Judaism Doctrines and Beliefs

Basic Doctrines and Beliefs

• Judaism insists that the community has been confronted by the divine not as an abstraction but as a person with whom the community and its member have entered into a strong relationship with each other.
• As the Torah indicates, it is a program of human action rooted in personal confrontation. The response of these particular people to its encounter with God is significant for all of mankind. 
• The community is called upon to express its loyalty to God and the covenant by exhibiting solidarity within its corporate life on every level, including every aspect of human behavior, from the most public to the most private.
• Jewish worship is a communal celebration where everyone comes together in the meetings of God in history and in nature. This people, together with all humanity, is called upon to institute political, economic, and social forms that will affirm divine sovereignty.
• Within the community, each Jew is called upon to realize the covenant in his or her personal intention and behavior. 

Judaism Sacred Texts

Tanakh 

• The Hebrew bible, the quintessential sacred text of Judaism. The first five books of this comprise the Torah (or Pentateuch), the core sacred writings of the ancient Jews, traditionally written by Moses under divine inspiration. 
• To Jews, there is no "Old Testament." The books that Christians call the New Testament are not part of Jewish scripture. The so-called Old Testament is known to us as Written Torah or the Tanakh. Includes the five books of Moses; Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. 
• Much like the Christian bible, there are many prophets introduced and told about in this text but are different. Some of these prophets include; Joshua, Ezekiel, Isaiah, Joel, Judges, and Jonah.
• Also includes writings such as the Proverbs, Chronicles, Job, Song of Songs, Lamentations, Esther, and Daniel. 
• In addition to the written scriptures we have an "Oral Torah," a tradition explaining what the above scriptures mean and how to interpret them and apply the Laws. The oral Torah is called the Talmud. Orthodox Jews believe God taught the Oral Torah to Moses, and he taught it to others, down to the present day. This tradition was maintained only in oral form until about the 2d century C.E., when the oral law was compiled and written down in a document called the Mishnah.
• Every Friday night and Saturday morning during celebration of Shabbat, a new portion of the Torah is read. At the beginning of the year, Genesis is read and all five books are read until the end of the year when the last scripture of Deuteronomy is read. The Torah is the most sacred text of the religion and is the leading authority of all Jewish people. 
• According to Jewish belief, the Torah was written by God.

Talmud

• The body of civil and ceremonial Jewish law comprising of two separate scriptures, the Mishnah and the Gemara. 
• There are two versions of the Talmud; the Babylonian and the earlier Palestinian or Jerusalem Talmud. 
• The Talmud was developed in two separate works: Talmud Yerushalmi (the Talmud of the Land of Israel) and Talmud Bavli (the Talmud of Babylonia.)
• The Talmud Yerushalmi was completed c.350CE when the Jewish community in the Land of Israel began to suffer genocidal persecution from the newly empowered Byzantine Christians. The demise of a vibrant Jewish community in the Land of Israel forced many of the Torah scholars living there to flee to Babylonia where Christian dominance did not hold sway.
• The Babylonian Talmud is the main source of definitive Oral law brought from Mount Sinai. 
• The Talmud is considered to be the main guide to Jewish life and the Jewish people in all of the lands typically live a Talmudic way of life differing from the ways of their ancestors.
• It is the guiding book for their lives, not just in ritual and law, but in terms of personal behavior, societal goals and vision of the Jewish future.

Excerpts

"...I command you today to love YHVH your God and to walk in His ways and to keep His commandments, His decrees, His civil laws so that you may live and you many increase and YHVH your God will bless you in the land into which you are coming to take as possession." (Deuteronomy 30:16). 

The text states that every one reading this excerpt or Jewish person to love "Adonai" our God. God will guide you through his ways, decrees, and laws so that you live a happy life and increase your love for God. One of the goals and main beliefs is to honor and love only one God and see him as the ruler and sovereign of the universe. If you honor God then he will bless you in return and take you under his wing. 

"But if you do not listen to Me and do not keep my commandments … I will then do the same to you … I will bring upon you feeling of anxiety with depression and excitement, destroying your outlook and making life miserable." ( Leviticus, 26:16) "I will scatter you among the nations and keep the sword drawn against you" (26:33) "You will then be destroyed among the nations. The land of your enemies will consume you." (26:38)

This is all about understanding the source of good and evil and that God is the creator of both but people tend to choose evil over good. In the Torah, the main message being sent is that each punishment has a reason, explicitly warned and predicted.

"If a false witness makes a statement against a man, saying that he has done wrong, Then the two men, between whom the argument has taken place, are to come before the Lord, before the priests and judges who are then in power; And the judges will have the question looked into with care: and if the witness is seen to be false and to have made a false statement against his brother, Then do to him as he intended to do to his brother: and so put away the evil from among you." (Deuteronomy 19:16-19)

This is a common responsibility or belief that is brought up many times in the Torah. If there any problem in someone's life or an issue that needs to be resolved, they must come to the Lord before seeking a solution from other people in power because God always has the authority and right answer over everyone. God is the ruler.

Judaism Rituals

Bar Mitzvah

• The initiation ceremony of a Jewish boy who has reached 13 years old and is highly regarded as ready to observe religious precepts and now eligible to take part in public worship. 
• The process of becoming a Bar Mitzvah is a very long one where the young man must master all sorts of specific prayers to recite at his ceremony and lead the service. Prayers such as; V'Havta, Yotzer, S'hma, G'vurot, and so on. 
• Each young man is also assigned a specific passage in one of the Five Books of Moses in the Torah based on the month their Bar Mitzvah takes place. 
• They need to memorize the words and different chants of their passage in the Torah for their Bar Mitzvah day. They study the passage with vowels under the letters, but no vowels will be under the letters in the Torah. 
• As the young man becomes a Bar Mitzvah, they are held accountable for all of their actions and become a man. In celebration, the parents of the Bar Mitzvah throw them a big celebration while inviting all of their family and close friends to the occasion.

       

Rosh Hashanah 

• Literally means "head of the year" in Hebrew. Rosh Hashanah is the celebration of the new year on the Jewish calendar. 
• It occurs on the first and second days of the seventh month of the Jewish year. The Jewish New Year is a time to begin introspection, looking back at the mistakes of the past year and planning the changes to make in the new year. 
• The name "Rosh Hashanah" is not used in the Bible to discuss this holiday. The Bible refers to the holiday as Yom Ha-Zikkaron (the day of remembrance) or Yom Teruah (the day of the sounding of the shofar). The holiday is instituted in Leviticus 23:24-25. 
• The shofar is a ram's horn which is blown somewhat like a trumpet. One of the most important observances of this holiday is hearing the sounding of the shofar in the synagogue, which wakes up our souls. 
• Another popular practice of the holiday is Tashlikh ("casting off"). Jews walk to flowing water, such as a creek or river, on the afternoon of the first day and empty their pockets into the river, symbolically casting off their sins. Small pieces of bread are commonly put in the pocket to cast off.
• Another popular tradition is dipping and eating apples and honey in wishes for a "sweet new year." 

    

Presentation

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/14VS7Tje78UC-mGbhxV7avwJ16fKKNuWEHmUrJzledwM/edit#slide=id.gad5f4e86a_0_10

Judaism Key Concepts

Covenant- An agreement between two contracting parties, originally sealed with blood; a bond, or a law; a permanent religious dispensation.

Torah- Name applied to the five books of Moses, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy.

Mitzvah- a precept or commandment

Halakhah- the path that one walks. Jewish law. The complete body of rules and practices that Jews are bound to follow, including biblical commandments, commandments instituted by the rabbis, and binding customs.

Mashiach- A man who will be chosen by G-d to put an end to all evil in the world, rebuild the Temple, bring the exiles back to Israel and usher in the world to come. It is better to use the Hebrew term "mashiach" when speaking of the Jewish messiah, because the Jewish concept is very different from the Christian one.

Israel The Hebrew people, past, present, and future, regarded as the chosen people of God by virtue of the covenant of Jacob.

Kedushah- traditionally the third section of all Amidah recitations. In the silent Amidah it is a short prayer, but in the repetition, which requires a minyan, it is considerably lengthier.

Teshuvah- one of the great gifts God gives each of us – the ability to turn back to Him and seek healing for our brokenness. Psalm 51 is sometimes called "Perek Teshuvah" – the great Chapter of Repentance of the Scriptures.

Shekhinah- the presence of God on earth or a symbol or manifestation of His presence.

Tikkun Olam- literally means "world repair." It is commonly used to refer to the pursuit of social action and social justice. However, few realize that the phrase and the concept behind it originate in kabbalah, in the teachings of the 16th century mystic Isaac Luria.