What did the Jews inspire us?

Jews attach great importance to tradition. But this nation is also an open and innovative nation, so we can see in the Bible that it often conflicts with God, which is called rebellion against God. Since the Jews were born, they have been called rebellion. So we see in the Bible that Adam and Eve, the ancestor of mankind, was placed in the Garden of Eden by God, so he refused to eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge. He insisted on eating and betrayed God. In addition, in the Bible, they show strong skepticism. In addition, they often argue with God. Some famous thinkers, including a large number of thinkers I just listed, are called Jewish rebels.

This is the president of the Pan Seattle Jewish Federation. He is a rabbi. Rabbis are equivalent to Christian priests. He gave me a book, Debate with God, a Jewish tradition. I was shocked when I received this book. A rabbi and a rabbi specialize in how Jews argue with God. Which debates God won and which debates God was speechless. Like the Book of Job, Job is an artist, an upright monarch and a devout believer in God, but his life is hard, so he argues with God. You made me an artist, and I did it. I did what you asked me to do, but why did those wicked people get some good news instead of artists like me? It's a bit like, I'm reading China's Tao Te Ching, and I said something, Heaven and Earth are heartless. Of course, we always say that good is rewarded with good and evil with evil, but sometimes this is not necessarily the case, so we have some arguments with God.

This painting is very interesting. It's about Spinoza. We say that Spinoza influenced modern philosophy. Originally, Jews wanted to train him as a Jewish spiritual leader, but later he gradually betrayed the Jewish tradition and founded atheism. At that time, the Jewish trade union was very angry, expelled him and ordered him to drop out of school. Say our orders: no one should communicate with him orally or in writing, show any affection for him, share a room with him, live within two meters of him, read his works or write anything. This is Spinoza reading while walking, and other Jews are far away, so many Jewish thinkers and innovators not only inherited the Jewish tradition, but also rebelled against some aspects. He has a strong spirit of innovation, so he challenges authority and has an eternal spirit of self-reflection and endless change, which is also his very important cultural spirit.

Seventh, Jews have a natural language talent.

This is really his gift. He developed a sense of language very early. When we read the Bible, there is the Tower of Babel, which is the earliest language phenomenon. What story is he telling? Look, this is a picture. This painting was painted by another painter, and the one behind it is clearer. This is the Tower of Babel. At that time, people all over the world joined forces to build a tower, which went to heaven and to God. When God saw this, he was very unhappy, so he changed the language of the migrant workers working below, moving bricks, stones or doing other jobs. In the past, when the language was the same, God said the same thing. I can't understand what you said, and neither can he. Well, this tower of Babel was not built until it was half built. This is a fairy tale. In fact, it shows an early language consciousness. Different races have different languages, so Babel is a famous story in the Middle East, which has legends in many national cultures.

Some time ago, a famous Burj Dubai was built, which is the highest in the world, with a height of over 800 meters. Then I wonder if there is such a complex of Babel in the Middle East and how high the tower should be built. This was unimaginable before. What international trade building was built in Shenzhen in those years? We mean that it is terrible to have more than 50 floors, and now it has built more than 800 meters, so this is actually an allusion to language confusion, reflecting the earliest language consciousness.

Therefore, for Jews, they are often bilingual and are language experts. How can you say that? Because Jews wander around and migrate everywhere, for example, he may be born in Poland, then go to primary school in Hungary, then go to middle school in Germany, go to university in Britain, and finally work in France, so Jews have such a talent for language, and he often speaks his own dialect at home. Therefore, the foreign language level of Jews is very high, unlike China, where it is very difficult to learn a foreign language.

Jews also have a Jewish doctor named zamenhof, who tries to spread a world language all over the world so that people all over the world can speak a language. At the beginning of reform and opening up, Esperanto was also very popular in China. At that time, I remember that I had just graduated from college, just joined the work, went to learn Esperanto at night, studied for a long time, and then forgot, so I wondered if Jews were subconsciously. It is necessary to restore the language before the tower of Babel was built. The whole world needs to use a language, but in any case, Jews have strong language ability, and this language talent is not only a language problem, not only a communication tool, but also a way of thinking, a multi-dimensional perspective to recognize the world and observe it from different angles.

Speaking of this place, we want to briefly summarize that the history of Jewish migration has produced specific cultural effects. His scattered cultural structure enables him to fully contact with other cultures, and strong cultural conflicts lead to this nation's strong adherence to its national spirit, strong sense of hardship, his cultural borrowing and his worship of knowledge and wisdom. Formed the concept and behavior of combining holiness and utility, he challenged authority and had the spirit of introspection, and his language talent made him have a multi-dimensional way of understanding the world.

Jews themselves believe that their success lies in their diligence, not in anything else, so they often say that while others are sleeping, we are moving forward rapidly. Therefore, including the Jewish Bible, one of his most prominent ideas is to emphasize doing, which is not like other religions, but simply emphasizes faith, so the Jewish Bible is very worth studying.

There are still many problems, in fact, we haven't solved them yet. There are many phenomena that can be said to be endless Jewish mysteries. Including why Jews earn money, why Hitler slaughtered Jews, where is the root of the Arab-Israeli conflict, and can it be reconciled? Because we turn on the TV every day today, we can see the Arab-Israeli conflict almost every day. What is the origin of Jews and China? What is the relationship between Jews and Japanese? Will the world be Judaized? Someone asked this question. Can the Jews and the World and the Prophecy in the Bible come true? There are many problems worthy of our further exploration and thinking.

Of course, today we use the cultural lecture hall to talk about the Jewish issue, mainly looking back, whether we can explore some, which can provide some enlightenment for us to build cultural soft power, how to improve our creativity and how to enhance the soft power of China culture. Today, China has become the second largest knowledge producer in the world, but our core competitiveness is not enough. So far, we haven't produced a Nobel Prize-winning scientist in Chinese mainland, and Mr. Qian Xuesen was still worried before his death. Why can't China be a master? Now, from the country to the province, from a city to a department and a school, we are proposing to build innovative countries, innovative provinces and innovative schools. How can we really innovate and realize innovation? In order to cultivate innovative talents and so on, I think the cultural conditions and characteristics of the two nations are different. But values, wisdom, family, many values have similarities. At the same time, in the development of culture, there are many things to learn and inspire, especially how to make our culture develop better today. Not only to become a manufacturing power, but also to become a creative power, not only in terms of hardware, but more importantly, in terms of the total GDP, and more importantly, in terms of the competitiveness of our culture, it can match the status of such a long national cultural tradition and such a great country. I think we can all learn by thinking like this.

There are some reference books at the back, mainly the books I have compiled in recent years. I would like to take this opportunity to briefly sort out the creative phenomenon and cultural roots of the Jewish nation, hoping to cause some thinking. Of course, many views are not necessarily correct. I hope to get criticism and correction from colleagues and friends present here. Thank you.

Moderator: Well, it's time to enter our live interactive session. If you have any questions, you can raise your hand, give you a microphone or write a note. We will ask Liu Jiaoshou to answer these questions.

Question: I am a student of Jinan University. Just now, you talked about many excellent characteristics of Jews. My question is, what do you think are the shortcomings of Jewish national character?

Liu Hongyi: Jews are a very complicated people. Anyone who tries to define a Jew by one characteristic will make mistakes. So what I just talked about was mainly his enlightenment. This nation has many different views in the west and academic circles. Personally, I think, for example, his advantages and disadvantages coexist. This nation is often a very divided nation, including its sects, but it is a very important phenomenon for him to be able to merge into one at a critical time.

In addition, the west often points out that Jews are stingy, so we see Sherlock written by Shakespeare in the west, so many people think Jews are misers. Of course, while the Jew is stingy, frugality is his virtue. He is also the nation that contributes the most to charitable donations among all nationalities in the world, so his advantages and disadvantages go hand in hand.

In addition, in the Arab-Israeli relationship, because of the special experience of this nation, there has been a sharp conflict with Arabia, and there are also some extremists in Arabia. However, in several wars in the Middle East, Jews also dealt a serious blow to Arab civilians. Therefore, the hatred between Arabs and Jews is deep, and it is a bit of revenge.

In a word, this nation is a very complicated one. On the other hand, almost every advantage of it is his shortcoming. His shortcomings and advantages are often linked. In the eyes of Jews, they have a strong nationality and stand firm, but in the eyes of outsiders, have they gone too far? So I think I have written several books and come to a conclusion that Jews are the most complicated people. At the same time, he is the most secular nation among all ethnic groups in the world, and also the nation that pays the most attention to money, and so on. He put these things together, so Jews are Jews with a long story to tell.

When analyzing Jews, we should avoid using one character to summarize this nation with one characteristic. I think so.

Q: Hello, I have heard you talk about some experiences and characteristics of Jews. I have always felt that the relationship between gypsies, gypsies and Russians is similar to that of Jews. So what's the difference between gypsies and Jews?

Liu Hongyi: The relationship between Russia and Gypsies, including Hugo in Europe, has written a lot about Gypsies. Gypsy is a typical nomadic people, and he has never gone out of the nomadic process. In particular, the characteristics of Jewish culture I just mentioned have sharp conflicts with foreign cultures, especially the borrowing of excellent elements from foreign cultures. Gypsies and Jews are different in this respect. He is also a traditional nomadic tribe. Generally speaking, unlike Jews who live in the cultural, economic and commercial centers of Europe, he is basically out of the mainstream of the western world in Europe and has never had such deep cultural contact, cultural integration and cultural conflict. So his gypsy folk customs are still relatively good, and he belongs to such a situation.

This is somewhat similar to our views on the multi-ethnic culture of American Native Indians, Indians and the United States. After all the ethnic minorities, including us from China and China, came to the United States, their creativity was also very strong in American universities and intellectual circles, and many Chinese scholars won the Nobel Prize. However, Indians are very conservative and still follow their traditional way of life. They don't want to accept more achievements of civilization. I think this question is related to this because I have no special thinking, according to my feelings and analysis, according to my experience?

Question: Hello, Liu Jiaoshou, I have two questions for you. As we all know, the Jewish nation has produced many human elites in the world. Does such an excellent and high-quality nation have anything to do with his high concern and high pursuit of this metaphysical and purely spiritual thing?

Secondly, the Talmud Sutra, a Jewish folk classic, is not very special in the Chinese version I saw in the market, but I think it is very general. Is this a translation problem or something else?

Liu Hongyi: I want to ask, what's your major?

Question: I studied law in college, but I am very interested in humanities.

Liu Hongyi: Your question is very good and professional.

The first question is that Jews are a nation that pursues spiritual life very much. You can use metaphysics to be more abstract. In other words, Jews attach great importance to transcendental life, that is, Jews attach great importance to spiritual life. He has a spiritual world, and he lives in two worlds, because he has a Judaism and a belief. God is the center of such a world. Under this God, God created man and created the world. We see that the Jewish Star of David is a hexagon, but it is actually a hexagon composed of two triangles. If you break it down, the first triangle has God above it, and the two corners below it, one is the world and the other is people. In such a transcendental metaphysical world, God is dominant and forms a series of rules. How does God make a covenant with people, and what rules should people abide by? Jewish faith, he lives in a metaphysical world, in which many ideas and values in turn affect another Jewish world. What world? It is a world of experience.

We in China believe in religion as if I were an atheist. Now we live in such a real world, a sensory world and an experience world. You can see me, I can see you, you can touch me, I can touch you. The Jew lives in such a metaphysical world, but he can supplement these two worlds. For example, what should a Jew do when he is in the most painful time in the real world? At this time, he switched to his transcendental world, and he thought about what God said. God said that if I truly believe in God in ungodly, I will suffer a disaster, so my real world situation must be that I am not doing well in some aspects, that is, he can find some answers from the transcendental world to explain his empirical world.

At the same time, he can get some spiritual support from the transcendental world to support him and deal with some problems in the empirical world, so he lives in such a transformation between the metaphysical world and the metaphysical world, so I think many religious peoples can transform these two worlds, so he has his own uniqueness when dealing with the difficulties of the world and looking for the goal of life, if possible. So this is a very important question. Your question is also very good. I think this is very important. Today, we will establish the traditional culture of China and endow it with a system of China culture and traditional values. This is a problem.