I am not Jewish !

Submitted by Peter Hall (Australia), Nov 22, 2011 at 21:16

Slayhy, what makes you think I follow the Torah?

I am not Jewish, I come from a Catholic background, but I do not believe the bible is the literal word of God. I believe that it was written by men, who were inspired by God, but must be reading within the social context it was written.

I view the Bible, old and new testaments, The Torah and most written religious texts, as documents that are there to try and educate people in how to act better, and be better people. These texts are a tool.

A thinking person reading any religious texts can usually see flaws, but when taken in the context it was written I believe there are good intentions on behalf of the authors.

2000 years ago, if you were living in the Midddle East, and you ate pork, you probably got very sick due to there being no means of storage and the swine were probably infected.

I do not believe God said DO NOT EAT PORK ! However, I believe the leaders at the time worked out you got sick if you ate pork, and the only way to stop the locals from eating pork and getting sick was to say. GOD WILL DAMN YOU IF YOU EAT PORK.

So they were using Gods name, to stop people from doing something stupid. I think that that is a good thing.

However, I eat bacon, loveee bacon, but I do not eat pork on Fridays. Not because I think Gods wants me to not eat pork, but for symbolic reasons and to remind myself to act better as a person.

I think Muslims need to understand that the Qu'ran is not the word of God, If God had written it he would of done a much better job of it and would not have been so concerned with the sex life of Mohammed and killing people.

But if read as inspired by God within a certain time and social context, then maybe Muslims can start being a bit nicer to other, and to non muslims.

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