Jewish diaspora

The Jewish diaspora (Hebrew: גוֹלָה gōlā), alternatively the dispersion (תְּפוּצָה təfūṣā) or the exile (גָּלוּת gālūṯ; Yiddish: גלות gōləs),^[a] consists of Jews who reside outside of the Land of Israel. Historically, it refers to the expansive scattering of the Israelites out of their homeland in the Southern Levant and their subsequent settlement in other parts of the world, which gave rise to the various Jewish communities.^[3][4]

In the Hebrew Bible, the term gālūṯ (lit. 'exile') denotes the fate of the Twelve Tribes of Israel over the course of two major exilic events in ancient Israel and Judah: the Assyrian captivity, which occurred after the Kingdom of Israel was conquered by the Neo-Assyrian Empire in the 8th century BCE; and the Babylonian captivity, which occurred after the Kingdom of Judah was conquered by the Neo-Babylonian Empire in the 6th century BCE. While those who were taken from Israel dispersed as the Ten Lost Tribes, those who were taken from Judah—consisting of the Tribe of Judah and the Tribe of Benjamin—became known by the identity "Jew" (יְהוּדִי Yehūdī, lit. 'of Judah') and were repatriated following the Persian conquest of Babylonia.^[5][6]

A Jewish diaspora population existed for many centuries before the Roman siege of Jerusalem in 70 CE. In the preceding Second Temple period, it existed as a consequence of various factors, including the creation of political and war refugees, enslavement, deportation, overpopulation, indebtedness, military employment, and opportunities in business, commerce, and agriculture.^[7] Prior to the mid-1st century CE, in addition to Judea, Syria, and Babylonia, large Jewish communities existed in the Roman provinces of Egypt, Crete and Cyrenaica, and in Rome itself.^[8] In 6 CE, most of the Southern Levant was organized as the Roman province of Judaea, where a large uprising led to the First Jewish–Roman War, which destroyed the Second Temple and most of Jerusalem. The Jewish defeat to the Roman army and the accompanying elimination of the symbolic centre of Jewish identity (the Temple in Jerusalem) marked the end of Second Temple Judaism, motivating many Jews to formulate a new self-definition and adjust their existence to the prospect of an indefinite period of displacement.^[9] Nevertheless, intermittent warfare between Jewish nationalists and the Roman Empire continued for several decades. In 129/130 CE, the Roman emperor Hadrian ordered the construction of Aelia Capitolina over the ruins of Jerusalem, sparking the Bar Kokhba revolt in 132 CE. Led by Simon bar Kokhba, this uprising endured for four years, but was ultimately unsuccessful and became the last of the Jewish–Roman wars; Jews were massacred or displaced across the province, banned from Jerusalem and its surrounding areas, and forbidden to practice Judaism, leading to a significant rise in the Jewish diaspora.

By the Middle Ages, owing to increasing migration and resettlement, diaspora Jews divided into distinct regional groups that are generally addressed according to two primary geographical groupings: the Ashkenazi Jews, who coalesced in the Holy Roman Empire and Eastern Europe; and the Sephardic Jews, who coalesced in the Iberian Peninsula and the Arab world. These groups have parallel histories, sharing many cultural similarities and experiences of persecution and expulsions and exoduses, such as the expulsion from England in 1290, the expulsion from Spain in 1492, and the expulsion from the Muslim world after 1948. Although the two branches comprise many unique ethno-cultural practices and have links to their local host populations (such as Central Europeans for Ashkenazi Jews, and Hispanics and Arabs for Sephardic Jews), their common religious practices and shared ancestry, as well as their continuous communication and population transfers, have been responsible for cementing a unified sense of peoplehood between them since the late Roman period.

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