Jewish Chosenness Exculpatory Deflection Beker

The Chosen: The History of an Idea, the Anatomy of an Obsession, by Avi Beker. 2008

Jewish Chosenness: An Exculpatory Deflection. Corrections Provided

This book is a disappointment. The analysis of Jewish Chosenness is quite shallow and rather exculpatory in tone. The most important practical aspect of the concept of Jewish Chosenness, that of Jewish conduct towards the gentile, as exemplified by the contents of the Talmud, is almost completely ignored. The author confuses “Jews are better” (which is, Biblically speaking, easily dismissed: Deuteronomy 7:6-8; 9:6) with the more subtle “Jews are special” or “Jews are favored”. More on this later.

This work gives a brief quotation from Rabbi Mordecai M. Kaplan, the co-founder of Reconstructionism (p. 23), concerning Kaplan’s repudiation of Jewish Chosenness. However, this does not begin to do justice to Kaplan’s reasoning behind his repudiation of Jews as Chosen. Please click on, and read my reviews, of Kaplan’s classics, The future of the American Jew, and his earlier Judaism as a Civilization: Toward a Reconstruction of American-Jewish Life .

In addition to all this, the book is less about Jewish Chosenness per se, and more about anti-Semitism, especially in its modern varieties. Even then, it tends to oversimplify anti-Semitism by reducing it to merely a reaction against Jewish Chosenness.

WHAT DOES “JEWS AS A CHOSEN PEOPLE” ENTAIL?

Author Avi Beker repeats the standard argument that Jewish Chosenness does not mean Jewish superiority, and that it instead implies extra obligations for Jews. (e. g, p. 9, 21, 73, 177-on). The informed reader probably already realizes that the “extra duties” contention is, in some ways, reminiscent of the “white man’s burden” concept of 19th century thinking. It may be a benevolent form of elitism, but it is Jewish elitism nevertheless.

More important, the “extra obligations” notion is only half the picture. It glosses over the fact that Jews as the Chosen People ALSO believe themselves to be the recipients of special favors from God in a way that the GOYIM are not. For instance, the Old Testament is full of examples of God waging battles alongside, and on behalf of, the Jews. For just some of the implications of Jewish Chosenness, as taught by the Talmud, please click on, and read my detailed review, of Jewish Identity in Early Rabbinic Writings (Arbeiten Zur Geschichte Des Antiken Judentums Und Des Urchristentums, Vol 23).

The whole concept of Jewish Chosenness, regardless of its ramifications, begs the question of its origins. If one believes in God, one can accept the contention that God acted unilaterally according to His will and chose the Jews, or that He chose the Jews because they agreed to obey the Torah. However, if there is no God, then no One exists to do the choosing, and therefore the Jews themselves must have invented the very idea of themselves as a Chosen People. How could they have come up with such a concept unless they, at some level, had believed themselves to be above the GOYIM? Avi Beker does not explain this.

Finally, author Avi Beker avoids the most controversial aspect of Jewish Chosenness–that of gentiles being servants of Jews (for example, as “wood hewers and water bearers”: Joshua 9:27). This view is not merely of historical interest. It enjoys support even today, as exemplified by the teachings of Rabbi Ovadia Yosef.

[In addition, this does not have to imply a literal, physical subservience of the GOY to the Jew. It can and does exist as a state of mind, or in terms of practical policies, all of which revolve around a tacit “Jews are favored” attitude. For instance, the pre-eminence of the Holocaust over the genocides of all other peoples, regardless of how it is rationalized, is consistent with the premise that the genocidal murder of gentiles is not as morally and historically significant as the genocidal murder of Jews. The potential “dual morality” works in many other contexts. For instance, Poles are called by Jews to “come to terms with the past” in terms of past Polish crimes against Jews, but Jews never recognize the need to “come to terms with the past” in terms of past Jewish crimes against Poles. When all is said and done, “Jews are favored” in some tacit way, and there is one morality for the GOYIM and another morality for the Jews.]

JEWISH CHOSENNESS: TRYING TO PASS THE BUCK TO THE CHRISTIANS

The author consistently tries to juxtapose Jewish Chosenness with its (presumed) appropriation by Christianity and Islam. (This is, in a sense, a revenge of unintended consequences. If the Jews invented the concept of a Chosen People to benefit themselves, why is it surprising that other religions imitated this Chosen-People idea for THEIR benefit, and sometimes used it against Jews? As an extreme, Nazi philosophy was, in part, a modernized and Germanized competitive imitation of Jewish Chosenness).

Any juxtaposition of Jewish Chosenness and its presumed Christian counterpart is fundamentally misleading. A Christian is not “Chosen” in any sense. He simply receives the free gift of salvation through the merits of Jesus Christ, and this free gift is available to anyone, regardless of their race or culture. A Jew acquires his Chosenness by being born a Jew (though, of course, a gentile can convert to Judaism). In contrast, the Christian is not bestowed with “Chosenness” merely by being born into a Christian home. He/she must actively believe in, and live for, Jesus Christ, in order to become “Chosen”. It is never a privilege that comes about by accident of birth.

The author makes an amazing statement. He asserts that Jewish converts to Christianity remain Jews. (p. 22). Huh?? Jewish believers in Jesus (such as Jews for Jesus) most certainly are not recognized either by Israel, or by Diaspora Jewish organizations, as valid Jews.

CONCLUSION

Avi Beker concludes that gentiles are obsessed about Jews in general and Jewish Chosenness in particular. Considering the volumes upon volumes of materials that Jews have written about themselves, and especially about their (often exaggerated) victimhood (the lachrymose view of history), dare the reader suspect that, if anyone is obsessed by the Jews in general and Jewish Chosenness in particular, it is none other than the Jews themselves?