- Who is a Jew?
Who decides that?
And why does it matter?
Identity is complicated.
I'm an educator.
I'm an entertainer.
I'm a brother.
I'm a Jew.
Your sense of self, comprises multiple roles.
It shapes what you care about
and how you prioritize your time.
For some, their identity as a Jew is their identity.
Others don't even think about it
but taking your Jewish identity for granted
is something you shouldn't take for granted.
Beyond being a simple label of self-defined identity,
this question of who is Jewish
comes with high stakes when it's defined by others.
Certain nations choosing who to oppress,
Israel deciding who gets to immigrate
and even just from individual communities
that aren't welcoming to some.
So is Jewish identity something you decide for yourself?
Or is it decided for you?
There's an old joke.
Anyone who's less religious than me
well, they're not really Jewish.
And anyone who's more religious than me,
well, they're just crazy.
There's always someone on your left and on your right.
So what ties us together?
And how do those opposing ideas shaped Jewish lives,
both in the past and in the present?
What connects a Hasid and Williamsburg
to a Tel Aviv beach bum?
Rabbi David Wolpe likens Jews to a religious family.
Essentially, "you're born into a family
the same way you are born into Judaism."
For some, this happens at birth
for others it happens by choice.
And the family you're a part of shapes who you are
and the choices you make.
Whether you're Ashkenazi, Mizrahi, Sephardi, Beta Israel,
Bukharah, Italkim, Reform, conservative, orthodox,
reconstructionist, renewal, or humanistic
They all identify as Jewish.
And that Jewish identity is tied to all sorts of things,
traditions, rituals, values, language, and even food.
That Hasid in Williamsburg strictly observes the Sabbath.
The women light the candles to welcome it in.
Reciting prayers and sitting down for a meal
with no phones to distract.
The guy in Tel Aviv caps off his busy week,
relaxing with family over a Friday night meal too.
Only no Kiddush prayer
and a soccer game on TV in the background.
Both spend Friday night differently
but what's influencing each is the same exact thing
a sense of Jewish identity.
But historically having a complete freedom of choice
to decide your own Jewish identity
was not 100% up to you.
For many, it was defined by sovereign nations
and a nation calling someone Jewish
regardless of how that person labeled themselves
meant that the person would share the same fate
as other Jews.
Most famously, if you had a single Jewish grandparent
the Nazis came after you.
When Israel was created in 1948
it was formed to be a home for all Jews.
But who are we talking about when we say "all Jews?"
When the lines are drawn on who is and isn't a Jew,
there's always consequences.
In 1950, the Law of Return was passed,
stating every Jew has the right to come into this country
as an oleh or immigrant.
But no clear definition of who is a Jew was established.
Halacha was generally held as the standard
namely Jews of matrilineal descent
or through Orthodox conversion.
But some Jews depending on how you define Jewish,
didn't qualify either because of who converted them
or who their parents were,
they weren't considered Jewish enough to immigrate.
The law's lack of clarity sowed polarization
in Israeli society,
prompting battles in the Israeli supreme court
over who is a Jew and multiple amendments.
In 1970, the version that we know today was ratified.
It extended immigration rights to anyone
with a single Jewish grandparent,
forming a refuge for anyone
who would have potentially been a target of the Nazis.
And there was of course, backlash to this too,
along the lines of are we letting Hitler
define our definition of who is Jewish?
The result?
After the walls came down over a million Jews
from Soviet Jewry, whose Jewish identity had been suppressed
by the Soviet Union were now eligible
to immigrate to Israel.
But in many countries today, and throughout history
being considered or not considered a Jew
mattered a whole lot.
Historically, whether we're talking about
the Spanish Inquisition, pogroms in Russia,
Nazi Germany, anti-Semitism in the Arab States,
or the KKK in the US,
it can mean the difference between equal rights
and second class citizenship, or between life and death.
Today, many of us are lucky enough to live in places
where we don't have to think twice
about our Jewish identity.
We can simply be. "The greatest happiness in life,"
Theodor Herzl said "is to be that which one is."
For centuries mechanisms like politics
and strict interpretations of Jewish law
shaped how people had their Jewish identity
assigned to them.
If you're in a situation
where you get to define it for yourself,
you shouldn't take it for granted.
That freedom allows people to do Jewish in their own way,
with a sense of agency.
For those who decide to make it a crucial part of their life,
it connects them to something deeper.
What Rabbi Jonathan Sacks called
"being a letter in the greater scroll"
that is the Jewish people.
Drawing a line on who precisely is
and isn't Jewish is not easy.
It's not an exact science.
If this is something that's a part of yourself
it's good to understand what that means,
how it plays into who you are and where you come from.
Thinking about Jewish identity goes
beyond having a few conversations.
It's making an active choice to experience Judaism,
whether on trips, through events,
or even taking part in discussions on topics like this.
Each person's own sense of Jewish identity
is both what keeps our people growing
from generation to generation
and what allows so many to access the fullness,
the richness of Judaism.
It's the experience as we have
chosen both by and for us, that make us who we are.
Jewish identity has meant many things
throughout history in the world.
Truly finding what it means to each of us
requires experiencing it in as many ways
and places as possible.
After all the very act of searching
is at the heart of Judaism itself.
Thanks for watching.
This is one part of a series on topics
that are central tenets of Judaism.
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