An Exploration in Judaism - 1

The past couple of days I have been listening to lectures by Orthodox Jewish scholars on many subjects.

The coincidence of belief between Christians and Jews, when truthfully compared, teaching against teaching, precept versus precept, is strikingly dissimilar. Like many others, I just assumed that Jews were Christians without the rest of the Bible - no Christ.

That's not the case.

In fact, I was quite surprised at the hostility evidenced in many of the lectures toward Christianity (frequently disguised as a joke) and by the presentation of erroneous information about the fundamentals of Christian theology. As they were audios only, I cannot assess whether the presenters knew the information was untrue or were persuaded it was factual.

What was just as interesting to me, however, was the nature of the Jewish approach to the practice of religion and the obligations of the faith. It was so technical and precise, words and phrases being dissected and parsed, entire lectures seemed to consist of a legal analysis of God's intent.

The evident reliance on oral tradition over the written word was a further surprise.

This is not to say that I had not heard that this was the Jewish practice, but more of the case that I took what I had heard to be the biased observations of non-Jews.

The passion and sense of special-standing expressed in various ways was an additional stand-out property.

It prompted me to ask many questions as I listened and meditated on the lectures.

Is present-day Judaism consistent with the historical Hebrew practice? Besides the obvious that there is no Temple and that temple-related acts are necessarily excised, where does the current religious expression differ from 2000 years ago or 3000 years ago?

How much of the Hebrew faith are Christians supposed to continue?

Is Christianity a radically different religion, as several of the lectureres stated, and if so, is radically different because it has strayed from the true path or is it radically different because Jesus meant it to be?

I don't know, but it seems as good a time as any to explore and see what truth I can find.

I did like the idea that each person is supposed to make their own copy of the Torah.