Jew (word)
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The
Etymology
Yehudi in the Hebrew Bible
According to the
The term Yehudi (יְהוּדִי) occurs 74 times in the
- "There was a man a Yehudi (Jewish man) in Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, had exiled."
The name appears in the Bible as a verb in Esther 8:17 which states:
- "Many of the people of the land became Yehudim (in the generic sense) (מִתְיַהֲדִים, mityahadim) because the fear of the Yehudim fell on them."
In some places in the Talmud the word Israel(ite) refers to somebody who is Jewish but does not necessarily practice Judaism as a religion: "An Israel(ite) even though he has sinned is still an Israel(ite)" (Tractate Sanhedrin 44a). More commonly the Talmud uses the term Bnei Yisrael, i.e. "Children of Israel", ("Israel" being the name of the third patriarch Jacob, father of the sons that would form the twelve tribes of Israel, which he was given and took after wrestling with an angel, see Genesis 32:28–29[2]) to refer to Jews. According to the Talmud then, there is no distinction between "religious Jews" and "secular Jews."
In
Development in European languages
The
Most European languages have retained the letter "d" in the word for "Jew". Etymological equivalents are in use in other languages, e.g. Jude in German, judeu in Portuguese, jøde in Danish and Norwegian, judío in Spanish, jood in Dutch. In some languages, derivations of the word "Hebrew" are also in use to describe a Jew, e.g., Ebreo in Italian and Spanish, Ebri / Ebrani (Persian: عبری/عبرانی) in Persian and Еврей Yevrey in Russian.[3] (See List of Jewish ethnonyms for a full overview.) The German word Jude ([ˈjuːdə]) is cognate with the Yiddish word for "Jew", Yid.[4]
Jewish dictionary definitions and etymologies
According to the Klein dictionary by rabbi Ernest Klein, the Hebrew word for Jew, Judean, or Jewish Hebrew: יְהוּדִי which is "yehudi" in Hebrew orig. meant 'member of the tribe Judah', later also 'member of the Kingdom of Judah'. When after the conquest of the Kingdom of Israel by the Assyrians in 722 B.C.E. only the Kingdom of Judah survived, yehudi יֽהוּדִי came to denote 'Jew', resp. 'Jewish'. cp. 'Judaic', 'Jew', 'Chueta' and 'Yiddish'.[5]
According to rabbi Marcus Jastrow's dictionary, yehudi is defined as "worshipper of one God" and rejecting idolatry.
Meg. 12b קרי ליה י׳ אלמא מיהודה וכ׳ he is called Y'hudi (Esth. II, 5), which would indicate that he belongs to the tribe of Judah, and yet he is called ish y'mini &c.?, v. נִימוֹס. Ib. 13a ... ואמאי י׳ ... שכל הכופר בע"ז נקרא י׳ but why is he designated as Y'hudi? Because he disowned idolatry; for whosoever disowns idolatry, is called a Jew (ref. to Dan. III, 12); Esth. R. to II, 5 לפי שייחד ... נקרא י׳ לומר י׳ יחירי because he professed the unity of God, he was called Y'hudi, meaning to say, a Y'hudi, a believer in One God.
— Marcus Jastrow, Jastrow's Dictionary[6]
Modern use
In
Perception of offensiveness
The word Jew has been used often enough in a disparaging manner by
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.[13]
References
- ^ Cf. Marcus Jastrow's Dictionary of the Targumim, Talmud Babli, Talmud Yerushalmi and Midrashic Literature, and the source he used: Megilla 13a:2 (Talmud).
- ^ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2005-11-29. Retrieved 2005-07-07.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) - ISBN 0-8386-3660-8.
- ISBN 0-87779-809-5.
- ^ Klein, Ernest. "Klein Dictionary, יְהוּדִי 1". www.sefaria.org. Sefaria. Retrieved 8 October 2023.
- ^ Jastrow, Marcus. "Jastrow's Dictionary". www.sefaria.org. Sefaria. Retrieved 8 October 2023.
- ^ "Yellow Star; 'Jude'". The National Holocaust Centre and Museum. 8 February 2015.
- ISBN 978-0-8173-5563-0.
- ISBN 978-1-60473-188-0.
- ^ Sales, Ben (October 5, 2020). "'Jew' isn't a slur. You don't have to avoid saying it". The Washington Post.
- ^ Oppenheimer, Mark (April 22, 2017). "Reclaiming 'Jew'". The New York Times.
- ^ "Jew down". American Jewish Committee. 30 March 2021. Retrieved 23 March 2024.
- ISBN 978-0-618-60499-9.