Rosends said : "I'm saying that you are in no position to judge the accuracy of any translation if you can't read the original."
Clear responded : The problem of original texts and later religions assuming they are the same as the early religions called by a similar name
One of the problems this principle causes for the various modern Jewish sect is that they also do not have the original text.
Nor can the modern Jews tell if the translation they have from the most original texts are accurate.
Nor can modern Jews tell if their translation from presumably original languages is correct.
Nor can modern Jews know how the original religion of the ancient Israelites interpreted the texts and how that differed from their own interpretation of the text.
I think that many "Jews" (such as the Jews of the modern religion of "orthodox" rabbinic Judaism) tend to think their modern religion is the same as the religion of the ancient Jews while the Karaite Jews and many of the other "Judaisms" feel the same way.
Since the modern religions that call themselves "Jewish" are not monolithic and none of them have convincing evidence that they are the same as ancient judaism (other than they feel like they follow some of the same practices), they have no right to simply assume they are the arbiters of what is "authentic ancient judaism". Having said that, the various Christianities have fallen into that same line of thinking as the Jews adopted in thinking their sect is like the original.
Indigochild5559 responded : "Just being persnickety here. Karaites may in fact be Jews, but their religion is not Judaism."
Clear responded : Do you mean you feel Karaite Judaism is "not judaism" in the same way Orthodox rabbinism and other later "Judaisms" are not the same as authentic, ancient Judaism or do you mean Karaite Judaism disagrees with your Judaism or are you making this claim about their Judaism for some other reason?
Can you explain why Karaite Judaism is "not Judaism" in your opinion?
IndigoChild5559 respponded : There are certain things that all denominations of judaism have in common, and one of them is a respect for the talmud.
1) The arbitrariness and Illogic of claiming "My Judaism is the only REAL Judaism".
Of course other Judaisms are not required to believe in your type of Judaism, nor in the productions of your type of Judaism. (I,e, a text written by rabbis that they claim is oral law given to Moses...)
Your personal definition of what is and what is not “Judaism” is an arbitrary and a self-serving claim.
For example, Judaism and Jews who lived long before the written Talmud existed could not believe in a Talmud that did not yet exist and the Talmud is a by-product of Rabbinic Judaism.
Other Judaisms are not required to believe in your specific traditions created and written down by rabbis.
One thing Jesus seemed to be attempting was to give insight to Pharisaic Judaism so that they could recognize that many of their silly man-made traditions were not true Torah nor its real intent.
The rabbis that Created the written Oral law had themselves, come to prioritize their own man-made traditions
above the value of Torah.
Karaite Judaism seems to understand this principle that the rabbinic movement did not.
2) Claiming that one must believe in the talmud and it's principles or placing the talmud on a pedestal or even placing it above Torah is silly.
For example, the rule of the
Sanhedrin xi.3a that It is more culpable to teach contrary to the precepts of the scribes, than contrary to the Torah itself reveals the true basis and intent of these non-torah traditions which came to characterize the Pharisaic Judaism of Jesus’ age and carried on into the rabbinic movement.
Why not value the Torah more than rabbinic traditions and engaging in “purity signaling” and “religious posturing”?
Some of the Talmudic traditions created by rabbinic Judaism are bizarre and silly and I do not see why ANYONE needs to believe in them nor “respect them” as representing truth.
For example :
3) CONSIDER THE RABBINIC TRADITION OF AN ANDROGYNOUS ADAM
Rabbinic discussions about the two versions of Creation and the androgyne can be found in Genesis Rabbah and Leviticus Rabbah, which are collections of midrashim about the books of Genesis and Leviticus. In Genesis Rabbah the rabbis wonder whether a verse from Psalms offers insight into the first version of Creation, perhaps indicating that ‘adam was actually a hermaphrodite with two faces: They support this view partly based on Psalms 139:5 “’You have formed me before and behind’.
Rabbi Jeremiah b. Leazar said: When the Holy One, blessed be He, created the first ‘adam, He created it with both male and female sexual organs, as it is written, ‘Male and female He created them, and He called their name ‘adam,’ (Genesis 5:2).
Rabbi. Samuel b. Nahmani said, “When the Holy One, blessed be He, created the first ‘adam, He created him with two faces, then split him and made him two backs – a back for each side.” (Genesis Rabbah 8:1)
According to this discussion, the account in Genesis 1 is actually describing the creation of a hermaphrodite with two faces and two sets of sexual organs (and the ability to have sex with itself without eve.)
Then in Genesis 2 this primal androgyne (as the creature is commonly called in scholarly texts) is split in half and two separate beings are created – a man and a woman.
Other rabbis objected to this interpretation, noting that Genesis 2 says God took one of the man’s ribs to create the woman.
They explain: “’He took one of his ribs (mi-tzalotav)’… [‘One of his ribs’ means] one of his sides, as you read [in an analogy from the similar use of the same word elsewhere], ‘And for the other side wall (tzel’a) of the Tabernacle’ (Exodus 26:20).”
It’s then described that what is meant here is that the phrase used to describe woman's creation from man's rib – mi-tzalotav – actually means an entire side of his body because the word “tzel’a” is used in the book of Exodus to refer to one side of the holy Tabernacle. A similar discussion can be found in Leviticus Rabbah 14:1 where R. Levi states: “When man was created, he was created with two body-fronts, and He [God] sawed him in two, so that two backs resulted, one back for the male and another for the female.”
In this way the concept of the androgyne allowed the rabbis to reconcile the two accounts of Creation. Some feminist scholars also contend that the creature solved another problem for patriarchal rabbinical society: it ruled out the possibility that man and woman were created equally in Genesis 1.
It is silly and arbitrary to claim that ALL types of Judaisms MUST believe in either such traditions and interpretations or they are not "judaism".
Other judaisms need not believe in such traditions in a written Talmud (that did not even exist anciently). Nor do they need to believe in all of the silly traditions the later rabbis generated and transmitted to their followers.
Once the rabbis chose to interpret “adam” in a collective sense, they created a bizarre theological problem of having to reconcile the text with their interpretation.
Rather than consider the actual sacred text, they then chose to add to the Biblical text, a set of traditions by which they hoped to reconcile the problem their interpretation created.
Though such theological additions to the text created a theological “stop-gap”, the traditions they created then produces OTHER problems which they did not reconcile (i.e. What happened to the adrogynus hermaphrodite of Adam, how were they separated, why didn’t others follow his genetic pattern, etc) other than to simply say “god did this or that”.
Such irrational thought is partly why I think Rosends claim that "
Judaism is consistent and informed by context and language" and his claim that :Non Jewish interpretations seem to be selective and inconsistent." is simply religious posturing and hubris.
When one READS the rabbinic theories and their justifications for theories and interpretations, such claims fall apart since much of this sort of theology and interpretation is irrational and bizarre.
4) RABBINIC TRADITIONS AS A SOURCE OF ERROR AND THEOLOGICAL / DOCTRINAL DEGREDATION OF REALITY AND TRUTH
This type of adding to or taking away from the biblical text by creation of a multitude of silly traditions is, part of why I think God was angry with the Jews, just as he had to warn them in Deut 12:32
"....do not add to it or take away from it." (e.g. his words)
One was not to change a text or it's meaning, either by writing extra words, or by taking away meaning or adding meanings and traditions to what God gave. As one looks at this cludgy inept Jewish tradition of a Hermaphrodite Adam, one can immediately see why God told them NOT to do this.
Clear
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