Inspired by "Ask A Muslim," I am creating this thread to answer any questions about Judaism. I will only answer questions about the religion, not why I believe in it, or how I can prove that it exists.
A Jew is someone who identifies with the history, culture, and future of the Jewish people; Judaism is the historic culture of the Jewish people, and religion is only one part of that culture; Jewish identity is best preserved in a free, pluralistic environment; People possess the power and responsibility to shape their own lives independent of supernatural authority; Ethics and morality should serve human needs, and choices should be based upon consideration of the consequences of actions rather than pre-ordained rules or commandments; Jewish history, like all history, is a human saga, a testament to the significance of human power and human responsibility. Biblical and other traditional texts are the products of human activity and are best understood through archaeology and other scientific analysis. The freedom and dignity of the Jewish people must go hand in hand with the freedom and dignity of every human being.
This may have been answered already, but are there any limitations on where you can/can't go? Like some religions believe that certain forms of entertainment are a waste of time and serve no purpose other than to keep you from learning how to get closer to God, so they're restricted. Anything like that?
This may have been answered already, but are there any limitations on where you can/can't go?
I do not think that we have restrictions on places that we are allowed to go. But I think that we are forbidden to go to brothels and the like because of adultery laws.
Follow-up to Dair. A lot of historians and some of my history teachers, too, have stated that occasionally Jews have made them the first people to pick on by being less open/heterogenous in their own communities. Example: A lot of Jewish communities in the past usually stuck together, not dealing with the outside world around them. --> Do you think it has lead to some people's seeing them as different/unwanted? Like, do you think Judaism closes off other people who aren't Jewish?
How do you feel about the ways jews have been treated in history?
I feel that history has been most unkind to the Jewish people. There have been many instances of genocide or attempts to convert us from the Spanish Inquisition of 1492, to the Holocaust.
Do you think it has lead to some people's seeing them as different/unwanted? Like, do you think Judaism closes off other people who aren't Jewish?
I do not think that Jewish people closed themselves off from the rest of the world. Rather I think it was the blood libels against the Jews that caused uneducated people to attack us.
