Reform Judaism: A Monotheistic Religion

Judaism was the first of the monotheistic religions. A monotheistic religion believes in one god. It was created around 1500 BCE. The three sects of Judaism are Conservative, Reform and Orthodox. Orthodox Jews are harsh with their Jewish Law. They are the ones that follow the closest to traditional Judaist ways. Reform Judaism came about because people wanted to get away from the traditional ways. They got rid of the majority of the rituals and traditions in Judaism. Conservative Judaism evolved from the idea that Reform Judaists were going too far but they also wanted to get away from the extremely strict ways of Orthodox Judaism. They tried to find a middle ground between the two (Kaplan).

The Sabbath is one of the most important and unique

They have services on Fridays and Saturdays. I decided to go to their Friday service. The service in its entirety lasted about an hour and a half. The place was beautiful. The place that the service was held, called the sanctuary, was a rather large room. On the sides of the room they had these huge stain glass windows. The seats were positioned in a semi-circle around the stage. The stage was centered in the front of the room. On the stage, towards the back was the ark, which holds the Torah scrolls. I was told at the service that the Ark is placed in a certain area so that it faces Jerusalem. Towards the front of the stage were two podiums where the Rabbi and the Cantor stood. There was a small little table in the center that held 2 candles and 2 loafs of special bread called challah. There were less than 20 people at the service. Everyone was dressed pretty casually. All the men wore Yakamas on their

This was because that week’s theme was meditation Shabbat. They tend to have different themes around the year. During our meditations, the cantor would tell us to free our mind of anything bad and just be in the moment. She also told us to think about people we cared about and loved and to meditate for them so hopefully they can find peace in their life. During the service, the rabbi and cantor talked about loving everyone no matter their religion (if they even had a religion) or their ethnicity or the color of their skin. They brought up the idea that some people have a different god or more than one god. I found it quiet refreshing to see that they did not believe that others were wrong in believing in something else. They were excepting of everyone and the both the rabbi and the cantor tried to make it clear that we should also be accepting of