וַהֲקִמֹתִי אֶת בְּרִיתִי בֵּינִי וּבֵינֶךָ וּבֵין זַרְעֲךָ אַחֲרֶיךָ לְדֹרֹתָם לִבְרִית עוֹלָם לִהְיוֹת לְךָ לֵאלֹהִים וּלְזַרְעֲךָ אַחֲרֶיךָ. וְנָתַתִּי לְךָ וּלְזַרְעֲךָ אַחֲרֶיךָ אֵת אֶרֶץ מְגֻרֶיךָ אֵת כָּל אֶרֶץ כְּנַעַן לַאֲחֻזַּת עוֹלָם וְהָיִיתִי לָהֶם לֵאלֹהִים. וַיֹּאמֶר אֱלֹהִים אֶל אַבְרָהָם וְאַתָּה אֶת בְּרִיתִי תִשְׁמֹר אַתָּה וְזַרְעֲךָ אַחֲרֶיךָ לְדֹרֹתָם. זֹאת בְּרִיתִי אֲשֶׁר תִּשְׁמְרוּ בֵּינִי וּבֵינֵיכֶם וּבֵין זַרְעֲךָ אַחֲרֶיךָ הִמּוֹל לָכֶם כָּל זָכָר.
And I will establish My covenant between Me and you and your seed after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be a God to you and to your seed after you. And I will give you and your offspring the land of your sojournings, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession; and I will be their God.’
Zohar: Creatures that have a "soul"-- that pertains to the Jews, for they are the Children of God, and from God came their holy souls....And the souls of other nations, from where do they come? Rabbi Elazar says that they have souls from the impure left side, and therefore, they are all impure, defiling anyone who comes near them.
Tanya Ch. 1: The souls of the nations of the world, however, emanate from the other, unclean kelipot which contain no good whatsoever.
כִּי עַם קָדוֹשׁ אַתָּה לַיי אֱלֹהֶיךָ וּבְךָ בָּחַר יי לִהְיוֹת לוֹ לְעַם סְגֻלָּה מִכֹּל הָעַמִּים אֲשֶׁר עַל פְּנֵי הָאֲדָמָה.
For you are a holy people to Hashem your God, and Hashem has chosen you to be His treasure out of all peoples that are upon the face of the earth.
| Rashi: For you are a holy people: Your holiness stems from your forefathers, and, moreover, “the Lord has chosen you.” - [Sifrei] | כי עם קדוש אתה: קדושת עצמך מאבותיך. ועוד, ובך בחר ה': |
Bal Shem Tov: G-d gives physical form to the spiritual; the Jew makes spiritual the physical.
Lou Silberman, JS Scholar at Vanderbilt University, USA, 2008
"The more extreme, and exclusive, interpretations of the doctrine of election among Jewish thinkers, were partly the result of reaction to oppression by the non-Jewish world. The more the Jew was forced to close in on himself, to withdraw into the imposed confines of the ghetto, the more he tended to emphasize Israel's difference from the cruel gentile without. Only thus did his suffering become intelligible and bearable. This type of interpretation reaches its hight in the Kabbalistic idea that while the souls of Israel stem from God, the souls of gentiles are merely of base material."
הֵן עַבְדִּי אֶתְמָךְ בּוֹ בְּחִירִי רָצְתָה נַפְשִׁי נָתַתִּי רוּחִי עָלָיו מִשְׁפָּט לַגּוֹיִם יוֹצִיא. לֹא יִצְעַק וְלֹא יִשָּׂא וְלֹא יַשְׁמִיעַ בַּחוּץ קוֹלוֹ. קָנֶה רָצוּץ לֹא יִשְׁבּוֹר וּפִשְׁתָּה כֵהָה לֹא יְכַבֶּנָּה לֶאֱמֶת יוֹצִיא מִשְׁפָּט. לֹא יִכְהֶה וְלֹא יָרוּץ עַד יָשִׂים בָּאָרֶץ מִשְׁפָּט וּלְתוֹרָתוֹ אִיִּים יְיַחֵילוּ. כֹּה אָמַר הָאֵל יי בּוֹרֵא הַשָּׁמַיִם וְנוֹטֵיהֶם רֹקַע הָאָרֶץ וְצֶאֱצָאֶיהָ נֹתֵן נְשָׁמָה לָעָם עָלֶיהָ וְרוּחַ לַהֹלְכִים בָּהּ. אֲנִי יי קְרָאתִיךָ בְצֶדֶק וְאַחְזֵק בְּיָדֶךָ וְאֶצָּרְךָ וְאֶתֶּנְךָ לִבְרִית עָם לְאוֹר גּוֹיִם.
Behold My servant, I will support him; My chosen one whom my soul delights in, I have placed My spirit upon him, He shall spread justice to the nations....He shall not fail nor be crushed, until he has brought justice to the land....I am YHVH [G-d] who has called you in righteousness, and grasped you by your hand and in your land I have given you a covenant to be a light unto the nations.
לֹא מֵרֻבְּכֶם מִכָּל הָעַמִּים חָשַׁק יי בָּכֶם וַיִּבְחַר בָּכֶם כִּי אַתֶּם הַמְעַט מִכָּל הָעַמִּים. כִּי מֵאַהֲבַת יי אֶתְכֶם וּמִשָּׁמְרוֹ אֶת הַשְּׁבֻעָה אֲשֶׁר נִשְׁבַּע לַאֲבֹתֵיכֶם הוֹצִיא יי אֶתְכֶם בְּיָד חֲזָקָה וַיִּפְדְּךָ מִבֵּית עֲבָדִים מִיַּד פַּרְעֹה מֶלֶךְ מִצְרָיִם.
Hashem did not set His love upon you, nor choose you, because you were more numerous than all other people-- for you were fewer than all other peoples-- but because Hashem loved you, and because God would keep the oath which He swore to your fathers-- for Hashem to bring you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you out of the house of bondage, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.
Michael Wyschogrod, Modern Orthodox Theologian:
If the Jews are chosen to serve for all eternity as a light unto the nations, it is because God, “sees the face of his beloved Abraham in each and every one of his children as a man sees the face of his beloved in the children of his union with his beloved.”
Isaac Meyer Wise (1819-1900, Prague/US) - Reform Rabbi and Author
"The idea of the Jews returning to Palestine is no part of our creed. We, rather, believe it is God’s will that the habitable world become one holy land, the human family one chosen people." Judaism, he declared, was a world-wide religion: "The Jew’s nationality is not endemic; it is not conditioned by space, land or water. The Jew’s nationality...is not in his blood...It is all intellectual and moral, without any reference to soil, climate, or any other circumstance. The Jewish nationality...has been made portable."
(ב) וַיֹּאמַר יי מִסִּינַי בָּא וְזָרַח מִשֵּׂעִיר לָמוֹ הוֹפִיעַ מֵהַר פָּארָן וְאָתָה מֵרִבְבֹת קֹדֶשׁ מִימִינוֹ אשדת [אֵשׁ דָּת] לָמוֹ.
(2) And he said: The LORD came from Sinai, And shone forth from Seir unto them; He appeared forth from mount Paran, And He came from the myriads holy, At His right hand was a fiery law unto them.
Rashi:
| and shone forth from Seir to them: [Why did He come from Seir?] Because God first offered the children of Esau [who dwelled in Seir] that they accept the Torah, but they did not want [to accept it]. | וזרח משעיר למו: שפתח לבני עשו שיקבלו את התורה ולא רצו: | |
| He appeared: to them [Israel] | הופיע: להם: | |
| from Mount Paran: [Why did God then come from Paran?] Because He went there and offered the children of Ishmael [who dwelled in Paran] to accept the Torah, but they [also] did not want [to accept it]. — [A.Z. 2b] | מהר פארן: שהלך שם ופתח לבני ישמעאל שיקבלוה, ולא רצו: | |
Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, Conservadox Rabbi, The Prophets (1962)
"The ultimate purpose of a prophet is not to be inspired but to inspire people; not to be filled with a passion, but to impassion the people with understanding for God."
Sir Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, Dignity of Difference (Chapter 3, 2002); former Chief Rabbi of the United Synagogue of Great Britain (Modern Orthodox Judaism)
“By reversing the normal order, and charting instead a journey from the universal to the particular, the Bible represents the great anti-Platonic narrative in Western civilization. Against Plato and his followers, the Bible argues that universalism is the first, not the last, phase in the growth of the moral imagination.
Judaism has a structural peculiarity so perplexing and profound that though Christianity and Islam took much else from it, they did not adopt this: is is a particularist monotheism. It believes in one God but not in one exclusive path to salvation. The God of the Israelites is the God of all mankind, but the demands made of the Israelites are not asked of all mankind....[as the Rabbis say]: 'The pious of the nations have a share in the world to come.' (MT Hilchot Teshuvah 3:5)
God the creator of humanity, having made a covenant with all humanity, then turns to one people and commands it to be different, teaching humanity to make space for difference. God may at times be found in human other, the one not like us. Biblical monotheism is not the idea that there is one God and therefore one gateway to God's presence. On the contrary, it is the idea that the unity of God is to be found in the diversity of creation."
Rabbi Lord Immanuel Jakobovits, former Chief Rabbi of the United Synagogue of Great Britain (Modern Orthodox Judaism)
Yes, I do believe that the chosen people concept as affirmed by Judaism in its holy writ, its prayers, and its millennial tradition. In fact, I believe that every people—and indeed, in a more limited way, every individual—is "chosen" or destined for some distinct purpose in advancing the designs of Providence. Only, some fulfill their mission and others do not. Maybe the Greeks were chosen for their unique contributions to art and philosophy, the Romans for their pioneering services in law and government, the British for bringing parliamentary rule into the world, and the Americans for piloting democracy in a pluralistic society. The Jews were chosen by God to be 'peculiar unto Me' as the pioneers of religion and morality; that was and is their national purpose.
Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, Rabbi of the US Renewal Movement - Extended Interview [segment]
Q: You have written that Judaism has unique gifts to offer the world. What are they?
A: I believe that Gaia is whole and that every religion is like a vital organ of the planet. You cannot say that Earth can be alive with only the heart or with only the kidneys or with only the guts. It needs to have the whole thing.
Todd Gitlin and Liel Leibovitz, Secular Academics, Authors of 'The Chosen People', New York University
In a way, the Jewish people have invented the idea of chosenness, but in truth, the idea of chosenness has also invented the Jewish people. Such is Judaism’s wonderfully inverted logic: First comes redemption, only then reasons...
When [the writer] Chabon credits Jewish survival to blind luck, he ignores the essential significance of the idea of chosenness—that only by believing themselves to be God’s dearest children, and therefore bound to principles that distinguish them from the nations of man, do the Jews manage to retain their distinct identity. Now, as in the days of Abraham, we owe all to this rich and strange idea...The idea of chosenness is too deeply ingrained in us to be overlooked, patronized, or definitively repealed. Whether or not we believe that the descendants of Abraham were singled out, in perpetuity, by God, and whether or not we find this to be an outlandish, if not offensive, notion—no matter what, we must grapple with it, for it is, behind our backs, grappling with us.
http://www.tabletmag.com/scroll/35579/the-centrality-of-jewish-chosenness