Judaism in Australia explained

See also: Australian Jews.

Group:Australian Jews
Population:99,956[1]
0.4% of Australia's population
Languages:Australian English, Hebrew, Yiddish, Russian, Hungarian, Romanian, French, Persian, Arabic, Spanish, Afrikaans, Bukhori, Polish, German, Chinese.

Judaism is a minority religion in Australia. 99,956 Australians identified as Jewish in the 2021 census, which accounts for about 0.4% of the population.[2] This is a 9.8% increase in numbers from the 2016 census.

There are many estimates of how many Jews are in Australia, with some estimates going as high as 250,000 [an estimate which, if based on the number of possibly Jewish family names in Australia, seems quite probable given the dilution of Jewish bloodlines after many generations of marrying out and other moves away from religious observance: unfortunately, the Bureau of Statistics reports only census enumerations of Jews by religion and not Jews by bloodline (ancestry) ==History== {{Main|History of the Jews in Australia}} In 1830 the first [[Jewish wedding]] in Australia was celebrated, the contracting parties being Moses Joseph and Rosetta Nathan.[3]

Jewish immigration came at a time of antisemitism and the Returned Services League and other groups publicized cartoons to encourage the government and the immigration Minister Arthur Calwell to stem the flow of Jewish immigrants.[4]

Affiliations

Until the 1930s, all synagogues in Australia were affiliated with Orthodox, acknowledging leadership of the Chief Rabbi of the United Kingdom. To this day, about 70% of synagogues in Australia are Orthodox.

There had been at least two short-lived efforts to establish Reform congregations, the first as early as the 1890s. However, in 1930, under the leadership of Ada Phillips, a Liberal or Progressive congregation, Temple Beth Israel (Melbourne, Australia), was permanently established in Melbourne. In 1938 the long-serving Senior Rabbi, Rabbi Dr Herman Sanger, was instrumental in establishing another synagogue, Temple Emanuel in Sydney. He also played a part in founding a number of other Liberal synagogues in other cities in both Australia and New Zealand. The first Australian-born rabbi, Rabbi Dr John Levi, served the Australian Liberal movement.[5] These congregations are supported by the Sydney-based Union for Progressive Judaism.

Demographics

About 90 percent of the Australian Jewish community live in Sydney and Melbourne.[6]

The Jewish Community Council of Victoria has estimated that 60,000 Australian Jews live in Victoria.[7] In Frankston, the Jewish community nearly doubled between 2007 and 2012.[8]

In Adelaide Australian Jews have been present throughout the history of the city, with many successful civic leaders and people in the arts.[9]

According to the, the Jewish population numbered 91,020 individuals, of whom 46% lived in Greater Melbourne, 39% in Greater Sydney, and 6% in Greater Perth. The states and territories with the highest proportion of Jews are Victoria (0.71%) and New South Wales (0.49%), whereas those with the lowest are the Northern Territory and Tasmania (both 0.05%).[10]

The same social and cultural characteristics of Australia that facilitated the extraordinary economic, political, and social success of the Australian Jewish community have also been attributed to contributing to widespread assimilation.[11]

Community success can also be measured by the vibrancy of Australian Jewish Media. While traditional Jewish print media is in decline,[12] new media forms such as podcasts,[13] online magazines,[14] and blogs[15] have stepped into the breach.[16] [17]

People

Academics

Artists and entertainers

Business people

Legal system

Politicians

See also: List of Jewish members of Australian parliaments.

Rabbis

Sportspeople

Other

See also

Notes and References

  1. News: Australia's Jewish population rises to 100,000 . Haaretz . 2012-06-25 . 2015-06-06.
  2. Web site: Australia's Jewish population at an all-time high . 28 June 2022 .
  3. Web site: Jews . Suzanne D. Rutland . 2008 . Dictionary of Sydney . Dictionary of Sydney Trust . 3 January 2012.
  4. Rutland, Susan, 2005, The Jews in Australia
  5. Rubinstein and Freeman, (Editors), "A Time to Keep: The story of Temple Beth Israel: 1930 to 2005" A Special publication of the Australian Jewish Historical Society, 2005.
  6. News: Goldberg . Dan . Australian Jews may top Forbes' rich list, but 20% live on poverty line Israel News . Haaretz . 2013-01-02 . 2013-09-15.
  7. Web site: Jewish Community Council of Victoria (JCCV) - Overview . JCCV . 2013-09-15 . 2013-09-08 . https://web.archive.org/web/20130908034028/http://www.jccv.org.au/about-us/overview.html . dead .
  8. Web site: Census shows Jews are on the move | The Australian Jewish News . Jewishnews.net.au . 2012-06-29 . 2013-09-15.
  9. http://www.adelaidejmuseum.org/ Adelaide Jewish Museum
  10. Web site: Census TableBuilder - Dataset: 2016 Census - Cultural Diversity. Australian Bureau of Statistics – Census 2016. 29 July 2017. 14 January 2023. https://web.archive.org/web/20230114122905/https://tablebuilder.abs.gov.au/webapi/jsf/login.xhtml. dead.
  11. Postrel. Virginia. Uncommon Culture . Reason Magazine. May 1993. 2007-10-05. https://web.archive.org/web/20071010033730/http://reason.com/news/show/29368.html. 10 October 2007 . live.
  12. Web site: The Australian Jewish News Galus Australis Jewish Life in Australia. galusaustralis.com. en-US. 2018-06-18. 2018-06-18. https://web.archive.org/web/20180618230650/http://galusaustralis.com/tag/ajn/. dead.
  13. Web site: Mazel Tov Cocktail. PodOmatic. 2018-06-18.
  14. Web site: J-Wire. J-Wire. en-AU. 2018-06-18.
  15. Web site: sensiblejew. sensiblejew.com. en-US. 2018-06-18. 2017-05-18. https://web.archive.org/web/20170518145754/http://sensiblejew.com/. dead.
  16. Web site: Home - Macroscope . 2017-05-18 . 2021-04-14 . https://web.archive.org/web/20210414114059/https://macroscope.com.au/ . dead .
  17. Web site: kvetchr.com. kvetchr.com. 2018-06-18. 2018-06-05. https://web.archive.org/web/20180605193030/http://kvetchr.com/. dead.
  18. Web site: The Last Post Ceremony commemorating the service of (8243734) Private Gregory Sher, 1st Commando Regiment, Afghanistan . 2023-06-07 . www.awm.gov.au . en.

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