My question is predicated on the assumption that Jews were created by God as fundamentally different from non-Jews. (I am referring, for example, to the idea that Jews have a special type of soula special type of soul. And even if this idea is rejected, there remains the axiomatic fact that Jews must be assigned some sort of unique status by God insofar as He made the Commandments apply only to them.)
When the rabbis decided that Am Yisroel would be defined according to matrilineal descent, how did they know who actually was and was not (or would be) given "Jewish" status by G-d?
(My understanding is that the Torah given to Moses did not specify such a definition of Am Yisroel, and that the rabbis, following Ezra's example, merely settled on matrilineality as the clearest way to establish a blood relationship between Jewish parent and child. But isn't it possible that God could have given Jewish souls to the children of Jewish fathers, too? And how would the rabbis know if He had??)
