Jewish Identity, Anti-Semitism, and Tikkun Olam

The beginning of an inquiry

I don’t know why, exactly, I feel this desire — this responsibility — to say the unsayable. I don’t feel totally comfortable unless I am exploring areas of ambiguity and even threat that most people, sensibly, avoid. Sometimes this bears fruit and serves a useful social function. Other times, not so much.

Why I feel this drive toward the unspeakable remains an open question. Actually, I connect my ongoing desire to explore taboo topics to the subject of today’s essay. This subject is, in part, my own relationship to Judaism. More than that, I want to reflect on Jewish power and influence in the world at this time when anti-Semitism is, once again, on the rise. 

I am Jewish by birth. My mother’s mother, Rosalind Glassman, was a Polish Jew. My grandfather, Daniel Glassman, was an English Jew. My great grandmother and two of my great aunts came to New York from Poland around 1910, escaping the tragic sequence of events destined to culminate in the Nazi Holocaust. By the time I came into the picture, my small family was secular, assimilated. I was never asked if I wanted a Bar Mitzvah. We barely celebrated Passover. I learned no prayers, did nothing ceremonial. 

Growing up on the Upper West Side in New York City, I had many Jewish friends who maintained a much deeper connection to Judaism. The private high school I attended had a large percentage of Jewish students, probably more than half. We were the children of financiers, retailers, cartoonists, doctors, art directors. Some were wealthy. 

I always felt cut off from the religious aspects of Judaism. The part of the Jewish tradition I identify with is the cultural, artistic, socially radical, and philosophical side. Through my mother, I knew Allen Ginsberg, Abbie Hoffman, and Grace Paley (a bit obscure now, a wonderful writer of short stories), growing up. I love the writings of Proust, Kafka, Walter Benjamin, Bruno Schulz, Georges Perec, Alfred Kazin, Henry Miller, and so on. I identify with the radical, anarchist edge of Jewish thinkers and activists such as Murray Bookchin, Paul Goodman, Noam Chomsky, even Karl Marx (under-appreciated for his rhetorical artistry) — not to forget Dylan, Lou Reed, and Leonard Cohen. These authors and artists, I suspect, felt the same magnetic pull I always feel toward Tikkun olam, the reparation of the world, a concept embedded in Judaism’s messianic tradition: “The thesis that Jews bear responsibility not only for their own moral, spiritual, and material welfare, but also for the welfare of society at large." 

Leonard Cohen continued Judaism’s prophetic tradition.

I always found mainstream Judaism — with its powerful network of institutions and centers (I have no personal connection to these networks) — problematic. I am going to skirt the subject of Israel here, as much as possible. I find it a huge, difficult topic. I don’t know enough about the situation – haven’t researched it deeply enough – to comment intelligently. It seems, however, a brutal irony of modern history that an often oppressed, persecuted people have been transformed by circumstances into oppressors and jailors.

I started reflecting on contemporary Judaism while writing about Kanye West’s recent anti-Semitic tirades. A friend sent me a link to a response to Kanye from Rudy Rochman, a young Israeli activist/influencer. Rochman notes that Kanye expressed jealousy about how the Jewish community takes care of itself, compared to blacks in America. Kanye belongs to a lineage of black artists who have railed against Jewish control of the music industry and media (a good piece on this is Justin Joffe’s ‘The Music Industry’s Long History of Dividing Blacks and Jews’). Ye has pushed this logic too far, embracing Hitler and Naziism, in a move that seems self-destructive, demented. 

In my research, I came upon this 4-year-old interview with Lyor Cohen, famous Hip Hop record executive from Def Jam and 300 Entertainment, on The Breakfast Club. While Roseman expressed sadness about rampant drug addiction in black communities, he defended signing up rap artists who glamorized drug use — even crack — because he had “mouths to feed.” Many people, myself included, found this revealing of the music industry as a whole, and, particularly, the attitude of Jews in that industry. Cohen admitted his opportunism — his willingness to pursue financial advantage over any ethical qualms. While nobody would say that opportunism is only or even primarily a Jewish trait, it is a tendency I have noted in various globally successful enterprises steered by Jews, whether it is the socially destructive algorithms applied by Zuckerberg’s Meta or the investment strategy of Larry Fink’s Black Rock. 

I don’t intend what I write here to be a conclusive statement, but a tentative experiment, the start of a reflection on a very complex topic.

I believe the Jews – perhaps through their institutions and networks – need to undergo a process of authentic self-inquiry about why and how we contribute to a situation where anti-Semitism is once again intensifying, becoming more virulent. If such an inquiry is already happening, please let me know. I haven’t found evidence for it. 

By writing this, of course, I don’t intend to “blame” the Jews for anti-semitism. Generally, I don’t believe in “blaming” anything or anyone. What I seek is a greater context for understanding. My hope is that a more thorough understanding might, in itself, influence the course of events toward a better path. 

There is always the possibility that rising hate-speech and hate-crimes will lead to more systemic, even state-supported, forms of violence and repression. We see hints that things might move in such a direction. QANON, for example, with its projection of a global NWO order conspiracy based on pedophilia and Satanism, has an anti-Semitic taint, invoking The Protocols of Zion. Elon Musk is promoting QANON – encouraging White Nationalists and the Far Right – on Twitter: 

“Follow the white rabbit” references the QANON narrative. QANON’s claims were revealed as delusional when Trump left office. Musk seems to want to revive flagging interest in QANON as this article explores.

White Supremacism is on the rise, with armed militias readying themselves for insurrection across the US. Many Republicans actively agitate against Democratic elections process and Constitutional safeguards. The Right calls for “total war” against liberalism and “the Left” (which, for them, means Biden and Pelosi, who I would call neoliberal moderates). They seek to drive the country toward authoritarianism, despotism, as the only means for maintaining an Anglo-European ethno-state despite rapidly changing demographics. This is the context in which I feel it is important to think honestly about how we, as “the Jews,” fit into this current, increasingly dangerous situation. And what “we” might do to help ameliorate it. 

The Jews are, by dint of history, in a unique position: We are an ethnic group marked by a particular cultural and religious identity, often exiled, demonized, reviled as an “other.” As Norman Cohn writes in Warrant for Genocide, considering the history of Jews in Europe going back to the 2nd and 3rd Century AD: 

If Judaism, with its profound sense of election and its elaborate system of taboos, tended in any sense to make Jews into a people apart, Christian teaching and preaching ensured they would not be treated simply as strangers but as most dangerous enemies. During the Middle Ages Jews were almost wholly without legal rights and were frequently massacred by the mob. Such experiences in turn greatly encouraged the Jewish tendency to exclusiveness. During the long centuries of persecution Jews became a wholly alien people, compulsorily restricted to the most sordid trades, regarding the gentile world with bitterness.

 In my case, for example, I could easily say I am not a Christian, even though my father was born Catholic. Despite my non-participation in any religious or tribal activities, I remain a Jew. This is an identity I can’t evade or forfeit. 

Statistically, Jews are a small percentage of the global population. There are 18 million Jews total; about half of those live in Israel. New York City has 1.6 million, the largest concentration in the world. In comparison, there are 2.2 billion Christians (1.3 billion Catholics) and 1.9 billion Muslems. Financially and culturally, Jews continue to have a vastly disproportionate impact on society. At another time time, I hope to review the historical reasons this is the case: How the particular, unique position of Jews in European society for many centuries led to our current circumstances — advantageous in many ways yet still precarious.  

I don’t know how I can say this delicately enough, but there is a way that Jews, often, do not use their extraordinary power and wealth in the most proper or dignified ways. In many cases, they gain wealth and influence through opportunistic, irresponsible, and even disgraceful activities. The choice of these opportunistic, irresponsible paths have led, in some cases, to public excoriation and downfall. 

Of course, the same is true for Christians and members of other groups: To attain wealth and hold onto power, people often act terribly and harmfully. Rupert Murdoch, Kenneth Lay from Exxon, the Koch brothers, the Mercers are a few examples. But because the Jews are such a statistically small group, the numbers of the publicly disgraced seem unnaturally high. I am thinking of people like Bernie Madoff, Jeffrey Epstein, Harvey Weinstein, Kathe Sackler and the Sackler family – now we can add Sam Bankman Fried to this ignominious list. 

It also must be said that, contrary to the conspiratorial views prevalent in subterranean and Alt-Right undercurrents, the Jews do not function as a coherent group with a shared agenda (as far as I know, in any case!). In The Origins of Totalitarianism, the German Jewish political philosopher Hannah Arendt explored the historical reasons for this “atomization.” She wrote: “The Jews had been the purveyors in wars and the servants of kings, but they did not and were not expected to engage in the conflicts themselves. When these conflicts enlarged into national wars, they still remained an international element whose importance and usefulness lay precisely in their not being bound to any national cause.”

For centuries, Jews were barred from many professions, such as farming or many kinds of industry. They held certain important positions in European societies, particularly as bankers and money-lenders, which created close ties with the nobility. As Capitalism displaced feudalism, the banking system became increasingly important. Wealthy Jews learned to maintain a close connection to establishment or aristocratic power, preserving an innate terror of the mob.

The elite Jewish bankers tended to be transnational agents, detached from local political disputes. This is partly why conspiratorial ideas attach to them so easily (as we saw with the Rothschilds and, today, George Soros). Even today, Jews tend to maintain a certain level of in-group insularity and clan identity. Private life and family ties take precedence over other allegiances. This is only an issue because of the global power we hold in fields such as media, technology, and finance.

Considering Judaism as a religious structure, what doesn’t exist is a centralized, spiritual and moral authority, a kind of chief Rabbi, like the Pope. Obviously, as a system of values, Jewish culture places a high premium on individual achievement and success, for the same historical reasons I want to bring up to the surface. 

Let’s stop here for now, to take up this subject again, perhaps next time. Please let me know your thoughts in the comments — feel free to disagree with me, too.