How do Jews view Christians? (Catholics, God, religion, religions)
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The video notwithstanding (because really, why try to prove anything with teenage rants?), I tend to have a very poor view of Christians. It's what happens when you spend your entire childhood fearing crosses being burned in your lawn, not knowing if a brick will be thrown through a window where your menorah is displayed (and they were), being spirited away to churches by your friends' parents when you thought you were just going to a pool party, etc etc. My adult interaction with Christians has been better, but is still painted by a condescension that I don't get from Muslims, Hindus, atheists, agnostics, etc etc.
Some of my best friends are Christian, but I will admit that they have to work a whole heck of a lot harder to prove that they are worth my trust than people of other backgrounds given what I have experienced as a Jew.
Why? To get some opinions from Jews and Christians about my question. Is it that compicated that I have to explain it?
And why should I contribute towards good relations? Is it a must on this forum? I think that many Christians don't like Jews and vice versa.
If you took a broad census of opinion, you'd find that more christians dislike jewish people and not the other way around. I am NOT saying that all feel this way but I know what I have seen and experienced in my travels.
You may possibly have heard of, let's say, the Spanish Inquisition. Among its niceties were forced conversions. Just to pick one phase of the last two thousand years' worth of history. When you get right down to it, Christianity has not been very kind to Judaism (if I may commit a serious understatement). And yet, it's still apparently OK to wonder why Jews might have a problem with Christians. As we say, go figure.
You might expect that, but you would be wrong. Also, Zionist and Orthodox are orthogonal concept. One's level of observance is rarely correlated to Zionist leanings.
The number of "anti-western" Jews you encounter is vanishingly small.
Have you ever met any Orthodox Jews? I'm guessing no...
Does growing up near Kiryas Joel count for nothing?
I have met a lot of Orthodox Jews growing up. It was hard to make friends with them because their parents didn't let them play with outsiders except maybe in a very limited context (such as at a playground or a carousel) and they had their own schools. Other than that, most of my contact comes from just seeing them in the community, shopping mall, stuff like that. There is a very limited context for social interaction, though.
Every Jewish person that I have had a true, close friendship or relationship with, has been Reform or Conservative.
Oh, and in case you don't know about Kiryas Joel, it is one of the biggest Hasidic communities outside of Israel.
Does growing up near Kiryas Joel count for nothing?
I have met a lot of Orthodox Jews growing up. It was hard to make friends with them because their parents didn't let them play with outsiders except maybe in a very limited context (such as at a playground or a carousel) and they had their own schools. Other than that, most of my contact comes from just seeing them in the community, shopping mall, stuff like that. There is a very limited context for social interaction, though.
Every Jewish person that I have had a true, close friendship or relationship with, has been Reform or Conservative.
Oh, and in case you don't know about Kiryas Joel, it is one of the biggest Hasidic communities outside of Israel.
kiryas joel, which was founded cause even Williamsburg and Boro Park were to open to "contaminating" influences (which I think meant other Jews as much as gentiles) I wouldn't judge all Orthodox Jews by Satmar, and I wouldn't even judge all Satmar by KJ.
Some of my best friends are Christian, but I will admit that they have to work a whole heck of a lot harder to prove that they are worth my trust than people of other backgrounds given what I have experienced as a Jew.
I consider myself quite a committed Jew (my DD is spending a gap year in Israel) yet I do not particularly feel that way. An awful lot of my friends are Jews, but thats really just because I have spent a lot of time doing jewish stuff over the years.
Does growing up near Kiryas Joel count for nothing?
No, not really - they're freaks. Its literally judging a religion by its most extreme and nutty members. The vast majority of even Orthodox Jews consider KJ residents to be way outside the Jewish mainstream.
Did anybody bother to check out the other videos posted by this 2000barak person on Utube? Such as, "God asks Christians to Kill Non-Christians" or "Hitler was Also a Christian".
This guy is a nut case or a plant trying to stir up trouble and blame everyone other than the Islamists who he admits he is a convert to. (I suspect he was one all along) In other words he's spreading propaganda. Don't believe his junk. It's clear that he has taken this video out of context to put the blame on everyone who isn't a muslim. Get it? This is very typical baloney to try to say that Christians and Jews are just the same as what we find reprehensible in muslim behavior.
I'd say the man on the other end of the camera was attempting a confrontation with these kids.
Let's just address the underlying question here and then we can get to the video.
To put it into persepctive, Christianity is like a man who beats his wife all the time and Judaism is the abused spouse. One day the man (Christianity) beats his wife so badly that he almost kills her (the Holocaust.) As luck would have it, she finally gets away from him (creation of Israel).
Jews have been slaughtered throughout Christian history. They've been treated horribly. They've been forced to live in special parts of town with completely inadequate space. The Holocaust might have served one useful purpose -- waking the collective Christian consiousness up to the horrors their anti-Semitic bigotry could potentially cause. If we read Hitler's thoughts about Jews, it seems too fanciful to be believed. He viewed them as inhuman beings who put on an illusion of humanity, etc. The thing is, Hitler was not alone in thinking that way. That kind of think was commonplace among Christians, and it's still around too.
It's unclear what the person with the camera did to agitate these two -- probably drunk -- teens. But personally, I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt. Above all else, I'm willing to give Judaism as a whole a lot of slack. Christianity has been waving the bloody cross in front of them for 2000 years. The Jews who actually killed him have been dead for countless generations. Meanwhile, Christian bigotry led to the massacre of 6 million Jews for no other reason than that they were Jewish -- this on top of all the centuries of torture, rape and massacre. I think they have the right to be a little ticked off about their past treatment. If we're being honest, I think there's more Christians who despise Jews than there are Jews living on this planet.
Putting all of that together, why would anyone be surprised if there are a few Jews out there with nothing but contempt for Christianity. Christianity has earned that contempt.
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