PunkTorah

Independent Jewish Spirituality Online

How To Justify Hating Converts (Or Loving Them)

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I want to share a series of texts which I like to call my Conversion Bible Bullets. Bible, because they reference holy scripture (in this case, the Tanakh and Talmud) and bullets because people shoot these verses at each other in Jewish pissing matches about converts to Judaism.

I believe that Judaism is what you make of it. Whoever you are, whatever you are truly about, is how you are going to understand the Divine. So the question is this: when you look at these texts, which would you rather do…love, or despise thy neighbor?

No converts to Judaism will be accepted in the era of the Messiah. Babylonian Talmud, tractate Yebamot, page 24B, (20th line on page)

The Holy Blessed One does not favor any one person over another, but receives all; the gates are always open, and anyone who wishes to enter may do so. Shʼmot Rabbah 19:4 

No converts to Judaism were accepted in the era of King David and King Solomon. Babylonian Talmud, tractate Yebamot, page 24B, (21st line on page)

Moreover concerning the stranger that is not of Thy people Israel…when he shall come and pray toward this house; hear Thou in heaven Thy dwelling-place, and do according to all that the stranger calleth to Thee for; that all the peoples of the earth may know Thy name (1 Kings 8:41-43)

Evil after evil will come upon those who accept converts. Babylonian Talmud, tractate Yebamot, page 109B (10th line on page)

God says to us, “As I welcomed Jethro the Midianite in the wilderness of Sinai, so must you welcome anyone who comes to you to join your people.” Yalkot Shimʼoni, Yitro, No. 268

Our Rabbis taught: Converts…delay the arrival of the messiah. Babylonian Talmud, tractate Niddah, page 13B (14th line on page)

Ruth the Moabite was an ancestress of King David (Ruth 4:13) whose direct descendent will be the Messiah.

The Golden Calf was built by converts. Midrash Tanchuma, Parshat Emor, chapter 11

The Israelites were struck dead with a plague for the Golden Calf that Aaron the Priest was responsible for. Exodus 32:35

Is B’Nai Noach Proof That Something Is Wrong With Judaism?

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My inbox is filled with emails about the Noachide Movement (aka B’nai Noach), most recently an article by Gordon Haber in Killing the Buddha.

Noahides are, according to Haber, gentiles who believe that Judaism is the true path but that they don’t have to be Jews to follow it. Thus they refer to God as “Hashem,” study Torah and Talmud, and follow a kind of halakhah-lite—the Seven Laws of Noah, as opposed to the 613 mitzvot for Jews.

If you want to Build-A-Noachide, you need a few basic ingredients:

  • A Christian who has lost faith in the divinity of Jesus
  • A passion for Judaism (especially Orthodoxy)
  • An utter disinterest in becoming Jewish

An honest question: if you enjoy celebrating Shabbat, studying Torah, learning Hebrew, meeting to discuss Talmudic ethics and making sweet promo love with Chabad-Lubavitch, then why not skip the B’nai Noach middle man and become Jewish?

To become a Christian, one simply decides to have faith in Jesus. To become a Buddhist, you simply “take refuge” to the Buddha, his teachings and community. Islam: one phrase, and that’s it.

Judaism takes a year at least. There’s hurdles to jump through, classes to take, an entire culture to absorb, and even then, you’re a ger tzedek and even though technically no one is supposed to point out you’re a convert…well kid…you are.

So I’m wondering whether the B’nai Noach movement is really about Judaism’s conversion-prevention-stigma. We’re so obsessed with being the religion that “doesn’t proselytize” that we have driven people to create a New Religious Movement that’s basically Judaism-lite.

I guess it comes down to this: if a group of people want to believe Jewish, study Jewish, pray Jewish and do Jewish, yet have to make a new religion that is not Jewish…then what does that say about Judaism today?

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