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Harun Yashayaee There have been various interpretations of religion – from traditional to post-modernist ones- in all religions during religion history, from when man accepted religious beliefs, either by his nature, prophets’ massages or logical reasoning. The Judaic believes have been formed on the basis of Torah (Old Testament), so any interpretation – Talmudic, Midrashic, modern, reform, Zionistic or anti-Zionistic- if being out of this basis, would not be valuable. This does not mean that all of Jewish interpretations have been uniform and in same framework in all periods of history. Judaism was under criticism both by Jewish and non-Jewish scholars, so was to answer to critics more than other religions. There has been a strong belief that Judaic ontology and its divine commandments are not variable, but should try to find proper language and methods according to every period and place to express them, resulting harmony between religion and its followers. This belief is as old as introduction of the Ten Commandments by Moses to Israelites, which continued through years by Sanhedrin (the council of 71 rabbis in Temple era in Jerusalem), then in Diaspora (after destruction of the holy Temple) by Ge’onim, Hasidim, Tana’im and Emora’im (authors of Talmud) till Maimonides, Espinoza and even today’s anti-Zionistic religious group called “ Neturei Karta”. As the Torah – Old Testament – was the axis of Judaic religion, early in the history of the Jewish people it was found necessary to expound and interpret the laws as given by Moses; this law-giver himself appointed judges throughout Israel for this very purpose. This lore is called Oral Law, in contra-distinction to the Torah – Old Testament-, which is the Written Law. It is believed that this Oral Law was indicated to Moses and handed down by him to future generations; in each generation the great teachers of the period in turn handed it down, amplified but still in oral form, to the next generation. As quoted, the Torah, however, was the law, which could not be altered. Therefore the scribes and the members of the Great Assembly busied themselves in probing and searching every sentence and every word of the Scriptures, to find solutions to the vexing problems by interpretations of each law. This accumulation of law and lore, of wisdom, custom, legend, and keen analysis, was assembled and organized by a great synod of Jewish scholars, and was named “ Talmud”. The Talmud is the official Jewish commentary on the Old Testament. Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz in his book “The Essential Talmud” (translated to Persian by Bagher Talebi Darabi) said: “If the Old Testament is the basis of Judaism, therefore Talmud is its main column which stood among events and supports all the structure of Judaic spirituality and intellectuality”. There have been so many articles pro and against Talmud, even in some periods Talmud was burnt, but it has been like a spring for its readers’ thirstiness and caused so many innovations in Jewish thoughts and believes. Talmud is a sign of flexibility of thoughts of Jewish scholars. The Talmud thus represents the climax of the process of interpreting written Torah. Over time, it has come to be seen as a kind of law code, whose main thrust is practical direction. Initially, however, the many instances of case-law and decisions found in Talmud were more theoretical than practical. It seems that it was the argument that mattered most. Even where the subject-matter of the Talmud is severely practical, the discussion is often conducted in an academic way, as if the stages of the argument are of more significance than its conclusion. Although there are so many conflicts in every argument, they never go beyond the basis and of Torah and framework of Judaism. Believing in religion is the core of Jewish spirituality, as it is said in Psalm (23): “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures. He leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul. He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.” So in Judaism there is no question of believing in religion, and if there would be any logical reasoning about accepting or rejecting of the basis of this belief, religious followers ask if where the origin of this logical reasoning is. In modernity the belief is that “religious believes are valuable only if they are on the basis of logics and could be felt by our senses”. But the followers of religion believe that this logics are not in the framework of divine religion and knowledge and believe in God is rooted in human’s soul, as it is said in Torah (Genesis 1:27): “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him”. It has been repeatedly said that God has no material body, so being in the image of God means that human received “Breath of life” (“Nishmat Hayim” – Genesis 2:7) from his creator. Therefore human knows God by his very soul, and this knowledge helps him to find his way toward truth and justice throughout worldly and materialistic life. No modernistic interpretation could divert a religious believer from this way, but he would be stronger in his believes when confronting negative reasons against religion. A famous and religious Christian philosopher in our time – Nicholas Walter Storf – said: “Tradition acts as if the Holy Divine Books are our guidance, not only for our redemption and salvation but also for our daily life in this world, they are fine guidance and give us whole and global perspectives to the world and life”. By this point view he noticed the conflict of Israel and Palestine in 1987 and defended for Palestinians’ rights to have an acceptable life. He also traveled to South Africa in 1975 and defended for rights of Blacks. These acts are noticeable as show that a religious philosopher goes near to ordinary life of people and tries to make a better life with humanitarian rights for them. There are so many Jewish scholars who tried the same, not only for Jews, but also for all human beings. Rabbi Elmer Burger, Moses Menuhin, Albert Einstein, Israel Shahak, Felicia Longer, Noam Chomsky are among these Jewish scholars who did their best for humanitarian services in different conditions and periods from each other, using traditional or modern interpretations of Judaism. Scholars of other religions also enjoy the similar divine light of love for humanity. At the end, here is another quotation from Nicholas Walter Storf: “A fundamental belief in Christianity, Judaism and Islam is that we as human have been addressed to believe in God, thrust in Him, rely on Him. Believing in God is our fundamental commitment. In these three religions it is basically believed that only by believing in God we can reach to a calmness in the most stressful conditions, by which behaving according to law and divine development reach together”.
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