Torah Quotes

The religious doctrine of traditional Judaism entails the acceptance of the nationhood of the Jewish people and the everlasting sanctity of the Land of Israel for them.

The Hebrews have done more to civilize men than any other nation.

These call themselves the Supreme Court? They're worthless. They should be put in a bottom court … for them [God] created all of the torments in the world. Everything that [the people of] Israel suffer from, is just for these evil people. Empty and reckless... What do they know? One of our children of 7–8 years knows better than they how to learn Torah. Who says that the nation wants such judges, such evil [ones]... They have no religion and no law. All of them have sex with Niddot. All of them desecrate the Sabbath.

Golden Rule”: “That which is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow. That is the whole Torah; the rest is the explanation; go and learn.

Since I invoke Torah so often, let me state that I don't personally believe in the God it postulates ... I am not religious, nor were the majority of the early builders of Israel believers. Yet their passion for this land stemmed from the Book of Books ... [The Bible is] the single most important book in my life.

[Referring to Judaism:] ... a gutter religion.

My grandfather was Orthodox, and he was religious, but neither of my parents were. Of course, as they got older, it seems like they get more religious the older they get, even though they're still not practicing Jews.

Tel Aviv was established in 1909 by a group of secular Jewish families; Judaism's origin story is about 2,000 years older.

I was a Jewish rabbinical student for 12 years, and studied the Bible all the time.

I found it unworthy of publication because it is not supported by any scientific or historic facts. Moreover, as a matter of principle, it's not right to exchange silly and false information about the use of human blood in the food of other humans whoever they may be because such a thing doesn't exist in the world at all.

My brothers were rabbis. My grandfather was a rabbi.

The Jews invented a portable religion in the shape of the Bible, the Torah, and eventually the Talmud, and with other portable forms of writing. So it's now possible to carry the religion, that is embedded in that writing, away from the ruins of political and military power.

I'm Jewish, and so religion, to me, is a kind of moral code and a kind of history.

My husband is Jewish.

One is also obligated to divide one's [learning] time into three: a third for learning the Written Torah, a third for learning the Oral Torah and a third in which to understand and comprehend what one learnt into the first two thirds by deriving facts from other facts

What is supposed to be the very essence of Judaism - which is the notion that it is by study that you make yourself a holy people - is nowhere present in Hebrew tradition before the end of the first or the beginning of the second century of the Common Era.

When you have a Jewish mother who has a very strong Jewish family, it's very ethnic in its practices. Eating brisket, the food and the family and the interconnectedness for better or worse.

The Bible is the great family chronicle of the Jews.

I remember going to a son's friend's bar mitzvah, and the text that he chose to explicate was right at the beginning of Genesis. It was not about a fall from grace or a fall from perfection; it was about an awakening into consciousness, which is what it means to be human.

if we were forced to choose just one, there would be no way to deny that Judaism is the most important intellectual development in human history.

Christianity and Judaism are united above all in their common affirmation and implementation of the moral teaching of the Hebrew Bible, or 'Old Testament,' and the traditions of interpretation of that teaching.

The Torah, the Jewish holy book, requires Jews to demonstrate their joy by eating pastries mixed with human blood.

Judaism is my life. Everything I do is through the lens of Torah.

We're not religious, but we've always done Passover and Hanukkah.

I went through a little hippy dippy program at Brandeis and was bat mizvahed by the rabbi who married my parents. We celebrated the High Holidays and had the traditional Rosh Hashanah dinner.