Do you think Jews tend to be more intelligent than Christians on average?

Not at all. I’ve known smart Jews and ignorant Jews both, but I tend to determine intelligence based on how well I know the individual, not assumptions and generalizations based on religious affilation.

I am nominally a Christian and I don’t know any Jews in real life but Judaism seems to encourage critical thinking more than most religions and is very undogmatic. Perhaps this leads to ‘smartness’.

I am neither. But they all seem about the same to me.

Judaism does encourage learning and questioning even about they way Jews are to live, Education is highly valued and children are encouraged to work hard to learn what they need to know to get by in the world that in some ways sees or treats Jews as “different” or “strange” or worse. Jews are not endowed with any more raw intelligence than other people. As members of a minority, they may just learn that doing as well as they are capable is necessary to be accepted by those around them.

Humour has always been a part of Jewish life and it seems to have served well as part of the immigrant experience. Gentle, even self-deprecating humour often serves to disarm those people with aggressive attitudes, a useful survival skill as a member of a minority group.

The Judaic tradition is to study, question, challenge, and defend. Very few beliefs are accepted on faith alone. A rabbi isn’t the “shepherd” leading his “flock”; he’s hired by the congregation, holds a status that’s similar to that of a tenured university professor, and can expect to encounter dissent and conflict.

If a child’s trained, from a young age, to think analytically and defend his/her positions, that child has some marvelous skills for school and beyond.

Oh yes indeed! We are all brilliant and witty and did I mention modest as well?

Jewish people are taught to be inquisitive and to thoroughly argue issues of belief, life, philosophies, moralities. Christians are taught to believe that truth can be found in the word of God through the Bible and many stop there as far as questioning anything. The actual intelligence of the participants of either group probably follows similar curves.

Huh? No.

Dumbest person I’ve ever known was Jewish. Theory debunked~

Please define super smart.

^^^^^^ that is a great request. I’m not sure I can define super smart but it appears the others understand. All my life I’ve had opinions about who was smart and who was average . The second grader we all considered to be a brain I found on Facebook. He got a Ph.d from Michigan’s best university but I can’t think of the name of it since I’m not that smart. He is a true intellectual and just retired from teaching at a university in Tasmania. Good thing this is on Social .

I also want to add that opinions about who is smart are often determined by the dominant classes. Back at the turn of the last century, psychologists who were members of more established ethnic groups gave immigrant Jews intelligence tests and deemed that they were dumb. I’m Jewish and I tend to take pride in our reputation as smart (even though I know that stereotypes are not valid), so I sometimes like to remind myself that we weren’t always seen that way!

Well, @gailcalled is the smartest of all of us, and she’s Jewish. I guess that answers your question.
Sample of one is always conclusive, I learned that in skool.

Judaism has a long tradition of scholarliness and erudition. In Fiddler On The Roof, the main character Tevye (based on a character created by Yiddish writer Sholem Aleichem around 1884) sings:

If I were rich I’d have the time that I lack
To sit in the synagogue and pray,
And maybe have a seat by the Eastern Wall.
And I’d discuss the holy books with the learned men
Several hours every day!
That would be the sweetest thing of all!

If I Were a Rich Man 4:00–4:40

I find this such an asinine question…

I know lots of Jewish people, some pretty damn smart and some pretty damn dumb. While it is true that education and critical thinking have been traditionally encouraged in Jewish families, I find that it’s less common in the younger families I know. Probably most of the families I’m thinking of don’t strongly identify as Jewish first. They are mostly intermarried and secular, so Judaism is more of a cultural background than something foremost in their minds. They don’t really care about maintaining the cultural influence very much at this point (in the US.)

On average, yes. It explains for example why there are so many Jewish Nobel Prize winners in relation to the total number of Jews.

We also have to keep in mind that many Christians live in developing countries with malnourished pregnant women and malnourished babies and toddlers (especially in Africa but to some extend also in Latin America and Asia). This dramatically harms brain formation during the critical stage and therefore affects the overall statistics.