Davka

What do you expect? They have been persecuted and driven from place to place for centuries by people claiming to be Christians. They have been beaten and spat upon while being called "Christ killer." The Christian Inquisitors tortured Jews and chased them from Spain, the Christian Cossacks burned Jewish villages and chased them from Russia, Christian Poles handed them over to be gassed and burned by Christian Germans, Christian Americans called them "kikes" and beat up their children on the way to school.

Do you imagine that this treatment would result in a healthy love of Christians among the Jews?

Duvduv

Excuse me, but I too am a Jew, and I find this posting of Davka rather oversimplified. A huge oversimplification with a heavy dose of paranoia. Yes, I am a Jew, an Orthodox Jew.

J-D

Then I'm going to take the risk of assuming that you accept that this religion of Judaism that we're talking about has not always existed. There's a period of time, still continuing, marked by the existence of Judaism, and there's an earlier period of time in which it did not exist, and so in-between those there must be a period of time in which it came into existence. The question 'how did Judaism start?' is meaningful. There must be an answer to it, even if none of us know what it is or ever will.

Davka

Oversimplified, certainly. This is a message board, not a full-length book.

Paranoid? Not really. The history of relations between Jews and Christians has been antagonistic for the most part. Only since the Shoah have most Christians in the West dropped their anti-Semitism. For a Jew to be suspicious of the motives of Christians is no more paranoid than for a Greek Cypriot to be suspicious of the motives of Turks.

semiopen

I think Duvi is taking a neo-con position.

Thus all the persecutions suffered by the Jews at the hands of Christians equals the persecutions of the Jews by Islam (perhaps more or less some cosmic constant).

It's technically improper for a Jew to go into a church however he can discuss the Torah with a Christian. Sure he can go into a mosque however he can't discuss Torah with a Muslim.

This has nothing to do with the indignities of persecution to my knowledge, simply a theological position.

Duvduv

What's the point of oversimplifying what has happened in Jewish history? What is the reason for dressing up Jewish experience in paranoia?
You know exactly what I mean.
If you knew Jewish history you would know that many problems in relationships between others and Jews are related to economic and social issues, not always religious ones.

You know that Jews under the Polish empire were restricted in employment and land ownership, forcing them to work directly as the agents of the regime against the peasantry, especially the UKRAINIAN peasantry, who were effectively serfs in their own country under the Poles, and who saw the Jews as the agents of oppression as tax collectors, etc. This was a dark stain on Jewish history, and part of the story of the 2000 year exile.

I don't want to address the issues of World War II because I am one of those Jews who does not agree with the entire narrative that everyone believes in like religious truth.

outhouse

I explained this already, in our exchange. Judaism was in a process of evolution from its inception.

Prior to 1209 BC to 1000 BC the religion matched Canaanites religion almost to a T, BUT it is also the foundation to, and very much a part of Judaism's foundation.



Judaism can only be followed with the ethnogenesis of the people themselves as defined.

It did not exist when Israelites did not exist.


Yes.


Speak for yourself my friend


The answer is well established, and there is no mystery at all here.

It was a evolution of the Canaanite religion, after the Canaanite culture collapsed, and these displaced people with pre-existing beliefs banded together, and continued to worship all they knew. Instead of the full pantheon of polytheistic deities the Canaanite government had instituted and followed. They the proto Israelites and proto Judaism, funneled it down to just the most important deities they needed for day to day life and the struggles they faced.


Again you can only discuss the evolution of Judaism and its starting point from 1200 BC forward.

Duvduv

Sorry, Semi, I don't follow the logic of your point at all...

Duvduv

I love this expression "Prior to 1209 BC to 1000 BC the religion matched Canaanites religion almost to a T"
I suppose you were there or the Israelites left behind videos to show you how their religion "matched Canaanite religion almost to a T."
So how DO you know this, pray tell??

Steve Weiss

The origins of religions and tribes are lost in history. The books attributed to Moses were not written by him since he never existed. As far as the Exodus is concerned, that is also fiction.