Q&A: The Uniqueness of the Hebrew Bible
The Uniqueness of the Hebrew Bible
Question
As is well known, you argue that nothing can be learned from the non-halakhic parts of the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh).
The question is whether it is unique in that respect. It seems to me that the answer is yes, because even in Tamar Duvdevani’s poem you think there is meaning to the text. Of course one can always argue, and nothing is certain, but in principle there is meaning and one can also try to get close to it. The fact that here there is no meaning to the text is something unique.
Where does that uniqueness come from? Is it from the text itself, which is different from any other text? I find it hard to see such a difference. It seems to me that the uniqueness comes from the attitude toward it (yours, in this case).
If everything I’ve written so far is correct (I could have asked this question by question, but I assumed that would be annoying and it was better to lay out the whole line of thought in advance), then the question is whether that attitude is correct. If these parts (the non-halakhic ones, which are the overwhelming majority) were given by God, it stands to reason that He wanted people to learn from them, and if your attitude prevents you from learning from them, it seems reasonable that you should change that attitude.
Answer
I don’t know where you got the idea that I think the Hebrew Bible is unique. In Tamar’s poem too, I interpreted it according to my understanding and did not infer from it anything I didn’t already agree with. That is exactly what I would do with the Hebrew Bible. See the latest post (“The Secret of Divine Service as a Higher Need”).
In any case, this has nothing whatsoever to do with my attitude. My claim is purely factual: that one cannot learn from the Hebrew Bible. On the contrary, show me how something can be learned from it and I’ll be very glad. There was a post whose discussion thread afterward was devoted to examples, and you should look at the discussion there.
Discussion on Answer
There are messages in the Hebrew Bible that I don’t agree with too, but in those cases I interpret them (like all of us do). I assume I would do the same with poems if I saw them as a binding source. In any case, from my perspective there is no difference between interpreting a poem and interpreting the Hebrew Bible. On the contrary, if anything the Hebrew Bible has an advantage, because if I managed to extract something clear from it, I would see it as binding—unlike a poem.
Which messages in the Hebrew Bible does the Rabbi disagree with?
Smashing infants against rocks, or killing them, for example. The absolute authority of a king. The attitude toward women, and more.
“Happy is he who seizes your infants and dashes them against the rock” is said as an expression of the mourner’s personal hope (about which one can in principle discuss whether one should identify with it), and not necessarily as a theological principle. In principle, it seems that if the Creator of the world wants to destroy a civilization—and of course He does so because it has presumably long since passed the point of no return in corruption—that is His right. It seems strange to me to object to God’s calculations of justice regarding babies when *every year* human beings carry out 52–53 million abortions around the world in the name of the religion of “humanism.” That is of course not an argument against the Rabbi, but against the main voices making this complaint.
The plain meaning of Scripture recoils from human monarchy. John Locke spilled quite a bit of ink trying to show how all the principles of liberty of classical liberalism (of which he was one of the main formulators) are proven directly from the plain meaning of the Hebrew Bible. And specifically from it, because Jesus (“Render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s”) and Paul (I can’t find the quote right now) did not help him much on this issue.
I do not see where Scripture treats women unjustly. In general, there seems to be something presumptuous in this confidence in our ability to grasp what justice is more clearly than the prophets of Israel did.
Copenhagen, you’re mixing up different levels of the discussion.
You asked what in Scripture arouses my disagreement, and I wrote examples.
But at the same time I also said that when there is disagreement, I (like all of us) interpret—exactly as you did here.
I did not write that I think I’m more right than the prophets or than the Holy One, blessed be He. Absolutely not. On the contrary, precisely because of that I interpret, because in my opinion it is not reasonable that they were wrong.
My main claim is that it is hard to imagine a situation in which I would find something in the Hebrew Bible that contradicted my beliefs and I would simply submit. Not because I know everything and am the smartest, and not because the Hebrew Bible has no authority, but because practically speaking I would usually interpret it in a way that fits my views. Beyond that, I also claim that everyone does this, except that they don’t admit it.
All of this is written in what I said above, and I don’t really understand how we got drawn into this argument (or non-argument).
I didn’t interpret. I wrote as someone who does not know what the interpretation is. It is possible to understand that smashing infants contradicts “The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge,” and if so, the plain meaning itself would presumably go in the direction I mentioned. But perhaps not. Either way, the source of my puzzlement is simply the claim that “nothing can be learned from the Hebrew Bible,” for the following reasons:
1. Even if I do not find in the Book of Deuteronomy things that actually contradict my beliefs, there are still countless things to which I would not assign the same degree of importance without it, or things to which I would assign no importance at all (though assigning them importance is coherent with my beliefs). For example, settling the Land of Israel (without that, it is not hard to find halakhic voices when one wants to) or the Temple.
2. There are things I simply would not know at all. For example, principles like the resurrection of the dead (learned from Daniel) and the Day of Judgment as realized in the concrete history of the earth. The fact that the Sages thought this is not enough, because who says they were not mistaken, as they were in other matters of worldview, history, or medicine (as Rabbi Abraham son of Maimonides taught in his essay on the homilies of the Sages)?
3. There are also things that really do contradict: at some point this caused me to “subordinate my beliefs” regarding the shared life of homosexual couples, and I now see it as a sin with which one should not express identification by participating in celebrations or offering any other support, even if it were possible to find a halakhic avenue for doing so.
4. It seems that literary study itself clarifies for the reader matters like the will of God, the meaning of history, the condition of man, providence, and the existential meaning of these for a person in a way that no other book succeeds in doing.
That brings us back to a discussion that has been beaten to death. All these points have already come up and been answered in columns 134–5 and in the talkbacks that followed them.
The four points I raised were a response to what was said here (that nothing can be learned from the Hebrew Bible). I can’t take into account, or presume to know, everything the Rabbi said everywhere else.
Brother, are you actually claiming that everything can be learned from the Hebrew Bible?
And if we assume not everything can be learned from the Hebrew Bible, then what?
The argument is not whether everything can be learned from the Hebrew Bible (obviously not), but whether *something* can be learned from it. In my view, much more than just something. In the Rabbi’s view as presented here, nothing.
In your analysis of Tamar’s poem, you spoke about the intention of the text, and it sounded like you meant something objective.
I’m sure there are stories and poems that you think convey a message you don’t agree with.