Morality, Faith, and Halakha – Lesson 17 – Rabbi Michael Abraham

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[Rabbi Michael Abraham] We had our best relations not with Iran, but with the Shah. One of the reasons the Iranians hate us is because of that. And the Iranian people hate us, not just the leadership. Actually, today, because we are fighting against the leadership—well, listen and read, it’s unequivocal—precisely today, because we are fighting against the leadership, we have more support among the public. Traditionally, Iranians hate us. They hate us because the Shah was a dictator, and we, as usual, cooperate with dictators, because they’re the only ones willing to be our friends, and so we cooperated with him. And that’s why we became the Great Satan, the Little Satan—America is the Great Satan, and that’s what we became—not after Khomeini, before Khomeini, because we supported the Shah. And precisely because of the current regime that abuses them, that hatred has been shaken a bit, because we’re supposedly with the people against the regime, so there’s a bit more support for us, though still not all that much. No, I do hear and read a bit; it’s really not simple at all. Never mind. In any case, back to our topic. No, I don’t read Haaretz. I used to subscribe, until I don’t know how long ago, twenty years or something like that, but I was a subscriber for about a year and that was enough. A kind of masochism. Anyway, no, no—you can read, there’s some expert on Iran, what’s her name, I forgot, from the University of Haifa I think. Gilden? An Iran expert, Tamar Gindin, something with a g, I said. Very interesting, she has a lot of fascinating knowledge. A lot, really, a woman full of good things. Search on Google, I don’t remember the name anymore, something with a g, Iran expert, University of Haifa, something—you’ll get her name first, I assume. Haifa? I think she’s from the University of Haifa. Anyway, the name slipped my mind. All right, anyway, to our matter. The claim is that according to this view, on the one hand you always have some interest because of which you act. On the other hand, that means not only that there is no moral act, but also that there is no irrational act. Because it is always rational: if you did it, then apparently it fits your utility function. Okay? Those are the two implications of the same view, which says that there is always some self-interested motive at the base of the act. Maybe I’ll give you an example to illustrate the point. Actually that was also in Sde Boker, but not in the high school—in the institute.

[Speaker B] Tamar Gindin,

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, exactly, Tamar Gindin. I said something with a g.

[Speaker B] You said that when there’s a clash, there’s some point in debating with Palestinians, Arabs.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I don’t see much point in it, I don’t know.

[Speaker B] But still, maybe the only point is public opinion,

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] to influence the viewers,

[Speaker B] but not

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] the person you’re speaking with.

[Speaker B] But in terms of pure logic, in the debate itself there’s no real logic to it.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I don’t think so. From the conversations I’ve had, I didn’t see much benefit, I don’t know. I had a few conversations; I didn’t see much benefit. Maybe to understand their mindset—that also has value. You probably won’t change it, but understanding their mindset also helps: you understand where they live mentally, you need to know what you’re up against. Yes, there were commenters today, but I have a good friend, a very energetic left-wing activist. He doesn’t live in Israel, but every so often he comes here, and once he arranged a meeting for me with some very well-known Palestinian activist, some doctor of political geography—they’re all doctors of political geography, by the way, all those people, that type and all that nonsense. Anyway, at that meeting—he’s smart, he has an impressive personality. And in the meeting he started—he knows how to quote all the poets, Tchernichovsky and all of them, like Haredim who know all the soccer players, you know that? Same thing. So he’s used to it, he’s in lots of meetings with Jews and all that, it’s a work tool. So he said to me: you sing, “Oh my homeland, my birthplace, a barren rocky mountain.” Right? What do you mean a barren rocky mountain? Barren? There were a quarter of a million dunams cultivated here before you arrived. The land, this country, was full of agriculture and all that, and you portray it as though it was desolation until you came. I said to him: look, I don’t know, I’m not familiar with the data, I haven’t checked it. I’m a little suspicious of it, but maybe not, maybe you’re right. What I do know is that most of the Palestinian people, even by your own account, arrived here after the Jews arrived. And they came not because of the quarter of a million dunams that were cultivated here before, but because of the development that the Jews who came here brought with them. And therefore they came here because they understood that there would be livelihood here, there would be more progress. Right, a lot of the Palestinian people are actually immigrants from Kuwait, from Iraq, from various Arab empires, from all sorts of places like that, who came here because they saw that something was developing here. So yes, it was a barren rocky mountain. A barren rocky mountain—I don’t know how many dunams were cultivated there—but it wasn’t developed. It wasn’t, and the fact is that it became more attractive after the Jews arrived. So that’s what I call a barren rocky mountain. Did I convince him? Absolutely not. And afterward he immediately went to a demonstration against the massacre in Gaza. I told him that if there were a demonstration to deepen the massacre in Gaza, I’d go too. Not the massacre, but what we’re doing there, which is not a massacre. Anyway, again, he’s an intelligent person, and it was interesting to get to know his mindset and see the framework within which he operates and how he thinks. You need to know who you’re talking to and who you’re facing, because what? He lives in a different world from mine. I judge him, of course, from my point of view, so that’s not entirely fair, but from my point of view he is completely wrong. But I understand that he has some different point of view and he has structured arguments with data and everything. Yes, so he says that he reaches the conclusion that we are dispossessing, and that there has been a Palestinian people here forever. I don’t know what, since when? And that’s it. Right, so there were all kinds of immigrants who joined them, and so the people grew a bit.

[Speaker E] It’s not hatred of

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Israel. I think that cheapens the issue a bit. It’s not classic antisemitism. There is also a religious dimension here, of course, but the religious dimension too is not antisemitic. It’s a religious struggle. An interreligious struggle is not antisemitism. They hate Christians just as much as Jews. ISIS beheaded more Christians there than Jews. So religious hatred is not antisemitism. It’s interreligious hatred. Also not a pleasant phenomenon, but it’s not antisemitism. And here too it’s not all religious. We have a national conflict with them, and a territorial conflict with them. What?

[Speaker E] In a synagogue you see one attack after another.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Right, because there there is less interreligious hatred, obviously. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t connected to antisemitism. On the contrary, in Europe many times there is no less antisemitism. It’s just sublimated because antisemitism is somewhat hidden, somewhat repressed, the laws don’t allow it. These are democratic countries, and there are legal restrictions on antisemitism and the like. Therefore it erupts less, but that doesn’t mean there is less antisemitism there. These are different things. That’s why I say there’s another side to the coin. People always say that when you give Arabs different treatment from Jews, that’s racism. It’s not racism. It’s not okay, by the way, in my view, in a democratic state, but it’s not racism. It has nothing to do with racism. Discriminatory treatment toward Arabs stems from the fact that we have a conflict with them. Racism is when I hate them because they are Arabs. I don’t hate them because they are Arabs; I hate them because they are my enemies. Now again, that doesn’t mean you should hate. I don’t think you should hate, and I also don’t think you should treat them unequally. No, you should give equal treatment to whoever deserves it. But if someone does not give them equal treatment, that isn’t racism. It has nothing to do with racism; there is a conflict here. What, you ignore the background? Racism or antisemitism is some kind of thing that has no real background, but is only because of who you are. That is not the situation here on either side. Both they toward us and we toward them. They are not antisemites and we are not racists.

[Speaker E] In October they came—you saw children in flip-flops, on bicycles, in order to murder, and he called his mother and said, “I just murdered ten,”

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] And what does that prove?

[Speaker E] I’m proving that the hatred there—you’re absolutely right.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] How is that connected to our discussion? You want to claim something about antisemitism. I also agree that there is hatred, obviously, because we are his enemies. We are not giving him a state. What do you mean, why does he hate us? What does that have to do with antisemitism? We have a conflict. In the war between Argentina and England, was that antisemitism? No, they had a conflict over the Falkland Islands and they fought to conquer the Falkland Islands, and of course they hated each other too while they were fighting, because when people fight they hate each other, what can you do? What does that have to do with antisemitism? That’s making life easy for ourselves.

[Speaker B] But if you claim that there’s no such thing as altruism because everything is based on interests, okay, then there’s also no such thing as racism or hatred for its own sake, right? According to those concepts.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, you can say that you have racism, because racism is ingrained in you and therefore you hate because you have some racist feeling.

[Speaker B] And where does that feeling come from?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I don’t know, from evolution, I don’t know where from, but it’s inside me. Like the fact that I love chocolate. Nobody denies that I love chocolate. Why do I love chocolate? I have no reason why I love chocolate, that’s just how I’m built, and chocolate tastes good to me. I don’t know, maybe evolutionary reasons, biological reasons, whatever. Okay? Fine. That means it does have a cause, you understand? A causal chain always starts from some given. Fine, but the given is not a value-laden given; it is a self-interested or natural given, some factual datum, okay? So maybe I’ll give an example, because I started with the example from Sde Boker. I lived in Yeruham, and we were part of the Haredi community there, and they used to travel every day in the afternoon for the afternoon and evening prayers to the Ben-Gurion Midreshet, Sde Boker, which is like an extension of Ben-Gurion University, because a new synagogue had been established there and there was some local worker or something who wanted people to come and give a lesson between the afternoon and evening prayers. So he arranged transportation, funding, brought I don’t know how many kollel fellows, ten, twenty, something like that: come to the synagogue, they’ll hold the afternoon and evening prayers there and a lesson in the middle. Then at some point they started panicking there: the Haredim are coming, they’re taking over, they’ll throw us out of the settlement, block our streets, and so on. They asked me to go talk to them. The first conversation wasn’t especially helpful, because it was with some action committee of theirs that had just come to give an ultimatum. But there was a second conversation afterward—I don’t even remember how it developed. There was a second conversation with a broader forum, of people there, usually Ben-Gurion faculty people, since it’s an extension of Ben-Gurion. And their claim to me, or to us, was: why are you coming here? We don’t come to you to bother you, to persuade you to stop lighting Sabbath candles. So why are you coming to persuade us to light Sabbath candles? So I asked them, first of all, persuade? I don’t even understand the claim. I come to persuade, and if you’re persuaded then good, and if not then not. What’s wrong with persuading? And second, I ask: why really don’t you come? No, not as a joke, seriously, I’m asking why you don’t come. You think you’re right, don’t you? Meaning that I’m doing stupid things when I light candles. Why don’t you come persuade me? Now there came up a whole series of explanations or justifications, and I rejected all of them, meaning I didn’t agree, and at a certain point I understood that I was rejecting every justification whatsoever, all for the same reason. For example, someone says to me: I don’t come because I won’t succeed in persuading you, you’re a fanatic, I won’t succeed in persuading you—as though they could persuade him to light candles, but never mind. So I said, okay fine, so you don’t come because I’m a fanatic, there’s no point coming. But I do come, so what’s the problem? So why do you think you are morally superior to me because you don’t come to me simply because you don’t want to waste your time? I come to you either because I am willing to waste the time or because I think I’ll succeed in persuading you. So why do you assume that there is some moral virtue or moral credit due to you from the fact that you don’t come to persuade me? So all kinds of justifications came up, like: you won’t be persuaded—that one I mentioned—fine, so that means nothing. I don’t care about you; do whatever you want. Is that a moral achievement? You want moral credit for not caring about me? I do care about you, so who is better? Are you better because you don’t care about me, than I am because I do care about you? Fine, I also don’t think you’re wrong at all, who cares, light Sabbath candles, everyone can do whatever nonsense he wants. Fine, but I do think you’re wrong. So your not coming to me is fine because you don’t think I’m wrong; it’s a waste of time, no? But I think you’re wrong, so why do I come to you in order to persuade you not to do it? And so with every—Or: I don’t come to you because I’m afraid you’ll come to me. Okay, so you’re just afraid, and therefore you don’t come. You understand that all those justifications are all rejected because of the same mechanism. Once you have a good reason why you’re not coming, then you don’t deserve moral credit for not coming. Right? Once you have a good reason, you have an interest, so you don’t come because you have an interest. And then I asked myself, after I understood that I was rejecting all these proposals in the same way, I suddenly had a realization: wait, but then why be tolerant? I also believe in the value of tolerance. I think tolerance means not coercing, not not persuading. It’s just idiotic, a tolerance that means not persuading. On the contrary—why not persuade? If you think he’s wrong and you’re right, what’s the problem with persuading him? But let’s even say coercion. Fine? So all the justifications why I don’t come to coerce—because it won’t help, because you’ll do the same to me, because I don’t care about you, all the justifications—those justifications actually empty the fact that I don’t coerce you of moral significance, right? Because I don’t do it because it’s pointless, because I’m not wasting my time, because there’s no chance, because I don’t care, whatever. So that’s not an act with moral significance, okay? But then I ask, okay, so why—why really not coerce? After all, I also believe in the value of tolerance, that one must not coerce. And if every justification I give for it empties it of moral content, then what, do I do it without justification? Then why do I do it? Am I an idiot? Why not coerce? All the reasons are in favor of coercing, right? I care about you, and I have the power to influence you, and I’m not afraid of it, and all the reasons exist. So why in the end not go and coerce? The only answer that can be given—and I’m bringing this as an example of what we talked about earlier—the only answer that can be given is that I don’t go because I believe in the value of tolerance. And how is that different from all the other answers? All the other answers were answers on the level of interest. I don’t go because I don’t feel like wasting my time, I don’t care about you, because—I don’t know, all kinds of things like that. Once I do it because of my own interest, I don’t deserve moral credit for that, right? But if I do it because I believe in the value of tolerance, then I do deserve credit for it. I’m doing it because of a value-based motive, not because of a self-interested motive. Okay? For that I deserve moral credit. So that’s an illustration of what I said before: the view that says every action of yours must have some self-interested motive actually empties morality of its content. Because there is no such thing as a moral action of a person, since a moral action of a person has to be an action without a self-interested motive. It’s just that those people think there is no such action, there’s no such thing as an action without a self-interested motive, and I claim there is. That’s what is called an altruistic action: an action that is not because of a self-interested motive but because of a value-based motive. That is the action, okay? And therefore, if I go back to the concepts of the utility function, I am basically saying this: when I don’t come to coerce you, then you can justify it in terms of utility function, but if utility means only self-interested utilities, then your conduct has no moral significance. But if we also include value-based utilities inside the utility function—I gain from being a moral person, from not coercing. You can call that gain or utility if you like; that’s just terminology, it doesn’t matter. Okay? But if in my utility function I include also value-based utilities and not only self-interested utilities, then you can say that a person does not act without motivation or without a reason or without some utility, so long as you expand the concept of utility from merely interests to interests and values. Okay?

[Speaker E] And what is the difference between those utilities? Don’t tell me they’re the same utilities—what difference does it make?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Because action for the sake of a value is an altruistic action, an action that has moral significance, you deserve credit for it. Action in order to fulfill an interest—no. You can call both of those things utility if you want, that’s perfectly fine, I don’t care. There has to be some reason why I act, okay, but that reason does not have to be a reason of interest. That’s the point I disagree about. It can also be a value-based reason. How do you

[Speaker B] explain this dichotomy between settling one’s guilty conscience and doing an action for the sake of—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Oh, exactly—that’s the point. A huge difference. Settling one’s guilty conscience is a self-interested consideration. I don’t like having a guilty conscience. So in fact I do it because I gain some kind of interest from it. When I speak about value-based interest or value-based utility, I gain nothing from it. I’m not talking about the good feeling from being moral—that’s an interest. I’m talking about the very claim of my being moral. I do it in order to be moral, not in order to feel good about the fact that I’m moral. Understand? So the “in order to” here is an “in order to” of a different kind. Actually it’s not correct to say “in order to”; the first one is not “in order to” but “because.” I do it because I have a guilty conscience, and here I do it in order to be moral.

[Speaker E] And altruism—how do you see that?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Altruism is an action done for the sake of value-based utility and not self-interested utility. And that can have moral value. If the value is a positive value, then it can have moral value. But an action done in order to fulfill an interest, to gain some interest, has no moral value, meaning it is empty of moral value. Okay?

[Speaker D] Recently I happened to study a bit of Mesillat Yesharim with my father, and from what I understood, we’re kind of in the early chapters, but from what it looks like to me, it seems as though the Ramchal describes serving God as because everything in this world is just nonsense and the only truly good thing is paradise. So it seems as though…

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Paradise—or is paradise the reward? Serving God, not specifically paradise. Yes, but that would be service not for its own sake.

[Speaker D] Exactly, that’s what I’m saying. That’s what I saw from him. So…

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I don’t know, I’ve never gone through Mesillat Yesharim, so I can’t tell you, but it surprises me a little.

[Speaker D] Right, it surprised me too.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes. Maimonides at the beginning of chapter 10 of the Laws of Repentance talks about this—that this is the way women and children serve, for the sake of paradise. That one should do the truth because it is truth. That is basically the meaning of value-based service. Now let’s look for a moment.

[Speaker F] From Kant’s moral point of view, for example. What? From a moral point of view?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Of course, usually you do get something from it. The only question is whether you do it in order to get that something. It’s not the factual question whether you get something or not. We all feel good if we act morally, so there—you got something. The question is whether I do it in order to feel good; if so, then it has no moral value. To feel good in the emotional sense, not to feel good in the sense that I rationally understand that I am a moral person. Satisfaction in that sense, not satisfaction in the emotional sense, is fine—that is the moral motivation. All right? So maybe I’ll give an example. Think, for example, about a soldier who sacrifices his life. Or a person who sacrifices his life in order to save the lives of others. Someone else, or others in general. Usually we call that an altruistic action, right? An altruistic action. What would the anti-altruists say? The interest people?

[Speaker B] They would say that if he doesn’t do it, then the soldier over there also won’t do it.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, that’s already Kant. We’ll get to Kant later. But they speak about the fact that he is really doing it because of—yes, after all, many studies show that soldiers do not fight for the state and not for anyone else; they fight for the guys. For the guys. The guys in the unit. And your motivation to fight is because you are part of them and you won’t leave them alone. Camaraderie in the deep sense, not just the shallow one—that is the main motivation of soldiers. There are many studies on this. It’s not about saving the state and—there are guys I went through difficult things with, difficult challenges, and I’m not going to leave them to fight alone. Now I take risks, I give my life for this, or a significant risk to my life, for what? So that the guys won’t be left alone. And what is—what is the meaning of that? So many times people bring this as an example of an altruistic act. You are really doing it for your friends or for the state—that’s even more altruistic, it doesn’t matter. But game theorists will say, what do you mean? Clearly you have some satisfaction or need to be part of the group or not to withdraw from the group. Your utility function is what causes you to enter this battle or risk your life in this battle. So there too, in their view, there is some self-interested motive. Okay? Therefore you will never be able to prove that an altruistic action exists, because every altruistic action that you bring as an example, those people will say, what do you mean? The satisfaction in doing an altruistic action is itself the self-interested reason why you do it. This is a theory that cannot be falsified. The theory that there are altruistic actions also cannot be falsified. Meaning, again, these are two sides—this is not a scientific dispute, it is a philosophical dispute.

[Speaker B] And the issue of the Holy One, blessed be He?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What do you mean?

[Speaker B] If one believes, then why did He create the world?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Maybe He did it for Himself, I don’t know. And what about us? I have suggestions for you. I wrote about it once. The problem of perfection and self-perfection in Rabbi Kook. But never mind, that’s another discussion. By the way, this appears in various places in the literature of Kabbalah, but not only in Kabbalah—that the Holy One, blessed be He, did it for Himself. כל הנברא לשמי לכבודי בראתיו יצרתיו אף עשיתיו (“Everyone who is called by My name, whom I created for My glory, whom I formed and also made”). Meaning everything is for Him. Meaning, it’s not for us. Fine, but that’s a discussion in its own right. In any case, what I want to say is that I still think, as an indication—not a proof—that to say this utility function of momentary satisfaction is what causes me to enter a real life-threatening danger is very strange. Meaning, if there were not the value dimension, where I understand that this is what is right and fitting and should be done, it is hard for me to accept—again, you can always say yes, of course. This is only my personal position—it’s hard for me to accept that this is a sufficient reason for a person to sacrifice his life or significantly endanger his life. Okay? So precisely in such situations I do tend to think there is also an altruistic dimension here. It’s not only the momentary satisfaction or the momentary impulse to be part of the group or something like that. There is here—by the way, even the impulse to be part of the group, one can discuss to what extent it is an impulse or really that I don’t want to abandon them, that they’ll die, that I need all the soldiers in order to win the battle. They take a greater risk if I don’t participate. Meaning, my consideration in fighting for the sake of the guys is not a low consideration, not necessarily. Meaning, I am loyal to them, I am their friend, and I won’t abandon them. That is not a—that is not a low thing. I am willing to take a risk for it. Meaning, it is not essentially different from fighting for the state. You can say it all depends on the circle of your empathy. Fine—but it is still some circle of empathy, meaning you are doing it for the sake of another. So I’m saying that once you’re talking about giving one’s life, it is very hard for me to accept that it is based on some momentary satisfaction. It’s not plausible. Okay? In any event, fine, there are those who claim yes. Yigal Amir—another example. Yigal Amir murdered Rabin. Okay? Now in my eyes, I am full of appreciation for that man. Suppose I thought like him, or someone thought like him—how many of us would do such a thing? You enter the place, you are certainly dead. The fact that he got out alive is inconceivable. You are certainly dead when you do such a thing, right? Huh? That’s the miracle…

[Speaker E] Doesn’t matter, there are people to this day—there’s one lawyer who to this day says he didn’t do it.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Doesn’t matter, I’m not getting into all those conspiracies now. Assume he did do it, okay? I’m speaking now on the assumption that he did do it, and still I am full of appreciation for his altruism. He was willing to die in order to save the Jewish people, I don’t know, the State of Israel, from what he thought was some great disaster. Again, I reject the act, I think he did something that must never be done, but in terms of the altruism of the action, he deserves a great deal of appreciation. People who thought like him would not do what he did. It is not enough to think like him; you also have to be altruistic, you also have to be willing to sacrifice your life for the values you believe in.

[Speaker C] Could it be that he believed he’d get out?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] He believed he’d get out, but he also knew there was a good chance he wouldn’t. You don’t take risks like that. There are several bodyguards there, you shoot the prime minister, he’s surrounded by bodyguards—what chance do you have of getting out?

[Speaker C] A psychopath. Maybe a psychopath, but altruistic.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Maybe altruistic, but then there’s no value to his altruism, because altruism is usually overcoming motives that should cause me not to do it; a psychopath has no such motives. He doesn’t care, meaning it’s not…

[Speaker E] A little fool. I don’t know what you’d call it.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] In the legal world, by the way, a psychopath is not seen as someone not responsible for his actions. A psychopath stands trial. Yes. In any case, what I basically want to say is that sacrificing life, for example, is, I think, a not-bad example of an altruistic action. Now, where do altruistic actions come from? There are those who propose evolutionary explanations. Yes, evolution basically developed in us an altruistic impulse. That makes a lot of sense. Right? Why? Because if we didn’t have such an altruistic impulse, nobody would go to war. Right? And if nobody went to war, we would all die. They would wipe us out—unless our enemies are also subject to evolution, in which case no one there would go to war either. But if there are dangers that need to be fought against, then in a group where nobody is willing to risk himself for the group, the whole group will become extinct. So clearly evolution, in a completely technical sense, gives altruism a very high survival value. Altruism has high survival value, and therefore there are evolutionary explanations for the emergence of altruism. The mistake here is that maybe this is true, I don’t know, but if I knew that the source was evolutionary—and you now claim we already know evolution in the twenty-first century, right?—and you tell me that altruism is a product of an evolutionary process, then I would not go to any war. I would overcome it. Am I crazy, to risk my life for some evolutionary impulse? Why should that interest me? In the end I also have to identify with that evolutionary impulse and decide that it is indeed worthy, in order to risk my life. Therefore, evolution can provide an explanation of how this arose, but evolution is not a justification for why it is correct or why it is proper to act this way. Those are two completely different things. You can say altruism arose from evolution, but if you think that’s all there is to altruism, then you cannot say that altruism is morally praiseworthy, because no—what does morally praiseworthy even mean? What evolution did is what it did. If I decided to act this way and not another, then I am programmed by evolutionary processes, okay? So evolution is an explanation of how it arose, but it does not explain why I also think it is justified to act that way. Those are two completely different things. Therefore, in moral philosophy, the dispute that is often between those who advocate altruism and people who incline toward evolutionary explanations—fine, no problem, both are right, or can be right, but there is one thing they cannot agree on: those who say the explanation is evolutionary cannot give moral value to this behavior. Because I behave this way because that’s how I am. Like a sheep, yes, we talked about the sheep last semester. The sheep does what it does, it is very nice to its companions, but it is not moral; it does it because that is how it is built. It did not decide to do that, it is not something for which you deserve moral credit. Okay? I give moral credit to the behavior of a person who decided to behave this way because he thinks that this is the right way to behave. If he was programmed to behave this way, then what? It has no value at all.

[Speaker B] So if someone holds that altruism comes from evolution, what causes some people to be more altruistic than others?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Everyone has, you know, his evolutionary bugs. One person’s genes emphasized the altruistic element more and another’s less. Why is one person taller and another shorter? Height also depends on genes. Fine, there are genes that cause you to be taller or shorter. There is always a range of phenotypes. In any event, what comes out is this: the categorical imperative basically demands from us an action that is an altruistic action. To do something simply because that thing is moral. That is the reason to do it, nothing else. Certainly not the result, because the result doesn’t even happen in many of the cases; it is only hypothetical, a hypothetical result. But even if it does happen, I do not do it because of the result; the result only signals to me that the act is a moral act. I do it because it is moral. Okay? That is basically the reason why I act. And then the claim is that Kant is basically demanding that we act when our utility function is value-based utility, or also value-based utility, and not only self-interested utility. And of course there is an assumption here that such a utility function can exist at all, meaning that values too can move us to action and not only interests. Okay? That is the subtext, the underlying assumption of this view. Now, and this basically means that the categorical imperative is unique in that it demands from us an altruistic action. But now notice what happens—I suddenly reverse myself. Think, say, of a world where there were no categorical imperative and nobody acted according to the categorical imperative. What would happen, say, with income tax? Each of us is debating whether to evade or not. We owe a thousand shekels in income tax. Each of us—whether to evade or not, okay? If there were no categorical imperative in the world, then we would all evade income tax, right? Why not?

[Speaker B] No, there are legal penalties.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, leave the legal penalties aside. I can evade; the assumption is that I have the option of evading. What?

[Speaker B] Why fifty percent?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I would say everyone. Why not gain a thousand shekels? You have no other reason.

[Speaker D] But I don’t want everyone to do it.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I don’t want everyone to do it, but I said that what I do is unrelated to what everyone does. So from the standpoint of my own consideration, certainly I would evade tax were it not for the categorical imperative, right? And so would everyone else, right? Rational reasons—leave me alone now, I’m talking about elevated people, okay? Only rational reasons. Okay, so what comes out?

[Speaker E] So what comes out is… what? They’re doing a Passover Seder, “it would have been enough,” on Passover each person will put in one cup of wine, whatever he has left, and we’ll have a Passover—flask of Passover. So one of the guys said, “I’ll put in water, they won’t notice,” just like you’re saying.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] And in the end they drank water.

[Speaker E] And in the end they drank water.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes. So that’s exactly the same thing. Now notice the absurdity. When I come to consider whether I evade a thousand shekels or don’t evade a thousand shekels—there is no consequentialist reason not to evade, right? Only the categorical imperative, but not a consequentialist reason. What? Yes, let’s say I don’t—I don’t have that problem, okay? I feel even poorer if I don’t have a thousand shekels; income tax is a different matter. So when I make my personal calculation, it’s obvious that I should evade, were it not for the categorical imperative, right? But of course everyone thinks that way, not just me; every citizen makes the same calculation. What will happen as a result? The state treasury will be empty. That is something none of us wants, right? So what can be done? Nothing can be done, because even if I give my thousand shekels, the state treasury will still be empty—it’s a thousand shekels. We all need to give the thousand shekels so that the state treasury won’t be empty. Fine, let everyone else give, but I won’t. It never ends. What is happening here is something quite amazing. It’s a fascinating logical loop. Because it turns out that the only way to achieve a good result is only if you do not act consequentially. Do you understand why? Each of us makes a non-consequentialist calculation, therefore he does not evade income tax, and only because of that is there money in the state treasury. Meaning, in the end we did achieve a result through our action. So this action did bring about a result. But how did that result happen? Only because I ignored the consequentialist consideration, because if I had gone by the consequentialist consideration, then I would have evaded my thousand shekels, and of course so would everyone else. Okay? Because there is no dependence between my evasion and the evasion of others. Mine I certainly ought to evade on consequentialist grounds. So what comes out is a kind of very strange thing. Kant is basically demanding that we ignore considerations of result, but in fact that is the only way to achieve the desired result—only if we ignore considerations of result.

[Speaker E] How much goes into the treasury?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, no, no, leave it—we don’t publicize, everyone works for himself. I’m not looking for solutions; I’m discussing hypothetical cases. The law is also a solution. Follow everyone and don’t let them evade—I have an even better solution.

[Speaker E] Fine, but in Sephardic synagogues, for example, when there’s a list of how much you pledged, how much you gave, how much you owe—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Okay, how does that touch our discussion? I’m talking about a place where this problem exists. I’m not looking for solutions to the problem; I’m trying to present the problem. I know you can also solve the problem with the law, right? Go into everyone’s books, check them, if someone evaded income tax, kill him—that also solves the problem. Fine, but I’m not looking for solutions. I’m presenting to you a problem on the logical level: on the one hand, Kant requires us to behave in a way that is not consequentialist, but that is the only way to arrive at the desired result. Because if we were behaving consequentially, we would not achieve the result. So something here is very… So is it consequentialist or non-consequentialist? In the end, when I don’t evade the income tax, is it because of a consequentialist consideration or not? I don’t know. Why not consequentialist? In the end, I really am doing it because the result will be that the state treasury will be empty. Meaning, to look at the end?

[Speaker E] You can’t know what…

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] He can’t know, so why don’t I hide it? He asks: why don’t I hide it? Because I don’t know, and then I’m worried about the outcome. Okay, so that is consequentialist. What? If you’re not influencing anything, then hide it. Why don’t you hide it? Fine, but Kant requires you not to hide it. You’re not a Kantian, fine. But Kant requires you not to hide it. Now I’m saying: he requires you not to hide it even though it has no outcome, meaning he requires you to act in a non-consequentialist way. But absurd as it sounds, that non-consequentialist action is the only way to reach the desired outcome. Because if everyone… if Kant had never invented the categorical imperative in the world, okay? And none of us had even known this consideration existed. Each one of us separately, not because of the others. Each one of us separately would have concluded that you should hide the thousand shekels. The only way to make sure the state treasury won’t be empty is if each one of us separately makes this non-consequentialist calculation and doesn’t evade taxes. Then we get the result. So am I doing it for the sake of the outcome, or is it non-consequentialist? The point is that the outcome exists, but it’s a collective outcome. The collective acts consequentially, but I as a private individual act non-consequentially.

Now this brings me to a very famous example. Think about it: this is really… it’s really just like the evolutionary explanation I gave earlier. The evolutionary explanation I gave earlier. So basically I’m saying: why does altruism have survival value? Because if nobody went out to fight, we’d all be dead. But from the standpoint of personal calculation, clearly in consequentialist terms it’s not worth going out to fight. Because if I go out to fight, I myself may die. If I stay in the rear, I don’t know what the others will do; either I’ll die or I won’t die, but it’s definitely less dangerous. Right? So consequentially I should have stayed behind and not gone out to fight. But evolution implanted in us the drive to fight anyway. Why? Because there’s some survival value there, because if everyone didn’t fight, then we’d all be dead. There was an outcome. So again, I act in a non-consequentialist way, I’m actually putting myself at risk, I’m not acting for my own interests, but only because of that do we reach the outcome. That evolutionary process is completely parallel to what happens in the philosophical aspect of the categorical imperative.

Now I’ll show you this mathematically. You know the prisoner’s dilemma, right? Since we can’t project it here, I’ll say it out loud. The prisoner’s dilemma basically goes like this: they catch two suspects in a theft. Okay? They have no evidence against them for the theft, but they do have evidence for breaking and entering. For breaking and entering you get one year in prison. Fine? So if they both, each one is in a separate cell, and the investigators question them, they offer them a deal. They tell them, look, right now we have no evidence, so both of you will go to prison for one year. Okay? But, they say to each one separately, if you inform on the other one, become a state’s witness, you’ll go free and he’ll get 15 years. Because then it’s theft too, not just breaking and entering. Okay? And they say the same thing to the second one as well. But if both of you inform, then that doesn’t help me, so you’ll each get five years. Okay?

Now when you draw this table, this is what’s called the prisoner’s dilemma in game theory. When you draw this table, let’s see, from my point of view. Suppose I’m Prisoner A, okay? And you’re Prisoner B. Okay? Now I calculate what’s best for me to do. If I keep quiet—sorry, if you inform on me, then if I keep quiet I get 15 years. If I inform on you, I get five, because then it’ll be five and five, right? So it’s better for me to inform. Right? Now if you keep quiet, then this is how it goes: if I also keep quiet, I get one year. If I inform, I get zero, and you get 15. Again, it’s better for me to inform. Right? So basically, from my point of view, no matter what you do, it’s better for me to inform. Right? But you make the same calculation. Your table looks exactly like mine. So what comes out in the end? Each one of us makes the calculation that maximizes his utility function, and where do we end up? Five and five. If we had both kept quiet, one and one. That would have been a better outcome. In other words, if each of us maximizes his own utility function, we get a worse outcome than if each of us were righteous, acted altruistically, didn’t inform on the other, and the other also didn’t inform on me, and we’d get one and one.

Only if I don’t inform on you, that’s risky, because if I don’t inform on you and you do decide to inform on me, I’m going to get 15 years. So I have to have some trust in you, when I don’t inform on you, that you also won’t inform on me. Okay? Now since we’re in separate cells, we don’t even have the option of talking to one another and agreeing on a strategy—let’s both inform, or let’s both not inform. And even if we did agree, who knows if he’d keep it; but let’s say there could at least be some kind of… but here there’s nothing. Each of us has to make his decision alone in his own cell. You understand that this is exactly the categorical imperative? The categorical imperative tells you: listen, you have to behave altruistically, not choose the best option from your own standpoint. And the other person too, same thing. And only in that way will you reach the best outcome for both of you, for each of you. You understand that this is exactly the same structure? The categorical imperative is exactly the same structure as the prisoner’s dilemma. Exactly the same thing, one to one.

Because what the prisoner’s dilemma is really saying is that when we evaluate strategy at the level of the individual person, we often don’t arrive at the best result. You try to maximize your own personal utility, so you’ll maximize it relatively speaking, but if you form a coalition with the other person and adopt a tactic that maximizes the shared utility of both of you, you’ll get a better result than if each one tries to maximize his own utility alone. That’s exactly Kant’s categorical imperative. Kant’s categorical imperative says: look, if you try to maximize your utility, to gain the 1,000 shekels, to evade income tax, then everyone else will do the same thing too, right? So in the end, there won’t be a penny left in the state treasury. You’ll end up in very bad shape. You’ll have another thousand shekels, but you won’t get any services from the state. Okay? By contrast, if we adopt a collective strategy—that is, a coalition—if we choose a strategy together, then the strategy will be: all of us pay, none of us evade taxes. Each one loses a thousand shekels, but that’s much better than being left with no services at all. Exactly like the five and the one in the prisoner’s dilemma.

And what they basically say in game theory as a result of the prisoner’s dilemma is that the prisoner’s dilemma is just one example, out of thousands of others in the world, where we see that it’s worthwhile for us to cooperate. And more than that: very often, when we examine possible strategies, it’s wrong to examine them only on the plane of strategies for a single player. You have to examine the possibility of forming coalitions and creating a coalition strategy. Because the coalition will often bring better utility to all the players, better than if each person is a sociopath and tries to maximize his own personal utility.

[Speaker E] But they’re all in a dilemma there. They’re all in a dilemma; each one of them doesn’t know what the other will decide. Right? So what’s the point?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Fine, if in the end it turns out that I placed unjustified trust in you, I got burned. Right? And that really can lead me to say, okay, I’ll inform on him, because if he informs then at least I’ll get five years and not fifteen. And he’ll make the same calculation too, and that way we’ll both get five years. But if we both trust each other, we’ll get only one year. Right? But trust is risky. I can trust him and he’ll inform on me. And I can’t know whether he trusts me too; we can’t verify that if I trust him, he’ll also trust me. It’s risky. That’s exactly Kant’s categorical imperative. I don’t evade taxes, I lose a thousand shekels, right? But I have some kind of—

[Speaker B] Trust that the others also won’t evade taxes.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] And how do you know? Maybe they will evade. Then I’ll come out the sucker.

[Speaker B] Can’t we make an agreement between us?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] You can make an agreement, but how do you know he’ll keep his word? What? He can promise you he won’t inform and then inform on you. Like some kind of American-style treaty? Exactly. British, not American. That’s my next line. There’s Golden Balls, a BBC program. I highly recommend you watch it. It’s a series of dozens or hundreds of clips, each one five minutes or I don’t know, seven minutes, something like that. There are longer ones too, but there are seven-minute ones, where two people sit and play the prisoner’s dilemma. They play a game like that. And it’s unbelievable—no clip is like any other.

What’s different in those clips from the prisoner’s dilemma is that in the prisoner’s dilemma the two thieves sit in separate cells; they can’t talk to each other about how to make decisions. In Golden Balls they sit around a table and make agreements. Golden Balls, golden balls. Golden Balls. Split or Steal. Yes, you have to decide whether you steal or split. It’s literally the prisoner’s dilemma; it’s just the prisoner’s dilemma on television. And it’s fascinating, I mean really, you should watch it. I brought one clip here as an example, but I have no way of projecting it here. What’s nice there is that you suddenly understand that it really doesn’t matter whether the prisoners are in separate cells. Because these people sit around a table, they try to persuade one another. Look, let’s decide that we’ll both split, which is basically like saying we won’t inform. Okay? Let’s agree that we’ll both split, and then at least we’ll each get half the full amount. Fine? So we agree between ourselves in all sorts of ways that okay, we both split. Then the second one—and now each person has to say what he decides. So I say I split because that’s what we agreed, I’m counting on him saying he’ll split too. But no, I decided to steal. The moment he steals, he gets the whole amount and I get nothing. Fine?

Now of course he’s taking a risk, because if he decides to steal and I also decide to steal, neither of us gets anything. So if both of us are unreliable, then neither of us gets anything. If he’s unreliable and I’m reliable, then I got burned.

[Speaker D] It sounds like in this thing, in any case there’s risk for you. The question is whether you want him not to get it. Like, I don’t want a situation where he gets it.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, right. So that actually comes up in their discussions there. There are people whose interest is that the other person not get it, not that they themselves get it. Not maximizing their own profit. By the way, that’s a utility function like anything else. His utility is that the other guy should suffer, not that I should gain. That’s worth it to me.

[Speaker B] One of the participants there said to him explicitly: just so you know, I’m going to steal. And that’s what convinced him. He said, okay, if he’s going to steal, then I’ll do split, there’s nothing else to do.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, it went like this—if it’s the same clip, because there are lots of clips there. I’m telling you, it was fascinating. He says to him, look, I’m going to steal. Just so you know. And if you also decide to steal, then neither of us gets anything. So I suggest that you announce that you’re splitting. Then I’ll get all the money, and I’ll split it with you fifty-fifty. That’s what he offered him. Okay? Now what happened in the end, I think, was that really that’s what happened in the end, I think. No, they split. In the end they both did split, so the outcome came out the same outcome.

[Speaker B] What interests me is, statistically, if you examine what happened over the course of that series—is the human being, at the end of the day, more altruistic or more greedy?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] In that series, that really is an interesting philosophical question. I once wrote about it, and I asked: is it actually dishonest to lie there? It’s legal according to the format rules; it’s not lying in ordinary life. The game is set up so that you have two options: either lie or don’t lie. Now, to lie or not to lie is a strategy in the game. They don’t call it lying, but that’s what it amounts to—it’s not lying in ordinary life. The rules of the game are that you have to understand that the other person can lie and can also not lie. And you have to decide between yourselves, each one, what he does. So I’m not at all sure that it’s immoral there to lie. You play with the cards you have, and those are the cards: to lie or not to lie. What?

[Speaker H] It’s part of the game, like pretending you have more than you really do.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Lying in a poker face—yes, in the game Golden Balls you can also have a poker face. Yes. Your point is that in the end, if I come back to our issue—but I’ll finish with this—basically the categorical imperative is equivalent to the prisoner’s dilemma. And the lesson is that—what’s the solution, yes, someone here, someone opens some article claiming there’s, I think, a contradiction in Kant. Ah, here. He says there’s a contradiction between the prisoner’s dilemma in game theory and the categorical imperative. Yes, it’s some book, doesn’t matter, in the seventh chapter of some book by John Robinson, doesn’t matter, John Robinson. So in the seventh chapter of his book, at the beginning he says there’s a contradiction between the prisoner’s dilemma in game theory and the categorical imperative. Why? Because the prisoner’s dilemma is based on a utilitarian calculation. How do we maximize utility, and it’s worthwhile for both of us to cooperate with one another because that maximizes utility. By contrast, the categorical imperative works in a non-utilitarian way. So there’s a contradiction between the prisoner’s dilemma and the categorical imperative. And of course that’s not true. The prisoner’s dilemma and the categorical imperative are exactly the same thing. Not only is there no contradiction, it’s exactly the same thing. The only difference is this: it’s not a consequentialist calculation in terms of the individual player, but it is a consequentialist calculation in terms of the coalition as a whole. So there’s no contradiction in saying that it’s non-consequentialist and also consequentialist. Both are consequentialist at the collective level, but not consequentialist on the private, individual plane. There’s really no contradiction between them. It’s exactly the same thing. Okay? Good, we’ll stop here.

[Speaker E] Next time we’ll already see it, next time,

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I need to be somewhere where it can also be projected, but—just search, search Google. Golden Balls, yes, search Golden Balls. Golden Balls? Yes.

[Speaker B] It’s BBC, it’s a BBC program.

[Speaker E] Split or—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Steal, that’s the other name of this game, same thing.

[Speaker B] Split or Steal.

[Speaker E] Split or Steal, got it.

[Speaker B] What would the Rabbi do in this game?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No idea, I haven’t thought about it. I’m only saying that I don’t think it’s a function of moral considerations. Deciding whether to split or steal is not a moral question, it’s a tactical question. So the weekly portion we’re in right now is the portion of Bamidbar. We’re basically beginning the fourth of the five books of the Torah, the Book of—

[Speaker E] Numbers. “And the Lord spoke to Moses in the wilderness of Sinai, in the Tent of Meeting, on the first day of the second month, in the second year after they had come out of the land of Egypt, saying”. We always read this portion before the festival of Shavuot, the time of the giving of our Torah. And the Sages say that the Torah was specifically given in the wilderness—why in the wilderness? The Torah was given through three things: through fire, through water, and through the wilderness. To tell you that whoever does not make himself like an ownerless wilderness cannot acquire the Torah. What is an ownerless wilderness? The wilderness is a place that has no owner; everyone can tread on it, everyone can pass through it. So too, a person who wants to merit the Torah has to lower his pride, be humble, be open to everyone. In this portion we see the counting of the Jewish people. Holy Rashi says on the first verse: “Because of His love for them, He counts them at every hour”. The Holy One, blessed be He, loves the Jewish people, and therefore He counts them again and again. This shows the affection, the importance, of each and every Jew. Every person is a whole world. Afterward, the Torah details the order of the banners, how the children of Israel camped in the wilderness. “Each man by his banner, according to the insignia of their fathers’ houses, shall the children of Israel camp; at a distance, surrounding the Tent of Meeting, they shall camp”. Every tribe had its own place, its own banner, its own special role. This teaches us that each person has his own mission in the world, but all together around the Tabernacle, around the Divine Presence.