Jews

TheJews(Hebrew:יְהוּדִים‎,ISO 259-2:Yehudim,Israeli pronunciation:[jehuˈdim]), or theJewish people, are anethnoreligious groupandnationoriginating from theIsraelitesofancient Israel and Judahand traditionally adhering toJudaism.Jewish ethnicity, religion, and community are highly interrelated,as Judaism is theirethnic religion,though it is not practiced by all ethnic Jews.Despite this, religious Jews regardconverts to Judaismas members of the Jewish nation, pursuant to thelong-standing conversion process.
The Israelites emerged from within theCanaanite peoplesto establishIsraelandJudahin theSouthern Levantduring theIron Age.By the late 6th century BCE, Judaism had evolved from the Israelite religion, dubbedYahwism(forYahweh) by modern scholars,having a theology that religious Jews believe to be the expression of theMosaic covenantbetween their ancestors andGod.TheBabylonian captivityof the people of Judah followingtheir kingdom's destruction,the movement of Jewish groups around theMediterraneanduring theHellenistic period, and subsequent periods of conflict and violent dispersion, such as theJewish–Roman wars, gave rise to theJewish diaspora, which is a worldwide dispersion of Jewish communities that have maintained their sense ofJewish history,identity, andculture.
In the following millennia, Jewish diaspora communitiescoalescedinto three majorethnic subdivisionsaccording to where their ancestors settled: theAshkenazim(CentralandEastern Europe), theSephardim(Iberian Peninsula), and theMizrahim(Middle EastandNorth Africa).While these three major divisions account for most of the world's Jews, there are other smaller Jewish groups outside of the three.Prior toWorld War II, theglobal Jewish populationreached a peak of 16.7 million,representing around 0.7% of the world's population at that time. During World War II, approximately six million Jews throughoutEuropewere systematically murdered byNazi Germanyin a genocide known asthe Holocaust.Since then, the population has slowly risen again, and as of 2021, was estimated to be at 15.2 million by the demographerSergio Della Pergolaor less than 0.2% of the total world population in 2012.Today, over 85% of Jews live inIsraelor theUnited States. Israel, whose population is 73.9% Jewish, is the only country where Jews comprise more than 2.5% of the population.
Jews have significantly influenced and contributed to the development and growth of human progress in many fields, both historically and in modern times, including inscience and technology,philosophy,ethics,literature,governance,business,art,music,comedy,theatre,cinema,architecture,food,medicine,andreligion. Jewswrote the Bible,foundedChristianity,and hadan indirect but profound influence on Islam.In these ways, Jews have also played a significant role in the development ofWestern culture.
The term "Jew" is derived from theHebrewwordיְהוּדִיYehudi, with thepluralיְהוּדִיםYehudim.Endonymsin otherJewish languagesinclude theLadinoג׳ודיוDjudio(pluralג׳ודיוס,Djudios) and theYiddishייִדYid(pluralייִדןYidn). Originally, in ancient times,Yehudi(Jew)was used to describe the inhabitants of the Israelitekingdom of Judah.It is also used to distinguish their descendants from thegentilesand theSamaritans.According to theHebrew Bible, these inhabitants predominately descend from thetribe of JudahfromJudah, the fourth son ofJacob.Together the tribe of Judah and thetribe of Benjaminmade up the Kingdom of Judah.
Though Genesis 29:35 and 49:8 connect "Judah" with the verbyada, meaning "praise", scholars generally agree that "Judah" most likely derives from the name of aLevantinegeographic region dominated by gorges and ravines.In ancient times, Jewish people as a whole were called Hebrews or Israelites until theBabylonian Exile. After the Exile, the termYehudi(Jew) was used for all followers of Judaism because the survivors of the Exile (who were the former residents of the Kingdom of Judah) were the only Israelites that had kept their distinct identity as theten tribesfrom thenorthern Kingdom of Israelhadbeen scatteredand assimilated into other populations.The gradualethnonymicshift from "Israelites" to "Jews", regardless of their descent from Judah, although not contained in theTorah, is made explicit in theBook of Esther(4th century BCE) of theTanakh.Some modern scholars disagree with the conflation, based on the works ofJosephus,PhiloandApostle Paul.
The English word "Jew" is a derivation ofMiddle EnglishGyw, Iewe. The latter was loaned from theOld Frenchgiu, which itself evolved from the earlierjuieu, which in turn derived fromjudieu/iudieuwhich throughelisionhad dropped the letter "d" from theMedieval LatinIudaeus, which, like the New TestamentGreektermIoudaios, meant both "Jew" and "Judean" / "ofJudea".The Greek term was a loan fromAramaic*yahūdāy, corresponding to HebrewיְהוּדִיYehudi.
Some scholars prefer translatingIoudaiosas "Judean" in the Bible since it is more precise, denotes the community's origins and prevents readers from engaging in antisemiticeisegesis.Others disagree, believing that it erases the Jewish identity of Biblical characters such asJesus.Daniel R. Schwartz distinguishes "Judean" and "Jew". Here, "Judean" refers to the inhabitants of Judea, which encompassed southernPalestine. Meanwhile, "Jew" refers to the descendants of Israelites that adhere toJudaism. Converts are included in the definition.ButShaye J.D. Cohenargues that "Judean" should include believers of the Judean God and allies of the Judean state.Troy W. Martin similarly argues that biblical Jewishness isnot dependent on ancestrybut instead, is based on adherence to 'covenantal circumcision' (Genesis 17:9–14).
The etymological equivalent is in use in other languages, e.g., يَهُودِيّyahūdī(sg.),al-yahūd(pl.), inArabic, "Jude" inGerman, "judeu" inPortuguese, "Juif" (m.)/"Juive" (f.) inFrench, "jøde" inDanishandNorwegian, "judío/a" inSpanish, "jood" inDutch, "żyd" inPolishetc., but derivations of the word "Hebrew" are also in use to describe a Jew, e.g., inItalian(Ebreo), inPersian("Ebri/Ebrani" (Persian:عبری/عبرانی)) andRussian(Еврей, Yevrey).The German word "Jude" is pronounced[ˈjuːdə], the correspondingadjective"jüdisch"[ˈjyːdɪʃ](Jewish) is the origin of the word "Yiddish".
According toThe American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, fourth edition (2000),
Judaismshares some of the characteristics of anation,anethnicity,areligion, and aculture,making the definition of who is a Jew vary slightly depending on whether a religious or national approach to identity is used.Generally, in modern secular usage, Jews include three groups: people who were born to a Jewish family regardless of whether or not they follow the religion, those who have some Jewish ancestral background or lineage (sometimes including those who do not have strictlymatrilineal descent), and people without any Jewish ancestral background or lineage who have formallyconverted to Judaismand therefore are followers of the religion.
Historical definitions ofJewish identityhave traditionally been based onhalakhicdefinitions of matrilineal descent, and halakhic conversions. These definitions of who is a Jew date back to the codification of theOral Torahinto theBabylonian Talmud, around 200CE. Interpretations by Jewish sages of sections of the Tanakh – such asDeuteronomy 7:1–5, which forbade intermarriage between theirIsraelite ancestorsand seven non-Israelite nations: "for that [i.e. giving your daughters to their sons or taking their daughters for your sons,] would turn away your children from following me, to serve other gods"– are used as a warning againstintermarriagebetween Jews and gentiles.Leviticus 24:10says that the son in a marriage between a Hebrew woman and an Egyptian man is "of the community of Israel." This is complemented byEzra 10:2–3, where Israelites returning from Babylon vow to put aside theirgentilewives and their children.A popular theory is that the rape of Jewish women in captivity brought about the law of Jewish identity being inherited through the maternal line, although scholars challenge this theory citing the Talmudic establishment of the law from the pre-exile period.Another argument is that the rabbis changed the law of patrilineal descent to matrilineal descent due to the widespread rape of Jewish women by Roman soldiers.Since the anti-religiousHaskalahmovement of the late 18th and 19th centuries,halakhicinterpretations of Jewish identity have been challenged.
According to historianShaye J. D. Cohen, the status of the offspring of mixed marriages was determinedpatrilineallyin the Bible. He brings two likely explanations for the change inMishnaictimes: first, the Mishnah may have been applying the same logic to mixed marriages as it had applied to other mixtures (Kil'ayim). Thus, a mixed marriage is forbidden as is the union of ahorseand adonkey, and in both unions the offspring are judged matrilineally.Second, theTannaimmay have been influenced byRoman law, which dictated that when a parent could not contract a legal marriage,offspring would follow the mother.Rabbi Rivon Krygier follows a similar reasoning, arguing that Jewish descent had formerly passed through the patrilineal descent and the law of matrilineal descent had its roots in the Roman legal system.
The prehistory and ethnogenesis of the Jews are closely intertwined with archaeology, biology, historical textual records, mythology, and religious literature. The ethnic stock to which Jews originally trace their ancestry was a confederation of Iron AgeSemitic-speaking tribes known as theIsraelitesthat inhabited a part ofCanaanduring thetribal and monarchic periods.Modern Jews are named after and also descended from the southern IsraeliteKingdom of Judah.Gary A. Rendsburglinks the early Canaanitenomadic pastoralistsconfederation to theShasuknown to the Egyptians around the 15th century BCE.
According to theHebrew Biblenarrative, Jewish ancestry is traced back to theBiblical patriarchssuch asAbraham, his sonIsaac, Isaac's sonJacob, and the Biblical matriarchsSarah,Rebecca,Leah, andRachel, who lived inCanaan. TheTwelve Tribesare described as descending from the twelve sons of Jacob. Jacob and his family migrated toAncient Egyptafter being invited to live with Jacob's sonJosephby thePharaohhimself. The patriarchs' descendants were later enslaved until theExodusled byMoses, after which the Israelites conquered Canaan under Moses' successorJoshua, went through the period of theBiblical judgesafter the death of Joshua, then through the mediation ofSamuelbecame subject to a king,Saul, who was succeeded byDavidand thenSolomon, after whom theUnited Monarchyended and was split into a separateKingdom of Israeland aKingdom of Judah. The Kingdom of Judah is described as comprising the tribes ofJudah,Benjamin, partiallyLevi, and later adding remnants of other tribes who migrated there from the northern Kingdom of Israel.
In the extra-biblical record, the Israelites become visible as a people between 1200 and 1000 BCE.There is well accepted archeological evidence referring to "Israel" in theMerneptah Stele, which dates to about 1200 BCE,and in the Mesha stele from 840 BCE. It is debated whether a period like that of theBiblical judgesoccurredand if there ever was aUnited Monarchy.There is further disagreement about the earliest existence of the Kingdoms of Israel and Judah and their extent and power. Historians agree that aKingdom of Israelexisted byc.900 BCE,there is a consensus that aKingdom of Judahexisted by c. 700 BCE at least,and recent excavations inKhirbet Qeiyafahave provided strong evidence for dating the Kingdom of Judah to the 10th century BCE.In 587 BCE,Nebuchadnezzar II, King of theNeo-Babylonian Empire,besieged Jerusalem, destroyed theFirst Templeand deported parts of the Judahite population.
Scholars disagree regarding the extent to which the Bible should be accepted as a historical source for early Israelite history.Rendsburgstates that there are two approximately equal groups of scholars who debate thehistoricity of the biblical narrative, theminimalistswho largely reject it, and the maximalists who largely accept it, with the minimalists being the more vocal of the two.
Some of the leading minimalists reframe the biblical account as constituting theIsraelites' inspiringnational mythnarrative, suggesting that according to the modern archaeological and historical account, the Israelites and their culture  did not overtake the region by force, but instead branched out of theCanaanite peoplesand culture through the development of a distinctmonolatristic—and latermonotheistic—religion ofYahwismcentered onYahweh, one of the gods of the Canaanite pantheon. The growth of Yahweh-centric belief, along with a number of cultic practices, gradually gave rise to a distinct Israeliteethnic group, setting them apart from other Canaanites.According toDever, modernarchaeologistshave largely discarded the search for evidence of the biblical narrative surrounding the patriarchs and the exodus.
According to the maximalist position, the modern archaeological record independently points to a narrative which largely agrees with the biblical account. This narrative provides a testimony of the Israelites as anomadicpeople known to theEgyptiansas belonging to theShasu. Over time these nomads left the desert and settled on the central mountain range of the land of Canaan, in simple semi-nomadic settlements in which pig bones are notably absent. This population gradually shifted from atriballifestyle to a monarchy. While the archaeological record of the ninth century BCE provides evidence for two monarchies, one in the south under a dynasty founded by a figure named David with its capital inJerusalem, and one in the north under a dynasty founded by a figure namedOmriwith its capital inSamaria. It also points to an early monarchic period in which these regions sharedmaterial cultureand religion, suggesting a common origin. Archaeological finds also provide evidence for the later cooperation of these two kingdoms in their coalition againstAram, and for their destructions by theAssyriansand later by the Babylonians.
Genetic studies on Jewsshow that most Jews worldwide bear a common genetic heritage which originates in theMiddle East, and that they share certain genetic traits with other Gentile peoples of theFertile Crescent.The genetic composition of different Jewish groups shows that Jews share a common gene pool dating back four millennia, as a marker of their common ancestral origin.Despite their long-term separation, Jewish communities maintained their unique commonalities, propensities, and sensibilities in culture, tradition, and language.
The earliest recorded evidence of a people by the name of Israel appears in theMerneptah Stele, which dates to around 1200 BCE. The majority of scholars agree that this text refers to theIsraelites, a group that inhabited the central highlands ofCanaan, where archaeological evidence shows that hundreds of small settlements were constructed between the 12th and 10th centuries BCE.The Israelites differentiated themselves from neighboring peoples through various distinct characteristics includingreligious practices,prohibition on intermarriage, and an emphasis on genealogy and family history.
In the 10th century BCE, two neighboring Israelite kingdoms—the northernKingdom of Israeland the southernKingdom of Judah—emerged. Since their inception, they shared ethnic, cultural,linguisticandreligiouscharacteristics despite a complicated relationship. Israel, with its capital mostly inSamaria, was larger and wealthier, and soon developed into a regional power.In contrast, Judah, with its capital inJerusalem, was less prosperous and covered a smaller, mostly mountainous territory. However, while in Israel the royal succession was often decided by a military coup d'état, resulting in several dynasty changes, political stability in Judah was much greater, as it was ruled by theHouse of Davidfor the whole four centuries of its existence.
Around 720 BCE, Kingdom of Israel was destroyed when it was conquered by theNeo-Assyrian Empire, which came to dominate the ancient Near East.Under theAssyrian resettlement policy, a significant portion of the northern Israelite population wasexiled to Mesopotamiaand replaced by immigrants from the same region.During the same period, and throughout the 7th century BCE, the Kingdom of Judah, now under Assyrianvassalage, experienced a period of prosperity and witnessed a significant population growth.This prosperity continued until the Neo-Assyrian kingSennacheribdevastated the region of Judahin response to a rebellion in the area, ultimately halting atJerusalem.Later in the same century, the Assyrians were defeated by the risingNeo-Babylonian Empire, and Judah became its vassal. In 587 BCE, following arevolt in Judah, the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar IIbesieged and destroyed Jerusalemand theFirst Temple, putting an end to the kingdom. The majority of Jerusalem's residents, including the kingdom's elite, wereexiled to Babylon.
According to theBook of Ezra, the PersianCyrus the Greatended theBabylonian exilein 538 BCE,the year after he captured Babylon.The exile ended with the return underZerubbabelthe Prince (so called because he was a descendant of the royal line ofDavid) and Joshua the Priest (a descendant of the line of the formerHigh Priests of the Temple) and their construction of theSecond Templecirca 521–516 BCE.As part of thePersian Empire, the former Kingdom of Judah became the province of Judah (Yehud Medinata),with a smaller territoryand a reduced population.
Judea was under control of theAchaemenidsuntil the fall of their empire in c. 333 BCE toAlexander the Great. After several centuries under foreign imperial rule, theMaccabean Revoltagainst theSeleucid Empireresulted in an independentHasmonean kingdom, under which the Jews once again enjoyed political independence for a period spanning from 110 to 63 BCE.Under Hasmonean rule the boundaries of their kingdom were expanded to include not only the land of the historicalkingdom of Judah, but also theGalileeandTransjordan.In the beginning of this process theIdumeans, who had infiltrated southern Judea after the destruction of theFirst Temple, were converted en masse.In 63 BCE, Judea was conquered by the Romans. From 37 BCE to 6 CE, the Romans allowed the Jews to maintain some degree of independence by installing theHerodian dynastyasvassal kings. However, Judea eventually came directly under Roman control and was incorporated into theRoman Empireas theprovince of Judaea.
TheJewish–Roman wars, a series of unsuccessful revolts against Roman rule during the first and second centuries CE, had significant and disastrous consequences for the Jewish population ofJudaea.TheFirst Jewish-Roman War(66–73 CE) culminated in thedestruction of Jerusalem and the Second Temple. The severely reduced Jewish population of Judaea was denied any kind of political self-government.A few generations later, theBar Kokhba revolt(132–136 CE) erupted, and its brutal suppression by the Romans led to the depopulation ofJudea. Following the revolt, Jews were forbidden from residing in the vicinity of Jerusalem, and the Jewish demographic center inJudaeashifted toGalilee.Similar upheavals impacted the Jewish communities in the empire's eastern provinces during theDiaspora Revolt(115–117 CE), leading to the near-total destruction of Jewish diaspora communities inLibya,CyprusandEgypt,including the highly influential community inAlexandria.
The destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE brought profound changes to Judaism. With the Temple's central place in Jewish worship gone, religious practices shifted towardsprayer,Torah study(includingOral Torah), and communal gatherings insynagogues. Judaism also lost much of itssectariannature.Two of the three main sects that flourished during the late Second Temple period, namely theSadduceesandEssenes, eventually disappeared, whilePharisaicbeliefs became the foundational, liturgical, and ritualistic basis ofRabbinic Judaism, which emerged as the prevailing form of Judaism since late antiquity.
TheJewish diasporaexisted well before the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE and had been ongoing for centuries, with the dispersal driven by both forced expulsions and voluntary migrations.In Mesopotamia, a testimony to the beginnings of the Jewish community can be found inJoachin's ration tablets, listing provisions allotted to the exiled Judean king and his family byNebuchadnezzar II, and further evidence are theAl-Yahudu tablets, dated to the 6th–5th centuries BCE and related to the exiles from Judea arriving after the destruction of theFirst Temple,though there is ample evidence for the presence of Jews in Babylonia even from 626 BCE.In Egypt, thedocuments from Elephantinereveal the trials of a community founded by a Persian Jewish garrison at two fortresses on the frontier during the 5th–4th centuries BCE, and according toJosephusthe Jewish community in Alexandria existed since the founding of the city in the 4th century BCE byAlexander the Great.By 200 BCE, there were well established Jewish communities both inEgyptandMesopotamia("Babylonia" in Jewish sources) and in the two centuries that followed, Jewish populations were also present inAsia Minor,Greece,Macedonia,Cyrene, and, beginning in the middle of the first century BCE, in the city ofRome.Later, in the first centuries CE, as a result of theJewish-Roman Wars, a large number of Jews were taken as captives, sold into slavery, or compelled to flee from the regions affected by the wars, contributing to the formation and expansion of Jewish communities across theRoman Empireas well as inArabiaand Mesopotamia.
After theBar Kokhba revolt, the Jewish population inJudaea, now significantly reduced in size, made efforts to recover from the revolt's devastating effects, but never fully regained its previous strength.In the second to fourth centuries CE, the region ofGalileeemerged as the new center of Jewish life inSyria Palaestina, experiencing a cultural and demographic flourishing. It was in this period that two central rabbinic texts, theMishnahand theJerusalem Talmud, were composed.However, as the Roman Empire was replaced by theChristianizedByzantine Empire underConstantine, Jews came to be persecuted by the church and the authorities, and many immigrated to communities in the diaspora. In the fourth century CE, Jews are believed to have lost their position as the majority inSyria Palaestina.
The long-established Jewish community of Mesopotamia, which had been living underParthianand laterSasanianrule, beyond the confines of the Roman Empire, became an important center ofJewish studyas Judea's Jewish population declined.Estimates often place the Babylonian Jewish community of the 3rd to 7th centuries at around one million, making it the largest Jewish diaspora community of that period.Under the political leadership of theexilarch, who was regarded as a royal heir of the House of David, this community had an autonomous status and served as a place of refuge for the Jews ofSyria Palaestina. A number of significantTalmudic academies, such as theNehardea,Pumbedita, andSuraacademies, were established in Mesopotamia, and many importantAmoraimwere active there. TheBabylonian Talmud, a centerpiece of Jewish religious law, was compiled in Babylonia in the 3rd to 6th centuries.
Jewish diaspora communities are generally described to havecoalescedinto three majorethnic subdivisionsaccording to where their ancestors settled: theAshkenazim(initially in the Rhineland and France), theSephardim(initially in theIberian Peninsula), and theMizrahim(Middle EastandNorth Africa).Romaniote Jews,Tunisian Jews,Yemenite Jews,Egyptian Jews,Ethiopian Jews,Bukharan Jews,Mountain Jews, and other groups also predated the arrival of the Sephardic diaspora.
Despite experiencing repeated waves of persecution, Ashkenazi Jews in Western Europe worked in a variety of fields, making an impact on their communities' economy and societies. InFrancia, for example, figures likeIsaac JudaeusandArmentariusoccupied prominent social and economic positions. However, Jews were frequently the subjects of discriminatory laws,segregation,blood libelsandpogroms, which culminated in events like theRhineland Massacres(1066) and theexpulsion of Jews from England(1290). As a result, Ashkenazi Jews were gradually pushed eastwards toPoland,LithuaniaandRussia.
During the same period, Jewish communities in the Middle East thrived under Islamic rule, especially in cities likeBaghdad,Cairo, andDamascus. In Babylonia, from the 7th to 11th centuries thePumbeditaandSuraacademies led the Arab and to an extant the entire Jewish world. The deans and students of said academies defined theGeonic periodin Jewish history.Following this period were theRishonimwho lived from the 11th to 15th centuries. Like their European counterparts, Jews in the Middle East and North Africa also faced periods of persecution and discriminatory policies, with theAlmohad CaliphateinNorth AfricaandIberiaissuing forced conversion decrees, causing Jews such asMaimonidesto seek safety in other regions.
Initially, underVisigoth rule, Jews in the Iberian Peninsula faced persecutions, but their circumstances changed dramatically underIslamic rule. During this period, they thrived in agolden age, marked by significant intellectual and cultural contributions in fields such as philosophy, medicine, and literature by figures such asSamuel ibn Naghrillah,Judah HaleviandSolomon ibn Gabirol. However, in the 12th to 15th centuries, the Iberian Peninsula witnessed a rise in antisemitism, leading to persecutions, anti-Jewish laws, massacres and forced conversions (peaking in 1391), and the establishment of theSpanish Inquisitionthat same year. After the completion of theReconquistaand the issuance of theAlhambra Decreeby theCatholic Monarchsin 1492, the Jews of Spain were forced to choose: convert to Christianity or be expelled. As a result, around 200,000 Jews wereexpelled from Spain, seeking refuge in places such as theOttoman Empire,North Africa,Italy, theNetherlandsandIndia. Asimilar fateawaited the Jews of Portugal a few years later. Some Jews chose to remain, and pretended to practiceCatholicism. These Jews would form the members ofCrypto-Judaism.
In the 19th century, when Jews inWestern Europewere increasingly grantedequality before the law, Jews in thePale of Settlementfaced growing persecution, legal restrictions and widespreadpogroms. Zionism emerged in the late 19th century inCentralandEastern Europeas a national revival movement, aiming to re-establish a Jewish polity in the Land of Israel, an endeavor to restore the Jewish people back to their ancestral homeland in order to stop the exoduses and persecutions that have plagued their history. This led to waves of Jewish migration toOttoman-controlled Palestine.Theodor Herzl, who is considered the father of political Zionism,offered his vision of a future Jewish state in his 1896 bookDer Judenstaat(The Jewish State); a year later, he presided over theFirst Zionist Congress.
The antisemitism that inflicted Jewish communities in Europe also triggered a mass exodus of more than two million Jews to theUnited Statesbetween 1881 and 1924.The Jews of Europe and the United States gained success in the fields of science, culture and the economy. Among those generally considered the most famous wereAlbert EinsteinandLudwig Wittgenstein. ManyNobel Prizewinners at this time were Jewish, as is still the case.
WhenAdolf Hitlerand theNaziscame to power inGermanyin 1933, the situation for Jews deteriorated rapidly. Many Jews fled from Europe toMandatory Palestine, the United States, and theSoviet Unionas a result of racial anti-Semitic laws, economic difficulties, and the fear of an impending war.World War IIstarted in 1939, and by 1941, Hitler occupied almost all of Europe. Following theGerman invasion of the Soviet Unionin 1941, theFinal Solution—an extensive, organized effort with an unprecedented scope intended to annihilate the Jewish people—began, and resulted in the persecution and murder of Jews in Europe andNorth Africa. In Poland, three million were murdered ingas chambersin all concentration camps combined, with one million at theAuschwitzcamp complex alone. TheHolocaustis the name given to this genocide, in which six million Jews were systematically murdered.
Before and during the Holocaust, enormous numbers of Jews immigrated to Mandatory Palestine. On 14 May 1948, upon the termination of the mandate,David Ben-Guriondeclared the creation of theState of Israel, aJewish and democratic statein the Land of Israel. Immediately afterwards, all neighboring Arab states invaded, yet the newly formedIDFresisted. In 1949, the war ended and Israel started building the state and absorbing massive waves ofAliyahfrom all over the world.
The Jewishpeopleand thereligionofJudaismare strongly interrelated.Converts to Judaismtypically have a status within the Jewishethnosequal to those born into it.However, several converts to Judaism, as well as ex-Jews, have claimed that converts are treated as second-class Jews by many born Jews.Conversion is not encouraged by mainstream Judaism, and it is considered a difficult task. A significant portion of conversions are undertaken by children of mixed marriages, or would-be or current spouses of Jews.
TheHebrew Bible, a religious interpretation of the traditions and early history of the Jews, established the first of theAbrahamic religions, which are now practiced by 54 percent of the world.Judaismguides its adherents in both practice and belief, and has been called not only a religion, but also a "way of life,"which has made drawing a clear distinction between Judaism,Jewish culture, andJewish identityrather difficult. Throughout history, in eras and places as diverse as the ancientHellenicworld,in Europe before and afterThe Age of Enlightenment(seeHaskalah),inIslamic Spain and Portugal,inNorth Africaand theMiddle East,India,China,or the contemporaryUnited StatesandIsrael,cultural phenomena have developed that are in some sense characteristically Jewish without being at all specifically religious. Some factors in this come from within Judaism, others from the interaction of Jews or specific communities of Jews with their surroundings, and still others from the inner social and cultural dynamics of the community, as opposed to from the religion itself. This phenomenon has led to considerably differentJewish culturesunique to their own communities.
Hebrewis theliturgical languageof Judaism (termedlashon ha-kodesh, "the holy tongue"), the language in which most of the Hebrew scriptures (Tanakh) were composed, and the daily speech of the Jewish people for centuries. By the 5th century BCE,Aramaic, a closely related tongue, joined Hebrew as the spoken language inJudea.By the 3rd century BCE, some Jews of the diaspora were speakingGreek.Others, such as in the Jewish communities ofAsoristan, known to Jews as Babylonia, were speaking Hebrew andAramaic, the languages of theBabylonian Talmud. Dialects of these same languages were also used by the Jews ofSyria Palaestinaat that time.
For centuries, Jews worldwide have spoken the local or dominant languages of the regions they migrated to, often developing distinctivedialectalforms or branches that became independent languages.Yiddishis the Judaeo-German language developed byAshkenazi Jewswho migrated toCentral Europe.Ladinois the Judaeo-Spanish language developed bySephardicJews who migrated to theIberian peninsula. Due to many factors, including the impact ofthe Holocauston European Jewry, theJewish exodus from Arab and Muslim countries, and widespread emigration from other Jewish communities around the world, ancient and distinctJewish languagesof several communities, includingJudaeo-Georgian,Judaeo-Arabic,Judaeo-Berber,Krymchak,Judaeo-Malayalamand many others, have largely fallen out of use.
For over sixteen centuries Hebrew was used almost exclusively as a liturgical language, and as the language in which most books had been written on Judaism, with a few speaking only Hebrew on theSabbath.Hebrew was revived as a spoken language byEliezer ben Yehuda, who arrived inPalestinein 1881. It had not been used as amother tonguesinceTannaictimes.Modern Hebrewis designated as the "State language" of Israel.
Despite efforts to revive Hebrew as the national language of the Jewish people, knowledge of the language is not commonly possessed by Jews worldwide andEnglishhas emerged as thelingua francaof the Jewish diaspora.Although many Jews once had sufficient knowledge of Hebrew to study the classic literature, andJewish languageslikeYiddishandLadinowere commonly used as recently as the early 20th century, most Jews lack such knowledge today and English has by and large superseded most Jewish vernaculars.
The three most commonly spoken languages among Jews today are Hebrew, English, andRussian. SomeRomance languages, particularlyFrenchandSpanish, are also widely used.Yiddish has been spoken by more Jews in history than any other language,but it is far less used today followingthe Holocaustand the adoption ofModern Hebrewby theZionist movementand theState of Israel.
In some places, the mother language of the Jewish community differs from that of the general population or the dominant group. For example, inQuebec, the Ashkenazic majority has adopted English, while the Sephardic minority uses French as its primary language.Similarly,South African Jewsadopted English rather thanAfrikaans.Due to both Czarist and Soviet policies,Russian has superseded Yiddish as the language ofRussian Jews, but these policies have also affected neighboring communities.Today, Russian is the first language for many Jewish communities in a number ofPost-Soviet states, such asUkraineandUzbekistan,as well as for Ashkenazic Jews inAzerbaijan,Georgia,andTajikistan.Although communities inNorth Africatoday are small and dwindling, Jews there had shifted from a multilingual group to a monolingual one (or nearly so), speaking French inAlgeria,Morocco,and the city ofTunis,while most North Africans continue to useArabicor Berber as their mother tongue.
There is no single governing body for the Jewish community, nor a single authority with responsibility for religious doctrine.Instead, a variety of secular and religious institutions at the local, national, and international levels lead various parts of the Jewish community on a variety of issues.Today, many countries have aChief Rabbiwho serves as a representative of that country's Jewry. Although manyHasidic Jewsfollow a certain hereditaryHasidic dynasty, there is no one commonly accepted leader of all Hasidic Jews. Many Jews believe that theMessiahwill act a unifying leader for Jews and the entire world.
A number of modern scholars of nationalism support the existence of Jewish national identity in antiquity. One of them is David Goodblatt,who generally believes in the existence of nationalism before the modern period. In his view, the Bible, the parabiblical literature and the Jewish national history provide the base for a Jewish collective identity. Although many of the ancient Jews were illiterate (as were their neighbors), their national narrative was reinforced through public readings. The Hebrew language also constructed and preserved national identity. Although it was not widely spoken after the 5th century BCE, Goodblatt states:
Anthony D. Smith, an historical sociologist considered one of the founders of the field ofnationalism studies, wrote that the Jews of the late Second Temple period provide "a closer approximation to the ideal type of thenation[...] than perhaps anywhere else in the ancient world." He adds that this observation "must make us wary of pronouncing too readily against the possibility of the nation, and even a form ofreligious nationalism, before the onset of modernity."Agreeing with Smith, Goodblatt suggests omitting the qualifier "religious" from Smith's definition of ancient Jewish nationalism, noting that, according to Smith, a religious component in national memories and culture is common even in the modern era.This view is echoed by political scientistTom Garvin, who writes that "something strangely like modern nationalism is documented for many peoples in medieval times and in classical times as well," citing the ancient Jews as one of several "obvious examples", alongside theclassical Greeksand theGaulishandBritish Celts.
Fergus Millarsuggests that the sources of Jewish national identity and their early nationalist movements in the first and second centuries CE included several key elements: the Bible as both a national history and legal source, the Hebrew language as a national language, a system of law, and social institutions such as schools, synagogues, and Sabbath worship.Adrian Hastingsargued that Jews are the "true proto-nation", that through the model of ancient Israel found in the Hebrew Bible, provided the world with the original concept of nationhood which later influenced Christian nations. However, followingJerusalem's destructionin the first century CE, Jews ceased to be a political entity and did not resemble a traditional nation-state for almost two millennia. Despite this, they maintained their national identity through collective memory, religion and sacred texts, even without land or political power, and remained a nation rather than just an ethnic group, eventually leading to the rise ofZionismand the establishment of Israel.
It is believed that Jewish nationalist sentiment in antiquity was encouraged because under foreign rule (Persians, Greeks, Romans) Jews were able to claim that they were an ancient nation. This claim was based on the preservation and reverence of their scriptures, the Hebrew language, the Temple and priesthood, and other traditions of their ancestors.
Within the world'sJewish populationthere are distinct ethnic divisions, most of which are primarily the result of geographic branching from an originatingIsraelitepopulation, and subsequent independent evolutions. An array of Jewish communities was established by Jewish settlers in various places around theOld World, often at great distances from one another, resulting in effective and often long-term isolation. During themillenniaof theJewish diasporathe communities would develop under the influence of their local environments:political,cultural,natural, and populational. Today, manifestations of these differences among the Jews can be observed inJewish cultural expressionsof each community, includingJewish linguistic diversity, culinary preferences, liturgical practices, religious interpretations, as well as degrees and sources ofgenetic admixture.
Jews are often identified as belonging to one of two major groups: theAshkenazimand theSephardim. Ashkenazim are so named in reference to their geographical origins (their ancestors' culture coalesced in theRhineland, an area historically referred to by Jews asAshkenaz). Similarly, Sephardim (Sefaradmeaning "Spain" in Hebrew) are named in reference their origins inIberia. The diverse groups of Jews of the Middle East and North Africa are often collectively referred to asSephardimtogether with Sephardim proper for liturgical reasons having to do with theirprayer rites. A common term for many of these non-Spanish Jews who are sometimes still broadly grouped as Sephardim isMizrahim(lit. "easterners" in Hebrew). Nevertheless, Mizrahis and Sepharadim are usually ethnically distinct.
Smaller groups include, but are not restricted to,Indian Jewssuch as theBene Israel,Bnei Menashe,Cochin Jews, andBene Ephraim; theRomaniotesof Greece; theItalian Jews("Italkim" or "Bené Roma"); theTeimanimfromYemen; variousAfrican Jews, including most numerously theBeta IsraelofEthiopia; andChinese Jews, most notably theKaifeng Jews, as well as various other distinct but now almost extinct communities.
The divisions between all these groups are approximate and their boundaries are not always clear. The Mizrahim for example, are a heterogeneous collection ofNorth African,Central Asian,Caucasian, and Middle Eastern Jewish communities that are no closer related to each other than they are to any of the earlier mentioned Jewish groups. In modern usage, however, the Mizrahim are sometimes termedSephardidue to similar styles of liturgy, despite independent development from Sephardim proper. Thus, among Mizrahim there areEgyptian Jews,Iraqi Jews,Lebanese Jews,Kurdish Jews,Moroccan Jews,Libyan Jews,Syrian Jews,Bukharian Jews,Mountain Jews,Georgian Jews,Iranian Jews,Afghan Jews, and various others. TheTeimanimfromYemenare sometimes included, although their style of liturgy is unique and they differ in respect to the admixture found among them to that found in Mizrahim. In addition, there is a differentiation made between Sephardi migrants who established themselves in theMiddle EastandNorth Africaafter the expulsion of the Jews from Spain and Portugal in the 1490s and the pre-existing Jewish communities in those regions.
Ashkenazi Jews represent the bulk of modern Jewry, with at least 70 percent of Jews worldwide (and up to 90 percent prior toWorld War IIandthe Holocaust). As a result of theiremigrationfromEurope, Ashkenazim also represent the overwhelming majority of Jews in theNew Worldcontinents, in countries such as theUnited States,Canada,Argentina,Australia, andBrazil. InFrance, the immigration of Jews fromAlgeria(Sephardim) has led them to outnumber the Ashkenazim.Only inIsraelis the Jewish population representative of all groups, amelting potindependent of each group's proportion within the overall world Jewish population.
Y DNAstudies tend to imply a small number of founders in an old population whose members parted and followed different migration paths.In most Jewish populations, these male line ancestors appear to have been mainlyMiddle Eastern. For example, Ashkenazi Jews share more common paternal lineages with other Jewish and Middle Eastern groups than with non-Jewish populations in areas where Jews lived inEastern Europe,Germany, and the FrenchRhine Valley. This is consistent with Jewish traditions in placing most Jewish paternal origins in the region of the Middle East.
Conversely, the maternal lineages of Jewish populations, studied by looking atmitochondrial DNA, are generally more heterogeneous.Scholars such asHarry Ostrerand Raphael Falk believe this indicates that many Jewish males found new mates from European and other communities in the places where they migrated in the diaspora after fleeing ancient Israel.In contrast, Behar has found evidence that about 40 percent of Ashkenazi Jews originate maternally from just four female founders, who were of Middle Eastern origin. The populations of Sephardi and Mizrahi Jewish communities "showed no evidence for a narrow founder effect."Subsequent studies carried out by Feder et al. confirmed the large portion of non-local maternal origin among Ashkenazi Jews. Reflecting on their findings related to the maternal origin of Ashkenazi Jews, the authors conclude "Clearly, the differences between Jews and non-Jews are far larger than those observed among the Jewish communities. Hence, differences between the Jewish communities can be overlooked when non-Jews are included in the comparisons."A study showed that 7% of Ashkenazi Jews have the haplogroup G2c, which is mainly found inPashtunsand on lower scales all major Jewish groups, Palestinians, Syrians, and Lebanese.
Studies ofautosomal DNA, which look at the entire DNA mixture, have become increasingly important as the technology develops. They show that Jewish populations have tended to form relatively closely related groups in independent communities, with most in a community sharing significant ancestry in common.For Jewish populations of the diaspora, the genetic composition ofAshkenazi,Sephardic, andMizrahiJewish populations show a predominant amount of shared Middle Eastern ancestry. According to Behar, the most parsimonious explanation for this shared Middle Eastern ancestry is that it is "consistent with the historical formulation of the Jewish people as descending from ancientHebrewandIsraeliteresidents of theLevant" and "the dispersion of the people of ancient Israel throughout theOld World".North African,Italianand others ofIberianorigin show variable frequencies of admixture with non-Jewish historical host populations among the maternal lines. In the case of Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews (in particularMoroccan Jews), who are closely related, the source of non-Jewish admixture is mainlySouthern European, while Mizrahi Jews show evidence of admixture with other Middle Eastern populations. Beharet al.have remarked on a close relationship between Ashkenazi Jews and modernItalians.A 2001 study found that Jews were more closely related to groups of the Fertile Crescent (Kurds, Turks, and Armenians) than to their Arab neighbors, whose genetic signature was found in geographic patterns reflective of Islamic conquests.
The studies also show thatSephardic Bnei Anusim(descendants of the "anusim" who wereforced to converttoCatholicism), which comprise up to 19.8 percent of the population of today'sIberia(SpainandPortugal) and at least 10 percent of the population ofIbero-America(Hispanic AmericaandBrazil), have Sephardic Jewish ancestry within the last few centuries. TheBene IsraelandCochin JewsofIndia,Beta IsraelofEthiopia, and a portion of theLemba peopleofSouthern Africa, despite more closely resembling the local populations of their native countries, have also been thought to have some more remote ancient Jewish ancestry.Views on the Lemba have changed and geneticY-DNAanalyses in the 2000s have established a partially Middle-Eastern origin for a portion of the male Lemba population but have been unable to narrow this down further.
Although historically, Jews have been found all over the world, in the decades since World War II and the establishment of Israel, they have increasingly concentrated in a small number of countries.In 2021,Israeland theUnited Statestogether accounted for over 85 percent of the global Jewish population, with approximately 45.3% and 39.6% of the world's Jews, respectively.More than half (51.2%) of world Jewry resides in just ten metropolitan areas. As of 2021, these ten areas wereTel Aviv,New York,Jerusalem,Haifa,Los Angeles,Miami,Philadelphia,Paris,Washington, andChicago. The Tel Aviv metro area has the highest percent of Jews among the total population (94.8%), followed by Jerusalem (72.3%), Haifa (73.1%), and Beersheba (60.4%), the balance mostly being Israeli Arabs. Outside Israel, the highest percent of Jews in a metropolitan area was in New York (10.8%), followed by Miami (8.7%), Philadelphia (6.8%), San Francisco (5.1%), Washington (4.7%), Los Angeles (4.7%), Toronto (4.5%), and Baltimore (4.1%).
As of 2010, there were nearly 14 million Jews around the world, roughly 0.2% of the world's population at the time.According to the 2007 estimates ofThe Jewish People Policy Planning Institute, the world's Jewish population is 13.2 million.This statistic incorporates both practicing Jews affiliated withsynagoguesand the Jewish community, and approximately 4.5 million unaffiliated andsecular Jews.
According toSergio Della Pergola, a demographer of theJewish population, in 2021 there were about 6.8 million Jews in Israel, 6 million in the United States, and 2.3 million in the rest of the world.
Israel, the Jewish nation-state, is the only country in which Jews make up a majority of the citizens.Israel was established as an independentdemocraticand Jewish state on 14 May 1948.Of the 120 members in its parliament, theKnesset,as of 2016, 14 members of the Knesset areArab citizens of Israel(not including the Druze), most representing Arab political parties. One of Israel'sSupreme Courtjudges is also an Arab citizen of Israel.
Between 1948 and 1958, the Jewish population rose from 800,000 to two million.Currently, Jews account for 75.4 percent of the Israeli population, or 6 million people.The early years of the State of Israel were marked by themass immigrationofHolocaust survivorsin theaftermath of the Holocaustand Jewsfleeing Arab lands.Israel also has a large population ofEthiopian Jews, many of whom were airlifted to Israel in the late 1980s and early 1990s.Between 1974 and 1979 nearly 227,258 immigrants arrived in Israel, about half being from theSoviet Union.This period also saw an increase inimmigration to IsraelfromWestern Europe,Latin America, andNorth America.
A trickle of immigrants from other communities has also arrived, includingIndian Jewsand others, as well as some descendants ofAshkenaziHolocaust survivors who had settled in countries such as theUnited States,Argentina,Australia,Chile, andSouth Africa. Some Jews have emigrated from Israel elsewhere, because of economic problems or disillusionment with political conditions and the continuingArab–Israeli conflict. Jewish Israeli emigrants are known asyordim.
The waves ofimmigration to the United Statesand elsewhere at the turn of the 19th century, the founding ofZionismand later events, includingpogromsin Imperial Russia (mostly within thePale of Settlementin present-day Ukraine, Moldova, Belarus and eastern Poland), the massacre of European Jewry duringthe Holocaust, and the founding of thestate of Israel, with the subsequentJewish exodus from Arab lands, all resulted in substantial shifts in the population centers of world Jewry by the end of the 20th century.
More than half of the Jews live in the Diaspora (see Population table). Currently, the largest Jewish community outside Israel, and either the largest or second-largest Jewish community in the world, is located in the United States, with 6 million to 7.5 million Jews by various estimates. Elsewhere in the Americas, there are also large Jewish populations inCanada(315,000),Argentina(180,000–300,000), andBrazil(196,000–600,000), and smaller populations inMexico,Uruguay,Venezuela,Chile,Colombiaand several other countries (seeHistory of the Jews in Latin America).According to a 2010Pew Research Centerstudy, about 470,000 people of Jewish heritage live inLatin Americaand theCaribbean.Demographers disagree on whether the United States has a larger Jewish population than Israel, with many maintaining that Israel surpassed the United States in Jewish population during the 2000s, while others maintain that the United States still has the largest Jewish population in the world. Currently, a major national Jewish population survey is planned to ascertain whether or not Israel has overtaken the United States in Jewish population.
Western Europe's largest Jewish community, and the third-largest Jewish community in the world, can be found inFrance, home to between 483,000 and 500,000 Jews, the majority of whom are immigrants or refugees from North African countries such asAlgeria,Morocco, andTunisia(or their descendants).TheUnited Kingdomhas a Jewish community of 292,000. InEastern Europe, the exact figures are difficult to establish. The number of Jews in Russia varies widely according to whether a source uses census data (which requires a person to choose a single nationality among choices that include "Russian" and "Jewish") or eligibility for immigration to Israel (which requires that a person have one or more Jewish grandparents). According to the latter criteria, the heads of the Russian Jewish community assert that up to 1.5 million Russians are eligible foraliyah.InGermany, the 102,000 Jews registered with the Jewish community are a slowly declining population,despite the immigration of tens of thousands of Jews from the formerSoviet Unionsince the fall of theBerlin Wall.Thousands ofIsraelisalso live in Germany, either permanently or temporarily, for economic reasons.
Prior to 1948, approximately 800,000 Jews were living in lands which now make up theArab world(excluding Israel). Of these, just under two-thirds lived in the French-controlledMaghrebregion, 15 to 20 percent in theKingdom of Iraq, approximately 10 percent in theKingdom of Egyptand approximately 7 percent in theKingdom of Yemen. A further 200,000 lived inPahlavi Iranand theRepublic of Turkey. Today, around 26,000 Jews live in Arab countriesand around 30,000 inIranandTurkey. A small-scale exodus had begun in many countries in the early decades of the 20th century, although the only substantialaliyahcame fromYemenandSyria.Theexodus from Arab and Muslim countriestook place primarily from 1948. The first large-scale exoduses took place in the late 1940s and early 1950s, primarily inIraq, Yemen andLibya, with up to 90 percent of these communities leaving within a few years. The peak of the exodus fromEgyptoccurred in 1956. The exodus in the Maghreb countries peaked in the 1960s.Lebanonwas the only Arab country to see a temporary increase in its Jewish population during this period, due to an influx of refugees from other Arab countries, although by the mid-1970s the Jewish community of Lebanon had also dwindled. In the aftermath of the exodus wave from Arab states, an additional migration ofIranian Jewspeaked in the 1980s when around 80 percent of Iranian Jews left the country.
OutsideEurope, theAmericas, theMiddle East, and the rest ofAsia, there are significant Jewish populations inAustralia(112,500) andSouth Africa(70,000).There is also a 6,800-strong community inNew Zealand.
Since at least the time of theAncient Greeks, a proportion of Jews have assimilated into the wider non-Jewish society around them, by either choice or force, ceasing to practice Judaism and losing theirJewish identity.Assimilation took place in all areas, and during all time periods,with some Jewish communities, for example theKaifeng JewsofChina, disappearing entirely.The advent of the Jewish Enlightenment of the 18th century (seeHaskalah) and the subsequentemancipation of the Jewish populationsof Europe and America in the 19th century, accelerated the situation, encouraging Jews to increasingly participate in, and become part of,secular society. The result has been a growing trend of assimilation, as Jews marry non-Jewish spouses and stop participating in the Jewish community.
Rates ofinterreligious marriagevary widely: In the United States, it is just under 50 percent,in the United Kingdom, around 53 percent; in France; around 30 percent,and in Australia and Mexico, as low as 10 percent.In the United States, only about a third of children from intermarriages affiliate with Jewish religious practice.The result is that most countries in theDiasporahave steady or slightly declining religiously Jewish populations as Jews continue to assimilate into the countries in which they live.
The Jewish people andJudaismhave experienced variouspersecutionsthroughoutJewish history. DuringLate Antiquityand theEarly Middle Ages, theRoman Empire(in its later phases known as theByzantine Empire) repeatedly repressed theJewish population, first by ejecting them from their homelands during the paganRoman eraand later by officially establishing them assecond-class citizensduring the Christian Roman era.
According toJames Carroll, "Jews accounted for 10% of the total population of theRoman Empire. By that ratio, if other factors had not intervened, there would be 200 million Jews in the world today, instead of something like 13 million."
Later inmedievalWestern Europe, further persecutions of Jews by Christians occurred, notably during theCrusades—when Jews all over Germanywere massacred—and in a series of expulsions from theKingdom of England, Germany, and France. Then there occurred thelargest expulsion of all, when Spain and Portugal, after theReconquista(the Catholic Reconquest of theIberian Peninsula), expelled both unbaptized Sephardic Jews and the ruling MuslimMoors.
In thePapal States, which existed until 1870, Jews were required to live only in specified neighborhoods calledghettos.
Islam and Judaismhave a complex relationship. Traditionally Jews and Christians living in Muslim lands, known asdhimmis, were allowed to practice their religions and administer their internal affairs, but they were subject to certain conditions.They had to pay thejizya(a per capita tax imposed on free adult non-Muslim males) to the Islamic state.Dhimmis had an inferior status under Islamic rule. They had several social and legaldisabilitiessuch as prohibitions against bearing arms or giving testimony in courts in cases involving Muslims.Many of the disabilities were highly symbolic. The one described byBernard Lewisas "most degrading"was the requirement ofdistinctive clothing, not found in theQuranorhadithbut invented inearly medievalBaghdad; its enforcement was highly erratic.On the other hand, Jews rarely faced martyrdom or exile, or forced compulsion to change their religion, and they were mostly free in their choice of residence and profession.
Notable exceptions include the massacre of Jews and forcible conversion of some Jews by the rulers of theAlmohaddynasty inAl-Andalusin the 12th century,as well as inIslamic Persia,and the forced confinement of Moroccan Jews to walled quarters known asmellahsbeginning from the 15th century and especially in the early 19th century.In modern times, it has become commonplace for standardantisemitic themes to be conflated with anti-Zionistpublications and pronouncements of Islamic movements such asHezbollahandHamas, in the pronouncements of various agencies of theIslamic Republic of Iran, and even in the newspapers and other publications of TurkishRefah Partisi."
Throughout history, many rulers, empires and nations have oppressed their Jewish populations or sought to eliminate them entirely. Methods employed ranged fromexpulsionto outrightgenocide; within nations, often the threat of these extreme methods was sufficient to silence dissent. Thehistory of antisemitismincludes theFirst Crusadewhich resulted in the massacre of Jews;theSpanish Inquisition(led byTomás de Torquemada) and thePortuguese Inquisition, with their persecution andautos-da-féagainst theNew ChristiansandMarranoJews;theBohdan ChmielnickiCossack massacres inUkraine;thePogromsbacked by the RussianTsars;as well as expulsions from Spain, Portugal, England, France, Germany, and other countries in which the Jews had settled.According to a 2008 study published in theAmerican Journal of Human Genetics, 19.8 percent of the modernIberianpopulation has Sephardic Jewish ancestry,indicating that the number ofconversosmay have been much higher than originally thought.
The persecution reached a peak inNazi Germany'sFinal Solution, which led tothe Holocaustand the slaughter of approximately 6 million Jews.Of the world's 16 million Jews in 1939, almost 40% were murdered in the Holocaust.The Holocaust—the state-led systematicpersecutionandgenocideof European Jews (and certain communities of North African Jews inEuropean controlled North Africa) and otherminority groupsof Europe duringWorld War IIby Germany and itscollaborators—remains the most notable modern-day persecution of Jews.The persecution andgenocidewere accomplished in stages.Legislation to remove the Jews from civil societywas enacted years before the outbreak of World War II.Concentration campswere established in which inmates were used asslave labouruntil they died of exhaustion or disease.Where theThird Reichconquered new territory inEastern Europe, specialized units calledEinsatzgruppenmurdered Jews and political opponents in mass shootings.Jews andRomawere crammed intoghettosbefore being transported hundreds of kilometres by freight train toextermination campswhere, if they survived the journey, the majority of them were murdered in gas chambers.Virtually every arm of Germany's bureaucracy was involved in the logistics of the mass murder, turning the country into what one Holocaust scholar has called "a genocidal nation."
Throughout Jewish history, Jews have repeatedly been directly or indirectly expelled from both their original homeland, theLand of Israel, and many of the areas in which they have settled. This experience asrefugeeshas shapedJewish identityand religious practice in many ways, and is thus a major element of Jewish history.The patriarchAbrahamis described as a migrant to the land ofCanaanfromUrof theChaldeesafter an attempt on his life by KingNimrod.His descendants, theChildren of Israel, in the Biblical story (whose historicity is uncertain) undertookthe Exodus(meaning "departure" or "exit" in Greek) fromancient Egypt, as recorded in theBook of Exodus.
Centuries later,Assyrianpolicy was to deport and displace conquered peoples, and it is estimated some 4,500,000 among captive populations suffered this dislocation over three centuries of Assyrian rule.With regard to Israel,Tiglath-Pileser IIIclaims he deported 80% of the population ofLower Galilee, some 13,520 people.Some 27,000 Israelites, 20 to 25% of the population of theKingdom of Israel, were described as being deported bySargon II, and were replaced by other deported populations and sent into permanent exile by Assyria, initially to the Upper Mesopotamian provinces of the Assyrian Empire.Between 10,000 and 80,000 people from theKingdom of Judahwere similarly exiled byBabylonia,but these people were then returned toJudeabyCyrus the Greatof the PersianAchaemenid Empire.
Many Jews were exiled again by theRoman Empire.The 2,000 year dispersion of theJewish diasporabeginning under theRoman Empire,as Jews were spread throughout the Roman world and, driven from land to land,settled wherever they could live freely enough to practice their religion. Over the course of the diaspora the center of Jewish life moved fromBabyloniato theIberian PeninsulatoPolandto theUnited Statesand, as a result ofZionism, back toIsrael.
There were also many expulsions of Jews during the Middle Ages and Enlightenment in Europe, including: 1290, 16,000 Jews were expelled from England, see the(Statute of Jewry); in 1396, 100,000 from France; in 1421, thousands were expelled from Austria. Many of these Jews settled inEast-Central Europe, especially Poland.Following theSpanish Inquisitionin 1492, the Spanish population of around 200,000SephardicJews were expelled by the Spanish crown andCatholic church, followed by expulsions in 1493 in Sicily (37,000 Jews) and Portugal in 1496. The expelled Jews fled mainly to theOttoman Empire, the Netherlands, andNorth Africa, others migrating toSouthern Europeand the Middle East.
During the 19th century, France's policies of equal citizenship regardless of religion led to the immigration of Jews (especially from Eastern and Central Europe).This contributed to the arrival of millions of Jews in theNew World. Over two million Eastern European Jews arrived in the United States from 1880 to 1925.
In summary, thepogromsin Eastern Europe,the rise of modernantisemitism,the Holocaust,as well as the rise ofArab nationalism,all served to fuel the movements and migrations of huge segments of Jewry from land to land and continent to continent until they arrived back in large numbers at their original historical homeland in Israel.
In the latest phase of migrations, theIslamic Revolution of Irancaused manyIranian Jewsto flee Iran. Most found refuge in the US (particularlyLos Angeles, California, andLong Island, New York) and Israel. Smaller communities of Persian Jews exist in Canada and Western Europe.Similarly, when theSoviet Union collapsed, many of the Jews in the affected territory (who had beenrefuseniks) were suddenly allowed to leave. This produced a wave of migration to Israel in the early 1990s.
Israel is the only country with a Jewish population that is consistently growing throughnatural population growth, although the Jewish populations of other countries, in Europe and North America, have recently increased through immigration. In the Diaspora, in almost every country the Jewish population in general is either declining or steady, butOrthodoxandHarediJewish communities, whose members often shunbirth controlfor religious reasons, have experienced rapid population growth.
Orthodox andConservative Judaismdiscourageproselytismto non-Jews, but many Jewish groups have tried to reach out to the assimilated Jewish communities of the Diaspora in order for them to reconnect to their Jewish roots. Additionally, while in principleReform Judaismfavours seeking new members for the faith, this position has not translated into active proselytism, instead taking the form of an effort to reach out to non-Jewish spouses of intermarried couples.
There is also a trend of Orthodox movements reaching out to secular Jews in order to give them a strongerJewish identityso there is less chance of intermarriage. As a result of the efforts by these and other Jewish groups over the past 25 years, there has been a trend (known as theBaal teshuva movement) for secular Jews to become more religiously observant, though the demographic implications of the trend are unknown.Additionally, there is also a growing rate of conversion toJews by Choiceofgentileswho make the decision to head in the direction of becoming Jews.
Jewish individuals have played a significant role in the development and growth ofWestern culture,advancing many fields of thought,science and technology,both historically and in modern times,including through discrete trends inJewish philosophy,Jewish ethicsandJewish literature,as well as specific trends inJewish culture, including inJewish art,Jewish music,Jewish humor,Jewish theatre,Jewish cuisineandJewish medicine.Jews have established variousJewish political movements,religious movements, and, through theauthorship of the Hebrew Bibleand parts of theNew Testament,provided the foundation forChristianityandIslam.More than 20 percentof the awardedNobel Prizehave gone to individuals ofJewish descent.