{"id":5279,"date":"2022-06-21T13:51:05","date_gmt":"2022-06-21T13:51:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/torahmates.org\/jewish-resources\/?p=5279"},"modified":"2022-06-21T15:11:24","modified_gmt":"2022-06-21T15:11:24","slug":"learning-about-other-beliefs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fargate.dev.torahmates.org\/jewish-resources\/learning-about-other-beliefs\/","title":{"rendered":"Learning About Other Beliefs"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div class=\"wp-block-group\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container\">\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote has-text-align-center is-style-large\"><p>&#8220;I once met a Jew who told me that he doesn\u2019t believe that Torah is from Heaven. I challenged him, asking him how he can reject the Torah if he\u2019s never learned it and doesn\u2019t even know what it says. He responded that religious Jews are no different. They don\u2019t believe in Christianity, never having read the Christian Bible. What can I respond? How can a Jew say he doesn\u2019t believe in ideas he knows nothing about?&#8221;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator is-style-dots\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\"><strong>Rav Chaim Mintz responds: <\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>There is an obvious flaw in this argument. The Jewish nation is unique because Judaism\u2019s beliefs are based on the firsthand experience of the entire nation. Millions of our ancestors stood at Mount Sinai and received the Torah from Hashem. They all witnessed a unique revelation when Hashem opened the heavens and let us know without a doubt that He designated us as His chosen nation and gave us the Torah. They passed this knowledge on to their children, who then passed it on from generation to generation until today. Since it is impossible to perpetuate a lie about something witnessed by so many people, and they all told their children about the same overpowering experience, it must certainly be true. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There is also no reason to be concerned that He \u201cchanged His mind,\u201d and chose a different nation, since Hashem told us that His Torah would never be changed and it would never be taken away from the Jewish people. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In addition, since Hashem is perfect and eternal, we know that His giving us the Torah is also perfect and eternal. A perfect Hashem doesn\u2019t change His mind or break the covenant He made with us. This leaves a Jew with no need to investigate other beliefs, because he knows the truth, and there can be only one truth, with nothing to learn from studying other religions. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>No other religion can make this claim. Christianity is based on a handful of men who spread the teachings of their new religion, claiming that G-d gave them a \u201cnew and improved\u201d version of the Torah. But since Hashem told us that His Torah would never be changed and it would never be taken from the Jewish people, their claims cannot possibly be valid. And even according to their claim that Hashem changed His mind and decided to make changes, He would not have done so in secret, to just a handful of people. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There are Jews who make it their business to study the claims of other religions, especially Christianity, to be able to counteract the efforts of <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Missionary\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">missionaries<\/a>. But in truth, this is really unnecessary. If you have ever had a chance to hear or read any of their presentations, you will see that anyone with a thorough Torah education can shoot gigantic holes in their \u201cproofs\u201d and arguments. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In fact, I once sat next to a priest on a plane and tried asking him various questions about inconsistencies in Christianity. His response was to steer the conversation toward a different topic. As Jews, our first obligation is to <a href=\"https:\/\/torahmates.org\/testimonials.php\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">learn about Judaism<\/a>, and indeed, the prophets rebuke those who were content with remaining ignorant of Hashem and the Torah. This accusation still stands today. Many of us may be content with our level of Torah knowledge, but we must heed the cry of the prophets and do our utmost to learn about Judaism and know Hashem and His Torah as best as we can. The more one becomes acquainted with our rich tradition, the more he will realize that there is no need to investigate other religions because there can be only one truth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>This question and answer session is taken from&nbsp;<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.oorah.org\/\" target=\"_blank\">Oorah\u2019s<\/a>&nbsp;<a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.oorah.org\/ask-the-rabbi.php\" target=\"_blank\">Ask the Rabbi<\/a>&nbsp;book by&nbsp;Rabbi Chaim Mintz, published by ArtScroll.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>There is an obvious flaw in this argument. The Jewish nation is unique because Judaism\u2019s beliefs are based on the firsthand experience of the entire nation. Millions of our ancestors [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":5280,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sfsi_plus_gutenberg_text_before_share":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_show_text_before_share":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_icon_type":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_icon_alignemt":"","sfsi_plus_gutenburg_max_per_row":""},"categories":[598,8],"tags":[13,594],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v15.9.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Learning About Other Beliefs - Jewish Resources<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"I once sat next to a priest on a plane and tried asking him various questions about inconsistencies in Christianity. 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