Three Variants of Jewish Traditions - Coursework Example

?Judaism Features of Judaism Judaism, the religion of the Jews, is considered as one of the oldest monotheistic religions, which held the roots for many other Western Religions. The most basic characteristic of Judaism is in their belief of one God, who created the universe and rules it. According to the Jews, the God himself revealed to the Israelites at the Mount Sinai, to deliver the commandments for them. Judaism believes in the covenant of the God with his people, and so they should acknowledge Him as the only God and obey Him and observe His laws. Their belief lies in the principles that goodness will be rewarded by the God and sins will be certainly punished in the Judgment after death. They also have a strong belief that God would send Messiah to the world by the End of Days to redeem his people to the Promised Land. There are also various religious practices and ethics followed by the Jews, based on their belief in one God. In addition, the laws in Torah, the Jewish bible, form the foundation for their religion based customs and practices. Their way of worship is traditional, three times a day, by reading the scriptures of Torah. According to their customs, Sabbath, the holy day of rest is observed on Saturday, as a reminder about God’s rest after creation. Also Jews are prohibited to do specific kinds of work on that day. Those prohibitory practices are clearly mentioned in their scriptures. The most common Jewish symbol is the ‘Star of David’ that is used to represent them in synagogues. Rise of Synagogues Synagogues, in the olden days, acted as a place for community gatherings on Sabbaths and festivals. Later, after the exile of large number of people from the holy land, the tradition of sacrifice ceased with the prayer being viewed as the means of worship. This established the development of synagogues as an institution where daily prayers, community meeting and religious studies were observed. Soon after the destruction of the Holy Temple, synagogues were given a significant importance as the central place of Jewish religious life, especially for their social and religion based practices. “After the destruction of the Second Temple by the Romans in 70 A.D. the synagogue emerges as a well established institution and the center of the social and religious life of the people.” (Harris, 2010). Though the actual origins of synagogue are not clearly stated in the annals of history, scholars infer that might have got originated right from the olden days of Babylonian exile. However, there is a common misconception that synagogues started to emerge only after the destruction of their temple. This is indeed a wrong concept as synagogues always existed, even during the times of Temple. However, the key point is that the destruction of the Temple primarily led to the rise of synagogues as places of worship. Over the course of time, synagogues replaced the central sanctuary in Jerusalem holding the Ark with the Torah scrolls and the Ner Tamid, the everlasting flame. Comparison of Jewish traditions There exist three variants of Jewish traditions - Orthodox, Conservative and Reformed Jews, differing minimally and maximally by the customs and beliefs that they hold and practice. Orthodox Jews are those who attach the highest level of importance to the scriptures and the prayers, by strictly adhering to the Sabbath laws and traditional beliefs. Conservative Jews are slightly liberal in their belief of Judaism adapting it in line with their contemporary life, which is much contrary to the Orthodox Jewish beliefs which states that the customs and laws of Torah should not be altered or rejected, by any means. In the early 19th century, the Reformed Jewish traditions were formed in response to the Enlightenment in Germany, adopting Judaism as a religion rather than a race or culture. They rejected most or all of the rituals performed pertaining to Torah but much emphasized the ethical aspects of the religion. Unlike Conservative and Orthodox Jews, they hold a belief that Torah is merely a good guideline to achieve spirituality, but not a divine scripture. Though Conservative Jews foster traditional customs in their liturgy like the Orthodox Jews, on the other hand, they have relinquished the ancient oral laws and embrace modernity in their approach, conforming to the Reformed Jewish traditions. “Conservative Jews combine a positive attitude to modern culture, acceptance of critical secular scholarship regarding Judaism’s sacred texts, and also commitment to Jewish observance” (“Variants of Judaism”, n. d). However, all the three streams of Judaism rely on the central belief about the existence of one God, as the creator of universe. Nevertheless, they honor Torah as the centre of Jewish laws, though to varying degrees. At the same time, they commonly subscribe to a total rejection of the concept of Messianic Judaism. Hebrew Scriptures After the Jews were expelled from the Palestine in the aftermath of the destruction of the Holy Temple at Jerusalem, they scattered all over the Roman Empire. The religious leaders started indulging in the restructuring of their Hebrew Scriptures due to the changing times and to develop a new ‘anchor’ for their religion. The Jewish scholars from different places assembled to take the task of reforming their ancient scriptures. The Pentateuch, the first five books of the Old Testament, namely, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy formed the core of the Hebrew Scriptures. In addition, they added 34 more books to it. However, in the later days, they rejected most of the books which were written after 150 BCE. The book of Apocrypha constituted the rejected parts as well as the inter-testament writings in the Scriptures which were used for spiritual guidance. The Hebrew Scriptures were originally written in Hebrew, with a few verses of Aramaic, a language related to Hebrew spoken by the Israelites. On examining the scriptures, scholars have inferred that these were, in fact, an assemblage of texts with some parts belonging to early 1200 BCE, which might have been written over a period of hundreds of years to reach the current form. Since there is no strong evidence towards it, the controversies about the historical, scientific or mythological interpretation of the chapters still exist. “Other findings did not come from official archaeological excavations, raising the possibility they were not even authentic.” (Kalman, 2012, p.6). Holocaust Website Review The Holocaust is the “bureaucratic” and unethical persecution and killing of millions of Jews by the Nazis. This United States Holocaust Memorial Museum website (“President Obama..”, 2012) provides the readers with an enormous amount of information, relevant to the genocide of the Nazis in Europe. It includes online exhibitions of various photos and other materials related to the period as well as thoughtful articles and commentaries. According to the site, the Museum is regarded as well as honored as the living memorial for the Holocaust victims as well as Holocaust as an tragic event, thereby inspiring citizens worldwide and world leaders to oppose such atrocities in future and promote humanity. One of the main aspects or objectives of the website is the ‘prevention of genocide’. In that direction, it wants to create maximum awareness among the countries and the citizens of the world to prevent genocide. The museum through the website is on a mission to disseminate the tragedies of Holocaust, and promote humanity and social responsibilities among citizens worldwide. President Obama has backed this initiative by stating, “Preventing genocide and mass atrocities has long been core to the Museum’s mission, as a key way in which they honor the victims of the Holocaust and give meaning to the promise of “Never Again.” (“President Obama..”, 2012). References Harris, T. (2010). “Overview of Synagogues.” Chasingalion.com. Retrieved from: http://chasingalion.com/0107/our-house-church/61-spiritual-library/topical- studies/synagogues/461-overview-of-synagogues Kalman, M. (2012). “Raiders of the Lost Relics.” The Chronicle. Retrieved from: http://chronicle.com/article/Raiders-of-the-Lost-Relics/132247/ “President Obama Launches Genocide Prevention Initiative at Museum.” (2012). United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Retrieved from: http://blogs.ushmm.org/COC2/838/ “Variants of Judaism.” (n. d). Israel and Judaism Studies. Retrieved from: http://www.ijs.org.au/Variants-within-Judaism/default.aspx Read More