This is one for Jews.?

Question

Do the Jews in Isreal still sacrifice lambs on alters to God? Why or Why not?

You cannot just build an alter like they did in biblical times?

Most people don't even know what the Talmud is. Most people don't even know what they believe.

For those of you who don't know what the Talmud is it is a series of discussions about the Old Testament written by Rabbi's. It's like an unofficial part of the bible and reading it helps people understand certain meanings about the bible.

Answer 1

No sacrifices without the temple as people have mentioned. The reason for this is that when the Temple was built God stated that he would take up his abode in "Kodesh Hakodshim", the "Holy of Holies", the place in the temple in which the ark containing the tablets from Sinai used to rest and that he would from then onwards eat from the altars set -up on the temple mount (there were two of them in different places, each of different levels of sanctity). Because of the way it was worded, the prophets and the Rabbis of the Great Sanhedrin understood this to mean that from that point onwards the only place that sacrifices could be offered would be on those two altars and from then onwards it was no longer allowed to build altars away from the Temple.

Also, not only lambs were sacrificed. The other sacrificial animals were goats, bulls and heffers. Bird offerings were also used (mainly by the poor who could not afford the animal sacrifices), and there was also the olah pffering (flour and oil).

One of the things that the mashiach will do is to rebuild the temple and reinstitute the temple service, including all the sacrifices. Until that day- we say a specific prayer in remebrance of the sacrifice of the day (the tamid offering) in the morning servie, and on festivals we have an extra section to the prayer service, called mussaf, in remberance of the extra sacrifices offered on the festival.

A clarification on your statement on the Talmud: The Jewish religious works have two main sections- the written law and the oral law. The written law is made up of the Torah, Nevi'im and Ketuvim- called the Tanach (What the non-Jewish world calls the old testament). The oral law is mad eup of the mishnah and gemorrah. The mishnah is the first section of the oral law and written down shortly after the destruction of the second temple when the Sanhedrin feared that it would be forgotten due to the exile. The gemorrah was written down afterwards and consists of discussion and clarification of the mishnah. The mishnah and gemorrah are usually gathered together, and with additional later commentaries, bundled together as the Talmud. Since the Talmud often requires clarification due to issues being difficult to understand, varous other works have been written to clarify and explain the Talmud. One of the most influential of these was the Shulchan Aruch based on the Tur, written by the Beis Yaakov in the twelth century. Concurrently to that the Rema wrote his commentary on the Tur- but instead of publishing it seperately, put it in as a gloss to the Shulchan Aruch (which is how it is published to this day). Various commentaries have been published on the shulchan aruch to clarify its rules in regards to the modern era- of these the Mishnah Berurah of the Chofetz Chaim is probably the most authoriatative of the last century- and is often used together with the commentaries of Harav Moshe Feinstein and Harav Slomo Zalman Auerbach.

Edit: I am inclined to disagree with your nitpick Reb Yoshi. Why? The ashes of the parah adumah are needed to remove the tuma meit to make us tahor to offer sacrifices. BUT, even with a parah adumah we could not offer sacrifices anywhere else but on the temple mount. Thus the parah adumah is a necessary pre-requisite to offer sacrifices, but we will not be able to offer the parah adumah until the temple is rebuilt! (or at least the golden altar to be able to offer the sacrifice correctly) Which raises the question- the Kohen Gadol when offering the parah adumah can be a tumas yom- but without a parah adumah he will still have tumas meit (since their is no parah adumah to purify him of that)- any idea of the order of things once mashich comes? Does masechta parah say anything on the difficulty of being able to purify a kohen to do the sacrificing of a parah adumah without him first being tahor- or even of rebuilding any of the altars when the people doing so will be tumah from tumas meit- or will the altar just have to be a plain wood or earthenware table which cannot contract tumah until such time as a parah adumah is sacrificed?

Answer 2

Sacrifices were replaced by prayer after the destruction of the 2nd Temple in the year 70 C.E.

Someone mentioned that the laws of the Torah were wrong. The Law is found in the Torah, but interpretation of the Law is found in the Talmud. We now have the death penalty for murder. Are all murderers sentenced to death???? Certainly NOT in the U.S. The Israelites were not idiots. They were the creators of the law we still use today, but Christians were forbidden from reading the Talmud and had to "reinvent the wheel."

Jews don't claim to understand Christianity without ever having read the "New" Testament. Why do Christians claim to understand Judaism without ever having studied the Talmud?
.

Answer 3

No, no sacrifices. I hate to be the nit picker, but everyone was wrong.

It is NOT because of the lack of a Temple. It's because of a lack of the ashes of the red heifer capable of dispelling tummah meis (impurity from contact with the dead.)

The temple is not necessary for sacrifices, only acess to the Temple Mount. During the reign of Bar Kokhba sacrifices were reinstated on the Temple mount though, obviously, the Temple was not rebuilt.

After the temple was built by King Solomon sacrifices outside the Temple area became forbidden as Bamot. The ENglish translation is "High Places." You can read in the Prophets about how angry G-d gets at Bamot.

A Jew is not permitted to go on the Temple Mount if he is Tummah (unclean I think the English translation is.) Tummas Niddah, Tummas Keri and other types of "unclean" can be done away with with a water immersion, Tumas Meis requires water and the ashes of a red heifer. There are none, so Jews are not permitted onto the Temple Mount by Jewish law, and thus are not allowed to sacrifice.

The penalty for a Jew going onto the Temple Mount in a state of Tumah is Kareis - Excission. Basically it means he loses the afterlife, dies without descendants, or perishes young, depending on how merciful G-d is with him.

Answer 4

No. Animal sacrifice was abandoned with the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE. The prayer services still used today are a complete fulfillment of those commandments.

Judaism is a dynamic religion, always has been. Animal sacrifice made sense to nomadic herders. When they settled, it was adapted to the Temple. When the Temple was destroyed, and the majority of the people were no longer herders, animal sacrifice was let go of altogether.

But our way has always been to adapt, rather than abandon, our tradition. The sacrifice laws are in Torah. They will always be there. But the means of fulfilling them was changed to meet the needs and conditions of the people.

Answer 5

No, you are only allowed to do that at the temple, which no longer exists alas.

Also I think most people realize that sacrifices are a bit non-21st century, you know? Most people would shudder at the thought of burning a dead lamb.

So we have symbolic customs and stuff but we don't sacrifice things. Nope.

Answer 6

No, for the reason given several times here, as well as every other time this question has been asked, no Temple, no sacrifices.

Answer 7

Muslims still sacrifice lambs on the day of Eid el khebir.

Answer 8

No. The sacrifices where to be made in the temple, which we currently do not have.

Answer 9

no, because their is currently no alter, and the area of the alter is off limits to Jews.

um we kind of cant build an alter where we need to because it will piss off about a billion Muslims...

Answer 10

Jews no longer stone adulteresses to death either--or extract an "eye for an eye"--or stone to death back answering children--or stone to death people who gather sticks on the Sabbath--you see--like the rest of the world they recognize that a lot of the Law of Moses was completely wrong--written in less civilized times--for a more primitive society.