Download - What do we mean by Judaism/American Judaism?
What is Judaism?Is it a religion, a culture, a nation, a people, a system of
ethics, an ethnic group, a pre-requisite for making it as a successful comedian?
It’s a religion It’s an ethnicity
One God◦ Universal Creator◦ Specific God of Israel
System of ethical and ritual laws & practices
Sacred homelandSacred texts
◦ Torah and Hebrew Bible◦ Talmud, Midrash, Kabbalah
HolidaysSacred narrative
(Moses, etc.)
Common language(s)Shared historyShared ritualsShared foodsShared humorShared roots in a
particular landSense of shared destinyShared physical
appearance attributes
Ashkenazi Jews (European descent)
Sephardi Jews (trace roots back to Spain)
Mizrahi Jews (Jews descending from the Middle East, North Africa, and Persian Gulf)
Ethiopian Jews
Sabras
Jews-by-choice
Jews adopted as children
“Judaism is an evolvingreligiouscivilization.”
Rabbi Mordecai M. Kaplan1881 - 1983
religioncuisine
homeland
art & literature
languages
history
culture
humor
Centers of Jewish civilization today
1,500,000
EUROPE
Jewish-Americans: population centers
Politics
Comedy
Hollywood
Different Ways of Analyzing or Surveying Contemporary American Jewish Cultures
By Movement/Philosophy
OrthodoxModern OrthodoxHarediChabadOther Hasidic Sects
Conservative
Reform
Reconstructionist
Renewal
Humanistic
Secular/Cultural
“Just Jewish”
How the movements differ
Beliefs about Torah & Sacred Texts
Beliefs about God
Authority of Jewish law (halakhah)
Who has authority to determine halakhic decisions or other decisions of ethics and ritual practice
Nature and purpose of the Jewish people
Ways of relating to modernity & the contemporary world
By Geographic Region
By Attitudes towards Israel
By Sub-ethnicity
By LGBT issues
By In-marriage/Intermarriage
By JBB or JBC