More on Spiritual Solipsism (Column 357)
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.
Following my recent classes in Tractate Shabbat (on “we do not tell a person to sin so that his fellow will gain merit”), I realized there is a need to sharpen a distinction I made in Column 236 between two approaches in the service of God, and perhaps also in ethics. Added to this was a question I was asked a few days ago in the site’s Q&A that raised the same issue. So I’m taking the opportunity to return to the matter of spiritual solipsism.
The Question and Its Resolution
The question I was asked was as follows:
| Why is it forbidden to commit murder in order to save the public (the prohibition on handing over a Jew to gentiles), but permitted to transgress sexual prohibitions for that purpose (the “sin for the sake of Heaven” of Yael, Esther, and Lot’s daughters)? After all, both prohibitions fall under the rubric of “be killed rather than transgress.” Perhaps they are not equal in their degree? And doesn’t the license to kill a pursuer in a case of a sexual offense indicate equality and equivalence between the two prohibitions? |
As I explained in my answer, there are several imprecise and unnecessary assumptions here. Beyond that, I noted that this question presumes a conception in which my spiritual calculus consists solely of my own commandments and transgressions, and that this calculus—and only it—must lead me to a decision. The questioner assumes that the reason I may not murder one person to save another (or others) is the prohibition of “You shall not murder,” and therefore the crucial parameter is the severity of the prohibition. From here he moves to comparison with other prohibitions of equal severity and wonders how the outcomes can differ.
But that itself shows that the severity of the prohibitions is not the only component in making such a decision. The question of whether to kill one person to save another is not only a question within the bounds of “You shall not murder”; there is something beyond that. Just as an example, what happens if I am required to rob one person to save another? Or perhaps harm someone (humiliate him) to save another? In Column 291 I explained the approach that holds all these to be forbidden. This cannot be understood within the questioner’s conceptual framework. If the key parameter is the severity of the prohibition, then all these prohibitions should be overridden by the value of saving a life (and indeed several Rishonim and Acharonim challenge Rashi’s view in Bava Kamma 60b cited there). I explained that the consideration of whether to harm another does not begin with the halakhic prohibition involved; rather, the reverse is true: the halakhic prohibition exists because of a prior, principled consideration that forbids harming another. I called this “territorial considerations,” and the claim was that I have no right to enter my fellow’s territory, even if my halakhic calculus would justify it. Considerations of harming someone’s territory are not entrusted to me, but only to the owner of that territory. This is an example of a broader phenomenon: the consideration of how to act should not be decided only on the basis of a halakhic accounting (the severity of the prohibitions and commandments involved) but also on the basis of a prior and more fundamental consideration.
I answered the above question in the same way. The prohibition on harming one person to save another is not based on the severity of “You shall not murder,” but on the fact that those lives are not entrusted to my decision. Decisions about another’s life are entrusted to him alone. Therefore, even if there is justification from the perspective of my personal halakhic calculation to do so, that is still insufficient to permit it. Incidentally, this is also one of the problems I saw in the book Torat HaMelekh, which permitted harming the life of a gentile to save Jews. My claim is that even if killing a gentile is a lighter prohibition, since it is not included in “You shall not murder” (but rather “one who sheds human blood”), that does not suffice to permit it. The prohibition on killing so-and-so to save so-and-so cannot be based on comparing the value of their lives; it is absolute. Such a decision is not entrusted to me, but only to the owners of those lives.[1]
Spiritual Solipsism and Spiritual Globalism
What lies at the basis of the prevailing view that hangs everything on the halakhic accounting? Beyond the assumption that sees halakha as the be-all and end-all (which itself deserves discussion), there is a conception I called in Column 236 “spiritual solipsism.” Solipsism is a metaphysical view that denies the existence of an external world. The solipsist thinks that only he himself exists, and the rest of the world and people who inhabit it are merely figures or abstract objects within his consciousness, nothing more. The discourse he conducts with other people or with things outside him is in fact a discourse he conducts with figures and objects within himself. In the spiritual realm, too, there is such an approach, which views the service of God as a stance in which a person stands alone before the Holy One, blessed be He, and nothing else matters. Everything else plays no part in his considerations. Even someone with a metaphysically realist outlook can be a solipsist in his halakhic and moral thinking. He can conceive the task imposed upon him as maximizing his own spiritual or ethical benefit. He makes halakhic decisions according to the severity of the commandments and transgressions at stake—that is, according to the question of how he himself will come out best before God.
Such a person sees other people as target silhouettes on a firing range, whose sole function for him is to challenge him—that is, to place before him spiritual tasks and trials from which he is supposed to emerge in the best possible way. For the spiritual solipsist, life is an obstacle course: he is the sole runner, others are hurdles or obstacles, and God is the judge. His goal is to fail as little as possible at the tasks (helping or refraining from harming the various “target silhouettes” around him earns him or costs him points).
Incidentally, one can think of solipsism in the ethical context as well. This is an approach in which a person makes ethical decisions by the consideration of maximizing ethical benefit (how to be as moral as possible). He will decide on a given step according to the severity of the ethical prohibition involved in doing or not doing that step. For him, morality imposes the task of being as righteous as possible, and other people are target silhouettes whose function is to challenge him. He helps them and refrains from harming them, but not for their sake; rather, in order to be maximally morally righteous.[2]
Against spiritual solipsism one can set a global-consequentialist conception, within which a person makes decisions according to the maximum spiritual benefit to the world, or to others, and not necessarily to himself. Although usually this consideration leads to results similar to those that come from the solipsistic consideration (for both types will try to maximize help to others—one to improve his own spiritual standing and the other to benefit others), sometimes there are differences. As an initial example, think about killing one person to save two others: a consequentialist consideration of maximal spiritual benefit, to the world or to others, leads to killing the one to gain two. The solipsistic consideration leads to the view that I may not kill him, because for me, if I kill him, I transgress the prohibition of murder, whereas if I refrain—though two people will die—I remain clean (I did not transgress anything).[3]
Note an interesting reversal here: the prohibition on killing the one—which is ostensibly an expression of a solipsistic approach—actually accords with the conception that leaves the other’s territory outside my domain; that is, it seemingly gives room to the other and not only to myself. To see why this is not contradictory, consider a case in which the one agrees that I kill him in order to save the two others. In such a case, the territorial consideration disappears (for he himself made the decision about himself), and what remains is solipsism versus global-consequentialism. The solipsist will say that even if he agrees, I will not kill him, because I would thereby violate the prohibition of murder. The globalist can say that if there is consent, then I should compare outcomes, and therefore it is preferable to kill one and save two.
Is This a Matter of Self-Interest?
The difference between the two approaches can be portrayed as the difference between self-interested egoism and altruism. The solipsist is, ostensibly, an egoist who cares only about himself and his World to Come, instead of caring for others and the world. At least on the assumption that he does not espouse metaphysical solipsism, there is a moral flaw here (if he is a metaphysical solipsist, then in his view there truly is no “outside” someone else to care for). Thus, for example, when I was in Bnei Brak the saying was popular: “Your this-world is my World to Come,” meaning: I care for your material welfare and thereby earn spiritual reward. Seemingly, this maxim reflects self-interested spiritual solipsism, since I care for others not for their sake but for mine (my reward in the World to Come).
But this identification is not necessary. One can speak of spiritual solipsism in a sense that is not egoistic at all. A person can hold that the task God placed upon him is to maximize his own spiritual state. Assume, for the sake of discussion, that there is no World to Come and that a person receives no reward for all his toil under the sun. Would a solipsistic decision in such a case express egoism? A person gains nothing from his improved spiritual state, but he understands that this is the task God assigned him. Solipsism can be a spiritual conception of the task God placed upon us, and not necessarily egoism.
The explanation for such an approach may lie in the reasoning that if each person focuses on himself or on his close circles, the entire world will thereby benefit. In Columns 188 and 266 I discussed such an argument against universalism. I claimed there that there can be a view that aims to maximize global outcomes (that is, for the whole world) yet favors a non-universalist conception. The assumption of such a view is that if each person cares for himself, his close circles, and only later—and to a lesser extent—for the rest of the world, then the world as a whole will be better off. If everyone is required to care for the entire world, then in the end there will be many people for whom no one cares. As the Sages say (Bava Batra 24b): “A pot that belongs to partners is neither hot nor cold.”
This consideration shows that even a global consequentialist calculus—which ostensibly necessarily leads to universalism—can lead to individualism. The same holds for the question of spiritual solipsism. It can stem from egoism and the desire to improve my standing in terms of my reward in the World to Come, but it can also stem from a sophisticated application of a consequentialist conception. For our purposes here, I will summarize: there are not necessarily “good guys” and “bad guys.” At root, this is a dispute between two spiritual approaches.
On Haredim and Others
It seems to me that in a significant part of the Haredi world (particularly the Lithuanian), the solipsistic approach is prevalent. True, one can interpret the maxim about another’s this-world metaphorically—that material assistance to another is itself a spiritual value for me—and not necessarily as a reference to reward in the World to Come. But it seems to me that usually its meaning there is the simple one. A Haredi person will generally not be willing to endanger his own spirituality or that of his children—for example, to send them to schools where, in his view, there are children in a poorer spiritual state—since his task is first and foremost to care for his own spiritual state and that of his close circles, even if the price is harm to the spiritual state of the rest of the world. Therefore, he will also generally refrain from meeting with other populations and from contributing to society through military service, employment, and higher education, since these threaten his spiritual state. In contrast, religious-Zionist and/or liberal conceptions are more prepared to care for others at the expense of their own spiritual state. And again I must stress: this is not necessarily a critique of Haredi egoism and self-interest. It is a spiritual dispute with two sides, and both can be consequentialist.
Of course, this is not a black-and-white picture. Haredim too will be willing to bear certain costs for the sake of improving others’ spiritual state, and religious-Zionists will not pay any price whatsoever for it. Still, along the continuum between the two extremes (solipsism versus globalism), there is a clear gap between the Haredi conception and the modern-religious one, with Haredim closer to the solipsistic pole. Not for nothing did we (in Bnei Brak) joke that in the absence of paupers on Purim, one should pray to God to impoverish someone and provide us with an “exquisite pauper” in whom to fulfill the commandment.
Bringing Spiritual Solipsism to Absurdity: “Say, I Pray You, You Are My Sister”
On second thought, it is far from clear that this is a joke. Seemingly, it is a necessary conclusion from spiritual solipsism. But precisely for that reason, the very sense that this is a joke indicates that there is something problematic in the approach of spiritual solipsism, even if it is not simple egoism. The other is not a statistic or a target silhouette meant only to challenge me; rather, he is an end in himself. I am supposed to care for him, not only to improve my spiritual state, but to benefit him and the world at large.[4]
In Genesis there appears three times a typological story about a man, his wife, and a lustful king (twice about Abraham and Sarah and once about Isaac and Rebecca).[5] In all these cases, the husband fears that the king will desire his wife and take her, and to that end he will kill the husband. Because of this fear, he asks his wife to say she is his sister so that the king will not have to kill him in order to take her. These stories raise not a few ethical and halakhic problems, and not only regarding the king, of course. For our purposes, I will focus on the classic question: Why would the Egyptians prefer to kill Abraham in order to take Sarah? In so doing they would transgress “You shall not murder.” If they did not kill him, they would transgress “You shall not commit adultery,” which is no more severe.
There are very clever and engaging answers to this,[6] but here I want to focus on the question. This question assumes spiritual solipsism, since the Egyptians’ calculus of what to do should, on this view, be based on comparing the severity of the transgression in each of the two options (to kill or not to kill Abraham). Is such a calculus truly the proper basis for making this sort of decision? Suppose that for the Egyptians the two options are equal—can they truly choose between them as they please? Is there not another consideration involved here, no less important?
In Column 236 I brought a very similar example. I told there of a friend of mine from Bnei Brak (Lithuanian!) who saw by someone a book he had been searching for a long time. He approached him and said: Look, I have two options—either to take the book from you and transgress “Do not steal,” or to leave it with you and transgress “Do not covet.” Since in any case I transgress a prohibition, it’s better that at least I get the book. Let us set aside for our discussion the mistakes in understanding the prohibition of “Do not covet” (which he himself knew well). Is such reasoning legitimate? This reasoning assumes that this decision should be based on a spiritual profit-and-loss calculation of my own. I am to choose the option in which my transgression is the lighter one, and if the two are equivalent, the decision is arbitrary and is up to me. This is a clear expression of spiritual solipsism. The other is nothing but a target silhouette, and my behavior is determined by considerations of my own spiritual profit and loss (my transgressions and commandments and their relative severity).
I think that within all of us there is a sense that such reasoning (even if it were correct) is illegitimate. A person cannot make decisions concerning another solely on the basis of his own commandments and transgressions. So too regarding Abraham and Sarah, the “exquisite pauper,” and similar cases. In all these, our intuition says this is a jest rather than serious reasoning, even though it would seemingly be a straightforward implication of spiritual solipsism. This indicates that spiritual solipsism is not a worthy approach—meaning, that is not the task God assigned us. And again I stress that this is unrelated to the question of egoism, since, as we saw, spiritual solipsism does not necessarily stem from egoism.
Incidentally, this also follows from R. Shimon Shkop’s analysis in Sha’arei Yosher, Gate Five, where he notes that the prohibition on taking another’s property does not derive from “Do not steal”; rather, “Do not steal” derives from the pre-halakhic prohibition (the legal prohibition) on taking another’s property. The fact that I do not take his property is not the result of “Do not steal,” and therefore it applies also to a gentile even though, at least according to some views, there is no prohibition of “Do not steal” regarding him. One implication of this distinction is that, according to the Rashi mentioned above, a person may not save his life at the cost of robbing a gentile’s property. The problem with robbing a gentile is not “Do not steal,” but that the property is his and not mine (that is, it is a decision about someone else’s territory, and it is not proper to make it on the basis of my own spiritual-benefit considerations alone).
[1] Indeed, in my article on organ donation I argued that it is permitted and a mitzvah to take organs from one who is brain-dead, even if he is not defined as dead, in order to save another person, and I based this on comparing the value of their lives. Seemingly, there I did rely on a comparison of life values; but I qualified this by requiring the donor’s consent. Without his consent, such a comparison cannot suffice to permit the act.
[2] I must clarify that this has nothing to do with the question of emotion. I am not discussing whether one ought to feel moral compassion or to perform the moral act as if compelled. In Column 22 (and briefly here) I clarified my position that emotion has no spiritual or ethical value whatsoever. The question I am asking here is not about emotion but about the ethical and halakhic motivation, even if it is entirely rational and has no emotional component at all.
[3] One can debate the prohibition of “Do not stand idly by the blood of your fellow,” which is transgressed by one who does not save his fellow, but for our purposes this is merely an example, so I will not enter into it here.
[4] In the next column I will elaborate further on the distinction between caring for another person and caring for the world.
[5] See at the end of my article on the guilt-offering, a comparative analysis of the three stories.
[6] For example, according to the Ran in Yoma, it is preferable to slaughter for a sick person on Shabbat rather than to feed him carrion (see the beginning of Column 62). Although slaughter on Shabbat is a severe prohibition whose penalty is stoning, eating carrion entails a large quantity of prohibitions (for each olive-sized piece). Quantity, then, outweighs quality. The wags resolve the classic question according to this Ran: the Egyptians held like the Ran. Therefore, in their view, if they did not kill Abraham they would transgress adultery with every act of intercourse, whereas if they killed him, they would transgress murder only once. Hence it was preferable for them to kill Abraham and only then take Sarah.
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It is very easy to slip from spiritual solipsism to self-interested egoism in which even God is nothing more than a means to my own success. In His great mercy, God has revealed how I can maximize my spiritual state and now I don’t actually need Him. In such a state, I am not truly serving God, but rather serving myself (with God’s help, of course).
A perception of working for a higher purpose frees me from this position. My act of mitzvot is intended for Him and not for me. Reward for mitzvot is meaningless. I do mitzvot out of duty as an adult and not out of self-interest, even if it is spiritual.
I was reminded today that a great example of value solipsism is NBA player Russell Westbrook. He makes a point of giving assists (giving his teammates their shots), which is ostensibly an altruistic act (making sure his teammates score points). But the common assumption is that he does it so they can count towards his personal statistics.
I thought of another excuse for the question about Abraham and Sarah.
The dispute is about the Tosafot in Kiddushin, page 2, whether the wife is the husband's property or not. The Gentiles believe that the wife is the husband's property and that no one puts himself above his property, and since Abraham will kill them, they have permission to kill him. And if you say that they introduce themselves to rape intentionally, you can excuse them by believing, like Rabbi Yehuda ben Batira, that if his desire becomes stronger, he should wear black and go to a place where there are no priests and do whatever his heart desires, that there is rape in desire.
Abraham, on the other hand, believed, according to the Tosafot, that a woman is not the property of her husband, and therefore a man puts himself above his wife, and if they kill him, it is in desire, not in rape. You can also say that he believes, according to the Tosafot, that everything is in the hands of God except for the fear of God, and there is no rape in desire, and therefore he introduces himself to rape intentionally, since it is as if he were to kill him intentionally.
And what about Sarah? It can be said that Abraham believed that a woman is the foundation of the world and there is no sin here. And Sarah, who is not comfortable with this, as Rashi said about Abimelech, what is her opinion? Or she believes according to Rashi's method that a person is forbidden to save himself with his friend's wealth, and even more so with his friend's body, and she disagrees with the Tosafot in the Sanhedrin regarding the matter of if a person is told to kill or to throw a baby and it is killed, he does not need to surrender his life and let them throw it. Or she believes, as do those who disagree with Rashi, that it is permissible, but since there is shame in the matter of making her a prostitute who is trampled upon by the whole world, and as Shimon and Levi said, "The whore will make our sister," it is better for the person to fall into the furnace and not be honored by the disgrace of his friend.
On the 24th of Tevet 5771
Abraham's calculation is simple. If the Egyptians/Canaanites think she is his wife, they will eliminate him immediately. On the other hand, if she is his sister, they will prefer to negotiate with him in order to close a "matchmaking" in a respectable manner.
Initially, they will be invited to parties and feasts of "high society" to woo the woman and her brother. Then the "matchmaking offers" will begin, which Abraham, as a shrewd merchant, will reject, and the offerors will think he is asking for a higher price, and in the meantime, several months pass until one bright morning Abraham gets up and leaves the place, without anything happening.
This is the "trick" that the servant In all the places where Abraham and Sarah roamed, until a mishap occurred in Egypt. The Egyptians gave up on the ‘respectable’, and instead of starting a courtship – they got straight to the point’. A mishap that also occurred in Gerar, and in both cases a miracle was needed to save them. But in the decades that Abraham and Sarah roamed in Canaan – the method worked and prevented kidnappings.
With blessings, Ben-Zion Yohanan Korinaldi-Radetzky
The risk is also calculated, even if, God forbid, the ’trick’ doesn’t work – after all, after rape, the woman remains alive and can somehow recover, but from death it is impossible to rise to life.
And so Jacob plans to be saved from his actions, a complete salvation by Doron Prayer and War, but he also prepares for the possibility of failure and tries to minimize the damage: "If Esau comes to one camp and attacks it, and the remaining camp becomes a desert."
On the 24th of Tevet 5771
In the Gem (Pesachim 68:2) it is reported that Rav Sheshet would say after he had reviewed his Talmud: “My soul rejoices, for I have read to you, for you I have read.” The Gem challenges: And does a person study only for himself? And does not the Torah sustain the entire world, as stated: “If it were not for my covenant day and night, I would not have established the laws of heaven and earth?” The Gem answers: “From the beginning, it is knowledge that is a work for the soul.” In order for his study to bring blessing to the world, a person must make personal advancement his main goal. When he satisfies his soul’s thirst for increasing wisdom and knowledge, Then he will have ‘something to sell’ to the whole world..
In fact, the Gamma teaches us the theory of ‘spiritual capitalism’. Just as Adam Smith discovered in his book ‘The Wealth of Nations’ that the success and economic well-being of the individual does not come at the expense of others, but rather contributes to the well-being of the whole. When a person develops his business – he thereby creates employment for many workers, suppliers, and distributors. The competition created by others who envy him – leads to attempts to develop more efficient production methods, and ’merchants' envy’ will develop the economy. And so we see that it is precisely in a capitalist country – that the standard of living of the workers rises.
Over a thousand years before Smith, the sages understood the correctness of this rule in the spiritual world. When a person cultivates his spiritual world with the goal of strengthening his personality by acquiring more and more wisdom and understanding, he thereby contributes to the spiritual strengthening of the entire world. Everyone will benefit from the fruits of his Torah innovations, whether by accepting his words or by trying to complicate and find new and different insights. When everyone strives to strengthen their mind, everyone is blessed and their spiritual wealth grows.
With blessings, Sully the Fasist Altruist
The sages thus emphasized the vitality of free competition for cultivating the spiritual life, and therefore the doctrine that permits free competition between teachers was accepted as law (in the sense of not digging) because "the envy of scribes increases wisdom."
However, just as in economic life, although the Torah sanctified the right of private property of man, and forbade violating it and ’enlarging the poor in his own way’, it imposed on the rich a duty of responsibility to his poor brother, to help him physically and financially, with the greatest justification being to find work for the poor that would return him to the circle of economic independence.
Thus in the Torah, the great Torah scholars of our generations recommended that the learner set aside ‘a tenth of his time’ in which he would help those weaker than him in learning. Here too, there is a process that combines giving with receiving, for ‘my students are more than all’. When a person needs to explain the words of the Torah to someone who is less well-off and experienced – he must clarify and define things in the clearest way, and in that way the giver's understanding will also be profound.
Receiving and giving, intertwined and complementary.
Best regards, Yaron Fish”l Ordner
Perhaps the behavior in Haredi society does not stem from spiritual solipsism, but simply because for them there are no other values besides the commandments (based on the common argument there that the commandments = morality). So for them there are no two sides at all because the global-consequential account is not a moral teaching; it contradicts the Torah (spiritual solipsism)
Shlomo Zalman
Line 3 – …It is immoral…
It's a play on words. The image you describe is also about solipsism.
In the 24th of Tevet 5, 1911,
A person who does not fear God can both commit adultery and murder, but taking a man's wife while her husband is alive is an open offense for all to see, while murder can also be committed secretly, by poisoning the husband or slandering him and having him executed, etc., and that way no one will know that there was murder here..
With greetings, Prof. Tut-Vanil-Limon, Department of Criminology, Nua-Amon University
It was probably not acceptable even among the ancient Egyptians to sit in court and annul the couple's marriage in the first place 🙂
Since you already mentioned the elegant poor man, the Haredi approach has already reached an absurdity in the commandment “Love your neighbor as yourself”; “Your neighbor’s name is a requirement for fulfilling this commandment”; a mitzvah. This of course cannot be because there is no such thing as true love without respect. Seeing your neighbor as a requirement is not respect. This is of course the Archimedean point from which it spreads to all the other commandments to which this approach is incorrect. Indeed, this mitzvah is not a particularly Haredi mitzvah and also explains why prohibitions such as slander, etc. are not perceived as replacing your status in Haredi society with fear of God (and fear of God is not worth much there either. It is for the unsuccessful (somewhat rightly so. Haredi fear of God is a bit of a type of conservative righteousness))
Correction to the third line from the bottom: And also explains why prohibitions such as slander, etc. are not perceived as those that elevate your status in ultra-Orthodox society as God-fearing.
Is there actually an opening here for permission for euthanasia? A person is suffering greatly and instead of considering my spiritual gain (not violating the prohibition of "Thou shalt not murder"), I kill him so that he does not suffer.
But you are not weighing here within the spiritual space (between my spirituality and the spirituality of others) but between one value (life + the act of killing) and another value (suffering). A person is also forbidden to kill himself through euthanasia.
I think you are both right. In principle, one could make a claim like Yishai's, but in the column I am dealing with the question of what the halakha says (whether it is solipsistic or not), and here it is clear that the halakha is that this should not be done. It may fall within the scope of an offense per se, but not spiritual globalism.
In the 21st of Tevet 5, the explanation for the prohibition of "rejecting a life for a life" is that if the reason for the prohibition "Thou shalt not murder" is "pikuach nefesh", then even if one transgresses the prohibition, there is a loss of life, and in any case there is no "pikuach nefesh" that permits it.
This is not the case with the pursuer. Since he is the culprit and is pursuing his companion to kill him, his life is not entitled to protection from "pikuach nefesh", and we are left with nothing but the pikuach nefesh of the pursued, and similarly with the pursuit of fornication, his life is not entitled to protection from "pikuach nefesh".
The question we were asked is whether it would be permissible to violate the Sabbath or commit another offense in order to save a woman from rape, or is the permission only to kill the pursuer, for whom the prohibition of “Thou shalt not murder” has expired.
With greetings, Yaron Fishel Ordner
In the “Torah of the King,” the discussion is from the side of the laws of war, which want to say that just as in the war between the sons of Noah a nation was permitted to harm its enemies in order to save its sons, so too will the law be in a war between Israel and another nation. And so it is accepted throughout the world that when shooting, shelling, and bombing, it is not possible to achieve complete sterility and during the battle innocent people are also harmed.
Regardless of the content of the article, the question that opens it compares two cases that are not comparable; the comparison should be whether it is permissible to give up a woman to be naked in order to save Jews, as in the case of Lot who offered his daughters to those surrounding his house. After all, in all the cases described (Yael, etc.), it is the same women who committed the alleged offense in their bodies, and the comparison to them should be with someone who is willing to give himself up and die in order to save others. That person certainly did not violate the “Thou shalt not murder” and in the same way, those women did not commit any offense of adultery, since they “committed suicide indecently”. I argue that Yael, Esther, and Lot's daughters did not commit any offense even though they did an act that itself could be considered forbidden, and therefore the expression “offense per se” Its true meaning is “admits the facts but denies the guilt” From a halakhic perspective, this is a type of rape, they volunteered to be raped. In order to commit a lewd act, one must have the intention to enjoy the act, and they are not saying that they intended for pleasure but for a different result. Hence, it is difficult to say, and therefore the interesting discussion in the article does not really stem from the analogy that compares bananas to Argentina.
As a matter of fact, if we neutralize the theological dimension of halakhic law, and it is a mitzvah to do so as it is said “not in heaven” we are dealing with a doctrine of law that is a law among Israel. The completely secular question here, because it is not related to any divine question, is what the source of law is, whether it stems from the threat in the law (i.e. the prohibition) or whether it stems from our desire to do a good deed through something pre-legal. This is an ancient legal debate and in modern times is represented by the British scholars Austin and Hart. In the area of property, this is precisely the question of whether property arises from the threat against robbers or from the fact that there is a pre-legal concept of ownership and the threat to robbers is intended to strengthen it. Since there are robbers in the world, property must be protected.
I agree that the idea that property arises from the fact that there are laws prohibiting robbery is a false idea, since it means that in a world without robbers there is no private property. On the other hand, the question of whether to save another person with his friend's money can be interpreted as meaning that although there is private property, there is also a right of expropriation, like the "high road". That is, if a person's life is at stake, then private property that could be used for rescue is expropriated for the purpose of saving it, and then it ceases to be private property. If it is permissible to expropriate private property for the sake of people's passage, why is it forbidden to expropriate in order to save one soul, which is a whole world? We have also found that it is permissible to "expropriate" Human life to save others, for example when criminals are put in a dome, so that they die, in order to save the public from them. It seems to me that if it is a criminal of the type that is put in a dome and Jewish lives can be saved by doing so, it would be permissible, because either way it is his judgment. But when it is simply a person whose possession is kosher, the value of life is greater than the value of property, and therefore in my opinion it is permissible to confiscate property to save a life, but it is forbidden to confiscate life to save a life, and this is the excuse and not a question of whether autonomy over the body is equal to autonomy over property.
Omri, your words are full of careless comparisons and distinctions, and none of them deal with the question discussed in the column.
The comparison was brought up in my words as an opening that demonstrates a common element between the two cases. The fact that there are other differences neither elevates nor detracts.
Regarding the offense per se, you are completely wrong. It is an offense for all intents and purposes, and there is no rape here. They introduced themselves into rape, and in various issues it has been proven (at least to most opinions) that it is not rape. I have also explained more than once that the intention neither elevates nor detracts in the matter of the offense per se.
The source you cited from “not in the heavens” for not considering theological levels is your invention. But really, my words are not related to theological dimensions. I am talking about the halakha from the perspective of the Almighty. It has nothing to do with not in the heavens.
The ancient legal debate you brought up deals with completely different points: legal realism, nominalism, and natural law. None of these are in any way related to our discussion here. And certainly the threat of the law is not related here (if anything, then the imperative).
The conclusion that in a world without usurpers there is no ownership is logical nonsense. Even if ownership was created by virtue of “Thou shalt not steal”, the prohibition against stealing exists even in a world where there are no usurpers. Not close to each other.
And finally, you are confusing the king's right to expropriate property with the right of a private individual to do so. Again, not close to each other. The king acts from a public perspective, and therefore has permission to do things that a private individual does not.
The negligence is only in your eyes because I was brief. The beginning of my words do not deal with the things that were raised in the column because to begin with, the example is not good since it compares Reuven's right to put Shimon at risk of his life or his nakedness, against Shimon's right to put himself at risk.
Regarding a crime per se, I am not “completely wrong” but both Rishonim and Aharonim state that it is not a crime in the case of Yael and Co.’ This is a big disagreement, each according to his own method, defining when it is permissible. As soon as there are rules for permission – When those rules are met, it is not a crime. As something is permitted, then it is permitted just like pork rinds in houses full of all good things. Also, the intention that you casually dismiss the matter, according to several Aharonim (for example, the Commissioner of Volzín) is important regarding a crime per se.
According to Maimonides, "not in the heavens" means that a prophet cannot innovate anything in the words of the Torah, meaning that the thinking in them is rational and not prophetic, and this is what I mean by not theological. The process of halakhic inference is purely legal thinking, when in addition to public and private law in the Torah, the law between man and God is also added, but here too the analysis is rational-legal. I do not mean erasing the commandments between man and God by saying that law is not theological, but rather that the tools of legal analysis do not include questions of reward and punishment in the next world, etc. Therefore, you can also erase the "commandment of God" in the commandments and replace it with "a convention that the matter is true for hidden reasons" or "we do it this way and do not ask why" and you will still get the same legal results.
The debate I brought up between Austin and Hart deals precisely with the question of whether the source of the law is a threat (human punishment) or the desire to do good (human commandment). If you replace in your column the desire to receive a reward with the desire to quiet the conscience, you will be able to arrive at exactly the same debate between Austin and Hart. I thought the analogy was self-evident.
A prohibition is not possible in a world in which there is no possibility of the emergence of an evil person who will violate the prohibition. A world without criminals is a world without criminal lawyers and without criminal law. This is why the sages had to look for an excuse why the Torah spoke of a rebellious and rebellious son when there is no such thing in reality - there is no place to prohibit something that does not happen. The prohibition cannot give rise to reality even in the contractual space. It is like saying that the fact that a chicken does not crow stems from the fact that there is a prohibition on chickens to crow, or that people speak because there is a prohibition on remaining silent for life. The concept of "prohibition" On the behavioral level, it arises solely from the existing and actual possibility of transgressing against it, in violation of a physical prohibition, for example.
I am not mixing anything up. The fact that the king has permission to confiscate means that for certain reasons private property is confiscated. What about the prohibition of leaven before the time of its prohibition from the Torah? The sages confiscated a person's property only to prevent a person from committing a crime, and this is for his own good. That is to say, in private property there are reasons (the public good, avoiding a prohibition) that allow its confiscation. Now the question arises: Can a king confiscate a person's property in order to save another person? Is a court of law permitted to confiscate a person's property in order to save another person? If he is permitted, then what would diminish Shimon's power when I testify that a court of law would confiscate Reuben's property in order to save Levi, that Shimon would also do so and make his own law? And if you wish, this is the true interpretation of “And he turned this way and that, and saw that there was no man”, Moses did not check whether there were no witnesses to the fact, but rather saw that there were no two people to join him in establishing a court to sentence the Egyptian to death, and in such a situation he appointed himself to the court and killed him. Therefore, the meaning of “Who appointed you as a man to rule and judge over us” is how you appoint yourself to a court of three “a man (a decent person), a ruler (a man of power), and a judge (a wise man in the Torah)” that you determine who is wicked (“And he said to the wicked” meaning he judged him) and when it is said “Indeed the matter became known” In other words, it was learned that Moses had taken on the role of a judge and this is why Pharaoh wanted to kill him. Pharaoh did not care that Moses was killing an Egyptian, but he was doing it as a single judge without the king's approval - this is rebellion. Ultimately, when there is no court in place and a decision must be made immediately, such as in the case of saving a life, a person may turn himself into a judge, confiscate property and save those who need to be saved, if there is no other way, and this is very simple for someone who does not think that Reuben's right to property outweighs Shimon's right to life, which is a puzzling conclusion.
PS I say it even differently – “offense per se” = “an act that would be considered an offense without special circumstances qualifying it, so don't learn from this act because in 99.99% of cases it is forbidden to do so”. From here one can argue about the circumstances: intention to enjoy or not (the commissioner of Volzín), a greater purpose, etc. And again, this is a rule that is not necessarily theological, it is also in the Israeli Penal Code in sections called justification, necessity, etc.