purronronner:

realsadjewishhours:

A How-To Not be Antisemitic/How-To interact with Jews Guide for Christians/Christianized folk.

I have some time before I go to a meeting. And in general I get a lot of asks, mainly from Christian folk, saying, “Hey @realsadjewishhours is this or is this not antisemitic?” “How do I interact with the new Jewish folk in my neighborhood without being antisemitic?” “Is it okay for me to celebrate Passover, Hanukkah, Rose Hashanah when I’m not Jewish?”

So I’m going to write up this helpful guide, I hope it is useful and informative. So let’s get started.

1. No, you cannot celebrate Jewish holidays, unless an actual Jewish person has invited you to do so. I know, bummer. Jewish holidays seem cool right? And they ARE cool. But Christianity and Christianized folk have had a long history of essentially being culture vultures when it comes to Jewishness. And it’s never ended well the Jewish mysticism Kabbalah and the Talmud (I even have a post about this that was recently posted if you need any proof) is a good example of this. Goyim have twisted, and destroyed the essential meaning of many many Jewish beliefs or cultural items. Once upon time Judaism/Jewish culture as a whole was never this closed off from the rest of world, we invited Gentiles to learn about our religion and many times participate, but due to thousands of years of oppression in order to survive our communities and religion were protected and guarded from outsiders.

Regardless of your intention, or you admiration of Jewishness, you are being complicit in the destruction of our culture by taking our holidays and celebrating them outside of our communities. It is absolutely, a hundred percent, okay to participate as long as a Jewish person’s ASKS you and not the other way around. (Though be mindful it is not your place to question or challenge the way they celebrate their holidays)

Do not ask or pressure your Jewish friends into allowing you to celebrate the holidays with them. Ever. It is not your place to ask. It is their’s.

2. Do not critique our religious books.

I’ve explained this is a previous post before called “Is it Antisemitic for a Goy to critique Judaism?” Where I explain though, theoretically it should be possible to critique Judaism without being antisemitic, that 99.99% of critiques from goyim are A) antisemitic conspiracy theories B) a generalized statement about Abrahamic religions that simply have nothing to Judaism and are clearly from a Christianized or Muslim POV. And sometimes C) just plain wrong.

Judaism is complex, so incredibly complex that many religious Jews themselves don’t have a firm, sound grasp of it all. A Rabbi once said, “For every single Jew, there is a different belief of G-d,” or something like that. Even the 13 Basic Principles of Judaism don’t encompass for many, if not most, religious Jews what Judaism and its beliefs actually are. So for an outsider, a Christianized one, nonetheless to try and pretend they know even a little bit about our beliefs as a group, and try and attempt to critique them almost never ends well.

Its also complicit in the Christianized supremacy that resides in the West. Again like I spoke of about the Talmud post I had recently posted, y’all “critiqued” our religious books in the Middle Ages, an event dubbed the Attack on the Talmud in which you labeled it a heretic book, used the few passages that spoke of Jesus as examples for anti-Christ sentiment, and then went to burn them in certain provinces. The attack on the Talmud, and Christian Middle Ages writings against it soon became a big part and contribution to us being mass expelled from European countries.

I understand that some sects of Judaism do indeed have issues, but that is just simply not your place to critique it, not without being complicit in Christianized supremacy. There are many secular and even religious Jews willing to challenge the issues in the Jewish community. It’s not your fight to fight stay out of it.

3. Stop using the term Pharisees, and Synagogue of Satan. They are antisemitic.

This should be obvious. Pharisees in particular has a long history as being used against us as a whole group. The term Pharisees, regardless of whom you are using it against and what definition you are using has a history of Antisemitism described in this article. The article goes on to explain the history of how Pharisees was used to describe Jews in general, and had a negative connotation ascribed to it by German scholars. The Synagogue of Satan has a near similar history to Pharisees, a term used to describe a small amount of Jews, being used negatively to describe all Jews (except Synagogue of Satan has always been antisemitic unlike the term Pharisees)

4. Stop Scheduling events on Jewish Holidays and Sabbath

It’s not hard to ask your Jewish mutuals and friends which holidays they take off for or celebrate like Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, etc. It’s normal for us to KNOW to not schedule things on Christmas and Easter. But many tend to forget there are other religions that MUST take off for certain days, like for observant Jews, we CANNOT do certain things on Saturday and Friday Evening, and Yom Kippur And Rosh Hashanah. All you have to do, prior to planning something is ASK and look up in advance the dates of important Jewish holidays. It never hurts to do a little research for your friends especially those in marginalized groups. If they don’t celebrate it and they say no to celebrating it then feel free to schedule something that day but if they say yes, please do not schedule something that day.

5. Do NOT call your Jewish friends Bloodthirsty, Money Hungry or compare them to Lizards, and Goblins, Trolls, or Sorcerer/Witches. Yes, even if it’s a joke. Calling Jewish folk or comparing them to these things is antisemitic. Even if you don’t intend for it to be. These caricatures in fairy tales and fantasy genre have been heavily Jew coded many since the Middle Ages. We have a long history of being compared to these things in fiction, unless they explicitly state they are comfortable being called any of these. Then. Do. Not. Call. Them. Any. Of. Those. And money hungry comes from the belief that we are bankers and control all the money and the wealth. And bloodthirsty comes from Blood libel theory.

6. Ask them if they keep Kosher. If so, when ever making something or giving them food make sure it’s Kosher. Do not lie about your food being Kosher or not.

Regardless of any religious beliefs, or dietarian regime you have for your personal self it is always important to make accommodations for those in your life, especially concerning food. For the Jewish People, Kosher allows us to be observant Jews who thrive on adhering to Jewish Law, not all Jews keep kosher but many of us do. Again, asking is important and the easy way to find out. Don’t assume based on how you they dress or act if they are observant or not and thus do not keep kosher. Not only is rude to assume something about something but you can’t pinpoint what an observant Jewish person looks like, nonetheless one that keeps kosher. Please, it seriously important for you to be honest about your food and it’s preparation. Do not lie to make us feel included that the food is kosher. It is also not a laughing or joking matter to lie, either. Keeping kosher to many Jewish people is a fundamental part of being Jewish. Lying about your food being Kosher does not allow us to do that it and to lie is a great misuse of trust.

7. Stop trying to explain our ethnicity, religious, or culture to us.

Seriously, we know. We know about our own shit. You will never know better than us about our own stuff.

8. Don’t ask about the Israel/Palestine conflict. Regardless if you say “I support Israel” or not.

We don’t care that you support Israel. It is exhausting to constantly talk about the I/P conflict especially for those that have little or nothing to do with Israel. The I/P conflict is complex especially with the fact it is a known fact Jews and Palestinians are both native to the land. Human rights abuse is never acceptable, making a place inhabitable and not allowing people to thrive in a place they existed for so long is unacceptable. But we do not have to talk about the conflict with you, and you are not allowed to have our thoughts whenever you wish. You don’t have the right to determine which of us is a “Good Jew” or “Bad Jew” based on what solution you exactly support.

9. Stop trying to practice Kabbalah

This especially goes out to witches, If you aren’t Jewish, stop. Yes, this includes the Christianized variants of Kabbalah, the art stolen by our people. I shouldn’t have to explain this so I won’t. If you understand that Jewish culture belongs to Jewish people, and yes, we do not want to share it with outsiders who have no interest in converting then you should understand why, exactly, we don’t want you practicing it.

10. If you cover your head it is not a Christian tichel. It is not a tichel at all.

A tichel is a Yiddish word for head covering. Unless you live in Israel where the official language is Hebrew and byproduct, it’s dialects, there is absolutely no reason to call your head covering by a Hebrew dialect term. In fact there is absolutely no reason for you to use or cling to Hebrew/Yiddish/Ladino etc. terms when you are not Jewish. Its not antisemitic per se to use Hebrew, but is a bit of a culture vulture thing to use Hebrew, especially terms that have some religious significance in a sense, when there is absolutely no need to and you are in no way Israeli or Jewish.

11. Stop dismissing the Old Testament as “not important” and saying no one follows that” in order to show your support for LGBT folk or in any such form.

Many of our holiest of scriptures are in what you call “the Old Testament” known as the Torah, that we follow and hold dear to this day. You are not in the place to dismiss our scriptures, especially since you quite generously were given to them from the Jews who were known as the Jesus Movement. From the Talmud and other scriptures there has been a long history of Christians denouncing our scriptures calling them heretical works. When dismissing our scriptures you burned our holiest of items and scriptures all the while exiting us from our lands. Plenty of queer Jews exist happily all the while praying and adhering to such scripture you try to dismiss. Find actual better ways of combating homophobia without being antisemitic,

Please.

12. Stop with the fucking shofar

Well, I didn’t think this was particularly big issue. But apparently as Ellen invited a goy onto her show who blew the shofar, and was found to be apart of a weird Christian sect that appropriated Jewishness, this needs to be said:

Stop blowing the fucking shofar. Stop using shofars. They were NEVER important and Christianity and have extreme importance in Judaism, especially for high holy days. The shofar has extreme religious significance, you blowing it for seemingly no reason diminishes that. If you want to blow something so bad go blow an instrument… or something else of a different nature.

13. Stop saying “Jesus was Jewish too!” to try and excuse your Antisemitism or relate to us

Really? Fucking, really? I’m not stupid, no Jew is stupid. We KNOW Jesus if all biblical accounts of him are correct he was Jewish. This does not mean: you can’t be antisemitic or relate to us religiously. For nearly a thousand years Christians have been able to successfully separate Jesus and other Jews, due to the belief that he is quote on quite “G-d’s son” he hasn’t really considered to be “Jewish” by Christians for the longest time. Infact y’all said and I quote “Jews are responsible for Jesus’ death” for hundreds of years as if Jesus wasn’t Jewish himself. You put up a Jesus V. Jews narrative for thousands of years. Don’t pretend that him and us are viewed the same when it comes to our Jewishness. This also leads me to another point: this hundred percent means that you cannot share in Jewish customs regardless if your “Messiah” is Jewish or not as for reasons stated above.

14. Do not set up Christian/Christianized Atheist information/conversion stalls/groups, whatever the fuck you call them, near Synagogues and Jewish centers.

I really don’t think I have to explain this. Attempting to convert Jewish people to Christianity or Christianized Atheism is cultural genocide. I’m pretty sure even most of the worst Christianized folk know that by now (probably not, but just here to remind you again, that yes, attempting to convert us to any belief system is BAD)

15. Don’t ask “how exactly are you Jewish?” For any reason. Unless they offer up the information, it’s none of your business.

Whether it’s in good faith or not (and for most of the time it definitely is NOT in good faith) don’t ask how someone is Jewish or how goyim like to phrase it “Are you Jewish or JEWISH Jewish?”

Many of the times when this asked it is to gauge just where the line is concerning Antisemitism, or what they can or can’t say without getting in trouble. It’s also another way to act like converts aren’t “Jewish Jewish” whatever the fuck that means. Seeing how exactly one person is connected to Jewishness and how much they are is, yep you guessed it, creepy.

16. Don’t buy/collect obvious Jewish things (such as antique Torah scrolls, siddur, Talmud, Kippah, Prayer shawl, etc.)

I know this one may seem out of the blue but it’s really not. Many evangelical Christians like the owners of Hobby Lobby, have been found to be buying Jewish things keeping them outside of the care and hands of Jewish people.

There is a specific way to take care of all the things above, a specific way that only a Jew can do, I’m glad you find our cultural mesmerizing I’m glad you find it interesting. But these things need be in the hands of Jews, because they are for Jews and by Jews. A Christian or someone Christianized simply cannot take care of these items like we can.

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I think that’s it at this time! If any Jewish people wish to add something or discuss one of these points I’m open and willing as long as no tokenization is taking place.

Not at comfortable with goyim adding on but they can reblog this post and any additions that have specifically Jews adding something to it.

Personally I’m comfortable with my goyische friends asking if they can celebrate a holiday with me, if they ask respectfully (I trust them to do so). I absolutely understand, though, why a lot of other Jewish people aren’t okay with it.