Synagogue

Visiting the synagogue stripped many stereotypes of the Jewish religion for me. It was interesting to see a place of where they worship in person instead of reading second hand accounts. It brings Jews to much more of a personal level. One thing that stuck in my mind was the observance that when the Jews that we spoke with talked about fasting or other inconviences of their religion, they acknowledged that it was annoying and unpleasent. In my experience growing up Catholic, inconviences were ignored and never complained about. Jews seem to take their religion as more of a personal duty while Christians seem to view religion as a privilege.

Three things that I found interesting about the synagogue were the fact that there were no statues or pictures anywhere. I know they do not believe in having them but it was weird to see a place like not having any pictures of religious leaders. In a Catholic church, the place is littered with statues and pictures of saints and Jesus. This was a huge difference for me.

Another thing that stuck out to me was the natural lighting that was required for a synagogue. Its funny because in today's world this could be seen as going "green" but Jews do it for much different reasons. It is required for them by the Torah. Maybe this is a sign of how wise these old religions are. Jews have been using natural for a long time and now things like these are becoming mainsteam and it is popular to use things like natural light. I think this a good example of how things change but Judaism remains mostly the same whether Nazis are trying to kill them or if it becomes popular to use natural lighting, they remain the same.

The third thing that stuck out to me was the fact that the Torah was covered with a curtain. This is just like how the tabernacle is covered with a curtain in a Catholic church. It is interesting how both sacred places of these religions are covered with a curtain. This is a good example how even though these religions believe in many different things and have had big disagreements, they still have many things that cannot them together. I think this is a good lesson to show humans that even though we might think we are very different individuals, we still have many common traits.