Judaism: A Branch's Attempt At Understanding the Root

Introduction
If you have had a theological conversation with me of depth, and especially if you have listened to my preaching, you might have picked up that Judaism is a fascination of mine. There are two main reasons for this. One, Judaism feels no obligation to rationalism. In other words, for Judaism to exist, Jews have to accept that the most important things are things that cannot be comprehended by the faculty of the mind, such as God’s pure essence, or Torah’s essence, or God’s election of the Jewish people. I have at times been accused of being an absurdist. I’d rather be called “Kierkegaardian” I think, but I wouldn’t say that my beef with rationalism constitutes me as an “irrationalist” or an absurdist. Neither should Judaism have to endure this criticism; for to say that there are things that one can know and that one cannot know is a perfectly rational philosophical presupposition. But to claim that the most important things are things we cannot know with the faculty of our mind, is not a rational claim, it is a religious claim, but is not automatically absurd. It is from what I can tell a definition of faith. Nothing I have read from any orthodox Rabbis, despite major theological differences between them, hints any other view of faith; faith as the beginning of the Jews’ religious epistemological presuppositions. And if you know me, you know why that appeals to me.
It is not at all inconvenient that the faith which I profess is historically and theologically attached to Judaism. Therefore the second reason for my fascination with Judaism has to do with Christianity’s dependency on it. They (Jewish folk) may view us (Christians) as the annoying toddler who they just cannot shake off their leg. But we’re there, and we both know it. Regardless of Christianity’s deviation from Judaism, which is frankly more significant than many postmodern theologians might lead you to believe it is, we do share the Old Testament, and we both see it as Scripture. The Christian Messiah is a Jew who claimed to be the Jewish Messiah, and the greatest apostle of Christianity (Paul) is also a Jew who claimed that Jesus’ Messiahship extended to Gentiles as well and that that was part of the plan all along. As divergent as Christianity may be from Judaism (ironically Christianity’s whole claim is that “Judaism” is divergent from true Judaism/Christianity), it still owes its worldview and way of approaching life to the Jewish worldview and Jewish history.
Believing in and holding to everything I have said thus far absolutely compelled me to study Judaism for myself; not Judeo-Christianity which can only mean one of two things: either it’s a synonym for “monotheism”, and in that case you might as well include Islam, or it’s the brand of Christianity which is somewhat educated in the Old Testament. Still, the latter is so blatantly biased in its research of Judaism. Therefore, I have endeavored to study Judaism itself without Christian presuppositions about the identity of the Messiah with a hope to gain from this a template which I can compare and contrast to the teachings and worldview of Jesus and the Apostles. The posts which follow highlight those comparisons and contrasts.
There are other things I’m reading right now, such as “The Early Church” and comparing to my appreciated but theologically limited Bible (Baptist) education. These things will also be a part of upcoming blog posts, and I may intentionally or unintentionally mix them with the other stuff I’ve been reading about Judaism or philosophy or the Bible itself. I think that this can be profitable for both you the reader and I the blogger; if I am able to untangle the mixed up pieces by the time that my fingers hit the keyboard. So as to avoid confusion, I will be sure to be very clear and possibly clever with the title of my posts, as well as with the purpose of them; making distinctions between ones that follow particular lines such as “Early Church” or “Judaism” and posts that are hodge-podgy or ruff attempts at synthesis.
As it pertains to Judaism, what I have done in the past regarding Hebraic studies has been either tainted with overblown New Testament ideas, or too heavily guided by subjective Rabbinical commentary of which I am usually ignorant of to what particular school the Rabbi I am reading belongs. Because of the disadvantages of this sort of approach, particularly the latter, I decided to start with the basics and I bought this book written by an Hasidic Orthodox Rabbi named Naftali Brawer. It is called “A Brief Guide To Judaism: Theology, History, and Practice.” It is from this book that I will be making the particular observations in the following post. Although his Hasidic biases come to surface sometimes, he’s up front about them, and reiterates compellingly that the purpose of the book is to inform non-Jews about Judaism. Plain and simple. One of the things I’ve learned in reading is that although I have a hodge-podge of ideas from randomly selected Rabbinical readings from various schools of thought and mixed in with my Christian background, there is a lot I don’t know about Judaism. Also, I would’ve thought going in that I would find more convergence with Christianity and Judaism, and have my faith strengthened thusly. Actually, I have been surprised to discover that Judaism and Christianity have major differences. So much so that I’m embarrassed at having told my friend Dan on a few occasions that one has to be a Jew before they are a Christian. I still believe in some senses that this is true, qualifications necessary, but I think if I can trust Rabbi Brawer’s “guide”, a Christian is someone very different than a Jew, even if Yahweh is who we both claim as God! However, comparisons are as helpful as contrasts in this study, because it helps us see that what the New Testament presents in Christianity is not a new religion, but to a Jew, an overblown Messiah cult, and to a Christian, a true, but totally different Judaism.
So welcome to my brain.