German American Jewish philosopher and political
theorist Hannah Arendt wrote
in her 1963 Eichmann in Jerusalem: A
Report on the Banality of Evil:
" ... in Israel, where rabbinical law rules the personal status of Jewish citizens, with the result that no Jew can marry a non-Jew; marriages concluded abroad are recognized, but children of mixed marriages are legally bastards (children of Jewish parentage born out of wed-lock are legitimate), and if one happens to have a non-Jewish mother he can neither be married nor buried."
Hannah Arendt. Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the
Banality of Evil (2006 edition) p.7
American Jewish professor of Political Science William
Safran wrote in
his 2003 book The Secular and the
Sacred: Nation, Religion, and Politics:
"A man with the surname of Cohen (the priest & highest caste in Judaism) or someone with another surname who is known to be a kohen cannot be married to a divorcee in Israel, and a bastard cannot be married to a Jew. The status of a bastard differs from Christian traditions that designate a bastard as the child of a couple not married to one another. The child of unmarried parents may not be a bastard in Judaism. Jewish law bestows the status of bastard on the child of a couple who could not be married to one another by virtue of one or another prohibition of religious law." *
William Safran. The Secular and the Sacred: Nation,
Religion, and Politics (2003) p.216
* Safran refers to, but doesn't mention, the fact that
Jews and non-Jews can not marry under Jewish Law
and can not marry in Israel today, like in Nazi
Germany
You say Mischling, I say Mamzerim
"One of the reasons why issues of conversion, marriage and divorce are so important to religious Jews is because of the possibility of mamzerim (illegitimates). In a Jewish divorce, a get must be signed by the husband. If he does not sign, then the divorce is not official and the couple is still legally married according to Jewish law. If the get is not issued, the woman is not free to remarry and have children, and if she does remarry and have children, then those children are considered to be bastards according to Jewish law. (There is no biblical injunction against multiple wives, however, it has been ruled illegal according to the Rabbis.) The bastard child cannot be issued a Jewish identity card and will not be permitted to marry another Jew in Israel. The illegitimate child is only permitted to marry other illegitimate children. Hence, many Orthodox Rabbis claim the reason they want to retain control over conversions, marriage and divorce is to avoid the problem of mamzerim."
And, of course, Sammy Davis, jr. and Marilyn Monroe count as Judeans, even if they are converts. The miracle is that once converted, their DNA changed somewhat to become like the true-blood chosen one's DNA.
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