We’ve all heard the familiar refrain “Believe in Judaism because of the miraculous history of the Jews! How could such an oppressed and pursued nation have survived the tribulations of the exile if not through some sort of miracle?”
Like most attempts to base Judaism on some sort of “proof” – this one IMHO fails. At best our history can inspire but it can’t prove and can’t even point or hint to some sort of divine agent who protects Israel.
How does one go about destroying the Jewish people/religion once they’ve become a relatively large religious movement spread all over the world? Are there really so many people plotting the destruction of world Jewry? And is such a scenario even a possibility were God to leave us to the vicissitudes of the world?
The most straightforward way to rid the world of Jews is to kill them. And indeed over the years many Jews have been killed because of their religion or “race”. However, it is important to remember that despite what we say in our Passover liturgy - no government or power (AFAIK) until Hitler ever made an attempt to physically destroy the Jewish People in its entirety. (With the exception of the story of Megillat Ester which is of dubious historicity) The uniqueness of the Holocaust in the long history of anti-Semitism is that it was meant to be a “Final Solution.” Progroms, crusades, and blood libels were not meant as a “final solution” to a “Jewish problem”. The reason that Jews physically survived the exile is actually quite simple – no one until the Holocaust ever tried to exterminate them completely.
The above is equally true when it comes to converting Jews. Although in a few cases entire countries tried to convert their Jewish populations (many times in Spain) we must keep in mind that both Christianity and Islam officially believe that forced conversions are not valid.
It is not a miracle that we survived if nobody was actually plotting to annihilate us, physically or spiritually, in the first place.
Another important factor worth considering is the dispersion of Jews. Jews are and were found in almost every corner of the Earth. Jews have lived in Europe, the Middle East, Russia, Buchara, Georgia, Britain, and even the New World and the Far East. With so many Jews living in so many places and under so many different religions and governments - it is literally impossible to convert or exterminate every last Jew in the world. The amount of organization that would be required is mind boggling and would require the most outrageous conspiracy to implement. Even if one or two anti-Semitic nations decided that a world with no Jews would be a better place, one or two nations simply do not have the power to kill/convert all the Jews spread out all over the world. It would take a veritable pandemic of universal, murderous anti-semitism for such a terrible thing to be even vaguely possible.
I think the better question to ask about Jewish History is “How couldn’t the Jews survive the Exile?” And I have to admit that I don’t find it too miraculous that we managed to survive when the entirety of our “nation” was never really in jeopardy.