Trudy Gold
The History of Jew Hatred, Part 1
Summary
Why is it that 78 years after the Holocaust antisemitism is out of control? Why is it that, having focused on hating our religion, then our race, the old world of monotheism now focuses on hating our nation? This two-part course will examine the beginnings of what Robert Wistrich called “the longest hatred.”
Trudy Gold
Trudy Gold was the CEO of the London Jewish Cultural Centre and a founding member of the British delegation to the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA). Throughout her career she taught modern Jewish history at schools, universities, and to adult groups and ran seminars on Holocaust education in the UK, Eastern Europe, and China. She also led Jewish educational tours all over the world. Trudy was the educational director of the student resources “Understanding the Holocaust” and “Holocaust Explained” and the author of The Timechart History of Jewish Civilization.
Well, I believe it would be rather interesting if they understood Jewish history a little better. Because we’ve had such an inverted commerce abnormal role in society. We’ve been forced into artificial employment patterns. In modernity, we are at the forefront of modernity, which became a problem for anyone who felt they were grieved by it. We went into high visibility occupation patterns. So you have the notion that all Jews are rich, all Jews are powerful, which of course is absolute rubbish. But this is where it all comes from. This is where it begins anyway. How do you fight it? I think by knowledge of Jewish history. In England, it’s hardly even taught in Jewish schools. It’s quite extraordinary, actually. When I first studied, there was a tiny little bit of it. Martin Gilbert at Oxford pioneered it in England. When we started, we brought him over from the Hebrew University. Now there are many places you can study, but it’s certainly not permeating into the Jewish schools, and of course into the non-Jewish schools. And Holocaust studies in which are non-Jewish schools stops in 1945, which is a real problem actually if you don’t study 45 to 48.
Well, I think there’s a difference between practitioners and individuals. And there’d be many, many great Christians. Be very, very careful here. And something else I’m going to say. Judaism has never been tested in the same way for 2000 years. We have to be careful. What I believe, Moses Mendelssohn said something rather beautiful when he was asked, a figure of the enlightenment, “Why are you still a Jew?” And he said, “Because I was born a Jew. There are many paths to the truth.” He said, “If I meet a so long or a Confucian, do I have to convert him? No. We have to accept there are many paths to the truth.” There is a problem for Jews with Christianity. But don’t forget the other side of Christianity. It is a religion of morality and of love. But as far as with the Jews, you’ve got this terrible story. The guilty secret is what John Grey called it.
Well, I think by having this kind of knowledge, they would be in a lot better position. I always believe knowledge is power. I’m absolutely burning at the moment because there was a programme on BBC saying that London University wasn’t too safe for Jewish kids, any boy who wears a kippah. And that really, really made me very angry. And I don’t mean a superficial knowledge. We’re going to have to actually teach them the kind of curriculum that most of you have been through in the past three years. I suppose we can’t expect that, but we can, you know. I remember one of the reasons I got to know Wendy so well is because when her son was 17, he and a group of friends, she asked me to tutor to them for a year and I did. And it gave them huge confidence. I think if you know who you are and where you come from, you can put up with a lot of things. Most Jews living in Britain are far better Britishly educated than Jewishly educated. And that’s a problem. In my view, you have to walk both worlds. And it’s possible. So you get one less GCS or GCSE. Oh, did I say that? Sorry, grandparents.