I need to report on last night's tour of Brooklyn by the US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation. First at an Arab-American church, then at a Park Slope church. 20 people in the first event, 100 at the second. Cold night. "You are there," as we say in the news business.
2 speakers. One a Palestinian-Canadian lawyer, Diana Buttu. One a religious guy from South Africa, Eddie Makue. Good pairing. David Wildman of the Campaign introduced. He said the Campaign had made the determination two years ago that they were now going to characterize the occupation as apartheid in their activist efforts in the U.S. This was not just marketing but a recognitioin: That the systematic discrimination between one people and another based purely on identity, creating sharply different conditions for the two peoples, was/is/will be apartheid.
At the Park Slope church, the Jewish religious issue was a theme. Makue: "There are people in Israel who believe they are the chosen people, and they have theological justification to occupy the land." Buttu: Yes let us talk about "the theological underpinnings of apartheid." Wildman: You have a "law of return for one people" and a "right of return" that is not honored for the other people. I'm saying, This was good stuff.
A Jewish woman in the audience got very upset. She rose at the end and said, almost shaking, that the words "the chosen people" were being thrown about with respect to occupation. "I respectfully ask you to leave that discussion to Jewish theologians and to the Jewish community."
Darling, I can't honor your request. I need the general community to talk about Jewish ethnocentrism– at the same time as they are talking about the theological basis of Islamic jihad. I want Jews to interrogate our legacy of superiority, 400 years after Baruch Spinoza teed the issue up in Amsterdam. I want Michael Walzer, my former professor of government, to openly explore the conditions of the occupation and the abuses of Palestinians as a follow-on to his brave and beautiful statement at Yivo that we have done a heckuva job for 3000 years governing ourselves but a bad job governing others. I don't want us to govern ourselves so much. Nor others. I like the legal framework of the U.S. with respect to minorities, including the Head Mutt, Obama. And a good thing that a black South African and a Canadian Arab are moving thru our country talking about it all.
The feline really has departed the gunnysack.
I don't think Phil knows what "chosen people" means. Maybe he should do a little journalism and find out.
Spinoza was the man!
However, to this day no one on Earth has been able to understand or even remotely comprehend his philosophical text THE ETHICS.
Go ahead and try — I dare ya.
I attended the Park Slope event, and spoke afterwards to the Jewish woman who freaked when "chosenness" was brought up. I have difficulty accepting the chosenness concept, but I sympathized with her insistent point that attacks on chosenness have historically been used in virulent anti-Semitic thought.
For her it's a question of rhetoric: she's open to criticizing the occupation, but if you want to bring more Jews on board, you can't criticize chosenness, because that will set off people's anti-Semitism alarms, and they'll walk out.
She has a point. In a way, a critique of chosenness could be perfectly valid, but if you go down that road, you're not going to persuade more Jews who are currently on the fence. And that's ultimately the point, right, not a theological debate!
But this woman was ultimately not comfortable at all with non-Jews discussing chosenness, and I think that's a mistake. It's a conversation that needs to happen, ideally in a deliberative setting. Many non-Jews are uncomfortable with chosenness, rightly or not, and when they see the atrocities in Israel-Palestine, chosenness at least appears to be part of a justification, and that is dangerous how Judaism is perceived.
(This woman did note that right-wing settlers don't necessarily use chosenness to justify their actions — they could simply believe that the land was given to them by God. True, but that means they're fundamentalists, so chosenness would be part of their self-conception as well.)
What a mess….
A Jewish person once told me that Chosenness really referred to Jews chosing to worship one God and not the other way around. By choosing monotheism over the popular polytheism of their time, and by agreeing to obey the believed commandments of this God, they had separated themselves from the other tribes, but the door was not closed to others joining them.
Michael,
I agree with you that Phil doesn't really understand the term itself, its potential, or its ACTUAL usage among the vast majority of Jews.
But, I think he is accurate that many DO regard the term "chosen people" as God-defined permission even obligation to control over the land from river to sea.
That ideology for a very long time had been condemned among the vast majority of liberal, conservative and haredi Jews. Now, its not as much.
Frankly, BOTH negligences are dangerous (literally that word Phil).
This is an example of the excesses of dissent, in the area of YOUR work.
At times you demonstrate a sensitivity to the balance of multiple meanings and multiple significance to words. And, at other times, you sink to a dogmatic mediocrity.
For what its worth, from my read of Michael Walzer, he has discussed the philosophical implications of the occupation. Its you who have not.
The term "chosen-ness" refers NOT to privilege, but to intimacy. It is NOT a comparative term in essence.
It is entirely a subjective obligation. "I" am obligated. "WE" are obligated.
Phil is part of that "we". HE is obligated to tikkun olam, and deeply, not simplistically (as movement politics are), not trivially.
And the obligation is NOT "control the land for advantage". The obligation is "do good". Its his first step in being actually Jewish, his substance over form.
He has a daily conflict between his job and his moral/spiritual obligation. He's formed the dialog in similarly taboo-breaking ways. That is around the holy word "censorship", confusing intentional and careful and informative use of language, with lack of restraint.
He doesn't get that in attacking the language, rather than attacking the usage, he is throwing out the jewel of the planet, and a large part of his native and most needed sentiment. And that is a meaning of self-hatred.
Christians believe they are "the Chosen People", or "the New Israel", since they believe they have the ultimate divine reveltation.
Muslims believe they are "the Chosen People" since they believe they have the ultimate divine revelation, given in Arabic.
Don't know what Phil means when he is worried about Jews considering themselves "the Chosen People" since anybody can convert to Judaism.
Anyway, since Phil's pals mentioned in this article have clearly swept up the Jewish people and convinced up to 120 people of the error of their ways, so in short order the other 12 million or so of us Jews will follow suit. Now that that is taken care of, I hope they will now convince the Muslims to get off their "jihad" mentality which says that they are destined to take control of the whole world and re-establish the Caliphate, and then force the rest of us non-Muslims either to convert to Islam or accept dhimmi restrictions. Can't wait.
John K. wrote: "You're not going to persuade more Jews who are currently on the fence. And that's ultimately the point, right, not a theological debate!"
I understand what you're saying, but personally I think it's far more important to awaken Gentiles to an understanding of what Zionism is all about than to continue treating this as a Jewish subject. If this causes some psychic unease in people like the woman from Park Slope, so be it. (Her unease has to be put into perspective agains the violence that is being perpetrated on the Palestinian people.)
The reason I fight against always treating this as a "Jewish subject" is that I see America's problem as basically a failure of the democratic process. For a number of reasons, ranging from campaign financing laws to the corporate structure of our media, the checks and balances have failed and one tiny group has legally seized control of our foreign policy. The remedy in such a situation is not to plead with them, but to fix the system.
Fixing the system means allowing the American people back into the conversation about Zionism. For almost two generations it's been taboo for the public to talk about any aspect of Jewishness (besides "antisemitism"), and as a result their conceptual tools for understanding the situation have atrophied. People no longer even possesses the vocabulary to discuss our situation.
Zionism is grounded in the concepts of choseness and separatism and survivalism. It can't be understood without them. These have to be given an airing and then we'll see whether the American public really considers them American values. You either believe in democracy or you don't. You can't change the rules just because Jews are involved.
Let us focus on the ball, and not the distracting movements of the likes of Witty. Whatever the theological significance of "chosenness", there is no doubt that the manner in which this theological concept is "deployed", in other words, applied to "real" life — not just in Israel, but in Jewish communities worldwide — reeks not only of "ethnocentrism" (as Phil puts it mildly), but pure and simple racism, or, at the very least, a condescending attitude towards the "goyim" (a term that might not be condescending in itself, but is SO OFTEN used in a condescending manner to refer to non-Jews; I also have a problem with the word "gentile" — why can't non-Jews simply be referred to as non-Jews?). Of course, this racist "chosen people" myth sits at the heart of the racist, fascist zionist project.
Phil Weiss has no fucking clue what the chosen people concept actually means. And that's because his only Jewish connection is by accident of birth.
bar_kochba132, I'm not sure if you're engaging in deception, self-deception or both. The difference between the 'choseness' of Jews and that of Christians and Muslims is the relative permeability of the Christian and Muslim groups. Judaism intentionally complicates the conversion process in order to maintain the ethnic purity of the group–'the holy seed'. As I've said before, Judaism is fundamentally a cult to ethnicity. If you don't recognize that point the entire discussion is meaningless.
Phil's Jewishness is not ONLY an accident of birth.
I've personally attended a few Jewish rituals with him, and conversed about elements of Jewishness.
It is an IGNORANCE to describe Judaism as a "cult of ethnicity" or a rationale for ethnic superiority.
Its just an innaccurate description.
And bad things come of resentment born of innaccuracy attributed to others.
The word "goy" for example, is literally just a word. Its descriptive, not an insult. While Lebanon blogger whines that it should be just a word, it is.
"While Lebanon blogger whines that it should be just a word, it is."
Oh, for heaven's sake. Will you stop hiding behind semantics and start addressing the real issue? The real issue is not whether "goy" is a word or should be a word, but how the word is used (as I said, it is often used in a condescending manner, I have experienced it on more than one occasion), and whether or not it should be used at all. Words do not descend from the heavens (unlike your property deeds for Palestine, apparently) ; language is a human invention, and words are not ahistorical or "neutral".
How about itbak al yahud. pretty common in moslem circles. look that one up scumbag
"I think it's far more important to awaken Gentiles to an understanding of what Zionism is all about than to continue treating this as a Jewish subject"
Lots of luck with that! I've never heard the word "Zionist" in public. EVER! Not even in private conversation.
The only reference to it on TV I can think of was on the Seinfeld "O'Brien" episode where it was predictably invoked in the speech of a far right racist bigot.
"How about itbak al yahud. pretty common in moslem circles."
Not aware of any such phrase "itbak al-yahud". Doesn't sound Arabic. Since you are so knowledgeable about what is "pretty common" (whatever that means) in Muslim "circles", perhaps you can come up with an explanation as to what you mean by that sentence, because I've never heard it in the Muslim "circles" I live in. And maybe you can also point to the source on which you base the claim that it's "pretty common" in Muslim circles.
"look that one up scumbag"
Wow, and I thought there were limits to nastiness. Why does Phil let you spew your venom here anyway? Clearly, you do not have an iota of decency in your veins.
Phil made a deal that he would let the deranged Sword of Gideon spew his idiocy here in order to let Ed spew his idiocy here.
SOW is at least funny in a buffonish sort of way.
Whatever the origins of chosenness, let's talk about exceptionalism. That justifies European colonialism, American imperialism, and Zionism. Now most Jews have adopted the notion that we are exceptional, thus exempted from basic rules of human decency, like you don't take what doesn't belong to you, you don't kill people, etc. We all know about exceptionalism in the history of this country, always invoked to justify killing people, all the more easily when they're darker skinned than white Americans. And good luck with Walzer, who invoked exceptionalism to justify the 1967 conquest–Israel conveniently gets its own pesonal "just war" theory to cover its actions.
I regard this site as a salutary reminder of the mindset of genocidal anti-semites, who want to sacrifice me in imagined revenge for what a Georgian maniac did to the Ukrainians, because many of the Georgian's henchmen and I share a label, a car dealer's sticker with no content, since the henchmen had drained it of all social, moral, religious and cultural meaning.
"Itbakh al-Yahud"="Slaughter the Jews". The word in Hebrew is "Tevach", from the same Semitic root, t-v-kh, "slaughter". I may have the ch/kh/k distinction a bit off because of Latin alphabet not matching Semitic phonology.
Blogger from Lebanon strikes me as one of those non-Arab Lebanese who wants to be as anti-Israel as possible. That's cool but remember Israelis know where you're coming from. I can assure you that in 2001 my neighborhood in Jerusalem looked like the Dahiya in 2006. Please be sure to make adequate preparations for the next war. (I know I am.)
As I'm the Jewish woman who challenged Rev. Makue's remark which was "They [the settlers] think they're the chosen people," I would like to point out that I am not opposed to all dialogues about choseness. I'm opposed to cavalier and distorted references to choseness; and to reductively conflating political issues with complex theological ones. I will not again allow Philip Weiss to quote me, as he is condescending (he does not know me well enough to call me "darling") and he makes it appear that Ms. Battu focused her remarks on choseness when she did not. In short, he slants his reporting to favor his own agenda.
"I've never heard the word "Zionist" in public. EVER!"
That's because the word is so good and holy that it can never be spoken aloud. :)
(I'm sorry, I can't stop repeating this joke.)
POLLY POSTED: "Lots of luck with that! I've never heard the word "Zionist" in public."
Not recently, but it was mentioned some back in the 'Zionism=racism" debate.