{"id":1931,"date":"2014-08-03T20:03:43","date_gmt":"2014-08-03T20:03:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/?p=1931"},"modified":"2014-08-03T20:03:43","modified_gmt":"2014-08-03T20:03:43","slug":"is-there-an-original-judaism-part-ii","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/is-there-an-original-judaism-part-ii\/","title":{"rendered":"Is There an \u201cOriginal Judaism?\u201d Part II"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Nicole Sivan
\nPart 1<\/a>
\nModerns Sects of Judaism<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Woman-Rabbi\"<\/a>

Woman-Rabbi<\/p><\/div>\n

Five million out of the world\u2019s thirteen million Jews live in the United States; slightly over six million Jews reside in Israel. While Orthodox Judaism and secularism dominate in Israel, there are four main streams of Judaism in the United States: Reform, Conservative, Orthodox and Reconstructionist. Orthodox and Conservative Judaism are often described as traditional movements while Reform and Reconstructionist Judaism are considered liberal or modern movements.<\/p>\n

Orthodox Judaism is made up of many groups including the Modern Orthodox who are integrated into modern society while observing Halakha (Jewish Law), Chasidim, who live separately from mainstream society and dress distinctly, and Yeshiva Orthodox, who dedicate their lives to the study of Torah and Talmud. All Orthodox sects believe in both the written and oral Torah, believe the Torah was handed down to the Jewish people from God and is unchanged, and follow the 613 commandments of the Torah (except those pertaining to Temple practices such as sacrifices, which cannot be implemented today).<\/p>\n

Reform Judaism was founded in 1810 in Seesen, Germany and emerged out of the movements of Emancipation and Enlightenment and the new outlook on viewing the world, people, and religion. Jews were liberated from their isolated ghettos and invited to participate in the modern era and European urban life. Reform Judaism believes in these ideals and sought to find a way to reconcile the Jewish peoples new freedom, the modern world, and their Jewish beliefs and heritage. Reform Judaism incorporates reason and logic and does not believe the Torah was written by God. Reform Jews say the Torah was composed by separate sources and compiled together into one text, a belief also held by many archeologists and secular biblical scholars. Reform Jews do not follow all of the 613 commandments but they do retain the values, ethics and traditions of Judaism. This Jewish movement believes in preserving the practices and culture of Judaism, while living in the modern world. 35% of US Jews identify themselves as Reform Jews.<\/p>\n

Conservative Judaism emerged as middle ground out of the conflicting views between Reform and Orthodox Judaism. The Conservative movement preaches that the truths in the Torah come from God but they were written down by humans and therefore can be flawed. Conservative Jews follow the laws of the Torah, but they believe these laws can be altered or adapted to fit modern culture while retaining their values. However, Conservative Synagogues vary greatly in their practices and some resemble Reform Synagogues while others feel more like Orthodox ones. 26% of US Jews identify themselves as Conservative Jews.<\/p>\n

Reconstructionist Judaism believes Judaism is an \u201cevolving religious civilization.\u201d This movement does not believe God is active in history and it does not believe God chose the Jewish people. However, Reconstructionist Jews do observe Jewish laws and commandments, not because God says so but because it is tradition to do so. They believe in preserving Jewish culture, heritage, and history. Only 2% of US Jews identify with this movement.<\/p>\n

Despite their philosophical differences, these various Jewish movements are quite similar and if you attend a service in any one of these movement\u2019s synagogues, you will find that the overall structure of the service is the same and all maintain the same foundation of Judaism.<\/p>\n

Yet, despite all of their similarities, Orthodox Judaism is the only movement legally recognized in Israel. The Orthodox Rabbinate in Israel controls all civil affairs such as marriages, conversions and divorce. In protest, or because they do not meet the strict requirements required by the Rabbinate, thousands of Israelis travel abroad each year to wed, mostly to the Island of Cyprus. Twenty-four hour wedding packages to the island are quite popular. In fact, more than 50% of Israelis define themselves as secular, meaning they do not identify with any stream of Judaism. This lack of identification may because they are provided with no other option outside Orthodoxy. Only 20% of Israelis are Orthodox, either Haredi (ultra-Orthodox) or Dati (Orthodox), although their numbers grow daily. The left over segment of Jewish Israelis are defined as Masorti (traditionally observant).<\/p>\n

Despite Israelis affiliation with secularism, Jewish tradition, culture and practice are a part of daily life in Israel. Schools close for Jewish holidays and Jewish history and bible studies are part of the public school curriculum. Also, a large number of secular Israelis light Shabbat candles and fast on Yom Kippur. Yet, secular Israelis avoid attending religious services and do not define themselves as religious. Their Jewish practices are simply a part of their national consciousness and are deeply entrenched as elements of their traditional, Jewish, historical, and Israeli identity. They do not view these acts as religious rituals, per se.<\/p>\n

Non-Orthodox movements in Israel are slowly gaining ground and many secular Israelis, while hesitant at first, are surprised at how comfortable they feel when attending a Reform service. Whether or not the Reform and Conservative movements will ever gain true legitimacy in Israel still remains uncertain, but nay sayers will have to find an argument more persuasive than the \u201coriginal Judaism\u201d stance for rejecting their Jewish Reform and Conservative counterparts.<\/p>\n

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By Nicole Sivan Part 1 Moderns Sects of Judaism Five million out of the world\u2019s thirteen million Jews live in the United States; slightly over six million Jews reside in Israel. While Orthodox Judaism and secularism dominate in Israel, there are four main streams of Judaism in the United States: Reform, Conservative, Orthodox and Reconstructionist. more \u00bb<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1932,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[340,75,625,631,240,125,241,341,242],"class_list":{"0":"post-1931","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-biblical-spiritual","8":"tag-conservative-jews","9":"tag-israel","10":"tag-israeli-news","11":"tag-israeli-life","12":"tag-judaism","13":"tag-news-from-jerusalem","14":"tag-orthodox-jews","15":"tag-reform-jews","16":"tag-ultra-orthodox-jews","17":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1931","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1931"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1931\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1933,"href":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1931\/revisions\/1933"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1932"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1931"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1931"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1931"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}