The Place of Religiosity in Religious Faith: A. A General Overview (Column 311)
In the previous column (310) I responded to several critiques of what I said in an interview with Yair Sheleg. One of the main points raised in the various critiques—perhaps the central one—concerned feeling and experience, and especially their place within religious faith and service of God. Among other things, because of this I was accused by Yehuda Yifrah of “rational autism,” a charge that, in different forms, recurs among many of my critics.[1] Although I have already dealt with these topics several times in the past (on emotions, see for example Column 22, and on experiences see a bit here), as I wrote there I thought it appropriate to focus my claims on this matter in a separate column—and here it is.
“And Mordechai the Jew would neither kneel nor bow down”
I found it appropriate to open the column with a strange response from “Mordechai” that I found on the site on Sunday morning.[2] He opens with the following riddle:
This is the central point—if indeed it’s impossible to attain prophecy and an unmediated relationship with the Holy One, blessed be He, with such “truth” (and I’m not asserting any positive claim here, only assuming for the sake of discussion)—then perhaps this itself is evidence that this isn’t really the “truth” (or at least only part of the truth)?
Even he felt that this riddle required some explanation, and so immediately afterward he added the following analogy:
Perhaps I was too terse, so I’ll expand (but only a little).
When I look at a map to find my way to Jerusalem and mark out a route on it, and at the end of the trip I find myself in Tel Aviv, it’s clear that somewhere I went wrong, as the saying goes, “This is neither the way nor the city.”
Clearly not everyone will merit prophecy or divine inspiration even if one is meticulous in mitzvah observance and studies Torah constantly. This is guaranteed to no one. Even if you marked the correct route on the map, you might make a navigational error, and so on. But if the route from the outset leads somewhere else—meaning, if the path you propose blocks in principle any possibility of prophecy and an unmediated relationship with the Holy One, blessed be He (and you even add words of disparagement toward that aspiration)—its end testifies to its beginning that something in your logical-philosophical analysis and your “thin theology” is flawed, even if I couldn’t point to the exact fallacy. (And it seems to me, after reading most of the trilogy, that I can point to a number of fallacies, but this is not the place.)
As noted, this is indeed a strange message (which begins with a sentence deserving to compete for understatement of the week), and I devote space to it because it expresses the point with which I wish to open here. Mordechai assumes that mapping out a theological-intellectual route (mine and in general) is meant to bring us to prophecy or to an unmediated (!) connection with God; therefore, if it does not do so, something in it fails.
Needless to say, Mordechai’s argument first and foremost begs the question. The claim I made, which he seeks to dispute, is that religious experience and feeling have no importance. Even if someone’s heart compels him to dispute these living words of God, I see no point in declaring that if my way does not lead to religious feeling and experience, this is a sign that the way fails. That is precisely what the debate is about. He assumes that my arguments are supposed to lead to his conclusions, and when they do not, they fail. If you wish to argue with me, it is appropriate to raise (positive) claims and arguments, not merely make declarations. The added GPS analogy only deepens the sense of question-begging and certainly does not help extricate us from this logical bind. Marking a route on a map is intended to bring us to the intended destination; if it fails to do so, it is indeed useless and unhelpful. By contrast, if the marking was intended for aesthetic purposes, for example, then there is certainly room to discuss its utility even if it leads elsewhere. In our case, our debate is about this very question: what is the purpose of the map and the marking on it (=my theology)? Therefore, as I wrote there, it is really not clear to me what this analogy could add to the discussion.
Mordechai’s substantive claim
But to reach our topic, we must leave aside Mordechai’s logic and methodology and focus on the claim itself. Like many others (some of whom were cited in the previous column and others appeared in the comments), Mordechai assumes that the meaning of faith (or at least a central part of it) is religious feeling or a religiose experience. I, as noted, deny this. In my view, this is not an essential component of faith, and certainly in my trilogy or here on the site I did not intend to chart a path that leads to them (and therefore, even if I did not help you reach mystical union, or a direct connection with the Creator, I do not feel I have failed—begging your pardon, of course). Moreover, I wrote that if someone finds himself in such a mystical union—good for him. As I wrote, even if there is some value in it (only when it appears beyond the foundational tier of commitment), I do not provide that service. Beyond that, I greatly doubt the cognitive/epistemic basis of such mystical experiences—that is, that they in any way testify to a connection with the Creator. True, I cannot deny their existence and perhaps cannot categorically reject their reliability; nonetheless, in my view they usually indicate a psychological structure and need of the experiencer rather than any referent in the objective world. The fact that a person feels some experiential connection to the Creator does not mean that this reflects any encounter with Him. To use the language of our Sages, it can also be wishful thinking. Finally, one could argue that even if this is not an encounter but rather an expression of the experiencer’s own religious feeling, perhaps there is value in it in and of itself. A person is connected to God with every fiber of his being, and therefore senses Him in the experiential and emotional realms of his soul (even if there is no encounter in any real sense). Later I will argue that I doubt even this—but this, of course, is debatable.
Why isn’t faith wishful thinking?
I can already anticipate readers’ questions: why not say, to the same extent, that faith too is wishful thinking? And indeed Marx already taught us that religion is the opiate of the masses. Incidentally, religious experiences and feelings generally do seem to me like that in practice. A person seeks a connection to the hidden, unfathomable God; it’s no wonder he finds it in one experience or another. But religion without experiences and feelings is actually less suspect of being an opiate meant to satisfy human needs. It is a religion that demands rather than supplies, requires rather than answers needs (perhaps it does answer a need for meaning and rationality, but that is true of any philosophical theory). And nevertheless, many accuse cognitive theology and faith of being the opiate of wishful thinking…
In principle, of course, this could be true. But to criticize and attack a claim based on reasons and arguments, one must substantiate the critical arguments. Someone who doubts the premises or logic of an argument should explain what in the premises or the logic seems wrong to him, and then there is room and need to conduct a debate about it. By contrast, the fact that a person experiences an experience or feels a certain feeling within his inner soul says nothing about their meaning. The human soul is rich and varied, and it has all sorts of depths from which a host of experiences and feelings can be hewn without any need for a source in the objective world. We dream, sense, and experience a great many things, and one who treats all these as expressions of an encounter with something in the objective world usually needs a professional’s care. Not for nothing do psychologists address the meaning of dreams in terms of revealing the depths of the soul—expressions of repressed needs and fears, etc. Ostensibly, none of this is necessary: a person dreamt that two pink eagles attacked him above Lake Hula—then apparently that’s what really happened, no?! After all, he had such an experience. A dream too is an experience.
In my view, when criticism is raised regarding feeling and experience, religious or otherwise, the burden of proof rests on the experiencer, not on the critic. This is not like criticism of an argument. Are there not plenty of people who experience visits by the angel Gabriel, by Jesus, or by Napoleon Bonaparte? Or those who feel that they are the Messiah, or the official spokesmen of God? Others feel that their grandmother appeared to them in a dream or is present at their daughter’s wedding. Even the officiating rabbi tells us again and again that all the grandfathers and grandmothers are gazing down upon us (as “the holy books” say—there, there). There are also people who are afraid at night. Does that necessarily mean that there are demons and harmful spirits there? Is anyone claiming that all these feelings and experiences must be taken seriously, or that the burden of proof lies on whoever doubts them?! Someone reports that he feels a certain feeling or experienced something—so what?! Does that mean it reflects a meeting or mystical union? Is anyone who doubts this a rational autistic? If so, then I am a proud autistic (see Column 218).
I stress again: in principle, it is possible that such experiences and feelings reflect a real encounter with the Creator. But it is also possible that they do not. My skepticism (or “autism”) only says that the burden of proof is on the one who claims that they do.
Summary of my claims
To summarize, my claims are the following:
- a. Religious feeling and experience are not necessarily expressions of an actual encounter with the Creator. b. Even if there were an encounter—there is not necessarily value in it.
- a. If there is no encounter, it may still be an emotional expression of the faith within us. b. But even such an expression does not necessarily have value.
- Even if there is some value in one of these, it is certainly not the foundation and not an essential component of faith and service of God. At most, this can be treated as a possible mode of faith or divine service, built upon the tier of cognitive faith and religious commitment, which are the basic and binding plane of divine service. As noted, I even doubt this.
- And even if all these had immense value (and as noted, in my opinion they do not), my theology does not try to help people reach illuminations of that sort. Does this disqualify the path I propose/describe? After the rational foundation, each person can take things and build upon them an edifice of experiences and feelings as he wishes and understands. As noted, unfortunately we do not provide that particular service, not even for an additional fee—but the path is open to anyone who desires to do so on his own.
Kant and Judaism
Kant conceived of Judaism as a kind of social code, not really a religion. His Jewish students and friends wrote at length about his mistaken conception and the unfamiliarity that led to that mistake.[3] But to the best of my judgment, he actually perceived Judaism quite correctly, and it was they who were mistaken. We must remember that Kant came from a Christian society and culture that saw two main essential features of religion: religiosity (religious experience and feeling) and morality. From that vantage point he looked at Judaism and saw that the main thing was missing. It is hard to deny that, at least factually, the essence of Judaism in the eyes of Jews is halakha (Jewish law). The experiential and emotional dimensions—even if they existed among certain Jews—were not regarded as essential components of Jewish religiosity. One who was not endowed with these was not considered religiously lacking (except on the fringes, which see these dimensions as the essence of Jewish religiosity). By contrast, one who was not committed to halakha could not be considered a religious Jew (perhaps a religiose Jew—but that very concept is Christian). The centrality of Torah study and the focus of learners on halakha, as well as the selection of rabbis and religious leadership according to their mastery of halakha in particular, also attest to this. It is no wonder that Kant’s conclusion was that this is not a religion but a normative code.
I do disagree with Kant regarding terminology. In my view, a religion can certainly be defined on the basis of a “code” and not on the basis of religiosity (and so it should be). Religiosity, at least in its Jewish sense, is indeed the acceptance of the yoke and commitment to a normative code—halakha. The definition of commitment to this code as “religion” derives from the fact that the source of this code is God (as opposed to commitment to other codes). Moreover, unlike other codes, most of it (and in my view all of it) has no practical, social, or other purposes. Like Maimonides, I too assume it has aims of some spiritual refinement (usually hidden and not understood), but it certainly is not a typical code. Morality and religious experience—even if they have some importance in the Jewish world—are certainly not the basis that defines Jewish religiosity. This is first and foremost an empirical fact. Go out and see what people actually do. But as I will argue below, in my view there is also a logical basis for this.
So, beyond terminology, I think Kant was right in his diagnosis. He grasped Judaism correctly and far more precisely than his Jewish students. Whether this is called a “religion” or not is secondary. In the Holy Tongue, as is well known, “dat” (religion) means law. True, these usages are later—mainly in the late prophets (the overwhelming majority in the Book of Esther, and also in Daniel and Ezra)—such as in the verse “and the decree (dat) was given in Shushan the capital,” “those who know every decree and law,” and many more. But there is at least one place in the Torah itself (Deuteronomy, the beginning of chapter 33):
“And this is the blessing with which Moses, the man of God, blessed the children of Israel before his death. And he said: The LORD came from Sinai and shone forth to them from Seir; He appeared from Mount Paran; He came from the myriads of holy ones—at His right hand, a fire of fiery law for them. Indeed, He loves the peoples; all His holy ones are in Your hand; they sit at Your feet; each receives Your words. Moses commanded us the Torah, an inheritance for the congregation of Jacob.”
From the plain sense of the text—and so explain all the commentators there—“dat” is the Torah. So, for example, in the Midrash Tannaim ad loc.:
“Dat—just as fire was given from the heavens, so too the Torah was given from the heavens. Another explanation: just as fire is life forever, so too the words of Torah are life forever. Another explanation: just as anyone who uses fire is warmed by it, and one who separates from it is cold, so too anyone who engages in words of Torah has life, and one who separates from words of Torah has no life.”
One could say that “Torah” includes not only halakha (the “code”), but we must remember that from the plain sense of the Torah it emerges that at Mount Sinai we were given primarily the halakha (the Ten Commandments). Add to that the meaning of the term “dat” in the later prophets as we saw, and it is quite clear that this is the meaning of the concept in the language of Scripture.[4]
Between Immanuel Kant and Yehuda Yifrah
I couldn’t help but recall a passage from Heinrich Heine’s biography of Kant:[5]
It is difficult to write the history of Immanuel Kant’s life, for he had neither life nor history. He lived a regular, mechanically ordered, almost abstract life, on a quiet, remote street in Königsberg, an old city on the northeastern border of Germany. I do not think that the great clock of the local cathedral performed its outward duty with less zeal and greater regularity than his fellow townsman Immanuel Kant. Rising, drinking coffee, writing, lecturing, eating, walking—everything had for him a fixed time, and the neighbors knew exactly that it was three-thirty when Immanuel Kant left his door in his gray coat, cane in hand, to go to the little linden avenue which, because of him, is still called the Philosopher’s Walk today. Eight times he would pace there and back, in all seasons; and on dark days or when gray clouds threatened rain, his servant, old Lampe, was seen walking behind him anxiously, an umbrella under his arm, a veritable image of Providence. A strange contrast between the outward life of the man and his destructive thought that undermined worlds! Indeed, had the citizens of Königsberg felt the full weight of this thought, they would have been gripped with terror at that man, a greater fear than the fear of an executioner, who puts to death only human beings—but the good people saw in him only a professor of philosophy, and when he passed them at the fixed hour, they greeted him and set their pocket watches by him.
This amiable fellow is depicted here as a person entirely devoid of experiences and feelings (=zeal). A punctilious square who does the same thing every day in exactly the same way, and who treats every idea and insight on a technical, logical, analytic plane—cold and dry as a cucumber. Where are the feelings and experiences, Immanuel?! And yet, let me remind you, Heine the writer understood that “Old Man Immanuel” is considered the greatest philosopher of the modern era, and he writes this critical description with genuine awe. Did he really have “neither life nor history,” in Heine’s words? Kant’s thought aroused storms and debates and effected passionate, emotional revolutions all over the world; it undermined ideas and worlds—even though he himself never left Königsberg, and in fact never strayed from the “Philosopher’s Walk” in Königsberg. I suppose Yehuda Yifrah would also call him a rational autistic. He would likely prefer mystical experiences to logical and philosophical analysis of synthetic a priori judgments, and he would prefer deep feelings about the categorical imperative over “wasting” time on cold, alienated intellectual musings on the foundations of moral theory. In his view, Kant too is a waste—after all, he could have been a shammes in the Baal Shem Tov’s synagogue instead of wasting his time on cold and empty ruminations (see here, and in Column 121).
You’ll probably be surprised, but I’m really not in Yifrah’s party. True, Kant tries with all his might to push me out of his party (in his view, as a religious person I am supposed to possess religiose experiences and not engage analytically and coldly with rational codes. In short, to be religious is to be Yehuda Yifrah). Still, I am very glad he did not succeed—that is, that I am still here. Not among the tribe of pagan cave dwellers who engage in channeling aliens and mystical reptiles, but among the group that has some cognitive statement. I am very happy to belong to this “autistic” party, even if some of my needs are not answered in this way (as noted, I am not autistic; no one is perfect).
A historical look
If at Sinai we received primarily a “code,” a normative system, then in the generations that followed it is hard to say that the focus was specifically on it. The Bible does not emphasize halakha, and one certainly cannot find in it the centrality of halakhic-Talmudic study. The Bible is a book of vibrant, tumultuous life and less of intellectual reflection—even beyond halakha. Even the wisdom books of the Bible are not written in the form of dry analytic thought. But beginning in the Second Temple period—the era of Oral Torah—halakha takes on an increasingly central place. The Talmud, as is known, includes additional components: aggadah and thought, life insights, and even illnesses and remedies, cosmology, and various stories. Yet in the post-Talmudic era, the focus returned to the halakhic component of the halakha. My sense is that in the Talmudic era the Sages viewed Judaism as the totality of life, and therefore included within it every insight and wisdom. In their eyes this was life, and nothing human was foreign to them. In my opinion, this is a by-product of the lack of self-awareness in antiquity and of living within a group that had no real competition from its surroundings. Anything that is not Torah is worthless, and anything of worth is Torah. In the modern era, when other forms of wisdom developed and it became clear that religion is not the whole of life but only a certain component within it, the focus on halakha is a natural and warranted development. Even so, I too am a product of my milieu, and I defined a peripheral circle of “Torah in the person” around the core circle of “Torah in the object.” I agree that not only Torah (in the object) has value, and that there is certainly interest and room to engage in other things. But precisely this requires us to define more clearly the place of each such engagement.
In recent generations, in my estimation, there has been a concentrated effort to change the essence of Judaism. People are trying to insert into center stage extra-halakhic conceptions—morality and values, theological principles and Bible study—and not least, feeling and experience. As I understand it, this stems mainly from two sources: Christian influences (to a large extent via Hasidism and no less via emancipation) and secularization. Christianity jettisoned practical commandments and preserved morality, religiosity, and faith; it redefined the concept of “religion,” and many Jews (including religious ones) are unwittingly following in its footsteps. Secularization also contributed to pushing halakha aside, since Jewish secularism seeks a way to define itself as Judaism—or even as religiosity—but without religious commitment (“you don’t have a monopoly on Judaism”). Naturally, everything beyond halakha moves to center stage, and halakha remains neglected on the side. The priestess and the innkeeper have switched places. Unfortunately, quite a few religious people—especially those influenced by the processes I described—adopt these conceptions as well. Why shouldn’t Judaism be a religion in the accepted sense? Why leave to Christianity the monopoly on morality and religiosity? We want that too…
Some go even further and see in this a renaissance—a religious revival through a return to ancient religiosity. Like Protestantism in Christianity, this too is a protest movement, a return to the Bible while skipping over thousands of years of exile and Oral Torah—a departure from the normative sphere (=the Philosopher’s Walk in Königsberg) to the breadth of life. In my view, this is also part of the influence of Zionism, which sought to revive Judaism in a secular-national sense, and of feelings of inferiority toward Christianity.
As I understand it, the years of exile—despite all their drawbacks—helped us focus our religious conception in relation to our surroundings and to understand what is religion and what is culture, and to distinguish between core and periphery, between the secondary (and perhaps trivial?!) and the principal. What belongs to God and the religious sphere, and what to the secular sphere and the breadth of life. Therefore these processes, in my view, are harmful and mistaken. Again, I say this as someone who sees great value in all the breadth of life; I simply see no need or logic to insert all of this into the religious sphere. It is possible—and proper—to engage in all these without a religious stamp of approval. As for feeling and experience, in my view this is less significant; still, if someone sees value in it—good for him. There is no need to turn these matters into principles of faith and foundations of the service of God.
Over the course of history, the very concept of “religiosity” underwent a metamorphosis. We saw that originally this term denotes a normative code, whereas under Christianity today it points specifically toward the religiose feeling. Some criticize the reduction involved—the turning of Judaism into a sector, whether code-based or experience-based. This critique too comes from a national direction (Judaism as a nation, not as a religion), and I do not see in it an authentic religious argument. But to me, it is not very important to debate the meanings of the terms “dat” and “religiosity.” The more important question is what is proper to do, and what is more or less important in serving God. Terminology is secondary. Here I return again to Kant, who was right at the diagnostic level—which is the important one—even if one can argue with him at the semantic-conceptual level.
The four claims I described above deal with substantive questions, not terminology. In other words: these are claims, not definitions. But claims, of course, require explanation. Why reject an approach that was prevalent in ancient times, especially when many of us see that period as a kind of religious ideal? If we have accepted the authority of the Talmud, how can we—and may we—depart from the picture of Judaism (or religiosity) that emerges from it? And even if we learned something from Christianity or from secular Zionism, does that necessarily invalidate these claims and conclusions? I am the last person to use “source” as a basis for invalidating an opinion or claim. In my opinion, the provenance of an idea is irrelevant to the substantive discussion about it. What matters is the idea itself. In the next column I will begin to examine the claims themselves.
[1] I don’t think this accusation is justified—but only because no one is perfect. See on this in Column 218.
[2] Perhaps I owe Mordechai an apology for putting him at the center of my remarks. I planned a column on the status of feeling and experience, and he simply lobbed me the perfect setup at just the right time.
[3] There is a chapter on this in Hugo Bergmann’s book, Immanuel Kant (see also a brief and imprecise discussion here). For many additional sources (though the entry itself does not discuss this), see the bibliography at the end of his Wikipedia entry.
[4] This itself is further evidence for my claim that the essence of the Torah is “dat,” i.e., halakha. So too emerges clearly from Rashi’s first comment at the beginning of his commentary on the Torah, where he asks why the Torah did not begin with the first commandment given to us in Parashat Bo. I have cited this several times in the past.
[5] From On the History of Religion and Philosophy in Germany, translated from German by S. Perlman, “LeGvulam” Press with the participation of the Bialik Institute. Quoted in note 2 in the aforementioned Wikipedia entry.