View source for Religion:Jews

{{short description|Ancient nation and ethnoreligious group from the Levant}}
{{pp-30-500|small=yes}}
{{Infobox ethnic group
| group          = Jews
| native_name    = {{lang|he|יְהוּדִים‬}} ({{lang|he-Latn|Yehudim}})
| native_name_lang = he
| rawimage       = Star of David.svg
| image          = 
| image_caption  = The [[Star of David]] which is a common symbol of the Jewish people.
| total          = '''14.6–17.8 million'''<br />
'''Enlarged population (includes full or partial Jewish ancestry):''' <br />
'''20.7 million'''
| total_year     = 2018
| total_source   = estimate
[[File:Jewish people around the world.svg|center|frameless|260x260px]]
| region1        = {{flag|Israel}}
| pop1           = 6,558,000–6,958,000
| ref1           = <ref name="JDB"/>
| region2        = {{flag|United States}}
| pop2           = 5,700,000–10,000,000
| ref2           = <ref name="JDB"/>
| region3        = {{flag|France}}
| pop3           = 453,000–600,000
| ref3           = <ref name="JDB"/>
| region4        = {{flag|Canada}}
| pop4           = 391,000–550,000
| ref4           = <ref name="JDB"/>
| region5        = {{nowrap|{{flag|United Kingdom}}}}
| pop5           = 290,000–370,000
| ref5           = <ref name="JDB"/>
| region6        = {{flag|Argentina}}
| pop6           = 180,000–330,000
| ref6           = <ref name="JDB"/>
| region7        = {{flag|Russia}}
| pop7           = 172,000–440,000
| ref7           = <ref name="JDB"/>
| region8        = {{flag|Germany}}
| pop8           = 116,000–225,000
| ref8           = <ref name="JDB"/>
| region9        = {{flag|Australia}}
| pop9           = 113,000–140,000
| ref9           = <ref name="JDB"/>
| region10       = {{flag|Brazil}}
| pop10          = 93,000–150,000
| ref10          = <ref name="JDB"/>
| region11       = {{flag|South Africa}}
| pop11          = 69,000–80,000
| ref11          = <ref name="JDB"/>
| region12       = {{flag|Ukraine}}
| pop12          = 50,000–140,000
| ref12          = <ref name="JDB"/>
| region13       = {{flag|Hungary}}
| pop13          = 47,000–100,000
| ref13          = <ref name="JDB"/>
| region14       = {{flag|Mexico}}
| pop14          = 40,000–50,000
| ref14          = <ref name="JDB"/>
| region15       = {{flag|Netherlands}}
| pop15          = 30,000–52,000
| ref15          = <ref name="JDB"/>
| region16       = {{flag|Belgium}}
| pop16          = 29,000–40,000
| ref16          = <ref name="JDB"/>
| region17       = {{flag|Italy}}
| pop17          = 28,000–41,000
| ref17          = <ref name="JDB"/>
| region18       = {{flag|Switzerland}}
| pop18          = 19,000–25,000
| ref18          = <ref name="JDB"/>
| region19       = {{flag|Chile}}
| pop19          = 18,000–26,000
| ref19          = <ref name="JDB"/>
| region20       = {{flag|Uruguay}}
| pop20          = 17,000–25,000
| ref20          = <ref name="JDB"/>
| region21       = {{flag|Turkey}}
| pop21          = 15,000–21,000
| ref21          = <ref name="JDB"/>
| region22       = {{flag|Sweden}}
| pop22          = 15,000–25,000
| ref22          = <ref name="JDB"/>
| languages      = {{plainlist|
* '''Predominantly spoken:'''<ref name=Languages>{{cite web|url=http://www.bh.org.il/links.aspx |title=Links |access-date=2 April 2012 |publisher=Beth Hatefutsoth |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090326102214/http://www.bh.org.il/links/jewishlangs.asp |archive-date=26 March 2009 |url-status=dead}}</ref>
* {{hlist|[[Social:Modern Hebrew|Modern Hebrew]]|[[Social:English language|English]]|[[Social:Russian language|Russian]]|[[Social:French language|French]]|[[Social:Spanish language|Spanish]]}}
* '''Historical:'''
* {{hlist|[[Social:Yiddish|Yiddish]]|[[Social:Judaeo-Spanish|Ladino]]|Judeo-Arabic|others}}
* '''Sacred:'''
* {{hlist|[[Social:Biblical Hebrew|Biblical Hebrew]]|Biblical Aramaic|Talmudic Aramaic}}
}}
| religions      = [[Religion:Judaism|Judaism]]
| related_groups = {{plainlist|
* Samaritans<ref>{{Cite book |title=Genes, Polymorphisms and the Making of Societies: How Genetic Behavioral Traits Influence Human Cultures |last=Kiaris|first= Hippokratis|publisher=Universal Publishers|year=2012 |isbn=978-1-61233-093-8 |page=21}}</ref><ref name="evolutsioon" /><ref name=DigitalSamaritans>{{Cite book |title=Digital Samaritans: Rhetorical Delivery and Engagement in the Digital Humanities |last=Ridolfo |first=Jim |publisher=University of Michigan Press |year=2015 |isbn=978-0-472-07280-4 |page=69}}</ref>
* Other [[Place:Levant|Levant]]ines and Semitic peoples such as<ref name="evolutsioon">{{cite journal |last1=Shen |first1=Peidong |last2=Lavi |first2=Tal |last3=Kivisild |first3=Toomas |last4=Chou |first4=Vivian |last5=Sengun |first5=Deniz |last6=Gefel |first6=Dov |last7=Shpirer |first7=Issac |last8=Woolf |first8=Eilon |last9=Hillel |first9=Jossi |last10=Feldman |first10=Marcus W. |last11=Oefner |first11=Peter J. |title=Reconstruction of patrilineages and matrilineages of Samaritans and other Israeli populations from Y-Chromosome and mitochondrial DNA sequence Variation |journal=Human Mutation |date=September 2004 |volume=24 |issue=3 |pages=248–260 |doi=10.1002/humu.20077 |pmid=15300852 |s2cid=1571356 }}</ref><ref>{{cite news|title=Studies Show Jews' Genetic Similarity|first= Nicholas|last= Wade|date=9 June 2010|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/10/science/10jews.html|work={{wipe|The New York Times}}}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Nebel |first1=Almut |last2=Filon |first2=Dvora |last3=Weiss |first3=Deborah A. |last4=Weale |first4=Michael |last5=Faerman |first5=Marina |last6=Oppenheim |first6=Ariella |last7=Thomas |first7=Mark G. |title=High-resolution Y chromosome haplotypes of Israeli and Palestinian Arabs reveal geographic substructure and substantial overlap with haplotypes of Jews |journal=Human Genetics |date=December 2000 |volume=107 |issue=6 |pages=630–641 |doi=10.1007/s004390000426 |pmid=11153918 |s2cid=8136092 }}</ref><ref name="sciencedaily">{{cite web|url=https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2000/05/000509003653.htm |title=Jews Are The Genetic Brothers Of Palestinians, Syrians, And Lebanese |publisher=Sciencedaily.com |date=9 May 2000 |access-date=12 April 2013}}</ref> Arabs<ref name="evolutsioon" /><ref name="Abraham 2010">{{cite journal |last1=Atzmon |first1=Gil |last2=Hao |first2=Li |last3=Pe'er |first3=Itsik |last4=Velez |first4=Christopher |last5=Pearlman |first5=Alexander |last6=Palamara |first6=Pier Francesco |last7=Morrow |first7=Bernice |last8=Friedman |first8=Eitan |last9=Oddoux |first9=Carole |last10=Burns |first10=Edward |last11=Ostrer |first11=Harry |title=Abraham's Children in the Genome Era: Major Jewish Diaspora Populations Comprise Distinct Genetic Clusters with Shared Middle Eastern Ancestry |journal=The American Journal of Human Genetics |date=June 2010 |volume=86 |issue=6 |pages=850–859 |doi=10.1016/j.ajhg.2010.04.015 |pmid=20560205 |pmc=3032072 }}</ref> and Assyrians<ref name="evolutsioon" /><ref name="sciencedaily" /><ref name=DigitalSamaritans/>
}}
}}

'''Jews''' ({{lang-he|יְהוּדִים}} <small>ISO 259-2</small> {{transl|he|''Yehudim''}}, <small>Israeli pronunciation</small> {{IPA-he|jehuˈdim|}}) or '''Jewish people''' are members of an ethnoreligious group<ref name="Jews-are-ethnoreligious-group"/> and a [[Earth:Nation|nation]]<ref name="Nicholson2002"/><ref name="Dowty1998"/> originating from the Israelites<ref name="Scheindlin1998">{{cite book|author=Raymond P. Scheindlin|title=A Short History of the Jewish People: From Legendary Times to Modern Statehood|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bfsuicMmrE0C&pg=PA1|year=1998|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-513941-9|pages=1–}} Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites"</ref><ref name="Incorporated2009">{{cite book|author=Facts On File, Incorporated|title=Encyclopedia of the Peoples of Africa and the Middle East|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=stl97FdyRswC&pg=PA337|year=2009|publisher=Infobase Publishing|isbn=978-1-4381-2676-0|pages=337–}}"The people of the Kingdom of Israel and the ethnic and religious group known as the Jewish people that descended from them have been subjected to a number of forced migrations in their history"</ref><ref name="MD2012">{{cite book|author=Harry Ostrer MD|title=Legacy: A Genetic History of the Jewish People|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=RayZR3V1SFwC&pg=PT26|year=2012|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-997638-6|pages=26–}}</ref> and Hebrews<ref>"In the broader sense of the term, a Jew is any person belonging to the worldwide group that constitutes, through descent or conversion, a continuation of the ancient Jewish people, who were themselves descendants of the Hebrews of the Old Testament." [http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/303358/Jew Jew] at [http://www.britannica.com/ Encyclopædia Britannica]</ref><ref>"Hebrew, any member of an ancient northern Semitic people that were the ancestors of the Jews." [http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/259033/Hebrew Hebrew (People)] at [http://www.britannica.com/ Encyclopædia Britannica]</ref> of historical Israel and Judah. Jewish ethnicity, nationhood, and religion are strongly interrelated,<ref name="Lederhendler2001">{{cite book|author=Eli Lederhendler|title=Studies in Contemporary Jewry: Volume XVII: Who Owns Judaism? Public Religion and Private Faith in America and Israel|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1wvahJv83AgC&pg=PA101|year=2001|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-534896-5|pages=101–}} "Historically, the religious and ethnic dimensions of Jewish identity have been closely interwoven. In fact, so closely bound are they, that the traditional Jewish lexicon hardly distinguishes between the two concepts. Jewish religious practice, by definition, was observed exclusively by the Jewish people, and notions of Jewish peoplehood, nation, and community were suffused with faith in the Jewish God, the practice of Jewish (religious) law and the study of ancient religious texts"</ref><ref name="Yee2005">{{cite book|author=Tet-Lim N. Yee|title=Jews, Gentiles and Ethnic Reconciliation: Paul's Jewish identity and Ephesians|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=x4OwXhMOn5cC&pg=PA102|year= 2005|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-1-139-44411-8|pages=102–}} "This identification in the Jewish attitude between the ethnic group and religious identity is so close that the reception into this religion of members not belonging to its ethnic group has become impossible."</ref> as [[Religion:Judaism|Judaism]] is the [[Religion:Ethnic religion|ethnic religion]] of the Jewish people, although its observance varies from strict to none.<ref name="KrauszTulea">{{cite book|author1=Ernest Krausz|author2=Gitta Tulea|title=Jewish Survival: The Identity Problem at the Close of the Twentieth Century; &#91;... International Workshop at Bar-Ilan University on the 18th and 19th of March, 1997&#93;|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dnxv-Mlz0JIC&pg=PA90|publisher=Transaction Publishers|year=1997|isbn=978-1-4128-2689-1|pages=90–}} "A person born Jewish who refutes Judaism may continue to assert a Jewish identity, and if he or she does not convert to another religion, even religious Jews will recognize the person as a Jew"</ref><ref name= Pew>{{cite web |url=https://www.pewforum.org/2013/10/01/jewish-american-beliefs-attitudes-culture-survey/ |title=A Portrait of Jewish Americans |author=<!--Not stated--> |date=October 1, 2013 |website=Pew Research Center |quote=But the survey also suggests that Jewish identity is changing in America, where one-in-five Jews (22%) now describe themselves as having no religion.}}</ref>

Jews [[Social:Ethnogenesis|originated]] as an ethnic and religious group in the [[Place:Middle East|Middle East]] during the second millennium BCE,<ref name="Abraham 2010"/> in the part of the [[Place:Levant|Levant]] known as the [[Place:Land of Israel|Land of Israel]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://mfa.gov.il/MFA/AboutIsrael/History/Pages/Facts%20about%20Israel-%20History.aspx|title=Facts About Israel: History|work=GxMSDev}}</ref> The Merneptah Stele appears to confirm the existence of a people of Israel somewhere in [[Place:Canaan|Canaan]] as far back as the 13th century BCE (Late Bronze Age).<ref name=NollMerneptah>K. L. Noll (2012), [https://books.google.com/books?id=hMeRK7B1EsMC&pg=PA139 ''Canaan and Israel in Antiquity: A Textbook on History and Religion,''] A&C Black, rev.ed. pp. 137ff.</ref><ref name=ThompsonMerneptah>[[Biography:Thomas L. Thompson|Thomas L. Thompson]] (2000),[https://books.google.com/books?id=RwrrUuHFb6UC&pg=PA275 ''Early History of the Israelite People: From the Written & Archaeological Sources,''] Brill, pp. 275–76: 'They are rather a very specific group among the population of Palestine which bears a name that occurs here for the first time that at a much later stage in Palestine's history bears a substantially different signification.'</ref> The Israelites, as an outgrowth of the Canaanite population,<ref name="John Day pp. 47">John Day (2005), ''In Search of Pre-Exilic Israel,'' Bloomsbury Publishing, pp. 47.5 [48] 'In this sense, the emergence of ancient Israel is viewed not as the cause of the demise of Canaanite culture but as its upshot'.</ref> consolidated their hold with the emergence of the kingdoms of Israel and Judah. Some consider that these Canaanite sedentary Israelites melded with incoming nomadic groups known as 'Hebrews'.<ref>Day, pp. 31–33, p. 57, n. 33.</ref> Though few sources mention the exilic periods in detail,<ref>Rainer Albertz (2003), [https://books.google.com/books?id=Xx9YzJq2B9wC&pg=PA45 ''Israel in Exile: The History and Literature of the Sixth Century B.C.E.''] Society of Biblical Lit, pp. 45ff: 'Since the exilic era constitutes a gaping hole in the historical narrative of the Bible, historical reconstruction of this era faces almost insurmountable difficulties. Like the premonarchic period and the late Persian period, the exilic period, though set in the bright light of Ancient Near Eastern history, remains historically obscure. Since there are very few Israelite sources, the only recourse is to try to cast some light on this darkness from the history of the surrounding empires under whose dominion Israel came in this period.'</ref>{{Failed verification|reason=this only refers to the first exile, the one in Babylon|date=August 2020}} the experience of diaspora life, from the Babylonian captivity and exile to the Roman occupation and exile, and the historical relations between Jews and their homeland thereafter, became a major feature of Jewish history, [[Social:Jewish identity|identity]] and memory.<ref>
* {{cite book|author=Marvin Perry|title=Western Civilization: A Brief History, Volume I: To 1789|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=U2pnv0Aoh2EC|year=2012|publisher=Cengage Learning|isbn=978-1-111-83720-4|page=87}}
* Botticini, Maristella and Zvi Eckstein. [https://www.aeaweb.org/annual_mtg_papers/2007/0106_1430_1101.pdf "From Farmers to Merchants, Voluntary Conversions and Diaspora: A Human Capital Interpretation of History."] pp. 18–19. August 2006. Accessed 21 November 2015. "The death toll of the Great Revolt against the Roman empire amounted to about 600,000 Jews, whereas the Bar Kokhba revolt in 135 caused the death of about 500,000 Jews. Massacres account for roughly 40 percent of the decrease of the Jewish population in Palestine. Moreover, some Jews migrated to Babylon after these revolts because of the worse economic conditions. After accounting for massacres and migrations, there is an additional 30 to 40 percent of the decrease in the Jewish population in Palestine (about 1–1.3 million Jews) to be explained" (p. 19).
* [http://nes.berkeley.edu/Web_Boyarin/BoyarinArticles/69%20Diaspora%20(1993).pdf Boyarin, Daniel, and Jonathan Boyarin. 2003. Diaspora: Generation and the Ground of Jewish Diaspora. p. 714] "...it is crucial to recognize that the Jewish conception of the Land of Israel is similar to the discourse of the Land of many (if not nearly all) "indigenous" peoples of the world. Somehow the Jews have managed to retain a sense of being rooted somewhere in the world through twenty centuries of exile from that someplace (organic metaphors are not out of place in this discourse, for they are used within the tradition itself). It is profoundly disturbing to hear Jewish attachment to the Land decried as regressive in the same discursive situations in which the attachment of native Americans or Australians to their particular rocks, trees, and deserts is celebrated as an organic connection to the Earth that "we" have lost" p. 714.
* [https://books.google.com/books?id=OcY0Oy5VpGIC&pg=PA24&lpg=PA24&dq=Superficially,+the+crushing+of+the+revolt+of+the+Judeans+against+the+Romans#v=onepage&q=greek Cohen, Robin (1997), Global Diasporas: An Introduction. p. 24 London: UCL Press.] "...although the word Babylon often connotes captivity and oppression, a rereading of the Babylonian period of exile can thus be shown to demonstrate the development of a new creative energy in a challenging, pluralistic context outside the natal homeland. When the Romans destroyed the Second Temple in AD 70, it was Babylon that remained as the nerve- and brain-centre for Jewish life and thought...the crushing of the revolt of the Judaeans against the Romans and the destruction of the Second Temple by the Roman general Titus in AD 70 precisely confirmed the catastrophic tradition. Once again, Jews had been unable to sustain a national homeland and were scattered to the far corners of the world" (p. 24).
* [https://books.google.com/books?id=YBarWAR2qVkC&pg=PA159&cad=3#v=onepage Johnson, Paul ''A History of the Jews'' "The Bar Kochba Revolt," (HarperPerennial, 1987) pp. 158–61]: Paul Johnson analyzes Cassius Dio's ''Roman History: Epitome of Book LXIX'' para. 13–14 (Dio's passage cited separately) among other sources: "Even if Dio's figures are somewhat exaggerated, the casualties amongst the population and the destruction inflicted on the country would have been considerable. According to Jerome, many Jews were also sold into slavery, so many, indeed, that the price of Jewish slaves at the slave market in Hebron sank drastically to a level no greater than that for a horse. The economic structure of the country was largely destroyed. The entire spiritual and economic life of the Palestinian Jews moved to Galilee. Jerusalem was now turned into a Roman colony with the official name ''Colonia Aelia Capitolina'' (''Aelia'' after Hadrian's family name: P. Aelius Hadrianus; ''Capitolina'' after Jupiter Capitolinus). The Jews were forbidden on pain of death to set foot in the new Roman city. Aelia thus became a completely pagan city, no doubt with the corresponding public buildings and temples... We can...be certain that a statue of Hadrian was erected in the centre of Aelia, and this was tantamount in itself to a desecration of Jewish Jerusalem." p. 159.
* [https://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Cassius_Dio/69*.html Cassius Dio's ''Roman History: Epitome of Book LXIX'' para. 13–14]: "13 At first the Romans took no account of them. Soon, however, all Judaea had been stirred up, and the Jews everywhere were showing signs of disturbance, were gathering together, and giving evidence of great hostility to the Romans, partly by secret and partly by overt acts; 2 many outside nations, too, were joining them through eagerness for gain, and the whole earth, one might almost say, was being stirred up over the matter. Then, indeed, Hadrian sent against them his best generals. First of these was Julius Severus, who was dispatched from Britain, where he was governor, against the Jews. 3 Severus did not venture to attack his opponents in the open at any one point, in view of their numbers and their desperation, but by intercepting small groups, thanks to the number of his soldiers and his under-officers, and by depriving them of food and shutting them up, he was able, rather slowly, to be sure, but with comparatively little danger, to crush, exhaust and exterminate them. Very few of them in fact survived. Fifty of their most important outposts and nine hundred and eighty-five of their most famous villages were razed to the ground. Five hundred and eighty thousand men were slain in the various raids and battles, and the number of those that perished by famine, disease and fire was past finding out. 2 Thus nearly the whole of Judaea was made desolate, a result of which the people had had forewarning before the war. For the tomb of Solomon, which the Jews regard as an object of veneration, fell to pieces of itself and collapsed, and many wolves and hyenas rushed howling into their cities. 3 Many Romans, moreover, perished in this war. Therefore Hadrian in writing to the senate did not employ the opening phrase commonly affected by the emperors, 'If you and our children are in health, it is well; I and the legions are in health'" (para. 13–14).
* [http://s3.amazonaws.com/academia.edu.documents/35322856/10.1safran.pdf?AWSAccessKeyId=AKIAJ56TQJRTWSMTNPEA&Expires=1448051543&Signature=RkGuXo51zJWymRJmow5zv%2BR%2B4yY%3D&response-content-disposition=attachment%3B%20filename%3DThe_Jewish_Diaspora_in_a_Comparative_and.pdf Safran, William. 2005. The Jewish Diaspora in a Comparative and Theoretical Perspective. Israel Studies 10 (1): 36.]{{Dead link|date=February 2016}} "...diaspora referred to a very specific case—that of the exile of the Jews from the Holy Land and their dispersal throughout several parts of the globe. Diaspora [galut] connoted deracination, legal disabilities, oppression, and an often painful adjustment to a hostland whose hospitality was unreliable and ephemeral. It also connoted the existence on foreign soil of an expatriate community that considered its presence to be transitory. Meanwhile, it developed a set of institutions, social patterns, and ethnonational and/or religious symbols that held it together. These included the language, religion, values, social norms, and narratives of the homeland. Gradually, this community adjusted to the hostland environment and became itself a center of cultural creation. All the while, however, it continued to cultivate the idea of return to the homeland." (p. 36).
* [http://sino-west.org/sjtu/Is.pdf Sheffer, Gabriel. 2005. Is the Jewish Diaspora Unique? Reflections on the Diaspora's Current Situation. Israel Studies 10 (1): pp. 3–4] "...the Jewish nation, which from its very earliest days believed and claimed that it was the "chosen people," and hence unique. This attitude has further been buttressed by the equally traditional view, which is held not only by the Jews themselves, about the exceptional historical age of this diaspora, its singular traumatic experiences its singular ability to survive pogroms, exiles, and Holocaust, as well as its "special relations" with its ancient homeland, culminating in 1948 with the nation-state that the Jewish nation has established there... First, like many other members of established diasporas, the vast majority of Jews no longer regard themselves as being in ''Galut'' [exile] in their host countries.…Perceptually, as well as actually, Jews permanently reside in host countries of their own free will, as a result of inertia, or as a result of problematic conditions prevailing in other hostlands, or in Israel. It means that the basic perception of many Jews about their existential situation in their hostlands has changed. Consequently, there is both a much greater self- and collective-legitimatization to refrain from making serious plans concerning "return" or actually "making Aliyah" [to emigrate, or "go up"] to Israel. This is one of the results of their wider, yet still rather problematic and sometimes painful acceptance by the societies and political systems in their host countries. It means that they, and to an extent their hosts, do not regard Jewish life within the framework of diasporic formations in these hostlands as something that they should be ashamed of, hide from others, or alter by returning to the old homeland" (p. 4).
* {{Cite book|title = The Cambridge History of Judaism: Volume 4, The Late Roman-Rabbinic Period|url = https://books.google.com/books?id=BjtWLZhhMoYC|publisher = Cambridge University Press|year= 1984 |isbn=978-0-521-77248-8 |first1 = William David|last1 = Davies|first2 = Louis|last2 = Finkelstein|first3 = Steven T.|last3 = Katz|quote = Although Dio's figure of 985 as the number of villages destroyed during the war seems hyperbolic, all Judaean villages, without exception, excavated thus far were razed following the Bar Kochba Revolt. This evidence supports the impression of total regional destruction following the war. Historical sources note the vast number of captives sold into slavery in Palestine and shipped abroad. ... The Judaean Jewish community never recovered from the Bar Kochba war. In its wake, Jews no longer formed the majority in Palestine, and the Jewish center moved to the Galilee. Jews were also subjected to a series of religious edicts promulgated by Hadrian that were designed to uproot the nationalistic elements with the Judaean Jewish community, these proclamations remained in effect until Hadrian's death in 138. An additional, more lasting punitive measure taken by the Romans involved expunging Judaea from the provincial name, changing it from Provincia Judaea to Provincia Syria Palestina. Although such name changes occurred elsewhere, never before or after was a nation's name expunged as the result of rebellion.}}
* Dalit Rom-Shiloni, ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=ffE3AAAAQBAJ&pg=PR15 Exclusive Inclusivity: Identity Conflicts Between the Exiles and the People who Remained (6th–5th Centuries BCE)]'', A&C Black, 2013 p. xv n.3: 'it is argued that biblical texts of the Neo-Babylonian and the early Persian periods show a fierce adversarial relationship(s) between the Judean groups. We find no expressions of sympathy to the deported community for its dislocation, no empathic expressions towards the People Who Remained under Babylonian subjugation in Judah. The opposite is apparent: hostile, denigrating, and denunciating language characterizes the relationships between resident and exiled Judeans throughout the sixth and fifth centuries.' (p. xvii)</ref>

In the millennia following, Jewish diaspora communities [[Biology:Coalescent theory|coalesced]] into three, major ethnic subdivisions according to where their ancestors settled: ''Ashkenazim'' (Central and [[Place:Eastern European Jewry|Eastern Europe]]), ''Sephardim'' (initially in the Iberian Peninsula), and ''Mizrahim'' (Middle East and North Africa).<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=GkzdBDuhoRgC&pg=PA87#v=onepage&q&f=false "Heritage: Civilization and the Jews; The Uses of Adversity." Page 87.] Eban, Abba Solomon. “Heritage: Civilization and the Jews.“ Summit Books, A Division of Simon and Schuster, Inc. Syracuse, New York: 1984. Page 87.</ref><ref name="Dosick">Dosick (2007), pp. 59, 60.</ref> Prior to [[Social:World War II|World War II]], the worldwide Jewish population reached a peak of 16.7&nbsp;million,<ref name="JVIL2010">{{cite web|url = https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Judaism/jewpop.html|title = The Jewish Population of the World (2014)|work = [[Jewish Virtual Library]]|access-date = 30 June 2015}}, based on {{cite book|title = American Jewish Year Book|publisher = American Jewish Committee|url = http://www.ajcarchives.org/main.php?GroupingId=10142}}</ref> representing around 0.7&nbsp;percent of the world population at that time. Approximately 6&nbsp;million Jews were systematically murdered during [[Social:The Holocaust|the Holocaust]].<ref>{{cite web|title = Holocaust {{!}} Basic questions about the Holocaust|url = http://www.projetaladin.org/holocaust/en/40-questions-40-answers/basic-questions-about-the-holocaust.html|website = www.projetaladin.org|access-date = 10 November 2015}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title = The Holocaust|url = http://www.history.com/topics/world-war-ii/the-holocaust|website = HISTORY.com|access-date = 10 November 2015}}</ref> Since then the population has slowly risen again, and {{as of|2018|lc=y}} was estimated at 14.6–17.8&nbsp;million by the Berman Jewish DataBank,<ref name="JDB" /> less than 0.2&nbsp;percent of the total world population.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4291987,00.html|title= Jews make up only 0.2% of mankind|publisher=ynetnews|date=October 2012}}</ref>{{refn|group=note|The exact world Jewish population, however, is difficult to measure. In addition to issues with census methodology, disputes among proponents of ''halakhic'', secular, political, and ancestral identification factors regarding who is a Jew may affect the figure considerably depending on the source.<ref name="Pfeffer">{{cite news|url=http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/903585.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090319024731/http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/903585.html |archive-date=19 March 2009 |title=Jewish Agency: 13.2 million Jews worldwide on eve of Rosh Hashanah, 5768 |access-date=24 January 2009 |last=Pfeffer |first=Anshel |date=12 September 2007 |newspaper=Haaretz |url-status=dead}}</ref>}}

The modern State of Israel is the only country where Jews form a majority of the population. It defines itself as a Jewish and democratic state in the Basic Laws, Human Dignity and Liberty in particular, which is based on the Declaration of Independence. Israel's Law of Return grants the right of citizenship to Jews who have expressed their desire to settle in Israel.<ref>A 1970 amendment to Israel's Law of Return defines "Jew" as "a person who was born of a Jewish mother or has become converted to Judaism and who is not a member of another religion." {{cite web|url=https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Immigration/Text_of_Law_of_Return.html|title=Law of Return}}</ref>

Despite their small percentage of the world's population, Jews have significantly influenced and contributed to human progress in many fields, both historically and in modern times, including philosophy,<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.iep.utm.edu/maimonid/|title=Maimonides – Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy|work=utm.edu|access-date=26 August 2015}}</ref> [[Religion:Jewish ethics|ethics]],<ref>{{cite book |last1=Sekine |first1=Seizo |title=A Comparative Study of the Origins of Ethical Thought: Hellenism and Hebraism |date=20 January 2005 |publisher=Sheed & Ward |isbn=978-1-4616-7459-7 }}{{page needed|date=October 2020}}</ref> literature,<ref name="Daly2013">{{cite book|author=Jonathan Daly|title=The Rise of Western Power: A Comparative History of Western Civilization|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9aZPAQAAQBAJ&pg=PA21|year= 2013|publisher=A&C Black|isbn=978-1-4411-1851-6|pages=21–}}"Upon the foundation of Judaism, two civilizations centered on monotheistic religion emerged, Christianity and Islam. To these civilizations, the Jews added a leaven of astonishing creativity in business, medicine, letters, science, the arts, and a variety of other leadership roles."</ref> politics,<ref name="Daly2013"/> business,<ref name="Daly2013"/> fine arts and architecture,<ref name="Daly2013"/> music, theatre<ref>{{cite web|url=http://dctheatrescene.com/2013/06/25/broadway-musicals-a-jewish-legacy/|title=Broadway Musicals: A Jewish Legacy|work=DC Theatre Scene}}</ref> and cinema, medicine,<ref>Roni Caryn Rabin [https://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/15/health/exhibition-traces-the-emergence-of-jews-as-medical-innovators.html Exhibition Traces the emergence of Jews as medical innovators], ''{{wipe|The New York Times}}'' (14 May 2012). Accessed 16 August 2015.</ref><ref>Shatzmiller, Joseph. Doctors to Princes and Paupers: Jews, Medicine, and Medieval Society. Berkeley: U of California, 1995. Print.</ref> and science and technology,<ref name="Daly2013"/> as well as religion; Jews authored the Bible,<ref name="Dimont2004">{{cite book|author=Max I. Dimont|title=Jews, God, and History|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Lm5U0YSPmBUC&pg=PT102|year= 2004|publisher=Penguin Publishing Group|isbn=978-1-101-14225-7|pages=102–}} "During the subsequent five hundred years, under Persian, Greek and Roman domination, the Jews wrote, revised, admitted and canonized all the books now comprising the Jewish Old Testament"</ref><ref name="Galambush2011">{{cite book|author=Julie Galambush|title=The Reluctant Parting: How the New Testament's Jewish Writers Created a Christian Book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=52nkWb8GNMAC&pg=PA3|year=2011|publisher=HarperCollins|isbn=978-0-06-210475-5|pages=3–}}"The fact that Jesus and his followers who wrote the New Testament were first-century Jews, then, produces as many questions as it does answers concerning their experiences, beliefs, and practices"</ref> founded [[Religion:Early Christianity|Early Christianity]]<ref name="BarclaySweet1996">{{cite book|author1=John M. G. Barclay|author2=John Philip McMurdo Sweet|title=Early Christian Thought in Its Jewish Context|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=DN0t06-wVvoC&pg=PA20|year=1996|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-0-521-46285-3|pages=20–}}"Early Christianity began as a Jewish movement in first-century Palestine"</ref> and had a profound influence on [[Religion:Islam|Islam]].<ref name="Paterson2009">{{cite book|author=Dr. Andrea C. Paterson|title=Three Monotheistic Faiths – Judaism, Christianity, Islam: An Analysis and Brief History|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=tuuys4HxSzcC&pg=PA41|year=2009|publisher=AuthorHouse|isbn=978-1-4520-3049-4|pages=41–}} "Judaism also contributed to the religion of Islam for Islam derives its ideas of holy text, the Qur'an, ultimately from Judaism. The dietary and legal codes of Islam are based on those of Judaism. The basic design of the mosque, the Islamic house of worship, comes from that of the early synagogues. The communal prayer services of Islam and their devotional routines resembles those of Judaism."</ref> Jews have also played a significant role in the development of Western Civilization.<ref name="Cambridge University Historical Series">Cambridge University Historical Series, ''An Essay on Western Civilization in Its Economic Aspects'', p. 40: "Hebraism, like Hellenism, has been an all-important factor in the development of Western Civilization; Judaism, as the precursor of Christianity, has indirectly had much to do with shaping the ideals and morality of Western nations since the Christian era."</ref><ref>[http://www.britannica.com/topic/Judaism/The-Judaic-tradition Role of Judaism in Western culture and civilization], "Judaism has played a significant role in the development of Western culture because of its unique relationship with Christianity, the dominant religious force in the West". [http://www.britannica.com/topic/Judaism Judaism] at [[Encyclopædia Britannica]]</ref>

== Name and etymology ==
The English word "Jew" continues [[Social:Middle English|Middle English]] ''{{lang|enm|Gyw, Iewe}}''. These terms were loaned via the [[Social:Old French|Old French]] ''{{lang|fro|giu}}'', which itself evolved from the earlier ''{{lang|fro|juieu}}'', which in turn derived from ''{{lang|fro|judieu/iudieu}}'' which through elision had dropped the letter "d" from the [[Social:Medieval Latin|Medieval Latin]] ''Iudaeus'', which, like the [[Religion:New Testament|New Testament]] [[Social:Greek language|Greek]] term ''Ioudaios'', meant both "Jew" and "Judean" / "of Judea".<ref>Encyclopedia of the Peoples of Africa and the Middle East, Facts On File Inc., Infobase Publishing, 2009, p. 336</ref> The Greek term was a loan from Aramaic ''{{transl|arc|Y'hūdāi}}'', corresponding to [[Social:Hebrew language|Hebrew]] {{lang|he|יְהוּדִי}} {{transl|he|Yehudi}}, originally the term for a member of the tribe of Judah or the people of the [[History:Kingdom of Judah|kingdom of Judah]]. According to the [[Religion:Hebrew Bible|Hebrew Bible]], the name of both the tribe and kingdom derive from Judah, the fourth son of Jacob.<ref>"Jew", ''Oxford English Dictionary''.</ref> Genesis 29:35 and 49:8 connect the name "Judah" with the verb {{transl|he|yada}}, meaning "praise", but scholars generally agree that the name of both the patriarch and the kingdom instead have a geographic origin—possibly referring to the gorges and ravines of the region.<ref>{{cite book|title=Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament|editor1-first=G. Johannes|editor1-last=Botterweck|editor1-link=G. Johannes Botterweck|editor2-first=Helmer|editor2-last=Ringgren|editor2-link=Helmer Ringgren|translator-first=David E.|translator-last=Green|publisher=William B. Eerdmans|location=Grand Rapids, Mich.|year=1986|volume=V|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=pcAkKMECPKIC&pg=PA483|pages=483–84|isbn=978-0-8028-2329-8}}</ref>

The Hebrew word for "Jew" is {{rtl-lang|he|יְהוּדִי}} {{transl|he|Yehudi}}, with the plural {{rtl-lang|he|יְהוּדִים}} {{transl|he|Yehudim}}.<ref name=EJ253>{{cite encyclopedia|last=Grintz|first=Yehoshua M.|editor=Fred Skolnik|encyclopedia=Encyclopaedia Judaica|title=Jew|edition=2d|year=2007|publisher=Thomson Gale|volume=11|location=Farmington Hills, Mich.|isbn=978-0-02-865928-2|page=253}}</ref> Endonyms in other Jewish languages include the Ladino {{rtl-lang|lad|ג׳ודיו}} {{transl|lad|Djudio}} (plural {{rtl-lang|lad|ג׳ודיוס}}, {{transl|lad|Djudios}}) and the Yiddish {{rtl-lang|yi|ייִד}} {{transl|yi|Yid}} (plural {{rtl-lang|yi|ייִדן}} {{transl|yi|Yidn}}).

The etymological equivalent is in use in other languages, e.g., يَهُودِيّ ''yahūdī'' (sg.), ''al-yahūd'' (pl.), in [[Social:Arabic|Arabic]], "Jude" in [[Social:German language|German]], "judeu" in [[Social:Portuguese language|Portuguese]], "Juif" (m.)/"Juive" (f.) in [[Social:French language|French]], "jøde" in [[Social:Danish language|Danish]] and [[Social:Norwegian language|Norwegian]], "judío/a" in [[Social:Spanish language|Spanish]], "jood" in [[Social:Dutch language|Dutch]], "żyd" in [[Social:Polish language|Polish]] etc., but derivations of the word "Hebrew" are also in use to describe a Jew, e.g., in [[Social:Italian language|Italian]] (''Ebreo''), in [[Social:Persian language|Persian]] ("Ebri/Ebrani" ({{lang-fa|عبری/عبرانی}})) and [[Social:Russian language|Russian]] (''Еврей, Yevrey'').<ref>{{cite book|last=Falk|first=Avner|title=A Psychoanalytic History of the Jews|year=1996|publisher=Fairleigh Dickinson University Press|location=Madison, N.J.|isbn=0-8386-3660-8|page=131}}</ref> The German word "Jude" is pronounced {{IPA-de|ˈjuːdə|}}, the corresponding adjective "jüdisch" {{IPA-de|ˈjyːdɪʃ|}} (Jewish) is the origin of the word "Yiddish".<ref>{{cite encyclopedia|encyclopedia=Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary|title=Yiddish|edition=11th|year=2004|publisher=Merriam-Webster|location=Springfield, Massachusetts|isbn=0-87779-809-5|page=[https://archive.org/details/merriamwebstersc00merr_6/page/1453 1453]|url=https://archive.org/details/merriamwebstersc00merr_6/page/1453}}</ref>

According to ''The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language'', fourth edition (2000),
<blockquote>It is widely recognized that the attributive use of the noun ''Jew'', in phrases such as ''Jew lawyer'' or ''Jew ethics'', is both vulgar and highly offensive. In such contexts ''Jewish'' is the only acceptable possibility. Some people, however, have become so wary of this construction that they have extended the stigma to any use of ''Jew'' as a noun, a practice that carries risks of its own. In a sentence such as ''There are now several Jews on the council'', which is unobjectionable, the substitution of a circumlocution like ''Jewish people'' or ''persons of Jewish background'' may in itself cause offense for seeming to imply that Jew has a negative connotation when used as a noun.<ref>{{cite book|title=The American Heritage Guide to Contemporary Usage and Style|at=Jew|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xb6ie6PqYhwC&pg=PA269|publisher=Houghton Mifflin Company|year=2005|isbn=978-0-618-60499-9|editor1-last=Kleinedler|editor1-first=Steven|editor2-last=Spitz|editor2-first=Susan|display-editors=etal}}</ref></blockquote>

== Who is a Jew? ==
[[File:A map of Canaan (8343807206).jpg|thumb|Map of Canaan]]
[[Religion:Judaism|Judaism]] shares some of the characteristics of a [[Earth:Nation|nation]],<ref name="Nicholson2002">{{cite book|author=M. Nicholson|title=International Relations: A Concise Introduction|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HvI8DAAAQBAJ&pg=PA19|year=2002|publisher=NYU Press|isbn=978-0-8147-5822-9|pages=19–}} "The Jews are a nation and were so before there was a Jewish state of Israel"</ref><ref name="Neusner1991">{{cite book|author=Jacob Neusner|title=An Introduction to Judaism: A Textbook and Reader|url=https://archive.org/details/introductiontoju0000neus|url-access=registration|year=1991|publisher=Westminster John Knox Press|isbn=978-0-664-25348-6|pages=[https://archive.org/details/introductiontoju0000neus/page/375 375]–}} "That there is a Jewish nation can hardly be denied after the creation of the State of Israel"</ref><ref name="Dowty1998">{{cite book|author=Alan Dowty|title=The Jewish State: A Century Later, Updated With a New Preface|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=vL8r4U1FKSQC&pg=PA3|year=1998|publisher=University of California Press|isbn=978-0-520-92706-3|pages=3–}} "Jews are a people, a nation (in the original sense of the word), an ethnos"</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://louisville.edu/law/library/special-collections/the-louis-d.-brandeis-collection/the-jewish-problem-how-to-solve-it-by-louis-d.-brandeis|title=The Jewish Problem: How To Solve It|first=Louis|last=Brandeis|date=25 April 1915|publisher=University of Louisville School of Law|access-date=2 April 2012|quote=Jews are a distinctive nationality of which every Jew, whatever his country, his station or shade of belief, is necessarily a member}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last1=Palmer|first1=Edward Henry|author-link1=Edward Henry Palmer|title=A History of the Jewish Nation: From the Earliest Times to the Present Day|url=https://archive.org/details/historyofjewishn00palm|access-date=2 April 2012|year= 2002|orig-year=First published 1874|publisher=Gorgias Press|isbn=978-1-931956-69-7|oclc=51578088|lay-url=http://www.gorgiaspress.com/bookshop/pc-45-60-palmer-e-history-of-the-jewish-nation.aspx}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://press.princeton.edu/einstein/materials/jewish_nationality.pdf|title=How I Became a Zionist|first=Albert|last=Einstein|author-link=Albert Einstein|work=[[Physics:Einstein Papers Project|Einstein Papers Project]]|quote=The Jewish nation is a living fact|date=21 June 1921|publisher=Princeton University Press|access-date=5 April 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151105012335/http://press.princeton.edu/einstein/materials/jewish_nationality.pdf|archive-date=5 November 2015|url-status=dead}}</ref> an [[Social:Ethnicity|ethnicity]],<ref name="Jews-are-ethnoreligious-group" /> a [[Religion:Religion|religion]], and a [[Social:Culture|culture]],<ref name="GordisHeller2012">{{cite book|author1=David M. Gordis|author2=Zachary I. Heller|title=Jewish Secularity: The Search for Roots and the Challenges of Relevant Meaning|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QWrSy8Ckd5UC&pg=PA1|year=2012|publisher=University Press of America|isbn=978-0-7618-5793-8|pages=1–}}: "Judaism is a culture and a civilization which embraces the secular as well"</ref><ref name="Kunin2000">{{cite book|author=Seth Daniel Kunin|title=Themes and Issues in Judaism|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=St_TAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA1|year= 2000|publisher=A&C Black|isbn=978-0-304-33758-3|pages=1–}}: Although culture - and Judaism is a culture (or cultures) as well as religion - can be subdivided into different analytical categories..."</ref><ref name="Mendes-Flohr1991">{{cite book|author=Paul R. Mendes-Flohr|title=Divided Passions: Jewish Intellectuals and the Experience of Modernity|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VBuFygk2C-AC&pg=PA421|year=1991|publisher=Wayne State University Press|isbn=0-8143-2030-9|pages=421–}}: "Although Judaism is a culture - or rather has a culture - it is eminently more than a culture"</ref> making the definition of who is a Jew vary slightly depending on whether a religious or national approach to identity is used.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.chabad.org/45132 |title=What Makes a Jew Jewish? |publisher=Chabad.org |access-date=2 October 2013}}</ref><ref>{{cite encyclopedia|url=https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Judaism/whojew1.html|title=Who is a Jew?|access-date=6 October 2007|last=Weiner|first=Rebecca|year=2007|encyclopedia=[[Jewish Virtual Library]]}}</ref> 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 strictly matrilineal descent), and people without any Jewish ancestral background or lineage who have formally converted to Judaism and therefore are followers of the religion.<ref>{{cite book|title=World Religions: An Introduction for Students|last=Fowler|first=Jeaneane D.|year=1997|publisher=Sussex Academic Press|isbn=1-898723-48-6|page=[https://archive.org/details/worldreligionsin0000unse/page/7 7]|url=https://archive.org/details/worldreligionsin0000unse/page/7}}</ref>

Historical definitions of [[Social:Jewish identity|Jewish identity]] have traditionally been based on ''[[Religion:Halakha|halakhic]]'' definitions of matrilineal descent, and halakhic conversions. These definitions of who is a Jew date back to the codification of the Oral Torah into the Babylonian Talmud, around 200 [[Common Era|CE]]. Interpretations of sections of the Tanakh, such as Deuteronomy 7:1–5, by Jewish sages, are used as a warning against intermarriage between Jews and Canaanites because "[the non-Jewish husband] will cause your child to turn away from Me and they will worship the gods of others."<ref name="John Day pp. 47"/> {{bibleref2|Leviticus|24:10}} says that the son in a marriage between a Hebrew woman and an Egyptian man is "of the community of Israel." This is complemented by {{bibleref2|Ezra|10:2–3}}, where Israelites returning from Babylon vow to put aside their gentile wives and their children.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.shamash.org/lists/scj-faq/HTML/faq/10-11.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/19961018024300/http://shamash.org/lists/scj-faq/HTML/faq/10-11.html|url-status=dead|archive-date=18 October 1996|title=What is the origin of Matrilineal Descent?|access-date=9 January 2009|date=4 September 2003|publisher=Shamash.org}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.torah.org/qanda/seequanda.php?id=318 |title=What is the source of the law that a child is Jewish only if its mother is Jewish? |access-date=9 January 2009 |publisher=Torah.org |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081224205847/http://www.torah.org/qanda/seequanda.php?id=318 |archive-date=24 December 2008}}</ref> 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.<ref name="Klein2016" /> 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.<ref name="Schott2010">{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6iFx-wHhMJMC&pg=PA67|title=Birth, Death, and Femininity: Philosophies of Embodiment|author=Robin May Schott|year=2010|publisher=Indiana University Press|isbn=978-0-253-00482-6|pages=67–}}</ref> Since the anti-religious ''Haskalah'' movement of the late 18th and 19th centuries, ''halakhic'' interpretations of Jewish identity have been challenged.<ref>Dosick (2007), pp. 56–57.</ref>

According to historian Shaye J. D. Cohen, the status of the offspring of mixed marriages was determined patrilineally in the Bible. He brings two likely explanations for the change in [[Religion:Mishnah|Mishnaic]] times: 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 a [[Biology:Horse|horse]] and a [[Biology:Donkey|donkey]], and in both unions the offspring are judged matrilineally.<ref name="J.D. Cohen">{{cite book|author=Shaye J.D. Cohen|year=1999|title=The Beginnings of Jewishness|publisher=U. California Press|pages=305–06|isbn=0-585-24643-2}}</ref> Second, the Tannaim may have been influenced by Roman law, which dictated that when a parent could not contract a legal marriage, [[Social:Mater semper certa est|offspring would follow the mother]].<ref name="J.D. Cohen" /> Rabbi Rivon Krygier follows a similar reasoning, arguing that Jewish descent had formerly passed through the patrineal descent and the law of matrilineal descent had its roots in the Roman legal system.<ref name="Klein2016">{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0BC_DAAAQBAJ&pg=PA6|title=Lost Jews: The Struggle for Identity Today|author=Emma Klein|year=2016|publisher=Springer|isbn=978-1-349-24319-8|pages=6–}}</ref>

== Origins ==
[[File:Procession of the Aamu, Tomb of Khnumhotep II (composite).jpg|thumb|upright=2|right|Egyptian depiction of the visit of Western Asiatics in colorful garments, labeled as ''Aamu''. The painting is from the tomb of a 12th dynasty official Khnumhotep II at Beni Hasan, and dated to c. 1900 BCE. Their nearest Biblical contemporaries were the earliest of Hebrews, such as Abraham and Joseph.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Mieroop |first1=Marc Van De |title=A History of Ancient Egypt |date=2010 |publisher=John Wiley & Sons |isbn=978-1-4051-6070-4 |page=131 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=JADDYAZ9GIIC&pg=PA131 |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Bard |first1=Kathryn A. |title=An Introduction to the Archaeology of Ancient Egypt |date=2015 |publisher=John Wiley & Sons |isbn=978-1-118-89611-2 |page=188 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lFscBgAAQBAJ&pg=PA188 |language=en}}</ref><ref name="archaeology.org">{{cite journal |last1=Curry |first1=Andrew |title=The Rulers of Foreign Lands – Archaeology Magazine |website=www.archaeology.org |date=2018 |url=https://www.archaeology.org/issues/309-1809/features/6855-egypt-hyksos-foreign-dynasty}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Kamrin |first1=Janice |title=The Aamu of Shu in the Tomb of Khnumhotep II at Beni Hassan |journal=Journal of Ancient Egyptian Interconnections |date=2009 |volume=1 |issue=3 |pages=22–36 |url=https://journals.uair.arizona.edu/index.php/jaei/article/view/28 |s2cid=199601200 }}</ref>]]
[[File:Jehu on the Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser III.jpg|thumb|upright|Depiction of King Jehu, tenth king of the northern Kingdom of Israel, on the Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser III, 841–840 BCE.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Kuan |first1=Jeffrey Kah-Jin |title=Neo-Assyrian Historical Inscriptions and Syria-Palestine: Israelite/Judean-Tyrian-Damascene Political and Commercial Relations in the Ninth-Eighth Centuries BCE |date=2016 |publisher=Wipf and Stock Publishers |isbn=978-1-4982-8143-0 |pages=64–66 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=zMOqCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA65 |language=en}}</ref> This is "the only portrayal we have in ancient Near Eastern art of an Israelite or Judaean monarch".<ref>{{cite book |last1=Cohen |first1=Ada |last2=Kangas |first2=Steven E. |title=Assyrian Reliefs from the Palace of Ashurnasirpal II: A Cultural Biography |date=2010 |publisher=UPNE |isbn=978-1-58465-817-7 |page=127 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=uRKU0YXBWtgC&pg=PA127 |language=en}}</ref> ]]
A factual reconstruction for the origin of the Jews is a difficult and complex endeavor. It requires examining at least 3,000 years of ancient human history using documents in vast quantities and variety written in at least ten near Eastern languages. As archaeological discovery relies upon researchers and scholars from diverse disciplines, the goal is to interpret all of the factual data, focusing on the most consistent theory. The prehistory and ethnogenesis of the Jews are closely intertwined with archaeology, biology, and historical textual records, as well as religious literature and mythology. The ethnic stock to which Jews originally trace their ancestry was a confederation of Iron Age Semitic-speaking tribes known as the Israelites that inhabited a part of [[Place:Canaan|Canaan]] during the tribal and monarchic periods.<ref>{{Cite book |title=Legacy: A Genetic History of the Jewish People |last=Ostrer |first=Harry |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=2012 |isbn=978-0-19-537961-7 |publication-date=8 May 2012}}</ref> Modern Jews are named after and also descended from the southern Israelite [[History:Kingdom of Judah|Kingdom of Judah]].<ref>Ann E. Killebrew, [https://books.google.com/books/about/Biblical_Peoples_and_Ethnicity.html?id=VtAmmwapfVAC Biblical Peoples and Ethnicity. An Archaeological Study of Egyptians, Canaanites, Philistines and Early Israel 1300–1100 B.C.E. (Archaeology and Biblical Studies)], [[Organization:Society of Biblical Literature|Society of Biblical Literature]], 2005</ref><ref name="Schama2014">{{cite book |last=Schama |first=Simon |title=The Story of the Jews: Finding the Words 1000 BC–1492 AD|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=sHIpAgAAQBAJ|year=2014|publisher=HarperCollins|isbn=978-0-06-233944-7}}</ref><ref>* "In the broader sense of the term, a Jew is any person belonging to the worldwide group that constitutes, through descent or conversion, a continuation of the ancient Jewish people, who were themselves the descendants of the Hebrews of the Old Testament."
* "The Jewish people as a whole, initially called Hebrews (ʿIvrim), were known as Israelites (Yisreʾelim) from the time of their entrance into the Holy Land to the end of the Babylonian Exile (538&nbsp;BC)."
[http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/303358/Jew Jew] at [http://www.britannica.com/ Encyclopædia Britannica]</ref><ref name="Ostrer2012">{{cite book |last=Ostrer |first=Harry |title=Legacy: A Genetic History of the Jewish People|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xIloAgAAQBAJ|year=2012|publisher=Oxford University Press, USA|isbn=978-0-19-970205-3}}</ref><ref name="Brenner2010">{{cite book |last=Brenner |first=Michael |title=A Short History of the Jews|url=https://archive.org/details/shorthistoryofje00bren|url-access=registration |year=2010|publisher=Princeton University Press|isbn=978-0-691-14351-4}}</ref><ref name="Adams1840">{{cite book |last=Adams |first=Hannah |title=The History of the Jews: From the Destruction of Jerusalem to the Present Time|url=https://archive.org/details/historyjewsfrom00adamgoog|year=1840|publisher=London Society House}}</ref>

According to the Hebrew Bible narrative, Jewish ancestry is traced back to the [[Religion:Patriarchs (Bible)|Biblical patriarchs]] such as [[Biography:Abraham|Abraham]], his son Isaac, Isaac's son Jacob, and the Biblical matriarchs Sarah, Rebecca, Leah, and Rachel, who lived in [[Place:Canaan|Canaan]]. The Twelve Tribes are described as descending from the twelve sons of Jacob. Jacob and his family migrated to Ancient Egypt after being invited to live with Jacob's son Joseph by the Pharaoh himself. The patriarchs' descendants were later enslaved until the Exodus led by [[Biography:Moses|Moses]], after which the Israelites conquered Canaan under Moses' successor Joshua, went through the period of the Biblical judges after the death of Joshua, then through the mediation of Samuel became subject to a king, Saul, who was succeeded by David and then [[Biography:Solomon|Solomon]], after whom the [[Place:Kingdom of Israel (united monarchy)|United Monarchy]] ended and was split into a separate Kingdom of Israel and a [[History:Kingdom of Judah|Kingdom of Judah]]. The Kingdom of Judah is described as comprising the Tribe of Judah, the Tribe of Benjamin, partially the Tribe of Levi, and later adding remnants of other tribes who migrated there from the Kingdom of Israel.<ref name="Broshi 2001 174">{{cite book |last=Broshi |first=Maguen |title=Bread, Wine, Walls and Scrolls |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=etTUEorS1zMC&pg=PA174|publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing |year=2001 |page=174 |isbn=1-84127-201-9}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.haaretz.com/archaeology/MAGAZINE-israelite-refugees-found-high-office-in-judah-seals-found-in-jerusalem-show-1.5448092|title=Israelite refugees found high office in Kingdom of Judah, seals found in Jerusalem show|website=www.haaretz.com}}</ref> Modern Jews claim lineage from those tribes since the ten northern tribes were lost following Assyrian captivity.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/Judah-Hebrew-tribe |title=Judah |publisher=Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. |access-date=1 April 2018}}</ref>

Modern [[Earth:Archaeology|archaeology]] and the current historical view has largely discarded the historicity of this narrative,<ref>{{cite book |last=Dever |first=William |title=What Did the Biblical Writers Know, and When Did They Know It? |year=2001 |publisher=Eerdmans |isbn=3-927120-37-5 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6-VxwC5rQtwC |pages=98–99 |quote=After a century of exhaustive investigation, all respectable archaeologists have given up hope of recovering any context that would make Abraham, Isaac, or Jacob credible "historical figures" [...] archaeological investigation of Moses and the Exodus has similarly been discarded as a fruitless pursuit.}}</ref> with it being reframed as constituting the Israelites' inspiring [[Social:National myth|national myth]] narrative. The Israelites and their culture, according to the modern archaeological and historical account, did not overtake the region by force, but instead branched out of the Canaanite peoples and culture through the development of a distinct monolatristic—and later [[Philosophy:Monotheism|monotheistic]]—religion of [[Philosophy:Yahwism|Yahwism]] centered on [[Religion:Yahweh|Yahweh]], 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 Israelite [[Social:Ethnic group|ethnic group]], setting them apart from other Canaanites.<ref>Tubb, 1998. pp. 13–14{{full citation needed|date=October 2020}}</ref><ref>Mark Smith in "The Early History of God: Yahweh and Other Deities of Ancient Israel" states "Despite the long regnant model that the Canaanites and Israelites were people of fundamentally different culture, archaeological data now casts doubt on this view. The material culture of the region exhibits numerous common points between Israelites and Canaanites in the Iron I period (c. 1200–1000&nbsp;BCE). The record would suggest that the Israelite culture largely overlapped with and derived from Canaanite culture... In short, Israelite culture was largely Canaanite in nature. Given the information available, one cannot maintain a radical cultural separation between Canaanites and Israelites for the Iron I period." (pp. 6–7). Smith, Mark (2002) "The Early History of God: Yahweh and Other Deities of Ancient Israel" (Eerdman's)</ref><ref>Rendsberg, Gary (2008). "Israel without the Bible". In Frederick E. Greenspahn. The Hebrew Bible: New Insights and Scholarship. NYU Press, pp. 3–5</ref>

The Israelites become visible in the historical record as a people between 1200 and 1000 BCE.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Spielvogel|first1=Jackson J.|title=Western civilization|date=2012|publisher=Wadsworth/Cengage Learning|location=Australia|isbn=978-0-495-91324-5|edition=8th|page=33 |quote=What is generally agreed, however, is that between 1200 and 1000 B.C.E., the Israelites emerged as a distinct group of people, possibly united into tribes or a league of tribes}}</ref> It is not certain if a period like that of the Biblical judges occurred<ref name="Yoder2015">For a bibliography of scholars who doubt anything like the period of the Judges ever occurred, see {{cite book|author=John C. Yoder|title=Power and Politics in the Book of Judges: Men and Women of Valor|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=h7kFCAAAQBAJ&pg=PA5|year=2015|publisher=Fortress Press|isbn=978-1-4514-9642-0|page=5}}</ref><ref name="Brettler2002">{{cite book|author=Marc Zvi Brettler|title=The Book of Judges|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9j9Jbcl6g38C&pg=PA107|year=2002|publisher=Psychology Press|isbn=978-0-415-16216-6|page=107}}</ref><ref name="Thompson2000">{{cite book|author=Thomas L. Thompson|title=Early History of the Israelite People: From the Written & Archaeological Sources|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=RwrrUuHFb6UC&pg=PA96|year= 2000|publisher=Brill|isbn=90-04-11943-4|page=96}}</ref><ref name="HjelmThompson2016">{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=hmOaCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA4|title=History, Archaeology and The Bible Forty Years After "Historicity": Changing Perspectives|publisher=Routledge|year=2016|isbn=978-1-317-42815-2|editor-last=Hjelm|editor-first=Ingrid|page=4|editor-last2=Thompson|editor-first2=Thomas L}}</ref><ref name="Davies1995">{{cite book|author=Philip R. Davies|title=In Search of "Ancient Israel": A Study in Biblical Origins|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5D5GNju1-ggC&pg=PA26|year=1995|publisher=A&C Black|isbn=978-1-85075-737-5|page=26}}</ref> nor if there was ever a [[Place:Kingdom of Israel (united monarchy)|United Monarchy]].<ref name="lipschits">{{cite book|last1=Lipschits|first1=Oded|editor1-last=Berlin|editor1-first=Adele|editor2-last=Brettler|editor2-first=Marc Zvi|title=The Jewish Study Bible|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-997846-5|year=2014|edition=2nd|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=yErYBAAAQBAJ|language=en|chapter=The History of Israel in the Biblical Period}}</ref><ref name=Finkelstein>{{cite book|last1=Finkelstein|first1=Israel|last2=Silberman|first2=Neil Asher|title=The Bible unearthed : archaeology's new vision of ancient Israel and the origin of its stories|date=2001|publisher=Simon & Schuster|location=New York|isbn=0-684-86912-8|edition=1st Touchstone}}</ref><ref name=Kuhrtp438>{{cite book|last=Kuhrt|first=Amiele|title=The Ancient Near East|year=1995|publisher=Routledge|isbn=978-0-415-16762-8|page=[https://archive.org/details/ancientneareastc00akuh/page/438 438]|url=https://archive.org/details/ancientneareastc00akuh/page/438}}</ref><ref name=Wright>{{cite web|last1=Wright|first1=Jacob L.|title=David, King of Judah (Not Israel)|url=http://www.bibleinterp.com/articles/2014/07/wri388001.shtml|publisher=The Bible and Interpretation|date=July 2014}}</ref> There is well accepted archeological evidence referring to "Israel" in the Merneptah Stele, which dates to about 1200 BCE,<ref name=NollMerneptah/><ref name=ThompsonMerneptah/> and the Canaanites are archeologically attested in the [[History:Bronze Age|Middle Bronze Age.]]<ref name="Golden">Jonathan M Golden,[https://books.google.com/books?id=EResmS5wOnkC&pg=PA3 ''Ancient Canaan and Israel: An Introduction,''] OUP USA, 2009 pp. 3–4.</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1 = Lemche |first1 = Niels Peter |year = 1998 |title = The Israelites in History and Tradition |publisher = Westminster John Knox Press |url = https://books.google.com/books?id=JIoY7PagAOAC&pg=PA35 |page=35|isbn=978-0-664-22727-2}}</ref> There is debate about the earliest existence of the Kingdoms of Israel and Judah and their extent and power, but historians agree that a Kingdom of Israel existed by c. 900 BCE<ref name=Finkelstein/>{{rp|169–95}}<ref name=Kuhrtp438/><ref name=Wright/> and that a [[History:Kingdom of Judah|Kingdom of Judah]] existed by c. 700 BCE.<ref name=Pitcher>[https://books.google.com/books?id=tu02muKUVJ0C&pg=PA229 The Pitcher Is Broken: Memorial Essays for Gosta W. Ahlstrom, Steven W. Holloway, Lowell K. Handy, Continuum, 1 May 1995] Quote: "For Israel, the description of the battle of Qarqar in the Kurkh Monolith of Shalmaneser III (mid-ninth century) and for Judah, a Tiglath-pileser III text mentioning (Jeho-) Ahaz of Judah (IIR67 = K. 3751), dated 734–733, are the earliest published to date."</ref> It is widely accepted that the Kingdom of Israel was destroyed around 720 BCE, when it was conquered by the [[History:Neo-Assyrian Empire|Neo-Assyrian Empire]].<ref name="Broshi 2001 174"/>

== History ==
The term Jew originated from the Roman "Judean" and denoted someone from the southern kingdom of Judah.<ref>{{cite book |url = https://books.google.com/books?id=zese2C-fDTEC&q=when+was+the+term+jew+first+used&pg=PA41| title = Teaching Jewish History|author= Julia Phillips Berger |author2=Sue Parker Gerson | publisher = Behrman House, Inc| page = 41| year = 2006| isbn = 978-0-86705-183-4}}</ref> The shift of ethnonym from "Israelites" to "Jews" (inhabitant of Judah), although not contained in the Torah, is made explicit in the Book of Esther (4th century BCE),<ref>''The people and the faith of the Bible'' by André Chouraqui, Univ of Massachusetts Press, 1975, p. 43 [https://archive.org/details/peoplefaith00andr/page/43]</ref> a book in the Ketuvim, the third section of the Jewish Tanakh. In 587 BCE Nebuchadnezzar II, King of the Neo-Babylonian Empire, besieged Jerusalem, destroyed the First Temple, and deported the most prominent citizens of Judah.<ref>The Hebrews: A Learning Module from Washington State University, © Richard Hooker, reprinted by permission by the ''[[Jewish Virtual Library]]'' under [https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/Exile.html The Babylonian Exile]</ref>

According to the Book of Ezra, the Persian Cyrus the Great ended the Babylonian exile in 538 BCE,<ref name="rennert">{{cite web|url=http://www.biu.ac.il/js/rennert/history_4.html |title=Second Temple Period (538 BCE. to 70 CE) Persian Rule |publisher=Biu.ac.il |access-date=15 March 2014}}</ref> the year after he captured Babylon.<ref>''Harper's Bible Dictionary'', ed. by Achtemeier, etc., Harper & Row, San Francisco, 1985, p. 103</ref> The exile ended with the return under Zerubbabel the Prince (so-called because he was a descendant of the royal line of David) and Joshua the Priest (a descendant of the line of the former High Priests of the Temple) and their construction of the Second Temple in the period 521–516 BCE.<ref name="rennert"/> The Cyrus Cylinder, an ancient tablet on which is written a declaration in the name of Cyrus referring to restoration of temples and repatriation of exiled peoples, has often been taken as corroboration of the authenticity of the biblical decrees attributed to Cyrus,<ref name="Becking">{{cite book |last=Becking |first=Bob |editor1-last=Lipschitz |editor1-first=Oded |editor2-last=Oeming |editor2-first=Manfred |chapter="We All Returned as One!": Critical Notes on the Myth of the Mass Return |title=Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1zi2i_C1aNkC&pg=PA8 |year=2006 |publisher=Eisenbrauns |location=Winona Lake, IN |page=8 |isbn=978-1-57506-104-7}}</ref> but other scholars point out that the cylinder's text is specific to Babylon and Mesopotamia and makes no mention of Judah or Jerusalem.<ref name="Becking" /> Professor Lester L. Grabbe asserted that the "alleged decree of Cyrus" regarding Judah, "cannot be considered authentic", but that there was a "general policy of allowing deportees to return and to re-establish cult sites". He also stated that archaeology suggests that the return was a "trickle" taking place over decades, rather than a single event.<ref name="Grabbe355">{{cite book |last=Grabbe |first=Lester L. |title=A History of the Jews and Judaism in the Second Temple Period: Yehud - A History of the Persian Province of Judah v. 1 |year=2004 |publisher=T & T Clark |isbn=978-0-567-08998-4 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-MnE5T_0RbMC&q=gave+the+Jews+permission+to+return+to+Yehud+province+and+to+rebuild+the&pg=PA355 |page=355}}</ref>

As part of the [[Place:Achaemenid Empire|Persian Empire]], the former Kingdom of Judah became the province of Judah (''Yehud Medinata'')<ref>Yehud being the Aramaic equivalent of the Hebrew Yehuda, or "Judah", and "medinata" the word for province</ref> with different borders, covering a smaller territory.<ref name="Grabbe355"/> The population of the province was greatly reduced from that of the kingdom, archaeological surveys showing a population of around 30,000 people in the 5th to 4th centuries BCE.<ref name="Finkelstein" />{{rp|308}} The region was under control of the [[Place:Achaemenid Empire|Achaemenids]] until the fall of their empire in c. 333 BCE to Alexander the Great. Jews were also politically independent during the Hasmonean dynasty spanning from 110 to 63 BCE and to some degree under the Herodian dynasty from 37 BCE to 6 CE.<ref>{{cite book|author1=Peter Fibiger Bang|author2=Walter Scheidel|title=The Oxford Handbook of the State in the Ancient Near East and Mediterranean|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=GCj09AmtvvwC&pg=PA184|year=2013|publisher=OUP USA|isbn=978-0-19-518831-8|pages=184–87}}</ref> Since the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE, most Jews have lived in diaspora.<ref>Johnson (1987), p. 82.</ref>

[[Biology:Genetic studies on Jews|Genetic studies on Jews]] show that most Jews worldwide bear a common genetic heritage which originates in the [[Place:Middle East|Middle East]], and that they share certain genetic traits with other Gentile peoples of the [[Place:Fertile Crescent|Fertile Crescent]].<ref name=WhoAreTheJews>{{cite web|url=http://ftp.beitberl.ac.il/~bbsite/misc/ezer_anglit/klali/05_123.pdf|title=Who are the Jews?|author=Jared Diamond|year=1993|access-date=8 November 2010|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110721133548/http://ftp.beitberl.ac.il/~bbsite/misc/ezer_anglit/klali/05_123.pdf|archive-date=21 July 2011}} Natural History 102:11 (November 1993): 12–19.</ref><ref>{{cite journal|title=Jewish and Middle Eastern non-Jewish populations share a common pool of Y-chromosome biallelic haplotypes| doi=10.1073/pnas.100115997|pmid=10801975|volume=97|issue=12|pmc=18733|date=June 2000|journal=Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.|pages=6769–74 | last1 = Hammer | first1 = MF | last2 = Redd | first2 = AJ | last3 = Wood | first3 = ET |display-authors=0|bibcode=2000PNAS...97.6769H}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|title=Y Chromosome Bears Witness to Story of the Jewish Diaspora|first=Nicholas|last=Wade|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2000/05/09/science/y-chromosome-bears-witness-to-story-of-the-jewish-diaspora.html|newspaper=The New York Times|date=9 May 2000|access-date=10 October 2012}}</ref> 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.<ref>{{cite journal| title=Tracing the Roots of Jewishness |first=Michael |last=Balter| website=Science| date=3 June 2010 | url=https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2010/06/tracing-roots-jewishness | access-date=4 October 2018}}</ref> Despite their long-term separation, Jewish communities maintained their unique commonalities, propensities, and sensibilities in culture, tradition, and language.<ref>{{cite book |title=Genes, Behavior, and the Social Environment:: Moving Beyond the Nature ...By Committee on Assessing Interactions Among Social, Behavioral, and Genetic Factors in Health, Board on Health Sciences Policy, Institute of Medicine, Lyla M. Hernandez |page=100 |date=2006 |publisher=National Academies Press |isbn=978-0-309-10196-7 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gFtYAgAAQBAJ&q=the+importance+of+ancestral+origin+box+5-1&pg=PT116 |language=en}}</ref>

=== Babylon and Rome ===
After the destruction of the Second Temple, Judaism lost much of its sectarian nature.<ref name = "Magness">{{cite book |chapter-url = https://books.google.com/books?id=VecxAQAAQBAJ&q=diaspora+70+ce&pg=PA189| title = Was 70 CE a Watershed in Jewish History?: On Jews and Judaism before and after the Destruction of the Second Temple|editor1= Daniel R. Schwartz|editor2=Zeev Weiss| author = Jodi Magness | chapter = Sectarianism before and after 70 CE| publisher = Brill| year = 2011 |isbn=978-90-04-21744-7 }}</ref>{{rp|69}}

Without a Temple, Greek-speaking Jews no longer looked to Jerusalem in the way they had before. Judaism separated into a linguistically Greek and a Hebrew / Aramaic sphere.<ref name="Ehrlich">{{cite book |url = https://books.google.com/books?id=NoPZu79hqaEC&q=jewish+diaspora| title = Encyclopedia of the Jewish Diaspora: Origins, Experiences, and Culture, Volume 1 |editor= Mark Avrum Ehrlich | publisher = ABC-CLIO| year = 2009 |isbn=978-1-85109-873-6 }}</ref>{{rp| 8–11}} The theology and religious texts of each community were distinctively different.<ref name="Ehrlich"/>{{rp| 11–13}} Hellenized Judaism never developed yeshivas to study the Oral Law. Rabbinic Judaism (centered in the Land of Israel and Babylon) almost entirely ignores the Hellenized Diaspora in its writings.<ref name="Ehrlich"/>{{rp| 13–14}} Hellenized Judaism eventually disappeared as its practitioners assimilated into Greco-Roman culture, leaving a strong Rabbinic eastern Diaspora with large centers of learning in Babylon.<ref name="Ehrlich"/>{{rp| 14–16}}

By the first century, the Jewish community in [[History:Babylonia|Babylonia]], to which Jews were exiled after the Babylonian conquest as well as after the Bar Kokhba revolt in 135 CE, already held a speedily growing<ref name="Translation 1981, pg. 95">מרדכי וורמברנד ובצלאל ס רותת "עם ישראל – תולדות 4000 שנה – מימי האבות ועד חוזה השלום", ע"מ 95. (Translation: Mordechai Vermebrand and Betzalel S. Ruth – "The People of Israel&nbsp;– the history of 4000 years&nbsp;– from the days of the Forefathers to the Peace Treaty", 1981, p. 95)</ref> population of an estimated one million Jews, which increased to an estimated two million<ref name="Solomon Gryazel p. 137">Dr. Solomon Gryazel, "History of the Jews – From the destruction of Judah in 586&nbsp;BC to the present Arab Israeli conflict", p. 137</ref> between the years 200 CE and 500 CE, both by natural growth and by immigration of more Jews from the [[Place:Land of Israel|Land of Israel]], making up about one-sixth of the world Jewish population at that era.<ref name="Solomon Gryazel p. 137" /> The 13th-century author Bar Hebraeus gave a figure of 6,944,000 Jews in the Roman world; Salo Wittmayer Baron considered the figure convincing.<ref name="Baron">{{cite book | title = A Social and Religious History of the Jews, by Salo Wittmayer Baron ... Volume 1 of A Social and Religious History of the Jews| author = Salo Wittmayer Baron | publisher = Columbia University Press | page = 132 | year = 1937}}</ref> The figure of seven million within and one million outside the Roman world in the mid-first century became widely accepted, including by Louis Feldman.

However, contemporary scholars now accept that Bar Hebraeus based his figure on a census of total Roman citizens, the figure of 6,944,000 being recorded in Eusebius' Chronicon.<ref>{{cite book | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=RQgW9NMML4wC&q=roman+empire+jews+8+million&pg=PA104| title = Jews in the Hellenistic and Roman Cities |pages = 90, 94, 104–05| year = 2002 | publisher = Routledge. London and New york |isbn=978-0-203-44634-8 }}</ref><ref name="Rutgers">{{cite book |url = https://books.google.com/books?id=r5yvfbc2W5UC&q=bar+hebraeus+first+century&pg=PA202| title = The Hidden Heritage of Diaspora Judaism: Volume 20 of Contributions to biblical exegesis and theology | author = Leonard Victor Rutgers| publisher = Peeters Publishers | page = 202|year = 1998 |isbn=978-90-429-0666-2 }}</ref> Louis Feldman, previously an active supporter of the figure, now states that he and Baron were mistaken.<ref name="Feldman">{{cite book | title = Judaism And Hellenism Reconsidered | author = Louis H. Feldman| publisher =Brill | year = 2006}}</ref>{{rp| 185}} Feldman's views on active Jewish missionizing have also changed. While viewing classical Judaism as being receptive to converts, especially from the second century BCE through the first century CE, he points to a lack of either missionizing tracts or records of the names of rabbis who sought converts as evidence for the lack of active Jewish missionizing.<ref name="Feldman" />{{rp| 205–06}} Feldman maintains that conversion to Judaism was common and the Jewish population was large both within the Land of Israel and in the Diaspora.<ref name="Feldman" />{{rp| 183–203, 206}} Other historians believe that conversion during the Roman era was limited in number and did not account for much of the Jewish population growth, due to various factors such as the illegality of male conversion to Judaism in the Roman world from the mid-second century. Another factor that made conversion difficult in the Roman world was the halakhic requirement of circumcision, a requirement that proselytizing [[Religion:Circumcision controversy in early Christianity|Christianity quickly dropped]]. The Fiscus Judaicus, a tax imposed on Jews in 70 CE and relaxed to exclude [[Religion:Christians|Christians]] in 96 CE, also limited Judaism's appeal.<ref name="docs.google.com">{{cite web|url=https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Ib2suAQgXxDFZ5zLdag9DMTFCaDPkJrDwResH1I_J4I/edit |work=The Times Literary Supplement|title=Secta and natio|first=Martin|last= Goodman|date=26 February 2010 |access-date=2 October 2013}}</ref>

=== Diaspora ===
[[File:Jewish people around the world.svg|thumb|Map of the Jewish diaspora.<br>
{{Legend|#000000|Israel}}
{{Legend|#002956|+ 1,000,000}}
{{Legend|#005696|+ 100,000}}
{{Legend|#36a2d8|+ 10,000}}|301x301px]]
Following the Roman conquest of Judea and the [[Biology:Siege of Jerusalem (70 CE)|siege of Jerusalem]] in 70 CE, hundreds of thousands of Jews were taken as slaves to [[Place:Rome|Rome]], where they later immigrated to other European lands. The Jews who immigrated to [[Place:Iberian Peninsula|Iberia]] and [[Place:North Africa|North Africa]] comprise the Sephardic Jews, while those who immigrated to the Rhineland and {{wipe|France}} comprise the Ashkenazi Jews. Additionally both before and after the Roman conquest of Judea many Jews lived in [[Religion:Iran|Persia]] and Babylon as well as other Middle eastern countries, these Jews comprise the Mizrachi Jews.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Ben-Sasson, Haim Hillel, editor: Ettinger, Samuel|title=Jewish society through the ages|publisher=Schocken Books|year=1972|oclc=581911264|orig-year=1969}}</ref> In [[Place:Francia|Francia]], Jews like Isaac Judaeus and Armentarius occupied prominent social and economic positions, as opposed to in Spain, where Jews were persecuted under [[Place:Visigothic Kingdom|Visigoth]] rule. In Babylon, from the 7th to 11th centuries the Pumbedita and Sura academies lead the Arab and to an extant the entire Jewish world. The deans and students of said academies defined the Geonic period in Jewish history.<ref>{{Cite web|title=GAON – JewishEncyclopedia.com|url=http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/6511-gaon|access-date=23 June 2020|website=www.jewishencyclopedia.com}}</ref> Following this period were the Rishonim who lived from the 11th to 15th centuries, it was during this time that the Ashkenazi Jews began experiencing extreme persecution in France and especially the Rhineland, which resulted in mass immigration to Poland and [[Place:Grand Duchy of Lithuania|Lithuania]]. Meanwhile, Sephardic Jews experienced a golden age under Muslim rule, however following the [[Social:Reconquista|Reconquista]] and subsequent Alhambra decree in 1492, most of the Spanish Jewish population immigrated to North Africa and the [[Place:Ottoman Empire|Ottoman Empire]]. However some Jews choose to remain and pretended to practice Catholicism. These Jews would form the members of Crypto-Judaism.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Schloss|first=Chaim|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OV9jKGJzg3QC|title=2000 Years of Jewish History: From the Destruction of the Second Bais Hamikdash Until the Twentieth Century|date=2002|publisher=Feldheim Publishers|isbn=978-1-58330-214-9|language=en}}</ref>

== Culture ==

=== Religion ===
{{Main|Religion:Judaism}}
The Jewish [[Social:Ethnicity|people]] and the [[Religion:Religion|religion]] of [[Religion:Judaism|Judaism]] are strongly interrelated. Converts to Judaism typically have a status within the Jewish ''ethnos'' equal to those born into it.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/judaism/beliefs/conversion.shtml |title=BBC Religions/Converting to Judaism: "A person who converts to Judaism becomes a Jew in every sense of the word, and is just as Jewish as someone born into Judaism." |publisher=Bbc.co.uk |access-date=2 October 2013}}</ref> However, several converts to Judaism, as well as ex-Jews, have claimed that converts are treated as second-class Jews by many born Jews.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.interfaithfamily.com/spirituality/conversion/Are_Converts_Treated_as_Second_Class.shtml |title=Are Converts Treated as Second Class? |work=InterfaithFamily}}</ref>
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.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.huffingtonpost.com/paul-golin/the-complicated-relations_b_842806.html |title=Paul Golin: The Complicated Relationship Between Intermarriage and Jewish Conversion |publisher=Huffingtonpost.com |access-date=2 October 2013}}</ref>

The [[Religion:Hebrew Bible|Hebrew Bible]], a religious interpretation of the traditions and early history of the Jews, established the first of the [[Religion:Abrahamic religions|Abrahamic religions]], which are now practiced by 54&nbsp;percent of the world. [[Religion:Judaism|Judaism]] guides its adherents in both practice and belief, and has been called not only a religion, but also a "way of life,"<ref>Neusner (1991) p. 64</ref> which has made drawing a clear distinction between Judaism, Jewish culture, and [[Social:Jewish identity|Jewish identity]] rather difficult. Throughout history, in eras and places as diverse as the ancient {{wipe|Ancient Greece}} world,<ref>{{cite book|last=Patai|first=Raphael|title=The Jewish Mind|year=1996|orig-year=1977|publisher=Wayne State University Press|location=Detroit|isbn=0-8143-2651-X|page=7}}</ref> in Europe before and after The Age of Enlightenment (see Haskalah),<ref>{{cite book|last=Johnson|first=Lonnie R.|title=Central Europe: Enemies, Neighbors, Friends|year=1996|publisher=Oxford University Press|location=Oxford|isbn=0-19-510071-9|page=[https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780195100716/page/145 145]|url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780195100716/page/145}}</ref> in Islamic Spain and Portugal,<ref name=Sharot2930>Sharot (1997), pp. 29–30.</ref> in [[Place:North Africa|North Africa]] and the [[Place:Middle East|Middle East]],<ref name=Sharot2930 /> India,<ref>Sharot (1997), pp. 42–43.</ref> China,<ref>Sharot (1997), p. 42.</ref> or the contemporary United States<ref>{{cite book|last=Fishman|first=Sylvia Barack|title=Jewish Life and American Culture|url=https://archive.org/details/jewishlifeameric0000fish|url-access=registration|year=2000|publisher=State University of New York Press|location=Albany, N.Y.|isbn=0-7914-4546-1|page=[https://archive.org/details/jewishlifeameric0000fish/page/38 38]}}</ref> and [[Place:Israel|Israel]],<ref>{{cite book|last=Kimmerling|first=Baruch|title=The Israeli State and Society: Boundaries and Frontiers|url=https://archive.org/details/israelistatesoci00kimm|url-access=limited|year=1996|publisher=State University of New York Press|location=Albany, N.Y.|isbn=0-88706-849-9|page=[https://archive.org/details/israelistatesoci00kimm/page/n178 169]}}</ref> 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 different Jewish cultures unique to their own communities.<ref>{{cite book|last=Lowenstein|first=Steven M.|title=The Jewish Cultural Tapestry: International Jewish Folk Traditions|year=2000|publisher=Oxford University Press|location=Oxford|isbn=0-19-513425-7|page=228}}</ref>

=== Languages ===
[[Social:Hebrew language|Hebrew]] is the liturgical language of Judaism (termed ''lashon 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 in Judea.<ref name=Grintz>{{cite journal|doi=10.2307/3264497|title=Hebrew as the Spoken and Written Language in the Last Days of the Second Temple|first=Jehoshua M.|last=Grintz|journal=Journal of Biblical Literature|volume=79|issue=1|date=March 1960|pages=32–47|publisher=The Society of Biblical Literature|jstor=3264497}}</ref> By the 3rd century BCE, some Jews of the diaspora were speaking [[Social:Ancient Greek|Greek]].<ref>Feldman (2006), p. 54.</ref> Others, such as in the Jewish communities of Babylonia, were speaking Hebrew and Aramaic, the languages of the Babylonian Talmud. These languages were also used by the Jews of Israel at that time.{{Citation needed|date=March 2016}}

For centuries, Jews worldwide have spoken the local or dominant languages of the regions they migrated to, often developing distinctive [[Social:Dialect|dialect]]al forms or branches that became independent languages. Yiddish is the Judaeo-German language developed by Ashkenazi Jews who migrated to [[Place:Central Europe|Central Europe]]. [[Social:Judaeo-Spanish|Ladino]] is the Judaeo-Spanish language developed by Sephardic Jews who migrated to the Iberian peninsula. Due to many factors, including the impact of [[Social:The Holocaust|the Holocaust]] on European Jewry, the Jewish exodus from Arab and Muslim countries, and widespread emigration from other Jewish communities around the world, ancient and distinct Jewish languages of several communities, including [[Social:Judaeo-Georgian|Judaeo-Georgian]], Judaeo-Arabic, [[Social:Judeo-Berber language|Judaeo-Berber]], [[Social:Krymchak language|Krymchak]], Judaeo-Malayalam and many others, have largely fallen out of use.<ref name=Languages />

[[File:Loew-rabin-tombstone.jpg|thumb|180px|Tombstone of the Maharal in the Old Jewish Cemetery, Prague. The tombstones are inscribed in Hebrew.]]
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 the [[History:Shabbat|Sabbath]].<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Parfitt |first1=T. V. |title=The Use Of Hebrew In Palestine 1800–1822 |journal=Journal of Semitic Studies |date=1972 |volume=17 |issue=2 |pages=237–252 |doi=10.1093/jss/17.2.237 }}</ref> Hebrew was revived as a spoken language by Eliezer ben Yehuda, who arrived in [[Place:Palestine (region)|Palestine]] in 1881. It had not been used as a mother tongue since Tannaic times.<ref name=Grintz /> [[Social:Modern Hebrew|Modern Hebrew]] is designated as the "State language" of Israel.<ref>{{cite web |title=Basic Law: Israel - The Nation State Of The Jewish People |url=https://knesset.gov.il/laws/special/eng/BasicLawNationState.pdf |website=The Knesset |publisher=Knesset of the State of Israel |access-date=3 September 2020}}</ref>

Despite efforts to revive Hebrew as the national language of the Jewish people, knowledge of the language is not commonly possessed by Jews worldwide and [[Social:English language|English]] has emerged as the lingua franca of the Jewish diaspora.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0VnB2Jq3fW4C&pg=PA428|title=International Handbook of Jewish Education|author=Nava Nevo|publisher=Springer|year=2001|page=428|quote=In contrast to other peoples who are masters of their national languages, Hebrew is not the 'common possession' of all Jewish people, and it mainly—if not exclusively—lives and breathes in Israel.... Although there are oases of Hebrew in certain schools, it has not become the Jewish lingua franca and English is rapidly taking its place as the Jewish people's language of communication. Even Hebrew-speaking Israeli representatives tend to use English in their public appearances at international Jewish conventions. |isbn=978-94-007-0354-4 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=hEHCW7KnuG8C&pg=PA121|title=Prophets and Profits: Managerialism and the Restructuring of Jewish Schools in South Africa|author=Chaya Herman|publisher=HSRC Press|year=2006|page=121|quote=It is English rather than Hebrew that emerged as the ''lingua franca'' of the Jews towards the late 20th century.... This phenomenon occurred despite efforts to make Hebrew a language of communication, and despite the fact that the teaching of Hebrew was considered the ''raison d'être'' of the Jewish day schools and the 'nerve center' of Jewish learning.|isbn=978-0-7969-2114-7}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bWmMAgAAQBAJ&q=%22english+as+a+lingua+franca+for+jews+worldwide%22&pg=PA185|title=Negotiating Language Policy in Schools: Educators as Policymakers|author=Elana Shohamy|publisher=Routledge|year=2010|page=185|quote=This priority given to English is related to the special relationship between Israel and the United States, and the current status of English as a ''lingua franca'' for Jews worldwide.|isbn=978-1-135-14621-4 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=rUpFAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA214|title=Dynamic Belonging: Contemporary Jewish Collective Identities|author=Elan Ezrachi|publisher=Bergahn Books|year=2012|page=214|quote=As Stephen P. Cohen observes: 'English is the language of Jewish universal discourse.'|isbn=978-0-85745-258-0}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.jafi.org.il/JewishAgency/English/Jewish+Education/Compelling+Content/Worldwide+Community/Connecting+to+Community/Jewish+Languages.htm |title=Jewish Languages&nbsp;– How Do We Talk To Each Other? |publisher=Jewish Agency |access-date=5 April 2014 |quote=Only a minority of the Jewish people today can actually speak Hebrew. In order for a Jew from one country to talk to another who speaks a different language, it is more common to use English than Hebrew. |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140307172019/http://www.jafi.org.il/JewishAgency/English/Jewish%2BEducation/Compelling%2BContent/Worldwide%2BCommunity/Connecting%2Bto%2BCommunity/Jewish%2BLanguages.htm |archive-date=7 March 2014}}</ref> Although many Jews once had sufficient knowledge of Hebrew to study the classic literature, and Jewish languages like [[Social:Yiddish|Yiddish]] and [[Social:Judaeo-Spanish|Ladino]] were 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, and [[Social:Russian language|Russian]]. Some Romance languages, particularly [[Social:French language|French]] and [[Social:Spanish language|Spanish]], are also widely used.<ref name=Languages /> Yiddish has been spoken by more Jews in history than any other language,<ref>Hebrew, Aramaic and the rise of Yiddish. D. Katz. (1985) ''Readings in the sociology of Jewish languages'</ref> but it is far less used today following [[Social:The Holocaust|the Holocaust]] and the adoption of [[Social:Modern Hebrew|Modern Hebrew]] by the [[Social:Zionism|Zionist movement]] and the [[Place:Israel|State 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, in Quebec, the Ashkenazic majority has adopted English, while the Sephardic minority uses French as its primary language.<ref name="forward">{{cite web|url=http://forward.com/articles/5434/quebec-sephardim-make-breakthroughs/|title=Quebec Sephardim Make Breakthroughs |publisher=forward.com|access-date=12 March 2015}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NYyiAgAAQBAJ&pg=PR22|title=Contemporary Sephardic Identity in the Americas: An Interdisciplinary Approach|author=Edna Aizenberg|year=2012|page=xxii|isbn=978-0-8156-5165-9}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fIZ6wftL3oQC&pg=PA449|title=Canada's Jews: A People's Journey|author=Gerald Tulchinsky|pages=447–49|isbn=978-0-8020-9386-8|year=2008}}</ref> Similarly, South African Jews adopted English rather than [[Social:Afrikaans|Afrikaans]].<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gbTFAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA51|title=Institutions, Ethnicity, and Political Mobilization in South Africa|author=Jessica Piombo|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|page=51|isbn=978-0-230-62382-8|year= 2009}}</ref> Due to both Czarist and Soviet policies,<ref>{{cite journal|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TIMoQbjAmhgC&pg=PA31|title=World War I and the Remaking of Jewish Vilna, 1914–1918|author=Andrew Noble Koss (dissertation)|publisher=Stanford University|year=2010|pages=30–31}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Ic5Kth7aiusC&pg=PA781|title=Jewish and Non-Jewish Creators of "Jewish Languages"|author=Paul Wexler|chapter=Chapter 38: Evaluating Soviet Yiddish Language Policy Between 1917–1950|publisher=Otto Harrassowitz Verlag|year=2006|page=780|isbn=978-3-447-05404-1}}</ref> Russian has superseded Yiddish as the language of Russian Jews, but these policies have also affected neighboring communities.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.jewish-languages.org/jewish-russian.html|title=Jewish Russian|author=Anna Verschik|publisher=Jewish Languages Research Website|date=25 May 2007}}</ref> Today, Russian is the first language for many Jewish communities in a number of [[Earth:Post-Soviet states|Post-Soviet states]], such as {{wipe|Ukraine}}<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NoPZu79hqaEC&pg=PA1007|title=Encyclopedia of the Jewish Diaspora: Origins, Experiences, and Culture, Volume 1|page=1007|isbn=978-1-85109-873-6|last1=Ehrlich|first1=Mark Avrum|year=2009}}</ref><ref name="google">{{cite book|title=Ukraine: A History, 4th Edition|author=Subtelny, O.|date=2009|publisher=University of Toronto Press, Scholarly Publishing Division|isbn=978-1-4426-9728-7|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ktyM07I9HXwC|access-date=12 March 2015}}</ref><ref name="google2">{{cite book|title=Multicultural Perspectives in Working with Families|author1=Congress, E.P.|author2=Gonzalez, M.J.|date=2005|publisher=Springer Publishing Company|isbn=978-0-8261-3146-1|url=https://archive.org/details/isbn_9780826131454|url-access=registration|access-date=12 March 2015}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.haaretz.com/weekend/jerusalem-babylon/.premium-1.579733 |title=The Jews who said 'no' to Putin |author=Anshel Pfeffer |newspaper=Haaretz |date=14 March 2014 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140326082731/http://www.haaretz.com/weekend/jerusalem-babylon/.premium-1.579733 |archive-date=26 March 2014}}</ref> and Uzbekistan,<ref name="jewishvirtuallibrary2">{{cite web|url=https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/History/Bukharan_Jews.html|title=Bukharan Jews &#124; Jewish Virtual Library|publisher=jewishvirtuallibrary.org|access-date=12 March 2015}}</ref> as well as for Ashkenazic Jews in [[Place:Azerbaijan|Azerbaijan]],<ref name="Maoz">{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=W_AR3BksrUcC&pg=PA135|title=Muslim Attitudes towards Jews and Israel|author=Moshe Ma'oz|pages=135, 160|isbn=978-1-84519-527-4|year=2011}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.worldjewishcongress.org/en/about/communities/AZ |title=Azerbaijan |quote=Like many immigrant communities of the Czarist and Soviet eras in Azerbaijan, Ashkenazi Jews appear to be linguistically Russified. Most Ashkenazi Jews speak Russian as their first language with Azeri being spoken as the second.}}</ref> Georgia,<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=UNczHm67tjIC&pg=PA72|title=DNA & Tradition: The Genetic Link to the Ancient Hebrews|author=Yaakov Kleiman|publisher=Devora Publishing|year=2004|page=72|quote=The community is divided between 'native' Georgian Jews and Russian-speaking Ashkenazim who began migrating there at the beginning of the 19th century, and especially during World War II.|isbn=978-1-930143-89-0}}</ref> and Tajikistan.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=AgkVAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA165|title=Readings in the Sociology of Jewish Languages|author=Joshua A. Fishman|year=1985|pages=165, 169–74|quote=Jews in Tadzhikistan have adopted [[Social:Tajik language|Tadzhik]] as their first language. The number of Yiddish-speaking Ashkenazic Jews in that region is comparatively low (cf. 2,905 in 1979). Both Ashkenazic and Oriental Jews have assimilated to Russian, the number of Jews speaking Russian as their first language amounting to a total of 6,564. It is reasonable to assume that the percentage of assimilated Ashkenazim is much higher than the portion of Oriental Jews.|isbn=90-04-07237-3}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=idAfAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA72|title=Language in Ethnicity: A View of Basic Ecological Relations|author=Harald Haarmann|publisher=Walter de Gruyter|year=1986|pages=70–73, 79–82|isbn=978-3-11-086280-5}}</ref> Although communities in [[Place:North Africa|North Africa]] today are small and dwindling, Jews there had shifted from a multilingual group to a monolingual one (or nearly so), speaking French in Algeria,<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=f4Mp4qy8lbUC&pg=PA234|title=Transnational Spaces and Identities in the Francophone World|page=234|isbn=978-0-8032-2465-0|last1=Gafaiti|first1=Hafid|year=2009}}</ref> Morocco,<ref name="Maoz" /> and the city of [[Place:Tunis|Tunis]],<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=45exFa6wDIIC&pg=PA258|title=Jewish Culture and Society in North Africa|pages=258, 270|isbn=978-0-253-00146-7|last1=Gottreich|first1=Emily Benichou|last2=Schroeter|first2=Daniel J|year= 2011}}</ref><ref name="jdc">{{cite web|url=http://www.jdc.org/where-we-work/africa/tunisia.html|title=Tunisia|publisher=jdc.org|access-date=12 March 2015|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131016211752/http://www.jdc.org/where-we-work/africa/tunisia.html|archive-date=16 October 2013}}</ref> while most North Africans continue to use [[Social:Arabic|Arabic]] or Berber as their mother tongue.{{Citation needed|date=March 2016}}

=== Leadership ===
{{main|Social:Jewish leadership}}
There is no single governing body for the Jewish community, nor a single authority with responsibility for religious doctrine.<ref>{{cite book|last=Eisenstadt|first=S.N.|title=Explorations in Jewish Historical Experience: The Civilizational Dimension|url=https://archive.org/details/explorationsjewi00eise|url-access=limited|year=2004|publisher=Brill|location=Leiden, The Netherlands|isbn=90-04-13693-2|page=[https://archive.org/details/explorationsjewi00eise/page/n89 75]}}</ref> 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.<ref>{{cite book|last=Lewis|first=Hal M.|title=From Sanctuary to Boardroom: A Jewish Approach to Leadership|year=2006|publisher=Rowman & Littlefield|location=Lanham, Md.|isbn=0-7425-5229-2|page=1}}</ref> Today, many countries have a Chief Rabbi who serves as a representative of that country's Jewry. Although many Hassidic Jews follow a certain hereditary Hasidic dynasty, there is no one commonly accepted leader of all Hasidic Jews. Many Jews believe that the Messiah will act a unifying leader for Jews and the entire world.<ref>[https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/guides/zjbyb82/revision/5 "Key beliefs in Judaism: Messiah"] BBC</ref>

===Theories on ancient Jewish national identity===
[[File:Hebrew Bible MET DP-15507-001.jpg|thumb|350px|Bible manuscript in Hebrew, 14th century. Hebrew language and alphabet were the cornerstones of the Jewish national identity in antiquity.]]
A number of modern scholars of nationalism support the existence of Jewish national identity in antiquity. One of them is David Goodblatt,<ref>[https://history.ucsd.edu/people/faculty/goodblatt.html David Goodblatt is professor of history at the University of San Diego. Short biography, publications.]</ref> 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, a common practice in the ancient eastern Mediterranean area. The Hebrew language also constructed and preserved national identity. Although it was not spoken by most of the Jews after the 5th century BCE, Goodblatt contends that:

:“the mere presence of the language in spoken or written form could invoke the concept of a Jewish national identity. Even if one knew no Hebrew or was illiterate, one could recognize that a group of signs was in Hebrew script. … It was the language of the Israelite ancestors, the national literature, and the national religion. As such it was inseparable from the national identity. Indeed its mere presence in visual or aural medium could invoke that identity.”<ref>[https://bmcr.brynmawr.edu/2007/2007.10.56 Carol Bakhos, review of Goodblatt, David M., Elements of ancient Jewish nationalism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006, in Bryn Mawr Classical Review, 2007.]</ref><ref>[http://www.jhsonline.org/reviews/reviews_new/review357.htm Adam L. Porter, Illinois College, review of Goodblatt, David M., Elements of ancient Jewish nationalism, 2006], in Journal of Hebrew Scriptures – Volume 9 (2009)</ref>

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.<ref>{{cite journal| last1 = Weitzman | first1 = Steven | year = 2008| title = On the Political Relevance of Antiquity: A Response to David Goodblatt's Elements of Ancient Jewish Nationalism | journal = Jewish Social Studies | volume = 14 | issue = 3| page = 168 | jstor = 40207028}}</ref>

== Demographics ==

=== Ethnic divisions ===
[[File:Maurycy Gottlieb - Jews Praying in the Synagogue on Yom Kippur.jpg|thumb|upright|Ashkenazi Jews of late-19th-century Eastern Europe portrayed in ''Jews Praying in the Synagogue on Yom Kippur'' (1878), by Maurycy Gottlieb]]
[[File:1900 photo of a Sephardi couple from Sarajevo.png|thumb|upright|Sephardi Jewish couple from Sarajevo in traditional clothing. Photo taken in 1900.]]
[[File:Yemenite Elder Blowing Shofat, February 1, 1949.jpg|thumb|upright|Yemenite Jew blows shofar, 1947]]

Within the world's Jewish population there are distinct ethnic divisions, most of which are primarily the result of geographic branching from an originating Israelite population, and subsequent independent evolutions. An array of Jewish communities was established by Jewish settlers in various places around the [[Earth:Old World|Old World]], often at great distances from one another, resulting in effective and often long-term isolation. During the millennia of the Jewish diaspora the communities would develop under the influence of their local environments: political, [[Social:Culture|cultural]], [[Earth:Nature|natural]], and populational. Today, manifestations of these differences among the Jews can be observed in Jewish cultural expressions of each community, including Jewish linguistic diversity, culinary preferences, liturgical practices, religious interpretations, as well as degrees and sources of [[Biology:Genetic admixture|genetic admixture]].<ref>Dosick (2007), p. 60.</ref>

Jews are often identified as belonging to one of two major groups: the ''Ashkenazim'' and the ''Sephardim''. Ashkenazim, or "Germanics" (Ashkenaz meaning "{{wipe|Germany}}" in Hebrew), are so named denoting their German Jewish cultural and geographical origins, while Sephardim, or "Hispanics" (Sefarad meaning "{{wipe|Spain}}/Hispania" or "Iberia" in Hebrew), are so named denoting their Spanish/Portuguese Jewish cultural and geographic origins. The more common term in [[Place:Israel|Israel]] for many of those broadly called Sephardim, is ''Mizrahim'' (lit. "Easterners", Mizrach being "East" in Hebrew), that is, in reference to the diverse collection of Middle Eastern and North African Jews who are often, as a group, referred to collectively as ''Sephardim'' (together with Sephardim proper) for liturgical reasons, although Mizrahi Jewish groups and Sephardi Jews proper are ethnically distinct.<ref>Dosick (2007), p. 59.</ref>

Smaller groups include, but are not restricted to, Indian Jews such as the Bene Israel, Bnei Menashe, Cochin Jews, and Bene Ephraim; the Romaniotes of Greece; the Italian Jews ("Italkim" or "Bené Roma"); the Teimanim from Yemen; various African Jews, including most numerously the Beta Israel of Ethiopia; and Chinese Jews, most notably the Kaifeng Jews, as well as various other distinct but now almost extinct communities.<ref name=EJ571>{{cite encyclopedia|last=Schmelz|first=Usiel Oscar |author2=Sergio Della Pergola |editor=Fred Skolnik|encyclopedia=Encyclopaedia Judaica|title=Demography|edition=2d|year=2007|publisher=Thomson Gale|volume=5|location=Farmington Hills, Mich.|isbn=978-0-02-865928-2|page=571}}</ref>

The divisions between all these groups are approximate and their boundaries are not always clear. The Mizrahim for example, are a heterogeneous collection of [[Place:North Africa|North Africa]]n, [[Place:Central Asia|Central Asia]]n, 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 termed ''Sephardi'' due to similar styles of liturgy, despite independent development from Sephardim proper. Thus, among Mizrahim there are Egyptian 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. The Teimanim from Yemen are 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 the [[Place:Middle East|Middle East]] and [[Place:North Africa|North Africa]] after the expulsion of the Jews from Spain and Portugal in the 1490s and the pre-existing Jewish communities in those regions.<ref name=EJ571 />

Ashkenazi Jews represent the bulk of modern Jewry, with at least 70&nbsp;percent of Jews worldwide (and up to 90&nbsp;percent prior to [[Social:World War II|World War II]] and [[Social:The Holocaust|the Holocaust]]). As a result of their emigration from [[Earth:Europe|Europe]], Ashkenazim also represent the overwhelming majority of Jews in the [[Earth:New World|New World]] continents, in countries such as the {{wipe|United States}}, {{wipe|Canada}}, {{wipe|Argentina}}, {{wipe|Australia}}, and {{wipe|Brazil}}. In {{wipe|France}}, the immigration of Jews from Algeria (Sephardim) has led them to outnumber the Ashkenazim.<ref name=EJ572>{{cite encyclopedia|last=Schmelz|first=Usiel Oscar |author2=Sergio Della Pergola |editor=Fred Skolnik|encyclopedia=Encyclopaedia Judaica|title=Demography|edition=2d|year=2007|publisher=Thomson Gale|volume=5|location=Farmington Hills, Mich.|isbn=978-0-02-865928-2|pages=571–72}}</ref> Only in [[Place:Israel|Israel]] is the Jewish population representative of all groups, a [[Social:Melting pot|melting pot]] independent of each group's proportion within the overall world Jewish population.<ref>Dosick (2007), p. 61.</ref>

=== Genetic studies ===
{{main|Biology:Genetic studies on Jews}}
[[Biology:Y chromosome|Y DNA]] studies tend to imply a small number of founders in an old population whose members parted and followed different migration paths.<ref name="hammer2000">{{cite journal |last1=Hammer |first1=M. F. |last2=Redd |first2=A. J. |last3=Wood |first3=E. T. |last4=Bonner |first4=M. R. |last5=Jarjanazi |first5=H. |last6=Karafet |first6=T. |last7=Santachiara-Benerecetti |first7=S. |last8=Oppenheim |first8=A. |last9=Jobling |first9=M. A. |last10=Jenkins |first10=T. |last11=Ostrer |first11=H. |last12=Bonne-Tamir |first12=B. |title=Jewish and Middle Eastern non-Jewish populations share a common pool of Y-chromosome biallelic haplotypes |journal=Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences |date=6 June 2000 |volume=97 |issue=12 |pages=6769–6774 |doi=10.1073/pnas.100115997 |pmid=10801975 |pmc=18733 |bibcode=2000PNAS...97.6769H }}</ref> In most Jewish populations, these male line ancestors appear to have been mainly [[Place:Middle East|Middle East]]ern. 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 in [[Place:Eastern Europe|Eastern Europe]], {{wipe|Germany}} and the French [[Place:Rhine|Rhine Valley]]. This is consistent with Jewish traditions in placing most Jewish paternal origins in the region of the Middle East.<ref name="Nebel 2001">{{cite journal |last1=Nebel |first1=Almut |last2=Filon |first2=Dvora |last3=Brinkmann |first3=Bernd |last4=Majumder |first4=Partha P. |last5=Faerman |first5=Marina |last6=Oppenheim |first6=Ariella |title=The Y Chromosome Pool of Jews as Part of the Genetic Landscape of the Middle East |journal=The American Journal of Human Genetics |date=November 2001 |volume=69 |issue=5 |pages=1095–1112 |doi=10.1086/324070 |pmid=11573163 |pmc=1274378 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Frudakis |first1=Tony |chapter=Ashkezani Jews |page=383 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9vXeydpj7VkC&pg=PA383 |title=Molecular Photofitting: Predicting Ancestry and Phenotype Using DNA |date=19 July 2010 |publisher=Elsevier |isbn=978-0-08-055137-1 }}</ref>

Conversely, the maternal lineages of Jewish populations, studied by looking at [[Biology:Mitochondrial DNA|mitochondrial DNA]], are generally more heterogeneous.<ref name="Behar2008b">{{cite journal |last1=Behar |first1=Doron M. |last2=Metspalu |first2=Ene |last3=Kivisild |first3=Toomas |last4=Rosset |first4=Saharon |last5=Tzur |first5=Shay |last6=Hadid |first6=Yarin |last7=Yudkovsky |first7=Guennady |last8=Rosengarten |first8=Dror |last9=Pereira |first9=Luisa |last10=Amorim |first10=Antonio |last11=Kutuev |first11=Ildus |last12=Gurwitz |first12=David |last13=Bonne-Tamir |first13=Batsheva |last14=Villems |first14=Richard |last15=Skorecki |first15=Karl |title=Counting the Founders: The Matrilineal Genetic Ancestry of the Jewish Diaspora |journal=PLOS ONE |date=30 April 2008 |volume=3 |issue=4 |pages=e2062 |doi=10.1371/journal.pone.0002062 |pmid=18446216 |pmc=2323359 |bibcode=2008PLoSO...3.2062B }}</ref> Scholars such as Harry Ostrer and 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.<ref name="Lewontin">{{Cite journal |last=Lewontin |first=Richard |date=6 December 2012 |title=Is There a Jewish Gene? |url=http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2012/12/06/is-there-a-jewish-gene/ |journal=New York Review of Books}}</ref> In contrast, Behar has found evidence that about 40&nbsp;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."<ref name="Behar2008b" /> 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."<ref name="Abraham 2010"/><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Feder |first1=Jeanette |last2=Ovadia |first2=Ofer |last3=Glaser |first3=Benjamin |last4=Mishmar |first4=Dan |title=Ashkenazi Jewish mtDNA haplogroup distribution varies among distinct subpopulations: lessons of population substructure in a closed group |journal=European Journal of Human Genetics |date=April 2007 |volume=15 |issue=4 |pages=498–500 |doi=10.1038/sj.ejhg.5201764 |pmid=17245410 |doi-access=free}}</ref><ref name="ReferenceA">{{cite journal |last1=Ostrer |first1=Harry |last2=Skorecki |first2=Karl |title=The population genetics of the Jewish people |journal=Human Genetics |date=February 2013 |volume=132 |issue=2 |pages=119–127 |doi=10.1007/s00439-012-1235-6 |pmid=23052947 |pmc=3543766 }}</ref> A study showed that 7% of Ashkenazi Jews have the haplogroup G2c, which is mainly found in Pashtuns and on lower scales all major Jewish groups, Palestinians, Syrians, and Lebanese.<ref>{{cite web | title=Sign In | website=Family Tree DNA | url=https://www.familytreedna.com/sign-in?ReturnUrl=%2Fpdf%2FBehar_contrasting.pdf | access-date=1 April 2018}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Hammer |first1=Michael F. |last2=Behar |first2=Doron M. |last3=Karafet |first3=Tatiana M. |last4=Mendez |first4=Fernando L. |last5=Hallmark |first5=Brian |last6=Erez |first6=Tamar |last7=Zhivotovsky |first7=Lev A. |last8=Rosset |first8=Saharon |last9=Skorecki |first9=Karl |title=Extended Y chromosome haplotypes resolve multiple and unique lineages of the Jewish priesthood |journal=Human Genetics |date=8 August 2009 |volume=126 |issue=5 |pages=707–17 |doi=10.1007/s00439-009-0727-5 |pmid=19669163 |pmc=2771134 }}</ref>

Studies of [[Biology:Autosome|autosomal 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.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Katsnelson |first1=Alla |title=Jews worldwide share genetic ties |journal=Nature |date=3 June 2010 |pages=news.2010.277 |doi=10.1038/news.2010.277 }}</ref> For Jewish populations of the diaspora, the genetic composition of Ashkenazi, Sephardi, and Mizrahi Jewish 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 ancient Hebrew and Israelite residents of the [[Place:Levant|Levant]]" and "the dispersion of the people of ancient Israel throughout the [[Earth:Old World|Old World]]".<ref name="discovermagazine">{{cite journal |last1=Behar |first1=Doron M. |last2=Yunusbayev |first2=Bayazit |last3=Metspalu |first3=Mait |last4=Metspalu |first4=Ene |last5=Rosset |first5=Saharon |last6=Parik |first6=Jüri |last7=Rootsi |first7=Siiri |last8=Chaubey |first8=Gyaneshwer |last9=Kutuev |first9=Ildus |last10=Yudkovsky |first10=Guennady |last11=Khusnutdinova |first11=Elza K. |last12=Balanovsky |first12=Oleg |last13=Semino |first13=Ornella |last14=Pereira |first14=Luisa |last15=Comas |first15=David |last16=Gurwitz |first16=David |last17=Bonne-Tamir |first17=Batsheva |last18=Parfitt |first18=Tudor |last19=Hammer |first19=Michael F. |last20=Skorecki |first20=Karl |last21=Villems |first21=Richard |title=The genome-wide structure of the Jewish people |journal=Nature |date=July 2010 |volume=466 |issue=7303 |pages=238–242 |doi=10.1038/nature09103 |pmid=20531471 |s2cid=4307824 |bibcode=2010Natur.466..238B }}</ref> [[Place:North Africa|North Africa]]n, [[Place:Italian Peninsula|Italian]] and others of [[Place:Iberian Peninsula|Iberian]] origin show variable frequencies of admixture with non-Jewish historical host populations among the maternal lines. In the case of Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews (in particular Moroccan Jews), who are closely related, the source of non-Jewish admixture is mainly [[Place:Southern Europe|southern Europe]]an, while Mizrahi Jews show evidence of admixture with other Middle Eastern populations. Behar ''et al.'' have remarked on a close relationship between Ashkenazi Jews and modern Italians.<ref name="discovermagazine"/><ref name=zooss>{{cite journal |last1=Zoossmann-Diskin |first1=Avshalom |title=The origin of Eastern European Jews revealed by autosomal, sex chromosomal and mtDNA polymorphisms |journal=Biology Direct |date=2010 |volume=5 |issue=1 |pages=57 |doi=10.1186/1745-6150-5-57 |pmid=20925954 |pmc=2964539 |bibcode=2010Sci...328.1342B }}</ref> 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.<ref name="Nebel 2001"/><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Haber |first1=Marc |last2=Gauguier |first2=Dominique |last3=Youhanna |first3=Sonia |last4=Patterson |first4=Nick |last5=Moorjani |first5=Priya |last6=Botigué |first6=Laura R. |last7=Platt |first7=Daniel E. |last8=Matisoo-Smith |first8=Elizabeth |last9=Soria-Hernanz |first9=David F. |last10=Wells |first10=R. Spencer |last11=Bertranpetit |first11=Jaume |last12=Tyler-Smith |first12=Chris |last13=Comas |first13=David |last14=Zalloua |first14=Pierre A. |title=Genome-Wide Diversity in the Levant Reveals Recent Structuring by Culture |journal=PLOS Genetics |date=28 February 2013 |volume=9 |issue=2 |pages=e1003316 |doi=10.1371/journal.pgen.1003316 |pmid=23468648 |pmc=3585000 }}</ref>

The studies also show that Sephardic Bnei Anusim (descendants of the "anusim" who were [[Religion:Forced conversion|forced to convert]] to Catholicism), which comprise up to 19.8&nbsp;percent of the population of today's Iberia ({{wipe|Spain}} and Portugal) and at least 10&nbsp;percent of the population of [[Place:Ibero-America|Ibero-America]] ([[Place:Hispanic America|Hispanic America]] and {{wipe|Brazil}}), have Sephardic Jewish ancestry within the last few centuries. The Bene Israel and Cochin Jews of {{wipe|India}}, Beta Israel of Ethiopia, and a portion of the Lemba people of [[Place:Southern Africa|Southern Africa]], despite more closely resembling the local populations of their native countries, are also thought to have some more remote ancient Jewish ancestry.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://forward.com/articles/155742/jews-are-a-race-genes-reveal/?p=all |title=Jews Are a 'Race,' Genes Reveal |publisher=Forward.com |access-date=12 April 2013}}</ref><ref name=discovermagazine/><ref name="in.reuters.com">{{cite news |last1=Begley |first1=Sharon |title=Genetic study offers clues to history of North Africa's Jews |url=https://in.reuters.com/article/us-science-genetics-jews/genetic-study-offers-clues-to-history-of-north-africas-jews-idINBRE8751EI20120806 |work=Reuters |date=6 August 2012 }}</ref><ref name="ReferenceA"/>

=== Population centers ===
[[File:Purim 2012 Williamsburg Brooklyn 01.jpg|thumb|New York City is home to 1.1 million Jews, making it the largest Jewish community outside of Israel.]]
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.<ref>Johnson (1987), pp. 529, 560–62.</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.pewforum.org/2012/12/18/global-religious-landscape-jew/|title=Jews|date=18 December 2012}}</ref> In 2013, the United States and Israel were collectively home to more than 80&nbsp;percent of the global Jewish population, each country having approximately 41&nbsp;percent of the world's Jews.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.pewforum.org/2013/03/20/israel-and-the-us-are-home-to-more-than-fourfifths-of-the-worlds-jews/|title=Israel and the U.S. are Home to More Than Four-Fifths of the World's Jews|date=20 March 2013}}</ref>

According to the Israel Central Bureau of Statistics there were 13,421,000 Jews worldwide in 2009, roughly 0.19&nbsp;percent of the world's population at the time.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.cbs.gov.il/shnaton61/st02_27.pdf|title=Jewish population in the world and in Israel|publisher=Israel Central Bureau of Statistics|access-date=18 July 2012|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111026202909/http://www.cbs.gov.il/shnaton61/st02_27.pdf|archive-date=26 October 2011|url-status=dead}}</ref>

According to the 2007 estimates of The Jewish People Policy Planning Institute, the world's Jewish population is 13.2&nbsp;million.<ref name="haaretz.com">{{cite news|title=Percent of world Jewry living in Israel climbed to 41% in 2007|first=Anshel|last=Pfeffer|url=http://www.haaretz.com/news/percent-of-world-jewry-living-in-israel-climbed-to-41-in-2007-1.236675|newspaper=Haaretz|date=6 January 2008|access-date=10 October 2012}}</ref> Adherents.com cites figures ranging from 12 to 18&nbsp;million.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.adherents.com/Na/Na_408.html|title=Judaism, continued...|work=adherents.com|access-date=26 August 2015}}</ref> These statistics incorporate both practicing Jews affiliated with [[Engineering:Synagogue|synagogue]]s and the Jewish community, and approximately 4.5&nbsp;million unaffiliated and secular Jews.{{Citation needed|date=March 2016}}

According to Sergio Della Pergola, a demographer of the Jewish population, in 2015 there were about 6.3 million Jews in [[Place:Israel|Israel]], 5.7 million in the {{wipe|United States}}, and 2.3 million in the rest of the world.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4702945,00.html|title=The Jewish people in 2050: 2 very different scenarios|work=ynet}}</ref>

==== Israel ====
[[File:Mahane Yehuda Market P1020256.JPG|thumb|Jewish people in [[Place:Jerusalem|Jerusalem]], Israel]]
[[Place:Israel|Israel]], the Jewish nation-state, is the only country in which Jews make up a majority of the citizens.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.jpost.com/IranianThreat/News/Article.aspx?id=257112|title=Iran must attack Israel by 2014|date=9 February 2012|newspaper=The Jerusalem Post|access-date=3 April 2012}}</ref> Israel was established as an independent democratic and Jewish state on 14 May 1948.<ref name="cia">{{cite web|url=https://www.cia.gov/the-world-factbook/countries/israel/|publisher=Central Intelligence Agency|work=The World Factbook|access-date=20 July 2007|date=19 June 2007|title=Israel}}</ref> Of the 120 members in its parliament, the Knesset,<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.knesset.gov.il/description/eng/eng_mimshal_beh.htm|publisher=The Knesset|access-date=8 August 2007|title=The Electoral System in Israel}}</ref> {{as of|2016|lc=y}}, 14 members of the Knesset are Arab citizens of Israel (not including the Druze), most representing Arab political parties. One of Israel's Supreme Court judges is also an Arab citizen of Israel.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/2009/israel|title=Israel|work=Freedom in the World|publisher=Freedom House|year=2009}}</ref>

Between 1948 and 1958, the Jewish population rose from 800,000 to two million.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www1.cbs.gov.il/reader/shnaton/templ_shnaton_e.html?num_tab=st02_01&CYear=2006 |publisher=Israel Central Bureau of Statistics |access-date=7 August 2007 |year=2006 |title=Population, by Religion and Population Group |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070930033403/http://www1.cbs.gov.il/reader/shnaton/templ_shnaton_e.html?num_tab=st02_01&CYear=2006 |archive-date=30 September 2007}}</ref> Currently, Jews account for 75.4&nbsp;percent of the Israeli population, or 6&nbsp;million people.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4280028,00.html |title=Jewish New Year: Israel's population nears 8M mark |publisher=Ynetnews.com |date=20 June 1995 |access-date=12 April 2013}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|author=Harriet Sherwood in Jerusalem |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jan/01/israel-jewish-population-six-million |title=Israel's Jewish population passes 6 million mark |work=Guardian |date=1 January 2013 |access-date=12 April 2013}}</ref> The early years of the State of Israel were marked by the mass immigration of Holocaust survivors in the aftermath of the Holocaust and Jews fleeing Arab lands.<ref name="persecution">{{harvnb|Dekmejian|1975|p=247}}. "And most [Oriental-Sephardic Jews] came... because of Arab persecution resulting from the very attempt to establish a Jewish state in Palestine."</ref> Israel also has a large population of Ethiopian Jews, many of whom were airlifted to Israel in the late 1980s and early 1990s.<ref>{{cite web|title=airlifted tens of thousands of Ethiopian Jews|url=https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Judaism/ejhist.html#operation1/|access-date=7 July 2005}}</ref> Between 1974 and 1979 nearly 227,258 immigrants arrived in Israel, about half being from the [[Place:Soviet Union|Soviet Union]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.memo.ru/history/diss/books/alexeewa/|script-title=ru:История инакомыслия в СССР|first=Lyudmila|last=Alexeyeva|location=Vilnius|year=1983|language=ru|trans-title=History of Dissident Movement in the USSR}}</ref> This period also saw an increase in immigration to Israel from [[Place:Western Europe|Western Europe]], Latin America, and [[Earth:North America|North America]].<ref>Goldstein (1995) p. 24</ref>

A trickle of immigrants from other communities has also arrived, including Indian Jews and others, as well as some descendants of Ashkenazi Holocaust survivors who had settled in countries such as the {{wipe|United States}}, {{wipe|Argentina}}, {{wipe|Australia}}, {{wipe|Chile}}, and {{wipe|South Africa}}. Some Jews have emigrated from Israel elsewhere, because of economic problems or disillusionment with political conditions and the continuing Arab–Israeli conflict. Jewish Israeli emigrants are known as yordim.<ref name="Dosick 2007, p. 340">Dosick (2007), p. 340.</ref>

==== Diaspora (outside Israel) ====
[[File:Happynewyearcard.jpg|thumb|upright|In this Rosh Hashana greeting card from the early 1900s, Russian Jews, packs in hand, gaze at the American relatives beckoning them to the United States. Over two million Jews fled the pogroms of the Russian Empire to the safety of the U.S. between 1881 and 1924.<ref>{{cite book|last=Gurock|first=Jeffrey S.|title=East European Jews in America, 1880–1920: Immigration and Adaptation|year=1998|publisher=Routledge|location=New York|isbn=0-415-91924-X|page=54}}</ref>]]

[[File:Birobidjan mainsquare.jpg|thumb|upright|A menorah dominating the main square in Birobidzhan. An estimated 70,000 Jews live in Siberia.<ref>{{cite web |url= http://www.fjc.ru/news/newsArticle.asp?AID=136974 |title= Planting Jewish roots in Siberia |publisher= Fjc.ru |date= 24 May 2004 |url-status= dead |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20090827113526/http://www.fjc.ru/news/newsArticle.asp?AID=136974 |archive-date= 27 August 2009 |df= dmy-all}}</ref>]]
The waves of immigration to the United States and elsewhere at the turn of the 19th century, the founding of [[Social:Zionism|Zionism]] and later events, including pogroms in Imperial Russia (mostly within the Pale of Settlement in present-day Ukraine, Moldova, Belarus and eastern Poland), the massacre of European Jewry during [[Social:The Holocaust|the Holocaust]], and the founding of the state of Israel, with the subsequent Jewish exodus from Arab lands, all resulted in substantial shifts in the population centers of world Jewry by the end of the 20th century.<ref>Gartner (2001), p. 213.</ref>

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 5.2&nbsp;million to 6.4&nbsp;million Jews by various estimates. Elsewhere in the Americas, there are also large Jewish populations in {{wipe|Canada}} (315,000), {{wipe|Argentina}} (180,000–300,000), and {{wipe|Brazil}} (196,000–600,000), and smaller populations in Mexico, Uruguay, Venezuela, {{wipe|Chile}}, Colombia and several other countries (see History of the Jews in Latin America).<ref name="JPPI2007">{{cite web|title=Annual Assessment|url=http://jppi.org.il/uploads/Annual%20Assessment%202007.pdf|year=2007|publisher=Jewish People Policy Planning Institute (Jewish Agency for Israel)|page=15}}, based on {{cite book|title=Annual Assessment 2007|publisher=American Jewish Committee|url=http://www.ajcarchives.org/main.php?GroupingId=10142|volume=106|year=2006}}</ref> According to a 2010 Pew Research Center study, about 470,000 people of Jewish heritage live in Latin-America and the Caribbean.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.pewforum.org/2015/04/02/jews/ |title= Jews - Pew Research Center|website= Pew Research Center|access-date= 28 March 2018}}</ref> 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.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.jewishjournal.com/demographic_duo/item/israel_may_be_main_topic_in_next_national_jewish_population_survey_of_the_u |title=Israel May Be Main Topic In Next National Jewish Population Survey of the U.S. |publisher=Jewish Journal |date=14 March 2013 |access-date=12 April 2013}}</ref>

[[Place:Western Europe|Western Europe]]'s largest Jewish community, and the third-largest Jewish community in the world, can be found in {{wipe|France}}, home to between 483,000 and 500,000 Jews, the majority of whom are immigrants or refugees from North African countries such as Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia (or their descendants).<ref>Gartner (2001), pp. 410–10.</ref> The {{wipe|United Kingdom}} has a Jewish community of 292,000. In Eastern 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 for aliyah.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.mskagency.ru/materials/2716461 |title=Исследование: Около 1,5 млн людей с еврейскими корнями проживают в России |trans-title=Study: About 1.5 Million People with Jewish Roots Live in Russia |date=20 October 2017 |publisher=Moscow Urban News Agency |access-date=28 October 2017}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.interfax-religion.ru/?act=news&div=57988 |title=В России проживает около миллиона иудеев |trans-title=In Russia, There Are About a Million Jews |date=26 February 2015 |publisher=Interfax |access-date=28 October 2017}}</ref> In {{wipe|Germany}}, the 102,000 Jews registered with the Jewish community are a slowly declining population,<ref>Jewish community in Germany: [https://web.archive.org/web/20131204213637/http://www.zwst.org/cms/documents/178/de_DE/ZWST-Mitgliederstatistik-2012-web.pdf ''Mitgliederstatistik der jüdischen Gemeinden und Landesverbände in Deutschland für das Jahr 2012''], p. 4</ref> despite the immigration of tens of thousands of Jews from the former [[Place:Soviet Union|Soviet Union]] since the fall of the Berlin Wall.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://jppi.org.il/uploads/Annual%20Assessment%202007.pdf|title=Annual Assessment 2007|access-date=3 July 2008|last=Waxman|first=Chaim I.|year=2007|publisher=Jewish People Policy Planning Institute (Jewish Agency for Israel)|pages=40–42}}</ref> Thousands of Israelis also live in Germany, either permanently or temporarily, for economic reasons.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.jg-berlin.org/en/service/israelis-in-berlin.html|title=Israelis in Berlin|publisher=Jewish Community of Berlin|access-date=11 October 2012}}</ref>

Prior to 1948, approximately 800,000 Jews were living in lands which now make up the [[Place:Arab world|Arab world]] (excluding Israel). Of these, just under two-thirds lived in the French-controlled [[Place:Maghreb|Maghreb]] region, 15 to 20&nbsp;percent in the [[History:Kingdom of Iraq|Kingdom of Iraq]], approximately 10&nbsp;percent in the [[History:Kingdom of Egypt|Kingdom of Egypt]] and approximately 7&nbsp;percent in the Kingdom of Yemen. A further 200,000 lived in Pahlavi Iran and the Republic of Turkey. Today, around 26,000 Jews live in Arab countries<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=bdAdAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA44#v=onepage The Rebirth of the Middle East], Jerry M. Rosenberg, Hamilton Books, 2009, p. 44</ref> and around 30,000 in [[Religion:Iran|Iran]] and [[Place:Turkey|Turkey]]. A small-scale exodus had begun in many countries in the early decades of the 20th century, although the only substantial aliyah came from Yemen and [[Place:Syria|Syria]].<ref>{{cite book |editor1-last=Simon |editor1-first=Reeva Spector |editor2-last=Laskier |editor2-first=Michael Menachem |editor3-last=Reguer |editor3-first=Sara |year=2003 |title=The Jews of the Middle East and North Africa in Modern Times |publisher=Columbia University Press |isbn=978-0-231-50759-2 |page=327 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VxEJrEY22egC&pg=PA327 |quote=Before the 1940s only two communities, Yemen and Syria, made substantial aliyah. }}</ref> The exodus from Arab and Muslim countries took place primarily from 1948. The first large-scale exoduses took place in the late 1940s and early 1950s, primarily in Iraq, Yemen and [[Place:Libya|Libya]], with up to 90&nbsp;percent of these communities leaving within a few years. The peak of the exodus from [[Place:Egypt|Egypt]] occurred in 1956. The exodus in the Maghreb countries peaked in the 1960s. [[Place:Lebanon|Lebanon]] was 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 of Iranian Jews peaked in the 1980s when around 80&nbsp;percent of Iranian Jews left the country.{{Citation needed|date=March 2016}}

Outside [[Earth:Europe|Europe]], the [[Earth:Americas|Americas]], the [[Place:Middle East|Middle East]], and the rest of [[Earth:Asia|Asia]], there are significant Jewish populations in {{wipe|Australia}} (112,500) and South Africa (70,000).<ref name="JVIL2010" /> There is also a 6,800-strong community in [[Earth:New Zealand|New Zealand]].<ref>"[http://www.worldjewishcongress.org/en/about/communities/NZ Community in New Zealand]," World Jewish Congress, July 2017. Retrieved 20 December 2018.</ref>

=== Demographic changes ===

==== Assimilation ====
Since at least the time of the {{wipe|Ancient Greece}}, 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 their [[Social:Jewish identity|Jewish identity]].<ref name=Johnson171>Johnson (1987), p. 171.</ref> Assimilation took place in all areas, and during all time periods,<ref name=Johnson171 /> with some Jewish communities, for example the Kaifeng Jews of {{wipe|China}}, disappearing entirely.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.shavei.org/communities/kaifeng_jews/articles-kaifeng_jews/chinese-jews-reverence-for-ancestors/ |title=Chinese Jews: Reverence for Ancestors |last=Edinger |first=Bernard |date=15 December 2005 |publisher=Shavei Israel |access-date=2 April 2012 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121003094552/http://www.shavei.org/communities/kaifeng_jews/articles-kaifeng_jews/chinese-jews-reverence-for-ancestors/ |archive-date=3 October 2012}}</ref> The advent of the Jewish Enlightenment of the 18th century (see Haskalah) and the subsequent emancipation of the Jewish populations of Europe and America in the 19th century, accelerated the situation, encouraging Jews to increasingly participate in, and become part of, [[Philosophy:Secularism|secular society]]. The result has been a growing trend of assimilation, as Jews marry non-Jewish spouses and stop participating in the Jewish community.<ref>Elazar (2003), p. 434.</ref>

Rates of [[Social:Interfaith marriage|interreligious marriage]] vary widely: In the United States, it is just under 50&nbsp;percent,<ref>{{cite web|title=NJPS: Defining and Calculating Intermarriage |url=http://www.jewishfederations.org/page.aspx?id=46252 |access-date=2 April 2012 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110812024158/http://www.jewishfederations.org/page.aspx?id=46252 |archive-date=12 August 2011}}</ref> in the United Kingdom, around 53&nbsp;percent; in France; around 30&nbsp;percent,<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www-prod.akadem.org/medias/documents/Rapport-Erik-Cohen.pdf |title=Les juifs de France: La lente progression des mariages mixtes |trans-title=The Jews of France: The slow progression of mixed marriages |last=Cohen |first=Erik H. |date=November 2002 |publisher=Akadem |language=fr }}</ref> and in Australia and Mexico, as low as 10&nbsp;percent.<ref>{{cite web|title=Australia|url=http://www.worldjewishcongress.org/en/communities/show/id/2|publisher=World Jewish Congress|access-date=2 April 2012|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120521082932/http://www.worldjewishcongress.org/en/communities/show/id/2|archive-date=21 May 2012}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=The Virtual Jewish History Tour&nbsp;– Mexico|url=https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/vjw/Mexico.html|access-date=7 July 2005}}</ref> In the United States, only about a third of children from intermarriages affiliate with Jewish religious practice.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://jppi.org.il/uploads/Annual%20Assessment%202007.pdf|title=Annual Assessment 2007|access-date=3 July 2008|last=Waxman|first=Chaim I.|year=2007|publisher=Jewish People Policy Planning Institute (Jewish Agency for Israel)|page=61}}</ref> The result is that most countries in the Diaspora have steady or slightly declining religiously Jewish populations as Jews continue to assimilate into the countries in which they live.{{Citation needed|date=March 2016}}

==== War and persecution ====
[[File:The Emperor sends Vespasian with an army to destroy the Jews (f. 177v) Cropped.jpg|thumb|upright|The Roman Emperor [[Biography:Nero|Nero]] sends Vespasian with an army to destroy the Jews, 69 CE.]]

The Jewish people and [[Religion:Judaism|Judaism]] have experienced various persecutions throughout Jewish history. During Late Antiquity and the [[History:Early Middle Ages|Early Middle Ages]] the Roman Empire (in its later phases known as the [[Place:Byzantine Empire|Byzantine Empire]]) repeatedly repressed the Jewish population, first by ejecting them from their homelands during the pagan Roman era and later by officially establishing them as second-class citizens during the Christian Roman era.<ref>Goldenberg (2007), pp. 131, 135–36.</ref><ref>Johnson (1987), pp. 164–65.</ref>

According to James Carroll, "Jews accounted for 10% of the total population of the Roman Empire. By that ratio, if other factors had not intervened, there would be 200&nbsp;million Jews in the world today, instead of something like 13&nbsp;million."<ref>Carroll, James. ''Constantine's Sword'' (Houghton Mifflin, 2001) {{ISBN|0-395-77927-8}} p. 26</ref>

Later in [[History:Middle Ages|medieval]] [[Place:Western Europe|Western Europe]], further persecutions of Jews by Christians occurred, notably during the [[Religion:Crusades|Crusades]]—when Jews all over Germany were massacred—and a series of expulsions from the Kingdom of England, Germany, France, and, in the largest expulsion of all, Spain and Portugal after the [[Social:Reconquista|Reconquista]] (the Catholic Reconquest of the [[Place:Iberian Peninsula|Iberian Peninsula]]), where both unbaptized Sephardic Jews and the ruling [[Religion:Muslim|Muslim]] Moors were expelled.<ref name="Johnson207-208" /><ref name="Johnson213plus" />

In the Papal States, which existed until 1870, Jews were required to live only in specified neighborhoods called ghettos.<ref>Johnson (1987), pp. 243–44.</ref>
[[File:The Jews the world over love liberty poster.jpg|thumb|upright|left|[[Social:World War I|World War I]] poster showing a soldier cutting the bonds from a Jewish man, who says, "You have cut my bonds and set me free—now let me help you set others free!"]]
Islam and Judaism have a complex relationship. Traditionally Jews and Christians living in Muslim lands, known as dhimmis, were allowed to practice their religions and administer their internal affairs, but they were subject to certain conditions.<ref name="Bernard1020">Lewis (1984), pp. 10, 20</ref> They had to pay the [[Religion:Jizya|jizya]] (a per capita tax imposed on free adult non-Muslim males) to the Islamic state.<ref name="Bernard1020" /> Dhimmis had an inferior status under Islamic rule. They had several social and legal disabilities such as prohibitions against bearing arms or giving testimony in courts in cases involving Muslims.<ref>Lewis (1987), pp. 9, 27</ref> Many of the disabilities were highly symbolic. The one described by Bernard Lewis as "most degrading"<ref name=Lewis131 /> was the requirement of distinctive clothing, not found in the [[Religion:Quran|Quran]] or [[Religion:Hadith|hadith]] but invented in [[History:Early Middle Ages|early medieval]] [[Place:Baghdad|Baghdad]]; its enforcement was highly erratic.<ref name=Lewis131>Lewis (1999), p.131</ref> 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.<ref>Lewis (1999), p. 131; (1984), pp. 8, 62</ref>

Notable exceptions include the massacre of Jews and forcible conversion of some Jews by the rulers of the [[Place:Almohad Caliphate|Almohad]] dynasty in Al-Andalus in the 12th century,<ref>Lewis (1984), p. 52; Stillman (1979), p. 77</ref> as well as in Islamic Persia,<ref>Lewis (1984), pp. 17–18, 94–95; Stillman (1979), p. 27</ref> and the forced confinement of Moroccan Jews to walled quarters known as mellahs beginning from the 15th century and especially in the early 19th century.<ref>Lewis (1984), p. 28.</ref> In modern times, it has become commonplace for standard antisemitic themes to be conflated with anti-Zionist publications and pronouncements of Islamic movements such as Hezbollah and Hamas, in the pronouncements of various agencies of the [[Religion:Iran|Islamic Republic of Iran]], and even in the newspapers and other publications of Turkish Refah Partisi."<ref name=Lewis_MEQ>{{cite web|url=http://www.meforum.org/396/muslim-anti-semitism|title=Muslim Anti-Semitism|first=Bernard|last=Lewis|work=Middle East Quarterly|publisher=Middle East Forum|date=June 1998}}</ref>

Throughout history, many rulers, empires and nations have oppressed their Jewish populations or sought to eliminate them entirely. Methods employed ranged from expulsion to outright genocide; within nations, often the threat of these extreme methods was sufficient to silence dissent. The history of antisemitism includes the First Crusade which resulted in the massacre of Jews;<ref name="Johnson207-208">Johnson (1987), pp. 207–08.</ref> the [[Religion:Spanish Inquisition|Spanish Inquisition]] (led by Tomás de Torquemada) and the Portuguese Inquisition, with their persecution and ''[[Religion:Auto-da-fé|autos-da-fé]]'' against the New Christians and [[Religion:Marrano|Marrano]] Jews;<ref>Johnson (1987), pp. 226–29.</ref> the Bohdan Chmielnicki Cossack massacres in {{wipe|Ukraine}};<ref>Johnson (1987), pp. 259–60.</ref> the [[Social:Pogrom|Pogrom]]s backed by the Russian Tsars;<ref name="Johnson 1987, pp. 364–365">Johnson (1987), pp. 364–65.</ref> as well as expulsions from Spain, Portugal, England, France, Germany, and other countries in which the Jews had settled.<ref name="Johnson213plus">Johnson (1987), pp. 213, 229–31.</ref> According to a 2008 study published in the ''American Journal of Human Genetics'', 19.8&nbsp;percent of the modern [[Place:Iberian Peninsula|Iberian]] population has Sephardic Jewish ancestry,<ref name="Adams2008">{{cite journal|last=Adams|first=Susan M.|year=2008|title=The Genetic Legacy of Religious Diversity and Intolerance: Paternal Lineages of Christians, Jews, and Muslims in the Iberian Peninsula|journal=The American Journal of Human Genetics|volume=83|issue=6|pages=725–36|issn=0002-9297|doi=10.1016/j.ajhg.2008.11.007|pmid=19061982|pmc=2668061}}</ref> indicating that the number of conversos may have been much higher than originally thought.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/04/world/europe/04iht-gene.4.18411385.html|title=DNA study shows 20 percent of Iberian population has Jewish ancestry|newspaper=The New York Times|date=4 December 2008}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|url= |title=The Genetic Legacy of Religious Diversity and Intolerance: Paternal Lineages of Christians, Jews, and Muslims in the Iberian Peninsula|publisher=Cell.com|journal=American Society of Human Genetics|date=December 2008|doi=10.1016/j.ajhg.2008.11.007|pmid=19061982|volume=83|pmc=2668061|pages=725–36 | last1 = Adams | first1 = SM | last2 = Bosch | first2 = E | last3 = Balaresque | first3 = PL |issue=6| display-authors = etal}}</ref>

[[File:Bundesarchiv N 1576 Bild-006, Minsk, Juden.jpg|thumb|Jews in [[Place:Minsk|Minsk]], 1941. Before World War II some 40&nbsp;percent of the population was Jewish. By the time the Red Army retook the city on 3 July 1944, there were only a few Jewish survivors.]]
The persecution reached a peak in [[Place:Nazi Germany|Nazi Germany]]'s Final Solution, which led to [[Social:The Holocaust|the Holocaust]] and the slaughter of approximately 6&nbsp;million Jews.<ref>Johnson (1987), p. 512.</ref> Of the world's 15&nbsp;million Jews in 1939, more than a third were murdered in the Holocaust.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Holocaust/history.html|title=History of the Holocaust&nbsp;– An Introduction|publisher=Jewishvirtuallibrary.org|date=19 April 1943|access-date=13 November 2011}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|author=Luke Harding in Moscow|url=https://www.theguardian.com/ukraine/story/0,,2096327,00.html|title=Pipeline workers find mass grave of Jews killed by Nazis|work=The Guardian|location=UK|access-date=13 November 2011|date=5 June 2007}}</ref> The Holocaust—the state-led systematic persecution and genocide of European Jews (and certain communities of North African Jews in European controlled North Africa) and other minority groups of Europe during [[Social:World War II|World War II]] by Germany and its collaborators remains the most notable modern-day persecution of Jews.<ref>Donald L Niewyk, ''The Columbia Guide to the Holocaust'', Columbia University Press, 2000, p. 45: "The Holocaust is commonly defined as the murder of more than 5,000,000 Jews by the Germans in World War II." However, the Holocaust usually includes all of the different victims who were systematically murdered.</ref> The persecution and genocide were accomplished in stages. Legislation to remove the Jews from civil society was enacted years before the outbreak of [[Social:World War II|World War II]].<ref>Johnson (1987), pp. 484–88.</ref> Concentration camps were established in which inmates were used as [[Social:Slavery|slave labour]] until they died of exhaustion or disease.<ref>Johnson (1987), pp. 490–92.</ref> Where the [[Place:Nazi Germany|Third Reich]] conquered new territory in [[Place:Eastern Europe|Eastern Europe]], specialized units called Einsatzgruppen murdered Jews and political opponents in mass shootings.<ref name="BBC-Grave">{{cite news|title=Ukrainian mass Jewish grave found|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6724481.stm|newspaper=BBC News Online|date=5 June 2007|access-date=10 October 2012}}</ref> Jews and Roma were crammed into ghettos before being transported hundreds of kilometres by freight train to extermination camps where, if they survived the journey, the majority of them were murdered in gas chambers.<ref>Johnson (1987), pp. 493–98.</ref> 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."<ref name=Berenbaum103>Berenbaum, Michael. ''The World Must Know," United States Holocaust Museum'', 2006, p. 103.</ref>

==== Migrations ====
[[File:Expulsion judios-en.svg|thumb|left|Expulsions of Jews in Europe from 1100 to 1600]]
Throughout Jewish history, Jews have repeatedly been directly or indirectly expelled from both their original homeland, the [[Place:Land of Israel|Land of Israel]], and many of the areas in which they have settled. This experience as refugees has shaped [[Social:Jewish identity|Jewish identity]] and religious practice in many ways, and is thus a major element of Jewish history.<ref>de Lange (2002), pp. 41–43.</ref> The patriarch [[Biography:Abraham|Abraham]] is described as a migrant to the land of [[Place:Canaan|Canaan]] from [[Religion:Ur of the Chaldees|Ur]] of the [[History:Chaldea|Chaldees]]<ref>Johnson (1987), p. 10.</ref> after an attempt on his life by King Nimrod.<ref>{{cite Jewish Encyclopedia|title=NIMROD|url=http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/11548-nimrod|first1=Emil G.|last1=Hirsch|first2=Max|last2=Seligsohn|first3=Wilhelm|last3=Bacher|authorlink3=Wilhelm Bacher}}</ref> His descendants, the Children of Israel, in the Biblical story (whose historicity is uncertain) undertook the Exodus (meaning "departure" or "exit" in Greek) from ancient Egypt, as recorded in the Book of Exodus.<ref>Johnson (1987), p. 30.</ref>
[[File:Vertreibung der Juden 1614.jpg|thumb|upright|Etching of the expulsion of the Jews from Frankfurt in 1614. The text says: "1380 persons old and young were counted at the exit of the gate".]]
[[File:Jewish refugees Liverpool 1882.jpg|thumb|Jews fleeing pogroms, 1882]]
Centuries later, [[Place:Assyria|Assyria]]n policy was to deport and displace conquered peoples, and it is estimated some 4,500,000 among captive populations suffered this dislocation over 3 centuries of Assyrian rule.<ref name="Smith-Christopher" /> With regard to Israel, Tiglath-Pileser III claims he deported 80&nbsp; of the population of Lower Galilee, some 13,520 people.<ref>Baruch Halpern, in Jerrold S. Cooper, Glenn M. Schwartz (eds.), [https://books.google.com/books?id=3hc1Yp0VcjoC&pg=PA311 ''The Study of the Ancient Near East in the Twenty-first Century: The William Foxwell Albright Centennial Conference,''] Eisenbrauns, 1996 p. 311.</ref> Some 27,000 Israelites, 20 to 25&nbsp; of the population of the Kingdom of Israel, were described as being deported by Sargon 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,<ref>Megan Bishop Moore, Brad E. Kelle, [https://books.google.com/books?id=Qjkz_8EMoaUC&pg=PA307 ''Biblical History and Israel S Past: The Changing Study of the Bible and History,''] Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, 2011 p. 307.</ref><ref>Sarah J. Dille, [https://books.google.com/books?id=NPoQkBwjnVcC&pg=PA81 ''Mixing Metaphors: God as Mother and Father in Deutero-Isaiah,''] A&C Black, 2004 p. 81</ref> Between 10,000 and 80,000 people from the [[History:Kingdom of Judah|Kingdom of Judah]] were similarly exiled by Babylonia,<ref name="Smith-Christopher">Daniel L. Smith-Christopher,[https://books.google.com/books?id=1YhMAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA31 ''The Religion of the Landless: The Social Context of the Babylonian Exile ,''] Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2015 pp. 30ff.</ref> but these people were then returned to Judea by Cyrus the Great of the Persian [[Place:Achaemenid Empire|Achaemenid Empire]].<ref>Johnson (1987), pp. 85–86.</ref>

Many Jews were exiled again by the Roman Empire.<ref>Johnson (1987), p. 147.</ref> The 2,000 year dispersion of the Jewish diaspora beginning under the Roman Empire,{{citation needed|date=March 2016}} as Jews were spread throughout the Roman world and, driven from land to land,{{citation needed|date=March 2016}} settled wherever they could live freely enough to practice their religion. Over the course of the diaspora the center of Jewish life moved from Babylonia<ref>Johnson (1987), p. 163.</ref> to the Iberian Peninsula<ref>Johnson (1987), p. 177.</ref> to Poland<ref>Johnson (1987), p. 231.</ref> to the United States<ref>Johnson (1987), p. 460.</ref> and, as a result of [[Social:Zionism|Zionism]], back to [[Place:Israel|Israel]].<ref name="Gartner431">Gartner (2001), p. 431.</ref>

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&nbsp;thousands were expelled from Austria. Many of these Jews settled in [[Place:East-Central Europe|East-Central Europe]], especially Poland.<ref name="Gartner 11-12">Gartner (2001), pp. 11–12.</ref> Following the [[Religion:Spanish Inquisition|Spanish Inquisition]] in 1492, the Spanish population of around 200,000 Sephardic Jews were expelled by the Spanish crown and Catholic church, followed by expulsions in 1493 in Sicily (37,000 Jews) and Portugal in 1496. The expelled Jews fled mainly to the [[Place:Ottoman Empire|Ottoman Empire]], the Netherlands, and [[Place:North Africa|North Africa]], others migrating to [[Place:Southern Europe|Southern Europe]] and the Middle East.<ref name="Johnson229-231">Johnson (1987), pp. 229–31.</ref>

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).<ref name="Johnson 1987, p. 306">Johnson (1987), p. 306.</ref> This contributed to the arrival of millions of Jews in the [[Earth:New World|New World]]. Over two million Eastern European Jews arrived in the United States from 1880 to 1925.<ref>Johnson (1987), p. 370.</ref>

In summary, the [[Social:Pogrom|pogrom]]s in Eastern Europe,<ref name="Johnson 1987, pp. 364–365"/> the rise of modern antisemitism,<ref name="Gartner 2001, pp. 213–5">Gartner (2001), pp. 213–15.</ref> the Holocaust,<ref>Gartner (2001), pp. 357–70.</ref> and the rise of Arab nationalism<ref>Johnson (1987), pp. 529–30.</ref> 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.<ref name="Gartner431" />

In the latest phase of migrations, the Islamic Revolution of Iran caused many Iranian Jews to flee Iran. Most found refuge in the US (particularly Los Angeles, California and Long Island, New York) and Israel. Smaller communities of Persian Jews exist in Canada and Western Europe.<ref>{{cite encyclopedia|last=Netzer|first=Amnon|editor=Fred Skolnik|encyclopedia=Encyclopaedia Judaica|title=Iran|edition=2d|year=2007|publisher=Thomson Gale|volume=10|location=Farmington Hills, Mich.|isbn=978-0-02-865928-2|page=13}}</ref> Similarly, when the Soviet Union collapsed, many of the Jews in the affected territory (who had been refuseniks) were suddenly allowed to leave. This produced a wave of migration to Israel in the early 1990s.<ref name="Dosick 2007, p. 340" />

==== Growth ====
[[File:Western Wall, Jerusalem, (16037897867).jpg|thumb|Praying at the Western Wall]]
Israel is the only country with a Jewish population that is consistently growing through natural 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, but [[Religion:Orthodox Judaism|Orthodox]] and Haredi Jewish communities, whose members often shun birth control for religious reasons, have experienced rapid population growth.<ref>Gartner (2001), pp. 400–01.</ref>

Orthodox and Conservative Judaism discourage proselytism to 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 principle Reform Judaism favors 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.<ref>Kaplan (2003), p. 301.</ref>

There is also a trend of Orthodox movements reaching out to secular Jews in order to give them a stronger [[Social:Jewish identity|Jewish identity]] so 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 the Baal teshuva movement) for secular Jews to become more religiously observant, though the demographic implications of the trend are unknown.<ref>{{cite book |doi=10.1002/9780470758014.ch27 |chapter=The 'Return' to Traditional Judaism at the End of the Twentieth Century: Cross-Cultural Comparisons |title=The Blackwell Companion to Judaism |year=2008 |last1=Danzger |first1=M. Herbert |pages=495–511 |isbn=978-0-470-75801-4 }}</ref> Additionally, there is also a growing rate of conversion to Jews by Choice of gentiles who make the decision to head in the direction of becoming Jews.<ref>de Lange (2002), p. 220.</ref>
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== Contributions ==
Jews have made many contributions to humanity in a broad and diverse range of fields, including the sciences, arts, politics, and business.<ref>{{cite book|last=Schwartz|first=Richard H.|title=Judaism and Global Survival|year=2001|publisher=Lantern Books|location=New York|isbn=1-930051-87-5|page=153}}</ref> For example, over 20&nbsp;percent<ref>{{cite book|last=Shalev|first=Baruch|title=100 Years of Nobel Prizes|year=2005|page=57|quote=A striking fact... is the high number of Laureates of the Jewish faith—over 20% of the total Nobel Prizes (138); including: 17% in Chemistry, 26% in Medicine and Physics, 40% in Economics and 11% in Peace and Literature each. These numbers are especially startling in light of the fact that only some 14&nbsp;million people (0.2% of the world's population) are Jewish.}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.jweekly.com/article/full/16556/as-the-nobel-prize-marks-centennial-jews-constitute-1-5-of-laureates/|title=As the Nobel Prize marks centennial, Jews constitute 1/5 of laureates|access-date=3 April 2012|last=Dobbs|first=Stephen Mark|date=12 October 2001|newspaper=j.|quote=Throughout the 20th century, Jews, more so than any other minority, ethnic or cultural group, have been recipients of the Nobel Prize—perhaps the most distinguished award for human endeavor in the six fields for which it is given. Remarkably, Jews constitute almost one-fifth of all Nobel laureates. This, in a world in which Jews number just a fraction of 1 percent of the population.}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.jewishbiography.com/biographies/list-of-jews/jewish-nobel-prize-winners/index.html|title=Jewish Nobel Prize Winners|access-date=25 November 2011}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|title=Judaism for dummies|chapter=28|year=2001|quote=Similarly, because Jews make up less than a quarter of one percent of the world's population, it's surprising that over 20 percent of Nobel prizes have been awarded to Jews or people of Jewish descent.|author1=Ted Falcon |author2=David Blatner |publisher={{wipe|John Wiley & Sons}}}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|title=The Central Liberal Truth: How Politics Can Change a Culture and Save It|author=Lawrence E. Harrison|page=102|year=2008|publisher=[[Organization:Oxford University Press|Oxford University Press]]|quote=That achievement is symbolized by the fact that 15 to 20 percent of Nobel Prizes have been won by Jews, who represent two tenths of one percent of the world's population.}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|title=The History of the Jewish People: Ancient Israel to 1880s America|page=1|year=2006|publisher=Behrman House, Inc.|quote=These accomplishments account for 20 percent of the Nobel Prizes awarded since 1901. What a feat for a people who make up only .2 percent of the world's population!|author1=Jonathan B. Krasner |author2=Jonathan D. Sarna}}</ref> of Nobel Prize laureates have been of Jewish descent, with multiple winners in each category.<ref>{{cite web|title=Jewish Nobel Prize Winners|url=http://www.jinfo.org/Nobel_Prizes.html|website=Jinfo.org|access-date=16 March 2016|quote=At least 194 Jews and people of half- or three-quarters-Jewish ancestry have been awarded the Nobel Prize, accounting for 22% of all individual recipients worldwide between 1901 and 2015, and constituting 36% of all US recipients during the same period. In the scientific research fields of Chemistry, Economics, Physics, and Physiology/Medicine, the corresponding world and US percentages are 26% and 38%, respectively. Among women laureates in the four research fields, the Jewish percentages (world and US) are 33% and 50%, respectively. Of organizations awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, 22% were founded principally by Jews or by people of half-Jewish descent. Since the turn of the century (i.e., since the year 2000), Jews have been awarded 25% of all Nobel Prizes and 28% of those in the scientific research fields.}}</ref>

== See also ==
* [[Social:Jewish studies|Jewish studies]]
* Lists of Jews
{{clear}}

== Notes ==
{{Reflist|group=note}}

== References ==
{{Reflist|refs=
<ref name="Jews-are-ethnoreligious-group">
* [https://books.google.com/books?id=V4qhTL61nXEC&pg=PA43&lpg=PA43&dq=jew+ethnic+mandla&ct=result&resnum=7 Ethnic minorities in English law]. Books.google.co.uk. Retrieved on 23 December 2010.
* {{cite journal|jstor=2573430|title=Jewish Ethno-Religious Involvement and Political Liberalism|author=Edgar Litt|journal=Social Forces|volume=39 |issue=4|year=1961|pages=328–32|doi=10.2307/2573430}}
* {{cite book|author=Craig R. Prentiss|title=Religion and the Creation of Race and Ethnicity: An Introduction|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ze30q1hm8uUC&pg=PA85|year=2003|publisher=NYU Press|isbn=978-0-8147-6700-9|pages=85–}}
* {{cite book|author=The Avraham Harman Institute of Contemporary Jewry The Hebrew University of Jerusalem Eli Lederhendler Stephen S. Wise Professor of American Jewish History and Institutions|title=Studies in Contemporary Jewry : Volume XVII: Who Owns Judaism? Public Religion and Private Faith in America and Israel: Volume XVII: Who Owns Judaism? Public Religion and Private Faith in America and Israel|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1wvahJv83AgC&pg=PA101|year= 2001|publisher=Oxford University Press, USA|isbn=978-0-19-534896-5|pages=101–}}
* {{cite book|author1=Ernest Krausz|author2=Gitta Tulea|title=Jewish Survival: The Identity Problem at the Close of the Twentieth Century; &#91;... International Workshop at Bar-Ilan University on the 18th and 19th of March, 1997&#93;|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=dnxv-Mlz0JIC&pg=PA90|publisher=Transaction Publishers|isbn=978-1-4128-2689-1|pages=90–}}
* {{cite book|author=John A. Shoup III|title=Ethnic Groups of Africa and the Middle East: An Encyclopedia: An Encyclopedia|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=GN5yv3-U6goC&pg=PA133|year=2011|publisher=ABC-CLIO|isbn=978-1-59884-363-7|page=133}}
* {{cite book|author=Tet-Lim N. Yee|title=Jews, Gentiles and Ethnic Reconciliation: Paul's Jewish identity and Ephesians|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=x4OwXhMOn5cC&pg=PA102|year=2005|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-1-139-44411-8|pages=102–}}
</ref>
}}

== Further reading ==
{{Refbegin|30em}}
* Baron, Salo Wittmayer (1952). ''A Social and Religious History of the Jews'', Volume II, ''Ancient Times'', Part II. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America.
* {{cite book|last=Carr|first=David R.|editor1-last=Neusner|editor1-first=Jacob|editor2-last=Avery-Peck|editor2-first=Alan J.|title=The Blackwell Companion to Judaism|year=2003|orig-year=2000|publisher=Blackwell Publishing|location=Malden, Massachusetts|isbn=1-57718-058-5|chapter=Judaism in Christendom}}
* {{cite book|last=Cowling|first=Geoffrey|title=Introduction to World Religions|publisher=First Fortress Press|location=Singapore|year=2005|isbn=0-8006-3714-3}}
* {{cite book|last=Dekmejian|first=R. Hrair|title=Patterns of Political Leadership: Egypt, Israel, Lebanon|publisher=State University of New York Press|year=1975|isbn=0-87395-291-X}}
* {{cite book|last=de Lange|first=Nicholas|title=An Introduction to Judaism|year=2002|orig-year=2000|publisher=Cambridge University Press|location=Cambridge|isbn=0-521-46073-5|url=https://archive.org/details/introductiontoju00nich}}
* {{cite book|last=Dosick|first=Wayne|title=Living Judaism|url=https://archive.org/details/livingjudaismcom00dosi|url-access=registration|year=2007|publisher=HarperCollins|location=New York|isbn=978-0-06-062179-7}}
* {{cite book|last=Elazar|first=Daniel J.|editor1-last=Neusner|editor1-first=Jacob|editor1-link=Jacob Neusner|editor2-last=Avery-Peck|editor2-first=Alan J.|title=The Blackwell Companion to Judaism|year=2003|orig-year=2000|publisher=Blackwell Publishing|location=Malden, Massachusetts|isbn=1-57718-058-5|chapter=Judaism as a Theopolitical Phenomenon}}
* {{cite book|last=Feldman|first=Louis H.|title=Judaism and Hellenism Reconsidered|year=2006|publisher=Brill|location=Leiden, The Netherlands|isbn=90-04-14906-6}}
* {{cite book|last=Gartner|first=Lloyd P.|title=History of the Jews in Modern Times|year=2001|publisher=Oxford University Press|location=Oxford|isbn=0-19-289259-2|url=https://archive.org/details/historyofjewsinm00gart}}
* {{cite book|last=Goldenberg|first=Robert|title=The Origins of Judaism: From Canaan to the Rise of Islam|year=2007|publisher=Cambridge University Press|location=Cambridge|isbn=978-0-521-84453-6}}
* {{cite book|last=Goldstein|first=Joseph|title=Jewish History in Modern Times|year=1995|publisher=Sussex Academic Press|isbn=1-898723-06-0}}
* {{cite book|last=Gould|first=Allan|title=What did they think of the Jews?|year=1991|publisher=J. Aronson|isbn=978-0-87668-751-2}}
* {{cite book|last=Johnson|first=Paul|title=A History of the Jews|year=1987|publisher=HarperCollins|location=New York|isbn=0-06-091533-1|url=https://archive.org/details/historyofjews00john}}
* {{cite book|last=Kaplan|first=Dana Evan|editor1-last=Neusner|editor1-first=Jacob|editor2-last=Avery-Peck|editor2-first=Alan J.|title=The Blackwell Companion to Judaism|year=2003|orig-year=2000|publisher=Blackwell Publishing|location=Malden, Massachusetts|isbn=1-57718-058-5|chapter=Reform Judaism}}
* {{cite book|last=Katz|first=Shmuel|title=Battleground: Fact and Fantasy in Palestine|year=1974|publisher=Taylor Productions|isbn=0-929093-13-5|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/battlegroundfact0000katz}}
* Lewis, Bernard (1984). ''The Jews of Islam''. Princeton: Princeton University Press. {{ISBN|0-691-00807-8}}
* Lewis, Bernard (1999). ''Semites and Anti-Semites: An Inquiry into Conflict and Prejudice''. W. W. Norton & Co. {{ISBN|0-393-31839-7}}
* {{cite journal|last=Littman|first=David|year=1979|title=Jews Under Muslim Rule: The Case Of Persia|journal=The Wiener Library Bulletin|volume=XXXII|issue=New series 49/50}}
* {{cite book|last=Neusner|first=Jacob|title=Studying Classical Judaism: A Primer|year=1991|publisher=Westminster John Knox Press|isbn=0-664-25136-6|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/studyingclassica0000neus}}
* Poliakov, Leon (1974). ''The History of Anti-semitism.'' New York: The Vanguard Press.
* Ruderman, David B. ''Early Modern Jewry: A New Cultural History'' (Princeton University Press; 2010) 326 pages. Examines print culture, religion, and other realms in a history emphasizing the links among early modern Jewish communities from Venice and Kraków to Amsterdam and Smyrna.
* {{cite book|last=Sharot|first=Stephen|editor1-last=Endelman|editor1-first=Todd M.|title=Comparing Jewish Societies|year=1997|publisher=University of Michigan Press|location=Ann Arbor, Mich.|isbn=0-472-06592-0|chapter=Religious Syncretism and Religious Distinctiveness: A Comparative Analysis of Pre-Modern Jewish Communities}}
* Stillman, Norman (1979). ''The Jews of Arab Lands: A History and Source Book''. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America. {{ISBN|0-8276-0198-0}}
* {{cite document |last1=Tausch |first1=Arno |title=The Effects of 'Nostra Aetate:' Comparative Analyses of Catholic Antisemitism More Than Five Decades after the Second Vatican Council |date=8 January 2018 |ssrn=3098079 }}
* {{cite book|last=Sweeney|first=Marvin A.|editor1-last=Neusner|editor1-first=Jacob|editor2-last=Avery-Peck|editor2-first=Alan J.|title=The Blackwell Companion to Judaism|year=2003|orig-year=2000|publisher=Blackwell Publishing|location=Malden, Massachusetts|isbn=1-57718-058-5|chapter=The Religious World of Ancient Israel to 586&nbsp;BCE}}
{{Refend}}

== External links ==
* {{Britannica|303358|Jew}}
* [https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/ Official website] of the [[Jewish Virtual Library]]
* [http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/ Official website] of the ''[[Jewish Encyclopedia]]''
* [http://www.worldjewishcongress.org/ Official website] of the World Jewish Congress
* [http://www.jewishagency.org/ Official website] of the Jewish Agency for Israel
* [https://www.jta.org/ Official website] of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency
* [http://cw.routledge.com/textbooks/0415236614/resources/indi.asp Maps related to Jewish history]
* {{Curlie|Society/Ethnicity/Jewish}}
* [https://www.jewishdatabank.org/databank Official website] of the Berman Jewish DataBank

[[Category:Judaism| ]]

{{Sourceattribution|Jews|1}}