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rfmcdonaldMikis Theodorakis' anti-Semitic statements, made as he received an award for his life work as a composer from the Greek government, have received a lot of coverage:
and
These statements, as has been observed by Eugene Volokh among many others, are anti-Semitic, particularly Theodorakis' definition of the Jews as "the root of evil." (Okay then ...)
One theme that hasn't been adequately explored, though, in the reaction to this is Theodorakis' interesting decision to place Greeks alongside Jews. Greeks, like Jews, definitely see their nation as diasporic. The construction of a Greek nation-state has obscured this fact, as has the post-First World War expulsion of Greeks from Asia Minor and the Balkans. George Prevelakis, in his paper "Finis Greciae or the Return of the Greeks" (PDF format), has suggested that the Greek diaspora might be disappearing as part of Greece's general Westernization. Still, perhaps half again as many ethnic Greeks live outside Greece as inside--in immigrant communities in western Europe, the Americas, the former Soviet Union, and Australasia, never mind Cyprus. The Greek diaspora--like the Jewish and the Armenian--remains a classical diaspora. To the extent that it's fading because of assimilation, all classical diasporas are fading.
It seems fairly clear that Theodorakis believes Jews to be stubborn and smart; that much is clear. What I want to know, and what hasn't been adequately explored in the commentaries I've seen, is why he compared Jews to Greeks. It seems to me that there is a touch of envy in Theodorakis' statement--perhaps he envies Israel's ability to stake its territorial claims without any opposition, its ability to gather up lands identified as eternally Jewish within the Israeli nation-state? The Greeks might be a nation without brothers--Greek is an Indo-European language, but it is the only surviving language in the Hellenic sub-family--but it could be argued that the 19th and 20th century Greek nationalist politicians did a worse job, territorially, than Zionist Jews. (I'm skeptical about this, not least since Greece was lucky to keep all of Macedonia; had the Germans won the First World War, Bulgaria's maximal territorial claims might well have been satisfied. For that matter, the success of the initial rebellions aganist Turkey in the Morea wasn't guaranteed.)
Theodorakis' anti-Semitism, in short, might be in part a criticism of the Greek political establishment of the past two centuries.
"We are two nations without brothers in the world, us and the Jews, but they have fanaticism and are forceful. . . Today we can say that this small nation is the root of evil, not of good, which means that too much self-importance and too much stubbornness is evil."
and
"We [Greeks] are alone. But without the fanaticism and self-knowledge of the Jews."
These statements, as has been observed by Eugene Volokh among many others, are anti-Semitic, particularly Theodorakis' definition of the Jews as "the root of evil." (Okay then ...)
One theme that hasn't been adequately explored, though, in the reaction to this is Theodorakis' interesting decision to place Greeks alongside Jews. Greeks, like Jews, definitely see their nation as diasporic. The construction of a Greek nation-state has obscured this fact, as has the post-First World War expulsion of Greeks from Asia Minor and the Balkans. George Prevelakis, in his paper "Finis Greciae or the Return of the Greeks" (PDF format), has suggested that the Greek diaspora might be disappearing as part of Greece's general Westernization. Still, perhaps half again as many ethnic Greeks live outside Greece as inside--in immigrant communities in western Europe, the Americas, the former Soviet Union, and Australasia, never mind Cyprus. The Greek diaspora--like the Jewish and the Armenian--remains a classical diaspora. To the extent that it's fading because of assimilation, all classical diasporas are fading.
It seems fairly clear that Theodorakis believes Jews to be stubborn and smart; that much is clear. What I want to know, and what hasn't been adequately explored in the commentaries I've seen, is why he compared Jews to Greeks. It seems to me that there is a touch of envy in Theodorakis' statement--perhaps he envies Israel's ability to stake its territorial claims without any opposition, its ability to gather up lands identified as eternally Jewish within the Israeli nation-state? The Greeks might be a nation without brothers--Greek is an Indo-European language, but it is the only surviving language in the Hellenic sub-family--but it could be argued that the 19th and 20th century Greek nationalist politicians did a worse job, territorially, than Zionist Jews. (I'm skeptical about this, not least since Greece was lucky to keep all of Macedonia; had the Germans won the First World War, Bulgaria's maximal territorial claims might well have been satisfied. For that matter, the success of the initial rebellions aganist Turkey in the Morea wasn't guaranteed.)
Theodorakis' anti-Semitism, in short, might be in part a criticism of the Greek political establishment of the past two centuries.
