No, it wasn't discrimination. and From Slate. I'd often wondered about this, just assuming it was laws that disallowed Jews from owning land. But that didn't explain Jews in the Muslim world, and I was aware that anti-Jewish discrimination was much worse in the late Middle Ages, not the early Middle Ages. Then I read this, and the proverbial light bulb went off. Obvious, and simple, but I never thought of it.
Good catch, Superdave. Jews have always been very educated for the reasons you listed. In addition, I believe the jewish boys had to (and may still have to) memorize the first five books of the Bible for their Bar-Mitz-vah (sp?). The Jewish Hierarchy at the time of Jesus were especially well educated-- If you've ever read any of the books of the Bible that Paul wrote, it is incredibly obvious that he is an incredibly intelligent and educated Man. Of course, Jews have long since done every occupation. Abraham was a farmer, and itinerant, and very wealthy. Jesus was a carpenter. Boys tended to follow the family trade. Jerusalem, built by the Jews, was one of the greatest cities of the world, and the temple was a wonder of the world. However, this is due as much to education as it is to highly skilled craftsmen. The current nation of Israel is one of the most fertile places on earth. Israel is one of the world's leading exporters of citrus fruits. This is what the Bible meant in Joshua when the Israelites were promised the land "flowing with milk and honey." So, it makes it easy for agriculture to be Israel's leading industry.
Agriculture hasn't been the #1 industry in Israel since at least the 1960s. It represents around 3-5% of exports. Given the water problems, if not for self-sufficiency issues, I doubt Israel would have much of an agriculture sector.
The contrast b/w the Israeli admiration of farmers (for a long time, though not so much today anymore, as BenReilly pointed out) and the lack of diaspora Jewish farmers is not coincidental. A lot of early Zionists believed the Jews' problems in Europe stemmed from having too many professionals and not enough farmers - yeah, there were tons of Jewish bankers, lawyers, and doctors, but not enough Jews at the "bottom" of the traditional job-pyramid. Because any society needed so many people at the bottom of the pyramid - farmers, janitors, etc., (as opposed to the relatively small need for bankers, lawyers, and doctors) Jews were made, in the early Zionists eyes, expendable. They could be persecuted at will without consequence. Thus, early Zionists emphasized a "back to the basics" approach in building a new State of Israel. European professionals were to give up their professions and adopt a simpler life in Israel. To some degree, this happened. David Ben-Gurion once bragged that he was trying to create a state where "even the prostitutes and pick-pockets are Jewish." A large part of this was the creation of communal farms - kibbutzim. Today the process is reversing itself, with Israelis often hiring foreign workers to do basic jobs like farming and construction - but in Israeli culture, the admiration of the farmer still has its place in some quarters - an admiration stemming from the lack of Jewish farmers in the diaspora, as noted in the article.
This is an interesting thread, and it highlights a distinction between the three major monotheisms in regard to literacy. Even though all are considered (by Muslims) people "of the Book," and thus granted special status, there IS a difference here. In Christianity and Islam, there is no real requirement to be literate. Both have "holy men" who can be counted on to read and interpret the Book for the masses. Hell, for a long time, many Catholics didn't even SPEAK the language of the church service, let alone read it. And in Islam, the children DO have to know and recite passages from the Koran, but in many cases it has been taught through rote memorization and chanting. Anyway, I suppose this has to do with the evangelical nature of the latter two religions: if you want tons of converts, it makes it easier if your standards are lowered a bit.
I recently read a book about Spain in the Middle Ages, which discussed the relationship between the Muslims, Jews and Christians. I can't think of the title. Ultimately, the book got pretty repetitive. However, the essential argument was that it was the Muslims who kept culture and intellectual thought alive. The Jews were able to extend their existence in Spain by becoming political advisors and counselors to the Muslims in power. When the anti-intellectual Christians eventually acheived power, they threw the Muslims out, and then the Jews. Obviously nutshelled, but what I took from the book was simply that the actual religious texts were not the driving force for knowledge and intellect. Instead, it was the Muslim's cosmopolitan lifestyle and involvement in trade (and their relative openess to other cultures,compared to the Christians), which allowed their artistic and intellectual life to bloom. For a short period of time, Muslims, Jew and Chrisitians got along in Spain. When the Muslims were the most powerful.
Oman...Muslim led Spain strikes me as a fascinating, fascinating topic. I've read some on that, years ago (out of interest.) It's just amazing how advanced, morally, the Muslims were, in terms of accepting diversity and whatnot. We didn't get to that level in the US until, at best, the 1920's era Klan (mostly an anti-Catholic movement) was broken, and maybe not until the 60's era Klan (and Klan mentality) was broken. They beat us by a millenium!! And from my understanding, you can't really compare that society to the Irish monks from the early Middle Ages, because learning and intellectualism was much more widespread in Spain. I'd be interested in reading a social history of how such ideas were accepted in many parts of the Muslim world. But that would be a very difficult subject to write on, because you'd have to be able to read medieval Arabic, and probably several dialects. (I'm assuming the dialects in Persia and Spain were very different.) And the writer would have to be familiar with the contemporary social climate in Europe, in order to provide context. Anyway, back to your post, yeah, that particular group of Christians don't really portray our best side. They expelled the Jews in 1492, and soon thereafter launched the Spanish Inquisition. And I'm sure at this point, everyone is thinking of this: Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!! Could you explain this better? I don't get it. It reads like you're saying that early Zionists thought they were more vulnerable because so many Jews were in fields with small employment, that they'd be better off if more of them were easily replaceable farmers. And that seems completely counterintuitive to me.
The Jewish Agency, which oversaw immigration into Palestine for the British, would reject shopkeepers, bankers and lawyers. They wanted people who were going to be dedicated to working on a kibbutz, working the land, sharing the work and the rewards and danger. They felt this was the way to build a lasting, united nation. They were (are)socialists. Check out Tom Segev's book The Seventh Million. It mainly deals with how the Holocaust affected the structure of pre and post independence Israel, but to do so, it addresses Zionism.
OK, so he was talking about their place in Palestine/Israel. I thought he was talking about their place in Europe.
I read somewhere that Jews avoided agriculture because when the occasional pogrom occured you couldn't pack up your farm and leave town. Whereas a shopkeeper could quickly pack up his goods and flee. Spanish history is very fascinating. A lot of the Jews converted to Christianity prior to 1492, and subsequently were the victims of the Spanish Inquisition. The Jews ran commerce while the Muslims controlled agriculture. Persecuting both hamstrung the Spanish economy. Surprisingly, Spain itself was a very poor country during the colonization of the western hemisphere. The gold coming in from the colonies created a hyperinflation, while there was little investment in the domestic economy.
I would hesitate to combine Catholicism and Protestanism together under the umbrella of "Christianity." Most Protestants (I'm Baptist) believe in what technically is called "Priesthood of the Believer." That is we are all Priests in that we don't need Priests to pray for us, forgive our sins for us, and read the Bible to us. We are all free and have the responsibility to do those things for ourselves (obviously we can't forgive our own sins, we must ask God to do that for us.) Remember, the Catholic church at the time didn't want regular churchgoers to read the Bible so they couldn't question the teachings of the church, so they could rip people off selling indulgences, etc. It was read in Latin and "translated" by the Priest. That's why William Tyndale feared for his life while he was translating the first English Version of the Bible. The Catholic church was corrupt during the Middle Ages, and it was all about control. I don't think you'll find anywhere in the Bible where it says you are not to be knowledgable. The whole book of Proverbs deals with the pursuit of Wisdom. Of the people who wrote the New Testament, Luke was a doctor and wrote 2 books. Paul (which I touched on above) was extremely well educated and wrote about half of the books. I believe that Christians should be well-educated. That being said, should we pursue knowledge just for the sake of it? Probably not. However, God expects every believer to study the Bible for themselves.
Sorry, I guess I was really unclear. The idea was that farmers were irreplacable - it was the lawyers, doctors, and bankers that were replacable - because only a few were needed. You needed so many farmers - so if Jews were in farming, you couldn't just get rid of them - they'd be essential to society You can live without tort claims. You can't live without bread. I'm not saying it makes complete sense (though I guess it could be described in a way that would make the theory sound better) - it was just something that a lot of early socialist Zionists believed (for a while, "socialist Zionist" was basically a redunancy). The bottom line is that the idea that salvation would come from an abandonment of white-collar work and the turn to blue collar work in the Land of Israel was very prevelent in their circles. Hence a change from white-collar Jews in the diaspora to blue-collar Jews in Israel.
The reason jews don't farm or do agriculture is because in Europe and as well in the middle east, jews weren't alloweed to own lands. In the ottaman empire, you could own a house, but you could own a land and farm on it, cause you were jewish. You had to give this job to a muslim person. And in Europe jews weren't allowed to own anything at all pretty much. Many of the jews decided to do more urbanized jobs at times of around 1000-1400A.D, like Goldsmith, carpentar, and so on. Education was always a big factor for judeo people, especially in UK, France, Italy and Spain. Jewish people were allowed to go and study education, whereas in the 1900's, when your father farm, you would have probably gone to school and would sell the farm. But 300 years ago, that wasnt the case. So it was hard to evolve in education and other jobs if you were born in a Farm family. also, one of the big aspiration for jewish agriculutre was israel, because after that, Jewish people had the right to to land and to finally not be persecuted for owning it. They also invtented community farms, where everyone helps one another, in a socialist-communist manner, called "THE KIBBUTZ"
No! your wrong!! How am i wrong? Your anti-semetic! SuperDave Osbourne is Anti-Semetic..Everyone is anti-semetic
Read the Slate article. Two historians have researched the question. You're just regurgitating the (false) conventional wisdom. The whole reason I started this thread was because I used to think what you did, and figured most people did. So since I learned something, I thought most of you would, too. I could explain it to you, but why should I? Go to Slate and do the work yourself.