Overview

The reader is introduced to Maimonides' family, people who generally failed to share his rational approach to life.The book addresses provocative questions such as: did the majority of Jews before Maimonides believe that God has a body? Why did Maimonides and many rabbis disparage women? Why did Maimonides extol intelligent non-Jews? Why don't Jews say a prayer before such activities as having sexual relations or giving charity? Why doesn't the Torah condemn the five suicides committed in its pages? Why were Jacob and david passive when their daughters were raped? should rational Jews observe mystical Jewish practices and say mystical prayers? This volume contains surprising facts, such as: not all Jews believe that people have ""souls."" Rabbis know that we do not possess the original Torah text. Rabbis suggest that Moses' staff had unusual magical powers. Jewish judges do not adjudicate cases according to Torah law. Many rabbis recognize that the ten plagues were not miracles. The Torah records how innocent people are killed for the misdeeds of their ancestors. dipping bread in salt is based on a superstitious fear of demons.

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Dr. Israel Drazin served for thirty-one years in the US military and attained the rank of Brigadier General. He has a PhD in Judaic studies, a master s degree in psychology, a master s degree in Hebrew literature, and is an attorney and a rabbi. He developed the legal strategy that saved the military chaplaincy when its constitutionality was attacked in court, and received the Legion of Merit for his service. He was the scholar who recognized that Targum Onkelos incorporated hundreds of words from the Tannaitic Midrashim, edited around 400 CE, and therefore must have been composed after that date, a period much later than has been widely accepted. He is the author of twenty-five books, including a series of five volumes on the Aramaic translation of the Hebrew Bible, which he co-authored with Dr. Stanley M. Wagner, and a series of four books on the twelfth-century philosopher Moses Maimonides, the latest being Maimonides: Reason Above All, published by Gefen Publishing House.

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