Halakha and Ethics – Lesson 6

Table of Contents

• Tzav, Kantian ethics, and religious value
• Double commitment and a sweeping command versus a specific command
• A map of the approaches to the relationship between Jewish law and morality
• Maimonides in Eight Chapters: rational commandments and revelational commandments
• The command even in moral commandments: the resident alien and the Avnei Nezer
• Leibowitz, an “atheistic category,” and Goldman’s resolution
• The problem of exclusivity and a proposal: religious morality outside Jewish law
• Rabbi Kook in Olat Re’iyah on the Binding of Isaac: “Do not stretch out your hand” and “Now I know”
• Religious laxity, education, and the priority of the “Binding” as a foundation
• Planned continuation and the focus of the conclusion
• A Jewish law note on fasting nowadays

Summary

General Overview

The text sets up a Kantian parallel between morality and Jewish law, according to which moral or religious value is created through commitment to a command, not through natural inclination or convenience, and it proposes that specifically in the halakhic world there is meaning to a “blank check” commitment to the command even when its content turns out to be hard to identify with. From this distinction it lays out a “map of possibilities” for the relationship between Jewish law and morality: complete identity in the style of Rabbi Kook, the superiority or exclusivity of Jewish law in the style attributed to the Chazon Ish, an internal split within Jewish law in the style of Maimonides, Leibowitz’s position of two normative systems, and finally a proposed thesis according to which Jewish law and morality are two alien religious categories, yet both are the will of God, and therefore a clash between them is not decided a priori in favor of Jewish law. Later, the text presents Rabbi Kook’s interpretation of the Binding of Isaac in Olat Re’iyah, emphasizing “Do not stretch out your hand against the lad” as the central lesson, while also sharpening the need for “fear” and for readiness to bind Isaac in order to prevent practical religious laxity. Finally, it concludes with a Jewish law note on the current status of fast days as custom and on possible leniencies.

Tzav, Kantian ethics, and religious value

The text adopts the Kantian conception according to which the basis of morality is commitment to a categorical imperative, and an act done only because it is pleasant to do is not a moral act but merely “nice” behavior. The text argues that the same structure exists in the halakhic context as well: an act has religious value only when it is done in response to a command, and the religious parallel to doing something “just because” is observing Jewish law in an “Ahad Ha’am” sense, for reasons of nationhood, tradition, and connection to the generations, without recognizing commitment to the command given at Sinai. The text states that the system of Jewish law requires a principle outside itself that grants it validity, and that principle is commitment to the divine command; even rabbinic laws can be grounded in “do not turn aside,” but Torah-level law derives its force from commitment to the command itself.

Double commitment and a sweeping command versus a specific command

The text distinguishes between a sweeping religious principle and morality as a specific principle: a general commitment to “morality” without examining each value is an empty statement, because one can always reject a command one does not like by claiming that it is not moral. The text argues that in religious life one can be committed to God’s command “blankly,” even without knowing in advance the content of the commandments, and only later discover something one does not identify with and still remain committed. The text presents the possibility of a double commitment to Jewish law and to morality when at least one of the systems is based on a sweeping value-principle, and it offers this as an introduction to the map of approaches.

A map of the approaches to the relationship between Jewish law and morality

The text attributes to Rabbi Kook a strong conception of identity: not only is there no contradiction between Jewish law and morality, there is not even any “foreignness,” and all of Jewish law strives only toward moral goals, which are also its exclusive goal. As an antithesis, the text presents a conception attributed to the Chazon Ish of the absolute superiority, or even exclusivity, of Jewish law, in which in a conflict Jewish law prevails, and at times it is even claimed that morality is an atheistic category that has no religious authority. The text presents another possibility, that of a split: within Jewish law there are commandments that aim at morality and commandments that are amoral or religious-ritual in nature; but it argues that the sharp conflicts are not between a “moral commandment” and an “amoral commandment,” but between Jewish law and an extra-halakhic moral principle, such as the duty to save a non-Jew on the Sabbath, and therefore this split does not solve the question of how to decide between them.

Maimonides in Eight Chapters: rational commandments and revelational commandments

The text cites chapter six of Maimonides’ Eight Chapters as an illustration of the split approach: philosophers prefer the “excellent person,” who is naturally drawn to the good, whereas the Sages praise “one who governs his soul,” who desires evil and overcomes it. The text quotes Maimonides’ solution, according to which there is no contradiction because these are two different kinds of evils and commandments. In rational commandments, such as bloodshed, theft, and robbery, the superior soul that does not desire evil is preferable, and these are “things which, had they not been written, it would have been fitting to write.” The text emphasizes that in revelational commandments, such as meat and milk, shaatnez, and forbidden sexual relations, “were it not for the Torah, they would not be evil at all,” and therefore the preferable person is the one who desires and overcomes, because the value is created by the command. It cites the saying of Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel: “I could desire it—but what can I do, when my Father in Heaven has decreed it upon me.” The text adds as a side note that forbidden sexual relations appear in Maimonides as statutory laws lacking intrinsic rationale, including male homosexual relations as part of the forbidden sexual relations in his framework, and it stresses that Maimonides portrays the non-moral commandments as having no intrinsic value without the command.

The command even in moral commandments: the resident alien and the Avnei Nezer

The text rejects a reading according to which Maimonides holds that in moral commandments it is preferable to act “not out of command,” and it distinguishes between refinement of character and natural identification on the one hand, and the source of motivation on the other. The text cites Maimonides at the end of chapter eight in the Laws of Kings regarding the resident alien: one who fulfills these laws because reason compels him is “one of their wise men” but not “one of the pious among the nations of the world,” and the text interprets this to mean that there is no religious-commanded value when the action is not done because of command. It illustrates this also through the introduction of the Avnei Nezer: there is value in pleasure and joy in Torah study, but if the study is done because of the pleasure itself, then it is “not for its own sake.” In this way the text presents a distinction between a desirable emotional state and a binding motive.

Leibowitz, an “atheistic category,” and Goldman’s resolution

The text presents Leibowitz’s position that “morality is an atheistic category,” and the common criticism that this seems to deny moral obligation for a religious person, especially in light of his public moral rebukes. The text attributes to Goldman a resolution according to which Leibowitz is committed to morality, but not as part of his religious world: Jewish law obligates by virtue of the Holy One, blessed be He, and morality obligates as it does for every person, and therefore there are two normative systems. The text notes that Leibowitz’s decision in a conflict would likely favor Jewish law in an “everything is a Binding of Isaac” model, but it emphasizes that the question is not settled in the text and that a broader inquiry into his writings would be needed.

The problem of exclusivity and a proposal: religious morality outside Jewish law

The text argues that logically one can be committed to two systems even when they contain contradictory norms, as long as one of them is based on a sweeping principle, but the halakhic system demands exclusivity, and therefore commitment to an additional source of authority resembles “idolatry in partnership.” The text proposes a correction to Leibowitz: Jewish law and morality are two parallel and foreign systems, but both originate in the Holy One, blessed be He, so there is no competing source of authority and no “idolatry in partnership.” The text argues that morality is not “part of Jewish law,” and even that “there are no moral aspects in Jewish law,” including “Do not murder” and “Do not steal”; rather, morality is an extra-halakhic religious category that obligates by virtue of God’s will, whether through verses such as “And you shall do what is upright and good,” or through reason and conscience implanted in the human being. The text concludes that when there is a clash between Jewish law and morality, Jewish law has no built-in superiority, because these are two “voices” of God’s will, and the decision cannot be made by halakhic rules, since Jewish law itself is one side of the conflict.

Rabbi Kook in Olat Re’iyah on the Binding of Isaac: “Do not stretch out your hand” and “Now I know”

The text presents Rabbi Kook’s interpretation of the Binding of Isaac in Olat Re’iyah and sets it up as a contrast to Kierkegaard: for Rabbi Kook, “Do not stretch out your hand against the lad” is the central lesson, and the divine command cannot contradict justice, nature, the feeling of a father’s love for his son, or principles of morality and reason, “not even by a hairsbreadth.” The text quotes Rabbi Kook as stating that the holy recognitions engraved in spiritual and material nature do not lose their standing, and that a father’s love and compassion are an offshoot of God’s love and compassion for all His creatures. The text points to an internal difficulty in this approach around the verse “Now I know that you are God-fearing,” and presents Rabbi Kook’s solution: the Binding joins the love of God in the fire of “supreme fear,” beyond any image of love and emotion, so that love of the son will be “a direct offshoot” of love of the Eternal Rock. The text interprets this as establishing an educational and psychological condition: only someone who is prepared to bind Isaac if required can live with the consciousness that there is no contradiction, and the Binding tests whether the choice of morality is not mere religious laxity but a religious commitment that contains fear.

Religious laxity, education, and the priority of the “Binding” as a foundation

The text argues that a Rabbi Kook-style theory of identity between Jewish law and morality may produce a practical tendency to decide automatically in accordance with morality without halakhic examination, and therefore a sense arises of “something lacking in halakhic commitment” when a person always decides against Jewish law. The text distinguishes between a “light” person who binds nothing and uses the conclusion “Do not stretch out your hand” without the path that leads to it, and a figure of double commitment whose heart is “torn,” and in whom the readiness to bind Isaac exists even if in practice one finds harmony or carries the tension. The text presents an educational idea in the name of Rabbi Lichtenstein: first one must build a foundation of absolute commitment to God’s command in the style of the Binding of Isaac, and only after a maturation of fear and Kierkegaardian readiness can one be exposed to more complex conceptions in the style of Rabbi Kook. The text adds that frum education at a young age is “not absurd” as a foundation, but requires caution so that it does not block development toward a more mature stage.

Planned continuation and the focus of the conclusion

The text declares an intention to continue and show the “full Binding of Isaac conception” in the Chazon Ish, if it indeed exists, and then to spell out “my own conception” and its advantages and implications in relation to all the possibilities that were listed. The text ends by pausing for questions and comments.

A Jewish law note on fasting nowadays

The text responds to a question about wording to the effect that “it is worthwhile to fast, it is proper to fast, unless you have some other good reason,” and grounds this in the fact that according to the law of the Talmud, in a time of “quiet and peace” there is no obligation to fast, and nowadays there is relative tranquility and autonomy, so the obligation is mainly “by force of custom.” The text states that because of custom one can be lenient when there is “a very good reason,” such as significant difficulty, a flight on that day, or major financial loss, and it asks rhetorically, “Why should you lose hundreds of dollars over this?” The text emphasizes that it is proper to fast because “the Temple is still destroyed” and the reason for fasting still exists, but one should know the force of the obligation, and it distinguishes Tisha B’Av as “a different law.”

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Okay, at the end of last time I started to summarize, or sketch out, the map of possibilities regarding the relationship between Jewish law and morality. Before I go back to that point, maybe one more short introduction that will complete the picture, and then it’ll be easier to continue. When we talked about morality, I described the Kantian conception, which I also very much identify with. Not only do I identify with it—I don’t think another conception is even possible. Basically, at the foundation of morality stands obligation to a command. There is some categorical command, and a moral act is defined as an act done מתוך obligation to the command, or submission to the command, or whatever you want to call it—respect for the command. Kant calls it respect for the command. And we talked a bit about the status of the command, and that without it things really have no meaning. If you do things simply because it feels good to do them, that is not moral action. You’re a nice person, a good person, a pleasant person—but that is not moral action.

This whole line of thought that I discussed there about morality—and I’m not going to repeat it now—exists, in my opinion, in the halakhic context as well. Exactly the same structure. Meaning, the Kantian structure that says that at the basis of things lies the command, and someone who does it not out of command—his act has no religious value, exactly as someone who does not act out of respect for the command has no moral value in Kant’s framework. So the religious context, it seems to me, is built in exactly the same way.

Therefore, the parallel, for example, to Tel of Amnon Yitzhak—you know, the one who does things simply because he has no reason to do otherwise, that’s how he feels so that’s what he does, not out of some commitment or moral ideology—the parallel to that is, let’s call it, Ahad Ha’am. The Ahad Ha’am-style religiosity—not religiosity, but observance of Jewish law in the Ahad Ha’am sense, which has nothing to do with religiosity—is basically a view that says one should keep Jewish law, let’s say for the sake of the discussion even in all its details and refinements, because I want to stay connected to the nation, to our tradition, to previous generations, and so on—but without recognizing the existence of a command, or my obligation to the command that was given at Sinai.

So what I said in the moral context, I also say in the religious context. Religious action means, in essence, action performed out of command. The principle I stated in the moral context is true, I think, in the religious context as well. And in fact this command reflects that same principle of value I spoke about last time, which has to stand at the basis of accepting the system. Meaning, I accept the moral system by virtue of the command—in my view only the divine can be the source of that command, there can be no other source—a command from some external factor that gives validity to that system. The same is true of the religious system, or let’s call it the halakhic system. Rabbinic laws—we talked about that, that maybe they derive from “do not deviate,” which is a Torah-level command—but Torah-level laws also need some principle located outside the halakhic system that gives them validity. That principle is commitment to the divine command. When the Holy One, blessed be He, commands us the commandments, commitment to the divine command is what stands at the basis of commitment to the halakhic world.

So I think there is a full parallel between the moral world and the halakhic world, and that brings us back to everything I talked about in the context of double obligation. Once I’m obligated both to morality and to Jewish law, then all the mechanisms remain in place. The two principles—I don’t know if both, really—the religious principle is a sweeping principle; the moral principle, in my opinion, is a particular principle. Meaning, each moral principle, each moral value, is examined on its own, simply in order to define it as a moral value. You can say that I am committed in general to the commands of morality without getting into the details, but that’s an empty statement, because in the end, when a particular command appears that doesn’t seem right to me, I’ll declare that it simply isn’t a moral command. So it has no real content to say that I’m committed to the moral command without checking what it says, blankly. Why should I? I examine each and every value to see whether it is truly moral or not.

By contrast, in the religious context there is meaning to the distinction between a sweeping value-principle and a particular value-principle, because there I can really be committed to God’s command without knowing what it says. And afterwards I suddenly discover what it says and I can get slapped in the face. It can be something I really don’t like, I really don’t identify with, but I am committed to the divine command blankly, regardless of what it says. So here I think there is a much clearer meaning to the distinction between a sweeping command and a particular command. Once one of the two systems is based on a sweeping command—in this case the halakhic or religious system—then double obligation can exist, both to the moral system and to the halakhic system. Up to here, that was the introduction.

Now I’ll return to the summary I made last time, but I’ll do it in a bit more detail, and then we’ll get into some sources. So here’s the basic picture: the principled approaches regarding the relationship between Jewish law and morality. I said that Rabbi Kook is usually associated with the view that everything is morality. Meaning, not only can there not be a contradiction between Jewish law and morality, but in several places that I’ve seen—speaking as someone who isn’t an expert in his writings, but even I have already come across many places where he writes this—not only is there no contradiction between Jewish law and morality, there is identity. Meaning, the goal of Jewish law is only morality. That is, Jewish law is the ultimate path to the complete moral person and the complete moral society. It has no other goals. In his view morality is the goal.

So to say that there cannot be a contradiction between Jewish law and morality—that’s a weak statement in relation to Rabbi Kook. “There cannot be a contradiction” is weak. This is identity. Of course there cannot be a contradiction, because there can’t even be foreignness. Think about it: not only can there not be contradiction, but maybe there could be halakhic values that do not come to achieve moral goals, but other goals. And Rabbi Kook seems not to accept even that. Not only can contradiction not exist; foreignness cannot exist either. Or amorality—not only anti-morality cannot exist in Jewish law, even amorality cannot exist in Jewish law. Jewish law as a whole strives for moral ends. You see this in many places in his writings. There is one interesting source—well, actually I’ll come back to that in a moment.

In contrast to this, I said that the Chazon Ish is associated—I don’t think that attribution is correct, but I’m using it only so we’ll have a label for the opposite conception—with the view that says absolute supremacy of Jewish law. When we speak about supremacy, of course we assume there is no identity between Jewish law and morality. And even if you are committed to morality—and that’s something one can discuss—it is clear that in any situation of conflict, Jewish law prevails. It could even be that someone who is an extreme Chazon-Ishnik in this context will say: what is morality? It’s an atheist category. Like Leibowitz says, I’m not obligated to it at all; as a religious person I’m obligated only to God’s command. Morality does not interest me. Such a view can also exist under the heading of the Chazon Ish. But even if not—even if I am committed to morality—it is still clear that when it stands against Jewish law, there is no conflict: Jewish law prevails. In that sense this seems fairly clear in the Chazon Ish’s words. I’m saying that this is how people attribute it to him; in my opinion even this moderate formulation is inaccurate—even this the Chazon Ish does not accept. But for now I’m presenting it only as an antithesis to Rabbi Kook.

A third possibility is the possibility of division. Meaning, that within Jewish law there is—what I said was the more moderate formulation that I inserted into Rabbi Kook. It could be that Jewish law is divided into two categories. There are certain laws that strive for moral ends: “do not murder,” “do not steal,” honoring parents, love your fellow, all kinds of things like that, charity—the moral commandments, as they’re called. And there are commandments that are amoral, maybe anti—soon we’ll see—but at least amoral. So there are two categories within the world of commandments: a category that comes to strive for morality, and a category that comes to strive for halakhah.

This, as I presented it, is a possible but more moderate view in the direction of Rabbi Kook. Meaning, Rabbi Kook basically says not only that contradiction is impossible, and maybe this view also says contradiction is impossible, but Rabbi Kook, as I said, says something much more far-reaching: he does not accept this division. In his view all of Jewish law strives for moral ends—that is its whole point, to reach the highest, most complete, most elevated morality of society, of the individual, and so on.

On the other hand, if we look from the side of the Chazon Ish, then from that side you can definitely include this. Namely, that some parts of Jewish law come to achieve moral values, and other parts of Jewish law come to achieve other values. The unclear point that emerges here is what one does when there is a conflict. But notice that usually when a conflict arises, it doesn’t look like a conflict between one law and another law; rather it looks like a conflict between an extra-halakhic principle and Jewish law. Killing Amalek, a kohen’s wife who was raped and therefore must separate from her husband, saving a non-Jew on the Sabbath, all kinds of things of that sort. In all those cases you might find some halakhic clause perhaps, but not really. The contradiction is not between a law that belongs to the category of morality and a law that belongs to the amoral category. No—it is a contradiction between Jewish law and some moral principle; not a halakhic command that belongs to the moral part, but a moral principle.

The importance of a non-Jew’s life—I don’t know where that is located within Jewish law. That is a moral command. I don’t think the clash here is with the—there is value to a non-Jew’s life, meaning it is forbidden to kill a non-Jew as well. But the importance of a non-Jew’s life in the positive sense—not when I killed him, but the obligation to save him—in my opinion, I don’t think there is a clear halakhic source for that; it is a moral principle. Therefore, if one accepts the thesis—I won’t call it duality, but the split thesis—that Jewish law is split between a part that strives for morality and a part that is amoral, that still does not touch the core of the problems of Jewish law and morality. Because the problems of Jewish law and morality involve a moral obligation that is outside Jewish law. Therefore, even if you accept that there is a part of Jewish law that strives for moral ends, that still tells me nothing about what you do when there is a conflict. You can still belong to the camp of the extreme Chazon-Ishniks and say that the moment there is a conflict, obviously Jewish law prevails, period. Because it is a moral command that is not part of Jewish law; for them it is not really perceived as a conflict, or at least not as something that has standing against Jewish law. Jewish law clearly prevails over it—that’s the point. Therefore I’ll present this duality view as another possibility.

So we have Rabbi Kook, for whom everything is essentially morality, and Jewish law is only the path to morality, the optimal path to complete morality. The Chazon Ish, who speaks about the supremacy or exclusivity of Jewish law. Supremacy or exclusivity—those are two formulations, both can be found under the label of Chazon Ish, I’m not deciding right now, but they are two different conceptions. Then there is the split thesis, which sees Jewish law as divided: part of it is Rabbi-Kook-like and part of it is Chazon-Ish-like. Meaning, part of it comes to achieve moral goals and part of it comes to achieve religious goals. By the way, this is the accepted view. The duality view is the accepted view. It says: yes, there is “do not murder,” “do not steal,” of course all these things are moral principles. And besides that there is the prohibition of eating pork, I don’t know, milk and blood, or all kinds of things that are not connected to morality—creeping creatures, impurity and purity, holiness, or things of that kind, which are religious matters, not moral matters. This whole division between commandments that are heard and accepted and commandments that are rational, or moral commandments and amoral commandments, which is accepted by a great many commentators—I think by most of them, most people and thinkers in fact speak this language—they belong to this category, the category of the split.

Maybe an example: let’s look at chapter six of Maimonides’ Eight Chapters. There there is a clear expression of this matter. Yes, the sixth chapter, on the distinction between the virtuous person and the one who restrains his soul. “The philosophers said that the one who restrains his soul, even though he performs the virtuous actions, does the good things while desiring the bad actions and longing for them, and he struggles with his inclination and opposes in his action what his power and desire and the disposition of his soul arouse him to do; and he does the good things while suffering in doing them.” Yes, that is the one who restrains his soul: someone who has an evil inclination but overcomes it. In the end he does the right thing, but he has not purified his soul; the bad tendencies still exist within him, but he overcomes them—that is the one who restrains his soul.

“But the virtuous person is drawn in his actions after that to which his desire and his disposition arouse him, and he does the good things, and he desires and longs for them.” The virtuous one is someone whose soul itself is clean, who has a natural inclination toward the good, who does not need to overcome himself in order to do good. So both of them do good; the difference between them is only the question of where their tendencies would take them were they not to overcome themselves. So the one who restrains his soul—his tendencies would take him, at least sometimes, toward evil; and the virtuous one is someone whose natural tendencies take him to do good.

“And the philosophers agree that the virtuous person is better and more complete than the one who restrains his soul.” So that is the philosophers’ view. And afterward he also brings verses supporting the philosophers’ position and so on. Then he says, in the second paragraph: “When we investigated the words of the Sages on this matter, we found that for them the one who desires transgressions and longs for them is better and more complete than one who does not desire them and does not suffer from refraining from and abandoning them.” Meaning, the Sages specifically say that the one who rules his inclination is preferable to the virtuous one, contrary to the philosophers.

And where do they say this? “To the point that they said: the more good and complete a person is, the stronger will be his desire for transgressions and his sorrow in abandoning them.” And that by itself, by the way, is not proof in my eyes. Meaning, he claims that “the greater a person is than his fellow, the greater his inclination is than his fellow’s.” Does that mean that overcoming the inclination is more virtuous than someone who has no inclination? I’m not sure. The greater than his fellow has a greater inclination, but it could be that in the end he succeeds in overcoming it and becomes virtuous. That is, Maimonides is assuming here a certain determinism, by definition: the very fact that I am greater means my inclination also has to be greater. I’m not sure that’s true. It may be that the basic inclination I had to deal with was greater, but I could still reach the level of the virtuous one who overcomes the inclination and becomes, in Rabbi Kook’s terms, the upright and the conqueror. The upright is one who naturally goes toward the good, and the conqueror is one who must conquer his inclinations in order to do good.

Okay, afterwards he says: “And they said, the greater than his fellow, his inclination is greater than his.” And not only that, but they said that the reward of one who restrains his soul is greater in accordance with the degree of his suffering in restraining his soul, and they said: according to the suffering is the reward.” All of that, in my opinion, really isn’t proof. But then Maimonides writes: “Moreover, they commanded that a person should restrain his soul, and they warned against saying: by my nature I do not desire this transgression, and even if the Torah had not forbidden it.” Meaning, even then I wouldn’t do it—I have no desire for it at all. “And this is what Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel said: A person should not say, I do not want to eat meat with milk, I do not want to wear wool and linen, I do not want to have relations with forbidden sexual partners, but rather, I do want to, and what can I do—my Father in Heaven decreed it upon me.”

Okay, so this really does seem like a clear source for the conception of the Sages as Maimonides presents it here, that the one who restrains his soul is preferable to the virtuous one. And that is against the philosophers. Now these things are well known—his resolution, yes? “According to the plain understanding of these two statements at first thought, the two statements contradict one another.” The philosophers contradict the words of the Sages. And I think I’ve already pointed out in the past that Maimonides’ very question is no less interesting than the answer. The fact that philosophers are against the words of the Sages—fine, so apparently the philosophers are mistaken and all is well. Why is there a difficulty here that needs to be wrestled with? For Maimonides, the philosophers say one thing and the Sages say another, and I am in a quandary. That is a paradigm case for conflicts. Meaning, Maimonides is committed to the conclusions of reason and he is also committed to the words of the Sages, and therefore he is in conflict—exactly like morality and Jewish law. The conflict is even similar.

He says: “It is not so; rather, both are true and there is no dispute between them at all.” And this is because “the evils that are evils according to the philosophers are those concerning which they said that one who does not desire them is better than one who desires them and restrains his soul from them. These are the things universally accepted among all human beings as evil: bloodshed, theft, robbery, oppression, harming one who has not harmed you, repaying evil to one who has done good, dishonoring parents, and the like. These are the commandments about which the Sages, peace be upon them, said: things that, even had they not been written, would have deserved to be written.” And some of our later Sages who suffered from the disease of the dialecticians—the theologians—called them rational commandments.

So with regard to these commandments, there is no doubt that a soul that desires one of these things and longs for it is a deficient soul, and that the virtuous soul will not desire any of these evils at all and will not be pained by refraining from them. So Maimonides says: with regard to moral commandments, rational commandments, there it is obvious that the virtuous one is preferable to the conqueror. Meaning, it is preferable that I not even have a natural tendency to do evil, not only that I succeed in overcoming it; rather, it is preferable that I not need to cope with it at all. If I am a more corrected person, I am a person who doesn’t even have a tendency toward evil. These are moral commandments.

“But the matters regarding which the Sages said that the one who restrains his soul is better and his reward greater are the commandments that are heard and accepted.” And this is correct, because had it not been for the Torah, they would not be evil at all. “Therefore they said that a person should set his soul upon loving them, and let nothing restrain him from them except the Torah.” Here the Kantianism enters. Here you have to do it only because the Torah said so. And on the contrary: if your natural tendency is indeed to do these things and you overcome it, then you are a greater person, because here there is no value in not desiring to do these acts, since there is nothing inherently wrong with them. The only wrong in them is solely the fact that the Torah commanded concerning them. That is a very interesting conception.

Meaning, beyond the fact that these commandments, in Maimonides’ eyes, do not strive for moral goals—here you see the split, the duality I mentioned before in Maimonides—it is even stronger than that. Maimonides claims that were it not for the command, there would not even be any point in doing it. Now, Abraham our father instituted the joining of cooked dishes for a festival before the Sabbath—but according to Maimonides here, that is completely devoid of value. Because the joining of cooked dishes does not belong to the moral part of the Torah, and before there was a command, what was the point of doing it? It has no value in itself, only by virtue of the command. Because what value would it have on its own? Even if not moral value—we spoke about human value or some other value—then here too it would certainly have been better to be the virtuous upright one than the conqueror of his inclination. Why here is the conqueror of his inclination better? Because Maimonides understands that these matters have no value. Their value is only because of the command. And that is quite a far-reaching view.

In any case, here I think one clearly sees in Maimonides this division of Jewish law into two categories—the split, what I earlier called the split thesis. And this thesis basically says that there is a part of Jewish law that comes to achieve moral goals, those are moral values, and there the virtuous one is preferable; and there is a part of Jewish law that is an amoral part, and perhaps even irrational, all of which is command—and there the greater value is specifically the conqueror or the one who restrains his soul.

Just parenthetically, look—Maimonides then brings his proof: “And contemplate their wisdom, peace be upon them, and what examples they gave.” Meaning, look at the examples the Sages brought for their principle. Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel did not say, “A person should not say: I do not want to murder, I do not want to steal, I do not want to lie; rather: I do want to, and what can I do—my Father in Heaven decreed it upon me.” He didn’t say any of that. Rather, what did he say? He brought only matters that are heard and accepted: meat with milk, wearing wool and linen, and forbidden sexual relations. “And these commandments and the like are what Scripture calls ‘My statutes’”—as in the statement: statutes that I have decreed for you, and you have no permission to question them. “And the nations of the world challenge them, and Satan prosecutes regarding them.” All of these are commandments without a reason.

This is very far-reaching on Maimonides’ part. He claims that all commandments—not only the red heifer or a few pathological cases—all commandments that are not moral are commandments without a reason. Only the command itself creates them. By the way, in the Guide for the Perplexed he gives reasons for some of these commandments, but we won’t get into all those contradictions. For our purposes, in any case, that is what Maimonides writes.

Just as an aside, notice for example that forbidden sexual relations appear on this list. Meaning, in Maimonides’ view these are statutes without a reason. Very interesting. If you asked many people, they would tell you: what do you mean? Aren’t forbidden sexual relations immoral? Now, which forbidden sexual relations is he talking about here? He writes all of them. As it appears, all of them. That includes a married woman, but also one who has relations with his sister, with his mother, okay? All kinds. Maybe also one who has relations with a male. According to Maimonides, homosexual intercourse is part of the category of forbidden sexual relations. In Maimonides this is clear. Someone on the website asked some time ago and brought some pamphlet in which someone wrote that male homosexual intercourse is not part of the category of forbidden sexual relations and therefore there is no prohibition of seclusion. In my opinion that is complete nonsense. It is very clearly part of that category. There are some places where Tosafot Rid perhaps and the like raise some doubt on this matter. It has no real basis.

In any case, here too we see in Maimonides the other side of the coin. It does belong to the category of forbidden sexual relations, but forbidden sexual relations in Maimonides’ view are not something morally reprehensible. In Maimonides’ view they belong to the camp of the statutes, not to the camp of rational commandments. It is a very interesting classification.

In any event, for our purposes, that is what Maimonides says. So in Maimonides one sees this conception of the split or duality, that Jewish law is divided into two subcategories. One subcategory is moral laws, and the second subcategory is amoral or religious laws, if you want to call them that.

Maybe one more remark before I continue. One could have seen in Maimonides an apparent contradiction to what I said before. Because I said that Maimonides is Kantian with respect to the amoral part of Jewish law, where we do it only because of the command. But in the moral part of Jewish law, Maimonides says the opposite: it is preferable in the eyes of the Holy One, blessed be He—or preferable in general—for someone to do it out of natural inclination, not out of command. And he is speaking about parts of Jewish law, moral parts of Jewish law: giving charity, honoring parents, loving one’s fellow, “do not murder,” “do not steal,” and so on. Which means that Maimonides seems to show that I am wrong in what I said before—or at least that he does not agree with what I said before—that Jewish law is built like Kantian morality, whose basis is commitment to command, and without that you have not performed a commandment or done something of religious value.

But in truth there is no contradiction. Not only is there no contradiction, it is clear that Maimonides does not hold that way. There are clear proofs of this. One proof, for example, is Maimonides at the end of chapter eight in the Laws of Kings, where Maimonides speaks there about a resident alien, and he says that any resident alien who performs his commandments because reason compels him is not among the pious of the nations of the world but among their wise. Yes, there is a version that says “and not among their wise,” but the more accurate text is apparently “but among their wise.” What does that mean? In my translation, and I think it is the correct translation, that it is not an act of religious value. It is an act of moral or rational, intellectual value—but not of religious value. Because an act of religious value is when you do it in response to a command, not because your reason or your morality tells you that this is what should be done.

Now the seven Noahide commandments—certainly Maimonides himself writes that these are things to which reason inclines. He writes that there in Laws of Kings. But that is also fairly obvious: look at the seven Noahide commandments and you’ll see they are all basically moral and rational commandments. And about them Maimonides says that one has to do them only because the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded them through Moses at Sinai. Without that, you have no commandment. You may be a good person, but it has no value as a commandment. How does that fit with what he writes here? Here he seems to say the opposite: with moral commandments there is value in this coming from you naturally, not because of the command. So no—that is an incorrect conclusion from what he writes here.

Maimonides does not say it should come from your nature and not from command. Maimonides says it is preferable that your nature should also direct you in that direction. That is something entirely different. You have to do it because of the command. Just don’t think that if you have to do it because of the command, then automatically someone who has an evil inclination and overcomes it, even in the moral realm, is a better person than someone who has no evil inclination. That is not true. In the moral realm, the person who has corrected his character traits is a more complete person. But that does not mean he does it because of his natural inclination. He does it because of the command.

More than that: if he corrected his character traits, what does that mean? That he in fact overcame what his inclination told him and corrected the trait. By virtue of what did he correct it? Apparently not by his natural inclination, but because of responding to the command. Only the response to the command caused him not only to behave properly, but also to correct his character traits. And now he no longer even has a tendency to do something bad. So he is a person who, Maimonides says, is more complete than someone who has the tendency and overcomes it. But that does not mean the motivation to do it is unrelated to the command. That is not written in Maimonides. On the contrary, in Laws of Kings it says the opposite.

I think I already gave the example in this context. The good example here is the introduction to Aglai Tal, where he says that there are those who mistakenly think it is not proper to rejoice in or enjoy Torah study. One should suffer—otherwise the Torah study is not for its own sake but for the pleasure. He says that is incorrect. We say, “Please make the words of Your Torah sweet in our mouths,” so there is value in enjoying and rejoicing. You also study better that way, and understand better that way. But then he continues, and one sentence later he says: but one who studies because he enjoys it and it makes him happy—that really is study not for its own sake. Exactly the same distinction I said exists in Maimonides. On the one hand, you should be someone who enjoys the study, who rejoices in the study. But that does not mean that pleasure and joy are your motivations for studying. Your motivation for studying is because there is a commandment of Torah study, or because of the value of Torah study, not because of the tendency that you enjoy it. But there is certainly value in enjoying it and rejoicing in it. Two different things.

The same, in my opinion, Maimonides says about moral commandments. You perform them too because of the command. If you did not do it because of the command, it is not a commandment. You may be a good and wise person, but not a religious person. You are not committed to the commandments. You have not performed a commanded act. But still, of course, if you are already doing it because of the command, that does not mean you have to make sure you have an evil inclination so that you can overcome it. No—correct your evil inclination, correct your character traits, and become a more complete person. Even though the act still has to be motivated by the command, not by natural action. But there is no point whatsoever in remaining a bad person just so the action will be pure by virtue of command. That is not true, says Maimonides; on the contrary. A more corrected person is one who does not even have an inclination to do bad things. So I’m just saying in parentheses that this does not contradict the introduction I gave earlier.

So if I now return to our summary, then I say as follows. Rabbi Kook’s conception is that everything is directed to moral ends. The Chazon Ish’s conception is that everything is directed to religious ends. And even if there is moral commitment—I don’t know, maybe yes and maybe no—certainly Jewish law prevails. There is no real conflict between Jewish law and morality. Jewish law always prevails. Then there is the split conception, what I brought here from Maimonides. By the way, according to this Maimonides, this is a difficulty for Rabbi… because according to Rabbi Kook there are no such two categories. It may be that there are commandments where we do not understand how they lead to morality, and by the way Rabbi Kook gives explanations in The Perplexities of the Generation and in various places. He shows the moral reasons—unconvincing in my view, but that is what he does there, giving various explanations. Therefore Maimonides’ division is emptied entirely of content according to his approach. This Maimonides is a difficulty for him. Again, he is allowed to disagree with Maimonides, but I’m not sure he would say that.

In any case, that is the split approach. So we said that this is the third or fourth approach, depending on whether under the Chazon Ish we included two possibilities: whether you are committed to morality but Jewish law always prevails, or whether I am not committed to morality at all. In Rabbi Kook, everything is directed to morality, and here there is the conception of duality—the Maimonides, the split.

A fourth or fifth conception is Leibowitz. Leibowitz claims that morality is an atheist category. Now again, people usually attacked him over this. It seemed, apparently, that what emerges from his words is that a religious person is not supposed to be committed to morality—the Chazon-Ishnik position in its first formulation. “An atheist category” means: that’s for atheists, not for religious people. As for morality—we have only Jewish law. And if I don’t murder, it’s because of the command “do not murder,” not because of morality. Or if I don’t steal, or if I help others, everything is because of the halakhic command and has nothing to do with morality. Morality is an atheist category. That is how many understood him, and therefore they challenged him: so what about “occupation corrupts,” and all the moral rebukes, the moral preaching that he preached to us day and night—if morality in his eyes is not binding at all?

And religious preaching is obviously irrelevant. He would be the first to say that with a person not committed to the religious command there is no point speaking in the language of religious preaching. Each person has his own decision. So what were you proving at the gates to all this Jewish people who do not keep Jewish law? Obviously he did not mean to rebuke us for not keeping Jewish law. These were moral rebukes. And therefore many attacked him for a contradiction in his doctrine.

But it seems to me—Goldman wrote this, I think, at least I saw it in Goldman, but it’s quite simple and quite clear—that this is not correct. When Leibowitz claims that morality is an atheist category, it does not mean that he is not committed to morality. He is committed to morality; only his commitment to morality does not belong to his religious world. It does not belong to the Holy One, blessed be He. The Holy One, blessed be He, obligates him to Jewish law, and morality obligates him like any person. Whether one believes in the Holy One, blessed be He, or does not believe in the Holy One, blessed be He, one must be committed to morality. So in effect he has two normative systems to which he is committed: the religious system, namely Jewish law, and the moral system, in which respect he is like any non-Jew, or secular person, or non-believer—the same thing—but he is committed to both. And therefore he absolutely can preach publicly in the name of moral values.

What would he do when there is a conflict between Jewish law and morality? I don’t know. Good question. On the level—I would expect, at least on the principled level, that he would prefer Jewish law. In several places, again, I haven’t done research in his writings, although I’ve read quite a bit, but at the moment I don’t remember, I haven’t done any study of his writings to check exactly what he says about these things. But at least according to his method it ought to come out that Jewish law should generally prevail.

[Speaker B] The binding of Isaac—everything is the binding.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Exactly. Everything is the binding. And therefore Jewish law is basically supposed to prevail. But again, that does not mean that when there is no halakhah he is not committed to morality. He is committed to morality.

[Speaker B] What is the source of morality? What is the source of the obligation to morality according to his view?