- What does it mean to be the Chosen People?
- What positive/negative interpretations can be given for being "chosen"?
- Chosen People — a nation of individuals who have been given the opportunity to sense God's closeness, hear God's truth and relay God's message to the world.
- To be chosen is to enter into a covenant - two-sided agreement
- The true test of chosenness is how humble you are.
- This view does not preclude a belief that God has a relationship with other peoples—rather, Judaism held that God had entered into a covenant with all humankind, and that Jews and non-Jews alike have a relationship with God.
"Humanity was produced from one man, Adam, to show God's greatness. When a man mints a coin in a press, each coin is identical. But when the King of Kings, the Holy One, blessed be He, creates people in the form of Adam not one is similar to any other"
(א) בַּחֹ֙דֶשׁ֙ הַשְּׁלִישִׁ֔י לְצֵ֥את בְּנֵי־יִשְׂרָאֵ֖ל מֵאֶ֣רֶץ מִצְרָ֑יִם בַּיּ֣וֹם הַזֶּ֔ה בָּ֖אוּ מִדְבַּ֥ר סִינָֽי׃ (ב) וַיִּסְע֣וּ מֵרְפִידִ֗ים וַיָּבֹ֙אוּ֙ מִדְבַּ֣ר סִינַ֔י וַֽיַּחֲנ֖וּ בַּמִּדְבָּ֑ר וַיִּֽחַן־שָׁ֥ם יִשְׂרָאֵ֖ל נֶ֥גֶד הָהָֽר׃ (ג) וּמֹשֶׁ֥ה עָלָ֖ה אֶל־הָאֱלֹהִ֑ים וַיִּקְרָ֨א אֵלָ֤יו יְהוָה֙ מִן־הָהָ֣ר לֵאמֹ֔ר כֹּ֤ה תֹאמַר֙ לְבֵ֣ית יַעֲקֹ֔ב וְתַגֵּ֖יד לִבְנֵ֥י יִשְׂרָאֵֽל׃ (ד) אַתֶּ֣ם רְאִיתֶ֔ם אֲשֶׁ֥ר עָשִׂ֖יתִי לְמִצְרָ֑יִם וָאֶשָּׂ֤א אֶתְכֶם֙ עַל־כַּנְפֵ֣י נְשָׁרִ֔ים וָאָבִ֥א אֶתְכֶ֖ם אֵלָֽי׃ (ה) וְעַתָּ֗ה אִם־שָׁמ֤וֹעַ תִּשְׁמְעוּ֙ בְּקֹלִ֔י וּשְׁמַרְתֶּ֖ם אֶת־בְּרִיתִ֑י וִהְיִ֨יתֶם לִ֤י סְגֻלָּה֙ מִכָּל־הָ֣עַמִּ֔ים כִּי־לִ֖י כָּל־הָאָֽרֶץ׃ (ו) וְאַתֶּ֧ם תִּהְיוּ־לִ֛י מַמְלֶ֥כֶת כֹּהֲנִ֖ים וְג֣וֹי קָד֑וֹשׁ אֵ֚לֶּה הַדְּבָרִ֔ים אֲשֶׁ֥ר תְּדַבֵּ֖ר אֶל־בְּנֵ֥י יִשְׂרָאֵֽל׃
(1) In the third month after the children of Israel were gone forth out of the land of Egypt, the same day came they into the wilderness of Sinai. (2) And when they were departed from Rephidim, and were come to the wilderness of Sinai, they encamped in the wilderness; and there Israel encamped before the mount. (3) And Moses went up unto God, and the LORD called unto him out of the mountain, saying: ‘Thus shalt thou say to the house of Jacob, and tell the children of Israel: (4) Ye have seen what I did unto the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles’wings, and brought you unto Myself. (5) Now therefore, if ye will hearken unto My voice indeed, and keep My covenant, then ye shall be Mine own treasure from among all peoples; for all the earth is Mine; (6) and ye shall be unto Me a kingdom of priests, and a holy nation. These are the words which thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel.’
(2) For thou art a holy people unto the LORD thy God, and the LORD hath chosen thee to be His own treasure out of all peoples that are upon the face of the earth.
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.
God did not set God's 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 God loved you, and because God would keep the oath which God swore to your fathers-- for God 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.
| 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': |
Of all the families of the earth—
That is why I will call you to account
For all your iniquities.
(22) Thereupon Joshua said to the people, “You are witnesses against yourselves that you have by your own act chosen to serve Ado-nai.” “Yes, we are!” they responded.
- According to the previous texts, why did God choose the Jewish people to be the chosen people?
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.
- What is God's expectation of Israel by claiming us as the chosen people?
It appears to me that the reason for God to show the children of Israel - this generation and every subsequent generation - that there are among non-Jews giants of understanding and insight. Go out and learn from the insight of Yitro in his advice...
The intention in this is that God did not choose Israel because their insight and cognition were greater than those of the nations of the world. Rather, their choosing came from a hesed (kindness) on high and from love of the patriarchs.
...Even though there are among the nations those who are wiser [than those among Israel], nevertheless, God brought us to himself and chose us. And it is especially for this [reason] that it is incumbent upon us to praise the one who chose us on account of His kindness.
(עד) עָלֵינוּ לְשַׁבֵּחַ לַאֲדון הַכּל. לָתֵת גְּדֻלָּה לְיוצֵר בְּרֵאשִׁית. שֶׁלּא עָשנוּ כְּגויֵי הָאֲרָצות. וְלא שמָנוּ כְּמִשְׁפְּחות הָאֲדָמָה. שֶׁלּא שם חֶלְקֵנוּ כָּהֶם וְגורָלֵנוּ כְּכָל הֲמונָם:וַאֲנַחְנוּ כּורְעִים וּמִשְׁתַּחֲוִים וּמודִים לִפְנֵי מֶלֶךְ מַלְכֵי הַמְּלָכִים הַקָּדושׁ בָּרוּךְ הוּא:שֶׁהוּא נוטֶה שָׁמַיִם וְיוסֵד אָרֶץ. וּמושַׁב יְקָרו בַּשָּׁמַיִם מִמַּעַל. וּשְׁכִינַת עֻזּו בְּגָבְהֵי מְרומִים:הוּא אֱלהֵינוּ אֵין עוד. אֱמֶת מַלְכֵּנוּ. אֶפֶס זוּלָתו. כַּכָּתוּב בְּתורָתו. וְיָדַעְתָּ הַיּום וַהֲשֵׁבתָ אֶל לְבָבֶךָ. כִּי ה' הוּא הָאֱלהִים בַּשָּׁמַיִםמִמַּעַל וְעַל הָאָרֶץ מִתָּחַת. אֵין עוד:
Aleinu
It is our duty to praise the Master of all, to exalt the Creator of the Universe, who has not made us like the nations of the world and has not placed us like the families of the earth; who has not designed our destiny to be like theirs, nor our lot like that of all their multitude. We bend the knee and bow and acknowledge before the Supreme King of Kings, the Holy One, blessed be he, that it is he who stretched forth the heavens and founded the earth. His seat of glory is in the heavens above; his abode of majesty is in the lofty heights..
כִּי בָֽנוּ בָחַֽרְתָּ וְאוֹתָֽנוּ קִדַּֽשְׁתָּ מִכָּל הָעַמִּים, וְשַׁבַּת קָדְשְׁךָ בְּאַהֲבָה וּבְרָצוֹן הִנְחַלְתָּֽנוּ. בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה יְיָ, מְקַדֵּשׁ הַשַּׁבָּת.
From Shabbat Kiddush
For you have chosen us and sanctified us out of all the nations, and have given us the Sabbath as an inheritance in love and favour. Praised are you, Lord, who hallows the Sabbath.
בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה ה' אֱלהֵינוּ מֶלֶךְ הָעולָם. אֲשֶׁר בָּחַר בָּנוּ מִכָּל הָעַמִּים. וְנָתַן לָנוּ אֶת תּורָתו. בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה ה', נותֵן הַתּורָה:
Traditional blessing over Torah
Praised are You, Adonai our God, Sovereign of the Universe, Who has chosen us out of all the nations and bestowed upon us His Torah. Praised are You, Adonai, Who gives the Torah.
“The idea of the Chosen People was justifiable religious doctrine in ancient Judaism, but today it is not merely untenable, but also detrimental to a normal adjustment of the Jew to his environment.”
Reconstructionist blessing over Torah
בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה ה' אֱלהֵינוּ מֶלֶךְ הָעולָם. אֲשֶׁר קֵרְבָנוּ לַעֲבוׂדָתוׂ וְנָתַן לָנוּ אֶת תּורָתוׂ. בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה ה', נותֵן הַתּורָה:
Praised are You, Adonai our God, Sovereign of the Universe, Who has drawn us near to Your service and has given us Your Torah. Praised are You, Adonai, Who gives the Torah.
- In what ways do you grapple with the concept of chosenness?
"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."
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.”
"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."
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.
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.
1. Is "Chosenness" a chauvinistic concept?
2. Can the Jewish concept of "Chosenness" coexist with the ideals of equality and egalitarianism fundamental to a liberal democracy? If so, how?
Aryeh Bernstein, Rachel Sabath Beit-Halachmi
Sh'ma Journal, February 10, 2015
In an exchange of letters, Rachel Sabath Beit-Halachmi and Aryeh Bernstein discuss how their thinking about chosenness has changed over time — whether chosenness, today, is a notion that is instructive or detrimental to Jewish life. They consider how chosenness influences our relationships with Israel and the concept of peoplehood.
Shalom, Aryeh,
What does chosenness mean for us as Jews today? Should it still guide how we act? I believe that the idea of chosenness must remain central to how we understand ourselves. That we are a chosen people is a core aspect of what it means to be Jewish. It is rooted in the origins of our people, in the biblical narratives of Abraham (Genesis 12) and in the redemption and revelation that made us who we are. Exodus 19 says it in three different ways. First, we are an am segulah, precious to God, as well as mamlekhet kohanim, God’s nation of priests, and a holy nation or people, a goy kadosh. It is significant that this is how God names us at the moment we are given the Torah with its commandments to create an ethical society. I understand these three statements to mean that from ancient times to the present era, whether we were celebrated or decimated, we understood ourselves to be precious, priestly, and holy.
Many Jewish thinkers have questioned this idea of chosenness — including the founder of Reconstructionist Judaism, Rabbi Mordecai M. Kaplan. And today, many who criticize the notion of chosenness for its particularist commitments — especially those on the far left who believe in a more universalist approach — are often the same people who most severely criticize the State of Israel. But I feel that a deep understanding of chosenness allows for a deeper understanding of the complexities of nationhood and statehood. Given our modern universal ethics and pluralist contexts, chosenness may seem foreign. But chosenness does not mean we see ourselves as superior to others. Rather, it affirms that we have a particular role to play and a particular relationship with God that demands creating and sustaining an ethical society. The command to protect the most vulnerable in the ancient world is no less essential today. And Israel, today, has the obligation and opportunity to be the nation that most protects the vulnerable and most ensures the rights of all its citizens. This is what it means to be a holy nation.
In order to maintain this possibility of both peoplehood and ethics, it is essential that all Jews understand their role as a chosen people, chosen to create and sustain Israel in all its struggles and in all its strivings. Whether we lovingly critique or more easily embrace the specific policies of any particular government, the value of supporting the state of the Jewish people should remain foundational.
For people who don’t see the connection between chosenness and commitment to the State of Israel, is it a failure of understanding or a failure of education? Is it that their universal sense of ethics has trumped their particularist identities? And, if so, what does this discomfort with particularist Jewish commitments mean for Jewish peoplehood as the global realities continue to become more complex?
With respect for our friendship and chevruta, Rachel Sabath Beit-Halachmi
•••
Shalom, Rachel,
I agree that chosenness is integral to Jewish life and that chosenness should not be understood to imply superiority. However, some of your definitions seem to obscure more than reveal. For example, you say that chosenness “affirms that we have a particular role to play…that demands creating and sustaining an ethical society.” But is creating and sustaining an ethical society the Jewish people’s particular role? Isn’t it our general role, one that we share with all peoples?
The state of Israel “has the obligation…to be the nation that most protects the vulnerable and most ensures the rights of all its citizens.” Why most? I agree that Israel has no less obligation than anyone else, but why more? And why is protecting citizens’ rights “what it means to be a holy nation”? Isn’t that just what it means to be a nation?
By contrast, you then distinguish peoplehood from ethics and identify chosenness with “creat[ing] and sustain[ing] Israel in all its struggles and… strivings.” You situate chosenness in tension with a universal sense of ethics that has perhaps “trumped” the “particularist identities” of those who don’t connect their sense of chosenness to a commitment to the State of Israel. How do you understand chosenness — as our universal ethics or our particular nationalism?
You express concern that many Jews are not sufficiently embracing Israel and they are eschewing chosenness; perhaps this is because they understand the current conception of chosenness as chauvinistic, and that it is this chosenness that creates the vulnerability to abuse for the most unprotected people in Israel: asylum-seekers, foreign workers, and Palestinians. Terms such as “precious,” “priestly,” and “holy” are often associated with feelings of superiority — among those who embrace chosenness as well as those who don’t. If we want to promote a non-chauvinistic sense of chosenness, we need to articulate that vision more clearly.
Here’s my stab at it: The association of chosenness with superiority reflects the faulty assumption that what I know is all there is to be known, that since I can testify to our chosenness because I remember Sinai, and since I have no personal knowledge of anyone else’s chosenness, therefore, we must be the only people to have been chosen. However, other peoples know things we don’t know and have their own inspiration. Our covenant is no evidence of superiority. The reason non-Jews cannot testify to Sinai is simply that they weren’t there. I mean that poetically; I’ll translate this into prose: Culture exists and inheritors of a culture have something unique to contribute to the world. It would be spiritually colonialist for me to testify to any other people’s chosenness or revelation. My role is to listen and take people at their word, at their testimony to their experience, just as I hope they’ll take my word and listen to my testimony of my experience.
The character of this chosenness is our unique, particular story. When we are called to the Torah, we say, “Praised are You…God…Who chose us from among the nations by giving us the Torah.” But all nations — all humanity — are responsible for a universal ethics as encapsulated by the seven Noahide laws that ordain core guidelines of civilized, human life.
Every nation must sustain an ethical culture. As Jews, we must sustain the particular ethical culture shaped by having been slaves in Egypt, guided through the desert, etc. We are chosen to serve as we are and it seems as though everyone else probably is, too.
With regard to the State of Israel, I wonder: Does Israel magnify or compromise our application of a particular, ethical culture? If it manifests a chauvinist understanding of chosenness, how should nonchauvinists interact with it?
B’vrakhah, Aryeh Bernstein
•••
Dear Aryeh,
I am grateful for your responses and your questions, because they highlight chosenness as what God uniquely commanded us to be. This notion is essential to our identity, because it defines our uniqueness and our particular and universal mission as a people. Without a particular commitment to the sacred narratives, ethics, and commandments that are at the core of our identity and spirituality, we have little that is unique to us through which we can ground our identity. God still wants us to create in our contemporary world the society of justice and ethics that we were once chosen to create.
This does not mean that the unique foundations of other peoples are less worthy, and we must vigilantly guard against perspectives that use chosenness to devalue or demonize other people.
Yes, our simultaneous commitment to both universal and particular ethics certainly includes — perhaps, even necessitates — both ancient and contemporary forms of nationalism. And though we have survived historically as a people without sovereignty, we are told in the Bible to create and steward an ethical society. Carrying out this obligation is dependent on some form of national existence. But that sovereignty is dependent upon our ethical behavior. We have to earn the right to live in the Land of Israel every day. Deuteronomy 11:12 and Leviticus 18:28 crudely warn us that we will be vomited out of the land for not observing the commandments that God chose for us to receive about creating and sustaining an ethical society in the Land of Israel. We thus learn that we must be very careful as a nation and as individuals in the State of Israel today. While we have a right to defend ourselves as well as the land, it is clear that it is conditional upon moral behavior.
If we are not creating an ethical society in the ancient Land of Israel or in the sovereign State of Israel, we must repent. We must engage in the necessary self-scrutiny and cheshbon hanefesh (accounting of the soul) to reorient ourselves, to recalibrate and do whatever we can to ensure that we are worthy of our chosenness, worthy of being God’s partners, worthy of the gift of God’s Torah, and worthy of residing in the Land of Israel. I do not believe that there can ever be a point at which one can relinquish such a gift or its responsibilities.
With respect for our friendship and chevruta, Rachel
Rabbi Rachel Sabath Beit-Halachmi is the national director of recruitment and admissions and a president’s scholar at the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in Cincinnati. Ordained at HUC-JIR, Sabath has a doctorate in Jewish philosophy from the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. She also teaches at the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem.
Aryeh Bernstein is the coordinator of the Back-to-Basics program for the Mishkan community (mishkanchicago.org) in Chicago. After fourteen years in Israel, where he was director of activist learning for the TAKUM beit midrash for human rights (takumbeitmidrash.com), he has returned to his native Chicago. He has also worked as director of alumni affairs & recruitment at Mechon Hadar, and continues as editor-at-large at Jewschool.com and editor-translator for the Koren English edition of the Steinsaltz Talmud. He is a board member of Jewish Public Media, has led high holiday services at New York’s Kehilat Hadar since 2002, and has been involved in the founding and nurturing of egalitarian learning and prayer communities throughout Israel and the U.S.