Is Jeremy Corbyn Jewish?

Jeremy Corbyn – the former leader of Britain’s Labour Party – is a well-known opponent of Zionism and the Israel Lobby although not Israel itself and has often been accused of being anti-Semitic although this is patently false as he is actually opposed to Zionism and not jews (and has stated so repeatedly).

Something interesting happened back in in September 2015 however when in an interview with Huw Spanner for the ‘Church Times’ he stated that:

‘Was there any religion in your family?

Yeah, there was. My mum was a Bible-reading atheist — no, agnostic, probably. She had been brought up in a religious environment, and her brother was a vicar, and there was quite a lot of clergy in her family. Going back a lot further, there is a Jewish element in the family, probably from Germany. My father was a Christian, and attended church; and the school that I went to was religious — we had hymns and prayers every morning.’ (1)

This would normally be accepted without too much comment but a jewess named Doreen Berger of ‘The Jewish Genealogical Society of Great Britain’ claims to have checked this claim and found it wanting in a later letter also published by the ‘Church Times’.

She writes:

‘Sir, — The Leader of the Opposition, Jeremy Corbyn, is mistaken in believing he may have a Jewish link in his family (Comment, 18 September).

His mother, Naomi Loveday Josling, is the descendant of the Revd Edward Nicholas Stott, a Yorkshire-born vicar living in Poplar. The biblical name of Naomi comes from Stott’s mother, daughter of the Dean of St Martin’s Church in Stepney. No trace of a Jewish ancestor can be found in the Josling family.

Although his father was David Corbyn, and his grandfather was Benjamin Corbyn, they are descendants of a Suffolk tailor, William Corbyn, and Dorothy Mary Bush, the daughter of a Norfolk chemist. Again, there is no Jewish pedigree to be found in the Corbyn family.

I am sorry to disappoint a politician, but it would seem that he is not of Jewish descent.

DOREEN BERGER

Chairman of The Anglo-Jewish Special Interest Group

The Jewish Genealogical Society of Great Britain

c/o The West London Synagogue

33 Seymour Place

London W1H 5AU’ (2)

Berger’s claims were rather predictably jumped on and promoted without comment by one Josh Jackman in the ‘Jewish Chronicle’ to claim that ‘there is no evidence’ of his ‘jewish roots’. (3)

However, I am far more sceptical of Berger’s claims in large part because while genealogy can be done without the collaboration/cooperation of those being studied – and often is – when we are faced with family traditions that may suggest something different from what genealogy appears to show. Then we have to compare the two to get to the bottom of whether the tradition or the official genealogy is correct.

This clearly Berger hasn’t done as Corbyn implies that the jewishness ‘from Germany’ - - which also fits the situation in Stepney given the bulk of these jews would have been Ashkenazim from eastern Europe - is on his mother’s side not his father’s and Berger is actually unclear about the maternal line as she states that:

‘His mother, Naomi Loveday Josling, is the descendant of the Revd Edward Nicholas Stott, a Yorkshire-born vicar living in Poplar. The biblical name of Naomi comes from Stott’s mother, daughter of the Dean of St Martin’s Church in Stepney.’ (4)

You’ll notice what Berger says is seemingly specific but also not: she points out that his maternal grandfather’s ancestry can be traced back to the Reverend Edward Nicholas Stott of Poplar – although originally Yorkshire – which makes him unlikely to be jewish, but Berger is strangely non-specific about his maternal grandmother who she merely states was the daughter of the Dean of St. Martin’s Church in Stepney and that his mother’s (common jewish) first name ‘Naomi’ comes from this grandmother.

Now if you know anything about the history of the jews in Britain then you’ll know that Stepney was at the time Corbyn’s mother was born (1915) a profoundly jewish area of London (5) with circa 40 percent of the population of Stepney being jewish. (6) This means that there is a good chance that Corbyn’s maternal grandmother or a maternal great-grandparent was in fact jewish.

This is especially so because Stepney was the epicentre of the Church of England’s ‘Mission to the Jews’ and we have records of numerous jewish converts to the Church of England’s Christian faith at this time, (7) which dovetails nicely with the fact that Corbyn’s maternal grandmother was the daughter of a Church of England clergyman operating in Stepney at just the right time.

We can thus see that Berger’s claims are not as solid as they at first appear as she has failed to check – or has been unable to check but not stated as much – this possibility that should immediately be obvious to anyone who knows anything of jewish history in London.

So, while Jackman jumped on Berger’s claims as definitive; the truth is that I suspect Corbyn is actually being quite honest that he has jewish ancestry – what we know from both Corbyn and Berger suggests it is also quite recent and probably halakhically valid in terms of Corbyn being regarded as jewish – and that Berger’s research was either not as conclusive or as comprehensive as she claims, or Berger’s was deliberately trying to undermine Corbyn’s jewish origins.

Going by her wording in her letter I think the former the more likely of the two suggestions, but this is somewhat counteracted by the fact that as a lay specialist Berger should know of the convert possibility and the link between the Anglican jewish convert to Christianity movement and Stepney.

So, the latter remains a distinct possibility.

In short however Jeremy Corbyn is indeed probably jewish and that jewishness is also likely to render him jewish both in terms of Israeli law as well as jewish religious law: halakhah.

References

(1) https://www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/2015/18-september/comment/opinion/i-am-much-too-old-for-personal-ambition also https://www.haaretz.com/jewish/2015-09-19/ty-article/jeremy-corbyn-claims-he-has-some-jewish-ancestry/0000017f-e0ba-df7c-a5ff-e2fabd0c0000

(2) https://www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/2015/2-october/comment/letters-to-the-editor/jewish-genealogist-s-conclusions-on-jeremy-corbyn

(3) https://www.thejc.com/news/sorry-to-disappoint-you-mr-corbyn-but-theres-just-no-trace-of-your-jewish-roots-qhlladi7

(4) https://www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/2015/2-october/comment/letters-to-the-editor/jewish-genealogist-s-conclusions-on-jeremy-corbyn

(5) For example: https://www.jewisheastend.com/stepney2.html

(6) https://www.thehistoryoflondon.co.uk/londons-jewish-community-in-the-19th-century-part-2-their-lives

(7) W. T. Gidney, 1908, ‘The History of the London Society for the Promoting Christianity Amongst the Jews’, 1st Edition, London Society for the Promoting Christianity Amongst the Jews: London, pp. 414; 522-523; 525; 534; 576-577