"Jewish" can refer to a religion, ethnicity, culture, nationality, or any combination of the above, depending on context and who is using the term.

I appreciate the question, and like many Jews I love questions like this. It is never hateful to be curious.

Like many/most identities, being Jewish doesn't mean just one thing to everyone. First and foremost, Judaism is a religion that is passed down through the matriarchal side of the family. So if your mother is Jewish, you're Jewish. You're Jewish particularly to other Jews in this instance, even if you don't necessarily consider yourself Jewish.

Judaism is not a race, full stop. Just like Christianity is not a race. There are white Jews, black Jews, Latino Jews, South Asian Jews, East Asian Jews etc. There aren't a lot of us as a whole, but we do exist in most racial groups. But Judaism is often correctly linked to ethnicity, which is a set of shared traditions, culture, language, and norms.

There is a huuuuge range of 'orthodoxy' under the umbrella of Judaism. Different 'sects' holds fundamentally similar values (for example: you won't find very many anti-abortion Jews), but people inside these different groups will observe their traditions at differently levels/extremes or not at all. Most Jews in America don't keep Kosher, for example, but most Orthodox Jews do.

Judaism also has a rich tradition of questioning everything (which is why we usually love these kinds of questions). It is not considered heresy to question beliefs or authority, in fact it’s usually encouraged. You’ll find many Jews who openly identify as atheists, and yet most still fully consider themselves to be Jewish. This usually doesn’t bother anyone, Rabbis included. Atheists even hold a place of honor in some Jewish communities, because atheists get their morality from their own values or other people, not from a fear of god or some external force. This is part of why it is pretty common to find Jews (observant or not) who consider themselves atheist.

All of that is to say you don't necessarily need to believe in god to be considered Jewish.

Questioning the Jewish religion is deeply part of the Jewish experience, so a person born a Jew is still considered a Jew even when they lack faith. Typically they come back around when they decide how to raise their offspring. Basically if your mother was Jewish, you are always a Jew.

I'm not a Jew but a few I know who are non-religious told me it is the basis of their cultural and family identity. There are blurry lines around religion, philosophy, and identity. And not just with Jews. There are quite a few Buddhists who practice it as a philosophy but no a religion, and countless other examples.

There's a guy on YouTube (Esoterica channel) who is a post-theist Jew who (occasionally) talks about this. He observes Jewish traditions and so forth, but he doesn't think God is real, etc. Fascinating channel BTW.

Anyway, I understand your confusion and I hope this doesn't sound condescending, I don't mean to be. I think you're overthinking it a little bit. I was in the same place years ago.

Hopefully a Jewish person answers you and explains it better than I did.

To give a super silly and reductive example: imagine you belong to a Star Wars fan club that you LOVE being a part of. Some of the members think the Force is real but you do not.