Posted on 08/09/2010 3:34:34 PM PDT by jjotto
Question:
My sister was baptized and has since married and had a child. My mother claims the child is Jewish, but how could that be? If Judaism is a religion, if someone leaves it, she's no longer Jewish, right?
Response:
Logically, I would have to agree with you. If Judaism is a religion, then someone who doesn't believe in the religion should be no longer Jewish. The reality, however, is that it doesn't work that way.
Throughout the Tanach, we find Jews breaking every facet of their covenant with G‑d, joining and forming all sorts of idolatrous cults and heathen practices. Yet when the prophets chide them, they are called "My people, Israel."
The Talmud focuses in particular on the precedent of a notorious character named Achan, who appears in the story of the fall of Jericho. "Israel has sinned," exclaims G‑d. "They have transgressed My covenant that I commanded them." Yet in the story's narration we discover that the lone sinner is Achan, who took from the spoils of Jericho. The Talmud points out that nevertheless Achan is considered "Israel," and remarks, "Israel, although he has sinned, is still Israel."
The choice of precedent is poignant and the wording laden with subtle meaning: Achan has broken "My covenant that I have commanded them"—interpreted by the Talmud to mean not only one detail, but the entire covenant of Torah. Yet he remains not only a Jew, but "Israel"—the entirety of the Jewish People in a single individual.
The principle extends not only to genealogical Jews, but converts as well. In Tractate Yebamot we learn that once a person has fulfilled all the requirements of a proper conversion, he is considered "like Israel in all matters." The Talmud explains those last words to mean that even if this convert would return to his pagan ways "if he marries a Jewish woman he has the same status as an apostate Jew and they are considered married."
Why does the Talmud choose to discuss Jewishness in terms of whether or not a marriage is valid? This is also precise: When it comes to having this Jew slaughter meat for you or relying upon him in other areas of kosher and similar matters, his status may indeed be the same as a non-Jew. But those are technicalities, dependent on extraneous factors. Marriage, however, is the real test of Jewishness. Even if a non-Jew would marry a Jew with a chuppah and a rabbi presiding with all the procedures "by the book," the marriage does not have the validity of a marriage sanctified in accordance with Jewish law. Saying that "they are considered married" is the best Talmudic language available for "Yes, he is still Jewish."
Based on the above statement of the Talmud, the Jewish Code of Law rules that the marriage between a Jewish man and a Jewish woman who "convert out" is completely valid. Therefore, their children are considered Jewish and could also marry other Jews.
Which brings us to your case, where a Jewish woman has joined another religion and married a non-Jew. In this instance, as well, since Jewishness is matrilineal, her children are considered Jewish.
Apparently, Jewishness is neither about religion nor race. Unlike a race, you can get in, but unlike religion, once you're in you can't get out. As with Achan, once you are a part of this people you are the entire people. As Israel is eternal, so your bond with them is irreversible, unbreakable and eternal.
Jewish by blood...
Islam works the same way, but they tend to enforce transgressions with the sword.
So, are children, born out of wedlock to a Jewish lady, considered Jews?
In my understanding, they are not.
Yep. Adolf and Osama would both agree on that.
Judaism does not stigmatize children simply for being born to unmarried parents.
A Jewish ‘bastard’ is someone born to parents who are not permitted to marry, as in adultery or incest.
Seriously, what would the Israelis decide if the children wanted to make Aliyah?
NOTE: The Nazis would have hauled them off to the ovens anyway.
So, the children are not “stigmatized” except for the fact that they can never marry?
Uh, I’d say that was being “stigmatized.”
So there is the contradiction.
A Jew can believe in the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, be descended from Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, hold fast to the TaNaK, believing every word therein, keep kosher, support Israel, attend synagogue every Shabot, observe all the holy days, and yet believe in Y'shua Hammoshiach and is not considered Jewish. Yet another can totally eschew the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, stay away from synagogue on shabot, disdain the nation of Israel and spit upon his tradition, and yet still be called Jewish.
I lament.
I am happy to be corrected, but I had always thought that a Jew could be almost anything, atheist, New Age, Buddhist, but that if he converted to Christianity he was no longer considered a Jew. This is incorrect??
The mother left but her child is Jewish unless and until the child is baptized.
Apparently, Jewishness is neither about religion
You're right. It's about blood.
Over the millennia, there have been many Jewish converts. Many of them retain their Jewish heritage by celebrating both Jewish and Christian holidays. The Jews are the older brothers of the christians who embrace the Jewish heritage of Jesus. You can learn more and possibly post the same question at this link.
You misunderstand.
Those born to unmarried parents have no handicap at all.
A halachic mamzer may marry another mamzer or may marry a convert, for example.
Jesus was a Jew, and he was baptized. So were all of his early followers until Christianity spread to the gentiles. So, the mother is still a Jew, and so is the child.
You can’t shed ethnicity.
[CATHOLIC CAUCUS] For All the Saints: Edith Stein
[CATHOLIC CAUCUS] St. Edith Stein and her Companions
"Martyred for their Catholic faith, martyred for their Jewish blood”
Living under the Mystery of the Cross: The Story of St. Edith Stein [St. Theresa Benedicta]
A meditation on the martyrdom of St. Theresa Benedicta of the Cross
Edith Stein, Apostate Saint
Edith Stein — Convert, Nun, Martyr
My Journey With St. Edith Stein
First Documents Emerge From Vatican Archives, Including Letter From Edith Stein
A Jew who professes another religion may forfeit certain privileges, but doesn’t lose his Jewishness.
And everyone involved is fully Jewish?
Qualifying for government benefits for making aliyah is decided by the secular government on the basis of political deals. Religious authorities do not decide these matters.
We can both lament.
Wanna meet at the Chinese buffet later? /s
A mamzer is a full Jew, no question.
The Mishnah states that a mamzer scholar is given honor over an ignorant high priest.
So such a Mamzer can marry a Jew?
In fact, the Jews are still and always will be the Chosen People of God whether I, a Christian, like it or not. Yet, I feel no envy towards them at all.
Some day, the Chosen People will realize that their Messiah did come 2000 years ago and that He was first recognized by Christians. Thereafter, everything will be in line with God’s Plan.
A mamzer may marry another mamzer or a convert to Judaism. All are Jews.
The union of a Jew and non-Jew is not considered a marriage.
To be clear, a mamzer is not allowed to marry an ordinary Jew.
A Cohen may not marry a convert or divorcee, so there are other restrictions on who can marry.
It’s not a question of ‘Jewishness’.
Thanks for the info
This poster is one.
The simple question of weather or not I'm considered a Jew is simple: ask Hitler or any radicalized Muslim
A non-Jew can covert to Judaism, a Jew by birth will always be a Jew by blood no matter what he considers himself.
especially through the maternal bloodline?
Something non-Jews will ALWAYS remind him of, positively or negatively.
Yep, spot on....But somebody should get that person to a Chabad rabbi for a dvar Torah.
ping
It's always an interesting moment after some ignorant moron claiming to be a Christian starts to tell me how the Jews run the world and all that other nonsense, that I am a converted Jew.
A Jew who professes another religion forfeits an entire nation and HaShem to boot. HaShem's massive fury has been upon those who practice idolatry and other religions. Lets not forget that small item.
Does that person lose their Jewishness......No. The neshama of a Jew is always in tact though for many, very surpressed. Living in the dispora has had its consequences.
B'H
B'H
A Jew that continues to reject Jesus is just hard headed or uninformed. Just as a Muslim is forbidden to read the Bible, Many Jews only hear what someone says about Jesus and haven't sought Him out for themselves.
In my personal opinion, Orthodox Jews are more tolerant than Reformed because Jewishness has evolved into a race instead of a religion. At least the Orthodox understand to look for Messiah and Reformed is almost to the atheist level as they now think Jesus isn't coming and it was a moralistic fable to expect a Savior. If you were to quiz someone like Larry King, they call themselves a Jew, but you cannot find anything religious about them. It is more of a racial issue for them.
I believe that if the mother is Jewish then so will the children be. Not so the father.
No, a gentile Christian is an “adopted” Jew, as per Romans 10-11. The Jewish Christian is merely following Jehovah’s plan since the beginning.
Jewish by blood or jewish by religion?
Unlike other religions Jewish can either be a religion or an ethnic people. A person of any ethnic background can be a part of the Jewish religion but not part of the Jewish ethnicity.
A Jewish person of Jewish ethnicity who converts to Christianity is refered to as a Messianic Jew or Jewish Christian.
Islam on the other hand is not only a religion but also a political structure but not an ethnicity.
Throughout the Tanach, we find Jews breaking every facet of their covenant with G‑d, joining and forming all sorts of idolatrous cults and heathen practices. Yet when the prophets chide them, they are called "My people, Israel."
In my reading, there's all sorts of things that can get one "cut off from the people".
Throughout the Tanach, we find Jews breaking every facet of their covenant with G‑d, joining and forming all sorts of idolatrous cults and heathen practices. Yet when the prophets chide them, they are called "My people, Israel."
In my reading, there's all sorts of things that can get one "cut off from the people".
The rabbis say that if a Jew becomes a Christian, he/she is no longer Jewish..*That is a Newer Concept*
Since all the first Christians were Jews they were always part of the *Jewish People* they worshipped in the Temple with other Jews that did not belive in Jesus Christ.
Maybe later on Orthodox Judaism called Jews who believed in Christ *Apostate* Jews but they were still Jews.....
Before Jesus Christ came you had Jews and Gentiles....When Jesus said the Jews and Greek are all one in Christ...It meant Jews and Gentiles were bound together in *Jesus Christ* SO Jews are still Jews even if they are Christian and Gentiles are still Gentiles if they are Christian....
When Saul/Paul went to Corinth and spoke to Gentiles they knew Paul was a Jew.
SOME FAMOUS JEWS THAT BELIEVED IN CHRIST...
1530 - Immanuel Tremellius - Hebrew Scholar, University Professor he came to faith in Messiah around 1530 and became Professor of Hebrew at Cambridge University in 1548. He later becomes Professor of Theology at Heidelberg, where he produces a Latin Old Testament that is published in Frankfurt in the 1570s and London in 1580. With Theodore Beza’s Latin New Testament attached to it, the Tremellius Bible is the Protestant contender against the Vulgate issued by Pope Sixtus V in a Reformation vs. Counter Reformation battle of Latin bibles.
1546 - Johannes Isaac - Hebrew Scholar, University Professor
Johannes Isaac came to faith in 1546. He became a professor of Hebrew at the University of Cologne.
1621 - Malachi ben Samuel - Polish Rabbi
Malachi ben Samuel, a Polish Rabbi, comes to faith in Messiah around 1621, several years after being impressed by a Yiddish translation of the New Testament. He is particularly surprised that marginal references to the Hebrew Scriptures are not distorted, as he had been told they would be. He writes, “My heart became full of doubt. No man can believe the pain and ache that assailed my heart. I had no rest day or night.... What should I do? To whom should I speak of these things?” He finally feels he has no choice but to believe.
1625 - Giovanni Jonas - Hebrew Scholar
Giovanni Jonas came to faith in Poland in 1625 and, working as a librarian, writes a Hebrew translation of the Gospels and a Hebrew-Chaldee lexicon.
1656 - Esdras Edzard - Hebrew Scholar
Esdras Edzard, who grew up studying Hebrew and the Talmud, and then studied in Leipzig, Wittenberg, and Basel, earns a doctorate and begins working among the Jews of Hamburg. He provides free instruction in Hebrew, helps the poor, and explains faith in Messiah to all. From 1671 to 1708 Edzard leads 148 Jewish people to faith. He emphasizes further study for those coming to faith, and almost all of those who joined him continue in faith.
1709 - John Xeres - Talmudic Scholar
John Xeres counteracts the slur that Jewish believers in Jesus are not well-educated in Judaism by emphasizing his Talmudic studies. Others on the list of learned Jewish believers include Ludwig Compiegne de Veil, Friedrich Albrecht Augusti, Paul Weidner, Julius Conrad Otto, Johann Adam Gottfried, and more.
1722 - Rabbi Judah Monis
Rabbi Judah Monis, after becoming the first Jewish individual to receive a college degree in America (M.A., Harvard, 1720), publicly embraces faith in Messiah Jesus. In 1735 he publishes a Hebrew grammar, the first to be published in America.
People convert to different religions all the time...a Jew that believes that Jesus is the Jewish messiah is no longer a Jew, obviously, but to say that Jews are too hard-headed about the “messiah” of the Christians is pure arrogance, and just plain dumb. Any Jew worth his salt can easily pick apart the notion that Jesus is the Jewish Messiah and can explain that Christianity is just a heretical sect of Judaism, no more, no less...magritte
Well said Magritte.
B’H
I am just saying Jesus is the Jewish messiah is no longer a Jew is a *NEW CONCEPT* Man-Made....It was not the thought of Ancient Israel about the Jews who were followers of the Messiah Jesus Christ.
All the Jewish Followers of Jesus Christ remained Jews, the Pharisees never said they were no longer Jews.
Any Jew worth his salt can easily pick apart the notion that Jesus is the Jewish Messiah *Not sure what you mean here*, but the debate rages on with *Biblical Scriptures*
The problem here is that Jews who deny Jesus have not a clue who the Messiah will be and when he is coming, or if he is.
Meanwhile our World Slips into further decline and debauchery validating every single End Time Scripture in the Gospels...
Go figure...
Very few Jews are Orthodox/observant and are ignored or an embarrassment to cultural Jews. I have heard the relative percentage of observant Jews is increasing but given the rate of Jewish intermarriage this percentage increase of observant Jews is inevitable. Thus accepting Jesus as the Son of G-d would not affect the status of one to most cultural Jews who represent the vast majority of Judaism. In Israel where the Orthodox hold sway it might be a different matter.
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