I will attempt to offer you food for thought. The other side of the door, a view that you may not currently have or even thought about. The subject today is Anti-Semitism, from 6000 years ago until our founding fathers.
So, to begin. Anti-Semitism is very old. If did not start with Germany, no further back. It is not a Christian invention, go back further
no it was not the Arabic who started the hypercritical view of the Jew
.. Egyptians? No, back even further. Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, known as the Patriarchs, are both the physical and spiritual ancestors of Judaism. And to correct a misconception right off, these men were not considered Jews. The terms "Jew" and "Judaism" were not used to refer to this nation until hundreds of years after their time; nevertheless, for convenience and in accordance with common practice, I will use these terms. Make no mistake these are the men who gave reason for the known world, and remember they did not have a concept of a world bigger than the places they had visited, to resent the nation that would grow from these gentlemen. Each one announced that their children were the chosen ones, those selected by God to carry the word, one God a belief of monotheism. This was a tough pill for many to handle, during that time there were all sorts of gods; ones that brought daylight and darkness, those that took the bodies of the dead, the ones who ensured the Nile would not flood, and this list is pretty much endless. Many of these gods competed with one another and there was a revolving door so to speak, one god would enter and another would exit. Depending on the needs of the worshipers. Now along comes Abraham, who actually had a conversation with God. Up until this point, the gods were figures who never engaged in conversations with the common folks, but now there is a nomadic family who claims that they were contacted and spoke with God. Anger, denial, and the curse of hate for this new nation began and it has grown and withered as the ocean races and retreats from the shores. Right now, we are going through high tide. A resurgence of hate, misunderstanding and resentment.
Okay, enough of way back history and I will skip all the way forward to the New World. America, the land of opportunity where all are welcomed and diversity is not only appreciated but needed for a forward moving nation. Surly the Jew was accepted as were other nationalities and religions. Well, sorry to bust that bubble, but America was not welcoming and in the beginning there were many who encouraged the Jew to seek a home elsewhere. My reference for some of the following is from an excellent book entitled A Convenient Hatred: The History of Anti-Semitism available from
http://www.facinghistory.org/for-educators/educator-network or you may be able to find it in a University Library.
So we are in the land of opportunity and the time is precolonial days, our nation was still owned by the United Kingdom, land was provided by grants and the overseers were appointed by the King. And a ship lands with 23 funny speaking and acting people, one would call them Dutch, but they came from South America and say they are Jews. A petition was circulated, people were upset and talking about the new odd people who just arrived. They did not want them spoiling the new world with their beliefs and history of killing Jesus. Arthur Hertzberg in The Jews in America: writes: Two weeks after they landed, Stuyvesant heard the complaint from the local merchants and from the Church that "the Jews who had arrived would nearly all like to remain here." Stuyvesant decided to chase them out. Using the usual formulas of religious invective - he called the Jews "repugnant," "deceitful," and "enemies and blasphemers of Christ" - Stuyvesant recommended to his directors... "to require them in a friendly way to depart." The push to ostracize these people failed, and so they remained. But, there were laws signed and enforced. Jews were not permitted to own property (land), they could not open a business, they were not allowed to build a place of worship and they were not allowed to pray in public. They were permitted to rent land and farm it, they were allowed to work on farms and for businessmen, and no one cared if they prayed in the house, providing that the noise could not be heard outside of the confines of that house. They had no say in town management, could not vote (and this did not change for many years), and they could not hold a public office. And one other law Jews were not allowed to import more Jews. Some of these laws and notions were very short lived and with perseverance the Jew gained rights. Perhaps this was due to the fact that The American Colonial world was growing, changing and evolving so rapidly it did not have time to focus on historical Jewish scapegoatism. The demands of the frontier and the expanding new American economic power needed the best of all of its people. Hatred of the Jew and imported anti-Semitism did exist but it could not flourish in the melting pot of common need and survival.
It was not until 1753, the British Parliament, to legitimize and encourage economic development both in the colonies and in the mother country passed a Jewish Naturalization Bill. The purpose simply enough was to grant limited rights, such as land ownership, to foreign born Jews who wished to become British subjects. The bill had the opposite effect in England stirring intense violent anti-Semitic feeling and prejudices. The bill was repealed by Parliament in 1760. In Colonial America the legislation was generally ignored or circumspectly treated. (The first permanent synagogue community Kehilah ha Kadosh Beth Shalome, was founded in 1789 in Richmond, Va.. Beth Shalome built its first permanent building in 1820 in Richmond.)
For almost a hundred years, if one colony refused to grant citizenship to a Jew the expedient thing was to go to another colony that would grant it or more simply ignore the issues of Naturalization entirely as most immigrants did. For the most part the tiny Jewish community was not affected by the machinations of the mother country's bigotry.
Unlike many immigrants, the Jews did not come seeking freedom of religion as much as freedom of opportunity. And that is why they settled where doors were opened to them.
And the War of Independence. You know, this did not start out intentionally as a revolution. The Colonial American world was an evolving, growing English world that demanded fair representation from the British Parliament. The British government saw the Americas as a source of money, power and natural resources to be delivered and ruled unquestioningly by the mother country.
The British government failed to realize that the Colonials saw themselves as British Americans with the right to a voice in their affairs, to influence their laws, their economy their frontiers and their taxation. The Revolutionary war was to be the longest war in American history prior to Vietnam. It was fought over a one thousand five hundred mile front on the developed farmlands of thirteen colonies, on the sea and on the frontier.
Oct. 25. 1765, a group of Philadelphia merchants gathered in the State House to sign the non-importation agreement to fight the hated Stamp Tax of the British government. The first man to step forward to sign his name was the president of Mikve Israel Congregation, Philadelphia's only synagogue, Mathias Bush.
As the tensions between Britain and the American Colonies increased and finally erupted into war the American Colonial population was split almost into thirds; one third supported the war, one third was neutral and one third was pro-British. The small Jewish population of America was also divided the choice though was very heavily and disproportionally in favor and support of the American Revolution. Not only did the Jews pledge their fortunes and sacred honor for America but their very lives.
Compromise between Britain and its colonies could not be reached. The British blockaded Boston and sent an occupying army to take the city. The call to arms rang throughout the countryside. Volunteers rushed to defend the city at the Battle of Bunker Hill, June 17, 1776. The famous order of the American commander during the battle was "do not fire until you see the whites of their (the advancing British Regular's) eyes."
In the front ranks of the smoke and fire of battle was Aaron Solomon standing shoulder to shoulder with his Christian comrades of the Gloucester volunteers. Eight hundred miles to the South the British were stirring up the Cherokee Indians to attack and kill settlers on the South Carolina/Georgia frontiers.
Francis Salvador, a Jew of Sephardic heritage, the first Jew to be elected to a Colonial constituent assembly rode out to carry the alarm and raise the volunteers to repel the impending Indians attacks. He returned at the head of a force of frontiersmen only to be ambushed, shot down and scalped, July 1, 1776. Salvador had the dubious honor of being the first American Jew to give his life for his adopted country.
A few days later in Philadelphia, July 4, 1776, the Declaration of Independence was written. A copy was sent to Amsterdam via the small Dutch Caribbean Island of St. Eustatius. The Declaration was intercepted by the British at sea. An accompanying letter with the Declaration of Independence was also intercepted and sent to London as being a secret code about the document that needed to be deciphered - the letter was written in Hebrew.
The war was not going well at first for the young American army. Though facing hard times and even defeat, Jews stood and fought along with their neighbors. Into the terrible dark cold winter at Valley Forge, Abraham Levy and Phillip Russell stood their watch. Joseph Simon from his frontier forge at Lancaster, Pa. supplied the Army with the famous Henry Rifles. Jewish trading merchants, peaceful before the war, outfitted their ships to become privateers and ravage the British at sea. The cost was great, the great merchant traders of Newport, Rhode Island saw their fortunes lost.
Men such as Aaron Lopez were bankrupted supporting the Revolution when their ships were lost to the British. In the area of finance the young American government might have foundered too except for the financial genius and personal financial risk and support taken on by Hayim Solomon. Solomon was to die bankrupted by his total support of the American cause. Though small in number the Jews chose to caste their fate with America.
As late as 1781 the war had not been won by the Americans nor was it lost by the British. Arms were being funneled into the Colonies by arms merchants running the British blockade primarily from the tiny free trading Island of Dutch St. Eustatius. Jewish merchants and arms traders were a major presence on the island.
In 1781, the British realized they had to cut off the open door of arms shipments to the rebels through St. Eustatius. Admiral Sir George Rodney was sent to capture the island. His goal was to destroy the supplies and destroy the island's commercial and merchant class so they could not provide any more aide to the rebels. Early in 1781 the lightly defended island fell to the heavy presence of the main British battle fleet. Rodney in his vehemence destroyed the warehouses and the supplies. He burnt every home. He paid particular venomous attention to the Jews of St. Eustatius. The British burnt their homes and the synagogue, Honen Dalim, "She Who is Charitable to the Poor" 1739. Jewish property was confiscated and the men imprisoned with particular cruelty. Rodney spent months directing half his fleet to convey much of the stolen treasure back to England.
While Rodney was engaged in St. Eustatius, Lord Cornwallis and his army of British regulars were forced out of the Carolinas and retreated to the small port of Yorktown, Virginia on the James Peninsula. He needed to await critical re-provisioning and fresh reinforcements being brought by the British fleet. The weakened British fleet, with Cornwallis's reinforcements, was intercepted at sea by the French fleet under Admiral DeGrasse and soundly defeated. Degrasse took up positions at the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay blockading Yorktown from the Sea.
General George Washington saw his chance. Washington trapped and besieged Cornwallis. In short course Cornwallis surrendered. The war was over. The Americans had won with the help of the French.
At this point, when I am lecturing, I normally ask the audience to raise their hand if they have heard of the Benjamin Franklin Prophecies. I normally get one or two. The last time I delivered this, almost 2 months ago, almost everyone raised their hands. So, I asked
. Raise your hand if you believe it to be true. Same hands. What? You do not know about this? Well, in 1934 a document was discovered where Benjamin Franklin was reported as having said "In whatever country Jews have settled in any great numbers, they have lowered the moral tone, depreciated the commercial integrity, have segregated themselves, and have not been assimilated, have sneered at and tried to undermine the Christian religion, have built up a state within a state, and have, when opposed, tried to strangle that country to death financially. If you do not exclude them from the United States, in the Constitution, in less than 200 years they will have swarmed in such great numbers that they will dominate and devour the land and change our form of government." This evil speech was reportedly giving warning about admitting Jews into the country. The Franklin quote apparently first turned up on February 3, 1934, in William Dudley Pelley's pro-Nazi sheet, Liberation, published in Asheville, North Carolina. According to Pelley, it was taken from notes made by Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, delegate to the Constitutional Convention from South Carolina, between sessions of the convention, and it was entitled, "Chit Chats Around the Table During Intermission." But there is no Pinckney diary, and historian Charles Beard, after a thorough investigation of the "Franklin Prophecy," concluded: "This alleged 'Prophecy' ascribed to Franklin is a crude forgery, and his name should be cleared of the crass prejudice attributed to him. There is in our historical records no evidence whatever of any basis for the falsehood."
However, many CT say that not just Benjamin Franklin, but indeed George Washington also hated the Jew. "They work more effectively against us than the enemy's armies. They are a hundred times more dangerous to our liberties and the great cause we are engaged in. It is much to be lamented that each state, long ago has not hunted them down as pests to society and the greatest enemies we have to the happiness of AmericaThe Jews."
This quote, popular among American anti-Semites, is a distortion of a statement Washington once made about speculators in currency during the American Revolution. "This tribe of black gentry," he wrote, "work more effectually against us, than the enemy's arms. They are a hundred times more dangerous to our liberties, and the great cause we are engaged in. It is much to be lamented, that each State, long ere this, has not hunted them down as pests to society, and the greatest enemies we have to the happiness of America."
I could go on, but I think that you may see a trend. Words and quotes of famous individuals have been manipulated for thousands of years to add life to a dull conversation or to cast doubt on others. Plato did it and so did Cicero. Why find it strange that those who hate will find a word or two to invert or change to charge an issue against those they hate. And now you know more of early American history, little know or ignored facts. Do you honestly think that Benjamin Franklin or George Washington saw the Jew as an enemy?
I think that this is long enough, so what are your thoughts? Discussion is welcome, regardless of which side you fall.