Bible Stories

What Is Judaism?

If you’re Jewish, or even if you are not, and your child asks about what it means to be a Jew, what would you say? Would you stress history or contemporary changes? Would you emphasize culture or religion? In asking these questions of parents, I’ve heard a great variety of responses. The following two illustrations provide an indication of how everyone’s interpretation of a religion can be quite different.

“Judaism is what makes us Jews,” thirty-year-old Rhonda tells her five-year-old daughter. “We believe in one God who selected us to be His people. Our forefathers suffered but kept their faith in God. It is a miracle that the Jewish people have survived for five thousand years. It could have only happened because we believe in God.”

Forty-one-year-old Janice, a mother of four, presents a somewhat different perspective on Jewry. “Jews are a group of people that we are a part of,” Janice tells her children. “We have to do everything we can to keep the group going, because it almost ended with the Holocaust. For some people, being Jewish has a lot to do with holidays and rituals. But your father and I feel that our own culture is what is most important. For us, as we hope you will feel, being Jewish means identifying with the state of Israel. It’s our obligation to make sure it remains the Jewish homeland,” Janice concludes.

There are many other approaches and points of view that parents assume with children. However, there are a few generalities about Judaism that many parents will want to bear in mind. These general considerations account for both biblical and modern Judaism, and Jewry as both a religious and a cultural phenomenon.

You can tell your child that Judaism was the first religion to believe in a single God. This Deity is portrayed in the Old Testament of the Holy Bible, in conjunction with the patriarchs of the religion. Judaism reveals a lineage of colorful leaders who were purported to be chosen by God. These major figures include: Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, and David. Jesus Christ was also part of this lineage, and he was the inspiration for the Christian religions of the world. He is not recognized by the Jewish religion as a significant figure in God’s plan, however, nor is he viewed as divine.

To describe the basic tenets of Judaism to your child, emphasize that Jews believe in an omnipotent and just God. The God depicted in biblical stories is above all a God of justice. Jews believe that God chose the Jewish people to represent God’s wishes on earth. Judaism holds that mankind’s responsibility is to live in accordance with God’s laws. The proper way to worship God, Judaism suggests, is to try to emulate those qualities which Jews perceive in God. Thus, since God is merciful, people should develop their ability to be compassionate. People should practice mercy with other human beings.

How can you sum up the primary tasks of a Jewish person, when Judaism contains so many specific laws and restrictions? You can focus on three fundamental demands of being a Jew. These are basic parts of the Sabbath service: (1) worship God as the one and only Deity (”Hear 0 Israel, the Lord is God, the Lord is One”); (2) love learning and love to study The Five Books of Moses in particular; (3) do good deeds (mitzvot) and give charity (tzedakah). These things are required for claiming Judaism as a way of life.

Your child may be curious about the social aspects of Judaism, and indeed, owing to the directive concerning good deeds, civic obligation is stressed. Judaism explicitly urges people to be concerned about the welfare of others. Each person is believed to be linked with each other person and God is thought to be the origin of all such relationships. Thus, Jews are taught to be sensitive to their neighbors at an early age a lesson that has helped the religion and the culture survive many perilous circumstances.

While God is thought to intervene in human affairs, just as God did when the Red Sea was parted in the time of Moses, Jews do not believe God appears in the flesh. Unlike Christians, Jews do not believe in the incarnation of God, but instead envision God as a purely spiritual Being. Nonetheless, the spirit of God is believed to communicate directly with human beings rather than through an intermediary. No priest or leader is required for communication and prayer, as each Jew must make his or her own covenant with God just as Abraham and Moses did in ancient times.

“Why do some Jews observe all kinds of special practices and others do not?” your child may wonder. In response, you can say that modern Jews divide themselves into three groups depending on how they interpret Jewish law. Orthodox Jews accept the Bible literally, as some Protestants and Catholics do. Orthodox Jews believe the Bible is unalterable and mankind must devote the lifetime that God provides for obedience to God’s wishes. The Orthodox life-style is a highly structured, ascetic way of living. There is considerable separation between men and women and households are run in a highly organized and solemn manner. Orthodox Jews use only Hebrew in their religious services, which run appreciably longer than the services of the other Jewish groups. Above all, Orthodox Judaism emphasizes a strict and absolute observance of the Sabbath (Saturday), and the unqualified observance of kosher dietary laws. That means partaking only of certain foods and specially prepared meats, not mixing meat and dairy products, and refraining from certain foods altogether.

Conservative and Reform Jews are much more relaxed in their understanding of Jewish laws and traditions. Conservative Judaism accepts much of traditional Judaism but sees the religion as evolving and continuously growing. Conservatives use a good deal of English along with Hebrew in their religious services and allow women a more prominent role in religious proceedings. They follow some Sabbath restrictions but frequently depart from others for the purpose of modernization.

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