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Ahh, I understand. I had forgotten about the doctrine of emptiness and its implications. I was not aware that the zen doctrine proposed that this world is nirvana. I was only a zen practitioner for a short period of time, and as soon as I learned that they were pro-war during world war 2, I...

Heh, no problem dauer, sometimes I forget that not every Jew is orthodox. In any case, I think it would be a noble goal to try and preserve some of the information on that site. I stumbled upon it really at random, but it has some tantilizing stuff.

It is the belief in Judaism that the five books of Moses(with some points of contention) were dictated directly by G-d to Moses, he then wrote them down verbatim. Some things, in particular the ten commandments, were told by G-d to all of the assembled Jews in front of Mount Sinai. They were...

As a Jew, I am totally unfamiliar with the Christian conception of Hell. Christianity happens to be the one religion I skipped out on during my spirtual cycle. In any case, I was hoping to get some clarification on this issue. 1) Do most Christians feel that Hell is a real place? 2) If...

Unfortunately, the story of HaSatan is a metaphor used in the book of Job. It is not something the Jews believed actually happened for all angels are obedient to G-d. The concepts of a final judgement(I assume you mean something like armageddon) does not appear in Judaism. The same is true...

Ahh, this is a an excellent question. Judaism does believe that we have a divine convenant with G-d. It is sealed in the flesh of every Jewish male who is circumscised. In addition, yes some branches of Judaism are perhaps stagnant, but others are eagerly awaiting the arrival of the...

Hmm, I was not aware that such a teaching was part of Buddhism. The Buddha certainly did not belive what he was teaching was wrong, on the contrary he felt he was teaching the ultimate truth of the universe. Later Buddhist sects also claimed to be teaching the truth. Learning for yourself is a...

When I was studying Buddhism back in the day, I often wondered about all of the different schools. There was the Buddha's original teachings, which he foreshadowed would die out a scant thousand(500? I can't remember the exact number) years after his death, the mahayana or so called greater...

When I was stuying Buddhism, I found much of it fascinating. There was always one question that I wondered. Buddha said that no new souls were being created, that it was possible to liberate all beings from suffering(Lets not diverge into speculation about liberation despite their being no...

I have certainly heard a Buddhist creation story, forgive me if I cannot cite the sutra or to which Buddhist sect this story pertains to. I will tell it as best as my memory allows. I believe this is how a world cycle begins. It starts out with ethereal spirtual beings with no mass living in...

For further clarification, the sephardic seem to accept the ramban entirely. In fact, I think you might be safe saying that most in the orthodox world accept his writings, with the exception being one of the chapters in the guide to the perplexed. I think it is the 2nd chapter or maybe the...

Okay, I will respond to bandit, and also try to seal the gap in this conversation that Dauer and I have created. With regards to the Lubavitcher rebbe, first a little history lesson for non-Jews. Chabad is a Jewish revival movement that began when the Jews were ghetto dwellers. Nowadays it seeks...

The Jewish opinion on Jesus is one that I have sought out as well. Essentially, Jesus did not fulfill the requirements for being a messiah. He did not bring the Jews out of exile. He did not establish a Jewish kingdom in Israel, free of foreign interests. In addition, according to the new...

Imminent was probably not the right word to use. The Jewish people have been waiting for the Messiah since the destruction of the second temple. Whats another couple hundred years of exile? The actual sense that the messiah could come "tommorow" is a chassidist point of view. The larger orthodox...

Jewish prophecy is a very interesting topic as well. For a prophet to be valid in Judaism, they must fulfill a number of well defined criteria, ex. A Prophet must make multiple valid prophecies. If a prophet has predicted a few events correctly, their word is accepted as prophetic. As...

Ahh, the messiah in Judaism. As a newly Re-converted Jew myself, this has been a topic that I have asked about with great enthusiasam. As I understand it we believe that the messiah will be a great leader. He will rise from his place of birth, and lead all Jews from their exile back to...

Hey, thanks for the welcome!

Zoroastrianism is a fascinating religion, but to say that it influenced Judaism is a tad incorrect. It has definitely influenced Christianity and Islam, but the concept of Hell is non-existant in Judaism. In addition, both Islam and Judaism are strictly monotheistic, whereas Zoroastrianism has...

I was pondering my last post and thought that perhaps I should add some clarification. What follows is an addendum to the post above it. G-d is a spirtual being, infinite in nature, and One who dwells on a spirtual plane. On the spirtual plane there are only pure concepts and nothing...

Excellent question, and props to lunamoth for a beautiful post. I do not think it is a contradiction. When G-d creates, he defines laws. G-d does not create individual things, He creates formulas and definitions. He does not work in the world of the physical but the spirtual. So it is...