05-01-2014, 11:49 PM
Hello, this is Sam here, please read my introduction on the welcome mat before making your way to this post. Thank you!
My father is an Ultra-Orthodox Jew. He loves the Jewish nation and is a firm believer in the old Judaic interpretation of the bible.
I am not religious, nor do I believe that the scripture is divine. I find his views extreme and mindlessly arrogant {e.g. he believes that Jewish people are born with a godly soul and an animal soul, while anyone non-Jewish is born solely (hehe) with an animal soul}. I respect my father a lot. He has taught me so much in life. Patience, love, devotion, motivation, passion, honesty, morality, kindness, and some optimism. That is the father I knew before I rejected his faith. After that our discussions led me to realize a new part of him I hadn't seen before. I started conversations that challenged his belief (such that perhaps all humans are equal, something I thought I had learned from him), and they only led to his disappointment, quiet anger, and rejection of me.
Now I have a girlfriend who I am in love with. We've been dating for four months, and I've met her parents. My father refuses to meet her even though my mother(who is surprisingly supportive), and a few of my siblings have met her(the religiously wishy-washy ones I wrote about in my introduction on the Welcome Mat).
He told me if I marry a non-Jewish woman (I'm 19 and not getting married any time soon... but it still hurts), he will cut me off from the family. Or in his words "we will have to split ways."
I've tried to reason with him and convince him to be open-minded, but he said this is the one line he will never cross. We have this argument frequently. We never raise our voices, and we are always civil. Today it got a bit hairy, and he showed me a video clip that finally made me understand his perspective. If he truly feels the way that the protagonist does in the clip (which I shall direct you to), I have no hope...
Please help. How can I get my father to accept me? He does not seem to listen to reason, yet I know he loves me. A lot.
If you need any other details please request them. I have nothing to hide and will post any details (except personally identifying ones) publicly.
The clip he showed me was from "A fiddler on the roof." I read the forum rules, and didn't see anything about posting links. Here is a link to the audio track from the scene he showed me.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zm6KapIDLvg
(Background information of the movie:
Jewish religious father has three daughters.
Two get married non-traditionally to Jews. Although a stickler for tradition, he manages to accept this. The last daughter wants to get married to a Russian gentile peasant. The father cannot bring himself to accept this intermarriage, takes is as a challenge to his personal faith and makes a hard decision by choosing what he feels to be the moral high ground. He rejects his daughter, cutting her off from the family and pronouncing her dead, despite her pleas for acceptance. -- irrelevant note, this is amazing acting.)
My father is an Ultra-Orthodox Jew. He loves the Jewish nation and is a firm believer in the old Judaic interpretation of the bible.
I am not religious, nor do I believe that the scripture is divine. I find his views extreme and mindlessly arrogant {e.g. he believes that Jewish people are born with a godly soul and an animal soul, while anyone non-Jewish is born solely (hehe) with an animal soul}. I respect my father a lot. He has taught me so much in life. Patience, love, devotion, motivation, passion, honesty, morality, kindness, and some optimism. That is the father I knew before I rejected his faith. After that our discussions led me to realize a new part of him I hadn't seen before. I started conversations that challenged his belief (such that perhaps all humans are equal, something I thought I had learned from him), and they only led to his disappointment, quiet anger, and rejection of me.
Now I have a girlfriend who I am in love with. We've been dating for four months, and I've met her parents. My father refuses to meet her even though my mother(who is surprisingly supportive), and a few of my siblings have met her(the religiously wishy-washy ones I wrote about in my introduction on the Welcome Mat).
He told me if I marry a non-Jewish woman (I'm 19 and not getting married any time soon... but it still hurts), he will cut me off from the family. Or in his words "we will have to split ways."
I've tried to reason with him and convince him to be open-minded, but he said this is the one line he will never cross. We have this argument frequently. We never raise our voices, and we are always civil. Today it got a bit hairy, and he showed me a video clip that finally made me understand his perspective. If he truly feels the way that the protagonist does in the clip (which I shall direct you to), I have no hope...
Please help. How can I get my father to accept me? He does not seem to listen to reason, yet I know he loves me. A lot.
If you need any other details please request them. I have nothing to hide and will post any details (except personally identifying ones) publicly.
The clip he showed me was from "A fiddler on the roof." I read the forum rules, and didn't see anything about posting links. Here is a link to the audio track from the scene he showed me.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zm6KapIDLvg
(Background information of the movie:
Jewish religious father has three daughters.
Two get married non-traditionally to Jews. Although a stickler for tradition, he manages to accept this. The last daughter wants to get married to a Russian gentile peasant. The father cannot bring himself to accept this intermarriage, takes is as a challenge to his personal faith and makes a hard decision by choosing what he feels to be the moral high ground. He rejects his daughter, cutting her off from the family and pronouncing her dead, despite her pleas for acceptance. -- irrelevant note, this is amazing acting.)
