Former Chief Rabbi Meir Lau addressed a forum on anti-Semitism. It’s a read-in-full recommendation, but here’s an excerpt:
“For instance,” Rabbi Lau continued, “some 200 years ago, and at other times, the Maskilim said that to get rid of anti-Semitism, we have to change our mores and be like the nations. It was said that the Jews dress differently, speak differently, and have different culture and the like, and that causes their persecution. ‘If we are like them, they’ll learn to appreciate us,’ it was said. They said this in Poland and in Hungary and in many other places. But of course we know that in Germany in the last century, we were not different in anything – not in clothing nor in language nor in arts nor in politics. The only thing that stood out very nicely was our genius, from Albert Einstein to the present Foreign Minister – but did it work? Did anti-Semitism disappear? Did they begin to like us? Of course not. Instead, they said, ‘Aaah, so you’re trying to be like us? Have you come to live here and then judge us? – Just like they said in Sodom [Gen. 19,9] … So we see that it’s not the differences and not the sameness that brings about anti-Semitism…
“So then we were told that one of the reasons they hate us is because we were temporary residents in their land, that we don’t have a home of our own. They told us to leave and go to Palestine, and that once we have our own country, they won’t hate us. How ironic – for we did that, and of course they still hate us. As the phrase goes: Sorry for winning… They hate us when we don’t have a home, and they hates us when we do have a home… So what’s the reason?
“I once heard an Arab man address a forum. He did not deny the Holocaust, but he said that as a Palestinian, he is the real victim of the Holocaust, because it caused him to be displaced by the Jews and now he does not have a home. So he said that the Jews should go back to Europe and there will no longer be a problem between Jews and Arabs. But what about the pogrom in Hevron in 1929, and the killings in Motza and elsewhere in the 30s, which happened way before the problem of the refugees of 1948; what, they had prophecy regarding what would happen later?
I’ve been thinking about this for years, and have my own ideas. I really must find the time to sit down and write that essay.
I suppose they thought that he was worth shooting at. So unlike Kofi (who would never have gone there and if he had would have soiled his diaper.)
They hate the Jews because the Jews are better than everyone else. Sounds weird in this day and age, but it’s true; the upper end of every statistical metric of accomplishment, from science to industry to economics to art to culture to athletics, are overwhelmingly dominated by the descendents of Abraham. Even those who believe in other gods, or no gods at all, can’t ignore this simple fact, and go mad trying to deny it, inventing shadowy conspiracies or magical powers in an effort explain it all away.
There are certainly Jewish underachievers, and even Jewish criminals, but they number far fewer among the Jews than among any other ethnic or religious group. I can’t begin to speculate why this is, only that I have observed that it is, and it causes a lot of anger among us goyim, the dangerous kind of anger that is completely unfettered by being attached to any logical explanation, and so cannot be reasoned with in any way.
Tatterdemalian
There has been research recently (see Natural History of Ashkenazi Intelligence by Gregory Cochran, Jason Hardy, Henry Harpending) which suggests that Jews of primarily European descent score significantly higher than average on tests of standard intelligence. It is theorized that intelligence may have been particularly selected for in Jewish populations due to a long history of discrimination, persecution, exile and periodic pogroms. For example, Jews were banned from many jobs forcing them to take up professions in fields like medicine and finance. The Jews that did well (higher intelligence) survived to procreate and generally had larger families, thus passing their genes for intelligence on to future generations. Or so the theory goes.
So, the hate was not caused by Jewish superiority, but instead the superiority was caused by the hate? That’s entirely possible, but there are several other persecuted minorities that have not shown any signs of betterment for their suffering… Haitians, Africans, and Native Americans come to mind.
Moreover, that theory also returns us to the starting question… why did the would develop such a hate of Jews, if at one time Jews were not exhibiting any signs of their current prowess? Suffering can sharpen the sword, but it cannot create the steel.
Tat, much of the hate was caused by the Catholic Church. There are simply no two ways about it. And then the spinoffs of the Church hated the Jews as well (see: Martin Luther and the Jews).
There was almost no Jew-hatred in India back in the days when it was all Hindu.
I think Jew-hatred comes down to a simple concept: We said “No.”
I will expound on that eventually. I keep meaning to.
We Jews are descended partly, but not entirely, from the inhabitants of southern Syria a few millennia ago. By the standards of “Send them back where they came from†we really would have to be dismembered.
The Other Side has no objection to my heart being in Israel, but only if my left foot is in Poland and my pancreas is in Romania.
Meryl, that sounds a lot better than my theory. I hope you get around to writing that essay soon.