Facts are pesky Things
“Anti-Semitism” came about (in its Germanic form) in the mid-nineteenth century. In 1860, an Austrian Jewish scholar, Moritz Steinschneider, introduced the term antisemitische vorurteile (anti-Semitic prejudices). He used the expression in a piece he wrote countering the ideas of French philosopher Ernest Renan, who claimed that the Semitic race was inferior to the Aryan race.
The term anti-Semitism was made common by Wilhelm Marr, a German publicist and agitator. Unfortunately, his 1879 pamphlet, “The Way to Victory of Germanism over Judaism,” in which he used the term Antisemitismus, was very popular. That same year, Marr founded the League of Antisemites. It is interesting to note that Marr’s first three wives (he was married four times) were all of Jewish lineage and that, in 1891, he published an essay titled “Testament of an Antisemite,” apologizing for his mistaken anti-Semitic notions.
*There are two schools of thought on whether this term should be hyphenated or not. In America it is most common to hyphenate it, and so it is hyphenated in this Treat.
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