Okay, I’ll rephrase the question about Leibovitz:

שו”ת › Category: faith › Okay, I’ll rephrase the question about Leibovitz:

asked 8 years ago

I think the rabbi doesn’t like the style of the question…
again,
Hello Rabbi,
Does Yeshayahu Leibowitz have the status of a ‘Torah apostate’ and is it forbidden to read his books because “you will not read the Torah”?

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מיכי Staff answered 8 years ago

Until you ask me if he has a law against infidelity, ask if there is such a law. In my opinion, there is no prohibition against reading any book of any kind, as long as it deals with reasoning and factual arguments. This prohibition, even if you find it somewhere, has no logical possibility (a system cannot prohibit someone from examining itself. After all, as long as I haven’t examined it, I am not obligated to it). If there is such a prohibition, then a Christian or a pagan is also prohibited from examining Judaism in the same way. This is nonsense. The question remains what to do with “do not turn,” but I intentionally do not go into it here (I did so in the trilogy), to emphasize that it really does not matter. Even if I could not find any possible explanation, this prohibition is still null and void as a kafra dala shofra dabli bara’a. It’s worth looking at the post about denying the Holocaust and not taking turns, and the post about me being an Epicurus. Then, update Greenzig (the person responsible on behalf of the Chief Rabbinate for sorting out heretics) so that he can also file this (tearful) message in Nadu.

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י.ד replied 8 years ago

Roni Miron in the article “Phenomenology of a Believing Man” in the collection “On Faith” points out a certain problem with Leibowitz’s demands. On the one hand, Leibowitz demands a separation between the transcendence of God and the immanent world, on the other hand, performing a commandment for its own sake connects man and God. As a result, the two demands exclude each other in a way that prevents them from existing together and therefore makes Leibowitz’s method impossible (I suggest reading the article because the presentation here is superficial and not exhaustive).
I remember having such an understanding vaguely at an early stage in a way that caused me to distance myself from Leibowitz’s position.

By the way, the Rabbi explicitly does not hold Leibowitz’s position After all, he maintains that the commandments are a high necessity, contrary to Leibowitz's first claim.