Opinion

By Rabbi Lewis John Eron Ph.D.

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Human beings are skilled at defining “the other” in ways that deny the other’s full humanity, permit aggression against the other, allow for oppressing the other, and justify the elimination of the other. How we accomplish this reflects the ideas and principles we use to define ourselves and explain our world. We may call ourselves “the people” and see the other as not fully human. We may understand ourselves as “civilized” and the other as “barbarian”. We may see ourselves as “the faithful” and the other as “the infidel.” All too often, when we rank the values that we believe make us human, we find that our group seems to embody those values more than others.

The tools we employ to support and justify these distinctions are the conceptual tools fundamental to our understanding of our world: philosophy, theology, and the natural and social sciences. These are the tools we value most. They reflect our most cherished achievements as well as our darkest sins. We may view ourselves as the most rational or intuitive of human beings. We might see ourselves as closer to God or nature than others. We may believe we represent the most evolved physical or spiritual human community. What we cherish most, we do best. All others pale in comparison.

This sense that we, whoever we are, are at the top, no matter how we define the top, is universal. It is often beneficial. It provides us with a sense of purpose. It strengthens our self-identity. It promotes a feeling of group unity. It protects us in times of trouble. When we are oppressed, it helps us to persevere. When we are free, it challenges us to achieve.

And yet, it is also often problematic.

Jews understand this dynamic intuitively. Even in antiquity, as a small community, Israel saw itself as having a unique relationship with God and a distinct appreciation for its spiritual and cultural achievements. This self-perception supported Jewish survival across time and space. Geography, demography, and politics limited the pernicious use of this gift.

To the outside world, however, Jews were seen as the other. In Classical Antiquity, Jews were culturally viewed as the other–barbarians. From a Christian and Muslim perspective, Jews were religiously and spiritually considered the other–infidels. In the modern world, various secular ideological movements defined Jews as the other: to nationalists, Jews were aliens; to socialists, Jews were capitalists; to those who sought to understand human differences using the tools of the natural sciences, especially biology, Jews were seen as a race lower on the evolutionary scale than the dominant group.

Those who used the now-discredited science behind racism typically labeled their animosity towards Jews as “Antisemitism.” They presented antisemitism as a modern form of Jew-hatred with a “scientific” sounding name and methodology. This provided a secular justification to maintain the status of Jews as the other. While it differed from earlier theologically and culturally based forms of Jew-hatred, antisemitic ideas soon reinforced and supplemented them. Antisemitism emerged as part of the constellation of racist theories explaining and justifying Western European imperial expansion. This both replaced and bolstered previous Western European notions of superiority.

In the Americas, the focus of racist theory and practice was on skin color, an arbitrary selection that justified a social, economic, and political system based on chattel slavery. In Europe, so-called researchers used other arbitrary criteria as well to differentiate between the “races,” creating a hierarchy with people from Northwest Europe at the top and Jews and other people of color at the bottom.

Those of us who live in the United States are familiar with the ways racist theories were employed to justify the enslavement and oppression of Africans, as well as the dispossession and destruction of Native peoples. We should also be aware of how racist theories were used to limit immigration from East Asia, Eastern and Southern Europe, the Middle East, and to place obstacles in the integration of these people into American life.

As Jewish immigration to the United States increased in the latter half of the 19th century, anti-Semitic ideas swiftly took root in American racist theories and actions. These beliefs manifested, sometimes explicitly and often implicitly, in American immigration policies, economic activities, settlement patterns, educational opportunities, and government decisions. Overt antisemitism saw a decline in the post-World War II era. In the latter half of the 20th century, lighter-skinned Jews, primarily of Ashkenazi descent, began to be categorized as “white” in the American racial context. However, a significant portion of the American Jewish community remains perceived as “non-white,” and many Ashkenazi Jews believe their “white” designation is conditional at best.

While the Jewish community in North America has generally achieved significant economic and social success, it’s evident how historical experiences of antisemitism have influenced the community and Jewish self-perceptions over time. The contemporary resurgence of antisemitism feels particularly threatening. Due to the recent uptick in anti-Semitic incidents and sentiments in North America and Europe, there’s a growing interest in understanding both the historical and present-day causes and manifestations of antisemitism.

Critical Race Theory (CRT) provides a powerful methodological approach to this exploration. CTR emerged as a method for legal analysis some forty years ago in American academic circles to explain the serious inequalities African Americans experienced and still experience after the successes of the Civil Rights Movement. CRT asks us to think systemically and look critically as we examine the relationship between our social, political, economic, and legal systems and our understanding of race and racial groups. Its basic insights involve looking at “race” as a social construct and understanding racism not as an individual’s problem but as a cultural concept built into our social systems. To eliminate racism and ameliorate the adverse effects culturally embedded racist ideas have imposed on minority groups’ merely examining our personal feelings, ideas, and actions is not enough. We need to look critically and systemically at the ways in which racist ideas appear in our social, cultural, political, economic, and religious institutions and explore how social attitudes, cultural assumptions, and policies converge or intersect to reinforce each other.

The concept of race remains an extremely powerful and harmful concept in American culture. It touches all of us. It is reductionist. Race, for example, allows us to look at African Americans as a group defined arbitrarily by distinct biological characteristics rather than as a community that shares a common history, heritage, and characteristic cultural patterns. It allows us to make assumptions that limit other people’s potential and maintain a restrictive social order. It is so forceful that it affects the self-understanding of members of an oppressed group. It is so pervasive that even those who attempt to correct the systemic abuse of race in American life and strive to be personally anti-racist often read other systems of social injustice and oppression in terms of racism when another set of social constructs may support the abusive situation.

However, when we look carefully at the issue of racism, including antisemitism CRT is a significant analytical tool. Although CRT addresses racism, particularly racism in America, methodologically, it matters little what set of characteristics are used to define the oppressed other. What matters is the way this definition appears consciously and, more importantly, subconsciously, in those laws, customs, practices, and social patterns that serve to restrict, exclude and oppress the other in a specific cultural and political situation.

To understand how antisemitism functioned and functions one must explore the way cultural patterns, policy decisions, and economic interests intersect to restrict Jews and Jewish life. CRT provides the model in showing particularly how a legal system expresses cultural ideas that harm minorities even in ways that are not obvious or clearly articulated. 

Dislike of Jews, discriminatory practices towards Jews, oppressive policies concerning Jews, and violence against Jews were not the personal choices of individuals. They were, and in some places, sadly, still are legal, economic, and social patterns of behavior reflecting well-established cultural beliefs. Not unlike the expression of racism as we know it in America, laws restricting Jews and Jewish life starting in Late Antiquity and being expanded in the Middle Ages and the Early Modern period continued well into the 20^th century and beyond. The totalitarian regimes of the 20^th century exploited this heritage portraying Jews as the dangerous other who needed to be controlled, expelled, or eliminated.

For many the systemic cultural analysis required by CRT feels threatening. As the debate over CRT in American civil discourse grow, opponents worry about undermining of their basic institutions and their sense of self. In crude terms, they do not want “white” students to feel bad.

This is a real but ungrounded fear. Human beings and human institutions are resilient. We have to capacity to self-correct and grow. Repentance is built into our spiritual traditions. Biblical prophets spoke as much to the community as they did to individuals and they understood that individuals’ righteousness was tempered by their communities’ injustices.

While there is a powerful individualistic thrust in American culture that is reflected in the religious experience in America, at their best, our religious communities see themselves not only as a collection of people of faith but as communities of faith. Moral and spiritual growth is not merely a personal practice but also the practice of the community. The prophetic call for communal repentance and regeneration was a call for systematic legal, social, economic, and spiritual reform and reorientation.

This is hard. It can be frightening. We are asked to look at our past–not a casual review but a serious reflection on the values we held, the choices we made, and the experiences we cherished. Sometimes, we are proud of what we have accomplished but, if we are honest with ourselves, we are often surprised, embarrassed, ashamed, and/or regretful. But only through reflection and self-knowledge can we grow. This is done through deep systematic analysis and investigation of how various ideas and practices converge to uphold oppressive situations. It requires giving up deeply rooted and highly cherished views of ourselves. It asks us to take responsibility for our errors. It holds us to our highest values. But, from a spiritual and moral point of view, it is an awesome challenge that we should embrace.

The transformation of the Christian-Jewish relationship after the tragedies of World War II showcases how the systematic analysis offered by CRT can remedy historical injustices and oppression. The commitment of both Christians and Jews to dialogue has fostered new understandings. The concerted effort by many Christian churches to deeply scrutinize their theological, exegetical, and liturgical traditions has empowered them to reevaluate their perspectives on Jewish spiritual traditions and the Jewish community. They confronted how Church doctrines and practices reinforced and promoted anti-Jewish sentiments. They realized how traditional interpretations of scripture endorsed anti-Jewish views. They recognized the shortcomings of faith leaders in showing kindness, empathy, and consideration towards Jews. However, the success of this challenging introspection has invigorated biblical studies, spiritual discovery, and societal consciousness. I believe it also stands as a defense against the secularization prevalent in today’s society.

In the United States, our communities, institutions, and society at large face similar challenges. While we may consider ourselves advanced, we are far from perfect . The biblical prophets grappled with the task of forging a just and righteous community. Achieving this demands deep and comprehensive self-reflection.

CRT is a helpful methodology. Its underlying principles go beyond the academic study of the American legal system. It helps us understand how oppressive systems, including antisemitism, work and how they can be overcome in ways that strengthen all of us. Its general methodological principles are of immense value in our attempt to understand the hatred of Jews in general and antisemitism in particular. The use of these methodologies successfully to explore and unravel centuries of oppression and denigration of Jews and Judaism demonstrates their utility.

The abiding legacy of racism in all its forms still tears at the soul of America. Confronting racism is as frightening and overcoming as it is difficult. CRT is a helpful tool in this struggle. Although CRT has its origins in academia, the issues it addresses are more than academic questions or even legal problems. It wants us to look at how oppressive systems establish and perpetuate themselves and how cultural beliefs and social attitudes interact harming not oppressed groups but society in general. When seen through the lens of our desire to understand and diminish antisemitism, the utility and success of CRT-type methodologies become apparent.

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The views expressed in this commentary do not necessarily reflect those of iPub Global Connection.