“Jewish law knows no incurable sin.”
— Moshe Glickson (via yidquotes)
“One of the biggest problems with religion is that people stubbornly, insistently reduce God to their own size; they imagine that God loves the same people they love, and that God hates the people they hate. This is not just insidious theology; it’s actually idolatry, because people are just worshiping a blown up version of themselves. So let me say it simply: God’s love transcends all of that. When your parents reject you, God loves you; when your friends or classmates make fun of you, God loves you; when your priest, minister, imam, or rabbi tells you that you are an abomination, God loves you; when politicians cater to people’s basest prejudices, God loves you. No matter how many times and in how many ways people make you feel less than human, God knows otherwise, and God loves you. When you feel frightened, or abandoned, or humiliated, I hope the unshakeable conviction that God loves you can help hold you and enable you to persevere.”
— From a Rabbi, An Open Letter To People Who Are LGBTQ by Rabbai Shai Held (via jewishtransition)
“Again the Jew has the right to say to the Christian, you have no right to laugh over the absurdities and ghost stories of the Talmud and its expounders of the past, when you believe in a personal Satan who tempted and tried the Son of God, absurdity can hardly go beyond this; when you believe the ghost stories and exorcisms of the New Testament, which are certainly glaring enough to defy reason and override all intelligence. The greatest miracles of the Talmud are mere child’s play in comparison to the immaculate conception, the resurrection of the crucified one from death and his post-mortem feats on earth, in Hades and then in Heaven.”
— Rabbi Isaac M Wise (via yidquotes)