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Chosen refers to God choosing the Jews to follow his laws, all 613 of them.
Non-Jews aren't required to follow the laws and they aren't penalized for not doing so, in fact Jewish tradition specifically says that non-Jews are recognized by God for living good lives, that is the tradition of the Righteous Gentile.
The Jews were chosen for a hard job of following a bunch of laws nobody else had to follow and getting ostracized into the bargain. Hardly a nice little deal. The joy is supposed to come from following Gods word.
If you are going to criticize it, at least understand it.
Chosen refers to God choosing the Jews to follow his laws, all 613 of them.
Non-Jews aren't required to follow the laws and they aren't penalized for not doing so, in fact Jewish tradition specifically says that non-Jews are recognized by God for living good lives, that is the tradition of the Righteous Gentile.
The Jews were chosen for a hard job of following a bunch of laws nobody else had to follow and getting ostracized into the bargain. Hardly a nice little deal. The joy is supposed to come from following Gods word.
If you are going to criticize it, at least understand it.
Hmm, didn't Hitler do that stuff to the Jews also? I guess Yahweh was a good role model for Adolf.
Chosen refers to God choosing the Jews to follow his laws, all 613 of them.
Non-Jews aren't required to follow the laws and they aren't penalized for not doing so, in fact Jewish tradition specifically says that non-Jews are recognized by God for living good lives, that is the tradition of the Righteous Gentile.
The Jews were chosen for a hard job of following a bunch of laws nobody else had to follow and getting ostracized into the bargain. Hardly a nice little deal. The joy is supposed to come from following Gods word.
If you are going to criticize it, at least understand it.
In order for God to chose a people, He had to choose a character trait that would hold stubbornly to the letter of the law.
Purposely, for the rejection of Jesus and the offering Him up as a universal sacrifice for all mankind.
Can we let this thread die out? It's very premise is hateful. Jews feel no superiority due to this "chosen people" concept - that I don't even know who created the idea in the first place. I know many feel hung up and resentful that the very idea exists. But the world would do better if we all just ignored this and moved on. It means nothing to us Jews, so all you non-Jews appear to have ulterier motives if it bothers you.
Yeah, seriously, there's a truly creepy amount of anti-Semitism showing through an awful lot of these "questions." Maybe the moderator would close this and any other threads based on disingenuous non-questions that sound like an Aryan Brotherhood FAQ.
Contrary to popular belief, Judaism does not maintain that Jews are better than other people. Although we refer to ourselves as G-d's chosen people, we do not believe that G-d chose the Jews because of any inherent superiority. According to the Talmud (Avodah Zarah 2b), G-d offered the Torah to all the nations of the earth, and the Jews were the only ones who accepted it. The story goes on to say that the Jews were offered the Torah last, and accepted it only because G-d held a mountain over their heads! (In Ex. 19:17, the words generally translated as "at the foot of the mountain" literally mean "underneath the mountain"!) Another traditional story suggests that G-d chose the Jewish nation because they were the lowliest of nations, and their success would be attributed to G-d's might rather than their own ability. Clearly, these are not the ideas of a people who think they are better than other nations.
Because of our acceptance of Torah, Jews have a special status in the eyes of G-d, but we lose that special status when we abandon Torah. Furthermore, the blessings that we received from G-d by accepting the Torah come with a high price: Jews have a greater responsibility than non-Jews. While non-Jews are only obligated to obey the seven commandments given to Noah, Jews are responsible for fulfilling the 613 mitzvot in the Torah, thus G-d will punish Jews for doing things that would not be a sin for non-Jews.
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