Q&A: Okay, I’ll rephrase the question about Leibowitz:
Okay, I’ll rephrase the question about Leibowitz:
Question
It seems to me that the Rabbi doesn’t like the style of the question…
Again,
Hello Rabbi,
does Yeshayahu Leibowitz have the status of a “denier of the Torah,” such that it is forbidden to read his books because of “do not stray after”?
Answer
Before you ask me whether he has the status of a denier, ask whether such a status even exists. In my opinion, there is no prohibition against reading any book of any kind, so long as it deals with reasoning and substantive arguments. This prohibition—even if you find it somewhere—has no logical possibility at all (a system cannot forbid someone to examine the system itself. After all, as long as I haven’t examined it, I’m not bound by it). If there is such a prohibition, then a Christian or a pagan would also be forbidden to examine Judaism in the same way. This is nonsense.
The question remains what to do with “do not stray after,” but I’m deliberately not getting into that here (I did so in the trilogy), in order to emphasize that it really doesn’t matter. Even if I couldn’t find any possible explanation, that prohibition would still be null and void, like the dust of the earth.
It’s worth looking at the post about Holocaust denial and “do not stray after,” and at the post about my being an apikoros. And afterward, update Grintsaig (the one appointed by the Chief Rabbinate to classify apikoroses) so that he can file this message (this tear) too in the navel of becoming.
Roni Miron, in the article “Phenomenology of a Believing Person” in the collection “On Faith,” points to a certain problem in Leibowitz’s demands. On the one hand, Leibowitz demands a separation between the transcendence of God and the immanent world; on the other hand, performing commandments for their own sake creates a bond between man and God. As a result, the two demands cancel each other out in a way that prevents them from existing together, and therefore makes Leibowitz’s position impossible (I suggest looking at the article, because the presentation here is superficial and not exhaustive).
I remember that I had some vague understanding of this already at an early stage, in a way that led me to distance myself from Leibowitz’s position.
By the way, the Rabbi explicitly does not hold Leibowitz’s position, since he maintains that the commandments are a divine need, contrary to Leibowitz’s first demand.