The world Jewish community has recently been shaken to its core by the tsunami of anti-Semitism that has broken out in the wake of Israel’s third Gaza war. We have been horror-stricken as the world media has condemned the Middle East’s only democracy for the simple act of defending itself against terror rockets and tunnels.
We have watched with mouths agape at the tens of thousands of people marching in the streets of London and Berlin chanting “Hitler should have finished off the Jews” and “Ham-As rhymes with poison gas.” We have been gob-smacked with scenes of pogroms against Jews hiding in synagogues in Paris. Most of all, we have wondered how could a civilized world with liberal humanistic values choose the women-honor-killing, gay-murdering, free-speech-suppressing Hamas terrorist death cult over democratic Israel.
Why isn’t this being effectively combated? Simply stated, there aren’t enough Jews in the world.
The greatest challenge facing the world Jewish community is its puny size. The number of Jews in the world has fallen below a critical mass and our scarcity raises the specter of unpleasant consequences.
Foremost among them is our inability to defend the State of Israel properly.
The point is easily demonstrated. In the United State where nearly 6 million Jews represent about 2 percent of the population, our large size and well-organized numbers enable us to create an effective political lobby that has yielded concrete positive results in the form of American support for Israel. Compare that to the 230,000 Jews of Britain who live in a population of 64 million, a minuscule percentage of the population. Such a paltry number has condemned the supporters of Israel to being virtually overwhelmed by the growing Muslim community of Britain, with support for Israel falling precipitously as a result.
Even in France, where there are 500,000 Jews, they are outnumbered by a Muslim population of 5 to 6 million representing about 10% of the population.
But security issues aside, we Jews, whose biblical mandate is to be a light unto the nations, are meant to leave a mark on the world. Real influence, to be sure, depends more on quality than quantity, but even as the smallest of nations, Jews have arguably been the most influential over the long term.
Yet numbers still matter greatly. Just look at the United Nations as an example of how Israel is treated with contempt mostly because we are too small to influence a world body.
Kicking up Jewish numbers isn’t going to be easy, and vastly increasing the Jewish birthrate, as well as reversing assimilation, is vital. With intermarriage in the United States at 50%, millions of offspring in the world who have a Jewish father and a non-Jewish mother are not considered halachically Jewish. But even with one Jewish parent, the connection is strong.
Should we not be approaching these people and inspiring them to connect with their Jewish roots? The same applies to hundreds of thousands, and perhaps millions, of Europeans who stem from Jewish ancestry, like the growing community in Spain and Portugal of former Marranos. These people feel themselves to be partially ‘Jewish.’ but we allow them to founder and never connect them with the Jewish people, even though they have Jewish antecedents.
But it is high time we considered actively proselytizing non-Jews to Judaism. The number of people without any religion at all is a group to which we ought to offer Judaism as a monotheistic alternative and actively promote the Torah as the word of God.
Should they resist becoming Jewish because they are reluctant to embrace Judaism’s exacting standards of ritual observance, we can promote a confederation of Noachides, as the Bible calls them, men and women who identify with Jewish spirituality but do not embrace Judaism’s ritual tenets. In effect, these people would be explicitly adopting Jewish values without converting to Judaism.
We should fund billboards with Jewish teachings for non-Jews, offer classes in synagogues where gentiles can discover Jewish spiritual essentials, and engage in social media outreach to those unaffiliated with a faith.
There are likewise millions of Christians today who would be happy to discover the Jewishness of Jesus in order to better understand their own faith.
Two thousands years ago a still-mysterious man named Saul of Tarsus saw that the ideas and values behind Judaism were so rewarding that they could appeal to the entire world, if only they were stripped of Judaism’s tough ritual demands and embodied by a human god who was more comprehensible than Judaism’s invisible God. Thus, Christianity, and later Islam, was founded on Jewish spirituality. It’s time to facilitate access to the original source, not necessarily by converting others to Judaism – although this too must be a possibility – but also by reviving an ancient “associate” status that allows non- Jews to live lives deeply influenced by Jewish spiritually and values while retaining their own identity.
The American religious sociologist Rodney Stark explains in One True God, Historical Consequences of Monotheism that “Jews constituted 10% of the Roman world, and attracted many pagan God-fearers to their synagogues…. Jews in general and the synagogue in particular were attractive to non-Jews. The simplicity of Jewish theology (belief in the one God), the ethical standards (the Ten Commandments), and the many festivals exercised a certain fascination among many in the Greco-Roman world. Some made a full conversion to Judaism. Others remained in a kind of ‘associate’ status – what Luke in Acts refers to as ‘God-fearers’ – perhaps unwilling to take upon themselves the peculiarities of Judaism.
A vast movement existed in Rome before the birth of Christianity, based on an ancient concept called “Judaizers.” It is very likely that many of the non-Jews who embraced Christianity were first exposed to the Jewish scriptures and Judaism through their association with the urban Diaspora synagogues in the Roman Empire.”
Jewish values and spirituality can be integrated into their existing identities of practically all groups. Becoming a Judaizer would entail a seven-step program of living: 1. Observe Friday night as family night by tuning out all electronic interference and focusing on children, friends and community.
2. Eat kosher food (20% of Americans already look for kosher symbols as a symbol of cleanliness and purity) and separate milk from meat as a symbol of the affirmation of life and its negation of all forms of corrosion and death.
3. Celebrate the themes of the Jewish festivals. Passover Seders, which emphasize the human capacity to rise above material enslavement. (President Barack Obama already hosts his own annual Seder at The White House.) Dismissing material comforts by returning to the essentials of nature on Succot. Lighting lamps on Hanukka as a symbol of the human capacity of illuminate a dark earth and heal a painful life, etc.
4. Studying Judaism’s great texts, from the Torah portion of the week to selections of the Talmud to the epistles of Maimonides to mystical and kabbalistic works.
5. Observing the marriage laws, including the monthly barrier to sexual and erotic involvement, thereby enhancing desire and lust.
6. Appreciation of, and respect for, the feminine, including codes of alluring modesty for women and domesticity of men based on reinforcing marital commitment.
7. A commitment to acts of communal kindness like regular visits to hospitals and to homes for the elderly and giving 10% of one’s income to charity.
There is a definite need to offer Judaism as a religion to those who wish to become deeply committed, Torah-observant Jews.
If we could agree on moderate yet essential halachic norms of conversion that focus on observance of Shabbat and festivals, a kosher home, and the laws of Niddah (mikve and sexual purity), we could add millions to the Jewish people and strongly redress depleted Jewish numbers.
I envision a seven-week class offered every Wednesday night at 7 all over the world on the seven essential values and teachings of Judaism, a single curriculum that is promoted to non-Jews. The venues would be synagogues, schools, Jewish Community Centers and other Jewish educational centers.
A massive media campaign would be launched to promote Judaism as a way of life. Imagine billboards throughout the United States with a single teaching in one of four areas: child-rearing, happier marriages, spiritual purpose, and commercial and business ethics. The ads would be changed monthly and would be augmented by TV, radio and social media. People would get the message that Judaism has much wisdom to offer in the area of mastering life and finding purpose.
The campaign would funnel people into the weekly classes. From there people would decide which of the three categories most appeals to them: 1. Living a life of Jewish values as a non- Jew.
2. Being a Judaizer, an “associate Jew,” a practitioner of essential Jewish values and selected Jewish ritual, without becoming legally Jewish.
3. Formal conversion to Judaism.
It’s time for a true, worldwide push to offer the resources of Judaism as a religion to the world’s inhabitants that focuses not on heaven but on earth. Not on salvation but on redemption. Not on perfection but on spiritual struggle.
I believe that through this effort we could, in just 20 years, increase the number of Jews in the world from 14 million to 20 million, and push the number of fans of the Jewish people and Israel into the billions.
With Israel’s survival threatened on all sides, the time has come to promote a global Jewish spiritual effort that shuns Jewish insularity and promotes the Jewish people as a light unto the nations.
@ yamit82:
Now it’s Good Afternoon. Computer is acting up. Put the skin and face on my Angel. I have decieded to hide miss-spelled words in my post like Matos at Passover. see if dweller can find them.
honeybee Said:
It’s 8:45 pm here. But good morning to you from both of us oxxxoooooxxxo!
@ yamit82:
Good morning, yamit82 & Dagmar!!!!!!!!!!!!
@ honeybee:
Gnight HB
yamit82 Said:
Perhaps they were better the Homo-sapiens? Look at the time Darlin, its tuckin up time our weary brains need the rest.
yamit82 Said:
From Argentina like HaLevi and mar55.
honeybee Said:
So they too were aesthetics and emotional, 40,000 years ago.
Got to be a world record for continuous customs.
@ honeybee:
That kills the 6000 year creationist dogmas.
Ever wonder why Dinosaurs were created? Was it an ontological error? Trial and error maybe?
Newly discovered dinosaur, Dreadnoughtus, takes title of largest terrestrial animal
yamit82 Said:
At a Neanderthal grave site in Israel pollen was found covering the bones, meaning flowers were place there as tribute.
http://www.livescience.com/23730-neanderthals-modern-humans-interbreeding.html
yamit82 Said:
Humans are Neanderthals. Neanderthals DNA has been found in Human DNA all about populations in Southern and Medterainian Europe, especially Calabria Italy and Southern Spain. Dyslexia strikes.
honeybee Said:
I too read that awhile back but your mention of Neanderthals reminds me of this Essay. dweller too. 😉
Neanderthals were human
@ yamit82:
Prehistoric Israel had large community of Neanderthals !!!!!!!!!
dweller Said:
Hard to believe but from you I do believe you for once:
Enjoy!!! or not, all the same to me.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0oNz-brp0TU
honeybee Said:
I Thought it was So.Ca??? It’s a different planet. The automobile is a Ca deity. The only state where the natives never learned to walk. And every 5th male resident is named Jesus? Go figure?
dweller Said:
And here I though you was hatched.
@ yamit82:
Intelligent people consider the information or “advice” on its own merits, irrespective of its apparent source.
Never said that. I said I don’t know when it was created.
I also said that YOU don’t know either.
Take your dumb-assed distortions and choke on ’em.
Identify the comment please.
Astounding just how high you can pile it, Pancho.
My family has lots of women in it, and we all get along quite well and all thoroughly enjoy each other’s company. I spent the first nine months of my life as the constant companion of a woman 24/7. No reason I would hate women. Actually there are many who say I’m much tougher on MEN than on women. (And they may be right about that.)
So you’re NOT Casper? (good thing I don’t listen to him)
Never had occasion to see a single episode, so how would I know?
No “cave” in my online handle.
yamit82 Said:
They migrated to Texas !!!!!!!!!!!
dweller Said:
Yadda Yadda dweller
I saw your boy last week last week and haven’t stopped laughing since
dweller Said:
Why should anyone take advice from a mutant who believes the earth and the world was really created some 6000 years ago.
Can’t afford his own computer or much of anything else according to a previous comment of his, and from one who hates women and bases his life choices on telepathic messages from Caper the Ghost and thinks the Flintstones was a documentary series?
He may or may not be intelligent but rational he ain’t and I leave it to others as to forming their own opinions as to his sanity, although I have stated mine openly that he is a real Looney Tune.
Might I suggest the following: “Psychedelic Mushroom Compound Found to Grow and Repair Brain Cells“.
Apparently some of these still walk among us and like his screen name still dwell in caves. 6000 years my ass. 🙂
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=co62imB4Xvk
@ honeybee:
You sell yourself short, HB.
Anybody who can read can learn to spell
— because once you’ve acquired the basic mechanics of it, the sheer act of reading will ITSELF reinforce the mechanics.
@ yamit82:
No complex. No delusions. Yes, haNitzri is an ORIGINAL. But the signal thing about him is that anybody who takes his path, metaphysically speaking (whether or not they are acquainted with the figure he represents), ultimately becomes an ORIGINAL too. The potential lies within everybody.
Not wrong. Metaphysical law. What you do or don’t do with my grave has no bearing on your subjection to the curse — which is something you do to yourself. And I repeat: it will dog your steps to the grave — your OWN grave. I have nothing to do with that.
Not so. You normally DO hate (not that there’s anything ‘normal’ about it).
You may not always be rip-roaring mad, 24/7 — but there is most surely an enormous operative reservoir of hate inside you. The fact that you keep it under wraps more often than not is quite beside the point. It’s not going anywhere, it’s constantly making its influence known, and continues to grow in volume.
What I said was NOT that YoursEverTruly would dog you to the grave — but that the CURSE you’ve saddled yourself with would dog you to the grave.
I think you’re expressing a secret personal wish in re your sexual
proclivities:
First, bitches in heat. Then, me. Are you turned on by powdered sugar donuts too? Or do you prefer the ones with the jelly center? (a nice reward if you’re willing to make your own hole)
What ‘lie’?
Yes, I see you took the hint. And by so doing, you’ve answered your own [above] question. . . .
honeybee Said:
Ouch!!!
yamit82 Said:
Oso de peluche del hierro con espinas!!!!!!!!!!
honeybee Said:
así que por qué tienes miedo de mí? Soy un oso de peluche. 😉
yamit82 Said:
mas cerca, no me hacia miedo de ti, ya !!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Tu eres un oso de miel.
honeybee Said:
no está claro haces o no lo haces? sí o no?
En todo caso usted está a una distancia segura. Por el momento 😉
yamit82 Said:
No me te hago miedo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
@ yamit82:
@ honeybee:
Dejando la elección a mí? Podría ser peligroso.
yamit82 Said:
I should have said, ” mucho mas” , but you can take any way you wish, Sugar.
honeybee Said:
“Understanding is a fountain of life unto him that hath it; but folly is the chastisement of fools.” Prov 16:22
grande mas.??? Hmmmm
Qué tan grande??
yamit82 Said:
Proverbs????????????
yamit82 Said:
Te entiendo grande mas.
dweller Said:
“Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it.” Mat 7:23 🙂
“…folly is the chastisement of fools.”
honeybee Said:
Leading question but I would need to know first what might interest you then I can say if I have it or not.
One thing I can promise, it won’t be boring.
honeybee Said:
Bueno saber que, creo que sabes lo que siento por ti también
yamit82 Said:
Doyou have any thing of value that would interest me ????
yamit82 Said:
me hago aficionada a ti, solo.
honeybee Said:
honeybee Said:
What?
dweller Said:
That’s how you described yeshu. Seems you also are inflicted with a ‘Jesus’ complex dweller? More delusions??? 😛
yamit82 Said:
Wanna BET ????
yamit82 Said:
Formal de que ??????
honeybee Said:
If I had read your comment first I would have ignored it and would not have commented because I know it is not you.
@ honeybee:
Por qué tan formal?
@ yamit82:
Somewhat garbled but I think I understand.
honeybee Said:
Yo no había llegado a la misma. Pero me gustaría tener y lo hizo.
yamit82 Said:
I thought you read every word from my lips ???????????
dweller Said:
I was born backside first, it laid the foundation for my whole life.
yamit82 Said:
Dear Yamit82, I must take credit for that piece of nonsense. What I wrote that is REALLY important is ,” I don’t do boring”.
dweller Said:
I didn’t read HB’s comment but it conforms to many of your verbal ejaculations regarding book knowledge in favor of intuitive reception of knowledge.
I see you play both sides of any subject. I have a near photographic memory dweller. I would say you agree with HB and my comment stands on it’s merit as it applies to you in particular.
dweller Said:
Wrong, I will shit on yours Barbie.
I normally don’t hate just disdain. Hate is not a sustainable emotion but in your case I will make an exception. You couldn’t dog a bitch in heat, eunuch.
Curse? At least I can afford my own computer and service.
The boys must have had a good time with you every time you bent over while in prison. Cursed? Pot kettle black.
More delusion from the LIAR!