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There are various common names used for tradescantias in English. Inchplant, spiderwort, dayflower… But probably the best known, and certainly the most controversial, is “wandering Jew”.
Up until now I’ve never written about this name, or in fact any common names. I’m perfectly content to use “tradescantia”, or “trad” if I’m in a hurry. Using common names – instead of scientific names – for plants often just causes confusion and ambiguity, which is why I tend to avoid them.
But I’ve also avoided writing about this specific name because it’s fraught with controversy. I wasn’t sure what my own opinion was, I didn’t feel like I knew enough about the context to explain it clearly to anyone else, and I was nervous about how to find information I could rely on. It’s taken me a long time and a lot of research to write this, but I’m finally ready to draw some conclusions.
The myth of the wandering Jew
Some time before the 13th century, a mythical figure arose in Christian folklore. The first written record of the myth was in Latin, and the English translation went like this:
When therefore the Jews were dragging Jesus forth [to be crucified], and had reached the door, Cartaphilus, a porter of the hall in Pilate’s service, as Jesus was going out of the door, impiously struck him on the back with his hand, and said in mockery, “Go quicker, Jesus, go quicker, why do you loiter?” And Jesus looking back on him with a severe countenance said to him, “I am going, and you will wait till I return.” And according as our Lord said, this Cartaphilus is still awaiting his return; at the time of our Lord’s suffering he was thirty years old, and when he attains the age of a hundred years, he always returns to the same age as he was when our Lord suffered. [1]
It went on to say the man was baptised and given the name Joseph. He was described as solemn, quiet, and devoutly religious; fearing the return of Christ but hoping to be forgiven for his sin.
The legend was retold in a German pamphlet a few hundred years later. [2] The man was described very similarly, although with a different name. His baptism wasn’t mentioned, but he was still devout, and wondered whether he was being kept alive as a witness to the crucifixion to convince unbelievers. This publication was translated and circulated widely through Europe. [3]
There have been many versions of the story throughout history, and the character has been given many different names. But the general theme remains the same: a Jewish man taunts Jesus on the way to his crucifixion, and as a result is doomed to wander the earth immortally. He converts to Christianity, but is forced to suffer endlessly as punishment for his earlier rejection of Christ. That man is the “wandering Jew”.
In 1940 the Nazis produced an antisemitic propaganda film called Der ewige Jude (considered equivalent to “The wandering Jew”, although the literal translation is closer to “The eternal Jew”). The film took its name from the old legend, but didn’t tell the same story. Instead it was formatted as a pseudodocumentary claiming to show Jewish people as they really are, but assembled from fictional footage and coerced recordings. It presented Jewish people as parasites, rats, and barbarians, and is now considered one of the most violently antisemitic films ever made. [4]
Alongside these associations of the myth with antisemitism, it has also been interpreted in sympathetic or positive ways. Some adaptations address the character’s humanity and his feelings in a dramatic story. In modern years, Jewish creators have brought the legend into the context of Jewish tradition and cultural memory. [5] And there are individuals who personally identify with the descriptor of “wandering Jew’, because of their own cultural or individual history. [6] [7]
Regardless of these occasional reclamations, today the myth is widely considered to be antisemitic. The story presents the Jewish diaspora (exile from their ancestral homelands) as punishment for not accepting Jesus. [8] The spread of the myth has been associated with antisemitic views throughout history. [9]
As a common name for plants
The first use I’ve found for “wandering Jew” as a common name for Tradescantia is 1867, [10] and it’s still very widespread today. The name is most often associated with T. zebrina, but sometimes with any of the trailing or scrambling houseplant species – and occasionally other genera in the family.
In Hebrew, tradescantias are called by the common name היהודי הנודד, which literally translates to “wandering Jew”. [11] I don’t know of equivalent names in any other languages (please let me know if you do!).
Like many common names, its origins are lost to history. There are various possible interpretations for why “wandering Jew” came to be used for tradescantias, some more charitable than others.
- It could have been because it’s a resilient plant which can withstand being uprooted and still go on to thrive,
- It could have been because it lives a long time and wanders from place to place with long stems or cuttings,
- It could have been because it can spread aggressively and invade ecosystems it doesn’t belong in.
Without knowing how or why it got its name, it’s impossible to make a judgement based on its original interpretation. The only reliable information to go on is the violent antisemitic history of the myth itself.
In modern houseplant communities
In the last five years or so, several houseplant shops and websites have announced that they will no longer use the name “wandering Jew” because of antisemitic connotations. [12] Many facebook groups and other online communities now have rules banning the use of the name. In some cases the name is substituted with alternatives like “wandering dude” or “wandering trad”. Others consider those variants equally unacceptable because they are callbacks to the original. [13]
The botanical world is also increasingly avoiding or replacing potentially offensive names, both common and scientific. [14] In fact the scientific world at large is going through this process in many areas. All of this reflects a wider societal trend to acknowledge and make reparations for historically harmful actions and language.
Alongside this trend – at all scales, ranging from tradescantia facebook groups to the rules of scientific nomenclature – there have been corresponding objections. Some argue that trying to undo or erase history can’t solve these problems. Others worry that changing established names will create too much confusion, and that following current societal morals will only lead to more instability in future. And many people who personally use these names are angry to learn that others are offended.
Views of Jewish people
Jewish people are a minority in the world population (about 0.2%), and a minority in every country except Israel. [15] So there are only a small proportion of Jewish people in English-speaking society, and therefore generally only a small proportion in any particular conversation about plants or the use of language.
This means that a lot of the people who make and justify recomendations against the name “wandering Jew” are not Jewish themselves. Which is not to say non-Jewish people have no right to make these recommendations – it’s certainly important for people who don’t belong to marginalised groups to speak out in support of them. But it’s also important to make sure the support being given actually reflects what the marginalised group wants and needs.
For that reason, I was particularly interested to find out what other Jewish people think of the name. I didn’t want to automatically spread a recommendation if it had originated entirely from non-Jewish people deciding what they thought was best for a group they didn’t belong to. But there isn’t any published research which covers the feelings of Jewish people specifically towards the term “wandering Jew” for plants.
My friend Cassian ran a casual online survey collecting people’s opinions about the name. [16] There were 726 responses, including 206 from people who said they either were Jewish, or had a complicated relationship to Jewishness. Those are small samples, but they’re not nothing. And the results were interesting.
The majority of all respondents said they don’t like the name “wandering Jew” and wouldn’t use it, and only 5% said they liked it. Among the Jewish respondents, the majority still disliked and wouldn’t use the name. But a much more sizeable minority of 15% actively liked the name.
Within the ten respondents who were from Israel (all of them Jewish), most said they would sometimes or always use the name. Of course, ten is a very small sample size to draw any conclusions about an entire country. But it is interesting that the handful of respondents from Israel seemed to oppose the trend of most other responses.
We can add context to that result by looking back at the Hebrew common name of היהודי הנודד, which translates to “wandering Jew” and is the same name given to the original myth. Perhaps respondents in Israel liked the English name because it’s equivalent to the local common name. Which begs the question – if the name “wandering Jew” is inherently antisemitic, why would it be the preferred common name in the official language of a majority-Jewish country?
In their report about the survey, Cassian suggests that this could be because mundane antisemitism is a less everyday concern in the majority-Jewish country of Israel. They also brought up the idea of reclaimed slurs, [17] summarised by one respondent as: “Sometimes if another jew says it, I don’t have a reaction but if a goyische [non-Jewish] person says it (especially comfortably) it rubs me the wrong way.”
Regardless of the minor but interesting differences in sentiment between different groups of respondents to the survey, the overall results still showed that both Jewish and non-Jewish participants mostly disliked and preferred not to use the name “wandering Jew” for tradescantias.
I myself fit into the “my relationship with Jewishness is complicated” category – I’m not entirely Jewish, but I’m definitely not not Jewish. The name has always made me uncomfortable when used casually and publicly. Even before I knew anything about the antisemitic myth, I’ve always found the use of “Jew” as a noun uncomfortable in itself, as many do. [18] But I also think that Jewish people have a right to use the name “wandering Jew” as a reclaimed slur, in the same way that some reclaim the use of “Jew” itself. [19]
The problem with common names
Plant common names are not regulated or controlled in any way. Unlike in some other groups – like birds, where the American Ornithological Society recently changed many common names, [20] to great discussion – no one is in charge of which common names refer to which plants. And while scientific names are agreed upon by scientists worldwide, plant common names may be used very differently depending on context, language, and location.
One result of this is that it’s often difficult to know what plant a common name actually refers to. Within a narrow and well-defined context they can be a useful shorthand, as long as everyone involved uses them consistently. But in a completely open situation like “talking about plants publicly on the internet”, they can be impossible to pin down. One person’s split-leaf philodendron is another person’s swiss cheese plant, and it only gets worse from there.
Another outcome of the unregulated nature of common names is that it’s impossible to control them. No one can decide that split-leaf philodendron is the “wrong” name for Monstera deliciosa. It’s a name which people commonly use for that plant, and therefore it’s a common name. It might be frustrating that the name is taxonomically misleading (Monstera isn’t a Philodendron at all), but there’s not much anyone can do about that other than correct the resulting confusion when it happens.
I’ve written about this problem before, so I won’t rehash it all again here. Suffice it to say, common names are ambiguous, and there’s no centralised solution for that problem. It’s easy enough for experts and authorities to make their own rational decisions about which names to use and how. But it’s impossible to get every single nursery, plant shop, and hobbyist grower to follow suit.
I’m the ICRA for Tradescantia, which means I have the authority to determine the official correct names for every cultivar in the genus. But that doesn’t extend to common names for species or the genus as a whole. All I can give here are suggestions, and hope that people agree with them. Common names are just the names people commonly use, and so they only change if lots of people individually decide to use different ones.
Conclusions and recommendations
It’s clear that the name “wandering Jew” has antisemitic origins. We might never know exactly how or why the name came to be used for tradescantia plants, but we know for sure that the myth the name comes from has a violently antisemitic history. And we know that many Jewish people (as well as many non-Jewish people) are uncomfortable with it.
If you’re in a position of authority
If you are perceived as any kind of authority – if you run an influential group or page, if you write and publish on the subject of plants, if you grow or sell them – I always recommend using precise scientific names for clarity.
But if you do want to use a common name (hopefully in addition to the scientific name!), I strongly recommend against “wandering Jew”. Variants like “wandering dude” receive mixed reception and generally seem like the worst of both worlds. It’s a less-familiar name that requires some explanation, but it’s also still a clear callback to the antisemitic name.
Instead, if you want to include a common name I recommend using “inchplant” for tropical houseplant types, and “spiderwort” for hardy garden types. Or my personal preference, simply treat “tradescantia” as a common name itself, and abbreviate it to “trad” if it’s clear from context.
If you feel the need to refer to the name “wandering Jew” to make sure that people know what you’re talking about, I’d suggest linking to a resource like this article to explain why you prefer not to use it.
If you’re an individual
I’m not the language police. You can use whatever words you choose, for any reason. But I hope that reading this article has helped you understand how it might be interpreted if you do use the name “wandering Jew”.
If you’re Jewish and you want to reclaim the slur with other Jewish people, that’s absolutely your right, and no one else gets a say.
If you’re not Jewish or you’re using the name among strangers, it’s likely to make a lot of people uncomfortable. Variants like “wandering dude” will also make some people uncomfortable in the same way.
If you want to use a different name and you find “tradescantia” difficult to spell or pronounce, I suggest trying “inchplant” for tropical houseplant types and “spiderwort” for hardy garden types. You can also use “trad” as a nickname in a context where it’ll be obvious what it’s short for.
My own decision
The discussion about the name “wandering Jew” has come up in my Tradescantia Hub facebook group, which now has over twenty thousand members from all over the world. They range from expert collectors and specialists, to beginners who have only just discovered tradescantias. Many members are native English speakers, but many others are not. It’s a truly global and very diverse group.
That diversity is great! It also means that I have to think very carefully about what rules I apply, and how I enforce them. Many English-speaking houseplant groups on facebook have explicit rules against ever mentioning the term “wandering Jew”. My group conspicuously has no such rule.
Although I find the name antisemitic, feel uncomfortable reading it, and never use it myself – I don’t ban or penalise members who do use it. If I did impose a rule like that, my group would become unwelcoming and exclusionary to:
- People who are new to tradescantias, or who otherwise have only ever known it under one common name,
- Non-native English speakers who may struggle to understand complicated English explanations about problematic names,
- Jewish people who like to use the name as a reclaimed slur,
- People who find it difficult to remember, spell, pronounce, or use other names because of neurodivergence, disability, or any other reason.
Among many others! Some of these are people who are already often marginalised and excluded in online communities. Many are people who, I hope, could benefit a lot from the information I share and the discussions that take place in the group. I really don’t want to make any of those people feel like they don’t belong.
But freely using or allowing an antisemitic name makes the group unwelcoming and exclusionary to many Jewish people, as well as anyone else who finds antisemitism uncomfortable. I don’t want them to feel they don’t belong either.
It may be impossible to make the group feel truly welcoming and inclusive to so many different kinds of people. But for now the approach I’ve settled on is that I won’t ban or punish people for using the name, but I will encourage people not to use it, and encourage the sharing of information (like this article) to explain why. I might change my approach in the future, but at the moment I think this is the most inclusive thing I can do.
References
- Wendover, R. (1849). Flowers of History (2nd ed.) (J. A. Giles, translator), p. 513. Henry G. Bohn. Internet Archive link. (Original work published 1235) [↩]
- Kurze Beschreibung und Erzählung von einem Juden mit Namen Ahasverus. (1602). Full text online.[↩]
- Britannica (2024). Wandering Jew. Encyclopedia Britannica. Entry online.[↩]
- Hazkani, S. (2008). Forbidden Films: An Analysis of the Nazi Propaganda Films The Eternal Jew and Jew Suess and Their Influence on the German Public. Moreshet Journal for the Study of the Holocaust and Antisemitism, 5, 181-219. Open access link.[↩]
- Lampert-Weissig, L. (2024a). Q&A with Lisa Lampert-Weissig [interview by Danielle Coty]. University of Michigan Press. Internet Archive link.[↩]
- Román, R. (2022). Uprooting the Wandering Jew. Tablet. Internet Archive link.[↩]
- Shulman, L. (2023). Wandering Jew. The Smart Set. Internet Archive link.[↩]
- Lampert-Weissig, L. (2024b). Wandering Jew. Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Literature. doi: 10.1093/acrefore/9780190201098.013.1467.[↩]
- Jackson, M. (2020). Racism in Taxonomy: What’s in a Name? Hoyt Arboretum. Internet Archive link.[↩]
- Cook, J. S. & Cook, W. C. (1867). Cook’s Descriptive Catalogue of greenhouse, hothouse and hardy plants, roses, dahlias, etc. cultivated and for sale at the Walnut Hills Nurseries, Madison Road, adjoining City Limits, Cincinnati, O. Nursery Depot & Seed Store, 197 and 199 Walnut Street, p. 17. Wrightson & Company, 167 Walnut Street. Internet Archive link.[↩]
- Neta. (2022). יהודי נודד זברינה. Internet Archive link.[↩]
- Bloombox Club. (2019). Why we’re no longer using the name wandering Jew. Internet Archive link.[↩]
- Kouatli, Z. (2022, February 23). Plants with surprisingly racist roots. The Wayne Stater. Internet Archive link.[↩]
- The Linnean Society. (2024, July 23). International botanists vote to change offensive plant name. Internet Archive link.[↩]
- Pew Research Centre. (2015). The Future of World Religions: Population Growth Projections, 2010-2050, p. 133. Internet Archive link.[↩]
- Cassian. (2024, July 27). Tradescantia name survey, take 2. Medium. Internet Archive link.[↩]
- Baker, C. (2010). Ask Me Another: Cynthia Baker, religious studies professor [interview by Bates Magazine]. Bates College. Internet Archive link.[↩]
- Davis, H. (2023, January 4). I’m a Jew who doesn’t like the word ‘Jew’. Hey Alma. Internet Archive link.[↩]
- Oppenheimer, M. (2017, April 22). Reclaiming ‘Jew’. The New York Times. Internet Archive link.[↩]
- American Ornithological Society. (2023, November 1). American Ornithological Society Will Change the English Names of Bird Species Named After People. Internet Archive link.[↩]