Once a Jew, always a Jew?

[DavidDvorkin]

In the U.S.A., six million people call themselves Jews, but 22% of them say they have no religion. Many are atheists. In what sense are they Jews? I say, in no sense at all.

http://www.dvorkin.com/oajew/

[trotsky]

1. An interesting question.

Given that there are also people who identify as "culturally Catholic" - what does that mean, exactly? If you participate in religious ritual or ceremony without believing in the supernatural elements that the true believers embrace, what does that make you?

I don't know. I grew up Lutheran but have nothing to do with churches anymore. I can begin to imagine going through the motions so as not to rock the boat with family, but beyond that, it's perplexing.

[DavidDvorkin]

2. Thank you for the thoughtful reply

I'm getting a very different type of response elsewhere on DU.

[muriel_volestrangler]

3. Honestly, I think you'd do better if your replies weren't "that's in the book"

Are you willing to talk about this subject here, or do we really need to buy it first?

[DavidDvorkin]

4. I'm willing to discuss things here

At the time, though, I was drained from the last-push effort on the book, and I felt that a lot of the questions were dismissals, hostile in many cases.

I don't know how feasible it would be to respond fully, compared to the longish discussions I have in the book of the various objections. But you're right. I should try.

[muriel_volestrangler]

6. Do you think it's possible to have no ethnicity at all?

Most people would argue that 'Jewish' is also an ethnicity, and that is what secular Jews are referring to. Are you saying that their ethnicity is German, British, Russian or whatever? Or do some people have no ethnicity (which might be argued, including with people with a very mixed ancestry and no particular inherited customs, I suppose)?

[Warren Stupidity]

7. Roma.

Their ethnicity and religion is also intertwined. A displaced people with a tribal religion.

[DavidDvorkin]

8. What I contend

is that secular Jews in America (the group the book is about) are Americans. If you want to call that an ethnicity, I'm okay with that. I point out that they have nothing in common with, say, ultra-Orthodox (Haredi) Jews in Brooklyn or Jerusalem, or Falashas in Ehtiopia, etc. They have pretty much everything in common with their non-Jewish neighbors, however. I can't see how it makes any sense for them to consider themselves Jewish ethnically.

[rug]

5. This writer addressed that question.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1218212079

Why do you call it babble?

[DavidDvorkin]

9. Because he doesn't address the question

Instead, he offers a word salad.

I've read a lot of similar stuff by people to whom certain religious traditions offer warm, fuzzy comfort connected with their upbringing. That's all it boils down to, to my ear.

[rug]

10. To my ear, he directly answers the nonreligious aspect of Jdaism.

For my colleague, a non-Jew, one is either religious or an atheist. Even more baffling to him was when he learned that, as a totally nonreligious Jew, I helped found a synagogue (IKAR), am married to IKAR’s founding president and executive director, revel in the study of Talmud, celebrate Shabbat dinner every Friday night, attend services almost every Shabbat morning, and regularly vacation with my rabbi and her family. The fact that atheism hasn’t diminished my deep connection to the Jewish tradition, people or even practice seemed utterly incongruous to him. But hardest of all for my colleague to understand was how my evolution into atheism has actually enhanced my enjoyment of Judaism over the years.

It's far from babble or word salad.

[DavidDvorkin]

11. To me, it says nothing

He should read my book.

[rug]

12. That's not a bad isea. It would be a friutful exchange.

[DavidDvorkin]

13. I would welcome it

But I don't expect it.