#and some fringe groups believing in gehenna does not speak for all of us any more than xtian cults do for xtians | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

nonegenderleftpain · 1 year ago

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If you say that religion must be studied in the context of how it is practiced, let me tell you as a practicing Jew that it is not widely practiced to believe in hell, and definitely not to teach children about it. Yes, Gehenna is mentioned in Talmud, and there is a lot of discussion about what that means that isn't for goyim to interpret for us. We do not have hellish iconography, we do not discuss it in sermons. Judaism is about doing right by people in the here and now, and the afterlife - good or bad - isn't really part of that. Because some small sects do interpret Gehenna as literal and not metaphorical does not mean that Judaism as a whole is practiced that way. The belief in hell is exceptional, in Judaism, not one of the primary, de-facto ways our religion is practiced.

my most antitheist opinion is that hell is like. a cartoonishly evil thing to believe in and insanely abusive to teach children about

#judaism #what youre saying about analyzing religion in how it is practiced and not by literalizing the text is true #but then you are not doing that when it comes to us #the way we interact with our text and our beliefs is fundamentally different than you think #and some fringe groups believing in gehenna does not speak for all of us any more than xtian cults do for xtians #and even more children could not go to gehenna and are not even responsible for following mitzvot until they are bnei mitzvah #it is objectively impossible even in groups that DO believe in hell for children to be at risk of it because they are not capable #of making decisions about mitzvot until they are old enough to understand them #you do not understand judaism please do not speak for us or compare torah to xtian scriptures #even where they are similar the way they are followed is not the same and xtian appropriation and misinterpreting of our texts #is not our problem #jewish stuff

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