what is the basis of anti-semitism.why does it still exist to-day?

Answer 1

Anti-semitism predates Christianity by millenia. The causes for pre-Christian anti-semitism were basically as follows:

1. Jews' strong cultural identity, insular lifestyle, and discouragement of converts.

2. Jewish "atheism", if you can believe that. In ancient times, worshiping a god of your choice did not mean that you rejected other gods or denied their existence. You could still occasionally worship other people's gods, particularly if you were a guest, out of courtesy. By being exclusive in their worship, Jews offended the prevailing norms of social grace. Although there were monotheistic religions before the development of Judaism -- such as the Egyptian cult of Aten, for example -- Judaism was the first major tradition which demanded exclusivity from its followers (I will worship only MY god, no matter what), derided other gods (My god is a strong god and your god is a wimp), and finally evolved to deny the existence of other gods (pure monotheism). A lot of people in the ancient times found this offensive.

3. Gentiles in the ancient times, as well as many Jewish scholars, interpreted the story of Abraham and Isaac as a prohibition against human sacrifice. People who practiced human sacrifice or whose founding mythology involved human sacrifice found this insulting.

4. The weirdness of the Jewish religion. Most people in the ancient times had a god for every tiny little thing. Rivers and lakes were gods. A spring or even a very big boulder could be a god. Having only one deity for everything seemed stupid. The conceptual difficulty of Judaism -- a religion worshiping a god who could not be named or depicted, and was simultaneously referred to as "they" and "the One" -- was extremely frustrating to outsiders. A platitude, I know -- but people hate what they can't understand.

PS: To address the answer that made a comment about money-lending. Jews did not practice money lending exclusively, nor were they the major money lenders in the Middle Ages. The major bankers and pawn brokers -- and the ones who invented compounded interest and all that other great stuff -- were actually northern Italians, Catholics -- notably the Florentines, the Siennese, and the Lombards. (In fact, to this day in some languages, the word for "pawn shop" is simply "lombard".) They were the biggest loan sharks -- but, needless to say, they had an obvious interest in encouraging, cultivating and exploiting anti-semitism in order to deflect people's anger from themselves towards those whose position was always precarious and who did not have any rights.

Answer 2

Okay I can answer this because I did a school report on this. Anti-semitism has been around since basically the beginning of time and one of the main reasons was that it was a competition between Judaism and Christianity. During the time of the Holocaust, a lot of Israelites were trying to seek refuge in the US, but FDR shut off immigration completely, so that taught a lot of America to hate and discriminate against the Jews. It still exists today because America is a fairly new country, and it's still growing, and people haven't quite learned to accept change and diversity yet.

Answer 3

Its because they are the ones that came up with interest and subsequently compounded interest. They own many banks and of course they displaced millions of people when Israel was created in 1948. They are very savvy politically and have a lot of power.

Answer 4

It's claimed it all stems from the early church when it was said the Jews killed Christ. That just seems laughable to me since Christ was a Jew too!

Answer 5

I don't know