Religious antisemitism

Religious antisemitism is a form of antisemitism, which is the prejudice against, or hostility toward, the Jewish people based on hostility to Judaism and to Jews as a religious group. It is sometimes called theological antisemitism, and distinguished from anti-Judaism, which is usually described as a critical rejection of Jewish principles and beliefs. Reuven Firestone notes that ""negative assessments and even condemnation of prior religions and their adherents occur in all three scriptures of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam."".According to William Nichols, religious antisemitism may be distinguished from modern antisemitism based on racial or ethnic grounds. ""The dividing line was the possibility of effective conversion ... a Jew ceased to be a Jew upon baptism."" However, with racial antisemitism, ""Now the assimilated Jew was still a Jew, even after baptism ... . From the Enlightenment onward, it is no longer possible to draw clear lines of distinction between religious and racial forms of hostility towards Jews... Once Jews have been emancipated and secular thinking makes its appearance, without leaving behind the old Christian hostility towards Jews, the new term antisemitism becomes almost unavoidable, even before explicitly racist doctrines appear.""