Because There Isn’t Enough Confusion: School Text Book That Mixed Up Jews and Muslims Withdrawn
School Text Book That Mixed Up Jews and Muslims Withdrawn
The GCSE religious studies text book on Judaism is so littered with errors that a school has produced its own four-page leaflet of corrections.
It includes picture of a Muslim kneeling in prayer, described as a Jew. One pupil said: “It was so bad, the teacher kept telling us, ‘don’t listen to this, ignore this, half of this is wrong’.”
The textbook is the AQA GCSE Religious Studies A: Judaism textbook, produced for the examination board by the educational publishers, Nelson Thornes.
Staff at the Jewish Free School, in Kenton, North West London, have issued GCSE pupils with a list of corrections. One angry parent of a JFS pupil told the Jewish Chronicle newspaper: “The textbook contains countless errors and general, confused assertions about Judaism. The factual errors are laughably bad.
“A section headed ‘Reform Judaism’ in fact talks about the practice of Orthodox Jews. A picture of a person kneeling in prayer, described as a Jew, is in fact a Muslim, while a picture of Jews ostensibly at a Seder table, is a Shabbat meal.