Would you please elaborate on this?
I know that a gentile woman who marries a Jew is sometimes disparagingly called a “shiksa.” Is there an equivalent term for a gentile man who marries a Jewish woman?
Also, would you ever date someone outside of your faith?
Pundit Lisa A shikseh is a perjorative term for any gentile woman, regardless of marital status.
Among many Orthodox (and some Conservative) Jews, any relative who marries outside the faith is referred to as ‘dearly departed’. While many families only cut the relative out of their lives completely, some go to the trouble of a funeral and actual mourning period.
So it turns out that you’re not supposed to pick scabs or cuticles on Shabbat, or bit dead skin off your lip, etc. Actually, I’m planning to speak to my psychiatrist about this- aside from the religious issues, it’s not a healthy habit. Yah know, some days I wonder what type of condition I don’t have.
A shiksa is just a not-nice term for a gentile lady. (Although, to be fair, most people don’t realize it comes from the Hebrew term for ‘abomination’). The male equivalent would be shaigetz, but you don’t hear it as often. (Although there is this joke about how the Manishewitz and the Christian Brothers Wine Company merged to form Manishaigetz). Anyway, like I said, people think it just means “hot gentile woman”. They don’t realize how offensive it is.
If I were interested in dating, I would find myself a nice Jewish boy. As of now, I’m not interesting in romance. But you never know.
What was the deal with the Ultra-Orthodox newspaper photoshopping out female members of the Israeli government and replacing them with images of men? link This was reported in the Toronto Star, along with reproductions of the original picture and the altered one.
What’s up with the Jewish calendar? I’ve heard it’s a lunar calendar which would imply it’s out of sync with the solar calendar, but the Jewish holidays seem to always come around the same time of year.
I don’t really get that one either. I guess some men don’t even want to look at photos of women?
It’s both. The months follow the cycle of the moon, but every few years, an extra month is added to make sure everything stays in the right season.
If you’re interested in the technical details, see here.
Manischewitz ought to be required to have something meaning “abomination” included in their name, under truth-in-advertising laws. At least my in-laws and their synagogue had dry wine as well at their seders, so I didn’t have to drink any of the other stuff. I was fearing the possibility of four cups of Manischewitz… 
Are they Jewish kitties? (You can tell by giving them a little gefilte fish and seeing if they like it.) They are pretty kitties, Jewish or not.
Or they may just be schmoozing and catching up with people they don’t see very often.
I wish I could go, at least once, to a seder that ran a long time and did have lots of Torah insights and comments on the Exodus and all that. I would imagine most people would rather go to one where there is socializing and gossiping, though, so the other kind is probably pretty rare.
It is, indeed.
Sorry, I didn’t mean to cause you a panic attack. (I know what those are like, and you have my sympathies)
I can tell you that I was extremely nervous about moving out of my parents’ house and going away to college, and it worked out fine for me. Better than fine- in fact, I started getting along a lot better with my parents when we didn’t live together and get on each other’s nerves all the time.
I can barely maintain a dorm room by myself, either (mine wasn’t nearly as bad as some guys’ dorm rooms I saw, but was well below average for girls’), and yet somehow I ended up with a house.
Shame on you. 
Sorry, I didn’t see this when I first answereds your questions.
I’m not very good at broad questions. Do you have a specific aspect you’d like to hear about?
Okay, I must admit that I am very intrigued and interested in the Messiah and what an Orthodox Jew believes will happen when the Messiah comes. I’ve read about it on the Judaism 101 website so I guess I’m more interested in your personal viewpoint here, as an Orthodox Jew.
I hope this isn’t too personal, btw! Apologies in advance if you’re uncomfortable with the question.
I [del]apolligize[/del] [del]appoligize[/del] regret any bad spelling. I don’t have a spell-check on me.
Prologue/background:
The general idea, as I understand it, is this: Plan A for the world was… what’s the opposite of entropy? Anyway, the world was supposed to be Not-Entropy. Everything would naturally be good, and it would take serious effort to mess up. Everyone would have the basic urge to be nice to one another, and be productive. Healthy foods would grow straight out of the ground, so no one would need to work. People would live forever, animals wouldn’t attack, and so on and so forth. This is what we call Eden.
Then came the familiar story of Adam, Eve, and a noxious snake. (What exactly the whole story means is for another question). However you understand it, Adam and Eve made a bad decision, and their entire personalities changed. They became subject to moral entropy- from now on, their basic urges would be selfish, and it would take real effort to behave. You can imagine what imagine what kind of havoc your average shlob would wreak if he was immortal and never did any work, so they were kicked out of Eden. The new world order reflected the changes in the New and Unimproved Adam and Eve, and that is why the world is such a mess today.
Eventually, people are supposed to revert back to the Edenic state, and with them, the world. We call this the Messianic Age. The Messiah is the person who will have a big role in bringing about the new age.
The reversion can happen in one of two ways. People could learn from their mistakes, and actually start acting nice to each other. Then the Messiah will step in to help finish the process. World peace will ensue, great miracles will happen, and we’ll all live happily ever after.
The other possibility is that things will get really, really bad. Humanity is going to be racing to hell in a handbasket. War will break out among the nations, a standard end-of-times apocalypse will ensue. Then eventually the Messiah steps in and puts a stop to all the chaos. World peace, miracles, etc, but it won’t be fun getting there.
I dunno about you, but I’d greatly prefer option 1.
Qualifications for messianicship:
- He has to be, well, a he. (Apparently all the past mini-redemptions were brought about by women, so I guess it’s the guys’ turn).
- He has to be descended from King David.
- He has to be a generally decent and righteous person.
- He will be a charismatic, well-regarded leader.
- He will be the first prophet in, oh, about two millenia or so.
On the Messiah’s grocery list:
- World peace.
- Re-establishing the Sanhedrin, the Jewish High Court.
- Rebuilding the Temple in Jerusalem (and you know it’s going to take a messaih to do this without starting a war).
- Gather in the exiles/lost tribes and bring them to live in Israel.
- Resurrect the dead.
- Two dozen eggs, tomatos, and a loaf of rye.
The rabbis disagree about what will happen post-messiah. Some say that the longetivity, no-sweat everything, and healthy living will be caused by advanced technology, and that the only outright miracle will be everyone becoming nice. Others say that it will be a time of extremely open miracles, and the laws of nature completely changed. Other people say that the world of the messiah will be a purely spiritual word, and that no one can describe it until we get there.
For everything I forgot, see Jewfaq.org.
Two questions about this that I’ve wondered:
1- Does it have to be a male line descendant (son of a son of a son of a son etc. all the way back) or can it be son-of-a-daughter-of-a-son-of-a-daughter-of, etc.)?
- Are there any people alive today who actually claim or trace direct descent from David?
Since David was a polygamist (the OT names twenty of his sons and presumably there were daughters other than Tamar, mentions his grandchildren by Absalom, and his grandson Rehoboam alone [well, alone with his wives and concubines] is said to have had 88 children) his descendants would be plentiful today (conceivably in the billions) but how would it be proven that you’re a descendant of David?
I think it has to be son of a son of a son. Everything except nationality is passed down through the dad.
There are families out there who can still trace family tree back to David, or at least to historical figures that traced their family back to David.
You’re right, though- “son of David” doesn’t exactly narrow things down much.
How did the establishment of Israel affect this part of the prophecy? I know that some Jewish sects saw it as anathemous- was it because of this part of the prophecy (i.e. only the Messiah should do this)? Also, have the prophecies been reinterpreted in the past 2 generations now that Israel exists again- is this marked off as “done” or is it believed the Messiah will call home to Israel the rest of the Jews? (And if so, could you please start with Joan and Melissa Rivers?)
All of them? Or just the Jewish (and presumably the righteous Jews at that) dead? What about those who died in the Holocaust whose bodies were cremated by the Nazis- can they be resurrected? (Honest question, though it may seem argumentative or rhetorical.)
Of course on the wrong day even that is liable to start a war in Jerusalem.
If these guys are right, anyone living before about 140 BC in Eurasia who has living descendants is an ancestor of everyone alive today with any Eurasian ancestors. King David is thought to have lived around 1000 BC, so if he has any living descendants, everyone with European or Asian ancestry today is very likely a descendant of King David.
A bit more frivolous a question- but still an honest one- I was surprised to learn (from this clip from the Topol movie Sallah Shabati) that Maschiach is used as a given name among some Jews. Is this common? Or are there any taboos against it by the more orthodox?
Malleus, if you don’t mind me answering this one, Mashiach is indeed the name that the Orthodox use to refer to the Messiah. In Hebrew, the word Mashiach means “Appointed one”. I don’t know of any Orthodox circles that consider the term taboo, although there might be (“two Jews, three opinions”, and all that…)