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Living with relatives who follow man-made religions
#7
Thanks very much for your questions. May G-d bless you for the caring and self-sacrifice you are putting out to do this goodness and kindness of helping to take care of your grandmother.

In response to your numbered questions:

1. "How do I deal with the fact that these images are pretty much all around me?"

- They are not your images, so you're not responsible for them being there.
- It will help you deal with it if you keep in mind that that the aggravation it causes you is being endured for the sake of the good and kind deed that you've undertaken, to help take care of your grandmother.
- You may be able to find ways, bit by bit, to respectfully and affectionately have a good influence on your grandmother's system of beliefs, to guide her to think more about the One True G-d, and less about the misguided images she's surrounded herself with.
- Keep in mind that by not praying in the rooms where those images are, you are actively fulfilling precepts of the Noahide Code!

2. "In an effort or honor her, I don't want to remove them except as noted above (my room and the room in which I pray). Am I correct in this thinking?"

Yes.

3a. "I remember, not in the same manner as the Jews, Shabbat (the seventh day - as a ger toshav which according to Rambam is appropriate for me) by lighting candles, praying (what I guess would be universal prayers - nothing inappropriate that doesn't apply to me as a Noahide) and I pray the Havdalah prayer (again, amended to be appropriate for me as a Noahide)."

Please be advised that designating Saturday or any other day as a Sabbath day for oneself is not permitted for a Ger Toshav (which anyway is not a status which is in effect in post-Biblical times), and that is the ruling by Rambam in Mishneh Torah, Laws of Kings ch. 10, and it is the accepted Torah Law for Noahides or any other Gentiles. But there are things you can do to honor the seventh day in respect of its being commanded upon Jews as their sanctified day of ritual abstinence from many activities as specified in their Torah Laws.
- For a Noahide, this means you may choose and enhance any normal activities, doing them in a nicer way in honor of the seventh day.
- But you should not recite any prayer or declarations that you are making the seventh day sanctified or separated for yourself (i.e. in a distinct separate category) compared to the other days of the week. This means that the blessings in the prayers of "Kiddush" (sanctification of the day) or "Havdalah" (separation of the day) should not be recited by Noahides.
- Examples of permitted activities of enhancement for the seventh day include: eating one or more nice meals, lighting candles on the meal table to beautify the meal, spending more time in prayer and/or enhancing the quality of your prayers.
- For more information and explanation about these points in the Noahide Code, here are some resources:
-- The book "The Divine Code," Part I, Ch. 3, "The Prohibition Against Making a New Religion or Adding a Commandment": https://asknoah.org/books/the-divine-code
-- Web page "The Seventh Day": https://asknoah.org/essay/the-seventh-day
-- Forum thread "Sabbath restrictions are for Jews only" (with recommendations for enhancing activities): https://asknoah.org/forum/showthread.php?tid=145

*The Q&A posts which followed in the response to this subject were moved to another thread in the Forum: "Remembering the Seventh Day"
https://asknoah.org/forum/showthread.php?tid=664

3b. "The issue is, these idolatrous images are also in the dining room where I say these prayers. So, in an effort to avoid idolatry, I hide and cover these images. Is this enough?"

- That is sufficient, since it sounds like you are able to do that without making your grandmother upset (?).
- The minimum prayers you would make would be the blessings on the food when beginning to eat, and the blessing after the meal. If a situation would arise that you couldn't cover or hide those images, you could take a little of the food that you would be making the blessings on (which could be a piece of bread for the blessing to begin and cover the entire meal) into your room and make the blessing there. And the Grace after the meal could be said in your room if it's a necessity, although it's preferred to say it at the table where the meal was eaten.

4. "Am I on the right path? Is there anything else I should be doing? According to "The Path of the Righteous Gentile", I shouldn't even be in a house of idol worship. Is this house thus considered?"

The "house of idol worship" mentioned in "The Path of the Righteous Gentile: An Introduction to the Seven Laws of the Children of Noah" (the 1st Edition, not the unauthorized and altered 2nd Edition) is speaking about a church or temple that's dedicated to serving the idol as its primary purpose. A person's home, on the other hand, is primarily designated for private dwelling purposes, and the presence of idols in the home is secondary. This would be different if the home was designated for regularly scheduled communal worship services for the idol.
The same thing applies for your cousin's house.
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RE: Living with relatives who follow man-made religions - by Director Michael - 10-05-2016, 04:40 PM

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