Part II:
In the first part of this article, I presented some ideas as to the origins of racism, discussed some problematic statements in the Talmud and suggested why those statements should not be used as models for public discourse today. In this continuation, I will present some other Talmudic statements and suggest how we, as individuals and as a group should respond to the disturbing phenomenon of racism in the Jewish community.
In the tractate Pesachim (87b), there is an interesting story that our Israeli rosh yeshiva might have had in mind when he made his remarks. A certain Roman sectarian declares that his people are better than Jews because King David, in a short period of six months, had killed every male in Edom (often identified in the Talmud with Rome) (I Kings 11:16), whereas the Jews had been living in the Roman empire for many years without being killed. R. Oshaia, a Palestinian amora, rebuts this claim saying that the only reason that the Romans have not killed off the Jews is for fear of being called a murderous kingdom. And, in Rashi’s interpretation, the Roman acknowledges that his people are indeed constantly occupied with this thought of how to exterminate the Jews without being taken to task. Some people may interpret this story as telling us that non-Jews are constantly immersed in planning the murder of Jews. But I think such a reading makes no sense for two reasons. First of all, the Talmud is constrained to come up with a strong counter-statement against the incontrovertible Biblical evidence proffered by the sectarian regarding Jewish slaughter; hence the (overly) strong rebuttal. Second, we have no reason to infer from this that Romans by their nature, or Arabs by their nature, are murderous – no more than we would infer from the evidence regarding King David that Jews are genocidal. The most we could conclude from this is that the Roman government might have been happy to get rid of a troublesome people in a land that would otherwise have happily agreed to be hellenized. In fact, what we have here is something very particular that cannot and should not be used as a basis for generalization.
We have another similar misunderstood source for hatred of non-Jews in a commentary to Genesis 33:4. There, Rashi quotes R. Shimon bar Yochai as saying that “Esau hates Yaakov.” Since Esau is identified elsewhere as the ancestor of Edom, this has been taken by some people as a statement that Christians (identifying Christians with Rome, the center of the Catholic faith) hate Jews. Others, including our Israeli rosh yeshiva (in a conversation with me), have extended this to the belief that all non-Jews hate Jews. Ignoring entirely the context of the statement where Esau and Yaakov are the two personalities, the two brothers, the two sons of Yitskhok – not the nations, and certainly not the two groups of non-Jews and Jews![1]
But precisely because there do exist such false sources for gentile-hatred in Jewish texts, it is important that Jewish religious leaders be vigilant and speak up against hate-mongering and racism. This applies not only to the extreme case of our Israeli rosh-yeshiva, but also to other less extreme, but equally important, utterances. For example, we recently heard Rabbi Hershl Schachter, a respected and learned rosh yeshiva at the centrist Orthodox Yeshiva University, referring to African-Americans as shvartses.[2] While Yeshiva University did put out a press release stating that “The recent use of a derogatory racial term and negative characterizations of African-Americans and Muslims, by a member of the faculty, are inappropriate, offensive …,” none of our local orthodox community rabbis, to my knowledge, used the opportunity to condemn the use of derogatory racial terms.[3] Neither did R. Schachter, himself, apologize for his remarks.[4] The point is not that R. Schachter is a bad person;[5] rather, given R. Schachter’s prominence and the likelihood of ordinary people learning from him, it is crucial that rabbis speak out against the use of such derogatory expressions.[6] After the Israeli rabbi whom I described at the beginning of this article spoke in our shul, I am happy to report that the following Shabbos, our own rabbi gave a derasha distancing himself and our shul from such vitriol. On the other hand, a couple of years later, this hate-mongering rabbi was once again given an opportunity to speak in our synagogue; worse, shul members were encouraged to contribute to his yeshiva. It seems we still have a long way to go in recognizing and redressing racist attitudes.
But it’s not only rabbis and rebbes that have such anti-other views. Many ordinary Jews have highly biased views of non-Jews; very likely such views have been inherited from their parents and grandparents who went through the Holocaust. It is important to make a distinction between understanding why somebody might have negative views of Eastern European gentiles and allowing that understanding to color one’s own views of gentiles. I personally, though not of Eastern European extraction, have been on both sides of the fence. Many of my relatives in India have/had anti-Semitic stereotypes of Jews, partly inherited from the English/Americans passing through India and partly due to the pro-Arab stance that the Indian government had for a long-time.[7] Many Hindu Indians have negatives attitudes towards Muslims as a group and against lower-caste Hindus; similarly Muslim think of Hindus as kaffirs – “idolators and polytheists, and educated Muslims are contemptuous of the inequality of the Hindu caste system.”[8]
On the other hand, in the US, I have personally been on the receiving end of some unpleasant experiences both from Jews and from non-Jews, because of my skin color and my geographical origin. For example, many years ago, in Chicago, I sat down next to an elderly white lady on a city bus, whereupon she promptly got up and moved elsewhere – even though there was more than enough room for both of us on the seat. I understood that the lady might have inherited her attitudes from her upbringing and didn’t hold it against her, especially given her advanced age, but I was certainly saddened by her action. Another time, I encountered a rather hostile reception while eating dinner with a white girlfriend at a restaurant in a Lithuanian neighborhood on the south side of Chicago.
I also know personally how easy it is to fall into racist behavior. I remember how at one time, I myself treated a Gideon New Testament with less than complete respect, and my children called me out on my behavior. I realized that I was wrong, that I had violated the very precepts that I had taught my children to follow. The point I want to make is that we have to be on our guard, lest we lapse into such behavior. The fact that such behavior is common or natural in some sense does not mean that it can be condoned. Our children should be taught that speech and behavior disrespectful of ethnic and religious groups is not tolerated, even when it emanates from individuals we teach our children to respect. The Orthodox community has experienced several instances of sexual molestation by rabbis and other people respected in the community; even if we, as a community, have not yet taken sufficiently strong steps to prevent the recurrence of such behavior, we all agree that it is unacceptable. We need to take a similar stance against racist speech and behavior.
The very first book of the Bible tells us that God made man in His own image. He made man in His own image, not just Jews! The Bible is clearly telling us to respect the humanity in every man. Even if other peoples do not recognize this fact, the Jews have a special obligation to remember it and act upon it. Even if other groups act hatefully towards us, we should not hate them. This doesn’t mean that we should not defend ourselves against violence, it doesn’t mean that we should not recognize and protect ourselves against violence perpetrated by various groups. It does mean that our actions should not be motivated by hate towards another human being qua human being. This is why even after four hundred years of slavery in Egypt, the Torah tells us that we may not oppress the stranger. Ki geyrim heyyisem be-erets mitsrayim – “for you were strangers in the land of Egypt” is a phrase that is repeated over and over again in the Torah in various contexts to admonish us against negative actions and thoughts.
Clearly, as Jews, we have an obligation to not be racist. But, equally importantly, we need to speak out against racism in our community, whenever and wherever it occurs and by whomever it might be perpetrated. In the words of Rabbi Jonathan Sacks (http://www.rabbisacks.org/ on parashas Noah, Covenant and Conversation 5774): “It is not enough to be righteous if that means turning our backs on a society that is guilty of wrongdoing. We must take a stand. We must protest. We must register dissent even if the probability of changing minds is small. That is because the moral life is a life we share with others. We are, in some sense, responsible for the society of which we are a part. It is not enough to be good. We must encourage others to be good.” We must act to eradicate racism from our community.
[1] See Dovbear’s blog http://dovbear.blogspot.com/2010/11/what-esav-soneh-lyaakov-really-means.html.
[2] The Jewish Daily Forward, March 29, 2013. As a fluent speaker of Yiddish who uses it on a daily basis, I am well aware that the yiddish word for black and for blacks is shvartse, shvartses. If one were speaking in Yiddish, one would have few other options. However, in Jewish English, the word shvartse has a clear negative connotation. It is difficult to believe that R. Schachter, a posek who renders halakhic decisions and who is thus supposed to be aware of the social and environment, does not know this.
[3] The use of pejorative terms such as sheygets and shiktse/shiksa and goy is far from unknown in our community. Although the term goy is not necessarily pejorative, it is often used with such intent, cf. other terms such as goyishe kop. Sheygets and shiktse are, invariably, used as slurs.
[4] This is in contrast to other rabbis, who have apologized for errors of commission or judgement. For example, in 2003, R. Mordechai Willig, another rosh yeshiva at Yeshiva University apologized for mistakes in the handling of the Baruch Lanner case.
[5] In fact, even as I disagree with him on his use of such terms, I continue to believe that R. Schachter is a scholar from whom one can learn a lot; from whom I have learned a lot.
[6] My criticism of R. Schachter’s use of pejorative terms has nothing to do with whether I consider Black Muslims dangerous as cellmates or not. The Nation of Islam, often referred to as the Black Muslim movement, has indeed been condemned by some scholars as anti-semitic. But whether that accusation is true or not, every human being has inherent worth and an accident of birth or skin color cannot be grounds for condemnation or for denigration.
[7] Ironically enough, because of the nationalist Hindutva movement in India, many Hindus are now pro-Israel based on the notion that my enemy’s enemy is my friend.
[8] Kana Mitra, “Exploring the Possibility of Hindu-Muslim Dialogue,” http://www.interfaithdialog.org/reading-room-main2menu-27/126-exploring-the-possibility-of-hindu-muslim-dialogue, viewed April 19, 2013.
By Meylekh Viswanath
