Q&A: Questions for Rabbi Michael Abraham
Questions for Rabbi Michael Abraham
Question
Hello Rabbi,
With your permission, I have several questions on the morality of religion, and then about simplicity of faith versus inquiry;
In one of your interviews you said, among other things:
"And what about issues of religion and morality? I ask because in many ways you are a student of Leibowitz. He made a complete separation between those two realms, and argued that morality is an atheistic category. But on the other hand, many religious thinkers today claim that morality without religion is impossible.
On this issue I am, more or less, in the middle. I think there is a close and airtight connection between morality and religion. In my view, without belief in God there is no morality. There may perhaps be good behavior on the factual plane, but not morality in its normative sense. At the same time, there is no connection whatsoever between morality and Jewish law; these are two completely different disciplines. When I say 'Jewish law,' I mean the normative part of the religious-Jewish world. That part truly has nothing to do with morality, and in that sense I agree with Leibowitz. However, I do not agree with Leibowitz that morality is an atheistic category. I think that within an atheistic world, even one that is not materialistic, there is no morality and there cannot be morality. This is because there must be a source that defines good and evil. That 'being,' whatever it may be, which gives validity to moral norms, is God Himself. In this context one may say that the distance between belief in such a 'moral' God and belief in a 'religious' God is not so great, because unlike belief in God as 'Creator of the world,' the moral God is a commanding God."
(Religion, Morality, Science, and Philosophy: An Interview with Rabbi Dr. Michael Abraham)
A. If one claims that there cannot be morality without God. How does the Rabbi interpret the statement "proper conduct preceded the Torah"? Do you think there is such a thing as "human morality"?
B. First, I do not understand why you separate morality and Jewish law. Does Jewish law not reflect the practical side of religion’s morality?
Second, the obvious follow-up question is: what then is the role of Jewish law? Just religious ritual for God? Does the commandment of tzitzit, for example, not embody a moral idea, with the goal of "and you shall remember all My commandments"? Meaning—that the function of tzitzit is to remind us of the moral idea for which the people of Israel were intended? Something that begins with our great mission and ends with the most particular commandment?
C. Rabbi Nachman in his Likkutei Moharan (not that I’m a great expert in his writings, only that I recently came across them—and this dilemma appears in many places among our sages) speaks about simplicity of faith versus intellectual inquiry. It seems from the sources (quoted below) that there is a contradiction, as it were, between the two approaches he presents. On the one hand, "to walk in innocence and simplicity," and on the other hand, "the intellect is a great light and illuminates him in all his ways." I wanted to know whether the Rabbi sees a contradiction here, and if so, how he resolves it.
If I, in my smallness, resolve it according to what I understood from the Rabbi’s article ("The Dilemma of Innocence" in "Two Wagons and a Hot-Air Balloon") it would be that these are two different matters—the first two sources are speaking about first principles that I must accept "with simple faith" (meaning the synthetic approach, and intuition—just in slightly less philosophically precise terms), while the second source speaks about the analytical part of investigating from those first principles. Is that what you mean? I would appreciate it if you could explain.
Likkutei Moharan, Tinyana, section 12
When a person follows his intellect and wisdom, he can fall into many errors and stumbling blocks, and come to great evils, Heaven forbid. And there are those who caused much corruption—such as the very great and famous wicked people who led the world astray—and it was all through their wisdom and intellect. The essence of Judaism is only to go in innocence and simplicity, without any sophistication, and to look at everything one does so that the blessed Name will be there, and not to pay any attention at all to one’s own honor. Only if there is honor of the blessed Name in it should he do it, and if not, then not—and then he will certainly never stumble.
Likkutei Moharan, Tinyana, section 44
It has already been explained in the books and in our words in several places, that one must distance oneself very, very much from examining at all the books of the philosophical investigators, and even from books of inquiry written by great figures from among our Jewish brethren—one must also distance oneself greatly from them, because they are very harmful to faith, for our faith that we received from our holy forefathers is sufficient for us. And this is a great rule and a foundation and main principle in the service of God: to be innocent and upright, etc., to serve Him, blessed be He, in simplicity, without any sophistication or inquiry whatsoever.
One must also distance oneself very much even from forms of cleverness within the service of God itself. For all this worldly cleverness that those who enter and begin somewhat in the service of God possess is not wisdom at all, but only fantasies and foolishness and great confusion. And this cleverness causes a person to fall greatly from the service of God—that is, when he thinks, investigates, and is overly exacting as to whether he is properly fulfilling what he does. For a human being cannot fulfill his obligation in perfection, "and the Holy One, blessed be He, does not deal tyrannically with His creatures" (Avodah Zarah 3a), and "the Torah was not given to ministering angels" (Kiddushin 54a). And concerning those who are over-exacting and overly stringent with excessive stringencies, regarding them it is said (Leviticus 18): "and live by them"—and not that he should die by them (Yoma 85b), for they have no vitality at all, and they are always in black depression, because it seems to them that they are not fulfilling their obligations through the commandments they perform, and they derive no vitality from any commandment because of their exactitude and their depressions (and he himself was not stringent with any stringency at all). And in truth, after all forms of wisdom, even one who truly knows wisdom—after all wisdom, one must cast away all wisdom and serve God in pure simplicity, without any sophistication. And this is the greatest wisdom of all wisdoms: not to be wise at all. For in truth there is no wise person in the world at all, "there is neither wisdom nor understanding against Him, blessed be He," and the essence is that "the Merciful One wants the heart" (Sanhedrin 106b; Zohar, Ki Tetze, p. 281a).
Likkutei Moharan, first edition, section 1
For a Jewish person must always look to the intellect in every thing, and connect himself to the wisdom and intellect found in every thing, so that the intellect found in every thing will illuminate him, bringing him close to the blessed God through that very thing. For the intellect is a great light, and it illuminates him in all his ways, as it is written (Ecclesiastes 8): "A man’s wisdom lights up his face."
And this is the aspect of Jacob. For Jacob merited the birthright, which is the beginning, which is the aspect of wisdom (Tikkunei Zohar, Tikkun 14; Zohar Mishpatim 121b), as it is written (Psalms 111): "The beginning of wisdom." And this is the aspect of (Genesis 27): "He has outwitted me these two times." And Targum Onkelos translates: "and he made me wise." And this is the aspect of the sun. For the intellect illuminates him in all his ways like the sun. And this is the aspect of (Proverbs 4): "The path of the righteous is like the light of dawn, shining brighter and brighter until full day." And this is the aspect of the letter chet, a term of vitality. For wisdom and intellect are the vitality of every thing, as it is written (Ecclesiastes 7): "Wisdom gives life," etc.
Thank you in advance,
Answer
A. Preceded the Torah does not mean preceded faith. Beyond that, "proper conduct" in the language of the Sages is not necessarily morality.
B. You are assuming what you need to prove. Your assumption is that the commandments are about morality, and then you prove from tzitzit—whose purpose is to remember the commandments, meaning morality. But in my view the commandments do not come to achieve morality, and therefore your whole argument collapses. See column 15 on my site.
C. I don’t see why there is any point in resolving contradictions in Likkutei Moharan if you do not see it as an authoritative source and do not study it. But if you ask, I do not see a contradiction. To see the intellect in everything does not mean to investigate, but to see the idea behind the thing—in other words, to contemplate it through a Torah perspective. That does not mean inquiry, but on the contrary, applying faith in one’s attitude toward everything.
Discussion on Answer
Why don’t you ask through the site? For me that’s much more convenient.
A. I explained that the moral dimension enters through our conscience, which is also a divine creation. Jewish law has other purposes. Indeed, there can be no morality without God, but that does not mean morality is part of Jewish law. God’s will has two components: Jewish law and morality.
You will know what is good and bad from your moral intuition, just as every gentile knows. The Torah itself writes, "And you shall do what is upright and good," without specifying, because it assumes this is obvious to everyone. The Holy One, blessed be He, demands from Cain the blood of his brother before commanding the prohibition of murder. And so on.
There is no connection at all between the proof from morality and revelation. The morality embedded in us, which everyone understands to be binding, proves that there is a God who implanted it within us. See Notebook Four, part 3.
A.1. Because it is God’s will.
B. I don’t know how to say more than that Jewish law has some kind of religious purposes. Eating pork does not serve a moral purpose. So what is it for?
C. I do not see him as an authoritative source, and therefore to me the discussion is not important. I said my suggestion, but if it interests you, ask those who deal with it.
Hello Rabbi, and thank you very much for the thought-provoking answers. These questions, on which I have not formed a firm opinion, stand at the foundation of faith (at least mine) and trouble me on a personal level, and I have not found anyone who deals with them satisfactorily the way you do in your illuminating notebooks. So again, thank you.
First, I apologize for the bother. It’s just that where I am, the internet is filtered and doesn’t let me enter certain sites. Also, I sometimes prefer the questions to remain on a more private level. If it’s a problem, I can find a way and ask through the site.
Second, unfortunately the email apparently got "swallowed" among the other emails and I missed it (and this was even after I looked at Notebook Four, part 3… and after I thought about the matter…), and so I’m only answering now (it really did seem strange to me that I hadn’t gotten a response for over two weeks…).
A. I understand; I’m not claiming there is a connection between the proof from morality and revelation. And yet, human conscience / our moral intuition is open to interpretation. In one person’s eyes, doing a certain act is moral, while in another’s eyes that act is not moral (even if one can point to a few similar universal lines, don’t murder, don’t steal, etc.). So how, in the end, can I (a person who believes in the Torah) decide? It’s easy to arrive this way at moral relativism. Isn’t man (meaning his intellect) subjective? How can a person determine what is a moral act? Is morality autonomous or heteronomous? Let me sharpen the question a bit more: how do we know what the moral act is without being told? (Spoiler: I’m assuming what I need to prove, based on my conception that man "can’t move" right or left, value-wise, by means of his subjective intellect [a conception built mainly on the ruins of modern humanism, which claimed that the humanist would discover the laws of morality just as the scientist discovers the laws of nature, and thereby created all sorts of "enterprises" for itself—socialism, communism, Nazism, etc., which caused a great deal of destruction and ruin to humanity, and this is not the place to elaborate], and therefore we need a heteronomous value system that dictates to us what a moral act is. Am I mistaken?)
A.1. If so, how do we know that this is God’s will? Through a commandment in the Torah, or through human conscience / the proof from morality?
A.2. How does the Rabbi interpret commandments that are seemingly moral (like gossip, honoring parents, etc.)? Why did the Torah also command things that "human" morality (I wrote it that way—human—because man cannot be the source of morality, and morality is the result of God) had already arrived at? If I follow your argument and try to answer my own question, maybe the idea is that God wanted to give them a kind of "stamp"? There are moral principles (which are, in principle, discovered through human conscience), and God emphasized them and gave them the status of a commandment?
A.3. According to this, is there any point specifically in learning morality from the writings of the great Torah sages, such as Mesillat Yesharim and the like? What about moral books written by gentiles? Why did the Sages invest effort and write Pirkei Avot for us?
B. Regarding issues like these, I would tend to say that commandments have several reasons—what is called "reasons for the commandments"—not all of which we know; some are clearer and some less so. Or that because human beings do not see the "full picture," whereas God does see it, He therefore established laws that do not necessarily appear moral to us, but are moral. And in any case, the moment we transgress some command of God, it turns out that we are behaving immorally because He, who established morality, told us not to eat pork and yet we defied His word. What does the Rabbi think?
C. My question is not specific but essential. I am trying to resolve the contradiction I presented through the writings of the great Torah sages, and to understand their approach to the issue (or their interpretation of the Torah’s approach to the issue). In any event, thank you.
D. Perhaps in that same context (of question C): how do you view the Torah scholars throughout the generations? From what I understood, the Rabbi has a great appreciation, for example, for the Chazon Ish, yet he (like the rest of the Torah-believing public, especially the Haredi world) did not necessarily investigate and examine his faith all that much, and in that context perhaps one could identify him as a fundamentalist (in the same way one could identify many of the great Torah sages…). And what about Rabbi Kook? The Vilna Gaon? And many others (who were versed in outside wisdom as well)? And as I understand it, the Rabbi recoils from that approach (and rightly so). How then can one see them as authoritative sources? (Even if we say that we value them only from the halakhic perspective, it would still be hard for me to accept. After all, a "great Torah sage" should be a person who strives for truth and does not suspend critical thinking…)
Hello.
A. The question whether we need to be given an objective and rigid system or not is a theoretical question. Factually, there is no such system, not even in the Torah. So what exactly is the argument about? By the way, moral relativity is much less powerful than people paint it. The disagreements are at the margins. Notice that there are also many disputes in Jewish law, so even if the Torah had conveyed to us the principles of morality, that would not have prevented disputes.
1. We know God’s will through the moral intuition He implanted in us and through our judgment. And if there are differences between people, the same is true in Jewish law. So what?
2. I didn’t understand the question. You answered it in your own words.
3. In my opinion there is no point in that at all. By the way, Jewish mussar books usually do not deal with morality in the sense we are discussing. The Sages also wrote medical passages for us in the Talmud. So should we learn medicine from there because of that? They wrote Pirkei Avot for us (which is also mostly not morality in the sense we are discussing) because that is what they thought. The question whether that is binding and whether it is necessarily correct is a completely different one.
B. The question whether defying the word of the Holy One, blessed be He, is an immoral act is not a simple one. But it has nothing whatsoever to do with our discussion, which concerns the question whether the halakhic command itself aims at morality. Here my answer is negative, certainly regarding commandments that are very far from moral issues (like pork, etc.).
D. I do not see all these people as authoritative sources, but as figures I value greatly. No one is perfect, and even someone who does not deeply investigate faith can still be a great person. Everyone starts from premises, and perhaps for them what they understood was enough to form a position. There is no obligation to investigate and philosophize, only if the questions trouble you.
A. I’m not sure I fully understood you. If so, how is this view different from the postmodern view (common today) that claims there is no absolute morality and therefore there is no objective point of judgment between me and my actions—in effect, moral relativism? My secular friend says, "live and let live," while I argue against him that if in the end he harms me, I am obligated to try (at least) to change his mind, because I possess an objective truth (which is such for me). Could you please help me sort this out? What advantage do I have over a moral relativist?
(By the way, why is this a theoretical question? There are people who hold the approach that Jewish law and morality go together, and then it turns out there is an objective rigid system, as you noted in your fourth notebook, part 3, in connection with Rabbi Eliezer Berkovits, "Essays on the Foundations of Judaism.")
A.1. I don’t understand. God also implanted in me an evil inclination—does that mean one should follow it? Is it because of a commandment from the Torah that we are obligated to morality?
And what about conflicts between morality and Jewish law? Does Jewish law win?
A.2. My question was: what is the reason for commandments that appear to us to be moral? Why are there commandments like gossip, honoring parents, etc., if we are claiming that the Torah separates morality from Jewish law? If we arrived at this morality through our moral intuition, why did the Torah specifically mention these moral commandments? (I asked in order to understand your view; I offered my own interpretation to see whether this is in fact your opinion.)
A.3. Then in what sense do Jewish mussar books deal? What is really the point of them? (After all, today there is no yeshiva without a daily mussar lesson based on Jewish mussar books.)
B. Interesting. Can you explain why that is not a simple question? (Because the jihadist also kills on the claim that it is God’s will, and therefore in his eyes it is moral?)
D. Even the fundamentalist jihadist had enough, from his perspective, to form a position, and yet we criticize him because he did not investigate and examine (or don’t we? because with first principles there is no possibility of discourse? [Isn’t that postmodern despair?]) Why in our case (within our own garden) is the rule different?
Thank you.
Hello.
We’re repeating ourselves a bit. I’ll try once more.
A. I am not a relativist, but someone who recognizes facts. The fact is that there are disagreements with respect to morality and also with respect to Jewish law. Therefore Rabbi Berkovits and anyone else can claim whatever they want about what ought to be, but not about what is (precisely because I am not a relativist). In practice there are disagreements in Jewish law and in morality, so how can one claim that Jewish law conveys rigid lines? That’s nonsense and empty talk. The fact that there are disagreements does not mean there is no truth; it means there is not always a way to decide a dispute and determine what the truth is. That is an empirical fact and has nothing whatsoever to do with relativism.
Berkovits’s claim, as I understand it, is not that there is a rigid system but that Jewish law is intended to achieve moral aims. That does not mean it is rigid (for he too does not deny that Jewish law is not rigid, whether it is moral or not). The two are unrelated.
A.1. God implanted morality in you as a binding command. Meaning, He not only implanted in you the moral inclination but also the understanding that it is binding and one must follow it. Not so with the inclination to speak gossip.
In conflicts between morality and Jewish law there is no "rule," because it makes no sense that one system should decide disputes between itself and another system. See my article on "a transgression for its own sake" here on the site. This is a decision made by the person in the situation, and there are no rules for it.
A.2. And I explained (and you did too) that sometimes the Torah wants to add a halakhic layer on top of the moral layer, and sometimes not. It depends whether there is an additional religious layer or not. What is unclear here? There are moral commandments that also have halakhic significance, and there are some that apparently do not.
A.3. That is a factual question. Open them and you’ll see that they deal much more with fear of Heaven and observance of commandments than with moral relations between people. By the way, I know quite a few yeshivot where there are no such lessons (actually I hardly know yeshivot where there are lessons at all. And even when there are, people usually laugh at them and look down on them).
B-D. Everyone needs to examine his own path, and therefore one may make claims against anyone. The fact that the jihadist is mistaken does not mean my own examination is mistaken too. Moreover, if he reaches his conclusion in good faith after an examination carried out according to his method, I have no criticism of his conduct (only a duty to be cautious of him). See section A above.
It may very well be that I have trouble understanding because a written text by itself is "dead," and therefore open to interpretations that sometimes slip a bit away from the intention. Quite often it’s hard to understand exactly what the poet meant (for me at least), so perhaps it seems that I "ask too much." But really I’m asking the questions from different angles only in order to sharpen this important issue for myself—one that has many practical ramifications in my Torah outlook—only out of good will and not, Heaven forbid, to waste your time. In short, I try to stick to Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin’s interpretation in Ruach Chaim (1:4) of the Mishnah "Let your house be a meeting place for sages, and sit in the dust of their feet," namely, that a student must not accept his teacher’s words if he has difficulties with them.
A. I understood that point. Let me ask from another angle. What am I leaning on (as someone who believes in the God of Israel and His Torah) when I claim there is objective morality? Does the Torah tell us that? Let me explain: after being persuaded by your words, I now separate between Jewish law and morality. Before that, I claimed there is objective morality with rigid lines. And now, after separating the two, what am I relying on when I say that there is objective morality?
A.1. I understand. I’m asking: is there a commandment from which I learn that one must behave morally? Binding command = commandment? If so, which one? "Love your fellow as yourself"? "And you shall walk in His ways"? And so on. (Regarding the evil inclination, the Sages instructed us not to follow the ways of the evil inclination—through commandments. I’m asking: is the same true in morality?)
How do I know that the God of Israel is the same God from the proof from morality, who strives for morality?
A.3. I’ve heard that people laugh at them, but as far as I understand that’s a minority (by the way, I don’t think that’s to the credit of those yeshivot; that is exactly what Mesillat Yesharim laments in its introduction). Why, then, were they called mussar books?
So contrary to the widespread view that character traits are a matter of interpersonal relations, do character traits deal with the relations between man and God? Do you see value in studying those books?
Does your position represent the Haredi position today (more precisely, the Lithuanian one)—that morality and character traits are part of the relationship between man and God?
B. Following up on your answer in the previous email: I’m interested in why the question of defying the word of the Holy One, blessed be He, in the moral context is not a simple question.
D. Maybe I’m drifting a little from the body of the original question. An interesting approach—could you please expand? Why is there no criticism of his conduct? (Maybe I don’t criticize his conduct, but what about the ideology? At the end of the day he is trying to kill me. I didn’t understand what you meant by a duty to be cautious of him…)
Thank you for your patience.
Hello.
It’s hard for me to conduct a discussion at such intervals. I no longer remember what was discussed (I have very many correspondences).
A. I don’t know what you rely on; I can tell you what I rely on. I do not rely on the Torah, and this has nothing to do with the Torah. I rely on my understanding (even though it says, "do not rely on your own understanding"), because that is what my reasoning tells me.
A1. How do I know that what I see really exists? Because I see it. How do I know that one must fulfill the moral command? Because I experience the moral command, and it tells me: fulfill me. That is the meaning of understanding that there is a moral command. The command includes within it the obligation to act accordingly. From the Torah one may learn this from "And you shall do what is upright and good," which is not a commandment and not part of Jewish law. It is an expectation of the Torah.
On the God of Israel and the God of morality, see Notebook Five.
A3. There is no point to that question. This is semantics. What is called morality in those books is not what is called morality in the world. It is simply use of the same word, not a dispute about any content, and therefore there is no reason to tie it to a particular approach (Lithuanian or otherwise). Just as the term "de'ot" usually means opinions, whereas in Maimonides, Laws of Character Traits, it means character traits. Is that a dispute? No. It is semantics.
B. Because in my opinion the obligation to obey Him is not a moral obligation but an intuition of a different kind. See my article on gratitude on the site.
D. He is trying to kill me, so I have to be cautious and defend myself from him. To kill him in order to prevent him from killing me. But I do not kill him as punishment for his wickedness. From his perspective, I understand that he acts as he understands. He is coerced by his beliefs, and one who is coerced is indeed mistaken but not wicked.
A.1. So the grounding is a subjective experience (or would you say synthetic a priori intuition)? There are people who feel this way, and there are people who experience that there is no such thing as morality, and therefore they murder innocent people because it makes them feel good. From here one can arrive very quickly at relativity… I’m asking what arguments I could have in favor of this.
A.3. I’m certainly not conducting an argument; I’m trying to learn from your knowledge, and that is why I’m asking. Why was this connection made between what the world calls morality and what Jewish books call morality?
I’m trying to sharpen the point you explained—do character traits (as described in those books) deal only with a person’s relationship to God and not with interpersonal relationships?
And is that (from your knowledge) the reason these mussar books are not taught in such a systematic way?
A.1. First, someone who murders simply because it makes him feel good is not making a different moral judgment than mine but yielding to inclination. Perhaps you mean someone who thinks it is proper to murder. In that case, indeed, it is hard to persuade him. So what? Because of that, is murder a subjective prohibition? There are people for whom it is very hard to teach quantum theory or relativity. So are those theories therefore theories one can just argue about? It only means that some people have a kind of blindness regarding them. So too regarding the prohibition of murder (assuming there is someone who thinks it is proper).
The fact that one can arrive at relativity, and even if one cannot persuade others, is not an argument but a difficulty. At most there is a difficulty in persuading. So what? What does that say about the claim itself? Relativity and quantum theory are also hard to teach.
A.3. I argue that the question of why they call it morality is semantic, and there is no real dispute behind it. You ask why the same term is used in two different senses? Ask Even-Shoshan.
My claim is that mussar books deal mainly with religious dimensions and not moral ones. This is not the same distinction as between man and fellow man versus man and God. Fear of Heaven and love of God are central topics of Jewish mussar books. Carefulness in commandments and zeal in observing them. What does that have to do with morality? And since they also contain such topics, then even when they deal with questions of interpersonal relations, it seems that morality is not their intention but rather fear of Heaven in the religious sense. Therefore too, the purpose of studying mussar books in yeshivot is not necessarily moral improvement (in the sense we are discussing), but fear of Heaven and service of God in the religious sense (which also has interpersonal aspects).
A.3. This surprises me, because in some way I can understand and even agree with your words. The problem is that it contradicts the whole idea behind the Mussar movement—really, history itself. After all, that movement was established because of the deficient moral functioning of yeshiva students. From here I have two options: one is to say that the people of the Mussar movement didn’t know what morality was, and that drags one toward disrespect for them and their knowledge. The second is to say that your idea is not correct. It is hard for me to part with either of them (and also because both sound convincing), and that is why I’m trying to resolve the difficulty. So how do you relate to the Mussar movement? Maybe I just didn’t read the history properly? Did they not come for the sake of moral correction (in the sense we use today)?
That is indeed correct. They did not come for moral correction. They came to say that Jewish law does not stand on its own and alone, but that there is a dimension beyond it (intentions, thoughts, values). That dimension has moral aspects in our current sense, but that is not the focus. The focus is fear of Heaven (as opposed to formalistic Jewish law). That is exactly why this movement was seen as a threat to the accepted Lithuanian mode of thought and service of God, which sees Jewish law as the essence of the service of God and tends to view it in a formalistic manner.
I don’t really understand what there is to discuss here, since this is an empirical question. Just read those books and you’ll see that they do not speak about morality in the ordinary sense (except in certain parts, and not the main ones).
In a certain sense, this was a "Hasidic" rebellion within the Lithuanian camp against Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin’s conception in Nefesh HaChaim. It came to create an alternative to Hasidism (and surely you would agree that Hasidism’s goal is not morality).
Very interesting, thank you!
And practically speaking, do you today see value in studying those books? What people call climbing the ladder of traits in Mesillat Yesharim, etc.?
Each person should do what helps him. There are no rules about this.
Thank you.
A. I looked at column 15 on your site. And still, I find this dichotomy difficult. If so, where does the moral dimension that God determines come in, if not through the practical commandments that guide us toward morality (one could add: divine, infinite, absolute—because He determines it)? After all, we said there cannot be morality without God.
How am I supposed to know what is good and what is bad if God didn’t tell me?
That is to say, without divine revelation, how do we know whether morality exists or not? If we go by the moral argument for the existence of God, then there must have to be a divine revelation that reveals to me the laws of morality, no? Otherwise we’re living in a certain kind of lawlessness—how would we know how to fulfill that morality? Meaning, if there had been no revelation, the moral proof would have no significance at all.
But beyond that, how do you explain prohibitions like gossip? Or honoring one’s parents? "Love your fellow as yourself"? And more. And what was the role of the Mussar movement of Rabbi Salanter, if not to restore to worshippers of God the divine morality (Torah-based, Jewish)?
A.1. So then why be moral at all?
B. Of course. I brought it only as an example. So then what is the function of tzitzit? And in general I really couldn’t understand from your words what the function of Jewish law is. What is it for? The Rabbi noted in the column that the role of Jewish law is a purely religious role. Meaning, is the intention religious ritual because that is how God wants us to worship Him?
I can agree that the Torah does not come to make us moral but rather holy, among other things because "proper conduct preceded the Torah." Meaning, before a person learns Torah he must be moral, otherwise his Torah will become a "potion of death" (I was taught that "merited" means refined—to refine the soul, good character traits, etc.). But that is assuming that "proper conduct" means morality.
And still, philosophically I find it hard to understand why the commandments would not be connected to morality. Again I ask, in another form: what is the point of the commandments then?
C. I absolutely do see him as an authoritative source, but what I meant was that I haven’t had the chance to study him in enough depth. I simply chose, from these sources, to express the core of my question.
Regarding your answer: is that really his intention? In the first and second source (especially) he says quite plainly not to study books of philosophy (and not even philosophical books by our great figures—the intention is presumably The Guide for the Perplexed, God save us) in order to remain with simple, straightforward faith, without philosophizing. Do you still interpret him that way?
Because after all it does sound from his writings as if one simply has to "develop faith" (in the language of my study hall, meaning to suspend critical thinking regarding the basic assumptions—that there is a God, etc., and basically not deal with the difficulties… = fundamentalism on the philosophical level). So my question is: is that really so? Or is he simply calling on us: "Don’t be analytical! Life is built on synthesis…" (obviously in modern language)?