Les Moonves - Wikipedia
It pains me to write this, but what the hell, it's an anonymous forum so here goes.
The (Roman Catholic) Second Vatican Council, as I saw it, defined a legitimate religion as one that (a) believed in a supreme being, (b) believed in an eternal soul, and (c) believed that in some way, after death, a virtuous life would be rewarded and an evil life would be punished. This last belief is sometimes cynically referred to as the "pie in the sky."
Putting it another way, any true religion believes that one's conduct in life MATTERS. Virtue will ultimately be rewarded and evil punished. Psychologically, this belief is one of the main justifications for the very existence of religion. In life, virtue is often NOT rewarded in any meaningful way, and bad people often go to their graves fat, dumb, and happy. The Pie in the Sky rectifies this perceived injustice.
Judaism has always been "weak" as regards the Pie in the Sky. I do not believe that there is any definitive jewish teaching regarding the afterlife, and there is nothing definitively describing rewards and punishments ("heaven & hell").
And while Jewish teachings encourage altruism in many aspects, they are not formulated as commands or imperatives (or at least not taken as such).
So it is with much regret that i bring my lifelong observation that jews are often at Ground Zero in areas where immorality rears its ugly head. Look at a listing of "slum landlords," and jewish names abound. In the days when pornography was nearly outlawed, the profiteers in this sordid business were almost all jews. As the common culture (in film) broke taboo after taboo, the trailbreakers were all jews. The businesses that exploit the poor, ignorant masses...pawn shops, ghetto jewelers, payday lenders, furniture "rental" stores...are all dominated by jewish businessmen. Not strictly illegal, but far from moral.
Today one notes that ethnic jews are walking away from their faith in droves, utterly rejecting its teachings on homosexualty, marriage, and abortion. Many Reform jews freely admit to being either atheist or agnostic.
In Israel, judaism seems to have devolved into such a self-centered incestuous cult in which nothing but the tiny clique matters.
Outside Israel, even among the truly faithful - orthodox and conservative congregations - judaism does not seem to result in a great deal of altruistic activity, save from a few ultra-rich jews who throw crumbs about, largely for their own glorification (M. Bloomberg).
Does virtue ultimately matter?
The subject of the above link is called a philanthropist by some, but obviously is a morally hollow fellow. Before knowing for certain i would have bet a thousand dollars that he was a jew.
So my thesis is as follows: the failure of judaism to embrace the Pie in the Sky has caused it to fail as a religion. For most of its adherents.
It pains me to write this, but what the hell, it's an anonymous forum so here goes.
The (Roman Catholic) Second Vatican Council, as I saw it, defined a legitimate religion as one that (a) believed in a supreme being, (b) believed in an eternal soul, and (c) believed that in some way, after death, a virtuous life would be rewarded and an evil life would be punished. This last belief is sometimes cynically referred to as the "pie in the sky."
Putting it another way, any true religion believes that one's conduct in life MATTERS. Virtue will ultimately be rewarded and evil punished. Psychologically, this belief is one of the main justifications for the very existence of religion. In life, virtue is often NOT rewarded in any meaningful way, and bad people often go to their graves fat, dumb, and happy. The Pie in the Sky rectifies this perceived injustice.
Judaism has always been "weak" as regards the Pie in the Sky. I do not believe that there is any definitive jewish teaching regarding the afterlife, and there is nothing definitively describing rewards and punishments ("heaven & hell").
And while Jewish teachings encourage altruism in many aspects, they are not formulated as commands or imperatives (or at least not taken as such).
So it is with much regret that i bring my lifelong observation that jews are often at Ground Zero in areas where immorality rears its ugly head. Look at a listing of "slum landlords," and jewish names abound. In the days when pornography was nearly outlawed, the profiteers in this sordid business were almost all jews. As the common culture (in film) broke taboo after taboo, the trailbreakers were all jews. The businesses that exploit the poor, ignorant masses...pawn shops, ghetto jewelers, payday lenders, furniture "rental" stores...are all dominated by jewish businessmen. Not strictly illegal, but far from moral.
Today one notes that ethnic jews are walking away from their faith in droves, utterly rejecting its teachings on homosexualty, marriage, and abortion. Many Reform jews freely admit to being either atheist or agnostic.
In Israel, judaism seems to have devolved into such a self-centered incestuous cult in which nothing but the tiny clique matters.
Outside Israel, even among the truly faithful - orthodox and conservative congregations - judaism does not seem to result in a great deal of altruistic activity, save from a few ultra-rich jews who throw crumbs about, largely for their own glorification (M. Bloomberg).
Does virtue ultimately matter?
The subject of the above link is called a philanthropist by some, but obviously is a morally hollow fellow. Before knowing for certain i would have bet a thousand dollars that he was a jew.
So my thesis is as follows: the failure of judaism to embrace the Pie in the Sky has caused it to fail as a religion. For most of its adherents.
