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Re: original sin, the Jewish ideal, follow up -- Paul Angle, 02:43:06 02/28/02 Thu
After pouring through numerous web searches looking for Jewish information, it seems one must buy a book, to get the real analysis in depth. From all I can gather on the subject of Adam and Eve:
-this story is indeed taken as allegory by the Jewish teaching. More accounts and versions of the garden story appear in the "Pseudepigrapha" a collection of historical biblical works that are considered to be fiction. Because of that stigma, these books were not included in the compilation of the Holy Bible by the Christain sources. This book is a written history of what happened in the days of Adam and Eve after they were cast out of the garden. The obvious notion its all a fiction comes to light in these texts, in one account Eve creates Adam from mud.
According to Jewish tradition, the sin of Adam and Eve was not sex. It was disobedience of God’s word. "Once they gained knowledge, Adam and Eve lost their innocence. Yet, they gained something else: the ability to achieve holiness." (Rabbi Michael Gold - 1992)
Adam's acceptance of Eve's offer is in Jewish teaching, what brought freewill and choice into the world, it did not instill the notion of the damnation of sin to every living human, it brought the notion of death, and mans choice of freewill. His ability to atone to God through his choice of righteous behavior. The Christian's magnified this view by creating the notion that the fall meant all had sinned since before birth and all were damned, that their only salvation was through Jesus. This is not how the Jews see it. A man is judged by his own actions and decisions, by his own sin and righteousness. Only God can forgive sin, only God gives salavation and atonement. The Christian's had to build the precept of Jesus by using the Jewish scriptures to support their claims, they used the Garden story but cut the Pseudepigrapha texts which it came from that showed it was an allegory teaching. Much in the same way the Christian writers ignored the specific Jewish prophecies and direct teachings concerning the messiah because they went against the Christian story of Jesus. Jesus did not meet the signs and prophecies of the Jewish messiah, not one. The notion that the messiah was a divine immortal, as god, or god, does not appear in Jewish teaching because this is a direct blasphemy to the Torah law. Judaism like Islam, is strickly and totally monotheistic there are no sons, or relatives of god, no other gods, no other like him, this is the teaching and thrust of both Judaism and Islam.
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Re: The nature of original sin, the Jewish ideal -- matthew Davidson, 20:33:48 09/08/02 Sun
I think you need to re-examine the passages in the Old testament concerning the perfect nature of Job and some others. It is true that Job was a highly moral and spiritual man, but to say that he never sinned is to assume a lot. I think you will find that words like perfect and upright and so on are A. archaic King James words and not literal and B. Not absolute even if they are the actual words they appear to be. By the letter of the Jewish law and ordinances, if a person offended even in one point, he/she was guilty of all. This means if I steal a penny, I am a murderer and an adulterer and a blasphemer because I have fallen short of the perfect and absolute holy nature of God. God is holy and perfect, therefore He can not allow even the smallest sin to enter heaven, that is why mankind needs a redeemer. The redeemer must be God because God says He will not share His glory with another and because only a perfect sinless being would be sufficient to "heal us by His stripes." Also remember, the Messiah will be someone who is the Everlasting Father, or God (in Isaiah), and the modern Jewish belief that the mesiah is somehow Israel is inplausable, since the Messiah is someone who Isaih says will be punnished for the sins of "my people", and Israel was Isaiah's people, so Israel is not the messiah.
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Re: The nature of original sin, Adam and Eve -- Rev Gadfly, 12:51:46 02/28/02 Thu
RevG
Hello Josh, I am quoting your points here and replying accoringly:
Josh
"Now I would like to ask a question about original sin (finally, right:)). I don't know what kind of jewish people you have talked to, but the jews in Bible times were very factually based people."
RevG
They were also an extremely supstitious people who amazing accomplished nothing compared to the Egyptians, Romans, Babylonians, Greeks; it is like they were a bunch of underachievers who compensated with fantasies of their importance. The Jews I spoke to were practicing Jews of the reform viewpoint.
Josh
"Now why would a group like this dedicate entire books and other portions of books to tracing their lineage to an allegory?
RevG
This is not uncommon in the ancient world; every people had fictional family trees, some were desended from gods, others from monsters. The Greeks had an extensive library of similar stories.
Josh
" It seems to me that these people wouldn't even
waste their time if the story of Adam and Eve was allegory."
RevG
Judaism teaches through allegory; it is a fundamental tool of the rabbi. Also, Adam means 'man' in Hebrew, and Eve means 'life'. The allegory is that man abandoned YHWH in pursuit of his own life. You are assuming that allegory is useless, in reality, it is the basis of many of the stories of many religions; only Christians and Muslims are simple minded about these stories, for both reject the rational for the irrational. Even the Church father Eusebius admits as much:
From his Praeparatio Evangelica 12.31, we get:
"'Truth is beautiful, stranger, and steadfast. But to persuade people of it is not easy.' ... "You would
find many things of this sort being used even in the Hebrew
scriptures, such as concerning God being jealous or
falling asleep or getting angry or being subject to some other human passions, for the benefit of those who need such an approach."
Although I hold Eusebius in contempt, he is proving that even as early as the 4th century, Christians recognized that allegory was at work in these stories.
Josh
"Also isn't it very possible that the types of Jews that you have talked to have different beliefs than those of the first generation of Jews,"
RevG
The Jews as a people developed over centuries, for more information, read "The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology's New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of its Sacred Texts."
Josh
"because it is also my understanding that Jewish
culture drastically changed due to the formation of different groups such as Pharisee's and Saduccee's."
RevG
Not really, Jewish culture was constantly in a state of flux, afterall, they were influenced by the peoples around them. I strongly suspect that the character of Samson was simply the Jewish version of Heracles: they suffer from the same vices. Today, there is no Jewish culture as such, but there are many Jewish cultures linked by a common religion; not unlike the idea of Christian culture.
peace
Rev Gadfly
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