#goyim

[psychologeek]

Also, a quick NP:

Most of what people call "Ashkenazi" isn't ACTUALLY Ashkenazi!!!

(Do you do Netilat Yadayim before Kidush? If not, sorry - not real Ashkenazi, buddy...)

"Ashkenaz" אשכנז was an area, including most of modern day germany and some parts of France. (Though most France jews would be known as Franks פרענק).

But most of the eastern Jews (AKA 92% of the 3 m jews in the biggest Jewish community, in Poland) were murdered. So, you know.

Speaking as an Israeli (I understand that in USA this is different, bc most communities are Ashkenazi. While 5 minutes walk from my home I have synagogues of Kuchin, Persian, Yemeni, and Ashkenazi. Also most people my generation are mixed, one way or another.)

This is even more frustrating when you realise that "Ashkenazi" refers to set of traditions. And those traditions are passed down paternaliy (from father to children).

So you can have, for example, someone with a very dark skin who is Ashkenazi, and a blond-with-blue-eyes person who's Edda (set of traditions) is Morrocan, Yemeni, Kuchin, or Ethiopian.

So yes, my grand-niece (not sure if this the accurate title) is mostly Yemeni, with great-grandparents also from Morocco and Tunisia - but her great-great-grandpa was born in Germany (1901), so she can't eat Kitniyot... 🤷🤷🤦🏽‍♀️

“can ashkenazi jews ever be white?” is honestly a question that should require 12 ashkenazi jews, a panel of historians & sociologists, and three consecutive business days in a conference room, but goyim often feel comfortable saying “Yeah obviously source: my beautiful brain.” infuriating!

[humusboii2thereturnoftheking]

There's a clear effort by malicious actors to paint Judaism and its teachings as something evil or bigoted in an effort to demonize it. If you've ever encountered such a person or are just willing to educate yourself a little, this one is for you.

[coffeelovinggayidiot]

I'm honestly heartbroken that someone, a friend of mine for the last year and a half, had to have me Explain to them multiple times that the word Goy isn't a slur.

[golem-brigadier]

When people, especially pro-pal revisionists, like to ignore that it's very common for regions to have multiple names, just look at Germany and Japan.

[changeling-droneco]

Hey few super quick question from a goy wanting to show support

is it okay for a goy to wear the yellow ribbon for bring them home? I wanna show support and I figure this is a good way now that I have some spare cash but I don't want to step on any toes accidentally

If it's fine, do you have any like, recs for where to get it? There's a lot of choices and I wanna make sure I get one that's good quality that has the money going to a good cause (whether it be for a jewish museum, or just to give a jewish artist a few more bucks) I'm probably going to get at least two, one for my pinboard, if it's fine

Are there any other like, pins or symbols in use that I haven't seen that are important or in use that goyim can use? Especially if it's a symbol for palestine and israel peace. A lot of it uses the star of david which is very cool but feels very much not my place.

[spale-vosver]

Every time goyim bring up "well ackchually the Bible doesn't SAY man it says YOUNG BOY" I go a little more crazy because

1) that's the Greek translation, which is NOT THE ORIGINAL

2) the assumption that we as religious Jews must 100% follow the law of the Torah today as they were written is incredibly reductive and Christocentric

3) they're not actually interested in critically engaging with religious material beyond using it as a "gotcha"

[elder-millennial-of-zion]

Having conversations with my intelligent, well read, well meaning non-Jewish friends who assume that everyone is as intelligent and well read and well meaning as they are 😆

“Of course October 7 was horrible. But Netanyahu’s response-"

"Do you have any idea how many leftists think October 7 was a good thing and simultaneously a false flag?”

"Wait, what?"

[ind1g3n0us-lev1t3]

@elenajones23 first of all, who are you, a non Jew to lecture me about what my religion does or doesn’t allow? Who are you to tell me, as someone who doesn't practice the same religion, that I can or cannot do things?

The Torah isn’t a simple set of guidelines and commands, it’s far more complex than that. It has different interpritations, so saying the torah doesn't allow it is blatantly false. The name "Zion" (Promised land) is mentioned 154 times.

“It isn’t your land and it never was your land” bullshit.

We absolutely do have a land, if we don't, then why do we have holy sights in Jerusalem? Why are names like "Jaffa" and "Haifa" Hebrew?

The land of Israel is where my ancestors came from, it is where they lived, it is where they had a connection to, and it is where they suffered under the romans and were exiled.

We were never welcomed in Europe, we were never welcomed in the rest of the middle east.

These are ancient scrolls called the "Dead sea scrolls" which are a set of ancient Jewish writings dating from the 3rd century BCE.

This is all of what remains of our ancient temple, this is what it once was:

The first temple is Solomon's temple, the second one is Herod's temple, which was destroyed in 70CE by the romans. centuries later, the Muslim caliphates built the Al Aqsa mosque which was built on top of our temple mount. Today, the west wall is all we have left of this historic holy place.

The name "Palestine" was given to the land of Israel by roman colonisers who exiled most of us from the land of Israel, took many of us slaves, and scattered everyone else through western Europe (Some moved further east).

Now about the Nazis = Zionist argument. The Nazis originally made a deal with German Zionist Jews (The Haavara agreement) to bring about a mass migration from Germany to Israel, it should be mentioned that this was because Hitler and the Nazis wanted a Jew-Free Europe, not because the Nazis supported Zionism.

This deal was criticized by both Nazis and Zionists. Zionist criticised it because it made a deal with the devil, and the Nazis criticised it because it went against their philosophy.

The Nazis were extremely antizionist, the belief that they were Zionists is soviet cold war propaganda to demonise the state of Israel and the broader Jewish community. They believed that Jews were biologically incapable of running their own state and were too inferior. Hitler had a "Palestinian" friend (Amin al-Husseini) who campaigned in Berlin, fought for a Palestinian state, and even CONTRIBUTED TO THE HOLOCAUST. They also lead a boycott of Jewish businesses in "Palestine".

So, you're wrong. So very very wrong. You can try to lecture me about the history of my own people and religion all you want, but you're wrong.

Please, kindly fuck off and read a history book. Please attend a Synagogue service and learn more about our religion before you come spewing false bullshit about it.

[the-garbanzo-annex-jr]

[unsolicited-opinions]

I'd like to try to clear up chronic (sometimes willful) misunderstandings about the words "goy" and "goyim."

I think the confusion is mostly from the assumptions of cultural Christians and cultural Muslims that Jewish culture shares Christian/Muslim views of other religions - so most of this is about how each of those religious traditions regards peoples of other faiths.

(Jews, Christians, Muslims - I'd welcome comments if I have misrepresented facts about Christian or Muslim belief/history and would welcome elaborating comments)

(TLDR version: Christians and Muslims sometimes assume "goy" is derisive because "infidel" and "kafir", their terms for those who don't share their faith, are derisive.)

Where does "goy" or "goyim" come from?

In the Torah (the first four books of what Christians call The Old Testament), in the book of Bereshit (בְּרֵאשִׁית‎), which Christians call Genesis, appears the first known written use of the Hebrew word for "nations," and that word is "goyim."

The first recorded usage of goyim occurs in Genesis 10:5 and applies to non-Israelite nations. The first mention of goy in relation to the Israelites comes in Genesis 12:2, when God promises Abraham that his descendants will form a goy gadol ("great nation")

If you like, you can see many translations of what Christians call Genesis 10:5 here.

You'll see that translators to English sometimes translate "goy" as "gentile," a word which comes from Latin and describes someone outside of one's own tribe/clan/nation. To me, that's often not a particularly bothersome translation. (I'm trying to be mindful of my own biases as a GenX USAmerican who has lived in the diaspora his entire life. I think most of my generation of US Jews was taught that "gentile" was an inoffensive word to describe non-Jews in most contexts.)

Other Christian translations, however, sometimes translate goy/goyim as "heathen"/"heathens," which does not generally align with Jewish thinking about other faiths. So for this to make sense we need to touch briefly on how Jewish thought views Jews and how it other religions.

Okay, how do Jews regard themselves in relation to other peoples and religions?

You've probably heard that Jews call themselves "The Chosen People," and you've almost certainly heard misinformation/disinformation about what that means. You've probably seen it suggested that Judaism regards Jews as superior to non-Jews. This 100% false assertion is profoundly dangerous. There is no Jewish supremacy in Judaism.

What being Chosen means to religious Jews is that Jewish people have a covenant with God which requires of them special responsibilities which other peoples are not obliged to observe. Religious Jews believe God chose the Jews to obey the commandments of the Torah, and that the Jews, in turn, chose the Torah. These resulting special responsibilities do not make the Jews more loved by God than other peoples and they do not privilege Jews over other peoples.

Jewish thought explicitly regards peoples/faiths which share the values of the Noahide laws as "rightious." Roughly, these are the Noahide laws:

Don't  worship idols (worship God only)

Don't curse God (don't desecrate the holy)

Don't commit murder

Don't commit adultery or incest

Don't steal

Don't eat flesh torn from a living animal (animal cruelty is bad)

Establish courts of justice

These values are nearly universal among the world's major religions. Christianity and Islam share these values.

Sidebar: One could certainly argue that religious Jews might prefer the Muslim prohibition of visual idols to what looks in Hinduism (to religious and uninformed Jewish eyes) like rampant idolotry, but any serious study of incredibly complex and varied Hindu practices reveals that Hinduism is certainly not idolotry when seen from inside its own belief system.

So the broadly held view of the overwhelming majority of the world's Jews is that God loves non-Jews and regards them as rightious if they are ethical and moral in how they interact with other human beings. They are Chassiddei Umot ha-Olam, pious people of the world. The Jewish word for non-Jews simply means "other peoples of earth" or "non-Jews." Theres no judgment or condemnation in it. There's no Jewish drive to make the world Jewish, to convert non-Jews to Judaism, or to condemn people of other faiths for being something other than Jewish. Such behaviors are forbidden. (I'd like to note here that I have seen video of ultra-orthodox haredi in Israel insulting and spitting on Christians. This is wrong, upsetting, and disgusting. Most Israelis and most Jews condemn such behavior. All fundamentalist movements, in my view, suck, including such haredi. They represent Jews as much as the Westboro Baptist Church represents Christians.)

Okay, but aren't Christians also okay with other religions?

Many forms of Christianity require Christians to proselytize, to "spread the good news" and to convert non-Christians to Christianity whenever possible. Many kinds of Christianity regard this as the greatest of good deeds, because non-Christians are doomed to the eternal torment of Hell, so if they offend a non-Christian with their efforts to convert, it's for the non-Christian's own good. In some places and times, conversion to Christianity was forced. (A huge topic for another time.) Generally, Christianity regards other religions as false and wrong, even if they are pro social, share similar values, and are not a threat to Christianity. Non-Christians (including the Jews from whom Christians drew their monotheism, Muslims who share their monotheism, and competing Christian movements) have been referred to by Christians as unbelievers and infidels.

Where "goy" simply means "non-Jew," "Infidel" does not simply mean "non-Christian." It is unquestionably a judgement and a condemnation.

How do Muslims regard other faiths?

In the same way that most Christians believe that faith in their Christ is the only way to attain the kingdom of heaven, polls show that a majority of Muslims worldwide believe that Islam is the only path to heaven.

Muslims say that Islam is the only religion that leads to eternal life in heaven in most countries surveyed in the Middle East and North Africa, including Egypt (96%), Jordan (96%), Iraq (95%), Morocco (94%) and the Palestinian territories (89%). Somewhat smaller majorities take this view in Lebanon (66%) and Tunisia (72%).

Muslim culture has its own specialized word for non-Muslims, "kafir." The Quran uses the word to describe early polytheistic antagonists of the Islamic movement and some verses stress the difference between kafir which are hostile to Islam and kafir who are not. Later, the word was used for any non-Muslim and became derisive.

In 2019, Nahdlatul Ulama, a large organization of Indonesian Sunni Muslims, called for their co-religionists worldwide to cease using the word.

“When someone calls you a kafir, that means you’re considered someone who is godless,” said Alex Arifianto, an Indonesian political scientist with the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore.

“Or you’re someone whose religion is considered inferior to the Islamic belief,” he said. “That’s why this is so significant. The largest Muslim organization in the world is saying, ‘Look, we have to treat non-Muslims as equals.’”

So if "goy" simply means "non-Jew" without condemnation or judgment, why are so many Christians and Muslims ready to believe that the word is derisive?

Bluntly, it's because the Christian and Muslim words for those who do not share their faith (Infidel and kafir) are derisive, are judgemental, and are condemning. Cultural Christians and Cultural Muslims assume that these elements of their faith and culture have clear analogs in Jewish thought. Here's the thing: They don't.

You're saying that Jews have never used "goy," "goyim," or "goyishe" derisively?

Absolutely not! I can't and won't pretend that theres no tribalistic bigotry in Jewish history. Jews learned over the last 2000 years to expect better and fairer treatment from other Jews than they'd expect from gentiles, and that shows up in language. "Goy" has unquestionably been used derisively. One of my Yiddish-speaking grandparents said that a "goyishe kop" (gentile head) was someone who didn't think ahead, or who lacked compassion, and that's undoubtedly a derisive use. It's beyond question that "goy" can be used derisively, I'm only arguing that this is the exception, not the rule.

(In the only Jewish nation on earth, the political, social, legal, and religious freedoms of the 20% of Israeli citizens are not Jewish...are identical to the rights of Jewish citizens- because that's a Jewish value.)

As for me, I don't use "goy" in mixed Jewish/gentile company because I live in a very pluralistic society and do not wish to inadvertently give offense, even if that offense is rooted in someone else's misunderstanding of my heritage. That's my choice.

At the same time, I have not with my own ears ever heard a Jew I know use the word derisively.

Your mileage may vary, your practices may vary, your experiences may vary. I have lived my entire life as a 2% minority in a majority Christian country where diasporan Jewish culture evolved to take pains to avoid insulting the majority and that is not a universal Jewish experience.

The hill I'll die on here is that unlike in Christian and Islamic thought, Jews do not regard the people of other faiths as inferior, wrong, broken, or in need of rescue.

Jews do not attempt to convince goyim to become Jews, Jews do not preach to gentiles from Jewish scripture or attempt to force them to pray as Jews pray. Jews do not believe that goyim are cursed, doomed, or unloved by God.

Those are Christian and Muslim takes on Infidels and Kuffaar, not Jewish takes on goyim.

Lastly, please know this: Christianity and Islam both took their basis from Judaism, but discarded many fundamental Jewish values.

The disrespect, condemnation, disparagement and disenfranchisement which Muslim and Christian nations and cultures have inflicted on those they called(/call) Infidels and Kuffaar were not derived from their Jewish origins.

[artisanalgoats]

The only people on my dash who genuinely post those old-style posts about punching Nazis are the goyim who don't engage with jumblr, which is. hm. I have feelings about it.

[brantheblessed]

"Goy" and "goyim" are slurs when uttered by Jews.

[golem-brigadier]

[zogdawg]

The most pathetic, scummiest, retard beings on this planet throw the most projecting insults towards me and expect me to feel sad. Like nigga hug your mom 😅🤣

[changeling-droneco]

I dunno if anyone's made this comparison yet but the sheer amount of hatred and anger and "protesting" the survivors of the Nova massacre gives me the exact same vibes of the people who were hating and angry and "protesting" the parents of the Sandy Hook shooting, it feels like every time I see it, it's just the exact same talking points and level of cruelty but with a reskin of thousands of years of antisemitic talking points. Straight down to the talk of it just being propaganda.

[aitiuilghrain]

An political cartoon, published in 1898 in the French

humor magazine Le Rire, depicts a caricatured Rothschild holding the world in his hands.

C. Léandre