One of the most common errors in trying to understand anti-Semitism is to assume it is a hangover from the distant past. All too often it is viewed as an ancient hatred which has evolved over time. This flawed perception leads to a serious underestimation of the malevolent power of anti-Semitism.

In contrast this article will argue that seeing anti-Semitism as a legacy of pre-modern times is a fundamental error. On the contrary, it is driven by contemporary forces. It is also far worse than just hatred.

I have explored in more detail elsewhere the idea anti-Semitism is more than hatred. At its core is the idea that Jews are the embodiment of the world’s evils. 

It is this notion of Jews personifying evil which explains the exterminationist character of anti-Semitism. It goes much further than despising Jews in the same way other groups might be detested. Instead anti-Semites seek to purge the world of any traces of Jewish influence and ultimately eliminate Jews themselves.

But here I want to focus on why anti-Semitism is a modern phenomenon. Despite appearances, with the recycling of medieval tropes, its main drivers are in the present and recent past. 

The more sophisticated versions of the oldest hatred argument appear to acknowledge the importance of modern influences but they do not go far enough.  Famously Rabbi Jonathan Sacks (pictured above), the late chief rabbi of the Commonwealth, described anti-Semitism as a mutating virus. In his view it is a hatred which adapts over time. It changed its form from theological in the Middle Ages, to racial in the 19^th and early 20^th centuries to ideological in the mid-20th century to virulent anti-Zionism today.

But this fails to get to the nub of the question. Besides reducing anti-Semitism to a form of hatred it underestimates the depth of the transformation of attitudes towards Jews over time.

The French revolution of 1789 and its aftermath marked a key turning point in the position of and perceptions of Jews. That is what unleashed the impetus to the emergence of anti-Semitism as a form of racial thinking. 

In the wake of that momentous event Jews were for the first time granted full equality and citizenship. Before that Jews, often geographically segregated in ghettos, tended to live at the margins of European society. It took many decades for Jews to enjoy full citizenship rights in much of Europe. Nevertheless, over time they moved from the margins to the centre of European society.

In parallel with that came the emergence of the idea of race. As I have argued several times on this site, following Kenan Malik, the notion of race emerged in opposition to the Enlightenment ideal of equality. 

In the 17^th and 18^th centuries, during the Age of Reason, it became increasingly accepted that human beings were in a fundamental sense equal. Many rejected the previous view that societies were naturally hierarchical. Racial thinking emerged in opposition to the Enlightenment view. Its proponents argued that inequality persisted because humanity was naturally divided into different races. 

So anti-Semitism emerged as a reaction against Jewish emancipation as a form of modernisation. As previously argued in relation to the Dreyfus case in France opposition to the two developments was closely bound together. Those who were against modernisation in general also tended to be those who opposed Jewish emancipation.

It is therefore no coincidence that the term “anti-Semitism” emerged in the late 19th century. It was coined to suggest that Jews were a malevolent force precisely because they represented a “race” rather than because of their religious faith.

Anti-Semitism has changed fundamentally since its advent in the wake of the Enlightenment. Nevertheless, it has retained its key characteristic as a racial ideology opposed to the perceived evils of modernity. In the 19th century this often meant the instability associated with speculative finance. In the aftermath of the Russian revolution this meant opposition to “Judeo-Bolshevism”: the notion that Jews were the force behind communism. More recently it has come to be embodied in anti-Zionism with Israel seen as the epitome of the evils of western civilisation. These are alleged to include colonialism and racism.

It is true that anti-Semitism sometimes incorporates tropes adapted from pre-modern times. For example, the revolting notion of Israel training rape dogs can be seen as a conspiracist fantasy against Jews. But the context is entirely different. 

In the contemporary case such accusations are best seen as part of a visceral reaction against modernity. It may take tropes from the past but that does not mean it is a direct continuation of old ideas. Medieval Jew hatred was not a response against the modern world but rather a form of religious animosity. The context and the position of Jews at the time were entirely different.

Besides the challenge is to work out what drives anti-Semitism in the present. Not the entirely different factors which motivated animosity to Jews in medieval times.

The key point to understand is that anti-Semitism is thriving in the current condition of extreme cultural pessimism. Western elites no longer believe in social progress or in the possibility of transcending differences between social groups. Instead they are plagued by self-loathing. They see the world as sharply divided between black and white. Not necessarily in relation to skin colour but as representing perceived differences in privilege. 

Essentially the identity politics which has come to the fore since the turn of the millennium is a new form of racial thinking.  In these circumstances it is all too easy to cast Jews as the hyper-white beneficiaries of privilege. Israel in turn is viewed as a bastion of white supremacy. The Jewish state is seen as the epitome of all that is evil in the West more generally with its attachment to national sovereignty and social progress.

This is the real challenge in understanding contemporary anti-Semitism. Not recognising how old tropes are modified and recycled for current ends. But rather what it is about today's society that provides such fertile ground for anti-Semitism to thrive.

 PHOTO: "Sirjonathansacks (headshot)" by cooperniall is licensed under CC BY 2.0.