can someone give me a brief summary about anti-semitism and it's origins?

Question

i have to write a very long essay about anti-semitism and i just need some help.
thank you

Answer 1

European antisemitism has a lot to do with dark age Catholic prohibition of moneylending at a profit.

In the dark ages, catholics could not make loans. So, only jews provided loans, while being excluded from many other occupations. They made money from having a virtual monopoly on banking which quickly became more profitable than many occupation they were excluded from.

Once jews were firmly entrenched in banking, they were reluctant to take on other more menial and less lucrative tasks, like blacksmithing. Also, with more banking experience, Jews were better able to discern credit risks than any other lending upstarts.

So, reforms, when attempted, often failed.

This is but one very small piece of the puzzle. Good luck.

Answer 2

It depends on the context of which you speak. Every culture which has been deemed anti-semetic has its reasons. A Semite is an ethnic catagory shared by most middle eastern people. The Arabs are Semetic peoples as well as the hebrews.

If your speaking of anti-semitism within a religious conflict there hasn't been much over the centuries. Convert from judaism and for the most part you were fine, excluding the inquisition. Theoretically if Israel were to become an Islamic nation tommorow then this crap in the middle east would stop. Religiously motivated.

Now if your talking about the persecution due to being a Semetic person as was Hitler, then this is a racial issue and did doesn't matter what you believe, the other doesn't want you to exist.

The religious break between Judaism and Christianity was politically motivated. Constantine the Great had a real bone to pick with the Jews (as did many Roman Emporers, and separated Christianity from Judaism, as they looked almost identical until then, to have a conduit in which to chop the residents of Palistine down. This evolved into a church doctrine with the fall of the Roman Empire. Why? Because when things go wrong you need a scape goat and the Jews were the best candidate for it.

Answer 3

This should be good. This may be the first time I will try to read all answers. I come from a Catholic family and I've tried to discover the origins of anti-semitism for 40 years without success.

Good luck.

Answer 4

While Jews have been persecuted for centuries the most focused and terrible persecution occurred during the Holocaust when millions were killed, maimed and tortured for their beliefs. This focus was due to the opinion of Wilhem Marr.

Wilhem Marr, a German editor and reporter claimed that Jews were sub-human because they were of the Semitic race. Changing the concept of Judaism from a religion to that of a race provided the excuse for Hitler to launch a campaign to eliminate them.

An earlier attempt to eliminate the Jews was in the late 1400's in Spain, the Inquisition. However, the Catholic rulers Ferdinand and Isabella and the church leaders did allow Jews to convert to Catholicsm.Still Jews were viewed with suspicion and were referred to as marranos (Spanish for pig because of Jewish dietary laws that banned eating pork). I hope this will help.

Religions can be changed however, race can't. Jews were then categorized as being a sub-species, like an insect or a pest. As in my professor of Jewish history said in class, "What do you do when faced with a pest? You call in the Orkin man." Hitler was the Orkin man. This was the attitude of Hitler towards the Jews. In addition to reading "Tramp For The Lord" try to read "Night" by Elie Wiesel. It is a first hand account of he and his father's imprisonment at Auschwitz. One other book is titled "Sorbibor" an account of a revolt at this death camp. I can't remember the author's name. Jews have for centuries the target of almost every civilization in the world. As far as ten Boom's book read the chapter "Thank God for the Fleas". Ten Boom's book tells of her family's internment in Auschwitz where her father and sister died. In this chapter she is thankful for the fleas because the guards would not enter the barrack due to the fleas. This provided her and the others to have Bible studies without interruption or punishment.

This is one of the most horrific events in human history and yet there are those called "revisionist historians" that deny the the Holocaust. Will it happen here? No one actually knows but there is always a possibility. There is a saying "Those who don't understand history are bound to repeat it." This is the reason the study of history is so important.

gatita_63109

Answer 5

Anti-Semitism began the day that the 11th Roman emperor embraced Christianity. The Jew were blamed for killing Jesus. It was furthered after the remaining tribes of Abraham became Muslims. The rest of the world needed someone to blame their "ills" on, why not those who had already been blamed for all the failures in history?

Answer 6

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Answer 7

the origins of anti semitism or the roots of it can be traced to the crusades of the middle ages. up until this point in history the jews were pretty much tolerated. very few jews had settled in europe and a large majority lived in palestine. at the time of the crusades during the muslim capitulation of jerusalem the crusaders went on a murderous rampage killing every living non "christian"; men, women, children and livestock.
as the crusaders finished their holy war the excuse used to killing the jews along with the muslims was "they had to be punished for the crucifixion of jesus christ." thus set the pretext for every christian and jewish religious encounter.
the next most serious exchange occurred during the inquisition of the spanish inquisador torquemada. after the muslim expansion across north africa and into catholic spain the pope and the spanish king was afraid that the populace would convert to islam thereby losing the most powerful country at the time; spain and nearby portugal.
the king set about stemming the tide of conversion to islam by isolating the country and questioning the populace. anyone that does not convert to christianity would be executed. the large percentage of those executed would be jews. the inquisition led to more attacks on jews across europe as the fear of muslim expansion gripped the whole continent. the murdering of jews only subsided when the king of spain finally and definitely checked the muslim expansion and drove them from the continent.
antisemitism does not crop up again until the counter-refomation during the 1600's to the 1700's. during this time period the whole of europe erupted into warfare along religious lines; protestants vs catholics. caught in the middle were the jews. again the pretext for the killing, raping, and destroying of property was the crucifixion of Jesus. at this time more and more jews settled east and south toward palestine.
wholesale slaughter along these lines does not erupt again until ww2.