Unit 5: Lecture - Judaism

                                                                                 

Judaism

The religions of the Middle East are intimately related, with Zoroastrianism being the foundation of them all.  There is supplemental reading information on Zoroastrianism available in this week, and you are encouraged to read it for greater understanding.  Do you know the story of the visit of the three kings, the three wise men, the three Magi bearing gifts, to the baby Jesus?  These three are believed to have been Zoroastrians.

Judaism is known as an Abrahamic religion:  Like Islam and Christianity, it traces its roots back to Abraham.  Jews differ from Muslims, though, regarding the rightful heir of the promise:  Muslims believe it to be Ishmael, while Jews hold that it was passed to Isaac.  In this way, the religions are ‘brothers,’ and like brothers, they fight.  Jews look for the coming of a Messiah;  Christians believe the Messiah has come in Jesus.  All three are known as ‘religions of the book,’ or ‘people of the book,’ as they all three have written scripture texts borrowed heavily from each other.

Monotheism characterizes all religions in the west, introduced by Judaism as the absolute refusal to acknowledge any god but God:  the One.  Christianity has its three persons of the Trinity, but nevertheless argues that this is one god.  Judaism and Islam leave no room for ambiguity.  The Shema of Israel, the statement of faith of the Jewish people, proclaims:  There is no god but God.

Jewish tradition established the concept of one god firmly, and Moses encoded it.  Not only was there proclaimed one god, but this was a personal god, an ethically demanding god:  one, moral, personal.  This was unique in the ancient world.  Unlike other gods of antiquity, this god was given no image.  Unlike other gods of antiquity, the name of this god was so sacred as to speak it only with caution, if at all, and to write it with missing letters, or write it in a variant form.  Unlike the other gods of antiquity, this god was decidedly male, probably in reaction and opposition to the strength of the female-centered goddess worship.

The Torah is the scripture text of Judaism, and it contains the essence of the law that governs Jewish society, theology and ethics.  This is something else shared with Christianity and Islam, as the Torah forms part of what Christians call the Old Testament, and a number of characters in the stories of the Torah appear also in the Muslim Qur’an.  There are many key figures and events in Jewish history; Moses and David top the list of key figures, while the exile to Babylon and the destruction of Herod’s temple top the list of key events.  However, the essence of Judaism can only be understood in the context of covenant: a special agreement between God and the people of Israel, with promises made and kept on both sides.

This religion, this still-living religion, has had an enormous influence on the religions which followed it, chiefly Christianity and Islam.  And it has had an enormous influence on the world.

Judaism is both a religion and an ethnic identity. Its millennia of history is usefully divided by Molloy as biblical Judaism and rabbinical Judaism. This division maps important shifts in self-identity, historical context, and religious practice. Because of the tradition’s importance for Jews, Christians, and Muslims, the earlier period, biblical Judaism, has been studied by scholars and historians of varying backgrounds. Rabbinical Judaism, also researched in detail, has been primarily studied by Jewish scholars, although some modern secularist scholarship exists as well. The subject of Judaism boasts more journals and topic-specific studies than any of the world’s traditions except Christianity. Often these sources emphasize either one or the other side of the historical division between biblical and rabbinical.  Those of you wishing to pursue study of this religion will find a wealth of resources available to you.

Although there are many branches of Judaism, and especially in the United States a diversity of Jewish ways of expressing identity and practice of faith, the arts are a primary expression of Jewishness and Jewish sensibility. Judaism’s relationship with the arts is shaped in part by the “aniconic” tradition that directs “thou shalt make no images” of the divine (similar to the aniconic tradition of Islam). However, the religious impulse toward material expression has produced a long history and variety of uniquely Jewish forms of art.