Not offended, just haven't been in the right mental space to do a lot of writing.
In general, I think Jews would say that our God is THE god and everyone else's versions are different names for the same thing. Waaaay way back, the Israelites/earliest Jewish people did acknowledge that other gods existed but that theirs was the most powerful one, but now there's no acknowledgement that any other gods exist at all. Some Jews feel Judaism is compatible with other religious traditions that don't emphasize their own specific god (Buddhism, varieties of paganism). There's also a strong tradition of Jewish socialist atheism that would say all the gods are pretend, but that's complicated in its own way (the socialists still participated in orthodox Judaism anyway in some cases).
Yes, that's right about the Noachide laws. I don't remember if gentiles who follow them are actually blessed or what. But Jewish law is supposed to be only for Jews, to the extent that someone who is doing an orthodox conversion & isn't Jewish yet is supposed to (according to some, anyway) purposely break Shabbat because full observance is only for Jews.
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branchandroot
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Date: 2010-07-08 03:07 pm (UTC)In general, I think Jews would say that our God is THE god and everyone else's versions are different names for the same thing. Waaaay way back, the Israelites/earliest Jewish people did acknowledge that other gods existed but that theirs was the most powerful one, but now there's no acknowledgement that any other gods exist at all. Some Jews feel Judaism is compatible with other religious traditions that don't emphasize their own specific god (Buddhism, varieties of paganism). There's also a strong tradition of Jewish socialist atheism that would say all the gods are pretend, but that's complicated in its own way (the socialists still participated in orthodox Judaism anyway in some cases).
Yes, that's right about the Noachide laws. I don't remember if gentiles who follow them are actually blessed or what. But Jewish law is supposed to be only for Jews, to the extent that someone who is doing an orthodox conversion & isn't Jewish yet is supposed to (according to some, anyway) purposely break Shabbat because full observance is only for Jews.