Why is Jewishness matrilineal?
Question: Why does whether you’re Jewish or not depend on if your mother is Jewish? Why doesn’t the father’s Jewishness count? Answer: First the Biblical inference to matrilineal descent: “You shall not intermarry with them; you shall not give your daughter to his son, and you shall not take his daughter for your son, for he will cause your child to turn away from Me and they will worship the gods of others” — Deuteronomy 7:3-4. The direct implication is that children from such a union will be torn away from Judaism. Since the verse states “for he (i.e. a non-Jewish father) will cause your child to turn away… “, this implies that a child born to a Jewish mother is Jewish “your child,” whereas, if a Jewish man marries a non-Jewish woman, the child is not Jewish—and as such there is no concern that “she,” the child’s mother, will turn the child away from Judaism.1 Although one’s Jewishness is dependent on the mother, other genealogical factors important in Judaism, such as one’s triba
