Big Ideas Simply Explained - The Religions Book

["BUDDHISM 149 See also: Preparing for the afterlife 58\u201359 \u25a0 The ultimate reality 102\u2013105 \u25a0 Seeing with pure consciousness 116\u201321 \u25a0 The enlightenment of Buddha 130\u201335 \u25a0 Immortality in Christianity 210\u201311 Body Sensations Perceptions Ideas and Consciousness intentions All these things are constantly changing. Although conventionally referred to as my \u201cself,\u201d in reality I am just this bundle of changing elements. We cannot say what a person is. belief systems and philosophies. Analyzing the self So where is the chariot, Nagasena It is implied by Buddha\u2019s teaching Milinda starts by innocently asking asks, if it is not the wheels, or the of the Middle Way (pp.130\u201335), whether the person he is greeting axle, and so on? Clearly, there is and also re\ufb02ects his teaching of is indeed Nagasena, whereupon no chariot over and above the parts the interconnectedness of all things. Nagasena launches straight into from which it is constructed. However, nowhere is the idea of the the discussion by stating that Chariot is a name applied to the changing self better illustrated than although the name Nagasena collection of those parts when they in The Questions of King Milinda, is conventionally used to refer to are put together to make the vehicle. written anonymously in the 1st himself, there is actually nothing In the same way, Nagasena argues, century CE. This text describes the that corresponds to it. The word there is no \ufb01xed or permanent self discussions between a Buddhist is a designation, a \u201cmere name,\u201d over and above the various parts sage known as Nagasena, and because \u201cno real person is here of which we are made. Nagasena King Milinda\u2014the Indo-Greek ruler apprehended.\u201d In an absolute does not represent anything that of northwestern India, c.150 BCE. sense, Nagasena does not exist. Milinda could point to. \u276f\u276f Bewildered, the King asks I am known as Nagasena. how that can be the case, since But the word \u2018Nagasena\u2019 is Nagasena is clearly standing there only a designation or name in front of him. To answer this, in common use. There is no Nagasena uses an analogy. He observes that the King arrived in permanent individuality a chariot, so it is obvious that a (no soul) involved in the matter. chariot exists. But he then starts to analyze the various parts of the Nagasena chariot: the axle, the wheels, and so on, and asks the King if any of these \u201care\u201d the chariot\u2014eliciting the answer that they are not. The monk Nagasena is often referred to as one of the Sixteen (or Eighteen) Arhats, beings who have realized a very high level of spiritual attainment.","150 THE SELF AS CONSTANTLY CHANGING We think of people as \ufb01xed objects. But Nagasena insists that the self is a process of ongoing change that can no more be pinned down than motion itself. Like the chariot, \u201cNagasena\u201d refers The \ufb01fth skandha is consciousness: in no way \ufb01xed. They re\ufb02ect a to a set of elements that exist in a the general sense we have of being constantly changing stream of state of mutual dependence. alive\u2014including an awareness of experience and response as we the information streaming in from engage with life. This means that Buddhists view the human being our senses, and of our thoughts, not only is it impossible to point to as made up of \ufb01ve interdependent ideas, and emotions. Nagasena, it is also impossible skandhas (literally, heaps). These to say whether anyone is the same are: form (our physical body); The key feature of Nagasena\u2019s person during the course of one sensations (information about the argument is that each of these lifetime. Nevertheless, we still have world that is constantly fed to us skandhas is constantly changing. a sense of a person being the same by our senses); perception (our This is most obvious in the case over a lifetime, since each of us has awareness of the world through of form, or the physical body, as a past and a future. Nagasena sensations); and mental formations we change from being a baby to an points out that it is absurd to say he or impulses (our ongoing \ufb02ow adult through the physical process remains the same over time, but of ideas, intentions, and thoughts of aging. But it is also true of the likewise absurd to say he does not. about the things we perceive). other four skandhas: they too are In fact, Nagasena insists that the questions themselves are wrong, because they presuppose a \ufb01xed self instead of one that is dependent upon the body. In a further example to illustrate the dependency of the self, Nagasena asks Milinda to consider milk, curds, butter, and ghee. These are not the same things, but the three later stages\u2014curds, butter, and ghee\u2014cannot be made unless milk \ufb01rst exists. That is to say that A meeting of cultures The meeting between King Milinda\u2014or Menander, as he is only appearance in literature Milinda and Nagasena occurred known in Greek\u2014was one such is his dialogue with the King in the context of a meeting of king. He ruled a region known in The Questions of King cultures. Buddhism had spread as the Indo-Greek Kingdom\u2014in Milinda, a widely respected to northern India through the present-day northwestern India text in Theravada Buddhism teachings of missionaries sent \u2014in the 2nd century BCE, so we that was written in the 1st by the Emperor Asoka around may assume that Nagasena lived century CE. One legend about 100 years earlier. Meanwhile, in that area sometime between Nagasena states that while the in\ufb02uence of classical Greece the 2nd and 1st century CE. living in Pataliputra (modern- was spreading eastward from day Patna, India), he created the Mediterranean, and, when While evidence of Milinda the Emerald Buddha, a jade it reached northern India, it exists in the form of coins and statue of Buddha clothed in was adopted by local rulers (a references by classical writers, gold, which is now in Wat Phra process known as Hellenization). we know very little about the Kaew, Bangkok, Thailand. philosopher-monk Nagasena. His","BUDDHISM 151 butter only exists because milk Which of these parts is the chariot? Nagasena chariot? exists; it depends on the existence would answer that none of them are. Likewise, of milk. In the same way, says whatever constitutes \u201cme\u201d cannot be pointed Nagasena, \u201cdo the elements of to, but nonetheless continues to affect things being join one another in serial in the universe now and in the future. succession: one element perishes, another arises, succeeding each chariot? other as it were instantaneously.\u201d A category mistake chariot? In the 20th century, the British philosopher Gilbert Ryle attacked chariot? the idea that the material body is linked to a nonphysical mind. In Toward the end of the 20th century, sense of purpose. Existentialism doing so, he used an argument that and into the 21st, most Western suggests that we shape our lives by is exactly parallel to Nagasena\u2019s. philosophers have argued for a the choices we make, and should A visitor to the city of Oxford who materialist (or physicalist) view of acknowledge our responsibility for has been shown various colleges, the mind: that mind is simply a doing so: we are what we choose libraries, and so on, asks, \u201cBut word that describes brain function. to do\u2014we do not have an internal where is the university?\u201d Ryle For modern science, there is no self real self or essence. claims that there is no university over and above the body; the brain over and above its constituent parts. performs a complex processing of Absolute truth experience and response, which we This discussion of the self Likewise, there is no mind think of as our mind, or self. highlights an important feature of that exists separately from the Buddhist teaching: the difference body. People who suppose that This differs from Nagasena only between conventional and absolute there is are making a category in the way that the sage applies truth. In order to function normally, mistake\u2014where things of one kind a closer analysis of the way in we have to assume a pragmatic are presented as though they which we experience ourselves as or practical approach and refer belong to another. It is wrong to thinking, feeling, and responding to objects as though they have treat the mind as though it is an beings. As he pointed out to King a recognizable, permanent, and object of substance, when mind Milinda, even the fact that we do independent existence. refers to a collection of capacities this does not mean that there is a and dispositions. separate thing called the self. It would be impossible to communicate if everything had What we are today comes The other modern philosophy to be described in terms of its from our thoughts of that unwittingly builds on this constituent parts. Buddhism Buddhist idea is existentialism. It therefore accepts the need for yesterday, and our present is often summed up in the phrase such conventional truth, but thoughts build our life \u201cexistence precedes essence,\u201d constantly guards against meaning that we are born and exist mistaking it for absolute truth. \u25a0 of tomorrow: our life is the before our lives have obtained any creation of our mind. Buddha","ENLIGHTENMENT HAS MANY FACES BUDDHAS AND BODHISATTVAS","","154 BUDDHAS AND BODHISATTVAS IN CONTEXT A bodhisattva is an Each image of a buddha enlightened being or bodhisattva represents KEY EVENT who vows to remain in one or more qualities of The development of the world to help all an enlightened mind. Mahayana Buddhism other creatures. WHEN AND WHERE Buddhist images are If we visualize or pay 2nd\u20133rd centuries CE, India aids to spiritual respect to an image, BEFORE development, not gods we are helped to From 1500 BCE The Hindu to be worshipped. develop the quality Vedas refer to many gods and goddesses, each depicting an represented by it. aspect of nature and life. Enlightenment has From 2nd century BCE many faces. Devotional practices become in\ufb02uential in Hinduism. AFTER 7th century CE Mahayana Buddhism, using elaborate images and ritual, is established in Tibet. 8th century CE Images of Buddhist teachers are used as a source of inspiration, as well as those of buddhas and bodhisattvas. A popular image is that of Padmasambhava, the Precious Guru, who introduced Tantric Buddhism into Tibet. T he teachings that Buddha Buddha \ufb01gures\u2014of different colors, Buddha\u2019s previous lives, and the encapsulated in his Four male and female, some fearsome, actions and characteristics he Noble Truths and Noble others in calm meditation\u2014appear must have displayed in those lives Eightfold Path (pp.136\u201343) were to be the objects of devotion in a to move toward nirvana. These straightforward and rational. To way that, to the external observer, musings led to the compilation follow them required mental training appears not unlike devotion to the of Jataka tales or \u201cbirth stories,\u201d and analysis of experience, but did gods and goddesses of other involving characters, sometimes not entail metaphysical speculation religions. Since Buddhism still often human and sometimes animal, (thinking about what does or does claims to be rational, how did this that depicted the Buddhist qualities not exist), religious ritual, or\u2014at imaginative transformation come of love, compassion, and wisdom least for the \ufb01rst few centuries\u2014any about, and how is it justi\ufb01ed? deemed necessary for progress use of images. However, a modern- toward enlightenment. In turn, day visitor to a Mahayana Buddhist The bodhisattva path these stories led to the idea of temple in China or Tibet would Given the general Indian belief in the \u201cbodhisattva\u201d: a being who see many elaborate images and reincarnation, it was not long before is capable of enlightenment\u2014or forms of devotional worship. people started to speculate about of buddhahood\u2014but who chooses","BUDDHISM 155 See also: The ultimate reality 102\u2013105 \u25a0 Physical and mental discipline 112\u201313 \u25a0 Seeing with pure consciousness 116\u2013121 \u25a0 Zen insights that go beyond words 160\u201363 \u25a0 Man as a manifestation of God 188 There has arisen in me the preaching to beings in a vast must cultivate six \u201cperfections\u201d: will to win all-knowledge, universe made up of many world generosity, morality, patience, with all beings for its object, systems, of which this present energy, meditation, and wisdom. that is to say, for the purpose world is a very small part. Followers These qualities are shown in of setting free the entire of Mahayana argue that the earlier individual bodhisattva images. teaching was a necessarily limited For example, the quality of wisdom world of beings. version, and that their own was is depicted through the image of Sikshasamuccaya kept hidden for many centuries, Manjushri, a young man holding a awaiting the right conditions to lotus (representing the enlightened to remain in the world, continuing allow it to be preached. mind) and brandishing a \ufb02aming to be reborn, in order to bene\ufb01t sword (representing the wisdom all other beings. This idea brought Mahayana Buddhism, although with which he cuts through the about a remarkable change in the it developed in India, spread north veil of ignorance). overall view of the Buddhist path. and was established in China Instead of striving to become an and then in Tibet. The earlier The most widely venerated of arhat, or \u201cworthy one\u201d (the term tradition still exists as Theravada images is that of Avalokiteshvara, used for those of Buddha\u2019s followers (\u201ctradition of the elders\u201d) Buddhism. the Bodhisattva of Compassion. His who have gained enlightenment), It is found today mostly in Thailand, name is a Sanskrit word meaning it was now possible for Buddhists Sri Lanka, and Southeast Asia. \u201cThe Lord who looks down.\u201d He to dedicate themselves to the looks upon earthly beings as more exalted path of becoming, Two bodhisattvas a good father would upon his in effect, apprentice buddhas\u2014 The earlier tradition, now known children, offering them assistance bodhisattvas who engage with the as Theravada, recognizes only two and trying to liberate them from world out of universal compassion. bodhisattvas: the incarnation their faults and suffering through of the historical \ufb01gure of Buddha his unwavering compassion. \u276f\u276f The great vehicle (who is also known as Sakyamuni Those who followed this new Buddha or Gautama Buddha), and This thangka, or silk wall hanging, ideal called it Mahayana, or \u201cgreat Maitreya, a bodhisattva who will depicts Tara, who vowed to become vehicle,\u201d in contrast to the earlier arrive in the future to preach the a female bodhisattva to show that the tradition, which they described truth of the dhamma. However, difference between male and female is as Hinayana (\u201csmall vehicle\u201d) and in Mahayana Buddhism, lay unimportant, as these ideas are illusory. regarded as too narrow in scope. people, as well as the monastic Practitioners of Mahayana believe community, are encouraged to that it represents a deeper reach nirvana and thereafter to teaching, which was implicit in become bodhisattvas. Once the the original Buddhist dhamma. possibility of a vast number of Its scriptures\u2014notably the Lotus bodhisattvas was accepted, each Sutra\u2014present an image of Buddha dedicated to the task of universal enlightenment, the \ufb02oodgates of Buddhist iconography were opened, because these beings could then be imaginatively depicted in order to provide inspiration to others. Symbolism and images Each bodhisattva vows to become a buddha (\u201cenlightened being\u201d) and to lead others toward enlightenment. To do this, they","156 BUDDHAS AND BODHISATTVAS May I be an unending treasury for those desperate and forlorn. May I manifest as what they require and wish to have near them. Shantideva Buddhists may offer incense or However elaborate or not these that requires sustained personal \ufb02owers before a buddha image as an images may be, and however far attention to the qualities and ideals act of devotion. This is not worship of removed they may appear to be that the image represents. a god but respect for an enlightened from the straightforward teaching human being, imaginatively expressed. of the historical Buddha, they are The impermanent mandala all taken to represent aspects of The mandala is another Buddhist Known to Tibetans as Chenrezig, enlightenment. They are not gods image created for the purpose of Avalokiteshvara takes on a female to be worshipped, although it may spiritual development, whether form as Kuan Yin in China, and be hard to remember this when used for meditation or instruction. Kannon in Japan. Avalokiteshvara observing Buddhists paying tribute A mandala is a geometric pattern is most commonly depicted as to them in temples and shrines. in which various shapes, letters, having four arms: two are crossed and images of buddhas and over his heart, a third holds a lotus Focuses for meditation bodhisattvas are intricately \ufb02ower, and a fourth holds a rosary. Images of bodhisattvas and buddhas interwoven in a complex image. The crossed arms symbolize the are regarded as aids to spiritual boddhisattva\u2019s compassionate progress. In meditation, a person The patterns are carefully outpouring from his heart to earthly may become adept at visualizing created out of colored sand, beings. The lotus \ufb02ower represents his or her chosen image, being displayed at festivals, and then enlightenment and pure wisdom, able to construct it imaginatively destroyed. Their destruction is while the rosary symbolizes at will. So, the practitioner of important because it reinforces the his desire to liberate earthly meditation has an ongoing idea that everything is temporary. beings from their endless cyclical relationship with a particular To attempt to retain the images existence. The 14th Dalai Lama image. It is often selected for would encourage clinging and (p.159) is traditionally thought that purpose, on the advice of craving, which are counter to of as an incarnation of this a teacher, in order to address a Buddhist teachings since they lead Bodhisattva of Compassion. particular quality\u2014represented to frustration and suffering. It is by the image of a bodhisattva only through letting go\u2014embracing Not all Mahayana images are or buddha\u2014that the individual detachment\u2014that the journey to elaborate in appearance. Each of needs or wants to develop. The enlightenment can begin. the dhyana or \u201cmeditation\u201d buddhas bene\ufb01t of such a practice is such as Buddha Amitabha, for generally only apparent over a Emptiness and buddhas example, are depicted sitting cross- period of time; it is not seen as The Buddhist philosopher legged, wearing a very plain robe, an automatic process, but one Nagarjuna (see facing page) their eyes closed in meditation. argued that everything is empty","If you want others to which sees earthly items and BUDDHISM 157 be happy, practice beings as having no essence (or compassion. If you \u201cown being\u201d) because they are all Nagarjuna want to be happy, dependent on the prior existence practice compassion. of something else. Given that we Nagarjuna is considered the The Dalai Lama ourselves have no independent, most important Buddhist underlying essence, the aim of philosopher after Buddha of inherent existence. By this he meditation is to see beyond our himself. He was born in the meant that nothing in the world, senses and the ideas we have 2nd century CE to a brahmin including all living beings, has a gained from them, to look directly (priestly) family, probably self or, therefore, an underlying upon ultimate truth. in southern India. An oracle essence (or \u201cinherent existence\u201d). predicted his early death at He maintained that this idea was Given that the buddhas and the age of eight, so when he implied by Buddha\u2019s original bodhisattvas may be conjured was seven, his parents sent teaching about the concept of up in meditation, this suggests him to a monastery to study interconnectedness (pp.130\u201335), that they are neither substantial under the great Buddhist (in other words, they do not have a teacher Saraha. It is said that There are three types of physical embodiment), nor located he avoided death by reciting bodhisattva, who approach their somewhere else in the universe. a mantra without interruption task of helping others reach Each of the images conjured up on the eve and dawn of his enlightenment in different ways. is not a representation of a person, eighth birthday. He then took but part of the ultimate truth about monastic vows. King the person who sits in meditation. \u201cI will become The vast array of buddha and Nagarjuna is best known enlightened and bodhisattva images are merely for the teaching of Buddha\u2019s then lead and help temporary aids to assist a Perfection of Wisdom sutras. others toward person in recognizing that every According to legend, he enlightenment.\u201d individual is a potential Buddha. \u25a0 rescued these from nagas (half-worldly spirits), gaining Ship\u2019s Captain the name Nagarjuna (master \u201cI will carry others of the nagas). He also wrote many sutras himself, and with me so that founded the Madhyamika we may become (middle position) school of Buddhist philosophy. enlightened together.\u201d Key works Shepherd c.200 CE Fundamental Verses \u201cI will guide of the Middle Way; The everyone toward Treatise on the Great enlightenment and Perfection of Wisdom only then seek it for myself.\u201d","158 ACT OUT YOUR BELIEFS THE PERFORMANCE OF RITUAL AND REPETITION IN CONTEXT Tibetan Buddhism These aim to engage uses colorful and the Buddhist emotionally KEY MOVEMENT imaginative rituals. and physically, not just Tibetan Buddhism intellectually. WHEN AND WHERE From 8th century CE, Tibet Act out This allows the your beliefs. Buddhist to experience BEFORE what it would feel like to 300 CE Tantric rituals that use dramatic forms to act be enlightened. out spiritual realities start to develop within some branches I n most forms of Buddhism the performances and dancing, with of Hinduism in India. rituals are simple (perhaps just huge images on cloth spread out making an offering before a or hung on temple walls, and the 4th\u20135th century CE Yogacara Buddha image), while Tibetan creation and destruction of intricate Buddhist philosophy argues Buddhism is colorful and dramatic. sand patterns, known as mandalas that all we know of reality During worship, monks may chant (p.156). How is all of this, which is in fact an interpretation repeated phrases (mantras), wear seems so different from the early made by the mind; therefore striking headdresses, blow horns, simplicity of the Buddhist path, imaginative and symbolic and use elaborate hand gestures explained and justi\ufb01ed? actions are real for us. (mudras)\u2014often while holding small symbolic objects (vajras) and For more than a thousand years, AFTER bells. Lay Buddhists may also Buddhism and Hinduism coexisted 19th century Western chant, turn prayer wheels, and in India and in\ufb02uenced one another. Orientalist scholars take an set out colorful prayer \ufb02ags. At When Padmasambhava, revered as interest in Tantric yoga. festivals, there may be dramatic the founder of Tibetan Buddhism, took the religion to Tibet in the 1959 Following the Chinese invasion of Tibet, lamas start teaching Tantric Tibetan Buddhism in other parts of the world, particularly the US and Europe.","BUDDHISM 159 See also: Symbolism made real 46\u201347 \u25a0 Living the Way of the Gods 82\u201385 \u25a0 Devotion through puja 114\u201315 \u25a0 Buddhas and bodhisattvas 152\u201357 \u25a0 Su\ufb01sm and the mystic tradition 282\u201383 \u25a0 Devotion to the Sweet Lord 322 early 8th century, it was in a form bodhisattvas. Each of the mudras Buddhist monks perform a ritual at in\ufb02uenced both by the general expresses a particular quality: an a northern Indian monastery. The bright Mahayana tradition, which had open-handed gesture, palm turned clothing and headdresses are intended already spread to China, and by outward, expresses generosity; to engage believers emotionally. the devotional tradition (bhakti) the fearless mudra with the right of Hinduism that had developed hand raised as though giving a and mudras to perform, depending in India during the previous greeting, a blessing, or even on their personal inclinations and centuries. Bhakti involved a a stop sign, is believed to induce what they hope to achieve. more personal and emotional a feeling of determination. By engagement with worship, which making these gestures, a Buddhist Although there are Tantric was taken a step further in both imitates the image of the buddha aspects to publicly accessible forms Hinduism and Buddhism with or bodhisattva, and thereby of Tibetan worship, many Tantric the development of Tantra. identi\ufb01es with what it represents. rituals are designed to be performed Chanting, mudras, and other in private and their details are Tantra involves not just aspects of Tantric Buddhism aim generally kept secret. But, whether thinking about what will be to immerse the worshipper in a performed in private or public, the achieved by spiritual practice, dramatic expression of what the feature common to all is that beliefs but also a process of acting out. path toward enlightenment is and values are acted out using For instance, rather than simply about, by not just explaining it, esoteric texts and actions. \u25a0 visualizing an image of a buddha, but making it feel real. the practitioner imagines him or herself as that buddha. This Personalized rituals process of emotional engagement Tantric rituals are performed involves the whole person, not under the instruction of a teacher, just the intellect, encouraging or lama, who selects those that him or her to feel what it would are likely to be of particular be like to be enlightened. value to each individual. In other words, practitioners are given So, for example, the mudras an individualized set of images that are made in Tantric worship to visualize, mantras to chant, are the same as those depicted on the images of buddhas and Tibetan lamas The Dalai Lama is the 14th in line In Mahayana Buddhism, a a sign that he is indeed the from Tsongkhapa, who founded the bodhisattva is someone who reincarnation. There are Gelugpa sect of Tibetan Buddhism remains on earth to help others, hundreds of tulku: perhaps the in the 15th century. perhaps through many lifetimes best known is the Dalai Lama, (p.155). Tibetan Buddhism re\ufb01nes considered the incarnate form the idea to a tulku, or \u201creincarnate of Avalokiteshvara, a bodhisattva lama\u201d\u2014lama being the title given of compassion and the patron to a senior Buddhist teacher in deity of Tibet. While he is Tibet. When a great lama dies, it is regarded as the bodhisattva\u2019s thought that another will be born latest manifestation, he remains to carry on his work. A search is an ordinary human, albeit one made for the new lama, and the with the extraordinary vocation child candidate is expected to of expressing Avalokiteshvara identify objects from his past life as in today\u2019s world.","160 IN CONTEXT DISCOVER YOUR KEY EVENT BUDDHA NATURE The development of Zen Buddhism ZEN INSIGHTS THAT GO BEYOND WORDS WHEN AND WHERE 12th\u201313th century CE, Japan BEFORE 6th century BCE The Buddha teaches meditation leading to insight and enlightenment. 6th century CE The Buddhist monk Bodhidharma brings meditation Buddhism (Ch\u2019an) to China, and is said to have instigated martial arts training at the Shaolin monastery. AFTER 1950s\u20131960s Zen ideas become popular in Western counterculture, as seen in the work of the Beat poets and Robert Pirsig\u2019s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. Many Zen meditation groups and California\u2019s \ufb01rst Zen monastery are founded. Z en and its Chinese equivalent, Ch\u2019an, simply mean \u201cmeditation.\u201d As a tradition of Buddhist practice, it is generally regarded as having been founded by an Indian monk, Bodhidharma, who brought it to China in 520CE, and is credited with the de\ufb01nition of Zen as \u201ca direct transmission of awakened consciousness, outside tradition and outside scriptures\u201d. This de\ufb01nition highlights the key features of Zen: it seeks to allow enlightenment to happen naturally, as a result of a clearing of the mind, and does so without the need for rational argument, texts, or rituals. In other words,","BUDDHISM 161 See also: Aligning the self with the dao 66\u201367 \u25a0 Su\ufb01sm and the mystic tradition 282\u201383 \u25a0 Life-energy cultivation in Falun Dafa 323 Using words\u2014in prayer, or discussion\u2014 creates clutter in our mind. Thinking and reading silently just create Nishida Kitaro more words in our heads. The Japanese philosopher When we strive to \ufb01nd answers and insight, Nishida Kitaro (1870\u20131945) our desire clouds the mind. studied both Zen Buddhism and the history of Western If we are to discover our Buddha nature, we must philosophy, and tried to empty our minds of all these things. express Buddhist insights using Western philosophical With an empty mind, insight and understanding terms. He taught at the will come to us without words. University of Kyoto from 1910 to 1928, and founded it creates the conditions in which two main Buddhist branches, what is known as the Kyoto a person\u2019s mental clutter, which Theravada and Mahayana School of Philosophy. detracts from clarity of the mind, (p.330), Zen sees itself as having can be replaced by direct insight. developed independently via a Nishida argued that pure separate line of transmission. experience took place before Zen claims to continue a tradition the split between subject and that goes back to the earliest days Buddha mind object, self and world\u2014exactly of Buddhist teachings. There is a Central to Buddhism is the idea the distinction made by Zen story that one day, surrounded by that existential unhappiness is between the ego-based his disciples, the Buddha simply caused by the illusion that each mind and the undifferentiated held up a \ufb02ower, turning it in his person has a \ufb01xed ego, which unity of the Buddha mind hand without speaking. One of the is separate from the rest of the (see left). This he compared disciples, Kasyapa, smiled; he world, yet which clings to it, trying to the ideas of the German had seen the point. That wordless to hold on to what changes. philosopher Immanuel Kant insight, it is claimed, was passed (1724\u20131804), who distinguished down from teacher to disciple for Zen sees this as the small, between a person\u2019s experience 28 generations to Bodhidharma, who super\ufb01cial mind; one that people of things (phenomena) and the took it to China, from where it spread acquire at birth, then develop, things themselves (noumena), to Japan. So, rather than being a in\ufb02uenced by those around them. the latter being unknowable. product of the development of the However, it holds that people also \u276f\u276f Nishida even introduced the idea of God as the basis of reality and our true self, and compared Zen with Heidegger, Aristotle, Bergson, and Hegel. Key work 1911 A Study of Good","162 ZEN INSIGHTS THAT GO BEYOND WORDS Sitting and meditating is all that is required to achieve enlightenment in Soto Zen. The stilling of the mind dispels the illusion of self. have a Buddha mind, freed from indivisible unity. Zen has no be repeated many times. It is said egocentric, conceptual thinking. scriptures or formal teachings; it to happen almost as if by accident; This is innate, but hidden by the is an oral teaching, a tradition of it cannot be forced, because clutter of the small mind. People meditation passed from teacher wanting to achieve satori is a form gain nothing by discovering their to pupil\u2014hence the importance of of grasping. Zen does not seek to Buddha mind, they simply recognize practicing only under the guidance de\ufb01ne reality or the nature of satori. what they have had all along. of an experienced teacher. Soto Zen was developed in Zen teacher Dogen said that A key feature of Rinzai Zen, Japan in the 13th century by the the true self is not the super\ufb01cial introduced by Hakuin, is the use teacher Dogen, who had traveled ego that each person has now, but of koans\u2014unanswerable questions in China and there encountered a the original face he or she had that shatter conventional thinking. meditation tradition called Ts\u2019ong before they were born and molded Probably the best-known koan is Tung. His form of meditation is by experience. It is only when Hakuin\u2019s, \u201cWhat is the sound of very different from the Rinzai form. people develop their own faces that one hand clapping?\u201d Those who Instead of trying to trigger sudden they see themselves as separate think they know the answer to a insight, Soto Zen is based on sitting entities and become egocentric. koan should think again, and let meditation (zazen) and a more Dogen is therefore suggesting that go of all preconceived notions. gradual process of enlightenment. people should strive to recognize Rationally examining a koan, or a who they were before they were Zen dialogue (a mondo) is unlikely Soto considered that religious conditioned by life and experience. to yield great insight, since it is traditions and rituals could be too easy to view it only within the dispensed with: enlightenment Zen in Japan parameters of personal discursive could be achieved simply through There are two main forms of Zen: thought. A Zen teacher will try to the practice of zazen. This involves Rinzai and Soto. Rinzai Zen was guard against that happening. periods of sitting in an upright, established in Japan in the 12th cross-legged position, facing century by Eisai, and reformed As a result of Zen practice, a a blank wall, interspersed with in the 18th century by Hakuin. person may suddenly experience re\ufb02ective walking, known as kinhin. This school introduced the Zen satori\u2014insight or enlightenment. In meditation, the mind is cleared view that the world is an illusion This is not a one-time or permanent of its \ufb02ow of ideas, so that the and that reality is in fact a simple, state of enlightenment, but a process of sitting is exactly what momentary experience that may If you understand the \ufb01rst word of Zen you will know the last word. The last word and the \ufb01rst word: they are not one word. Mumon","BUDDHISM 163 If you meet the Buddha calligraphy or raking sand in a cause of suffering. In a world where on the road, kill him! garden\u2014both of which are features people seek to gain things, to claim Zen koan of Zen practice\u2014can help to free knowledge and insight like personal the mind from the constant process possessions, Zen is the ultimate enlightenment is about. A person of thinking, allowing a person to frustration. Collecting beautiful does not sit in order to become act in greater harmony with nature. Zen artifacts could never result enlightened; in the act of sitting That is why Zen \ufb01nds expression in understanding what lies behind that person is already enlightened. in many artistic forms, from \ufb02ower their production. Zen is letting go. Stilling the mind and clearing arranging to computer design. away the illusion of a separate In some ways, Zen returns to self is enlightenment. Zen is about creating situations the earliest phase of Buddhism, that bring insight, without trying before the buddha and bodhisattva Beyond words to explain or express it rationally. images, devotional practices, and In Zen meditation, something is To try to describe the goal of Zen revered scriptures. Enlightenment seen but cannot be described. is to have failed to understand it: is open to all: indeed, everyone is Careful attention to a piece of Zen aims to set the mind free from already enlightened, if only they content; it is not part of that content. could recognize it. Zen dispenses Zen is not studied, it is practiced; with almost everything related to and if satori or enlightenment is religion and presents itself as a path \ufb01nally achieved, nothing new is of insight and understanding that known\u2014all that is known is that it is without religious trappngs. is not necessary to know anything. Deliberately full of paradoxes, Zen It is also deliberately anarchic, its aims to gradually break down the stories provocative, and its teachers normal processes of logical thought. notoriously challenging. Asked to summarize Buddhism, Bodhidharma Attempting to explain something is believed to have replied, \u201cVast is to grasp at it, and that grasping is emptiness; nothing holy\u201d\u2014not what what the Buddha described as the was expected, but to the point. \u25a0 That wind, banner, and mind are Neither the wind nor the not innately different is what this koan banner is moving. It is your seeks to demonstrate. Externalization is a function of the ego-based mind, not of minds that are moving. the undifferentiating Buddha mind. I say the banner I say the wind is moving. is moving, not the banner.","JUDAISM FROM 2000 BCE","","166 INTRODUCTION The era of King David Millions of Jews The Talmud is The Zohar, the Patriarchs: reigns over die in two revolts completed. It includes a key work in Israel as God\u2019s against Roman the Mishnah and the the kabbalah Abraham, his anointed one, rule, and are again Gemara (commentaries (the Jewish son Isaac, and or \u201cmessiah.\u201d driven out of Israel. grandson Jacob. on the Mishnah). mystical movement), is compiled. C.2000\u20131500BCE C.1005\u2013965BCE 70 AND 135CE C.425 CE 1250 C.1300 BCE EARLY 6TH CENTURY BCE 200 CE 900\u20131200 Moses leads his Babylon conquers A written version of The Golden Age of people from captivity David\u2019s kingdom Jewish Oral Law, Jewish culture in in Egypt to Canaan, of Israel and in the Mishnah, Spain expands; the Promised 586 BCE destroys the is compiled. the philosopher Land, and receives Maimonides writes First Temple of in\ufb02uential works. the Torah. Jerusalem. O ne of the oldest surviving faith with a son, Isaac; he in turn Solomon built a permanent temple religions, Judaism evolved had a son, Jacob, who, the Tanakh in Jerusalem, symbolizing the from the beliefs of the relates, was the father of the Twelve claim of the Jewish people on the people of Canaan in the southern Tribes of Israel. Together Abraham, Land of Israel. But twice the Jews Levant region, more than 3,500 Isaac, and Jacob are known as the were forced from their \u201cPromised years ago, and is closely connected Patriarchs\u2014the physical and Land\u201d and the temple destroyed: to the history of the Jewish people. spiritual ancestors of Judaism. \ufb01rst by the Babylonians in the 6th The Hebrew Bible, the Tanakh, century BCE, and again after they tells not only the story of God\u2019s The Tanakh recounts how Jacob had returned and fallen under creation of the world, but also the and his descendants were enslaved Roman rule, in the 1st century CE. story of his special relationship in Egypt, and then led to freedom with the Jews. by Moses at God\u2019s command in The Diaspora the Exodus. As part of Moses\u2019s As a result of foreign rule, the God\u2019s agreement, or covenant, covenant with God, he received Jewish people became a widespread with the Jewish people began with the Torah (the Five Books of Moses) diaspora. Some Jews, later known God\u2019s promise to Abraham that on Mount Sinai. Moses took his as the Sephardim, settled in Spain, he would be the father of a great people back to the Land of Israel, Portugal, North Africa, and the people. God told Abraham that his where they settled once again. Middle East, but the majority, the descendants must obey him and Later, God appointed David\u2014the Ashkenazim, formed communities adopt the rite of circumcision as a anointed one or \u201cmessiah\u201d\u2014as king, in Central and Eastern Europe. sign of the covenant; in return, God from which came the belief that a Inevitably, the geographical would guide them, protect them, descendant of his, the Messiah, separation led to differences in the and give them the land of Israel. would come to bring in a new age way Judaism developed between Abraham was rewarded for his for the Jewish people. David\u2019s son","JUDAISM 167 Revolutions in France The Reform, Theodor Herzl The State of Israel and America lead to Orthodox, and starts the modern is founded. Jews being given full Conservative movement of Zionism with the publication rights and freedom movements of The Jewish State. of religion. separate. 1775, 1789 19TH CENTURY 1896 1948 18TH CENTURY LATE 18TH CENTURY 1881\u20131920 1938\u201345 1972 Hasidism is The Jewish Thousands of Jews Nazi Germany The \ufb01rst female founded in Eastern Enlightenment are killed and persecutes and rabbi is ordained (Haskalah) occurs; millions more executes millions within the Reform Europe as a Jews in western Europe of Jews in the reaction against integrate more fully into displaced in waves movement. the austerity of their adopted societies. of pogroms in Holocaust. legalistic Judaism. Russia and Ukraine. the groups, and various different Torah, which was considered to be attacks. From the 18th century religious traditions evolved. In divine in origin, while Reform and on, countries such as the US and Spain, a Golden Age of Jewish Conservative Judaism took a less France granted them full rights, thinking \ufb02ourished between the rigorous approach, regarding the and there was a movement toward 10th and 12th centuries, which Torah more as a set of guidelines greater integration. However, this produced great philosophers such rather than obligations. An issue posed a question of identity. Were as Moses Maimonides. This was that divided the different branches the Jewish people a religious, also the center, in the Middle Ages, of Judaism in the 20th century was ethnic, cultural, or national group? of interest in the more mystical the status of women. In spite of the Zionism, which arose in response, aspects of Judaism, known as doctrine ruling that Jewish identity pressed for the formation of a Jewish kabbalah. In eastern Europe, a is passed down solely through the state, and matters were brought to number of the more isolated small maternal line, women were not able a head in the aftermath of the Jewish settlements, the shtetls, to play an active part in religious Holocaust with the formation of found that the scholarliness of ceremonies until recently. the State of Israel in 1948. Today, their religion did little to promote it is dif\ufb01cult to assess how many strong community ties, and a Oppression and identity followers of Judaism there are, more spiritual movement, Largely because of their position because many who identify Hasidism, emerged as a result. In as displaced immigrants and themselves as Jewish are not the following centuries, there were their distinctive faith, Jews have actively religious. However, it is further divisions in Judaism, largely been widely persecuted throughout estimated that there are more than over matters of interpretation of their history. In many places, they 13 million Jewish people in the Jewish Law. Orthodox Judaism have been isolated in ghettos, and world, the majority of them living advocated a strict adherence to the suffered violent vili\ufb01cation and in either North America or Israel. \u25a0","I WILL TAKE YOU AS MY PEOPLE, ANDI WILL BE YOUR GOD GOD\u2019S COVENANT WITH ISRAEL","","170 GOD\u2019S COVENANT WITH ISRAEL IN CONTEXT God asked Abraham to leave his home and family, and go to another land. KEY TEXT The Torah If he did so, God promised to reward him; this promise became known as the covenant WHEN AND WHERE c.1000\u2013450 BCE, This promise was that as long as Abraham the Middle East and his descendants obeyed God, God would protect his descendants and BEFORE give them the land of Canaan forever. c.1300 BCE Hittite royal treaties provide a model for the Torah\u2019s \u201cI will take you as my people, description of the covenant. and I will be your God.\u201d AFTER 200\u2013500 CE The Mishnah and Talmud codify the oral law, or received body of rabbinic learning, and are used to offer further Biblical interpretation and guidance on the covenant. 1948 In the aftermath of World War II, the State of Israel is founded, allowing Jewish people to return to their historical homeland. 1990 US theologian Judith Plaskow urges Jews to reinterpret traditional texts that exclude women from the covenant. The covenant, or contract, roughly equivalent to modern The \ufb01rst covenant with God is the central Israel and Palestine, perhaps as Like many peoples in the ancient concept of Judaism, and early as the 15th century BCE. In Middle East, the Israelites were dates back to the beliefs of the around 1200 BCE, during a period polytheists, but worshipped a Israelites, an ancient Middle when this part of the world was national god, one whom they Eastern people. In fact, Jews view under Egyptian rule, an inscription viewed as offering their people themselves as bound to God by a was carved that contains the \ufb01rst particular protection. Jews were series of covenants. The Abrahamic mention of Israel as a people. later to deem their God\u2019s name covenant was the \ufb01rst, speci\ufb01cally too holy to pronounce and did not singling out the Israelites as God\u2019s In the 6th century BCE, many preserve its original vowels, so it chosen people, while the later of the Israelites were forced into became known only by its four Mosaic covenants (mediated by exile in Babylonia. During this consonants: YHWH (probably Moses) renewed this initial bond. period of exile, much of the Hebrew, pronounced \u201cYahweh\u201d). YHWH or Jewish, Bible was composed. was also known by several other The Israelites, sometimes It sets down the history of the names, including El and Elohim, called Hebrews, were a people Israelite people and the origin meaning God. who occupied part of Canaan, of their religious beliefs.","JUDAISM 171 See also: Animism in early societies 24\u201325 \u25a0 Sacri\ufb01ce and blood offerings 40\u201345 \u25a0 The burden of observance 50 \u25a0 A challenge to the covenant 198 According to the Book of Genesis, Jewish boys are circumcised on The Hebrew Bible the \ufb01rst of the \ufb01ve books of the the eighth day after their birth Torah (the \ufb01rst section of the as a sign that they are parties to The Hebrew, or Jewish, Bible, Hebrew Bible), it was by God\u2019s this pledge. the sacred scriptures of the decree that the Israelites \ufb01rst Jewish people, is a collection settled in Canaan. He called on Abraham had two sons, Ishmael of writings composed mostly a man, Abraham, born in the and Isaac. God blessed Ishmael, in the Hebrew language and Mesopotamian city-state of Ur (in promising that he would become written over the course of the modern-day Iraq) and commanded the father of a great nation. But \ufb01rst millennium BCE. With some him to travel to a place named it was Isaac that God chose to variations in sequence and Canaan, which was to become inherit the covenant from his content, these same scriptures the Israelite homeland. The Torah father, appearing to him directly. make up the Old Testament recounts that in Canaan, God Isaac in turn handed down the of the Christian Bible. established a covenant with covenant to his son Jacob, who in Abraham, which took a similar his turn received the name Israel Jewish tradition divides form to a type of royal grant that from God and handed the covenant the Bible into three parts. kings of the time handed out to down to all his offspring. The \ufb01rst, called the Torah or loyal subordinates. It stipulated Pentateuch, describes God\u2019s that, as a reward for Abraham\u2019s Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob creation of the world and loyalty, God would grant him are known as Israel\u2019s patriarchs, his covenant with Israel, and many descendants who would because they represent the \ufb01rst outlines the commandments inherit the land. As a sign of this three generations included in that were imposed on the compact, Abraham and all the the covenant with God. Israelites. Tradition attributes male members of his household the Torah to Moses, but modern were circumcised. To this day, The covenant at Sinai scholars believe that it was The Torah relates that when written by many authors Abraham\u2019s loyalty was tested when Canaan was struck by famine, over several centuries. God asked him to sacri\ufb01ce his son Jacob and his sons migrated to Isaac. However, at the last moment, Egypt, where their descendants The second part of the God sent an angel to stop Abraham, were subsequently enslaved. Bible, Prophets, includes a as shown in this 18th-century painting. Several generations later, when narrative of Israelite history. the Israelite population in Egypt This runs from the people\u2019s had increased, God appointed entry into Canaan to the Moses, an Israelite raised in the end of their kingdom, when Egyptian court, to lead the people their capital and temple are out of slavery and back to the land destroyed and their people of Canaan. The Israelites\u2019 escape exiled. It also contains the from Egypt (the Exodus) involved writings of the prophets. many miracles: God struck the Egyptians with plagues that The \ufb01nal part, called included af\ufb02icting them with boils Writings, comprises a diverse and turning the Nile to blood, and collection of later literature. he split the Red Sea so that the Israelites could pass through. With these miracles, God demonstrated his power, and his loyalty to the covenant with the patriarchs. After liberating the Israelites from Egypt, and before leading them into Canaan, God brought \u276f\u276f","172 GOD\u2019S COVENANT WITH ISRAEL them to a mountain called Sinai, while all the people of Israel The whole land of Canaan\u2026 or Horeb. Moses ascended the listened from below. Tradition I will give as an everlasting mountain to speak to God, and has it that these commandments possession to you and your a new covenant was established were inscribed personally by God between God and the entire people onto the two stone tablets that descendants after you; of Israel. The covenant at Sinai Moses brought down from the and I will be their God. recalled God\u2019s salvation of Israel mountain, although the Torah and promised the Israelites that is not consistently clear on this Genesis 17:8 they would be God\u2019s treasured point. Moses broke the tablets possession if they observed the in anger when he saw that the commandments that he had given Israelites had built a false god, to Moses on Mount Sinai. a golden calf, while he was on the summit. He returned to Mount According to the Torah, God Sinai to have a new set of stone spoke these commandments aloud tablets inscribed, and these were from the top of Mount Sinai, which placed in a gilded chest called was covered by cloud and \ufb01re, the Ark of the Covenant. The ark was equipped with poles so that it could be carried by the Israelites as they continued to Canaan. The commandments The most famous commandments in the Sinai covenant are the Ten Commandments, or the Decalogue. The Decalogue comprises the most fundamental rules of Israel\u2019s covenant. It prohibits the worship of other gods or the depiction of God in physical form; it says that each week the Israelites must observe a sacred day of rest, the Sabbath; and it prohibits certain actions, such as murder and adultery. In addition to the Decalogue, the Torah includes numerous laws that God is said to have conveyed to the Israelites indirectly through Moses, both at Sinai and on other occasions. These laws also form part of the covenant. According to a calculation in the Talmud (rabbinic interpretation of When the Israelites \ufb02ed Egypt during the Exodus, God protected them and supplied them with food, as shown here in The Gathering of the Manna, a 15th-century work.","JUDAISM 173 Jewish law) there are a total of this additional covenant with the The rituals of Judaism, such as 613 commandments in the Torah. people of Israel. It took the form of the lighting of candles for Shabbat, the They address many aspects of the a \ufb01nal address from Moses, who Sabbath or day of rest, serve to remind Israelites\u2019 life in Canaan. Some was to die before he entered the Jews of the bond created by their constitute what we would consider promised land. Moses recalled covenant with God. civil law, describing systems of God\u2019s salvation of Israel, relayed government, regulating property further commandments that laws deal with agriculture and disputes, and setting guidelines God had given him at Sinai, and are considered binding only in for dealing with cases of murder promised that God would bless Israel. In the present day, Jews and theft, among other matters. the Israelites if they obeyed the maintain a range of approaches Others relate to the construction commandments, and curse them to the commandments and their of a sanctuary for worshipping if they disobeyed. The covenant interpretations. Traditional Jews God, and establish sacri\ufb01cial rites at Moab reaf\ufb01rmed the Israelites\u2019 observe the Sabbath, the festivals, to be performed by a hereditary loyalty to their God and his and dietary laws (such as avoiding priesthood. Still others direct the commandments. certain meats and not mixing behavior of individual Israelites, meat and dairy), as well as \u276f\u276f instructing them on matters The covenant in practice ranging from what they may In principle, traditional Jews eat, and whom they may marry, consider the laws of the Torah to the fair and charitable treatment eternally binding. However, the of other people. Generally, commandments have been subject the commandments aimed to to centuries of interpretation, and establish a society that was just, many are no longer applicable in by the standards of the day, and practice. Certain laws pertaining distinctive in its service of God. to the rule of kings, for example, have not been applicable since The \ufb01nal book of the Torah, the fall of the monarchy of Judah Deuteronomy, describes a third in the 6th century BCE, and the covenant between God and Israel, sacri\ufb01cial rites have not been established in the land of Moab practiced by mainstream Jews (in modern-day Jordan) before since the Romans destroyed the Israelites entered Canaan. their temple in Jerusalem in 70 CE. Deuteronomy tells that God In addition, many of the Torah\u2019s commanded Moses to make The covenant with Noah Noah is not only an important In addition to God\u2019s covenant Noah was the rainbow, which \ufb01gure in Judaism and Christianity, with Israel, the Torah also tells would thereafter serve as a but also in Islam; his covenant of a covenant between God and reminder of God\u2019s promise of with God forms part of the Qur\u2019an. all living beings. God made this safety. Later Jewish tradition covenant with Noah, whose family understood the Noahide survived a primordial \ufb02ood that covenant to include seven wiped out most life on Earth. commandments, which were This covenant stipulated that incumbent on all humankind. God would never again destroy These Noahide laws forbade the world by \ufb02ood. Like Israel\u2019s idolatry, murder, blasphemy, patriarchs after him, Noah was theft, sexual immorality (such also promised many descendants as incest), and consuming who would \ufb01ll the Earth. The forbidden \ufb02esh, and required sign of God\u2019s covenant with courts of justice to be set up.","174 GOD\u2019S COVENANT WITH ISRAEL The Israelites\u2019 loyalty to God was tested by 40 years of exile in the desert. This is commemorated in the festival of Sukkot, in which fragile booths are built to resemble their desert homes. the promise of the land, although conditional, remains eternal: the Israelites might lose the land for a time due to their sins, but they need not lose hope of returning. other rules. But for many modern The promise of the land The \u201cChosen People\u201d Jews, the essential laws are those In his covenant with Abraham, The Torah offers little in terms that pertain to the love of one\u2019s God granted the land of Canaan of explanation as to why God neighbor and the just treatment to the patriarch\u2019s descendants chose the patriarchs and their of other human beings. Progressive as an inviolable gift. Yet it is descendants, yet it emphasizes Jews often cite a dictum attributed stated elsewhere in the Bible that by virtue of their covenantal to Rabbi Hillel the Elder on the that the Israelites\u2019 hold on the relationship with him, the Golden Rule: \u201cThat which is land is conditional on observance Israelites are privileged above hateful to you, do not do to your of the commandments. This other nations. The authors of the neighbor. That is the whole conditionality is said to explain Bible did not view the Israelites Torah; the rest is the explanation.\u201d why the Israelites were eventually as inherently superior to other conquered by their enemies and people\u2014on the contrary, they If you will obey Me exiled from their land. Parts of the often describe them as sinful faithfully and keep My Torah include exile among the and unworthy\u2014but they clearly covenant, you shall be curses that would befall the perceived Israel\u2019s status as special. My treasured possession Israelites if they violated the As Jews came to believe that their among all the peoples. covenants at Sinai and Moab; god was the one God who ruled many modern scholars believe the whole world, their status as Exodus 19:5 that these passages were written his chosen nation took on even in response to these events. greater signi\ufb01cance. At the same time, the Torah Throughout history, Jews have asserts that God never abandoned struggled to understand why his covenant with the patriarchs. God chose them and what this While in exile, the Israelites had choice implied about their place the opportunity to repent, and in the world. One ancient tradition God led them back to their land, suggests that, rather than God thereby upholding his covenant choosing Israel, Israel chose God. with Abraham. In this way This tradition maintains that God offered the commandments to all the nations of the earth, but all except Israel rejected them, \ufb01nding them too burdensome. In accordance with this view, the Israelites\u2019 status is not a result of choice on God\u2019s part, but a product of free will. At the same time, it seems to deny freedom of choice by holding individuals responsible for the decisions of their ancestors.","JUDAISM 175 The meaning of Jewish between Jews and non-Jews. non-Jew to become Jewish through history revolves around Modern Jewish thinkers tend to conversion. Under rabbinic law, the faithfulness of Israel view the covenant instead as a convert to Judaism must accept imposing a mission on Jews to live the Jewish commandments and be to the covenant. in accordance with God\u2019s will and immersed in a ritual bath (and if Abraham Joshua thereby convey God\u2019s truth to the male, be circumcised), at which Heschel, Polish-born world. Some have suggested that point he, or she, assumes all the Israel is not unique in having been rights and duties of a Jew. US rabbi chosen by God, and that other peoples may have been chosen to Traditionally, conversion to Some Jewish mystical traditions ful\ufb01ll other missions. Some liberal Judaism involved a commitment with origins in the Middle Ages Jews reject the idea of chosenness to a strict regime of observance. suggest a different perspective, on the grounds that it presupposes Today, progressive Judaism places asserting that the souls of Jews superiority over other people and greater emphasis on individual were chosen at the time of creation encourages ethnocentrism. autonomy in determining Jewish and are qualitatively superior identity and its obligations. In to those of non-Jews. However, Joining the covenant both Reform Judaism in the US prominent thinkers from the major Traditional Judaism maintains and Liberal Judaism in the UK, modern denominations of Judaism that status in the covenant is the children of Jewish fathers and (Modern Orthodox, Conservative, transmitted from parent to child non-Jewish mothers are accepted and Reform) emphatically reject through the maternal line; so without formal conversion if they any claims of essential difference the child of a Jewish mother self-identify as Jewish. is automatically Jewish and bound by the commandments. In spite of varying beliefs This inherited status cannot and practices, the concept of the be forfeited: a Jew who does not covenant remains central to all observe the commandments has streams of Judaism. It represents violated the covenant, but he and de\ufb01nes the individual Jew\u2019s or she remains a Jew. On the purpose in the world, linking him other hand, it is possible for a or her to the Jewish people across the span of history, and to the Jewish God. \u25a0 How an individual joins the covenant depends on the faith, or otherwise, of his or her parents. Judaism does not actively seek converts, but accepts those who show commitment and sincerity. If your mother is If only your father is If neither of your Jewish and your father Jewish, some modern parents is Jewish, you is not, then you are denominations will may convert to Jewish, and can never accept you without Judaism, following the be not Jewish. conversion. correct rituals.","176 BESIDE ME THERE IS NO OTHER GOD FROM MONOLATRY TO MONOTHEISM IN CONTEXT YHWH is the T he earliest authors of the greatest god; his power Jewish Bible seem to KEY SOURCE have acknowledged the Second Isaiah is supreme, universal, existence of many gods, but and eternal. insisted that the one whose name WHEN AND WHERE is rendered as YHWH was the c.540 BCE, Babylon\/Judea Because he is greatest among them, and that omnipotent he needs the Israelites should worship only BEFORE YHWH. It appears, then, that at 1400\u20131200 BCE The prophet no subordinates. some time during the biblical Zoroaster forms a new religion period, the Jewish people moved with one supreme god. No other being can from this exclusive worship of countermand his wishes. one god among many (known as c.1000 BCE The \u201cSong of the monolatry) to the belief that only Sea,\u201d a poem in the Bible\u2019s Even events that harm his one god existed (monotheism). Exodus, proclaims YHWH people\u2014the Israelites\u2014are supreme over other gods. YHWH rules all nations orchestrated by him. In addition to the views of the c.622 BCE King Josiah of Bible\u2019s authors, archaeological Judah abolishes worship Both the evil and good of the evidence suggests that the early of gods other than YHWH. world are part of his plan. Israelites worshipped a variety of regional gods. The prophets of AFTER There are no other gods the god YHWH, whose writings c.20 BCE\u201340 CE Philo of but YHWH. comprise a large portion of the Alexandria argues that biblical Bible, harshly rebuked the people monotheism had anticipated for this practice. It is not clear later Greek philosophical whether the prophets were all conceptions of God. true monotheists, but they did believe that YHWH was supremely 7th century Islam is revealed powerful and ruled over all nations. to the Prophet Muhammad, and monotheism supplants In 722 BCE, the Assyrians polytheistic beliefs held conquered the northern kingdom of among the tribes of Arabia. Israel and exiled its people. Around 130 years later, the Babylonians","JUDAISM 177 See also: Beliefs for new societies 56\u201357 \u25a0 The battle between good and evil 60\u201365 \u25a0 God\u2019s covenant with Israel 168\u201375 \u25a0 De\ufb01ning the inde\ufb01nable 184\u201385 \u25a0 The unity of divinity is necessary 280\u201381 The people of Israel were Around this time, the earliest clear Second Isaiah vanquished by the Assyrians during articulation of monotheism in the the 8th century BCE and led away to Bible emerged, in a collection of The biblical Book of Isaiah exile, as shown on this relief from the writings known as Second Isaiah. claims to be the work of a palace of Sennacherib at Nineveh. It emphasizes that YHWH created, prophet by that name who and rules over, the world alone. lived in the late 8th and early conquered the southern lands of Israel\u2019s restoration is a sign of 7th centuries BCE. However, the Jewish people, known as the YHWH\u2019s control over history, which the latter portion of the book Kingdom of Judah. In the ancient is both transcendent and personal: deals with the Jews\u2019 return Middle East, such conquests were he determines the actions of kings from exile in Babylon in the usually interpreted as victories but also leads his people to salvation 6th century BCE. Modern by the conquering people\u2019s god like a shepherd guiding his \ufb02ock. scholars refer to this section as over that of the defeated people\u2014 Second Isaiah or Deutero- so the supremacy of YHWH The problem of evil Isaiah and attribute it to one appeared to be challenged. Yet the Monotheism raises the problem or more 6th-century writers. prophets insisted that these events of evil: namely, if there is only were all, in fact, YHWH\u2019s doing: he one God, who is just and merciful, Second Isaiah echoes was using the other nations to as the Bible insists, then how can the language and themes punish the Israelites for violating he preside over a world in which of the \ufb01rst part of the book, their covenant with him (pp.168\u201375). the righteous suffer? This is the while also introducing new theme of the biblical book of Job, ideas and motifs, including No God but YHWH which tells of a righteous man who explicit monotheism. Like The Jews returned from exile in questions how God could have earlier prophetic works, it Babylon to their homeland in 538 BCE, allowed his terrible misfortune. God\u2019s interprets Israel\u2019s exile as under the decree of Cyrus the Great, response suggests that there is no punishment for the people\u2019s emperor of Persia, where the answer: his rule over the world is sins, but proclaims that the Zoroastrian faith predominated. beyond human understanding. \u25a0 punishment has ended and it will be followed by everlasting glory when Israel \ufb01nally embraces YHWH alone. Many scholars believe that the \ufb01nal portion of the book was written later still and constitutes a Third Isaiah. Before Me no God was formed, nor shall there be any after Me. Isaiah 43:10","178 IN CONTEXT THE MESSIAH KEY TEXTS WILL REDEEM The Dead Sea Scrolls ISRAEL WHEN AND WHERE THE PROMISE OF A NEW AGE c.150 BCE\u201368 CE, Palestine BEFORE c.1005\u2013965 BCE King David reigns over Israel as God\u2019s anointed one, or Messiah. 586 BCE The Babylonian conquest and exile of the Jews ends David\u2019s dynasty. AFTER 1st century CE Jesus is proclaimed the Messiah. 2nd century CE Simeon Bar Kokhba is hailed as the Messiah. 20th century CE Menachem Mendel Schneerson, leader of a Hasidic sect, promotes Jewish observance as a way to bring the Messiah; he is himself hailed as the Messiah by his followers. T hroughout much of their recorded history, the people of Israel were ruled by kings. A ritual called anointing, in which oil was poured on the monarch\u2019s head, functioned much like a coronation and served to indicate God\u2019s election of the ruler, who was referred to as God\u2019s anointed one, or in Hebrew, Messiah. Originally, the term Messiah was used for any anointed leader, but over time it came to refer to a speci\ufb01c ruler who would arise in the future and rescue Israel from its enemies, ushering in a golden age\u2014the Messianic Era. Jewish tradition offers much speculation as to the events that","See also: God\u2019s covenant with Israel 168\u201375 \u25a0 Faith and the state 189 JUDAISM 179 \u25a0 The origins of modern political Zionism 196\u201397 Israelites and Jews Perfect harmony and abundance Abraham\u2019s son Isaac fathered two sons, Esau and Jacob; in nature. the Bible relates that God changed Jacob\u2019s name Peace among All Jews return to Israel. The families of all nations. from exile Jacob\u2019s 12 sons grew into the to Israel. 12 tribes of Israel (Israelites), occupying an area roughly The Messianic Era equivalent to the modern territory of Israel. In the late Reinstatement Universal 10th century BCE, the Israelites of the Temple. acceptance of were divided into two the Jewish God. kingdoms\u2014the southern tribes formed the Kingdom No sin or of Judah, while the northern evil; all Israel tribes formed the Kingdom will obey the of Israel. These two kingdoms commandments. were subsequently conquered and broken up\u2014Israel by the Assyrians in 722 BCE, and Judah by the Babylonians in 586 BCE. However, the people of Judah endured as a distinct group with a distinct religion. From this point, they were called \u201cJews\u201d and their religion \u201cJudaism\u201d, although they still thought of themselves as Israelites. Modern citizens of Israel are called Israelis. would characterize the Messianic A Messiah from David\u2019s line They will beat their Era, but most agreed that it would One of the \ufb01rst kings of the united swords into plowshares be a period of brotherhood and monarchy of Israel and Judah and their spears into pruning glory on earth, when delicacies and was a man named David, who hooks. Nation will not take miracles would be commonplace, reigned from around 1005 to up sword against nation, swords would be beaten into 965 BCE. According to the Bible, plowshares, and the wolf would David was instrumental in uniting nor will they train for live with the lamb. the people of Israel and defending war anymore. them against the Philistines. Isaiah 2:4 Some traditions speculated that The Bible relates that God loved the Messiah would be an earthly David, referring to him as his son, ruler (with a close connection to and established an agreement, God), others that he would be a or covenant, with him, promising heavenly \ufb01gure appointed in a time that his descendants would rule before creation itself. Similarly, a over Israel forever. number of traditions envisioned the Messianic Era to be part of the However, the Babylonians normal course of history, while for conquered Judah in 586 BCE, others it was a miraculous time when exiling most of its inhabitants God\u2019s spirit would reign on earth. and destroying the temple, and \u276f\u276f","180 THE PROMISE OF A NEW AGE David\u2019s dynasty came to an end. misfortunes were God\u2019s My servant David will be The fall of the kingdom might punishment for the sins of the king over them, and they will have suggested that God had people and its leaders and that all have one shepherd. They broken his covenant with David. future restoration would only be Yet the people of Judah continued possible if Israel repented. will follow my laws and be to hold out the hope that, some time careful to keep my decrees. in the future, a descendant of David Foreign rule would once again rule over Israel The prophets\u2019 visions were partly Ezekiel 37:24 as God\u2019s Messiah. realized when the Persian king Cyrus the Great defeated the plagues and tribulations that would Foretold by prophets Babylonians and allowed many precede the advent of the Messiah: Even before the fall of the monarchy, Jews to return to their homeland \ufb02oods and earthquakes, the some of Israel\u2019s prophets predicted and rebuild the Temple. Indeed, darkening of the sun and moon, that a king descended from David Cyrus is addressed in the Bible and the falling of the stars from would unite the two kingdoms and as the \u201cLord\u2019s Messiah\u201d. However, the sky. These events came to be rescue them from their enemies. a lengthy period of domination known as the \u201cbirth pangs of the Although these prophecies were by foreign powers, including Messiah\u201d, since for all the agony written in different periods and the Greek and Roman Empires, that they would cause they were some referred to speci\ufb01c historical followed the return of the Jews simply a precursor of the Messianic kings, later generations interpreted to the homeland. During this Era, when evil would be banished them as foretelling the advent of a time, they turned again to biblical from earth, the rule of oppressive future Messiah. After the Babylonian prophecies about the Messiah empires would be swept away, and conquest, some prophets foretold and an age of national restoration. people could live free of distraction that the people would eventually and crime. return to their homeland and The Jews drew on prophetic rebuild their temple. A few traditions that envisioned a great envisioned that the nations of the battle between the forces of good world would one day recognize and evil, in which God would Israel\u2019s God and come to worship emerge triumphant and sinners him in Jerusalem. These visions would be punished. Jewish of a glorious future were not apocalyptic works of this period, unconditional, however. The which include the Dead Sea Scrolls, prophets believed that Israel\u2019s offer elaborate descriptions of this battle and the accompanying The Dead Sea Scrolls Biblical manuscripts make up In 1947, a Bedouin goatherd they awaited the end times, almost half of the scrolls. Most are discovered a cache of buried apparently believing that they on parchment in Hebrew, Aramaic, scrolls in a cave in Qumran, on alone would be redeemed in the Greek, or Nabatean. the northwest shore of the Dead Messianic Era, which would Sea. The scrolls are thought to be usher in a new, purer temple the writings of the Essenes\u2014an and priesthood. The scrolls ancient Jewish sect\u2014that had include the earliest known been hidden when members manuscripts of nearly every of the sect \ufb02ed the Romans during book in the Hebrew Bible as the Jewish revolt of 66\u201370 CE. The well as a wealth of later Essenes rejected the priesthood Jewish literature, and they that was then in control of the have contributed greatly to Jerusalem temple and formed a our understanding of Jewish community in the desert, where thought in the period.","JUDAISM 181 Some Jewish thinkers maintain that the return of the diaspora and the rebuilding of Jerusalem will be the two most important preludes to the coming of the Messiah. Appearance of the Messiah underworld, but offered little detail in particular, rejected the ideas Every so often throughout history, on the subject. Many Jews came of a messianic king, a return to an exceptional individual would to believe that a person\u2019s ultimate the Jewish homeland, and the appear whom some people thought fate depended on his or her conduct rebuilding of the temple, although might be the Messiah. One such in life. Some said that the righteous aspects of these beliefs have been person was Jesus of Nazareth, lived on in Paradise while the reevaluated over the years. The known to his followers as Christ, wicked were condemned to a place one feature of messianism that from the Greek word for Messiah. of torment, called Gehenna. Others remains central in all streams Jesus\u2019s followers, who became emphasized a \ufb01nal judgment in of Judaism is, however, the belief known as Christians, continued to the Messianic Era, when the dead that humankind\u2014and the Jewish believe that he was the Messiah would be resurrected. Both ideas people in particular\u2014has the after his execution by the Romans, persisted in Jewish belief, and ability to bring about a better but other Jews rejected this claim. both the Messianic Era and the future through righteous action. \u25a0 individual afterlife are commonly Another messianic claimant referred to as the \u201cWorld to Come.\u201d was Simeon Bar Kokhba, who led a revolt against the Romans in 132 CE. His revolt was a colossal failure, which effectively brought an end to Jewish life in Jerusalem and the surrounding area. Those Jews who were not killed were dispersed throughout the Roman Empire, and many were sold into slavery. The failure of this, and other revolts against Roman rule and the loss, again, of the Jewish religious centre in Jerusalem brought new relevance to the prophecies from the Babylonian exile. Resurrection and afterlife Jewish messianism today King Messiah, the Son The Messianic Era was originally Within Orthodox Judaism, the of Man, will arise in the future envisioned by some traditions as a promise of messianic redemption and will restore the kingship of time of national restoration, when remains a core belief. Many David to its ancient condition. Israel would be redeemed and its leaders state that if Jews, as a oppressors would perish. Later, group, embrace God and obey his Moses Maimonides however, it was generally believed commandments, they can hasten that it would also be a time of the Messiah\u2019s arrival. Yet the judgment for every person, living or idea of the Messiah has mostly dead, when the righteous would be \ufb02ourished when Jews have been rewarded and the wicked punished. oppressed, and the relative freedom of Jews in much of the modern The Hebrew Bible says little world has lessened the sense of about life after death. Most early urgency of the hope for national biblical authors shared the ancient restoration. The Reform movement, belief that the dead lived on in the","182 RELIGIOUS LAW CAN BE APPLIED TO DAILY LIFE WRITING THE ORAL LAW IN CONTEXT Each page of the Talmud holds J ewish tradition maintains the text of the Mishnah\u2014a that God gave Moses a body KEY TEXT Hebrew account of the Oral Law of laws and teachings, which The Talmud he passed on to the people of Israel The text of the Mishnah is (pp.168\u201375). Many of these are WHEN AND WHERE explained and discussed in recorded in the \ufb01rst \ufb01ve books 2nd\u20135th century CE, the surrounding Gemara. of the Hebrew Bible, the Torah, Palestine and Babylonia but some Jews also believe Texts of the Mishnah and that Moses received additional BEFORE Gemara are then surrounded teachings (transmitted verbally to 140 BCE \u201370 CE The Pharisees the community\u2019s leaders, and then espouse belief in an Oral Law. by other layers of text from generation to generation), and commentaries from which became known as the Oral 2nd century CE Rebellions Law. This Oral Law included against Roman rule prompt a later period. additional details about, and the destruction of many of the interpretations of, the biblical laws. Yeshivot (places for the study The text of the Talmud of the Torah); Rabbis write is a discussion. From the 2nd century CE, Jewish down the Oral Law. rabbis (a word meaning \u201cscholars\u201d Its arguments guide the reader or \u201cteachers\u201d) set out to record the AFTER to the kernel of the truth. Oral Law. The result was a large 11th century CE Rabbi new body of literature. Many of Solomon ben Isaac (Rashi) the rabbis\u2019 writings are collected produces a commentary on in a set of books called the the Talmud, which becomes Talmud which, for observant standard in printed editions. Jews, is the most important and authoritative religious text after c.1170\u201380 The Jewish the Bible itself. philosopher Maimonides composes the Mishneh Part of the reason the Oral Torah, a work describing Law is important is that the Bible\u2019s and reviewing the laws laws are frequently ambiguous. mentioned in the Torah. For example, the Bible prohibits working on the Sabbath, but it does not explain what kind of work is prohibited. The Talmud","JUDAISM 183 See also: God\u2019s covenant with Israel 168\u201375 \u25a0 Progressive Judaism 190\u201395 \u25a0 The pathway to harmonious living 272\u201375 The primary purpose of the Talmud is to record the analysis of Jewish traditions by the best intellects of previous generations, and to challenge new students to \ufb01nd their own truths. resolves this ambiguity by Talmud, the doctrine of the Oral in the biblical text. Nonetheless, specifying 39 types of activity Law was promulgated by a Jewish other branches of Judaism accept (including building, cooking, sect called the Pharisees. However, the Talmud as a sacred text, and and writing) that are forbidden. two sects\u2014the Karaites and the Orthodox Jews continue to trace Sadducees\u2014rejected this doctrine. its origins to the Oral Law given In addition to recording the The Karaites originated around the to Moses by God. Many modern laws given to Moses, the Talmud 8th century in Baghdad and (unlike Jews do not take this idea literally, includes extensive discussions the Sadducees) still exist today. but rather view the Talmud as between rabbis over interpretation. Karaites have their own traditions part of a living tradition that These discussions are considered for interpreting the Bible, but they preserves and interprets Jewish part of the Oral Law too, because do not believe that any teachings law for every generation and the authority to interpret the laws were given to Moses besides those encourages theological debate. \u25a0 was handed down through Moses. Each page of the Talmud is designed to re\ufb02ect this debate: the earliest writings, or Mishnah, setting out the law, are surrounded by the discussions, or Gemara, so the book can be read a series of conversations between rabbis. Acceptance of the Talmud The concept of an oral law has not been universally accepted among Jews. Prior to the writing of the Versions of the Talmud A collective work of thousands Although there are many Moses received the Torah of rabbis over hundreds of similarities between the from Sinai and transmitted years, the Talmud is organized two versions, the Babylonian it to Joshua, Joshua to the into six orders that deal with Talmud, which is more than elders, and the elders to the different aspects of law and 6,000 pages in extent, is prophets, and the prophets tradition, then into tractates generally considered to be transmitted it to the men and chapters. There are more authoritative and is two versions of the Talmud: used more widely by students of the Great Assembly. the Jerusalem Talmud, which of Judaism. The Jerusalem Ethics of the Fathers was compiled in the 4th Talmud was never completed century CE in the Land of Israel, due to the persecution of and the Babylonian Talmud, the Jews in Israel, and is thus which was compiled c.500 CE far shorter and more cryptic in Babylonia (modern-day Iraq). than the Babylonian Talmud.","184 GOD IS INCORPOREAL, INDIVISIBLE, AND UNIQUE DEFINING THE INDEFINABLE IN CONTEXT Since biblical times, belief in Middle Ages, a number of Jewish one God has been a central philosophers in the Muslim sphere KEY THINKER feature of Jewish religion. Yet of in\ufb02uence sought to demonstrate Moses Maimonides the idea that God is one may be that the oneness of God, properly understood in a variety of ways: understood, excluded all of these WHEN AND WHERE that is, God could be the greatest of other possibilities. 12th century, North Africa many divine beings, or God could be a single being composed of Moses Maimonides was a BEFORE several different elements. In the particularly in\ufb02uential philosopher 30 BCE\u201350 CE The Jewish of this school. He explained the philosopher Philo describes the God of the Bible in Greek God has no physical or God is all-powerful, philosophical terms, as lacking mental attributes that we because there can be Aristotelian attributes. can describe, as these cannot nothing over which he exist outside his oneness. does not have control. 933 CE Rabbi Sa\u2018adia Gaon\u2019s Book of Beliefs and Opinions God has a unity and nature unlike proposes several arguments anything that we can comprehend. for God\u2019s unity. God is in\ufb01nite, because we God is eternal, because we AFTER cannot imagine any limits to cannot conceive of a time at 13th century The Zohar, a Jewish mystical text, his presence and power. which he did not exist. propounds the idea that an in\ufb01nite and uni\ufb01ed Godhead became manifest in creation and in ten emanations. c.1730 Rabbi Moshe Chaim Luzzatto\u2019s The Way of God states that God encompasses all perfections, but these exist in him as a single, essential attribute.","JUDAISM 185 See also: From monolatry to monotheism 176\u201377 \u25a0 Mysticism and the kabbalah 188 \u25a0 The unity of divinity is necessary 280\u201381 Jewish tenet of monotheism in God is not two or more Moses Maimonides terms of the classical Greek entities, but a single entity philosophical doctrine that God Moses Maimonides (also is \u201csimple\u201d\u2014that is, not composed of a oneness even more known as Rambam) was born of parts or properties. single and unique than any in 1135 in Cordoba, Spain, into a Jewish family. His childhood God\u2019s oneness, according to single thing in creation. was rich in cross-cultural Maimonides, is different from the Maimonides in\ufb02uences: he was educated in oneness of any other being: he is a both Hebrew and Arabic, and single, unique, indivisible entity; he his father, a rabbinic judge, is also beyond human understanding taught him Jewish law within and description, and therefore the context of Islamic Spain. cannot be given speci\ufb01c attributes. His family \ufb02ed Spain when the Berber Almohad dynasty came God cannot be categorized a physical object, which can be to power in 1148, and lived God, Maimonides argued, is not broken into parts. But Maimonides nomadically for 10 years until \u201cone of a species\u201d\u2014he is not a went further, and argued that God they settled \ufb01rst in Fez (now member of a group of beings that is also intellectually indivisible: in Morocco) and then in Cairo. share certain characteristics. he cannot have any attributes (as Maimonides began training Three different men, for example, de\ufb01ned by Aristotle), as he would as a physician due to his are each individuals, but they share then consist of both his essence and family\u2019s \ufb01nancial problems; the attribute of maleness and his attributes. If God were eternal, his skill led to a royal therefore belong to the category of for example, there would effectively appointment within only a males. God, on the other hand, has be two gods: God and God\u2019s eternity. few years. He also worked no attributes, and therefore cannot as a rabbinic judge, but this belong to a category of beings, Maimonides\u2019 belief that God was an activity for which he divine or otherwise. has no attributes is a product of a thought it wrong to accept school of thought called negative any payment. He was God\u2019s oneness also differs from theology, which maintains that recognized as head of the that of a body, which is divisible. it is inaccurate to characterize Jewish community of Cairo This means that God is not like God in any af\ufb01rmative way. Given in 1191. After his death in the limits of human language, we 1204 his tomb became a place According to Maimonides, God may describe God as eternal, but of Jewish pilgrimage. existed before everything and is the in truth we can only af\ufb01rm that creator of all things. His existence is God is not non-eternal: that is, his Key works independent of all other things but all essence is beyond comprehension. other things need him in order to exist. Maimonides included the doctrine 1168 Commentary on of God\u2019s oneness among his 13 the Mishnah essential principles of Jewish faith, 1168\u201378 Mishneh Torah which also include such concepts 1190 Guide for the Perplexed as God\u2019s antiquity and the belief that the Torah comes from the mouth of God. Many regard these principles as the fundamental elements of Jewish belief. \u25a0","186 GOD AND HUMANKIND ARE IN COSMIC EXILE MYSTICISM AND THE KABBALAH IN CONTEXT T he texts of Judaism include, teacher Isaac Luria, whose along with the Hebrew interpretation of the Zohar gave KEY FIGURE Bible (p.171) and the a unique description of the Isaac Luria Talmud (a compendium of rabbinic creation that was applicable to interpretations), a body of mystical the experience of Jews in exile. WHEN AND WHERE knowledge known as kabbalah. It provided an explanation of good 16th century, Palestine Originally an oral tradition, it was and evil, and the way to redemption. collected in the Zohar (\u201cDivine BEFORE Splendor\u201d) in the late 13th century In Luria\u2019s interpretation, before From 1200 BCE Zoroastrians in Spain. The Zohar and its the creation only God existed. In believe that every act of right kabbalistic ideas took on a special order to make space to create the moral conduct by humans signi\ufb01cance for exiled Jews\u2014 world, he contracted or withdrew collectively aids the cosmic in particular for the scholars of into himself (tzimtzum): a form of struggle of good against evil. Safed in Palestine\u2014after their self-imposed exile for the sake expulsion from Iberia (present-day of creation. A divine light streamed 10th\u201315th century CE Spain, Portugal, and Andorra) in into the created space in the shape Christian mysticism \ufb02ourishes the 1490s. Among them was the of 10 se\ufb01rot\u2014emanations of the in Europe in the Middle Ages. divine attributes of God. Adam Jewish men at penitential prayers, Kadmon (meaning primordial AFTER the Selichot, in Jerusalem. According man) formed vessels to contain 18th century In Europe, to kabbalah, observance of the the se\ufb01rot. But the vessels were too as the Haskalah (Jewish commandments will help lead delicate to hold the divine light: the Enlightenment) dismisses people from exile to redemption. upper three were damaged, and the mysticism, Israel ben Eliezer lower seven completely destroyed, founds Hasidic Judaism in scattering the divine light. This Ukraine, based on Isaac Luria\u2019s destruction of the vessels (known exposition of kabbalah. as shevirat ha-kelim or shevirah) upset the process of creation and 1980s In Los Angeles, the divided the universe into those Kabbalah Center attracts elements that assisted, and those celebrity followers with that resisted, the creation: good and teachings derived from the evil, and the upper and lower worlds. Judaic mystical tradition. This damage can be repaired, Luria explained, by detaching the holy sparks of divine light to which","See also: The promise of a new age 178\u201381 \u25a0 Man as a manifestation JUDAISM 187 of God 188 \u25a0 Su\ufb01sm and the mystic tradition 282\u201383 Isaac Luria God contracted himself to make a void in which to create the world yet maintain his transcendence. Isaac ben Solomon Luria Ashkenazi was born in 1534 There then followed But the vessels in Jerusalem. His German 10 emanations, the containing the se\ufb01rot father died when Isaac was se\ufb01rot, which together formed were not strong enough a child, so he moved with his a divine light revealing and were destroyed in mother to stay with her brother a catastrophe, shevirah. in Egypt. There he studied God\u2019s purpose. rabbinical literature and Jewish law with some of This is the source of both good and evil, the foremost scholars of the and is embodied in the Fall of Adam. day, including Rabbi Bezalel Ashkenazi, and traded as a The damage cannot be repaired until the sparks of merchant. He married aged the divine light are reunited, and until then\u2026 15, but continued his studies. Six years later he moved to an \u2026God and humankind are island on the Nile to study the in cosmic exile. Zohar and the early kabbalists, barely speaking to anyone, and then only in Hebrew. During this time, he said he had conversations with the long-dead prophet Elijah, who told him to move to Safed, a center of kabbalistic study in Ottoman-ruled Palestine. Working with Moses Cordovero, Luria became known for his teaching of the kabbalah, and his disciples dubbed him HaARI, \u201cthe Lion,\u201d from the initials, in Hebrew, of \u201choly Rabbi Yitzhak.\u201d He died in Safed in 1572. the forces of evil in the lower world Although Luria did not leave a record The Torah is concealed. are clinging, and restoring them to of his interpretation of kabbalah, his It is only revealed to their source in the upper world: a esoteric teachings were preserved process of tikkun olam\u2014repairing by his followers. After his death, those who have reached the world. The responsibility for his ideas spread quickly throughout the level of the righteous. this rests on the Jewish people, who Europe. Because of the rational, The Talmud, Hagigah rescue a holy spark each time they comprehensive nature of Lurianic obey a holy commandment, and kabbalah, kabbalistic study became pass one back to universal evil when a mainstay of Jewish thought, and in they sin. Until all the divine sparks the 18th century it formed the basis are reunited in the world of the good, for the Hasidic movement (p.188), there can be no redemption, and which places particular emphasis on humanity will live in cosmic exile. a mystical relationship with God. \u25a0","188 THE HOLY SPARK DWELLS IN EVERYONE MAN AS A MANIFESTATION OF GOD IN CONTEXT H asidic Judaism, founded They offered worshippers not only by Israel ben Eliezer (known guidance, but also an opportunity to KEY FIGURE as Baal Shem Tov, or the participate more actively in religious Israel ben Eliezer Besht) in the 1740s, is characterized observances. Where rabbinical by enthusiasm and rituals of mass teaching had become detached from WHEN AND WHERE ecstasy, performed under the the people, charismatic leaders such 1740s, Ukraine guidance of a spiritual leader, or as Baal Shem Tov explained that the zaddik. One of its main teachings Torah was not the exclusive realm of BEFORE is that the divine dwells within the rabbis. Spiritual learning was 16th century Isaac Luria everyone. It is now one of the major available to all: the holy sparks, and other teachers reawaken branches of ultra-Orthodox Judaism. or divine light\u2014a manifestation interest in the mystical of God\u2014outlined in the mystical elements of the kabbalah. The movement emerged from tradition of the Lurianic kabbalah the Jewish communities of Central could be found in everyone. \u25a0 AFTER and Eastern Europe during the 18th 19th century Hasidism century. These communities were Hasidic men dance at a wedding gains adherents in reaction often small and isolated, and their celebration. The distinctive clothing of to the intellectualization and lifestyle was very different from that Hasidic Jews, drawn from earlier styles secularization of Judaism. of urban Jews living elsewhere. of Eastern European dress, sets them Mainstream Jewish philosophy had, apart from other branches of Judaism. 1917 The Bolshevik Revolution by then, become more intellectual, in Russia breaks up many and theology more legalistic. This Hasidic communities. development was at odds with the needs of the inhabitants of small 1930s With the rise of Nazism, villages, or shtetls, especially in Jews from Germany, Eastern areas such as southern Poland. Europe, and Russia \ufb02ee to the US; all Hasidic communities in To maintain cohesion in these Europe are destroyed during communities, especially in the World War II. face of persecution by the Cossacks (East Slavic people), religious leaders 1948 The State of Israel is traveled around from place to place. founded. Many displaced Hasidic Jews settle there. See also: Mysticism and the kabbalah 186\u201387 \u25a0 Mystical experience in Christianity 238 \u25a0 Su\ufb01sm and the mystic tradition 282\u201383","JUDAISM 189 JUDAISM IS A RELIGION, NOT A NATIONALITY FAITH AND THE STATE IN CONTEXT F ollowing in the wake of the The state has physical power Enlightenment in Europe, and uses it when necessary; KEY FIGURE the Haskalah movement, Moses Mendelssohn or Jewish Enlightenment, was the power of religion is inspired largely by the work love and bene\ufb01cence. WHEN AND WHERE of the German Jewish philosopher Moses Mendelssohn Late 18th century, Germany Moses Mendelssohn. He believed that the persecution endured by the part in secular cultural life. In BEFORE Jews was largely a result of their particular, he promoted the idea 135 CE The Romans drive the separateness from the societies of Jews learning the local language Jews from the Land of Israel. in which they lived. \u2014as he had done\u2014to help integrate themselves better into non-Jewish AFTER His criticism of the separation societies, and published his own 1770s\u20131880 The Haskalah or of Jews and Gentiles (non-Jews) translation of the Torah into German. Jewish Enlightenment: Jews, also raised the issue of what it especially in western Europe, meant to be Jewish. In his opinion, Although Mendelssohn was become increasingly integrated Judaism was a religion that should himself a practicing Orthodox into their adopted societies. be treated in the same way as any Jew, his ideas and the Haskalah other in a tolerant, pluralistic movement he inspired built the 1791 The emancipation of society, and its followers should be foundation for Reform Judaism in Jews in France during the allowed freedom of conscience as the 19th century. \u25a0 French Revolution is followed citizens of the country in which by emancipation in Holland, they lived; conversely, being and later in the countries a Jew did not imply belonging conquered by Napoleon. to a separate nation or people. 1896 Theodor Herzl publishes In his book Jerusalem: or On The Jewish State and starts Religious Power and Judaism (1783), the modern Zionist movement. Mendelssohn argued not only for emancipation of the Jews, but also 19th century Reform Judaism that they should \u201ccome out of the is inspired by the Haskalah. ghettos\u201d and play a more active 1948 The State of Israel See also: God\u2019s covenant with Israel 168\u201375 \u25a0 Progressive Judaism 190\u201395 is founded. \u25a0 The origins of modern political Zionism 196\u201397","DRAW FROM THE PAST, LIVE IN THE PRESENT, WORK FOR THE FUTURE PROGRESSIVE JUDAISM","","192 PROGRESSIVE JUDAISM IN CONTEXT J ewish emancipation in The Talmud speaks with Europe began in Germany in the ideology of its own time, KEY MOVEMENT the 18th century. Previously, and for that time it was right. Progressive Judaism Jews had been restricted in where I speak for the higher ideology they could live, and had been WHEN AND WHERE barred from entering universities of my own time, and for 19th century, and the professions, but the force this age I am right. Europe and US of European Enlightenment led to them being given equal rights as Extreme reformers in BEFORE citizens. Yiddish-speaking Jews 19th-century Germany 19th century The German learned German, became part of Enlightment offers Jews the the modern world, and began to that had kept them apart from possibility of secular education feel the freedom of individuality. society. The authority of the classical and participation in society. Many Jews started looking to rabbis was now seen to be a secular education\u2014rather than function of its time, and was AFTER Jewish tradition\u2014as a means also called into question. 1840 The West London of achieving their potential. Synagogue is established. Progressive Judaism, which Some, faced with this new began with the Reform movement insight and the opportunities 1872 The Reform Academy in Germany, was a response it gave rise to, abandoned their Hochschule f\u00fcr die Wissen- to these changes, to modernity, Judaism in favor of secular schaft des Judentums is and to the new freedoms. nationalism. Others sought instead established in Berlin. to modernize Judaism in the The earliest and most visible light of historical, academic study 1885 Reform Judaism reforms emerged in Berlin and of the religion (Wissenschaft des \ufb02ourishes in the US. The Hamburg. They concerned the Judentums). The pace of change Pittsburgh Platform de\ufb01nes synagogue service: the sermon was too rapid for some, and various the principles of Reform. would be given in German, and men and women would sit together 20th century Progressive rather than being segregated. More synagogues and communal radically, the impact of modern organizations are established biblical scholarship led some Jews throughout the world. to question the divine authority of the biblical texts, and the traditions Abraham Geiger Abraham Geiger was born in was appointed as second rabbi Frankfurt-am-Main, Germany, in Breslau, in 1838, Geiger found in 1810. He was educated in the his authority disputed by the Jewish and German classics, and existing, traditionalist rabbi: studied Arabic for his dissertation, both were of\ufb01cially rabbis of the \u201cWhat Did Muhammad Take from whole community, but eventually Judaism?\u201d. A passionate advocate each served his own faction. of Wissenschaft des Judentums, Geiger later presided as the the academic study of Judaism, he rabbi in Frankfurt and then in set out to distill Judaism\u2019s eternal Berlin, and also taught at the spiritual and ethical core through new Reform Academy for two groundbreaking scholarship. He years before his death in 1874. sought to modernize Judaism as a whole rather than to create Key works a separate movement, rejecting practices if their historical reason 1857 The Original Text and was no longer relevant. When he Translations of the Bible","JUDAISM 193 See also: The promise of a new age 178\u201381 \u25a0 The origins of modern political Zionism 196\u201397 \u25a0 The Protestant Reformation 230\u201337 \u25a0 The rise of Islamic revivalism 286\u201390 \u25a0 The compatibility of faith 291 groups seceded from the Universalism: Particularism: community, perhaps to be identi\ufb01cation with the task and served by a more orthodox rabbi. destiny of the the common Questioning theology concerns of all Jewish people. Theological innovation led to liturgical reform and the publication humanity. of a new Reform prayer book in Hamburg in 1818. Scholars and Power and Responsible Jewish history rabbis, such as Abraham Geiger, freedom of autonomy and Jewish now began to question key individuals to peoplehood. theological assumptions. Geiger act on their The individual recognized historical precedents own choices. making informed for modifying Jewish tradition to adjust to new conditions, and choices. suggested that some observances could be altered to be compatible Education: with modern ways of living. secular and Some of Judaism\u2019s traditional Jewish. theology was abandoned too. The German reformers no longer felt that they could pray for a messiah in the form of one person who would return the people to the Land of Israel to rebuild the Temple and restore the priestly sacri\ufb01cial cult. Instead, they replaced the idea of the messiah with one of the messianic ideal\u2014peace for every nation on earth\u2014that every Jew A minority is always would work to bring about. Even part of a nation and community compelled to think. more daring was the new idea that (universalism), and having a unique That is the blessing of the Jews were no longer in exile but destiny (particularism). What being in the minority. could realize their Jewish destiny differs for progressive Jews is as citizens of a modern nation. probably the modern focus on Leo Baeck, autonomy\u2014their freedom to progressive rabbi This dream was in some ways determine how they live their short-lived. For many there was Jewish lives. Progressive Judaism no real social integration without teaches that responsible autonomy conversion to Christianity, and the requires making choices based Holocaust of Nazi Germany and on ethics, Jewish education, and World War II made clear the limits commitment to the Jewish people, of hope for an enlightened humanity. with reverence for the past and a commitment to the future. Religious autonomy There is a tension in progressive Jewish theologies continue to Judaism, as in other strands of develop. Although monotheism the religion today, between being remains a fundamental tenet \u276f\u276f","194 PROGRESSIVE JUDAISM of the faith, progressive Judaism\u2019s relationship between individual, problems in the contemporary theology extends the notion of a God, and the commandments, Jewish world. This view takes \u201ccommanding\u201d God to the idea Jews in the progressive movement account of modern scienti\ufb01c of an ongoing relationship with also came to review conventional developments, such as stem cell God, in which each Jew exercises interpretations of the Hebrew Bible. research, and is strongly guided his or her individual freedom. The They now regard it as a composite by contemporary ethics, tackling mitzvot, or commandments, text from different historical issues such as care at the end of are expressions of this relationship. periods\u2014a written record of a life. Other progressives describe human encounter with the divine, a post-Halachic Judaism, perhaps The concept of monism rather than the recorded words of identifying more closely with the Another group of progressive God, meaning that its authority is ancient Hebrew prophets and an thinkers believes God to be an not straightforward. Since God\u2019s ethically driven Prophetic Judaism. inseparable part of the self, rather intentions were not \ufb01xed once in than an external divinity. Some time, the revelation could be Rituals and observances have absorbed the views of considered continuous. Modern approaches to ritual Jewish mystics, who understand practice also re\ufb02ect the idea of the entire creation as taking place In a similar way, progressive Judaism\u2019s continuing evolution, within God, which means that Judaism recognizes the impact of stipulating that divine authority everything is God. Monotheism, history and human authorship on is not limited to the Torah. The or the belief in one god, becomes the development of Jewish law, Sabbath (Shabbat), for instance, monism, meaning that there or Halachah, which is traditionally is considered a day of rest and is only oneness, and that this rooted in biblical commandments holiness distinct from the working oneness is God. These theological and the rulings of classical week. Progressive Jews respect transformations within progressive rabbis. Halachah has undergone the Sabbath, and are still likely Judaism mean that the role of the transformation in both progressive to begin it with lighting Shabbat individual and the commandments and Orthodox communities. One candles on Friday evening, although can no longer be seen as \ufb01xed. progressive view sees Halachah as not all will insist that this be done Along with the newly de\ufb01ned undergoing continual adaptation before sunset, if it occurs very early. to respond to ethical and practical They may also reject the traditional Orthodox Jews believe that prohibition on driving a motor car to the Torah was given by God the synagogue on Shabbat. to Moses at Mount Sinai. Progressive Jews, however, Dietary laws believe it was written by human In matters of kashrut (dietary law), beings under divine inspiration, some progressive Jews might and should be responded dismiss all the rules as antiquated, to accordingly. while others might avoid the meats that are forbidden in the Torah but not concern themselves with the later rabbinic prohibitions concerning the separation of meat and milk products and the utensils used in the preparation of each. Some might focus instead on the discipline of kashrut as a way of expressing consciousness of what they eat, perhaps extending this to eating organic, fair-trade products or food with low food miles. Others might view vegetarianism as a proper or suitable (from the","JUDAISM 195 Progressive communities mark the Novel liturgical compositions Progressive Judaism today time when a girl becomes bat mitvah may sometimes be included, The core ideals of German Reform (a daughter of the commandment); such as poetry or prayers of Judaism took root, and led to the traditional custom prohibited women interfaith understanding, and growth of progressive Jewish from taking part in religious services. a shorter weekly passage from the communities in most countries Torah read. In many congregations, in the world today. In the UK, meaning of the Hebrew word services are conducted in Hebrew Reform Judaism and Liberal \u201ckashrut\u201d) diet and therefore as as well as the vernacular, and are Judaism emerged, and, with a modern, progressive expression often accompanied by music. German Jewish immigration to the of the observance. Progressive Jews observe the US, an American Reform movement Hebrew festival dates given in came into being there. This gave Liturgy for today the Torah, as is the practice of rise to other progressive Historically, Jewish liturgy has all Jews in the Land of Israel. communities in the US, such as tended to lengthen over the This is in contrast to Orthodox Reconstructionist Judaism, and centuries as new prayers have been and Conservative Jews in the Conservative Judaism, which is added. Progressive services retain diaspora, who traditionally extend modern in its theology but the framework and core prayers, but the duration of festivals by a day, traditional in its practices. Other remove some repetition; prayers, as was the custom outside Israel progressive forms of Judaism are and their translations, re\ufb02ect a before the Hebrew calendar was found worldwide, including in reworking of concepts that do not \ufb01xed in 358 CE. Israel, where the faith tends toward accord with progressive beliefs, a more traditional expression of such as the resurrection of the Women and men in progressive Judaism than in the diaspora. dead, the restoration of the temple, communities generally enjoy full and animal sacri\ufb01ces. Many equality in communal leadership A recent worldwide resurgence progressive liturgies avoid feudal (including ordination as rabbis) of interest in Jewish learning and gendered language both for and in ritual life, whether in the across the religious spectrum God and the community, referring, synagogue or home. Girls therefore has led to an engagement with the for example, to the Eternal instead celebrate their ritual adulthood study of classical texts in Hebrew of the Lord, ancestors instead of at the age of 13 (becoming bat for their spiritual, literary, and forefathers, and including the mitzvah) just as boys do (becoming ethical value. Today\u2019s believers may biblical matriarchs along with bar mitzvah) by reading publicly draw from a wide range of Jewish the patriarchs. from the Torah and even leading and secular in\ufb02uences, and are the congregation in prayer. therefore less likely to form a lifelong commitment to only one of the Jewish movements. \u25a0 The past has a vote, but not a veto. Dr. Mordecai M. Kaplan, Progressive theologian","196 IF YOU WILL IT, IT IS NO DREAM THE ORIGINS OF MODERN POLITICAL ZIONISM IN CONTEXT The solution to the Since being driven into \u201cJewish question\u201d is not exile, Jews have dreamed KEY FIGURE Theodor Herzl assimilation, but the of returning to Zion, establishment of a the Land of Israel. WHEN AND WHERE Jewish nation state. 1896, Austria-Hungary This requires \u2026 and if there are BEFORE lobbying of the suf\ufb01cient numbers of 586 BCE King Nebuchadnezzar international community\u2026 Jewish people who want it, of Babylon destroys the Temple it can be achieved. in Jerusalem and drives the Jews into exile. From 538 BCE If you will it, it is no dream. the Jews start to return to the Land of Israel, in accordance E ver since their expulsion hopes were consolidated into a with a decree from Persian from their homeland by political movement, Zionism, which emperor Cyrus the Great. the Babylonians and the aimed to establish a nation state in Romans, many among the Jewish Palestine for the Jewish people. 70 CE The Romans destroy the diaspora had dreamed of a return to second Temple; the Jews are Eretz Yisrael, the Land of Israel, also During the Haskalah, or exiled again. known as Zion after Mount Zion in Jewish Enlightenment, Jewish Jerusalem. It was not until the late thinkers inspired by Moses 635 The Islamic Caliphate 19th century, however, that their Mendelssohn (p.189) had urged conquers Palestine; in 1516 the Jews to assimilate themselves Ottoman Empire takes control of the region. AFTER 1882\u20131948 Jews from the diaspora immigrate to the Land of Israel in waves. 1948 The State of Israel is founded.","JUDAISM 197 See also: God\u2019s covenant with Israel 168\u201375 \u25a0 Faith and the state 189 \u25a0 Ras Tafari is our Savior 314\u201315 be defeated or eradicated, but could be avoided by establishing a Jewish nation state. I consider the Jewish A Jewish homeland Theodor Herzl question neither a social In Herzl\u2019s short book The Jewish State, published in 1896, which Theodor Herzl was born in nor a religious one\u2026 he described as a \u201cproposal of 1860 in Pest, part of modern- It is a national question. a modern solution for the Jewish day Budapest. He moved to question,\u201d he set out the argument Vienna with his family when Theodor Herzl for establishing a Jewish homeland. he was 18. There he studied The obvious choice for this was law, and, in 1839, after a brief into the culture of their adopted the Land of Israel, then a part of legal career, he moved to countries as a way to overcome the Ottoman-ruled Palestine. This Paris. Here he worked as a persecution they had suffered. In proposal marked the beginning correspondent for the Neue much of western Europe and the of modern Zionism as a political Freie Presse (New Free Press) US, emancipation had allowed movement, rather than a theological and as a theater writer. middle-class Jews, in particular, aspiration. The following year, to integrate into society. 1897, Herzl set up an international After reporting on the conference, the First Zionist Dreyfus Affair of the 1890s, One such Jew, the journalist Congress, at which it became clear in which a Jewish of\ufb01cer and writer Theodor Herzl, \ufb01rmly that the political will for a Jewish was framed for treason by believed in Jewish assimilation, state existed, and was achievable the military, he concluded that until he experienced extreme if Jews in suf\ufb01cent numbers were the establishment of a Jewish anti-Semitic feeling in France, to put pressure on the international homeland in Zion, the Land an ostensibly liberal country. He community for its foundation. A of Israel, was essential. He came to realize that ghettoization phrase from Herzl\u2019s novel Old New outlined his arguments in The and anti-Semitism were inevitable: Land was adopted as the Zionist Jewish State and elaborated Jews tended to gravitate to places movement\u2019s rallying cry: \u201cIf you on them in his novel, Old New where they were not likely to be will it, it is no dream\u201d. \u25a0 Land. Herzl worked tirelessly persecuted, but once they had to promote the ideals of immigrated in signi\ufb01cant numbers Israel\u2019s \ufb02ag, adopted in 1948, is Zionism: he organized the \ufb01rst to these places, anti-Jewish feeling derived from a design produced for the congress of Zionism in Basel, arose, and persecution followed. First Zionist Congress. It is inspired Switzerland, in 1897, and was Similarly, even where Jews had by the tallit, or blue-bordered prayer president of the World Zionist tried to blend in with the local shawl, and the Star of David. Organization until his death community and behave as loyal in 1904. In 1949 his remains citizens, they were still treated as were moved from Vienna aliens and driven into isolation. and reburied in Jerusalem. He concluded that the solution to these problems lay not in Key works assimilation, but in the large-scale separation of Jewish people into 1896 The Jewish State one place. Anti-Semitism could not 1902 Old New Land","198 WHERE WAS GOD DURING THE HOLOCAUST? A CHALLENGE TO THE COVENANT IN CONTEXT E ver since their expulsion Never shall I forget those from Israel by the Romans moments that murdered KEY MOVEMENT in 70 CE, the Jews have Holocaust theology endured exile and persecution. my God and my soul. However, the Holocaust, or Sho\u2019ah Elie Wiesel WHEN AND WHERE (catastrophe)\u2014the systematic Mid-20th century, Europe genocide of around 6 million Jews, others saw it as punishment for or two-thirds of the European the sin of abandoning God and his BEFORE Jewish population\u2014was an event laws, which God had responded to 1516 The Republic of Venice of unprecedented horror that tested with his own temporary absence. establishes the ghetto, which the faith of the Jewish people in A further group saw the Sho\u2019ah as becomes the model for ghettos their covenant with God. This separate from God, an example of created across Europe to challenge raised an important human free will and its fallibility, isolate Jewish communities. question: was the Holocaust God\u2019s perhaps explained in kabbalistic doing, or did he stand aside and terms as a stage of God\u2019s tzimtzum, 1850s Anti-Semitism in allow it to happen? Jewish theology or contraction, from the world. Europe takes on a more struggled to provide answers, and a secular, racist stance. number of Jews lost faith, believing A whole new \ufb01eld of Holocaust God had abandoned his people. theology has since emerged, 1880s Beginning of a series of examining these various responses, pogroms\u2014violent anti-Jewish The greatest test and reappraising the covenant in mob attacks\u2014in Russia. Different groups of Jews offered a the light of the Sho\u2019ah. \u25a0 range of other interpretations of the 1930s Hitler becomes German Holocaust. Some saw it as being no Chancellor, and begins a different from the persecutions they campaign of harassment and had already suffered, except in genocide against Jews. scale. They de\ufb01ned it as an extreme example of suffering in the world, AFTER a test of faith, and a revelation 1945 Jews are liberated from calling for an af\ufb01rmation of survival; concentration camps at the end of World War II and resettled, See also: God\u2019s covenant with Israel 168\u201375 \u25a0 Mysticism and the kabbalah many in the US and later in 186\u201387 \u25a0 The origins of modern political Zionism 196\u201397 the newly formed State of Israel."]