The mental gymnastics that some people use in their religious fights are so twisted that they would leave Simone Biles dizzy. Intra-religion fights often remind me of animals eating their own young.

To illustrate what I mean, I will show an intra-religion feud that pertains to who is a Jew.

First, the American-Israeli Cooperative Enterprise (AICE) states the following:

The above-shown description states, “It is important to note that being a Jew has nothing to do with what you believe or what you do. . . a person born to a Jewish mother who is an atheist and never practices the Jewish religion is still a Jew, even in the eyes of the ultra-Orthodox.”

In his commentary Outreach to Jewish Secularists and Atheists, Rabbi Harold M. Schulweis writes, “Secular Jews, atheist Jews and agnostic Jews produce no shock. In fact, they comprise the largest constituency of the Jewish people.”

As Rabbi Diana Fersko states, “We’re [We Jews are] not a religion only. We are also an ethnicity and a history and a people and culture.”

So, on the one hand, we are told that person can be both an atheist and a Jew.

On the other hand, on Twitter, several Jews told me that one must worship the God of Abraham in order to be a Jew.

Obviously, atheists do not worship the God of Abraham. So, if worshipping the God of Abraham is a requirement for being a Jew, then logic dictates that an atheist cannot be a Jew.

Well, which is it when it comes to atheists? Jew be, or not Jew be: that is the question.

Judaism originated thousands of years before the start of the Common Era. The Jewish organization Chabad-Lubavitch states, “Judaism originates nearly 4,000 years ago in the Middle East with a couple named Abraham and Sarah, whom G-d selected to start a new people, the chosen nation.”

According to an educational document published by the government of Manitoba, Canada, Jews and Judaism existed prior to the birth of Alexander the Great.

The Virtual Jewish Library is a product of the American-Israeli Cooperative Enterprise. The former describes how Jews and Judaism flourished after Cyrus the Great became king of Persia in 560 BCE:

“The Second Temple was completed on the very site of the first Temple in 516 B.C. Though Cyrus allowed the Jews freedom to practice their religion, he would not permit them to reestablish the monarchy. Instead, Cyrus sent Zerubbabel, a prince of the house of David, along with 42,360 other exiles to establish what essentially became a theocracy, with Zerubbabel as High Priest. Over the next 150 years, Judea flourished as the Jews rebuilt Jerusalem and developed the surrounding areas. The Persians resisted any Jewish efforts to restore the monarchy, but allowed them a high degree of autonomy under the High Priest, whose power was partially checked by the Sanhedrin, the Jewish Court, and the Popular Assemblies. During this period, Judaism’s Written Law took its final form.”

In short, Jewish history shows that Jews and Judaism predate the Hasmonean Dynasty, the latter being the era when the Pharisee faction of Judaism originated.

Logic dictates that one is a Jew if one is a descendant of the Jews who lived during the time of Cyrus the Great and if one studies the Tanakh – which is what Jews studied during the 5th Century BCE – uses the Hebrew language and strives to conform to the commandments in the Tanakh that are currently applicable.

Yet, some Jews insist that isn’t enough. They insist that the only Judaism is the what the ancient Pharisees created, even though Jews and Judaism existed centuries before any Pharisees existed.

So, were the Jews who lived during the time of Cyrus the Great just pseudo-Jews? If they weren’t, then it is illogical to imply that Judaism is a creation of the ancient Pharisees.

Yet, one will be accused of antisemitism if one dares to disagree with the ancient Pharisees. I kid you not. I have witnessed such accusations take place on Twitter.

Regarding this particular intra-religion feud, what I see is the frequent use of appeal to popularity.

Yes, the beliefs of the ancient Pharisees have the most popular support among modern-day Jews. However, nobody possesses a copyright, patent or trademark on the words Jew and Judaism.

In regions of the world where there is separation of religion and state, nobody has the legal authority to deny the Jewishness of “a descendant of the Jews who lived during the time of Cyrus the Great” who studies “the Tanakh – which is what Jews studied during the 5th Century BCE – uses the Hebrew language and strives to conform to the commandments in the Tanakh that are currently applicable.” Logic dictates that the latter is a Jew even if the person disagrees with the ancient Pharisees. After all, the Pharisees didn’t write the Tanakh.

Yet, I have witnessed Jews declare that the latter isn’t a Jew while also claiming that a person can be both an atheist and a Jew. I kid you not. This twist in logic is so dominant that not even Simone Biles can compete against it.

Yes, I realize that the government of modern-day Israel may have its own definitions of Jew and Judaism for legal purposes, but Israeli laws are not binding outside of Israel, and Israeli laws cannot erase or nullify the historical record that I have presented in this post.

Anyway, I will now move on to feuding that is taking place within a different group of religious people.

Twitter is one place where Kevin M. Young, Th.D. presents his disagreements about the way that evangelical and fundamentalist “Christians” interpret the Tanakh and the New Testament.

Dr. Young believes and teaches what the New Testament says in John 3:16, Romans 10:8-13 and 1 John 5:13. Yet, his critics frequently accuse him of not being a believer in Messiah Jesus.

Here is an example of the attacks on his character that he has to put up with:

Dr. Young fits the New Testament’s description of a believer in Messiah Jesus who will be in Heaven after he dies, but because he disagrees with a traditional Western ethnocentric concept of Hell, other alleged “Christians” deny that he is one of them.

Dr. Young’s critics will quote Ephesians 2:8-9 when it comes to their own spiritual status, but they deny what Ephesians 2:8-9 says when it comes to Dr. Young’s spiritual status. The logic used by his critics is so knotted that not even Popeye the Sailor Man can untangle it. I kid you not.

I have my own critics on Twitter who substitute personal attacks for sound reasoning.

For example, here are recent Twitter responses to me:

Thankfully, modern-day verbal attacks within Christendom are not as bloody as the intra-religion warfare that took place in Scotland and England between the time of Richard the Lionheart and the founding of the USA as a nation. Back then, people in England and Scotland claimed to be Christians, but they literally killed each other over biblical disputes. I kid you not.

Perhaps the worse modern-day intra-religion dispute pertains to Muslims. It is no secret that, in certain parts of the world, Muslims are killing Muslims, and mosques are being attacked by Muslims.

This bloody feud began after Muhammad died without leaving behind clear instructions on who was to be his successor in the leadership of Islam. The Sunnis believed that Abu Bakr Abd Allah ibn Abi Quhafa was to be the successor, while the Shias believed that Ali ibn Abi Talib was to be the successsor.

In a 27 April 2023 article for the Council on Foreign Relations, Mohammed Aly Sergie explains the current situation in Islam:

“An ancient religious divide is helping fuel a resurgence of conflicts in the Middle East and Muslim countries. Struggles between Sunni and Shia forces have fed a Syrian civil war that threatens to transform the map of the Middle East, spurred violence that is fracturing Iraq, and widened fissures in a number of tense Gulf countries. Growing sectarian clashes have also sparked a revival of transnational jihadi networks that poses a threat beyond the region.

Islam’s schism, simmering for fourteen centuries, doesn’t explain all the political, economic, and geostrategic factors involved in these conflicts, but it has become one prism through which to understand the underlying tensions. Two countries that compete for the leadership of Islam, Sunni Saudi Arabia and Shia Iran, have used the sectarian divide to further their ambitions. How their rivalry is settled will likely shape the political balance between Sunnis and Shias and the future of the region, especially in Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Bahrain, and Yemen.”

As 21st-Century CE history has revealed, Islamic terrorists aren’t kidding around.

Gee, Ted, haven’t you watched the movies that you are in?

If it will please you, now I will kid you:

Side Note 1: No, it is not an act of antisemitism on my part to use the definitions of Jew and Judaism that were in use before Alexander the Great was born.

If one is to answer the question “Jew be or not Jew be” from an academic perspective, then the entire ancient historical record must be considered. Granted, some people will reject that record because of emotional or religious bias.