Women in Judaism

Last week we briefly mentioned how, unlike many other cultures throughout history, Jewish girls were educated alongside boys in Beth/Bet Sefer until they were 12 or 13, meaning that girls and women were often just as educated as their male counterparts. Only some boys/men went on to study more in Beth/Bet Midrash after finishing Bet Sefer. Given that discussion, I thought you all might appreciate an article from Judaism 101 about the "Role of Women" in Judaism. Here are some interesting snippets:

The position of women is not nearly as lowly as many modern people think; in fact, the position of women in halakhah (Jewish Law) that dates back to the biblical period is in many ways better than the position of women under American civil law as recently as a century ago.

The equality of men and women begins at the highest possible level: G-d. In Judaism, unlike traditional Christianity, G-d has never been viewed as exclusively male or masculine. Judaism has always maintained that G-d has both masculine and feminine qualities.

The rights of women in traditional Judaism are much greater than they were in the rest of Western civilization until the 20th century. Women had the right to buy, sell, and own property, and make their own contracts, rights which women in Western countries (including America) did not have until about 100 years ago. In fact, Proverbs 31:10-31, which is traditionally read at Jewish weddings, speaks repeatedly of business acumen as a trait to be prized in women (v. 11, 13, 16, and 18 especially).

The following passage is perhaps the best explanation for why it was so important for girls and women to be educated in the Torah:

There is no question that in traditional Judaism, the primary role of a woman is as wife and mother, keeper of the household. However, Judaism has great respect for the importance of that role and the spiritual influence that the woman has over her family. The Talmud says that when a pious man marries a wicked woman, the man becomes wicked, but when a wicked man marries a pious woman, the man becomes pious.

The entire article can be read here: http://www.jewfaq.org/women.htm.

Trinity and Monotheism

Check out Hebrew For Christians for some Messianic Jewish/Christian thoughts on the trinity. This follows up our discussion on how sometimes Jews and Muslims, those who also hold to a strong belief in monotheism, struggle with the idea of the trinity. From John Parsons article, The Trinity: Multiplicity in Oneness:

The idea of the "Trinity," however, is clearly implied in the Scriptures. From the first letter of Torah (i.e., the Bet in the word "Bereshit") through the last letter of the New Testament (i.e., the Nun in the word "Amen") -- the letters of which spell the word בּן ("Son") -- we see God as defined as One yet expressing Himself in different Persons. God the Son is "First and Last" (Isa. 48:12, 44:6, Rev. 1:17, 2:8; 22:13).

And this article here: Hebrew Names of God: Hashilush Hakadosh - Is the Trinity Biblical?

Although the word "Trinity" (Ha-shilush Ha-kadosh) does not directly appear in the Scriptures, it is an entirely Jewish concept, derived from both the Tanakh and the Brit Chadashah.

And from the same article comes this lovely quote...

Monotheistic systems that attempt to reduce God to absolute monism are not unlike the ancient Greek pagan philosophers who said things like, "Everything is Water" or "Everything is Number." These systems attempt to be "rational" but end up limiting the power of God Himself... God is LORD over all possible worlds - the great cosmos as well as the subatomic realms - and He can surely do whatever He wills with creation. The triune nature of the Godhead implies that what is most real and true about ultimate reality is community and love.

Take some time to read the whole articles when you have the chance! They're dense, but totally worth the read!!

If Jesus was/is a Jew, then what are we?

After last week's discussion, I realized that one of the things we are going to run into in our discussion is the nature of the current relationship between Judaism and Christianity.  It would not be surprising at all to find that we have differing answers to that question. Various denominations of Christianity have taken different positions on this issue over time.

Some of the discussion we had was in response to ideas drawn from this article: If Jesus Was a Jew, Then Why are We Catholic? Namely:

The term Jew is used in at least two senses in Scripture: to refer to those who are ethnically Jews and to those who are religiously Jews. Jesus was a Jew in both senses. In fact, he completed the Jewish religion by serving as the Messiah (Christ) whom the prophets had long foretold. 

And this:

Christians are those who Paul refers to as being inwardly (religiously) Jewish, while non-Christian Jews are those who he refers to as being outwardly (ethnically) Jewish. The former condition, he stresses, is the more important.

From Hebrew For Christian article "Israel and the Church" by John Parsons:

When studying the Jewish roots of Christianity, certain questions often arise regarding the nature of the "Church," the nature of "Israel," and the relationship between them. Do Gentile Christians become "Jewish" on account of their relationship to Jesus?  Does the "Church" somehow replace the Jewish people in God's plan as the "new Israel"?  Exactly how should we understand the relationship between the Church and Israel today?

I recommend a full reading of the above article (Israel and the Church) to sort through the 3 different theological positions in response to those questions:

1) Replacement/Supercessionism/Fulfillment/Covenant Theology
2) Separation/Dispensationalism Theology
3) Remnant Theology

The article is long and includes a history lesson on Israel and the Church before getting into the relationship between the two. I recommend clicking on the "Printer Friendly PDF" link above the article's title and printing it if you don't like to read on the computer screen. Also note that the article takes a strong position in favor of remnant theology.

Sabbath and The Shema

Central to the celebration of the Sabbath among Jews and Messianic Chistians is the recitation or singing of the Shema. It is a prayer that Jesus would certainly have recited countless times in his life and a prayer that affirms the nature of the One true Creator God. The Shema is drawn from Deuteronomy 6:4-9, which begins, "Hear Oh Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One." Many Jews recite (or sing) the Shema twice a day, in addition to recitations as part of holidays, such a Sabbath, and services at the synagogue.

A transliteration of the Shema in Hebrew:

Shema Yisrael, Adonai eloheinu, Adonai echad.
Barukh shem kevod malkhuto le-olam va’ed.

And English translation of the Shema:

Hear O Israel, the LORD our God is one LORD.
Blessed be His name, whose glorious kingdom is
forever and ever.

A beautiful version of the Shema, as performed by Anna Brooks, of Temple Israel in Bloomfield, MI:

Yet another rendition of the Shema by a Messianic group called 3b4jHoy:

PBS: Jewish Jesus; Huffington Post: Jesus 'Used to Be Jewish'?

In preparation for Session 1 of Mudhouse Sabbath, Judaism and Christianity, I recommend checking out this 7-minute PBS video interview with Professor Amy-Jill Levine (co-editor of the Jewish Annotated New Testament), Rabbi Schmuley Boteach (author of Kosher Jesus), and Professor Brad Young (of Oral Robert University):

Jewish Jesus

An especially poignant piece of the interview regarding the Jewishness of Jesus:

PROFESSOR LEVINE: He teaches like a Jew. He talks in parables, and Jews then knew that parables were not simple banal little stories. They were designed to shake us up, to get us to see the world in a new way, to challenge us. And Jesus is just a fabulous Jewish storyteller.

LAWTON (Correspondent): She says his teachings, such as in the famous Sermon on the Mount, are expansions of teachings in the Torah.

PROFESSOR LEVINE: He’s going to the law and bringing out the heart of it, which is also what Jewish teaching does. So he says not only don’t murder; he actually says you have to love your enemy, and he’s the only person in antiquity I’ve found who says that. But I think that gets to the heart of scripture.

An article in the Huffington Post by the author of Jesus Uncensored: Restoring the Authentic Jew, Bernard Star, provides still more fodder for the discussion on Judaism and Christianity:

Jesus 'Used to Be Jewish'? That's Not What the Gospels Say

Of note:

When I interviewed Christians and Jews for my book "Jesus Uncensored: Restoring the Authentic Jew," I heard over and over "everyone knows Jesus was Jewish." But when I dug a little deeper I discovered that "everyone knows he was Jewish" really means "he used to be Jewish."

And...Something that has come up numerous times in our discussions during the Animate studies:

I even took a walking tour of the Renaissance galleries of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. To my astonishment, Jesus, his followers and his Jewish community were consistently pictured as blond, fair-skinned, northern European latter-day Christians, often surrounded by latter-day saints, Christian clergy and Christian artifacts -- images totally at odds with biblical facts and without a trace of any Jewish connections.

Counting Gifts, Slowing Time and Sabbath

This is a post from my personal blog this week. Thought I would share:

Last week we talked about how slowing down enough to notice the gifts in our lives may actually make us feel like we have MORE time. We constantly feel like we don't have the time to stop, notice, and give thanks. And, yet, when we do, we feel somehow as though we've done more, lived more...in fact, had more time. 

Ecclesiastes 4:6 says, "Better is a handful of quietness than two hands full of toil and a striving after wind."

Abraham Joshua Heschel said,

"One who wants to enter the holiness of the day must first lay down the profanity of clattering commerce, of being yoked to toil. He must go away from the screech of dissonant days, from the nervousness and fury of acquisitiveness and the betrayal of embezzling his own life. He must say farewell to manual work and learn to understand that the world has already been created and will survive without the help of man."

"The world has already been created..." I cracked a smile at this. Do we really somehow think that everything will cease if we cease our toil? "Better is a handful of quietness..." Why?

I think that when we stop we recognize who we are and who God is. We see that our work will never be done, and yet, that is just fine because God created this whole world for us, and the world is held in existence by God. It is all held together by God. Our work matters, yes. But our connection with God and with each other matters more. When we are quiet, we see God...in creation, in the people around us, in the gifts we have dared to count. And then we can go about our work, mindful of those things.

This practice of quiet, of mindfulness, of ceasing toil isn't easy, I think. So, God made it mandatory. Among the ten commandments we find, "Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy." (Exodus 20:8) Holy means set apart. We set this day aside. "...the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it, you shall not do any work..." (Exodus 20:10)

The Sabbath Manifesto project (a non-sectarian project, by the way) says it this way:

"Way back when, God said, 'On the seventh day thou shalt rest.'  The meaning behind it was simple: Take a break. Call a timeout. Find some balance. Recharge."

"Somewhere along the line, however, this mantra for living faded from modern consciousness. The idea of unplugging every seventh day now feels tragically close to impossible. Who has time to take time off? We need eight days a week to get tasks accomplished, not six."

Blogger and former YWAM missionary, Andrew Odom, puts it this way,

"We are destroying every sense of our being by not observing a day of rest. Remember the tortoise and the hair? There is a reason we run faster and work harder, but only fall farther behind. Our lives are too hurried, too full, and subsequently too out of balance."

We are not very good at stopping, but it is only in the stopping that we are restored. In the words of Rabbi Wolpe:

"Shabbat means stopping. Pursuit slows and ceases; grasping and getting are no longer our aim. The world still spins but we do not. Balance is restored. We give ourselves a day to celebrate God's giving us a world. Flash and dazzle dim. Meaning slowly ripens. As the poet wrote, peace comes dropping slow. Shabbat Shalom."

Strangely enough, the practice of Shabbat seems to free me all week long. Yes, my work is more productive when I have rested. But, somehow, greater productivity does not equal more frazzled and hurried. Stepping out of the toil once a week teaches me to step into the moments of daily life. And there I can count my thousands of gifts...