OT -- Re: random cover of a range

[Denis Koroskin]

On Mon, 16 Feb 2009 15:28:33 +0300, Christopher Wright  
<dhasenan at gmail.com> wrote:

> Don wrote:
>> Yigal Chripun wrote:
>>> Nick Sabalausky wrote:
>>>> "Yigal Chripun"<yigal100 at gmail.com>  wrote in message
>>>> news:gn9qp7$apa$1 at digitalmars.com...
>>>>> A millennium ago, Europe was in the midst of the dark ages while all
>>>>> scientific advances were made by Islamic scholars (know Algebra?),  
>>>>> and the
>>>>> christian world went on holy crusades to fight the evil  
>>>>> "barbarians", now
>>>>> a millennium later the wheel had turned and the Islamic world is in  
>>>>> its
>>>>> own dark-age (Iran is prime example of that) and the Islamic  
>>>>> extremists
>>>>> are calling for Jihad against the corrupt and evil heretics of the  
>>>>> west.
>>>>> Non of that is present in Judaism.
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> I'm no theology expert, but from what I understand, the Islamic  
>>>> concept of
>>>> Jihad really refers to a person's internal good-vs-evil struggle, not  
>>>> an
>>>> external struggle. The so-called "Muslims" that take Jihad to mean  
>>>> actually
>>>> committing violence against other people are bastardizing thier own  
>>>> religion
>>>> in the same way that some people bastardize Christianity into  
>>>> allegedly
>>>> being pro-"white power".
>>>>
>>>
>>> Not quite so. Jihad is one of the pillars of Islam, and has about 4  
>>> sub-categories one of which is _Jihad_by_sword_
>>> here's a quote for example from  
>>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_of_Islamic_scholars_on_Jihad :
>>> <quote>
>>> Ibn Rushd, in his Muqaddimāt, divides Jihad into four kinds:
>>>
>>>     "Jihad by the heart; Jihad by the tongue; Jihad by the hand and  
>>> Jihad by the sword." He defines "Jihad by the tongue" as "to commend  
>>> good conduct and forbid the wrong, like the type of Jihad Allah (swt)  
>>> ordered us to fulfill against the hypocrites in His Words, “O Prophet!  
>>> Strive hard against the unbelievers and the hypocrites” (Qur'an  
>>> [Qur'an 9:73]). Thus, Seraj and Ahmad Hendricks have expressed a view  
>>> that Muhammad strove against the unbelievers by sword and against the  
>>> hypocrites by tongue
>>> </quote>
>>>
>>>>> the only link between Judaism to Christianity is that supposedly  
>>>>> Jesus was
>>>>> Jewish.
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Umm...Judaism and Christianity share an entire Bible. Of course,
>>>> Christianity adds another Bible (the "New Testament") but they equally
>>>> revere what they call the "Old Testament", which *is* the Jewish  
>>>> Bible. As
>>>> part of that Bible, both religions contain The Ten Commandments,  
>>>> Moses,
>>>> Abraham (this particular part also being shared by Islam), Adam and  
>>>> Eve,
>>>> Noah's Ark, and probably some other things. I'm not sure where you  
>>>> get the
>>>> idea that Jesus's religion is the only connection between Judaism and
>>>> Christianity.
>>>>
>>> Christianity has mostly redefined out of existence most of the Jewish  
>>> concepts if not all of them as they appear in the bible (the old  
>>> testament), and the new testament which overrides the old one defines  
>>> different, and contradicting new concepts.
>>> Christians use different interpretations of the bible and the  
>>> christian faith basically broke backwards compatibility (to borrow a  
>>> software concept) with Judaism.
>>  You seem to be assuming that modern Judaism is identical to  
>> first-century Judaism. It clearly isn't. In particular, (1) the  
>> destruction of the temple required significant "breaking of backward  
>> compatibility" (not to anywhere near the same extent as Christianity,  
>> of course), and (2) Orthodox Judaism recognizes the Talmud, which was  
>> written down later than the New Testament.
>>  Also Christianity retains the Tanakh(Old Testament) word-for-word and  
>> regards it as authoritative. This put strict limits on the extent of  
>> possible divergence.
>
> Divergence of belief in the historical content of the text, yes. (I know  
> that Christianity has some divergence on whether the text is completely  
> and literally accurate in all aspects. I don't know whether there are  
> any young-earth creationists among non-Christian Jews, or anything like  
> that.)
>
> However, there are a lot of commandments given down regarding what is  
> clean and unclean, and how to distinguish, and treatment for being  
> unclean in various ways. That is universally ignored. Doctors do better  
> at healing people than priests who follow the Torah exactly. In case of  
> an infestation of mold in your house, you are going to call someone who  
> specializes in that issue, and they're not going to follow the Torah,  
> even if they are the strictest of orthodox Jews. And I haven't seen any  
> Christian who felt compelled to avoid eating shellfish due to biblical  
> restrictions.
>

I know one - Jesus.

There is also "Jews for Jesus" organization that follow kosher diet.
And I've also heard of christian old-believers in Russia that don't eat  
pork and shellfish.

> I don't know many ultra-Orthodox Jews; do any of you know a Jew who  
> would go to his priest regarding a rash before he would go to a doctor?

I've heard many Jews refuse to do the blood transfusion even if it costs  
them their life.