alexseanchai | (no subject)

(no subject)

Attn: Jewish folks who read my journal! I have a favor to ask. Specifically, I have the impression that the "Judeo-" prefix in the italicized sentence to follow is somewhere from misleading to actively wrong. I wish one or two people with active familiarity with Judaism to confirm or deny this.

Haides should not be confused with the Judeo-Christian figure of Satan, for Haides is neither wicked nor a tempter.

(The problem is I really have no idea how much of the whole Satan/Lucifer/etc concept is derived from the Tanakh et al and Jewish thought and how much from the Old and New Testaments and Milton, Dante, et al and Christian thought. I know the Book of Job is pertinent, but that doesn't, like, help. And I do not want this project I'm on to misrepresent anybody.)

Thanks!

ETA: All answered, thank you!

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I think "Judeo-Christian" is supposed to represent less both current religions and more the fact that Christianity had its roots in Judaism. Because you can't easily overlap the religions now, but they do have similar roots, and "Judeo-Christian" just gives a nod to Christianity having similar roots.

Which doesn't particularly help answer your question, when I say "that just means Christian" *shrug* Looking forward to other comments.

*nod* Thanks.

I will leave the specifics to someone who hasn't done martial arts and then tromped all around downtown, which might still be me later, but yes, it is wrong.

Thank you!

Go rest :)

Obviously not Jewish, but familiar with some of the history here. Sathanas (quite likely misspelled) is absolutely not the Christian Satan, making Satan not a Judeo-anything figure. Sathanas may literally mean "adversary", but it's a job title more like prosecutor, the person arguing against the subject. His job is just to present an opposing side. Satan-the-tempter, Satan-the-deceiver, is absolutely a purely Christian figure. I've definitely seen Jews take offense at Judeo-Christian in the context of Satan.

Judeo-Christian may be meant by some Christians to indicate the historical roots of Christianity, but it also makes a claim that Judaism and modern Christianity are currently connected, and a lot of Jews don't like the term in any context.

Gotcha. Thank you!

The Hebrew, if I recall correctly is samach-tav-nun. I have no clue where the other "as" is coming from. It's pronounced Sah-tan (both a's as in father) though your interpretation sounds familiar.

Wait, I'm a dingbat. *grabs Hebrew-English dictionary* well, that's not useful, it's not in there. I recall the snake in the Garden of Eden being described as the satan, but it's not a proper noun?

I might be thinking of the Arabic word, then. Oops. Sorry.

I think the snake isn't actually described that way, because I seem to recall that that's a later interpolation by Christians, but I could be wrong.

Our version of Satan is so far from the Christian version of the devil it's not even funny.
"Judeo-Christian" is a phrase I've learned to live with. I don't find it very helpful though: there's a lot of very real differences that people who are Christian don't seem to care to understand.
I've never heard a Jew use that phrase.

Okay. So what I want to do is convince the team to take that phrase out of the thing we're editing. Thank you!

Rereading the sentence: Yeah, make it Christian. :)

Indeed. :)

Interestingly, I've gone the opposite way. "Judeo-Christian" is a phrase I've gotten tetchy about as I've gotten older. I think it has to do with learning the history of the word. There's mixed responses to the validity of the word among Jews, but these days it's so broadly used among philo-semites and Christian end-times Zionists that it feels icky.

(Also co-sign to the responses to your initial worry about Satan,

alexseanchai. Good instinct.)

Edited 2016-10-17 15:26 (UTC)

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only