Jew vs. Jewish Person

Dunno but “you Jews” is certainly disrespectful.

I don;t feel strongly either way
but the concern of those gentiles makes sense

Unfortunately Jew has taken on some negative meanings.
There have been a couple such stories involving Google search over the years

for example in Dec 2022 the first hit on Google for “Jew” was the definition: “”Bargain with someone in a miserly or petty way.”
this was the first result

A while ago the leading results included antisemitic websites such as Jew Watch.
At the time it was noted that “Jewish” did not result in the same offensive results

As a result of thsi “defitnion of Jew and as a result of Antisemites choosing the term Jew as the subject of their hate (often with a snarl) “polite” Goyim have shifted towards using Jewish PErson.

Since people hate Jews, the word Jew is often used in a derogatory way. Then people start associating Jew with derogatory things.
[search wikipedia: “Jew (word)”]

This happens with names of other targeted minorities which are considered respectful at one point, but then become seen as derogatory.

Similar to the word shvartze which is just Yiddish for black, but many people consider offensive because they might have heard it in an offensive context and assumed that it was derogatory.

George Santos is Jew”ish” but not a Jew

Huju

no the comments state that “Jew” has taken on a negative meaning that “Jewish” has not.

Would you agree that when used as an attributive form of a noun * as in “Jew Lawyer” or “jew bakery” in Avira’s example it is probably being used pejoratively?

to play it safe some use “Jewish” all the time, since it doesnt have that same connotation Jewish Lawyer, Jewish Bakery

(note this is not inherently grammatically incorrect, nouns can be used to modify other nouns eg business meeting, research paper you don’t NEED to use an adjective)

huju > “Jew” has been pejorative among gentiles since we left HarSinai.

it is somewhat cultural. For example, Zhid (Yid) in Polish and Lithuanian is not pejorative per se (although some might use it), but it is in Russian.

At one time, Jew” was considered pejorative. The polite words were “Hebrew” and “Israelite”. I guess that going back to the latter is not politically correct in some circles.

Avraham was indeed “Ivri”, Hebrew. Mordechai seems to be the first person to be called “Yehudi” and yamini at the same time, that is yehudi being used as a “Jew”, not as a tribe. Are there earlier references during 1st BM?

The Gemara says that the title “Yehudi” went to anyone who was kofer in avoda zarah (like Mordechai) which could explain (at least spirituallly/subconsciously) why goyim consider the term pejorative. We, however, should be proud of it.

>>>Avraham clearly was not a Yehudi

True. Though it’s interesting that the term Ivri (which Avraham was called) connotes a similar idea, that Avraham was on one side while the entire world was on the opposite side.

Judean ( Yehudi ) did not equate to being from the tribe of Yehudah. First, the tribe of Benjamin was part of the Judean Kingdom and many Israelites fled south into Judea after the destruction of Israel by Senncherib

What’s interesting is that the terms Jew, Jewish, and Judaism all derive from a Greek translation of Yehudi in the 3rd Century BCE. Biblical Hebrew doesn’t have a J sound but the Greek Y sound was often pronounced as a J sound. It was that Greek translation that carried forward and led to the term Jew

Anonymous, it’s always good to learn something new:

>>>Yehudi simply referred to someone from the Kingdom of Judah. In English the person was called a Judahite. There were no mystical attachments.

Meggilah 13:
רבי יוחנן אמר: לעולם [מרדכי] מבנימן קאתי, ואמאי קרי ליה ‘יהודי’? – על שום שכפר בעבודה זרה, שכל הכופר בעבודה זרה נקרא ‘יהודי’

>>>Menachem, he was called Ivri because he had to cross “over” rivers to get to Israe( Canaan ). Again, nothing mystical

Bereishis Rabba:
ויגד לאברם העברי, רבי יהודה ורבי נחמיה ורבנן, רבי יהודה אומר כל העולם כלו מעבר אחד והוא מעבר אחד [כי כל בני תבל לא ידעו אז את ה’ כי עבדו אלילים רק אברהם הכיר את בוראו והוא לבדו היה לעבר אחד בעולם לעבוד את ה’. וכל בני תבל לצד חוץ -עץ יוסף]. רבי נחמיה אמר שהוא מבני בניו של עבר. ורבנן אמרי שהוא מעבר הנהר

I know that Alexa doesn’t use the word “yid” because it’s derogatory but I know a lot of people who want to be referred to as one

Benny Friedman for example 😃

So, I’m curious. What was the mystical experience of the Greek translation of Judea that led the future formulation of the word Jew?

I totally agree with you. The source is not mystical. Deriving mysticism today is not a problem