r/JewsOfConscience • u/AutoModerator • Nov 13 '24
AAJ "Ask A Jew" Wednesday
It's everyone's favorite day of the week, "Ask A (Anti-Zionist) Jew" Wednesday! Ask whatever you want to know, within the sub rules, notably that this is not a debate sub and do not import drama from other subreddits. That aside, have fun! We love to dialogue with our non-Jewish siblings.
Please remember to pick an appropriate user-flair in order to participate! Thanks!
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u/_II_I_I__I__I_I_II_ Jewish Anti-Zionist Nov 13 '24
This is a question for everyone:
What upcoming movie are you most looking forward to?
For me it's Nosferatu. I like all of Robert Eggers's films. I saw Witch in London, on a lark (bored and wandering around during vacation), by myself in a almost empty theater. It was so great seeing it for the first time. Looking forward to his latest.
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u/ShakeTheGatesOfHell Non-Jewish Ally Nov 13 '24
I'm interested in Moana 2.
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u/_II_I_I__I__I_I_II_ Jewish Anti-Zionist Nov 15 '24
I still need to see Moana 1! I hear good things.
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u/sudo_apt-get_intrnet LGBTQ Jew Nov 13 '24
I'm excited to re-watch Look Back once it comes out on streaming services to cry to it a 3rd time (once reading the manga, once in theaters, and the inevitable next time when I watch it again at home).
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u/_II_I_I__I__I_I_II_ Jewish Anti-Zionist Nov 15 '24
I wonder if that is at all similar to 'Only Yesterday'.
I actually haven't seen either, but I like slice-of-life stories and nostalgia. I'm getting that vibe from 'Look Back' and 'Only Yesterday' was basically about that too.
You might like a South Korean film called 'Christmas In August'. In terms of vibes.
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u/conscience_journey Jewish Anti-Zionist Nov 13 '24
One of my friends once told me Gladiator was his favorite movie, to my disbelief. And then much later he told me actually he had never seen it. So now itâs a joke between us, so I want to go see Gladiator 2 without him seeing the first one.
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u/FurstRoyalty-Ties Anti-Zionist Ally Nov 13 '24
Considering the magnitude in capacity and scale of lies that zionists convey every day, to themselves, and to the world. As well as how everything and everyone is made out to be an antisemitic person, or has such thoughts.
Does it make you scared to talk to people about real anti-semitic events when it happens to you or someone you know ?
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Nov 14 '24
I definitely do feel hesitant at times in certain spaces. I have a lot of Arab friends, and I do a lot of anti-Zionist organising with Arab-Americans. Sometimes it can be quite difficult to discuss antisemitism with them. And I understand all the reasons why it is a difficult conversation. But itâs going to take some time and solidarity building until it becomes an easier conversation
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u/TonyJadangus Jewish Anti-Zionist Nov 13 '24
I don't really feel fully trustful of any conversation with non Jews around antisemitism save a few very close people
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u/ExpertInvestment5592 Jewish Anti-Zionist Nov 13 '24
No, because pro-Palestinian/anti-zionist spaces understand nuance and have empathy for bigotry. I have not face much antisemitism in my life but I have a few experiences where being Jewish meant being othered. When I share them I get nothing but empathy and understanding. I also don't present it like it's the worst oppression/bigotry anyone has ever experienced.
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Nov 13 '24
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u/ContentChecker Jewish Anti-Zionist Nov 13 '24
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u/Aldous_Szasz Non-denominational Nov 14 '24
When did you began to oppse Isreal?
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u/Inappropriate_Piano Jewish Anti-Zionist Nov 14 '24
I have thought that Israelâs actions toward Palestinians are at least as bad as Hamasâs actions toward Israel, in manner and in scale, for longer than I can remember. Reading The Hundred Years War on Palestine earlier this year convinced me that Israel, as a religious ethnostate, has no right to exist.
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u/ExpertInvestment5592 Jewish Anti-Zionist Nov 14 '24
In college when I read about the West Bank settlements and saw the maps showing Israel was stealing more and more land from Palestine. It just hit me that the aggressor has to be the one stealing more land.
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u/verrma Non-Jewish Ally Nov 13 '24
Iâm curious on what Jewsâ views are on the Messiah prophesied in the Tanakh. My understanding is that Christians and Muslims believe that this Messiah is Jesus, while Jews believe that the actual Messiah will arrive sometime in the future. What qualities of this Messiah do you believe that Jesus did not have? Also, are there Jews out there who view Jesus as the Messiah, but donât believe in the Holy Trinity like Christians do, and still eat Kosher etc.? Sort of like how the earliest Christians were?
I donât practice any of the Abrahamic faiths, but I am curious about them
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u/douglasstoll Reconstructionist Nov 13 '24
There is no universal view on messianism. I do not subscribe to it. If there is a moshiach, it is all of us and always right now.
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u/sudo_apt-get_intrnet LGBTQ Jew Nov 13 '24
Hi! Not really "religious" in the traditional sense myself, but learned enough that I think I can answer this question.
What qualities of this Messiah do you believe that Jesus did not have?
The Jewish Messiah has the following requirements:
- Be from the house of David patrilineally
- Establish a theocratic monarchy under his rule in a united biblical Israel
- Rebuild a physical 3rd temple in Jerusalem
- Revive the dead en masse
- Bring all the Jews into biblical Israel
- Perform miracles on such a grand scale that no person on the planet is able to disbelieve in the Jewish version of the almighty
- Create an everlasting paradise on Earth
Meanwhile, Jesus:
- Is the "Son of Gd" in Christian canon, meaning he cannot also inherit kingship through a human father (though admittedly Muslims don't believe this)
- Did NOT establish a theocratic monarchy over the entire land of Israel, with the only claim of it being a metaphorical kingdom
- Did NOT build a physical temple, the only claim again being metaphorical
- Did NOT revive the dead en masse, only twice (a feat also claimed by multiple Jewish religious characters too IIRC, including some prophets and even regular Rabbis in the midrash)
- Did NOT transport all Jews to Israel
- Was NOT so miraculous as to make literally everyone on the planet believe in his version of Gd, as evidenced by the existence of Jews, Hindus, Atheists, etc
- Did NOT create an everlasting paradise on Earth, as evidenced by the continued existence of horrific evil
In short, Jesus's only claim according to Judaism is that he fulfilled a few of the requirements metaphorically instead of literally, but even then not all of them.
Also, are there Jews out there who view Jesus as the Messiah, but donât believe in the Holy Trinity like Christians do, and still eat Kosher etc.?
There do exist so-called "Messianic Jews" that claim to be this but in general we don't consider them Jewish. I'm personally not sure the ratio in their ranks between gentiles who "convert to 'Judaism'" vs Jews who become "saved" in their ranks, but I've heard it leans more towards the former (and anecdotally I've only ever met/been harassed by the former). Either way we consider them the same way we'd consider the early Christians -- Christian, not Jewish.
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u/verrma Non-Jewish Ally Nov 13 '24
Oh ok that makes sense, thank you. Didnât the Tanakh also say that the Messiah is supposed to be born in Bethlehem? Given what the modern state of Israel is doing, I wonder how Jews imagine this will shape things. Given that Palestinians have a lot of ancient Hebrew DNA, are Zionist Jews not at all concerned that they may be displacing/exterminating the line of David?
Also, off topic but judging by your username, youâre a Linux user too, arenât you lol
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u/sudo_apt-get_intrnet LGBTQ Jew Nov 13 '24
Didnât the Tanakh also say that the Messiah is supposed to be born in Bethlehem?
I don't recall reading anything about that myself. I also think that this isn't likely to be correct given the amount of Jewish Messianic claims throughout history and how none I recall other than Jesus were born in Bethlehem (and not all of them were even born in the ME).
Given that Palestinians have a lot of ancient Hebrew DNA, are Zionist Jews not at all concerned that they may be displacing/exterminating the line of David?
The Jews believe the Messiah will be Jewish. Israel isn't displacing/exterminating Palestinian Jews (aside from eliminating the term itself).
This is aside from the fact that the Zionists doing the exterminating aren't religious by and large, meaning they couldn't care less about the Messiah.
Also, off topic but judging by your username, youâre a Linux user too, arenât you lol
Yup, Debian sid. I made this account back when I was a child just starting out with Ubuntu over a decade ago lol. I honestly don't like the username but haven't bothered making a new account since then.
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u/verrma Non-Jewish Ally Nov 13 '24
Oh ok that makes sense. I guess a religious Jew would not so blatantly violate the Ten Commandments lol.
Iâm more of a Fedora guy myself, but I also like Mint and Debian Stable. Iâd probably be using Ubuntu or Kubuntu if it werenât for snaps
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u/sudo_apt-get_intrnet LGBTQ Jew Nov 13 '24
I guess a religious Jew would not so blatantly violate the Ten Commandments lol.
Unfortunately they aren't really violating the 10 commandments. "Thou shalt not murder" only means specifically not religiously allowed murder, while Judaism does allow war. Thou shalt not steal/covet can be argued by the religious Zionists (which are a large part of the actual settlers in the WB) believe that Israel is already religiously theirs so they're allowed to take it "back".
The only religious item that the Zionists are explicitly breaking are a) the prohibition on forming a Jewish state in Israel before the Messiah comes, which is explicitly rabbinical and therefore open to interpretation via contradicting rabbinical sources (again, as religious Zionists do), and b) Zionism is constantly doing Chillul Hashems (basically, making Jews look bad as a whole) which the religious Zionists handwave away with logic that I don't personally understand.
Iâm more of a Fedora guy myself, but I also like Mint and Debian Stable.
I'm too joined at the hip with
apt&dpkgto move to something else at this point. I'm on sid because I love rolling releases and admittedly making weird frankendebian systems lol. I get all the stability of Arch with all the support of Debian.Iâd probably be using Ubuntu or Kubuntu if it werenât for snaps
Yeah I use Flatpaks even on my debian systems for this reason. My mini homelab is running Ubuntu on the physical nodes but everything runs on top of kubernetes so luckily I don't really need to care.
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u/loselyconscious Traditionally Radical Nov 15 '24
u. Didnât the Tanakh also say that the Messiah is supposed to be born in Bethlehem?
David was born in Bethlehem, so since the Messiah is a descendant of David, in liturgy and poetry, the Messiah is sometimes associated with Bethlehem because of this. Most scholars agree that the reason the story of why "Jesus of Nazareth" had to born in Bethlehem was to create this association with David
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u/Living-Effective9987 Non-Jewish Ally Nov 15 '24
How does mainstream Jewry regard the Rabbis who talk about gentiles being slaves to Jews or how itâs good that there is Muslim immigration to Europe because a clash between Islam and Christianity will benefit the Jews?
My assumption is they are the Jewish equivalent to Islamic extremist Imams who preach holy war and Jihad but whereas whenever those imams preaching violence get coverage on MSM, there is an expectation that ânormalâ Muslims distance themselves, however Iâve not seen any mainstream media coverage of these extremist rabbis and therefore the ânormalâ Jewâs perception of them.
In Israel my understanding from polling is that Jewish supremacy is prevalent amongst a significant portion of the population so Iâm curious how diaspora Jewry perceive rabbis preaching Jewish supremacy vs how Israeli Jews perceive them?
2nd question. Do most western Jews who support Israel the type that think of Israel as Tel Aviv? Do these Jews ever frequent the extremist settler communities? As Israel turns more extreme by the day, and as a large number of the Tel Aviv secular types are leaving Israel for good, I feel a lot of western Zionists are battling for a state that they probably wouldnât be comfortable living in themselves!
Thanks peeps
Shalom
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Nov 16 '24 edited Nov 16 '24
-The majority of Jewish people, even including most Israelis, regard those Rabbis as completely deranged. Very similar to how most Muslims would view the extremist UK preacher Anjem Choudary. There are definitely lots of Israelis and Zionists who hold some form of beliefs around Jewish supremacy, but itâs a very small amount who are so extreme that they would promote enslaving gentiles or harming any non-Jew.
-I would say a majority of western Jews are some range of liberal to centrist Zionist, who embrace an image of Israel as a kind of modern Western European/North American secular democracy. They think of Tel-Aviv and gay pride parades, not far right messianic settlers in Hebron. A large portion of Israeli society is secular, but Iâm not sure if western Zionist Jews understand the strong tensions between Israeli secular society and religious society.
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u/Thisisme8719 Arab Jew Nov 16 '24
does mainstream Jewry regard the Rabbis who talk about gentiles being slaves to Jews
Those are just religious fanatics. They're not liked by Modern Orthodox Jews, and not by any non-Orthodox Jews. Most aren't even aware of them saying stuff like that. Mainly comes out of some exposés on hassidic schools, or the religious Zionists who are nuttier than squirrel shit (not that the "moderate" ones aren't nutty).
how itâs good that there is Muslim immigration to Europe because a clash between Islam and Christianity will benefit the Jews?
Haven't seen them saying that. If there are apocalyptic ones saying stuff like that, they're probably mostly in the colonies. If anything, the far-right are trying to "save Western civilization" and spread anti-Muslim "Eurabia" conspiracies.
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u/loselyconscious Traditionally Radical Nov 17 '24
 Rabbis who talk about gentiles being slaves to Jews
Does anyone know what the actual source of that claim is? If its real I assume it's in the Talmud but where?
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u/Thisisme8719 Arab Jew Nov 17 '24
I've been drinking so I might be getting my sources wrong off the top of my head, but iirc it's a chauvinistic interpretation of the eschatology originally in Isaiah.
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Nov 15 '24
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Nov 14 '24
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Nov 15 '24
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Nov 15 '24
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u/uhln Non-Jewish Ally Nov 15 '24
Just want to know, for any Jewish person from Germany who might have a hint of willingness to critically support the Palestinian struggle, is St Pauli the football club had ever criticized Israeli Settlers actions?
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u/valonianfool Anti-Zionist Nov 19 '24
On social media I see zionist talk about it being "hypocritical" that Israeli representation in media gets a lot more backlash than for other settler colonies. For example the Marvel heroine Sabra gets lambasted by anti-zionists for being pro-israel, pro-IOF propaganda, but no one is demanding to cancel Captain America for being us military propaganda. And an artist got backlash for taking part in the trend of drawing vocaloid Miku as x nationality and drawing her as Israeli, saying its hypocritical or antisemitic that Russian and American mikus dont get this hate.Â
Do these people have a point? Is it a double standard to cancel a character such as Sabra for being pro idf but not Captain America for being pro us military?Â
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u/ShakeTheGatesOfHell Non-Jewish Ally Nov 13 '24
Trigger warning: generational trauma.
My partner is from Pakistan. Back when he still lived in Pakistan and was constantly nervous about getting murdered in a blasphemy killing, he was unable to talk about his ancestors' experiences of partition without breaking into tears. He now lives with me in a developed country. He's able to speak about partition much more candidly.
It has made me wonder, how much of generational trauma is due to present day stresses of poverty and violence? Are there any surveys or studies about the descendants of Holocaust survivors and how much of a difference that makes?