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Would you choose this life?

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Layokee

Wed, Jun 26 2024, 3:22 pm

If I wouldn't be jewish I probably wouldn't convert because I'm not such a seeker and change is soo hard.
I'm happy that I was born as a frum jew

4

tweety1

Wed, Jun 26 2024, 4:13 pm

Nope. Just because of the niddah part.

5

↑ zaq ↓

Wed, Jun 26 2024, 5:56 pm

#BestBubby wrote:

Many women are not happy in devout Muslim communities.

And devout xtian families are rare these days.

Your statement may have been true 60+ years ago, but AMerican culture today is Sedom.

I and others, are true glad we are not part of today's immoral, confused, anxious and unhappy culture.

Don't be disingenuous, lady, and don't twist my words. I never claimed all devout Muslims, male or female, are happy. Are all devout Orthodox Jews happy? If you are deluded enough to think so, you clearly don't read Imamother very often, or maybe you just read the recipes and shopping forums. There's enough sheer misery right here to float the Queen Mary, and only a sliver of it is because of persecution by The Other.

Perhaps I should have said you may have been just as happy or unhappy being a devout whatever as you are as a devout Jew. So sorry for my careless wording. (Not.) We have plenty of tzuris of our own and if you read your Bible correctly, you can see that it doesn't all come from the outside.

You, having never known anything else, assume that the superiority of observant Judaism is self-evident. After all, that's what you've been fed since birth. However, this is obviously NOT universally obvious, because if it were, everyone seeking enlightenment would already have converted, and no one would ever become or stay anything else.

If you had been born into a different religion or no religion, what makes you so sure you would have converted to Judaism? People join ashrams, become Moslem, Unitarian, join the Humanist Church, or are cheerfully agnostic. Not everyone finds their society to be empty of values and morally bankrupt. YOU do, sure, but you are not the be-all and end-all.

Maybe I was particularly blessed--you would call it cursed--to have known any number of nonJews of different stripes, who were fine upstanding members of society with many values that parallel my own. They are not living lives empty of meaning, and it's the height of obnoxiousness to make a blanket assumption that anyone who is not an observant Jew is living a life of misery and moral decay, devoid of meaning.

Last edited by zaq on Wed, Jun 26 2024, 6:28 pm; edited 1 time in total

13

BH Yom Yom

Wed, Jun 26 2024, 6:06 pm

zaq wrote:

Don't be disingenuous, lady, and don't twist my words. I never claimed all devout Muslims, male or female, are happy. Are all devout Orthodox Jews happy? If you are deluded enough to think so, you clearly don't read Imamother very often, or maybe you just read the recipes and shopping forums. There's enough sheer misery right here to float the Queen Mary, and only a sliver of it is because of persecution by The Other.

Perhaps I should have said you may have been just as happy or unhappy being a devout whatever as you are as a devout Jew. So sorry for my careless wording. (Not.) We have plenty of tzuris of our own and if you read your Bible correctly, you can see that it doesn't not all come from the outside.

You, having never known anything else, assume that the superiority of observant Judaism is self-evident. After all, that's what you've been fed since birth. However, this is obviously NOT universally obvious, because if it were, everyone seeking enlightenment would already have converted, and no one would ever become or stay anything else.

If you had been born into a different religion or no religion, what makes you so sure you would have converted to Judaism? People join ashrams, become Moslem, Unitarian, join the Humanist Church, or are cheerfully agnostic. Not everyone finds their society to be empty of values and morally bankrupt. YOU do, sure, but you are not the be-all and end-all.

Maybe I was particularly blessed--you would call it cursed--to have known any number of nonJews of different stripes, who were fine upstanding members of society with many values that parallel my own. They are not living lives empty of meaning, and it's the height of obnoxiousness to make a blanket assumption that anyone who is not an observant Jew is living a life of misery and moral decay, devoid of meaning.

This seems pretty harsh…In BB’s first post, she acknowledges that to become a frum Jew after being born non-Jewish would be very difficult and she doesn’t know if she could do it had she not been born frum. I didn’t see anywhere in her post that anyone who is not a frum yid is living a life of “misery and moral decay.” She does correctly note that in much of America, morals are out the window (think the cultural nonsense being taught in public schools about CRT and the “pride” movement, rising crime rates in certain areas, aggression towards anyone labeled an “oppressor”….none of those behaviors are indicative of contentment and inner happiness, or of real meaning). It’s not a stira that of course there are many many non-Jews who live wholesome, meaningful lives.

11

↑ #BestBubby ↓

Wed, Jun 26 2024, 7:37 pm

Zaq,

Not all non jews are living lives of misery and moral decay, but most are.

I said that 60+ years ago most American non Jews were religious and had meaningful lives and stable families.

While there are many sad stories on imamother, I feel the majority are basically happy.

People who are managing are not the ones posting.

7

papermageling

Wed, Jun 26 2024, 7:45 pm

I chose it as a BT, but I was not thrilled at the time: I did not want to give up the ease of eating non-kosher food with my non-kosher family.

But I felt that I needed to, so I did.

Now, after ten years frum, I feel like if I had been born a non-Jew, converting would be worth it, but I doubt I would actually go ahead with it if I wasn't Jewish, because I wouldn't know what being frum was like and it's a lot to jump into.

5

penguin

Wed, Jun 26 2024, 7:52 pm

Sorry, if you want to know, you'll have to move this to an anon-enabled forum : )

6

honeymoon

Wed, Jun 26 2024, 8:08 pm

Had I been born non jewish I probably wouldn't convert.

As a seeker by nature, had I been born to a secular Jewish family, I like would have been drawn to some level of religiosity. But most definitely not to the community and lifestyle I was raised in.

2

familyfirst

Wed, Jun 26 2024, 8:14 pm

I think the reason we make the Brocha “shelo
Osani [gentile]” is because it takes the choice out of being created Jewish.
Being Jewish comes with a lot of responsibility and we aren’t always well liked etc. but it comes with huge privilege as well. We were born as part of G-d’s chosen people! How lucky are we!!

But certainly glad that we were created that way and that HaShem Himself sees us as worthy if that is great privilege. Having to choose it on our own might be overwhelming.

Which makes me respect those who gave up so much to join our nation and this way of life

2

effess

Wed, Jun 26 2024, 8:16 pm

I wouldn’t know what it is to want it enough.
I’d have a superficial understanding based on movies, neighbors, magazine articles.
And just flip to the next one.
I wouldn’t know that it’s possible to feel this way, with so much purpose.

3

↑ #BestBubby

Wed, Jun 26 2024, 8:24 pm

In a frum magazine a read a true account by A BT, whose parents disapproved.

The parents were proud of their secular grandchildren, the grand daughter who got into an Ivy league and the grandson who was a little league star.

But about dozen years later the two secular grandchildren are all messed up. The granddaughters slutty dressing shock even the secular grandparents. And she is a radical marxist who despises her family. The grandson is a druggie loser. Both are foul mouthed.

The grandfather finally tell his religious daughter

" your children are my normal grandchildren"

Grandchildren who are married, working and speak refined.

2

Chavas

Wed, Jun 26 2024, 8:34 pm

I love my life and am so grateful for being Jewish.

3

↑ SunshineGirl

Thu, Jun 27 2024, 8:15 am

penguin wrote:

Sorry, if you want to know, you'll have to move this to an anon-enabled forum : )

I didn’t realize there was such a thing. I might do that to get more, dare I say, honest responses.

gootlfriends

Thu, Jun 27 2024, 8:29 am

I think religious life is challenging but having no rules doesn't make life easier. It means you have more choices which can be overwhelming. Most people like having some rules to follow and I would rather follow torah m'sinai than man made rules that keep changing based on whims.

2

↑ zaq ↓

Thu, Jun 27 2024, 2:43 pm

"It means you have more choices which can be overwhelming."

This is true. I imagined being a young nonJewish single woman in college, every unattached male in your classes or out of them is a potential date. Yikes! Who would be able to concentrate on studies?

OTOH it would be really really nice to be able to travel and stop anywhere to eat, rather than have to tote along your own nonperishable provisions wherever you go outside of the major Jewish centers. Especially since food is a huge part of a culture, and if you travel you presumably want to experience the culture. (Though I could do without the monkey brains in India and the deep-fried crickets in the Far East.)

2

↑ kneidelmeidel

Thu, Jun 27 2024, 3:07 pm

SunshineGirl wrote:

This is an amazing response. I love it! You sound like someone I would love to be friends with in real life. I also hope to be a Halachially sound person.

I’d love to be friends with a sunshine girl🤩

1

Jewishmofm ↓

Fri, Jul 12 2024, 10:19 am

giftedmom wrote:

Probably not. It’s rare. Most of us stay the way we’re raised.

Not as rare as it used to be - Batei Din throughout the US are reporting unprecedented numbers of applicants for geirus, since Covid. I believe it is the same worldwide. There has been a sharp increase even above that since October 7.

1

Ruchel

Fri, Jul 12 2024, 10:27 am

Am I raised in a strong tradition? Am I exposed to Judaism?

If I'm myself and I'm not raised in a traditional setting I'll be seeking. Yed, I'll miss the exotic restaurants and stuff. I'll trade it for stability.

↑ Jewishmofm

Fri, Jul 12 2024, 10:31 am

zaq wrote:

This is true. I imagined being a young nonJewish single woman in college, every unattached male in your classes or out of them is a potential date. Yikes! Who would be able to concentrate on studies?

There was a non-Jewish intern working under our frum school nurse in Bais Yaakov HS for a while. She commented on the girls doing so well in their studies, (our BY secular dept was waaaay ahead of the public schools in our state) and creating vibrant authentic friendships with each other and concluded it was because there were no boys in the school. No distraction, no competition for the boys attention.

1

↑ zaq

Fri, Jul 12 2024, 12:03 pm

Jewishmofm wrote:

There was a non-Jewish intern working under our frum school nurse in Bais Yaakov HS for a while. She commented on the girls doing so well in their studies, (our BY secular dept was waaaay ahead of the public schools in our state) and creating vibrant authentic friendships with each other and concluded it was because there were no boys in the school. No distraction, no competition for the boys attention.

This has to do with gender-segregated education, not religion. It's been proven that students in all-girls' schools do better than girls in coed schools. Not competing for male attention or being distracted from their studies by girl-boy socializing is only one element. Teachers' bias, conscious or otherwise, favoring males is also a strong factor. So is the desire on the part of girls not to harm the mythical fragile male ego by appearing to be smarter than boys in the class, regardless of whether or not they're interested in them socially.

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