Does Judaism require a belief in God [Split from earlier thread]

Great Debates
121

Well, of course, Messianic Jews/Jews for Jesus do regard Jesus as the incarnation of God, and also consider themselves to be Jews. Mainstream Jews, however, disagree with them on the latter point.

As others have pointed out, Judaism involves prohibitions as well as positive injunctions, and a huge prohibition is “idolatry”. Idolatry involves worshipping as God anything which is not God. The mainstream Jewish concept of God entirely precludes the possibility that he could be human, or incarnate. Therefore, to worship Jesus as God is idolatry. Therefore, it’s not Judaism.

A Jew embracing Islam would not face quite the same problem, since Muslims worship God and have no truck with any of this incarnation stuff. Still, what FinnAgain and DSeid say looks right to me. Embracing a religion which is not Judaism is, well, not Judaism.

And, remember, in this context embracing a religion is not really about what you believe, but about what you do and how you live. A Jew could certainly adopt a variety of beliefs which are shared with Christians or Muslims or some other group; that’s not necessarily problematic, except in so far as holding those beliefs might be inconsistent with observing the Law. What’s problematic is joining the other group; sharing religious practice with them; living as a member of that group.

122

Sure, ask virtually any Jew if Christians can be Jews too. Why would you think it has to be written down?

Don’t you know that Jews don’t have anybody from whom we take orders?

Because we say so. You’re getting stuck up trying to reason with religion and tribal identity. Cut it out, just accept it. Even if it doesn’t make sense, it still is what it is.

123

Like I said. This is a world where chicken (poultry) isn’t pareve and rice isn’t kosher for Passover (in the majority of the modern Jewish world).

rules is rules.

124

I’m not going to respond to this since the moderator has declared this issue off-limits.

Again, are you interested in a thousand dollar bet that you are wrong?

Well are there any sects which require a belief in G-d? (And by “require,” I’m not talking about the threat of expulsion for failure to comply, I’m simply talking about what is urged upon the members of that sect.)

First please quote me where I made such a claim. Failing that, please admit that I made no such claim and apologize.

125

Under your definition of “require,” what is required besides paying your synagogue bill?

126

Seriously, am I going mental or have we not had this exact conversation with many of the same people in a thread 6-12 months ago?

127

You’re not going mental.

If you are a Jew, than your ignorance here goes beyond the willful ignorance you’ve maintained so far in this thread. If you were born a Jew, the ignorance you’ve displayed still places you as an outsider in a great many ways.

As for your other question about Jewish sects, I’m not going to answer any more baiting, especially if you refuse to actually admit when you’re taking a position. So feel free to address any idle questions to someone else. I will note, however, that the topic of the thread is not “what denominations of Judaism preach that there is a God” but “does Judaism require a belief in God?”

If you’re going to say that you haven’t made arguments when you have, that you have no point of view when you do, and deny your own statements when you make them, there’s really not much reason for anybody to respond to your posts further. To clarify for you, you’re the one who claimed that belief in God is required and gave definitions of requisite components of Judaism that are part of Orthodox tradition. One of the prerequisites you claimed was belief in God. That means that one cannot be a religious Jew in Orthodox tradition if they don’t believe in God, at least according to your non-argument.
It seems that you are not, in fact, willing or able to support your own arguments about Jewish faith, tradition or the requirements for membership in a Jewish religious community.

But like I said, unless and until you’re going to actually admit to having a point of view and a position and discuss your claims instead of just this bizarre mutation of Socratic dialog, I’m done playing your game.

128

Please stop attacking my good faith.

Anyway, your position makes no sense at all and you refuse to answer questions to help clarify it. Instead, you alternate between imagining I have taken some position and then criticize me for not taking a position.

Worse yet, you confuse the issues by conflating “Requiring X” with “Expulsion for not doing X”

129

I’m still confused about what you mean by “require” in this context, sorry. Post #92 didn’t clear it up for me.

130

Under “my” definition of “require” most of the Jewish movements only require that you be born of a Jewish mother or properly converted, the Reform movement accepts either parent being Jewish and raised with a Jewish identity or proper conversion. Nothing else is required. Not even congregational membership. There are other things advised, requested, held up as behaviors to emulate or as negative examples, so on, but not required. An Orthodox Jew may have a different answer and state that (s)he is required to fulfill as many of the Mitzvot as (s)he can and would look down on a Jew who is not doing so.

131

This why I chose to not engage this debate and referenced the other thread. That other thread devolved into people who are not Jewish explaining to me how I was not an observant Jew and was misleading myself due to my atheism. Didn’t want to do it again.

But I do want to say this: My family (myself, my non-Jewish husband and two teenage kids) have been open about our atheism since we joined our Conservative shul over 10 years ago. I was a member of the board and on the religious education committee. My husband was an ex-officio member of the board representing interfaith families. My kids routinely engaged the rabbis in theological debates on atheism and at my daughter’s recent bat mitzvah the current rabbi extolled how much he loved working with her due to her inquisitive mind, mastery of reading torah, embracing of Jewish ethics etc. She is slated to lead service and read Torah in a couple of months. The previous rabbi felt the same way about my son, three years earlier. It is not rabbi specific. My family is treated with pride and respect and looked to as leaders in the Synagogue. I go to shul, pray, learn about Torah. My religion gives me comfort, and Jewish specific ethical framework, community and a sense of purpose in the world. Prayer, to me, does not require a recipient to be meaningful. While I belong to a Conservative shul, Reconstructionist is probably closer to my point of view. My mother was Lubuvitch as a child in Poland, I started as a child in an Orthodox shul and would never feel at home in a Reform one.

Our cantor is a converted Jew, who converted through Reconstructionist movement as it specifically does not require a statement of faith and she couldn’t attest to a faith statement. She runs services and educates the kids with the congregation and both rabbis we had’s full endorsement. Judaism does not require accepting G-d to be “saved”, erased of sin, moved along to the afterlife, be in good standing or to buried in Jewish ceremony in our shul cemetery. My husband could convert tomorrow, should he choose, via Reconstructionist movement and not answer a question about his beliefs. He be required to learn Torah, learn rituals etc, but required to believe anything. Jews from birth are not required to do anything.

OK. Phew. I finally got my internet back and I was not going to type all that on my phone, LOL.

132

I can’t believe that it wasn’t until Post #73 that someone cited: Can you be an atheist and still be Jewish? - The Straight Dope
… which, BTW, was not by Cecil but was a staff report by moi.

The short answer, just to sum things up:

  • For persons born Jewish, there are no “requirements” for belief or practice. They are Jewish. Period.
  • For persons who are converted to Judaism, there are indeed requirements for beliefs, education, etc. These vary a little (Reform vs Orthodox), but are there.

ON the diff between the Lubavitcher Rebbe and Jesus as Messiah: no one believes that the Lubavitcher Rebbe is divine, or God incarnated. The problem that Jews have with Jesus is the notion of God being born in a human body, which is antithetical to Jewish beliefs.

133

That’s because it was post 26 where it first happened. :wink:

134

Reconstructionsit Judaism (a split from Conservative movement) doesn’t require a statement of faith. They feel a belief in the ethical side of Judaism, with a focus on Tikkun Olam (repairing the world) is a valid belief system in and of itself. I am not terribly knowledgeable in the details of the movement, so there may be other beliefs that are required. Further, a converted Jew (reform, conservative or recon) who later revealed no belief in G-D would not be excommunicated. Once converted, you have the same standing as any other Jew, AFAIK.

135

I agree, but I think that your definition of “require” is not true to the spirit of the exchange which sparked this discussion. For example, the second post in this thread:

136

“Messiah” in Judaism isn’t the same thing as “an aspect of God”. He’s just a person, albeit a special person.

You can’t be a Jew and believe in other gods, as it states in the commandments: “Thou shalt have no other God before me”.

Christians believe that Jesus was an aspect of God. Christians also (most sects anyway) believe in the mystery of the trinity - that all three aspects of God are part of a unity, and thus that the commandment is not breached. Note that Hindus have a similar belief, that all of the Hindu gods are part of a mysterious and mystic whole - but Hindus are usually not considered Christians, and Christians are not considered Jews.

It is simply odd to me that this issue keeps comming up. Why on earth do so many Christians wish to tell Jews what they are supposed to believe? Do they hope to thereby convert them?

Other aspects of Judaism that tend to blow Christian minds:

  1. Jews cannot agree on whether an afterlife exists and if so, what form it takes. The official Religious Conservative position is that it is up to each Jew to decide whether the afterlife really exists or is some sort of metaphor;

  2. Non-Jews who obey the commandments handed down to Noah are considered exactly as “righteous” as the most religious Jews. These so-called “Noahide laws” exist because of basic logic, arising from Biblical mythology: Noah was famously a “good person”, and of course he’s (a) not a Jew (as Jews didn’t exist yet!) and (b) ancestor of everyone alive today (assuming of course the myth was literally true); therefore, anyone alive today can be as “good” as Noah if they follow the commandments God gave Noah (no killing people, no stealing, that sort of thing). Unlike in Christianity, being Jewish doesn’t actually earn you any brownie points …

137

The messiah is not divine. It may be the same word, but does not have the same meaning as in Christianity. The messiah fulfills the prophecy, but is a human being without divine attributes.

138

A long weekend comes along, and suddenly I find that a thread that I participated in in GQ caused the awakening of a Zombie in GD which caused the spawning of a new GD thread, which has hit 3 pages before I even saw it.

I have read through the thread, but there’s no way I can respond to every point raised before I came in. I will do my best to not re-hash old ground. I will respond here to the OP, in what I hope is an original manner, and if something someone had said in the interim is relevant, I beg your indulgence and ask that you repeat, directed toward my statements, whatever point you wish to make.

As I recall, the main point of contention was that the commandments of the Torah can be properly observed without believing in G-d. Here are a few that I think are very clear cannot be:

Deuteronomy 6:9-10: Only be careful, and watch yourselves closely so that you do not forget the things your eyes have seen or let them fade from your heart as long as you live. Teach them to your children and to their children after them. Remember the day you stood before the LORD your God at Horeb, when he said to me, “Assemble the people before me to hear my words so that they may learn to revere me as long as they live in the land and may teach them to their children.”

Deuteronomy 6:39 - Acknowledge and take to heart this day that the LORD is God in heaven above and on the earth below. There is no other.

Deuteronomy 8:10 - When you have eaten and are satisfied, praise the LORD your God for the good land he has given you.

Deuteronomy 15:15 - Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and the LORD your God redeemed you. That is why I give you this command today.

I know I could find more - and certainly, there are some commandments to “say” things that an atheist could repeat but wouldn’t mean in his heart, so I will try to avoid those, even though it is my opinion that when the commandment says “say” it means “say and mean sincerely.” But the above four are taken from the Torah portions we read over the past few months. They command Jews to remember and acknowledge the existence of G-d who has done very specific things, and/or to show him gratitude. Someone who does not believe G-d exists cannot do these.

139

Jewish atheists take the position that the mythology of the OT is not to be taken literally, but must be filtered through human understanding. The commandments are of the nature of commandments to remember and acknowledge awe at bits of mythology (for example, Jewish slavery in Egypt) which may not have historically occurred … but the occurance or non-occurance isn’t the point to an atheist, any more than with the stories of the Tower of Babel or the Creation: the point is the (positive) messages which can be extracted from the mythology.

For example, take Deuteronomy 15:15, cited above. The actual commandment isn’t to remember that God redeemed the slaves - that is mere reinforcement to the commandment, which is essentally to treat slaves with humanity:

The point, the actual commandment, is to show some sympathy in your actions - you were once slaves (according to the myth), so treat slaves well: let them free after 7 years and supply them. The belief in God, and in the myth, is taken for granted and used to support the commandment.

Naturally, Orthodox believers have a different interpretation. But more than one is possible.

140

Ivory,

I can see how it would give you comfort and community.

What is the Jewish specific ethical framework?

What purpose have you found through Judaism?

Also, I notice that you hyphenate the word “God”. Surely you are not afraid of angering God. Is the point of doing this to identify yourself as a member of the tribe? To follow a mitzvah because it is a mitzvah? Something else?

I don’t wish to gotcha you on the following but I am curious to know how you determine which mitzvoth are to be followed and which ones aren’t.