Register a SA Forums Account here!
JOINING THE SA FORUMS WILL REMOVE THIS BIG AD, THE ANNOYING UNDERLINED ADS, AND STUPID INTERSTITIAL ADS!!!

You can: log in, read the tech support FAQ, or request your lost password. This dumb message (and those ads) will appear on every screen until you register! Get rid of this crap by registering your own SA Forums Account and joining roughly 150,000 Goons, for the one-time price of $9.95! We charge money because it costs us money per month for bills, and since we don't believe in showing ads to our users, we try to make the money back through forum registrations.
The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Ask/Tell > Ask me about Judaism
 
  • Locked thread
PT6A
Jan 5, 2006

Public school teachers are callous dictators who won't lift a finger to stop children from peeing in my plane

Green_Machine posted:

What motivation would anyone have to convert to Judaism? I'm a non-Jew and I've participated in Reform Jewish religious services a number of times at different synagogues; all of those Jews were totally chill and welcoming. There's no "become an official Jew to go to heaven" thing like Christians and Muslims have. Jews seem to accept that all people can have an understanding of and relationship with God whether they're Jewish or not. The covenant with Abraham was already fulfilled literally so I don't see what impact it has on current Jews. What I'm trying to say is that there isn't the quid-pro-quo present in most religions where you are offered some payoff for joining. It seems to me like Jews give a lot of the milk away whether you buy the cow or not.

For my friend, who was very close to converting but stopped short once he couldn't reconcile it with his atheism, it was the culture and sense of community that it offered. I don't want to say it's been fetishized at all, but I think particularly in North America, where a lot of people struggle to remain in touch with their heritage and yet still feel like they need that connection, it can be a powerful draw. That's a similar reason I've heard for people "converting" from reform Judaism to orthodox/Hasidic Judaism, but there are separate factors at play there.

* # ¿ Jul 8, 2015 03:30
  • Quote
Adbot
ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ¿ Apr 27, 2024 13:07
  • Quote
PT6A
Jan 5, 2006

Public school teachers are callous dictators who won't lift a finger to stop children from peeing in my plane

Green_Machine posted:

I can see that, although what would probably lead me to stop short is the thought of letting another person cut off part of my penis.

I guess no one can do more than speculate, but I wonder if the origin of that requirement isn't to make conversion more appealing for women than for men. There's a reason that the only convert in the Tanach was a woman, right? I vaguely remember that there's one story where an ancient tribe agrees to convert to Judaism en masse, and the Jews in the story take advantage of their post-circumcision weakness to slaughter all of their men and steal their stuff. I think if you don't get cut when you're born, circumcision is an exceptionally hard door to walk through later in life.

This is Canada, I think most guys got circumcised near birth around the time we were born, or at least a really significant fraction.

* # ¿ Jul 8, 2015 04:11
  • Quote
PT6A
Jan 5, 2006

Public school teachers are callous dictators who won't lift a finger to stop children from peeing in my plane

Noctis Horrendae posted:

The real question is - could the island of Madagascar feasibly sustain six million Jews?

According to Wikipedia, the current population of Madagascar is over 22 million, so I'm going to take a wild guess and say "yes."

* # ¿ Oct 2, 2015 18:08
  • Quote
  • Locked thread
The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Ask/Tell > Ask me about Judaism