Jesus wasn't white: he was a brown-skinned, Middle Eastern Jew. Here's why that matters

The Jewish people from antiquity kept detailed records of genealogy, and many are recounted in the Bible, as a way to keep track of who was a member of the Hebrew people and who was not. There is no such thing as race; speaking of race is always an approximation and a generalization. But you are missing the point if you continue to insist that Jews are not a distinct group with genetic characteristics. It’s not playing the race card to make note of what they have so carefully cultivated, and also the difficulties of such things as a susceptibility to Tay-Sachs disease. These are the earthly, material aspects of being Jewish. The Jewish religion is a voluntary observance, especially here in America, where so many self-identified Jews are secular and non-observant.

I agree with the poster above that Jesus did not start a new religion. He deepened the development of his own religion and is the perfection of it. It is impossible to understand the New Testament deeply without knowig and appreciating the Hebrew Bible (the Old Testament).

I believe Jesus is the Son of God and that does not make him Jewish, which is not an ethnicity.

Then you need to read the Old Testament again; and for that matter, the New Testament, where God's identification of the Chosen People Israel and his anointing of a Jewish woman, Mary, to bring forth His Son are all made clear. Jesus was a Jew while he was here on earth, taught in the Temple and observed the Jewish Passover and other requirements. No-one has an ethnicity, a sex or a spouse in heaven.

The recent DNA samples you cite cannot prove the ethnicity of 2,000 years ago, when people were far more insular to their tribes and less traveled. Semites comprise many peoples: Jews are one subgroup of Semites.

As posted previously, the Jewish people kept detailed genealogies. Read Nehemiah, who led the rebuilding of the walls around the Temple in Jerusalem during the return of the Jews from exile in Babylon. As their leader, Nehemiah separated Jews from their non-Jewish spouses and children and reinstituted Jewish religious law, even beating some of them to make them separate. His purpose was not racist but rather it was religious: to keep the people within the Temple walls true to the Jewish religious law. He had the scholar Ezra read the scriptures to the people to re-commit them to Jewish belief and practice. The Temple and walls that were rebuilt would eventually be the site where Jesus debated with the elders as a chlld and taught as an adult.

Albion, I have read the Bible a few times.

It's a pretty large book, and hard to comprehend. Many people read and/or study it deeply it for a lifetime and never feel they are done with it.

why argue so strongly that Jewish is an ethnicity and not a religion, or both?

You have indicated your belief that it is impossible for a Christian to be Jewish or for Jesus himself to have been Jewish. These statements are misunderstandings. There is more than one element to this discussion—it's not a simple either/or thing.

As I have said, the word "Jewish" can mean an ethnicity; It can also mean a person who follows the Jewish religion, which was anointed by God more than 5,000 years ago and transmitted by God through the patriarchs (Abraham, Isaac and Jacob), through Moses and through the Hebrew prophets of the Old Testament. Some Jews today are only ethnic Jews who do not practice the religion; other Jews are both ethnically Jewish and also observe (practice) the religion.

Christians do not practice the Jewish religion as such; but the Christian religion sprang out of Judaism and contains many elements of Judaism, as Jesus taught. However, it is entirely possible for ethnic Jews to embrace Christianity and believe Jesus is the Messiah promised to the Jewish people in the Hebrew Bible (the Old Testament). Many have done so, ever since Jesus walked the earth. And yes, Jesus was ethnically Jewish here on earth and practiced the Jewish religion; but He came to earth to teach the next step according to God's plan for humanity. His innovations are central to Christian theology.

Are we ethnic Christians?

There is no such thing as a Christian ethnicity. There is no comparison to the Jewish ethnicity, which does involve genealogy and bloodlines; Christianity does not. A person cannot be born a Christian; "you must be born again." This teaching of Jesus is one of the cardinal ways in which the Son of God came to redevelop the Chosen People and extend the Judeo-Christian civilization anointed by God, extending to all peoples the Commandments given to Moses and the heartfelt faith in God's Word as taught by Christ. It is a civilization of the rule of law instead of tribalism, of sexual purity outside marriage and faithfulness to one partner within marriage, and of repentance for sins which cannot be wiped away by rituals, but only by believing that Christ died to make atonement for our sins before God the Father. Many of the other virtues associated with Christianity arose within the Jewish religion that preceded Christ, such as ethical dealings, charity and mercy, care of family members and the poor, hygiene, avoidance of premarital sex, incest and homosexual behaviors, and a sabbath day set aside for worship.

Is there any other religion on the planet that claims they too are not a religion but an ethnicity?

This is not what was said about Judaism. Please understand this point, which you are apparently missing. The word "Jewish" can mean either the ethnicity or the religion, or both, depending on the individual who can be described as "Jewish." Jewishness is an ethnicity determined by bloodlines. Judaism is a religion; it is also called "the Jewish religion." While Judaism accepts converts under some circumstances, it does not proselytize (actively seek new converts) the way Christianity is expected to do.

A person in the United States, in Israel and in many other countries can be a Jew and practice the Jewish religion. Another person can be a Jew ethnically, that is, descended by bloodlines from the 12 sons of Jacob (Abraham's grandson), yet choose not practice the religion. This is the reality of how Jews are in the world at this time. It has no bearing on how Christians are.

Christians, according to Christ's teachings can come to belief in Him from any ethnicity. Christianity is a profession of faith in the hearts of believers, who accept the gift of Salvation by believing that Jesus is the Messiah promised to the Jewish people, that he is the Savior for all who believe in Him, and that by believing in Him and repenting of our sins, we have eternal life.

What is anti-Semitism?

That is a word people use in the United States to denote prejudice against Jewish people. In has over time become an inexact word, because as you have noted, there are peoples other than Jews who are also Semites. So the word is somewhat outdated. This happens to words that once were common euphemisms, like "retarded", "crippled", etc, which have been replaced by "learning disabled" or "motor skills disabled" and so forth. More accurate terms would be "anti-Jewish" or "biased against Jews."

I hope I have shed some light on your questions. Blessings,

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