# Genocidal Supremacism One of the most glaringly destructive elements of the Tanakh and contemporary Judaism is the current of genocidal supremacism. I think that for most of Jewish history, this current was relatively insignificant. Jewish power was almost never a big threat for non-Jews. However, in our time, unfortunately, this aspect of our tradition must be front and center. ## The Deuteronomist (Dtm) At least two outbursts of genocidal supremacism require our attention. The first is the Deuteronomistic school of the Tanakh, which was the authoritative tradition for the people responsible for writing and editing much of the Hebrew Bible, particularly in the Deuteronomist History, running from *Devarim* (Deuteronomy) through Joshua, Judges, Samuel and Kings. While there are many beautiful elements of the Deuteronomist movement (they most likely wrote the text of *Shma Yisrael*, for example), they also engendered an extremely twisted and self-destrutive interpretation of history. They posited that YHVH commanded genocide against the other peoples who lived in the Land alongside the Israelites, and believed that the divine punishment for not exterminating them was that they would destroy us. Inside this narrative, historical periods in which Israelites murdered and plundered other peoples were presented as exemplary. Periods in which Israelites coexisted with neighboring peoples, sharing family life and religious practice, were presented as sins. Periods in which the Israelites were murdered and plundered by their neighbors were presented as divine punishment for not finishing the job of murdering and plundering them first, as was commanded. See Joshua and Judges for more details. The genocidal militarism of the Deuteronomistic school was largely fictional in nature, in that the relevant peoples no longer existed when the texts commanding genocide were formulated. But why make up a commandment to exterminate non-existent peoples? Some scholars argue that the purpose of these texts was to facilitate the persecution of Israelites who resisted the *g'zerot* or religious decrees of the Deuteronomists, such as forbidding traditional Israelite worship of YHVH in the *bamot* or high places, the use of a wooden cultic object called an *asherah*, and the worship of Israelite-Canaanite deities such as Ba'al and Asherah. The *Mitnabot* lived in the period before the Dtm school became ascendant. Dtm is thought to have come to power under the reign of King Josiah [יאשיהו] in Judah, usually dated 639-609 BCE. The *Mitnabot* are situated roughly a century earlier, during the years 740-710 BCE. However, various currents of the Dtm school would already have been on the rise (such as under King Hezekiah). And while the *Mitnabot* might have been part of these cultural currents in some ways (such as in their focus on covenantal theology and social justice, also hallmarks of the Dtm school), they would have opposed the rising tide of genocidal militarism and religious intolerance. Since they themselves worshipped YHVH-Asherah at a *bamah* or high place in the Judean hills west of Jerusalem (near Even Sapin of today), the ascent of the Dtm school would mean destruction for their school and possibly the execution of its practitioners. And since they shared bonds of family and love with non-Israelite peoples, like Moshe and his Midianite wife Tsiporah, they knew that genocidal rhetoric against "the others" could only mean death for people they loved. ## Modern Jewish Supremacism The second outburst is today. Powerful streams of contemporary Judaism explicitly and often militaristically champion an ideology of Jewish supremacism. The most virulent and catastrophic of these currents expresses itself in the behavior the State of Israel, and popular Jewish religious and nationalist movements, towards Palestinians. Before getting into this, I want to make clear that I think that Israel's Palestinian, Arab and Muslim neighbors in the Middle East, and beyond, are responsible for many atrocities against Israeli Jews, and also bear significant responsibility for the Israel-Arab-Palestine conflict. I think its clear that much of mainstream Arab and Muslim thought in regard to Israeli Jews is genocidal in logic and sometimes in action. Additionally, we should recognize that important segments of the global Left legitimized the mass murder of Israeli civilians on Oct. 7. Since refusing to treat the mass murder of civilians belonging to a particular ethnic-national group as a crime means the dehumanization of that group, such "Left" perspectives are also grounded in the logic of genocide. However, nothing that I have said in this long caveat can obscure the reality of Jewish supremacism. The State of Israel, guided and supported by dominant currents in Jewish religion and nationalism, is committing ongoing crimes against humanity against Palestinians. Whether we're talking about the persecution and oppression of Palestinians in East Jerusalem and the West Bank, or the mass-murder of Gazans and the destruction of Gaza, Israel's policies exist in a symbiotic relationship with the Deuteronomist's genocidal ideology. State and religious leaders, and much of the larger public, understand their world and justify their actions through the prism of the Jewish supremacism that characterizes these biblical texts and parts of subsequent Jewish tradition that reflect them. If enough people believe that they are participants in Joshua's holy war of conquest, even if that story is historically a fiction, they can will it into reality. אם תרצו אין זו אגדה. Our current reality is the proof that such a thing can be done. It is the awesome and dangerous power of the genre of religious fantasy. See [[We Witness Silwan]] For example of the dangerous alchemy of combining Dtm's supremacism with contemporary Jewish religious nationalism and militarism, see Rabbi Shlomo Goren writings on pgs. 26-34 in [this anthology of sources](https://drive.google.com/file/d/1LW4Le8Yya6Cl0Hwm303Omof_1fn4jebX/view?usp=sharing) . This is about the West Bank decades before Oct. 7. ## Towards *ADAM* or Humanization The *Mitnabot* struggled against the genocidal currents in Israelite tradition. Their struggle focused on two elements, one political in orientation ([[The Huma'n Covenant]]), and one spiritual-political ([[Facing the Genocidal god]]).