Most atheists have never read the bible

[McCulloch]

Most atheists have never read the bible and so I believe that if they had, the basics would be the same. Clearly they do not speak as if they have this knowledge.

I throw down the gauntlet. Faith has made a positive claim. Either back up this claim with evidence or withdraw it.

On a less confrontational note, do atheists reject religion and God because they are ignorant of religion as many staunch religionists claim?

[cnorman18]

Oh, I see. Not Judaism. Just their Judaism.

What you fail to recognize, and I think this applies to a lot of people in the Jewish community, is that there is a difference between being religious Jewish and ethnically Jewish. Whether you like it or not, if you're born of ethnically Jewish parents, you're a Jew whether you practice or recognize the traditions and religion that you want to tack on. That's like saying you can't be black unless you're a Southern Baptist and listen to rap music. You're confusing a particular sub-culture with everyone who has a particular ethnic heritage.

Are you nuts? There isn't a Jew on Earth that doesn't recognize the difference between ethnic and religious Jews. What I am saying is that they are all Jews, and all part of the community. It may be due to centuries of persecution, or to being a tiny minority in a Gentile world; but we stick together, and we don't reject each other because we have different beliefs or none at all. The commitment is to the community, not to the religion, and especially not to any particular take on theology.

When I was first deciding to convert, I asked an Orthodox Lubavitcher rabbi, a Hasid, what I should do. His answer? "A Jew is a Jew."

Go ask a dozen atheist Jews if religion is part of Judaism. Not their Judaism. Judaism, which is what we were discussing.

Actually heard the answer to that on the radio last night when someone who was ethnically Jewish, but rejects the religion entirely. You keep acting like Judiasm is monolithic and it isn't.

I have never said any such thing. Look through my posts, all of them, 188 threads so far. I have always said that Judaism is pluralistic, and I have never said anything else.

Your claims that Judiasm includes particular religious beliefs is made invalid by the fact that many do not accept it.

Wrong again. Judaism as an institution and a community unquestionably does include religion, but one does not have to participate or believe in that aspect of it to be a Jew. What's so hard about that? If that wasn't true, there could be no such thing as a "secular Jew" in the first place. In the same way, ethnicity is sn aspect of Judaism too; and though I participate in the religious aspect, I am not ethnically Jewish; still, I am recognized as a real Jew.

Further, which specific beliefs do you want to declare "true Judiasm"? Orthodox? Conservative? Reform? Hasidic? Reconstructionist? Renewal? Heck, throw in Humanistic Judiasm, the non-religious branch, for good measure.

Those are all "true Judaism."

Tell me, have I ever used that term? Ever? Even once?

My whole point here is that Judaism does not prescribe any specific set of theological beliefs. You can pretend or wish that it did all day, but that doesn't change the facts.

So you can be a Republican regardless of your belief, as long as you go through the procedure? Hmmm, interesting--very much like the Jews....

You argued that you have to be "accepted" and now you're arguing that you can just go through a procedure? Make up your mind.

Sorry if you can't understand it, but the procedure and the acceptance are the same thing. When one goes through conversion, one is accepted. In no case is theology the determining factor.

It's matter of Jewish law, true for all the branches. Sorry. Jews get to set the standards. You don't.

All branches, huh? Even those who don't recognize Jewish law?

On how a non-Jew can become a Jew? Name one.

Well, you only have to pay dues if you're a member of a particular synagogue. And if you're born a Jew, you don't have to declare commitment to the community before a . Bet Din (as opposed to "passing a test"). Can you be born into a "club"?

Sure, just ask all the fraternities who allow membership simply because their parent(s) were a member.

Even then, you still have to formally join, do you not? You are not a member of that group on the day of your birth. Jews are.

If you want to pretend that correct theology determines who is a Jew, good luck with that. I thought you wanted to talk about reality, not personal fantasies about the way you want things to be.

Hey, you're the one who keeps changing your position.

188 threads. Show me what positions I have changed. There have been a few, but not on this.

I'm the one who can differentiate between ethnic and cultural Judiasm. You keep claiming that in order to be a Jew, you have to accept that the religious aspects are a valid part of the culture

I said that the religious aspects were a part of the culture, and they are. I never said one had to accept them as "valid" in the sense that one must believe in them.
I haven't changed my position at all; on the contrary, you keep misstating it.

and be accepted by the community.

Since one cannot change one's ethnicity, the only way to convert to Judaism is by way of the religious aspect; but even then, there are no specific theological beliefs prescribed. Sorry, but that's just the way it is. I've proven that over and over, and even proved that taking the Torah literally raises eyebrows when one is converting to Conservative Judaism. Nobody tells you what you have to believe.

As literal history? Or as to the principles it teaches?

There comes a point where there's a crossover. You can learn valid principles from a lot of sources, everything from Aesop's fables to Harry Potter, without believing there are really talking foxes trying to get grapes. But if you want to accept that Harry Potter is real, you pretty much have to accept that what J.K. Rowling wrote is accurate and true. Otherwise you have no valid source for the existence or characteristics of Harry Potter.

You keep bringing up Harry Potter as if he had something to do with all this. He doesn't.

If you want to take the Torah and say it's a source of some good moral teachings and Jewish history, that's fine.

Haven't I consistently said that that's exactly what we do, and nothing else? "What difference does that make?" Remember?

As soon as you start taking the mythical character of God and declaring him to be real,

Do you think that belief is based on the Torah? I've already dealt with that, and you're ignoring it. Again.

especially when you start attributing characteristics only found in the Bible to him

And what would those be? Judaism does not formally attribute any "characteristics" to God. Ein Sof. Unknowable. Remember?

, then you need to have a source which is demonstrably reliable.

You don't.

Do you mean LITERALLY, or not? Why don't you use that word any more? Have you realized that that won't fly?

Once again; you aren't defending your contentions. You're only repeating them, and now you're trying to do it without even stating them outright..

(1) Why does the Bible have to be taken literally or not at all? Don't you object if it's taken literally, too?

I don't object to it, it just fails under examination.

If that's not an objection, what would an objection look like?

Unfortunately, you're just taking the spiritual elements and declaring them to be true without having any valid reason for doing so.

Would you care to define "spiritual elements," and tell me exactly where in the Torah they may be found, and explain why those parts are taken literally by Jews, and how you know this?

How do you determine that the spiritual elements are valid when so much of the rest of the Torah, you discard as wrong?

Define "wrong," and defend "discard," Can you give specific examples? If not, why should anyone take your argument seriously?

What is the logical criteria? I keep asking that, you keep refusing to answer.

The logical criteria for WHAT? You haven't established that anything you say is true! You can't even give an example of what you're talking about!

Do I have to point out that you haven't answered the question?

"(1) Why does the Bible have to be taken literally or not at all?"

(2) Why is not taking it literally "throwing it away"? Isn't NOT taking it literally the right approach to you? You've argued against it often enough.

Are you or are you not rejecting portions of the Torah as false, invalid or not applying?

Literally? Why won't you use the word? That was your contention. Why are you distancing yourself from it now while trying to make it look like you're not?

If you want to talk about the ethical principles that we draw from the Torah, yes, those have been revised and changed over the centuries; but the Torah itself commands us to do just that. Does that then constitute "rejecting" it? Would we not be rejecting the teachings of the Torah if we did not revise them?

If you want to talk about the literal truth of the narratives, I have shown you that that issue is irrelevant to Jewish teaching. We don't care, and every Jew can believe what he likes. It's called "theological pluralism."

Make your point clear, give some examples, and then we'll have something to talk about. So far, all you've done is make assertions that have no basis in reality and no actual relationship to Jewish beliefs.

Again, how do you make that determination, logically, that some parts are valid and some parts are not?

(sigh) One more time; By "valid," do you mean literally true, or not?

I keep asking, and you won't answer; What parts of the Bible are you alleging that Jews take literally? You're making the contention; exactly what parts do you mean?

Youi're clearly trying to edge away from "literal" now and substitute this undefined weasel-word "valid." What, exactly, do you mean by that?

You were formerly, and quite explicitly, talking about reading the Bible as a literally and historically accurate document. Is that still what you mean? If so, say so. If not, admit that you're backing down from those assertions. .

And, yet again, you did not answer the question!

"(2) Why is not taking it literally "throwing it away"?"

(1) Why do you keep insisting that the Bible is the highest authority and "the basis of [our] belief system," as you said above? I've shown you more than once that it's neither.

Well, the Torah and related writings anyhow, the Bible is the Christian version.

From what I've seen so far, you know very little about Jewish beliefs and teachings and understand them even less than that. You have just proved it once again..

What, exactly, do you know about the Talmud? Do you know its place in Jewish teaching, and the principles upon which it based? Do you know what it teaches, and how? Do you even know what it is and where it came from? Do you know how long it is, and how it is studied, and by whom?

How on Earth can you pass judgment on an entire religious tradition when, as a matter of fact proven right here, you know next to nothing about it?

Unfortunately for you, you seem to be of the mind that your highest authority is yourself.

Care to defend that nasty little bit of ad hominem?

The only one here dictating what is and is not authentic belief, what is and is not intellectual dishonesty and dodging, and what anyone can and cannot properly and rationally believe is YOU, Cephus.

If you want to take a poll on who is the most arrogant and claims the most authority, go for it.

[Confused]

Please avoid comments such as this. It does nothing to promote a civil debate. Thanks.

Neither do people who blatantly violate your own rules, specifically:

5. Support your assertions/arguments with evidence. Do not make blanket statements that are not supportable by logic/evidence.

When can we expect that they are going to get moderated for their violation of the rules?

MODERATOR INTERVENTION:

Cephus, you have been with the forum long enough to know that one of the rules is if you wish to challenge an intervention made by a moderator/administrator, it is to be done so in a PM, not on the forum which would only serve to take the thread even further off topic (though I think this one has already diverted way off).

If you feel a rule has been violated, you are just as capable of reporting it as any other forum member. Yours was reported.



MODERATOR SUGGESTION:

Though this thread has taken a very interesting turn towards a subject I find to be actually quite fascinating, I am not so sure it is even remotely related to the OP of this thread. Cephus, Cnorman18, Goat, if you all wish to further debate the Jewish issue, feel free to start a new thread on the cultural (ethnic) Jew vs the religious Jew. It has already taught me a lot.

[cnorman18]

MODERATOR SUGGESTION:

Though this thread has taken a very interesting turn towards a subject I find to be actually quite fascinating, I am not so sure it is even remotely related to the OP of this thread. Cephus, Cnorman18, Goat, if you all wish to further debate the Jewish issue, feel free to start a new thread on the cultural (ethnic) Jew vs the religious Jew. It has already taught me a lot.

The lady has a point. Cephus, shall we?

I see little point in continuing this fencing match, since you can't find a sword and you don't know what mine looks like, but if you care to start a thread on a subject about which you have proven you know nothing, I'll be there.

[Cephus]

Are you nuts? There isn't a Jew on Earth that doesn't recognize the difference between ethnic and religious Jews. What I am saying is that they are all Jews, and all part of the community. It may be due to centuries of persecution, or to being a tiny minority in a Gentile world; but we stick together, and we don't reject each other because we have different beliefs or none at all. The commitment is to the community, not to the religion, and especially not to any particular take on theology.

Make up your mind already. First you say that in order to be a part of the Jewish community, you have to follow rituals, be tested and be accepted by the community. Ethnic Jews certainly don't have to do that and atheist and humanist Jews most certainly do nothing of the sort, yet they are still Jews. You got backed into a corner so you're changing your tune, now anyone who is an ethnic Jew is magically part of this community whether they acknowledge or care about the community or not.

Like it or not, there are plenty of ethnic Jews who don't give a damn about your so-called "Jewish community", but you're trying desperately to use the term, just like some people try to use "black community" to imply strength in numbers and a powerful voting block where none really exists. You, and by that I don't mean to single you out, there are plenty who do the same thing, simply declare that all Jews are part of a community so you can say "look at how many of us there are". That doesn't fly.

I have never said any such thing. Look through my posts, all of them, 188 threads so far. I have always said that Judaism is pluralistic, and I have never said anything else.

Yet right here you're trying to claim there is a single Jewish community when there's nothing of the sort. There are many, many so-called communities, many beliefs, many ideas, etc. Judiasm is just as fragmented in it's thinking as Christianity is, Jews are just as diverse as any other ethnic group. You can't post a list of criteria for being a Jew any more than you can post a list of criteria for being a Christian, both groups have massive variations in their beliefs, no matter what your rabbi friend might think, a Jew is not a Jew.

Wrong again. Judaism as an institution and a community unquestionably does include religion, but one does not have to participate or believe in that aspect of it to be a Jew. What's so hard about that? If that wasn't true, there could be no such thing as a "secular Jew" in the first place. In the same way, ethnicity is sn aspect of Judaism too; and though I participate in the religious aspect, I am not ethnically Jewish; still, I am recognized as a real Jew.

Oh, playing the old No True Scotsman fallacy, hmmm? "Secular Jew" isn't a title, it's a description, the same as "secular black", "secular Eskimo" or whatever. One is a Jew the moment one pops out of the womb, it has nothing whatsoever to do with one's beliefs.

Since one cannot change one's ethnicity, the only way to convert to Judaism is by way of the religious aspect; but even then, there are no specific theological beliefs prescribed. Sorry, but that's just the way it is. I've proven that over and over, and even proved that taking the Torah literally raises eyebrows when one is converting to Conservative Judaism. Nobody tells you what you have to believe.

And since one cannot change one's ethnicity, you need to specify that you're only talking about RELIGIOUS Judiasm and stop pretending that Judiasm, all of the various and disparate meanings thereof, are all the same or are even related. That's like saying that all blacks have to be Southern Baptists, just because a lot of them are. There is no inherent link between being black and being a Southern Baptist, any more than there is an inherent link between being ethnically Jewish and following the Jewish religion, or even having any respect whatsoever for the Jewish culture. You're insisting on links that simply don't exist.

You keep bringing up Harry Potter as if he had something to do with all this. He doesn't.

As an analogy, he most certainly does.

Do you think that belief is based on the Torah? I've already dealt with that, and you're ignoring it. Again.

You've said that it's based on a lot of other writings as well and the same question applies to them. You're still not answering the question.

And what would those be? Judaism does not formally attribute any "characteristics" to God. Ein Sof. Unknowable. Remember?

Yet they still do. Things like... EXISTING. Caring about the Jewish people. Giving the Jewish people a stretch of worthless desert. These are all things that many Jews think are accurate and true about God.

Do you mean LITERALLY, or not? Why don't you use that word any more? Have you realized that that won't fly?

You're really hung up on that word, aren't you? I don't use it because every time I do, you go into a binary "the whole Torah has to be completely and totally literal" or "we get to pick and choose whatever we want because we feel like it" and the answer is in the middle somewhere. If you're going to reject stories in the Torah like the creation story or the flood story or the burning bush story, then why not just reject the whole God concept? You're the one who keeps insisting that your beliefs are logical and reasonable, yet every time I ask you to demonstrate how you logically or reasonably come to the conclusion that God exists, you change the subject.

Why is that?

[Cephus]

The lady has a point. Cephus, shall we?

If you'd like to, that's fine with me, although this thread is otherwise dead. I'm all for organization.

I see little point in continuing this fencing match, since you can't find a sword and you don't know what mine looks like, but if you care to start a thread on a subject about which you have proven you know nothing, I'll be there.

That's because you've been backed into a corner, your claims of "reasonable and rational Judiasm" have fallen, just like your claims that all Jews have to be part of a community. Your tone keeps getting more and more antagonistic as your claims fall by the wayside and you desperately try to salvage anything from your Jewish belief.

But hey, if you want to bow out, I understand. Losing sucks.

[cnorman18]

The lady has a point. Cephus, shall we?

If you'd like to, that's fine with me, although this thread is otherwise dead. I'm all for organization.

I see little point in continuing this fencing match, since you can't find a sword and you don't know what mine looks like, but if you care to start a thread on a subject about which you have proven you know nothing, I'll be there.

That's because you've been backed into a corner, your claims of "reasonable and rational Judiasm" have fallen, just like your claims that all Jews have to be part of a community. Your tone keeps getting more and more antagonistic as your claims fall by the wayside and you desperately try to salvage anything from your Jewish belief.

Antagonistic?

Uhh... Which one of us got a moderator intervention, again?

The rest is what we here in Texas call "All hat and no cattle." You haven't defended a single one of your claims, and now you can't even bear to state them outright because they're so obviously indefensible. Posturing doesn't make the obvious course of this conversation vanish.

But hey, if you want to bow out, I understand. Losing sucks.

LOL! If you want to indulge yourself in that fantasy, feel free. I'm sure *E*V*E*R*Y*O*N*E*
believes you, expert on Judaism who doesn't know the Talmud from a tallis.

Have a nice day.

ETA:

I just saw your response to my last; got lost in the moderator action. I'll be posting my answer on a new thread. It will be on the "Non-Christian Religions" forum. See you there.

I'm having fun here! Aren't you?

[faith]

Hi cnorman18,

I wanted to thankyou for you warm and generous reply to my post on page 8 I think it was on this thread. I was touched by your openess and honesty.
I also like the way you shared your beliefs and I also loved the way you made it feel it was about doing the best you can.

Thank you for that.

Love Faith.