{
  "id": 3471971,
  "title": "You Don't Have to Be Religious to Be Jewish | Opinion",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/08/26/you-dont-have-to-be-religious-to-be-jewish-opinion",
  "topic": "culture",
  "section": "Culture",
  "published": "2026-08-26T09:00:00.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "Newsweek",
    "slug": "newsweek",
    "url": "https://www.newsweek.com/you-dont-have-to-be-religious-to-be-jewish-the-law-hasnt-caught-up-12351297"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "Two Jewish men, both wearing skullcaps, discuss how their connection to Jewish faith and ritual evolved over time. They were identified as Jews before they ever wore a yarmulke. Antisemitism does not consider whether a person believes in God or observes the Sabbath, just as two Jews recognize each other upon meeting. Faith is not what makes someone Jewish, according to their community or those who pose a threat. You don't need to believe in God, keep kosher, or visit a synagogue to be Jewish. Some deeply Jewish individuals don't practice these traditions and are just as Jewish. However, American law sees the religious aspect only. On government forms, \"Jewish\" is recorded as a religion, which doesn't fit those whose Jewishness comes from ancestry, culture, and peoplehood. Judaism is a religion, but Jewishness is also a people, a shared inheritance of ancestry, history, language, culture, and belonging, not dependent on belief. A bill in California, Senate Bill 1387, aims to ensure that when the state collects data on ethnicity, \"Jewish\" is an option. This is about recognizing Jews as a people, not just a religious group. Current data misses many Jews who don't practice religion or describe themselves as non-religious. A century ago, immigration officials recorded Jews as \"Hebrews,\" a people. After Nazi race theory, American Jewish leaders urged their government to treat Jews purely as a religious group to avoid persecution. However, the misunderstanding remains in the law. Jewish scholarship and communal life have long returned to the language of peoplehood. The law has not followed. This issue is separate from Israel or Middle East politics; it's about ancestry, culture, and whom the state can see. The law's inability to see this affects Jewish Californians' representation in public policy data. There is no registry or requirement to identify as Jewish; it's voluntary and self-chosen, with results published only in aggregate. This bill is about recognizing Jewish identity as an ethnicity, not about how one prays or believes.",
  "summary": "Some of the most deeply Jewish people do not believe in God, keep kosher or go to synagogue.",
  "key_points": [],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 1,
    "also_reported_by": []
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}