Shalom, I am Rabbi Jonathan Ginsburg of the Ezra-Habonim, Niles Township Jewish Congregation of Skokie, Illinois. This video is trying, and tempting to use the Jewish star, as I am teaching to you to explain some of the basic concepts of Judaism. The Jewish star actually was not a Jewish at the beginning, it is found on Christian sites before I was ever found in Jewish site. The star of David had nothing to do with King David but it is a useful teaching too.
It is a very famous book by Franz Rosenzweig, great German Jewish teacher. Thinker of the 19th century, called the star of redemption. So, the way in which to approach this, is to take the Jewish town and divided into two triangles. In my last congregation, there was a beautiful sculpture in the garden outside, where they had six triangles, three pointed up and three pointed down passing one another, and when they pass, they forms into three Jewish stars.
So take when each and apparently, let us think about one. First, pick the one that is pointing up, what are those three points on that triangle? Well, those would be the three most important moments in Jewish history, the one which we understand time. The first of course is creation, God begins the Torah by saying, and this is, in the beginning, God began creating the heaven and the earth that is where it all begins.
Without an understanding and belief, the God created the universe, everything else really does not foul, it does not matter, you believe in a god that is a creator. Number two is the moment of revelation, we believe that God existed and God created the universe and that God had a desire to communicate with human beings and that desire was expressed in the revelation.
We have, of course believe as Jews that the revelation of the Torah was the key revelation and then nothing could ever come after that which would superseded. It does not make any sense to us that God would say “Here is what I want, here are the commandments”, and then later say “I was just kidding”. So, we believe the Torah is the revelation.
And there will never be a revelation that supersedes, maybe helps clarify, explain, understand but, and then the Torah continues to warn us against people come in later and say “No, do not pay attention to this”. The third major moment in history then would be redemption. We celebrate the first redemption; it is an expression of what possibly could be held in the future, in the Exodus from Egypt, in the fringe of slavery.
That is why we anticipate the future redemption we call the Messianic era, to a current Passover too, we open the door for Elijah. So, to review the first triangle of the Jewish star, would be the three major moments of history for shadowing the future great moments. God is creator, God has the revelation, and God then is redeeming us from a span situation looking forward to the Messiah.
So, what then is the triangle number two, that would be the three major players in the equation of Judaism, the three are of course, are God, Torah, and Israel, and Israel, I do not mean the country here but the Jewish people. That, anyway, you draw the line between any of those two is impossible to consider Judaism without one of those three. God and the Jewish people, in the covenanting document, you could say the marriage document, and the Katubah would be the Torah.
And so, when you put in all of these together, you have a phenomenal basic understanding of the principle ideas of Judaism of time, through the creation, the revelation, and the redemption, and then, the three major payers, God, the Torah, and Israel. So when you see a Jewish star, think about these six important items.
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