We are two Jewish men who wear yarmulkes, the skullcaps that mark us in public as religiously observant. Neither of us came to that easily or early; our connection to Jewish faith and ritual deepened over the course of our lives—ebbing and growing along the way—until each of us, in his own time, chose to cover his head. But we were singled out as Jews long before we ever wore one.
Antisemitism has never paused to ask whether a Jew believes in God or keeps the Sabbath—and neither do two Jews meeting for the first time, as that quiet flash of recognition passes between them. Faith is not what makes a person Jewish, in the eyes of our own community or in the eyes of those who would do us harm. You do not have to believe in God, keep kosher or ever set foot in a synagogue.
Some of the most deeply, unmistakably Jewish people we know do none of those things, and they are no less Jewish for it. Yet American law can see only the religious part of us. On government forms, "Jewish" is typically recorded as a religion—a matter of faith and practice.
For the many Jews whose Jewishness runs through ancestry, culture and peoplehood, rather than belief, that box simply doesn't fit. Judaism is a religion, yes. But Jewishness is also, and for many of us primarily, a people: a shared inheritance of ancestry, history, language, culture and belonging that does not depend on what a person believes.
That is the conviction behind a bill we are working to pass in California, Senate Bill 1387. It would ensure that when the state collects data on ethnicity, "Jewish" is one of the options a person can choose. It is really about whether the government can see Jews as most of us actually are—a people—rather than as members of a faith that many of us don't hold.
The numbers show how much the current approach misses. In surveys by the Pew Research Center, a majority of American Jews say religion is not central to what makes them Jewish: 52 percent point to ancestry and 55 percent to culture, while just 36 percent name religion. More than a quarter describe themselves as having no religion at all.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
