Episode 7 - A Christian Chats with a Jewish Rabbi

What are the differences in beliefs between Jews and Christians?  We all worship the same God, but there are many differences in our traditions and beliefs. In order to learn more, Laurie has a conversation with Rabbi Weissman and presents many of her questions to him.

Laurie's guest today is the lovely and entertaining Janice DeAngelis.  Janice is a friend of Laurie's and was raised in the Jewish faith. Then she grew up and fell in love with a Christian.  The ladies discuss "A Jew Falls in Love with a Christian" and what it's been like combining two faiths in one loving family.

Do you want to check out more of Laurie's The Year I Read the Bible resources?  Take a look here. 

Transcript

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​Hi, I'm your host Laurie Larsen, and this is The Year I Read the Bible. Welcome! A Lifelong Christian, I thought I was familiar with the Bible, but in 2023 I accepted the challenge of reading the whole thing, cover to cover. Whenever I encountered something I didn't understand or wanted to learn more, I jotted it down, but I kept reading to stay on schedule. When I finished reading.(Imagine confetti raining down on me and a huge sigh of relief.) I had more than 50 topics to research. In 2024. I started diving into all those topics. I did research, I wrote blogs, and I shared them with whoever might wanna learn too. And in 2025, the project continues. I published a book containing my essays, and now a podcast. Is there something you can learn from that dusty book that sits on all of our shelves? Yes. Yes, there is. Let's dive into The Year I Read the Bible. Today's episode is called a Christian Chats with a Jewish Rabbi. I took on my, the year I read the Bible with a goal of learning, learn more about God, about the Bible, about my faith. The more I read the books in the Old Testament, the more I realized how much I still didn't know. Like many Christians, I leaned more heavily to the New Testament, the part where Jesus comes and I neglected digging into the Old Testament in my adult years. What Christians call the Old Testament is the Jewish Bible, the Hebrew Bible. The books are in a different order than ours, but for the most part, they're the same content. The Hebrew Bible is broken up into three parts. The Torah, which in Hebrew translation means law or instruction. The Torah is made up of the books of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, numbers, and Deuteronomy. The. Neeva, IM meaning prophets in Hebrew. Please forgive me if I pronounce that wrong. This section can be broken down into two key parts, the former prophets, books such as Joshua, judges, Samuel and Kings, and the Latter Prophets made up of the books of Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel. And lastly, the meaning writings in Hebrew. This section contains 11 books across a variety of literary genres and styles. From history to poetic verse. The poetic books of the Kete Vim are the books of Psalms, Proverbs, and Job focusing on wisdom and commitment to God, as well as the prophecy of Daniel and the history books of Ezra, Nehemiah, and Chronicles. Thank you to the article. The TaNaK explained the Hebrew Bible versus the Christian Bible on the website, alabaster co.com for the help. When you want to learn, often you seek out experts willing to share their knowledge. Who else would be well versed in helping me translate ancient writings and meanings than a person born and raised in the Jewish faith? I needed to talk to a Jew. Fortunately, I have a Jewish friend and I asked her for help, but I think I made her nervous that she wasn't up for the challenge, although I'm sure she would've been. So instead she talked to her rabbi and told him about my Bible in a year challenge, and the blogs I'm writing. She asked if he would speak to me and he generously agreed. That's how it came to be, that in the middle of January, 2024, I placed a call to Rabbi Weissman. We had a delightful chat. He was warm and friendly, interested in answering my questions, and had a great way of explaining what I wanted to know. I could tell he was a loving and devoted. Man, and we both agreed that we weren't trying to convert each other to our own beliefs. This was just an open fact finding conversation. Here I will relate some of the topics that you might find interesting. I'm including the rabbi's answers as he gave them as closely as I can. Caveat. If anything I've recounted from our conversation is inaccurate information. It is 100% my interpretation of the explanation and a hundred percent not Rabbi Weissman's explanation that is at fault. The first thing we talked about was how the Jewish. Religion is organized in modern times just as the Christian religion has organized into many different denominations based on nuances of the faith. The same could be said for Judaism. There are three major Jewish denominations in quotes. The first Orthodox, this is the most traditional grouping of the Jewish faith. They adhere to the original understanding of the Jewish law as documented in the Torah and interpreted by rabbis over the centuries. Currently, 10% of all Jews are Orthodox. Second conservative represents a midpoint on the spectrum. They've loosened up the strict rules in the Torah on some subjects, but kept them in others. 18% of all Jews are conservative and reform. The most liberal and largest of all the denominations. About 35% of Jews identify as reform. Rabbi Weissman is part of the reform denomination. The ethics of the Jewish tradition are more important and often take the place of ancient law. They seek to adapt Jewish tradition to modern sensibilities and sees itself as politically progressive and social justice oriented while emphasizing personal choice in matters of ritual observance. Note the Messianic Jews denomination is outside the mainstream Messianic. Jews believe that Jesus is the promised Messiah. They also believe that to follow Jesus, you must be Jewish. Just like the early disciples were in the acts of the Apostles book of the new testament, how the Jewish faith views the Bible, quote, the modern reform Jewish take, is that the Bible is a God inspired work. Parts of the Bible are specific to the social and historic time. The Bible was written in the ancient times. However, some parts of the Torah have eternal value and apply to modern Jews. The faith is based on the many learnings that have eternal value. Rabbi Weissman goes on to say. Here's an example of a Bible law that is seen from a modern lens. Now, modern man has become more sophisticated and sensitized to moral issues. Example, homosexuality. The Torah forbids it, but the modern take is that people are all made differently, all in God's likeness, and we are all God's children. If you are a good person leading a good life as described in the Jewish Bible, it doesn't matter that you happen to be homosexual. End quote. The next question I asked Rabbi Weissman was how the Jewish faith views other religions such as Christianity. Here's what he has to say. There is a place for all righteous people in God's world. No one has an exclusive hold on truth. We are all just part of one ultimate truth. People who faithfully follow another faith and worship a God besides our God. As long as they're good people, it's not up to me to question their beliefs. You are a Christian. I don't believe the same things that you do because I'm Jewish. But that doesn't mean that you're not a good person, and that doesn't mean that you're not a part of God's kingdom. An exception would be if someone's religion requires them to use their faith as a weapon of hate, that is an abomination against God. The next thing I wondered about with Rabbi Weissman was how the Jewish faith views animal sacrifices to earn God's forgiveness. As detailed in the Torah, he says this. In the reform denomination, we have evolved our practices and beliefs as our world has evolved. Now, a mitzvah has replaced animal sacrifice. Mitzvah means doing a good deed or fulfilling a commandment. It's not what you think that counts. It's what you do that counts. It's seen as a commandment from God to be performed as a religious duty. A Mitzvah is often associated with doing an act of kindness or charity. It's a way to connect with others and make a positive impact on the world around us. God is out there for us to experience when we do a good deed, such as comfort, donate to a charity, feed the poor, et cetera. We experience God in the actions. The best definition is God is love. God wants us to lead good lives. This pleases him. The next question I had for the Rabbi was how the Jewish faith views what happens to believers after death. He says, not all Jews believe in life after death. I believe that the soul survives, but I don't know in what form. A person's essence may continue to exist, but not in a physical form. Some Jews believe in reincarnation. Humans have a very vivid imagination, and they dreamed up a place called heaven. In truth, no one knows. In general, the Jewish faith does not believe in heaven and hell or life after death. And my last question. How the Jewish faith views Jesus as the long awaited Messiah, and I'm going to end this blog right there as a cliffhanger until next time. Of course, this is the exact point where Jews and Christians have opposite points of view. Christians believe Jesus is the Messiah, and Jews believe he is not, but why do they not believe it? Stay tuned for next week, and we will discuss this topic. Let's end with a prayer. God, I thank you for Rabbi Weissman, the faithful Jewish rabbi who educated me so well on the faith of your chosen people. I thank you that despite the differences in belief between Christians and Jews, we can have a logical and calm discussion and learn from each other. Please help Christians to respect our Jewish friends, despite our differences, knowing that we are all part of the same family. Amen. And now stay tuned for our guest. My guest today is the delightful Janice DeAngelos. Janice, welcome. Thank you, Lori. I mentioned you not by name in today's essay, which is called a Christian Chats with a Jewish Rabbi, you introduced me to Rabbi Weissman because when I was writing this essay back last year. I needed the Jewish perspective on some of the things that I was studying, and I asked you to do it because you are a Jewish woman and a good friend of mine. But you said, uh, I think I'd rather, refer you to a more knowledgeable Jewish representatives. So you introduced me to Rabbi Weisman. I thank you so much because he was just a delightful person to talk to, to learn from, to hear his perspective, and I really learned a lot from him. So, I thank you for the introduction, but guess what, you didn't get out of this because here we are today, and instead of the topic being a Christian chats with a Jewish Rabbi. This section of the podcast, I'm gonna call a Jew, falls in love with a Christian. Cute. So today we are going to talk to you about your life as a Jewish person and also a person who fell in love with a Christian, someone of somewhat of a different faith. So first start by telling us a little bit about yourself, and then also how you and I became acquainted with each other. Okay, well, a little bit about myself. I was born the third daughter, last child of, my mom and dad who were Jewish. And there were no inner marriages at all. She had six siblings and he had nine, and none of them were intermarried. And then I was thinking about my first cousins, and I know two were intermarried and there were a lot of first cousins. So of course I, was already exposed to it. My sister married somebody that was Christian. They were married by a judge because at the time she got married there were no rabbis. That would, intermarry. Mm-hmm. So when Jean and I met and he was Catholic, and of course, we knew each other's religions, but he wasn't really a practicing Catholic. He was raised Catholic, went to Catholic school, he was an altar boy. His grandma from Italy was super religious. But when we got her blessing, we knew we were okay. Yeah. My parents were okay with it. So at that point, my parents were living in Florida. He got to know my family. They got to know him and me with his family. I was single and I wasn't really a member of any temple, but I had been a member of the conservative temple. That's where I was raised. There was a reform temple next to us, and I knew the rabbi, so I called him after we were engaged and, he agreed to meet with us. And at that time he, explained what his, requirements were for doing an intermarriage. And Jean and I took a instruction with him for several weeks, I think about six, and he had to read about four different books, and then he had to sign. I can't remember the exact name of it. I think it might be a Katu, but I'm not sure. I can't remember what it's called. In agreeing that his children would be raised Jewish, and so we met all the criteria, and on October 21st, 1984, we got married at the. City Club of Akron and the rabbi came and married us and it was wonderful we embraced each other's culture and each other's religions and all of his family was Catholic and they all were very. Pleased with me and vice versa, so, you know, well, of course they would be. You're a wonderful person. But let me go back a little bit. You were saying about having to go to some classes because it was an intermarriage between two face. That's something that I'm very familiar with too because I grew up Presbyterian in the Christian faith, and my husband grew up Lutheran, and I don't know if it was because. Of the fact that we were different denominations, which are very similar. I mean our beliefs are very similar between those two, Christian denominations. But we have to go through, premarital, I guess counseling, meeting with the minister.'cause he wanted to ask us about, you know, do you both plan to work? Do you, have the same. Beliefs about where you wanna live. Do you wanna have children? Like I think it's kind of typical, for the, the pastors? Yeah. Maybe like more like premarital counseling kind of thing? Yes, exactly. Necessarily the goal. It was more to make sure you both were on the same journey together. Well, because marriage, is kind of a 50 50 proposition these days. I think it's still true that about 50% of marriages end up in divorce. And so I'm thinking the religious people who lead the ceremonies, they wanna make sure that this couple. I mean, they can't stop you from getting married, but at least they can ask questions to get you guys thinking about what, challenges are you gonna face, I didn't marry a Catholic, but when a Protestant, I. Mary's a Catholic. There is often some concern among the leaders of the church that, okay, what are you gonna do? Because the denominations are different enough that there's gonna be some decisions that have to be made about, for example, how to raise the children that way. I, I would say, Lori, especially if one party is more involved, committed, to their religion, you know? Yeah. Our case, it was an easier blend because although I was raised Jewish and I would never consider myself anything but Jewish and Gene was raised Catholic, he wasn't as in as I was. Yeah. If he had been a strong faith-based Catholic and had, his different dog, me that he had to, pursue, I don't know how it would've been. That would be tough. Yeah. That would be tough. Okay, now let's go back to your childhood. How did your family practice Judaism? Did you go to the synagogue regularly? Did you practice the Jewish holidays? I. Yes, we, we're members of a conservative temple and all of my dad's brothers and sisters, with the exception of maybe one, lived in Canton. So all my relatives went to the same synagogue. We were all conservative and that made it nice. You know, cousins, we all went to Sunday school together, so a lot of it was, cultural. A, a small part for me was religious. I mean, I, I went to. Preschool there. I went to Sunday school starting in kindergarten, and I went all the way through confirmation. 12th grade I did not get bat mitzvah. My oldest sister did, my middle sister quit, and when I tried it, I just couldn't do it. This is based on my inability to learn how to read Hebrew. And, 15 years later I found out I had dyslexia when I was in college. One of the big problems is I, being able to identify a sign and, that's part of why I never learned how to type, part of why I could never learn Spanish. I mean, just things like that. Interesting. So Hebrew, I started. I was in the third grade and my parents said, this is so much stress on you. I developed a stomach issue because I was so nervous that I couldn't learn it anyway. Oh. It was, yeah, it was tough. In third grade, all my friends got bat mitzvah or Bar Mitzvah, but me, we went on Friday nights to Temple. That's generally the time when Jews practice. Hold on. You didn't get bat mitzvah because you had to, in your Bar Mitzvah or Bat Mitzvah, you had to memorize a bunch of Hebrew words, right? That's hard. You had to learn Hebrew, you had to learn how to read it. And then everybody had a Torah portion that, was reciprocal with the date. So like two years in advance, you, my sister knew her bat mitzvah was gonna be April 10th. So two years in advance she started learning her Ha Torah, which is her section of the Torah that fell on April 10th. And it, in that respect, it was very nice because she did have all that time. But there's a lot to learn. It's not like just learning about your religion. You have to learn that language and. I don't know if you've ever seen it Hebrew, but it is very difficult to learn. Hmm. I opinion. Yeah, I would agree. There's a lot to it, but, I did attend Sunday School, which was fabulous. I learned all about Judaism from all the holidays and the meaning of them. And, the general takeaway from being raised Jewish is love. Mitzvah Mitzvah is when you do good, when you do for others, when you contribute in a positive way to your country. And those, to me, are the tenets of Judaism. It's not discriminatory, it's not, selfish. It's not any of those things. It's all centered around love, which should be universal, but unfortunately it isn't. It's exactly what Rabbi Weissman said. I, I remember that. Now what were your favorite Jewish holidays that your family, participated in? I would say all of them seriously, they're not as plentiful as it seems like you see on the calendar, oh, it's Rosh Hashanah. Oh, it's Yom Kipper, which is always 10 days after Rosh Hashanah. And then you have Sim Ka Torah, which is in, usually October. And that's when you, have the. Suka, that's when you have all the growth, all the new vegetables and the new meaning and the turn of the season, and it's a rejoicing time. And then there's, Hanukkah, which of course is the most prominent and the probably the most, celebrated. Then there's Passover, which the tenets of that, is probably the most religious of all of them in spirit because it's the beginning of the Jewish population and everything is based on the fact that so many Jews were able to escape and start their own country. I think a lot is predicated on Passover. I would say my favorite would probably be, the Rosh Hashanah. It's the renewal of the year. It's a time to take note of your accomplishments, your failures, and how to find a divide between them so that you can do better the next year, but not re yourself for the failings. And then Yom Kippur, which is actually the beginning of the new year, so Rosh Hashanah is kind of delving into what your year was like and Yom Kippur is what you're going to accomplish in the year to come. So I think that for me that was always, you know, we would fast before Yom Kippur was over. As a young child, I did that and it meant a lot to me that I felt like I was really able to participate in the holiday. Mm-hmm. And, um, and we always had about 30 people at, all the holidays. So it was a big family time and yeah, like a kid, I resented having to go to Sunday school on a Sunday when it was nice out, stuff like that. But, that's the norm and I'm, I'm very appreciative that I had that opportunity. I love that theory of, or the background behind Rash Hashanah. I didn't realize that it's such a good thing to do for any human, you know? As the New Year is approaching, think about what you've done that you could improve upon or continue to do or whatever. How did that look when you were growing up as a family, did you share that with each other or was there a meal that went along with that or? Absolutely. Honey, when you're Jewish, there's always a meal. If there's not a me Jewish, yes, everything was a festival, especially in my family. Like I said, there would be 30 people, probably 12, 14 adults, rest cousins and everybody. Took part in it. I have memories with, my mother making the apple osis. That was a big deal. And you learn what all the meanings were, what those represented For Passover, for example, and, we had the custom, we would sit around, we would read from the Haga, which is the prayer book. Is germane only to Passover. And even though part of me was like, oh my gosh, I wish this would end. Part of me was excited because this meant a connection to all my family and to all the Jewish population. I went to a school, there were probably 20 or 30 kids that were Jewish, and that's. Quite a bit for most schools, they don't have as big of a Jewish population unless you're in New York, where they actually close schools for the Jewish holidays because they have such high Jewish population. My father was more religious than my mother, but they were both instrumental in making sure all of us, the three of us really understood. That we were given this opportunity to be Jewish and what it meant, and my parents both served in the service. They both were recent, coming off of, the Holocaust. We had plenty of relatives that never made it, and that was always inscribed to my sisters and I about. Not only are we Jewish, but we have to stay Jewish. We have to keep this going for the people that were lost for the generations to come. And that was really instilled to me and my sisters and my friends. That's, it was very, that's, that's beautiful. It's very uncommon. When I was growing up and when I got married for inner marriage, it really, all of my Jewish friends married Jewish people, all of'em. Um, was the first that didn't, but, we were very happy that this rabbi was progressive enough to embrace that and came to the realization. And you and I talked about this a little bit, isn't it far better to accept a non-Jew into your fold and have the expectation that, the children of that marriage are going to also be. Born Jewish and raised Jewish, then to say, no, you have to go. You have to convert, you have to do this, you have to do that, or you're not welcome. And that over time has lost the whole Jewish population trickling down to what it is today, which is very minimal. Yeah. So I am lucky that I had him in my life and he helped us with that. So when you met Jean and fell in love and decided to get married and faced whatever challenges would come of having, two different faith systems in your marriage, did your family have any issues with that? Or was it simply okay because of this rabbi that you found that was gonna, embrace him? I was very fortunate. My parents didn't put, expectations on me that I wasn't allowed to go out with non-Jews. Most of my friends. Were Jewish, we're not allowed to date non-Jews, but my parents were always very, willing to let us kind of figure it out on our own. Now that said, of course they wanted us to marry Jewish men just because in reality there's so many things that come up in marriage anyway, and it would've made life easier if you had that commonality between you. But, my sister married somebody that wasn't Jewish and. Her boys were bar mitzvahed, but they never stayed with the faith at all. When we got married, my parents were accepting of it. His parents were. Accepting of it. Both of our families were very, happy for us and, and my relatives, my parents thought the world of him and felt that. He would follow the tenants that he said he would, and he always did. Our children, had naming ceremonies at the temple when they were born, all the parents came, grandparents rather. And they both went to Jewish daycare, preschool, and they both went to Sunday school. In fact, I was a Sunday school teacher for kindergarten because that's all I could do because I only could learn four Hebrew letters and that's all they needed in kindergarten. And they both were bat mitzvah at our temple. I'm happy to report that they both ended up marrying Jewish men. So that was something that's great. I really and truly did not think that would happen because they always had, these feelings that Jewish boys were mama boys because so many of'em are. Yeah, we were just elated over that. They both came from very, very stable. Good. Jewish homes very similar to their own. And to me it was nice that they married somebody Jewish just because I knew it would be easier for'em. But the more important part for me was that they had the same value systems. That's wonderful. Now let me ask you, as you and Jean, and then later, you added to your family by having two beautiful daughters. How did you address the different holidays and observances in both Judaism and Christianity? As your lives went on well, like I said, most of their younger friends from the temple and from going to preschool was at the Jewish Center, so a lot of their friends were Jewish. But then things started to evolve a little bit and the Jewish Center started accepting non-Jewish kids to go to preschool. So they started inter mixing a little bit with different. Friends from different faiths and it was wonderful. We were happy that they were able to, explore that and see the differences and be excited about it. So their preschool actually started not celebrating non-Jewish holidays, but discussing them reading books, showing that this is a, a wonderful custom to learn about each other's religions. So because Jean was raised as a Catholic and always had a Christmas tree and always celebrated all the holidays, I wanted to do the same. So we did ever since they were little, Nikki, wasn't even 1-year-old yet, I. We had a Christmas tree and we had menorah and they would usually would fall right around the same time. And then that sort of evolved as she got older and she would learn, the Christmas music along with the Hanukkah musics and her non-Jewish friends would be so excited. So many of them would come to our home because they didn't really have the opportunity to, see how it is in a different type of culture. We always had a very open, they were always welcome to go to church with their friends, to check things out and vice versa, their friends to come with us and yeah, so they ended up both, I would say it was half and half their, half their friends were Jewish and half were non-Jewish. But I always thought it set the stage for them to, be more, diversified in their friendships and what they were interested in. I just felt it was well-rounded. Whereas some of friends, were not even really allowed to. A couple of them. I mean, this is in the eighties and the nineties weren't even really allowed to go to non-Jewish friends' homes, which is archaic to me. Yeah, this way it's more inclusive, it's more diverse. It's helping, your children to understand the world more. I mean, as adults, they encounter not just Christian and Jews, but people from faith outside of the Judea Christian, tradition, so yeah, it's all about understanding and accepting each other and. Understanding the differences, but always finding what you have in common. You know, that was so important to both of us, to Jean and I, we just wanted them to grow up with a balance in life, knowing that, it's hard enough, but if you have an understanding that we're not all alike, but we accept each other anyway. That's a good place to start. Absolutely. And I think we skipped over how you and I got acquainted with each other. Do you want to, address that question? Well, we were very lucky that we got acquainted with each other, and it's all due to our common friend Barb, who I became friends with. When we were living in Italy and we bought a house and we didn't have anything'cause we sold everything before we moved to Italy and my kids told me, oh mom, you can go on this, Craigslist. And you can find signature and then you can at least have some pieces when you get there before you start dropping. So that's when I found Barb's chair, the infamous chair that I'm looking at right now. And she wrote me back and said, is this a scam? Because I said, well, we're in Italy, but we'll be back in two weeks. So we got together, we met, we became friends, and she asked me if I wanted to be in Bunco. And I was like, well, I don't really know anybody. Sure, why not. And then you joined and now we're all good. All 12 of us are really good friends, and we're so lucky the way life turns out. Once a month, we all get together at someone's house. And Bunco is a game that you don't really have to learn any rules or have any skills. It's all about eating, drinking, and chatting with your friends. Oh, and rolling the dice and counting. So. That's a good description. Well, when Carolyn and I thought about it, I don't know if I ever shared you with this. We looked it up'cause we didn't know what Bunko was and the description said it was okay for a three yearold to play and we said we're in. That's right. You with your, interest in the Bible and all of the religious knowledge that you have. We've gotten to be closer friends and it's a wonderful opportunity for me too, because even though I was open to non, Jewish friends, I have a ton of them. I never really talked about Christianity or anything like that with them. Yes. So it's been a wonderful part of our relationship. Well, I sure enjoy every time I get to see you or talk to you. We've even gone on just a month ago. We went on a field trip to Charleston and we, took a little tour and had a delicious lunch and some shopping. And just every time I get to see you, I love being with you. You're a hoot, and I just very entertaining. Well, my teachers wouldn't have said that, but that's how I feel about you too, Laura. You're just a sunshine person. Oh, thank you so much. I'll, get ready to wrap this up, but is there anything else you wanna share on this topic or anything else before we go? Hmm, not really. I just, you know, My hope for the world is for people to have an open heart and mind because I believe religion is the basis of all that's gone wrong in this world, and it's not supposed to, divide us. It's supposed to join us. And it is really sad and I think if more people we're involved with something like you are trying to find a cohesion, how much better the world would be. So I applaud you for doing this. Thank you so much and thanks for being such a big part of it. I appreciate again, your introduction to the Rabbi and I am so happy that you agreed to be my guest on this episode. Thank you. So you have a great rest of your afternoon and I will talk to you soon. Okay honey. Bye bye. And that's it for today. Thank you very much for being here with me on The Year I Read the Bible Podcast. We'll be back with another episode next week. If you enjoy this podcast, please do all the normal things to spread the word: like it, review it, share it with your friends. If you are interested in additional The Year I Read the Bible resources such as the book, the video channel, and the blog, I will certainly include the links in the show notes. And I'd love to hear about your own journey to read the Bible cover to cover. Have you done it or are you doing it right now? Please reach out to me and let me know how it's going. Until next time, it's Laurie Larsen with The Year I Read the Bible. Bye.