text:
Talk:Algebraic quantum field theory

Is the functor $$\mathcal{A}$$ covariant, or contravariant (as it would be in the case of a sheaf)? It perhaps looks like the former, from what is said (restriction maps are rarely going to be injective). But I think we should be told.

Charles Matthews 12:56, 1 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Aren't functors automatically assumed to be covariant by default unless explicitly told otherwise? Phys 13:33, 2 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Yes - but the notation i-sub-stuff wasn't introduced explicitly, making it harder to suss out.

Charles Matthews 17:17, 2 Dec 2003 (UTC)

does AQFT stand for axiomatic quantum field theory?Lethe

Apparently algebraic QFT, though it is also axiomatic.

Charles Matthews 18:34, 12 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I'm somewhat unsatisfied with this article but don't know how to proceed. So I'll start on the discussion pages (in fact I added a link before I got my user account and did a small change on QFT, BTW thanks for sp and fmt).

The entry doesn't read as physics but as pure mathematics. Of course an axiomatic approach has a strong mathematical side, but there's something beyond.

The entry has only the objective side of AQFT, what is IMHO missing are motives, successes, failures relative standing compared to other approaches. Any feedback whether this would be OK to add? Then I'll try to do it.

Pjacobi 21:56, 7 Jul 2004 (UTC)
 * I agree completely. Let's hope there'll be more progress towards this in the next 18 months ! _R_ 19:17, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

 * That is completely the wrong tag (technical tag) for asking for improvements on content (which would probably make the article more technical anyway). I removed it.  --C S (talk) 07:32, 27 April 2009 (UTC)

Also, how does one "pull an action back" to the target category, when the action is defined on the domain category? This does not make any sense, though an equivalent notion could be developed if the functor $$\mathcal{A}$$ were an equivalence of categories. Regrettably, it is not. The Poincare covariance axiom is not well explained in this article and should be reformulated. Haag's famous paper from the 60s would do nicely as a source. myrkkyhammas 18:40, 2 March 2007

List of researchers
The list of researches at the end along with links to their websites seems promotional to me. So I plan to cut down the list to those researchers who are notable as evidenced by an article on them at WP. --Mark viking (talk) 20:58, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

The description is only for category theorists.
The page is written in the language of category theory. I suggest that many people who would be interested in the Haag-Kastler axioms don't speak that language.

FWIW, Haag and Kastler did not present their axioms in the language of category theory.

Gregweeks (talk) 01:43, 25 May 2012 (UTC)gregweeks

Net and net monomorphism need to be defined
Somebody more expert in AQFT than I should explain what "the net" and "net monomorphism" refer to. My general sense is that an AQFT defines an allowed set of states on a "net of algebras" but it should pointed out just what that net is before the term is used. There is a monomorphism referred to earlier, maybe that's the net monomorphism, but then this should be stated. Hope someone can do this!

MorphismOfDoom (talk) 18:51, 7 October 2014 (UTC)

Requested move 20 December 2022

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Local quantum field theory → Algebraic quantum field theory – New name is much more widely used in the scientific literature and thus more appropriate STEMster42 (talk) 10:46, 20 December 2022 (UTC) This is a contested technical request (permalink). Steel1943 (talk) 14:23, 20 December 2022 (UTC) The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
 * This comment thread began at WP:RMTR. Steel1943  (talk) 14:23, 20 December 2022 (UTC)
 * Some quick searches says otherwise, so I do not think this is uncontroversial. UtherSRG (talk) 12:10, 20 December 2022 (UTC)
 * May I ask what did you search? Searching both on Google:
 * https://www.google.com/search?q=algebraic+quantum+field+theory
 * https://www.google.com/search?q=local+quantum+field+theory
 * Shows far more relevant results for the first query than the second. Furthermore if you want an example from another Wikipedia run by academics working in the field (https://ncatlab.org/nlab/show/Haag-Kastler+axioms) it states pretty clearly on the page "The formulation of quantum field theory via these axioms has come to be known as algebraic quantum field theory or AQFT, for short." It also notes the issues with terminology but again looking at the respective pages there (https://ncatlab.org/nlab/show/AQFT) and (https://ncatlab.org/nlab/show/local+quantum+field+theory) you can see algebraic quantum field theory is more appropriate since the latter also can include functorial QFT which is not the main topic of the page. I will also add that recent textbooks in the area all call it algebraic quantum field theory (https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-319-21353-8 https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-319-25901-7 https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-319-21894-6) while the term local as mentioned in the first ncatlab article I linked comes from a book published in the 90s. STEMster42 (talk) 12:38, 20 December 2022 (UTC)
 * I think is right, particularly as it is the accepted term for modern textbooks. Polyamorph (talk) 13:16, 20 December 2022 (UTC)
 * To add a further authoritative reference, recent Snowmass papers (https://arxiv.org/abs/2203.08053, https://arxiv.org/abs/2210.03128) also refer to it solely as Algebraic QFT. Snowmass is a once a decade gathering of particle physicists in the United States where they talk about the future of their field. For more info see: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/physicists-struggle-to-unite-around-future-plans/ STEMster42 (talk) 14:16, 20 December 2022 (UTC)
 * I did google and gscholar searches of the strings in quotes: Google "Algebraic quantum field theory" Google "Local quantum field theory" Gscholar "Algebraic quantum field theory" Gscholar "Local quantum field theory" UtherSRG (talk) 14:49, 20 December 2022 (UTC)
 * With the Google Scholar links you see most of the references for Local AQFT are much older than than Algebraic QFT ones which reflects how the terminology has changed. STEMster42 (talk) 15:19, 20 December 2022 (UTC)
 * Ping current participants. Steel1943  (talk) 14:24, 20 December 2022 (UTC)

title: Talk:Algebraic quantum field theory


text:
User talk:Adam Carr/Anti-Zionism 1

the term anti-Zionism has gained currency in English only since the 1970s -- I wonder what the evidence is for that statement. Frankly I don't believe it. During the British Mandate the rights and wrongs of Zionism were earnestly debated throughout the English-speaking world (especially in the UK, for obvious reasons) and it is hard to imagine that the contrary opinion was never called "anti-Zionism". Certainly the concept was very well known. As for the word itself, I found a 1947 usage but I bet that I can find some earlier. --Zero 02:53, 27 Nov 2003 (UTC)

 * I have been following the Middle East debate very closely since about 1970 and I don't recall hearing the term anti-Zionist as a political category until fairly recently. "Anti-Israeli" was much more common I think. Obviously I am not asserting that the expression was never used: I chose the phrase "gained currency" deliberately so as not to be understood as saying that. If we were writing a dictionary entry it would be relevant to find the earliest citation of the term. The point in an encyclopaedia is to show when it came into common use. Adam

 * My comment was in respect of the Mandate period, when you can be quite sure that nobody was called "Anti-Israeli". What were the very many opponents of Zionism called then, and does it really matter whether they were called "anti-Zionists" or "opponents of Zionism"?  Your comment about dictionaries was one I was going to raise in support of my own position.  The article devotes a lot of attention to types of anti-Zionism (called that or not) prior to 1948 so why the focus on when the word came into use?  It is your writing that is like a dictionary! --Zero 05:15, 27 Nov 2003 (UTC)

 * Well I haven't read the English-language press from the Mandate period, so I can't answer that. Are you telling me that the term was in common usage then? In reference to whom? Anti-Zionist Jews? The Palestinian Arabs? If that is so I will change the text accordingly. I will still argue that even if the term was in common usage before 1948, it then fell out of usage again until recently.

 * I'll do some research on this next week. What I believe is true is that anti-Zionist Jews were so called, anti-Zionist Arabs were not (because it was the default position for Arabs), and anti-Zionist Brits were called that.  During the British mandate period, especially when the British soldiers started coming home in body-bags, there was heated argument on the merits of Zionism all through the British press, in the British parliament, and presumably in the British public.  Many people took an anti-Zionist position and I'd be really surprised if they weren't called "anti-Zionists". What else would they be called? --Zero 11:57, 27 Nov 2003 (UTC)

 * Zero, I still await your comment on the article as whole: you challenged me to write a NPOV article on anti-Zionism. Have I succeeded? Adam 05:23, 27 Nov 2003 (UTC)

 * I never thought that you couldn't write a good article on the subject. What I still think is that it is impossible to write and maintain a good article on it.  It's not a statement about you at all.  What is going to happen is that people will start adding crap to it and finally it will be as bad as the previous article.  We can prevent that to a limited extent by continuous vigilance, but we are finite and eventually we will lose the battle.  Unfortunately, I think that the existing anti-Zionism article represents the Wikipedia steady-state.  Call me cynical. --Zero 06:13, 27 Nov 2003 (UTC)

 * Yes, I acknowledge that that is what you originally said, and of course you may be right. I think, though, that bad articles attract more crap than good articles. I note that the new Zionism article has not been attacked yet. We will see. Adam 06:46, 27 Nov 2003 (UTC)

historically some anti-Semites were pro-Zionist -- The word "historically" suggests that this was true mostly in the past, but it is just as true today. Some of the most ardent supporters of Israel today (esp. in the USA) are fundamentalist Christians whose opinions about the role of Jews in the world are reasonably called anti-Semitic. --Zero 02:59, 27 Nov 2003 (UTC)

 * I will defend this statement: I'm not aware of any recent examples of anti-Semites arguing that all the Jews should be made to emigrate to Israel, as they did in the 20s and 30s. Christian Zionism is a different topic altogether, which need an article to itself. I don't think it is correct to call Christian Zionists anti-Semites without careful explanation of what they say and what that categorisation means. They believe that the Jews must eventually accept Christianity as the fulfillment of Biblical prophecy, but I don't think they hate Jews. Adam

 * Some in Farrakhan's Nation of Islam and in the Ku Klux Klan still hold this view. Most anti-Semites today dislike Jews and are prejudiced towards them, but do not want to exterminate them. They just want them elsewhere. (Of course, the trouble is that when everyone wants them "elsewhere", what happens next is ugly.) RK 21:14, Nov 28, 2003 (UTC)

 * I didn't call Christian Zionists in general anything; I was referring to a particular group of fundamentalists. They believe that Jews have a particular purpose which involves rebuilding the Temple then getting slaughtered en masse in the resulting world war (except for those who accept Jesus, of course).  I would call this "anti-Semitism" without hesitation even though it derives from a religious perspective.  This is a minority view amongst Christian Zionists but not a fringe view.  I can't give numbers but I believe it is millions.  These groups present as blind supporters of Israel and there is a large literature on their alliance of convenience with the far right of Israeli politics. --Zero 11:39, 27 Nov 2003 (UTC)

the existence of even a small minority of anti-Zionist Jews is sufficient to show that there is no necessary identification between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism -- This is based on the idea that Jews can't be anti-Semites. At the very least that is a highly disputed claim. You can look around Wikipedia and find quite a few Jews who are labeled as anti-Semites by someone; I rarely agree with the examples but there is no logical reason to say it is impossible. Won't you refer to an Australian as anti-Australian if they are passionately in opposition to Australia? --Zero 03:08, 27 Nov 2003 (UTC)

 * My statment has no logical connection with the question of whether Jews can be anti-Semites unless you are accepting the proposition that anyone who is anti-Zionist is ipso facto an anti-Semite, in which case the argument becomes completely circular and pointless. An anti-Semite is a person who hates Jews as Jews. Are you arguing that the ultra-Orthodox anti-Zionists hate all Jews? Personally I think the category "Jewish anti-Semite" is a semantic impossibility, and the fact that the term is used here as a term of abuse proves nothing. Adam 04:56, 27 Nov 2003 (UTC)

 * There are many Jewish people who effectively hate Jews. The Satmar have published a large amount of violent hatespeech towards all Jews (except of course towards themselves). Similarly, one can find racits material on balcks written by black people! The existence of such self-hatred may be confusing, but it exists. RK 21:14, Nov 28, 2003 (UTC)

 * I can't understand your reply at all. It is certainly not targeted at what I tried to say. Let me put it more simply. You have written "the existence of even a small minority of anti-Zionist Jews is sufficient to show that there is no necessary identification between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism" and "My statement has no logical connection with the question of whether Jews can be anti-Semites".  These two statements appear at face value to contradict each other.  Your argument needs you to present some people who are anti-Zionist but not anti-Semite, but you only managed to present some people who are anti-Zionist and Jewish.  To complete the logic you need to show they are not anti-Semites.  I'm not saying they are anti-Semites [in fact I'm sure the great majority are not], I'm just saying you have a gap in your logic. --Zero 11:47, 27 Nov 2003 (UTC)

the anti-Zionism of those who argue that Israel ought to be voluntarily transformed into a binational secular state in which Jews and Palestinians live together as equals -- I have two problems with this statement. One is that it is not a correct definition of what is usually called a "binational state" in this context. What you describe is a unitary state. A binational state involves some type of internal autonomy for the two nations. The Swiss model is often cited. Variations include systems that are almost indistinguishable from two separate states in a confederacy. The second objection is that you are stating a far from universal opinion by calling this anti-Zionism at all. Many of the proponents of this system, especially the Israelis, deny being anti-Zionist. A common claim is that a binational state is the only way to preserve the democratic nature of Israel, and that it is therefore a pro-Zionist position. I'm not arguing for or against any of these opinions, but I don't think you should either. At the moment you present one viewpoint as if there is no other. --Zero 12:24, 27 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Response to Zero's first point

Yes, you are right, I did not phrase that very well, I think because I changed my mind halfway through about what I was saying. Of course there is a connection between my original statement and your response to it. So let me start again. The logical sequence is this:

I say: the existence of even a small minority of anti-Zionist Jews is sufficient to show that there is no necessary identification between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism

You say: ''Your argument needs you to present some people who are anti-Zionist but not anti-Semite, but you only managed to present some people who are anti-Zionist and Jewish. To complete the logic you need to show they are not anti-Semites.''

My response is: On any reasonable definition of anti-Semitism a Jew cannot be an anti-Semite. The fact that the accusation is made in the course of inter-Jewish arguments doesn't change that. Therefore my first statement is correct.

Your response must then be: Either to agree with me, or to show how the category "Jewish anti-Semite" can exist in reality rather than just in rhetoric. I hope that is clearer :) Adam 12:31, 27 Nov 2003 (UTC)

 * I believe that is incorrect. You are making an unfounded assumption. I have personally met Jews (i.e. people who are Jewish by Jewish law) who hate the Jewish people, and who think that Jews are the cause of most of the world's problems. For goodness sakes, there even have been Jews in the Ku Klux Klan. Your argument incorrectly assumes that people think logically. You think logically, and so does Zero, Danny and most people here, but that isn't true of all people. Also, remember that the term "Anti-Semitism" does not mean "The desire to kill and exterminate Jews".  It never has referred only to such an extreme belief. The term has always been used for a much lesser (and more common belief), i.e. any form of bigotry and racism towards Jews as a group. RK 21:14, Nov 28, 2003 (UTC)

Reply to Zero's second point. You are correct that I am muddling two different proposed alternative to the present situation, the existence of Israel as a Jewish state. I think it is correct to say that anyone who proposes the abolition of Israel as a Jewish state is an anti-Zionist, but the proposed alternatives need to be stated more precisely. Please suggest an alternative wording. Adam 12:34, 27 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Early forms of Jewish anti-Zionism are really not related to modern forms of anti-Zionism. One of the big problems with the current anti-Zionism article, and this one, is that we are using the same word to describe unrelated belief systems. This article describes several groups of people with different reasons for different beliefs...yet lumps them all in the same category. I have thus made recent additions which try to clarify this issue. RK 21:14, Nov 28, 2003 (UTC)

OK we have two things to discuss here:

 * Different types of anti-Zionism

I agree with RK that is very misleading to discuss pre-1948 Jewish opponents of Zionism and lump them in with Hamas as "Anti-Zionists." I agree that we are talking about two quite different phenomena. The problem is that we have to discuss them together, partly to make exactly that point (I did try to make this clear through my structuring of the article, but I agree that we can make the point more clearly), and partly because modern anti-Zionists themselves seek to draw this connection, by saying: "See, we cannot be accused of anti-Semitism because all these Jews in the past were also anti-Zionists."

I think the paragraphs RK has added to the text help clarify what "Jewish anti-Zionism" actually meant, although I think their formatting is a little clumsy. I will try to integrate them into the text a bit more.

 * It was a clumsy first attempt. Your edits would be highly appreciated. RK 17:40, Nov 29, 2003 (UTC)

This question arose because I said that the existence of even a small number of Jews who oppose Zionism demonstrates that a simple identification between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism cannot be made. To this Zero said that the Jewish anti-Zionists might themselves be anti-Semites. To this I replied that in my opinion a Jew cannot be an anti-Semite.

To this RK makes two points: that he has himself has met Jews whom he defines as anti-Semites, and that that Satmar etc are anti-Semites. I cannot of course debate RK's first point. If he says there are individual Jewish anti-Semites, I will have to take his word for it, although I think he is describing a psychiatric phenomenon rather than a political one. (One might compare this to internalisaed homophobia among gay men, which is clearly a psychological disorder.)

 * Just to clarify, the reason I view certain ultra-Orthodox groups as anti-Semitic is not because of their anti-Zionism. That is just a complicating coincidence. I (and others) view them in this way because of their statements about the entire Jewish people. The leaders of certain extremist groups have very angry, if not hateful, things to say about all Jews. (Except, of course, themselves.) Their anti-Zionism is likely one factor which makes them feel separate from other Jews. RK 17:40, Nov 29, 2003 (UTC)

On the second point, I don't claim to know much about the ultra-Orthodox anti-Zionist groups. I have read the website given at the Zionism article as an example of this tendency. I didn't see anything there I could describe as anti-Semitic. I saw a group of extremely pious Orthodox Jews making a theological argument against Zionism based on their interpretation of Jewish law and tradition. One might say they are wrong or foolish (matters which are not for me to judge), but I can't see how they can be described as anti-Semitic. RK will have to give me some sources for the "hate speech" to which he refers if I am to be persuaded about this.

 * I actually agree. However, this is a sanitized website, which leaves out all the actual events and attacks which cause many Jews to view certain Jewish extremists as virtually anti-Semitic. RK 17:40, Nov 29, 2003 (UTC)

(Later: I have done some research on this now. I discover that Satmar, far from being a handful of cranks as I had been led to believe by an earlier argument between (I think) RK and Danny, is a major Chassidic sect, with tens of thousands of followers in New York, and that when Rebbe Teitelbaum visited Israel in 1994 he was met by 100,000 people. Am I expected to believe that all these people are anti-Semites on any reasonable definition of that word? Earlier, RK thoughtfully provided a definition of anti-Semitism: "any form of bigotry and racism towards Jews as a group." Can he show how a large community of ultra-Orthodox Jews, who devote their entire lives to Torah observance, express "bigotry and racism towards Jews as a group"?)

In any case, to return to the point, it is not sufficient for the purposes of this discussion to show that individual Jews can be anti-Semites in some way, nor is it sufficient to show that some Jewish anti-Zionists definitely are anti-Semites. To refute my point that the existence of Jewish anti-Zionists demonstrates that anti-Zionism is not automatically the same as anti-Semitism, it is necessary to show (not merely allege) that all Jewish anti-Zionists, without exception, are anti-Semites. And the mere fact that they are anti-Zionists cannot be cited as evidence that they are anti-Semites, because that is the point which is in dispute. Other evidence of their alleged anti-Semitism must be produced. I suspect this will be beyond even RK's dialectical skills.

Adam 01:49, 29 Nov 2003 (UTC)

 * I believe that it is totally possible to be anti-Zionist without being anti-Semitic. SJK, a former Wikipedia contributor, is one such person. He was against all forms of nationalism, including Jewish and Arab nationalism. Nothing anti-Semitic about that. However, what many Jews find anti-Semitic is the belief that Jews alone have no right at all to any form of homeland or nationalism. That is the view of the leadership of the Reform, Conservative and Modern Orthodox movements, as well as the view of the ADL, and leaders in many other American Jewish groups. The predominance of this view does not make it true, of course, but I do wish to point out that this is not some lone opinion held only by me. RK 17:40, Nov 29, 2003 (UTC)

One further question arising from RK's comments: he says that "Some in Farrakhan's Nation of Islam and in the Ku Klux Klan still hold this view" [that all the Jews should be deported to Israel], in other words that there are still pro-Zionist anti-Semites. I would find it extraordinary if American Black Muslim anti-Semites supported the existence of Israel, even for anti-Semitic reasons, since this would mean breaking solidarity with the rest of the Islamic world. Can RK provide sources for this? Adam 02:41, 29 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Satmar is actually the largest Hasidic group in the world today, with over 100,000 followers, based in New York, Canada, the United Kingdom, and Belgium. They are also an extremely influential group, because they are wealthier than most of the other groups--Satmar is prominent in the international diamond trade. They are politically active, and generally support conservative causes. Many other Hasidic groups are influenced by Satmar and look up to the previous rebbe, Joel (Yoel) Teitelbaum, as an authority figure. His book, VaYoel Moshe, is an important exposition of the ultra-Orthodox position on Zionism, based on a literal interpretation of midrash (Bab. Talmud, Ketubot) that God and the Jewish people exchanged three oaths at the time of the Exile: This was the position of most of the ultra-Orthodox world until the Holocaust. Even today, many ultra-Orthodox Jews, including the Agudat Israel party, which has participated in most of Israel's coalition governments, accepted these oaths, arguing either that the Holocaust was "excessive persecution," or more commonly, that whereas they are opposed to Zionism, Israel exists de facto as a state, and it woudl be better to cooperate with it than to actively oppose it. In fact, this latter view is held by virtually all hasidic groups, incl. the supposedly Zionist Lubavitch, to some degree or another. Another important point is that Neturei Karta, an Israeli phenomenon (though some ultra-Orthodox Jews outside of Israel now identify themselves as Neturei Karta) are not Satmar, even though they have been influenced by Teitelbaum's writings. Danny 03:57, 29 Nov 2003 (UTC)
 * 1) That the Jewish people would not rebel against the non-Jews that ruled over them;
 * 2) That the Jewish people would not return to Israel en masse (shelo ya'alu be-homa, literally, that they would not "ascend like a wall");
 * 3) That God would not allow the non-Jewish world to persecute the Jews excessively.

 * That's all very interesting Danny, but what is your view on my discussion (above) with RK and Zero? Does the existence of a significant current of anti-Zionism in Orthodox Judaism establish the point that anti-Zionism is not synonymous with anti-Semitism, or does it not? Adam 04:47, 29 Nov 2003 (UTC)

I have been arguing this point sporadically with RK for well over a year now. I maintain that anti-Zionism is not synonymous with anti-Semitism, and I further maintain that Satmar, Neturei Karta, and other anti-Zionist groups are not anti-Semitic. Personally, I find it offensive to claim that they are, but that is besides the point. While it is fairly easy to find objectionable statements made by these groups, no one familiar with them will call them anti-Semitic, or if they do (and I doubt it is possible to find a statement that "Satmar is anti-Semitic), that it is anything more than a rhetorical jibe. Satmar is NOT anti-Semitic. Danny 04:55, 29 Nov 2003 (UTC)

 * In case it wasn't clear before, I agree with Danny on this. On the other hand, I don't find any reason in principle why a Jew can't be just as anti-Semitic as anyone else.  It isn't an emotion felt towards one person (even if it's yourself) but against a group.  The suggestion that such examples are due to mental disorder is ...how can I put this?... astonishingly 19th century.  So my problem with the example given in the article is not that it isn't valid but that there is a defect in the presentation.  Of course RK isn't the only person on earth that claims anti-Zionism is a form of anti-Semitism.  It is the stated position of the president of the ADL, for example.  I just happen to strenuously disagree. --Zero 06:23, 29 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Even then, a minority of Jewish opinion opposed the creation of a Jewish state, although that minority dwindled almost to nothing in the 20 years after the establishment of Israel. --For the reasons stated by Danny above, this statement is stronger than the facts allow. Can I suggest that Danny revises it? --Zero 06:28, 29 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Of course. I would not have written that sentence had I read the stuff about Satmar beforehand, although I think it is probably true of non-Orthodox Jewish opinion.

On your previous point, I stick to my position. If anti-Semitism is reasonably defined (I am happy with RK's definition of "bigotry and racism towards Jews as a group"), I fail to see how a Jew of sound mind can hold such a position. I find your statement that "I don't find any reason in principle why a Jew can't be just as anti-Semitic as anyone else" extraordinary. Of course there is a reason - because they are Jewish. For a Jew to accept "bigotry and racism" towards themselves - to believe that they themselves are a money-grubbing parasite, or spread venereal diseases, or kill Christian children, or secretly control the world (and that is what we are talking about when we use the expression anti-Semitism), can only be evidence of some sort of pyschological problem. Adam 06:47, 29 Nov 2003 (UTC)

 * So you disagree with the point that anti-Semitism is antipathy towards the group rather than towards particular individuals? --Zero 08:16, 29 Nov 2003 (UTC)

 * I just said I accept RK's definition of anti-Semitism as ""bigotry and racism towards Jews as a group." What are you getting at? Adam 08:21, 29 Nov 2003 (UTC)

 * So someone can believe that Jews as a group are evil while excluding some individuals. Why can't those individuals include themself?  --Zero 08:51, 29 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Bigotry among the average person usually isn't well thought in detail. From what I have read and experienced, it seems to me that most people who are racist towards blacks allow themselves not to be racist towards certain black individuals whom they know or respect. There are even some black people, in the black community, who have come to believe racist stereotypes abouts blacks as a whole, yet don't apply such beliefs to themselves or other black people they work with. The same goes for people in other groups, like Jews. Its not a sympton of a psychological problem; it is rather a problem of failing to think one's position through logically, and examining the logical consequences of one's beliefs. RK 17:45, Nov 29, 2003 (UTC)

Yes well I suppose all that is possible, but that is not what we are debating. We are debating the question of whether anti-Zionism is synonymous with anti-Semitism. I cited the existence of anti-Zionist Jews as evidence for that. Zero suggested that these Jews may themselves be anti-Semites. I still think that is an unlikely proposition, but I suppose it may be true in some individual cases. But it clearly cannot be true for all the tens of thousands of Orthodox Jews in sects such as Satmar whose opposition to Zionism is based on Jewish theology, not on some quirk of personality. Please address yourselves to this central point. Adam 01:25, 30 Nov 2003 (UTC)

 * As attested to in many older discussions on the Anti-Semitism and Anti-Zionism page, as well as on the Wiki-En list, the view of most Wikipedians is that anti-Zionism is not synonomous with anti-Semitism. However, it seems to me that many people have reached this conclusion largely due to the fact that some Jewish groups are "anti-Zionist". It has been repeatedly argued that "If some Jewish groups are anti-Zionist, then it cannot possible be anti-Semitic. However, I believe such reasoning is totally flawed, because they are using the same word ("anti-Zionism") to refer to totally different belief systems. The anti-Zionism of Hamas, Hizbollah, Islamic Jihad, and of many other people simply has nothing to do with the anti-Zionism of early Reform Jews, or Orthodox Jews. Also, as I said above, anti-nationalism is a philosophy in which one is against any form of nationalism, including Jewish nationalism, aka Zionism, and there is nothing anti-Semitic about this even-handed belief.  So here is my personal conclusion:

 * Principled anti-nationalism, when applied evenly to all groups, is not anti-Semitic.
 * The "anti-Zionism" of early Reform Judaism is not anti-Semitic
 * The "anti-Zionism" of religious Jews who are against a secular socialist Jewish is not anti-Semitic.
 * The "anti-Zionism" of religious Jews who are against a the creation of a Jewish state before the coming of the messiah is not anti-Semitic, even though it is stupid beyond words.
 * However, most forms of anti-Zionism that exist today are inherently anti-Semitic, including the rising tide of Jew-hating vitriol masquerading as anti-Semitism in the European and American left-wing, among Palestinians, and among many Arabs and Muslims. These latter forms of anti-Zionism bear no relationship the other forms of "anti-Zionism" listed above, and are only linked together by those who wish to justify a double-standard against Jews. This is not my view alone, but the view of a great many in the leadership of the mainstream religiou and non-religious Jewish community. Your mileage, of course, may vary. RK 22:53, Nov 30, 2003 (UTC)
 * This last statement of mine will be more controversial, but I stand by it, as it is a mainstream view of not a small number of non-Orthodox Jews. The views of certain anti-Zionist ultra-Orthodox groups may fairly be termed anti-Semitic. Not, however, because they are against Zionism, but because in addition to this, they put forth rather vile hatespeech towards others Jews, and incite violence towards other Jews. It is distressing to me to state this, but I won't present all of my co-religionists in a good light just because we technically are in the same religion. One's behaviour counts more than one's label, and many gentiles have been nicer to me than many fanatic ultra-Orthodox Jews. RK 22:58, Nov 30, 2003 (UTC)

Thanks for that explanation of your position. You may be surprised to know that I agree with nearly all of it. Clearly "anti-Zionism" is two completely different things, and I will try to recast the article to make that clearer, but they do have to be discussed together for the reasons discussed above. As to the last point, I haven't seen the anti-Semitic hatespeech you refer to, but the point isn't really central to the topic so I don't need to argue with you about that. Adam 00:52, 1 Dec 2003 (UTC)

 * Good to hear this. Just to make thing easier, I agree that the last point is off-topic, and I won't press it in any Wikipedia article. It is an opinion, not a fact. Unless some article needs a discussion of inter-denominational relations in Judaism, it would best be avoided. If the topic does come up, we can always say "Group X is against group Y because of such-and-such; the more liberal groups responds by saying that they feel Z because of such-and such", and just leave it in terms of a formal attribution of opinions. RK 01:33, Dec 1, 2003 (UTC)

OK well that deals with the issue of the anti-Zionist Jews, for now anyway. I would still like you to document the suggestion you made earlier that there are pro-Zionist anti-Semites - people who still advocate that all the Jews should or be sent to Israel. You mentioned Farrakhan as one. I find this improbable, but I am open to persuasion if there is evidence. Adam 02:30, 1 Dec 2003 (UTC)

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license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: User talk:Adam Carr/Anti-Zionism 1


text:
Culture of Angola

The culture of Angola is influenced by the Portuguese. Portugal occupied the coastal enclave Luanda, and later also Benguela, since the 16th/17th centuries, and expanded into the territory of what is now Angola in the 19th/20th centuries, ruling it until 1975. Both countries share prevailing cultural aspects: the Portuguese language and Roman Catholicism. However, present-day Angolan culture is mostly native Bantu, which was mixed with Portuguese culture. The diverse ethnic communities with their own cultural traits, traditions and native languages or dialects include the Ovimbundu, Ambundu, Bakongo, Chokwe, Avambo and other peoples.

Ethnic groups and languages
There are over 100 distinct ethnic groups and languages/dialects in Angola. Although Portuguese is the official language, for many black Angolans it is a second or even third language. The three dominant ethnic groups are the Ovimbundu, Mbundu (better called Ambundu, speaking Kimbundu) and the Bakongo. There are also small numbers of Mestiço (mixed African and European descent) and ethnic white Europeans as well.

Ovimbundu
The largest ethnolinguistic category, the Ovimbundu, were located in west-central Angola, south of Mbundu-inhabited regions. In 1988 the United States Department of State estimated that they constituted 37 percent of the population. The language of the Ovimbundu is Umbundu.

The core area of the Ovimbundu kingdoms was that part of the Benguela Plateau north of the town of Huambo. Expansion continuing into the twentieth century enlarged their territory considerably, although most Ovimbundu remained in that part of the plateau above 1,200 meters in elevation.

Like most African groups of any size, the Ovimbundu were formed by the mixture of groups of diverse origin (and varying size). Little is known of developments before the seventeenth century, but there is some evidence of additions to the people who occupied the Benguela Plateau at that time. Over time, a number of political entities, usually referred to as kingdoms, were formed. By the eighteenth century, there were twenty-two kingdoms. Thirteen were fully independent; the other nine were largely autonomous but owed tribute to one of the more powerful entities, usually the kingdom of Bailundu, but in some cases Wambu or Ciyaka. By the beginning of the second decade of the twentieth century, effective occupation by the Portuguese had caused a fairly rapid decline in the power of the heads of these kingdoms, but Ovimbundu continued to think of themselves as members of one or another of the groups based on these political units after World War II.

In addition, to the groups that clearly spoke dialects of Umbundu, there were two on the periphery of Ovimbundu distribution: the Mbui, who seemed to straddle the linguistic boundary between the Ovimbundu and the Mbundu; and the Dombe living to the west near the coast, whose language was closely related to Umbundu, although not a dialect of it. The Dombe and several other groups, including the Nganda and the Hanya (who, according to one account, spoke Umbundu dialects) relied on cattle raising, as did their southern neighbors, the Herero and the Ovambo. Still others, typically the old tributary kingdoms, came to speak Umbundu relatively recently.

Until the Portuguese established firm control over their territory, the Ovimbundu – particularly those of the major kingdoms of Bailundu (to the northwest), Bihe (to the northeast), and Wambu (in the center) – played important roles as intermediaries in the slave, ivory, and beeswax trades, acting as carriers, entrepreneurs, and raiders. With the decline of the slave trade in the last decades of the nineteenth century, the entrepreneurs among the Ovimbundu turned to the rubber trade, abandoning the warfare and raiding that had hitherto been integrally related to their economic activities. The rubber slump at the beginning of the twentieth century, the end of the de facto autonomy of their kingdoms not long after, and the displacement of Ovimbundu traders by the Portuguese forced these people to turn to cash-crop agriculture. (The men had hitherto had little involvement with cultivation; in fact, the women continued to be responsible for the cultivation of subsistence crops.)

The introduction of cash crops, particularly coffee, led to a series of changes in settlement patterns and social arrangements. But after a time, soil exhaustion, lack of support of African agriculture by the colonial authorities, incursions of Portuguese settlers who took over valuable property in the highlands, and a number of other factors contributed to a decline in the success of Ovimbundu cash-crop agriculture. By the early 1960s, up to 100,000 Ovimbundu, estimated at one-quarter of the group's able-bodied adult males, were migrating on one-year and two-year labor contracts to the coffee plantations of Uíge and Cuanza Norte provinces; another 15,000 to 20,000 sought work in Luanda and Lobito; and roughly the same number worked in the industrial plants of Huambo or for European farmers in the Benguela Plateau. In most cases, remuneration was low, but these migrant workers had little alternative. This pattern continued through the remainder of the colonial period, except for those males who were involved in nationalist activity (usually with UNITA).

In the 1940s, the Ovimbundu organized what was probably the most closely knit Angolan community of the colonial era. With the financial and ideological aid of North American Christian missionaries, they established a network of Christian villages, each with its own leadership, schools, churches, and clinics. They were thus able to maintain the Ovimbundu culture while providing educational and social amenities for their children. The generation that emerged from this structure became the disciples of Jonas Savimbi and the basis for UNITA, which in the 1980s used the same concepts to maintain Ovimbundu cohesiveness within UNITA-controlled areas.

Given the degree of change in Ovimbundu society and the involvement of the Ovimbundu with UNITA, it was difficult to determine their long-range role in Angolan politics. Just how long Ovimbundu solidarity would persist under changing circumstances could not be predicted.

Mbundu
Just north of Ovimbundu territory lived the Mbundu, the second largest ethnolinguistic category, whose language was Kimbundu. In 1988 they made up an estimated 25 percent of the Angolan population. In the sixteenth century, most of the groups that came to be known as Mbundu (a name apparently first applied by the neighboring Bakongo) lived well to the east of the coast in the plateau region (at a somewhat lower altitude than the Ovimbundu); a few groups in the far northeast lived at altitudes below 700 meters. In general, the outlines of the area occupied by the Mbundu had remained the same. The major exception was their expansion of this area to parts of the coast formerly occupied by Bakongo and others.

Although most of the boundaries of Mbundu territory remained fairly firm, the social and linguistic boundaries of the category had shifted, some of the peripheral groups having been variably influenced by neighboring groups and the groups close to the coast having been more strongly influenced by the Portuguese than were the more remote ones. Moreover, the subdivisions discernible for the sixteenth century (and perhaps earlier) also changed in response to a variety of social and linguistic influences in the colonial period. The Mbundu in general and the western Mbundu in particular, located as they were not far from Luanda, were susceptible to those influences for a longer time and in a more intense way than were other Angolan groups.

There were a number of Kimbundu dialects and groups. Two, each incorporating Portuguese terms, gradually became dominant, serving as lingua francas for many Mbundu. The western dialect was centered in Luanda, to which many Mbundu had migrated over the years. The people speaking it, largely urban, had come to call themselves Ambundu or Akwaluanda, thus distinguishing themselves from rural Mbundu. The eastern dialect, known as Ambakista, had its origins in the eighteenth century in a mixed Portuguese-Mbundu trading center at Ambaca near the western edge of the plateau region, but it spread in the nineteenth century through much of eastern Mbundu territory. Another Kimbundu-speaking group, the Dembos, were generally included in the Mbundu category. Living north of Luanda, they had also been strongly influenced by Kikongo speakers.

By the late 1960s, the Mbundu living in the cities, such as Luanda and Malanje, had adopted attributes of Portuguese lifestyle. Many had intermarried with Portuguese, which led to the creation of an entirely new class of mestiços. Those who received formal education and fully adopted Portuguese customs became assimilados.

The Mbundu were the MPLA's strongest supporters when the movement first formed in 1956. The MPLA's president, Agostinho Neto, was the son of a Mbundu Methodist pastor and a graduate of a Portuguese medical school. In the 1980s, the Mbundu were predominant in Luanda, Bengo, Cuanza Norte, Malanje, and northern Cuanza Sul provinces.

Bakongo
The Kikongo-speaking Bakongo made up an estimated 15 percent of the Angolan population. In 1988 the Bakongo were the third largest ethnolinguistic group in Angola. Concentrated in Uíge, Zaire, and Cabinda provinces, where they constituted a majority of the population, the Bakongo spilled over into the nation of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (where they were the largest single ethnic group) and Congo. Although the Angolan city of São Salvador (renamed Mbanza Congo) was the capital of their ancient kingdom, most of the Bakongo were situated in Zaire.

Their former political unity long broken, the various segments of the ethnolinguistic category in Angola experienced quite different influences in the colonial period. The Bashikongo, living near the coast, had the most sustained interaction with the Portuguese but were less affected by participation in the coffee economy than the Sosso and Pombo, who were situated farther east and south. All three groups, however, were involved in the uprising of 1961. The Pombo, still farther east but close to the Zairian border, were much influenced by developments in the Belgian Congo (present-day DR Congo), and a large contingent of Pombo living in Léopoldville (present-day Kinshasa) formed a political party in the early 1950s. The Solongo, dwelling on the relatively dry coastal plain, had little contact with the Portuguese. They and the Ashiluanda of the island of Luanda, to the south, were Angola's only African sea fishermen.

The Mayombe (also spelled Maiombe) of the mountain forests of Cabinda spoke a dialect of Kikongo but were not part of the ancient kingdom. That part of the Mayombe living in Zaire did join with the Zairian Bakongo in the Alliance of Bakongo (Alliance des Bakongo – Abako) during the period of party formation in the Belgian Congo, but the Cabindan Mayombe (and other Kikongo-speaking groups in the enclave), relatively remote geographically and culturally from the Bakongo of Angola proper, showed no solidarity with the latter. Instead, in 1961 the Mayombe formed a Cabindan separatist movement, the Alliance of Mayombe (Alliance de Mayombe – Alliama), which merged with two other Cabindan separatist movements in 1963 to form the Front for the Liberation of the Enclave of Cabinda (Frente para a Libertação do Enclave de Cabinda – FLEC).

One of the first major revolts of the nationalist struggle was instigated by Bakongo in March 1961 in the northwest. The Portuguese crushed the peasant attack, organized by the Bakongo group, the Union of Angolan Peoples (União das Populações de Angola –  UPA), on their settlements, farms, and administrative outposts. Subsequently, 400,000 Bakongo fled into Zaire. In 1962 the UPA formed the National Front for the Liberation of Angola (Frente Nacional de Libertação de Angola –  FNLA), which became one of the three major nationalist groups (the other two being the MPLA and UNITA) involved in the long and bloody war of independence. Most of the FNLA's traditional Bakongo constituency fled into exile in Zaire during the war. Following independence, however, many Bakongo exiles returned to their traditional homesteads in Angola. They had since retained their ethnolinguistic integrity.

The Bakongo are a matriarchal tribe, which means that the women have the authority and power in the tribe.

Lunda-Chokwe
The hyphenated category Lunda-Chokwe constituted an estimated 8 percent of the Angolan population in 1988. As the hyphenation implies, the category comprises at least two subsets, the origins of which are known to be different and the events leading to their inclusion in a single set are recent. The Lunda alone were a congeries of peoples brought together in the far-flung Lunda Empire (seventeenth century to nineteenth century) under the hegemony of a people calling themselves Ruund, its capital in the eastern section of Zaire's Katanga Province (present-day Shaba Province). Lunda is the form of the name used for the Ruund and for themselves by adjacent peoples to the south who came under Ruund domination. In some sources, the Ruund are called Northern Lunda, and their neighbors are called Southern Lunda. The most significant element of the latter, called Ndembu (or Ndembo), lived in Zaire and Zambia. In Angola the people with whom the northward-expanding Chokwe came into contact were chiefly Ruund speakers. The economic and political decline of the empire by the second half of the nineteenth century and the demarcation of colonial boundaries ended Ruund political domination over those elements beyond the Zairian borders.

The Chokwe, until the latter half of the nineteenth century a small group of hunters and traders living near the headwaters of the Cuango and Cassai rivers, were at the southern periphery of the Lunda Empire and paid tribute to its head. In the latter half of the nineteenth century, the Chokwe became increasingly involved in trading and raiding, and they expanded in all directions, but chiefly to the north, in part absorbing the Ruund and other peoples. In the late nineteenth century, the Chokwe went so far as to invade the capital of the much-weakened empire in Katanga. As a consequence of this Chokwe activity, a mixed population emerged in parts of Zaire as well as in Angola, although there were virtually homogenous communities in both countries consisting of Chokwe, Ruund, or Southern Lunda.

The intermingling of Lunda (Ruund and Southern Lunda) and Chokwe, in which other smaller groups were presumably also caught up, continued until about 1920. It was only after that time that the mixture acquired the hyphenated label and its members began to think of themselves (in some contexts) as one people.

The languages spoken by the various elements of the so-called Lunda-Chokwe were more closely related to each other than to other Bantu languages in the Zairian-Angolan savanna but were by no means mutually intelligible. The three major tongues (Ruund, Lunda, and Chokwe) had long been distinct from each other, although some borrowing of words, particularly of Ruund political titles by the others, had occurred.

Portuguese anthropologists and some others accepting their work have placed some of the peoples (Minungu and Shinji) in this area with the Mbundu, and the Minungu language is sometimes considered a transitional one between Kimbundu and Chokwe. There may in fact have been important Mbundu influence on these two peoples, but the work of a number of linguists places their languages firmly with the set that includes Ruund, Lunda, and Chokwe.

Economic and political developments in the 1970s affected various sections of the Lunda-Chokwe differently. Substantial numbers of them live in or near Lunda Norte Province, which contains the principal diamond mines of Angola. Diamond mining had been significant since 1920, and preindependence data show that the industry employed about 18,000 persons. Moreover, the mining company provided medical and educational facilities for its employees and their dependents, thereby affecting even greater numbers. How many of those employed were Lunda-Chokwe is not clear, although neighboring villages would have been affected by the presence of the mining complex in any case. In the intra-Angolan political conflict preceding and immediately following independence, there apparently was some division between the northern Lunda-Chokwe, especially those with some urban experience, who tended to support the MPLA, and the rural Chokwe, particularly those farther south, who tended to support UNITA. In the 1980s, as the UNITA insurgency intensified in the border areas of eastern and northern Angola, Lunda-Chokwe families were forced to flee into Zaire's Shaba Province, where many remained in 1988, living in three sites along the Benguela Railway. The impact of this move on the ethnolinguistic integrity of these people was not known.

A somewhat different kind of political impact began in the late 1960s, when refugees from Katanga in Zaire, speakers of Lunda or a related language, crossed the border into what are now Lunda Sul and northern Moxico provinces. In 1977 and 1978, these refugees and others whom they had recruited formed the National Front for the Liberation of the Congo (Front National pour la Libération du Congo – FNLC) and used the area as a base from which they launched their invasions of Shaba Province. In the 1980s, these rebels and perhaps still other refugees remained in Angola, many in Lunda Sul Province, although the Angolan government as part of its rapprochement with Zaire was encouraging them to return to their traditional homes. The Zairian government offered amnesty to political exiles on several occasions in the late 1980s and conferred with the Angolan government on the issue of refugees. In 1988, however, a significant number of Zairian refugees continued to inhabit LundaChokwe territory. The significance for local Lunda-Chokwe of the presence and activities of these Zairians was not known.

Nganguela
Ngangela is generic term for a number of closely related Bantu languages in south-eastern Angola spoken by the Ngonzelo, Luchazi, Nyemba, Luvale, Luimbi, Mbunda, Mbuela, Yauma and Nkangala ethnic groups. Yauma language and Nkangala language are in turn Mbunda dialects. Nkangala, Mbalango, Sango, Ciyengele ("Shamuka") and Ndundu are closely related.

Ovambo, Nyaneka-Nkhumbi, Herero, and others
In far southwestern Angola, three categories of Bantu-speaking peoples have been distinguished. Two of them, the Ovambo and the Herero, were more heavily represented elsewhere: the Ovambo in Namibia and the Herero in Namibia and Botswana. The Herero dispersion, especially that section of it in Botswana, was the consequence of the migration of the Herero from German South West Africa (present-day Namibia) after their rebellion against German rule in 1906. The third group was the Nyaneka-Humbe. Unlike the other groups, the Nyaneka-Humbe did not disperse outside Angola. In 1988 the Nyaneka-Humbe (the first group is also spelled Haneca; the latter group is also spelled Nkumbi) constituted 3 percent of the population. The Ovambo, of which the largest subgroup were the Kwanhama (also spelled Kwanyama), made up an estimated 2 percent of the Angolan population. In the second half of the nineteenth century, the Kwanhama Kingdom of southern Angola was a powerful state involved in a lucrative trade relationship with the Portuguese, who, together with the Germans, occupied Kwanhama territory in the early twentieth century. In the 1980s, the Ovambo were seminomadic cattle herders and farmers. The Herero constituted no more than 0.5 percent of the population in 1988. Traditionally, the Herero were nomadic or seminomadic herders living in the arid coastal lowlands and in the mountainous escarpment to the east in Namibe, Benguela, and Huíla provinces. Many Herero migrated south to Namibia when the Portuguese launched a military expedition against them in 1940 following their refusal to pay taxes.

In the southeastern corner of the country the Portuguese distinguished a set of Bantu-speaking people, described on a map prepared by José Redinha in 1973 as the Xindonga. The sole linguistic group listed in this category was the Cussu. The Language Map of Africa, prepared under the direction of David Dalby for the International African Institute, noted two sets of related languages in southeastern Angola. The first set included Liyuwa, Mashi, and North Mbukushu. These languages and other members of the set were also found in Zambia and Namibia. The members of the second set, Kwangali-Gcikuru and South Mbukushu, were also found in Namibia and Botswana. The hyphen between Kwangali and Gcikuru implies mutual intelligibility. Little is known of these groups; in any case, their members were very few.

All of these southern Angolan groups relied in part or in whole on cattle raising for subsistence. Formerly, the Herero were exclusively herders, but they gradually came to engage in some cultivation. Although the Ovambo had depended in part on cultivation for a much longer time, dairy products had been an important source of subsistence, and cattle were the chief measure of wealth and prestige.

The southwestern groups, despite their remoteness from the major centers of white influence during most of the colonial period, were to varying degrees affected by the colonial presence and, after World War II, by the arrival of numbers of Portuguese in such places as Moçâmedes (present-day Namibe) and Sá da Bandeira (present-day Lubango). The greatest resistance to the Portuguese was offered by the Ovambo, who were not made fully subject to colonial rule until 1915 and who earned a considerable reputation among the Portuguese and other Africans for their efforts to maintain their independence. In the nationalist struggle of the 1960s and early 1970s and in the postindependence civil war, the Ovambo tended to align themselves with the Ovimbundu-dominated UNITA. Many also sympathized with the cause of SWAPO, a mostly Ovambo organization fighting to liberate Namibia from South African rule.

Hunters, gatherers, herders, and others
Throughout the lower third of Angola, chiefly in the drier areas, were small bands of people. Until the twentieth century, most of them were nomadic hunters and gatherers, although some engaged in herding, either in addition to their other subsistence activities or as their chief means of livelihood. Those who survived turned, at least in part, to cultivation.

The bands living a nomadic or seminomadic life in Cuando Cubango Province (and occasionally reaching as far east as the upper Cunene River) differed physically and linguistically from their sedentary Bantu-speaking neighbors. Short, saffron-colored, and in other respects physically unlike the Nganguela, Ovambo, and Nyaneka-Humbe, they spoke a language of the !Xu-Angola or Maligo set of tongues referred to as Khoisan or Click languages (the exclamation point denotes a specific kind of click), whose precise relations to each other are not yet fully understood by observers.

Several other hunting and gathering or herding groups, the members of which were taller and otherwise physically more like the local Bantu speakers, lived farther west, adjacent to the Ovambo and Herero. These people spoke Bantu languages and were less nomadic than the Khoisan speakers, but they were clearly different from the Ovambo and Herero and probably preceded them in the area. As with most African art, the wooden masks and sculptures of Angola are not merely aesthetic creations. They play an important role in cultural rituals, representing life and death, the passage from childhood to adulthood, the celebration of a new harvest and the marking of the hunting season. Angolan artisans work in wood, bronze, ivory, malachite or ceramic mediums. Each ethno-linguistic group in Angola has its own unique artistic traits. Perhaps the single most famous piece of Angolan art is the Cokwe thinker, a masterpiece of harmony and symmetry of line. The Lunda-Cokwe in the north eastern part of Angola is also known for its superior plastic arts.

Other signature pieces of Angolan art include the female mask Mwnaa-Pwo worn by male dancers in their puberty rituals, the polychromatic Kalelwa masks used during circumcision ceremonies, Cikungu and Cihongo masks which conjure up the images of the Lunda-Cokwe mythology (two key figures in this pantheon are princess Lweji and the civilizing prince Tschibinda-Ilunga), and the black ceramic art of Moxico of central/eastern Angola.

Mestiço
In 1960 a little more than 1 percent of the total population of Angola consisted of mestiços. It has been estimated that by 1970 these people constituted perhaps 2 percent of the population. Some mestiços left at independence, but the departure of much greater numbers of Portuguese probably resulted in an increase in the proportion of mestiços in the Angolan total. In 1988 mestiços probably continued to number about 2 percent of the Angolan population.

The process of mixing started very early and continued until independence. But it was not until about 1900, when the number of Portuguese in Angola was very small and consisted almost entirely of males, that the percentage of mestiços in the population exceeded the percentage of whites.

After a number of generations, the antecedents of many mestiços became mixed to the extent that the Portuguese felt a need to establish a set of distinctions among them. Many mestiços accepted this system as a means of social ranking. One source suggests that the term mestiço used alone in a social context applied specifically to the offspring of a mulatto and a white; the term mestiço cabrito referred to the descendant of a union between two mulattos; and the term mestico cafuso was applied to the child of a union between a mulatto and a black African. It is possible that an even more complex set of distinctions was sometimes used.

Most mestiços were urban dwellers and had learned to speak Portuguese either as a household language or in school. Although some of the relatively few rural mestiços lived like the Africans among whom they dwelt, most apparently achieved the status of assimilados, the term applied before 1961 to those nonwhites who fulfilled certain specific requirements and were therefore registered as Portuguese citizens.

With some exceptions, mestiços tended to identify with Portuguese culture, and their strongly voiced opposition over the years to the conditions imposed by the colonial regime stressed their rights to a status equivalent to that of whites. Before World War II, only occasionally did mestiço intellectuals raise their voices on behalf of the African population. Thus, despite the involvement of mestiços in the nationalist struggle beginning in 1961 and their very important role in the upper echelons of the government and party, significant segments of the African population tended to resent them. This legacy continued in the late 1980s because mestiços dominated the MPLA-PT hierarchy.

Starting in the late 1970s, an average of 50,000 Cuban troops and civilian technical personnel (the overwhelming majority of whom were male) were stationed in Angola. As a result, a portion of the nation's younger population was undoubtedly of mixed African and Cuban descent. This new category of racial mixture, however, had not been described by researchers as of late 1988, and no figures existed on how many Angolans might fall into this category.

title: Culture of Angola


text:
Romanian Orthodox Church

The Romanian Orthodox Church (ROC; Biserica Ortodoxă Română, BOR), or Patriarchate of Romania, is an autocephalous Eastern Orthodox church in full communion with other Eastern Orthodox Christian churches, and one of the nine patriarchates in the Eastern Orthodox Church. Since 1925, the church's Primate has borne the title of Patriarch. Its jurisdiction covers the territories of Romania and Moldova, with additional dioceses for Romanians living in nearby Serbia and Hungary, as well as for diaspora communities in Central and Western Europe, North America and Oceania. It is the only autocephalous church within Eastern Orthodoxy to have a Romance language for liturgical use.

The majority of Romania's population (16,367,267, or 85.9% of those for whom data were available, according to the 2011 census data ), as well as some 720,000 Moldovans, belong to the Romanian Orthodox Church.

Members of the Romanian Orthodox Church sometimes refer to Orthodox Christian doctrine as Dreapta credință ("right/correct belief" or "true faith"; compare to Greek ὀρθὴ δόξα, "straight/correct belief").

In the Principalities and the Kingdom of Romania
The Orthodox hierarchy in the territory of modern Romania had existed within the ecclesiastical jurisdiction of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople until 1865 when the churches in the Romanian principalities of Moldavia and Wallachia embarked on the path of ecclesiastical independence by nominating Nifon Rusailă, Metropolitan of Ungro-Wallachia, as the first Romanian primate. Prince Alexandru Ioan Cuza, who had in 1863 carried out a mass confiscation of monastic estates in the face of stiff opposition from the Greek hierarchy in Constantinople, in 1865 pushed through a legislation that proclaimed complete independence of the church in the principalities from the patriarchate.

In 1872, the Orthodox churches in the principalities, the Metropolis of Ungro-Wallachia and the Metropolis of Moldavia, merged to form the Romanian Orthodox Church.

Following the international recognition of the independence of the United Principalities of Moldavia and Wallachia (later Kingdom of Romania) in 1878, after a long period of negotiations with the Ecumenical Patriarchate, Patriarch Joachim IV granted recognition to the autocephalous Metropolis of Romania in 1885, which was raised to the rank of Patriarchate in 1925.

Romanian Orthodox theological education was underdeveloped at the end of the nineteenth century. The theological institute at Sibiu, for example, had only one theologian as part of its faculty; the rest were historians, journalists, naturalists, and agronomists. The focus of priestly education was practical and general rather than specialized. In the early twentieth century, the curriculum of a priest included subjects such as hygiene, calligraphy, accountancy, psychology, Romanian literature, geometry, chemistry, botany, and gymnastics. A strong emphasis was placed on church music, canon law, church history, and exegesis.

After World War I, the Kingdom of Romania significantly increased its territory. Consequently, the Romanian Orthodox Church needed massive reorganization in order to incorporate congregations from these new provinces. This led to shortages and difficulties. The Church had to establish a uniform interpretation of canon law. It had to handle public funds for paying clergymen in the newly acquired territories and, generally speaking, manage the relationship with the state. The legislation was intricate. The Statute on the organization of the Romanian Orthodox Church adopted by the Romanian parliament on May 6, 1925, counted 178 articles. The law on the functioning of the Romanian Orthodox Church counted 46 articles. Legislators adopted the Transylvanian tradition of mixing clergymen and laymen in administrative assemblies and granted bishops seats in the Romanian Senate. However, the context also allowed a number of young theologians like Nichifor Crainic, Ioan Savin, or Dumitru Stăniloae to study abroad. These theologians proved extremely influential after their return to Romania and helped shape theological academies. With a few rare exceptions, like Gala Galaction, the Romanian Orthodox theologians of this period embraced nationalism. Their scholarly works are thus imbued with nationalist ideology.

The second half of the 1920s is marked by the rise of antisemitism in Romanian politics with figures such as A.C. Cuza or Iron Guard founding father Codreanu. Antisemitism also became apparent in church publications. In 1925, for instance, church journal Revista Teologică (The Theological Review) published an anti-Semitic article by Sibiu professor priest Pompiliu Morușca. Morușca's article blamed the Jews for the economic situation of Romanians in Bukovina. It is a testimony of an older form of anti-Semitism going back to the 19th century. The Romanian Orthodox Church would evolve different forms of antisemitism in the 1930s. The Concordat of 1927 also triggered anti-Catholic reactions.

1930s - Patriarch Miron Cristea's premiership
The rise of Nazi Germany exposed Romania to the Reich's theological ideas. This mixture of nationalism, racism and theological thought found fertile ground in a Romanian Orthodox Church that was already no stranger to antisemitism. It became particularly evident in the second half of the 1930s in the writings of theologians such as Nichifor Crainic, Nicolae Neaga or Liviu Stan.

In 1936, Crainic published a seminal text titled Rasă și religiune (Race and Religion). While rejecting the Nazi idea of a superior Germanic race, as well as the fascination with Germanic paganism, Crainic argued that some races are indeed superior based on their accomplishment of the Christian essence. Crainic also denied the Jews the moral right to use the books of the Old Testament since, according to him, those prophesies had been fulfilled by the coming of Christ who had abolished the Jewish religion.

The deaths of prominent Iron Guard members Ion Moța and Vasile Marin on the same day, January 13, 1937, at Majadahonda during the Spanish Civil War while fighting for the Nationalist faction led to the organization of massive processions in Romania, particularly in Bucharest where they were interred. Hundreds of Orthodox priests participated and Metropolitans Nicolae Bălan of Transylvania and Visarion Puiu of Bukovina held special services. Shortly after the funeral, Orthodox theologian Gheorghe Racoveanu and priest Grigore Cristescu founded the theological journal Predania (The Tradinion). The first issue featured a glorification of Moța and Marin and their sacrifice and reflected the Guard's obsession for martyrdom. Intended as a bi-monthly Predania printed a total of twelve issues before being banned by the authorities. It stood out for its profoundly anti-ecumenical editorial line, publishing attacks against Catholics, Protestants, Evangelicals.

Also in the aftermath of Moța and Marin's grandiose funeral, the Holy Synod issued a condemnation of Freemasonry. Moreover, following the lead of Metropolitan Bălan who wrote the anti-Masonic manifest, the Synod issued a "Christian point of view" against political secularism stating that the Church was in its right to choose which party was worthy of support, based on its moral principles. Iron Guard leader Codreanu saluted the Synod's position and instructed that the Synod's proclamation should be read by Guard members in their respective nests (i.e. chapters).

In 1937, the Goga-Cuza government was the first to adopt and enact antisemitic legislation in the Kingdom of Romania, stripping over two hundred thousand Jews of their citizenship. That very same year, the head of the Romanian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Cristea made an infamous speech in which he described the Jews as parasites who suck the bone marrow of the Romanian people and who should leave the country. The Orthodox church directly or indirectly supported far-right parties and antisemitic intellectuals in their anti-Jewish rhetoric. At the time many Orthodox priests had become active in far-right politics, thus in the 1937 parliamentary elections 33 out of 103 Iron Guard candidates were orthodox priests. In 1938 an Orthodox priest named Alexandru Răzmeriţă, elaborated a plan for the total elimination of Jews in the cities and their deportation to forced labor camps in the countryside. Overall, the church became increasingly involved in politics and, after King Carol II assumed emergency powers, Patriarch Miron Cristea became prime-minister in February 1938. In March 1938, the Holy Synod banned the conversion of Jews who were unable to prove their Romanian citizenship. Cristea continued the policies of the Goga-Cuza government but also advocated more radical antisemitic measures including deportation and exclusion from employment. Cristea referred to this last measure as "Romanianization". The church newspaper Apostolul was instrumental in propagating Cristea's antisemitic ideas throughout his premiership but church press as a whole became flooded with antisemitic materials. Miron Cristea died in March 1939. Soon after, the Holy Synod voted to uphold regulations adopted under Cristea banning the baptism of Jews who were not Romanian citizens.

Cristea's death led to elections being held in order to select a new Patriarch. Metropolitans Visarion Puiu and the highly influential Nicolae Bălan publicly declared their refusal to enter the race. Both of these bishops held pro-German, pro-Iron-Guard and antisemitic views and it is reasonable to assume that King Carol II's opposition was instrumental in their refusal. Thus, the patriarchal office passed to a reluctant Nicodim Munteanu.

1940s - World War II
King Carol II abdicated on September 6, 1940. An openly pro-German coalition of the military headed by marshal Ion Antonescu and the Iron Guard took over. Patriarch Nicodim Munteanu's reaction was cautious and his September 1940 address was unenthusiastic. Munteanu, like Cristea before him, feared the anti-establishment nature of the Guard. But the Iron Guard was highly influential on the Church's grassroots. In January 1941, seeking full control of the country, the Iron Guard attempted a violent insurrection known as the Legionary Rebellion. The putsch failed and out of the 9000 people arrested, 422 were Orthodox priests. Some particularly violent episodes during the insurrection directly involved the Orthodox clergy. Students and staff of the Theological Academy in Sibiu, led by Professor Spiridon Cândea and assisted by Iron Guard militiamen rounded up Jews in the courtyard of the academy and forced them to hand over their valuables at gunpoint. Monks from the Antim Monastery in Bucharest, led by their abbot, armed themselves and, using explosives, blew up a Synagogue on Antim Street. The numerous Jewish inhabitants of the neighborhood hid in terror.

After Antonescu and the Army crushed the insurrection, the Holy Synod was quick to condemn the Legionary Rebellion and publicly paint it as a diabolical temptation that had led the Iron Guard to undermine the state and the Conducător. Many of the clergymen who had participated in the Rebellion were, however, shielded by their bishops and continued parish work in remote villages. Romania's participation in World War II on the Axis side after June 1941 would provide them with opportunities for rehabilitation.

By the early 1940s, Orthodox theologians such as Nichifor Crainic already had a lengthy record of producing propaganda supporting the concept of Judeo-Bolshevism. After 1941 the idea became commonplace in central church newspapers such as Apostolul or BOR. A particularly infamous article was signed by Patriarch Nicodim himself and published in BOR in April 1942. It referred to the danger of domestic enemies whom he identified as mostly being Jewish. In 1943 BOR published a 13-page laudatory review of Nichifor Crainic's infamous antismetic book Transfigurarea Românismului (The Transfiguration of Romanianism). Antisemitism was also present in regional journals, a leading example being Dumitru Stăniloae's Telegraful român (The Romanian Telegraph). Orthodox chaplains in the Romanian army cultivated the Judeo-Bolshevik myth.

A particular case was Romanian-occupied Transnistria. On August 15, 1941, The Holy Synod established a mission, rather than a new bishopric, in Romanian-occupied territories across the Dniester. The assumption was that Soviet atheist rule had destroyed the Russian Orthodox Church and the Romanian Orthodox Church took it upon itself to "re-evangelize" the locals. The main architect of the enterprise was Archimandrite Iuliu Scriban. In 1942 the Mission evolved into an Exarchate and was taken over by Visarion Puiu. Many of the missionaries were former affiliates of the Iron Guard, some were seeking rehabilitation after the 1941 insurrection. Abuse against the Jewish population was widespread and numerous reports of Orthodox priests partaking and profiting from the abuse exist. In 1944, Visarion Puiu fled to Nazi Germany, then, after the war, in the West. In Romania he was tried and convicted in absentia after the war. Many priests active in Transnistria also faced prosecution after the war, although communist prosecutors were mostly looking for connections to the Iron Guard, rather than explicitly investigating the persecution of Jews.

Historical evidence regarding the Romanian Orthodox Church's role in World War II is overwhelmingly incriminating but there are a few exceptions. Tit Simedrea, metropolitan of Bukovina is one two high-ranking bishops known to have interceded in favor of the Jewish population, the other being the metropolitan Nicolae Bălan of Transylvania. Evidence also surfaced that Simedrea personally sheltered a Jewish family in the metropolitanate compound. Priest Gheorghe Petre was recognized as Righteous Among the Nations for having saved Jews in Kryve Ozero. Petre was arrested in 1943 and court-martialed but was released in 1944 for lack of evidence.

After King Michael's Coup on August 23, 1944, Romania switched sides. The coup had been backed by the communists; the Church, known for its long-term record of anti-Soviet and anti-communist rhetoric now found itself in an awkward position. Patriarch Nicodim was quick to write a pastoral letter denouncing the previous dictatorship, blaming the Germans for the events that had taken place in Romania during the 30s and during the war and praising "the powerful neighbor from the East" with whom Romania had, supposedly, always had "the best political, cultural, and religious relations."

Starting in 1944, and even more after Petru Groza became Prime-minister with Soviet support in 1945, the Church tried to adapt to the new political situation. In August 1945 a letter of the Holy Synod was published in BOR. Again, it blamed the Germans for the horrors of the war and claimed that the Orthodox Church had always promoted democracy. The Romania Army was also praised for having joined forces with "the brave Soviet armies in the war against the true adversaries of our country." Finally, the Orthodox faithful were asked to fully support the new government. Later that year BOR published two relatively long articles authored by Bishop Antim Nica and, respectively, by Teodor Manolache. Both articles dealt with the Holocaust and painted the Romanian Orthodox Church as a savior of Jews.

Communist period

Romania officially became a communist state in 1947. Restricted access to ecclesiastical and relevant state archives makes an accurate assessment of the Romanian Orthodox Church's attitude towards the Communist regime a difficult proposition. Nevertheless, the activity of the Orthodox Church as an institution was more or less tolerated by the Marxist–Leninist atheist regime, although it was controlled through "special delegates" and its access to the public sphere was severely limited; the regime's attempts at repression generally focused on individual believers. The attitudes of the church's members, both laity and clergy, towards the communist regime, range broadly from opposition and martyrdom, to silent consent, collaboration or subservience aimed at ensuring survival. Beyond limited access to the Securitate and Party archives as well as the short time elapsed since these events unfolded, such an assessment is complicated by the particularities of each individual and situation, the understanding each had about how their own relationship with the regime could influence others and how it actually did.

The Romanian Workers' Party, which assumed political power at the end of 1947, initiated mass purges that resulted in a decimation of the Orthodox hierarchy. Three archbishops died suddenly after expressing opposition to government policies, and thirteen more "uncooperative" bishops and archbishops were arrested. A May 1947 decree imposed a mandatory retirement age for clergy, thus providing authorities with a convenient way to pension off old-guard holdouts. The 4 August 1948 Law on Cults institutionalised state control over episcopal elections and packed the Holy Synod with Communist supporters. The evangelical wing of the Romanian Orthodox Church, known as the Army of the Lord, was suppressed by communist authorities in 1948. In exchange for subservience and enthusiastic support for state policies, the property rights over as many as 2,500 church buildings and other assets belonging to the (by then-outlawed) Romanian Greek-Catholic Church were transferred to the Romanian Orthodox Church; the government took charge of providing salaries for bishops and priests, as well as financial subsidies for the publication of religious books, calendars and theological journals. By weeding out the anti-communists from among the Orthodox clergy and setting up a pro-regime, secret police-infiltrated Union of Democratic Priests (1945), the party endeavoured to secure the hierarchy's cooperation. By January 1953 some 300-500 Orthodox priests were being held in concentration camps, and following Patriarch Nicodim's death in May 1948, the party succeeded in having the ostensibly docile Justinian Marina elected to succeed him.

As a result of measures passed in 1947–48, the state took over the 2,300 elementary schools and 24 high schools operated by the Orthodox Church. A new campaign struck the church in 1958-62 when more than half of its remaining monasteries were closed, more than 2,000 monks were forced to take secular jobs, and about 1,500 clergy and lay activists were arrested (out of a total of up to 6,000 in the 1946-64 period). Throughout this period Patriarch Justinian took great care that his public statements met the regime's standards of political correctness and to avoid giving offence to the government; indeed the hierarchy at the time claimed that the arrests of clergy members were not due to religious persecution.

The church's situation began to improve in 1962, when relations with the state suddenly thawed, an event that coincided with the beginning of Romania's pursuit of an independent foreign policy course that saw the political elite encourage nationalism as a means to strengthen its position against Soviet pressure. The Romanian Orthodox Church, an intensely national body that had made significant contributions to Romanian culture from the 14th century on, came to be regarded by the regime as a natural partner. As a result of this second co-optation, this time as an ally, the church entered a period of dramatic recovery. By 1975, its diocesan clergy was numbering about 12,000, and the church was already publishing by then eight high-quality theological reviews, including Ortodoxia and Studii Teologice. Orthodox clergymen consistently supported the Ceaușescu regime's foreign policy, refrained from criticizing domestic policy, and upheld the Romanian government's line against the Soviets (over Bessarabia) and the Hungarians (over Transylvania). As of 1989, two metropolitan bishops even sat in the Great National Assembly. The members of the church's hierarchy and clergy remained mostly silent as some two dozen historic Bucharest churches were demolished in the 1980s, and as plans for systematization (including the destruction of village churches) were announced. A notable dissenter was Gheorghe Calciu-Dumitreasa, imprisoned for a number of years and eventually expelled from Romania in June 1985, after signing an open letter criticizing and demanding an end to the regime's violations of human rights.

In an attempt to adapt to the newly created circumstances, the Eastern Orthodox Church proposed a new ecclesiology designed to justify its subservience to the state in supposedly theological terms. This so-called "Social Apostolate" doctrine, developed by Patriarch Justinian, asserted that the church owed allegiance to the secular government and should put itself at its service. This notion inflamed conservatives, who were consequently purged by Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej, Ceaușescu's predecessor and a friend of Justinian's. The Social Apostolate called on clerics to become active in the People's Republic, thus laying the foundation for the church's submission to and collaboration with the state. Fr. Vasilescu, an Orthodox priest, attempted to find grounds in support of the Social Apostolate doctrine in the Christian tradition, citing Augustine of Hippo, John Chrysostom, Maximus the Confessor, Origen and Tertullian. Based on this alleged grounding in tradition, Vasilescu concluded that Christians owed submission to their secular rulers as if it were the will of God. Once recalcitrants were removed from office, the remaining bishops adopted a servile attitude, endorsing Ceauşescu's concept of nation, supporting his policies, and applauding his peculiar ideas about peace.

Collaboration with the Securitate
In the wake of the Romanian Revolution, the church never admitted to having ever willingly collaborated with the regime, although several Romanian Orthodox priests have publicly admitted after 1989 that they had collaborated with and/or served as informers for the Securitate, the secret police. A prime example was Bishop Nicolae Corneanu, the Metropolitan of Banat, who admitted to his efforts on behalf of the Romanian Communist Party, and denounced activities of clerics in support of the Communists, including his own, as "the Church's [act of] prostitution with the Communist regime".

In 1986, Metropolitan Antonie Plămădeală defended Ceaușescu's church demolition programme as part of the need for urbanization and modernisation in Romania. The church hierarchy refused to try to inform the international community about what was happening.

Widespread dissent from religious groups in Romania did not appear until revolution was sweeping across Eastern Europe in 1989. The Patriarch of the Romanian Orthodox Church Teoctist Arăpașu supported Ceaușescu up until the end of the regime, and even congratulated him after the state murdered one hundred demonstrators in Timișoara. It was not until the day before Ceaușescu's execution on 24 December 1989 that the Patriarch condemned him as "a new child-murdering Herod".

Following the removal of Communism, the Patriarch resigned (only to return a few months after) and the Holy Synod apologised for those "who did not have the courage of the martyrs".

After 1989
As Romania made the transition to democracy, the church was freed from most of its state control, although the State Secretariat for Religious Denominations still maintains control over a number of aspects of the church's management of property, finances and administration. The state provides funding for the church in proportion to the number of its members, based on census returns and "the religion's needs" which is considered to be an "ambiguous provision". Currently, the state provides the funds necessary for paying the salaries of priests, deacons and other prelates and the pensions of retired clergy, as well as for expenses related to lay church personnel. For the Orthodox church this is over 100 million euros for salaries, with additional millions for construction and renovation of church property. The same applies to all state-recognised religions in Romania.

The state also provides support for church construction and structural maintenance, with a preferential treatment of Orthodox parishes. The state funds all the expenses of Orthodox seminaries and colleges, including teachers' and professors' salaries who, for compensation purposes, are regarded as civil servants.

Since the fall of Communism, Greek-Catholic Church leaders have claimed that the Eastern Catholic community is facing a cultural and religious wipe-out: the Greek-Catholic churches are allegedly being destroyed by representatives of the Eastern Orthodox Church, whose actions are supported and accepted by the Romanian authorities.

The church openly supported banning same-sex marriage in a referendum in 2018. The church believes that homosexuality is a sin and unnatural.

In the Republic of Moldova
The Romanian Orthodox Church also has jurisdiction over a minority of believers in Moldova, who belong to the Metropolis of Bessarabia, as opposed to the majority, who belong to the Metropolis of Chișinău and All Moldova, under the Moscow Patriarchate. In 2001 it won a landmark legal victory against the Government of Moldova at the Strasbourg-based European Court of Human Rights.

This means that despite current political issues, the Metropolis of Bessarabia is now recognized as "the rightful successor" to the Metropolitan Church of Bessarabia and Hotin, which existed from 1927 until its dissolution in 1944, when its canonical territory was put under the jurisdiction of the Russian Orthodox Church's Moscow Patriarchate in 1947.

After the debut of the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Romanian Orthodox Church in Moldova has seen a significant number of parishes switching afilliation from the Moscow controlled Metropolis of Chișinău and All Moldova to the Metropolis of Bessarabia, sometimes smoothly, otherwise through intense debates and highly polemicized switches.

Organization and leadership

The Romanian Orthodox Church is organized in the form of the Romanian Patriarchate. The highest hierarchical, canonical and dogmatical authority of the Romanian Orthodox Church is the Holy Synod.

There are ten Orthodox Metropolitanates, twenty archbishoprics, twenty-three bishoprics in total, of which four metropolitans and nine bishops administer the Church services for the Romanian Diaspora in Europe, the Americas, Asia and Oceania. An estimated number of over twelve thousand altar servers in parishes, monasteries and social centres of the Church. Almost 400 monasteries exist inside the country, staffed by some 3,500 monks and 5,000 nuns. As of 2004, there are, inside Romania, fifteen theological universities where more than ten thousand students (some of them from Bessarabia, Bukovina and Serbia benefiting from a few Romanian fellowships) currently study for a theological degree. More than 14,500 churches (traditionally named "lăcașe de cult", or houses of worship) exist in Romania for the Romanian Orthodox believers. As of 2002, almost 1,000 of those were either in the process of being built or rebuilt.

Current leadership
The patriarchal chair is currently held by His Beatitude Daniel, Archbishop of Bucharest, Metropolitan of Muntenia and Dobrudja, Locum Tenens of Caesarea in Cappadocia and Patriarch of the Romanian Orthodox Church. The title of Locum tenens of Caesarea in Cappadocia is a titular office granted in 1776 by Ecumenical Patriarch Sophronius II to the holder of the office of Metropolitan of Ungro-Wallachia, the precursor position of the Orthodox Church to the today Patriarchate of Romania.
 * Teofan, Metropolitan of Moldavia and Bukovina
 * Laurențiu, Metropolitan of Transylvania
 * Andrei, Metropolitan of Cluj, Maramureș and Sălaj
 * Irineu, Metropolitan of Oltenia
 * Ioan, Metropolitan of Banat
 * Petru, Metropolitan of Bessarabia
 * Iosif, Metropolitan of Western and Southern Europe
 * Serafim, Metropolitan of Germany and Central Europe
 * Nicolae, Metropolitan of the Americas

Notable theologians
Dumitru Stăniloae (1903–1993) is considered one of the greatest Orthodox theologians of the 20th century, having written extensively in all major fields of Eastern Christian systematic theology. One of his other major achievements in theology is the 45-year-long comprehensive series on Orthodox spirituality known as the Romanian Philokalia, a collection of texts written by classical Byzantine writers, that he edited and translated from Greek.

Archimandrite Cleopa Ilie (1912–1998), elder of the Sihăstria Monastery, is considered one of the most representative fathers of contemporary Romanian Orthodox monastic spirituality.

Metropolitan Bartolomeu Anania (1921-2011) was the Metropolitan of Cluj, Alba, Crișana and Maramureș from 1993 until his death.

List of patriarchs

 * Miron (1925–1939)
 * Nicodim (1939–1948)
 * Justinian (1948–1977)
 * Iustin (1977–1986)
 * Teoctist (1986–2007)
 * Daniel (since 2007)

Jubilee and commemorative years
Initiative of Patriarch Daniel’s, with a deep missionary impact for Church and society, has been the proclamation of jubilee and commemorative years in the Romanian Patriarchate, with solemn sessions of the Holy Synod, conferences, congresses, monastic synaxes, debates, programmes of catechesis, processions and other Church activities dedicated to the respective annual theme.

 * 2008 – The Jubilee Year of the Holy Scripture and the Holy Liturgy;
 * 2009 – The Jubilee-Commemorative year of Saint Basil the Great, Archbishop of Cæsarea in Cappadocia;
 * 2010 – The Jubilee Year of the Orthodox Creed and of Romanian Autocephaly;
 * 2011 – The Jubilee Year of Holy Baptism and Holy Matrimony;
 * 2012 – The Jubilee Year of Holy Unction and of the care for the sick;
 * 2013 – The Jubilee Year of the Holy Emperors Constantine and Helena;
 * 2014 – The Jubilee Year of the Eucharist (of the Holy Confession and of the Holy Communion) and the Commemorative Year of the Martyr Saints of the Brancoveanu family;
 * 2015 – The Jubilee Year of the Mission of Parish and Monastery Today and the Commemorative Year of Saint John Chrysostom and of the great spiritual shepherds in the eparchies;
 * 2016 – The Jubilee Year of Religious Education for Orthodox Youth and the Commemorative Year of the Holy Hierarch and Martyr Antim of Iveria and of all the printing houses of the Church;
 * 2017 – The Jubilee Year of the Holy Icons and of church painters and the Commemorative Year of Patriarch Justin and of all defenders of Orthodoxy during communism;
 * 2018 – The Jubilee Year of Unity of Faith and Nation, and the Commemorative Year of the 1918 Great Union Founders;
 * 2019 – Solemn Year of church singers and of the Commemorative Year of Patriarch Nicodim and of the translators of church books;
 * 2020 – Solemn Year of Ministry to Parents and Children and the Commemorative Year of Romanian Orthodox Philanthropists;
 * 2021 – Solemn Year of pastoral care of Romanians abroad and the Commemorative Year of the reposed in the Lord;
 * 2022 – Solemn Year of Prayer in the Church’s life and the Christian’s life and the Commemorative Year of the Hesychast Saints Symeon the New Theologian, Gregory Palamas and Paisius of Neamț;
 * 2023 – Solemn Year of the Pastoral Care of the Elderly and the Commemorative Year of the Hymnographers and Church Chanters;
 * 2024 – Solemn Year of the pastoral care of the sick and the Commemorative Year of all the holy unmercenary healers;
 * 2025 – The Jubilee Year of the Centennial of the Romanian Patriarchate and the Commemorative Year of the Romanian Orthodox confessors of the twentieth century.;

title: Romanian Orthodox Church