Monday, January 19, 2009

Jews and Marriage

I had no awareness of this before, but for Jewish people, marriage is supposed to mean marrying another Jew. My roommate had said that Jewish people are supposed to marry other Jews, so I wanted to educate myself about the subject:

A Rabbi on the Ohr Somayach website writes the following on why it's important for Jews to marry other Jews:

. . .By marrying a non-Jew one thereby ends over 3,000 years of Jewish continuity, effectively cutting oneself and one's offspring off from what it means to be Jewish.

For Jews, "marrying within the faith" isn't a cultural preference or prejudice. Rather, it is one the commandments G-d gave us at Mount Sinai. A Jew who marries a non-Jew transgresses a Torah prohibition.

Some scriptural background:
The practice of not "intermarrying" is in fact one of the oldest features of Judaism. It dates back to Abraham telling Eliezer, his servant, not to find a wife for his son from the Canaanites. It continues with Isaac's command to his son Jacob not to marry the "daughters of the land." The practice is mentioned in the Bible as a legal prohibition, and is also part of the covenant that Ezra the scribe had the Jews make when they rebuilt the Temple after the Babylonian Exile.

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