The Jewish Self Identity Essay - 2488 Words

Mary Margaret Hyer Professor Melvin Arrington Honors 101 11 December 2014 The Jewish Self-Identity Throughout history, there has not been a more persecuted ethnoreligious group than the Jews; examples of their persecution can be traced back to Biblical times. Because of their mistreatment by other ethnic and religious groups, the Jewish people have formed a self-identity that is unlike any other cultural group in this world. There are three components that make up the Jewish self-identity: antisemitism and its effects, the image of the self-hating Jew, often a result of antisemitism, and the events and repercussions of the Holocaust. Some scholars would argue that antisemitism is a result of the New Testament’s portrayal of the Jewish people as the reason for Christ’s crucifixion. In fact, in the Gospel of Acts, the Bible blatantly states, â€Å"The people of Jerusalem and their rulers did not recognize Jesus, yet in condemning him they fulfilled the words of the prophets that are read every Sabbath. Though they found no proper ground fo r a death sentence, they asked Pilate to have him executed† (Acts 13:27-28). The term â€Å"Jewish decide†, an idea that states that the Jewish people as a whole are responsible for the death of Christ, was coined as an act of antisemitism; this decide term was often expressed as the ethnoreligious slur, â€Å"Christ-killer.† Antisemitism has evolved over time, and its development has been categorized into six stages: â€Å"(1) Pre-ChristianShow MoreRelatedAs I have shown, throughout his essays, Gordon establishes a narrative of the past in the Diaspora1200 Words   |  5 Pagesthroughout his essays, Gordon establishes a narrative of the past in the Diaspora which is distinctly negative, drawing on images of the Jewish people as passive and parasitic, alienated from nature and labor and accordingly without a living culture. Through his ideology, Gordon establishes an idea of the perfect relationship between people, nature and labor; a relationship that must b e withheld in order for a people to be a living, creative culture. Gordon asserts that the Jewish people have beenRead MoreJewish People and Collective Memory: The Early Years of Zionist Settlement in Palestine1637 Words   |  7 Pageswith the examination of Gordon’s essays, one of the main themes is the establishment of Jewish group identity; the negative diasporic identity Gordon creates is essential to compliment the positive future identity of the Jewish people. Following the definition of Fredrik Barth, group identity is created through shared fundamental cultural values and entails a membership that identifies themselves as members and which is identified by others as members. Group identity emerges when a group of peopleRead MoreRecognition Of Identity : American Culture1586 Words   |  7 PagesRecognition of Identity in American Culture Where are you come from? Where is your family? Questions like this can be sensitive, paradoxical and intimate to people’s identity and their social locations. In America, we come from variety of cultural backgrounds and consist of different types of community based on religion. Being an American could be Jewish, Christian, Italian, gay or firefighter. Therefore, finding your position is not easy while balancing all other factors among your community. FactorsRead MoreWhat Is A Cultural Identity?1055 Words   |  5 Pagescultural identity? According to the definition from Wikipedia, cultural identity is â€Å"the identity or feeling of belonging to, as part of the self-conception and self-perception to nationality, ethnicity, religion, social class, generation, locality and any kind of social group that have its own distinct culture,†. (1) Both the authors, Moses Milstein in â€Å"Memories of Montreal—and Richness† and Rohinton Mistry in â€Å"Lend Me Your Light† indicate the difference in seeing the cultural identity between themselvesRead MoreAn Analysis of Objective and Style in Bains Hyphen and Bissoondaths Illusions1253 Words   |  5 PagesBissoondaths Illusions At first glance, it appears that Anurita Bains Riding the Hyphen and Neil Bissoondaths Selling Illusions stake diametrically opposed viewpoints: Bains essay derides assimilation (using her own experiences as a Punjabi girl growing up in Canada as a point of emphasis); Bissoondaths essay opposes multiculturalism. The uncritical reader might suggest that one must either be pro-assimilation or pro-multiculturalism and that both writers are representing a side. And yetRead MoreNational Identity And Religious Identity1707 Words   |  7 PagesNational Identity and Religious Identity has been a bone of contention in Israel, with the Ultra-Orthodox pushing for a unified identity for both while the nationalists and pluralists believe that the two identities need to remain independent in entirety. The subject has made it quite difficult for the country to move forward, as the divergent views of the different factions have led to a great number of violent altercations, both in the political s phere and in religious circles as well.  This essay isRead More The Me Nobody Knows Essay1494 Words   |  6 PagesThe Me Nobody Knows Throughout most of my life I have often confronted myself with the question of self-identity. My past is inundated with people I have been: the quiet, reserved child, the intellectual, arrogant adolescent, and recently the cool, collected young woman. My once alternating identity was a product of the tendency we all have to accommodate others, often sacrificing part of ourselves in the process. The perception others have of becomes most important and the thoughts, feelingsRead MoreThe Victims Of The Holocaust1467 Words   |  6 Pagesof this psychological process as, for a variety of reasons, the Nazi s goal was to deprive human qualities such as individuality, compassion and most importantly, identity through the process of dehumanization. In his attempt to bear witness to the horrors of the Nazis attempt to exterminate the Jewish people, Primo Levi, a Jewish-Italian chemist, writer and Holocaust survivor provides his own personal testimony of his experience in the Auschwitz conce ntration camp in the form of his memoirs,Read MoreCritically Engage With Hannah Arendts Humanistic Approach On Political Action1743 Words   |  7 PagesHumanistic approach to â€Å"political action.† This essay will be split into two parts. The first will be concerned with critically engaging poststructuralist and postmodernist rejections of humanism highlighted by Stuart Sim, with notions of a humanism put forward by Timothy Brannan that place importance on the shared universal attributes shared by every human. I will to this with the aim of placing Arendt’s humanism with the latter. For the second half of this essay I will develop a focused analysis on Arendt’sRead MoreThe Theology, Christology and Pneumatology of The Book of Revelation1741 Words   |  7 Pageswhat Trinitarian Christianity would identify as God the Father. If we then use the base definition of Theology as ‘talk about God’, and extend this to both Christology and Pneumatology, we assemble a clearer idea of what we intend to do in this essay. Through examining the way in which John describes these three entities, God, Christ and the Spirit, as well as what they say and do, we wil l elicit the way in which John understands the heavenly realm and the divine being, as well as where Christ