Holocaust and Anti-Semitism, the Jews need to sit down and be quiet. The Christians are talking now.
So yes, I am still talking about this, and I will keep talking about this as long as I have to.
(But hey, I also have some positive response news to share. I didn't want to lump it in with these garbage responses, so I'm saving it for tomorrow. Stay tuned!)
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In my post on Wednesday I wrote I haven't had to explain to her (yet) why our Temple has a perimeter of ugly concrete planters, because if you put flowers in it, maybe we can glide over the fact that our house of worship needs protection against car bombs.
She asked this morning when I was dropping her off at school (her preschool meets at our Temple.) And yes, because we put flowers in them, I could glide over the fact they're there to protect against car bombs. I told her they were planters for flowers, for decoration, to make things pretty. I dodged the question. Maybe I shouldn't have, maybe I should have tried to put a positive spin on them and said they're REALLY COOL because we can put flowers in them AND they protect us. They're pretty AND strong! And put it in a way she could understand, but after this week and the conversations online about this book and all the greater issues it raises and brings up, I'm just tired and sad and hurt. So I told her they were planters for flowers, for decoration, to make things pretty.
And when I got home, I saw that RWA put out an official response. I'm going to quote the entire thing here:
The Board of Directors of the Romance Writers of America (RWA) has received a great deal of heartfelt and moving feedback about some of the finalists in this year's RITA contest. We want the membership to know we have heard your concerns and have spent days discussing them.
The question that we must answer is what RWA as a writers' organization should do when issues arise regarding the content of books entered in the RITA contest. Discussions about content restrictions inevitably lead to concerns about censorship. Censoring entry content is not something the Board supports. If a book is banned from the contest because of its content, there will be a move for more content to be banned. This is true, even especially true, when a book addresses subjects that are difficult, complex, or offensive.
There were 2,000 entries in the RITA contest this year. The RITA is a peer-reviewed award. There is no vetting of content before a book may be entered. Books are entered, not nominated, and those books are judged by fellow romance authors. The Board believes this is how the contest should be run. RWA does not endorse the content of any book entered in the contest. We do believe, however, that education and conversation are important in dealing with the concerns expressed. To that end, we will open an online forum on the RWA website for members to discuss their concerns. This is not a perfect solution, but we believe open dialogue, not the censorship of content, is the right way to handle the issues expressed.
They missed the point entirely.
Because here's the thing: there are already a lot of guidelines and content restrictions surrounding what is eligible to be entered. For instance, the book has to be a romance, and they define what that is. (And let's not forget, the set-up of this book is not a romance. The set-up of this book is a major imbalance in power dynamic [honestly, I can't think of a larger one right now] leading to Stockholm Syndrome disguised as a romance. If they had sexual contact, it would be straight-up rape.)
Guidelines aren't censorship. (And let's be really careful using the word censorship when we're talking about the Holocaust, ok?)
Mostly, this statement utterly fails to address the fundamental problem.
RWA does not endorse the content of any book entered in the contest. The problem wasn't that the book was entered. I've been on several award committees--bad stuff gets nominated and entered all the time. That's why there's a process between entry and winner. The board believes in the process, but that process completely failed this time. Because the problem was never that the book was entered. The problem is that it was a FINALIST. Being a finalist is a big deal. "RITA FINALIST" becomes part of an author bio and book marketing. It's a big deal. RWA endorses its finalists. If it didn't, the RITA would become a meaningless award.
But we should all feel great, because RWA is going to have a new forum on its (member-only) website where the echo chamber that created this debacle can talk about it. I'm sure the people who were betrayed and now feel unsafe by this book being a finalist and this non-response will feel super-duper comfortable participating in this forum.
I've gotten a lot of support these past few days. So many people have shared my post and reached out to me. I haven't heard anything from Bethany House, but four members of the RWA board wrote back in a personal capacity, and at least one more shared my post on Twitter. I've dodged a lot of the hate that others have gotten. There was deafening silence from some quarters, but it's the same places that are usually quiet when Jewish issues come up, until they're called out on it. I had hoped they wouldn't ignore something this egregious, but wasn't surprised when they did. But I also found some really strong allies, and greatly expanded my "Jewish twitter" circle.
In response to Wednesday's post, many Jews nodded and said "yep" and many non-Jews went "wait, what? really?" at my experiences. It's one of the reasons I shared, because I think it's often hidden.
As Katherine Locke said in her post,
It is not easy to be Jewish in America. Many think it is because of stereotypes, but when push comes to shove, especially online, we turn toward our own and huddle close. It’s a collective memory safety measure.
It's also one of the reasons why I've started Instagramming our Shabbat candles.
I'm Jewish by Choice, which means I converted 4 years ago, after going before the Bet Din, after years of studying and classes, after a decade of soul searching. I made a conscious decision to be Jewish and I love it.
This morning, after I dodged the planter question, before I saw the RWA response, I celebrated Shabbat with my daughter's preschool. We said our blessings and thanked G-d for all we have. We sang joyful songs. It was adorable (because, preschool) and wonderful.
Shabbat Shalom.
Bim bom, bim bim bim bom, bim bim bim bim bim bom.
A few years ago, I was interviewed by Madelyn Cohen Travis as part of her PhD study of Jews and Jewishness in British children’s literature. Why, she asked me, as a writer who is Jewish, did I not write about Jewish themes and characters?
My answer was that my first two books concerned themselves with a boy in witness protection, struggling with his sense of self when taking on a new identity. Making him Jewish would have added huge complications to the plot, while distancing him from the experience of ordinary readers. I wanted teenagers to feel that this could happen to them, so it was important that he was an ‘ordinary’ boy - whatever that is.
I was, however, quite happy to make him a Roman Catholic, and delighted in using Catholic concepts and imagery, although the underlying themes - running from danger, changing ones name, starting again, are really very Jewish.
There were other reasons why I didn’t create Jewish characters. First, I very much didn’t want to be pigeon-holed in any way as a Jewish or even ethnic writer, as I consider myself equally British and Jewish. Second, there’s a very British Jewish thing about keeping one’s head down, not being ‘too Jewish’ which I had learned from a very early age. Third, I was well aware of anti-Semitic tropes. My third book is about a girl who wins a lot of money. I wasn’t going to put anything Jewish into a book like that, because the only overt anti-Semitism I had experienced in Britain, up until a few weeks ago, was based on the myth that Jewish are rich and mean.
Thinking about it, though, I became aware that one day I wanted to write a book about British Jewish teenagers. Partly because, as Madelyn’s excellent research proved, there are almost no books being written today about British Jewish teens, and in the past many Jewish characters were offensive stereotypes. Even Beatrix Potter created a greedy starling called Ikey Shepster.
If Jews appear in more recent British children's books generally they are victims (mainly historical) or villains (mainly Israeli). Or they are only vaguely Jewish (there's a boy called Goldstein in the Harry Potter who has no personality, let alone a Jewish identity). Or sometimes they are Jewish but completely secular and keen to prove it, a bit like Ed Miliband, munching his bacon sandwich. Of course there are many secular Jews, and many tangentially sort-of Jews in Britain. But the Jewish kids I know, the ones who go to synagogue at least occasionally, who might go to Jewish schools or youth groups, who know how to play Jewish Geography, who have friends called Rafi or Zak or Ariella: I never see them in books.
I am passionate about diversity in YA literature. My books have characters who just happen to be Muslim, black and mixed race. I feel it is important to reflect the world I see around me, and to put the teenagers that I meet at schools into the books they read. Shazia, in my book Lia’s Guide to Winning the Lottery, is a Muslim girl inspired by some of the lovely girls I met at Elizabeth Garrett Anderson School in Islington, voracious readers with open minds and a lot to say for themselves. They deserve to see themselves in books, and it doesn't happen enough.
 |
| Miranda West with a parcel for a friend |
One of the reasons that I am so passionate about this is that I almost never saw anyone like me in any book that I read when I was growing up. Antonia Forest’s Marlow family books were one shining exception, with a character Miranda West who was British and Jewish, who suffered from mild occasional anti-Semitism, and general ignorance about who she was and what she might believe, but mostly got on with life without her Jewishness getting in the way. Although Miranda was different from me in most ways, we had enough in common to make me feel less odd, different and invisible.
So, I have just finished writing a book, entitled This is Not a Love Story. It is a book about falling in and out of love, with the problems, passion and anguish that can bring. It is set in Amsterdam, but two of the teenagers are Jewish and British, and I based them on kids that I know and love.
My characters don't talk much about Israel and Palestine - hardly at all in fact. For Theo Israel is a central part of his identity, somewhere where he’s visited often on holiday and on youth group trips, somewhere where he has close family. For Kitty, it’s somewhere she hasn’t visited and doesn’t feel especially close to, partly because her mother thinks it has too much ‘negative energy.’ In some ways her distant relationship with Israel reflects her feeling of being an outsider in the Jewish community in London. .
They only talk about this in passing, because I didn’t want the book to be swamped with earnest discussions about Zionism and I didn’t want readers to judge Theo and Kitty on the basis of their ideas about Israel and Zionism. One of the disquieting things about the last few weeks has been the feeling that one is judged as a ‘good’ or ‘bad’ Jew – by some people on how much you are prepared to condemn Israel, and by some other people on how much you are backing its government’s strategy. In private many of us have admitted feeling scared to say anything at all. I am scared to post this blog, I have to admit.
Writing the book, I was happy with the decisions I made, because in my experience most Jewish teenagers didn’t tend to sit around debating the Middle East. Until now. For the last few weeks the Jewish teenagers that I know best have been busily educating themselves about the past and present history of the Middle East. They are watching the news, reading newspapers, looking at YouTube. They are asking big questions. They are scared, curious and passionate. ‘Why,’ one asked me, ‘are people being anti-Semitic on my Instagram feed, when I have nothing to do with Israel? Why don't they care about the children dying in Syria as much as they do about Gaza?' Another told me proudly that when a few Jewish boys he knew said unacceptable things about Arabs, ‘I put them right,’ but when another Jewish friend condemned Israel utterly ‘I put him right as well.’
My book is finished (pending editorial notes) and I am hoping that the world will become normal again, that our blundering leaders will find a way towards peace, and more than peace, find a way to happy lives, free from fear and oppression, not just for Israel and Palestine, but for all the many places in the world where people are dying and under threat of death. I hope that some of the frightening anti-Semitism I have witnessed recently signifies nothing more than ignorance. I hope that yet again my characters will become typical in not feeling very connected to world affairs, in their assumption that dangerous anti-Semitism mostly lives in the past.
My book is only a very tiny part of any bigger picture. But my hope is that by writing about Jewish kids I can fight prejudice and stereotypes in my own small way.
1. Words I never in a million years thought I hear myself say: "I'm so happy to be back on my diet!"
But after eight days of eating matzo, the cement of the digestive system, it feels really good to be eating mean and lean again. Of course, this will not be lasting long because tomorrow:
2. WE'RE GOING TO FLORIDA!! The Webmeister's niece is getting married and we're hitting Universal and DISNEY. I'm just majorly bummed that the Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal isn't open yet. They said "Spring". Spring is April, dudes, not "late June". And I was looking forward to that SO MUCH. :-((( Oh well. Will just have to go back.
3. Blog reviews are starting to come in for LIFE, AFTER, You can read them here and here and "here. I'm so happy that so far readers seem to be loving this book as much as I do. And based on the great idea from Sarah at The Reading Zone, I'm going to be printing up some posters of the beautiful cover designed by Becky Terhune for a contest to be announced at a later date. STAY TUNED FOR DETAILS.
4. My daughter is back from her school trip to Washington, DC. She had to keep a journal. I was reading it last night and it's clear I'm not the only writer in the family. My favorite part was where she wrote a note to future 8th grade students telling them that everything they heard about all the drama that takes place on the dinner cruise on the Potomac is true.
Then right underneath she wrote "To the teachers: The dinner cruise was fun. The pizza was yummy."
Yep. There's so much drama going on beneath the surface, behind that "It was fun." And that's our job as tween and YA writers. To get to that place.
5. My WIP is kind of like my kids. It amazes me every day with the new places it takes me.
It started with an idea here:
and here:
Now being more of a "pantser" than a plotter, especially with this idea, I just plunged into writing. But around the 15K word mark, I hit a plateau (which wasn't helped by both kids being in plays the same week followed by Passover). This can be seen by the extremely geeky word count graph I did the other day.
Then I had made a connection that took me here:
That got me totally fired up and cranking with the writing and research. Which lead me here:
By: Kirsty,
on 9/11/2008
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Regular OUPblog readers will know that we have a series of posts around our Very Short Introductions series, where authors answer a few questions on their topic. Today I’m doing something a little different. Steven Beller is the author of Antisemitism: A Very Short Introduction. I asked him what he saw as the main reasons for there being such a high level of antisemitism throughout world history, and why he thought so much irrational hatred was leveled at the Jewish faith. His answer was so in depth and interesting that I thought it deserved a post all of its own. Check back next week for the rest of his fascinating Q&A.
It is true, as I state at the beginning of my book, that antisemitism can be and has been defined as an almost “eternal hatred” of Jews that has stretched from Antiquity to the present. But that is not the definition I operate with in my VSI, because in the end I do not think it is all that helpful in getting to grips with the central problem of antisemitism in the modern era, as a political and ideological movement, starting in the second half of the nineteenth century. I define antisemitism as that modern political and ideological movement, and one of my main points in the book is that it is wrong to think that the previous history of anti-Jewish prejudice and persecution in European history made the emergence of antisemitism as a movement inevitable. It is another major point of my book to dispute the notion that the emergence of antisemitism as a potent political and ideological force before 1914 meant that there was anything inevitable (until it happened that is) about the triumph of Nazism in Germany in the 1930s and the ensuing Holocaust.
I do not even think that it is all that accurate to assume that antisemitism has been present “throughout history”. Even when we define antisemitism in the “eternal” variety, as any form of anti-Jewish hatred, whether religiously, politically, socially, ideologically or economically based, there are vast swathes of time and recorded space in which it was not present, or at least of little consequence. Chinese and Indian history, and pre-Columbian history and Sub-Saharan African history, accounting for most of human historical experience, knew little or no animus against Jews before the modern era, mainly because Jews were an unknown or insignificant group. Anti-Jewish hatred was really a phenomenon of Middle Eastern and European history, and only spread to the rest of the world with the triumph of Eurocentric modern civilization. Even within Europe, and in what I see as the bastion of modern antisemitism, Central Europe (German-speaking and otherwise), there were periods when anti-Jewish hatred could be dismissed as an insignificant atavism; even in its era of major success around 1900 in Central Europe, there were many areas and centres, such as German Prague, Budapest and Breslau (Wroclaw) where the message of antisemitism was rejected or simply ignored.
It is true that anti-Jewish hatred has a very long history, going back (one assumes) to the Egyptians and the Romans, but I think some of this sense of “eternal hatred” is a consequence of a Judaeocentric view of the world, and I do not think that, until the emergence of Christianity, there was anything all that unique about anti-Jewish hatred. Jews were just one of the peoples in the Mediterranean world that needed to be dealt with by others, and I do not think the Romans, for instance, hated the Jews more than they had hated, let us say, the Carthaginians. With Pauline Christianity came a special animus against Jews resulting from the fact of Christianity’s Jewish roots; there is a similar special character about the pre-modern Muslim, religiously-based animosity to Jews, because, ironically, of the shared religious heritage. In European history it was the Christian need to be proved the true faith that led to anti-Jewish hatred being so ingrained into European culture and thought. Even so, this animosity was not the same as antisemitism, and in many eras, such as the late eighteenth century, was very much on the wane. It took further developments in modern European history to enable such underlying, religiously-based prejudices to be transformed into modern antisemitism. Antisemitism is thus a subject of modern history and not simply the study of an atavistic survival.
To talk of “irrational hatred” suggests that there is such a thing as “rational hatred”, and it is another point of my book to at least suggest that there are indeed many more “reasons” for anti-Jewish animosity and hence for antisemitism than many students of the subject are prepared to admit. This does not mean that such hatred is morally right, or acceptable, but it does open up the possibility that it is not irrational. Hence, Christian animosity towards Jews is based on a non-rational belief in the divinity of Christ that Jews can never share—is Christian animosity towards Jews because of this refusal to accept the “truth” (in Christian terms) irrational, therefore? I am not sure it is. But it should not be too surprising that Christian societies have tended to be anti-Jewish as a result of this fundamental theological conflict, and it is this religiously based difference which is at the heart of European society’s animosity towards Jews. At the same time, the Freudian/Nietzschean claim that it was precisely the fact that Christianity imposed “Jewish” moral, anti-hedonistic, repressive values on pagan European societies also has much going for it: Jews end up being blamed for both rejection and origination of the imposed faith. This might explain why the Jewish religion, seen as the original monotheism, has been such a focus of animosity within Christian societies. At the same time, I would like to stress that this particular strength of hatred of the Jews compared to “other faiths” was not historically a constant. Jews might have been restricted and persecuted in medieval Christendom, but they were allowed to exist within it as Jews, unlike any other heretical Christian group, or indeed Muslims or other faiths. In North America there are examples, such as Peter Stuyvesant’s New Amsterdam, where Jews were a tolerated minority, but other groups, such as Quakers, were not. So we need to be careful not to assume that Jews have always and everywhere been the most hated faith.
I am also intrigued by the use of the term “faith”. There is, I would agree, a foundation of religious conflict to both Christian and Muslim animosity towards Jews. Yet faith is only a part of it, and there is also a very strong group or ethnic component to this animosity, especially after the emergence of nationalism, and this has very little to do with Jews as a community of faith, and everything to do with them being perceived as a group of others. When it comes to this ethnic animosity, then Jews have also been historically the premier example of the consequences of “irrational hatred”, as in the Holocaust; on the other hand, the animosity directed and the horrors perpetrated against all kinds of other minority ethnic or religious groups, such as the Armenians in Turkey, the Chinese in Southeast Asia, the Igbo in Nigeria, or African-Americans in the United States (or even once upon a time Catholics in the United kingdom) should remind us that Jews are far from being alone in being the object of such hatred and persecution.
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[…] Very Short Introductions: What is antisemitism? OUPblog - New York,New York,USA This might explain why the Jewish religion, seen as the original monotheism, has been such a focus of animosity within Christian societies. … See all stories on this topic […]
[…] Last week I brought you a post from Steven Beller, author of Antisemitism: A Very Short Introduction, on what antisemitism really is. Today I’m bringing the second part of the Q&A I did with him on the subject. […]