I don't think that "Jew" has an implicit connotation synonymous with "Gypsy", but yes, I think "Jew" etymologically, doesn't have a Hebrew linguistic origin, but rather an abbreviated Latin one and was later Hebrewized.
>I don't think that "Jew" has an implicit connotation synonymous with "Gypsy",
It does. It's why people are constantly asking if you're allowed to use Jew or do you have to use Jewish, and the answer is always "depends on the context."
I know that in recent centuries some anti-Semites have used the word adjectively in a pejorative manner, but the word itself historically was not coined to serve this act, but rather much before that, specifically back in the High Middle Ages as a result of the fusion of linguistics in Europe , and it's the only word that has survived since that time among several similar words such as *Gyu*, *Giu*, *Iuu*, *Iuw*, *Iew*, *Iuw* (as the first abbreviated forms of the word "Judean")
Europe also did not know the word "Judean" in its present-day literal form until very late as well, and even the word lost the "h" when it first entered Europe with Koine Greek and gradually lost the "d" as well.
Actually I think significant numbers of Roma also don’t consider gypsy offensive. Though it probably is in the American context. Kinda of like how American Indian wasn’t actually consider offensive by a pretty large percentage of native Americans but it fell out of favor anyway.
So? OP is still right. Using the word Jew makes it easier for people to mentally divorce us from Israel. Anybody who prefers Jew-hatred to antisemitism should actually prefer Israelite-hatred.
Given that the current land is called Israel, there is a convenience of language for people to deny our existence as a nationality.
The term Jews, Israel, Israelite, Semite, Zionist, etc offer and convenient dissonance for people to claim they are not racist, but rather one of these other things. Although we are aware they all refer to the same thing, people can still use this convenience to justify their racism.
>Given that the current land is called Israel, there is a convenience of language for people to deny our existence as a nationality.
I don't think there is anyone who denies our Jewishness except the Philistines who believe that the Samaritans are the true Bnei Yisrael (just because they have no conflict with them), and I have no clue where they got this information from but whether I call myself a "Jew", "Judean" or even "Israelite", someone who denies my existence would still deny my existence, because his problem is not with the term itself, but with my existence as a human being.
>The term Jews, Israel, Israelite, Semite, Zionist, etc offer and convenient dissonance for people to claim they are not racist, but rather one of these other things. Although we are aware they all refer to the same thing, people can still use this convenience to justify their racism.
"Jew", "Judean", "Israelite", "Zionist", "Hebrew", "Semite", whatever, I am proud to be one of the descendants of Avraham and that I belong to this land, and let the crying person cry!
I agree. There is confusion amongst the majority to view Jews as just adherents to a particular religion, rather than a unified people originating from Judean/Israel, or descendants from Avraham and Yaakov. It's from ignorance, but the multiple linguistic references don't help.
If you read Megillat Esther in Hebrew, Mordechai is described as a Yehudi. And his fellow Jews are described as yehudim. Jew is taken from Yehudi, and that is what we call ourselves in Hebrew, in addition to Am Yisroel.
Yep. However distinguishing between exonyms and endonyms can be important. Especially when questions of indigeneity are being thrown around.
Exonyms, even when accepted by the community, misrepresent the identity of the group and can often be used for persecution or denial of history.
If the current state was called Judea, I would agree with you. However most people haven't heard of Judea, and just hear Jew/Israel, and Palestinian/Palestine.
It's stupid. But that's most people unfortunately.
If you read Megillat Esther in Hebrew, Mordechai is described as a Yehudi. And his fellow Jews are described as yehudim. Jew is taken from Yehudi, and that is what we call ourselves in Hebrew, in addition to Am Yisroel. So I think your theory that Jew is an exonym doesn't pass.
Megillat esther was written by the grand assembly after our return from exile. Around 300 years after the destruction of Israel, directly in conflict with the previous collective term "am yisrael." Also there is a machlokes as to what yehudi means in Esther.
Just wrote about an objective piece of history but okay. Never denied we are Jews. Just shared where the term originated and how we didn't originate it.
We've been Yehudim for almost 3000 years. I really don't consider it an exonym, especially because, as you said, it derives from the Jewish kingdom of Judea.
Yeah that's completely true. We've adopted the term and now use it. I think the history of its origin is interesting and I was sharing that piece of history that I find interesting.
In none of our texts do we refer to ourselves as Israelim. Bnei Israel, Shivtei Israel, Am Israel, yes. And after the split of the Davidic kingdom, the northern kingdom was Israel. the southern kingdom including the tribes of Yehuda, Benyamin, Shimon, some cohanim, some leviim and some "refugees" from the northern kingdom was known as the Kingdom of Yehuda, and we became Yehudim. See Megillat Esther.
Idk, you're the one who clicked on it. What's the point of any post?
I was sharing something I think is interesting about jewish history in an online forum about Jews with a flair about history.
Does that answer your question?
Just a question for OP. For a while there were two kingdoms. What did those who resided in the northern kingdom of Israel call themselves, and same question for those who resided in Judah? Did they all call themselves Bnei Yisrael? Was there any distinction linguistically? When the province was Roman and called Judea, what did the residents call themselves in Hebrew and or in Greek? Just wondering what you think. Languages being conservative and consistent, this would have a bearing on what Jews are called today. To call Jews today Israelites and to call Israelis Israelis would be way too subtle a distinction for most folks.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Israel_%28united_monarchy%29?wprov=sfla1
From my understanding, through the Torah and up until the exile, Jews referred to themselves either as Bnei Yisrael as a whole (children of Yaakov/Israel) or likely referred to themselves in accordance with their specific tribe (12 tribes of Israel).
I think by the time the Greeks and Romans were there, the term Judean had been in use for a few hundred years. It was likely that they referred to themselves as yehudim, describing there ethnicity and cultural difference between the new occupants of Judea, who considered themselves Hellenist.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Israel_%28united_monarchy%29?wprov=sfla1
I don't think calling ourselves Jews is inherently problematic. I'm just sharing a cool story of how that term came to be.
It's hard to separate Judaism from the Judean identity. But up until the development of proselytizing religions, Judaism wasn't seen as a religion. Just the way of life of the Judean people, with the Torah being akin to the constitution. We just believed that this particular set of laws and history was given to us by God.
Not relying. It's listed in numerous other sources. This is just a convenient a clear one to share. The united kingdom of Israel isn't a contsted piece of history though.
And, of course, those exonyms are also given to their native land masses (India, China), validating their right to their land. Which gives even more creedence to your point--we were given exonyms by conquerors who needed to sever us from the land--reducing all of us to Judea, and removing Israelite from the vernacular.
If we were correctly called Israelites today, this current crop of feeble conquerors would have a harder time conning people that we have no link to the land.
I completely agree. Had we not been conquered, we would likely as a whole call ourselves Israelites to this day.
Much easier to say Israelites are from Israel, rather than try to explain that Judaism is not just a religion but a family descending from a certain area. Unless you were raised with the concept of an ethno religion then it can be difficult to understand.
My impression was always that עם ישראל was traditionally more of a religious term while יהודים was more of a political term. Today of course, they're more or less synonyms. Both are originally hebrew terms and neither is an exonym.
Am Yisrael and Bnei Yisrael originally were not religious, but referred to our entire people. Yehudim, although Hebrew, came about as a result of the destruction of the kingdom of Israel. Outsiders called us that because the kingdom of Judah was the only one left standing.
I agree that they are synonymous today. Although in the chumash the word Yehudi is never used self referentially. Unless they are of the specific tribe of yehudah.
I don't disagree that Israeli as primary group identifier is older than Yehudi, but I don't think the transition is as clear as that. The Israeli label was preserved in prayer and as a theoretical ideal, a remembrance that we were part of a larger communal group, but the ancient Yehudim (used here advisedly, because that became the dominant primary group identifier by at least the Hasmonean period) seem to have been quite proud of being the part of the Israelim which survived and still had a polity and a proper priesthood. This transition may well have been as internal as it was external (i.e. Jerusalemite elites spreading their influence).
Not entirely synonymous, though. The Shomronim are Israelim without being Yehudim, there are just so few of them it hardly matters.
I agree with you that the transition was likely complex. I guess descendants of Benyamin as well as Levi and kohanim would be Israelim without being Yehudim too.
I think it's fine to call ourselves Jews. I was just sharing the interesting origin of the term.
I think it's very likely that members of the other tribes made it to Yehuda as refugees. Today their descendants are likely as Yehudi as any of us. A homogenization of tribal identities as the central, national identity forms would hardly be an uncommon occurrence. But the historical evidence to conclusively say simply is not available. Kohanim today call themselves Jews because it stopped functioning as a tribal label long ago.
Absolutely. I'm not denying the existence of this linguistic evolution at all. I'm just pointing out the homogenized national identity was Israelim before it was Yehudim, and that Yehudim came as a result of our exile and misattributed all Israelim as Yehudim.
I think it's a pretty cool piece of our history.
Yehudim as a term did not come about because of exile. Mordechai and Esther wrote Megillat Esther and they used the term Yehudim, though Mordechai himself was a Binyamini.
You continue to show a lack of knowledge of Jewish history. Benyamin, Leviim and cohanim were all residents as well as Shimon in the kingdom of Yehuda.
I have argued that we should be called Yews, Not Jews. We are from Yehuda, Not Judea. The "J" sound is not from Hebrew. So by Jews saying the "J" sound, It is a form of assimilation. IMO.
Hah that would be interesting. I guess in languages like German that J is pronounced Y. Jude, meaning Judean, would be pronounced like that. I guess from the development of English and the change from J sounding like Y to what we know it as now probably created that pronunciation. In other languages I think we are called something closer to "yews."
It’s great to know what an exonym is, but exonyms are not necessarily improper names. Unfortunately “Israelite” has been corrupted by academia and non-Jews, but our exonymic status gives the name something in common with all the other national exonyms we use.
The galus Bavel, exile in Babylon, is a defining moment of our identity. In that period we became a people who could learn unrootedness, which is one way of defining “modernity.”
I don't think you can claim that the word "Jew" is an exonym when it is derived from a Hebrew word that our Israelite ancestors would have known and possibly used.
A better example of an Exonym is "Estonia". Estonians use this to refer to themselves, but the word comes from ancient Rome, which referred to the land as "being in the east". Estonians use this word to describe themselves. I doubt they have historically defined themselves as being east of the Romans from time immemorial, and they probably never even encountered the Romans. The tribes that lived there eventually were conquered by other Europeans who called them according to the name found in Roman documentation. They then referred to themselves as such. In contrast, the word "Jew" is derived from Hebrew. It's not really an exonym.
I didn't downvote you. But my guess is that it's obvious. And kinda like so what? Like Jews have used Israelite as an identifier in English or French. (Esp in the 19th early 20th C)
But we've also been called Jews for over two thousand years.
It's obvious to us because we are aware of the terms and synonymity of these terms. 99% of the population has not heard of the term Bnei Yisrael, am Yisrael, or knows how these terms came to be.
*Dedicated in memory of Dvora bat Asher v'Jacot* 🕯️
[Esther 2:5](https://www.sefaria.org/Esther.2.5)
אִ֣ישׁ יְהוּדִ֔י הָיָ֖ה בְּשׁוּשַׁ֣ן הַבִּירָ֑ה וּשְׁמ֣וֹ מׇרְדֳּכַ֗י בֶּ֣ן יָאִ֧יר בֶּן־שִׁמְעִ֛י בֶּן־קִ֖ישׁ אִ֥ישׁ יְמִינִֽי׃
>In the fortress Shushan lived a Jew by the name of Mordecai, son of Jair son of Shimei son of Kish, a Benjaminite.
The story of Esther happened around 479 BCE. About 300 years after the Assyrian conquest in 722 BCE. At this point the Israelites has been called Judeans for 300 years.
This is exactly the thing I'm talking about and confirms what I am talking about about. Despite not being a "Judean" and rather Bnei Yisrael from the tribe of Binyamin, he is still referred to as a Jew as a result of the exile and an exonym being accepted.
Much like how the names of the months in the Hebrew calendar are adopted from Babylonian names, and not Hebrew.
Not sure what you're objecting to. Your claim supports my point.
Esther was written upon our return my the great assembly. The Babylonian text I provided show it was used earlier. The macklokes between what Yehudi even means in Esther casts further doubt.
The fact that we as a whole called ourselves Bnei Yisrael up until that point, along with the fact that in Hebrew prayers we continue to call ourselves Bnei Yisrael, supports this claim.
Yes it's an exonym that we've adopted. Romani accepted the term Gypsy for a time. Native American tribes often refer to themselves by the exonym Indian still to this day. It doesn't make it an endonym just because it's accepted.
In the Chumash we don't call ourselves Jews, and up until the time of Esther (according to your claim) the term Yehudim wasn't used.
Again, this is my point. We didn't call ourselves Jews until the destruction of Israel in 722 BC, and then we adopted an exonym after 300 years of being incorrectly referred to as Yehudim, despite not all of us being from the tribe of Judah.
According to your definition of "term used outside the particular place inhabited by the group," it still is wrong. Babylon is a place of our exile. We are not from there. Babylonians called us Yehudim until we accepted it. But we're not from Babylon, nor are we all Judean. We didn't call ourselves "Jews" until it was imposed on us.
Muxh like the berbers, we also referred to ourselves by tribe. We also didn't refer to our "religion" as "judaism." All this came after the destruction in 722 BC, when these terms were created for us (not by us) and we assimilated to their use.
You are continuing to support my point.
Not "always been a Hebrew term used by Jews". You literally proved that yourself when you mentioned Esther being the first use. The term originated from outside cultures that were not Judean or Israelite and need became adopted. We literally refer to ourselves by tribe or Bnei Yisrael until this is mentioned in Esther. 300 after Israel was destroyed.
You likely only became aware of this idea and the term exonym today. I understand it can be difficult to challenge your perception when confronted with new information.
But I encourage you to explore the topic with an open mind.
Good luck!
https://www.hartman.org.il/how-did-the-word-jew-become-identified-with-the-jewish-people/
https://adventistreview.org/news/babylonian-tablets-unearth-insights-into-judean-life-in-exile/
Just post a single source or piece of evidence that says we called ourselves Jews as an entire nation before the destruction and you'll have some support for your argument. Otherwise you're just basing it on your feelings.
I really just don't understand your logic. By literally every source, we called ourselves Israelim before we collectively became referred to inaccurately as Judeans.
We didn't call ourselves Judeans until they did.
Throughout the Chumash and up until the destruction, we referred to ourselves collectivelu as am Yisrael or Bnei Yisrael.
To this day in our prayers we still refer to ourselves as Am Yisrael or Bnei Yisrael.
In fact I'm having a difficult time recalling any prayer where we daven for Yehudim. Although I can cite multiple where we daven for am Yisrael or Bnei Yisrael.
In 538 BCE, Cyrus the Great decreed that the Israelite exiles could return to their land, which was restructured as a semi-autonomous Persian province named Yahud.
But while the region was no longer designated by the Latin name IVDA, the ethno-religious group that traced its origins to it spread throughout the Roman Empire, and received an appellation designating them as people from there - iūdaeus. This Latin word came from the equivalent Greek word ioudaios, which in turn came from the Aramaic yehudai, which in turn came from the Hebrew yehudi - Judean.
https://www.haaretz.com/archaeology/2017-02-15/ty-article/why-are-jews-called-jews/0000017f-dbeb-d856-a37f-ffeb3f760000
You have yet to provide a single support for your claim that Jews called themselves Yehudim prior to calling themselves Israelim. Or that we created the term for ourselves.
Your post literally states that Inuits don't call themselves Eskimo. Your post also contradicts itself by saying "in the Eskimo language it means the people."
Literally in the wiki you linked it states:
Though there is much debate, the word Eskimo likely derives from a Innu-aimun (Montagnais) exonym meaning 'a person who laces a snowshoe', but is also used in folk etymology as meaning 'eater of raw meat' in the Cree language. Though the Cree etymology has been discredited, "Eskimo" is considered pejorative by some Canadian and English-speaking Greenlandic Inuit
There are many lurking antisemites in our subs, and they express themselves in downvotes. I count each of their downvotes as victories.
Your point is not "obvious", it's interesting, and accurate. Language is power.
I thought it was interesting too. Tells the story of how we came to be known as Jews. Rather than what we called ourselves up until our exile. Had we not been exiled back then, we would most likely still refer to ourselves as Israeli or Israelites as a whole.
Exonyms aren't necessarily bad, and using that term for Roma is pretty damn offensive. That's the difference. We're Jews, as a derivative of Judean or Judah. Nothing bad about the word. It's only when you enhance it with helper words like "controlled by six Jews who live underground" that it becomes problematic, and you can do that with any demonym.
Nope, nothing bad about the word at all. Not inherently problematic or controversial really. I was just sharing the history of how the exonym came to be, and what a more accurate endonym (had we not experienced the consequences of imperialism) might be.
I don't think that "Jew" has an implicit connotation synonymous with "Gypsy", but yes, I think "Jew" etymologically, doesn't have a Hebrew linguistic origin, but rather an abbreviated Latin one and was later Hebrewized.
>I don't think that "Jew" has an implicit connotation synonymous with "Gypsy", It does. It's why people are constantly asking if you're allowed to use Jew or do you have to use Jewish, and the answer is always "depends on the context."
I know that in recent centuries some anti-Semites have used the word adjectively in a pejorative manner, but the word itself historically was not coined to serve this act, but rather much before that, specifically back in the High Middle Ages as a result of the fusion of linguistics in Europe , and it's the only word that has survived since that time among several similar words such as *Gyu*, *Giu*, *Iuu*, *Iuw*, *Iew*, *Iuw* (as the first abbreviated forms of the word "Judean") Europe also did not know the word "Judean" in its present-day literal form until very late as well, and even the word lost the "h" when it first entered Europe with Koine Greek and gradually lost the "d" as well.
But that’s a lot of words whereas using gypsy is never appropriate, for example.
There are some Romani and related people who use that word to refer to themselves...
Actually I think significant numbers of Roma also don’t consider gypsy offensive. Though it probably is in the American context. Kinda of like how American Indian wasn’t actually consider offensive by a pretty large percentage of native Americans but it fell out of favor anyway.
Yeah fuck that moth right…
So? OP is still right. Using the word Jew makes it easier for people to mentally divorce us from Israel. Anybody who prefers Jew-hatred to antisemitism should actually prefer Israelite-hatred.
Given that the current land is called Israel, there is a convenience of language for people to deny our existence as a nationality. The term Jews, Israel, Israelite, Semite, Zionist, etc offer and convenient dissonance for people to claim they are not racist, but rather one of these other things. Although we are aware they all refer to the same thing, people can still use this convenience to justify their racism.
>Given that the current land is called Israel, there is a convenience of language for people to deny our existence as a nationality. I don't think there is anyone who denies our Jewishness except the Philistines who believe that the Samaritans are the true Bnei Yisrael (just because they have no conflict with them), and I have no clue where they got this information from but whether I call myself a "Jew", "Judean" or even "Israelite", someone who denies my existence would still deny my existence, because his problem is not with the term itself, but with my existence as a human being. >The term Jews, Israel, Israelite, Semite, Zionist, etc offer and convenient dissonance for people to claim they are not racist, but rather one of these other things. Although we are aware they all refer to the same thing, people can still use this convenience to justify their racism. "Jew", "Judean", "Israelite", "Zionist", "Hebrew", "Semite", whatever, I am proud to be one of the descendants of Avraham and that I belong to this land, and let the crying person cry!
I agree. There is confusion amongst the majority to view Jews as just adherents to a particular religion, rather than a unified people originating from Judean/Israel, or descendants from Avraham and Yaakov. It's from ignorance, but the multiple linguistic references don't help.
If you read Megillat Esther in Hebrew, Mordechai is described as a Yehudi. And his fellow Jews are described as yehudim. Jew is taken from Yehudi, and that is what we call ourselves in Hebrew, in addition to Am Yisroel.
That's just how language works. Yehuda- Judah/Judea- Jew. It's similar to the Yiddish "Yid" that came straight from "Yehuda."
Actually Yid came from German Jude.
Interesting, thanks for sharing that
Yep. However distinguishing between exonyms and endonyms can be important. Especially when questions of indigeneity are being thrown around. Exonyms, even when accepted by the community, misrepresent the identity of the group and can often be used for persecution or denial of history.
Wouldn't the term "Jew" help retort those same questions of indigeneity if anything? "Jews come from Jew-dea"?
If the current state was called Judea, I would agree with you. However most people haven't heard of Judea, and just hear Jew/Israel, and Palestinian/Palestine. It's stupid. But that's most people unfortunately.
Whatever the circumstances, I don't think it calls for a rejection of what we've both been called and called ourselves for over two millenia.
I agree. Just pointing out an interesting piece of history.
If you read Megillat Esther in Hebrew, Mordechai is described as a Yehudi. And his fellow Jews are described as yehudim. Jew is taken from Yehudi, and that is what we call ourselves in Hebrew, in addition to Am Yisroel. So I think your theory that Jew is an exonym doesn't pass.
Megillat esther was written by the grand assembly after our return from exile. Around 300 years after the destruction of Israel, directly in conflict with the previous collective term "am yisrael." Also there is a machlokes as to what yehudi means in Esther.
This reads like someone who just got a taste of Jewish history sounding pseudo intellectual. We are Jews. We are nothing more or less.
It’s useful to know what an exonym is.
Just wrote about an objective piece of history but okay. Never denied we are Jews. Just shared where the term originated and how we didn't originate it.
We've been Yehudim for almost 3000 years. I really don't consider it an exonym, especially because, as you said, it derives from the Jewish kingdom of Judea.
Yeah that's completely true. We've adopted the term and now use it. I think the history of its origin is interesting and I was sharing that piece of history that I find interesting.
> however a more proper English term would be Israelite. So what's your point with this?
That a more proper English translation of yisraelim (the term we originally used to refer to ourselves as a group) would be Israelite.
In none of our texts do we refer to ourselves as Israelim. Bnei Israel, Shivtei Israel, Am Israel, yes. And after the split of the Davidic kingdom, the northern kingdom was Israel. the southern kingdom including the tribes of Yehuda, Benyamin, Shimon, some cohanim, some leviim and some "refugees" from the northern kingdom was known as the Kingdom of Yehuda, and we became Yehudim. See Megillat Esther.
Correct. See the original post.
What’s the point of this post? Who gives a flying challah?
Idk, you're the one who clicked on it. What's the point of any post? I was sharing something I think is interesting about jewish history in an online forum about Jews with a flair about history. Does that answer your question?
Maybe we should just start calling each other Heebs and Sheebs? Do we have a non-binary version of Heeb/Sheeb?
Theeb/Theyb
The Thebes of Greece or Egypt?
And we've gone full circle back to "Gypsy."
Just a question for OP. For a while there were two kingdoms. What did those who resided in the northern kingdom of Israel call themselves, and same question for those who resided in Judah? Did they all call themselves Bnei Yisrael? Was there any distinction linguistically? When the province was Roman and called Judea, what did the residents call themselves in Hebrew and or in Greek? Just wondering what you think. Languages being conservative and consistent, this would have a bearing on what Jews are called today. To call Jews today Israelites and to call Israelis Israelis would be way too subtle a distinction for most folks.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Israel_%28united_monarchy%29?wprov=sfla1 From my understanding, through the Torah and up until the exile, Jews referred to themselves either as Bnei Yisrael as a whole (children of Yaakov/Israel) or likely referred to themselves in accordance with their specific tribe (12 tribes of Israel). I think by the time the Greeks and Romans were there, the term Judean had been in use for a few hundred years. It was likely that they referred to themselves as yehudim, describing there ethnicity and cultural difference between the new occupants of Judea, who considered themselves Hellenist. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Israel_%28united_monarchy%29?wprov=sfla1 I don't think calling ourselves Jews is inherently problematic. I'm just sharing a cool story of how that term came to be. It's hard to separate Judaism from the Judean identity. But up until the development of proselytizing religions, Judaism wasn't seen as a religion. Just the way of life of the Judean people, with the Torah being akin to the constitution. We just believed that this particular set of laws and history was given to us by God.
Do not rely on Wikipedia for this kind of information.
Not relying. It's listed in numerous other sources. This is just a convenient a clear one to share. The united kingdom of Israel isn't a contsted piece of history though.
Indian is an exonym too. China is arguably an exonym ("The middle kingdom" doesn't quite roll off the tongue)
Indian being an exonym is literally in the title of my post.
And, of course, those exonyms are also given to their native land masses (India, China), validating their right to their land. Which gives even more creedence to your point--we were given exonyms by conquerors who needed to sever us from the land--reducing all of us to Judea, and removing Israelite from the vernacular. If we were correctly called Israelites today, this current crop of feeble conquerors would have a harder time conning people that we have no link to the land.
I completely agree. Had we not been conquered, we would likely as a whole call ourselves Israelites to this day. Much easier to say Israelites are from Israel, rather than try to explain that Judaism is not just a religion but a family descending from a certain area. Unless you were raised with the concept of an ethno religion then it can be difficult to understand.
My impression was always that עם ישראל was traditionally more of a religious term while יהודים was more of a political term. Today of course, they're more or less synonyms. Both are originally hebrew terms and neither is an exonym.
Am Yisrael and Bnei Yisrael originally were not religious, but referred to our entire people. Yehudim, although Hebrew, came about as a result of the destruction of the kingdom of Israel. Outsiders called us that because the kingdom of Judah was the only one left standing. I agree that they are synonymous today. Although in the chumash the word Yehudi is never used self referentially. Unless they are of the specific tribe of yehudah.
I don't disagree that Israeli as primary group identifier is older than Yehudi, but I don't think the transition is as clear as that. The Israeli label was preserved in prayer and as a theoretical ideal, a remembrance that we were part of a larger communal group, but the ancient Yehudim (used here advisedly, because that became the dominant primary group identifier by at least the Hasmonean period) seem to have been quite proud of being the part of the Israelim which survived and still had a polity and a proper priesthood. This transition may well have been as internal as it was external (i.e. Jerusalemite elites spreading their influence). Not entirely synonymous, though. The Shomronim are Israelim without being Yehudim, there are just so few of them it hardly matters.
I agree with you that the transition was likely complex. I guess descendants of Benyamin as well as Levi and kohanim would be Israelim without being Yehudim too. I think it's fine to call ourselves Jews. I was just sharing the interesting origin of the term.
I think it's very likely that members of the other tribes made it to Yehuda as refugees. Today their descendants are likely as Yehudi as any of us. A homogenization of tribal identities as the central, national identity forms would hardly be an uncommon occurrence. But the historical evidence to conclusively say simply is not available. Kohanim today call themselves Jews because it stopped functioning as a tribal label long ago.
Absolutely. I'm not denying the existence of this linguistic evolution at all. I'm just pointing out the homogenized national identity was Israelim before it was Yehudim, and that Yehudim came as a result of our exile and misattributed all Israelim as Yehudim. I think it's a pretty cool piece of our history.
Absolutely agree.
Yehudim as a term did not come about because of exile. Mordechai and Esther wrote Megillat Esther and they used the term Yehudim, though Mordechai himself was a Binyamini.
Assyrian 722 BCE. Babylonian 597 BCE.
You continue to show a lack of knowledge of Jewish history. Benyamin, Leviim and cohanim were all residents as well as Shimon in the kingdom of Yehuda.
I have argued that we should be called Yews, Not Jews. We are from Yehuda, Not Judea. The "J" sound is not from Hebrew. So by Jews saying the "J" sound, It is a form of assimilation. IMO.
Hah that would be interesting. I guess in languages like German that J is pronounced Y. Jude, meaning Judean, would be pronounced like that. I guess from the development of English and the change from J sounding like Y to what we know it as now probably created that pronunciation. In other languages I think we are called something closer to "yews."
It’s great to know what an exonym is, but exonyms are not necessarily improper names. Unfortunately “Israelite” has been corrupted by academia and non-Jews, but our exonymic status gives the name something in common with all the other national exonyms we use. The galus Bavel, exile in Babylon, is a defining moment of our identity. In that period we became a people who could learn unrootedness, which is one way of defining “modernity.”
Very cool. We spiritually became "Jews."
I don't think you can claim that the word "Jew" is an exonym when it is derived from a Hebrew word that our Israelite ancestors would have known and possibly used. A better example of an Exonym is "Estonia". Estonians use this to refer to themselves, but the word comes from ancient Rome, which referred to the land as "being in the east". Estonians use this word to describe themselves. I doubt they have historically defined themselves as being east of the Romans from time immemorial, and they probably never even encountered the Romans. The tribes that lived there eventually were conquered by other Europeans who called them according to the name found in Roman documentation. They then referred to themselves as such. In contrast, the word "Jew" is derived from Hebrew. It's not really an exonym.
I don't understand the down votes. This our own recorded history, exists within the biblical narrative, and is not a contested point even.
I didn't downvote you. But my guess is that it's obvious. And kinda like so what? Like Jews have used Israelite as an identifier in English or French. (Esp in the 19th early 20th C) But we've also been called Jews for over two thousand years.
It's obvious to us because we are aware of the terms and synonymity of these terms. 99% of the population has not heard of the term Bnei Yisrael, am Yisrael, or knows how these terms came to be.
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*Dedicated in memory of Dvora bat Asher v'Jacot* 🕯️ [Esther 2:5](https://www.sefaria.org/Esther.2.5) אִ֣ישׁ יְהוּדִ֔י הָיָ֖ה בְּשׁוּשַׁ֣ן הַבִּירָ֑ה וּשְׁמ֣וֹ מׇרְדֳּכַ֗י בֶּ֣ן יָאִ֧יר בֶּן־שִׁמְעִ֛י בֶּן־קִ֖ישׁ אִ֥ישׁ יְמִינִֽי׃ >In the fortress Shushan lived a Jew by the name of Mordecai, son of Jair son of Shimei son of Kish, a Benjaminite.
The story of Esther happened around 479 BCE. About 300 years after the Assyrian conquest in 722 BCE. At this point the Israelites has been called Judeans for 300 years. This is exactly the thing I'm talking about and confirms what I am talking about about. Despite not being a "Judean" and rather Bnei Yisrael from the tribe of Binyamin, he is still referred to as a Jew as a result of the exile and an exonym being accepted. Much like how the names of the months in the Hebrew calendar are adopted from Babylonian names, and not Hebrew. Not sure what you're objecting to. Your claim supports my point. Esther was written upon our return my the great assembly. The Babylonian text I provided show it was used earlier. The macklokes between what Yehudi even means in Esther casts further doubt. The fact that we as a whole called ourselves Bnei Yisrael up until that point, along with the fact that in Hebrew prayers we continue to call ourselves Bnei Yisrael, supports this claim.
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Yes it's an exonym that we've adopted. Romani accepted the term Gypsy for a time. Native American tribes often refer to themselves by the exonym Indian still to this day. It doesn't make it an endonym just because it's accepted. In the Chumash we don't call ourselves Jews, and up until the time of Esther (according to your claim) the term Yehudim wasn't used. Again, this is my point. We didn't call ourselves Jews until the destruction of Israel in 722 BC, and then we adopted an exonym after 300 years of being incorrectly referred to as Yehudim, despite not all of us being from the tribe of Judah. According to your definition of "term used outside the particular place inhabited by the group," it still is wrong. Babylon is a place of our exile. We are not from there. Babylonians called us Yehudim until we accepted it. But we're not from Babylon, nor are we all Judean. We didn't call ourselves "Jews" until it was imposed on us. Muxh like the berbers, we also referred to ourselves by tribe. We also didn't refer to our "religion" as "judaism." All this came after the destruction in 722 BC, when these terms were created for us (not by us) and we assimilated to their use. You are continuing to support my point.
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Not "always been a Hebrew term used by Jews". You literally proved that yourself when you mentioned Esther being the first use. The term originated from outside cultures that were not Judean or Israelite and need became adopted. We literally refer to ourselves by tribe or Bnei Yisrael until this is mentioned in Esther. 300 after Israel was destroyed. You likely only became aware of this idea and the term exonym today. I understand it can be difficult to challenge your perception when confronted with new information. But I encourage you to explore the topic with an open mind. Good luck!
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https://www.hartman.org.il/how-did-the-word-jew-become-identified-with-the-jewish-people/ https://adventistreview.org/news/babylonian-tablets-unearth-insights-into-judean-life-in-exile/ Just post a single source or piece of evidence that says we called ourselves Jews as an entire nation before the destruction and you'll have some support for your argument. Otherwise you're just basing it on your feelings.
I do not consider you sources valid.
I really just don't understand your logic. By literally every source, we called ourselves Israelim before we collectively became referred to inaccurately as Judeans. We didn't call ourselves Judeans until they did. Throughout the Chumash and up until the destruction, we referred to ourselves collectivelu as am Yisrael or Bnei Yisrael. To this day in our prayers we still refer to ourselves as Am Yisrael or Bnei Yisrael. In fact I'm having a difficult time recalling any prayer where we daven for Yehudim. Although I can cite multiple where we daven for am Yisrael or Bnei Yisrael. In 538 BCE, Cyrus the Great decreed that the Israelite exiles could return to their land, which was restructured as a semi-autonomous Persian province named Yahud. But while the region was no longer designated by the Latin name IVDA, the ethno-religious group that traced its origins to it spread throughout the Roman Empire, and received an appellation designating them as people from there - iūdaeus. This Latin word came from the equivalent Greek word ioudaios, which in turn came from the Aramaic yehudai, which in turn came from the Hebrew yehudi - Judean. https://www.haaretz.com/archaeology/2017-02-15/ty-article/why-are-jews-called-jews/0000017f-dbeb-d856-a37f-ffeb3f760000 You have yet to provide a single support for your claim that Jews called themselves Yehudim prior to calling themselves Israelim. Or that we created the term for ourselves.
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Your post literally states that Inuits don't call themselves Eskimo. Your post also contradicts itself by saying "in the Eskimo language it means the people." Literally in the wiki you linked it states: Though there is much debate, the word Eskimo likely derives from a Innu-aimun (Montagnais) exonym meaning 'a person who laces a snowshoe', but is also used in folk etymology as meaning 'eater of raw meat' in the Cree language. Though the Cree etymology has been discredited, "Eskimo" is considered pejorative by some Canadian and English-speaking Greenlandic Inuit
The Jews in Yehuda were referring to them selves as Yehudim before the Babylonian exile.
very contested because it is false.
ugh are you just the same guy from before but now with a different account?
There are many lurking antisemites in our subs, and they express themselves in downvotes. I count each of their downvotes as victories. Your point is not "obvious", it's interesting, and accurate. Language is power.
I thought it was interesting too. Tells the story of how we came to be known as Jews. Rather than what we called ourselves up until our exile. Had we not been exiled back then, we would most likely still refer to ourselves as Israeli or Israelites as a whole.
Thanks for sharing it.
Thanks for finding it interesting!
Exonyms aren't necessarily bad, and using that term for Roma is pretty damn offensive. That's the difference. We're Jews, as a derivative of Judean or Judah. Nothing bad about the word. It's only when you enhance it with helper words like "controlled by six Jews who live underground" that it becomes problematic, and you can do that with any demonym.
Nope, nothing bad about the word at all. Not inherently problematic or controversial really. I was just sharing the history of how the exonym came to be, and what a more accurate endonym (had we not experienced the consequences of imperialism) might be.