RELIGION
What it is:
“Religion is a system of beliefs, values, and practices concerning what a person holds sacred or considers to be spiritually significant.” Sociologist Émile Durkheim described religion as “a unified system of beliefs and practices relative to sacred things, that is to say set apart and forbidden, beliefs and practices which unite into one single moral community, called a church, all those who adhere to them.” Religion is also concerned with the search for meaning in a harsh world. As sociologist J. Milton Yinger put it, religion is “Where one finds awareness of and interest in the continuing, recurrent, permanent problems of human existence.” |
Remember:
Some people might identify with organized religions, such as the Catholic Church or Sunni Islam, while others identify with a belief in God or other higher power(s) with out subscribing to a particular organization. For some, religion may be about personal belief, while for others, it may be just as much about belonging to a community. |
- Christian [Christianity]- Catholic (Roman, Ukrainian, etc), Protestant (Baptist, Congregationalist, Evangelical, etc), Unitarian, and more
- Jewish [Judaism] - Reform, Conservative, Orthodox, and more
- Muslim [Islam] - Sunni, Shia, and more
- Hindu [Hinduism]
- Sikh [Sikhism]
- Buddhist [Buddhism]
- Atheist - a person who disbelieves or lacks belief in the existence of God or gods.
- Agnostic - refers to someone who doesn't know whether there is a god, or even if such a thing is knowable.
FAQs
What is the religious makeup of the US? How religious are Americans?
The following chart from Pew’s Religious Landscape Study shows what percentage of Americans identify with which religions. Visit the website to find out a lot more! You can even see the religious makeup of Massachusetts and Boston, or the ways religious identification overlaps with other demographics and other beliefs.
The study, which was done in 2014, also shows:
- 83% of Americans say they are absolutely certain or fairly certain they believe in God (a 5% decrease from 2007).
- 77% of Americans report that religion is very important or somewhat important in their lives (a 5% decrease from 2007).
Are Americans more religious than people in other countries?
According to Pew Research, The U.S. is “the most devout of all the rich Western democracies.” In most of the world, adults living in countries with lower GDPs tend to be more religious, but the U.S. bucks this trend. For instance, “more than half of American adults (55%) say they pray daily, compared with 25% in Canada, 18% in Australia and 6% in Great Britain. ...when it comes to their prayer habits, Americans are more like people in many poorer, developing nations – including South Africa (52%), Bangladesh (57%) and Bolivia (56%) – than people in richer countries.” This graph shows how much of an outlier the U.S. is:
Why is the U.S. such an outlier? Here are two theories from the same article referenced above:
- “One idea popular among modern sociologists for a number of decades held that America’s unregulated and open religious ‘market’ – where different faiths compete freely for new members without government interference – has fostered fertile ground for religious growth.”
- “More recently, some sociologists have argued that there is a link between relatively high levels of income inequality in the U.S. and continued high levels of religiosity. These researchers posit that less-well-off people in the U.S. and other countries with high levels of income inequality may be more likely to seek comfort in religious faith because they also are more likely to experience financial and other insecurities.”
What is the religious makeup of the world?
Pew Research has a wealth of data on this, too. Here is their “Global Religious Landscape” study. Their survey of people in over 230 countries and territories found that about 84% of the world’s population in 2010 identified with a religious group. Here you can find graphs that display the relative size of major religious groups, their geographic distributions, and a world map in which countries are colored according to the majority religion. You can also look at more detailed data by religion and by region.
What does it mean that the U.S. gives its citizens the right to religious freedom?
According to the ACLU, “The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution says that everyone in the United States has the right to practice his or her own religion, or no religion at all.” In order to protect this right, our country’s founders wrote The Establishment Clause of the First Amendment, which guarantees the separation of church and state. This clause “prohibits government from encouraging or promoting (‘establishing’) religion in any way.” Every government act or policy must “have a non-religious purpose; not end up promoting or favoring any set of religious beliefs; and not overly involve the government with religion.” Another clause of the First Amendment, the Free Exercise Clause, “gives you the right to worship or not as you choose. The government can't penalize you because of your religious beliefs.”
According to the ADL, the founders wrote religious freedom into the Bill of Rights “in response to two centuries of state-sponsored religious conflict and oppression in America, and with a keen understanding of the religious persecution in European nations resulting from official state religions and religious wars.”
Read more about the history and law behind religious freedom in the U.S. from the First Amendment Center.
Do people in other countries have the right to religious freedom?
Religious freedom varies widely from country to country. Wikipedia has a country-by-country summary. This Pew study looks at the bigger picture. They found that out of the 199 countries and territories they analyzed, “More than 80 countries favor a specific religion, either as an official, government-endorsed religion or by affording one religion preferential treatment over other faiths.” In 27 countries, Islam is the offical state religion, and in 13 countries, Christianity or a particular Christian denomination is the official state religion. “But an additional 40 governments around the globe unofficially favor a particular religion, and in most cases the preferred faith is a branch of Christianity. Indeed, Christian churches receive preferential treatment in more countries – 28 – than any other unofficial but favored faith.”
Why are people religious? Why are people not religious?
According to this article from the American Psychological Association, religion “exists in every culture, with more than 85 percent of the world’s population embracing some sort of religious belief.” Why might this be? Researchers in psychology have identified certain cognitive tendencies that bias human beings toward religious belief, such as our tendency to seek order and meaning, particularly in times of uncertainty. Religion might even be good for our mental and physical health: “A large body of research finds that religious people live longer, are less prone to depression, are less likely to abuse alcohol and drugs, and even go to the dentist more often.” This may be because of religion’s “contemplative practices” like meditation or prayer, or because of “its ability to make people calmer overall by ‘explaining’ phenomena we don’t understand.” Religion also serves a larger function within society: it “is one of the big ways that human societies have hit on as a solution to induce unrelated individuals to be nice to each other,“ allowing us “to live in large, cooperative societies.”
The American Academy of Religion’s Guidelines for Teaching About Religion in Public Schools puts it succinctly: “Religions… address more than answers to questions about the natural world; they address fundamental questions of meaning and provide frameworks for ethical reflection and structures of social formation.”
If religion can be so valuable, both on the personal and societal level, why is there a significant minority (or, in some countries, a majority) of people who are not religious? First, it is important to know that there is significant diversity among people who are not religious. Some are atheists (people who lack belief in God or gods), some are agnostics (people who do not think we can know for sure whether God exists or not), while some simply do not strongly identify with any particular religion, though they may believe in God. In a 2014 Pew Research poll, 22.8% of American adults fell into their “religiously unaffiliated” category, up significantly from 16.1% in 2007. 3.1% self-identified as atheist, and 4.0% self-identified as agnostic. Meanwhile, 15.8% of people said their religion was “nothing in particular,” but among that group, there was significant variation in how important religion was in their life.
Among atheists and other religiously unaffiliated people, there are a wide range of reasons for their rejection of a belief in god, or of organized religion. According to Atheist Alliance International, “A significant proportion of atheists in the world today are atheists because they were not taught to be anything else. Other atheists were taught to believe in a god or gods but decided it didn’t make sense so they abandoned their belief.” An atheist or nonreligious person might be a “cultural Catholic” who no longer goes to church except on Christmas and Easter; they might be someone who grew up in China, where the dominant culture is not religious; or they might be a humanist who believes that “without theism or other supernatural beliefs,” human beings have the “ability and responsibility to lead ethical lives of personal fulfillment that aspire to the greater good.” As American Atheists states, “The only common thread that ties all atheists together is a lack of belief in gods. ...atheists do not have a common belief system, sacred scripture or atheist Pope. This means atheists often disagree on many issues and ideas. Atheists come in a variety of shapes, colors, beliefs, convictions, and backgrounds. We are as unique as our fingerprints.”
Atheists are often misunderstood. In the Pew Research poll, there seemed to be significant confusion of what the word even means. According to Pew Research, “Although the literal definition of ‘atheist’ is ‘a person who does not believe in the existence of a god or any gods,’ according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, 8% of those who call themselves atheists also say they believe in God or a universal spirit. Indeed, 2% say they are ‘absolutely certain’ about the existence of God or a universal spirit. Alternatively, there are many people who fit the dictionary definition of ‘atheist’ but do not call themselves atheists. About three times as many Americans say they do not believe in God or a universal spirit (9%) as say they are atheists (3%).”
Pew Research also found that “Americans like atheists less than they like members of most major religious groups.” When they asked Americans to rate religious groups on a “feeling thermometer,” “U.S. adults gave atheists an average rating of 41, comparable to the rating they gave Muslims (40) and far colder than the average given to Jews (63), Catholics (62) and evangelical Christians (61).” In addition, “About half of Americans (51%) say they would be less likely to support an atheist candidate for president, more than say the same about a candidate with any other trait mentioned in a Pew Research Center survey – including being Muslim.”
If religion is supposed to bring societies together, why does it often seem to tear us apart?
In his book The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion, psychologist Jonathan Haidt makes argues that “Our righteous minds made it possible for human beings to produce large cooperative groups, tribes, and nations without the glue of kinship. But at the same time, our righteous minds guarantee that our cooperative groups will always be cursed by moralistic strife.” This Scientific American article translates his point in this way: “morality binds us together into cohesive groups but blinds us to the ideas and motives of those in other groups.” Human societies are tribal; we look for ways to define “us” in opposition to “them,” and religion is often a part of this definition.
On the other hand, while it seems that religion is at the root of many conflicts, from the Spanish Inquisition and the Crusades to the Arab-Israeli conflict and Islamic terrorism, religion is not, in fact, the cause of most wars. The Huffington Post reports, “In their recently published book, “Encyclopedia of Wars,” authors Charles Phillips and Alan Axelrod document the history of recorded warfare, and from their list of 1763 wars only 123 have been classified to involve a religious cause, accounting for less than 7 percent of all wars and less than 2 percent of all people killed in warfare.” After all, most religions value peace and preach love for all other human beings, regardless of their beliefs.
Can we teach about religion in a public school?
Public schools cannot teach religion, but they can teach about religion in a secular context. The ADL explains the distinction: “Programs that ‘teach about religion’ are geared toward teaching students about the role of religion in the historical, cultural, literary and social development of the United States and other nations.” In contrast, “‘Teaching religion’ amounts to religious indoctrination or practice and is clearly prohibited in public schools.”
As public school teachers, we not only can teach about religion -- we should. The American Academy of Religion has an excellent resource called Guidelines for Teaching About Religion in Public Schools (and our own Stephanie McAllister was on the task force that created it!). It begins by establishing the importance of teaching about religion. It argues that there is “widespread illiteracy about religion in the U.S.” which fuels “prejudice and antagonism,” but that “It is possible to diminish religious illiteracy by teaching about religion from a non-devotional perspective in primary, middle, and secondary schools.”
It then quotes the following guidelines for teaching about religion, which come from the First Amendment Center:
- The school’s approach to religion is academic, not devotional.
- The school strives for student awareness of religions, but does not press for student acceptance of any religion.
- The school sponsors study about religion, not the practice of religion.
- The school may expose students to a diversity of religious views, but may not impose any particular view.
- The school educates about all religions, it does not promote or denigrate religion.
- The school informs students about various beliefs; it does not seek to conform students to any particular belief.
They also advise explaining to students that studying religion as a scholar is different from practicing religion, and that their personal experiences and beliefs may not always support a scholarly approach to religion. They assert that the most important first steps in teaching about religion are for both teachers and students “to examine what assumptions they harbor about religion generally and religious traditions in particular,” and to “foster a climate of tolerance, respect, and honesty.”
The AAR resource gives practical advice for how to teach religion, guided by the following three principles: 1) “Religions are not internally homogenous but diverse,” 2) “religions are dynamic and changing as opposed to static and fixed,” and 3) “religions are collections of ideas, practices, values, and stories that are all embedded in cultures and not isolated from them.”
In their resource on teaching about religion in public schools, the ADL urges educators to keep the following in mind:
- Students are extremely susceptible to peer and public pressure and coercion.
- If religion is discussed, great care must be taken to discuss minority as well as majority religions.
- Students should not be put on the spot to explain their religious (or cultural) traditions.
- Every effort should be made to obtain accurate information about different religions.
- Discussion of religion in the classroom may alienate those students who are being raised with no religious faith.
- Discussion of religion in the classroom may alienate those who are being raised with orthodox religious faiths.
Are religion and science incompatible?
Here’s how the The American Academy of Religion answers that question in their Guidelines for Teaching About Religion in Public Schools: “No, not categorically. Most religious traditions and worldviews can function in concert with scientific worldviews and are, indeed, complementary with them. Furthermore, there are many scientists who are people of faith and many people of faith who are devoted scientists. Within traditions, however, there are some theological beliefs that are in tension with certain scientific assertions. The most publicized example of these tensions in the US is between some Christian communities and the biological theory of evolution. Though these tensions are real for the communities involved, it is wrong to assume, for example, that all Christians experience a contradiction between their theological beliefs and evolutionary theory or, by extension, that religious and scientific worldviews are fundamentally incompatible.”
Here is some evidence to back up these assertions:
- According to the National Center for Science Education, “... of Americans in the 12 largest Christian denominations, 89.6% belong to churches that support evolution education.”
- Sociologist Elaine Howard Ecklund found that while professional scientists are on the whole less religious than the general American population, a majority “desire to link their spirituality with a greater mission for the work they do as scientists.”
How much diversity exists within religions?
Quite a lot. Each major religion is tied together by foundational beliefs, but each has many sub-groups with their own sets of beliefs. One of the American Academy of Religion’s three premises of religious studies is “religions are internally diverse.” They elaborate on this idea in the following way: “It is important for students to learn, for example, that Muslims in Indonesia will practice their faith differently than Muslims in Nigeria. In a similar vein, wealthy Muslims in Jakarta may practice an Islam that looks somewhat different than poor Muslims in rural Java. Helping students see that there are many “Islams” (or Judaisms or Hinduisms) in the world enables them to consider carefully both what it means to study Islam and the complexity of answering the question, ‘What do Muslims believe?’”
One example of diverse beliefs in a single religion is this worldwide survey from Pew Research. Researchers found “widespread conviction that there is only one God and that Muhammad is His Prophet,” but “Muslims across the 39 countries and territories surveyed differ significantly in their levels of religious commitment, openness to multiple interpretations of their faith and acceptance of various sects and movements.”
The world’s major religions are also more racially and ethnically diverse than you might suppose. For example, see this article on the major ethnic groups of Judaism, or this one, about a Jewish community in China.
Harvard Divinity School’s Religious Literacy Project is a good place to start learning about the world’s religions.
How often does religious discrimination occur in the U.S., despite our constitutional protections?
Let’s start with the good news. According to a Pew Research poll done in early 2017 with over 4200 US adults, “when it comes to religion, Americans generally express more positive feelings toward various religious groups today than they did just a few years ago.” Americans have the “coolest” feelings towards Muslims and Atheists, and the “warmest” towards Jews, Catholics, and mainline Protestants. The survey also found that “across the board, Americans express warmer feelings toward religious groups when they are personally familiar with someone in the group.”
On the other hand, another Pew Survey, done in 2019, found that “Most American adults (82%) say Muslims are subject to at least some discrimination in the U.S. today… including a majority (56%) who say Muslims are discriminated against a lot.” This backs up a 2017 survey of Muslim Americans, nearly half of whom “say they have experienced specific instances of discrimination, including being treated with suspicion, singled out by airport security or called offensive names.” These instances of discrimination have been on the increase in recent years. See the following graph for details:
See our section on Islamophobia below for more information. This reading list from the Haas Institute at Berkeley provides more resources on discrimination and hate crimes against Muslims. The Muslim Diaspora Initiative also tracks Anti-Muslim activities in the United States. Finally, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) has an excellent resource, its 2018 Civil Rights Report.
To return to the 2019 Pew survey, “roughly two-thirds of Americans (64%) also say Jews face at least some discrimination in the U.S., up 20 percentage points from the last time this question was asked in 2016. More say Jews face some discrimination than a lot (39% vs. 24%).” According to the 2017 ADL Audit of Anti-Semitic Incidents, “In 2017, anti-Semitic incidents surged nearly 60 percent… This was the largest single-year increase on record and the second highest number reported since ADL started tracking such data in 1979. The sharp rise was due in part to a significant increase in incidents in schools and on college campuses, which nearly doubled for a second year in a row.” According to the ADL’s 2018 Audit, antisemitic incidents in the U.S. have decreased by 5% since 2017 but remain the third highest in the last four decades, with 1,879 incidents recorded. Massachusetts had the fourth highest number of incidents in 2018, with 144; only California, New York, and New Jersey recorded more. A significant number of these incidents have occurred in schools, like those in Framingham, Newton, and Brookline.
Recent national incidents, such as the horrific shooting at a Pittsburgh synagogue in 2018 and the conspicuous appearance of antisemitic imagery at the Charlottesville “Unite the Right” rally in 2017 have sparked increased conversation on anti-Jewish discrimination. For example, this New York Times article attempts to explain the apparent rise in antisemitism in Europe and the United States. See our section on antisemitism below for more information.
Half of Americans from the 2019 Pew survey, “say evangelical Christians suffer at least some discrimination. As with Jews, most people who think evangelicals are discriminated against say they suffer some inequity rather than a lot (32% vs. 18%).” See more on discrimination against Christians below.
Of course, religious discrimination in the United States extends beyond Muslims, Jews and Christians. Here are a few examples:
- Sikhs have faced a long history of discrimination in the U.S., particularly since 9/11.
- “In the early 2000s, some American Hindus organized to stop perceived discrimination against them in American public school books.” Read more about it here.
- When the United States government imprisoned Japanese Americans in internment camps during World War II, Buddhists were particularly targeted.
The FBI’s 2018 Hate Crime Statistics reveals that hate crimes motivated by religious bias accounted for 1,550 offenses reported by law enforcement. A breakdown of the bias motivation of religious-biased offenses is as follows:
- 57.8 percent were anti-Jewish.
- 14.5 percent were anti-Islamic (Muslim).
- 4.1 percent were anti-Sikh.
- 3.8 percent were anti-Catholic.
- 3.2 percent were anti-multiple religions, group.
- 2.7 percent were anti-Other Christian.
- 2.5 percent were anti-Protestant.
- 2.1 percent were anti-Eastern Orthodox (Russian, Greek, Other).
- 0.9 percent (14 offenses) were anti-Hindu.
- 0.6 percent (10 offenses) were anti-Buddhist.
- 0.6 percent (9 offenses) were anti-Mormon.
- 0.6 percent (9 offenses) were anti-Jehovah’s Witness.
- 0.4 percent (6 offenses) were anti-Atheism/Agnosticism/etc.
- 6.2 percent were anti-other (unspecified) religion.
Islamophobia is “an irrational fear of, aversion to, or discrimination against Islam or people who practice Islam.” Common Islamophic beliefs in the Unitied States include the belief that Islam encourages violence, or the belief that Muslims want to impose Sharia law in the United States. To find out why these and other assumptions are false, read Hishaam Siddiqi’s 10 Misconceptions About Islam That Muslim Americans Are Tired of Hearing.
See also the Council on American-Islamic Relations’ (CAIR)'s website. CAIR is “America's largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization.” Their website offers helpful resources, like this Islamophobia 101 article, as well as research and suggestions for action.
Teaching Tolerance also has a great resource on “the truth about American Muslims,” which has its own list of recommended resources.
Islamophobia and extremist violence
The years after the September 11 terrorist attacks saw national and global panic over Islamic extremism, and the rise of ISIS in the 2010s spurred similar alarm. While extremist attacks are certainly worrying, the associations between Islam and terrorism have been overblown and misrepresented, which is a common form of Islamophobia.
To begin with, Islam, like other religions, is not inherently violent. According to Teaching Tolerance, “Many American Muslim leaders and organizations have repeatedly denounced extremist violence in the strongest possible terms.” The Fiqh Council of North America (an Islamic juristic body) writes, “Islam strictly condemns religious extremism and the use of violence against innocent lives. There is no justification in Islam for extremism or terrorism.”
In addition, it is not Islam itself but the extremist perversion of it, combined with other social forces, that drives violence. According to the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a bipartisan think tank, terrorist attacks “are perpetrated by a small minority of Muslims seeking power primarily in their own areas of operation and whose primary victims are fellow Muslims.” Also, though “the overwhelming majority of extremist and violent terrorist incidents do occur in largely Muslim states,” “religion is only one of many factors that lead to instability and violence in largely Muslim states. It is a critical ideological force in shaping the current patterns of extremism, but it does not represent the core values of Islam and many other far more material factors help lead to the rise of extremism.”
Finally, Islamic extremism poses no greater terrorist threat than other ideologies. According to a report on Terrorism in America After 9/11 from New America, “No jihadist foreign terrorist organization has directed a deadly attack inside the United States since 9/11, and no deadly jihadist attacker has received training or support from groups abroad. In the almost 18 years after 9/11, jihadists have killed 107 people inside the United States. This death toll is virtually the same as that from far-right terrorism (consisting of anti-government, white supremacist, and anti-abortion violence), which has killed 109 people. The United States has also seen attacks in recent years inspired by ideological misogyny and black separatist/nationalist ideology. Individuals motivated by these ideologies have killed eight people each. America's terrorism problem today is homegrown and is not the province of any one group or ideological perspective.” In addition, Charles Kurzman, a sociologist at UNC Chapel Hill, in a report on Muslim American involvement with violent extremism, shows that the number of Muslim Americans involved with violent extremism is extremely small and has declined significantly since 2015.
Islamophobia and headscarves
The attire of Muslim woman has frequently been a target of anti-Muslim bigotry. There’s even a word for it: hijabophobia.
According to this Huffpost article on the experiences of American Muslim women, “For many Americans, the hijab has become a stark physical reminder of ‘difference’ and otherness.” As a result, women who wear a hijab or other type of Islamic veils frequently face prejudice and discrimination. According to the American Civil Liberties Union, this discrimination includes being “prohibited from wearing their headcoverings,” as well as being “harassed, fired from jobs, denied access to public places… because they wear hijab.” According to CAIR’s 2018 Civil Rights Report, a headscarf on a woman was identified as the trigger in 13% of anti-Muslim bias incidents in 2017. Outside of the U.S., several European countries have instituted or considered bans on head scarves or face veils. Watch this video for a debate on whether to ban the niqab in the UK.
There are also many common Islamophobic assumptions about hijab. This Huffpost article clears up a number of them. First, just because a woman wears the hijab does not mean she is “oppressed”: “there is no correlation between the hijab and the oppression of women. As a matter of fact, American Muslim women who wear the hijab choose to do that as a statement of identity. They are making the point that they can be independent, strong and free and choose to wear the hijab as part of their freedom of choice as an American.” In addition, not all Muslim women wear the hijab, and those who choose to wear it are not a homogenous group: “Decisions to wear the hijab vary from one woman to the other and from one culture and country to the other.” Watch this video to hear three Muslim women discuss their choices. That said, there are some places where women are required to veil. For example, in Saudia Arabia, all Muslim women must cover their hair and all women must wear clothing that covers their entire body. Iranian law requires that women wear a veil in public, and the requirements are stricter for attire in governmental and religious institutions.
The Qu’ran does not explicitly require women to wear the hijab. According to Teaching Tolerance, “The Qur’an requires men and women to dress modestly, but without specifying exactly what that means (24:30-31). Muslims therefore differ on what modesty requires, resulting in a variety of practices in different cultures and countries. Historically, male dominance in Muslim societies has led to unequal application of modestly rules, with women in some cultures being made to cover much more of their bodies then men are required to do. At the same time, it must be said that many Muslim women in the United States and other countries freely choose to veil as an expression of their faith.”
Islamophobic beliefs about Sharia
According to Teaching Tolerance, “Sharia represents how practicing Muslims can best lead their daily lives in accordance with God’s divine guidance. It may be generally defined as the Islamic law revealed by God to the Prophet Muhammad. That divine law was then interpreted by Muslim scholars over the centuries. Among the primary aims of the Sharia are the achievement of justice, fairness and mercy.” Islam, like all religions, is both diverse and dynamic, so this is not the only understanding of Sharia, but it is one that would be understood by most American Muslims. Sharia is “overwhelmingly concerned with personal religious observance such as prayer and fasting,” though currently, “35 countries incorporate Sharia into their civil, common or customary law.”
Conspiracy theories about Sharia law are a clear example of anti-Muslim bigotry. According to the Anti-Defamation League, “The threat of the infiltration of Sharia, or Islamic law, into the American court system is one of the more pernicious conspiracy theories to gain traction in our country in recent years. The notion that Islam is insidiously making inroads in the United States through the application of religious law is seeping into the mainstream, with even some presidential candidates voicing fears about the supposed threat of Sharia to our way of life and several states are considering or having already passed bills that would prohibit the application of Sharia law.”
These conspiracy theories are based in prejudice. The following information, from Teaching Tolerance, refutes this bigoted thinking. First of all, Sharia poses no threat to American law: “Many aspects of Sharia or Islamic law are consistent with modern legal rules found in American law… If and when religious laws conflict with American law, the Free Exercise and Establishment Clauses of the First Amendment prohibit American government, including the courts, from substituting religious laws for civil law or following religious laws that violate civil law. This prohibition applies to all religions equally.” What is more, “American Muslims overwhelmingly support the U.S. Constitution and do not seek to replace it with Sharia or Islamic law. The vast majority of American Muslims understand Sharia as a personal, religious obligation governing the practice of their faith, not as something American governments should enforce.”
The ADL defines antisemitism as “The belief or behavior hostile toward Jews just because they are Jewish. It may take the form of religious teachings that proclaim the inferiority of Jews, for instance, or political efforts to isolate, oppress, or otherwise injure them. It may also include prejudiced or stereotyped views about Jews.” The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) has adopted the following working definition of antisemitism: “Antisemitism is a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews. Rhetorical and physical manifestations of antisemitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities.” The United States Department of State uses the IHRA’s definition.
According to Encyclopedia Britannica, “The term antisemitism was coined in 1879 by the German agitator Wilhelm Marr to designate the anti-Jewish campaigns under way in central Europe at that time. Although the term now has wide currency, it is a misnomer, since it implies a discrimination against all Semites. Arabs and other peoples are also Semites, and yet they are not the targets of antisemitism as it is usually understood.” A more appropriate term would be anti-Jewish, but the term antisemitism is still widely used.
This fact sheet, from the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, provides an overview of 10 common antisemitic tropes, including their history and present-day manifestations. These include the portrayal of Jews as demons or Christ-killers, the stereotypes of Jews as greedy or stingy, and the myth of a global Jewish conspiracy. The fact sheet ends with this caveat: “Anti-Semitism has never been limited to a finite stock of stereotypes, defamations, distorted images and fables. Instead, it has repeatedly generated new figures while recycling old ones in new forms.” The International Holocaust Alliance’s definition of antisemitism also includes a list of common manifestations of antisemitism today.
Here are some articles worth reading: Understanding Anti-Semitism from Jews for Racial and Economic Justice, and The Past Didn’t Go Anywhere: Making Antisemitism Part of All of Our Movements, from April Rosenblum. Rosenblum also offers these links to other resources.
A note on the spelling of antisemitism: according to the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, we should avoid the hyphenated spelling of antisemitism (anti-Semitism) because “the hyphenated spelling allows for the possibility of something called ‘Semitism’, which not only legitimizes a form of pseudo- scientific racial classification that was thoroughly discredited by association with Nazi ideology, but also divides the term, stripping it from its meaning of opposition and hatred toward Jews.” In direct quotations in this glossary, we have preserved the hyphenated spelling of the original.
The swastika as an antisemitic symbol
As the ADL writes, “the swastika is an ancient symbol that emerged independently among many cultures on several continents. Before the 20th century, its use (including in the United States) was almost always benign. Even today, the swastika is a common symbol across Asia, used by Hindus, Buddhists, and adherents of other religions, where it is often associated with good fortune.
“However, in the early 20th century, various right-wing adherents of the so-called “völkisch” movement in Germany, a movement in large part dedicated to uncovering a romanticized and largely mythical German/“Aryan” past, adopted the swastika as a symbol. The use of the swastika in this context subsequently influenced Adolf Hitler to adopt the swastika as the primary symbol for the Nazi Party in 1920. The murderous legacy of the Nazi regime, especially the Holocaust, permanently converted the swastika into a symbol of hate, antisemitism and infamy.
“Since 1945, the swastika has served as the most significant and notorious of hate symbols, antisemitism and white supremacy for most of the world outside of Asia. Its display is prohibited in Germany and some other countries, leading some right-wing extremists to devise variants or alternatives to the swastika that would evoke a similar effect. In the United States, the swastika is overwhelmingly viewed as a hate symbol.”
As this article describes, during recent years, there have been several incidents (both in Brookline and the greater Boston area) of swastikas as hate speech.
Holocaust denial as a form of antisemitism
According to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, “Holocaust denial is an attempt to negate the established facts of the Nazi genocide of European Jewry. Holocaust denial and distortion are forms of antisemitism. They are generally motivated by hatred of Jews and build on the claim that the Holocaust was invented or exaggerated by Jews as part of a plot to advance Jewish interests.
“These views perpetuate long-standing antisemitic stereotypes, hateful charges that were instrumental in laying the groundwork for the Holocaust. Holocaust denial, distortion, and misuse all undermine the understanding of history.”
Israel and antisemitism
Criticism of the state of Israel is not inherently antisemitic. According to the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemistism, “Manifestations [of antisemitism] might include the targeting of the state of Israel, conceived as a Jewish collectivity. However, criticism of Israel similar to that leveled against any other country cannot be regarded as antisemitic.” In other words, criticizing the actions or policies of the Israeli government is NOT hate speech, just as it is not hate speech to criticize the actions or policies of the American government. However, it is antisemitic if the criticism holds Israel to a different standard than other nations.
Criticism of Israel does often cross the line into antisemitism. According to the Anti-Defamation League, “Certainly the sovereign State of Israel and its government can be legitimately criticized just like any other country or government in the world. Criticism of particular Israeli actions or policies – even harsh and strident criticism and advocacy - in and of itself does not constitute anti-Semitism. However, it is undeniable that there are those whose criticism of Israel crosses the line into anti-Semitism. It is also undeniable that criticism of Israel is considered socially acceptable, thereby providing a pretext for some whose criticism masks deeper anti-Jewish attitudes.”
The ADL gives this advice on how to distinguish between legitimate and bigoted criticism of Israel. Does the criticism demonize Israel by drawing on familiar anti-Jewish stereotypes? Then it is antisemitic. Does the criticism seek to delegitimize Israel by diminishing the significance of the Holocaust? Antisemitic. Does the criticism hold Israel to a different standard than any other country in the world? Antisemitic. It is also important to note the distinction between intention and impact. At times, criticism of Israel may not be anti-Jewish in its intention, but it may be anti-Jewish in its impact.
The recent controversy surrounding Congresswoman Ilhan Omar’s comments about Israel illustrate this. Her comments crossed the line into antisemitism because they drew on some common anti-Jewish tropes, like the conspiracy theory that American Jews have an “allegiance” to Israel. Even if she did not intend to refer to these tropes, the impact of her words is still antisemitic.
Is Judaism a race? An ethnicity?
Both race and ethnicity are social constructs. Ethnicity is based on a “shared culture or way of life,” which may include “language, religion, material culture… and cultural products.” According to this definition of ethnicity, many Jews might identify as an ethnic group, based on their shared religion and culture. Jewish people may also identify with one of four different ethnic groups: Ashkenazi Jews, Sephardic Jews, Mizrahi Jews, or Ethiopian Jews.
Race is based on “skin color and other apparent physical differences,” and “has no genetic or scientific basis.” It was created to “justify social and economic oppression of people of color by Whites.” While most light-skinned Jewish people today are considered white, they have historically been defined as a “race” in order to justify oppression, most egregiously during the Holocaust. Read this case study from Harvard Divinity School to learn more about Jews’ racial identity in the U.S. On the other hand, the Jewish people as a whole are racially diverse and do not fit neatly into existing racial categories. In addition, referring to Jews as a “race” can be reminiscent of Nazi hate campaigns and other historical and contemporary persecution.
Ultimately, some Jewish people might identify primarily with Judaism as a religion, while some might see themselves as ethnically Jewish. As with other aspects of identity, don’t assume how people identify.
Sometimes when people ask if Judaism is a race or ethnicity, though, what they are really curious about is if there are genetic similarities among the Jewish people. This article from Chabad.org addresses that question. They sum things up this way: “While there is a definite cluster of Jewish genes, plenty of people have those genes but aren’t Jewish, and plenty don’t have them and are. DNA does not make you a Jew. It’s something much deeper.”
One example of the aforementioned “cluster of Jewish genes” is the frequency of Tay-Sachs disease. As written by the National Organization for Rare Disorders, “Tay-Sachs disease occurs with greater frequency among Jewish people of Ashkenazi descent, i.e. those of Eastern or Central European descent. Approximately one in 30 Ashkenazi Jewish people carries the altered gene for Tay-Sachs disease. In addition, one in 300 individuals of non-Ashkenazi Jewish heritage is a carrier.” Why Ashkenazi Jews? According to this news item from Stanford Medicine, it seems that “the majority of the mutations...entered the population when the Ashkenazi Jews formed a coherent group about 50 generations ago.” As described further in the article, the founder effect is responsible, and it was just chance: “It just happened that those who founded the Ashkenazi Jewish population had disease mutations and passed them along to their children. Because Ashkenazi Jews tend to marry within their own population, those mutations remained common.” In other words, the small and isolated group that originally established the Ashkenazi Jew population just so happened to have a higher-than-typical frequency of DNA mutations that cause Tay Sachs.
In this Education Week article, author Sarah Sparks discusses how science teachers can inadvertently leave students with the impression that groups of humans are more distinct than they actually are. As science teachers, we need to be careful that our students understand that humans are inherently much more alike than different (we share 99.9% of our DNA sequences with one another, no matter our ancestry, gender, race, sexuality, or any other characteristic), that the heightened presence of Tay Sachs in a group such as Ashkenazi Jews is random, and that there are many other examples of the founder effect, in terms of other diseases in other groups of people.
Do Christians face discrimination in the United States?
It can be difficult to cut through the partisan noise on this question. This Washington Post opinion piece argues that because Christians in the U.S. are a powerful group, they cannot be “persecuted.” Author Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian notes that Christians are “over-represented in national politics,” which “precludes the possibility that Christians as a group experience formal marginalization or informal scorn that bars them from the halls of power.” Others argue that Christians who believe they face systematic discrimination are reacting to a loss of relative privilege.
On the other hand, University of North Texas sociologist George Yancey, who studies Christianophobia, found that “about 32 percent of all Americans like conservative Christians significantly less than other social groups. In comparison, about 31 percent of all Americans like Muslims significantly less than other social groups. So it’s fair to say that if we’re concerned about anti-Muslim prejudice, then we should also be concerned about anti-Christian prejudice—at least prejudice against conservative Christians.” However, he discourages “Christians in the United States from saying they are persecuted.” Persecution implies discrimination that is more systematic and of greater severity. On his own blog, Yancey writes, “In light of the harassment of all religions in China, the Holocaust in Nazi Germany, and the oppression of Christians in ancient Rome, it seems unseemly to talk about persecution for the troubles Christians face in the U.S. today.”
In addition, Ross Douthat, in this opinion piece for the New York Times, refutes Allen-Ebrahimian’s point that American Christians are unquestionably powerful and privileged. He writes, “marginalization of traditional faith in much of Western Europe is obvious and palpable, and the trend in the United States is in a similar direction — and residual political influence is very different from the sort of enduring cultural-economic power that a term like ‘privilege’ invokes.” This marginalization is particularly pronounced in the bastions of the so-called liberal elite, like the coastal cities, or major universities. For example, Yancey found evidence of anti-Christian discrimination in academia. Brookline is also the type of place where Christians might feel marginalized. Here is a Boston Globe column that discusses the uproar after a church co-sponsored a Brookline town event.
Christianity is still the dominant religion in the United States, so Christians do not face systematic descrimination here at the scale experienced by minority religious groups. However, there are certainly prejudices that many Americans hold against Christians, and in particular, that secular, liberal Americans hold against conservative Christians. For example, some people falsely assume that all conservative Christians are Republicans, or that all conservative Christians reject science. Christian groups that are considered outside of the “mainstream” like Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses are particularly vulnerable to bias.
It is also important to mention that there are Christians in the world today who do face clear persecution. Douthat includes a few examples in his piece: “Christians like the murdered first communicants in Sri Lanka, or the jailed pastors in China, or the Coptic martyrs of North Africa.”
What is the difference between a cult, a sect, and a denomination?
According to this sociology course from Lumen Learning, cults are “new religious groups.” However, the word cult often has a negative connotation, implying that the group is “secretive, highly controlling of members’ lives, and dominated by a single, charismatic leader.”
A sect is “a small and relatively new group, as the Methodists and Baptists in the United States originally were when they “protested against their parent Anglican Church in England.” A sect may be “a breakaway group that may be in tension with larger society,” or a group that “begins as an offshoot of a denomination, when a group of members believes they should separate from the larger group.”
A denomination is “a large, mainstream religious organization, but it does not claim to be official or state sponsored. It is one religion among many. For example, Baptist, African Methodist Episcopal, Catholic, and Seventh-day Adventist are all Christian denominations.”