Jewish belifes

[dauer]

If the creation story is a creation story. And if the garden of eden is allegory, and original sin, hell, devil are not part of common Judaic thinking...Where the heck did Christianity get it all from when they utilize heavily your books to prove all this?

Neither hell, nor the devil, are ever mentioned in the Tanach. Nor is original sin. Now the question of whether to read the creation story as allegory or not is another matter. There is no reason it has to be read allegorically, except that what we know about the world clearly makes a literal reading very difficult. Of course, Jewish interpretations that take it non-literally predate knowledge that would make a literal reading unacceptable.

Your question may be better suited to another forum. It is my understanding that Christianity is influenced by Zoroastrianism and pagan religions. The mythical Jesus is in my opinion modelled after the familiar dying gods such as Mithras. The idea of a god who can offer salvation through belief seems to me like it would appeal much more to a people who believed in a chaotic world ruled by many fickle gods than it would to a people who believed in one god of a world with a clear orderliness to it, with clear and reasonable expectations.

The idea of a devil in opposition to god seems very Zoroastrian to me. As I said before, hell seems like a clear way to motivate people to think they need saving. It also has some parallels to Tartarus.

Perhaps what you should do is review the places that supposedly reference the devil, hell, etc, and see if that interpretation can be maintained without reading through the lens of later christian theology.

I would actually make the argument that most of the tanach, if not all of it, has ideas about the afterlife that are alien to us today, although also very familiar. But rabbinic Judaism as well went in a different direction regarding the afterlife.

This rendition of Moses is mostly watched by Christians and not Jews...

thoughts? if correct, reasons?

I thought the Hallmark version was horrible. I can't tell you how many times I've seen the Heston version. I don't care about the inaccuracies. It's a classic.

Is that a common interpretation of the story within Judaism?

Yes. If it happened, and it wasn't a horrible sin (which the text never hints at (quite the opposite)), then why did it happen?

It's like they were children in the garden, and they couldn't begin to grow up until they made a boo boo. And of course you have God saying, "Whatever you do, don't press the shiny, blinking button." What happens when you say that to a child?

[AletheiaRivers]

Originally Posted by dauer

It's like they were children in the garden, and they couldn't begin to grow up until they made a boo boo. And of course you have God saying, "Whatever you do, don't press the shiny, blinking button." What happens when you say that to a child?

What got me thinking down this road was actually a poem by EE Cummings, which has a line in it about "a tree called life" (which I do not think has anything to do with God, but could be wrong).

Anyway, it hit me that eating of the tree could be symbolic for life - being born, dealing with the dualities of this existence, etc. Life means knowing good and evil.

Here is some of the poem:

Here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life, which grows
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide) …

[bananabrain]

wil,

what dauer said about translation, capitalisation and emphasis - english works very differently from hebrew, so an understanding of how the language works (letters are consonants, modified by dotted vowels) will improve your appreciation of the issue.

as far as the calendar is concerned, i think we work it out by the ages of the people given at in genesis (all the "begats") by which we can calculate the traditional calendar date. note that we can only calculate traditionally to the creation of adam - time before that is in the six days of creation, which are not subject to the same rules (or indeed any that can be easily explained). in the artscroll 'stone edition' pentateuch (which is otherwise not my favourite version) the commentary includes a diagram of how the calendar is worked out. i think r. kaplan's "living Torah" (which i *do* recommend as the best translation i've ever seen) also includes this.

re hell and the devil, the term "sheol" is mentioned a seven times in the Torah, although the context is not made clear. by the time of the Talmud, the term "gehinnom" is in common usage. "ha-satan" is a character in the book of job and is mentioned twice in the book of zechariah. i encourage you to investigate the contexts (http://unbound.biola.edu is an excellent resource from an evangelist university which allows you to compare versions)

Your question may be better suited to another forum. It is my understanding that Christianity is influenced by Zoroastrianism and pagan religions.

that is my understanding as well - i was under the impression that the portrayal of jesus explicitly adopted these aspects because it helped with the marketing to the contemporary pagans, rather like him being identified with the jewish messiah - it was good for converts.

and, re the apple - yes, that big red shiny button. remember your "matrix" - "everything begins with choice".

b'shalom

bananabrain

[Zaakir]

what is the fundamental and main beleif in judaism?

[Karimarie]

Originally Posted by Zaakir

what is the fundamental and main beleif in judaism?

God.

[Zaakir]

yeah but all religions beleive in god dont they?i was meaning basically on the concept of god...one god who is in comparable to anyone?or a god that is three ?and taht He will have a son?

[Karimarie]

Originally Posted by Zaakir

yeah but all religions beleive in god dont they?i was meaning basically on the concept of god...one god who is in comparable to anyone?or a god that is three ?and taht He will have a son?

There isn't one Jewish concept of God... There are in fact several different ideas. Each individual Jew has his or her own understanding of what God is. Judaism isn't monolithic and it has very little in terms of set beliefs regarding the nature of God.

God is impersonal, beyond all human comprehension. The idea that God is a trinity is nonsense in the scope of Judaism because God is One, not three. God cannot 'have a son', because that would mean creating another god, which would violate the central principle of monotheism.

[Zaakir]

fanx, tahts what i wanted to hear

[Seeker_of_truth]

Originally Posted by wil

Where the heck did Christianity get it all from when they utilize heavily your books to prove all this?

Pagan religions. This can be read in the book "Jesus Mysteries" by Timothy Freke

[Amir]

Peace be upon you all,

I am new to this site. I am Amir. I am very interested in the Jewish faith. My particular questions are in regard to the Law:

Is anyone able to keep the law perfectly? If no how does one atone for the mistakes that inevitably come upon us in life?

There is a mulititude of beliefs in the after life? I never knew this. Please elaborate a little for me in your spare time.

That is it for now I suppose. I had a few but I lost them. I will try again when they come to me. Peace be upon you all.

Amir

[dauer]

Hey Amir. Welcome to C-R.com.

Is anyone able to keep the law perfectly? If no how does one atone for the mistakes that inevitably come upon us in life?

Well, part of what is laid out in halachah is the methods for atonement. There are two categories of sin, sins against man and sins against God. For sins against man we must first seek forgiveness from the person we've wronged, make good on anything we must make good on, before that's taken care of. Sins against God are a little simpler, since there isn't the same need to seek out an individual that you have wronged. Instead you just have to seek forgiveness from God.

There is a mulititude of beliefs in the after life? I never knew this. Please elaborate a little for me in your spare time.

Well, the Tanach, the Jewish Scriptures, don't discuss the afterlife very much. The Talmud does discuss it a bit, but it's more or less considered inspired conjecture, if you will. And there are other texts that discuss it as well, and can go in very different directions. The biggest thing is that the afterlife isn't a big focus in Judaism. This life is. If you're interested in more specific information about some different Jewish afterlife beliefs, one of them is that when people die, there are two places, gehenna and gan eden. Gehenna is a temporary place of transformation. It is like a sword being tempered, perhaps by experiencing in some way all the harm it has caused in life, so that it can go to gan eden, which is some type of paradise. If the soul cannot be tempered, then it is extinguished. Another idea is reincarnation. As it occurs traditionally in Judaism, it's a little different from the Eastern ideas. Essentially you could get reincarnated into a certain form as punishment for the way you've lived. But it's a similar idea of potential cycles of reincarnation. So those are two examples.

Dauer

[Amir]

Peace Dauer,

Thanks for the post. Your faith is very interesting to me. I always though and it's because I never bothered to look into the Jewish faith that it was monolithic. That all the beliefs were pretty much the same. What is your particular view on the afterlife. I know it's from your back ground and all but I am interested. Why? Well, tell you the truth I have been on the spiritual walk for some time now. Perhaps 10 yrs or so. I have looked at Christianity, Islam and now the Jewish faith. My wife has been feeling that perhaps she may convert to the Jewish faith if its possible that is which is why I have looked into the faith myself. I read a book why the Jews rejected Jesus. It put some things in very good perspective to me. Thanks Dauer for your help. Enjoy your day.

Amir

[path_of_one]

Hello, all-

I thought this might be as good a place as a new thread would be to ask for resources.

I know I asked for some resources in spring of 2006, but in the two moves since then I've lost a lot of my notes and I can't seem to get the post to come up by clicking on it from my user profile (it just brings up the error screen).

At any rate:

Good online resources for the basics of Jewish beliefs?

Good text commentaries, books, etc. regarding the interpretation of the scriptures? Good translations of the scriptures?

I'm in the odd position of being Christian (well, sort of- depends who you ask ) but finding that so far most of what I've come to in reading the Bible and praying to God for guidance is more aligned with Jewish beliefs than orthodox Christian ones.

I'm interested in furthering my understanding of Judaism as much as possible. I think partially what gets me is the question of how much, as a follower of Christ, I'm supposed to be following Judaism versus how much, as a Gentile, I wasn't created to be Jewish. I'm not sure if that makes sense, but there you have it.

I have seen Christ's work in my own life, so that's why I'm a Christian, but a lot of the doctrine has not been what I've been led to in my study of the scriptures. Any help is much appreciated- and thank you in advance.

[dauer]

Amir,

I always though and it's because I never bothered to look into the Jewish faith that it was monolithic.

Yeah, truth be told it's far from it, and that's before we even get to the denominational differences. Most of the theology is interchangeable in any of the denominations. The things that separate them are generally some key differences of opinion on things like revelation, authority, and for more of the denominations it's really about how they've reacted to the Enlightenment that separates them. That's what generally creates a change in views on things like revelation, covenant, authority, etc.

What is your particular view on the afterlife.

To be honest, when it comes to the afterlife I'm a complete agnostic "I'll find out when I get there" kind of person. Sometimes I think it's interesting to wonder about, but I really have no expectations.

Thanks Dauer for your help.

You're welcome. Good luck on your search.




path,

Good online resources for the basics of Jewish beliefs?

There are a few. Many people will invariably point you to

http://www.jewfaq.org

I am less fond of this site because it is written by one individual from one particular viewpoint (in this case Orthodox.) But for basic information it's not terrible, just a bit uneven, in some places much more than others. My first recommendation to people is always

http://www.myjewishlearning.com

It's a very big site, and for that reason a little more difficult to navigate than jewfaq (although if you do their guided learning, it's pretty simple to follow from one essay to the next) and features authors from all denominations. Often the essays are excerpted directly from books. They have information on everything from medieval commentators to the origins of kabbalah to modern rituals to recipes for Jewish food from around the world.

Those two sites should cover all the basics.

For tex commentary, books etc, and translations of scripture, first web info. Myjewishlearning has commentary on the weekly torah portion from all denominations. I actually can copy a bunch of links from a thread in the parsha project to here that can prove useful for text commentary/study.

This is a link to Chabad's parsha page, which includes sources from various time periods as well as Rashi's commentary and some hasidic sources, and an overview of the parsha.

http://www.chabad.org/article.html?AID=46091

This site has "summaries, commentaries, and text studies" coming from all of the denominational perspectives.

http://www.myjewishlearning.com:80/t...Commentary.htm

From the Conservative Seminary's website, this page has commentary by the Chancellor and by the Fellows as well as, it appears, the new JPS translation by parshah.

http://www.jtsa.edu/community/parash...es/index.shtml

The following site houses the book "Legends of the Jews" by Louis Ginzberg, a compilation of classical midrashim.

http://philologos.org/__eb-lotj/

This site holds, in addition to translations of the Tanach, translations from the deuterocanon, the pseudepigrapha, Philo of Alexandria, and Flavius Josephus.

http://www.earlyjewishwritings.com/

Bible quiz by parsha or from the whole database.

http://www.bible-quiz.co.il/

This page contains parsha studies by a humanist Jew.

http://home.teleport.com/~hellman/ar...0Commentaries/

Other

This site has a number of Near Eastern texts important to the comparative study of the Torah against surrounding cultures as well as some Hebraic material not covered on earlyjewishwritings, some DSS, Early Christian Lit, Early Gnostic Lit, Church Documents, and a long list of links.

http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~humm/Reso.../bibTexts.html

A glossary of important vocabulary to know when studying the bible.

http://www.read-the-bible.org/glossary.html

Now for books, one of the best I think not just for learning to approach Tanach but also for Talmud, Midrash, Medieval Bible Commentary, Medieval Jewish Philosophy, Kabbalistic Texts, Teachings of the Hasidic Masters, and Prayers and the Prayerbook, is:

http://www.amazon.com/Back-Sources-R...e=UTF8&s=books

It's put together by the Conservative movement and is simply fantastic, honoring a modern view of text while still doing justice to traditional approaches. Simply one of the best things out there imo.

For translations I'd go with either/and/or the Fox Translation or the new JPS translation.

Fox may eventually do the entire Tanach. The largest chunk afaik that he's done so far is the Torah.

http://www.amazon.com/Five-Books-Mos...e=UTF8&s=books

Just a wonderful translation. Although of course it's still a translation, but the music of it is beautiful. And you get commentary with that one as well, modern as opposed to traditional in that case.

The JPS translation is really a very good, more standard translation than Fox's is. Very little commentary though. Just some footnotes at the bottom of the pages. If you want the JPS translation with some more commentary, you might try the Jewish Study Bible:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/019...730646-8042361

Or, with the same translation and somewhat different, more varied (including more of the traditional type) commentary (that only covers the Torah and haftarah portions), etc chayyim chumash:

http://www.amazon.com/Etz-Hayim-Comm...e=UTF8&s=books

Hope that helps.

Dauer

[Zaakir]

hi...just wandering, what do the jews beleive the messiah will be because i read on this thread that you dont beleive you have to be saved by anyone,which i agree with its only ourselves we need saving from really!its just i dont get why christians suddenly beleived jesus was the son of God...i thought judaism didnt teach this,as itd be blasphemous in judaism?also..why cant anyone just convert to judaism.i read something about only certain people as theyre Gods chosen ones...what about all non jews,do we not get a chance in your view?...thanks..i hope someone can answer my q's...when answering the jesus one, i know alot of christians quote to isiah in the old testament that says his name will be emmanuel (meaning God with us) obviously the torah wont have it in latin word,so what does the torah say,does it say this..if so do you think it means the way they portrayed it as God on earth?