On Labels and Discussions, or: Am I an Apikoros? (Column 74)
Why the label apikorus is not, in his view, an insult but only a conclusion that must be justified
The column opens by clarifying that he does not see the Facebook discussion as contempt, insolence, or insult. If someone thinks he is an apikorus and believes the public should be warned, then it is actually proper to say so openly, as long as the claims are reasoned and substantive.
In his view, the problem begins not with a sharp label but with an empty one. Someone who attaches a label without argument replaces discussion with denunciation, and someone who takes offense often does so because he lacks substantive arguments. The central criterion, then, is the quality of the reasoning, not the level of politeness or delicacy. In that sense he is even glad the discussion is happening, because it serves the broader goal at the heart of all his writing.
The aim of the site: to cleanse religious discourse of ad hominem, ad populum, and fear of heresy
The column explains that the point of his writing is not only to defend particular claims but to change the form of religious discourse: fewer dogmas, less reliance on majorities or authorities, and more substantive examination of arguments. That is why it matters to him to clarify who is authoritative at all, in which areas, and what that authority means.
At a deeper level he argues that the only real question is whether something is true or not. Even a foreign, extreme, or repulsive claim deserves discussion if it is reasoned; and one cannot forbid a person to think or express a position, because even obedience to God first requires an independent decision that God exists and ought to be obeyed. He goes so far as to say that if he were convinced that Christianity, or any other position, is correct, intellectual honesty would require him to follow it. So if the accepted interpretation of Hazal sees this stance as heresy, then by that definition they may indeed be right; from his perspective, the very fact that this charge is now being voiced already advances the discussion he wants to have.
Why he is willing to pay the price of destabilization: truth comes before security, and suppression does more harm
The column acknowledges that the kind of discourse he proposes unsettles beliefs that many people consider principles of faith, and that it may indeed cause damage. Even so, in his view one cannot sacrifice truth for the sake of a sense of security, and in practice suppression causes greater damage.
His main audience is religious people who live in deep dissonance between traditional language and modern, scientific thought. Many of them remain religious only in a sociological sense, or abandon faith internally, because they have no substantive answer. Against dogmatists on one side and postmodern skeptics on the other, he proposes the synthetic path: rational, systematic, non-certain inquiry that purifies faith of mistaken accretions, even if great rabbinic authorities across the generations adopted them.
The distinction that drives the entire column: formal authority belongs to norms, not to facts
The column distinguishes between formal authority and substantive authority. Formal authority obligates obedience even if the authority figure is mistaken, and therefore belongs to norms: the laws of parliament, or binding halakhic rulings. Substantive authority means that I accept a claim because I am convinced the authority knows the truth, like a doctor or other expert.
From that comes his central conclusion: in matters of fact there is no room at all for formal authority. One cannot demand that a person believe something merely because an authoritative source said it; one can only persuade him. Therefore foundational questions in Jewish thought, such as providence, the messiah, the afterlife, miracles, or the special nature of the people of Israel, are not subject to blind obedience but to intellectual, interpretive, and empirical examination. Even if a claim appears in the Talmud, in Maimonides, or even in the Torah, that by itself does not create an obligation to believe it.
Because of human mediation, Hazal, the Talmud, the Rishonim, and even prophets are not immune to error
The column argues that only God knows facts with complete certainty, but every message that reaches us through human beings involves interpretation and the possibility of error. Therefore Hazal and later rabbinic authorities have no special authority in factual matters, and the Talmud may contain factual mistakes, as well as educational and policy recommendations that are not correct for our time. Even with prophecy he leaves, at least in principle, room for human error or misunderstanding of the message.
This also shapes his approach to sacred texts: when observation, reason, or science lead to a strong conclusion, he will prefer to interpret a talmudic or biblical source in a strained way rather than deny the conclusion. He adopts here the principle that one must not deny what is plainly observed, and therefore verses and rabbinic sayings are not decisive proof for him as long as they can be interpreted otherwise.
The practical examples: lice on Shabbat, prayer, the attitude toward gentiles, and a non-fundamentalist reading of sources
The column gives examples to show that the line between facts and norms is not always sharp, but precisely for that reason one must examine the factual background. If the permission to kill lice on Shabbat rests on a mistaken biological claim, if prayer presupposes certain assumptions about divine involvement, and if the halakhic attitude toward gentiles rests on a description of reality that is no longer true, then one cannot go on reciting the sources without reexamining the facts.
In the same spirit he mentions the tension between the creation story and evolution, or Maimonides' wording that one found guilty in divine judgment dies immediately. In his view, the proper solution is not denial of reality but careful, and at times renewed, interpretation of the sources.
Why the Meiri, Maimonides, and the Kuzari do not have a monopoly on thought
From there the column turns to the dispute that ignited the discussion: his reading of the Meiri and of halakhic change בעקבות changing circumstances. Even if his interpretation of the Meiri turns out to be wrong, the principled claim remains: when the factual basis changes, the application of halakhah can change as well, and there is no reason that what was permitted to the Rishonim should be forbidden to us.
That is why he rejects the aura surrounding works like the Kuzari, the Maharal, or even Maimonides in matters of thought. They can serve as important sources of inspiration, but not as a binding canon. A good argument by Kant is, in his view, worth no less than an argument by a medieval or later rabbinic authority, because in matters of faith and thought we are dealing with human reasoning, not with error-free transmission of divine facts.
The conclusion: camp labels do not replace inquiry, and there is no reason to feel like second-class religious Jews
The column closes by saying that the question whether to call him an apikorus hardly interests him. Labeling is possible, if it is argued for, but the label does not answer whether the claim is true. So from his point of view there is no prior boundary to the legitimacy of reasoned positions, even though he is far from being a pluralist who thinks they are all correct.
Practically speaking, he is willing to learn from anyone who teaches through reasoning rather than preaching, and he sees the discourse of heresy mainly as a camp-maintenance tool, legitimate from the conservatives' standpoint, whose aim is to preserve the boundaries of the camp and avoid a real confrontation with arguments. His hope is that readers who think this way will not internalize feelings of inferiority as merely lite or reform, but will understand that one can think independently and still remain within the camp of faith and commitment.
With God’s help
In recent days I received updates that a Jew named Avishai Grinzaig opened a Facebook discussion about whether I am an apikoros. At the outset appears the declaration: “It is unpleasant to say, but Michael Abraham is not a rabbi but, by definition, an apikoros.” My students and friends drew my attention to this discussion, and many of them expressed shock and offense at the remarks, and at certain parts of the content and style of the discussion there. Since I am not on Facebook and am not really familiar with that medium, I had not seen the remarks and I am not participating in the discussion. Still, following these inquiries I took a look at what was written, and I will write here what seems important to me to say on this matter. I would like to explain here my foundational assumptions and my attitude to such discussions in general. This came out a bit longer than planned, and on that I will say, following Mark Twain, that unfortunately I wrote at length because I had no time (to shorten it).
Discussions, Labels, and the Culture of Debate: On Insults and Insolence
First, regarding insults and insolence. I must say that I did not see contempt there, nor insult, nor insolence. This is an entirely legitimate discussion, and to the best of my understanding, anyone who thinks that I am an apikoros and that it is important to clarify this and inform the public of it is certainly obliged to do so. I support clear and sharp discussion, in which everyone says exactly what he thinks and does not recoil because of considerations of insult, insolence, and the like. Moreover, when people raise a reasoned argument and draw a conclusion from it, there is no insult in that, no insolence, and no contempt. It is a legitimate expression of a position, and it is very important that it be done. If I am an apikoros, then what insolence is there in saying that this is indeed the case?! It is a description of me. Even if it is not correct (and I am not sure of that), it is the writer’s opinion, and it is legitimate and proper that he express it. Especially if the public needs to be informed so that it will know and beware of me, then it is certainly important to say so.
When I too draw conclusions about people or groups, I do so sharply and without obscuring my intentions or my conclusions. Things can be phrased more or less cautiously and politely, but I am really not a person who is careful about that, nor am I among those who think it important to be careful about it. What is important is that the positions be reasoned and substantive. That is the most important criterion, and everything else is marginal in my eyes. See on this Column 63, which also appears on the side of the main page under Clarifications for Site Readers. It seems to me that what was said in that discussion was, generally speaking, reasoned.
The one who insults, shows contempt, or is insolent is only someone who applies labels without reasons, especially if this is done out of self-interest rather than substance. That is not the case here. My impression is that some of the writers truly think I am an apikoros and that it is important to make this clear and inform the public, and if so, they did well to say so plainly and substantively.
Unsupported labels are usually used by people in situations where they have no arguments on the merits. Instead they label, and therefore it is not substantive. But that is not the case here. This is true of the person insulting, but the same applies to the one who is insulted. There too, it usually stems from the fact that he has no substantive arguments, and so all that remains for him is to be offended. To the best of my judgment, there is no reason to be offended by anything written about me unless it is done in a non-substantive, tendentious, and self-interested way, and above all without reasons. Any conclusion of any kind about me, so long as it is substantive and reasoned, is neither contempt nor insolence. On the contrary, it is important to place it before open discussion.
I hope my readers and those who know me will believe me that I am not writing this in order to appear artificially noble. I genuinely bear no grudge against anyone, and I genuinely am entirely in favor of this form of discourse and see it as legitimate and worthy. On the contrary, I am glad that the discussion is taking place, and that it is being conducted in this way. I even see it as an important arena and, from my perspective, a useful one as well (I will explain why below) for advancing religious discourse about faith.
As stated, I do not have even the slightest hard feeling about what was written there, but of course the substance itself deserves clarification. Due to lack of space, I will touch here only on the main points. I will deal mainly with the methodological and general plane, and less with my specific claims that are discussed there (some of them are presented there inaccurately), for two reasons: 1. It is hard to discuss my entire worldview in detail in a single post. I will try to do that in my trilogy, which will certainly arouse even harsher discussions (unless they tire of it). 2. To the best of my knowledge and understanding, the root of everything is methodology, and everything else is a derivative of that.
The Purpose of the Discourse: Foundational Assumptions
My site has one main purpose (apart from avoiding the prohibition of Do not make yourselves abominable, as applied to someone who suppresses and keeps inside what ought to be brought out): purifying and improving public discourse on various subjects. The discussion and clarification of ideas in Judaism is part of that. In the Jewish context, which is the subject on that Facebook page, my principal aim in writing on the site, in lectures, and later also in the trilogy, is to change religious and faith discourse, and not necessarily to present and argue for specific claims. The heart of the matter is the need to make discourse about faith more substantive and less dogmatic.
In my view, in order to clarify an idea or a position, it is not enough to bring sources that say this or the opposite; one must discuss the matter on its own merits. In fact, my main aim is to free faith from unnecessary, mistaken, and harmful appendages, and to sharpen the distinction between essential and peripheral, correct and mistaken. Among other things, discourse must be purified of ad hominem and ad populum fallacies (appeals to authorities or to prevailing opinion). To that end, it is important to me to clarify who (person or text) has binding authority, in which domains that authority exists (Jewish law, thought, and which parts of them), and what the nature of that authority is (substantive—he does not err, or formal—there is an obligation to obey even if he errs).
Beyond all this there is an even deeper level, which is that in my opinion everything is open and available for discussion. There is no place whatsoever for considerations of heresy or non-heresy; the only important question is whether something is true or not true. From my perspective, every argument and every discussion is worthy, and one should engage it on its own merits. The claims may rest on any assumption whatsoever, come from any person whatsoever, and from any motivation whatsoever, so long as they are reasoned. As far as I am concerned, one should discuss the positions of Christians, Karaites, atheists, Nazis, and people from al-Qaeda.[1] Any reasoned question or position merits discussion, and the expression of no position whatsoever should be forbidden or prevented, whatever it may be—not within the framework of the democratic state and not within the study hall. The label “heresy” expresses helplessness in my eyes. When arguments run out, some prefer labels (if the labels are reasoned, then there is no problem, as noted) instead of coping with the issue. As for myself, I want to consider every reasoned position seriously, and I have no problem if someone convinces me that Christianity is right. I hope that in such a case I will be honest enough to become a Christian or a jihadist. Moreover, when one forbids the expression of a position or an opinion, one deprives me of the possibility of forming a position about it and deciding whether I adopt it or not. This is an intolerable limitation on my ability to formulate a position, and a priori I accept no such limitation, even if it comes from the Creator of the universe Himself (after all, in order to obey, I must first decide that He exists and that His words are binding).
It is important to clarify that the restriction on freedom of thought and expression is not an invention of the hardal (Haredi-nationalist) world or of any other group. It is the core of the tradition we received already from the Sages (at least in the accepted interpretation. I do not accept it and do not think that this is what the Sages meant), and I fully understand the meaning of rebelling against it. If someone thinks that disputing the accepted interpretation of the Sages, or even the Sages themselves, is apikorosut, then perhaps he is right that I am an apikoros. From my perspective that of course has no practical consequence (apart from marriage betrothals, of course), since this is what I think whether it is apikorosut or not. I only have to add that, in my view, someone who thinks otherwise is both foolish and not a genuine believer, because he does not formulate a position fully, and therefore the position he holds is not really his position (he has not weighed options that one is forbidden to express, expose, or even think about). When he believes in God and in Torah from Heaven, he is in fact not a genuine believer, since he has not been exposed to arguments such that, had he been exposed to them, his position would have turned out different. So is his current position really his position, or is he deceiving himself?
In this sense I am very glad that this discourse is taking place, because it is exactly what I wanted to happen. Those who think that such a form of discourse counts as apikorosut (= most of the sages of Israel) are precisely the object of my discussion, and if those who hold this position do not express their opinion, then what have I accomplished?! My aim is to bring them to present me as an apikoros, because according to their view I truly am one, and thus to arouse a discussion of whether it is right to label people and positions in this way, and whether arguments of my kind are really illegitimate or incorrect. That is why I wrote above that this very discussion seems important and worthwhile to me. It itself constitutes progress toward advancing my goal.
Because the critics’ position is the accepted view and has always been so, not only in the hardal world, people think that faith and religious commitment require such conceptions even if they do not identify with them. Others do not identify with them, but because of that feel as though they are not truly religious or true believers (slackers, “lite” religion, and so on), and in my view that feeling is problematic and harmful. It causes the religious ethos to remain as it was, while changes are made under the classification of being lite or apikorosut (Reform). My aim is to show that these changes, radical as they may be, ought to be made within the camp of belief and commitment, and there is nothing about them that lies outside the boundary (I doubt there is any “boundary” at all). That is why it is so important to me to stir this discussion, and why I am glad that it is happening.
The Justification: Harm versus Benefit
The implications of the mode of thought I am proposing are enormous and touch the foundations of faith. A great many things that seem to people to be principles of faith are undermined by such a way of thinking and discussing, and it is no wonder that this stirs up a storm. I have written more than once that, in my assessment, this destabilization is more constructive than destructive (though harms are certainly also possible)[2]. My principal aim is twofold: first, even if there are harms, I am tired of sacrificing truth for the sake of security. If this is the truth, then it should be stated clearly, even if some people will be harmed. Beyond that, silence also entails harm, which in my assessment is greater, as I will now explain.
My remarks are meant to offer an outlet for people who feel distress between the tradition and its accepted dogmas on the one hand, and what they truly believe and identify with on the other. The dissonance in which many of us who are immersed in modern and scientific thinking live leads them to a deep internal destabilization of their religious identity. Even those among them who do not actually abandon religious commitment and the traditional, accepted conceptions sometimes abandon them in an essential and inner sense. Because of this tension, they cling to slogans they do not really believe in, and then disconnect from their inner faith, remaining religious on a superficial sociological level and no more. My remarks are directed mainly to those people.
I understand that there are those who may be harmed by this open discourse, but for them there is Avishai Grinzaig and his friends, and really almost everyone else. Almost all literature of Jewish thought speaks to such people, and therefore my remarks are not directed to them. What I am trying to do is offer an answer to people who do not find themselves in the traditional accepted conception and in its accepted arguments, and who therefore, as I explained, find themselves forced to abandon or at least detach from it at the level of their inner identity. I meet many such people, some of the finest among us, whom we are losing outwardly or inwardly, because almost none of them find a convincing answer to their questions (see, for example, here). Many in the public do not sense this because they relate to secularization as merely a kind of educational failure. They do not understand that this is a serious phenomenon that requires us to engage in a very deep self-examination of our faith. There are not a few things about which those becoming secular are right, and the failure is ours.
The other side of the coin is that those who sense the problem and try to offer solutions of their own do so on a mistaken basis. They juggle words and think as though they have solved something. The lack of systematic and substantive engagement with the foundations of faith (and I do not mean the study of “faith,” of course, which has nothing to do with systematicity) leads to the field being open and handed over to two parties: the dogmatists, who hold unsupported and sometimes downright foolish beliefs in dogmatic fashion simply because to say otherwise is “heresy”; and opposite them, the postmodern skeptics, who raise bizarre and strange arguments whose whole point is the desire to reach the desired conclusion. The arguments need not hold water, and the concepts need not be defined.[3] In my book Emet Ve-lo Yatziv I explained that the way to cope with postmodernism and skepticism is not to present a dogmatic position and declare that it is heresy. Dogmatic fundamentalism and postmodern skepticism are two sides of the same coin. The real alternative is a systematic and substantive engagement with arguments, together with an understanding that there is no certainty and there are no absolute truths, but that it does not follow that the required conclusion is skepticism. There I called this “the synthetic path.” Synthetic thinking makes it possible to construct a rational, systematic, and coherent faith, at the “price” (or benefit) of distilling faith from all sorts of peripheral elements that entered it for no good reason. Some of them were indeed enthusiastically adopted by the public and also by the great sages of Israel throughout the generations (yes, yes, they too can err. From Rabbi Akiva and Rabban Yohanan ben Zakkai, through Rav Ashi and Maimonides, the author of the Kuzari, Rabbi Yosef Karo, Maharal, Rabbi Kook, Rabbi Shach, and all the rest. All of them were human beings, and as such exposed to the possibility of error), and yet, at least in my opinion, common-sense thinking places them under a very large question mark.
The Methodological Foundation of My Views
One of the focal points of the discussion is the authority of the sages. I sometimes allow myself to question conceptions accepted by the overwhelming majority of the public, because the majority is usually wrong. “Collective divine inspiration” (If you do not know, O fairest among women, go forth in the footsteps of the flock, “follow the tracks of the flock”) does not persuade me at all. But I also allow myself to go against conceptions accepted by the sages of Israel throughout the generations, and that is apparently what arouses the anger of quite a few critics. Above I wrote that the pillars of my conception are three: examination of the sources of authority (persons and texts), their scope, and the essence and nature of that authority. I will therefore briefly describe my assumptions on these three planes.
Two Concepts of Authority: Facts and Norms
First, one must distinguish between formal authority and substantive authority. The meaning of formal authority is that I must accept statements because of their authorized source (text or person), even if I do not agree with them. Thus, for example, even if in my opinion sorting is not a prohibited labor on the Sabbath, the Talmud determined that it is. Therefore, despite my personal opinion, I must be careful not to sort. Formal authority does not assume that the authority is necessarily right, but that even if it is not right, one must obey its words. The Knesset, for example, has such authority. No one would claim that it is always right, or even that it is more right than an ordinary citizen. And yet there is an obligation to obey its laws because it is the authorized body. By contrast, substantive authority is grounded in the claim that the authority is right. In truth, this is not really authority, because in the final analysis I accept the claims not because so-and-so said them, but because in my view they are correct. The conclusion that they are correct, however, does not stem from substantive reasoning but from trust that so-and-so knows what he is talking about and is a great expert. Such, for example, is the authority of a doctor. I heed his instructions not because he has some authority, but because I estimate that he is right, since he is a professional who knows what he is talking about (and I do not). The other side of the coin is that if I somehow reach the conclusion that he is wrong (whether by my own reasoning or through hearing other views, a second opinion), I will not heed him. Under formal authority this is not supposed to happen (within the limits in which it exists, of course).
Now, with respect to fields that deal with facts (whether those facts are clear and known or not), there is no place for formal authority, only for substantive authority. If we ask whether there is a Higgs boson in the world (a fundamental question in physics), we will not accept an answer by virtue of formal authority. Even if the greatest of scientists, or the World Association of Physicists, comes and says that there is, I will accept it only if I am convinced they are right. I may be convinced because they explained it to me and I understood, or because I trust that they know what they are talking about. But in the final analysis I accepted it not because of authority, but because I was convinced that it is true. There is no meaning at all to a demand that I accept a factual determination simply because someone said it. It is a fact, and if it is true it is true, and if not—then not. Formal authority is possible only with respect to norms, not with respect to facts. One may demand that I act in a certain way even if I do not think it correct (as in the example of sorting on the Sabbath), but one cannot demand that I believe something if I think it is not true. If I think it is not true, then that is what I think. At most I can declare outwardly that I believe it, but that would be worthless verbiage. Of course, if I become convinced that my intuition is mistaken, even because I trust the holder of the other position, then there is no problem. I have become convinced, and therefore I can truly say that I believe it. But one can believe facts only as a result of persuasion and not because of formal authority. A demand that I believe something I do not believe is a meaningless demand that cannot be realized and ought not to be realized.
It must be understood that many of the questions dealt with by Jewish thought are factual questions. Does the Holy One, blessed be He, exercise providence or not? Did a miracle occur or not? Is there a special nature to Israel, different from the rest of humanity, or not? Is there a World to Come or not? Will a Messiah come or not? And so on. All of these are factual questions, and therefore one cannot apply formal authority to them, only substantive authority. If I become convinced that the Holy One, blessed be He, exercises providence even over cows, then that will be my belief. But if I think not, no one can tell me that it is heresy not to believe it because so-and-so or such-and-such wrote so (even the Talmud, or the Torah itself), and then demand that I believe it. There is no place for formal authority in the realm of Jewish thought, just as in all realms of fact.[4]
Therefore, if I have reached the conclusion that I do not believe in X, I do not see how one can demand that I believe it merely because Maimonides said so, or because it is written in the Talmud, or even in the Torah. This is a logical absurdity. One might apply here what is said in the Talmud (Hullin 124a): He said to him: By God, even if Joshua son of Nun had told me this in his name, I would not obey him (“By God, even if Joshua son of Nun had told me this in His name, I would not obey him”).[5]
Factual Conclusions
How does one arrive at conclusions regarding facts? Questions such as the survival of the soul, redemption, the existence of God, and the like are examined in the crucible of reason. Questions of fact are examined with empirical tools. One simply observes them and understands them, exactly as the Sages and the sages of all generations did. They did not draw on divine inspiration; they simply acted according to their understanding and consulted experts. That is exactly what we too should do. The Sages have neither authority nor superhuman capacity in factual domains. To tell the truth, I do not think their opinion in factual matters is worth more than mine. Therefore they have no formal authority (because in facts there is no such authority at all), and no substantive authority either (because they are not professionals). The same applies to recommendations and guidance about proper policy in various situations. Here too the decisor must decide according to his own understanding. This is certainly true regarding medieval and later authorities. There is a myth as though all of these figures possess divine inspiration or some kind of infallible Torah insight. If so, I wonder when that ended. After all, the sages of our own generation make decisions after consulting experts. Moreover, in my opinion some of their decisions are manifestly mistaken. Was it also like that a hundred years ago? And five hundred years ago? And in the time of the Talmud? When does this period of the sages’ divine inspiration, in which they could not err, begin? This conception is childish.
Who Has Authority?
Who possesses substantive authority? Those who know the facts exactly as they are and whose statements should be accepted just because they said them. To the best of my understanding, there are no such beings apart from the Holy One, blessed be He. Only He knows the facts sharply and clearly, and therefore only from Him am I willing to accept facts simply because He said them. No human being, however wise, has full substantive authority. He is human, and as such he can always err. This applies to prophets, sages of all generations, and of course right down to our own day. All are human beings, all can err, and presumably all have used that ability. This is unlike halakhic or normative instructions, where there is meaning to the formal authority of human beings, since one can say that they have authority to determine what I must do even if they err. In such a case, though as human beings they can err, I still have an obligation to fulfill their instructions (see the example of the Knesset).
And what if a person tells me something in God’s name? At first glance, his words would seem to have substantive authority, since he is conveying to me the word of God. But in such a case I must examine whether he really intends here to transmit a message received from God or whether he is expressing his personal opinion. Moreover, I must examine whether he really received this from God or whether he erred. I must also examine whether he understood the message correctly. Every human instruction involves human interpretation and is therefore exposed to the possibility of error. Even when a person conveys to me a law given to Moses at Sinai that he received from his teachers, I can never be sure that he is right. Not because I harbor doubts about the wisdom of the Holy One, blessed be He, but because in the end the message reaches me through human mediation. Still, if it is a normative instruction, one can say that there is formal authority—that is, I must obey even if the transmitter errs. But with regard to facts, I have explained that the situation is not like that.
The conclusion that emerges from this is that the Talmud is not free of errors. On the contrary, it is clear that there are a number of factual errors in it (because we can examine and see this), and therefore I assume that there are also a number of halakhic-normative errors in it (for after all, human beings wrote it, and the Talmud itself reports mistakes by its sages). As stated, the normative errors are binding because the Talmud has formal authority (even if it errs), but it has no authority regarding facts, because there substantive authority is required. Moreover, even normative determinations that are not settled Jewish law, but rather worldview, educational recommendations, or policy conduct, are not binding. On the contrary, there are quite a few recommendations in the Talmud that are not suitable for our time, and I oppose applying them as they stand. Thus, for example, the recommendation that when difficulties arise one should raise higher walls and enact more fences—At a time when others are scattering, gather in (“when things scatter, gather inward”)—is, in my opinion, not the right way to act today. The same applies to the attitude toward women (at least the parts outside Jewish law) and toward gentiles (including the halakhic dimension). Without entering here into the substance of those discussions, I want only to illustrate my fundamental conception.
And what about the Hebrew Bible and the prophets? Seemingly this is the word of God, and there errors cannot exist. About this I will say briefly two things: 1. In my estimation, sometimes even a prophet can err. He too is human. True, I would reach such a conclusion only if it were as clear to me as daylight that there is an error. But that is only a theoretical statement, because the next point is more practically significant. 2. It is not always possible to understand what is written in the Torah and the Prophets. Even things that seem explicit are diverted from their plain meaning by sages in every generation. If Tosafot says of a law given to Moses at Sinai that in fact it is a rabbinic law, and that it was called a law given to Moses at Sinai only in order to reinforce its force, why should I not say the same in other cases where it is clear that an error is involved? I will interpret the texts in a way that fits my conclusions. For me, the way to reach conclusions about facts is observation and logical analysis. As Ran writes in Sukkah, One cannot deny what is plainly evident (“one must not deny the evident”). I will not lightly give up the results of logical conclusions and observation, and if there is a Talmudic saying or prophetic utterance that says otherwise, I will prefer, as far as possible, to interpret it in a forced way. As Beit Yosef writes (Yoreh De’ah sec. 228), It is preferable to strain the language rather than the reasoning (“it is preferable to force the wording rather than the reasoning”). This is another difference between the fundamentalists and me. For me, logical and scientific thinking carry great weight, and for me to relinquish them one would have to show me very strong arguments. Of course, this depends on how convinced I am of my conclusions and how authoritative and unequivocal the source being interpreted is. One should remember that quite a few things that appear in Scripture are interpreted in wildly different ways, and therefore proofs from verses, whether in the Torah or in the Prophets, are always weak in my eyes. This is also why the study of the Hebrew Bible has, in my opinion, limited value. It is hard to learn anything unequivocal from there.
After all, the description in Genesis stands in fairly direct contradiction to the theory of evolution. The fundamentalists reject evolution because of this, but there are quite a few who conclude that the biblical description is metaphorical or some kind of parable. That is, where we have reached a conclusion by scientific and logical means, we adopt creative interpretation in order to reconcile the biblical verses. Maimonides already made this point in the Guide of the Perplexed in his discussion of the eternity of the world and the corporeal image of God, and in many other places as well. Reason has a superior standing with respect to the interpretation of the Torah. If so, then certainly there is no obstacle to doing this with verses that speak about matters such as the survival of the soul or the Messiah, or at least not to regard them as decisive proof against a logical argument (if there is one. Here I am not taking a position, only illustrating). Therefore citation of biblical verses does not really persuade me, not much more than the tradition we have received.
The Sharpness of the Distinction
The distinction between facts and norms is not sharp, of course. In many cases there is a connection between them. For example, the Sages permit killing a louse on the Sabbath because a louse does not reproduce. According to what we know today, a louse certainly does reproduce, that is, the Sages were mistaken (one case among quite a few). Is it heresy to say such a thing? Perhaps, but what can I do if it is true. So what is the conclusion? Most decisors accept that one may not dispute the Talmud even in factual domains. I disagree with that, and in my opinion such a determination is itself based on an original error (if the Sages were alive today it would not have been made), and therefore it is not binding. This is not a change in Jewish law but a nullification from the outset. I know that this runs against accepted conceptions in Jewish law. So what? It is my view.
The same applies to prayer. The petitions in prayer are based on assumptions about God’s involvement in the world. These are factual assumptions, and therefore there is room not to accept some of the laws of prayer that are based on error. True, laws are norms and there is formal authority regarding them, but prayer is exceptional because one cannot pray without intention (otherwise it is valueless), and intention depends on facts.
The same applies to attitudes toward gentiles, which are nourished by a conception of the gentile as a human being. Therefore here too I am not willing to regard the words of the Sages as binding instructions. They conceived the gentiles in a certain way, perhaps because they erred and perhaps because the gentiles around them really were like that. To the best of my understanding, the gentiles of today do not fit the Talmudic description, and therefore the instructions of Jewish law should be applied to them differently. Here too the law is based on an assessment of reality, and therefore it should be reconsidered anew in every given set of circumstances.
A Few Examples
The debate with Grinzaig began with an article he wrote in response to my article on the attitude toward gentiles and changes in Jewish law. In my article I made two claims: 1. An interpretive claim about Meiri: that he made a substantive change in the halakhic attitude toward gentiles relative to the Sages because of a factual change that he identified. 2. A principled claim about changes in Jewish law (which is true even had Meiri not written what he wrote): that when circumstances change, one may change Jewish law. In his article, Grinzaig disputed claim 1, but as I understood from the Facebook discussion he apparently sees claim 2 as a move beyond the pale. Why? Why am I forbidden to do what Meiri did or could have done (and what many others did as well)? The attitude toward the medieval authorities is presented among us under some aura of holiness, as though they were ministering angels. Well, no: with all due respect, the medieval authorities were human beings like me and like you, perhaps wiser and more righteous than I am, and perhaps even more than you are, but they too could err. Beyond that, from the halakhic standpoint there is nothing that was permitted to them and forbidden to us. Whatever they could do, we too may do. Jephthah in his generation is like Samuel in his generation (“Jephthah in his generation is as Samuel in his generation”).
This certainly applies to conceptions of authors such as the Kuzari or Maharal, or even Maimonides in matters of thought. The Kuzari, which was an esoteric work with no especially strong standing, has today, in the non-Haredi yeshiva world (apparently mainly following the words of the Vilna Gaon and Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook), become a binding theological canon, to the point that some cite it as though anyone who disagrees with it disagrees with the Divine Presence. I do not understand from where this principle of faith has been drawn. Why may the Kuzari say things of his own accord, while I may not? Is what he says a law given to Moses at Sinai? These are his own reasonings and interpretations, and what is permitted to him is permitted to me. Thus, various basic beliefs were formed on the basis of remarks by medieval or later authorities and turned into principles of faith that may not be disputed. As stated, in my view there is no authority in matters of thought, and certainly these people and works have no authority. At most they are sources of inspiration. They do not convey divine information to me, and therefore I do not understand why I should assume that no error crept into their words. A good argument by Kant is worth no less than one by the Kuzari or Maimonides in matters of thought. All these are the reasonings of wise human beings, and I may use them or not, and form my own outlook.
The same applies to questions of providence and God’s involvement in the world, and certainly to the Messiah and the World to Come. These are positions presented by sages, some from the Talmud and some later, and therefore mistakes concerning them are certainly possible. Even when verses from the Torah or the Prophets are brought, one must always take into account that perhaps we have not interpreted them correctly (as stated, there are quite a few verses that the Sages themselves already removed entirely from their plain meaning). For example, Maimonides writes in the Laws of Repentance that one who is found guilty in judgment He immediately dies in his wickedness (“immediately dies in his wickedness”). Has anyone among the readers noticed a higher mortality rate around Rosh Hashanah? Observation somewhat contradicts Maimonides’ statement. So what does one do? Some will deny the evident, but others find excuses, interpretations, and various explanations for his words. Why? Because the facts indicate that this statement is not correct. The same applies to the verses of creation in relation to modern science.
What Is an Apikoros, and What Value Is There in Discussing It?
The discussion of the question what an apikoros is does not seem relevant to me. I do not really care if someone defines me as an apikoros. Not only am I not offended, I am even willing to agree with the determination. According to his view, I am indeed an apikoros. Labeling is legitimate, and so long as it is done with reasons there is no problem with it. But labeling is not relevant to a substantive discussion. I am willing to discuss arguments and reasons, but not labels. Even if I am indeed an apikoros, this is what I believe, and that is that. Whether you like it or not. Whether you call it apikorosut or May deliverance arise, or even Yankele.
At first glance, the question of the boundary arises here (someone just sent me a link to another Facebook page that Avishai Grinzaig opened following the previous one, dealing with this question. But I have not seen that one). Does everything go? Is there no limit to the legitimacy of opinions? My answer is that indeed there is no limit. The question is what is right and what is not, and not what is apikoros and what is not. So long as a person formulates a position on the basis of reasons, his position is legitimate, even if he is Christian, Reform, or Hindu. Whether or not to drink his wine is, in my view, a marginal and unimportant question; certainly it is not a relevant parameter in clarifying the views themselves. As for myself, I am willing to drink wine from any Jew who sees the Torah as halakhically binding and accepts commitment to the Torah according to his interpretation, whatever that interpretation may be. I may of course disagree with his views, but if he interprets on the basis of reasons and his own logic, he is as legitimate as I am. Not necessarily as right as I am, but as legitimate as I am (I am not a pluralist but a tolerant person).[6] Another question is from whom one should learn Torah. If someone is an apikoros, is it right to learn Torah from him? I would learn from anyone from whom something can be learned, that is, from anyone who discusses matters on the basis of logical reasons and teaches me an angle I would not have thought of. If he is not preaching but explaining and reasoning, it is certainly worthwhile to learn from him. I know there are several sayings of the Sages that can be understood otherwise (and a few that cannot), but I, for one, do not think so. So either I will interpret them differently, or I will rely on opposing sayings, or I will disagree.
Conclusion
In many cases the labeling is intended for camp or sectarian purposes (which is also legitimate). One defines someone as an apikoros in order to make it unnecessary to address his views and to keep the boundary of legitimacy clearly defined. This is the discourse of conservatives, meant to preserve the purity and unity of the camp and to show that everyone who is not an apikoros obviously agrees with the “correct” views, and therefore those views are correct. But the moment one defines the camp through the “correct” views, it turns from a claim into a definition, and therefore it has little meaning. It is certainly not an argument showing that those views are correct, for the definition of the camp itself was based on that assumption (that is begging the question).
The discourse about apikorosut is an internal discourse of the conservative camp for its own needs (as stated, it is deeply rooted in our tradition. I am not claiming that they invented it). I hope and believe that these are its death throes. The Enlightenment too was once treated as repulsive and beyond the pale, and today has become a legitimate position (certainly in modern Judaism). So too with women’s Torah study, women voting in elections, appointing women to various roles, and other modern ideas. The change penetrates more and more deeply into the foundations, which arouses great fears, but from my perspective that is only encouraging. I hope and believe that the same will happen with the ideas I am raising. When that happens, if indeed it does, then the conservative camp will become a small and unimportant bubble that will continue talking to itself through labels instead of reasons (they will of course continue to see themselves as the guardians of the flame on whom the world rests, in their megalomaniacal way)[7]. What is important is that the broader public not assume that this is indeed the Torah and halakhic truth. It is important to understand that there is a path here that is not only legitimate but more correct, and not to give the “guardians of the flame” the privilege of determining the ethos for everyone. Someone who thinks this way is not lite and not sloppy, but simply someone who is willing to think for himself honestly and draw the necessary conclusions. Do not let this discourse instill in you a sense of inferiority and a low spiritual self-image. Those who are spiritually diminished here are the “guardians of the dim flame” themselves. The time has come to breathe life into that ember instead of constantly busying ourselves with guarding it from going out.
About a week after the post was published, my friend Yehudit Ronen sent me the following beautiful clip, and I could not refrain from adding it here:
[1] See on this Column 6 here.
[3] See, for example, here and here.
[4] I already anticipate questions, so I should note that my remarks do not depend at all on the question of what the path is by which one becomes convinced of the facts under discussion—whether I, as a human being, have a way to arrive at a position about them or not. The very fact that these are facts means that there is no formal authority regarding them. At most, one can say that I should accept the words of the Holy One, blessed be He, because He knows everything. Then again, this is not formal authority but substantive authority. That is unlike His command not to sort on the Sabbath, where one can demand that I fulfill it even if I do not think it is correct, because He has formal authority to command.
[5] In simple terms, this is said there regarding Jewish law and not regarding facts, so the point applies all the more so to facts. Admittedly, one may still discuss whether there is a factual background there, but this is not the place.
Discussion
I’m not getting into such details here. Obviously there is always a tension between the degree to which the existing view is established and the degree of justification of the new view and the confidence in it. My claim is only that there is room for deliberation and for change when necessary—that is, everything is open to discussion. What is the algorithm? I don’t have one.
A quote from one of the comments on Avishai’s post:
“Michael Abraham is one of the only reasons I still have a kippah on my head.”
I know I’m falling into labeling here, but the rabbi’s remarks are very similar to the Conservative movement’s approach. Heaven forbid, there is nothing wrong with that. But why does the rabbi continue to be part of the Orthodox corpus?
Michael Abraham is the only reason I have a head under the kippah
Orel my dear, if you know that then why are you falling into it?
You know the truth… and intend to rebel…
“That is also the reason that Bible study doesn’t have much value in my opinion. It is hard to learn anything unequivocal from it.” So what is the rabbi’s attitude toward the Bible, in light of the fact that the rabbi does not study it or from it?
Because the Conservative community in Israel has not managed to gain momentum. And a respectable addition like Rabbi Michi could help it.
So if the rabbi does indeed identify with their approach, why doesn’t he join them?
I’m not part of any corpus. Anyone who cares to may decide for himself where I belong. The label does not interest me in the least.
I liked that very much. 🙂
I have no interest in helping communities. I generally refrain from joining groups because I am not interested in labels and ideological dictates, but rather in each question on its own merits. There are questions on which I feel close to Orthodoxy, and questions on which I feel close to the Conservatives. For the same reason I also do not join rabbinic organizations of various kinds, since I do not want them speaking in my name as part of some collective.
My attitude is that it is a primary source in some theoretical sense, but it doesn’t have much practical value. I am of course not presuming to grade the prophets and their compositions. I am speaking only about its value for me as a learner.
The Kuzari was never esoteric. It has always been an important book in its field.
Thank you for the detailed remarks.
I admit that today I was one of those who doubted your method, and I would like to make a comment and hear your response:
Do you not feel the great danger in your path?
To give people (the masses) the freedom to ask and investigate and not take anything for granted—is that a privilege whose risk you can afford to take?
A person like you, fine. It is evident that you command almost everything written, and one can only envy that.
What is a yeshiva student supposed to do when he hears your recommendations? What is a person who has not studied much Torah supposed to do?
In practice, many of them hear and read you and do exactly what you recommend not to do! They buy your merchandise and believe that because you are a polymath who expresses himself clearly, you are presumably right.
Well then, should one trust you more than the Kuzari?
If I assume that the matter of faith in the sages, or Haredi conservatism (to which I belong), comes from the understanding that the early and later authorities were righteous people of the world, and that at the very least you will agree with me that they were more expert in Torah than most of this generation (let us assume not more than you or Yeshayahu Leibowitz or Rabbi Shach), then where does it suddenly stop and we say: enough, here is someone one should listen to more than (or no less than) the Ramchal, or the Maharal, or Rav Kook?
And the main thing that troubles me in this approach is that, in terms of actual results, people use it not in order to grow in fear of Heaven, but mainly the opposite.
I completely believe in your good and sincere intentions. Truly. But please, go out and see today, in the perspective of just one generation after Yeshayahu Leibowitz: did he generate much Torah and fear of Heaven among his followers?
Are most of his students today people of Torah and piety, or complete heretics (I assume even in your opinion)?
Has the enlightenment movement that you encourage produced more rabbis and observant believers, or more secularizers, such that after a generation or two there is no trace of Torah and mitzvot left in their families (there are quite a few examples we all know)?
According to your method, is there any importance at all to fear of Heaven as an outgrowth of the study and inquiry that you ask all of us to undertake?
That is, suppose you became convinced that this path of inquiry would ultimately produce more Sabbath desecration than Sabbath observance—would that be something that should be taken into account?
Because apparently (reality seems to show this), a person who takes for himself the freedom of inquiry and the possibility to ask and try to understand and not accept anything as self-evident—ultimately, the chances that he will distance himself from religion and from observance are not low. Certainly higher than someone who observes because he completely believes what is written.
I believe that when Hazal adopted an approach opposite to yours (you yourself admit that most of them do not agree with your approach, and that does not trouble you), they knew very well that this was a bottomless pit or a slippery slope. They knew very well the dangers in this path. Therefore there is significance to faith in the sages and to Maimonides’ Thirteen Principles, in all of which a person declares, “I believe,” even if he has not studied and investigated.
Would you recommend to your physics students to investigate everything that has already been proven and established, and if they are not convinced then let them go build a machine against the science that has already been proven and established, just to show that they do not simply believe the sages of physics but
are capable of arguing with them and standing their ground?
Would you buy from them a machine that was built contrary to what has been accepted from time immemorial?
In summary: your path may be suitable for individuals. But in practice you are drawing after you also those for whom, probably for various reasons, it is convenient to challenge the ancient tradition and simple faith, and who like setting up an alternative to Hazal and to halakhic rigidity. I personally know several such people, and I was not impressed or convinced that through your words they are becoming more devout Jews—rather the opposite. I saw this literally over the past week in the hundreds of comments related to the posts you published and the answers you gave.
I would be glad to hear your response.
He already addressed it in the article.
He wrote at such length, and you want him to go on at length and write it again?
As for the Bible, I am left only to wonder whether the One who gave the prophecies was so naive and did not know that in fact it has no practical value. Perhaps He did not know enough about hermeneutics?
In addition, I wonder why the attitude toward the commandments in the Bible (especially in the Torah) is different. They too can be understood however one wants, and the sages indeed did not always follow what is written. In your view, after all, the Giver wanted to achieve some goal by our observing the commandments as He wanted, and the question is whether you think that what you observe is indeed what helps accomplish His goal.
I am not the rabbi’s emissary and I am not responding on his behalf.
But your scientific example illustrates exactly what you do not understand—certainly (though the explanation is a bit simplistic, still), scientists try to replicate experiments even on “accepted” things, and every so often a student discovers that something in the previous interpretation was mistaken/partial/inaccurate and refines the idea, even if it belongs to a scientist more senior than he is (not that this is always easy, and clearly conservatism and ego exist in the scientific world too, but over time the idea will change).
The assumption is that truth is what matters and not what is accepted, and that is why science is so successful. The day scientists assume that Einstein’s and Newton’s ideas are divine and may not be disputed, it will freeze exactly as happens in many sectors of Judaism.
In addition, I would say there is a whiff of condescension and paternalism in your proposal to limit people’s freedom in society so that heaven forbid they not make mistakes.
You’d die to be a heretic. Unfortunately, you’re not.
You are a very likable person, and it seems to me that I am inclined to recite the blessings over Torah study because of you (at least over your books on faith). There’s nothing to be done—“It is Torah, and we must study it.”
And as for Avishai Grinzeig—who would he be without you?
In your opinion, is the lack of value in studying the Bible because there is not really much to learn from the Bible itself, or because in principle it is possible to learn from it, but the problem is with us (without getting into what that problem is)?
Truly one of the only people who still have integrity! I think I’d go crazy if Michael Abraham didn’t exist in the world
“First, even if there are damages, I am sick of sacrificing truth for the sake of security. If this is the truth, then it must be stated clearly, even if there are those who will be harmed.”
These matters were mostly discussed in the link I referred you to. I will address them briefly.
I oppose conditioning, even if it helps in terms of the final outcome. In my view, someone who examined matters and reached different conclusions, even if in my opinion they are mistaken, is not a failure but a success.
The historical question of what produced fear of Heaven is really not as simple as you present it. What produced the problems of the Enlightenment was no less the conservative opposition to it than the Enlightenment itself, and perhaps more so. As they say about the Vilna Gaon: when one proves to him that Hasidism actually produced people with fear of Heaven, the Lithuanian response is that this is because of the Vilna Gaon’s opposition. The same applies to Yeshayahu Leibowitz. You cannot know what would have come of his students without him. It is entirely possible that he saved many.
If people use their intellect for unworthy purposes, I am not responsible for that, nor would I recommend ceasing to use one’s intellect because of it. People use their mouths to speak slander—do you suggest abstaining from speech and going off into the deserts? About this I wrote the column on holy lies:
https://mikyab.net/%D7%A2%D7%9C-%D7%A9%D7%A7%D7%A8%D7%99%D7%9D-%D7%A7%D7%93%D7%95%D7%A9%D7%99%D7%9D-%D7%98%D7%95%D7%A8-21/
As far as I am concerned, inquiry is not a means to fear of Heaven but to clarifying the truth. If there were a falsehood the study of which would lead to more fear of Heaven, I would oppose it (if only because the heaven they would fear would not be the right heaven). As the author of Nefesh HaChayim explained in Gate 4, study is not a means to anything, not even to fear of Heaven. It is an end in itself—to clarify the truth because it is truth (a paraphrase of Maimonides’ language at the end of Hilkhot Teshuvah chapter 10).
Since Torah is not scientific research, I do not accept the conclusions of the sages of the generations as though they were the conclusion of an investigation, like a machine built on the basis of tested knowledge.
“Important in its field” is a rather vague definition. His field did not interest many people, and he was not really studied. Certainly he was not regarded as binding authority (it is doubtful, I think, how much of a Torah scholar he was at all. “The leading authority of the generation in matters of faith” is, as is well known, a new invention).
Excellent questions. Do you deny the fact that it is hard to learn something unequivocal from the Bible? That is a fact. The questions are questions, but that does not change the facts.
By the way, one can ask a similar question, but it is one that really does have meaning. Those who try to learn Torah lessons from history assume that it was brought about by the Holy One, blessed be He, in order to teach us something. Thus the Haredim learn from the Holocaust that Zionism is the mother of all sin, and the Religious Zionists learn from it that anti-Zionism is the mother of all sin. Is that not a pedagogical failure on the part of the One who brought about the Holocaust? Why is that question a good one here (unlike yours)? Because here it supports a sensible view—that history (from the end of prophecy onward, and at least in recent generations) was not meant to teach us educational-Torah lessons. That is how it appears in practice, and that is also what emerges from the consideration about pedagogical failure. But your question leads to a conclusion that contradicts facts, and therefore, although it is certainly worth considering, I do not see it as a relevant consideration for our matter.
See also my reply to Amir above (I wrote it after I wrote this).
I absolutely would not die to be a heretic, but it also does not bother me. I want to be what I am and live according to what I conclude as best I can, whether that is called heresy or not. I do not measure myself by preordained results, just as I do not see study as a means to fear of Heaven. If my conclusion from study is outright heresy, the study has very great value, for it led me to my conclusion. It seems ridiculous to me to assign value to study only if it leads to a preordained conclusion. That is not how I see value in scientific research on condition that it lead דווקא to theory X. A person must study and formulate a position and live according to his understanding, whatever comes out.
Many thanks. No need to go crazy, but I’m glad my words help. 🙂
Excellent post. Thank you very much!
You will never get a substantive response from fundamentalists like Grinzeig—they simply don’t have it in the structure of their brains. I mean, they really believe what they say, and damn it, I can’t understand how they do it. It’s just a kind of self-suggestion, a high level of self-persuasion, belonging to that psychological realm you hate so much.
In short, more power to you for expressing your views. Personally I owe you a great deal; I have inner wholeness with what I do, much thanks to you, even though I do not necessarily agree with you on everything.
I first came to know you through Atzchach, and later, when I got to Bar-Ilan, I had the privilege of learning from you in person, and your books served as an anchor for me. From the start I understood that I connect with your way of thinking, and some of your insights had been hidden in my mind… [secretly, out of fear of the censor of course]. You’d be surprised, but many of my friends, Haredim too, know and love your books, and in a certain place you saved them. You put into words what they think, and you brought order to the mess, and suddenly you discover that there is much light in all the surrounding darkness…
I would be glad if you could explain further what you wrote: “The same applies to prayer. The requests in prayer are based on assumptions about God’s involvement in the world. These are factual assumptions, and therefore there is room not to accept some of the laws of prayer that are based on a mistake. Admittedly these are laws, meaning norms, and with respect to them there is formal authority, but prayer is exceptional, since one cannot pray without intention (otherwise it is devoid of value), and intention depends on facts.” Which laws are you referring to? What kind of intention? Why is prayer exceptional? And what is the connection between intention and facts?
With love and appreciation
The Least of the Students
I don’t know. From Yishai’s wish (below) it follows that it ought to have value, otherwise why was it written? But practically, the reality is that it is hard to derive non-trivial conclusions from it. Everyone derives from it what he thought to begin with. It is hard for me to imagine someone who studies a biblical passage and comes away with conclusions that contradict what he thought beforehand. Usually you can see that when people study a biblical passage they derive conclusions from it that contain nothing new (except for interpretive novelties—that is, a good and interesting understanding of the verses. But the insights themselves are almost never new. If something comes up that does not seem right to us, we will usually find a creative interpretation that fits it to our own reasoning).
By the way, it is possible that the reason for this is that the Bible has already done its work and brought humanity to the basic moral insights that once were not trivial (at least some of them). But today this is the situation.
Don’t be so heavy, I was just joking about the title you gave the article:
“Am I a heretic?”
Like when they answered Shimon Peres back in the day, when he asked, “Am I a loser?” with a resounding “Yes!!”
Still, there is some inner desire to be a breaker of conventions, a radical who shows deference to no one. It seems to me that this is one aspect of your modernity as opposed to the ancients (Maimonides, for example, who all his life aspired to moderation while carrying out revolutions beside which your revolution pales). I very much recommend Leo Strauss’s books. It seems to me you would derive much wisdom from them even if you do not agree with them. I would present the arguments there myself, but I fear I am not up to it.
Hello.
I don’t much like remarks ad hominem (about Grinzeig), and certainly not about his brain structure. By the way, I was actually very impressed by him in our conversation and by the article of his that I read. He wrote a very fine and sharp critique of my article on the Meiri—not all of which I agreed with, but there were definitely interesting and intelligent points there, with a great deal of straight thinking. Perhaps as my student you will also take that from me :).
As for what I wrote about prayer, perhaps I can clarify it with an example. In the Amidah prayer there are requests. The Men of the Great Assembly instituted this and they have formal authority, so it is halakhically binding. But if on the factual plane one reaches the conclusion that the Holy One, blessed be He, is not involved in the world, what sense is there in asking Him for anything? Again, this is a normative instruction, so in principle I can say the words because I am obligated to, even though I do not believe them (just as one may not sort on Shabbat even if in my opinion that ought not to have been forbidden. That is only an example; it is not necessarily my opinion regarding sorting).
But here the connection between the normative and the factual emerges: because in prayer there is a requirement to intend what one is saying (this is not only a halakhah; it is simply that the definition of speech is not mere lip movement but a cognitive act—meaning to think what you are saying), then in this specific case a difficulty arises in adhering to the normative instruction when one does not agree with the factual infrastructure at its base. After all, you cannot intend what you are saying, because the intention is connected to the facts (that the Holy One, blessed be He, helps those who ask). But prayer without intention is not prayer. Therefore a problem on the factual plane creates here a difficulty also on the normative plane.
I will note that our master the Rema rescued us by ruling that nowadays one may pray without intention, or at least that one need not repeat the prayer if one lacked intention (because in any case we do not have intention). Even so, these matters are still very difficult for me, because this is not about lack of intention (about which one can say that unspecified intent defaults to the proper one) but about lack of agreement. I have partial solutions (which will appear in the trilogy), but they are really not satisfactory. And we need a great scholar, son of a great scholar, to resolve it for us—not the theoretical difficulty; I do not have one. Rather the practical difficulty—what to do with prayer.
I understood perfectly well (I’m not that heavy). I just took advantage of the softball you tossed me in order to clarify an important point. 🙂
And one more remark. Indeed I do have an urge to slaughter sacred cows, but I try (and hope I succeed) to reach conclusions that really seem correct to me. I hope and believe that this urge is only a trigger to examine things even if they are accepted (and perhaps especially because they are accepted), but I hope I have the integrity to accept what is reasonable and to offer new proposals only for what is not reasonable.
On a panel I once participated in I said that a decisor is not supposed to be original or innovative or conservative or anything of the sort. He simply has to say what seems right to him in the situation. The characterizations of whether he is conservative or innovative, courageous or original, belong to the domain of the academic researcher who studies that decisor. The decisor himself is not supposed to be driven by those ideals. His researcher will explain to us (and to him too—cf. Agnon and Kurzweil) whether he is conservative or not, whether he is original or not, and so forth.
I don’t know what “studied” means. They certainly read it. The fact that in the yeshivot where you studied Torah this was not customary does not make it an esoteric book. It is a book every Torah scholar has known from then until today.
To prove that perhaps one cannot show you are wrong.
But the deficiency in the non-conservative position is that it is not the Torah of Moses.
That is, if I adhere to tradition I preserve what we received at Sinai with the most minimal change.
When I give free rein to reason without limit, it may be correct but it is not from Sinai.
If the assumptions lead to a contradiction, apparently one of them must be given up.
How can it possibly be that the Torah of Israel, which descends to the minutest details of positive and negative commandments, has no statement or authority regarding the great theological questions, in which “each man may think as he sees fit”? Did the Lord reveal Himself on Mount Sinai with thunder and lightning merely to teach us “the laws of spoon and pot”?
With blessings, S.Z. Lwinger
By the way, from His blessed words there as well—“I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt,” “visiting… and showing kindness to the thousandth generation of those who love Me and keep My commandments,” “so that your days may be lengthened upon the land…” and the like—it appears that the Lord does intervene in what happens in this world.
Itamar, conservatives live with the ethos that they are preserving the Torah of Moses. But they are very far from it. The Torah underwent a great many changes according to the reasoning of earlier generations, and conservatives preserve those earlier changes while refusing to make changes themselves. My uncle once told me that Abaye and Rava certainly studied in Yiddish (for it is unthinkable that they did not know how to learn). He of course knew this was nonsense and said it as a joke. But in my opinion, as an ethos he accepts it entirely.
This reminds me that Rabbi Blumentzweig (head of the hesder yeshiva in Yerucham) once said that custom is the solidification of a revolution. Custom breaks through the existing halakhah and changes it, and from the moment it is created there is an obligation not to deviate from it and change it (“Do not forsake”).
There is no contradiction at all. There are good questions and they also have answers (which is why I referred you to my reply to Amir). But questions do not change facts (and facts are not assumptions).
Rabbi, as one of your admirers, I do not always manage to get to the bottom of the method of what one does or does not accept from Hazal’s accepted tradition.
The rabbi too agrees that the sages preserved some tradition from Sinai (whose scope is disputed). When I encounter something that contradicts reason (“there were ten thousand towns on the king’s mountain”), it is clear to me that this is a parable or some other explanation.
When a certain principle accords with *reason*, more or less with a straightforward interpretation of *the sources*, and it is a *central* part of the tradition—why not accept it on that basis alone (for accepting something reasonable and well-grounded when it is transmitted by a reliable tradition is a rational thing). Let us take as an example the World to Come: intellectually one can defend this position; Saadia Gaon already did so. There is no doubt that this is considered very central among our sages (one of the great differences from the Sadducees who disputed the tradition), so it is not some marginal matter. And one can even find here and there reasonable scriptural supports for it, like Saul and the necromancer of En-dor and so forth (one can argue about those verses, but there are several like them, and I think they are more convincing than the verses brought to prove God’s incorporeality).
I understand that one can always remain with “requires further thought” or with not being sure, but if it is simply a central claim in the tradition that accords with reason and Scripture, why reject it? That is, why does the tradition not persuade here? (I emphasize that I am not discussing here, of course, authority over facts; on that point what the rabbi wrote is persuasive.) The same argument can be extended to the coming of the messiah and so on, about which too, to the best of my recollection, the rabbi has no position as to whether they are true.
As an aside—today it was published on the Srugim website that Chotam want to establish a committee to deal with the problem of religious youth going off the path. I very much hope the rabbi will join and influence them to focus on dealing with the problem of not answering young people’s questions, and less on emotional problems and the like. I can only hope they will accept your words.
Shatz”l, shalom aleikhem (you haven’t visited here in a long time).
You assume that those are the big things and the halakhot are little things. But I do not share that view (and do not answer me with the saying of our sages: “A great thing… a small thing”).
Regarding God’s involvement in creation, I have already written here dozens of times that the Torah and the Prophets are full of sources that say the opposite. Therefore I suggested that perhaps the policy changed: just as miracles disappeared and prophecy disappeared, so too divine involvement disappeared. See here:
https://mikyab.net/%D7%9B%D7%AA%D7%91%D7%99%D7%9D/%D7%9E%D7%90%D7%9E%D7%A8%D7%99%D7%9D/%D7%97%D7%99%D7%A4%D7%95%D7%A9-%D7%90%D7%97%D7%A8-%D7%90%D7%9C%D7%95%D7%94%D7%99%D7%9D-%D7%91%D7%A2%D7%95%D7%9C%D7%9D/
Hello.
I have written several times that these beliefs seem reasonable to me. But precisely because of their plausibility, it is possible that they were innovated out of the sages’ own reasoning over the generations. Therefore I cannot be sure that they are in fact true, at least if they are not a tradition from Sinai. Therefore I say that I do not have a clear position on these matters, since I am not sure they are a law given to Moses at Sinai. If you ask me, my estimate is that the soul remains in some form and in some place. But that is my own reasoning (and that of many others better than I), and therefore I treat it as such.
As for “Chotam,” there is no chance of cooperation. They would not agree, and I would not want it either. Let everyone do the best he can, and I assume they can help a certain type of person and perhaps I too can help a (different) type of person. I do not like mergers, because they usually do harm.
I have several questions and would be happy to receive an answer. First I will note that the idea that nothing is absolute so long as no formal ruling has been given on it (in your definition) seems right to me. Likewise the idea that every statement and opinion needs to be examined by the test of reason also seems right. But when this comes down to the practical level, questions arise. (The questions are not written in order of importance.) 1. You used the example of selecting on Shabbat. It is not explicitly written in the Torah—what made it binding? 2. By whom was the Torah written? If not all of it by God, which part was, which part was not, and what power do you have to clarify this? 3. At the beginning of Deuteronomy it says, “Moses undertook to expound this Torah…” If Moses’ exposition is not formally binding (since he is a human being capable of error), which exposition is binding? 4. Your comparison of halakhic laws to a formal obligation like the Knesset is, in my humble opinion, incorrect, because any Knesset can be followed by another Knesset (which is not greater in wisdom and number) that will completely cancel its laws and enact different ones. Is it correct to say the same with respect to halakhah?
I have more questions but it seems I have already overloaded things…
I would be glad for your response. Thank you very much!!!
The question is how to bring the rabbi’s approach to the religious education system without going through people of influence there?
For example, a new book just came out on the problem of religious youth going off the path (“The Departing” by Margolis, a translation and adaptation of the well-known American book). I haven’t read it yet so I’m not sure, but according to short online reviews it too deals more with emotional issues and the like (unlike Fisherman’s old book, which was written exactly along the rabbi’s lines). According to the preface, it is a study for which she consulted psychologists and rabbis, and to the best of my knowledge the rabbi was not involved (by the author) in the book—and that is a shame….
Since the new site and the Yediot books, the rabbi is reaching many audiences, but without the cooperation of centers of influence there is a glass ceiling on the size of the population one can reach, and the public loses out.
(Maybe the solution is educators’ conferences?)
More power to the rabbi for these remarks (even if I do not currently agree with all the positions, and on some I have no opinion)!
I too, small though I am, think it is important to influence and introduce into the beit midrash and the Torah world this kind of discourse. The question, however, is indeed how one can influence in this direction also those Jews who are not connected to the internet and the like—and of course I mean the Haredi Torah world, for it is not enough to influence only the Religious Zionist and Hardal worlds?
Is the obligation of intention specifically the simple meaning of the words? It seems to me one could argue that any intention that is ultimately for the sake of Heaven would count as intention, even if it does not fit the plain meaning of the words.
Since I too am doubtful about the very direct effect of prayer on what happens in reality, every time I pray and also manage to think about my words, I find in them a new, non-simple meaning.
To the honorable M—greetings,
After Rabbi Abraham has taught us that the Holy One, blessed be He, has ceased intervening in His world—it is fitting that we fulfill “and you shall walk in His ways” and cleave to God’s attribute and not intervene 🙂
After all, in the religious schools they teach the philosopher’s view in the Kuzari that God does not intervene, so why should we care what religion the next generation invents for itself?…
With blessings, Shin Tzin Levin-Ger
I published a Facebook post in your defense:
https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=296995467422100&id=100013349473702
I do not recommend adopting the Greek philosopher Epicurus’s view that God does not intervene at all in their world (as cited in his name in Guide of the Perplexed 3:17)—for the reasons Maimonides wrote there.
What I would take from Epicurus is the method of studying in a garden, in the open air among fresh and lovely trees that broaden a person’s mind—then the hearts of our students will be more open to profound Torah thinking.
With blessings, Park Giant Margolinger
The green garden will be a fitting tool (green-zeig 🙂 for absorbing words of Torah!
1. The determination of Hazal in the Talmud.
2. I assume by the hand of the Holy One, blessed be He, though there are verses that suggest otherwise. The default is yes, unless there is a strong reason against it. In any event, it is binding even if it was not written by the Holy One, blessed be He.
3. The fact that Moses can err does not mean his exposition is not binding. On the contrary, that is the meaning of formal authority, as I explained. Beyond that, the fact that he can err does not mean that he did err. In order to ask, you have to prove that he erred.
4. Indeed that is correct. That is one difference between them. There are other differences as well, but those are not what I was talking about. The comparison is only regarding formal authority. If you wish, compare to the rulings of the Great Court. They have formal authority, but a later court can nullify their words (see Maimonides, beginning of chapter 2 of Hilkhot Mamrim).
M, I publish, and others may do with it what they find appropriate. If there are suggestions—I’d be happy to consider them.
See above (I write, and if there are suggestions I’d be happy to hear them).
As Rabbi Chaim already wrote, there are two kinds of intention in prayer. Intention of the words is necessary in order to fulfill the obligation, otherwise there is no speech here. This is not because commandments require intention, as I wrote, but rather from the definition of speech.
Regarding the Haredi public, I believe we will have to wait for the complete trilogy to come out
Although from personal knowledge
many of them are here on the site like (holy) ghosts
I personally also belong (as a matter of communal affiliation only) to the aforesaid shakkak community
My friend, is Rabbi Michael Abraham proposing anything “new”? I would like to remind you of a couple of passages from Rav Kook—perhaps you connect more with them, and I would be glad for your explanation, but you understand his demand:
1. Rav Kook, Orot HaKodesh II, p. 314
One whose soul does not roam in expanses, one who does not seek the light of truth and goodness with all his heart, does not suffer spiritual demolitions, but neither does he have independent edifices. He shelters in the shade of natural structures, like the rock-badgers for whom the rocks are a refuge. But a human being, one in whom a human soul dwells—his soul can find shelter only in edifices that he builds through his spiritual labor, whose diligent work never ceases.
2. Rav Kook — Shemonah Kevatzim, II, 174
Everything that enters one soul from the influence of another soul, although it benefits it in some way, for after all it imparts to it some knowledge or some good and sometimes useful feeling, also harms it, in that it mixes a foreign element into its essence. And the world is perfected only in a state of negating foreign influence, and they shall no longer teach one another, nor shall one say to his brother, “Know the Lord,” for they shall all know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them. The process that negates foreign influences with regard to each individual, although it appears in a destructive form, is the demolition that brings about the more enduring and more perfected construction, and it is the only entrance to eternal life, where the Holy One, blessed be He, makes for each and every one his own Eden; it does not say “your Eden” but “your Edens.” The general national awareness to guard against foreign influences is the foundation of revival, and it penetrates as a private ferment, creating destructions, making revolutions, and building new worlds, enduring and radiant.
If you really understand what Rav Kook is saying, then you need to:
A – fall off the chair you are sitting on (just be careful with your head…)
B – become the greatest advocate of Rabbi Dr. Michael Abraham…
In any case, drink a lot today, because it’s hot…
Amiel, hello.
Many thanks for the assistance. Regarding the second passage, if I understood correctly then he opposes foreign influences, and ostensibly that is contrary to my approach. Admittedly, from my perspective too one should not simply accept any influence, but one should read every source and formulate from it what suits me and seems right to me and incorporate it into my outlook. So perhaps there is no contradiction. I am against influences altogether, foreign or not foreign. But I am in favor of reading and studying everything (internal and foreign alike) in order to formulate a position that is as broad and correct as possible.
Thank you for the response
A. I did not mean Avishai specifically, but rather people of a certain type with the same form of thinking; it is the form of thinking that bothers me. They do not respond to the substance of the arguments. Perhaps the day will come when they understand that the great amount of people going off the path, today and in the past, is the result of “holy lies” told by many rabbis. Unfortunately, I believe there are many rabbis who understand that there are logical failures in the beliefs they present to the public, but they would never dare express their real opinion, out of fear of “what will people say,” even though there are quite a few who think as they do in secret. It reminds me of Bolshevik Russia—many think one thing and despise the regime, but everyone is afraid of everyone. In your case, I think you say “for the most part” what you think. “For the most part,” because every person hides a few thoughts inside… [By the way, I don’t know if he still sits there, but last year he was writing his doctorate above your head in the beit midrash… ]
B. Regarding prayer, I immediately suspected that you meant Rabbi Chaim’s words, but you surely know that the Hazon Ish disagrees with him and brings proofs that the intention of the words alone is sufficient. If so, there is no problem at all in fulfilling prayer in its formal way in full.
Even if we accept Rabbi Chaim’s words, I still do not agree with your understanding, because while it may be that you think Rabbi Chaim’s condition of intending oneself as “standing before God” includes within it belief that prayer is effective, I see no necessity for that. There is a basic requirement during prayer to intend oneself as “standing before God,” meaning an act of prayer and not an act of speech. In addition there is a need for intention of the words. But Rabbi Chaim does not require the intention “to believe that prayer is effective,” only that you are “performing an act of prayer and standing before God.”
It seems to me that the Hazon Ish would not disagree that the person must, in an abstract sense in his subconscious, understand that he is “standing before God” in prayer [according to how I presented Rabbi Chaim’s understanding], but in his view there is no need to intend this throughout the entire prayer; only that in his consciousness he understand that he is in a state of prayer. In my opinion this is possible even if we agree that prayer is not effective. So prayer still remains a formal commandment.
C. As food for thought, I would be glad to hear your opinion: Maimonides writes in the Guide of the Perplexed (end of part 3) that providence depends on “cleaving to Him,” meaning that the more a person cleaves, the more the flow of providence is drawn upon him, like “He fulfills the desire of those who fear Him.” It may be that belief that prayer will help in such a situation is not falsifiable, since we have no tools to measure when a person is cleaving to God or not. If we assume that every prayer helps, then you are right that statistically it does not seem so. But if we posit that prayer has conditions—cleaving, requests that fit within the natural human order, as emerges from Hazal’s own words—I do not see how one can refute that. On the other hand, I also do not see a reason not to accept it, especially if we have biblical sources indicating that in time of distress one should pray and that this has some chance of helping.
In addition, it is quite clear that Hazal too, when they instituted prayer, did not institute “exceptional requests” that depart from the bounds of nature; that is, this is not prayer for miracles. The requests are very general and fit within nature, such as wisdom, general redemption, healing [depending what kind, but there are many cases of healing in life even in extreme situations], ingathering of exiles [and apparently prayer for this was fulfilled in part], and more.
It also seems that Hazal directed prayer toward a general goal; that is, if we pray for redemption, the Temple, the ingathering of exiles, etc., then we will act and preserve the desire for these things; and similarly for the poor, wisdom, or healing, there will be effort on our part in the matter. This keeps these things in our consciousness, and therefore we act through nature and with God’s assistance to improve the situation.
I would be glad for a response, with thanks in advance!
The Least of the Students
An intellectual delight
Of you it is said:
“He kisses the lips who gives a right answer.”
“No weapon formed against you shall prosper, and every tongue that rises against you in judgment you shall condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord, and their vindication is from Me, says the Lord.”
Thank you, thank you. Even a Lithuanian radish like me sometimes finds himself moved by such compliments.
A. Still, I prefer arguments and not insults or generalizations.
B. It is not about Rabbi Chaim, and certainly not about the intention of standing before God. I am speaking specifically about intention of the words. This is straightforward reasoning and cannot be disputed. There is no speech that is merely lip movement. That is how one does not fulfill any commandment involving speech, because it is not speech. The Hazon Ish’s “intention of the words” is exactly what I was talking about. If you ask God for something while thinking the request will not be answered, there is no intention of the words here. Intention of the words is not understanding the words, but intending what the words say.
C. Indeed, that is possible. Clearly, a thesis that is not falsifiable cannot be refuted. But by the same token, those who write such things cannot know them either, since it is impossible to test them (except for the tithe—“Test Me in this,” and even there it does not work).
There is no miracle that is integrated into nature. That is a common mistake. Every divine intervention is a departure from nature. Of course one can immediately say that He intervenes in a way concealed from our eyes, and once again we have returned to unfalsifiable theses.
Intention as meditation is a possible thesis, but it is hard to accept that this was the original meaning of prayer. These are justifications that come to answer the difficulty that it does not work.
They still haven’t burned your books—you still have something to aspire to :ף
To burn them they first have to buy them, no? 🙂
The many words, the analytical precision, the almost scientific language produce a sense of absolute knowledge, total knowledge. There is truth and falsehood, and you present them. In your case truth and falsehood are properties of claims; there are two kinds of claims, true and false ones.
I assume that in certain fields like logic, metaphysics, and mathematics, claims are binary. What exists in those fields is never a text, but rather claims that a text carries.
In the Torah sphere I assume מראש that in parts of it, especially the moral parts and halakhic conduct in matters of eating and gender, there are no binary claims of truth and falsehood. (Even the metaphysical moral position has difficulty defending a non-extreme case and claiming that it is specifically immoral.)
If so, what is the situation when we depart from the binary world? Political thought established institutions that have formal authority with various justifications. Another field in which fruitful discourse was created without authority is the aesthetic one, where there are no claims that are true or false. Rather, we are engaged in characterizing situations.
Torah is a broad word, so I will use Hazal as they interpreted the Torah. They refrained from using the terms truth and falsehood. The word “truth” appears very little in the Bible compared to the New Testament and the writings of the philosophers of the fifth century BCE.
Therefore I think that when one stands before a saying of Hazal, the understanding that this is a claim and that after understanding it we need to judge whether it is true or false—this view seems problematic to me. It is not a claim, and it is certainly not a claim about which one can say whether it is true or false.
Therefore, although I agree with a large part of your arguments, I do not know whether Torah is a sport of claims. Or perhaps something a bit more complex.
“Then I was beside Him as a confidant, and I was daily His delight, playing before Him at all times.”
True or false claims are not a confidant and not delights and are not found on the heights of the city. (Of course this is only a figure of speech and not a claim grounded in a text”
Still, thank you, a very interesting text.
Rabbi, you have no idea how much you help young people and people in general. In my opinion this is an exceptional historical phenomenon that will yet be studied in Jewish history (I am really not joking). I know of no comparable phenomenon elsewhere (various intellectual rabbis, of course, deserve all due respect). Engaging deeply and broadly in almost every matter a human being can imagine, and especially believers: belief in God, free will, meta-halakhah, the thirteen hermeneutical principles—it is simply unbelievable.
I am willing to bet all my money that most of the intellectually inclined young people who have gone off the path whom I know would not have left religion if they had encountered your thought at earlier stages.
All that remains now is for educators who work with youth (teachers and the like) to have the courage and humility to refer those who are wavering to you in the early stages of the process, despite their disagreement with you.
Of course, it would also be worthwhile to refresh the library shelves in the high-school yeshivot with books like Hamehapekh and the like, and to bring in your books, foremost among them the forthcoming trilogy.
Maybe also hand out the faith notebooks to every ninth-grade student as an end-of-year gift :).
I hope you find a way to reach broader relevant audiences (perhaps hire a few agents to roam the relevant youth forums, where the centers of atheism are, and they can direct wavering youth to you).
Love and deep appreciation.
Hello and blessings. It is enjoyable, enlightening, and challenging to read you anew each time. I don’t know whether I agree, but there is no doubt that your way is inspiring. I know from my familiarity with your words that the answer to my question will be in the style of “I do not deal in the discussion with the parameter of practical results and the like, only with clarification of the truth,” but you yourself also referred here to the results of the modern enlightenment movement and hoped for change in the conservative-traditional sphere. So I have to ask you: does what seems to me the simple reasoning—that your path will end up like that of Yeshayahu Leibowitz, whose thought is today studied in the dry faculties of the university as a remnant of fragments—does that not make you think that perhaps there is justice in the path of the traditional and conservative majority of the people of Israel? Thank you.
Hello,
I appreciate the rabbi’s thought very much and in my opinion it is greatly needed. In my humble opinion I also do not think the thought is heretical.
It seems that the rabbi holds that there is not much practical significance to the question of who is a heretic, since in any case a person will think what he thinks, and beyond that it also does not matter to other people whether another person is a heretic, since one may drink his wine (provided he is obligated by Torah according to his own view) and learn from his Torah.
I wanted to ask whether according to this the rabbi rules that one may drink the wine of a Conservative Jew and learn from their Torah. The practical question is less important to me; rather, I ask whether this approach seemingly leads to the absurdity of recognizing even such movements. (The absurdity is that in practical terms what they are actually committed to is a small subset of Orthodox commitments.)
If the answer is yes, can the rabbi accept an approach that might allow learning from their Torah (for one who has filled his belly, etc.) but would still exclude them from the beit midrash from an educational and sociological standpoint? Is there room for the conservatives’ approach (toward which, despite what I wrote, I am very much inclined)?
Hello Y.D.
Thank you for the post, but I must say that you did Grinzeig an injustice. When he protests against my views, that does not mean he does not protest against charlatans or identify with them. When I question personal providence, the alternative is not necessarily only mystical charlatanism. Is everyone who does not agree with my views a fraudulent sorcerer?! If someone were to protest Sabbath desecration, that would not mean that theft does not trouble him. He devoted a post to criticizing my views, and perhaps in the future he will also write against magic. Think of Rabbi Tau, whom, from what I gather from what you wrote, you hold in esteem. He certainly speaks out forcefully against various sorcerers, and yet it is clear that he would write even more forcefully than Grinzeig did against me and my views. In such a case would you also accuse him that magic does not bother him?
I am a bit embarrassed, because I find myself defending Grinzeig again and again, even though of course I do not agree with his outlook. But one of my aims is precisely to purify the discourse and the arguments raised in it. I am trying to say that the confrontation should be with the substance of his arguments and not with his person, and certainly not with positions attributed to him that he himself did not express.
I hope my remarks are received in good spirit. I definitely do not suffer from Stockholm syndrome (the victim identifying with the perpetrator). But that is exactly what I think in this matter. That is why I wrote this post—to present substantively my arguments against Grinzeig’s criticism, and I did not get into side issues.
Rabbi Michi is wise, and indeed a sage is preferable to a prophet, but a prophet is greater than a sage. Therefore, from those people of spirit, who did not lie to us or to themselves, and were not living in a movie, but rather peeked behind the scenes—from them we shall take our way of life.
From whom shall we determine our attitude to prayer—from Rabbi Abraham Michael, or from Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook, about whom there is testimony that he once spoke with someone about agricultural matters before prayer, because he feared that otherwise his soul would depart from the greatness of the love of God that was burning within him at that hour?
When there are stories like that about Rabbi Abraham, talk to me.
Indeed, apparently there will be no such stories about him, because of the rationality of his students. Note this well.
In honor of His Holiness, King of the universe, author of “Examiner of the kidneys and the heart” and of the responsa “Receiver of the prayers of Israel,” etc. etc., Mr. Epi Course, may he live long,
More power to you for these apt remarks.
However, in accordance with His Holiness’s request not to converse in his vicinity
before we merit to see with our own eyes the
Greek Epicurus and seducer of the souls of Israel (in his spare time), the perfect sage M.A.,
conversing between the hand tefillin and the head tefillin
about the significant difference between the flowering of the snapdragon
and the budding of pomegranates, and what they have in common with a blue-tailed lilac.
In any case I gathered courage in my soul to ask by hinting,
and to be brief, is quantum mechanics not different from its agricultural counterpart?
And I shall now withdraw to put on the head tefillin.
Signed in tears,
? -place of signature-
In all honesty, if feeble-minded people like you (known as Epi Course) are the average religious people, I am considering going off the path and even converting to Christianity..
What is so important about having a kippah on one’s head?
Sorry for the great delay in replying (this is my response to the first comment on the post, which I wrote and to which you replied).
I claim that if there are things we cannot know with certainty, then one cannot say that the Holy One, blessed be He, commands us to believe with certainty that they are true.
If so, with respect to these areas, one can argue that someone who does not believe them is a heretic, in the sense that he does not believe in the set of beliefs included in our particular religious faith. This still does not come to prove or argue that this is true regarding all of Maimonides’ Thirteen Principles or any other principles.
If the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded us to believe they are true, then they are certainly true, and command has nothing to do with it. The question is what about a certain principle that we do not know whether it came from the Holy One, blessed be He, or not.
I do think that a principle that survived the tradition of the generations and entered the canon, even if it has no proof from Sinai, is very likely correct, and perhaps there is even a conclusive presumption that it is correct (note well: a conclusive presumption does not require correctness, but it does require conducting oneself on the assumption that it is correct). Perhaps the intent of “heresy” is failure to conduct oneself accordingly.
With God’s help, ערב שבת קודש Beha’alotekha, 5777
To Yoni—greetings,
If you examine every religion in the world, you will discover: (a) that every religion has a defined system of beliefs and opinions. (b) Every religion aspires to closeness to God, to feel the presence of God in the heart.
Meticulous observance of thousands of details of law without faith and religious feeling is not religion, but a distortion of the concept of religion. Who can live that way?
With blessings, S.Z. Lwinger.
Unfortunately I did not understand the criticism. Hazal’s statements are not claims? Then what are they— aesthetic judgments? By the way, in my personal opinion judgments too are claims, though not claims of fact in the usual sense (see my book Stable and Unstable Truth on this). The dismissive expression “sport” implies as though there is some possibility of engaging in things that are not claims (and that is the truly serious occupation, not just sport), but that is not so.
Y
Thank you. Though there are people on whom Hamehapekh’s books have more effect than my books. In my view that is nonsense, but I am not as optimistic as you are. Not all problems are on the intellectual plane.
Achiyah,
I have no idea, and for me it is not a consideration. By the way, in my opinion you are mistaken even about Leibowitz. His thought has certainly not been shelved, and it helps quite a few people (myself included, despite all my disagreements with him). Rav Kook’s writings too were obscure esoterica without significance in his own time. After a few decades they became foundational assets for many.
Hello Evyatar.
The definitions Orthodox, secular, Conservative, and so on are sociological. I do not think one can determine a halakhic or other position by them. Each person on his own merits. There are Conservatives out of conviction and learning, and I would certainly drink their wine. There are others who belong sociologically, but their whole point is laxity combined with some minimal Jewish identity. I would not drink their wine.
As for Torah study, I would learn from anyone so long as they offer reasoning and do not preach. There is no need to exclude anyone; one can disagree, even forcefully.
Avi answered well. If the Holy One, blessed be He, told me something, I would accept it—not because He has formal authority (for there is no formal authority regarding facts), but because I think He knows what He is talking about (substantive authority). Therefore I repeat and say that if there is a principle X that is included in the tradition and I have concluded that it is not correct, then there is no possibility of requiring me to believe it because of formal authority. At most, if they show me that it came from the Holy One, blessed be He, I will be persuaded that it is correct. But that is not obedience to authority; it is persuasion.
One can always claim that someone who does not believe in a set of beliefs is a heretic; I simply do not see the importance of that label. Whoever cares about it—health to him.
As for Avi’s last remark, I am actually not at all convinced that if something survived the filter of the generations, it is therefore strongly presumed correct. Quite a few things passed that filter and are nonsense. For example, that anyone killed because of his Judaism is a holy martyr, and other such nonsense. There are other things that perhaps are not nonsense, but are still blatantly unreasonable. In my opinion, acceptance guarantees nothing, unless the question is one whose basis is observation, or one for which the wisdom of crowds is relevant (see column 62).
And one more remark. I did not understand what you meant by the expression “a conclusive but not certain presumption.” A presumption that serves as an evidentiary estimate but not 100% (every presumption is like that), or a presumption of conduct (a legal assumption and not necessarily a factual one)? From the expression “conclusive presumption” I understand the second option. If I am right, then I disagree completely, because I do not accept presumptions of conduct (in the analytic terminology) regarding factual questions. Presumptions are a way to determine what is a legal fact for purposes of halakhic decision or legal ruling. Thus, for example, the presumption that a person does not repay before the due date is a reasonable factual estimate, so I would accept it both legally and factually (though not with certainty). But a presumption of fitness or another presumption of conduct (status quo presumption, or possession) are presumptions that determine only with regard to normative questions and not facts. If you ask me, in a case where Reuven sues Shimon and there is no evidence either way as to who the true owner is (not how to rule), I would not use possession as a basis for the answer. Just to head off expected questions: the presumption that a blemish remained as it was until the priest left the house (the source for status quo presumption in Hullin 10) is an evidentiary presumption and not a presumption of conduct. Factually it is improbable that in precisely those few seconds the blemish changed. And indeed it is difficult how one can derive from there the rest of the status quo presumptions, which are certainly presumptions of conduct.
Epi,
If you ask my opinion, do not determine your attitude to prayer on the basis of my words or anyone else’s. Think and come to your own conclusion. You assume that a position is always determined by authorities and are discussing who the authority is or whose authority is greater. Your mistake is already here, even before we enter the question whether you prefer Rav Kook to me (to that I definitely agree. The thickness of his little finger exceeds my waist). If you want to determine a position based on my words, I waive that in advance. I am trying to persuade, not to instruct and command or prophesy.
I meant, of course, only the intellectually inclined religious dropouts, who in my estimation are about a third of all such dropouts.
Shatz”l, although one kind in another kind is nullified, it is not recommended to mix them ab initio.
Observance of commandments without faith is devoid of value (not that one cannot live that way), even if one could live that way (Ahad Ha’am succeeded). By contrast, observance of commandments without religious feeling definitely has value and, in my opinion, is entirely possible (though I am willing to accept that it depends on the person). What is a distortion and what is not—that is hard to answer under the sun. Note this well.
I understand your distinction. I simply think that most of the things with respect to which principles of faith were stated are things whose truth cannot be proven or disproven—not by logical claims and not by empirical claims.
For example, I do not think one can refute or negate belief in the resurrection of the dead. How can one negate something future that is supposed to occur miraculously? Likewise regarding the coming of the messiah (even if it does not occur miraculously).
How can one refute or negate the claim that Moses’ prophecy is different from the prophecy of the other prophets? That too is a claim that creates formal authority, and not only a factual claim.
Since I did not state my argument in full, for the sake of the discussion I will explain where I am heading:
I am willing to accept the determination that one cannot require someone to believe something he is sure is not true, when it is a factual claim.
I think that with regard to things about which there is doubt, one can require belief even in a factual claim when it has authoritative implications (if I knew how, I would emphasize the last sentence). That is, the Holy One, blessed be He, or Hazal can obligate a person to believe in the coming of the messiah, if this has halakhic implications.
For example, the claim concerning the uniqueness of Moses’ prophecy has significance, according to Maimonides, with respect to the possibility of a prophet claiming that the Holy One, blessed be He, told him to cancel a commandment. So the factual claim (Moses’ prophecy is unique) also has a formal meaning (another prophet cannot dispute Moses’ prophecy).
So if what I said above is agreed upon, the important question is whether there are principles of faith that are based on a factual truth that is not proved one way or the other, but that has formal significance.
I do not agree. If this is a principle that is inaccessible to our thought/observation, how can another person (for example Maimonides) know it? So whichever way you look at it: if he is speaking on his own behalf, I will not accept it (because he too cannot know, just like me). And if he is transmitting to me a tradition from Sinai—I will accept it even if it were accessible to human thought. Conclusion: accessibility to human thought is irrelevant to the discussion. QED.
Yoav (this got inserted in the middle, so I deleted it and brought it here):
But that is true לגבי any claim connected to formal authority that also rests on factual claims.
Do you reject every formal authority that is based on factual claims?
For example, the claim of the uniqueness of Moses’ prophecy?
Interesting in light of this week’s Torah portion—indeed it is said that Moses is exceptional among all the prophets, but the verses do not say that Moses is exceptional among all the prophets who will ever arise. Did we receive such a belief from Sinai?
As stated, the practical implication of this question is the authority of the Torah as against the authority of a prophet.
Michi:
Indeed. There is no formal authority with respect to factual claims. Regarding the uniqueness of Moses’ prophecy, it depends what that principle means. If it is a factual principle (for example, that Moses can do things others cannot), then indeed there is no formal authority with respect to it. If the meaning is normative (Moses’ prophecy overrides the prophecy of every other prophet and it is forbidden to disagree with him), then formal authority with respect to it is possible.
I did not understand the implication you brought at the end, but I think I clarified my position.
Again the same thing.
Yoav:
On further thought, since you wrote that you are not pressed to say that Moses wrote the entire Torah, and nevertheless you see it as binding, then presumably you are not pressed about the connection between factual claims and formal authority.
Perhaps you could refer me to the place where you wrote why formal authority binds us?
Michi:
It is not that I am not pressed; rather there is no connection between facts and norms. That is the naturalistic fallacy. You undertake an obligation to the command of the Holy One, blessed be He, or to what is written in the Torah. The fact that something is written or that there is a command does not in itself mean one must obey.
The decision to obey God’s command or what is written in the Torah is your own decision. I have nothing to write about that. In my personal opinion there is an obligation to obey the command of the Holy One, blessed be He. I have nothing more to say about it beyond that. See, for example, my article on gratitude here:
https://mikyab.net/%D7%9B%D7%AA%D7%91%D7%99%D7%9D/%D7%9E%D7%90%D7%9E%D7%A8%D7%99%D7%9D/%D7%94%D7%9B%D7%A8%D7%AA-%D7%98%D7%95%D7%91%D7%94-%D7%91%D7%99%D7%9F-%D7%9E%D7%95%D7%A1%D7%A8-%D7%9C%D7%90%D7%95%D7%A0%D7%98%D7%95%D7%9C%D7%95%D7%92%D7%99%D7%94/
And also at the end of the fifth notebook.
And please, try to make sure the comments are written in the right order. Each time I have to delete and copy.
I enjoyed and delighted in the article on heresy—indeed words of depth and courage.
A few remarks and thoughts, with your permission:
1. Regarding Bible study—the conclusions are moral, value-based, and spiritual, not necessarily practical, but without Bible study we have lost our identity.
I liked that prophets can err; on Shavuot I hinted that there is a possibility of disagreement between prophets. I was asked how I could say such a thing. The Gemara stood at my side… as did Maimonides, and the matter was resolved; specifically a “conservative” answer helped.
2. I do not think the vast majority of the public can hear your words; it is too fixed and square. I wonder whether it is right to say things that at this stage they cannot hear. But for the public, if one shows that Maimonides or Rav Kook, say, thought this way, it is very significant, even if you say and shout that it does not matter who said it, only what is true. The public, including most of its rabbis, is not ripe for that. Therefore in the past they wrote allusively and hid things from the public.
3. With my meager abilities I try to exert influence in classes and talks.
Every Shavuot I give a class in a different synagogue: what are the goals of the Revelation at Mount Sinai? And what did Israel understand at the Revelation? The goal is to break the argument that everyone saw it and it was passed on by tradition. It works nicely.
I encourage questions and express positions that for many are not a novelty.
When I finish, I will publish a book on the matter, only I do not know through whom. In academia there are all kinds of “mystics” and accepted fashions, and so too in…
4. Rav Kook: a simple look at his writings will show that he relies much more on Maimonides than on Rabbi Judah Halevi; the Rav was more open and radical than people think, especially in matters of faith and opinion. Thus Maimonides was very radical and not dogmatic, as I think people wrongly interpret him; and even Rabbi Judah Halevi is explained inaccurately—for example, as relying on the principle of Mount Sinai. It seems to me that my friend Rabbi Uriel Eitam once conveyed this in the Yerucham yeshiva in an introductory class on the Kuzari.
5. “A wicked person… dies immediately in his wickedness,” in Hilkhot Teshuvah—this is a good example that one has to study a few more halakhot and arrive at the sentence “and it is weighed only according to the knowledge of the God of knowledge, and He knows how merits are weighed against sins.”
This is so even without using the Guide of the Perplexed.
Before Rosh Hashanah, I ask: “A person who walked 100 cubits in the Land of Israel gets 25 portions in the World to Come. So can he insult another person—24 people—and still remain in the black?”
Everyone smiles—an embarrassed smile.
I press: why not?
And everyone’s answer is the same: well, obviously it is not such a simple accounting…
In summary, the discourse has to be changed, including on the matter of what questions need to be asked and what issues need to be confronted. I think one can rely on sources, and then there is a chance this will influence the public.
More power to you!!
Hello Ayin.
Many thanks for the remarks. A few comments:
1. I cannot manage to see something one can learn from the Bible, but perhaps that depends not on it but on me. Considerations of identity are educational considerations. I am tired of educational considerations in place of considerations of truth.
2. I agree that most of the public would prefer to hear this from sources, but then I have thrown out the baby with the bathwater. My goal is not only the conclusions but specifically the methodology. And whoever does not agree and will not listen—loses out. As far as I’m concerned, that is his problem. I am speaking to people who specifically need this discourse, because there is no one else who will speak to them. As for those for whom it is not suitable—there are many others who will speak to them.
4. I do not deal with the thought of others and do not trouble myself to clarify their intellectual wares. What matters to me is not what so-and-so meant, but only what is true. Therefore I am not expert in this. It is entirely possible that you are right.
5. Here I disagree. That is the standard excuse, but it does not hold water. For some reason the consideration of the God of knowledge, which no one understands, leads to the conclusion that there are no wicked people (because nobody dies immediately). It empties the statement of content. I did not buy it.
All the best, and success,
Regarding section 5.
I think there is a wink from Maimonides here.
As for the methodological issue: as long as it matters to people what x or y said, in my opinion one should continue in that direction.
Few people will be willing to examine arguments on their own merits.
I’ll say more.
Since in my opinion this approach can be shown in the Rishonim, I would base this claim on them.
After all, even in halakhah you relate to sources, although you could speak from your own opinion. The authority today, and since the Gemara, is the acceptance of Israel. And there is room to discuss how much that authority still exists today.
In the post I explained the difference between halakhah and thought. Halakhah deals with norms, and there there are authorities. Beyond that, in halakhah clarifying the decisor’s intention can help clarify what the truth is. Such clarification certainly has a place in thought as well.
Again the same thing (it is a mystery to me. I sent a query to the site editor).
Yoav:
I very much hope the remarks are now being written in the right place. I don’t know how to make sure that this is indeed so.
1. I know the concept of the naturalistic fallacy. I do not think a fact can generate a norm, but I do think a fact can be a condition for a norm. For example, you base philosophical gratitude on the claim that God created us. That is, here there is a factual claim that generates a norm.
2. As an aside—I just read the article on gratitude. I did not manage to understand why in your opinion the fact that God created us generates the norm of gratitude. Why does saying this is a philosophical claim answer the question? The principle of causality is part of human thought. Therefore one can use it in a philosophical argument (I think), or reject it. Is the principle of philosophical gratitude also part of human thought?
3. If you agree with 1, then you need to say that a Torah exists, and state what it is, in order to say למשל that you think you are obligated to it. If so, you need to decide what this Torah includes. Surely it includes, even in your view, components that are the Oral Torah.
We do not know when the belief in the uniqueness of Moses’ Torah arose. It may be an invention of Hazal. And it may be that Moses received this information at Sinai. But we also do not know when the belief in the existence of the 39 categories of labor arose, or the content of the tefillin passages.
I cannot understand why this seems different to you.
If there are factual claims that entail norms, then accepting Hazal’s formal authority would obligate accepting the norms based on certain facts. I do not understand how one can be obligated to norms without believing in the correctness of the facts necessary for that norm.
As I understand it, one cannot be obligated to the norm that a prophet cannot annul a commandment in the Torah without believing in the uniqueness of belief in Moses’ Torah. One can believe in the uniqueness without being obligated to the norm. But the reverse, I cannot understand.
It may be that the discussion also is not progressing.
As stated, I hope the remarks are brought in the right place and not elsewhere in the thread. If not, perhaps we should conduct the discussion בינינו by email (and if the discussion is not progressing, one can also say that just as I received reward for the effort, etc.)
Michi:
1. Indeed. That is exactly what I wrote. Except that in the move from fact to norm there enters my own assumption that this fact entails the norm (for example, that a command entails obedience).
2. Indeed. Philosophical gratitude is part of human thought, and in my view it is what underlies the obligation to obey God’s command. This answers the question because I show that we have this intuition within us. Whoever does not—indeed will not feel obligated. Every argument is based on premises, and whoever does not accept them of course will not accept the conclusion either.
3. What seems different from what? I did not understand the question. The Torah expresses God’s will, and what expresses His will obligates me. Sometimes the clarification of what is included in His will is done after I have already decided on the obligation, according to arguments and facts that become known (like biblical criticism, for example). Your assumption is wrong that first one must decide what is included in the Torah and only then undertake obligation. On the contrary: in the midrashim about how the Holy One, blessed be He, offered the Torah to the nations, we see that they asked what is written in it, meaning they wanted to examine what it contains and only then commit. But Israel committed simply because the Torah is God’s will, without needing to clarify what it contains. The clarification of what it contains can be done afterward. In my books I distinguished in this context between a principle of sweeping value (one principle that obligates obedience to God’s will regardless of its content) and a specific one (an obligation grounded in specific identification with each command).
I do not understand the question. Above I raised two possibilities for understanding uniqueness. If the uniqueness of Moses’ prophecy is a fact, then you are right. But if it is a norm, then you are not right. Moreover, if I deny the factual uniqueness, I can still accept the normative instruction of the Holy One, blessed be He, to prefer Moses’ prophecy over that of any other prophet. What is the problem with that? Thus, for example, the Knesset is authorized to legislate laws and that binds citizens (=norm), even if you do not accept that the greatest people of the nation sit there and are always right (=fact).
Below is my response to Avishai Grinzeig on the original post:
“You are stupid, yes, but even fools need to be answered.
When Hazal said that ‘Moses received Torah from Sinai,’ they meant Moses son of Amram, not Moses son of Maimon. Judaism existed before Maimonides and it exists after Maimonides as well. The mere fact that Maimonides established a theological determination (which he reached by way of philosophical inquiry—something Rabbi Michael Abraham is an expert in, and you, how shall I put it, it is doubtful whether you even understand what the word means), still does not obligate anyone. If someone’s philosophical conclusions differ from Maimonides’, it is good and proper that he follow them.
The only thing common to all Jews is observance of the commandments. Take the Ari, whom if Maimonides had met him, he would have condemned for his bizarre theology in several kinds of condemnations. And nevertheless this one went his way and that one went his way.
Even if Maimonides himself had stood on his own two feet and publicly declared that anyone who disagrees with him has no share in the God of Israel—it would have been utterly meaningless. This is a philosophical dispute and not a halakhic dispute. But unlike you, Maimonides would not have said that. Maimonides understood philosophy, and he would have thought about Rabbi Michael’s words instead of waving vile categories as you did. But Maimonides was a wise man, so you can hardly be blamed.”
Yoav, hello.
I agree with the content of your remarks, of course, but I think the personal attacks are unnecessary and harmful (and also not true—he is far from being stupid). By the way, I’m also not sure Maimonides would have been so tolerant of other views, certainly not views he considered heretical.
By the way, someone told me that on Facebook comments opposing Grinzeig’s opinion get deleted there. So I am not sure your remarks will be published there.
Yoni, consider converting to Islam, that’s going to be the next big thing
I somewhat disagree with the rabbi regarding “stupidity.” I do not know Mr. Grinzeig. But I think the reference to “stupid” is not necessarily to him, but to a certain public (to which he belongs). And the intention is not to inferential ability (which I do not know about), but to the way the claims are made and not to the claims themselves. There is no problem at all with claiming that the rabbi is a heretic and drawing operative conclusions from that. The problem usually is in a kind of panic with which such a claim is usually made. People of this sort react to claims they see as heretical like an animal into whose territory someone has entered, and then it attacks instinctively and is not at all occupied with checking what the (innocent) intention of the person who entered was (and who did not mean to harm that animal at all). Conclusions are reached calmly (one can argue them passionately afterward), and not out of impulsiveness. I doubt whether that person even sat and read a small part of the rabbi’s words (maybe he did, but most of those who accuse the rabbi do not) and tried to understand him deeply. And it is against that that the criticism of the person or public is directed, and I also think that is what the responses that “defend” the rabbi are aimed at. Besides, it seems that this is the only style these people understand.
(If you do not insult him, he simply will not listen even to the substantive arguments—“a whip for the back of fools.”)
By the way, I personally do think there is such a thing as a heretic and that it is “bad.” But truly, if a person sat and invested effort, thought, and reached heretical conclusions, he is not bad, and he is even forbidden to act otherwise than what he thinks. I believe such a person is mistaken, and mistakes have consequences. But if he does not act according to his consequences—because I believe (and also somewhat know) that Hazal’s words are true and describe reality—then if he does not trust his intellect, he will never arrive at the truth either. (As in physics, through mistakes one reaches truths.) Specifically, after much, much thought and contemplation that I invested in this matter, I reached the conclusion that today (unlike in the period of the Mishnah and the Gemara at least) we are not born automatically with a share in the World to Come and occupied with not losing it (and also with increasing it), but rather with a blank slate, and during our lives we must earn it (and then one also sees the share he has earned even while still alive). And only one who has indeed merited it has something of him remain after death and for the resurrection of the dead, while one who has not is like a sophisticated animal (here I am already jumping to the claim that only one who has merited this is called a human being (= a being with free choice)).
A heretic (and the rest of those who have no share in the World to Come) is not to blame for being a heretic if he invested thought and these are his conclusions, and he is indeed not bad. But a World to Come he will not have (to earn one must work). But that is not bad for him because he did not lose something he had before; he simply did not gain what he did not have. Here of course one must already understand what the World to Come is and what good there is in it. But really Hazal’s words are of the kind whose truth one cannot see without first believing them (that is, first one agrees and only afterward understands, not the reverse—what is called faith above reason, which is not faith against what the eyes see but where the eyes see nothing at all (like the non-existence of a magnetic monopole, which is actually not a good example because Gauss’s law for magnetism was in fact confirmed through the confirmation of relativity and בעקבותיה Q.E.D.)). After faith there finally comes knowledge.
More than that: such a heretic is in a better state than believers of the metaphorical Grinzeig sort. They are not even that. They are simply beasts. Their faith is lip service (faith below reason). All their lives they are occupied with definitions of who belongs to their camp and who does not, and even that in the instincts of an animal that needs to identify whether someone is dangerous to it or not (and in matters of thought there is no such thing as dangerous—everything can be conceived, except that there is no thought [and even that too—sometimes])). They do this without even asking themselves what is good about belonging to one camp or another. About this Rav Kook said that there is a kind of heresy that is greater than faith. Such a heretic will one day understand that his conclusions are empty (he is right and not wise, which means he is not really right but is satisfied with superficial appearances), and then he will be driven to believe Hazal’s words (or he will kill himself). But all the foolish believers will arrive at nothing, and they do not even have this world. By the way, probably the emotionality with which they respond is probably the identification of what is called in the language of Proverbs “foolishness” (see the introduction of Da’at Mikra to the character types of Proverbs and the difference between an evile [which he claims is what we would call today “primitive”] and a kesil [which he claims is what we call stupid, though one still needs to discuss what stupid is]).
By the way, in my humble opinion Maimonides himself too (in Hilkhot Avodah Zarah), in his explanation of the prohibition “Do not stray after your hearts—this is heresy” regarding “prohibitions on inquiry,” casually notes that the problem in this matter is that it is done lightly and rashly. (“For a person’s mind is short, and not all minds can grasp the truth clearly. And if every person follows the thoughts of his own heart, he will destroy the world because of his short mind. How so? Sometimes he will pursue idolatry, and sometimes he will think about the unity of the Creator: perhaps He exists, perhaps not; what is above and what is below, what is before and what is behind; and sometimes about prophecy, whether it is true or not; and sometimes about the Torah, whether it is from Heaven or not. And he does not know the measures by which he should judge until he knows the truth clearly, and thus he comes to heresy.”) In our time, I truly do not know what remains of this prohibition according to that. Perhaps it was intended for simple people (who, surprisingly to me over time, turn out to be the majority).
Is the rabbi a “heretic” according to this? In my humble opinion, not officially. In practice this identification has no value because, according to my claim, until one sees the existence of this World to Come while still alive, in any case there will be no World to Come when one dies.
I apologize for the length, but I didn’t have the energy to write more briefly.
Rabbi Michael, hello!
I wanted to share my opinion on the matter with the rabbi.
There are realities that are “in our hands,” that we can investigate with the powers given to us and understand properly. Logic, science, parts of philosophy, and ethics are areas in which one investigates realities of this kind. By contrast, there are insights that a person does not acquire through active effort; rather, he prepares himself to absorb them. The inwardness of morality, the inner content of philosophy, and Torah are indeed insights of the second kind.
To the extent that a person prepares and refines his soul honestly in the first domain, his soul becomes a vessel more prepared and fit for the light to rest upon him—the insights of the second kind. The people of Israel prepared their soul most of all in the first domain (this process in fact stems from the second plane, but that is another discussion) and therefore merited that the light should dwell upon them to the greatest degree. From here comes the intuitive tendency among the people of Israel simply to speak about the insights of the second kind as a known and clear reality, because this is indeed a reality apparent and visible to them.
From this comes the slogan-filled discourse in the believing public, because every child who hears such a slogan immediately agrees with it, because his heart sees that it is simply true. This discourse stems from a great virtue. Therefore one should recognize its value and hold on to these slogans as a precious treasure. These are the roots that the Jewish people have polished throughout history until now. One who ignores the data that the experts in the field have gathered over years certainly will not get far at all. Here I would emphasize that according to what was said above, the inner content contained in the ritual handwashing of a little religious child who does not know his right from his left is essentially of higher value than all the thought of philosophers who did not succeed in reaching the inner content that this child has reached.
It follows that the tendency of most of the believing public is to approach and speak directly about the light itself. Thus over time there is indeed an erosion in the insights of the first kind, due to neglect of engagement with them, which causes the “vessel” not to be so fit for the “light” to dwell upon it, and consequently even the ancient familiar slogans become filled with dross of misunderstanding and turn hollow. When the vessel is not fit for the light to dwell upon it, the light immediately withdraws upward. Therefore, alongside our speaking about what appears in our spiritual vision as self-evident with respect to the light, we must return to contemplating the basic insights on which it rests and clarify and deepen them.
Unlike the tendency of most believers in our day to look and speak directly about the light, Maimonides tended to begin דווקא from the simple, lower reality. It was precisely that reality that appeared to him as clear and such that one can trust our insights about it more simply, and therefore from it he begins his observation of reality and the construction of the edifices of his apprehension. Of course he too arrived at inquiry and construction in the realm of the light, but the lens from which he speaks is from below, from the discourse that exists in the world of the material “vessels.”
In this, Rabbi Michael, it seems to me you have failed. You have a Maimonidean tendency in the angle from which you look at and examine things, and thank God that we have merited you, because the people of Israel desperately need this purification of vessels and lights. But whereas Maimonides refined the lights down to the foundation, you trim them a bit as well.
We observe Torah developing and becoming clarified over generations, one foundation built on another, link upon link. We observe the light flowing down to our world through the hearts and minds of the Jewish people, with a group of sages of the generation always standing at their head from time immemorial. Every generation was always faithful to the heads of the previous generation, trusted them, and clarified their words. All this is because every generation *saw* that the desired light passed through them. Every generation heard anew that this is what God commanded and this is what truth says. Every generation understood that if it disconnects from the previous link, it disconnects from the source of light.
We trust Hazal’s words not only because that is what was agreed upon regarding halakhah, but mainly because we see (with the help of the tradition directing our vision) that this is the truth in the sense that this is the right way to act; this is where God’s will dwells. For that reason we must place exactly the same trust that we place in their words on halakhic matters in their aggadic words. The difference is that in matters of halakhah one can tell a simple person to perform what Hazal said even if he has not yet succeeded in fully grasping it intellectually. But with aggadic matters one cannot tell a simple person to believe what is written, because the purpose in aggadah is that the matters settle on the mind and heart. Also, until the matters have settled on a person’s mind, there is a high likelihood that he has not even understood their meaning properly. Therefore a person who does not identify with a saying of Hazal should not agree with it and identify with it in a forced and false way. But he should devote himself to clarifying the topic in light of Hazal’s words and strive to understand their words מתוך trust—seeing that when he understands, he will identify with them.
I estimate that this discourse, in which I point to spiritual seeing as clear and as something one can rely on at least as much as scientific evidence/proof, is foreign to your discourse. I infer this from the style of your words and from many of your conclusions. The lack of trust and devotion conveyed in your words toward Hazal and the greats of Israel in the realm of aggadah, the lack of seeing value in studying the Bible, the comparison between Hazal who saw the light and Kant who slogged through vessels, and more—all convey disconnection from recognition of the clear reality of the said light, a reality that is clear to some extent even to that child who performs ritual handwashing.
Sometimes exclusive engagement with the vessels causes one to forget the purpose for which they are meant—to direct toward the light. Sometimes focusing on the laws of reality causes one to forget contemplation of the will that is expressed through them. I assume that your concern only with the parameter of what is correct or not, and your indifference to the label “heretic,” stem from lack of recognition of the impurity and evil that this term is meant to express, and the hatred it is supposed to arouse.
Because I do recoil from the expression, it is important to me to say that it is clear to me that you are not a heretic. It is clear to me that you have not denied the principle of reward and punishment, because you do think that one who cleaves to the path of God is elevated, and that would be called reward.
Your talk about death throes of a broad public indicates a disconnection from the content that that public sees before its eyes, and that occupies it, and in which it merits to see blessing and development unseen for generations.
In summary: Rabbi Michael, I appreciate you and your ideas very much. I even admire you. I think what you lack is recognition that we have the ability not only to investigate the laws of the world but also the will of God embedded and revealed in it. I think that in Judaism—or if you prefer,
in the most correct and penetrating path of inquiry—philosophical inquiry does indeed have a foundational and scientific character, but its main content ultimately is standing before a being revealed as possessing will, and cleaving to Him and to His will.
With your desire to answer those who are distant from standing before God and speaking with Him, please be careful not to harm the bond of those who have merited this.
With sincere and great love,
Yonatan
P.S. I would be glad for the rabbi’s response to my words
Regarding a conclusive presumption: this is a presumption that cannot be rebutted, certainly not by anything less than certainty. In other words, for various reasons Hazal shifted the burden of proof to whoever tries to refute the principles of faith, and required us to rely on them until then. A kind of faith in the sages.
The term itself is taken from the legal field, where there are quite a few presumptions that override even certainty, for various reasons (by the way, is there such a situation in halakhah? Perhaps akin to what Rabbi Soloveitchik wrote about the presumption that “it is preferable to dwell as two than to dwell alone,” but it seems that there he simply assumes that the empirical situation does not give a complete picture—that is, that the presumption is true in reality even though it does not appear so).
Regarding plausibility: first, there is a non-negligible likelihood that some of the knowledge came from a tradition from Sinai or from prophecy, and this likelihood increases the less disputed the matter is. Second, even if the filter is not perfect, surely you will agree that it exists and succeeded in filtering out most errors. Are these not enough to create an evidentiary estimate?
I still did not understand which of the possibilities you meant. Why can it not be rebutted by less than certainty—because it is true, or because one ought (normatively) to follow it? “Hazal shifted the burden of proof” is a vague formulation. They can shift all day long to whomever they wish. Regarding facts, the question is what is true and what is not.
I know it is taken from the legal field, but there it has two meanings, and I asked which of the two you intended. Rabbi Soloveitchik’s remarks about “it is preferable to dwell as two than to dwell alone” are so far-fetched that it is clear he himself did not mean them literally, but rather for polemical purposes. After all, that presumption is not learned from a verse. So how did Hazal understand it if it does not emerge from empirical observation? Obviously they derived it from observation, for that indeed was the nature of women in their time. Not so today.
I do not agree that it filtered out any errors whatsoever. How do you know which and how many errors it filtered out?! And how do you assume that I will surely agree to such a baseless claim? I also do not know how you infer how much and what part of the knowledge came from Sinai. Aside from what is explicitly said to be a law given to Moses at Sinai—and even regarding that, the early authorities already wrote that sometimes this is only a metaphorical expression (a rabbinic law about which they feared a challenge would arise, and therefore they wrote that its force is like a law given to Moses at Sinai).
Yonatan, hello.
Many thanks for your remarks. I disagree with you on the most fundamental point: in my opinion the slogan-filled discourse stems from dogmatism. Nothing more. Intuitive vision of truths is something I have written about extensively, and in fact it is the basis of my whole method. But in my opinion, its excessive use in the world of faith indicates dogmatism. People who see all this (assuming there are such people) will not be harmed, and they will not listen to my words either. I speak to those who did not “merit” to see, in the light of lights, the light of truth. And in their sins they are searching for their way, like me, with ordinary intellectual tools, and are unwilling to place blind trust in things that are not worthy of trust.
So let each go his own way, and from me and from you the One above will be praised.
My comment appears there, and was not deleted. It even got a respectable number of likes
Rabbi Michael, hello again.
It is hard for me to imagine a person whose worldview is like the one the rabbi holds and proposes and who nevertheless is a person who devotes his whole life from the depth of his heart to benefiting others and doing his Creator’s will with all his strength. I estimate that the rabbi’s inclination would be that the person fitting that devoted description is superior to the first person, even the most intellectually gifted one, if he is relatively dried out of moral aspirations and the aspiration to benefit others with all his strength. Is this not a kind of proof that there is a flaw in the path the rabbi proposes?
Likewise, I will be impertinent and say that I estimate the rabbi has experienced an experience of cleaving to God, and therefore also knows that one can investigate and speak about it. Why should we not walk in this path trodden by all the prophets, and in whose light we saw (and see) that God turns His face toward us?
True, from me and from you… but clearly holding only one aspect is “not it.” One who knows a reality can connect to it; one who recognizes its value and stands in awe of it can connect and love it. One who wants to connect in soul but does not contemplate with the intellect does not know what to connect to, and one who only knows intellectually and does not connect with the soul has merely set up a system of pipes without running water through them.
And how will he set up the pipes correctly if he is not constantly aware in a clarified way where the source of the water is and where he is to direct his work?
Shabbat shalom,
Yonatan
Emotion (for one who has it) and soul are perfectly fine, but not as a substitute for intellect. Our debate was not over whether it is important to have a religious soul and/or religious feeling. That is another discussion, and I have things to say about that as well. Our debate here was about how insights and conclusions are formed: whether only through the intellect or whether there is something else in its place. So let us not mix one kind with another.
Thank you for laying out the method.
Maybe I need to read earlier articles, but every logical discussion rests on axioms. If so, one could say that earlier sources have authority at the 90% level. That is, in order to argue about whether the State of Israel is the beginning of the flowering of our redemption (assuming that phrase has some concrete meaning), one has to decide it as a factual claim in what is a fairly open debate. But to argue about whether there was a Revelation at Mount Sinai in a way that more or less accords with the plain sense of the verses in the book of Exodus—if someone wants to change the tradition, he has to have a very, very strong basis.
So if there is some convergence in the Torah world around a certain position, it should take a very high level of persuasion to dispute that position.