Why Be Jewish?
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About this ebook
"All beginnings require that you unlock new doors."--Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav
In this short and inspiring text, Rabbi David J. Wolpe addresses all who seek to enlarge the spiritual side of their lives. For those considering a return to the faith of their forebears, for those drawn to conversion, Why Be Jewish? is a learned, graceful, and welcoming introduction beckoning readers into the heart of this venerable and enduring religion.
David J. Wolpe
David J. Wolpe is widely known for his acclaimed books: Teaching Your Children About God, In Speech and In Silence, and The Healer of Shattered Hearts. Ordained in 1987, he is Assistant to the Chancellor of the Jewish Theological Seminary.
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Reviews for Why Be Jewish?
12 ratings1 review
- Rating: 1 out of 5 stars1/5The book is just a collection of platitudes. Joy? Sure, that's Judaism. Courage? Of course, Judaism. The problem is, if one substitutes Judaism for new age, spiritism or theosophy, you get exactly the same book. The theology of Judaism is miles apart from the faith of Abraham and Moses. I mean, just read the Old Testament. God was present, he judged people because of disobedience. Nothing like this new age nonsense of today. Or should we say racist new age religion? I suggest anyone considering conversion to first read the Torah and examine if this confusion they have today has any similarity to the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
Book preview
Why Be Jewish? - David J. Wolpe
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For Eileen
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Notice
PREFACE
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
1 - TO GROW IN SOUL
The Secret and the Mystery
The Start of the Journey
Judaism’s Central Teaching
What Is Spirituality?
Science and Spirit
The Truth About Human Nature
The Challenge of Goodness
Pleasure and Desire
Repentance
Joy
A Live Mind
Shaping a Self
Courage
2 - TO JOIN A PEOPLE
You Are the Fewest
The Jewish People
Chosenness and the Jewish Mission
The Land of Israel
Torah and Tradition
Hatred and the Holocaust
The Hero
Conversion: Choosing Judaism
The Ever-Dying People
3 - TO SEEK GOD
What Is God?
Talking About God
The God of the Rabbis
A God of Passion
Speaking to God
Listening to God
Moments of Transcendence
What Does God Want of Us?
What Do I Want of God?
The Eternal One
CONCLUSION - Our Ultimate Fate
Also by David J. Wolpe
GO AND LEARN
- For Further Reading
INDEX
About the Author
Notes
Copyright Page
PREFACE
For many Jews, religion seems an antique and unyielding system that no longer fits our lives. Having learned little about Judaism since childhood, we remember our religious education as a jumble of curious legends and ideas. We feel ourselves to be sensitive, perhaps even spiritual people, but organized religion is associated with boredom at best, narrowness at worst.
Yet as I travel around the country, speaking and meeting with various groups, I encounter thousands of people who are exploring religion, spirituality, and Judaism. Some are asking deeper questions of life after having made a place in their careers or community. Some are now planning a family and wondering what to teach to their children. Some are just beginning to forge their own paths in the world and want to start out with a clear, persuasive explanation of where they come from and what their legacy means. Still others, born into another faith, are contemplating marriage to a Jew and seek to understand what this tradition and people are all about.
Such a list hardly exhausts the kinds of people who are wondering, Why be Jewish? If this question has stirred your soul, or perhaps simply roused your curiosity, this book is for you. Why Be Jewish? is not a full-fledged introduction to Judaism but a personal portrait of faith for those who are searching: an attempt to show in quick, large strokes what this remarkable faith is really about and how it can transform your life.
In each of its three chapters, the book explores an answer to the question, Why be Jewish?: to grow in soul, to join a people, and to seek God. The text is intentionally short and to the point. It is not intended to explain all of Judaism but rather to guide you to its heart.
For thousands of years people have found Judaism a rich, artistic, and holy path of living. There is an enormous effort in our time to seek out ways to lengthen life. Here is a way to deepen it.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This book began with a conference in Oakland, California, at which I was asked to address the question Why Be Jewish?
The response to that talk, which brought letters and visits from attendees, convinced me that this most fundamental question was often neglected. While many explained what Judaism was about, there was less discussion of why it was so vital to people’s lives today.
I was fortunate to be able to write this book while teaching at the University of Judaism in Los Angeles. In the decade I have spent there as a student and a teacher I have been constantly enriched by its atmosphere and its mission. Why Be Jewish? also profited from the help of a number of friends and colleagues: Robert Wexler, Daniel Gordis, and Mimi Sells, all of the University of Judaism; as well as Joseph Telushkin, Lynn Nesbit, and my editor Marian Wood, whose knowledge of books is second only to her insight into her authors. Finally, my greatest debt is to Eileen, who supplies love, wisdom, and patience in equal, unending measures.
1
TO GROW IN SOUL
The human soul is the candle of God.
Proverbs 20:27
The Secret and the Mystery
Inside each of us is a secret searching for a mystery. The secret we carry is uniquely our own. We can share it with others, but we never lose it, like the candle whose light kindles a new flame without being itself diminished. We can hide our secret, hoard it, damp it down until it is almost extinguished, but we cannot fully destroy it.
The mystery is what to do with our secret. When we are young, the secret seems something both wonderful and trivial; we play at it, expand it, and dream that it will one day matter. But it is only as we grow older that we are captured by the force of the mystery: for the secret is our soul, and the mystery is how to tend it and help it grow.
The world blares at us. Each morning as we arise we hear the screech of the headlines, demanding our attention. This is what you must hear, think, give yourself to right now. Tomorrow the issue will be different, but it is never less than urgent, never less than loud. The melody of the self, a strain so thin and delicate, has little chance to be heard. Listening takes time and silence, and in the frantic noise we lose attunement.
One solution is to close out the world. Retreat, ignore the clatter of the street. But isolation is at best a temporary solution. The world is the stage of all drama. To be healthy, a soul has to care about other things and other souls beside itself and its source. If all we attend to is our own cultivation, we are listening not to the call of the soul but the tyranny of the ego.
To believe in our secret and tend it is a beginning. The spark of soul inside each of us is unique. Out of the billions who live, who have lived, no one has shared exactly our secret; no one