Friday, June 27, 2014

The Jewish Connection

I'm not as you would call a very religious Jew. Yes, I go to synagogue twice a year for high holidays but compared to Israeli Orthodox Jews I'm basically atheist. Although I don't pray every day and celebrate Shabbat every Friday, I am still Jewish. It's how I define myself and it's who I am.

The Israeli Jews however have a different view of us reform Jews in the United States. Let us flashback 20 years from now, the soon to be Israeli president after attending a reform service in the United States, while walking out the doors of the synagogue said "this isn't Judaism." 

During a media summit today, June 25, we were shown a Facebook interactive map showing to what countries are specific countries connecting with (i.e having the most friends on Facebook) the most and the least. Each country was represented by a circle, the greater the circle the greater the connection with that country was. When Israel was clicked on its most connected countries were it's surrounding countries (Jordan, Syria, Lebanon). The United States however wasn't even in Israel's top 20 most connected countries.

Israel is the homeland of the Jews and it is very important that it stays connected with the Jews of the world. The United States has the second (to Israel) largest population of Jews in the world, but we don't connect with one another.

The strict ancient traditions of the orthodox Jews in Israel are much different than the way reform Jews practice their religion in America. Due towards cultural differences such as this we have become isolated within one another creating separate communities. In the future maybe the Israelites will look past our liberal ways and we can all be one big happy Jewish community.


---Johnny Scher 

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