To many readers of the Bible, it would seem that the opposite would be true and that one’s Jewishness would be traced through the father rather than the mother. After all, biblical genealogies trace descent through the father, we speak of the patriarchs Abraham, Isaac and Jacob rather than the matriarchs Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel and Leah, and men in Bible days were known as the son of their father (e.g., Simon Bar Jonah means “Simon son of Jonah”). Why, then, does the Talmud claim that Jewish descent is traced through the mother? And why does this remain the primary determining factor in Jewish law today (“Is your mother Jewish?”)? This is so established in Jewish culture that a Jew seeking to gain citizenship in Israel needs to prove that his or her mother was Jewish.
Many scholars believe today that this understanding was not fixed until the early centuries of this era, and some cite Acts 16:1–3 as a case in point. There we read that Paul met Timothy in Lystra, “whose mother was a Jewess and a believer, but whose father was a Greek. . . . Paul wanted to take him along on the journey, so he circumcised him because of the Jews who lived in that area, for they all knew that his father was a Greek.” According to the Jewish historian Shaye Cohen, this points to the fact that Jewish identity through the mother was not universally fixed throughout the Jewish world at that time, which is why Timothy was not circumcised at birth. Paul, however, recognized him as Jewish, hence his willingness to circumcise him, whereas Titus was not circumcised, since he was a Gentile (see Galatians 2:3).[84]
Professor Cohen further notes:
Numerous Israelite heroes and kings married foreign women: for example, Judah married a Canaanite, Joseph an Egyptian, Moses a Midianite and an Ethiopian, David a Philistine, and Solomon women of every description. By her marriage with an Israelite man a foreign woman joined the clan, people, and religion of her husband. It never occurred to anyone in pre-exilic times to argue that such marriages were null and void, that foreign women must “convert” to Judaism, or that the off-spring of the marriage were not Israelite if the women did not convert.[85]
Traditional Jews, however, believe that the concept of matrilineal Jewish descent does, in fact, go back to the Bible, which would be in keeping with their view that the traditions they follow today have their ultimate origin in the Scriptures (as interpreted, of course, by the Oral Law). What, then, is the basis for this belief? Several Scriptures are offered in support, a few of which will be treated here.
The Talmud (b. Kiddushin 68a-b) points to Exodus 21:4: “If [a slave’s] master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the woman and her children shall belong to her master, and only the man shall go free,” which is explained as follows: “This refers to a Gentile bondmaid given as wife to a Hebrew slave. The children remain slaves when their father is freed, shewing that they bear their mother’s status.”[86] (Notice that the Torah does not say that the woman is a Gentile; this is read into the text by the later rabbis.)
Another text cited in the Talmudic discussion is Deuteronomy 7:3–4:
Do not intermarry with them [the surrounding, pagan nations]. Do not give your daughters to their sons or take their daughters for your sons, for they will turn your sons away from following me to serve other gods, and the Lord’s anger will burn against you and will quickly destroy you.
The Talmud then asks, “How do we know that her issue bears her status?—R. Johanan said on the authority of R. Simeon b. Yohai, Because Scripture saith, For he will turn away thy son from following me: thy son by an Israelite woman is called thy son, but thy son by a heathen is not called thy son.” This is typical of Talmudic reasoning: Every word in the Torah can take on special significance, hence this seemingly forced deduction here.
Two other, related passages cited by Orthodox Jews are Ezra 10 and Nehemiah 9, where the Jewish men were called to account for marrying foreign wives, being commanded to divorce their wives and send them off along with the children who had been born to them. This, too, would point to the non-Jewish status of these children. Otherwise, why were the fathers ordered to send them away?
These arguments, which are developed at greater length in the Talmud and rabbinic writings, are hardly compelling. In the case of Ezra and Nehemiah, the issue could have simply been pragmatic, since it was expected that the mother would raise the children rather than the father (there was no such thing as stay-at-home dads!). And the point of Professor Cohen, cited above, with regard to many Israelite men marrying Gentile women, is well taken: Their children were considered Israelites without any record of the wives formally converting to the Israelite faith. Nonetheless, only Jewish descent through the mother was recognized in Jewish communities for almost two thousand years until Reform Judaism decided in 1983 to accept the children of Jewish fathers (patrilineal descent), without any conversion process being required. Orthodox Jews, as expected, completely dismiss this viewpoint, although a very good case can be made for patrilineal descent.
Messianic Jewish leaders have also discussed this question, with no kind of universal viewpoint being adopted as of yet, although some have suggested this guideline: If someone had either a Jewish father or a Jewish mother and considers himself or herself to be Jewish, he or she should be accepted as such.