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Concept
Jews as the chosen people
Summary
In Judaism, the concept of the Jews as the chosen people (הָעָם הַנִבְחַר ha-ʿam ha-nivḥar , IPA: haʕam hanivħar) is the belief that the Jews, via descent from the ancient Israelites, are the chosen people, i.e. selected to be in a covenant with God. The idea of the Israelites being chosen by God is found most directly in the Book of Deuteronomy as the verb baḥar (בָּחַר), and is alluded to elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible using other terms such as "holy people". Much is written about these topics in rabbinic literature. The three largest Jewish denominations—Orthodox Judaism, Conservative Judaism and Reform Judaism—maintain the belief that the Jews have been chosen by God for a purpose. Sometimes this choice is seen as charging the Jewish people with a specific mission—to be a light unto the nations, and to exemplify the covenant with God as described in the Torah.
While the concept of "chosenness" may be understood by some to connote ethnic supremacy, the status as a "chosen people" within Judaism does not preclude a belief that God has a relationship with other peoples—rather, Judaism holds that God had entered into a covenant with all humankind, and that Jews and non-Jews alike have a relationship with God. Biblical references as well as rabbinic literature support this view: Moses refers to the "God of the spirits of all flesh", the Tanakh (Hebrew Bible) also identifies prophets outside the community of Israel and the prophet Yonah (Jonah) is explicitly told to go prophesize to the non-Jewish people of Nineveh. Based on these statements and stories, some rabbis theorized that, in the words of Natan'el al-Fayyumi, a Yemenite Jewish theologian of the 12th century, "God permitted to every people something he forbade to others ... [and] God sends a prophet to every people according to their own language." (Levine, 1907/1966) The Mishnah states that "Humanity was produced from one man, Adam, to show God's greatness. When a man mints a coin in a press, each coin is identical.
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