I honestly have no idea what some people have against Jews! Will you enlighten me?

Antisemitism predates Christianity as well. It was around in Greek and Roman times.

I might add to your support of Judaism that wherever the Jews are, there is a great influx of arts and culture. They lead the way in academic scholarship, scientific advancement, business and commerce, civil rights and social justice, etc etc. All the values inherent to a civilized society.

Moreover, Jews have lived in Europe as long as Christians have. There was a massive synagogue in Prague as early as 1200 C.E. So aren’t they just as much a part of ‘us’ as anyone?

“Otherness” and tribalism. Jews are a conspicuous group, with a unique culture. And because of their traditional emphasis on education, they are over-represented among the influential and the wealthy.

It’s easy to stir up resentment among the weak-minded, telling them they could succeed if the Jews (or immigrants, or blacks, or Muslims, etc.) were not working against them and getting unfair advantages.

“The chosen ones” makes a lot of people feel snubbed. People of power want that sort of status cut down.
Then too, Christians can be known to hate Jews for killing their Savior. Of course, it was supposedly that killing which made Jesus a Savior at all, but explain that to the devout deranged.

I know the historical answers but it does not compute in my mind. Never has.

They have been a target of hate in the past so they are now as well. It’s just that simple. History echoes into today and the hate fueled stories about them find a new audience because they are spread widely with no filter and presented as truth. People under the age of thirty or sometimes older have never been taught to find the truth of things in any systematic way. Many will never learn as an elder either so in their world misinformation and truth are hopelessly muddled together. If you can get to people when they are young there is a chance but the more ideological people become about things the more disconnected they are with reality. This makes them harder and harder to reach and sometimes it even makes them dangerous. For those who are angry and just need to feel the rush of having something to hate is one thing, they can probably be turned around. How do you deal with someone who has lost all sense of objectivity and has accepted their indoctrination into hate? The people who really believe what they are hearing are the dangerous ones IMO.

Why waste your time searching for rational explanations of ethnic hatred?

It’s simple. Jesus was a Jew. He completely bucked the system and called them out for overpricing goods to fellow Jews. Then he became very popular through miracles. The Jews wanted him gone before they lost power. They had the Romans kill him, and they really didnt even want to. So the Jews accepted guilt for all their generations.

That is the brief explanation. So some racists embrace all that and more as a reason to hate them. Other people, christians like me often, think they are the chosen of God, a blessed race, as Jesus was a Jew.

Now the thing is, not all Jews recognize Jesus as Messiah and son of God, but others do. The ones who do put on the prayer that apparently offended some people.

It’s a long-standing, complicated prejudice. Probably the Jews’ status as an exclusive ethno-religious group that refused to capitulate to conquerors’ rules and religions drew the ire of early peoples, like the Romans. Their refusal to convert to the “update” of their religion and the power of Matthew 27:25 and all it implies can explain much Christian hatred for them. Their historical position as handlers of money and wealth has always drawn resentment from people and a feeling that they have too much power. Ultimately I think the root of it all is that exclusivity, which causes them to be separated from the other peoples in the places they live in various ways, naturally breeds suspicion and resentment.

That is at least what I have gathered from my interest in history.

Catholics and Protestants have been known to lock horns, so it isn’t just the Jews.

Good question. I find it a most stupid reason that Christians hated Jews for killing Jesus.

As for Hitler and the Nazis it seemed because they were not of the Aryan race. I also think Nazis saw them as a threat because they would never bow down to an asshole like Hitler.

I have a feeling the Nazis then and the Nazis now also envied the Jews for reasons I’m not quite clear on yet.

The Jews have been a source of negative attention since Abraham.

See @Demosthenes. Best answer so far.

In the beginning, they were unusual in their monotheism, in an ancient world of polytheistic paganism. They started life as a militaristic conquering tribe, which I am sure made some people unhappy.

They were unyielding in their faith in their rules and doctrines which vexed the Romans. The Greeks thought that circumcision was peculiar. They got chased around the Middle East so much that they never really developed a tradition in farming. So they learned to make a living in the ways that they are sort of identified with.

The more negative attention they got, the more insular as a society they became until they gave the appearances of being willfully segregated and self interested.

As time went by, their “bad press” sort of followed them into Europe. And so on, and so on.

And that is why religion is so damn dangerous. It gives logic to hate, where there is none.

Atheists do a pretty good job of hating on Christians, and that without professing to having any “religion“!

I am surprised by those here who hold the Jews responsible for the killing of Jesus. Pope Benedict famously took issue with this rubbish Even if the Jews at the time were responsible, that says nothing about current day Jews.

Throughout history, people adopted the religion of their conquerors. Their gods had failed them, so they might as well scrap them for an obviously superior group of gods. The Jews confounded and annoyed people by refusing to let go of their religion, even after being conquered multiple times.

The Jews were largely forced to get involved with banking and money handling. Being barred from property ownership, they had limited alternatives. The abhorrence on the part of Christians of money lending provided a golden opportunity.

I am surprised by those here who hold the Jews responsible for the killing of Jesus.

They’re naming it as an example of “what some people have against Jews”, not themselves.

Did you read @KNOWITALL ’ s post? She does not directly contradict the notion that the Jews at the time were responsible for the death of Jesus. This needs to be called out. The whole idea is absurd. As Pope Benedict said, “How would it have been possible for the entire population to have been present at that moment to ask for the death of Jesus?”. What she does is provide a way out, by accepting Jesus, who was Jewish, as the Savior. The implication is that Jews can absolve themselves of guilt by converting to Christianity.

Yes, the Jews as Christ-killers was an excuse for violent pogroms against Jews in Russia and other places. It was the Romans who crucified Christ, not the Jews. And as @LostInParadise says, Jews became money lenders and bankers because in Europe in former times they were forbidden to own land. And then they were vilified for it, cf Shylock..

In Russia, Jewish young men who were impressed into the Czar’s army had to serve for 25 years which is why my grandfathers both came to the US as young men.

Well, christians have historically blamed them for killing jesus, and have, over the centuries, constructed a continent spanning system of self-reinforcing propaganda and oppression against them.
For example, the whole crap about them being bankers and money loving is a direct result of the medieval christian guild system explicitly banning Jews from pursuing other professions.

@snowberry People can be haters. The difference between atheists being haters is they have to come up with their own unique bullshit excuse for hating.
Religions, on the other hand, provide excuses whole cloth for thousands and thousands of people. They don’t even have to think for themselves. Preachers can stand in the pulpit and preach hate. I’ve never known one who did, by they are out there.
Atheists don’t get together in groups (that I know of) to discuss philosophies like organized religion does. Atheists don’t say “OK, people. This is how you need to think. This is what you have to believe.”

Like the song says, “tradition.”

We are a small group, easy to pick on. We are stereotyped as wealthy (plenty of poor Jews, but statistically we actually do do better than average) and the stereotype is that we are making our money by being awful to others, so we are easily hated when economic conditions are difficult.

In modern times in America a lot of Jewish lawyers fought for civil rights, the South didn’t like that, and Jewish lawyers often work with minorities still on the civil rights front. Working for the LBGT community, African American, Hispanic. Of course their are plenty of lawyers who are not Jewish doing the same, but we get more noticed I think. Ironically, the black community has more antisemitism then you would think. I don’t mean it’s the majority, I don’t mean that at all, but just that it exists. We can get grouped in with doctors they don’t trust, slumlords, and other negative stereotypes.

In the Philippines where 90% or more of the population are Catholics, you would see elaborate re-enactments of Jesus’ suffering and death during Holy Week.

( real crucifixions just short of killing the idiot who thinks it’s awesome to play Jesus! )

There would be a few guys dressed as Roman soldiers wearing scary looking masks. The weird thing is the Filipinos for centuries probably had called them not Romans, not centurions not anything else but guess what…they call them “hudyo” aka Jews.

The scoundrels, the despicable Spaniards who ruled the islands for more than 300 years did a great job keeping the locals ignorant and totally clueless.

@LostInParadise I answered the question, but I didn’t say I agreed.

It’s in the bible, as everyone knows who recently discussed this another thread, where the link to the bible verse was posted.

I also never commented on anyone accepting Jesus and being absolved, are you insane? Geesh, learn to read.

Are you saying that the Jews are not responsible for the death of Jesus? I dare you to agree.

@Lost How would I know, I wasnt alive then.

You know you could read the actual bible, not just Catholic condensed version lol

Intereresting

@KNOWITALL but you do know, and you don’t have to have been alive then to know—that was @LostInParadise‘s point. I’m assuming you were focused on a pithy-sounding comeback, but your statement also implies that you believe it’s possible to blame an entire ethnic group for the death of a single person. Why give that sort of idea breathing room?

@Soubresaut I wasnt there, its heresay.

If certain groups of people believe the Jewish elder accepted guilt on all their generations, as a literal interpretation, that’s their choice. I’m not going to defend it because I dont interpret the whole bible to mean that.

But it doesn’t matter that you weren’t there. Based on the character of the statement—that an entire ethnic group is responsible for the death of one man—we know it can’t be true.

We also know that this explanation isn’t a “legitimate reason” for the prejudice this question asked about. It’s a rationalization. Prejudice isn’t built on “reasons,” but it does like to find rationalizations to give the hate, mistreatment, etc., a guise of respectability, a guise of “What can I do? It’s just the way things are!”

(We don’t have to go farther, though if we do, others have pointed out that the evidence we have goes against the claim itself and the notion that this was where the prejudice began.)

To be clear, I know you don’t personally hold those feelings. But it just seems to me that by saying you weren’t there so you can’t know, by saying it’s “their choice” to believe this or not, you are defending the prejudice that leans on this explanation, even if inadvertently, by treating this explanation as a valid “reason” to have those feelings.

@Soubresaut I dont label people good or bad for how they feel. We are all allowed to feel anything we want.

Some people take the bible very literally, others do not. If the Jewish elders said they accepted their guilt forever and someone today wants to use that to justify their hate, is is their choice. I dont have to agree or judge them for that, thats Gods job not mine.