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Posted: Thu Apr 21, 2005 9:05 pm
by Mastermind
vvart wrote:
You realise Judaism also has two manifestations of God, right? There is the spirit of God and there is the LORD.
Ah, not necessarily. The spirit of God in Judaism is not a manifestation of God, but rather refers to the presence of God. This would then be called the shekinah, which traditionally only referred to God's presence in the temple, but if we refer to his presence outside of the temple it may be the same term, or a different one. Afterall, God is one, to divide God into 'god' and 'spirit of god' would be to divide God into having two parts.
What a coincidence, it's the same thing in Christianity.
Yet, the question that you're asking is very difficult, and I'm not sure that Jews all have the answers to this. Concepts like the shekinah, and the nature of God, are pretty deep and I don't think everyone agrees. Kabbalah is the whole system of Jewish mysticism that deals with answering these kinds of questions.
Hey, not all Christians agree on the trinity, so it's not like we have a consensus on God's nature either.
Well, there is no parallel to the christian hell in Judaism. There are various afterlife concepts, but in Judaism, there is no set idea of the afterlife, heaven, etc.
The reason for this is because Judaism teaches that this life is simply to be lived to the best of our ability, rather than to worry about an afterlife. It teaches that God will take care of the afterlife. Most Jews also believe in a heaven, I don't know any that believe in a hell. Sheol simply means the grave, i.e. where everyone goes when they die. You get buried in the ground, the grave.
Not the way it's described in the OT. Although Sheol could simply mean total destruction of the soul. It's a compex subject. I know the boundaries to judaic afterlife are loose, but there are some things that are set(like the "book of life"). as for there not being a parallel to the christian hell in judaism, christianity still doesn't have an exact definition of hell. most christians have their own interpretation of hell, or settle on the one dante popularised.