Python is a pleasant language to start programming in for several reasons. The syntax is minimalistic and clear, and has no syntactic frills, whereas Java has a lot of syntactic sugar. It is possible to write powerful and interesting programs without a lot of work. However, Python is a dynamic language and has its merits and flaws. Python can be thought of as a fairly informal language, whereas languages like Java, C#, and C++ are more formal.
These three programming languages have some obvious advantages. Firstly, speed: for very large programs, Java, C#, and C++ provide better performance. Secondly, they are easier to maintain.
Much of what makes Python easy to use is that you have to remember certain things. For example, if you set a variable t as a reference to an integer or an object of type T, and then forget that t is of this type and try to call a method for a string on it, you will get an error. Java, C#, and C++ protect you from these types of errors by forcing you to declare the type of each variable before you can refer to it.
Python is representative of a whole class of languages, sometimes referred to as scripting languages such as PHP, Ruby and Perl.