Question from an atheist to a Jew, please help me understand your religion.

You've touched on a few points, and they are big ones coming from a Christian lens. Here are the biggies Christians usually don't know.

1.) Christianity pivots on faith- have faith and believe, and that is the heart of it. Judiasm doesn't operate that way. Its more about commitment to do, live, and connect in a certain way with an understanding that faith will weave its way in and out of your life at different times. Some days and you wake up with a sunrise sure there is more out there. Other days, you just deal with what is in front of you. That's life. The commitment is to be part of the community, do what is asked of you as a Jew, and to allow that to be the support for opening yourself to a spiritual side, which is very personal.

2.) Jews may have a loose sense of the afterlife, but I will tell you, in the past 15 years I could count on one hand how many times it has home up in conversation. It is just not a driver of the religion or behavior. We are OK with not knowing. I know that for almost all other major religions that is hard to grasp, but we just... don't think about it or talk about it. The life on earth and what we need to do here is where we are focused almost exclusively. The afterlife is like "Huh? I wonder what happens. Don't know. Pass the butter, please."

3.) Jews also don't talk a whole lot about the messiah. Some groups more than others, but by-and-large, again- almost never comes up and only a few prayers that touch on it at all. Again- not really a thing.

4.) In a religious sense, we do not operate on guilt or pain or loneliness. Fasting for a few holidays is not a punishment, but a reminder and if it causes pain, you aren't supposed to do it. We are told specifically and often that God wants us to be happy and not to dwell in sadness or guilt. There are a million examples of this- but the one that always seems to catch Christians off guard are the few days of fasting. They are not a punishment, but a reminder. The fasting is not to cause pain (and if it does, you are not supposed to do it). It is not out of guilt, but out of a sense of remembering and connecting. We believe that God has given us lives that are meant to be filled with happiness and that self-imposed suffering is not in line with that gift. To go along with this, sexual pleasure in adult relationships is also A-OK (and there are even rules that a woman's satisfaction come first as a husband's responsibility).

5.) We don't believe we're the only ones that "go to heaven" and we're perfectly cool with other people who are not Jews. We do not seek to convert because we don't think we have the big secret. We think that if other people act good and ethically (even if they believe in other Gods) then, well, all good. We think God has special rules for US. THOSE Jews should follow, but God doesn't ask them of others. Judaism will accept converts, but its more like them knocking on the door to get in vs. people inside reaching out. No sense in trying to convert people when you have this mentality.

6.) We have different divisions (Orthodox, Conservative, Reform, Ashkenazi, Sephardic, etc.) but by-and-large, we see ourselves as one and those differences are more akin to elements of a large family. We might squabble and disagree on some things, but we pretty much know we're stuck with each other ;)

7.) It is an ethnicity as well as a religion. Jews of different regions (embedded in the larger culture) still would share a separate language, stories, culture, etc. even if they are the same race as the people around them. The religious components are just one aspect of the Jewish cultural/ethnic experience.

8.) Women have a special role- Jewish birthrights are not passed father to son, but mother to children. Women are the glue. Gender roles may vary group to group, but women are to be respected and honored. They are not to be looked down on or seen as lesser.

/r/Judaism Thread