Jewish Identity

My Jewish friends are mostly indifferent or even hostile towards their own religion, while I love Judaism and strongly desire to become a Jew. Then this rabbi tells me that "Judaism is not for you" ?!

Keeping kosher is not a reasonable act and neither is Shabbat or the prohibition against mixing wool and linen. These are neither rational nor religious acts—at least not in the modern understanding of "religious"...

The Jews and Greeks could have learned so much from each other! Instead, the extremists of both sides hit the battlefield

I like Shabbat. I like Torah, especially the Kabbalah stuff and Chassidic stories. I feel a strong attachment to the Jewish people. But I'm a non-conformist at heart -- I just can't see myself following all those regulations

I have always felt that the essence of spirituality is that, underneath it all, we are all one. Isn't it absurd to characterize a soul as "Jewish"? Why put souls in boxes?

I was accosted at the beach today by a guy from Jews for Jesus. He offered me a New Testament in Yiddish and said that many Jews have been "saved" by accepting Jesus as the messiah.

Are there Jewish fundamentalists, the way that there are those folks in Christianity and Islam? What would the core beliefs of a "Jewish fundamentalist" be?

As a rabbi, I assume you believe that Judaism is THE truth. If so, how do you explain the fact that there are so many other religions, and only a tiny minority of the world's population believes as you do?

Can you see a time when all Jews will follow the same customs?

I try to live by the words of John Lennon: Imagine there's no countries / It isn't hard to do / Nothing to kill or die for / No religion too.... Isn't that what life is about?

If Tevye's Judaism is anything to go by, don't you think it's time for an updated version?

Interestingly, as much as we have taken from alien cultures in the course of our thousands of years in exile, these cultures were even more affected than we were

In all seriousness, laughing has been an important part of Judaism since biblical times. But what is the source of the Jewish sense of humor in our times? Is it nature or nurture?

At almost every function I attend, a wedding, kid's birthday party or communal gathering, someone comes up to me and says, "Rabbi, do you know why I don't go to synagogue...."

The problem with rabbis is you always talk about the Jewish future, Jewish continuity, Jews marrying Jews. What about the rest of humanity?

What do you say to people like me who simply are not inspired by Judaism?

I pay my taxes, I am friendly to people around me, and I am charitable to those less fortunate. Doesn’t that make me a good person?

My nine-year-old son is the only Jewish child in his school. He has been disappointed numerous times because of the scheduling of fun and exciting events on major Jewish holidays. This has happened again this year. His school's overnight fieldtrip is scheduled on a Jewish holiday.

My Chabad rabbi has been bugging me to take off one semester to study in a yeshiva “some time before graduate school.” It’s still not clear to me what this yeshiva place is all about, and definitely not clear why I should take off in the middle of my studies to go there.