Saturday, March 12, 2022

A study in Judaism

My close friends know I have devoted a great deal of time and effort on the study of Judaism. This has included studying the Bible, which are the books of the Old Testament for Christians. In addition, I have specifically studied the Torah, the Talmud (the Mishna and the Gemara) and the Midrash. I’ve also read a great deal about the basic Jewish sects: Ashkenazim, Sephardim, and the Karaites. 

Over the past 45 years, I have visited many synagogues in the six continents and memorized (by heart) the Psalms (in both English and Arabic).

I recently re-read a book about Jewish women's clothing, which makes a woman who follows the teachings of the Haredim (Jewish Orthodox) a mirror image of a Muslim woman who follows the teachings of the Salafis.  I have also studied the issue of purity, from the Jewish standpoint, which is (relatively) similar to the same point in Islam and completely different from the idea of purity in Christianity.

As I translated my interest in studying Christianity by founding the Chair of Coptic Studies at the American University in Cairo (1998), I did something similar when I founded a scholarship in my name for post-graduate studies in Jewish/Islamic relations at the University of Toronto, Canada. 

https://www.jewishstudies.utoronto.ca/graduate/phd-program/scholarships-and-awards






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