Okay the holocaust/gun thread is getting really sidetracked with the discussion because of a side remark by the OP.
To get that thread back on track, would you say that historically the Jews were a fighting people?
Personally, from what I’ve learned the Jews were indeed a fighting people for most of their span. There are numerous examples throughout the old testament in the bible (hey, even if allegorical at least gives a relatively good historic account) of battles with brilliant maneuvers. From the possible covert ops operationt aht was Jericho (the circling and possibly housing of soldiers that climb up that one cord) to the Jews walking armed out of Egypt and pillaging a town on the way out after being freed (not to metnion I’ve seen it argued they weren’t slaves but rather hired mercenaries). And of course after they founded Israel they (the earlier one) were pretty good on the conquest thing.
I would agree though that in the second diaspora times after they were expelled from the HRE they had a bit of trouble, and weren’t very warlike but as a whole they had jsut as colored of a military background as everyone else.
Anyway, like I said, this is mainly to keep the other thread on topic. So what are your feelings on it?
OK, if we’re going to get technical about it, all peoples around the world have at some point been a fighting people, if your definition of “fighting people” is “have historically engaged in some form of battle at some point or another.”
That’s not the definition I’m operating from, though. The definition I’m operating from is “does this culture have a tradition of making war which has been consistent throughout the majority of said culture’s history?” I think the Jews, as a culture (both Sephardic and Ashkenazic, if we’re going to divide it up that way) have not been warriors throughout most of their history.
I specified in the first post in that other thread that I was talking about the Jews from the end of the Biblical times up until the establishment of Israel - in other words, the Jews in the Diaspora. These Jews have not been a warlike people. Maybe it’s because they were, as Captain Amazing said, “smashed down by the state.” But the question isn’t “did the Jews have warlike potential hiding within them that the tyranny of European rulers prevented from being realized,” it’s “do the Jews have a fighting tradition?”
“A bit of trouble” is a pretty colossal understatement. And when you say “everyone else,” you really think the Jews have as much of a military tradition as the Normans? The Scots? The Magyars or the Mughals or the Germans or the Arabs or the Chinese? We’re talking about centuries and centuries and centuries of evolving military technology, massive armies, and warrior-cults on one hand, and a few military victories in ancient times plus the establishment of Israel, with two thousand years of being Europe’s whipping-boys in between, on the other hand.
Has there ever been a non-fighting people? Pretty much any ethnic group I can think of have had some sort of history of warfare and/or cultural myths and traditions that glorify violence. So I’d say the Jews are a fighting people at least as much as any other cultural group.
Are you expecting me to re-type everything I just wrote in the post before yours? Because what you’ve written is basically a duplication of the OP, plus a restatement of the first sentence of my post.
That was intentional litotes. And yes, I’d argue the Jews have a pretty colossal military history. Sure they were interupted for a couple millenia give or take during the second diapora (the first one being Babylon’s expulsion). Like I said i’ve seen it argued (including but not limited to a special ont he History Channel called Bible Battles) that the Jews up until the HRE expelled them were mercenaries, and then great conquerors around the are that became Israel. There are some tactics that appear to be big G’s doing as they describe it, but upon examination are brilliant military tactics (The Jericho Scenario, sacking a town after years of oppression, and though it’s a fairly common military tactic that whole thing about defending with their back to the sun blinding the enemy I know I used two of tehse above but).
And I do udnerstand what you said in your OP in the other thread, but you have to admit the discussion changed from “the Jews weren’t very warlike during diaspora” to “the Jews were/were not ever any good at military” somewhere in the thread.
Give him a break, his post was one minute after yours. He was probably typing it when you hit submit.
One thing to keep in mind is that at some point the ancient Israelites for the most part stopped taking slaves or treasures. If they fought a group or settlement, they killed everyone and burned everything to the ground. There is a special term for this. It think it was something like putting people under the ban. This made war unprofitable for them.
The Abyssinian Jews have a really bloody history (mostly in defense).
Well, I’m talking about the Jews in the Diaspora, as I have been for the entirety of my participation in this discussion. I certainly can’t argue that the Jews haven’t been effective fighters in the modern day, because the Six Day War victory was a pretty astonishing triumph. And the Israelis’ skill in all areas of battle, particularly aviation and special-operations, is a force to be reckoned with - claimed by many to be the best in the world.
But like I said, this is a blip on the radar of history. And who knows how much longer Israel will even be around? If it’s not blown up in a war with one of its neighbors, its Jewish residents may simply be out-populated over time by their Arab counterparts, even if there is eventually peace in the region.
Certainly there weren’t Jewish armies rampaging across Europe during the Medieval and early modern periods, so if that’s your definition of “fighting people” then I agree, but that seems more a function of their not having any organized state or political structure then a cultural aversion to military adventures. In those states where they were allowed, were the Jews less likely to serve in the military. Off the top of my head I know there were “jewish legions” during WWI and the Napoleonic wars, and that Jewish settlements fought against invading Crusaders and revolted against the Byzantines. And of course the famous revolt against the Nazi’s in the Warsaw ghetto during WWII. I suspect someone with more knowledge of European history could give more examples.
As a Jew, and as a member of a society that has as much claim to the title of “fighting people” as any in this day and age, let me say that if such a thing as a “fighting people” ever existed, the Jews of the Diaspora weren’t it.
Conscription into the Czar’s army was for thirty years, and units were formed according to ethnic identity (and were posted as far away as possible from their homelands). There was a Jewish regiment, and I’d be interested in reading about it’s combat history.
Individually, there are plenty of examples to dispell the myth that Jewishness precludes physical courage. Two-Gun Cohen, Sun Yat-Sen’s bodyguard, comes to mind, as do the Jewish boxers and gangsters of the early twentieth century. And professional basketball, which makes up for its lack of formal violence with alternate agressiveness, was largely Jewish when it began.
(my great-grandfather was one of those Jewish gangsters)
Heh, I had a great-uncle who was a Jewish gangster, though not a successful one - he got ventelated by a rival gang, apparently shot so many times that they had to sweep up what was left of him into a bucket for burial.
The rival gang was also Jewish. Could be your relation was one.
My Grandfather was a reasonably famous Jewish athlete, a professional swimmer in Toronto.
When he started out, the long-distance swimming races were run by a private club which did not let Jews compete. He decided to teach 'em a lesson. He waited until after the race had started and then dived in after the ‘legitimate’ competitors - and in spite of this handicap, he won. This got him lots of publicity. My parents still have a newspaper clipping of this race, with the headline “JEWBOY WINS RACE”.
