Who Is a Jew? Court Ruling in Bri­tain Rai­ses Ques­tion  — from The New York Times

November 8th, 2009 § 7

The Supreme Court in England is set to rule by the end of this year on a case invol­ving a ques­tion that has vexed Jewish com­mu­ni­ties throughout the world for cen­tu­ries: Who is a Jew? The case began because a 12-year-old boy whose father was born Jewish and whose mother con­ver­ted to Judaism was denied admis­sion to an Ortho­dox Jewish high school on the grounds that, because his mother was con­ver­ted not in an Ortho­dox syna­go­gue, but in what the Times article refers to as a “pro­gres­sive syna­go­gue” (which I assume corres­ponds to something like Reform here in the Sta­tes), she is not really Jewish; and so, the­re­fore, neither is he. The boy’s family deci­ded to sue the school for disc­ri­mi­na­tion and lost. The Court of Appeal, howe­ver, rever­sed that deci­sion on grounds that ques­tion one of the foun­da­tio­nal tenets of Jewish iden­tity: that, short of con­ver­sion, the only way one can be Jewish is to have been born to a Jewish mother.

In an explo­sive deci­sion, the court conc­lu­ded that basing school admis­sions on a clas­sic test of Judaism — whether one’s mother is Jewish — was by defi­ni­tion disc­ri­mi­na­tory. Whether the ratio­nale was “benign or malig­nant, theo­lo­gi­cal or supre­ma­cist,” the court wrote, “makes it no less and no more unlawful.”

The case res­ted on whether the school’s test of Jewish­ness was based on reli­gion, which would be legal, or on race or eth­ni­city, which would not. The court ruled that it was an eth­nic test because it con­cer­ned the sta­tus of M’s [which is how the boy is refe­rred to in court docu­ments] mother rather than whether M con­si­de­red him­self Jewish and prac­ti­ced Judaism.

“The requi­re­ment that if a pupil is to qua­lify for admis­sion his mother must be Jewish, whether by des­cent or con­ver­sion, is a test of eth­ni­city which con­tra­ve­nes the Race Rela­tions Act,” the court said. It added that while it was fair that Jewish schools should give pre­fe­rence to Jewish chil­dren, the admis­sions cri­te­ria must depend not on family ties, but “on faith, howe­ver defined.”

The same rea­so­ning would apply to a Chris­tian school that “refu­sed to admit a child on the ground that, albeit prac­ti­cing Chris­tians, the child’s family were of Jewish ori­gin,” the court said. (via Who Is a Jew? Court Ruling in Bri­tain Rai­ses Ques­tion — NYTi​mes​.com.)

Is Jewish a reli­gious or an eth­nic iden­tity? I was always taught it is both. Anti­se­mi­tes, on the other hand, have almost always argued other­wise. For the Nazis, Jewish was racial; go back further, and you find the Catho­lic Church trea­ting Jewish as if it were a bio­lo­gi­cal cha­rac­te­ris­tic. Jewish men, for exam­ple, were unders­tood to mens­truate; Jews in gene­ral were belie­ved inca­pa­ble of per­cei­ving the world accu­ra­tely, of telling the truth in any lan­guage other than Hebrew, even of lear­ning any lan­guage other than Hebrew – all because of the inhe­rent defi­cien­cies they suf­fe­red from as Jews. Even Jews who con­ver­ted to Catho­li­cism could not fully be trus­ted to have become sin­cere Chris­tians, peo­ple at the time belie­ved, because “once a Jew always a Jew,” and all it took to send a Jewish con­vert to be bur­ned at the stake, or other­wise tor­tu­red and put to death, was for someone to imply that he or she was still, sec­retly, Jewish.

That Jews should trace their Jewish­ness back through their mothers, accor­ding to the rab­bis, is com­man­ded in the Torah. Here are the rele­vant ver­ses from Deu­te­ro­nomy 7:

1. When the Lord the God shall bring thee into the land wither thou goest to pos­sess it, and shall cast out many nations before thee, the Hit­tite, and the Gir­gashite, and the Amo­rite, and the Canaa­nite, and the Periz­zite, and the Hivite, and the Jebu­site, seven nations grea­ter and migh­tier than thou; 2. and when the Lord thy God shall deli­ver them up before thee, and thous shalt smite them; (then) thou shalt utterly des­troy them; thou shalt make no cove­nant with them, nor show mercy unto them; 3. neither shalt thou make marria­ges with them: thy daugh­ter thou shalt not give unto his son, nor his daugh­ter shalt thou take for thy son. 4. For he will turn away thy son from follo­wing Me, that they may serve other gods; so will the anger of the Lord be kind­led against you, and He will des­troy thee quickly. (Empha­sis mine.)

The com­men­ta­tor Rashi explains the pas­sage I have ita­li­ci­zed as follows. (I am quo­ting here and above from The Pen­ta­teuch and Rashi’s Com­men­tary: A Linear Trans­la­tion into English, published in 1950 by S. S. & R. Publishing, Brooklyn, NY.)

For he will turn away thy son from follo­wing Me: [Rashi is here paraph­ra­sing the pas­sage from the Torah:] The son of a heathen, if he will marry your daugh­ter, will turn away your son, which your daugh­ter will bear him, from follo­wing Me. So [here begins Rashi’s com­men­tary], we learn that your daughter’s son that is born of a heathen is con­si­de­red your son; but the son of your son that is born of a heathen woman is not con­si­de­red your son, but her son, for it is not sta­ted regar­ding his [the heathen’s] daugh­ter: “Thou shalt not take…for she will turn away thy son from follo­wing Me.” (Empha­sis mine)

In other words, a son born to your (Jewish) son and a non-Jewish woman does not count as a mem­ber of your family, i.e., that child is not con­si­de­red Jewish, and so it is not neces­sary to state the pos­si­bi­lity that she will turn the child away from her or his Jewish heri­tage. One spiritual/mystical expla­na­tion that is given for this line of thin­king is as follows:

Jewish­ness is not in our DNA. It is in our soul. The rea­son it is pas­sed down through the mater­nal line is not just because it is easier to iden­tify who your mother is. It is because the soul iden­tity is more directly sha­ped by the mother than the father.

From a purely phy­si­cal pers­pec­tive, a child is more directly con­nec­ted to their mother. The father’s con­tri­bu­tion to the pro­duc­tion of a child is ins­tan­ta­neous and remote. The mother, on the other hand, gives her very self to the child . The child is con­cei­ved inside the mother, deve­lops inside the mother, is sus­tai­ned and nou­rished by the mother, and is born from the mother.

This is not to say that a father and child are not inti­ma­tely attached. Of course they are. But as deep and essen­tial as the bond bet­ween father and child may be, the child’s actual body was never a part of her father’s body. But she was a part of her mother. Every child begins as an exten­sion of their mother’s body.

This is a sim­ple fact. It doesn’t mean she will be clo­ser to her mother, or more simi­lar to her mother, or follow her mother’s ways. We are not dis­cus­sing the emo­tio­nal bond bet­ween parent and child, but rather the natu­ral phy­si­cal bond. There is a more direct phy­si­cal link bet­ween mother and child, because a child starts off as a part of her mother.

The body and its wor­kings are a mirror image of the wor­kings of the soul. The phy­si­cal world is a para­llel of the spi­ri­tual world. And so, the direct phy­si­cal link bet­ween mother and child is a reflec­tion of a soul link bet­ween them. While the father’s soul con­tri­bu­tes to the iden­tity of the child’s soul, it is the mother’s soul that actually defi­nes it. If the mother has a Jewish soul, the child does too.

If the mother is not Jewish but the father is, his Jewish soul will not be exten­ded to the child. There may be a spark of Jewish­ness there, but if it was not ges­ta­ted in a Jewish mother, the child will have to go through con­ver­sion for their Jewish­ness to be activated.

Jewish­ness is pas­sed down by the mother because being Jewish is a spi­ri­tual iden­tity, it defi­nes our very being. And our very being we get from our mother, both in body and in soul. (Via Cha­bad.)

This expla­na­tion essen­tia­li­zes Jewish in a way that would have been very fami­liar to the medie­val Church, I think, and I ima­gine the Nazis as well, to the degree that any of them accep­ted the notion of a soul, would have endor­sed it as well. I think anyone who belie­ves in the neces­sity of kee­ping church and state sepa­rate, howe­ver, would be rightly trou­bled if a secu­lar court were to accept such an expla­na­tion for why the actions of the Ortho­dox High School in England refu­sed admis­sion to M. (I should be clear that I have not read the court docu­ments and so I don’t know if this expla­na­tion even ente­red into the school’s argu­ment.) More to the point, if you read the pas­sage from Deu­te­ro­nomy without the mys­ti­cal expla­na­tion, it’s hard to see matri­li­neal des­cent as anything other than a ques­tion of ethnicity.

The more I think about the ques­tions rai­sed by this case, the diz­zier I get. I don’t know Bri­tish law; I don’t know the Race Rela­tions Act; I don’t what the legal stan­ding of M’s family’s suit would be here in the Sta­tes. Indeed, I think the idea of a court ruling on what I have always thought of as a reli­gious ques­tion is kind of scary. If the courts can rule on this, then what other ques­tions that have tra­di­tio­nally been hand­led within reli­gious com­mu­ni­ties by the follo­wers of the faith in ques­tion might the courts and then the govern­ment sud­denly have juris­dic­tion over? What hap­pens then to our sepa­ra­tion of Church and State. Then there is the part of me that says the legal ques­tion is almost beside the point. The lar­ger ques­tion is who gets to define the cri­te­ria by which someone is con­si­de­red Jewish by other Jews? If we follow the rea­so­ning of the Ortho­dox, aren’t we (and I mean here the Jews) saying that it’s okay for us to disc­ri­mi­nate within our own com­mu­nity in a way that we would never accept were the disc­ri­mi­na­tion racial, say, or eth­nic and taking place outside the community?

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§ 7 Responses to “Who Is a Jew? Court Ruling in Bri­tain Rai­ses Ques­tion  — from The New York Times”

  • Humans says:

    Who is a Jew can be used wrong in many ways.

    NEVADA SUPREME COURT CASE “Uni­ted Sta­tes of Ame­rica” GOING ON: THIS HATE CRIME RACIST ACTIVITY THE SAME AS HITLERS LAWS WERE OF
    “WHO IS A JEW”
    IS GOING ON EVERYWHERE BY CHABAD.

    WHO WANTS HITLERS LAWS AROUND AGAIN CHABAD?

    IN LAS VEGAS FEDERAL COURTS A CONVICTED SEX OFFENDER IS ALLOWED TO HIDE IN BANKRUPTCY.

    WHY? SO THE VICTIMS HAVE NOTHING LEFT IN COURT TO GO FORWARD ON THE ISSUES OF RAPE AND “WHO IS A JEW” RACIST INVESTIGATIONS.

    IN LAS VEGAS THAT IS HOW YOU GET A JUDGMENT ON VICTIMS OF HATE LAWS.

    Cha­bad Motto? If At First You Don’t Suc­ceed, Sue the Victim

    A Cha­bad man ser­ves as the haz­zan of a Cha­bad syna­go­gue. Seve­ral years ago, outside another syna­go­gue after a com­mu­nity event, the Cha­bad haz­zan sexually assaults a woman who is a mem­ber of the Cha­bad syna­go­gue. He is even­tually arres­ted and plea­ded guilty to a mis­de­mea­nor charge of lewd con­duct. He is sen­ten­ced, ser­ves a very brief time, is given pro­ba­tion and com­mu­nity service.

    Meanwhile, the vic­tim civilly sues Cha­bad, in part because she claims Cha­bad shel­te­red the haz­zan. Now Cha­bad has sought a judg­ment against the vic­tim for more than $175,000 in attor­neys’ fees, and a judge is about to grant that.

    The Cha­bad? Las Vegas, Nevada. The Rabbi? She Har­lig. The haz­zan? Michael Segels­tein. As Jewish Sur­vi­vors notes:

    Rabbi Har­lig is attemp­ting to sue a rape vic­tim for attor­ney fees. This is a rape vic­tim of a con­vic­ted sex offen­der who is on the natio­nal sex offen­der list.

    Imme­dia­tely after the arrest, Rabbi Har­lig fal­sely clai­med this vic­tim – who wor­ked in the synagogue’s kitchen – was not Jewish. She went to the RCA’s beit din. They inves­ti­ga­ted and found Rabbi Harlig’s claim false. The woman is the daugh­ter of a Jewish holo­caust sur­vi­vor from Vienna, Aus­tria. The beit din issued her a docu­ment verif­ying her Jewish­ness. But, during the time the beit din was inves­ti­ga­ting Rabbi Harlig’s false claims, this woman’s tee­nage son – a very active syna­go­gue goer and par­ti­ci­pant – was for­ced to sit in the back of the syna­go­gue. He was ban­ned from recei­ving ali­yot or lea­ding ser­vi­ces. And he was shun­ned by other mem­bers, as was his mother, appa­rently at the direc­tion of Rabbi Harlig.

    And the man who attemp­ted to rape this woman? He is a proud mem­ber of Cha­bad to this day, lea­ding ser­vi­ces and fully par­ti­ci­pa­ting in syna­go­gue life.

    A dou­ble stan­dard? You bet it is. And that dou­ble stan­dard is sanc­tio­ned by and orches­tra­ted by Chabad-Lubavitch.

    • I am going to leave this com­ment up, Humans, to give you a chance to post some links to subs­tan­tiate the claims you are making. If you don’t do that, I will remove the com­ment since, as you’ve writ­ten it, it appears to be nothing more than a smear against Cha­bad – of which, I will add, I am no great fan, but that doesn’t mean that I think accu­sa­tions like yours should be allo­wed to stand without substantiation.

  • Humans says:

    Richard, Thank You very we can do this. I agree.

    Case of Can­tor Michael Segels­tein (Las Vegas, NV)
    It appears that Michael Segels­tein is an hono­red mem­ber of Cha­bad of Southern Nevada. Please con­tact Rabbi Shea Har­lig and let your voice be heard! …
    http://​www​.thea​wa​re​ness​cen​ter​.org/​s​e​g​e​l​s​t​e​i​n​_​m​i​c​h​a​e​l​.​h​tml — Cached

    MICHAEL SEGELSTEIN — Flo­rida Sexual Offen­der
    Name: MICHAEL SEGELSTEIN. Sta­tus: Relea­sed — Requi­red to Regis­ter. Depart­ment of Correc­tions #: Not Avai­la­ble Search the Dept of Correc­tions Web­site …
    offen​der​.fdle​.state​.fl​.us/​o​f​f​e​n​d​e​r​/​f​l​y​e​r​.​d​o​?​p​e​r​s​o​n​I​d​=​3​6​939

  • Humans says:

    No human needs to smear Cha­bad­nicks, they are quiet well at pro­ving what they do even inside of The Uni­ted Sta­tes now.

    Please ask “Rabbi Krinsky” at head­quar­ters in Crown Heights, and his power ruling group how they make money off “Safeco Ame­ri­can Ultra Reli­gious Sexual Moles­ta­tion Policy” threw law­yers who take the case against “Who Is A Jew and the sex vic­tims” they receive kick­back ten per­cent pro­fit off the law­yers fees?

    They call them­sel­ves Torah Jews?

    Please call nvscclerk@​nvcourts.​nv.​gov
    Telephone: {775) 684‑1600 (Car­son City) howe­ver they “guard the case under sec­recy under the orders of a Con­gress per­son and sena­tor” who they give or allow any right to that infor­ma­tion to but here is a start with infor­ma­tion and proof and can be obtai­ned threw the Free­dom Of Infor­ma­tion Act»> Sec­ret bloc­king any media to like Com­mu­nist you know.

    CASE NO. 49341
    THE STATE OF SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF NEVADA

    ON APPEAL FROM THE EIGHT JUDICIAL DISTRICT COURT, CLARK COUNTY NEVADA CASE NO. A466121

    You see one can use “Who Is A Jew Ques­tion” for many evil was as the Nurem­berg laws were reve­red and used to hurt Jews.

    That law of Who Is A Jew is being used against Jews by Cha­bad to disc­re­dit vic­tims of sex cri­mes they choose to pro­fit off of.

    Who wants that law around racist and bigots sim­ple and plain?

  • Humans says:

    Richard, make sure you see spea­king “pra­ying” at the Senate and Con­gress floor video.

    Poli­ti­cal rules Las Vegas Judai­cal sys­tem even when they know about a sex cri­mes with a conviction.

    Sena­tor Harry Reid and his son Rory Reid are a sha­rehol­der in the law firm “Lio­nel Saw­yer and Collins” who pro­tec­ted them. Great honor bes­to­wed as they all share in the pro­fits off “WHo Is A Jew and sex cri­mes” where the vic­tim almost died by hours.

    It is “OK for a Ortho­dox Beth Din” to do inves­ti­ga­tions. But when Cha­bad Rab­bis says the Beth Din ruling they are against. Then have non Beth Din law­yers and Safeco Ame­ri­can Insu­rance pay law­yers of the public Court and in the Ame­ri­can Judai­cal sys­tem start doing inves­ti­ga­tions it is a human rights abuse and dan­ge­rous for all Jews.

    Cha­bad of Southern Nevada
    For more infor­ma­tion please call Cha­bad at 259‑0770. This pro­gram was made pos­si­ble through a grant from the UJC/Jewish Fede­ra­tion of Las Vegas …
    http://​www​.cha​badlv​.org/ — Cached — Simi­lar

  • Humans says:

    Richard one last say the case in England star­ted after the cou­ple left Israel he was from a fisher­man family. She con­ver­ted told the Beth Din she had no marriage plan­ned. After she married the Beth Din in Israel said because they were not infor­med she had a love and he is a Cohen, and a Cohen should not have married a con­vert. If she left Israel she was no lon­ger Jewish so her chil­dren either. {I do not agree with this but I’M not a Beth Din} howe­ver the suf­fe­ring for the chil­dren was horri­ble terri­ble abuse and this cau­ses hate against Jews. From the non Jewish side of the family as it makes Jews look racist and an insult to the non Jewish family.

    After moving back to England her Mother took the chil­dren to the yeshiva school and a “Cha­bad­nick woman” over heard the word “CONVERTS” and then she ran repor­ting it cau­sing trou­ble. After that the inves­ti­ga­tion of “Who Is A Jew” star­ted. Due to the rea­son above the chil­dren were thrown out of the school.

    This case has been going on well over nine years as the case in Nevada to.

    I will try to get the case from England that was repor­ted in Hebrew in Israel back many years ago for you.

    Cha­bad recei­ves money from State and Fede­ral funds to as the case in England. Because they receive money from the Govern­ment they have a say in the race issue.

    The case in Las Vegas should enter the Fede­ral sys­tem under a new suit.

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