Do Jews get offended when atheists and others mock the Tanakh (the so-called 'old tes

Although the 'old testament' is a poor and deliberate mistranslation of the Jewish bible, the words and message are mostly the same. God still sends bears to maul a group of children, donkeys still talk, and the Jews are ordered to commit genocide of their unbelieving neighbors.

Do you take of fence at this mocking of a mistranslation of your holy book, do you consider them ignorant of the bigger picture so you're not too troubled, or do you just not care since the criticism's directed at Christians, or do you think something else?

All religion is garbage.

I am not going to go rooting through the garbage for a hair to split.

No Jews are usually much smarter than fun dies that spend all day warring about atheists. They have been attacked for their religion for a long time and don't worry about such trivial things. Also, most of them are not so silly as to believe those stories in a literal way.

Everyone is entitled to their opinion. I don't take offense.

Judaism is so different than Christianity that when a question is directed at the "Old Testament", I know it's not a question that has anything to do with Judaism. Of course, I will sometimes answer them from a Jewish perspective.

It doesn't bother most people.

The OT and the Torah are different, not only in wording and translation, but in application. People are taught to question everything that seems odd (down to the very semantics of the wording), to argue the morality of different concepts, and to debate on how it is or isn't applicable in today's society.

Jewish people also tend to look at things from a more allegorical, and metaphorical light, rather than a literal one in many cases. If there isn't a reason or answer to something, someone might surmise a theory, but they aren't going to place an excuse for it.

Generally, debate is encouraged in an intellectual manner, rather than an insult tossing one. People are free to believe whatever they want to or don't want, as long as no one tries to force others into their belief (hence: Jewish people do not proselytize).

The fact is: You don't have to believe it and Jewish people aren't asking you to. To be honest, they don't really care whether you do or not (that's more of a personal choice).

No. I give people plenty of room to mock spiritual phenomenon if they haven't experienced it. I try to listen between the lines for any questions. If there aren't any then I just go on looking for my talking cat and hope like hell it hasn't mauled the neighbor's Doberman.

The text is only an outline. It contains enough key words to spark further understanding of more than meets the eye. It is full of puns and layers of double, triple and hidden meanings about life, people and the universe. These layers come alive in Hebrew and with the Oral Tradition. It is not about bears mauling taunting children, talking donkeys, or genocide for unbelief. Many of the stories may not have even happened. No one would spend the time (a year to copy a scroll) or the expense (as much as a house) to preserve quaint stories about how the snake lost its legs and learned to crawl on the ground. Everything references something deep inside us and maps to show how to restore ourselves and repair the universe.

It was very shocking to find out Tanach had been back-engineered by Christians into a diatribe with trinity and messianic prophecies inserted into the text. I began to question everything, including Jewish translations. I was horrified to find several Latin -based translations of Sefir Yetzirah and a few other texts, and learned to distinguish between reliable Hebrew originals versus the Catholic translations.