Avinu Malkeinu.
In light of the tragedies that constantly engulf this world, how can we turn to G-d as a father? "Avinu" implies love and confidence, a feeling of safety in our Father's arms...
James Fitzjames Stephens, certainly, cannot accept "Love of G-d" as a human possibility:
"To say that the Author of such a world is a purely benevolent being is, to my mind, to say something which is not true, or, at the very least, something which is highly improbable in itself, impossible to be proved, and inconsistent with many notorious facts, except upon hypotheses which it is hardly possible to state or to understand, and of which there is absolutely no evidence whatever.
Therefore, to the question, ' Admitting the existence of God, do you believe him to be good ?' I should reply, If by 'good' you mean 'disposed to promote the happiness of mankind absolutely,' I answer No. If by 'good' you mean virtuous, I reply, The question has no meaning. A virtuous man is a being of whom we can form an idea more or less distinct, but the ideas of virtue and vice can hardly be attached to a Being who transcends all or most of the conditions out of which virtue and vice arise. If the further question is asked, Then what moral attributes do you ascribe to this Being, if you ascribe to him any at all ? I should reply, I think of him as conscious and having will, as infinitely powerful, and as one who, whatever he may be in his own nature, has so arranged the world or worlds in which I live as to let me know that virtue is the law which he has prescribed to me and to others. If still further asked, Can you love such a Being ? I should answer, Love is not the word which I should choose, but awe.
The law under which we live is stern, and, as far as we can judge, inflexible, but it is noble and excites a feeling of awful respect for its Author and for the constitution established in the world which it governs, and a sincere wish to act up to and carry it out as far as possible. If we believe in God at all, this, I think, is the rational and manly way of thinking of him."
Friday, April 11, 2008
Wednesday, August 1, 2007
Tocqueville on Daas Torah
It has been shown that at times of general culture and equality the human mind consents only with reluctance to adopt dogmatic opinions and feels their necessity acutely only in spiritual matters. This proves, in the first place, that at such times religions ought more cautiously than at any other to confine themselves within their own precincts; for in seeking to extend their power beyond religious matters, they incur a risk of not being believed at all. The circle within which they seek to restrict the human intellect ought therefore to be carefully traced, and beyond its verge the mind should be left entirely free to its own guidance.
Mohammed professed to derive from Heaven, and has inserted in the Koran, not only religious doctrines, but political maxims, civil and criminal laws, and theories of science. The Gospel, on the contrary, speaks only of the general relations of men to God and to each other, beyond which it inculcates and imposes no point of faith. This alone, besides a thousand other reasons, would suffice to prove that the former of these religions will never long predominate in a cultivated and democratic age, while the latter is destined to retain its sway at these as at all other periods.
In continuation of this same inquiry I find that for religions to maintain their authority, humanly speaking, in democratic ages, not only must they confine themselves strictly within the circle of spiritual matters, but their power also will depend very much on the nature of the belief they inculcate, on the external forms they assume, and on the obligations they impose.
Mohammed professed to derive from Heaven, and has inserted in the Koran, not only religious doctrines, but political maxims, civil and criminal laws, and theories of science. The Gospel, on the contrary, speaks only of the general relations of men to God and to each other, beyond which it inculcates and imposes no point of faith. This alone, besides a thousand other reasons, would suffice to prove that the former of these religions will never long predominate in a cultivated and democratic age, while the latter is destined to retain its sway at these as at all other periods.
In continuation of this same inquiry I find that for religions to maintain their authority, humanly speaking, in democratic ages, not only must they confine themselves strictly within the circle of spiritual matters, but their power also will depend very much on the nature of the belief they inculcate, on the external forms they assume, and on the obligations they impose.
Would Tocqueville be a Conservative Jew?
"Those who have to regulate the external forms of religion in a democratic age should pay a close attention to these natural propensities of the human mind in order not to run counter to them unnecessarily.
I firmly believe in the necessity of forms, which fix the human mind in the contemplation of abstract truths and aid it in embracing them warmly and holding them with firmness. Nor do I suppose that it is possible to maintain a religion without external observances; but, on the other hand, I am persuaded that in the ages upon which we are entering it would be peculiarly dangerous to multiply them beyond measure, and that they ought rather to be limited to as much as is absolutely necessary to perpetuate the doctrine itself, which is the substance of religion, of which the ritual is only the form. A religion which became more insistent in details, more inflexible, and more burdened with small observances during the time that men became more equal would soon find itself limited to a band of fanatic zealots in the midst of a skeptical multitude.
I anticipate the objection that, as all religions have general and eternal truths for their object, they cannot thus shape themselves to the shifting inclinations of every age without forfeiting their claim to certainty in the eyes of mankind. To this I reply again that the principal opinions which constitute a creed, and which theologians call articles of faith, must be very carefully distinguished from the accessories connected with them. Religions are obliged to hold fast to the former, whatever be the peculiar spirit of the age; but they should take good care not to bind themselves in the same manner to the latter at a time when everything is in transition and when the mind, accustomed to the moving pageant of human affairs, reluctantly allows itself to be fixed on any point. The permanence of external and secondary things seems to me to have a chance of enduring only when civil society is itself static; under any other circumstances I am inclined to regard it as dangerous."
----------
But Rabbi Frances Nataf will disagree:
" It is well-known that many great rabbis went out of their way to make physical preparations for Shabbat. Some would involve themselves with food preparation and others with preparing the home. Although lovely anecdotes about the importance of Shabbat, these stories seem counter-intuitive, would not these great rabbis have done better to study, pray or meditate to prepare for Shabbat?
A similar question exists in our preparations for Pesach. The rabbinically ordained requirement to search our homes for chametz may seem like a terribly pedestrian way to prepare for the holiday. In fact, it seems downright counterproductive. All the physical preparations really get in the way of having time to sit down and think about the deep meaning of Pesach.
Of course, part of the problem may be in how we relate to our bodies, or perhaps better still, how we do not relate to our bodies. Such thinking is in line with the question posed by many religious philosophers, especially in the Western tradition, as to why G-d would create man with a body. At best, the body just takes orders from our minds to accomplish good acts, like visiting the sick or bowing before G-d. At worst, the needs of the body put pressure on our minds to dictate things we know to be unethical and counterproductive. Indeed, from this perspective, G-d’s creation of man with a body requires explanation.
But is such a separation between mind and body so clear? On one level, it is very clear. Our ability to conceptually divide an organism, or any phenomena for that matter, is what allows us to understand how things work. If we have trouble breathing, we correctly know we have to pay attention to the lungs. If our pulse becomes irregular, it has to do with our heart. And if we are depressed, it is usually a matter of the mind. On another level, however, such distinctions mask our true identities. We are neither minds nor bodies – we are both together. As the rabbis homiletically point out, were mind and body to really be distinct, each one could blame the other for our shortcomings. Instead, they point out that it is the entire self, made up of two components as it is, that will be rewarded or punished.
My only living exposure to my rosh yeshiva, Rabbi Yosef Dov Soloveitchik (the Rav) was when he was very close to his retirement. It was not the Rav that many others knew. He had already contracted Parkinson’s disease and the Talmudic lectures that he delivered were literally echoes of those that he had delivered in earlier years. So much so, that those students who had notes from the previous occasion he had taught a particular chapter were able to “predict” what he would say. But the Rav was clearly not consciously repeating what he had said several years back. Rather, his was an effortless speech of something etched into his brain – his knowledge had literally become a part of him. Whether he understood what he was saying or not, when he would look at the Talmud, words would simply come out of his mouth – words that formed beautiful and profound constructions of faith through law. But the words were no longer coming from his mind; they were coming from his body. More to the point, his disease had obliterated the distinction between mind and body – mind was body and body was mind.
In a way, it is what we do on “autopilot” that really defines who we are. What do we do automatically without thinking? Do we click on the TV or do we gossip? Do we try to make others happy, or do we busy ourselves with preparations for holy times?
Involving our bodies in the holiness of looking for chametz, or preparing for Shabbat, is something that can become a habit. That is not to say that we should not use our minds to superimpose even greater meaning on these actions while we perform them. But it does mean that accustoming our bodies to do worthwhile things has value unto itself. The same way that thinking correctly, even without deeds, makes us better people, doing correctly, albeit without thoughts, also makes us better people. Thus, we should not resent the “drudgery” of doing, taking us away from the sublime world of thinking, anymore than we should resent the need to think that takes us away from our ability to constantly act.
Descartes famous words, “I think, therefore I am” represent a fatally Western way of looking at ourselves. I am not commenting on whether or not he was correct. Rather, I mean this as an observation about Western man’s complete personal identity with the intellect. When Jewish tradition tells us that doing things that seem menial will sometimes take precedence over spending the time in thought, it is telling us that we are not subsumed by our minds.
We are both what we think and what we do. Both and at the same time.
---------
And Rabbi Eliezer Berkovits makes a fascinating point on the importance of ritual as well.
I firmly believe in the necessity of forms, which fix the human mind in the contemplation of abstract truths and aid it in embracing them warmly and holding them with firmness. Nor do I suppose that it is possible to maintain a religion without external observances; but, on the other hand, I am persuaded that in the ages upon which we are entering it would be peculiarly dangerous to multiply them beyond measure, and that they ought rather to be limited to as much as is absolutely necessary to perpetuate the doctrine itself, which is the substance of religion, of which the ritual is only the form. A religion which became more insistent in details, more inflexible, and more burdened with small observances during the time that men became more equal would soon find itself limited to a band of fanatic zealots in the midst of a skeptical multitude.
I anticipate the objection that, as all religions have general and eternal truths for their object, they cannot thus shape themselves to the shifting inclinations of every age without forfeiting their claim to certainty in the eyes of mankind. To this I reply again that the principal opinions which constitute a creed, and which theologians call articles of faith, must be very carefully distinguished from the accessories connected with them. Religions are obliged to hold fast to the former, whatever be the peculiar spirit of the age; but they should take good care not to bind themselves in the same manner to the latter at a time when everything is in transition and when the mind, accustomed to the moving pageant of human affairs, reluctantly allows itself to be fixed on any point. The permanence of external and secondary things seems to me to have a chance of enduring only when civil society is itself static; under any other circumstances I am inclined to regard it as dangerous."
----------
But Rabbi Frances Nataf will disagree:
" It is well-known that many great rabbis went out of their way to make physical preparations for Shabbat. Some would involve themselves with food preparation and others with preparing the home. Although lovely anecdotes about the importance of Shabbat, these stories seem counter-intuitive, would not these great rabbis have done better to study, pray or meditate to prepare for Shabbat?
A similar question exists in our preparations for Pesach. The rabbinically ordained requirement to search our homes for chametz may seem like a terribly pedestrian way to prepare for the holiday. In fact, it seems downright counterproductive. All the physical preparations really get in the way of having time to sit down and think about the deep meaning of Pesach.
Of course, part of the problem may be in how we relate to our bodies, or perhaps better still, how we do not relate to our bodies. Such thinking is in line with the question posed by many religious philosophers, especially in the Western tradition, as to why G-d would create man with a body. At best, the body just takes orders from our minds to accomplish good acts, like visiting the sick or bowing before G-d. At worst, the needs of the body put pressure on our minds to dictate things we know to be unethical and counterproductive. Indeed, from this perspective, G-d’s creation of man with a body requires explanation.
But is such a separation between mind and body so clear? On one level, it is very clear. Our ability to conceptually divide an organism, or any phenomena for that matter, is what allows us to understand how things work. If we have trouble breathing, we correctly know we have to pay attention to the lungs. If our pulse becomes irregular, it has to do with our heart. And if we are depressed, it is usually a matter of the mind. On another level, however, such distinctions mask our true identities. We are neither minds nor bodies – we are both together. As the rabbis homiletically point out, were mind and body to really be distinct, each one could blame the other for our shortcomings. Instead, they point out that it is the entire self, made up of two components as it is, that will be rewarded or punished.
My only living exposure to my rosh yeshiva, Rabbi Yosef Dov Soloveitchik (the Rav) was when he was very close to his retirement. It was not the Rav that many others knew. He had already contracted Parkinson’s disease and the Talmudic lectures that he delivered were literally echoes of those that he had delivered in earlier years. So much so, that those students who had notes from the previous occasion he had taught a particular chapter were able to “predict” what he would say. But the Rav was clearly not consciously repeating what he had said several years back. Rather, his was an effortless speech of something etched into his brain – his knowledge had literally become a part of him. Whether he understood what he was saying or not, when he would look at the Talmud, words would simply come out of his mouth – words that formed beautiful and profound constructions of faith through law. But the words were no longer coming from his mind; they were coming from his body. More to the point, his disease had obliterated the distinction between mind and body – mind was body and body was mind.
In a way, it is what we do on “autopilot” that really defines who we are. What do we do automatically without thinking? Do we click on the TV or do we gossip? Do we try to make others happy, or do we busy ourselves with preparations for holy times?
Involving our bodies in the holiness of looking for chametz, or preparing for Shabbat, is something that can become a habit. That is not to say that we should not use our minds to superimpose even greater meaning on these actions while we perform them. But it does mean that accustoming our bodies to do worthwhile things has value unto itself. The same way that thinking correctly, even without deeds, makes us better people, doing correctly, albeit without thoughts, also makes us better people. Thus, we should not resent the “drudgery” of doing, taking us away from the sublime world of thinking, anymore than we should resent the need to think that takes us away from our ability to constantly act.
Descartes famous words, “I think, therefore I am” represent a fatally Western way of looking at ourselves. I am not commenting on whether or not he was correct. Rather, I mean this as an observation about Western man’s complete personal identity with the intellect. When Jewish tradition tells us that doing things that seem menial will sometimes take precedence over spending the time in thought, it is telling us that we are not subsumed by our minds.
We are both what we think and what we do. Both and at the same time.
---------
And Rabbi Eliezer Berkovits makes a fascinating point on the importance of ritual as well.
Monday, March 19, 2007
Is Judaism Conservative or Liberal?
In his privately sponsored column for the Jewish Week, Marvin Schick argues that Torah Jews should not subscribe, unconditionally and without thought, to the agendas of either the conservative or liberal camps in the United States. The Torah viewpoint is independant; while our view of Homosexuality is in line with the conservative camp, the Torah's approach to issues such as gun control and environmentalism may very well be more aligned with the liberal camp.
Benjamin Disraeli, Great Britian's most famous Jewish conservative, argued that traditionally, the Jewish instinct was conservative: "they are the trustees of tradition, and the conservators of the religious element. They are a living and the most striking evidence of the falsity of that most pernicious doctrine of modern times, the natural equality of man... Thus it will be seen that all the tendencies of the Jewish race are conservative. Their bias is to religion, property, and natural aristocracy (based on merit); and it should be the interest of statesmen that this bias of a great race should be encouraged and their energies and creative powers enlisted in the cause of existing society." (Disraeli, Lord George Bentink)
Russel Kirk elaborates on Disraeli's view of the Jews: The Jewish radical is an anomaly: the traditions of race and religion, the Jewish devotion to family, old usage, and spiritual continuity, all incline the Jew toward conservatism. It is exclusion from society which provokes the Jewish social revolutionary..." (The Conservative Mind, 267)
Kirk outlines some of the "canons of conservative thought":
1) Distrust of thoe who would reconstruct society upon abstract designs (think: the 60's)
2) Recognition that hasty innovation may be a devouring conflagration, rather than a torch of progress.
3) Economic levelling is not economic progress
4) Belief in a transcendant order (natural law) which rules society as well as conscience; political problems are really moral and religious problems - there is no separation
5) Civilised society requires orders and classes - equality before G-d is recognized, but equality of conditions means equality in servitude and boredom.
Do Torah Jews agree with these statements?
Benjamin Disraeli, Great Britian's most famous Jewish conservative, argued that traditionally, the Jewish instinct was conservative: "they are the trustees of tradition, and the conservators of the religious element. They are a living and the most striking evidence of the falsity of that most pernicious doctrine of modern times, the natural equality of man... Thus it will be seen that all the tendencies of the Jewish race are conservative. Their bias is to religion, property, and natural aristocracy (based on merit); and it should be the interest of statesmen that this bias of a great race should be encouraged and their energies and creative powers enlisted in the cause of existing society." (Disraeli, Lord George Bentink)
Russel Kirk elaborates on Disraeli's view of the Jews: The Jewish radical is an anomaly: the traditions of race and religion, the Jewish devotion to family, old usage, and spiritual continuity, all incline the Jew toward conservatism. It is exclusion from society which provokes the Jewish social revolutionary..." (The Conservative Mind, 267)
Kirk outlines some of the "canons of conservative thought":
1) Distrust of thoe who would reconstruct society upon abstract designs (think: the 60's)
2) Recognition that hasty innovation may be a devouring conflagration, rather than a torch of progress.
3) Economic levelling is not economic progress
4) Belief in a transcendant order (natural law) which rules society as well as conscience; political problems are really moral and religious problems - there is no separation
5) Civilised society requires orders and classes - equality before G-d is recognized, but equality of conditions means equality in servitude and boredom.
Do Torah Jews agree with these statements?
The Need to be Noticed
As we embark on this blog, we should, for the sake of honesty, confess to one of our chief motivations: the need to be noticed. As the philosopher-president John Adams pointed out, of all the passions and propensities of man, none is more essential, or more remarkable, than the passion for distinction.
Adams continues: "A desire to be observed, considered, esteemed, praised, beloved, and admired by his fellows, is one of the earliest, as well as keenest dispositions discovered in the heart of man... Wherever men, women, or children, are to be found, whether they be old or young, rich or poor, high or low, wise or foolish, ignorant or learned, every individual is seen to be strongly actuated by a desire to be seen, heard, talked of, approved and respected by the people about him, and within his knowledge." (John Adams, Discourses on Davila),
While others have found man's chief motivation to be sexual desire, the drive for power, and man need for meaning in life, Adams considers the passion for distinction to be at the root of emulation, ambition, jealousy, envy and vanity. But the desire for the congratulations of others is not necessarily bad; without it, Adams speculates, few scholars would have the motivation or dedication to make the sacrifices necessary to succeed in their chosen fields. Curiosity and pure love of learning can only take you so far.
Tosafot appear to take a similar view: "A person should always be involved in Torah study even shelo lishmah, for from involvement shelo lishmah comes involvement lishmah." (Pesachim 50b). Tosafot, in Berachot 17a, interprets shelo lishma as "for the sake of honor". While study shelo lishma may not be the highest level of study, it is certainly a beginning!
Adams continues: "A desire to be observed, considered, esteemed, praised, beloved, and admired by his fellows, is one of the earliest, as well as keenest dispositions discovered in the heart of man... Wherever men, women, or children, are to be found, whether they be old or young, rich or poor, high or low, wise or foolish, ignorant or learned, every individual is seen to be strongly actuated by a desire to be seen, heard, talked of, approved and respected by the people about him, and within his knowledge." (John Adams, Discourses on Davila),
While others have found man's chief motivation to be sexual desire, the drive for power, and man need for meaning in life, Adams considers the passion for distinction to be at the root of emulation, ambition, jealousy, envy and vanity. But the desire for the congratulations of others is not necessarily bad; without it, Adams speculates, few scholars would have the motivation or dedication to make the sacrifices necessary to succeed in their chosen fields. Curiosity and pure love of learning can only take you so far.
Tosafot appear to take a similar view: "A person should always be involved in Torah study even shelo lishmah, for from involvement shelo lishmah comes involvement lishmah." (Pesachim 50b). Tosafot, in Berachot 17a, interprets shelo lishma as "for the sake of honor". While study shelo lishma may not be the highest level of study, it is certainly a beginning!
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