Races vs. Pseudo-races

Submitted by Michael S, Mar 20, 2017 at 22:40

Hi, Tovey. An interesting study. To answer some of your (rhetorical?) questions,

"Was Jesus racist in initially refusing her request due to her not being Jewish?"

No. Jews and Syrophoenicians are of the same race; and Jesus made his distinction along religious lines.

"The Egyptians were racist towards the Jewish population"

Again, the Egyptians and Jews were both part of the same race; but the distinction is a bit more blurry:
Afars, Ethiopian Jews, Oromos and Somalis are definitely on the border between bing Sub-Saharan Africans and Euradian-North Africans. Also, according to

https://www.census.gov/prod/cen2010/briefs/c2010br-05.pdf

The White racial category includes people who marked the "White"
checkbox. It also includes respondents who reported entries such
as Caucasian or White; European entries, such as Irish, German,
and Polish; Middle Eastern entries, such as Arab, Lebanese, and
Palestinian; and North African entries, such as Algerian, Moroccan,
and Egyptian.

On the other hand, natives of the Maghreb and Egypt are about 1/4 "Negroid", according to their autosomal DNA; and most of them share yDNA Hg "E" with Sub-
Saharan Africans (but also with Adolf Hitler). As with Aaron and Miriam speaking against Moses because of his "Cushite" wife, their reasoning may have been racial; but more likely, it was religious: The Cushite woman was probably non-Jewish.

Here we are dealing with the distinction between real "races", which actually exist, and "pseudo-races, such as Hitler's "Aryan race", or the UN's former classification of "Judaism as racism".

Supper's on the table. I have to go. Sorry.

Note: Opinions expressed in comments are those of the authors alone and not necessarily those of Daniel Pipes. Original writing only, please. Comments are screened and in some cases edited before posting. Reasoned disagreement is welcome but not comments that are scurrilous, off-topic, commercial, disparaging religions, or otherwise inappropriate. For complete regulations, see the "Guidelines for Reader Comments".