What is Judaism’s teach? | Rapp Report Weekly Wrap-up 008 | Striving for Eternity

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Judaism’s Sources of Authority: Tanakh, Midrash, Mishnah, and Talmud

This week we're gonna take a look at what Judaism believes and we're getting most of the information from my book that I have written called What Do They Believe? and you can get a copy of that at whatdothebelieve .com.

Now we're looking at Judaism and we're gonna look at five different areas. We're gonna look at what is their authority? What is their view of God? What's their view of Jesus Christ? Their view of man and his sinfulness and then we're gonna look at their view of salvation and end times.

What we end up seeing in these is that Judaism that we know of today which is referred to as Second Temple Judaism, is very different than the Judaism that we knew of in the Old Testament. There were changes and you're gonna see that in the authorities that they hold to.

This becomes an important distinguishing factor because many people make the mistake of thinking that the Judaism they read about in the Bible is the same Judaism that they think people are following today.

What is referred to today by Judaism is referred to as Second Temple Judaism. They have additional authorities of Scripture, specifically the Talmud, and we're gonna see that and see that they focus more on the Talmud than they do the Bible because that becomes where they get their authority.

So this is this week's wrap up on Judaism. I hope you find this helpful. Please share this with others as we wrap up this week's dailies of the wrap report and give it to you all in one shot for you to keep together.

I'm gonna take a look at what it is that Judaism believes. When we speak of Judaism today we're speaking of Second Temple Judaism, which is different than Biblical Judaism. As we look at Second Temple Judaism we see that they have four sources of authority.

First is what's called the Tanakh. It's what we would call the Old Testament. This is broken up into three sections. You'll often see it referred this way in the New Testament even. It is referred to as Moses, referring to those first five books, the prophets, referring to the major and minor prophets, and the writings.

Those would be the three subdivisions of what we would call the Old Testament or what would be referred to as Tanakh. Now there is a Midrash. The Midrash is a interpretation or commentary on the Tanakh.

And then you have the Mishnah. Now where the Tanakh is the written law, the Mishnah is the oral law that was supposedly handed down from generation to generation and eventually written down. And this is where things like Kabbalah focuses much of their time.

It's a very mystical book. Then you have the commentary on the Mishnah, which is called a Talmud. This is where you get rabbinical law from. Much of what we say with Second Temple Judaism is from the Talmud.

And the Talmud is a commentary on the Midrash, which again is that oral tradition, oral law. So this is a commentary. This is also something that gets changed over time. But when we look at modern Judaism, it is based mostly from the Talmud and not the Tanakh or what we would call Old Testament.

That is what we see in the authority in Judaism. As we continue looking into Judaism, and when we say Judaism, we are referring to Second Temple Judaism. That is the Judaism that was developed after the period of time that we see in the Old Testament where Israel was taken into captivity.

They were returned to Israel. And by then they built the Second Temple. And that is really a legalistic Judaism that was different than the Old Testament. And much of what we see of Judaism in the New Testament is based on that.

The Jewish View of God and the Shema

Now today we want to look at the Jewish view of God. They would hold to a very strict view of monotheism. Now they would be strict in the sense that they would deny the Christian view of a trinity. The Christians believe in one God and three persons.

The Jewish view would be that there is one God, one being, one person. They would not hold to any multiple persons. Now their view of God is seen clearest in Deuteronomy in chapter 6 verse 4 where it says, Hereo Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one.

This is actually called the Shema. It is one of the most well-known passages in Judaism. It's something that's recited often. And if you ever go to a Jewish home and you see on the side of the doorpost, you will see what's called a mezuzah.

And inside is that passage of Deuteronomy. It is to remind people that there is one God. This is what separated early Israel or early Judaism from all the other pagan religions with their multiple gods.

Judaism’s View of Jesus Christ and the Jewish Messiah

As we take a look at the Jewish view of Jesus Christ, there is one thing that we know for sure. And that is that Judaism does not believe that Jesus Christ is the Jewish Messiah. In fact, they believe that that is just a fable created by Christianity.

Now much of what we see about the Jewish Messiah is from the Talmud. And remember that the Talmud was something that was written after the time of Christ. And we mentioned in an earlier rap report that it was something that was a redacted work.

So therefore they would edit the later writings of the Talmud from the earlier. And so much of it is responsive and reactionary to the view that Jesus was the Messiah. They're reacting to Christianity.

Now they believe that this person who was to be Messiah was known from before the time began. But they believe he was just a human being. A human being who is divinely appointed to carry out a special task.

They do not believe that he's any supernatural or superhuman deliverer. So the one thing that they're all unanimous about when it comes to the Talmud and all the rabbis, is that they are convinced that Jesus Christ could not have been the Messiah.

That's one thing they all seem to agree though. There seems to be some differences of who the Messiah would be. And this is an important point that differentiates Christianity from Judaism. If you want to get more, you can get my book, What Do They Believe?, at whatdotheybelieve .com.

Judaism’s View of Human Sinfulness and the Two Impulses

As we look today at the Jewish view of man's sinfulness, we see that first off, in Judaism, there is the belief that man pre-existed his body. It is the idea that God created all of the souls of all of humanity at the same day as he did the angels in some time in our past.

And then when we are born, we are given this spiritual soul. Another thing that's very important to understand is that within Judaism, it is the belief that we have two impulses. One good, the other evil.

And the really important thing here is that it makes God the author of sin, because the evil impulse is what causes us to sin. And the Talmud ends up teaching that God created man with two impulses, one good and the other evil, which makes God the author of sin.

They make excuses for sin, by the way. This is a very interesting quote from the Talmud. Quote, if a man sees his evil impulses gaining mastery over him, let him go to a place where he is unknown, put on black clothes, and do what his heart desires, but let him not profane the name publicly, unquote.

In other words, as long as no one sees what you're doing, it's okay. They believe that man has a free will, that man can master his sin. And this makes an important distinction that we're going to look at when it comes to salvation.

Salvation by Obeying the Law and the Noahide Commandments

If you'd like to read more about this, get my book, What Do They Believe, at whatdotheybelieve .com, as we take a look at what Judaism teaches when it comes to man's salvation. We saw previously that it teaches that man has a free will, and that they have an evil impulse that they can master, they can conquer.

Now, in Judaism, it is referred to as Dun Torah, which means obeying the 613 commandments found in the first five books of Moses, that they are to obey. And in obeying those commandments, they would be able to earn salvation.

They can merit salvation by obedience to the law. They do not see that the law is something that they cannot fulfill. In fact, they believe that by fulfilling those in obedience, they can earn themselves salvation.

Now, there is a Gentile salvation, since they don't have the law. They follow the law of Noah, that is seen in the Talmud, which they wouldn't be able to get unless they were Jewish. Okay, but the fact is that they believe that they can earn salvation.

The Eternal State in Judaism and the Absence of a Literal Hell

When it comes to the eternal state, they do not believe in Second Temple Judaism, that there is a literal hell that they would, people would spend eternity in. And most of Second Temple Judaism would believe in the heaven, but they do not believe in a literal hell.

They believe that the way to get to heaven is by works righteousness. But if you don't succeed in fulfilling the law, where do you go? Well, it's not exactly clear. If you'd like to get more information about Judaism and other religions, get my book, What Do They Believe?, at whatdidtheybelieve .com.

This podcast is part of the Striving for Eternity ministry. For more content or to request a speaker or seminar to your church, go to strivingforeternity .org.