Q&A: Formal Authority and the Physico-Theological Proof, Continued
Formal Authority and the Physico-Theological Proof, Continued
Question
Many thanks for the latest column.
I’d like to point out another interesting source in this discussion (and it may be that the Rabbi mentioned this in other articles, and in a quick look I didn’t come across it; I’m fairly new here), namely the words of the Chazon Ish in Yoreh De'ah, siman 1, סעיף 6, and at length in siman 2 (from paragraph 16 to paragraph 19 primarily, though the whole siman deals with the topic). It seems that he has a very rational approach there, and a real attempt to adapt and define the proper attitude toward mistakes and coercion in matters of belief.
I’d be very curious to know whether, in the Rabbi’s view, there is some definition there that would better explain the oxymoron of substantive authority regarding facts.
And many thanks as well for the references regarding the physico-theological proof (we need to think of a shorter expression for that…). Strangely enough, we see that Kant and Aquinas serve here as illuminating commentators on midrashim of the Sages and books of Jewish thought, whose words were stated briefly or in awkward translation, and an ordinary person would have difficulty developing the whole topic from them.
Answer
Those remarks of the Chazon Ish deal with halakhic ruling and not with thought. This is his autonomous approach, which I have indeed mentioned here in the past.
And the midrashim of the Sages serve as explanations of Greek philosophers. Philosophy was not born among us, nor did we really have it back then.
Discussion on Answer
For some reason I thought you mentioned siman 3 and 150. Just my own stray thoughts. You’re talking about his claims that in our generation there is no one who knows how to offer proof, etc. Many halakhic decisors wrote that as well. But their claim is only that the practical transgressions are not transgressions. That does not connect directly to decision-making in matters of thought. Only to the point I mentioned, the issue of coercion in beliefs. There is still much more to elaborate on about this.
I was also trying to derive from his words an explanation of command and rebellion, which is the other side of the coin in relation to coercion.
I’m referring to the difficulty the Rabbi raised: how can one command thought (“principles of faith”) and also impose sanctions (“they are cast down”) on someone who weighed the matter and reached a different conclusion (that same “poor apikoros”).
And from the Chazon Ish it seems that in fact the command and the sanction apply only to someone for whom it is clear to everyone that his different conclusion on these critical matters is biased and tainted by a conflict of interest, and serves only as an excuse (“cognitive dissonance”) for rebellion (“a wayward shoulder,” “he roots resistance within himself,” “a special craftiness in the inclination’s biasing”) against a life of the yoke of faith. (That is an expanded interpretation of the concept of acting “out of provocation,” as opposed to acting out of “appetite,” which is recognition of the yoke together with awareness of one’s failure to bear it.) In that case the command is legitimate: to demand of him that he not allow himself to deliberate about something so important when he knows he is biased. And the sanction for this too applies mainly in times when there is a reasonable possibility (?) of checking such a thing, and in an individualized way for each person as he is, and its main purpose is to prevent him from leading others into rebellion (“to fence the matter”).
In other words, and more relevantly, the command is that a person should listen to intuition and common sense (if he indeed has those) and know how to recognize logical fallacies, even though he is very tempted to hang his case on other great authorities whose importance and decisiveness can be persuasive.
As examples, I could mention in a nutshell the debate with the head of the atheist line on the podcast “Head to Head,” and also the latest column on the considerations regarding returning hostages, and really all the sharp criticism we’ve learned from the Rabbi about Dawkins.