Hello, I'm an American Orthodox Jew. Ask me anything about Jewish theology or practice and I'll do my level best to answer. I'm not a Rabbi or anything, so I can't guarantee I'll know if it's something really complex, but I'm reasoanbly well versed in this stuff so I can at least make a stab at things.
I can only stay for an hour or two though.
JOO
Is loyalty to the Zionist cause inherent (either in the religion itself or the culture surrounding it) to modern Judaism?
Also, do you identify as a Jew more in a religious sense or racial/cultural sens?
>Is loyalty to the Zionist cause inherent (either in the religion itself or the culture surrounding it) to modern Judaism?
Not particularly. There are considerable groups, especially among the Chasidim, who are vehemently anti-zionist, and among non-religious Jews, at least in the U.S., not giving a damn seems to be the predominant position. In places like Israel, you get a different spin on things.
>Also, do you identify as a Jew more in a religious sense or racial/cultural sens?
At least for me, definitely in a religious sense. "Cultural Judaism" is in a lot of ways similar to Cultural Christianity, a bunch of things that people kind of do without really thinking about why, and then attributing it to their religious organization, whether or not that's actually the case. For instance, there's a certainbelief, although completely baseless in religious literature, that you can purify a cooking or eating utensil that you accidentally mixed milk and meat on by burying it in dirt for three days. It's enormously prevalent among Jewish communities that are from the Ukraine, you don't see it in nearly the same degree anywhere else, although there is some holding to it in other groups that are from Eastern Europe originally. I have no idea what it stems from originally, but if you asked a Yemenite or any sort of Sephardi or German Jew, they'd think you're nuts for doing something like that.
Why keep all those rules in the Torah? I don't mean sensible moral laws but rules relating to diet, hygiene, ceremony etc. There is no divine judgement in Judaism over these things - the only afterlife in Judaism is the one after the Messiah arrives, but pretty much everyone (maybe apart from serious sinners, but that's debated as well) will get resurrected and live in Olam haBa.
So why bother with keeping those rules? You don't benefit from them at all, just making life inconvenient for yourselves.
how do you reconcile the lack of evidence for jewish enslavement in egypt.
have you read Josuphus?
Do jews still sacrifice animals or will that only happen when "the temple is rebuilt"
are you of semetic decent or of slavic origen.
do you talk differently infront of goyim?
>Why keep all those rules in the Torah?
Because they're the right thing to do.
>I don't mean sensible moral laws but rules relating to diet, hygiene, ceremony etc.
Because they're important. Picking and choosing like that is almost inevitably out of a desire to do less, to avoid the discipline, to slack off but at the same time feel good about yourself in order to say you've kept to the core of things.
>There is no divine judgement in Judaism over these things - the only afterlife in Judaism is the one after the Messiah arrives,
That is wrong in a lot of ways. Mainstream Judaism believes in an afterlife, and that the Messianic era has little to do with it other than a belief in the bodily resurrection of the dead, which would be an interruption of said afterlife, not a creation of it.
>but pretty much everyone (maybe apart from serious sinners, but that's debated as well) will get resurrected and live in Olam haBa.
Because the next world isn't like this world. You have a soul and no mind or body to filter its experiences through. You can, eventually, learn to function in a world like that, but skipping over this is not going to make things easy on yourself.
Why did you goyims do 9/11?
How many goyim have you tricked into (((Cultural Marxism)))? Do you like fucking kids?
I don't think you know what Goyim means.
>how do you reconcile the lack of evidence for jewish enslavement in egypt.
Biblical "enslavement" is a crude and large category for a colossal number of relationships in which one party is subordinated to another, they all get tossed out as עבד . You'll note that the Jewish "Slaves" in Egypt still had their own homes and own communities in the Biblical narrative, which seems markedly different from say, American chattel slavery. Furthermore, you have an enormous amount of "Egyptianization", that persists even after the exodus, people wanting to go back, or of repeating Egyptian cultural mores and wanting to worship animals at the feet of Har Sinai. For all practical purposes, they became Egyptians (Lower class Egyptians), and only forged a new identity afterwards. How would you tell them apart from the natives?
>have you read Josuphus?
Not in full, and certainly not in the original Greek. I've read fairly large excerpts though from the Jewish Wars and Antiquities.
>Do jews still sacrifice animals or will that only happen when "the temple is rebuilt"
When the temple is rebuilt, although there are a few smaller sub-groups which do "practice sacrifices" for the event.
>are you of semetic decent or of slavic origen.
I'm an enormous mongrel, I have both in some small degree, as well as German ancestors tossed into the mix.
>do you talk differently infront of goyim?
I've never talked in front of multiple nations at all. I imagine I would get terrible stage fright and speak in a dusty whisper if the occasion ever came up though.
>Because the next world isn't like this world. You have a soul and no mind or body to filter its experiences through. You can, eventually, learn to function in a world like that, but skipping over this is not going to make things easy on yourself.
Hm, makes sense.
>the bodily resurrection of the dead, which would be an interruption of said afterlife, not a creation of it.
Are you talking about reincarnation? I heard it exists in Judaism, can you confirm that or explain the specific beliefs?
Beg pardon? Just for a quick linguistic lesson גוי "Goy", means nation, although more in the sense of the people or ethnicity of a nation rather than the state itself that usually develops from it. Pluralizing it to גויים just means there are now more than one nations you're talking about. As far as I'm aware, the 9/11 attacks were conducted by a fairly small group of mostly Saudi terrorists, not an international coalition.
0, and no, I don't.
Why do you reject Jesus as the Messiah?
>Are you talking about reincarnation?
No, although I don't pretend to be an expert in post-Messianic cosmology. But as I understand it, everyone gets back up in their old (now restored) bodies, and lives for a time.
>I heard it exists in Judaism, can you confirm that or explain the specific beliefs?
There are some Chasidic groups that do believe in reincarnation, but even there, as I understand it (not being any sect of Chasid myself), it's not the normal approach that everyone gets, people only reincarnate when there's something abnormal about their conduct in the first life and go back as a kind of "extended test". I'm sorry, I'm not too up on the particulars, but it is extant, but at a very, very fringe level among the observant community.
Because he didn't fulfill the messianic prophecies, and if the Gospels are representative of what a historical Jesus in fact said, he conflated himself with both the messianic and divine, which is pretty heretical, not to mention contradictory in that the Messiah is a prophet.
Why are most of your Jewish fellows so unspiritual? I find it disgusting how many of them want to subscribe to Judaism but hold extremely materialistic and naturalistic world views. I would expect that from the Catholic community, seeing as it's extremely big and diverse, but not from the Jewish community that's a lot smaller. Has there been an attempt to eradicate this secular judaism?
Why do you dress like Polish 17th century merchants?
>Why are most of your Jewish fellows so unspiritual?
Because being spiritual requires a lifetime of dedication and sacrifice, as well as considerable intellectual and sometimes even physical effort to fulfill the mandates of the Torah. It's way, way easier to just sit on a couch and eat potato chips and masturbate to whatever weird porn appeals to you.
>Has there been an attempt to eradicate this secular judaism?
Considerable efforts. If you've ever heard of the group Chabad, they're most prominent and successful primarily because they do a lot of "outreach", trying to bring lapsed Jews back into the fold of the religion. I don't agree with all (or even many) of their particular views, but they do a good job when it comes to getting people back involved. I do have a funny story concerning them, if anyone's interested, although it's not particularly relevant to theology.
I don't, at work I wear a 3 piece suit and tie. Some Hasidic groups do (although they tend more towards 17th century Hungarian noblemen). Primarily, it's because they've embarked on a grand retreat from the world outside their own communities where they attempt to re-create the Shtetl experience as much as possible, so all their notions of what is fashionable and what isn't are frozen at that.
For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
hoe do you wash your asshole
tell the story, good fella
And what makes you think Isaiah 9:6 is talking about the Messiah?
With soap and water. How do you wash yours?
>And what makes you think Isaiah 9:6 is talking about the Messiah?
The very next verse
Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore.
corn cob
Well, a lot of Jewish worship is communial. You're not just you the individual, you're you the member of the Jewish community, and certain things are either best or in some cases only done with 10 adult men or more, and in any case, a lot of rituals are considered better if done as a body.
I went to law school in Chicago, and I was away from my family around the holidays, so I went to a Chabad Seder, a Seder being a ritual meal and lesson that's done on Passover. I introduced myself to the Rabbi running it, and being somewhat educated, I made a pretty good impression, and he asked me to be kind of his assistant when running things, because there were going to be about 30ish people, and just passing out everything and keeping everyone together is something of a task. Sure, I was thrilled.
Come the night of the Seder, and I'm doing my job, helping him run things, and, because it's a Jewish holiday, eating and drinking prodigiously. By the end of things, I'm more than a little sloshed. We had finished all the ritual stuff, and we were just singing some old songs, because who doesn't like singing? There are several ones that seem to get sung at every Seder, Had Gadya, Ki'lo Na'eh, Adir Hu, etc. In what I can only imagine was because he was sick of the same ones over and over again, the Rabbi asks me if I know any Hebrew songs that haven't been done to death.
Keep in mind, I'm quite drunk. And the first song that pops into my head is a filthy one that a buddy of mine from college and an ex IDF guy taught me, about a rooster who really likes this one hen in the back of the coop, but by the time he's done fucking all the other hens, he's too tired to give her a good time. And I just launch into it, probably badly off key as well, and only realize what I'm singing when I'm about 4/5 of the way through with it and I can see this unbelievably stony expression on the Rabbi's face. It was awkward coming back the next night.
>Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore.
So.... you mean the reign of Hezekiah? I hope you realize that Jews don't consider Hezekiah to be the messiah, even if he was a good king. You might want to check out Isaiah 37'ths chapter to see how this one turns out.
What do you think of some Jews equating criticism of the Israeli government with Anti semitism?
Moreover, what do you think of the settler groups in Israel? Are there actions justified in Scripture, or is it more of a ethnonationalist land grab?
Finally, are you guys (either you yourself or Orthodox culture in general) suspicious of Muslims?
holy shit, this is gold hahaha. Thank you. Do you keep going there?
>What do you think of some Jews equating criticism of the Israeli government with Anti semitism?
Retarded. Understandable in a way if you're overly defensive intellectually, but still retarded, and right up there with the sorts that think normal international relations and the political science behind it don't apply when you're talking about Israel, which is sadly common.
>Moreover, what do you think of the settler groups in Israel? Are there actions justified in Scripture, or is it more of a ethnonationalist land grab?
Definitely the latter. We as a people have gotten along just fine without the West bank for quite a while, and building a bunch of apartments and antagonizing the locals is definitely not helping. Not to mention the number of Haredi there, who should probably just be left out for the Arabs to shoot.
>Finally, are you guys (either you yourself or Orthodox culture in general) suspicious of Muslims?
Personally, I am, for a given value of "suspicious". Do I think that all Muslims, or even most muslims are part of some grand conspiracy to overthrow western values and flood into Europe to create a Caliphate? No. But I do think they're by and large from a culture that is so enormously different than the one that I at least grew up in that even seeming agreement is unlikely to mean actual agreement; the entire cultural context of things like right and wrong is subtly askew vis a vis each other, which means you should step very cautiously and make as sure as you can that what you think he's saying and what he thinks he's saying (as well as what you're saying) are the same.
Well, no. I went there the next night because I didn't have other plans, and after that I made sure to go back home for Passover.
Isaiah 37 doesn't apply Isaiah 9:7 to Hezekiah
What is the Jewish interpretation of the garden of eden story. Is it literal? a parable? what id anything is its meaning?
Yes it does. It connects into that whole "The Might of God" part of the name.
There is no unified interpretation of the Garden of Eden that applies to even all of Orthodox Judaism, let alone anywhere else. That whole 2 Jews needing 3 synagogues is not entirely a meme.
As for my own little sub-sect of Orthodox Judaism; we believe and reason as follows.
The Garden of Eden narrative has several points in which Adam and Eve "Talk" to God. Per other bits of Jewish belief that get tedious to explain, unless you're Gary Stu Moses, to "Talk" to God requires entering into a sort of trance or vision state, which is necessary to prepare the mind for that kind of visitation. The entire thing with the snake and the eating of the fruit and the expulsion happens in between one conversation and the next, and while there was a literal vision and something literally happened, it was not a physical thing that happened of a bodily snake talking to them and them munching on a piece of fruit and sewing fig leaves together.
As to WHY such a vision would have such profound effects on human (and non-human, don't forget the snake!) development, I admit that's a bit out of my pay grade. I can fumblingly suggest that it was something of a fine-tune testing of human psyche, but that's an intuition, not something I can really justify textually.
>It connects into that whole "The Might of God" part of the name.
Where?
And yet Abraham said "God will provide himself a lamb for the sacrifice."
And then a ram was caught in the thicket, not a lamb.
Was Abraham wrong, or are you?
Reject the Messiah.
Murder the Messiah.
Reject the Kingdom.
Blame the Murdered Messiah for not ushering in the Rejected Kingdom, while ignoring hundreds of messianic prophecies Jesus did fulfill, including time dependent ones.
Jews.
What do you think of goyim having jewish tattoos? I'm planning to tattoo "victory" in hebrew because I basically idolize jews and wish I could be one.
Don't be rude to our guest.
try verses 33-35
>And yet Abraham said "God will provide himself a lamb for the sacrifice."
What on earth makes you think Abraham was uttering prophecy at that point? Considering his likely emotional state, no matter how certain he might or might not have been that God was going to call off the whole "kill your son" thing at the last second, somehow I doubt he was in the tranquil, relaxed, almost trancelike state of mind prophecy requires.
>What do you think of goyim having jewish tattoos? I'm planning to tattoo "victory" in hebrew because I basically idolize jews and wish I could be one.
I think tattoos in general look terrible and are stupid. One tattoo vs another isn't all that different except insofar as how visible they are.
If you wish you could be one, why not convert instead of getting a marking on yourself that's forbidden by Jewish law?
>try verses 33-35
I don't see anything about divine might there
Btw, if you're an Orthodox Jew why are you saying God and not G-d?
as a christian who is attempting to follow the Law, please guide me with extant books to read about following the Law and remaining kosher.
I am married, and work and live in nyc. Many of my friends are jewish and I do business with many hasidic and orthodox jews.
teach me your ways shlomo
>I don't see anything about divine might there
Look harder then. What exactly do you think is keeping the Assyrians out?
>Btw, if you're an Orthodox Jew why are you saying God and not G-d?
You are, as per the Second "Commandment" (Despite the fact that it's really not 10 commandments to begin with, rather 10 words or phrases), not supposed to take the name of God in vain.
This begs the question as to things like "What is the name of God?", and "What is taking it in vain?"
For the former, you have two reasonable propositions; either a "Name of God" is a couple of formulations, in Hebrew, that have special significance, in which neither "God" nor "G-d" are in any way special, or it has a contextual meaning, if I say something that I know to refer to God, and you think of it as referring to God, and we can understand each other such, then whatever the word is becomes a name of God. Personally, I subscribe to the former. But even if I subscribed to the latter, after usage, "G-d" becomes a divine name just as much as "God". So why use it?
Furthermore, taking God's name in vain more has to do with forswearing yourself than just using God's name in conversation. I mean look at a random cross-section of Biblical names; most of them have a divine name placed in there somewhere. You think people had to walk around calling each other not quite their real names to avoid accidentally saying "God"?
Also, my wife came home, so I'm going to answer one last round of questions, anything that came up while I was writing this, and then I'm heading off for the night. Toodles.
This thing called the bible.
John 8:56 Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day, and he saw it and was glad.”
And here's John the Baptist, whose sole function in life is to point out the Messiah:
John 1:29
[ The Lamb of God ]
The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, “Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!
Hmmm, let's think about this for a second. Abraham and Isaac. Abraham had been promised descendants as numerous as the stars, yet Isaac here in his 30's didn't have any children. Yet God told Abraham to kill Isaac.
And Abraham woke up, got his stuff together, and took Isaac to Mt. Moriah (do I need to tell you where Mt. Moriah is?).
So here's a mid-30's man carrying wood upon his back up Mt. Moriah to willingly go to the place of his own execution, without complaint or resistance. Completely obedient to his father, even unto death.
Because of course Abraham knows that even if he has to kill Isaac, well, God will just raise Isaac from the dead in order to deliver on that promise to have descendants as numerous as the stars.
See, that's faith. Abraham is the Father of Faith. Abraham is my father, not by DNA but by Faith.
If God just wanted DNA descendants of Abraham, he would have made them out of stones.
Matthew 3:9 and do not think to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ For I say to you that God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones.
>as a christian who is attempting to follow the Law, please guide me with extant books to read about following the Law and remaining kosher.
If you just want a book of Law and "follow this", I would recommend the Shulchan Aruch, by Rabbi Yosef Karo. It won't teach you to understand anything except practical details, you won't understand why the various laws are interpreted in this way and not another way, but it is very good for things like "how to keep Kosher" and festival and Sabbath observance and stuff.
Acts 15
Now then, why do you test God by placing on the necks of the disciples a yoke that neither we nor our fathers have been able to bear?
On the contrary, we believe it is through the grace of the Lord Jesus that we are saved, just as they are.”…
Yes. Jews who knew more than you designed YHWH to be unpronounceable in order to not blaspheme God by mispronouncing his name.
i want to understand
i have been reading the chabad website
i want to be jew
>What exactly do you think is keeping the Assyrians out?
It says HE will be called Mighty God, not that the might of God would be with him
John 7:19 Did not Moses give you the law, yet none of you keeps the law? Why do you seek to kill Me?”
What do you think of atheism
>be studying christian theology
>get introductionary course on judaism
>in one meeting we get some translated excerpts from the talmud and we're asked to read it
>first two excerpts are understandable
>next excerpt is ultra-long and worded in the vaguest and most elusive way, very tedious to read
>get asked what it means
>"absolutely no idea sir"
>prof responds: "you see, whenever in the talmud you absolutely have no idea what two old rabbis are talking about, they are talking about sex in the most elusive and euphemistic way"
>it was actually about sex
Kek, jews.
How you can not know that Ezekiel 37 starts with the Holocaust and the Dry Bones prophecy that sets up the creation of Zion in one day is just absolutely ponderous.
Except of course that the answer is in the bible.
2 Corinthians 3
Therefore, since we have such hope, we use great boldness of speech— unlike Moses, who put a veil over his face so that the children of Israel could not look steadily at the end of what was passing away. But their minds were blinded. For until this day the same veil remains unlifted in the reading of the Old Testament, because the veil is taken away in Christ. But even to this day, when Moses is read, a veil lies on their heart. Nevertheless when one turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away.
Read Hebrews
He's a Jew in 2017.
He is an atheist.
Aye from the people with the holes in the sheet and the proof of virginity (the sheet with the holy splattered with blood) being touted about the wedding reception.
Their women they wanted to keep pure; they're worship of YHWH?
Filthy abominations all.
What are you even saying?
Thoughts?