EZRA 9:1-4

Q: Ezra notes that by marrying foreigners they have “mingled the holy race.” I don’t recall references to Israel as “the holy race.” Is this phrasing used elsewhere in scripture? It sounds like it has uncomfortable parallels with the Germans wanting to maintain “the master race.” How is this different?

The NIV choice of “race” as a translation is an unfortunate one since neither the Jews nor the Aryans constitute a race in anthropological terms. In Hebrew, the word is “seed” and is usually translated as “descendants” or “offspring.” The issue of genealogy first comes up in Ezra in 2:59, where some people could not prove their Jewish background. Unlike the Nazis, the issue was not so much to avoid physical contamination of the bloodline as it was to avoid spiritual contamination from the other nations (see Ezra 9:1 with its mention of their “detestable practices”).

The actual phrase “holy seed” only appears in one other place in the Old Testament: Isaiah 6:13. There God states that even in exile there would be a chosen remnant. He compares them to a burnt tree where “the holy seed is its stump.”

Of course, the concept of the Jews as a chosen people (holy seed) stems from God's promise to Abraham:

“By your offspring shall all the nations of the earth gain blessing for themselves.” (Gen. 22:18)

“All the families of the earth shall be blessed in you and in your offspring.” (Gen. 28:14)

This constitutes the major difference between the Nazis and the Jews. The Jews were set apart (made “holy”) in order to eventually bless all the people of the world. This is the exact opposite of the xenophobic Nazis. So the adjective “holy” actually connotes the service the Jews will do for mankind. This is quite different from the use of the adjective “master,” which indicates that those not in the group will serve them as slaves.

The actual nature of the blessing from the Jews is spelled out by Peter in Acts 3:17-26 when he quotes from the Abrahamic promise and argues that “offspring” in the Genesis passages is singular, not plural, and refers to Christ. Thus, Peter can later state that all believers in Christ, both Jew and Gentile, constitute “a chosen race” (I Peter 2:9). So if we are concerned with the Jews being called a holy race, we should be equally concerned with the equivalent title the Scriptures apply to us.