| | Luke,
The biggest factor in anti-Semitism has not been envy itself, but culture, including the cultural foundations of the Jews' orientation toward individual excellence (in Greek arete) that stem from cultural Hellenism. The Talmudic reformation of Judaism transformed the Jews into the primary carriers of Hellenistic values - and therefore the primary cultural enemies of opposite Christian and Moslem values, such as faith, self-sacrifice and sexual repression - in the Moslem and Christian worlds. Another important factor has been the centrality of science, based on the evidence of the senses, in Jewish culture after Maimonides - the Jews have been the primary cultural enemies of Christian intrinsicism and of intrinsicist rationalism, and the primary advocates of observation-based science, in the otherwise Christian West.
But envy also plays an important part. More than 60 of 100 richest self-made people in America are Jews, vs. 2% of the population. Add anti-Hellenism and anti-science sentiment to the resulting envy, and you have a triad of very powerful motives for anti-Senitism.
(Edited by Adam Reed
on 10/08, 12:27am)
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