Star of David

History

Although the Magen David is today widely regarded as a symbol of Judaism and the Jewish people, this is a relatively recent innovation. The development of this symbol has been most fully outlined by the outstanding Jewish scholar Gershom Scholem.

In the Hellenistic world, hexagrams were a widely used decorative motif used by Jews and non-Jews alike. In these instances, it appears to have had no special connection with Jews. By the early medieval period, hexagrams acquired a new relevance as they were used by Muslims, Christians and Jews alike as talismans to ward off demons and fires. It also continued to be used ornamentally on churches, biblical manuscripts, and as parts of Christian and Jewish signatures on official documents. By the fourteenth century, Jewish mystical texts associated the talismanic hexagram -- among other symbols -- with older accounts of a shield that was associated with the power of God and that was used to protect the Biblical hero King David, ruler of ancient Israel. With the emergence of printing technology in the fifteenth century, some European Jewish publishers used hexagrams in the design of their company imprimaturs.

It was in sixteenth-century Prague that the hexagram began to be used to designate the local Jewish population. As early as 1354, the Jews of Prague were allowed by Emperor Charles IV to display a flag. Records indicate that, at least by 1527, the Jewish flag in Prague featured a hexagram. In the following century, Jews of Prague used hexagrams in personal seals and the seals of Jewish organizations, as well as to decorate the synagogue and Jewish "city hall." From Prague, use of the hexagram spread to neighboring Jewish communities, traveling as far away as Amsterdam.

In seventeenth-century Vienna, we find a boundary stone demarcating the Christian section of town -- indicated by a cross -- from the Jewish section of town -- indicated by a hexagram. This is the earliest instance of a hexagram used as a symbol to designate Jews in manner equivalent to the cross being used to designate Christians.

Beginning with the Enlightenment in eighteenth-century Europe, when the emergence of Jewish Emancipation intimated the hope of full citizenship of Jews in the newly forming European nation-states, an important transformation occurred. Previously, the Jews were a distinct people; with the prospect of fully entering European society, "Judaism" was poised to become a religion. For the integrationist-minded Jews of the Enlightenment who sought to champion the idea of Judaism as a religion, a symbol was required to signify the religion in a way that the cross signified Christianity. That symbol was the Magen David. Non-Jewish architects used the Magen David to distinguish the new synagogues that they were commissioned to build from churches, which they resembled.

By the end of the nineteenth century, European Jews became increasingly concerned that even full civic equality wouldn’t protect them from anti-Semitism. One response was Zionism -- the project of establishing a separate Jewish nation-state. Zionists, too, adopted the Magen David, but to symbolize the future of Jews -- a future than didn’t necessarily have anything to do with Jewish religion.

With the rise of Hitler, Nazis forced Jews to wear the Magen David as a badge on their clothing for purposes of identification. This may have been a repetition of possible episodes in Medieval Europe, in which Christian sovereigns decreed the Magen David be used as an insignia to designate Jews for purposes of social and economic marginalization.

In the wake of the Holocaust, the Magen David was featured prominently in the national flag of the new State of Israel. As such, it has represented for millions of Jews the promise of a new hope for security, autonomy, and dignity, even as that prospect harbored new and significant challenges for fruitful co-existence with Palestinians.