Religion 2: Judaism – Flashcards
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Bar Mitzvah
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Hebrew, "son of the commandment"; young Jewish males used to become a Bar Mitzvah just by turning 13; now, though, one must demonstrate that one can read directly from and comment on the Torah
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Bat Mitzvah
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"a daughter of the commandment; since the 1920s, this rite has been extended to women
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Tanakh/Hebrew Bible
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Jewish Scriptures
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Authors of Hebrew Bible
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central conflict was over one issue: Would Israelites remain loyal to their one God (referred to, in Hebrew, by the consonants YHWH), or would they worship the deities of Egypt, Assyria, Babylonia and the gods of the Canaanite peoples among whom they lived?
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Jewish Diaspora
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many Jews were driven out of Israel and Palestine, living in communities around the world, but especially in Mesopotamia and throughout the Mediterranean; dispersion, acculturation, and resistance to total assimilation have formed the larger pattern of Jewish life
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The Biblical Period
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1700 BC- 500 BC; rise of the Patriarchs (Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob); the exodus from Egypt; the formation of the monarchy; rise and fall of the two kingdoms, Israel and Judah, that followed
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Exodus
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marked a decisive moment in Israel's history of divine revelation and law-giving- on Mt. Sinai, divine instruction was given to Moses, who then imparted these teachings in written form to the assembled Israelite masses; the moment that it becomes a "confessional" community, bound together by a common faith in a Creator-God and committed to his service
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Solomon's Reign
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Construction of the First Temple- a permanent sanctuary, designed to replace the portable tent (or "Tabernacle"( of Moses; time, wherein prayers and animal sacrifices were offered to YHWH; after Solomon's death, the northern tribes formed Israel and the southern tribe called itself Judah; the northern kingdom was invaded by the Assyrians, and the southern kingdom by the Babylonians (who destroyed the First Temple)
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The First Temple
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the loss of the First Temple and of the kingdom of Judah became the archetype of all later tragedies of displacement
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The Second Temple Period
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began with the gradual return of a relatively small band of Judean exiles from Babylonia, following the Persian conquest of the Babylonian empire; the First Temple was rebuilt; the movement of Jews between Babylonia and "Yehud" (as the Persians called Judah) provided for the passage of ideas and literature from Mesopotamia to the land of Israel; formation of Jewish Scriptures can be dated to this period (scribes and priests gather ed edited these books); in the absence of a Jewish nation-state, religious leadership within the Jewish community fell to the priesthood and to an intellectual class connected to the Priesthood (these two groups formed the "Men of the Great Assembly"); by the 200 BC, the first five books of the Hebrew Bible had already reached a sufficient state of finality to allow Greek-speaking news to translate it from Hebrew into Greek (the Septuagint); increasing tension within the Jewish community between those who favored social and intellectual assimilation into Greek (and, later, Roman) culture and those who resisted such assimilation in favor or preserving "traditional" values and religious practices- this led to the gradual appearance of religious "parties" whose influence on Jewish belief and practices few during the period of Roman domination and occupation of Palestine
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Pharisees
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religious "party" in Second Temple period;appear to have commanded the attention and loyalty of the Jewish masses; believed in the "Oral Torah"- the teachings imparted to God by Moses on Sinai; taught that torah incorporated a belief in both the immortality of the soul and the resurrection of the dead
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Sadducees
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religious "party" in Second Temple period;influence on Judaism of the time was much weaker; drew constituents mostly from priestly families; believed only in written scriptures, not in Oral Torah; tended toward literalism in their understanding of Scripture and therefore could find no warrant for believing in either immortality or resurrection; most accommodating of Roman rule
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Essenes
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religious "party" in Second Temple period; general term designating groups of devout Jews who has withdrawn from society in protect against the moral and spiritual corruption of their contemporaries; had eschatological beliefs (beliefs that the End-Time of divine judgment and global catastrophe was at hand); wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls, the oldest copies of the Jewish Scriptures known to exist today (found in caves near their settlements not until 1947-1956)
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Zealots
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religious "party" in Second Temple period; revolutionaries; eager to see the Romans driven from the land of Israel and looked forward to a restoration of Israel's sovereignty and of its monarchy; believing that god would fight on their side, they sought to expel the Roman army through direct action
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First Jewish War against Rome
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66 AD-70 AD; ended in defeat of Jewish forces and in the destruction of the Second Temple
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The Formative Age
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also called Rabbinic Age (70AD-700AD); synagogue provided a substitute for the Temple, but it was never like the Temple a place of animal sacrifice, nor was it under the control of a priesthood (the Temple could only stand in one place, but a synagogue could be built anywhere); marked the emergence of a religious intellectuals known as Rabbis (who saw themselves as sages or wisdom teachers); signature accomplishment was the writing and compilation of the Talmud, which was soon seen as a second Torah
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Rabbi
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Hebrew, "my master"
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Hillel
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a Rabbi who supposedly came up with the Golden Rule
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Talmud
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collection of expansive, often highly imaginative interpretations of biblical law; its format is dialogical (that is, a series of question-and-answer exchanges); practical objective of all these debates was the creation of an authoritative form of ritual behavior- referred to in Hebrew as halacha- that would enable the observant Jew to sanctify daily life and fulfill the commandments imparted to Moses on Sinai; two stages of formation of Talmud: 1) Mishnah ("repetition") is written in Hebrew and consists of economical formulations of halacha, often accompanied by an attribution to a particular rabbinic scholar, 2)Gemara ("completion") is written in Aramaic and the rabbinic debates recorded there often take up where the Mishnah leaves off
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The Conflict between Judaism and Christianity
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those early followers of Jesus, who may have thought of him as a prophet, or even a Messiah-figure, were soon displaced by those who saw Jesus as the "Son of God", and who eventually came to believe in him as the incarnate human form of YHWH; in Judaism, the deity was a transcendent being, and any material representation of God was merely a metaphor, while in Christianity, the embodiment of the divine in Jesus as the "Christ" soon became a central doctrine; in Christianity, the Church was uniquely empowered to enable those in a state of sin to obtain forgiveness and true righteousness (through the sacrifice of Jesus), while Jews believed that good works could help one obtain divine mercy; with the Roman Emperor Constantine's conversion to Christianity, Judaism found itself facing a religious and political, violent antagonist (institutionalized hatred)
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The Age of Philosophy and Mysticism
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500AD-1600AD; Jewish Diaspora stretched very far (Askenazim= Jews in Europe, Sephardim= Jews living Spain, Portugal, and parts of North Africa; Mizrachim= Jews living in various parts of the Middle East); some of most creative developments in Judaism took place during this period; as the Palestinian Jewish community dwindled, the center of Jewish intellectual life shifted to Babylonia
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The Karaites
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challenged Jewish community from a group within; anti-rabbinic Jews who rejected the very notion on "Oral Torah", and therefore rejected both the Talmud and whatever claims to religious authority the Rabbis had asserted since the beginning of the Common Era; Rabbi Saadiah ben Joseph argued in defense of Rabbis that the interpretation of Scripture rested not only on a profound knowledge of the language of Scripture but also on "reliable tradition"
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The Encounter with Islam
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Jews accorded a degree of tolerance within Muslim societies that they rarely encountered in Christian lands; Rabbi Saadiah ben Joseph realized need to present Judaism to an educated Jewish audience already familiar with the teachings of both Islam and Greek philosophy, and to do so in a way that did not contradict Jewish Scriptures (and so Saadiah published The Book of Beliefs and Opinions in 933 AD, which is the earliest example of scholasticism in Jewish thought- that is, a systematic attempt to reconcile faith and reason by relating mainstream religious beliefs to contemporary philosophical arguments)
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Maimonides
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Moses ben Maimon (1135-1204); listed every single one of the 613 biblical commandments; clearly describes what he believed to be the thirteen essential articles of Jewish belief, thereby creating a dogmatic framework for any subsequent discussion of Judaism as a faith-system; distrusted any comparison between humanity and the eternal creator (emphasizes God's "otherness"); created a demythologized version of messianic Judaism
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The Kabbalah
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collectively, the many diverse traditions that make up the the world of Jewish mysticism; "received tradition"; acknowledges hidden "essence" of YHWH, which cannot be fully grasped and certainly never directly perceived or represented
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Zohar
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the bible of Kabbalah; entire structure of divine qualities and emanations is laid out in the form of a biblical madras, that is, an extended interpretation of select passages form the Book of Genesis; holds a theory of immanence- or of divine-human interaction
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Rabbi Isaac Luria
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1534-1572); known as the Ari (or "holy lion"); taught that the individual believer could liberate the divine "spark" within by careful observance of the divine commandments and acts of self-discipline and meditation; envisioned each soul undergoing a series of reincarnations, as the soul constantly strives to return to its Source
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Baal Shem Tov (1700-1760)
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taught the necessarily of releasing the spark of holiness within and thereby hastening the approach of the Messiah; referred to as the "Master of the Good Name"; fame derived from faith healings and exorcisms
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Hasidism
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"pious ones"; formed by Baal Shem Tov and his followers; believed that God could be found everywhere, and everyone was at least potentially capable of spiritual communion with the Creator; to worship God properly, one need not be a master scholar, nor engage in acts of self-mortification, nor even engage in constant prayer; the most ordinary of everyday acts, he insisted, if performed with an awareness of God's nearness and in a spirit of joy and love, become acts of spiritual devotion and serve to make everyday life sacred; urged disciples to choose a spirit guide, or tsaddik ("righteous one"), to provide a living example for themselves and the rest of the community of what it is like to live a life of intense religious commitment and intimacy with God- result is that virtually all Hasidic communities are centered around the personality and religious leadership of one man- often referred to in Yiddish as the Rebbe- whose authority in all things is largely unchallenged
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The Modern Era
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many Jews lived in the Jewish Quarter of many cities (i.e., the Ghettos)- a symbol of political and cultural containment
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Moses Mendelssohn
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principal representative for his time of the Age of Enlightenment (referred to in Hebrew as the Haskalah); eloquently defended religious freedom, coupled with a defense of the Jewish faith, in a volume entitled Jerusalem (1783), in which he argued that all religious share certain common beliefs (such as the existence of a benevolent Creator-God); Mendelssohn proposed that Judaism was unique because it emphasized doing God's will rather than professing correct ideas about God or the afterlife
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Reform Movement
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sought to accomplish two goals: first, the modernization of Jewish thought and ritual practice, and, second, the acculturation of Jews to the secular culture of 19th century Europe and America; split into Reform Judaism and Conservative Judaism
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Reform Judaism
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more radical type of reformist thinking flourished in the US after the Civil War; rejected the biblical idea of a direct, finite, and exclusive revelation from God- opted instead for the concept of an evolving (and therefore universal) revelation; got rid of many "antiquated" Jewish practices; declared Jews no longer were determined to return to Palestine
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Conservative Judaism
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offered a more moderate departure from traditional (or what is now called "Orthodox") beliefs and practices; acknowledged the evolutionary character of Judaism, but were not willing to abandon either principles of faith or religious behaviors that had defined Judaism for many centuries; high level of adaptation to secular culture combined with a selective realization of halacha (with respect, for example, to travel on the Sabbath) and institutional innovations frowned upon by the Orthodox community (like the ordinations of women as rabbis); supported Zionism- the formation of a Jewish nation-state in what is now Israel and for the emigration of American Jews to this state
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Reconstructionist Judaism
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offshoot of Conservative Judaism; emerged in America and centered on teachings of Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan; occupies a philosophical position somewhere between Conservatism and Reform; held firm to the concept of a Jewish nationhood and tended to place greater emphasis upon the historical continuity of religious customs than did Reform Judaism; had a more naturalistic concept of God, as the expression of whatever moral and spiritual potential human beings possess in their search for holiness and righteousness (abandonment of concept of divine transcendence)
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The Shoah
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the Holocaust; means "whirlwind", referencing the insane rage of anti-Semitic hatred that was loosed on Europe's Jews during WWII; word preferred over Holocaust because it avoids the connotation of a divinely commanded sacrifice, which is exactly what the biblical term "holocaust" brings to mind; Nazis destroyed 1/3 of world's Jewish population; not viewed by theologians as divine punishment (break with traditional Jewish thought)
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Ignaz Maybaum
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the Shoah can be seen as a kind of churban, through which the Jews perform an act of vicarious atonement for the sins of the world
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Richard Rubenstein
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insists that the Shoah challenges, at the most fundamental level, Judaism's belief in a just and benevolent Creator who values every single human life
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Eliezer Berkovits
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Shoah reflects God's restraint in interfering with human life (in order to allow human beings to be capable of choice)
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Abraham Joshua Heschel
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only defensible Jewish theology after the Shoah is one that posits God's need for, and yearning after, humankind; God's longing for us does not annul the reality of evil but does establish what Heschel calls an "analogy of being", that is, a hint of divine likeness in every soul, and thereby the capacity to mend a broken world
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Statehood for Israel
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establishment of state of Israel in 1948 is second pivotal event of modern Jewish history; Moses Hess argued that anti-Semitism was an ineradicable presence in Western society, and therefore Jews could never hope to assimilate successfully into a society in which they were bound to be hated (the only solution is to reestablish a Jewish state in Palestine); Theodor Herzl said largely the same thing in this book The Jewish State (1898); in 1917, British Zionists found a sympathetic advocate in the foreign minister of Great Britain, Lord Arthur Balfour
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Zionism
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rests on a few basic assumptions: 1)anti-Semitism may abate from time to time, but it will never disappear, and as long as Jews are hated anywhere in the world, their lives are in peril, 2)only guarantee of physical survival in a hostile world is national sovereignty- because only a nation-state can effectively defend its citizens; 3)the guest-host relationship Jews have lived under, whether in Christian or Muslim lands, has always been inherently unstable and on occasion threatening to Jewish survival
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The Feminist Challenge
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traditionally, the status of women in Judaism has been that of a respected but subordinate member of the religious community, and for many centuries Jewish women lived in a male-dominant culture (assumption was that a woman's chief responsibility was raising of children and maintenance of home); privilege of advanced religious study was reserved exclusively for men; first woman Rabbi in American Reform movement= Sally Priesand; reform liturgists began to experiment with gender-neutral words for God, like "Eternal One"
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The Challenge of Humanist Judaism
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the rejection of Judaism's central God-concept by secular jews who found any form of theism philosophically untenable; logical response to the insane violence of the Shoah; one can remain a Jew, sociologically and culturally, while at the same time rejecting any belief in a supernatural creator; believe that Jews are a people first, and only secondarily a religious community
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God
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Jewish religion is a type of ethical monetheism, as it assumes the existence of a Creator-God whose benevolence and goodness are reflected in His love of humanity and who has imparted to the Jews ethical principles by which they (and the rest of the human race) are expected to live; God is understood to be omniscient and omnipotent; Judaism's idea of transcendence presupposes that a fundamental difference in reality exists between God and the world He has brought into existence; belief that Creator-God was also the shaping force or will behind our universe and our human world
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The Problem of Evil
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question of how God can be benevolent and omniscient and still let events like the Shoah occur; original answer to question= the people of Israel have sinned against God by violating His Covenant, and therefore God has no alternative but to punish those who have rejected Him and His laws- this viewpoint has become increasingly less popular, however; another idea is that of a "divine eclipse": the belief that God periodically conceals Himself from human understanding, thereby creating a seeming void in which evil, for a time, may prevail (although God does still remain present in human hearts during His "absence")
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Torah
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Judaism claims to be a "revealed" religion and believes in divine-human communication (as proved by the texts that exist); the scrolls of the Torah are the parchment scrolls of the first five books of the Hebrew Bible (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy)- these scrolls contain virtually all scared legislation within the Hebrew Bible; often referred to as "The Law"; some belief in the Oral Torah, or the Talmud
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Mitzvot
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"commandments"; 613 commandments in total (although many of those are no longer applicable w/o a Temple in Jerusalem); at heart of sacred law are the Ten Commandments (bedrock of Jewish faith and social and philosophical ideals); informally means "good deeds"- greatest mitzvah is the study of the Torah; there are practical limits to carrying out commandments, acknowledged in rabbinic law under the principle of pikuach nefesh, or "the preservation of life": whenever carrying out a mitzvah entails imminent risk to one's life or health, one is released from that obligation until the threat to life has passed (except, with regards to worshipping another God)
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B'rit
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Covenant; on God's side, an unconditional promise is given to the patriarch Abraham that his descendants would be numerous and that they would inhabit the land God had given Abraham as a legacy; the people of Israel, meanwhile, are expected to live up to all of God's demands and to obey His mitzvot; the penalty for disobeying God is a temporary dissolution of the covenant connection, couple with such punishments as famine, defeat in war, etc.- provide a theological rationale for the worldwide dispersion of Jews and their subsequent statelessness
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Election
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belief that the Jewish people have been "chosen" by God to receive His laws and to live in His presence (no concept in Judaism has evoked more hostility and misunderstanding); covenant demands that Israel actively serve God's purpose in history: first by becoming a "holy nation", completely obedient to His will, and second by representing God to the peoples of the world who have no knowledge of His existence; Jews have come to see their "chosenness" as simply an obligation to serve both God and humanity, rather than as an assertion of moral or religious superiority
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Conversion
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those who enter Judaism by choice are required by tradition to prove their sincerity and to undertake a term of study to prepare for full participation in Jewish religious life; the final stage of conversion customarily entails circumcision for men who are not already circumcised, and for both men and women immersion in ritual pool (known as a mikveh in Hebrew); Jewish religious identity traditionally traced through mother's line
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Israel
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for many years, connoted both a political and a spiritual community, a double frame of reference that is still preserved within the synagogue liturgy; God's covenant, it is believed, was established with the b'nei yisrael- literally, the "children of Israel"; many Jews today are comfortable with their double identity as members of both a religious and ethnic community (although many also have become citizens of another nation and sought to define Judaism as solely a religion)
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Aliyah
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"to ascend"; to immigrate to Israel and become citizens of a Jewish state
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The Messiah and the Messianic Age
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at its root, mashiach ("anointed one") means any person who was ceremonially anointed with oil in preparation for becoming a priest or king; later extended to an unnamed future "prince" who would redeem his people from subjugation to a foreign nation; some writers imbued Messiah with more supernatural elements, and saw him as an instrument of divine power through whom God would accomplish both the final judgment and the ultimate renewal of life on earth; there have been many "false" Messiahs attempting to defraud Jews (but still that belief in a Messiah has persisted into the modern era, even among traditionalist communities)
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The Afterlife
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Olam Ha-Bah ("the world to come"); beliefs in afterlife are largely post biblical in origin; for most biblical writer, death of the body entailed the passage of the soul into an underworld (Sheol=pit), where it would remain forever; many reform-minded Jews concluded that any belief in an existence beyond this world was either an archaic folk-belief or an insupportable, unscientific hypothesis (although many Orthodox Jews maintain a belief in an afterlife)
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Jewish Mysticism
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visionary passages can be found throughout the Book of Ezekiel and in other prophetic texts- testify to a tradition of ecstatic mediation in biblical Judaism in which a prophetic writer experiences the presence of God in a manner that is at once direct and mysterious; what distinguished the Kabbalah school of mystical writers from other visionary writers was a fascination with the mysterious prices of world-creation and a deep curiosity over the role of the Creator in this process; key to Kabbalah is the image of the Sephirot, which are ten in number and can be visualized as connected "spheres" of divine power- as such, they come to represent at least one of two things: the primary attributes of God and the dynamic emanations of His creative force; every blessing uttered by a Jew can be invested with an almost magical power to "heal" the world (Hebrew, tikkun olam) and is directly related to soul's longing to reunite with its Creator; the end-goal of this longing, kabbalists believe, is devekut, or a clinging to God that represents the highest state in mystical Judaism of the covenant relationship
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Lurianic cosmology
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before creation, God withdrew into Himself, thereby creating an empty space in which a material universe could take shape; then the Creator allowed rays of light to penetrate the void, resulting in a concentration of this creative force into ten spheres (the Sephrot); however, the ten "vessels" God had prepared to hold this Sephirotic light mysteriously shattered, leaving the material universe in disarray (true origin or evil an dissuader in the world)- resulted in scattering of divine "sparks" throughout the cosmos, and particularly within the human soul; with the coming of the Messiah, all these "sparks" would be reunited with God; ideas and images derived from Kabbalah continue to exert some influence on contemporary Jewish thought
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Rosh Hashanah
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Jewish New Year, celebrated for two days at the beginning of the month of Tishri (Sept-Oct); year begins with a period of self-reflection, signaled by the blowing of a ram's horn (shofar) during the synagogue service- which is designed to awaken the conscience of the worshiper to the need for repentance and reconciliation with God; it is customary to eat a dish of apples and honey as an expression of hope that they coming year will be one of sweet fruitfulness and fulfillment, as well as for Jews to greet each other with the words l'shanah tovah tikatevu- "may you be inscribed for a good year" at end of service (based on ancient idea that God writes names between the New Year and Yom Kippur of those who will live or die in the Book of Life, the Book of Death, and the Book of Intermediate Souls
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Yom Kippur
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Day of Atonement; most solemn day in Judaism's sacred calendar; there is a dusk-to-dusk fast and penitential prayers; repentance must be accompanied by some restorative action; in Orthodox communities, it is customary for married couples to abstain from intimacy, for men to wear white garments (symbolic of purification) to synagogue, and to neither shave nor bathe (as one were in mourning); one cannot work on Yom Kippur either
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Sukkot
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five days after the conclusion of Yom Kippur, Jews undertake a week-long full harvest celebration, known as Sukkot (Hebrew, "booths"); displays symbols of the seasons, like palm frond (lulav), citron (etrog), and leaves of the willow tree (aravah) and the myrtle (hadassah); it is customary to adorn the sukkah- or temporary hut, from which Sukkot derives its name0 with each of these plants- Jews are encouraged to eat and sleep in the sukkah, so as to reenact, symbolically, the biblical Exodus; one usually attend synagogue during the first two days and the last two days of the festival, offering Thanksgiving prayers- each worshipper is required to carry a lulav and an etrog to morning services, and in the course of the ceremony both the lulav and etrog are waved in six directions, signifying God's presence throughout the universe; the biblical book of Ecclesiastes is read on the Sabbath of Sukkot; at the conclusion of the Sukkot, an eighth day of prayer and celebration, known as Shemini Atzeret ("the Eighth Day of Assembly") is the culminating moment in the process of expressing one's gratitude to God for the bounty of the world; traditionally, Jews living outside Israel divide up the Shemini Atzeret into two days, with the second day referred to as Simchat Torah ("Joy of the Torah"), the day on which the annual reading of the first five books of the Hebrew reading comes to an end
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Pesach
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"Passover:; week-long festival to recount the Exodus sorry and to celebrate this event through a ceremonial mean known as a Seder- a practice that may well have begun in biblical times; March-April celebration; the first two days and the last two days are subject to the same restrictions that govern any chag- no work and limited travel; no foods containing yeast may be consumed during this period; observance begins in the evening in the home, where is the Seder is celebrated, followed the next morning by a festival service in the synagogue; children play a very prominent role in this rite by being given questions to anew, songs to sing, etc.; combined celebration of nature's bounty, historical members, and redemptive visions of the future, all of which turn upon the ancient miracles of god's intervention on behalf of an enslaved Israel
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Seder
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the Seder consists of two rituals in one: 1)a festive meal, featuring biblical and seasonal foods that reflect the Exodus story, and 2)a liturgy, found in an ancient text called the Haggadah (Hebrew, "telling"), which contains both the story of Israel's escape from Egypt and a collection of hymns and songs and rabbinic commentaries in praise of God, who made that deliverance possible; during the Seder meal, other foods are displayed or consumed (bitter herbs- for bitterness of slavery, mixture of wine, chopped nuts, and apples- symbolically representing mortar used by Israelite slaves to build cities and pyramids, a roasted lamb shank bone- sacrifice of lambs by Israelites before departure from Egypt, four small symbolic cups of wine- reminder of the many blessings god bestowed upon ancient Israel and continues to bestow upon the Jewish people (a fifth cup is set aside for prophet Elijah, whose symbolic presence at the Seder represents the hope that a Messiah will some day appear and bring peace and justice into the world)
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Matzah
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a type of unleavened flatbread that, according to biblical writers, the escaping Israelites baked in haste while fleeing Egypt
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Shavuot
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"weeks"; seven weeks after Pesach; became associated with giving of the Torah on Mt. Sinai; involves a public reading in synagogue of the Ten Commandments; celebrated for two days in May-June, but its festivities are less elaborate than those connected to Pesach or Sukkot; common to decorate synagogue with flowers and to serve meatless meals with honey as a key ingredient, those these practices are not obligatory; common also is a public reading of the Book of Ruth and staying up the entire first night of the chag for the purpose of studying some portion of the Torah; for Jews it is as much a reenactment as it is a remembrance of that central event in biblical history
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Hanukkah
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commemorates the Maccabean rebellion that began in 167 BC against the tyrannical rule of the Syrian monarch, Antiochus IV, who sought to suppress the practice of Judaism within Palestine and who "defiled" the Temple in Jerusalem by dedicating it to the Greek gods; Hanukkah celebrates the recovery and cleansing of the Jerusalem Temple and the mural of the lights that Jewish tradition records (people only had one flask of oil, but this continued to burn for eight days, thus attesting to the renewal of God's presence within the Temple and to His continuing commitment to Jewish survival; the candle-lighting ceremony (one lights a candle each night for eight nights until a menorah is completely lit) is accompanied by the chanting of prayers, the singing of songs, and in more recent times the giving of gifts; common game is with the dreidel, on whose 4 sides are inscribed four Hebrew letters, which stand for the words meaning "a great miracle occurred there"
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Purim
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occurs in Februar-March; carnival-like holiday; celebrates a victory, this time over an antagonist named Haman, who appears in the Book of Esther as a would-be destroyer of the Jewish people (this appears, though, to have little or no historical basis, unlike Hanukkah); for Orthodox Jews, Purim begins with a fast; includes a reading of the megillah (or scroll) or Esther, during which congregants interrupt with shouting and stamping every time man's name is read aloud; rabbis long ago sanctioned practice of drinking to excess on Purim, contributing to an atmosphere of barely-controlled anarchy; common practice of dressing children in costumes that suggest that the principal characters in the Esther story; often referred to as the Jewish Mardi Gras; includes sending of gifts to friends, or to the poor, and the eating of triangular-shaped fruit-filled cookies known as hamantaschen (thought to represent Haman's ear,s, or hat, or pockets)
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Tu B'Shevat
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in Jan-Feb; "New Year's Day of Trees"; Jewish version of Arbor Day- typically trees are planted on this day and monies are set aside for the poor; some Jewish communities hold a special Seder on this day
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Tisha B'Av
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commemorates the destruction of both the First Temple by the Babylonians in 587 BC and the Second Temple by the Romans in 70 AD; commonly celebrated in July or August; Jews fast from sunset to sunset as they remember tragedies in Jewish history; day of collective contrition and virtual mourning, as Jews gather in synagogues to read from the Book of Lamentations and sing hymns; in many Orthodox and Conservative communities, congregants don't wear prayer shawls but sit on low stools in a darkened sanctuary; gives way, a week later, to the Sabbath of Comfort, where prophet Isaiah reassures Jews that God will never forget them
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Yom HaShoah
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Holocaust Memorial Day is the most recent addition to the Jewish sacred calendar; in March-April; date was chosen because it coincides with the beginning of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising of 1943 ; not a fast day; customary to gather and recite memorial prayers for the dead and to light commemorative candles in the ome
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The Sabbath
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forms core of the sacred calendar in Judaism; day of prayer and rest; its observance is explicitly mandated in the Ten Commandments; the Torah provides two rations for Shabbat: in the Book of Exodus, it is identified as the day which God rested from His creative labors and in the book of Deuteronomy, it is associated with the Exodus from Egypt and liberation from slavery; represents idea that God has separated sacred time from ordinary time, and so must we; begins at dusk on Friday and concludes at sundown on Saturday- ushered in by lighting of two candles in the house reminiscent of first act of creation; Erev Shabbat (Sabbath evening) service is conducted in the synagogue: Sabbath itself is seen as a "bride" and the feelings aroused by the "joy of the Sabbath" are similar to the emotions evoked by a wedding; Sabbath meal begins with a prayer of sanctification recited over wine and a blessing said over two loaves of bread (Sabbath bread is called challah); ; after Sabbath morning service where portion of Torah is read, the remainder of the day is spent in quiet study or in rest until the evening when the last two worship services are celebrated and a separation ceremony (Havdalah) is celebrated with a cup of wine, a braided candle, and a spice box; Sabbath is the most direct link to the ancient past
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Birth
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on the eighth day of life, Jewish males are circumcised- as part of a divine commandment imparted to the biblical patriarch Abraham and incumbent upon all of his male descendants from that time forward; after the mohel (a ritual-circumciser, who is usually a medically trained professional) has removed a portion of the infant's foreskin, the newborn receives his Hebrew name, which traditionally consists of the child's own name and that of the father (for example, Isaac son of Abraham); worldwide practice of bringing the newborn to the synagogue on the first Sabbath after birth- then the baby girl is given a Hebrew name (this ceremony is briyhayim= "covenant of life")
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Bar/Bat Mitzvah and Confirmation
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Jewish males enter stage of religious maturity at 13 years; serious underlying purpose is the preparation of young person to assume what the rabbis have called the "yoke of Torah"; Bar Mitzvah expected to deliver a d'rash, or a brief scholarly explanation of the portion of the Torah that he had just read; Confirmation: a process of study and ritual performance by both young men and young women- Reform and Conservative congregations added this ceremony to the process of Jewish education; instead of supplanting the Bar Mitzvah, the Confirmation ceremony simply became a secondary stage of the passage to adulthood
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Marriage and Divorce
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marriage assumed to be both monogamous and enduring- a relationship upon which divine blessings can be invoked; first, the bride and groom drink from the same wine cup, and, second, having the groom present the bride with her marriage contract (Hebrew, ketuvah- this is essentially a prenuptial agreement and the core of the marriage rite in Judaism); finally, at the conclusion of the ceremony, the groom crushes a wine glass with his shoe- traditionally understood to symbolize the destruction of the two Temples- whereupon the attending guests shout Mazel Tov (Hebrew, "good luck"); Divorce: after marriage counseling has been tried and failed, the couple comes before a rabbinic court (Hebrew, bet din) that consists of three rabbis who hear the case; the divorce document (Hebrew, get) is then drawn up- the husband can marry again whenever, but the wife must wait 3 months to marry again (on the presumption that she may be pregnant); if her husband refuses to grant her a divorce- or cannot do so because he is missing- traditional Jewish law leaves her few options for dissolving the marriage (such a woman in an agunah- Hebrew, "chained woman")
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Death and Mourning
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whenever possible, a Jewish burial will take place within twenty-four hours of death (unless Sabbath or a festival interferes); body is prepared for burial by being bathed and wrapped in a shroud, then traditionally placed in a simple pine box, thus discouraging ostentation; mourners express sorrow at burial service by a symbolic tearing of their clothes while reciting prayers of praise for God and comfort for the soul of the deceased- people discouraged though from showing excess grief; once burial occurs, the family of the deceased enter into a weeklong period of intensive mourning known as shivah (Hebrew, "seven"), interrupted only by the Sabbath- mourners do not work, remain at home, and receive well-wishers; customary for friends to form a prayer quorum (Hebrew, minyan) in the home so that morning and evening prayers may be recited; after the week is up, the mourners will abstain for the remainder of that month from entertainments of all kinds and remain in a somber state of mind; erecting of a tombstone does not normally occur until eleven months have passed- then, close relatives are expected to visit the grace at least once a year as well as to recite prayers in memory of the dead during memorial services held during all major festivals; customary to light candles in the home at the time of the yearly anniversary and to place small stones on the gravestone
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The Dietary Code
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The essentials of the Jewish dietary code (Hebrew, kashrut) are as follows: 1)the only animals that may be late are those that have been properly slaughtered; no animal that has been killed by other or that has died a natural death may be consumed 2)the only quadrupeds that may be eaten are those with split hooves who also chew the cud (like cows or goats), and once properly slaughtered their blood must be drained away 3)no fish may be eaten that does not have both fins and scales 4)no insects may be consumed at all 5)no meat dish may be eaten at the same time as a milk dish; "kosher"= meaning in conformity to rabbinic standards of food selection and preparation; some neutral foods, known by the Yiddish term pareve, and they may be eaten at either a meat-based or a milk-based meal; makes act of eating a religiously self-conscious event
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Family Purity
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women must be attentive (especially in Orthodox churches) to ritual "purity", and so attend a mikveh (Hebrew, "pool") at the conclusion of their menstrual period; sometimes husband and wife will abstain from sexual intimacy not only during the entire period of menstruation, but for seven days thereafter; the mikveh is a symbolic act of spiritual preparation; rabbinical laws governing this process are known as taharat hamish-pachah (Hebrew, "purity of the family"); added concern for maintaining a distance from the normative behavior of non-Jewish societies; only a distinguishing mark of family life within the Orthodox Jewish home
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Prayer
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there are prayers of praise, confession, petition, and thanksgiving; biblical writers addressed God in a language that is at once intimate and awestruck; all prayers in Judaism are addressed directly to God and all assume His compassion and just concern; the architectural arrangement of early synagogues oriented the entire building in the direction of Jerusalem, though in later centuries Jews were content with placing the Ark- a large, upright cupboard designed to hold several scrolls of the Torah- on the eastern wall; the most common setting for prayer in Judaism is communal (quorum of worshipers= minyan, sometimes consists of ten males 13 years old or older); during the morning service (Hebrew, shacharit), men traditionally wear a prayer shawl (Hebrew, tallit) and phylacteries or prayer-amulets (Hebrew, tefillin) throughout and then remove them at the conclusion of prayers; once the Sabbath it is customary to wear the tallit during prayer services, with tefillin worn only during weekday prayers; a head covering (known as a kipah or a yarmulke) is worn during prayer, chiefly by males and as a sign of respect; prayer services are conducted in the later afternoon (Hebrew, minchah) and early evening (Hebrew, maariv) as well and they consist of certain fixed prayers that represent a succinct summation of Jewish faith; one of the most powerful prayers is the Shema, recited during morning and evening services and which consists of biblical verses that first declare the unity of God and then declare Israel's commitment to His service- it is traditionally the last prayer one utters before death; in Orthodox and Conservative congregations, it is customary to read aloud a portion from the Torah every week, on Monday and Thursday mornings, and especially on the Sabbath (morning and later afternoon); all readings are normally recited or chanted in Hebrew- in modern times, though, Hebrew reading skills began to decline rapidly
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What is Ultimate Reality?
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Ein Sof or Infinite One- one God of Jewish faith is understood to be not only the source of all created things but also the highest and most complete form of reality the human mind can imagine
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How Should We Live in this World?
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divine commandments meant to bring humans into conformity with God's will; all ideas of right and wrong- like the Ten Commandments- must, therefore, be referred back to God's revelation of His will at Sinai and the Torah's laws that govern human conduct; biblical writers and rabbinic commentators believed that humans were created in God's image but at the same time are tor between good and bad
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What is Our Ultimate Purpose?
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belief that both individuals and whole societies are capable of changing their behavior and that, through active repentance, they are even capable of drawing closer to each other and to God; soul is immortal and survives death- the fate of the soul and God's judgment of that soul remain a subject a speculation and wonder, even today
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Baal Shem Tov (1698-1760)
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a charismatic faith-healer, mystic, and teacher (whose given name was Israel ben Eliezer) who is generally regarded as the founder of the Hasidic movement
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Bar/Bat Mitzvah
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a rite of passage for adolescents in Judaism, the Bar Mitzvah (for males age 13) and the Bat Mitzvah (for females age 12-13) signal their coming-of-age and the beginning of adult religious responsibility
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Covenant
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a biblical concept that describes the relationship between God and the Jews in contractual terms, often thought of as an eternal bond between the Creator and the descendants of the ancient Israelites
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Dead Sea Scrolls
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religious literature hidden in caves near the shores of the Dead Sea (second-first centuries BC)
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Diaspora
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a Greek word in origin, it refers to those Jewish communities that live outside of the historical land of Israel
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election
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the belief that the biblical God "chose" the people of Israel to be His "kingdom of priests" and a "holy nation; this biblical concept is connected to the idea of the Covenant, and it entrails the belief that the Jews' relationship with God obliges them to conform to HIs laws and fulfill His purposes in the world
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eschatological
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any belief in an "End-Time" of divine judgment and world destruction
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ethical monotheism
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a core concept of Judaism: it is the belief that the world was created and is governed by only one transcendent Being, whose ethical attributes provide an ideal model for human behavior
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Exodus
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the escape (or departure) of Israelite slaves from Egypt as described in the Hebrew Bible (c. 1250 BC)
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halacha
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an authoritative formation of Hebrew law
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Hasidism
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a popular movement within eighteenth century Eastern European Judaism, Hasidism stressed the need for spiritual restoration and deepened individual piety; in the course of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries the Hasidic movement spawned a number of distinctive communities that have physically separated themselves from the rest of the Jewish and non-Jewish worlds, and who are often recognized by their attire and their devotion to a dynasty of hereditary spiritual leaders
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Holocaust
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the genocidal destruction of approximately 6 million European Jews by the government of Nazi Germany during WWII; this mass slaughter is referred to in Hebrew as the Shoah
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Kabbalah
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one of the dominant forms of Jewish mysticism, cabalistic texts begin to appear in Europe during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries; mystics belonging to this tradition focus on the emanative powers of God- referred to in Hebrew as Sephirot- and on their role within the Godhead as well as within the human personality
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Luria, Isaac
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a sixteenth-century mystic who settled in Safed (Israel) and gathered around him a community of disciples; Lurianic mysticism seeks to explain the mystery surrounding both the creation of the world and its redemption from sin
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Maimonides
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a twelfth-century philosopher and rabbinic scholar whose codification of Jewish beliefs and religious practices set the standard for both in subsequent centuries
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Messiah
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a possibly supernatural figure who will judge and transform the world
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Mikveh
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a ritual bath in which married Jewish women immerse themselves each month, after the end of their menstrual cycle and before resuming sexual relation with their husbands
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Mitzvot
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literally translated, the Hebrew word mitzvot means "commandments" and it refers to the 613 commandments that the biblical God imparted to the Israelites in the Torah
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Moses
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the legendary leader and prophet who leads the Israelite slaves out of Egypt, Moses serves as a mediator between the people of Israel and God in the Torah and is later viewed as Israel's greatest prophet; it is to Moses that God impacts the Ten Commandments and the teachings that later became the Torah
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omnipotence
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the divine attribute of total and eternal power
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omniscience
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the divine attributed of total and eternal knowledge
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Pesach
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an early spring harvest festival that celebrates the liberation of the Israelites from Egypt, Pesach (known as "Passover" in English) is celebrated for seven days in Israel and eight days in the Diaspora; the first two nights are celebrated within a family setting
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Rosh Hashanah
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the Jewish New Year, it is celebrated for two days in the fall (on the first day of the month Tishrai) and accompanied by the blowing of ram's horn (a shofar, in Hebrew); it signals the beginning of the "ten days of repentance" that culminates with Yom Kippur
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Seder
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a ritualized meal, observed on the first two nights of Peach, that recalls the Exodus from Egypt
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Shavuot
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a later spring harvest festival that is celebrated for two days and is associated with the giving of the Torah at Mt. Sinai; along with the Pesach and Sukkot it was one of the "pilgrimage" festivals in ancient times
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Siddur
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the prayer book that is used on weekdays and on the Sabbath
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Sukkot
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a fall harvest festival that is associated with the huts (in Hebrew, sukkot) in which the ancient Israelites sought shelter during the Exodus; it is celebrated for seven days in Israel (eight days in the Diaspora); during that time Jews take their meals, and if possible sleep, in huts that are partly open to the sky
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synagogue
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Jewish houses of worship; the focal point of every synagogue is the Ark, a large cabinet where scrolls of the Torah are stored
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tallit
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a prayer-shawl that is worn during morning prayers (traditionally by men); the fringes of they shawl represent, symbolically, the 613 mitzvot found in the Torah
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Talmud
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a multi-volume work of commentary on the laws of the Torah and on the teachings of the entire Hebrew Bible, composed in two stagesL the Mishnah (edited in approximately 200 AD) and the Gemara (edited, in its Babylonian version, around 500 AD); traditionally, Jews refer to the Talmud as the "Oral Torah" and referred it as an extension of sacred scripture
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Tanakh
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an acronym standing for the entire Hebrew Bible: Torah (the first five books of the Hebrew Bible); Neviim (or "Prophets", which includes works of both prophecy and history); and Khetuvim (or "Writings", a miscellaneous gathering of works in poetry and pose); taken together, the 24 books that make of this collection constitute the core "scriptures" of Judaism
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Tefillin
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taken from the word for "prayer", the term tefillin refers to two small boxes to which leader straps are attached; traditionally, Jewish males from the age of 13 wear tefillin during weekday morning prayers; inside each of these boxes a miniature parchment containing biblical verses can be found; one box is placed on the forehead and the other is placed on the left arm, signifying that the individuals mind and will are devoted to God
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Torah
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literally, the word torah means "teaching"; and in its most restrictive sense it refers to the first five books of the Hebrew Bible; less restrictively, it signifies the totality of God's revelations to the Jewish people, which includes not only the remaining books of the Hebrew Bible but also the writings contained in the Talmud
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transcendence
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the divine attribute of being above an beyond anything human beings can know or imagine
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YHWH
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these four consonants constitute the most sacred of names associated with the biblical God; the exact pronunciation of this name, according to ancient Jewish tradition, was known only to the High Priest, but after the destruction of the Second Temple the precise vocalization of these letters was lost- only to be recovered in the days of the Messiah
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Yom Kippur
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referred to as the "Day of Atonement", it is the most solemn of all of the fast-days in the Jewish religious calendar
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Zionism
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a modern political philosophy that asserts a belief in Jewish national identity and in the necessity of resuming national life within the historical Land of Israel
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Zohar
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a kabbalistic midrash based on the biblical Book of Genesis
