Self-Reference in Doing Repentance (Column 367)

With God’s help

Disclaimer: This post was translated from Hebrew using AI (ChatGPT 5 Thinking), so there may be inaccuracies or nuances lost. If something seems unclear, please refer to the Hebrew original or contact us for clarification.

In recent columns we discussed self-reference. In the last column I surveyed several halakhic instances of self-reference and distinguished between them. All along I compared the logic of the various instances to that found in Ron Aharoni’s critique of philosophy. I remind that he argues that we must not identify the human being as object with the human being as subject, and that consistent treatment must view self-reference exactly like one person’s reference to another.

In the last column I noted that several of the halakhic examples are not similar to the identity Aharoni is concerned with, and only the examples of self-reference brought by the author of Etvan De’oraita begin to approach it, because there we are already speaking about a person’s reference to himself, and not merely about his joint action with himself as in the previous examples. Of course, even in those cases there is no paradoxical loop, and not for nothing did I remark that one cannot conclude from there that the Talmud opposes Aharoni’s philosophical claim. In this column I wish to take one more step toward the identification of object and subject, and to discuss a situation in which a genuinely paradoxical loop is already created. I shall discuss here self-reference as it appears in processes of repentance, and as we shall see, in the processes of repentance there already appears full identification between object and subject, precisely in Aharoni’s sense.

Two Ways of Repentance

In Columns 172–173 I dealt with the phenomenon of weakness of will. In such a situation a person believes that it is proper to act in manner X but acts in manner Y without being coerced to do so. In many cases he ascribes this to having had a “weak will.” In the halakhic context this is essentially the situation of a transgression, and for that a person is required to do repentance (an action done under duress is not a transgression, and he need not repent for it).

Now, in my article on repentance I explained that there are two ways to understand the process of repentance: (a) At the time of the sin the person did not act as a choosing agent, and repentance is a return to being a chooser; (b) At the time he sinned the person did not think it was a sin, and now he changes his evaluative and normative views (that one ought to obey halakha), and perhaps also his factual beliefs (whether God exists or not). In option (a) this is repentance for a state of weakness of will, and in option (b) it is a change in the will itself (here the sin was not committed due to a weak will but due to a will for something else, a negative will).

Between a ‘Baal Teshuva’ and a ‘Chozer beTeshuva’

Many do not notice the essential difference—almost an inversion—between the terms “baal teshuva” and “chozer be-teshuva” (I addressed this here and here). The term “baal teshuva” appears in the literature of Hazal and the commentators through the generations, in the sense of a person who returns to his inner conceptions. It refers to a believing and committed person who sins due to his impulse—whether for appetite or to provoke—meaning that he does deeds that he himself understands to be sinful, and then repents, that is, returns to conduct himself as he himself has always understood to be proper. By contrast, “chozer be-teshuva” in its contemporary sense is a person who adopts a different worldview: formerly he did not believe in the Blessed Holy One and/or was not committed to His commandments, and now he recants and changes his positions.

The notion of a “baal teshuva” in the sense described here is rooted in the phenomenon of weakness of will. The person acted out of a weak will and therefore was drawn along and did not choose, and when he returns from his path he returns to being a chooser. He does not change his fundamental attitudes and desires. The “baal teshuva” in Hazal is a person who stumbled. By contrast, a “chozer be-teshuva” is a person who, when he sinned, did exactly what he believes in (or at least did not believe it was improper). Only from his present vantage point is that deed regarded by him as a sin, because he has changed his positions/values.[1]

In my above-mentioned article on repentance I argued that in a case where a person sins by choice (and not because of absence of choice), he is necessarily a person whose value-scale is flawed. The assumption is that a person who acts by choice is a person who does precisely what he thinks is right to do (if he did not think so, he would not have done it; see the columns on weakness of will). The excuse that the impulse caused him to act as he did, although he did not want it, does not really change the picture, for there are only two possibilities here: 1) The impulse forced him. But then he was coerced (an urge not subject to mastery; the evil inclination overpowered him), and for that there is no need to repent. 2) The impulse did not force him but merely pulled him, and he decided to respond/succumb. But then the decision to be drawn/succumb was his conscious, choosing decision, and again the question returns: what is the value-scale on the basis of which this decision was taken? In other words, he preferred the desire to eat tasty food over the desire to eat healthy or kosher food. Therefore here it is a flawed value-scale, not a weak will. In the first case, his repentance is to return to being a chooser so that henceforth he will act precisely as he himself thinks is proper; whereas in the second case his repentance is to change his value-scale (that is, to change his “ought”). The first case is a “baal teshuva,” and the second is a “chozer be-teshuva.”

Why do people mix these two?

Many conflate these two processes or types. In my estimation this stems from their view that every Jew inwardly believes in God and is committed to His commandments (this is the Jewish/divine spark within), and therefore if he sins it is only the “leaven in the dough” (the evil inclination) that obstructs. Hence, for them every “chozer be-teshuva” is essentially a “baal teshuva.” Even the term “returns” used here indicates that we see his change of stance as a return to positions that were already in him in some sense beforehand. At most he is bringing them to the surface.

But to my judgment this is anachronistic and mistaken. There are kosher Jews (by origin, even if not by their conceptions) who truly and sincerely do not believe in God and do not understand that they are obligated by His commandments. For them He is the Flying Spaghetti Monster or an imaginary friend, no different from the idols believed in by pagan societies, even if He is somewhat more abstract. Such a Jew who comes to adopt a religious worldview is a “chozer be-teshuva” in the sense I defined above, not a “baal teshuva.”[2]

Just to sharpen matters, I’ll note that this dispute has several ramifications. One of them is the treatment of the statements of Hazal and their attitude to heretics and sinners. I argue that in their time the presumption was that the sinner is a believing and committed person, only that his impulse prevailed over him. But in our time the situation is different, for there are Jews who truly and sincerely do not believe. They do not even fall under the rubric of “captive infants,” regarding whom the presumption is that when the facts are told to them (the revelation at Sinai, the creation of the world) everything will immediately fall into place (they will “return to the strength of the Torah,” in Maimonides’ language). A “captive infant” is a person who lacks information. But as I understand it, many secular people today are truly atheists, exactly like any decent gentile atheist. Therefore in my view there is no need, and it is not correct, to adopt Hazal’s conceptions regarding sinners; and for the same reason even Hazal’s terminology on these matters (such as “captive infant,” “one who eats carrion to provoke,” or “for appetite”) is anachronistic. Another ramification is coercion to grant a get (see Column 199). In my view one cannot coerce an atheist to give a get, for even if he says “I want to,” this is not an expression of an inner will that was hidden within him, but merely submission to violence and fear of beatings. In such a situation, even if he says “I want to,” the get is still coerced and invalid.

Deliberate Return in Repentance

The question that arises here is whether one can treat “return in repentance” in its contemporary meaning (not “doing repentance”) as a kind of repentance. Seemingly it is one of the two types of repentance described above, and this is precisely the definition of a “chozer be-teshuva.” But when one looks more precisely, one sees that there is here an insoluble problem. To sharpen the problem, I will use a simple example of a person who has in his world only one value: maximizing reward and minimizing punishment.

Consider a person who serves God not for its own sake. His sole concern in life is to maximize reward and minimize punishment. He calibrates all his deeds to achieve optimal payoff, and for that purpose he is meticulous about light commandments like the heavy, fears every opinion of early or later authorities, prays every day at sunrise with great concentration, does not rely on the eruv, eats only glatt, takes care not to harm even a fly, and expresses gratitude even to Mother Earth. In short, a paragon of righteousness and fear of Heaven. Now I wish to persuade him to change his way and serve for its own sake (not for reward and the avoidance of punishment). How can this be done? Any argument I present to him must assume his premises; otherwise it is pointless. But from the evaluative premise that one should maximize reward one cannot in any way derive the conclusion that one ought to serve for its own sake. The way to reach that conclusion is only by assuming other premises. Yet our friend now adamantly holds to a value-system that contains a single premise: maximizing payoff. You can speak to him only in his own language; otherwise you will not succeed in persuading him. A possible way to do this is, of course, to tell him that if he serves for its own sake his reward will grow even more—but that, of course, will not truly change his conception. This reminds me of the story about A.D.M. ha-Kohen, the well-known Maskil, who wished to repent on his deathbed only in order to refute the Sages’ dictum that the wicked do not repent even on the very threshold of Gehinnom.

Thus far we dealt with one person attempting to persuade another. Let us now take a step to substitution, or self-reference. Consider a situation in which a person initiates a change in his own conceptions/values. Can he do this? It is clear that people sometimes change their positions, but it is hard to see how such a change could be effected deliberately. It is, of course, impossible. His values can change in one way or another accidentally, but there is no way to initiate such a change, for any argument that would persuade him must be based on his current values, and from these one cannot derive other values.

Put differently, I will describe it as follows. A person sins because of value-system X, and now he is required to repent. That means we are demanding that he change his value-system to Y. Now, whichever way you look at it: if he truly wants to change himself, then already now he holds value-system Y (for otherwise, why would he aspire to adopt it?!). And if he holds value-system X, there is no reason for him to want to change his values to system Y, for it contradicts his current beliefs and values. In short, just as another person cannot persuade me to change my values by means of a logical argument based on my current values, so too I myself cannot do so.

‘Return in Repentance’ as Self-Reference

Note that in this description I present deliberate “return in repentance” as a change that a person performs on himself or within himself. He here wears two hats: the changer (the subject) and the changed (the object). For Reuven to deliberately change himself from value-system X to system Y, the changer (the subject) must already hold system Y, for otherwise why would he change and adopt it?! But the changed (the object) is supposed still to hold system X, for otherwise there is nothing left to change (the change has already occurred nondeliberately). In short, a change of value-system cannot occur deliberately. Either it happens somehow on its own, or it cannot happen at all. A person cannot set out to the task of changing his value-system. He can, of course, examine his values and see whether he truly identifies with them, and perhaps he will discover that he is living in an illusion. But he cannot change them deliberately.

I now remind that “return in repentance” is a change in a person’s value-system. The upshot of the argument I presented is that the loop of self-reference proves that one cannot “return in repentance” deliberately (although one can apparently “do repentance” deliberately). This is a proof that a “baal teshuva” and a “chozer be-teshuva” are entirely different phenomena, and what existed always (a baal teshuva) is not similar to what is familiar to us today (a chozer be-teshuva).

In a marginal note I will add that ostensibly here substitution does work. We saw that Reuven cannot change Shimon’s values, and now we see that the same holds when we substitute Reuven for Shimon. But this is, of course, not correct. Note that Reuven’s inability to change Shimon’s values does not stem from Shimon’s being other, but from the very impossibility of Shimon changing his positions deliberately. Reuven here is a bystander. Therefore the self-reference described here cannot be presented by way of substitution. Even formulating the claim with two different people is impossible, and needless to say substitution will not change that.

Comparison and Implications for Self-Reference in the Previous Examples

Note that this is not a psychological difficulty or some human limitation. It is a logical difficulty. Such deliberate change is contradictory. Of course, the contradiction arises only because we identify the changing factor (the subject) with the changed factor (the object). Here we have returned to Ron Aharoni, and this time—unlike the examples in the previous column—this already seems precisely identical to the logic he speaks about.

Ron Aharoni, of course, calls upon us not to fall into this fallacy, and to continue treating the situation as if it involved two different people. But in this case such a demand is truly bizarre. For it is clear that we are speaking of the very same person, and such a person, at a given moment, has a defined value-system (unless he lives in contradiction—but that is not our topic). One cannot separate between the value-system of the changer and the values of the changed, unless you adopt the assumption that there is within us a small homunculus (and then you will fall into the well-known regresses concerning it). A similar consideration will show you that even with regard to the cogito such a separation is implausible. If I think about myself, then indeed there is an identity between the thinker and the thought-of. The separation between them is a formal matter but does not reflect the philosophical and ontic truth. In this sense, Aharoni’s solution to philosophy’s paradoxes is similar to Russell’s theory of types, for Aharoni, like Russell, does not propose a solution to the paradoxes but only a language that prevents the possibility of expressing them.

On Choice and Repentance

Several times in the past I have explained that Maimonides places the discussion of free choice in his Laws of Repentance, because the essence of doing repentance is rooted in choice. He follows here the Torah itself, which places the verse “And you shall return to the Lord your God” in the passage that deals with choice (“and you shall choose life”). We must now note that although free will and choice are elusive and confusing concepts, the problem there is not related to self-reference. It is difficult to understand how a process of adopting values, a path, or a conception takes place when we are speaking of a person’s basic evaluative assumptions. Here too there is an argument of “whichever way you look at it”: there cannot be a reason for it, for if the reason is evaluative then the question returns to that same basic evaluative substrate (how did we choose it); and if the reason is otherwise (psychological, various influences), then there is no choice here but programming or sheer happenstance. Therefore the deliberate adoption of values is a highly problematic procedure.

To this difficulty, however, I propose the following explanation. A person adopts values by way of contemplating the Idea of the Good and the Right. We are speaking of a different kind of facts (evaluative or ethical facts), for which we have a capacity, or a kind of sense, that contemplates them and infers from them what is proper and what is improper. This is not an inference based on premises that yields an evaluative conclusion, nor is it an influence of some other factor upon us. As noted, in my view this is a kind of observation (this is the stance of moral realism). Therefore there is also no deliberate process here of adopting certain values. I can deliberately set out to contemplate the Ideas and to formulate some value-system in accordance with what I find. But I cannot deliberately set out to adopt a particular value-system (unless it has already been adopted by me and is within me). From this you can understand that choice and free will do not deal with adopting the right values (for that is the outcome of factual observation), but solely with the decision to be committed to them and to act in accordance with them (that is, to be a chooser. This is a “baal teshuva,” not a “chozer be-teshuva”).

It is now easy to see that with regard to “return in repentance,” such an explanation will not help us. The process of repentance is not an adoption of values but a deliberate change of them. Here, and only here (and not with respect to choice), does the loop of self-reference enter, for there is an action of a changing agent upon the very person who also serves as the changed. I can adopt values (by way of contemplating the Ideas), and therefore choice can be explained without resorting to self-reference. But, as I have explained, I cannot change myself deliberately. This is a logical contradiction, and therefore we may conclude from here that the process of repentance (in the contemporary sense of “return in repentance”) is not done deliberately. It is, in fact, not “doing repentance” but choosing values.

[1] This is the accepted terminology, and therefore I use it. Although, on the face of it, the meanings of these expressions seem exactly reversed: “chozer be-teshuva” sounds like someone returning to his ancestral roots, whereas “baal teshuva” sounds like someone adopting a new path.

[2] I have already explained several times in the past that I disagree with this conception in two respects: (a) Factually, I think there are Jews who really are atheists, inwardly as well. (b) Even if inwardly they are not atheists, and even if I ignore the paternalism in my explaining to a person what he believes (and I have written more than once that I am a proud paternalist), there is no meaning or value to implicit beliefs. A person is judged solely by his conscious beliefs.