English term derived from Hebrew "Yehudi"
Look up
Jew
in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
The
English
term
Jew
is originally derived from the
Hebrew
term
Yehudi
(
lit.
'
of
Judah
'
), which passed into
Greek
as
Ioudaios
and into
Latin
as
Iudaeus
, in turn evolving into the
Old French
term
giu
after the letter "d" was dropped.
[1]
A variety of related forms are found in early English from about the year 1000, including
Iudea
,
Gyu
,
Giu
,
Iuu
,
Iuw
, and
Iew
, which eventually developed into the modern English word for the
Jewish people
.
Etymology
[
edit
]
Yehudi
in the Hebrew Bible
[
edit
]
According to the
Book of Genesis
,
Judah
(
????????
,
Yehudah
) was the name of the fourth son of the patriarch
Jacob
. During the Exodus, the name was given to the
Tribe of Judah
, descended from the patriarch Judah. After the conquest and settlement of the land of
Canaan
, Judah also referred to the territory allocated to the tribe. After the splitting of the
united Kingdom of Israel
, the name was used for the southern
kingdom of Judah
. The kingdom now encompassed the tribes of Judah,
Benjamin
and
Simeon
, along with some of the cities of the
Levites
. With the destruction of the northern
kingdom of Israel (Samaria)
, the kingdom of Judah became the sole Jewish state and the term
y'hudi
(
?????
) was applied to all Israelites.
The term
Yehudi
(
????????
) occurs 74 times in the
Masoretic text
of the Hebrew Bible. The plural,
Yehudim
(
????????????
) first appears in
2 Kings 16:6
where it refers to a defeat for the Yehudi army or nation, and in
2 Chronicles 32:18
, where it refers to the language of the Yehudim (
?????????
).
Jeremiah 34:9
has the earliest singular usage of the word
Yehudi
. In
Esther 2:5?6
, the name "Yehudi" (
????????
) has a generic aspect, in this case referring to a man from the
tribe of Benjamin
:
- "There was a man a
Yehudi
(Jewish man) in
Shushan
the capital, whose name was
Mordecai
the son of Jair the son of
Shimei
the son of
Kish
, a
Benjamite
; who had been exiled from
Jerusalem
with the exile that was exiled with
Jeconiah
, king of
Judah
, which
Nebuchadnezzar
, king of
Babylon
, had exiled."
The name appears in the Bible as a verb in
Esther 8:17
which states:
- "Many of the people of the land
became Yehudim
(in the generic sense) (
????????????
,
mityahadim
) because the fear of the Yehudim fell on them."
In some places in the
Talmud
the word
Israel(ite)
refers to somebody who is Jewish but does not necessarily practice
Judaism
as a
religion
: "An Israel(ite) even though he has sinned is still an Israel(ite)" (Tractate
Sanhedrin
44a). More commonly the Talmud uses the term
Bnei Yisrael
, i.e. "Children of Israel", ("Israel" being the name of the third patriarch
Jacob
, father of the sons that would form the twelve tribes of Israel, which he was given and took after wrestling with an angel, see
Genesis
32:28?29
[2]
) to refer to Jews. According to the Talmud then, there is no distinction between "religious Jews" and "secular Jews."
In
modern Hebrew
, the same word is still used to mean both Jews and Judeans ("of Judea"). In
Arabic
the terms are
yah?d?
(sg.),
al-yah?d
(pl.), and ????? ??????????
ban? isr???l
. The
Aramaic
term is
Y'h?d?i
.
Development in European languages
[
edit
]
The
Septuagint
(reputedly a product of
Hellenistic Jewish
scholarship) and other Greek documents translated
????????
,
Yehudi
and the
Aramaic
Y'h?d?i
using the
Koine Greek
term
Ioudaios
(
Greek
:
?ουδα?ο?
; pl.
?ουδα?οι
Ioudaioi
), which had lost the 'h' sound. The
Latin
term, following the Greek version, is
Iudaeus
, and from these sources the term passed to other European languages. The
Old French
giu
, earlier
juieu
, had
elided
(dropped) the letter "d" from the Latin
Iudaeus
. The
Middle English
word
Jew
derives from
Old English
where the word is attested as early as 1000 in various forms, such as
Iudeas
,
Gyu
,
Giu
,
Iuu
,
Iuw
,
Iew
. The Old English name is derived from Old French. The modern
French
term is "Juif/Juive" (m/f).
Most European languages have retained the letter "d" in the word for "Jew". Etymological equivalents are in use in other languages, e.g.
Jude
in
German
,
judeu
in
Portuguese
,
jøde
in
Danish
and
Norwegian
,
judio
in
Spanish
,
jood
in
Dutch
. In some languages, derivations of the word "Hebrew" are also in use to describe a Jew, e.g.,
Ebreo
in
Italian
and Spanish,
Ebri / Ebrani
(
Persian
:
????/??????
) in
Persian
and Еврей
Yevrey
in
Russian
.
[3]
(See
List of Jewish ethnonyms
for a full overview.) The German word
Jude
(
[?juːd?]
) is
cognate
with the Yiddish word for "Jew",
Yid
.
[4]
Jewish dictionary definitions and etymologies
[
edit
]
According to the Klein dictionary by rabbi
Ernest Klein
, the Hebrew word for Jew, Judean, or Jewish
Hebrew
:
????????
which is "
yehudi
" in Hebrew orig. meant 'member of the tribe Judah', later also 'member of the Kingdom of Judah'. When after the conquest of the Kingdom of Israel by the Assyrians in 722 B.C.E. only the Kingdom of Judah survived, yehudi ???????? came to denote 'Jew', resp. 'Jewish'. cp. 'Judaic', 'Jew', 'Chueta' and 'Yiddish'.
[5]
According to rabbi
Marcus Jastrow
's dictionary,
yehudi
is defined as "worshipper of one God" and rejecting idolatry.
Meg. 12
b
??? ??? ?? ???? ?????? ??? he is called Y'hudi (Esth. II, 5), which would indicate that he belongs to the tribe of Judah, and yet he is called ish y'mini &c.?, v. ???????. Ib. 13
a
... ????? ?? ... ??? ????? ??"? ???? ?? but why is he designated as Y'hudi? Because he disowned idolatry; for whosoever disowns idolatry, is called a Jew (ref. to Dan. III, 12); Esth. R. to II, 5 ??? ????? ... ???? ?? ???? ?? ????? because he professed the unity of God, he was called Y'hudi, meaning to say, a Y'hudi, a believer in One God.
Modern use
[
edit
]
In
modern English
and other contemporary languages, the term "Israelite" was used to refer to contemporary Jews as well as to Jews of antiquity until the mid-20th-century. Since the foundation of the
State of Israel
, it has become less common to use "Israelite" of Jews in general. Instead, citizens of the state of Israel, whether Jewish or not, are called "Israeli", while "Jew" is used as an ethno-religious designation.
Perception of offensiveness
[
edit
]
The word
Jew
has been used often enough in a disparaging manner by
antisemites
that in the late 19th and early 20th centuries it was frequently avoided altogether, and the term
Hebrew
was substituted instead (e.g.
Young Men's Hebrew Association
). The German counterpart
Jude
was extensively used during the
Nazi period
as a part of its anti-semitic campaign (eventually leading to
genocide
).
[7]
The word has become more often used in a neutral fashion, as it underwent a process known as
reappropriation
.
[8]
[9]
Even today some people are wary of its use, and prefer to use "Jewish".
[10]
[11]
Indeed, when used as an adjective (e.g. "Jew lawyer") or verb (e.g. "to Jew-down someone"
[12]
), the term
Jew
is purely pejorative. According to
The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language
, Fourth Edition (2000):
It is widely recognized that the attributive use of the noun
Jew
, in phrases such as
Jew lawyer
or
Jew ethics
, is both
vulgar
and highly offensive. In such contexts
Jewish
is the only acceptable possibility. Some people, however, have become so wary of this construction that they have extended the stigma to any use of
Jew
as a noun, a practice that carries risks of its own. In a sentence such as
There are now several Jews on the council
, which is unobjectionable, the substitution of a circumlocution like
Jewish people
or
persons of Jewish background
may in itself cause offense for seeming to imply that
Jew
has a negative connotation when used as a noun.
[13]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
Cf.
Marcus Jastrow
's
Dictionary of the Targumim, Talmud Babli, Talmud Yerushalmi and Midrashic Literature
, and the source he used:
Megilla
13a:2 (Talmud).
- ^
"Genesis ≫ Chapter 32"
. Archived from
the original
on 2005-11-29
. Retrieved
2005-07-07
.
- ^
Falk, Avner
(1996).
A Psychoanalytic History of the Jews
. Madison, N.J.: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press. p. 131.
ISBN
0-8386-3660-8
.
- ^
"Yiddish"
.
Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary
(11th ed.). Springfield, Massachusetts: Merriam-Webster. 2004. p.
1453
.
ISBN
0-87779-809-5
.
- ^
Klein, Ernest.
"Klein Dictionary, ???????? 1"
.
www.sefaria.org
. Sefaria
. Retrieved
8 October
2023
.
- ^
Jastrow, Marcus.
"Jastrow's Dictionary"
.
www.sefaria.org
. Sefaria
. Retrieved
8 October
2023
.
- ^
"Yellow Star; 'Jude'
"
.
The National Holocaust Centre and Museum
. 8 February 2015.
- ^
Stephen Paul Miller; Daniel Morris (2010).
Radical Poetics and Secular Jewish Culture
. University of Alabama Press. p. 153.
ISBN
978-0-8173-5563-0
.
- ^
M. Lynn Weiss (1998).
Gertrude Stein and Richard Wright: The Poetics and Politics of Modernism
. Univ. Press of Mississippi. p. 66.
ISBN
978-1-60473-188-0
.
- ^
Sales, Ben (October 5, 2020).
"
'Jew' isn't a slur. You don't have to avoid saying it"
.
The Washington Post
.
- ^
Oppenheimer, Mark (April 22, 2017).
"Reclaiming 'Jew'
"
.
The New York Times
.
- ^
"Jew down"
.
American Jewish Committee
. 30 March 2021
. Retrieved
23 March
2024
.
- ^
Kleinedler, Steven; Spitz, Susan; et al., eds. (2005).
The American Heritage Guide to Contemporary Usage and Style
. Houghton Mifflin Company. Jew.
ISBN
978-0-618-60499-9
.