Jews vs Christians
Jews are the followers of Judaism and Christians all over the world believe in Jesus Christ as being the Messiah of mankind. However, the fact that Jews and Christians are the followers of two related but separate religions called Abrahamic religions is not the only difference between Jews and Christians. History tells us that there has traditionally been a rivalry between the Jews and the Christians that reached its nadir during World War II in the form of Holocaust that led to near annihilation of Jews from the face of the earth. This article attempts to find out the real differences between Jews and Christians.
Jews
Judaism is a monotheistic religion that has existed thousands of years before the birth of Christianity. All followers of Judaism are called Jews. Jews trace their ancestry to prophets such as Abraham, Jacob, and Isaac nearly 2000 years before the birth of Christ. The modern nation of Israel that was created in 1948 is considered to be the nation of the Jews. Jews consider Hebrew Bible as their sacred book. According to this bible, Jews are the descendants of Abraham who settled in the land that is the modern nation of Israel along with his family. According to another view, Jews share their ancestral roots with the people of the Fertile Crescent.
Because of the low conversion of people of other faiths into Judaism, and also because of persecution of Jews in all parts of the world, there are in total just 13.4 million Jews worldwide at present. Jews have been the victims of good and bad anti-Semitism where they have been either forced to live in specified areas in cities called ghettos or where they have been purposefully tortured and killed. The world saw the peak of Anti-Semitism during the holocaust when nearly 6 million Jews got slaughtered by the Nazis.
Christians
Christians are the followers of Christianity, a major religion of the world that is spread in all continents of the world with a total population being more than 2 billion people. Surprisingly, Christianity has roots in Judaism. It separated from Judaism and based itself on the life and sufferings of Jesus Christ, the son of God. Christians believe that God sent his son to earth to be the savior of mankind. Christ is born of Virgin Mary as a human, yet he is an incarnation of God. This is the principle of Trinity, the basic tenet of Christianity. Christ is believed to be the Messiah and faith in him alone is enough for the salvation of the followers of Christianity.
What is the difference between Jews and Christians?
• Jews believe in Judaism while Christians believe in Christianity.
• Christianity arose in the form of rejection of Judaism but remained a fringe religion for many years even after the death of Christ.
• Jews believe in oneness of God whereas Christians believe in the principle of Trinity.
• Jesus Christ is the messiah in Christianity whereas he is not considered as savior by Jews
• Hebrew Bible is based upon Old Testament whereas Christian bible is based upon New Testament.
• All through history, Jews have been persecuted by Christians and their population is just 13.4 million whereas there are more than 2 billion Christians worldwide.
• Though Old Testament says there would come a Messiah and the chosen people would be known by another name, Jews do not accept Christ as their Messiah.
• Jews pray in the synagogue while Christians pray in churches.
• Jews are mainly concentrated in Israel and North America whereas, Christians are spread across 6 continents.
• Cross is the symbol of Christianity whereas Star of David is the symbol of Judaism.
Wow. Missed quite a bit of the more relevant differences.
Christians believe in original sin. Jews do not. You are born without sin in Judaism.
Jews live in every country in the world.
Christians believe in heaven and hell. Jews do not.
Christians focus on the afterlife. Jews do not.
Christians are split into numerous denominations with varying liturgy and beliefs. Jews are one. While there are “varying movements”, like Reform, Conservative and Orthodox, there remains one set of liturgy all rely upon, one set of laws, one set on beliefs. The movements differ primarily in the level of non-Hebrew injected into services/prayer and other more cosmetic/western practices added to services (like music and sermons).
The Christian view of the Messiah from the Old Testament does not comport to that which the Jews accept and believe. The Jewish Messiah isn’t G-d but rather a man/messenger. Additionally certain things must happen prior to the appearance of the Messiah… things that have not yet occurred.
Christians observe the Lord’s Day on Sunday and most confuse this day with the term Sabbath… Which in Christianty it is NOT. The Jewish Sabbath is the same Sabbath in Christianty – it never changed. Seventy Day Adventists observe Saturday as the Sabbath. In Judaism the Sabbath starts at sundown on Friday and ends at sundown on Saturday.
The reason why all Jewish events start at sundown is a reflection of how the day was created by G-d as written in Genesis. The day starts as darkness then light “first day”. As such the evening precedes the daytime in Jewush events and thus, the Sabbath too.