Originally posted on David's Harp
MONDAY, JANUARY 16, 2006
Link
1 And it came to pass after these things, that God did prove Abraham, and said unto him: 'Abraham'; and he said: 'Here am I.' 2 And He said: 'Take now thy son, thine only son, whom thou lovest, even Isaac, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt-offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of.' (Genesis 22)
The story of the Akeidah – Abraham’s task to sacrifice Isaac – occupies a central place in orthodox thought and emblemizes the power and supremacy of faith. This is Abraham’s final test of faith, it is this act of supreme belief and devotion which solidifies God’s pledge to Abraham and the Jewish People:
15 And the angel of the LORD called unto Abraham a second time out of heaven, 16 and said: 'By Myself have I sworn, saith the LORD, because thou hast done this thing, and hast not withheld thy son, thine only son, 17 that in blessing I will bless thee, and in multiplying I will multiply thy seed as the stars of the heaven, and as the sand which is upon the seashore; and thy seed shall possess the gate of his enemies; 18 and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed; because thou hast hearkened to My voice.' (Ibid)
I had always found this story inspiring – and it all made perfect sense to me, both the story itself and all of the many midrashic explorations. Abraham, had not only longed for many years for a son who would succeed him, but had devoted his entire life to renouncing the local pagan worship, especially it’s most odious form – human sacrifice. His triumph is the struggle to overcome his native emotional instincts to fulfill God’s will.
As we say on Rosh Hashanah: "Master of the Universe! Just as Abraham our father suppressed his compassion for his only son to do Your will with a whole heart, so may Your compassion suppress Your wrath against us, and may Your mercy prevail over Your attributes of strict justice."
It is difficult, from the orthodox starting point, to gain some independent spiritual perspective on this. This is excerpted from something that I recently wrote:
“One of the facets of being religious (at least ‘frum’) is the idea that the moral code is completely proscribed by God. “The only free person is he who is immersed in Torah.” (Perek, 6:1). Our job is to free ourselves of the need to make independent moral choices. There is no stronger message than the Akadah. If God commands Avraham to sacrifice his son, his challenge is to suppress his innate sense of morality in favor of the divine decree. If you can do this, you are truly religious. You may be able to achieve happiness and serenity, and a sense of meaning and purpose in your life. The only problem, however, is that you’ve slain your son in the process.
To put it in less macabre terms (although, it wasn’t me who wrote Bereishis), you have given up your prerogative (and perhaps, ability) to develop your own sense of right and wrong. If the world is fortunate, the dogma to which you subscribe is magnanimous and humanistic. If less fortunate (as history has unfortunately demonstrated) it is prejudiced and brutal. Probably – if the Torah is any indication – it is a mixture of both
Whether or not there is a God, the one thing that I believe is that we are born with an innate sense of justice and morality. That sense is compromised throughout our lives by the dogma and socialization to which we are born. Our supreme moral challenge is to re-connect with that sense within us all - that inner voice which has been drowned out by dogma, by social stigma and by prejudice. What we arrive at may not be perfect, but it paves the way for those who will come to take the next steps. That is my definition of “Tikun Olam”, and that is what we sacrifice when we choose to remain believers.”
================================================================
dbs said...
Thanks for a very thought provoking comment. I think that there is much encouragement for independent thought, but strictly within the bounds of the Torah. Man’s thoughts on morality are viewed (in my opinion) as being relativistic and biased, while the Torah is an objective reflection of God’s eternal will. In any case, my post reflects how I personally internalize the message. And, I do think that the Akeidah is a lesson in faith over thought. I will look for the book.
January 20, 2006 12:33 AM
anonymous said...
"Man’s thoughts on morality are viewed (in my opinion) as being relativistic and biased, while the Torah is an objective reflection of God’s eternal will."
I think less so than generally thought. A sanhedrin could theoretically overturn any d'oreisas that are learned from droshas, and of course d'rabbanons and gezeiras.
January 31, 2006 12:16 PM
Ben Avuyah said...
>>>I think less so than generally thought. A sanhedrin could theoretically overturn any d'oreisas that are learned from droshas, and of course d'rabbanons and gezeiras.
but the prerequisite to being on the sanhedrin is buying into a system that considers human morality a mere shadow of absolute godly morality.
February 09, 2006 9:40 AM
Foilwoman said...
Daas: I'm not Orthodox or even Jewish, but the story of Abraham and Isaac was always deeply troubling to me and is one of the sources of my rejection of a literal reading of any part of the Bible. What kind of deity makes that sort of request as a proof of faith? Any entity that requests proof of my willingness to kill my offspring for any purpose (or asks my parents to do that to me), I would hope be exposed for the sick monster that it is. You explain the idea of submission to faith (actually, in a very Muslim way, ironically) wonderfully, but I just don't see how one can do that in the face of actually human feeling and need (much less the lifeblood of one's own child).
Anyone want to explain to me why the Abraham/Isaac story doesn't mean that the god of that story is a manipulative psychopath?
February 09, 2006 11:27 AM
dbs said...
Foilwoman:Anyone want to explain to me why the Abraham/Isaac story doesn't mean that the god of that story is a manipulative psychopath?
I’ll give it a shot: God knew that Abraham’s children would sin, and be deserving of punishment. He therefore tested Abraham, knowing that Abraham would pass the test, thus creating a ‘merit’ which would help atone for his wayward children. It’s also helpful to understand that, from the orthodox perspective, death – while a bummer – is not really so bad.
February 10, 2006 8:50 AM
Foilwoman said...
DBS: Still doesn't work for me. Anybody who willing kills their kid on command from anyone/anything is not doing something meritorious. Unless of course, one views the child as merely chattel rather than a person with humanity and the right (probably such a concept didn't exist in Abrahamic times) to exist, to not be harmed, blaah, blaah, blippity blaah. Since I reject the notion of inherited sin or merit, the whole idea of Abraham earning merit for his potential descendants by agreeing to kill one descendant off just seems sick to me.
I understand the values then were different, and that human sacrifice was not unheard of then, but a god that requires such a thing, even just conceptually and not in actually really doesn't rate too high in my book. Actually, it seems rather Jim Jones-ish (or pick your favorite cult). You know: "Do you love me (god)? Do you really, really love me? Well, prove it. Here's your child. Kill him because I ask it of you." That's really what's being said. When Abraham proves that he's nuts enough to do it, god let's him off. That's not a loving story. That's not a loving god. That's a story about control, withholding, and abuse (and if the reprieve hadn't come, murder).
That story stops me in my tracks every time. There is no way I have found to read it which doesn't make me think that the god of that story sounds like an abusive and not mentally well cult leader. Judaism, Christianity, Islam all tell versions of this story and they all make my blood run cold.
February 10, 2006 11:00
Showing posts with label David's Harp. Show all posts
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Sunday, October 2, 2011
Monday, September 26, 2011
Hearts and Minds
Originally posted on David's Harp
THURSDAY, JANUARY 26, 2006
Link
It is a well traveled saying that people do not give up orthodoxy because of religious doubts, rather, they develop doubts to rationalize their desire to give up orthodoxy. I have a strong instinctive urge to refute this idea. It seems inherently dismissive and not respectful of the legitimacy of the ideas and motivations of those of us who ‘leave’. For someone like myself, who is inherently cognitively driven, and who has spent so much time reinforcing this intellectualism in the bais medrash, it is particularly annoying.
After all, there are more than enough difficult points of belief within Judaism to have rational reasons to disbelieve. If anything, believing – which requires the acceptance of almost endless supernatural events and divine prophesies - is far less rational.
But as much as I would like to get on my soapbox and argue that this is fundamentally untrue – that we stay or leave because of our theological reasons, the fact is that I believe that it touches on one of the most basic facets of humanity and faith. I’ve seen much discussion on what ‘belief’ – a principle requirement of orthodoxy – really means. But what is often overlooked is that belief is inherently an emotional process. It is the adherence to an idea which, by definition, has no rational verification. In modern psychological literature it is “an emotion which gains long term purpose”. Beliefs are ideas which have become deep seated sentiments.
As anyone who has engaged in theological debate knows, you can’t talk someone out of their beliefs. This concept is very well understood by those who are in the business of changing the ideology of others – missionaries, kiruv workers, cult recruiters. They know that in order to change a belief, the emotional groundwork must be established.
Of course, we are rational beings as well, and we struggle to maintain a coherent intellectual ‘story’ which works with our beliefs. Perhaps the more far fetched and irrational our beliefs are, the stronger our emotional attachment must be to maintain it. The emotional attachment which we develop with orthodoxy – from our earliest childhood experiences - are incredibly strong. Those who change a fundamental belief require a strong emotional incentive to do so. Perhaps that incentive is unhappiness in their life, perhaps it is something about the way that frum society works which doesn’t work for them, perhaps it is an emotional pull from outside of the frum world. It’s possible that some of us are so strongly intellectual that the very irrationality of the frum system adds to their unhappiness. But for all of us, you must understand the emotional context in order to understand why we remained orthodox or did not.
Frankly, this mechanism is one of the things that I wish were different about our species. If our rationality is fundamentally at the mercy our emotions, how do we go forward with our intellectual exploration. How do we trust our own reasoning. How do we be believe our own thoughts. For someone who grew up with the ideals of intellectual honesty and being true to ideals and beliefs, it is unnerving to think that our cognitive process is so polluted by our emotions. I was raised with the belief that, while our intellect represents our higher calling, and should guide our actions, emotions are the voice of the baser part of our beings. Emotions are there only as a test of our ability to use our intellects to overcome them.
I think that it is only by embracing the interplay between feelings and ideas can we regain our intellectual honesty. Navigating through our reasoning with honesty and moral clarity requires an heightened respect for and awareness of our emotions. If you’ve been raised in a religious environment, it becomes almost second nature to dismiss feelings. Many of the things which we feel are not helpful to our lives – the easiest thing to do is to shut those emotions out. Some feelings don’t jibe with our moral outlook. We automatically label these emotions as being ‘wrong’, and often don’t even let our conscious mind acknowledge that they exist.
But it is only in being highly aware of our emotions – be they comfortable or uncomfortable – that we can be fully aware of our intellectual process. Doing this is what gives us choice. We don’t have to act on our emotions – life is about making those choices. But if we do not listen to what our hearts are saying to us, we will never really understand our own minds.
=================
The Jewish Freak said...
What you say about developing religious doubts to rationalize a desire to give up orthodoxy can not be taken lightly. Perhaps metaphysical ideas of G-d and religion are so abstract, that we are easily fooled by our emotions. Maybe those who give up orthodoxy are just fooling themselves. This idea takes up much of my brain much of the time. After all, it is not really orthodoxy that anyone is really after, it is truth that we pursue - no one claims to believe an orthodoxy that isn't true. So the question becomes: How can we ever trust our own thoughts?
I try to answer that question by assuming the orthodox point of view. Why am I any less biased in favor of orthodoxy which is my comfort zone, my social network, and maybe even my livlihood, not to mention my main source of ego and self-esteem, than I would be toward skepticism? A religious figure can accuse a scientist (and maybe even rightly so) of being biased against religion, but he can not escape his own criticism because he is no less biased toward religion. And if truth is the goal, which one is closer?
Human reason has been the only method that I am aware of that has produced anything that remotely resembles truth. The religious person would have to explain how his human reason informs him to have faith. In other words, how it makes "sense" to have faith, put simply, "it is rational to suspend rationality". This is clearly a difficult position, and not one that I would want to defend.
January 26, 2006 3:24 PM
dbs said...
I agree that it is a difficult proposition. Of course, it is symetrical - the same emotional forces are at play to keep you orthodox.
January 28, 2006 10:13 PM
anonymous said...
Very interesting post, and the notion that emotion is at the root of faith is of course true.
However, I don't think that being in a religious environment trains one to ignore emotions. I think that is likely a function of personality or individual family background.
January 31, 2006 12:08 PM
dbs said...
Certainly there are other factors besides religion which influence how in tune we are with our emotions. On the other hand, I think that the view of feelings being spiritually good or bad – rather than thoughts which inform us about ourselves – encourages us to dismiss our emotions as evil messages from within, rather than important information from our subconscious minds.
February 01, 2006 8:01 PM
THURSDAY, JANUARY 26, 2006
Link
It is a well traveled saying that people do not give up orthodoxy because of religious doubts, rather, they develop doubts to rationalize their desire to give up orthodoxy. I have a strong instinctive urge to refute this idea. It seems inherently dismissive and not respectful of the legitimacy of the ideas and motivations of those of us who ‘leave’. For someone like myself, who is inherently cognitively driven, and who has spent so much time reinforcing this intellectualism in the bais medrash, it is particularly annoying.
After all, there are more than enough difficult points of belief within Judaism to have rational reasons to disbelieve. If anything, believing – which requires the acceptance of almost endless supernatural events and divine prophesies - is far less rational.
But as much as I would like to get on my soapbox and argue that this is fundamentally untrue – that we stay or leave because of our theological reasons, the fact is that I believe that it touches on one of the most basic facets of humanity and faith. I’ve seen much discussion on what ‘belief’ – a principle requirement of orthodoxy – really means. But what is often overlooked is that belief is inherently an emotional process. It is the adherence to an idea which, by definition, has no rational verification. In modern psychological literature it is “an emotion which gains long term purpose”. Beliefs are ideas which have become deep seated sentiments.
As anyone who has engaged in theological debate knows, you can’t talk someone out of their beliefs. This concept is very well understood by those who are in the business of changing the ideology of others – missionaries, kiruv workers, cult recruiters. They know that in order to change a belief, the emotional groundwork must be established.
Of course, we are rational beings as well, and we struggle to maintain a coherent intellectual ‘story’ which works with our beliefs. Perhaps the more far fetched and irrational our beliefs are, the stronger our emotional attachment must be to maintain it. The emotional attachment which we develop with orthodoxy – from our earliest childhood experiences - are incredibly strong. Those who change a fundamental belief require a strong emotional incentive to do so. Perhaps that incentive is unhappiness in their life, perhaps it is something about the way that frum society works which doesn’t work for them, perhaps it is an emotional pull from outside of the frum world. It’s possible that some of us are so strongly intellectual that the very irrationality of the frum system adds to their unhappiness. But for all of us, you must understand the emotional context in order to understand why we remained orthodox or did not.
Frankly, this mechanism is one of the things that I wish were different about our species. If our rationality is fundamentally at the mercy our emotions, how do we go forward with our intellectual exploration. How do we trust our own reasoning. How do we be believe our own thoughts. For someone who grew up with the ideals of intellectual honesty and being true to ideals and beliefs, it is unnerving to think that our cognitive process is so polluted by our emotions. I was raised with the belief that, while our intellect represents our higher calling, and should guide our actions, emotions are the voice of the baser part of our beings. Emotions are there only as a test of our ability to use our intellects to overcome them.
I think that it is only by embracing the interplay between feelings and ideas can we regain our intellectual honesty. Navigating through our reasoning with honesty and moral clarity requires an heightened respect for and awareness of our emotions. If you’ve been raised in a religious environment, it becomes almost second nature to dismiss feelings. Many of the things which we feel are not helpful to our lives – the easiest thing to do is to shut those emotions out. Some feelings don’t jibe with our moral outlook. We automatically label these emotions as being ‘wrong’, and often don’t even let our conscious mind acknowledge that they exist.
But it is only in being highly aware of our emotions – be they comfortable or uncomfortable – that we can be fully aware of our intellectual process. Doing this is what gives us choice. We don’t have to act on our emotions – life is about making those choices. But if we do not listen to what our hearts are saying to us, we will never really understand our own minds.
=================
The Jewish Freak said...
What you say about developing religious doubts to rationalize a desire to give up orthodoxy can not be taken lightly. Perhaps metaphysical ideas of G-d and religion are so abstract, that we are easily fooled by our emotions. Maybe those who give up orthodoxy are just fooling themselves. This idea takes up much of my brain much of the time. After all, it is not really orthodoxy that anyone is really after, it is truth that we pursue - no one claims to believe an orthodoxy that isn't true. So the question becomes: How can we ever trust our own thoughts?
I try to answer that question by assuming the orthodox point of view. Why am I any less biased in favor of orthodoxy which is my comfort zone, my social network, and maybe even my livlihood, not to mention my main source of ego and self-esteem, than I would be toward skepticism? A religious figure can accuse a scientist (and maybe even rightly so) of being biased against religion, but he can not escape his own criticism because he is no less biased toward religion. And if truth is the goal, which one is closer?
Human reason has been the only method that I am aware of that has produced anything that remotely resembles truth. The religious person would have to explain how his human reason informs him to have faith. In other words, how it makes "sense" to have faith, put simply, "it is rational to suspend rationality". This is clearly a difficult position, and not one that I would want to defend.
January 26, 2006 3:24 PM
dbs said...
I agree that it is a difficult proposition. Of course, it is symetrical - the same emotional forces are at play to keep you orthodox.
January 28, 2006 10:13 PM
anonymous said...
Very interesting post, and the notion that emotion is at the root of faith is of course true.
However, I don't think that being in a religious environment trains one to ignore emotions. I think that is likely a function of personality or individual family background.
January 31, 2006 12:08 PM
dbs said...
Certainly there are other factors besides religion which influence how in tune we are with our emotions. On the other hand, I think that the view of feelings being spiritually good or bad – rather than thoughts which inform us about ourselves – encourages us to dismiss our emotions as evil messages from within, rather than important information from our subconscious minds.
February 01, 2006 8:01 PM
Sunday, September 25, 2011
Pegs
Originally posted on David's Harp
FRIDAY, JANUARY 20, 2006
Link
I’ve been asked many times by my orthodox friends and family why I don’t believe in Torah M’shamayim (the divine origin of the bible). Sometimes the question is a challenge, sometimes it is negative and judgmental, and sometimes it is a sincere attempt to try to understand my decisions. I always feel that I would love to have some concise ‘zinger’ to offer – the ultimate ‘taiku’ - a problem so fundamental that it would convey with absolute certainty that my rejection of orthodoxy is firmly based on irrefutable logical and textual analysis.
As anyone who has studied Talmud will know, there can never be such an answer – or such a problem. We have created a mesorah that is so rich with explanations and analysis that every problem has at least one possible solution – and probably many more than one. Pointing out any one of the many issues which I have will immediately bring a rush or possible answers.
Instead, I usually explain to them that my problems with the Torah are the same as everyone else’s problems and questions. The only difference is that, to me, the world makes much more sense if you replace the many, many complicated answers with a single, simple thesis – that the Torah has problems because it was written by men, not by God.
Here is (yet) another excerpt from something that I wrote recently:
“There are many hundreds of problems and incongruities within the Torah. When you are thinking within the Orthodox system, all of these problems become points of departure for a deeper understanding of the Torah. All of them have solutions – some more elegant and some more forced. Many answers are quite difficult to reconcile – they are all square pegs in round holes - but each in itself can be rationalized.
It is only when you are ready to peak at the questions from a different perspective that you realize that with just a simple change in the fundamental assumptions, all of those pegs become round. All of a sudden, everything makes a lot more sense.
I can’t prove that men, not God, wrote the Torah. I am skeptical about the quality of the historical evidence which existed before the common era. And, I think that alternate arguments can be offered which reconcile these problems. But these are just more and more square pegs.”
============================================================================
Tamara said...
I appreciate this perspective, because my own journey has been the inverse of yours.
I started out thinking the Torah was written by people. When I started studying Torah with a wonderful Rabbi, I couldn't reconcile my belief that it was authored by human beings with the mystery I was encountering in those pages.
The Torah remains for me that way -mysterious and divine.
January 20, 2006 11:54 AM
dbs said...
tamara,
I think that there are so many factors which affect what will and will not resonate for each person. I was raised with a very intellectually focused perspective on Torah – with a premium placed on definition and clarity. Perhaps where you’re intellect ultimately leads you is (at least partly), dependent on what your heart was seeking. I’ve spent a lot of time pondering and observing the fascinating interplay of emotional and intellectual aspects of belief (and rejection of belief), and I hope to post some of my riffs soon. (Hopefully written more elegantly than my comment here.)
Thanks for writing.
January 21, 2006 1:16 AM
Me & My Yetzer said...
Like Tamara, I also am coming from the opposite direction.
I attended a two-week outreach program while in college. I recall a transitional moment: I was listening to the Rabbi explain something; I forgot exactly what it was, but his rationale made sense, though it was foreign to my way of thinking then.
I recall hearing myself say to my mind: I don't believe him, but I have to admit that his way of thinking has its own internal logic.
I had thought Torah, or Orthodoxy, was irrational or purely belief-based: I can hear Tevyeh of Fiddler on the Roof singing: "Tradition! Tradition! Tradition!"
But, now, as the Rabbi spoke, the internal logic of the Torah perspective seemed to consistent to me; it was a self-consistent worldview with its own perspectives, even if they were not all familiar to me. I was still not committed to observance, and wouldn't be for another month or two, but this was a transitional moment.
Let me add that, to me, self-consistent is not necessarily the same as airtight. My liberal education exposed me to a lot of different ways of thinking; each had their advantages and disadvantages. None seemed air-tight to me. (The book: "Godel, Escher, Bach" played heavily on my thinking in that regard.) I didn't necessarily think the Torah perspective was airtight; I may not even think that today, but for the first time I realized it was self-consistent. That was my revelation.
And to this day I still think it is: Self-consistent, even if only from a self-contained perspective.
January 21, 2006 7:19 PM
dbs said...
me,
I can well imagine how powerful is the experience of discovering that Judaism – assumed to be based on naïve and simplistic notions – is, in fact, a system of thought with virtually unlimited depth, breadth and sophistication. I should say, if it isn’t apparent, that I am not trying to convince anyone to change their beliefs (…a “chaas v’sholom seems in order).
Part of my point, (though not my main one), is that orthodoxy is inherently impervious to inconsistency. The tools of fixing problems are too well embedded into the system. A larger point is that the system may be coherent from within but absurd from a more “objective” standpoint. (That is to say – contradictory to history, science and nature.)
More to say about this in the future, but it is really not possible to completely separate sentiment from belief. Something in your life sent you to the outreach course – that part of the epiphany was happening long before the intellectual part. And so it was for me… in reverse.
January 21, 2006 9:36 PM
The Jewish Freak said...
DBS: I found your blog thru responding to jblogs, and I am glad I found it. Your writing style is quite good, and your struggle and humanity are well represented. Mostly, I am excited to have found a kindred spirit. I too, have left orthodoxy in middle age and have experienced all that comes along with that. I have found that the orthodox community hates nothing more (and has no greater fear) than a mature individual with a very strong Jewish and secular education going "off the path". Usually people become more religious and "spiritual" as they get older, and suddenly find great meaning and comfort in Orthodox Judaism. The orthodox community really loves to nurture these people, but I just see them as searching for false security and paying for it with their ability to reason. I find though, that I am much happier since making the change, although it is certainly not for everyone. I am raising my children orthodox (or at least my version of it) because of the benefits that I have reaped from my own orthodox background, and also not to confuse them too badly. Please continue to write, as you have a very interested reader.
Regarding this particular post, one of the insights that I had that cleared up a lot of confusion in the bible for me was once I started to view certain stories as explanations after the fact rather than as a real-time narrative. This becomes quite obvious once you change your perspective.
To me and my yetzer: I agree that orthodoxy has a wonderful self-consistency that I really do appreciate, however, you must first accept some very difficult premises in order to access that wonderful self-consistency.
January 22, 2006 10:26 PM
dbs said...
freak (if I may call you that),
Its quite a feeling to read a comment which is so close to home. I have much the same perception about the reaction of the community – I’m not sure how much I should say on the blog about it, but I’ll probably get around to relating some experiences and thoughts. Also, the children issue is one of endless complexity and difficulty – on many levels. I'm looking forward to more exchanges (who knows, there may be one or two others like us out there). Thank you.
January 23, 2006 12:20 AM
Me & My Yetzer said...
Let me state that I too struggle within the self-consistent system of Torah observant Judaism.
The objectivity that you, dbs, find in history and science lost their objectivity to me as I studied them in pursuit of advanced degrees; I began to see that they, despite their claims, are ultimately self-contained system, just starting from different assumptions. (A great secular book on the subject is "Godel, Escher, Bach.")
From my perspective, then, it became choosing between different self-consistent systems, neither of which was necessarily "objectively" provable.
And, freak, everyone accepts premises; read the above book to find out why. Perhaps the most dangerous premise to accept is that one doesn't have any premises.
Nevertheless, as I said, I still very much have my struggles within this lifestyle.
January 24, 2006 5:35 PM
dbs said...
Me,
The objectivity that you, dbs, find in history and science lost their objectivity to me as I studied them in pursuit of advanced degrees; I began to see that they, despite their claims, are ultimately self-contained system, just starting from different assumptions.
I basically agree that things which we accept as truth requires some “subjective” assumptions, which is why I used quotes for “objective”. That said, I still think that the acceptance of the orthodox system requires a huge amount of ongoing suspension of disbelief. If one person believes that water does not flow from rocks, and another believes that God performed a miracle which made that happen, they both are making assumptions, but I think that the first requires less mental gymnastics to rationalize. Again, you can pick any system, I just like the one which is more consistent with the rest of my experiences in life.
January 25, 2006 4:23 PM
e-kvetcher said...
So it seems like there are two groups of people here, and each one is gravitating towards something that they were lacking, while the other group is moving away from the same thing.
Fascinating.
February 01, 2006 1:01 PM
e-kvetcher said...
The Jewish Freak said:
I am raising my children orthodox (or at least my version of it) because of the benefits that I have reaped from my own orthodox background, and also not to confuse them too badly.
I'm very curious to learn about what you mean by this. Are you saying that you have secretly left orthodoxy, but are going through the motions for the sake of the kids? Are you openly "off the derech" but tell your kids they should be orthodox nonetheless? Or are you sending your kids through the system but explicitly telling them that they do not need to believe the tenets of Orthodoxy that they are learning?
February 01, 2006 4:55 PM
FRIDAY, JANUARY 20, 2006
Link
I’ve been asked many times by my orthodox friends and family why I don’t believe in Torah M’shamayim (the divine origin of the bible). Sometimes the question is a challenge, sometimes it is negative and judgmental, and sometimes it is a sincere attempt to try to understand my decisions. I always feel that I would love to have some concise ‘zinger’ to offer – the ultimate ‘taiku’ - a problem so fundamental that it would convey with absolute certainty that my rejection of orthodoxy is firmly based on irrefutable logical and textual analysis.
As anyone who has studied Talmud will know, there can never be such an answer – or such a problem. We have created a mesorah that is so rich with explanations and analysis that every problem has at least one possible solution – and probably many more than one. Pointing out any one of the many issues which I have will immediately bring a rush or possible answers.
Instead, I usually explain to them that my problems with the Torah are the same as everyone else’s problems and questions. The only difference is that, to me, the world makes much more sense if you replace the many, many complicated answers with a single, simple thesis – that the Torah has problems because it was written by men, not by God.
Here is (yet) another excerpt from something that I wrote recently:
“There are many hundreds of problems and incongruities within the Torah. When you are thinking within the Orthodox system, all of these problems become points of departure for a deeper understanding of the Torah. All of them have solutions – some more elegant and some more forced. Many answers are quite difficult to reconcile – they are all square pegs in round holes - but each in itself can be rationalized.
It is only when you are ready to peak at the questions from a different perspective that you realize that with just a simple change in the fundamental assumptions, all of those pegs become round. All of a sudden, everything makes a lot more sense.
I can’t prove that men, not God, wrote the Torah. I am skeptical about the quality of the historical evidence which existed before the common era. And, I think that alternate arguments can be offered which reconcile these problems. But these are just more and more square pegs.”
============================================================================
Tamara said...
I appreciate this perspective, because my own journey has been the inverse of yours.
I started out thinking the Torah was written by people. When I started studying Torah with a wonderful Rabbi, I couldn't reconcile my belief that it was authored by human beings with the mystery I was encountering in those pages.
The Torah remains for me that way -mysterious and divine.
January 20, 2006 11:54 AM
dbs said...
tamara,
I think that there are so many factors which affect what will and will not resonate for each person. I was raised with a very intellectually focused perspective on Torah – with a premium placed on definition and clarity. Perhaps where you’re intellect ultimately leads you is (at least partly), dependent on what your heart was seeking. I’ve spent a lot of time pondering and observing the fascinating interplay of emotional and intellectual aspects of belief (and rejection of belief), and I hope to post some of my riffs soon. (Hopefully written more elegantly than my comment here.)
Thanks for writing.
January 21, 2006 1:16 AM
Me & My Yetzer said...
Like Tamara, I also am coming from the opposite direction.
I attended a two-week outreach program while in college. I recall a transitional moment: I was listening to the Rabbi explain something; I forgot exactly what it was, but his rationale made sense, though it was foreign to my way of thinking then.
I recall hearing myself say to my mind: I don't believe him, but I have to admit that his way of thinking has its own internal logic.
I had thought Torah, or Orthodoxy, was irrational or purely belief-based: I can hear Tevyeh of Fiddler on the Roof singing: "Tradition! Tradition! Tradition!"
But, now, as the Rabbi spoke, the internal logic of the Torah perspective seemed to consistent to me; it was a self-consistent worldview with its own perspectives, even if they were not all familiar to me. I was still not committed to observance, and wouldn't be for another month or two, but this was a transitional moment.
Let me add that, to me, self-consistent is not necessarily the same as airtight. My liberal education exposed me to a lot of different ways of thinking; each had their advantages and disadvantages. None seemed air-tight to me. (The book: "Godel, Escher, Bach" played heavily on my thinking in that regard.) I didn't necessarily think the Torah perspective was airtight; I may not even think that today, but for the first time I realized it was self-consistent. That was my revelation.
And to this day I still think it is: Self-consistent, even if only from a self-contained perspective.
January 21, 2006 7:19 PM
dbs said...
me,
I can well imagine how powerful is the experience of discovering that Judaism – assumed to be based on naïve and simplistic notions – is, in fact, a system of thought with virtually unlimited depth, breadth and sophistication. I should say, if it isn’t apparent, that I am not trying to convince anyone to change their beliefs (…a “chaas v’sholom seems in order).
Part of my point, (though not my main one), is that orthodoxy is inherently impervious to inconsistency. The tools of fixing problems are too well embedded into the system. A larger point is that the system may be coherent from within but absurd from a more “objective” standpoint. (That is to say – contradictory to history, science and nature.)
More to say about this in the future, but it is really not possible to completely separate sentiment from belief. Something in your life sent you to the outreach course – that part of the epiphany was happening long before the intellectual part. And so it was for me… in reverse.
January 21, 2006 9:36 PM
The Jewish Freak said...
DBS: I found your blog thru responding to jblogs, and I am glad I found it. Your writing style is quite good, and your struggle and humanity are well represented. Mostly, I am excited to have found a kindred spirit. I too, have left orthodoxy in middle age and have experienced all that comes along with that. I have found that the orthodox community hates nothing more (and has no greater fear) than a mature individual with a very strong Jewish and secular education going "off the path". Usually people become more religious and "spiritual" as they get older, and suddenly find great meaning and comfort in Orthodox Judaism. The orthodox community really loves to nurture these people, but I just see them as searching for false security and paying for it with their ability to reason. I find though, that I am much happier since making the change, although it is certainly not for everyone. I am raising my children orthodox (or at least my version of it) because of the benefits that I have reaped from my own orthodox background, and also not to confuse them too badly. Please continue to write, as you have a very interested reader.
Regarding this particular post, one of the insights that I had that cleared up a lot of confusion in the bible for me was once I started to view certain stories as explanations after the fact rather than as a real-time narrative. This becomes quite obvious once you change your perspective.
To me and my yetzer: I agree that orthodoxy has a wonderful self-consistency that I really do appreciate, however, you must first accept some very difficult premises in order to access that wonderful self-consistency.
January 22, 2006 10:26 PM
dbs said...
freak (if I may call you that),
Its quite a feeling to read a comment which is so close to home. I have much the same perception about the reaction of the community – I’m not sure how much I should say on the blog about it, but I’ll probably get around to relating some experiences and thoughts. Also, the children issue is one of endless complexity and difficulty – on many levels. I'm looking forward to more exchanges (who knows, there may be one or two others like us out there). Thank you.
January 23, 2006 12:20 AM
Me & My Yetzer said...
Let me state that I too struggle within the self-consistent system of Torah observant Judaism.
The objectivity that you, dbs, find in history and science lost their objectivity to me as I studied them in pursuit of advanced degrees; I began to see that they, despite their claims, are ultimately self-contained system, just starting from different assumptions. (A great secular book on the subject is "Godel, Escher, Bach.")
From my perspective, then, it became choosing between different self-consistent systems, neither of which was necessarily "objectively" provable.
And, freak, everyone accepts premises; read the above book to find out why. Perhaps the most dangerous premise to accept is that one doesn't have any premises.
Nevertheless, as I said, I still very much have my struggles within this lifestyle.
January 24, 2006 5:35 PM
dbs said...
Me,
The objectivity that you, dbs, find in history and science lost their objectivity to me as I studied them in pursuit of advanced degrees; I began to see that they, despite their claims, are ultimately self-contained system, just starting from different assumptions.
I basically agree that things which we accept as truth requires some “subjective” assumptions, which is why I used quotes for “objective”. That said, I still think that the acceptance of the orthodox system requires a huge amount of ongoing suspension of disbelief. If one person believes that water does not flow from rocks, and another believes that God performed a miracle which made that happen, they both are making assumptions, but I think that the first requires less mental gymnastics to rationalize. Again, you can pick any system, I just like the one which is more consistent with the rest of my experiences in life.
January 25, 2006 4:23 PM
e-kvetcher said...
So it seems like there are two groups of people here, and each one is gravitating towards something that they were lacking, while the other group is moving away from the same thing.
Fascinating.
February 01, 2006 1:01 PM
e-kvetcher said...
The Jewish Freak said:
I am raising my children orthodox (or at least my version of it) because of the benefits that I have reaped from my own orthodox background, and also not to confuse them too badly.
I'm very curious to learn about what you mean by this. Are you saying that you have secretly left orthodoxy, but are going through the motions for the sake of the kids? Are you openly "off the derech" but tell your kids they should be orthodox nonetheless? Or are you sending your kids through the system but explicitly telling them that they do not need to believe the tenets of Orthodoxy that they are learning?
February 01, 2006 4:55 PM
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