r/JewsOfConscience • u/AutoModerator • Jul 17 '24

AAJ "Ask A Jew" Wednesday

It's everyone's favorite day of the week, "Ask A (Anti-Zionist) Jew" Wednesday! Ask whatever you want to know, within the sub rules, notably that this is not a debate sub and do not import drama from other subreddits. That aside, have fun! We love to dialogue with our non-Jewish siblings.

21 Upvotes

85% Upvoted

108 comments sorted by

View all comments

7

u/bbbojackhorseman Non-Jewish Ally Jul 17 '24

Hello everybody.

I have been seeing on social media during these last few months that « Jews don’t believe in heaven/hell » so I guess my question is : is that true? And if it is, what do you guys believe will happen after we all die?

For context I’m muslim and if I’m not mistaken, in both Christianity and Islam we believe that people will be judged for their actions and either go to heaven or hell, so I always assumed that was the same thing in judaism. Thank you

11

u/CyborgDiaspora Ashkenazi Jul 17 '24

Jews do not have a standardized view of the afterlife, but there are several conceptions of the afterlife out there. For example, one pretty distinctive idea that some Jews have is that “heaven” is a study hall where you can spend eternity studying Jewish law without interruption.

Generally speaking, Jews are focused on consequences for their actions in this world rather than in the afterlife. Good actions are understood to please God and benefit oneself, one’s descendants, and one’s community.

To tie this back around to what this sub is all about, this is related to one of the reasons some ultra-orthodox Jews are anti-Zionist. They believe that if Jews are good enough, God will send the messiah who will lead the Jews back to Israel and usher in a golden age. In a way, you could say that the idea of a messianic golden age played the role of afterlife for many Jews historically. In any event, many ultra-orthodox think that Jews are not spiritually worthy to return to Israel, and that the modern state of Israel reflects humans usurping God’s role in ushering us back to Israel. More theologically moderate Jews tend to reject that reasoning.

4

u/ezkori Ashkenazi, American, raised in orthodoxy, currently cultural Jul 17 '24

Maybe specific to litvish yeshevish Judaism that I grew up with but we definitely had a concept of “olam habah” being some sort of afterlife situation. I would wager it was DEFINITELY heavily influenced by Christian heaven & hell mixed with Jewish afterlife. Interesting the different views. (Though id say we also had a very apocalyptic view of mashiach so it definitely is not the mainstream Jewish norms that I grew up with)

3

u/ezkori Ashkenazi, American, raised in orthodoxy, currently cultural Jul 17 '24

But it was definitely a “you do mitzvot in this world to ensure a place in Olam HaBah”.

6

u/CyborgDiaspora Ashkenazi Jul 17 '24

I think there are a lot of different interpretations of Olam Haba. I usually hear it as a term for the messianic age, or in the context of more liberal/disenchanted Judaism, a better time that is yet to come.

3

u/bbbojackhorseman Non-Jewish Ally Jul 17 '24

I see. Thank you!

13

u/sudo_apt-get_intrnet LGBTQ Jew Jul 17 '24

I've studied with many different rabbis, and here are just some of the different afterlife ideas I've encountered:

  • Everyone goes to what could definitely be described as "heaven". Different people go to different levels of heaven depending on how good they were. Bad people go through a temporary (6 month IIRC?) "hell process" to cleanse them of their sins, and get Shabbat off.
  • Jews reincarnate to be able to fulfill all the mitzvot, and once we succeed the Messiah will come.
  • When Jews die they enter a sort of "holding pattern" similar to sleep and will do so until the Messiah comes, in which case the Messiah will create the equivalent of heaven on Earth.
  • Death reabsorbs your spirit back into Gd, with how "good" you are in life determining how difficult/ "painful" the process will be.
  • A combination of multiple of the above.

Worth noting too that these were all Orthodox rabbis, so other denominations could have even more different opinions!

6

u/bbbojackhorseman Non-Jewish Ally Jul 17 '24

I see. Thank you.

I think (I may be wrong though) that muslims believe the same thing as your 1st and 4th point.

7

u/PreparationOk1450 Jewish Anti-Zionist Jul 17 '24 edited Jul 18 '24

AFAIK: Muslim beliefs in heaven and hell are more similar to Christians. Although, in most ways, Muslim beliefs are more similar to Jews than Christians. An exception being that Jesus is highly revered by Muslims.

1

u/bbbojackhorseman Non-Jewish Ally Jul 18 '24

Thanks! I didn’t know