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How many Hebrew Israelites are there, and how worried should Jews be?
(JTA) — Dressed in matching purple hoodies and shirts, with gold fringes attached to the bottom in observance of Deuteronomy 22:12, hundreds of members of a controversial Hebrew Israelite group marched through the streets of Brooklyn on Sunday.
“Hey Jacob, it’s time to wake up,” they chanted, using a term for people of color who have yet to embrace their “true” identity as descendants of the Biblical Jacob, later called Israel. “We got good news for you: YOU are the real Jews.”
The march and a demonstration that followed at the Barclays Center were organized by Israel United in Christ in solidarity with Brooklyn Nets star Kyrie Irving, who was suspended for eight games after he posted a link to an antisemitic film on social media last month and then was slow to apologize. But IUIC has also used the controversy to promote its incendiary ideology and recruit new followers into what it calls “God’s army.”
After the demonstration — the second held by IUIC outside of the Brooklyn arena this month — the group’s founder posted a message on his Twitter account. “We are not here for violence,” Bishop Nathanyel Ben Israel wrote, “we are here for the spiritual war.”
Before 2019, those American Jews who were even aware of the once-obscure Black Hebrew Israelite spiritual movement likely associated it with the loud but non-violent street preachers who would harangue pedestrians in city centers. In December of that year, however, extremists professing Israelite beliefs attacked a kosher grocery store in Jersey City, New Jersey and a Hanukkah party in Monsey, New York. Two Jews were killed in Jersey City, and a 72-year-old rabbi who was stabbed in the head in Monsey died from his injuries three months later.
With the memory of those attacks still fresh, and against the backdrop of a surge this fall in public expressions of antisemitism combined with threats of violence against Jewish communities emanating from other extremist corners, the militant posturing of IUIC has alarmed many Jews already on edge.
Rabbi Mordechai Lightstone of Crown Heights observed on Twitter that the Israelites who regularly preach near his home on Shabbat have been “particularly aggressive” of late, heaping verbal abuse on both him and his children. On Sunday afternoon, Lightstone posted a video of IUIC members assembling for their march and rehearsing their chants in Grand Army Plaza.
“Terrifying,” commented Elisheva Rishon, a Black and Jewish fashion designer who blames Hebrew Israelites for inflaming tensions between the two communities to which she belongs. A few Twitter users compared the march to the 2017 far-right rally in Charlottesville, at which participants chanted “Jews will not replace us.”
The recent IUIC rallies give the impression that the radical wing of the Hebrew Israelite movement is large and riled up. Meanwhile, recent comments by Kanye West, the rapper who now goes by Ye, and Irving that align with elements of Hebrew Israelite doctrine suggest the movement has broad support among powerful Black celebrities.
But how big is the movement in reality? What percentage are extremists who assail Jews as impostors who stole their heritage from them? And if Black Israelism has entered the marketplace of mainstream religions in the United States, should Jews be concerned?
The numbers
The only available statistics on Israelite identification in the United States were collected as part of a small national survey conducted by an evangelical Christian research firm in 2019. For that survey, which sought to capture African-American attitudes toward the state of Israel, Lifeway Research asked 1,019 African Americans, “Which of the following best describes your opinion of Black Hebrew Israelite teachings?”
Most respondents (62%) said they are not familiar with the teachings, but 19% said they agree with “most of the core ideas taught by Black Hebrew Israelites,” and 4% said they consider themselves Hebrew Israelites. The remaining 15% said they either “firmly oppose” the teachings or disagree with most of them. (The survey did not specify what those teachings are.)
The 2020 U.S. Census put the Black population at 41.1 million, so extrapolating from the Lifeway data, there are approximately 1.6 million Hebrew Israelites in the U.S. — not counting the small numbers of Latinos and Native Americans who also belong to Israelite groups — and 7.8 million people who may not identify as Israelites but who agree with the spiritual movement’s main teachings.
For lots of these people, the attention that West and Irving have brought to their belief system has been validating.
“Israelism is becoming part of the plausibility structure of Black America,” Christian activist and author Vocab Malone told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, referring to a social context in which certain ideas are considered credible. “The suspicions that a lot of folks have toward the Jewish community, they think they’re vindicated now.”
Scott McConnell, Lifeway’s executive director, told JTA that the survey’s sponsor, the Christian Zionist organization Philos Project, supplied the question about Hebrew Israelite teachings. Asked if there are plans to include similar questions in future surveys, he replied, “I know there are some pastors at African-American churches that have concerns about some of their parishioners being led astray by the teachings of the Hebrew Israelites, so we’ll keep it on our radar.”
Malone, who uses an alias in keeping with hip-hop culture, is a close observer of the Israelite world. The Phoenix resident frequently engages in debates on the street and online with members of groups described as hateful by the Southern Poverty Law Center — including IUIC, Israelite School of Universal Practical Knowledge, Israelite Church of God in Jesus Christ, and The Sicarii — in hopes of convincing them to follow what he considers to be the true path of Christianity.
Founded in 2003, IUIC has proven the most adept at creating public spectacles and garnering media coverage. The group operates 71 U.S. chapters and 20 international ones, according to the Anti-Defamation League, and it holds men’s conferences each year that culminate in choreographed marches on city streets, like the one on Sunday in Brooklyn. Based on the size of those marches, Malone estimated that national membership has grown from around 5,000 in 2015 to around 10,000 today. Other radical groups likely have much smaller memberships but don’t share any figures, preferring to “play their cards close to their chest,” Malone said.
These estimates suggest that the extremists comprise a very small percentage of the 1.6 Hebrew Israelites living in the United States.
Ultimately, IUIC has a goal of recruiting 144,000 Black, Latino and Native American people who will be spared by God during the end time, as foretold in the book of Revelation. In order to achieve this goal, the group sends representatives to proselytize overseas, including in parts of Africa and the Caribbean. (IUIC did not respond to requests for comment from JTA.)
Both the Southern Poverty Law Center and the ADL monitor the activities of IUIC and other radical camps, as Israelites call their groups. However, spokespeople for both organizations told JTA they do not know how many people belong to these camps.
An online movement
What is clear is that the camps have greatly expanded their reach in recent years, taking their message from street corners to the entire globe thanks to the internet and social media. IUIC members run dozens of YouTube, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter accounts where they post a constant stream of videos and memes, many containing antisemitic tropes. One recent Instagram post shows a startled-looking Hasidic Jewish man holding his hat above the words “The Synagogue of Satan.” (Louis Farrakhan, the leader of the Nation of Islam, uses similar language about Jews. A video he recorded this month defending West and Irving has been viewed millions of times.)
The main IUIC YouTube channel, @IUICintheClassRoom, has 126,000 subscribers and 29.4 million video views. A series of videos posted three years ago on the channels of local chapters provide some insight into how members hear about IUIC and why they join.
The most common way these members say they found their way to the camp was via videos they watched online. “Prior to actually coming to IUIC, I did do some Israelite window shopping,” recounts Officer Joshua of IUIC Tallahassee. “I always questioned myself, why is it that our people are at the bottom? How come we get the worst jobs and so forth? I knew Christianity wasn’t answering my questions, so what I did was I just started soul searching.”
As part of his quest, Joshua says he stumbled upon a video of Bishop Nathanyel and other IUIC leaders preaching on the street. “I was like man, these brothers really know what they’re doing, they really have our history,” he says. “That’s what actually made me do more research on IUIC and the truth.”
Sar (“Minister”) Ahmadiel Ben Yehuda speaks at the African Hebrew Israelites’ annual New World Passover celebration in Dimona, Israel, May 2013. (Andrew Esensten)
In another video, Sister Ezriella from the Concord, North Carolina, branch explains that as a young adult, she felt uncertain about her life’s purpose. Then her mother shared information with her about IUIC. “She was so happy it changed her life, I had to take notice and I had to come check it out for myself,” she says. “I fell in love with it. I fell in love with finding out who I am.”
A number of Black, male celebrities have also been drawn into the wider Israelite orbit in recent years, including rappers Kendrick Lamar and Kodak Black, TV host Nick Cannon, boxer Floyd Mayweather and retired NBA player Amar’e Stoudemire.
Some of these celebrities appear to have been exposed to Israelite teachings by relatives and other acquaintances. Lamar, who famously rapped “I’m a Israelite, don’t call me Black no mo’” on a 2017 song, learned about Israelism from a cousin who was involved with IUIC. Black began identifying as a Levite in 2017 after studying scripture with an Israelite priest while serving a jail sentence in Florida. Stoudemire has said his mother taught him he had “Hebraic roots.” (He officially converted to Judaism in 2020, a step most Israelites reject because it contradicts their claims of already being authentic Jews.)
Isabelle Williams, an analyst at ADL’s Center on Extremism who tracks radical Israelite camps, said celebrity endorsements of the ideology can have a big impact because they come from figures who are widely respected.
“If people came upon an extremist Black Hebrew Israelite group street preaching, it might be easier to dismiss it and recognize the extreme ideology behind it,” she said. “But when it’s being shared by these influential figures, people might be less likely to recognize the really insidious ideology and dangerous antisemitic conspiracy theories that are behind these statements.”
Williams added that a range of extremist groups have seized on comments made by West and Irving. “It’s not just BHI and NOI groups that are leveraging this moment,” Williams said. “We’ve seen white supremacists who are also using this recent attention and circulation of antisemitic conspiracy theories to promote their own agenda.”
Rabbi Capers Funnye is the most prominent Israelite leader in the U.S. He serves as chief rabbi of the International Israelite Board of Rabbis, an organization that provides spiritual guidance to about 2,500 people in the United States, along with tens of thousands of Israelites in southern and west Africa.
In an interview, Funnye condemned West, Irving and the radical Israelite camps that have rallied around them. “God is never about divisiveness,” Funnye said. “God is never about hatred. God is never about, ‘You ain’t.’ I don’t have to say what you aren’t to make me who I am.”
A member of the Chicago Board of Rabbis and the leader of a Chicago synagogue with a mixed membership of around 200 Jews and Israelites, Funnye was at pains to differentiate his community from IUIC and its ilk: His follows the Torah and supports the state of Israel, he said, while others follow both the Old and New Testaments, worship Jesus and reject Israel’s government as illegitimate.
“Whatever army that Kyrie is speaking about, we are not a part of his army,” he said, referring to a comment Irving made during an Oct. 29 press conference about how he has “a whole army” behind him.
But Funnye said another of Irving’s recent statements — “I cannot be antisemitic if I know where I come from” — resonated with him and his congregants.
“We are Semitic,” he said of Black people who identify as Israelites, “so now we really have to draw a line when antisemitism is only defined by one’s complexion or ethnicity. We were not the ones that racialized Judaism, and we will never racialize it because Jews are not a race.” (“Semitic” refers to people who speak Semitic languages, such as Hebrew and Arabic.)
Outside of the United States, the largest organized group of Hebrew Israelites is located in Israel. The African Hebrew Israelites of Jerusalem are a Dimona-based community of more than 3,000 African-American expatriates and their Israeli-born offspring.
African Hebrew Israelite youth serve in the army — not Kyrie Irving’s or IUIC’s army, but the Israel Defense Forces. After 53 years in Israel, the community has never been fully accepted, in part because they are not Jewish according to halacha, or Jewish law. Currently, some 100 community members are being threatened with deportation for living in the country illegally.
Ahmadiel Ben Yehuda, the African Hebrew Israelites’ minister of information, said he interpreted Irving’s remarks as a reference to “the global awakening of people of African ancestry to their Hebraic roots.” He said the backlash Irving has faced shows that the conversation around this awakening must involve qualified representatives of communities who can cite reputable sources — not documentaries such as the one Irving boosted — “Hebrews to Negroes: Wake Up Black America” — in support of their claims of Israelite ancestry.
“What is certain is that Israel and Judaism must figure out a way to better accommodate these communities,” Ben Yehuda said. “This is not going to fade away, and it shouldn’t. It will intensify as the awakening continues.”
How this awakening will affect Jews and established Jewish communities remains to be seen.
In September, George Washington University’s Program on Extremism released a report titled “Contemporary Violent Extremism and the Black Hebrew Israelite Movement.” The report noted that the “predominant threat” today comes not from Israelite groups themselves but from “individuals loosely affiliated with or inspired by the movement.”
Malone, the Christian activist, cautioned that as the extremist wing of the Israelite movement grows, more violent lone wolves may emerge.
“There’s a big funnel with any movement, and the bigger the funnel is, you get certain things down at the bottom,” he said. “This is not Buddhism. This is a different kind of thing with a different kind of rhetoric.”
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The post How many Hebrew Israelites are there, and how worried should Jews be? appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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How Warsaw became the center of Yiddish culture
אױפֿן שװעל פֿונעם צװאַנציקסטן יאָרהונדערט האָט װאַרשע געהאַט די גרעסטע צאָל ייִדישע תּושבֿים אין אײראָפּע, בערך אַ פֿערטל מיליאָן נפֿשות. אָבער די דאָזיקע באַפֿעלקערונג איז באַשטאַנען פֿון דרײַ פֿאַרשײדענע סאָציאַלע און קולטורעלע גרופּעס: אַסימילירטע פּױלישע ייִדן, חסידים און ליטװאַקעס. צװישן זיך האָבן זײ גערעדט ייִדיש, פּױליש, רוסיש און אַ ביסל דײַטש.
יאָאַנאַ נאַלעװאַיקאָ־קוליקאָװ (היסטאָרישער אינסטיטוט בײַ דער פּױלישער װיסנשאַפֿט־אַקאַדעמיע) באַװײַזט אין איר בוך „דאָס רעדן אין אונדזער אייגענעם נאָמען: ייִדישע פּרעסע און דאָס שאַפֿן פֿון דער ייִדישער נאַציאָנאַלער אידענטיטעט אינעם לאַנגן נײַנצנטן יאָרהונדערט“, אַז דװקא די טעגלעכע ייִדישע פּרעסע, װאָס איז אַנטשטאַנען אין די ערשטע צענדליק יאָר פֿונעם צװאַנציקסטן יאָרהונדערט, האָט געמאַכט ייִדיש פֿאַר דער כּלל־שפּראַך פֿון עפֿנטלעכע דיסקוסיעס אין דער ייִדישער סבֿיבֿה.
זי רופֿט דאָס אַ „סאָציאַלע רעװאָלוציע“ פֿאַר ייִדן אין דער רוסישער אימפּעריע בכּלל און אין פּױלן, װאָס איז דעמאָלט געװען אַ טײל פֿון דער אימפּעריע, בפֿרט. אַ דאַנק די צײַטונגען „האָבן די מאַסן גענומען לײענען, און זײ האָבן אָנגעהױבן צו לײענען אין זײער אײגענער שפּראַך“.
די ייִדישע פּרעסע איז געװאָרן אַ קולטורעלער שטח, װוּ די אינטעליגענציע האָט זיך געטראָפֿן מיט די מאַסן. די פּרעסע האָט אױך געשאַפֿן דעם עקאָנאָמישן יסוד פֿאַר דער ייִדישער ליטעראַטור און דערלאָזט ייִדישע ליטעראַטן ציִען פּרנסה פֿון זײערע װערק. אָבער די ייִדישע פּרעסע איז ניט געװען סתּם אַ געשעפֿט. אַלע צײַטונגען האָבן זיך אַקטיװ באַטײליקט אין פּאָליטיק.
ערבֿ דער ערשטער װעלט־מלחמה האָט דער טיראַזש פֿון „הײַנט“, דער גרעסטער װאַרשעװער ייִדישער טאָגצײַטונג, דערגרײכט 100,000 עקזעמפּלאַרן, גלײַך מיט דער גרעסטער פּױלישער מאַסן־צײַטונג.
צװישן די, װאָס האָבן געשריבן פֿאַר „הײַנט“, זײַנען געװען די באַרימטסטע ייִדישע שרײַבער: יצחק לײבוש פּרץ, הערש דוד נאָמבערג, הילל צײטלין, דוד פֿרישמאַן, דער קריטיקער בעל־מחשבֿות און אַנדערע.
„הײַנט“ האָט געדרוקט שלום עליכמס ראָמאַנען „מנחם מענדלס בריװ“ און „דער בלוטיקער שפּאַס“, װי אױך שלום אַשעס „קידוש־השם“ און „פּעטערבורג“.
די רוסישע מאַכט האָט דעמאָלט דערשטיקט די פּױלישע שפּראַך און קולטור. דאָס האָט געשאַפֿן אַ שאַרפֿע פּאָליטישע פּראָבלעם פֿאַר ייִדן. אײניקע האָבן געשטיצט פּאָליאַקן אין זײער קאַמף פֿאַר אומאָפּהענגיקײט, אײניקע זײַנען געװען אױפֿן רוסישן צד, אָבער דאָס רובֿ ייִדן האָבן זיך געהאַלטן בײַ דער זײַט אינעם דאָזיקן שטרײַט פֿון צװײ סלאַװישע פֿעלקער.
נאַלעװאַיקאָ־קוליקאָװ דערמאָנט דעם לײענער אָן אַ װיכטיקן היסטאָרישן פֿאַקט: דאָס רובֿ צײַטונג־מענטשן אין װאַרשע זײַנען געװען ליטװאַקעס, װאָס זײַנען געקומען פֿון שטעט און שטעטלעך פֿון דער הײַנטיקער ליטע און בעלאַרוס. כאָטש מען דאַרף האָבן אין זינען, אַז אַ היפּשע צאָל װאַרשעװער ייִדן האָבן געהאַלטן פֿאַר „ליטװאַקעס“ אַלע ייִדן, װאָס האָבן גערעדט אױף ייִדיש אַנדערש פֿון זײ.
דװקא די ליטװאַקעס האָבן אַרײַנגעבראַכט קײן װאַרשע דעם באַגריף פֿונעם ייִדישן פֿאָלק װי אַ פּאָליטישע נאַציע. די מיגראַציע פֿון ליטװאַקעס קײן װאַרשע האָט גורם געװען אַ פֿײַנטשאַפֿט סײַ מצד אַסימילירטע פּױלישע ייִדן, װאָס האָבן זיך געהאַלטן פֿאַר „פּאָליאַקן פֿון משה רבינוס אמונה“, און סײַ מצד פּױלישע נאַציאָנאַליסטן.
סײַ די, סײַ יענע האָבן געהאַלטן די ליטװאַקעס פֿאַר „שליחים פֿון סאַנקט־פּעטערבורג“ — דאָס הײסט, שטיצער פֿון דער רוסיפֿיקאַציע־פּאָליטיק פֿון פּױלן. די דאָזיקע דעה איז ביזן הײַנטיקן טאָג פֿאַרבליבן בײַ אײניקע פּױלישע היסטאָריקער, באַמערקט נאַלעװאַיקאָ־קוליקאָװ.
זי שאַצט אָפּ דעם ליטװאַקישן בײַטראָג אינעם װאַרשעװער ייִדישן לעבן מער פּאָזיטיװ. זי מאָלט אַ לעבעדיק און רײַך בילד פֿון ייִדישער װאַרשע אין די לעצטע צענדליק יאָר פֿאַר דער ערשטער װעלט־מלחמה. דאָס דאָזיקע בילד שטעלט זיך צונױף פֿון שטיקלעך מיטצײַטלערישע אַרטיקלען און פֿון שפּעטערע זכרונות אױף ייִדיש, העברעיִש, פּױליש און רוסיש.
אױפֿן סמך פֿון אַרכיװאַלע דאָקומענטן אַנטפּלעקט נאַלעװאַיִקאָ־קוליקאָװ דעם פֿאַרפּלאָנטערטן ביוראָקראַטישן פּראָצעס פֿון קריגן פּובליקאַציע־דערלױבענישן בײַ די הױכע פֿענצטער פֿון דער רוסישער אַדמיניסטראַציע.
נאָך דער רעװאָלוציע פֿון 1905 איז דער פּאָליטישער קלימאַט אין דער רוסישער אימפּעריע געװאָרן מילדער, און אין 1906 זײַנען דערשינען פֿינעף נײַע צײַטונגען.
צװישן זײ איז געװען דאָס „ייִדישעס טאַגעבלאַט“. דער רעדאַקטאָר איז געװען שמואל־יעקב יאַצקאַן (1874־1936), אַ געוועזענער ישיבֿה־בחור װאָס האָט אָנגעהױבן זײַן זשורנאַליסטישע קאַריערע אין דער העברעיִשער פּרעסע. מען האָט געזאָגט אַז ער האָט גערעדט זיבן שפּראַכן, אַלע מיטן ליטװאַקישן אַקצענט.
יאַצקאַן איז געװאָרן דער ערשטער ייִדישער צײַטונגס־מענטש, װאָס האָט זיך געװענדט צו די ייִדישע מאַסן אױף זײער אײגענעם לשון. אין 1908 האָט ער אין אײנעם מיט אַנדערע מיטאַרבעטער פֿון „ייִדישעס טאַגעבלאַט“ געשאַפֿן „הײַנט“. דאָס איז געװען די ערשטע טאָגצײַטונג אױף ייִדיש אינעם מאָדערנעם פֿאָרמאַט מיט ספּעציעלע אָפּטײלן פֿאַר נײַעס, רעפּאָרטאַזשן, עדיטאָריאַלן, קאָמענטאַרן, אַנאָנסן און רעקלאַמע.
אָבער דער סאַמע פּאָפּולערער זשאַנער איז געװען דער „געשפּאַנטער“ ראָמאַן אין המשכים, װי למשל „אין נעץ פֿון זינד“. דער דאָזיקער ראָמאַן האָט שטאַרק געהעכערט דעם טיראַזש אָבער אַרױסגערופֿן שאַרפֿע קריטיק מצד ייִדישע אינטעליגענטן. זײ האָבן באַשולדיקט יאַצקאַן אין פֿאַרדאַרבן דעם געשמאַק פֿונעם ייִדישן מאַסן־לײענער.
אין אַלגעמײן איז נאַלעװײַקאָ־קוליקאָװס אָפּשאַצונג פֿון דער ראָלע פֿון „הײַנט“ פּאָזיטיװ: „עס איז מסתּמא ניט קײן גוזמא צו זאָגן, אַז אַ דאַנק ׳הײַנט׳ האָבן זיך ייִדישע לײענער פּלוצעם אױפֿגעװעקט אינעם צװאַנציקסטן יאָרהונדערט און אַנטדעקט, אַז זײ באַלאַנגען צו דער גרױסער װעלט און ניט בלױז צו זײער שטעטל אָדער קװאַרטאַל“.
אין גיכן האָט „הײַנט“ באַקומען אַ שטאַרקן קאָנקורענט. אין 1910 האָט צבֿי פּרילוצקי געשאַפֿן דעם „מאָמענט“. דאָס איז געװען אַ מער „בירגערלעכע“ צײַטונג, װאָס האָט אױסגעמיטן דעם סענסאַציאָנעלן סטיל און ניט געדרוקט קײן „שונד“־ראָמאַנען.
ניט אַלע ייִדישע צײַטונגען האָבן איבערגעלעבט די שװערע מלחמה־יאָרן צװישן 1914 און 1918. אין 1915 איז װאַרשע געפֿאַלן אונטער דער דײַטשישער אָקופּאַציע און ייִדן האָבן געמוזט זיך צופּאַסן צו די נײַע בעלי־בתּים. אָבער „הײַנט“ און „דער מאָמענט“ זײַנען פֿאַרבליבן די װיכטיקסטע טאָג־צוטײַנגען ביז די סאַמע לעצטע טעג פֿון דער פּױלישער רעפּובליק. זײערע לעצטע נומערן זײַנען אַרױס װען היטלערס חיילות זײַנען אַרײַן אין װאַרשע, אין די לעצטע טעג פֿון סעפּטעמבער 1939.
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Nobody can tell me how many animals die for a shtreimel
I’m a wildlife ecologist who has spent the better part of a half-century studying, among other topics, what makes mammal populations resilient and what pushes them toward collapse. Most of this work has been on the raccoon, one of North America’s most common furbearers. So, I found myself wondering how many animals go into the creation of a shtreimel, the broad ring-shaped hat of fur typically worn by married Hasidic men (aside from Chabad Lubavitchers) on Shabbat, holidays, and other celebrations, and how many individual mammals that adds up to in any given year.
The question of particular interest was whether the number of animals “harvested” in shtreimel manufacturing is sustainable, i.e., if the furbearer populations behind this endeavor can be maintained in a healthy state over the foreseeable future. I decided to investigate this matter based upon the fundamental principles of wildlife management.
I initially expected that somewhere along the supply chain, someone would be able to provide some basic information. Instead, I found out that the most basic data needed to assess the fur trade behind shtreimels do not appear to be compiled at all. These would be found in the answers to such questions as: How many hats are made annually? Which species are used? What places did the animals come from? What is the status of the populations of these animals? And were they wild-caught, farmed or taken from an existing stock of individuals used for other items such as coats?
That uncertainty matters because a shtreimel is not simply just another fur product. It is a visible expression of religious identity and communal belonging. For the men who wear one, the hat can mark a life stage, a community and a connection to their ancestors. That should make issues about its production more profound than just a conventional debate over fashion. What does Jewish tradition ask us to consider when a religious object depends on animals?
A brief history of the shtreimel
The shtreimel was not originally a distinctively Hasidic garment: According to the historian Levi Cooper, Mitnagdic rabbis in the Vilna Gaon’s circle in the 18th century wore fur hats as well. He also suggests that the shtreimel may not have even become an exclusive marker of Hasidic identity until after World War II. He also maintains that the story that Polish authorities forced Jews to wear animal tails as a humiliation, which Jews then transformed into a badge of pride, is unsupported by the evidence. Finally, Cooper discusses that the type of shtreimel varies within the Hasidic world. Hasidim from Galicia, Hungary, Romania and Ukraine typically wear the more well-known broad shtreimel, while many Polish Hasidim wear a taller, narrower fur hat known as a spodik. Such particularities are meaningful within these communities.
The physical construction of the hat also varies considerably. A U.S. patent for shtreimel manufacturing describes the use of fur “plates” made by splitting, flattening and reassembling tails so that the finished hat appears to be a continuous piece of fur. Older designs used about 13 tails, whereas the patent describes a design using closer to 36. Dan Arnon’s book Kova’im ba-Rosh notes that some makers favor 13, 18 or 26 tails. But a tail is not an animal as one tail can become several pieces. The hat’s fur therefore cannot tell us how many animals died to make it.
Such opacity is hardly unique to the shtreimel. Anyone buying a fur-trimmed parka might well face the same unanswerable calculations. I’m focusing on the shtreimel not because its supply chain is especially mysterious, but because of what the garment itself represents: a marker of religious identity. A garment carrying that much meaning should be worth at least the same scrutiny I’d give to any product dependent upon the harvesting of wildlife.
Nor is there a reliable count of how many shtreimels are made each year. A 2009 Sydney Morning Herald article quoted an Israeli shtreimelmacher who estimated that 10,000 hats are sold annually worldwide. That might be a useful clue, but it is not a suitable statistic for wildlife management. It is only an anecdotal estimate from a single maker, with no known methodology behind it.
Confusion also arises from the names of the animals used in producing shtreimels. Their fur is usually described as coming from sable, marten and fox. But these common names do not provide the information a wildlife biologist needs. What are the exact species? A fox alone can be several different ones. Which population are they from, and which region? What was the harvest rate of each population? A species might be abundant over most of its range while a particular population could be small or declining. The Pacific marten offers a useful cautionary example: A coastal population in northern California and Oregon has been listed as threatened, with trapping among the pressures that contributed to its decline. While there is no evidence that any shtreimel fur came from that population, the point is that the use of the name “marten” tells us precious little to draw a conclusion about the population these animals are from.
A distinction between sustainability and animal welfare is important to recognize. The taking of animals by hunting or trapping, i.e., the harvest, can be sustainable at the population level but still involves methods and actions that raise ethical questions about the killing of animals for their fur. Trapping methods differ: Some traps are intended to kill quickly, while others might hold an animal alive until the trapper returns to finish the job. Canada and Russia are the major sources of shtreimel fur. The degree to which these countries adhere to humane trapping standards is not certain, and even so, it does not settle the moral question of whether killing a wild animal for its fur is justifiable.
The difference between a supply that would exist anyway and a supply created by the demand for new individual animals is another important consideration. If shtreimel-grade tails are largely or even partially a byproduct of a fur trade that operates without the Hasidic shtreimel market (e.g., for coats), the additional pressure on a furbearer population attributable to shtreimels could be relatively small. Alternately, if the demand for particular tails makes certain animals or populations more valuable to trappers, the dynamics of the furbearer populations would be affected. Only supply-chain information from the trappers and other entities can tell us about the circumstances we are dealing with.
What the Talmud says about using animals for shtreimels
The Jewish community has addressed some of these concerns. When Israel restricted its commercial fur trade in 2021, it created an exemption for fur used in religious practices, thus allowing fur for shtreimels to continue to be imported. This exception acknowledged that the use of fur for religious reasons is not simply another form of fashion. Nevertheless, according to Jewish law, the shtreimel has no special religious significance, though the wearing of two head coverings is considered to add additional spiritual merit. (The shtreimel is always worn over a kippah.) Yet, while Israel’s granting permission to import the fur resolved a legal question, it did not take into account certain ecological and ethical issues. Its exemption for the shtreimel does not address whether the populations supplying that fur are sustainable or whether the animals were trapped humanely.
The Talmud provides an expression that addresses the suffering of animals: Tza’ar ba’alei chayim, the prohibition against causing animals unnecessary suffering. I am not suggesting that this principle yields a ruling about shtreimels; Judaism does not prohibit the use of animal products. But this belief does make the welfare of the animal a legitimate subject of Jewish ethical inquiry. As a wildlife ecologist, I arrive at the issue from a different direction: What did this product cost the population from which the animal came? Perhaps this perspective is not as foreign to Jewish thought as it might first appear, in this case, when one reflects on the health of an entire population of animals.
I cannot determine whether the fur used in shtreimels is harvested sustainably or whether it is obtained by methods that minimize suffering. Neither can I, based on the information available, confidently say that it is not. A useful next step is to seek transparency in the process of creating shtreimels. Makers should document the sources of their fur. Suppliers should more carefully identify the species, their geographic origins, and assess whether their pelts are wild-caught, farmed or drawn from existing inventory. Wildlife organizations could ask for that information as a matter of responsible stewardship. Researchers could then evaluate the data to determine whether the harvests of these furbearing mammals are being done in a sustainable manner.
Such inquiries could produce illuminating answers. They might show that the majority of shtreimel fur comes from stable, well-managed populations and that the demand for it adds little pressure on wild furbearers. A religious tradition can thus be even more cherished knowing that its materials are harvested in a sustainable manner (while recognizing that questions remain about the morality of killing animals for their fur). For a garment that carries so much meaning, it is worth finding out the answers to these questions.
The post Nobody can tell me how many animals die for a shtreimel appeared first on The Forward.
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How a new tool in Lithuania helps people read letters from their Jewish ancestors
(JTA) — VILNIUS, Lithuania — At a family reunion in California in 2013, Felicita Trueblood discovered a portal to the past: a binder full of letters from her great-grandfather, a rabbi in Ukraine, from before World War II.
As exciting as the discovery was, the letters were illegible to her — until now, thanks to an artificial intelligence tool developed by Sergii Gurbych, a researcher in Lithuania who hungered for information about his own Jewish past. They unveiled a world of grief but also brought Trueblood solace, uncovering the truth about her great-grandfather’s death.
The letters, about 50 pages in total, had sat untouched for decades in her cousin’s house in Palm Springs. They were penned in Yiddish by Pavel Malisoff, Trueblood’s great-grandfather in Konotop, Ukraine — then in the Soviet Union — to his son, Trueblood’s great-uncle Solomon, who immigrated to the United States and changed his last name to Malis.
Between 1927 and 1934, the letters bridged two worlds — on one side, a father in Ukraine witnessing a community on the brink of destruction, and on the other, a son journeying from New York to California under the weight of the Great Depression. Malis died in 1985. For nearly a century, no one else read those pages.
At the 2013 reunion, none of the living family members could decipher their ancestor’s Yiddish letters, written in Hebrew script. Trueblood, who is now 75, felt compelled to take charge of the treasure trove. She grew up in San Diego with few traces of her Jewish past. Her mother, Malisoff’s granddaughter, became a Christian Scientist before marrying her father, a non-Jewish descendant of colonial Americans. Trueblood wanted to know who her great-grandfather was and the life he inhabited, long cut off from her family memory.
“I was raised outside the Jewish community, with no day-to-day connection,” Trueblood told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. “But I was always fascinated.”
Trueblood soon ran into obstacles. She found only a handful of translators who could help decipher the handwritten letters, and the cost of hiring them to work through the whole stack was prohibitively high.
But 13 years after inheriting the letters, she saw a Facebook post about VILNISH, a new project in Lithuania that aims to turn handwritten and historical printed texts in Yiddish and Hebrew into digital texts that can be easily searched and translated.
Gurbych, a researcher at Vilnius University’s Center for the Study of East European Jewish History, built the AI model behind VILNISH, which launched late last year. Born in Ukraine, Gurbych studied Hebrew and Yiddish on top of electrical engineering. At Vilnius University, he focuses on developing digital approaches to analyzing archival Jewish texts.
Gurbych’s particular interest is texts written between World War I and World War II, when Jewish cultural and intellectual life flourished in Vilnius. In 1925, Vilnius became the first headquarters of the Yiddish Scientific Institute, or YIVO, which continues to preserve the Yiddish language and Eastern European Jewish heritage in New York City.
Gurbych turned to a plethora of diaries, memoirs and other documents that were written by Jews in the interwar period and stored in the National Library of Lithuania. They provided the perfect material to teach a language model to recognize handwritten texts from the period. As he trains VILNISH on more and more handwriting types, it becomes a more universal tool.
Soon after Gurbych publicized the service, he began to hear from people like Trueblood, who sought to read letters left behind by their relatives.
Their urge to connect with the past was familiar to Gurbych. His own grandfather was a Jew born in 1915 in the Polish city of Łódź. During the Holocaust, he escaped the Łódź Ghetto days before its liquidation by the Nazis, when most of the 67,000 Jews who lived there were killed. Gurbych’s grandfather settled in present-day Ukraine in the Soviet Union.
Gurbych is drawn to pieces of writing that evoke the atmosphere, the tastes and smells of life for Jews in Poland before their communities were destroyed.
“I want to know more about the world where my grandfather lived,” said Gurbych. “He died in 2001, and I just feel that I didn’t speak with him about this time enough. He was a person who lived in the Soviet Union, so he was just closed, and didn’t very much like to talk about his Jewish background and about life in interwar Poland.”
Trueblood contacted Gurbych in May. Within a month, he sent her translations of all her great-grandfather’s letters. She was stunned by the vivid images of Malisoff’s life in Konotop, marked by poverty and separation. All of his 11 children were forced to relocate across the Soviet Union or immigrated to Canada and the United States.
Konotop was racked by famine during Stalin’s rapid forced collectivization of agriculture. Malisoff described “people walking half naked, hungry, with only a few coins in their pockets, without a piece of bread, without proper clothing, silently, without work and without money.” The “spiritual condition” was destroyed, he wrote, as the Sabbath, the holidays, kosher food, circumcisions and religious teaching disappeared — “as though they had never existed.”
It wasn’t just an AI language model that supplied her these windows to the past, said Trueblood. Gurbych had the knowledge of Jewish history and religious tradition to explain the terms used by her great-grandfather, a rabbi, and to point her toward the stories and texts that he referenced.
“What I got back was just beautiful, because he understands the context, the history, the biblical references,” she said.
She also made a discovery that shifted her understanding of how her great-grandfather died. Trueblood and her other living relatives knew that Malisoff had been tortured by Stalin’s regime for receiving small packages of money from family members in California. They always believed that was how he died.
But after the letters from Malisoff stopped abruptly in 1934, other letters from his wife and children revealed the truth: Malisoff had died not from torture, but from a heart attack at 74. A letter from one of his children in the Soviet Union gave Trueblood the unexpected gift of her great-grandfather’s dignified death and memorial service.
“Our old father of blessed memory has passed away, but his good and beautiful name has not died,” the letter said. “It lives on, and will continue to live for many years. The town paid him the highest honors. The entire town, old and young alike, accompanied him on his final journey, and he was given the place of highest honor in accordance with his good deeds.”
Gurbych hopes that VILNISH will retrieve such memories for many more people like Trueblood, while also helping academic researchers who face huge sets of archival documents in Yiddish and Hebrew that few people can read.
The tool also has the potential to support the descendants of Jews who were persecuted during the Holocaust as they prepare materials to confirm their eligibility for repatriation or citizenship, such as synagogue records, internal rolls of Jewish communities and other historical documents.
Trueblood was struck by how many others have yet to access threads to their past, as stacks of paper like hers sit untouched in attics and libraries.
“These letters are all over the world,” she said. “There are thousands of them out there that haven’t been translated.”
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
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