Q&A: Rationality in Relation to Emotion
Rationality in Relation to Emotion
Question
I hear in your lectures over and over that you say you are rational with respect to commandments and religion, and from your perspective there is no emotion or some kind of experience in observing the commandments that the Torah…
On that assumption I have a few questions.
1. Is your lifestyle too also rational? Meaning, are you with your wife because she does the dishes or cooks well, that is, only for rational reasons? Or suppose any choice you make in life—choosing a wife is an excellent example—do you examine things only in a rational way? (I assume not, so what is the difference between that and the commandments and the Torah, toward which alone one must be rational?) To continue the question—God forbid, a son of some rational person is killed: do you expect him to accept it and say, "That is the way of the world," and then go celebrate as if nothing happened?
The point is that I think the service of God is built from the combination of the rational and the emotional, and if a person feels that when he eats matzah on Passover he is happy, or feels some kind of spiritual uplift, that does not detract.
2. I also heard in other talks of yours that you are very "angry" at the Haredi / Religious Zionist way of thinking. My question is whether the Rabbi understands that people are fundamentally different from one another, and there are those whose emotional motivation is different from their rational motivation. It is quite possible that if you introduced them to the rational motive, they would very quickly lose their way, and the reason is simple: not every person, as such, has the intellectual capacity to contain this rationality, and he prefers to remain simple and believe on an emotional level. And it is better for him to remain that way than to become some philosopher who certainly may not have the tools to contain this reality, and in any case he would be ruined. He is happy that he gets up in the morning and that he needs to say thank God that by His merit he got up in the morning. I think what you are doing, and what you are fighting for, is the opposite of the person's own good, because his good is to remain simple, because that is how God created him. And there is nothing to be done: there are people whose emotional dimension is stronger than their intellectual dimension, and that is how they are happy, and trying to change their path will only make them sadder. In my humble opinion, that is a crime.
In advance, thank you, Ben Zion Tzadok
Answer
- No. I try for my positions to be formed in a rational way. That does not mean I have no experiences or emotions in any area.
- I am not talking about the question of what is preferable for people and what they want. I am talking about the question of what is correct.
Discussion on Answer
1. I have explained these things more than once, and you can search here on the site. Emotion is not invalid, but in my view it has no value. One does not determine a position by emotion but by intellect.
2. I am not talking about what is right for me but about what is right. If something makes you feel good, then do it. Enjoy. But there is no point in turning that into a value.
I suggest you search here and read about my attitude toward emotion. It has all already been spelled out more than once.
I agree that emotion has no value, and not by it can I make rational decisions or determine any facts… My claim is about the tone in which you present things: you have turned all emotional / conservative people into ignoramuses and amei ha'aretz, to the point of heretics, and you fight this and say it openly without restraint.
My claim is simple: if God had wanted to create everyone as rationalists, that is what He would have done. The fact is that there are people whose service of God is based on emotion, even though nothing can be determined that way, because that is how God wanted there to be a variety of types of service of God from all across the spectrum. And the reality is that if you took that same person who flies to Uman and gave him a rational brainwashing, it is not at all certain that he would remain a believer… Don't you think you are missing the point?
In the end, what is your goal—that a person should think the truth according to your rational approach? Is that what you are trying to persuade people of? So I am telling you, it is hopeless from the outset, and this way you are not advancing anything in the world.
Try to address the claim—that God created people in such a way that each one would have his own place in the service of God.
Well, you described your feelings here; I have nothing to do with such subjective descriptions. We've exhausted this.
Too bad that you are not addressing the substance of the claim. My argument is not emotion but common sense—plain facts.
That there are people in the world with more or less emotional tendencies—that is a fact.
Do you deny that fact?
(If you deny it, I am ending the discussion.)
1. So why don't you introduce the parameter of emotion into Torah / Jewish law, and make everything intellectual? Or maybe both?
2. Regarding the second question: true, there is what is right for you and what is right for him, because God created reality in this way. Not everything is black and white; there is a lot of gray. Therefore any attempt to impose what is right for you on what is right for him only creates destruction. I would perhaps suggest that you try less to change conservative society, because the destruction outweighs the benefit. In the end, you cannot educate humanity to think rationally as a sweeping rule, and the reason is that this is what God wanted and this is how God created humanity. Meaning, in some sense you are fighting against the divine creation.
P.S.
I personally am considered a rationalist, and anything that contradicts the rational I will not observe in the halakhic aspect. However, I will also lift a Torah scroll on Simchat Torah and dance with it, because that is what makes me feel good, and not out of conservatism or ignorance. And from time to time I can also pray the Amidah and close my eyes even though I know it has no practical significance. So you can analyze the act and say that it is not right, and I can tell you that right now it is the most right thing for me in that situation, and there is no paradox between me and you.