 The history of each of the world's religions consists of two periods. The first period is the formative period. This is the time when the belief system was established. The formative era is when the founders of the belief system came to believe in that particular system. Now, generally, this consists of the sequence of events which convince the founders of the religion of the truth of the faith that they were about to adopt. Then comes the era of transmission. This is the time period which separates the foundation of the belief system and the present. Each belief system must provide some way of transporting its message safely and accurately through the ages. People who subscribe to any particular belief system must be confident that the founders of their belief system were correct in their beliefs. Now, if there's no way to determine that the founders of the religion were not mistaken, then it's naive to accept their belief system. One must also be sure that the contents of the belief system did not get distorted through the passage of time. Now, if the method of transmission is not foolproof, then again it's naive to accept the belief system. If there is no way to ascertain the integrity of the transmission, there's no way of knowing that the belief system being presented is the same system which was adopted by the founders of the faith. The entire belief system of Judaism is founded upon two pieces of information. The first piece of information is the simple fact that God is an absolute unity. The second piece of information is the fact that Moses is the prophet of God. Both of these pieces of information came to the Jewish people directly from God. At Sinai, God revealed himself to the Jewish people. It's through this national prophecy that the Jewish people came to know that God is absolutely one. At Sinai, God spoke to Moses while the entire nation listened in. This is how God demonstrated to his people that Moses is his prophet. For 40 years, Moses led the Jewish nation. During these 40 years, the nation lived in seclusion. They ate bread that rained down from heaven, and they drank water which poured out from a rock. And during this time, Moses taught them the law which God had revealed to him. When Moses died, he left behind a complete body of law. Nothing can be added to the teaching of Moses, nor can anything be detracted from it. With the death of Moses, the formative era of Judaism came to a close. Now after Moses, Judaism had many prophets and many teachers, but the prophets and teachers did not come to introduce a new law. The role of the prophets who followed Moses was to encourage the people to uphold the laws that God revealed to Moses. The prophets were appointed by God to reprove the nation when they went astray from the law of Moses and to guide the people in bringing their lives back in line with the law of Moses. The prophets also took the basic themes presented by Moses, such as the suffering of the Jewish nation and their ultimate redemption, and illustrated how these concepts would be played out. But never do the prophets add or detract from the law of Moses. The role of the teachers of the Jewish nation that followed Moses is to guide the people and the practical application of the law of Moses. Using methods of deduction that were transmitted by God to Moses, the teachers of Israel draw precise instructions which render the laws of Moses applicable to every situation. But the teachers did not introduce a new law. The prophets and the teachers did not participate in the formation of the Jewish belief system. These men could not be involved in the formation of Judaism. Moses remains the only man authorized by God to deliver his holy law to the people. Judaism recognizes this limited authority of the prophets and the teachers only because Moses taught that these men should be granted this measure of authority. It is the law of Moses which defines the terms prophet and teacher, and it is the law of Moses which delineates the roles of the prophets and the teachers. According to these guidelines the Jewish people recognized many great teachers and prophets, but these men did not affect the formation of the belief system. The formation of the Jewish belief system was completed by Moses. At the time of Moses's death, the Jewish nation already possessed a complete system of belief and practice. Judaism's era of transmission began when Moses left his people and camped on the eastern bank of the Jordan River. God chose to transmit his message through the living legacy of the Jewish nation. By the time Moses died, the entire belief system of Judaism was firmly planted in the hearts and minds of the Jewish nation. This belief system was the focal point of their daily lives. The second generation was born into a nation that worshiped the God of Sinai and lived with the teaching of Moses. It's through the living practice and belief of an entire nation that we receive the word of God. The written word is also utilized in the transmission of the Jewish belief system. The core of God's revelation to Moses was recorded by Moses in the five books. The words of some of the prophets were also written down. Together the five books of Moses and the books of the prophets make up the Jewish scriptures. The books of the Mishnah and the Talmud also play a role in the process of transmitting the teachings of Judaism through the ages. The Mishnah and the Talmud record many of the decisions made by the teachers of Israel pertaining to the application of the law. These books also contain many of the teachings revealed to Moses which were not recorded by Moses in his five books. The books of Scripture, the Mishnah and the Talmud, enable the nation to retain a vast amount of knowledge. But the role of all of these books is secondary to the testimony of the living people. It is only the testimony of the living people which informs us that these books are authentic and authoritative. The fact that these books were in the possession of a living nation preserved the accuracy of the texts and is only through the living legacy of the nation that we can arrive at a true understanding of the spirit of these books. The written word, no matter how explicit, can always be misinterpreted. The Jew can be confident that the testimony of his nation is true, both the formation of the belief system and the transmission of the system were national experiences. In order to assume that the Jewish belief system is false, one must accept that an entire nation is unanimously lying. A Jew is born into a nation of witnesses, a child who is born into a Jewish community in which the educational system is still intact, enters a world of living Judaism. The Jewish educational system is not limited to the scholastic experience, the Jewish home is the keystone of the Jewish educational system. Long before the Jewish child can read, he has come to know the creator of the world. Through the simple faith of his parents, the child begins to develop a real relationship with the god of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. The living example of his parents will teach the child what the Sabbath means to a Jew. Passover, Pentecost, Shavuot in Hebrew, and the Tabernacles, Sukkot, are all living realities in the Jewish home. Through the observance of these holidays, the Jewish child learns of the Exodus, of the Revelation at Sinai, the journeying of the Jewish nation and the wilderness for 40 years. These were the formative events of the Jewish belief system. As the child grows older, he's introduced to the holy books of Judaism. The child learns the position that each of these books occupies in the minds and hearts of his people. The meaning and the spirit of these books comes alive for the child through the example of his parents and teachers. The child comes to realize that this world of Judaism is the same all over the globe. Wherever Jews faithful to the teachings of their ancestors can be found, the belief system is the same. Jews all over the world teach their children to worship the creator of the world, who is absolutely one. Wherever Judaism is alive, the Sabbath is the same, as well as the dietary laws and the laws regulating marital life. Whenever the Jew has a question concerning the law of Moses, he will consult with the teachers of the law. All over the world, the teachers of Israel use the same methods of deduction to provide answers to the question posed to them. The Jewish people teach their children that this is how their parents taught them to live and their parents learned it from their parents, extending all the way in the chain back to Moses. There is no Jew alive today, nor is there any record of a Jew claiming to possess a different tradition which goes back to Moses. All the Jews in history who deviated from the unanimous practices of the nation admitted that they did not receive their deviant teachings from the previous generation. There was only one belief system which comes with the claim that it goes back to Moses. This is the Judaism into which the Jewish child is born. He knows that his people are not lying, and he will pass on to his children the same testimony that he received from his parents. Throughout history, many people rejected or ignored the national testimony of the Jewish people. The Jew faced the rejection of these people with equanimity. The Jew saw that no one else possessed a belief system which claims to have been established by God on a national basis. No other belief system began its journey through time on a national level. Every other belief system places its trust in the testimony of individuals. Individuals can lie. Individuals can be mistaken. A nation cannot unanimously lie. A nation cannot be unanimously mistaken concerning concrete events which were collectively experienced. As long as no rival belief system is claiming a national revelation, the Jew can be confident that Judaism is true. As long as Moses remains the only prophet who had the truth of his mission attested to by God in the presence of an entire nation, the Jew can be confident that his teachings still stand. If the Jew faces other belief systems with equanimity, then he faces Christianity with sheer amazement. Other belief systems may reject the Jewish testimony outright, but Christianity is different. Although Christianity rejects the testimony of the Jewish people, they still accept the Jewish scriptures. The Jewish scriptures are one of the pillars of Christian faith. The Christian claim that the Messiahship of Jesus is founded upon the presumption that he fulfilled the prophecies of the Jewish scriptures. If the Christians would recognize that Jesus did not fulfill these prophecies, they would have to admit that he is not the Messiah. All the alleged miracles of Jesus would be irrelevant. If his message would be seen as running contrary to Jewish scripture, it's only because Christians believe that Jesus's mission conforms to the vision of the Jewish prophets that they accept him as the Messiah. Who are the prophets of Jewish scripture whose words the Christian belief system considers so powerful? How do we know that they really existed? How do we know that the books of scripture were indeed authored by them? How can we know that these people were not frauds? In the history of mankind, few terms were misused as often as the title prophet. What criteria were used to establish the authenticity of the scriptural prophets? And who was charged to make this determination? The only way that the world knows of the existence of the Jewish prophets is through the testimony of the Jewish people. The Jewish nation bear witness that these men existed and that the books of scripture were written by them. The Jewish nation testifies that these men were able to demonstrate that they were really sent by God. The criteria used to determine the authenticity of the prophets were the teachings of Moses as applied by the teachers of the Jewish nation. If these teachers had not acknowledged that the prophets of scripture were authentic, we would not have their books today. The testimony of the Jewish nation is the means through which the message of the prophets travels through time. But Christianity places no trust in the testimony of the Jewish people. Christianity maintains that the Jewish people are lying about fundamental concepts of their belief system. Christianity is founded upon the notion that the Jewish people are bearing false witness concerning the revelation at Sinai. All of Christendom admits that this was an event which took place in the presence of the entire Jewish nation. Christianity acknowledges that this revelation made it clear to the Jewish people that either God is or isn't an absolute unity. The Jewish people testify that God revealed Himself as an absolute unity. Yet Christianity asserts that the Jews are unanimously lying. Every last one of them. Christianity believes that the Jewish people falsely attribute to Moses a massive body of law which He never taught. So how can Christianity be sure that this nation of liars is not attributing the books of scripture of prophets who never wrote them? Christianity accuses the Jewish nation of maintaining loyalty to a fraudulent belief system. So then how can Christianity rely on this very same nation to sort out the genuine prophets from the frauds? The Jew accepts the words of the Jewish scripture based on the testimony of the Jewish people. But upon which foundation does the Christian base his acceptance of Jewish scripture? Christianity uses the words of the Jewish prophets to lay the groundwork of their belief system. At the same time, Christianity has a total confidence that the Jewish nation is bearing false witness. This is hypocrisy. Either the witness is lying or he's telling the truth. It cannot be both.