Religious Identity and Appropriation

[danceswithwaves]

Someone I'm friends with on Facebook just had a bunch of stress dumped on her and her family and posted "Please be praying for us that things will fall into place quickly and smoothly. I praise Hashem for his amazing grace and his son Yeshua (Jesus) for dying on the cross. (I know not everyone believes and that is okay, but the first person that

Comments

[sartorias]

I wonder if she might belong to one of the (many) break-off sects along the lines of 7th Day adventists or Mennonites, who I have heard use various terms that they have taken from the Old Testament, and who use Saturday as their Sabbath, instead of Sunday, etc. The use of 'Yeshua' is what makes me wonder about this.

[danceswithwaves]

I was thinking something along the same lines in the beginning. The problem with that -- and I particularly checked on this -- is that the name Hashem for God isn't found in the Old Testament.

Which means it came from Rabbinic Judaism, and using something from Rabbinic Judaism in a Christian context feels like appropriation to me.

That doesn't mean she's not from one of those sects, just that I completely disagree with their use of the name for God.

[sartorias]

They probably have their reasons (drawing on Judaic connections out of which Christianity arose) but it does really feel appropriative, doesn't it? Why not use one of the other names of God?

[danceswithwaves]

I had a more intense discussion about this earlier and I think the why is really important. But at the same time, I think names and words for things are also really important, so while I might be ok with someone taking a ritual they like and making it meaningful to them, as long as they call it something else, I'm less ok with them taking a word or name they like and attaching a different meaning to it.

[kalimac]

Unfortunately, it does occur in the Torah - Leviticus 24:11, "The son of the Israelite woman pronounced the Name in blasphemy" in the JPS translation; the fourth word of the verse in the Hebrew is et-hashem.

That doesn't change the main point, though, which is that a lot of Christians act as if they think they've occupied Judaism the way that Peter Jackson fans think they've occupied Tolkien, while in both cases those of us who revere the original wish these interlopers no harm, just wish that they'd stick to their own stuff.

[danceswithwaves]

You're right, I found it. Your in-depth knowledge trumps my google search.

However, I don't think the connotations are the same as in modern Judaism. To me it sounds like the text is saying "Name" to describe that the woman is speaking the actual forbidden name of God, (and "et" really just means "the" in the context), rather than the text using the word "hashem" as an actual substitute for God's name.

So I'm not sure that you would come up with using "the Name"/"hashem" as a name for God without hearing it somewhere else first. Although someone had to come up with it first, so theoretically two someone's could have come up with it

[kalimac]

I think you could read it either way. In the whole story about the blasphemy, God in His Person is referred to in the usual holy formula, while references to speaking His Name out of class are given as hashem, because there the topic is not actually God, but His Name in its own right. I suspect this chapter is the root of the Orthodox custom of saying Hashem when speaking of God outside of liturgical contexts, to give a wide berth to any possibility of blasphemy; not a surprise, since most of halakha is built on giving a wide berth around any possible violations of scriptural commands

[danceswithwaves]

I don't know Plaut. Most of my knowledge comes from 13 years of a Jewish Day School; much of my knowledge of halakha comes directly from the Talmud and I don't remember the sources for anything else. (I also haven't dug most of it out for about 6 years now, except the basics, so google tends to be my friend

[kith_koby]

Currently at the army, and I already used up most of my break replying and reading this, but when I get home, Lord willing, I have a detailed reply to many of the questions you raise here.

[kith_koby]

So, as promised