Rabbi

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Rabbi (Hebrew for “my teacher” or “my master”, in Judaism, is a religious teacher and leader of a Jewish community or congregation. Especially in Israel, they may also have political powers, and may have more so in the future, with demographic changes having been argued to cause Israel in the future to become a nuclear-armed theocracy.

Mainstream Judaism is often referred to as Rabbinic Judaism, illustrating the importance of rabbis. Secular descriptions characterize Rabbinic Judaism as a development from older forms of Judaism. Rabbinic Judaism contrasts with the Sadducees, Karaite Judaism and Samaritanism, which do not recognize the Oral Torah as a divine authority nor the rabbinic procedures used to interpret Jewish scripture.

There is a special (claimed genetically based) group within Judaism, the kohanim, traditionally believed to be of direct patrilineal descent from the biblical Aaron (also Aharon), brother of Moses, with this group having special religious privileges, including religious leadership privileges, varying in different forms of Judaism.

The education of a rabbi consists primarily of Talmudic and other religious studies, possibly problematic for reasons such as the various criticisms against the Talmud and Judaism, such as accusations of Jewish supremacism.

Prominent rabbis have made various controversial statements, sometimes stated to be Jewish supremacist. See the "External links" section.

See also

External links

Encyclopedias

Part of this article consists of modified text from Wikipedia, and the article is therefore licensed under GFDL.