Q&A: Integrating Morality into Jewish Law
Integrating Morality into Jewish Law.
Question
Hello to our holy Rabbi, may he live long and well.
Please do not be angry with me, but despite the Rabbi’s attempts to explain to me why there are moral commandments even though these are two separate domains, I wasn’t really persuaded. After all, Jewish law is the Jewish legal system, and the fact that there are loopholes in the law (indirect murder and the like) does not mean that the law is supposed to be separate from morality. And the fact that, for example, dry Jewish law relates to the rape of captive women the same way it relates to eating forbidden foods does not mean these are separate domains. When we get to the laws of rape, Jewish law will speak about it with the full severity of the law; but when we are discussing prohibitions of holiness, we compare them to one another. (Even nowadays this is done; for example, there are Haredi rabbis who discuss whether there is copyright on the internet, even though in their eyes the internet is the height of impurity—and the same applies here.)
Despite this, there are several pretty good sources supporting the Rabbi’s approach, so I thought of a solution involving a combination of the two.
Jewish law and human morality are separate, but despite that there is an obligation to bring morality into Jewish law. That is, when the Torah was given at Sinai, it was loaded with moral commandments, but more or less according to the morality of their time. In other words, the Torah took conscience and natural justice and gave them a binding religious dimension (for everyone; otherwise, to behave more morally than the Torah requires would be “sanctify yourself in what is permitted to you”). After the Torah, the Sages also continued this idea, and even the medieval authorities (Rishonim) did so to some extent. Today, because Orthodoxy trembles in fear of the Reform movement, this matter has stopped.
To sum up: morality develops along with the human race, and it is universal. There is no such thing as specifically Jewish morality or gentile morality. But the Torah obligates the Jewish people, and at a basic level all humanity, to turn morality into a halakhic category that keeps developing all the time.
I hope I managed to explain myself well.
Answer
I did not understand your difficulty. I do not see the slightest difficulty here. By the way, you write that when Jewish law gets to the laws of rape it will speak about it with full severity. Where exactly does that happen? Or has Jewish law not yet gotten there? Was there another round of the revelation at Mount Sinai that I haven’t heard about? Please uncover my eyes that I may behold wonders…
As for your proposal itself, I do not see a big difference. Clearly there are moral norms that enter into Jewish law, and still, the main purpose of Jewish law is not to achieve moral goals but religious goals.