Another Look at the Predicament of Secularism: How Do You Deal with an Empty Wagon? (Column 425)

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 the last two columns I touched, in various ways, on secular values and the secular predicament that accompanies them. Here I wish to conclude this trilogy, that is, to address directly the predicament, its meaning, and its implications. I’ll preface by noting that I’ve already addressed most of these points in the past; my aim here is mainly to focus and sharpen them.

The context

In column 423 on Rabin’s assassination I commented on the secular vacuum that creates an acute need for a rebbe and a path-setter—a need that leads people to treat a redhead with no heritage as if he were a world-class thinker and a leader of historic stature, and to wail and mourn his death as if their grandpa or their rebbe had been murdered. In column 424 I discussed the value of life, which is also being devalued in secular culture. One can still hear pathetic verbiage about the “sanctity of life,” but in my estimation this is a leftover from religious discourse (see, for example, in the talkback here and in my response), and it’s no wonder that it fades with time. Gradually it’s being replaced by the value of autonomy, and in fact by the dominant value (soon the only one) of a value-vacuum and the absence of sacred principles beyond bare life and the right to do whatever you feel like (what the existentialists, in their confused parlance, call “existence precedes essence”).

Against this backdrop I recalled that a few days ago I saw an article by a man named Rami Livni (who, as I noticed, tends to write in Haaretz columns about secular Judaism), in which he argues, with good taste and sense, that Judaism needs secularism. The article’s headline is “Only the secular will continue Judaism,” but I assume the site provided the headline rather than the author (as is customary). Be that as it may, I presume I needn’t describe to you what’s written there. All these columns are predictable, banal clones of one another, and needless to say they’re all vanity and a striving after wind. Sometimes they point to problems (some real) in religious and traditional Judaism; in most cases they explain what secular Judaism is and leave it to the fevered imagination of the reader to understand why secular Judaism is the sure prescription for an authentic and productive continuation of Judaism.

Is there criticism here? The “empty wagon” predicament

The predicament created by the secular vacuum (an empty wagon) is understandable. It’s hard to live without anything worth dying for. Rotblit wrote it and Ariel Zilber sang it—and eventually decided to take a step to improve the situation. It’s difficult when you have no binding values, no rebbes (why do rebbes sprout like mushrooms after rain in the Hasidic world?), no heritage, no national and cultural identity, and the like (see here, here, here, and here, and in the series of columns 336 and on). In such a situation nothing is supposed to matter to you. I’ve already clarified in the past that I claim this on two levels: (A) If there are secular values, there’s nothing Jewish about them. They are universal. So even if there are secular values, a secular Jewish identity is certainly not present here (see the links in the parentheses above). (B) The existence of such values in a secular world is inconsistent, since in fact there cannot be values in a world devoid of God (see my book The First Being, Fourth Conversation, part C). This is the emptiness of analyticity and the emptiness of secularism that emerges from it and in turn reproduces it.

I have made clear more than once that I am making a philosophical claim here, not an empirical-factual one. There are many secular people who are wonderful human beings—by my impression, no fewer in number and quality than among the religious. My claim is that they are inconsistent. Their wagon is empty in the philosophical sense, not necessarily in the human sense. In other words, secular morality exists as a phenomenon on the psychological plane (values are embedded in them and they act accordingly) but not on the philosophical plane (they cannot infer the values and decide to be committed to them). At most there is here an implicit faith (that is, someone who is committed to values is a covert believer, even if he himself is unaware of it; see columns 191 and 194).

By the way, these words of mine are not a critique of secularism but a description of it and of what emerges from it and is reflected through it. This is indeed the picture that follows from a secular world. I certainly do not expect that someone suffering from such a predicament will repent because in the religious world he will find values and rebbes (come spend Shabbat with us). My critique of the religious world is also well known in certain respects regarding adherence to values and leaders solely out of psychological need (opium for the masses, as Marx rightly said). If that is a person’s outlook, so be it; he must make peace with it. Nor am I interested in rubbing salt into the wounds of a population in distress (though in most cases they are not aware of this predicament; it finds expression in various ways). What would be fitting in the face of such distress is to turn to a psychologist who will create meaning for them where it doesn’t exist. It’s hard to live without meaning. True, it comes out a bit amusing (see column 159), but at least it’s an understandable and natural outlet. If there are no real meanings, let us create something artificial that will at least keep us going.

My critique here is directed only at those whose distress drives them out of their senses and leads them to find values where there are none; that is, to think that the meanings they have created ex nihilo are equivalent to real meanings. That’s what leads people to write, again and again, nonsense like this.

Since these things recur under every green tree (apparently due to the acute predicament and inferiority complex vis-à-vis the full wagon), I thought it right, after all, to devote to them a short column, even though most of the points have already been discussed by me elsewhere.

A first glance: three assumptions

The claim in the title of Livni’s article rests on three assumptions of different kinds, each of which requires examination:

• Factual-evaluative assumption: secularism is a continuation (at least possible, even if not necessary) of Judaism.
• Evaluative assumption: there is value in the existence and continuation of Judaism in this sense.
• Factual assumption: it is secularism that will continue Judaism.

As noted, Livni himself does not deal with survival but with the idea that Judaism needs secularism. But I assume that this need is for its existence and survival. Therefore I will continue to discuss these three assumptions.

Claim A is, at the very least, odd. Judaism has always been a religion. True, there was a nation that bore it, but what defined it was its origin and its religion. Its origin is an ethnic fact, and its religion is a value-laden and ideological decision. The origin is the technical framework, and the religion is the essential content that is passed on. Now the descendants of that nation-religion, who preserve only the ethnic framework without the essential content, come along and declare themselves its authentic (or at least: an authentic) continuers. Ethnically and genetically this is of course correct, but that’s a trivial fact, and I assume this is not the point of his claim nor of the debates against it. In the essential sense, in what way is he continuing traditional Judaism? That he speaks Hebrew? Studies the Bible or the legends of the Sages and Jewish history? That he is a moral person? That he lives in Israel? One can argue about each such feature, but even if I accept all of them as legitimate Jewish features (it seems to me that among these only Hebrew might perhaps qualify), why does this matter at all? This brings me to claim B.

Suppose that a set of genetic and ethnic features can sustain a definition of some type of Judaism. Definitions tolerate anything. Is there value in holding on to such features? What is the value in the continuation of Judaism in this sense? The claim that only secularism can continue Judaism, or that Judaism needs it, apparently assumes that there is some value here. I am Jewish in all these technical senses just as a Belgian is Belgian and a Tanzanian is Tanzanian. Is there value in an inborn affiliation that I did not choose? And if this group were to become extinct (physically or culturally), what would be bad about that? There will be other people who will conduct themselves in ways that seem right to them. And even if I did choose this affiliation for reasons of taste and sentiment—so what? Are following my personal taste and sentiment of any value? I also choose to wear black trousers and sandals made by Mahmoud Abbas. I belong there because that’s how I was born. That’s all; and even if I chose an ethnic affiliation (doubtful—it’s clear that most of us did not choose it), it has no evaluative significance. I chose to live in neighborhood A or B, or to engage in profession C or D. So what?

Were I not afraid to say it, I would ask him whether, in his view, anything in the characteristics of secular society constitutes the fulfillment of the will of the Almighty. I’m not speaking of positive values that this society has—values found in many societies worldwide. I’m speaking of its Judaism. That is the only point under discussion. Is there here a continuation of the mission of our forefather Abraham? Was his mission that someone speak Hebrew? What would have been wrong with Tanzanian?

Only after all this can we ask the factual question (which is already clear to be entirely unimportant): will secularism indeed continue Judaism? I very much doubt it—but time will tell.

Back to the article

If you look in his article for any hint of engagement with any of these three claims, it will be in vain. He merely describes the essence of secular Judaism without explaining in what way it is Jewish. Critical interest in the history of the Jewish people and its personalities is, in my view, far from constituting a criterion of Jewishness; nor is the establishment of a moral and open society. You will not find with him even any arguments for claim C (that Judaism needs secularism, or that secularism will continue Judaism). He focuses on describing the ambivalent historical and cultural link that secular Judaism has to the past—and that’s it. The conclusions—why this is necessary and vital, or why this is what will carry us forward—you will look for there in vain. That is left to the reader’s wild imagination. Not to mention arguments as to why any of this has value. In his remarks, as in all his hundreds of boring, bored, and boring clones—the humanistic secular Judaism crowd—there is not even a sliver of a hint on this matter. Imagine an article in which I described my relationship to the used sandals of women in Venice taller than 1.70 meters. I would devote my life to researching the matter and critically engaging with other approaches to those sandals. I would then expect you, my loyal readers, to understand why this is the most meaningful pursuit for the survival of Judaism—or even of the city of Venice—and why, for heaven’s sake, this peculiar occupation and its survival have any value at all.

Consider, for example, the following pathetic passage:

When the secular Zionist looks back, he chooses not to focus first on the continuity of belief, texts, and rituals—that is, on “tradition”—even if he does not deny their centrality and power for those times. His attention is given first to the historical, national, linguistic, and experiential continuum; and also to literary and cultural aspects that do not derive their validity only from religion and go beyond it. He will be less interested in the question of what moral literature commands, and more in the question of how it influenced communal cohesion.

He speaks again and again of survival and continuity without defining what is at issue, and certainly without addressing the value of a mere simple factual affiliation and its continuation. Think about my experiential and historical continuum with the tall women of Venice and their sandals. Unlike them, I do not espouse their values or their beliefs—but I certainly engage with their sandals. And that’s really something, isn’t it!

When I referred Chayuta Deutsch to this article (and asked her for a working link—thanks for that), she said that, in her eyes, Livni proposes to continue the shoe size of our forefather Abraham. That gave me the association to the sandals of the women of Venice. It seems to me this is not a bad description of his article. Even in a talkback there (number 90), someone wonders what on earth Livni means when he says that Israel needs secularism. He did not even hint as to why—not even a subtle hint.

This article reminds me of the poor Chinese man who received two pennies of charity and bought with them a slice of bread and a flower. When asked why he didn’t buy two slices of bread, he replied: the bread is to live, and the flower is to have something to live for (look at me—I’m a legitimate continuer of Chinese culture; I just look at it and interpret it in my own way). Livni deals with the technical and factual framework while completely dropping the evaluative essence. So what’s the point of all this?

I have likewise written more than once (for example, in column 419; see also 139, 34, 240, and 266) about the Talmudic discussion of “He to study and his son to study—he precedes his son.” At times we have the sense that our goal is to pass on the Torah torch, and sometimes that overshadows the duty to study ourselves. But if we engage only in passing the torch, who in this chain will study Torah? For whom are we doing all this? Mere survival, absent content whose survival has value, has no value. A framework has no value if it is not dedicated to transmitting some evaluative content.

Later he speaks of historical memory and the (ambivalent) connection to the historical heroes of Judaism. But what is the value in all this? Why is this connection important if it does not serve to pass on values or certain evaluative missions? These connections are, first of all, a fact, and then a sentiment and a personal taste. This is, of course, a perfectly legitimate hobby. Let everyone engage in what he fancies—but there is no reason to make an ideology out of it.

Is someone who obsessively (though critically) busies himself with the fate of his elementary-school classmates carrying a torch of significance for the generations? Is there any point in making an ideology out of this? To argue about it, to debate with people of other views? To explain why the memory of the class needs this engagement? Do whatever you want—just spare me.

Summary

I will repeat that I have no criticism of the emptiness of the secular wagon. That follows from its very essence, and my statements about the emptiness are a description, not a judgment. My criticism is of the blindness of those who drive it and of turning emptiness into an alternative content. I must further sharpen that my intent here is to emptiness in the Jewish sense (any secular individual or group may have rich content in several other respects—but his secularism is empty by definition).

What causes intelligent people to recycle, again and again, such foolish and tasteless claims—and even to get excited by them, write about them, and copy them from one another, as if there were here a new gospel for the universe? It seems to me this is a sharp, clear demonstration of the vacuum and the predicament described above. Sometimes the predicament is conscious and sometimes not, but in my estimation it is always there. People feel frustration in the face of the emptiness of their Jewish wagon; therefore, an alternative that ostensibly holds water suffices for them, and they are exempted from explaining in what sense this is a continuation of anything and what value there is in the survival of such phenomena. Others are satisfied with pointing to problems in the full wagon of the religious (which, thank God, are plentiful) to buttress their preposterous claims—but they do not bother to explain what their alternative is and in what sense it is Jewish.

Here I focused on the negative side, that is, on explaining where he is wrong and why one cannot even argue against his proposals—because he has no proposals (there is no such thing as a secular Jewish identity; see the series of links brought above). But it would seem that I am disqualifying by my own blemish, for I too did not explain what my alternative is. However, this is not the place to get into that. In several places in the past I have explained that the only positive side of Judaism—the only thing that can be considered “Judaism” in an evaluative sense and not merely a factual one—is Halakhah.