Vengefulness

The stereotype of Jewish vengefulness refers to the supposed irrational, misanthropic, egoistic drive to punish those who they perceive as having wronged them. This drive is allegedly accompanied by bitterness, intolerance and hate against non-Jewish society. The stereotype relies on the idea that there is a fundamental difference between the Old Testament, whose content to a large extent overlaps with the Hebrew Bible, and the New Testament around the notion of retribution. The idea of the flood and extermination of entire population as God's punishment for the sins described in the Genesis, the first book of the Old Testament, is emblematic for the concept of retaliation and is being used as an argument for the stereotype of Judaism as a vengeful religion. In opposition, Christianity and the New Testament are constructed as a religion of mercifulness, forgiveness and non-resistance, formulated as: “[b]ut if anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.”