National Scholar Updates

David Weinberg, a writer for the Jerusalem Post, has recommended his top 25 Jewish books from 2022-2023. Rabbi Hayyim Angel's recent Psalms Companion is on the list, as are several other excellent reads.

See his article here.

https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-735237

Wrestling with the God of Revelation: Preserving Moral Necessity in the Face of Divine Text and Divine Encounter^[1]

by Jonathan Arking

The Problem with Fundamentalism

In his wonderful new book, To Be a Holy People: Jewish Tradition and Ethical Values, Rabbi Eugene Korn sets out to examine and explain the relationship between the ethical/moral values and Jewish tradition.^[2] In his chapter entitled “Moralization in Jewish Law: Divine Commands, Rabbinic Reasoning and Waging a Just War,” Rabbi Korn proposes four potential lines of reasoning in the face of a morally challenging divine command (such as perpetrating a genocide and mass slaughter of non-combatants during war).^[3] The first two options are The Kierkegaardian Argument—in which one recognizes the tension between divine command and morality but suspends their moral judgment in favor of the divine command—and the Divine Command Morality Argument—in which divine commands are asserted to be constitutive of, or at least perfectly exemplary of, true morality. As Rabbi Korn articulates, neither option has backing in traditional rabbinic tradition. Further, both fail to satisfy the biblical reader concerned with the notion of moral necessity, the prioritization of acting morally as a necessary prerequisite for any action taken. The Kierkegaardian argument simply cedes the argument and admits that if one follows it, one will act immorally. The Divine Command Morality Argument at least makes the claim that one who follows it will always act in a morally perfect way, but is implausible in the face of epistemological concerns about both any specific reading of a sacred text, and contention over which texts are sacred. There is widespread argument over how to read nearly every passage in the Bible, and according to Jewish tradition, the text itself is multivocal and cannot be confined to one “correct reading.” This implies that were one to try to act morally only on the basis of strict hermeneutical interpretation, it would be impossible to act in a perfectly moral way because one could never attain, or at least never be sure they had attained, the true “objective” reading of the text.

Further, there is intense contestation as to what scriptures are divine and could serve as the basis for this type of fundamentalism; a Jew who reads their own scripture in a fundamentalist way is nonetheless likely to condemn a member of another religion who commits violence in the name of a fundamentalist reading of their own scripture and vice versa. One may try to argue that if they could establish the truth of their revelation (e.g., this text, not those other ones, was revealed by God), this worry of epistemology could be ignored. I think this is dubious given the assumptions one would need for such a claim to hold including not only that this text and not those others were the result of revelation, but also that the revelation was given by a morally perfect God. This is of course unprovable. There is no method of distinguishing between the revelation of a morally perfect God and, say, a non-physical entity capable of transmitting information that is not perfectly moral, without actually just morally investigating the divinely revealed text. Further, the worry about correct interpretation remains, as well as concerns of perfect transmission of the revelatory message. My point here is not that any given scripture is not morally perfect, only that a claim to its sanctity does not establish that on its own, as there are many scriptures that nonetheless seem to have competing moral visions, at least at times. It seems, then, that the moral perfection of a given text could not be known to the reader a priori and could only be the case upon investigation and subjecting the text to some external criterion, namely their own moral judgment. This, however, is exactly what Divine Command Morality is trying to object to.

There is a further moral problem with the Divine Command Morality Argument in that its method seems to itself call its morality into question; to determine whether or not to massacre innocent civilians, including children, on the basis of a reading of a verse rather than based on the atrocity such an act would be relative to the people it would affect seems seriously misguided. Morality, one might think, ought to be a response to the needs and situations of those whom we affect with our actions, not simply a hermeneutical game to be figured out regardless of how that may literally destroy the lives of many. The “necessity” of moral necessity is thus non-existent in Divine Command Morality, as actions are contingent on subjective readings of texts that are themselves contested as valid sources of fundamentalist morality, instead of responses to the real lives of real people in front of us.

In Defense of the Heretical Argument

The latter two options that Rabbi Korn presents are what he terms the Heretical Argument and the Casuistic Argument. Both arguments accept at least the prima facie moral incorrectness of the divine command, but while the former concludes that the moral imperative must therefore override the divine command, the latter attempts to harmonize the command and morality by introducing extenuating factors or new features to the command. While the casuistic argument is clearly the favored method of rabbinic tradition, as Rabbi Korn details, it does not succeed in truly resolving the tension between the divine command and morality. Simply put, the casuistic approach is methodologically, and not fundamentally distinct from the heretical approach. Rabbi Korn dismisses the heretical approach outright because “no religious tradition can use this argument and retain its theological coherence or moral authority.” The idea here is that once one accepts that morality ought to override an explicit command, any reason to follow any commands at all falls away. The text becomes nothing more than something to be shunned or accepted based on the subjective human reader. But is this less true for the casuistic approach? Is the decision to read a verse against its plain meaning, or to introduce contingencies found nowhere in the text, or to read a commandment entirely out of existence (as in the case of the wayward son) not a subjective human decision to reject the text in front of oneself? Additionally, it challenges the notion of approaching sacred text with integrity; it asks us to read a text against what we see with our own eyes, and then claim that the reading we are imposing onto the text is how the text actually ought to be read! Finally, the Casuistic Argument shares a deficiency with Divine Command Morality in that it emphasizes technicality rather than humanity, making moral action rely on stretched hermeneutics rather than on the actual “moral patients” from whom moral reality arises.

I thus want to return to the heretical argument and work out some of the implications of what it would mean to adopt it, from the perspective of both hermeneutics and theology. This project stems from a desire to engage with all of the options at our disposal, even if the theological implications of doing so are challenging or beyond contemporary traditional norms. It also aims to preserve the integrity of reading sacred text as it is, even if that sometimes conflicts with how we think it ought to be. It should also be noted that in opposition to Rabbi Korn’s statement that one who adopts the heretical approach loses all moral authority, I contend that the so-called heretical approach may be the only path to preserve moral necessity—and thus any possible claim to moral authority. Even if one does opt for the casuistic approach, I believe the following analysis remains quite relevant, as the method of prioritizing one’s morality over the plain meaning of a sacred text is less relevant than its occurrence in terms of both hermeneutical and theological ramifications. Thus, for the remainder of this article we will be trying to think about the question: What does it mean to engage with a text as truly divinely inspired while also asserting that one will not act in accordance with that text if they believe it to be morally problematic?

Learning Normative Action through Imitating God

One of the primary themes of right action in our tradition is that of imitating God, the basic assumption being that if one imitates God, one will be acting correctly. This notion of imitatio dei appears a number of times throughout the Jewish tradition, as, for example, it does in Leviticus, when God proclaims, “You shall be holy, for I, your God Hashem, am holy” (Leviticus 19:2). In the rabbinic tradition, there are a few explicit statements telling the reader to either act in certain ways or have dispositions in imitation of God:

And Rabbi Ḥama, son of Rabbi Ḥanina, says: What is the meaning of that which is written: “After the Lord your God shall you walk, and Him shall you fear, and His commandments shall you keep, and unto His voice shall you hearken, and Him shall you serve, and unto Him shall you cleave” (Deuteronomy 13:5)? But is it actually possible for a person to follow the Divine Presence? But hasn’t it already been stated: “For the Lord your God is a devouring fire, a jealous God” (Deuteronomy 4:24), and one cannot approach fire.

He explains: Rather, the meaning is that one should follow the attributes of the Holy One, Blessed be He. He provides several examples. Just as He clothes the naked, as it is written: “And the Lord God made for Adam and for his wife garments of skin, and clothed them” (Genesis 3:21), so too, should you clothe the naked. He, visits the sick…so too, should you visit the sick. Just as the Holy One, Blessed be He, consoles mourners… so too, should you console mourners. Just as the Holy One, Blessed be He, buried the dead… so too, should you bury the dead.^[4] (Translation from Sefaria.org. Bold is from Sefaria and indicates literal translation, while non-bolded words are added to provide grammatical cohesiveness to the passage.)

Within this passage, we can see a number of important aspects of this rabbinic conception of imitating God. First, the very notion of “being like God” is taken as a biblical command. Secondly, it is immediately pointed out that it is impossible to truly imitate the rabbis’ conception of God. This may be for two reasons. First, this may be thought of as a literal impossibility. The God of the rabbis is a generally incorporeal, mighty to incredibly superhuman levels, the creator of the universe; God is a “devouring fire,” a being whose nature is radically unlike that of any person. But it seems that, in context, Rabbi Hama is making a moral claim: God is “a devouring fire, a jealous God.” The phrase “a jealous God” is absent in the Hebrew quotation in the Gemara. It is only implied and left for the reader to fill in on their own, as if acknowledging that God could not be imitated because God had bad moral qualities could not be stated outright. But this is exactly what Rabbi Hama seems to be insinuating when he responds to his own questions by asserting the proper moral virtues of God to be imitated, rather than any abstract characteristics of divine nature to which we ought to aspire.

            This notion of imitating God insofar as God “clothes the naked,” “visits the sick,” “comforts the mourners,” and “buries the dead,” but not God’s jealousy, is a fascinating theological statement by Rabbi Hama. Throughout the Bible we read of God’s care and love for the downtrodden, but also that “Hashem is a man of war.”^[5] The multiplicity of God’s portrayals throughout the Bible allows, and maybe even forces, the rabbis to make specific decisions as to which aspects of God are to be imitated. As Rabbi Eliezer Berkovits, an influential theologian and legal scholar within Orthodox Judaism in the twentieth century, writes, “The rabbis in the Talmud were guided by the insight: God forbid there should be anything in the application of the Tora to the actual life situation that is contrary to the principles of ethics.”^[6] The ethics of imitatio dei are thus shaped by the moral sentiments of the reader; God can no longer be invoked as an excuse to act immorally because God is only to be imitated only insofar as we, the moral reader, deem it so. In order to preserve moral action, selective reading is necessary.

The Godwrestling Model of Navigating Morality and Integrity in Reading Sacred Text

However, within this rabbinic model of imitation of God, we of course run into the problem of demystifying our sacred texts and making ourselves into the arbiters of their worth. What is the purpose of Scripture if it cannot teach us how to live, but is merely a mirror off of which we reflect our own values? And does this model not ask us to ignore real literary evidence we may find in the text and ask us to claim that the text asserts something that we think it does not? This would seem to be both epistemically and psychologically untenable. I propose that we turn back to the talmudic passage to begin to formulate an approach to the dilemma. Interestingly, Rabbi Hama does not immediately answer his initial question of how to walk in the ways of God with his selectively picked examples that focus on God caring for the downtrodden. Instead, he first raises the stakes of the question by pointing out the potentially problematic nature of God as found in the biblical text. There is no attempt to read out of existence God’s jealousy even while there is a deliberate choice to see it as non-normative.^[7] The text leaves open the question of how to theologically deal with the fact of a God (or portrayal of God) who is not worth emulating in all ways, but implies that it is a question that, while real and challenging, ought not to come in the way of acting morally. There is thus a two-tiered approach to the reading of biblical text. To preserve its authenticity, we ought to engage with it as we truly find it, reckoning with a portrayal of a jealous and violent God. But at the same time, the religious person needs to interact with it as a reader who locates their way of life in the biblical text. This requires not just that we read the Bible, but that we read a moral Bible, a Bible that preaches love and obligation and care for those who are in need. This is also consonant with a rigorous oral tradition that is not in fact committed to applying literal understandings of the Torah, but is already in the market, so to speak, of creative normative applications of divine texts. This overall process could lead to a Rawlsian-type “reflective equilibrium” in which the reader has both principles that ought to be expressed in the text, but also reads the text honestly in hope of informing and challenging those principles.^[8]

            This dual approach to scripture finds a prominent voice in the work of Judith Plaskow, the author of the first book of Jewish feminist theology, Standing Again at Sinai.^[9] As a feminist grappling with the absence of women in both the biblical and rabbinic traditions, Plaskow sees herself as both within the tradition, working to make true the conviction that Berkovits attributes to the rabbis, and as an outsider, seriously challenging the foundations and authority of the Jewish tradition:

I pronounce the Bible patriarchal; but in taking the time to explore it, I claim it as a text that matters to me. This double relation is not unthinking. It stems from my belief that the Jewish feminist must embrace with equal passion (at least) two different attitudes to Jewish sources.^[10]

One could assert that the Bible is not patriarchal by misreading it, or one could embrace patriarchy because it is asserted in the Bible. To the moral and honest reader of the Bible, neither of these views is possible. Integrity demands that we not simply read our own values back into the text and that we do our best to understand the Bible on its own terms. But this cannot, according to Plaskow, lead us to either abandon the tradition or to accept it as it is.^[11] Instead, it forces us into a space of grappling, or what Plaskow calls “Godwrestling.” Godwrestling is for Plaskow what occurs after moments of encounter with God, which “would need to be interpreted and applied, wrestled with and puzzled over, passed down and lived out before they came to us as the Torah of God.”^[12] When one sees their own encounter with the biblical text as one of encounter with God, they too then must undergo Godwrestling, struggling over how to interpret and apply, wrestle with and puzzle over, that which they have encountered. This allows for an encounter with a biblical text that does not automatically happen to align with one’s values. But it also recognizes and accepts the necessarily subjective matter of grappling with and applying the biblical texts to our lives. This model thus preserves the necessarily dual natured encounter with the biblical text, the integrity based attempt to engage with what is written, and the subjective lens through which we read the Bible as in accordance with moral principles. It does so by embracing the complexity of engaging with God, a moment that requires us to challenge ourselves and our assumptions, and God as well.

Theological Responses to the Godwrestling Approach

            However, what might it mean that encounter with God requires us to rethink our conception of God? And, further, what does it mean that God’s revelation requires subjective mediation to preserve its prompting of morally perfect action?^[13] This takes us to the brink of (if not over and into) the discussion of theodicy, and how to understand a God that seemingly acts unjustly. God’s moral imperfection is challenging both in its incarnation in God’s messages and revealed nature (as described in scripture), as well as its effects on the world as it relates to the suffering of the innocent. I see three main potential responses (although there certainly are more) to the challenge of how to understand God in light of a world and a model of reading sacred texts that denies God’s moral perfection: 1) God simply is not morally perfect. Moral mistakes arise in God’s revealed word and works because God does not have access to true morality; 2) God intentionally commands and acts in ways that call on humans to respond with protest against God. This serves as a means of moral education or test and helps improve the overall state of morality in the world. This approach could also include an appeal to moral progress and divine commands given as a concession to historical context that God wants us to overcome; 3) There is a distinction between God as an infinite, morally perfect being, and (the) God of history and revelation with whom humans interact. In the remainder of this article, I will try to present a view that makes sense of and incorporates all three responses. It is worth noting that there is no logical necessity in incorporating the different approaches, and one may find one sufficiently compelling or choose to join some together in different ways. Nonetheless, I intend for the process of incorporating these approaches to serve as a model of the type of thinking around this issue I personally find compelling. I will argue that a conception of God who has a highest order desire to be morally good but is limited in knowledge of moral perfection gives rise to human interaction with a God calling on humans to partner with God in bettering the world and God Godself. I present this view by rooting it in biblical and traditional Jewish texts. I do this not to prove its correctness within a biblical or rabbinic framework, but to convey my thoughts in a way that demonstrates their relation to the theological dialogue that has influenced me. I believe the content of the view stands on its own, but is best presented as continuous with and arising from the content it is commenting on.

Response 1: God Is Morally Limited

The question of theodicy, or justifying God, has been answered by one strain of Jewish thought by rejecting the project altogether; there is evil in the world that cannot be justified, therefore justification for God is impossible. In recent times, this has been notably presented in Elie Wisel’s The Trial of God, in which God is placed on trial for the suffering of God’s people and found guilty.^[14] Similarly, in his paper “Judging God: Learning from the Jewish Tradition,” Episcopol Priest Daniel London relates the story of Levi Yitzhak of Berditchev, who, on behalf of his people who are suffering, challenges God. London writes that through “his bold prayers of protest, Rabbi Levi Yitzhak acts as though he has the power and authority to kick God off His throne for not taking care of His people.” Thus, God is not justified at all, but condemned. According to London, “Levi Yitzhak offers no theology to reconcile the dissonance between the deified Torah and the God who fails to follow it. Instead he brings the dissonance to God in prayer and offers prayers of intercession for Israel.”^[15] Theology cannot do the work to justify God because the distance between a morally perfect God and the reality we inhabit is simply too large. Instead, it must be conceded that God is morally limited; the world God has created and the scripture God has given are reflections of God, but this says more about the moral character of God than the works, which have already been judged as deficient. This notion of God’s moral limitation can be seen in the Torah in the case of God's desire to wipe out Israel after the sin of the calf. Nonetheless, Moses confronts God and convinces God not to destroy the people (Exodus 32). Further, God is seemingly bound by the limitations on God’s knowledge within the biblical narrative, including when God “regrets” that God had created humankind upon seeing the depths of their sin (implying God had not known this would occur). Michael Carasik further writes that “the unspoken assumption that implicitly underlies this repeated focus on God's testing the heart^[16] is that when God wants to know what is in a particular human being's mind, God cannot sense it, but must deduce it.”^[17] Given God’s failure to create a moral world, it seems plausible to accept these limitations on God’s knowledge, and given the moral imperfections of God’s teaching, plausible to accept the limitations on God’s moral knowledge, especially when this lack of knowledge is reinforced by the presumably sacred text itself.

Response 2: God Desires Our Protest

            Once we have posited God as limited, though, how should we interact with God and God’s lackings? Alternatively, we may ask, could we understand what we see as moral imperfections as consistent with a morally good or perfect God? Both questions lead us to the notion of protesting God in God’s name. The first instance of protest against God’s injustice in the bible occurs in Genesis 18, when Abraham is informed that God is planning on destroying the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. Abraham responds by challenging God, “Far be it from You! Shall not the Judge of all the earth deal justly?”^[18] Clearly, Abraham is holding God up to a standard external to God. But this is occurring not just as a chance encounter, but following the Bible’s telling of God’s internal dialogue in which God relates that God “singled him out, that he may instruct his children and his posterity to keep the way of The Lord by doing what is just and right, in order that The Lord may bring about for Abraham what has been promised him.”^[19] Thus, seemingly, God is aware of the potential for injustice in God’s plan and welcomes Abraham’s challenge to God’s decision. In this model of Abraham, faith in God is in God’s goodness, not as an acceptance of what is as a manifestation thereof, but in God’s desire to be called to the good. Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks comments that “Abraham was the first person in recorded history to protest the injustice of the world in the name of God, rather than accept it in the name of God.”^[20] God is, in this model, a call to morality, a call to hold others, even God, accountable. Abraham is just the first of a long list of prophets who act as intermediaries not just from God to the people, but from the people to God. As Yochanan Muffs, in his analysis of prophets interceding with God on behalf of the people, entitled “Who Will Stand in the Breach?: A Study of Prophetic Intercession,” details,

The prophet… is also an independent advocate to the heavenly court who attempts to rescind the evil decree by means of the only instruments at his disposal, prayer and intercession. He is first the messenger of the divine court to the defendant, but his mission boomerangs back to the sender. Now, he is no longer the messenger of the court; he becomes the agent of the defendant, attempting to mitigate the severity of the decree.^[21]

To engage with God in the face of injustice is an act not of rebellion but the ultimate prophetic act of creating intimacy with God.

What is important about this approach is not just that it can be rooted back in the biblical text and thus adopted comfortably by the religious person, but that it presents a model of interaction with God that can make some sense of our challenge. In this model, what it means to interact with God has been radically transformed. The prophet, the person who is most intimately in communion with God, is not a passive recipient of the divine word, but a partner in a dialogue, engaging in reciprocal conversation to figure out the good. What it means to encounter God is to engage in Godwrestling, to bring oneself, with all one’s convictions and beliefs, into the space of the encounter. This therefore represents a nuancing of our treatment of Plaskow’s notion of Godwrestling, in which the encounter with the divine occurs for the human as an overwhelming passive experience that later gets forced into subjectivity so that it can be made sense of. Instead, here, encounter with God has a similar structure, but allows for a bringing of the subjective into the initial objective encounter; to encounter God in this way is to open oneself to being an active interlocutor with God, a partner God seeks and calls for.

In this vein is also the notion of divinely intended moral progress, or the notion that what we encounter as immoral was merely a concession to historical contingency that God would not want us to adhere to today. Slavery, for example, can be understood as something that the Torah thought ought not to be practiced, but that for historical reasons it could not abolished. Proponents of this view might then point to the reality of today in which slavery is not practiced and argue that this serves as evidence that this is what was truly intended by the divine.  Nonetheless, this view seems to give little guidance in regard to when we should invoke this notion and if it should be invoked proactively at all. Still, it presents a model of how to understand changes in practice against divine revelation as in line with what God truly wants of us.

Response 3: Protest Improves God

The third potential response to our dilemma I wish to consider is that protesting God is a means of improving God. This model appears, I believe, when we consider the conclusion of the book of Job. Throughout the book, we read of the unjust punishment of Job and Job’s argument with his interlocutors. The dialogue builds throughout, with Job calling out God Godself to be held to account for Job’s fortune. When, at the end of the book of Job, God reveals Godself from out of the whirlwind, we, the readers, expect some justification for Job’s mistreatment at the hands of God. Instead, we read as God overpowers Job by telling Job of God’s might in a thoroughly unsatisfying response; power is simply no excuse to not act well. Tellingly, after Job responds to God for a second time, acknowledging God’s might and therefore recanting, God no longer speaks to Job. It is as if God has destroyed Job’s faith in a God who cares for justice, and Job now recognizes the futility of arguing against a being who is unaccountable, and the Job-God relationship is therefore undone. Nonetheless, Job turns to God in the interest of those in need to conclude the book, praying on behalf of his interlocutors. There is thus little joy in the relationship Job has uncovered with God, but a hope, a refusal to let go of a conception of God that can help those in need. This then introduces a hopeful conclusion, one in which the reality of the dissonance between the world and God’s justice is acknowledged, but taken not as inevitable, and instead as a current reality we ought to work to repair. To continue one’s relationship with God in the face of God’s injustice is done not by recognizing that God could be better, that we could form a relationship in which it is we who hold God accountable. Even in the depths of the failure of God to justify Godself, Job turns to God because God is needed by those who are suffering, and God needs a prompting, a call of justice from God’s prophets in order to engage morally with the world.

By distinguishing between God as God wants to be and God as God is (at least when related to human action), we can conceive of this call to engage in moral improvement of a limited God as itself a Godly act. In Lurianic Kabbalah, a school of Jewish mystical thought that arises in Safed in the mid-sixteenth century,^[22] creation occurs only via tzimtzum, or contraction. Tzimtzum occurred when the infinite God, the ein sof, contracted Godself in order to “make room” for the world. However, this forced the infinite God to limit Godself in vessels, which then broke because they could not contain God’s infinitude. In this model, God as Hashem or Elohim is simply the incarnation of the truly infinite ein sof that is necessarily broken because only a confined (and therefore incomplete) God could interact with the world without overwhelming it.^[23] This then gives rise to the notion of tikkun, of fixing, which is the basis of the kabbalistic worldview, that when one acts well, one is literally repairing both the world and God. While he does not present as ontologically real kabbalistic metaphysics,^[24] Jonathan Sacks appeals to a similar notion in his book To Heal a Fractured World, when he writes, “God, by entering the human situation, enters time, and thus uncertainty and risk.”^[25] While I too am not inclined to take as literally true the kabbalistic notion of tzimtzum, the notion that God as God interacts with the world as necessarily constricted seems useful for our project. Specifically, it gives us the context in which we can talk about God having a higher form, or truer self, that we are trying to bring out when we engage in protest against the divine. When God acts unjustly, to argue with God is not just to refuse to release one’s moral commitments, but it is an act of divine tikkun, of bringing God’s actuality closer to alignment with God’s potentiality and God’s higher order will. In order to make sense of God’s limitedness and God’s moral imperfection in the context of a God who is nonetheless worth engaging with, we presume that God not only can be better, but fundamentally desires to be better and to be bettered by us, the reader of scripture and participant in the divine encounter. God is thus not fixed as a morally imperfect being, doomed to continue acting and revealing Godself in morally problematic ways, but instead can, just like ourselves, be redeemed by the power of human action.

Conclusion

In this article, I have asserted that in order to preserve the morality of one’s biblically rooted actions, one ought to subjectively read the bible through the lens of morality. Nonetheless, I maintained that one must concurrently affirm the text as they find it and acknowledge its problematic or immoral teachings. In order to make theological sense of this model of reading sacred text, I argued that one can accept God as morally limited while also desiring us to improve God through engagement with God. Thus, the act of subjectively reading normatively authoritative text ought to be understood as just such an engagement and thus an act desired by God Godself. It is an act of improving God and God’s message on earth, an act of tikkun that will bring about a better God and a better world.

While I have attempted to engage seriously with sources and scholarship, throughout the writing process it has been clear to me that this piece of writing is at least intending to follow the method that it sets out. Sources were appealed to not as authoritative but as explanatory, and I presented worldviews rather than arguments. By doing so, I hope to have given a glimpse into my own Godwrestling that comes out of my encounters with the text I take to be sacred, and thus shed light on the content of this article through its form. Whether or not I am entirely correct in my reading of scripture, or if I am in fact wrong about the nature of God, is less vital to the project than the genuine desire to make sense of the tension between moral necessity and the presumed reality and objectivity of the divine encounter.

Works Cited

Arking, Jonathan. “Halakhic Response to Meta-Halakhic Values,” Conversations issue 39, Spring 2022 pp. 76–89.

Babylonian Talmud, Tractate Sotah, 14a. Sefaria.org.

Bamidbar Rabbah 13:16.

Berkovits, Eliezer. “The Nature and Function of Jewish Law.” Not in Heaven, Shalem Press,

2010, pp. 3–70.

Carasik, Michael. “The Limits of Omniscience.” Journal of Biblical Literature 119, no. 2 (2000):

221–32.

Gutiérrez, Gustavo. On Job: God-Talk and the Suffering of the Innocent. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis

Books, 1987.

“Isaac ben Solomon Luria.” Encyclopædia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Isaac-ben-Solomon-Luria.

Korn, Eugene. To Be a Holy People: Jewish Tradition and Ethical Values. Urim Publications, 2021.

Lamm, Norman. “Amalek and the Seven Nations.”  In Faith and Doubt: Studies in Traditional

Jewish Thought. Jersey City: KTAV Pub. House, Inc., 2007.

London, Daniel DeForest. “Judging God: Learning from the Jewish Tradition of Protest against

God.” Journal of Comparative Theology. Harvard Divinity School, June 2, 2016.

“Lurianic Kabbala.” Encyclopædia Britannica. https://www.britannica.com/topic/Lurianic-Kabbala.

Magid, Shaul. From Metaphysics to Midrash: Myth, History, and the Interpretation of Scripture

in Lurianic Kabbala. Indiana University Press, 2008.

Muffs, Yochanan. “Who Will Stand in the Breach?: A Study of Prophetic Intercession.” In Love

& Joy: Law, Language and Religion in Ancient Israel, 9–48. New York, NY: Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1992.

Plaskow, Judith. Standing Again at Sinai: Judaism from a Feminist Perspective. San Francisco,

CA: Harper & Row, 1990.

Rawls, John. A Theory of Justice. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The Belknap Press of Harvard

University Press, 1971.

Sacks, Jonathan. “Covenant & Conversation: Lech Lecha: A Palace in Flames.” Rabbi Sacks,

February 9, 2022.

Sacks, Jonathan. To Heal a Fractured World: The Ethics of Responsibility. Bloomsbury, 2013.

Sobrino, Jon. Jesus the Liberator. Burns and O., 1993.

Tanakh: A New Translation of the Holy Scriptures According to the Traditional Hebrew Text.

Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1985.

Wiesel, Elie. The Trial of God. New York: Random House, 1979.

Preface

There are numerous ways in which a person can stand up for a principle. It can be through action or inaction, speech or silence, song or march, it can be overt or even an internal stand known only to the principled actor.

In our history, there is one character-type whose job is fundamentally to stand on principle, to “speak truth to power” (to use a tired and grossly misused current cliché) and to be ready to declare God’s Truth to an unwilling and resistant audience. That is the “prophet,” the Navi who is God’s agent, sent with a message that no one ever wants to hear. There is no better place to find example after example of principled stands than in the books of our Nevi’im, books that have inspired generations of people to right wrongs, to insist on justice and to refuse to back down in the face of tyranny. I give you…Amos of Tekoa.

Introduction

The 14 books of literary prophecy (Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and 11 of the “Trei Asar”[1]), in spite of their heavy emphasis on oratory, include numerous (auto)biographical narratives. While these are chiefly found in the three independent books, there are also mini narratives in a number of the smaller volumes included in Trei Asar. The nine-verse interaction between the prophet from Judean Tekoa’ and Amaziah, the high priest of the royal sanctuary at northern (Samarian) Beit-El, makes up the one such passage in Amos.

Before tackling the text, it is important to note that this interaction at Beit-El bears some significant parallels with another interaction at Beit-El. Amos’s adversarial dialogue is with a “Kohen” at the bama in Beit-El, and the king who is the focal point of Amos’s diatribe is Jeroboam ben Joash. But we have previously encountered a similar prophetic interaction. Just after Jeroboam ben Nebat establishes his two “alternate” worship sites at Dan and Beit-El to serve as a local and more convenient substitute for Jerusalem, an enigmatic visitor arrives there:

And, behold, there came a man of God out of Judah by the word of Hashem to Beit-El; and Jeroboam was standing by the altar to offer. And he cried against the altar by the word of the Lord, and said: “O altar, altar, thus says the Lord: Behold, a son shall be born to the house of David, Josiah by name; and upon you he will slaughter the priests of the high places that offer upon you, and men's bones shall they burn upon you” (I Kings 13:1–2).

Note the parallels—a “man of God” (i.e., a prophet) from Judea comes to the altar at Beit-El and prophesies destruction of the site. Jeroboam is seen as the direct target of the prophecy, and the priests of the high places (“kohanei bamot”) are explicitly identified as targets of God’s anger.

Is it possible that Amos deliberately chose Beit-El in order to reenact that earlier anonymous Judean prophet’s appearance there? Is it significant that the king in Amos’s time is the only one in the numerous dynasties that ruled Shomron to carry the pioneering king’s name? Perhaps. In our study of this confrontation, we will see even more parallels that draw these two meetings together.

The Text

Then Amaziah the priest of Beth-el sent to Jeroboam king of Israel, saying: “Amos hath conspired against thee in the midst of the house of Israel; the land is not able to bear all his words. For thus Amos saith: Jeroboam shall die by the sword, And Israel shall surely be led away captive put of his land.” Also Amaziah said unto Amos: “O thou seer, go, flee thee away into the land of Judah, and there eat bread, and prophesy there; but prophesy not again any more at Beth-el, for it is the king's sanctuary, and it is a royal house.” Then answered Amos, and said to Amaziah: “I was no prophet, neither was I a prophet's son; but I was a herdsman, and a dresser of sycamore trees; and the Lord took me from following the flock, and the Lord said unto me: Go, prophesy unto My people Israel. Now therefore hear thou the word of the Lord: Thou sayest: Prophesy not against Israel, And preach not against the house of Isaac; Therefore thus saith the Lord: Thy wife shall be a harlot in the city, And thy sons and thy daughters shall fall by the sword, And thy land shall be divided by line; And thou thyself shalt die in an unclean land, And Israel shall surely be led away captive out of his land.” (Amos 7:10–17)

Then Amazia the priest of Beth-El sent to Jeroboam king of Israel, saying: Jeroboam appointed non-Levites to act as his priests.[2]

We have no idea if the “priesthood” that Jeroboam established became dynastic, such that only the sons of his appointees could take over the position, or if it remained non-tribal. Although Jeroboam I established the sanctuaries as oriented to worship of Hashem, within a hundred years or so (Ahab’s time), those same sanctuaries may have been devoted to Ba’al worship. That is why the Rishonim here, without identifying Amazia’s tribal background, mark him as an idolatrous priest. If that is the case, then the priests would have been a whole new crop of devotees to Ba’al. Alternatively, with each change of dynasty (Jeroboam, Baasha, Omri, Yehu), there may have been a change in “religious leadership.”

Note that the end of the third vision (verse 9) and the first two verses of this narrative are the only places where Jeroboam is mentioned by name in the book.

Amos has conspired against you in the midst of the house of Israel: Amazia sees Amos as more than a troublesome prophet from the south; he perceives him as a rabble-rouser, whose rebukes and visions of doom have the potential to generate a popular rebellion against the crown.

The message here is odd, considering the content of the book until this point. Nearly all of Amos’s oratory is aimed at the aristocracy, the corrupt judiciary, and the royal house—hardly “in the midst of the House of Israel.” We must consider the possibility that Amazia sees Amos as a personal threat. Remember that Amos already warned the people not to go to Beit-El (or Gilgal or Beer-Sheva) to worship. If the leadership heeds him, the populace is likely to follow suit. That may be a threat to (at least) the livelihood of the priests at Beit-El. Perhaps the message that Amazia sent to the king, tinged with some hysteria, was intended to spur the king to action against Amos and was itself an exaggeration.

It is also possible that Amos was delivering some of these prophecies—notably, the visions in this section—in Beit-El, at the site of the royal sanctuary. Amazia’s words in the next few verses seem to support this back story. If so, celebrants and onlookers would have also heard him, and even if Amos did not intend his prophecies to speak directly to the people, they would have heard and been potentially inspired to rebel.

The word kesher, which appears approximately 20 times in the monarchic history,[3] appears only twice (with the meaning of “conspiracy”) in the words of the literary prophets.[4] In other words, although it is a somewhat regular feature of the narrative, describing the fate of dynasties, it was not often used in rhetoric.[5]

The land is not able to bear all his words: The image of the land having to “bear” words is a curious one. Radak reads “the land” as meaning “the people of the land,” and he explains that the people (who are presumably loyal to the crown) cannot bear to hear so many bad things about their own nation. Hakham, on the other hand, sees the phrase lo tukhal ha-aretz le-hakhil et kol devarav as a metaphor. His words are like bubbling wine, which, when put into a barrel, will burst the barrel. In the same way, his words are likely to generate a rebellion among the people.[6] Abravanel, without resorting to the metaphor-explanation, sees it the same way—as a warning against the potential of Amos’s words inciting rebellion against the king.

This approach presumes a significantly lowered sense of loyalty among the people. Their first response would not be to despise the “southern man of God” who threatens the king, but rather to side with him!

It is significant to note that there is a history, specifically in the north, of prophets identifying and anointing kings (such as Elisha in the case of Hazael and Jehu, and Ahija in the case of Jeroboam ben Nevat). It is not unreasonable to think that Amazia saw Amos as yet another prophet aiming to unseat Jeroboam and the house of Yehu and replace him with another king (who might be, in their eyes, a Judean vassal).

Paul points to the alliteration in this phrase—tukhal le-hakhil kol. A subliminal message of this alliterative scheme would be okhel ha-kol—that his words will lead to (or prophesy) everything in the north being devoured.[7]

For thus said Amos: This short phrase is heavy with implication. The priest uses the same familiar introductory “messenger formula” with which Amos himself had delivered the first series of oracles. Remember that this formula is used when relaying or delivering the words of a liege to a vassal. Thus, “Ko amar Balak,” “Ko amar Par’oh,” and “Ko amar Yosef.” The understated power of “Ko amar Amos” as a message to the king is clear—Amos presumes himself to be the lord over Jeroboam, his servant. That is, of course, not Amos’s position, but that is how Amazia wants to portray the Judean prophet to his king.

Secondly, and of no less significance, is the very phrase ko amar Amos. Amos would not have said ko omar (“thus say I”), but rather ko amar Hashem. This central and determinant piece of Amos’s prophecies is omitted. The conclusion that Jeroboam is intended to reach is that these are Amos’s words—not God’s! As such, corralling Amos as a rabble-rousing orator from the south is the right move—just as Jeroboam I sought to do to the anonymous Judean prophet at Beit El, two hundred years earlier (yet another parallel).

Jeroboam shall die by the sword: This paraphrased quote from Amos’s last vision is inexactly presented. Amos had reported in God’s name that the meaning of the anakh vision was

the high places of Yishak will be made desolate and the sanctuaries of Israel will be destroyed, and I will rise up against the house of Jeroboam by the sword.

In other words, the threat of the sword hung over the “house of Jeroboam”—i.e., his children. Indeed, Jeroboam’s son, Zachariah, was assassinated and killed by the sword. Amazia’s deliberate blurring of the message was intended to spur immediate and drastic action on the part of the royal house against the Tekoite interloper.

And Israel shall surely be led away captive put of his land: When we look back to Amazia’s first warning—“the land will not be able to tolerate/contain all of his words”—we observe a nearly polar divide among the commentators as to the intent of the phrase. Some, such as ibn Ezra and R. Eliezer of Beaugency, understood that the people naturally sided with their king, and they would not tolerate the threats uttered by Amos. However, we also saw the comments of others, notably Abravanel, who included the phrase as part of the threat. In other words, Amos is riling “the whole land” against the king. It is difficult to sustain this interpretation considering Amazia’s brief message, however. The first half—that Jeroboam will die by the sword—fits this read comfortably. But the second half—that Israel will surely be exiled—does not comport, prima facie, with this interpretation. For if the threat is against all of the people of the Northern Kingdom, why would this lead to a rebellion? It would more likely lead to a popular lynching of Amos!

There is a way to salvage Abravanel’s approach, and it may be contextually (and textually) appealing. If the message that Amos is broadcasting is specifically anti-Jeroboam and his intent (per Amazia’s reporting) is to provoke a popular rebellion, then the second part of the message should be understood with a bit more nuance. Instead of reading the two clauses as sequential—first the king will be killed and then Israel will be exiled—read it as conditional. To wit—Jeroboam must die by the sword or else Israel will be exiled. These two verses comprise Amazia’s excited and near-hysterical message to the court. The next few verses are the direct dialogue between “priest” and prophet.

Then Amatzia said to Amos: Are we to understand that Amos was privy to Amatzia’s message to the king? Did Amatzia state it aloud, or was it sent as a private message to the court? Nothing in the verses above provides any guidance, but this verse may be indicative. If we interpret va-yomer here as, “Also, Amatzia said,” as numerous translations render it (KJV, JPS), then this would seem to be the second overt and public statement made by Amatzia. First he turned to a messenger, in the presence of those gathered as well as Amos, and sent his urgent message to the court. He then turned to Amos to confront him directly.

On the other hand, if we interpret va-yomer here as, “then Amatzia said” (as we have it here, per NET, CSB and numerous other translations), these may very well be the first words that Amos (or anyone else present) heard.

Seer! Go, flee yourself away to the land of Judah: Amazia uses a seemingly archaic term for a prophet—hozeh, literally “seer.” We will revisit this and the implication of Amos’s response below, where he references the term navi.

And there eat bread, and prophesy there: This is a most curious send-off. What does Amazia mean here? Why would Amos be eating bread “there” or “here”? Amazia sees Amos as an unwelcome southerner, out of his element and without the right to orate in the north.[8]

But prophesy not again any more at Beit-El: This phrase gives us the impression that Amos may have been at Beit-El for a while, presenting his prophecies. Why would he choose this location? Several answers come to mind. First of all, it was a royal sanctuary (mikdash melekh), where the king may have himself have come to participate in the cult practices. It was also a popular pilgrimage site.[9] In addition, it was originally chosen by Jeroboam (in addition to its storied past beginning with Yaakov) due to its proximity to Judah. It was, for a time, the southernmost city in the Israelite kingdom. This may have made it a “safer” place for Amos to preach, given that it was also quite a distance from the capitol in Shomron.  

For it is the king's sanctuary: Is the proper translation “it is the king’s sanctuary” or “it is a royal sanctuary”? The distinction makes quite a difference. In the first read, Amatzia is telling Amos to leave because this is the “property” of Jeroboam, and the king himself is liable to return at any point. In the second read (which I admit to favoring), it raises Amos’s effrontery to an insult to the crown—coming into a royal sanctuary and preaching against the king.

The phrase mikdash melekh (which we know from a more positive context, as R. Shlomo Alkabetz integrated it into Lekha Dodi) appears only once in Tanakh. Indeed, the notion of a mikdash melekh is familiar to us, but from foreign, pagan nations, where the divinity and the royal house sit at proximate corners of a blurry divide. In a sense, Amazia’s clumsy description of the altar at Beit-El says more than Amos could, although this is not a point that Amos ever directly attacks. The establishment of Beit-El was occasioned by Jeroboam’s fear that the people’s pilgrimage to Jerusalem would lead them to revert their allegiance to Rehoboam, and Jeroboam’s kingdom (or his life) would not last long. Beit-El (and Dan) were set up to provide a “local and convenient” place to worship Hashem. Yet it wasn’t long before Jeroboam turned the “off-site” sanctuary to God into a royal sanctuary, which it remained for at least two hundred years.

And it is a royal house: The concluding phrase here seals the point made above. The sanctuary is not a guarded place, off-limits to impurity and outsiders due to its connection with the divine. It is, instead, a royal precinct and, as such, someone coming with a message of doom against the kingdom is a true trespasser.

Then Amos answered, and said to Amazia: Again, we will assume that this interaction is public and that Amos is aiming his response at the assemblage, far more than at Amazia himself.

I am not a prophet, nor am I a prophet's son: At this point, we may note that Amos’s claim is that he is not part of a professional guild of prophets, nor is he a prophet by vocation. Rather, he is…

For I am a herdsman: Amos is a rancher, who herds animals. In other words, he is not part of the scholastic or ascetic class, but rather a “regular person.”

And a dresser of sycamore trees: The word boleis is a hapax legomenon (word unique in Tanakh), but the best hypothesis as to its meaning is the puncturing of sycamore figs; evidently this practice, which is still done in Egypt today, hastens the ripening of the fruit without exposing the fruit to worm infestation. This was only done during a short part of the season therefore it was possible for Amos to be both herder as well as a “sycamore dresser.”

And the Lord took me from behind the flock: This description is evocative, in no uncertain terms, of God’s words to David.[10] The notion is that, like David, Amos was not someone who sought this office, nor did he relish the awesome responsibility that comes with it. He was tending his flock, dressing his sycamores, when God plucked him up and sent him on his mission for the benefit of the entire nation.

And Hashem said to me: Although this is a necessary cog in the oratory, it does seem to underscore that which Amazia deliberately omitted. The words that Amos is delivering are not his own; they are God’s words and a divine message, ignored at one’s own peril.

Go, prophesy unto My people Israel: This completes the picture. Amos was sent; he did not “go.” When Amazia tells him to “go and flee yourself,” he expresses an assumption that Amos chose to come and may now choose to go. This is not the case, as Amos spells out for him.

Before moving on, I’d like to address two oddities in Amazia’s words. The priest speaks directly to Amos. Even though he referred to him by name in his message to the court, here he calls him hozeh—literally “visionary” or “seer.” What does this term mean?

This question becomes either clarified or intensified when we see that he tells Amos—seemingly in a derisive manner—sham tinavei, using the popular root for “prophecy” (from which navi derives). If we assume that the two words are synonymous and interchangeable—i.e., hozeh=navi—then the phrase is straightforward, and the differentiation in terms used is intended for rhetorical variety. If, on the other hand, the two words are distinct in meaning, then our question becomes exponentially more complex. Why did the priest call him by the unusual sobriquet hozeh and then tell him to no longer tinavei? This interpretive fork widens with Amos’s answer in which he avers that he is neither a navi nor a ben-navi, avoiding the term hozeh altogether. This does not augur well for those who would read hozeh as equivalent in meaning to navi. For purposes of their dispute, it would have been more impactful for Amos to deny his prophetic vocation by responding to the word hozeh and say, lo hozeh anokhi ve-lo ben hozeh. That is, of course, not the case.

A brief but vital tangent is in place here. We have only one character in Tanakh who is identified as a hozeh. That is Gad ha-Hozeh, who operates as David’s “court prophet” as early as his time on the run from Saul[11] and is most well-known for his role in the census punishment.[12] It is helpful to note that when he is first referenced in that story, the text uses seemingly redundant terms: “…and the word of Hashem was given to Gad the prophet (ha-navi), the seer (hozeh) of David, saying.”

Note that the term navi remains independent, but the hozeh belongs to David—hozeh David. Gad is also noted as one of the three authors of the chronicles of David’s life:

Now the acts of David the king, first and last, behold, they are written in the words of Shemuel the seer (ro’eh), and in the words of Natan the prophet (navi), and in the words of Gad the seer (hozeh).[13]

Other than the references to Gad, hozeh as a generic title is used disparagingly. When Ezekiel describes the false prophets,[14] he consistently returns to the word hozim and juxtaposes them with kosmim (wizards) several times. Indeed, the most famous kosem in Tanakh (Bilam) refers to himself as one who mahazeh Shadai yehezeh (“sees the visions of Shadai”)—but never calls himself a navi.

The evidence here points to an essential difference between a hozeh and a navi. The hozeh is a court prophet, who works in the employ of the king and serves as his royal oracle. Gad is first introduced this way; his first “visionary act” is to direct David where to move in his wanderings, and his most famous prophetic task is to lead David in response to God’s anger over the ill-conceived census and to identify the location of the altar. The court hozim referenced by Ezekiel would present prognostications favorable to the king. This is not to say that the members of such a group are never called nevi’im,[15] but overall the terms have an underlying difference.

Whereas a hozeh works for the king, the navi works for God; he brings God’s word to the court, the leaders, and the people. (Some have suggested that the root of navi is havei, bringer, i.e., of the Word.)

All of which means that Amazia assumes that Amos works in the employ of the Judean king. He has been sent to Beit-El, goes the thinking, in order to stir up the local populace against their king and to potentially restore sovereignty of the north to the House of David.

Regarding Amazia’s other odd phrase—“eat bread there,” this seems to point to the crucial difference highlighted above. Is the prophet in the hire of the court—does he “eat bread at the king’s table”? Or is he an independent person, carrying the unpolluted word of God?[16]

When Amos responds that he is not a navi, it is clear that he means that this vocation is not one he chose for himself. Ben-navi is a different story. We meet the benei ha-nevi’im in several contexts in Tanakh, chiefly in the company of Shemuel[17] and in the Elijah-Elisha circles.[18] They are a guild of students who, at least in Elisha’s times, had adopted a life of penury in their quest to “study” prophecy. It appears that they had guided meditation-type experiences in which they became more sensitized to receiving prophetic inspiration. Amos is claiming that he not only is not a navi by vocation, but he was never in the navi-school; he never studied for it.

He is, rather, a “regular” person, fully occupied by his chosen vocations. Having a mission to speak to God’s people was never his choice.

He is not a professional navi who “belongs” to a court; he represents one thing and one thing only—God’s word to God’s people. He is not about to return to Judea and eat bread there, for although he comes from there, he is not supported there. He is not in the employ of the southern king. It is possible that Amazia was not even aware of any other type of prophet, and Amos’s words bring home the point of the type of agent that he truly is.

And Hashem took me from behind the flock and the Lord said to me: Go, prophesy unto My people Israel: With this short phrase, Amos makes it clear that he was “plucked” from a hard-working but serene and pastoral life and thrown directly into the crucible of conflict with kings, priests, and judges.

Now therefore hear the word of the Lord: The causal ve-ata appears over 250 times in Tanakh, with 55 appearances in the literary prophetic canon, but it only appears this one time in Amos. The meaning—“and now”—is always presented as the back half of a causal relationship and is usually found in the middle of a passage.[19] In other words, “such-and-such has happened” or “God has done such-and-such for you,” ve-ata here is the appropriate response.

Amos’s use of ve-ata here is a bit curious. We would expect it to follow a rebuke or detailing of the crimes of the kingdom (or judiciary or aristocracy). Instead, it follows Amos’s autobiographic sketch of his call to divine agency.

Paul understands that ve-ata indicates a transition. Amos has concluded justifying his agency and now shifts (ve-ata) to the pronouncement. Hakham, on the other hand, interprets the use of ve-ata as causal: “Now that I’ve been tapped as a prophet, I have prophecy regarding you, Amazia…” This seems to be the most likely meaning of ve-ata, as it fits the usual usage in Tanakh.

What is unusual about this opening clause is that Amos punctuates his prophecy with the words “hear the word of Hashem”—but then, before actually stating the prophecy of impending doom, he recalls Amazia’s call for Amos to cease prophesizing to Israel. We would have expected the line shema devar Hashem to follow his repeat of Amazia’s attempt to throw him out, as follows:

Ve-ata ata omer lo tinavei al Israel, ve-lo tatif al beit Yishak

Lakhen ko amar…

In other words, the clause shema devar Hashem appears to be superfluous and somewhat clumsy.

We apparently must conclude that the line ata omer…Yishak is part of the words of Hashem. In other words, Amos is not speaking on his own behalf when he rebuffs Amazia’s attempt to have him silenced.

Ve-ata—and now, here is the prophecy that God has sent me to deliver: “You tell me (or Me) not to deliver prophecy against Israel and not to rebuke the house of Yishak. Therefore, this is what Hashem says…”

Amos’s paraphrase of Amazia’s words are not his own personal response; they are prophetic and part of God’s response to the attempt to silence God’s words at Beit-El.

You say: Prophesy not against Israel, and do not preach against the house of Yishak: Note that Amos uses tinavei in parallel with tatif.  The root natof means “drip,” as it is used in most of its infrequent appearances in Tanakh (there are 18 in total). For instance, in the opening lines of Devora’s song, poetically describing the cosmological reaction to God’s appearance at Sinai.[20]

This original meaning is then borrowed to describe, metaphorically, prophetic words of rebuke, which “drop down” from heaven.[21]This root is used with this meaning in Micah[22] and Job.[23]

The only other time that Amos uses the root natof is at the restoration prophecy of consolation at the epilogue of the book. There it takes the original meaning of “dropping” and inheres great blessing and grace. Why does Amos, whose prophecies are filled with rebuke, choose to use this word so sparingly and only here?

Keep in mind that Amos is standing at Beit-El, looking, as it were, “up” to the priest who is officiating at the altar. The difference between their perspectives on the prophet’s words could not be more diametric, as outlined above. The application of natof to prophecy implies a directional orientation—the words are coming down like dew (if comforting) or like harsh rain or hail (if threatening). It is specifically here, where Amos’s role and agency is directly challenged, that he stresses that his words are coming “down,” i.e., from above.

The alignment of hinavei with “Israel” and tatif with “Beit Yishak” is deliberate and elegant. The classic and familiar word navi is associated with Israel, beginning from the promise of prophetic continuation of Moshe’s leadership.[24] On the other hand, the “put-down” implied by tatif specifically targets “Beit Yishak.” The one other mention of “Yishak” in Amos’s prophecies, delivered just before Amazia’s angry reaction, made mention of bamot Yishak—the “high places” of Yishak.[25] As we discussed in analyzing this uncommon spelling in the prophecy of the anakh, this was a deliberate play on the name Yishak, turning it from a name of divine favor and joy to a name of licentiousness and frivolity. For Amos’s words to “drop down” on the “high places,” it would have to be a word that emanates from on high—exactly the point of Amos’s response to Amazia throughout.

Therefore thus says Hashem: Amos is already delivering God’s words. Why add this introductory phrase?

One possible explanation is that Amos’s words are made up of two segments. The first one, introduced with ve-ata shema devar Hashem, is God’s response to Amazia’s attempts to silence God’s prophet. The second is the prophecy that had already been given to Amos and for which he was sent to Beit-El in the first place.

This is a bit difficult, however. Amos reported three visions and, in the case of two, his own attempts at intercession. These presentations were presumably made at Beit-El, before being stopped by the priest. He continues with a fourth vision and it is commonly assumed that this takes place at the same setting of the first three—at Beit-El. In other words, the fourth vision was the final intended prophecy for Beit-El—not the harsh five-fold curse here.

Holding onto the notion that Amos’s words are to be understood as segmented into two, we might propose that they are both divine responses to Amazia. The first is a strong-arm rebuff of Amazia’s attempts to silence God’s prophet. The second is the concomitant punishment that will now befall Amazia and, presumably, his sovereign due to their attempts to silence Amos.[26]

In what may be an ironic twist, it is possible that this harsh pronouncement was originally intended for the king only. This is implied in the denouement of the curse—that Israel will be exiled. Perhaps since the priest tried to prevent the prophet from announcing God’s words to the king, these words now also apply to his minion at Beit-El.

As pointed out above, this curse has five prongs to it. This is a rhetorical pattern that Amos has used several times. There are five instances of punishment listed in 4:6–11, each of which concludes with “and still you have not returned to Me.” There is also the list of five cosmic wonders in chapter 4:13, as well as the curse of Amazia and/or Jeroboam in our verse.

Your wife will act the harlot in the city: R. Eliezer of Beaugency understands that this means that his (whose? Amazia’s? Jeroboam’s?) wife will voluntarily go out into the city and commit harlotry/adultery. The excess here is that, as he points out, a person violating a marital bond will typically do so discreetly, whereas, to heighten the shame, she will do so publicly.

Paul suggests that this is directed exclusively at Amatzia and that it is his wife who will act the harlot, heightening the shame (as it will be public knowledge), as the real Kohanim were banned from marrying a zona.[27]

Both of these commentators, one medieval and the other modern, assume that the act of tizneh is voluntary and brazen. This does not, however, fit the context. The rest of the curse is about an enemy conquering the land, killing their children, dividing up the land, and exiling the people.

I believe that the wife in question (again, whose wife? Perhaps everyone’s?) will be so desperate for food that she will turn to whoring. She will do so in the city, publicly, as she will be so far gone in her tragic circumstances that she will just focus on finding sustenance for herself and her family.[28]

This interpretation also fits the form of the verse. This is not a simple curse of five horrible things. It is a sequence, concluding (as these sequences often do) with exile. First, there will be such dire hunger that women (including wives of previously notable people) will offer their sexual favors for food. This suggests a siege—something that the people in Samaria were all too familiar with from their own history.[29] This is followed by an incursion in which the young people (fighters?) will be slaughtered, after which the land of the vanquished will be divided up by the victors. This progresses to the exile of the leaders, who have seen their own wives, children, and land taken from them. Now they will be led away from Israel to die “on impure land.” The curse concludes with and a complete exile of the people.

And your sons and your daughters will fall by the sword: Admittedly, the mention of daughters here seems to belie the proposal above that these are soldiers. There are two possibilities here. It is possible that the enemy referenced here is excessively brutal (and operating against their own long-range interests to boot), and they massacre everyone. But if that is the case, then why stop at the children? Why exile the leaders instead of killing them? We would expect the leaders to be killed first.

The other possibility—which is, I believe, more likely here—is that even in biblical times, young women would join young men at war when every person was needed. This is evidenced—again in Yoel—when he describes, yeitzei chatan mei-chedro ve-kalla mi-chuppata, “let the bridegroom go out from his room and the bride from her wedding canopy.”[30] Even though contextually this seems to be about joining the community in prayer during times of plague, Hazal read it as a call to conscription.[31]

And your land will be divided by the surveyor’s rope: The image of the conquering enemy dividing the spoils of the vanquished is fairly common in Tanakh.[32]

And you yourself will die in an impure land:  Is this “impure land” implying that all lands outside of Eretz Israel are impure? Or does it reflect specifically on dying in the land of the enemy? Prima facie, we would assume the former.[33] Yet, from the perspective of Israelite sovereignty and a recognition that conquest and exile represent an essential breach in the covenant, one might argue that it is specifically dying in the captor’s land as an eternal exile that constitutes the impurity.

And Israel will surely be led away captive out of his land: This is where all biblical downward spirals end—in Leviticus 26, Deuteronomy 28, and throughout prophetic literature. The end of the relationship that the Torah confirms, and that Jewish history consistently reaffirms is shattered with exile.

Afterword

We have explored one of numerous interactions between prophet and politician, the one representing the eternal voice of God and the other—the established aristocracy’s mewling for the status quo. Generations of students of the Tanakh, from all walks and across cultural borders, have drawn inspiration from the prophetic oratory of Amos and his colleagues; yet the words deserve—nay, they demand—much more attention than use as convenient slogans. If we are to take Amos seriously, we ought to take every word seriously and constantly deepen our connection with the text to discern ever greater depths to the eternal messages his words convey.

Notes

Is it appropriate for just anyone to get drunk on Purim?

The Talmud (Megillah 7b) quotes Rava’s opinion that one must become drunk on Purim so as to be unable to tell the difference between “cursed be Haman” and “blessed be Mordecai.” But the same passage goes on to report that Rabba and Rav Zeira became so drunk on Purim that Rabba slaughtered Rav Zeira with a knife. The latter was revived only by a miracle. When Rabba invited Rav Zeira to a Purim celebration the following year, Rav Zeira wisely declined.

Some people read this passage but stop right after Rava’s opinion that one must become drunk on Purim. Others correctly read the entire passage and recognize that the anecdote is a blatant refutation of Rava. The Talmud’s lesson is: don’t get drunk; terrible things can happen if you become intoxicated.

Drunkenness is a shameful state. Maimonides (Hilkhot De’ot 5:3) states: “One who becomes intoxicated is a sinner and is despicable, and loses his wisdom. If he [a wise person] becomes drunk in the presence of common folk, he has thereby desecrated the Name.” In his section on the Laws of Holiday Rest (6:20), Maimonides rules: “When one eats, drinks and celebrates on a festival, he should not allow himself to become overly drawn to drinking wine, amusement and silliness…for drunkenness and excessive amusement and silliness are not rejoicing; they are frivolity and foolishness.”

Not only does drunkenness impair one’s judgment, it demeans a person in the eyes of others and in the eyes of God. Drunkenness is an affront to one’s own dignity and an affront to the ideals of Torah.

Is Torah-true Judaism inherently aligned with conservative politics, liberal politics, a combination, or neither -- or is this the wrong way to think about the Torah? 

Torah-true Judaism is inherently aligned with policies that foster love of God, respect for fellow human beings, and the wellbeing of society as a whole. We strive for a world of honesty, justice, peace, a world in which the ideals of our prophets can be realized.

Rabbi Benzion Uziel (1880-1953), late Sephardic Chief Rabbi of Israel, wrote of our responsibility for yishuvo shel olam, the proper functioning of a moral society. Judaism demands that its adherents live ethical and upright lives. Religious Jews must feel troubled by any injustice in society and must strive to defend and protect the oppressed. Striving to create a harmonious society is not merely a reflection of social idealism; it is a religious mandate.

Sometimes Torah values are more aligned with conservative politics, and sometimes they are more aligned with liberal politics. Our real concern isn’t with political labels, but with the over-arching values that conduce to a more righteous society.

Although our concerns need to relate to society in general, we can’t ignore issues that specifically impinge on Jewish life and on the State of Israel. If conservatives or liberals promote policies that are detrimental to our physical and spiritual welfare, we obviously must oppose them. If they advance bills that weaken or endanger Israel, we have the right and responsibility to object. Our universal commitment to society does not negate our particular commitment to our own wellbeing.

In spite of the many problems Torah-true Jews face, we are optimists.  We believe, with the prophet Amos (8:11), that righteousness will prevail: “Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord God, when I will send a famine in the land; not a famine for food nor a thirst for water, but for hearing the words of the Lord.” Amen, Kein Yehi Ratson!!

Is it proper to eat kosher l'Pesach rolls, pasta, cakes, pizza and "bread" on Pesach?

It’s best to leave it up to people to decide for themselves what they do or don’t want to eat on Pessah, as long as all the ingredients are kasher for Pessah. For those who want to add stringencies to the already stringent rules of Pessah, that’s their business. But no one should stand in judgment of others who choose not to add unnecessary stringencies. We should each worry about what’s on our own plates, not on what’s on the plates of others.

Moadim leSimha.

Is it proper to listen to a cappella music during Sefiras Ha'Omer?

The real question is: why would it not be proper to listen to such music during the Sefirah period? Although the Talmud (Yevamot 62b) reports a tradition that 24,000 students of Rabbi Akiva died between Pessah and Lag L’Omer, no formal mourning prohibitions are indicated for this period. Sefirah mourning practices are first reported in a Gaonic collection, Sha’arei Teshuva 278. The Shulhan Arukh (O.H. 493: 1-2) refers to the customs of restricting weddings and haircuts, but mentions no prohibition relating to music.

It seems that restrictions relating to music only developed in the Middle Ages, and not consistently throughout the Jewish world. In recent centuries, various stringencies have been added including the limitation of dancing, music, and even recorded music. Some now also wish to prohibit a cappella music. These prohibitions do not go back to the Talmud, Rambam or Shulhan Arukh. If people wish to adopt these stringencies, or if they are part of communities that consider these stringencies as obligatory minhagim, then that is their right.

But there is no fundamental halakhic prohibition to listening to music, let alone a cappella music, unless one has adopted this stringency as a minhag; or unless one follows posekim who rule stringently on this.

Angel for Shabbat, Parashat Bemidbar

by Rabbi Marc D. Angel

“And the Lord spoke unto Moses in the wilderness of Sinai, in the tent of meeting, on the first day of the second month, in the second year after they came out of the land of Egypt…” (Bemidbar 1:1).

The Torah refers often to the “tent of meeting” (ohel mo’ed) as the place where God communicates with Moses. But where exactly was this tent located?

It seems that the ohel mo’ed was another name for the mishkan—the sanctuary that was constructed in the center of the Israelite encampments while in the wilderness. The Torah goes to great length describing the exact measurements and materials in the construction of the mishkan. It specifies the clothing that the cohanim must wear, and the details of what kind of offerings are to be sacrificed. The ohel mo’ed/mishkan was the physical and spiritual center of the Israelites.

But Shemot 33:7, in a scene prior to the construction of the mishkan, informs us that Moses took the tent and pitched it outside the camp, “far off from the camp; and he called it the tent of meeting, that was outside the camp.”

Commentators and scholars offer various suggestions attempting to understand these two frameworks for the ohel mo’ed—one at the center of the camp and one outside the camp.  Perhaps the Torah is teaching us something essential about the proper functioning of religious life…and of civilization in general.

The ohel mo’ed at the center of the camp represents orderliness, organizational integrity, ritual propriety. All the tribes of Israel were arranged around the ohel mo’ed. This reminded the Israelites that their physical and spiritual core was God-centered. The ohel mo’ed symbolized a structured pattern of religious and communal life.

The ohel mo’ed outside the camp was a counter-force. If the tent at the center of the camp represented orderliness and organization, the tent outside the camp represented an unpredictable source of divine truth. It was a challenge and corrective to the central tent. Yes, religion and civilization require a structured central framework…but they also need an outside voice that doesn’t allow them to become complacent. Orderliness and ritual—while vital to society’s wellbeing—cannot be allowed to become stultified. An outside prophetic voice must constantly inject new insights and new approaches; it must inspire the central tent to stay alive and receptive to the needs of the people. Spiritual friction—while not always welcome or appreciated—is vital to the overall wellbeing of society.

In his novel, The Lost World, Michael Crichton offers a wise observation. “Complex systems tend to locate themselves at a place we call ‘the edge of chaos.’ We imagine the edge of chaos as a place where there is enough innovation to keep a living system vibrant, and enough stability to keep it from collapsing into anarchy….Too much change is as destructive as too little. Only at the edge of chaos can complex systems flourish.”

The two tents of meeting were, in a sense, keeping the community at the “edge of chaos,” a spiritual condition that required balancing stability and innovation, orderliness and spontaneity. “Organized religion” provides vital structure. But the voice from outside the camp prods innovation, creativity, re-evaluation. It challenges stagnation.

We need a strong and stable spiritual center. And we also need prophetic voices from outside the camp. The “edge of chaos” keeps religion alive and awake. It is challenging to stay on balance…but very dangerous to slip off the edge into chaos.

In her landmark book, The Feminine Mystique, Betty Friedan asserted that “American women no longer know who they are. They are sorely in need of a new image to help them find their identity.” Originally published in 1963, her book became a rallying cry for the feminist movement. Friedan lamented the fact that women were expected (and expected themselves) to model themselves after the stereotypical image of mother and home-maker; that their self-image was vastly influenced by images of women in glossy magazines and the movies.

Friedan argued that woman needed to become equal partners in society—socially, politically and economically. “There is only one way for women to reach full human potential—by participating in the mainstream of society, by exercising their own voice in all the decisions shaping that society. For women to have full identity and freedom, they must have economic independence….Equality and human dignity are not possible for women if they are not able to earn.”

The Feminine Mystique played an important role in triggering a re-evaluation of the role of women in society. The feminist movement has achieved monumental changes since 1963. When the book was reprinted in the 1990s, Friedan wrote an epilogue in which she rejoiced over past progress, and foresaw an era of true equality. “We may now begin to glimpse the new human possibilities when women and men are finally free to be themselves, know each other for who they really are, and define the terms and measures of success, failure, joy, triumph, power, and the common good, together” (from her epilogue, written April 1997).

Friedan’s hopes are reminiscent of Martin Buber’s philosophy of “I and Thou.” Ideally, people should relate to each other as full, dignified human beings. Relationships between an I and a Thou are characterized by respect, sympathy, sensitivity. When relationships operate on an I-It level, the “It” is reduced to an object, someone whose full humanity is not encountered.

When it comes to relationships between men and women, things can become complicated. Regardless of the ideals of human equality and mutual respect, we also have to deal with the reality of sexuality. Human beings are not pure spiritual beings; physical appearance and sexual drives must be taken into account.

Some communities/societies attempt to curtail male/female relationships so as to avoid sexual improprieties and abuses. The most extreme example of this is in Muslim societies where women are expected to stay out of the public domain to the extent possible, and only to appear in public while totally covered from head to toe, including the face (except for the eyes). Less extreme examples can be found in other communities—including the so-called ultra-Orthodox Jewish community—where women are restricted to wearing clothing deemed to be modest by their rabbinic leaders and are limited in their social interactions with men. The goal is not to foster equal and dignified relationships between men and women, but to keep the genders as separated as possible for fear of falling into temptation and sin.

On the other extreme are societies that foster sexual promiscuity, where women and men interact according to their own feelings rather than by norms of religious modesty. While such societies ostensibly foster equality between men and women, the ubiquitous sexual component can tend to foster relationships of the I-It mode, rather than the I-Thou ideal. Since the bars of religious or cultural morality have been dropped, men and women may see each other as potential objects of sexual pleasure rather than as dignified human beings.

Betty Friedan believed that our society was beginning “to glimpse the new human possibilities when women and men are finally free to be themselves, know each other for who they really are.”  But is this really so? With all the permissiveness and freedom in our society, have relationships between men and women actually become I-Thou?

Although it is argued (correctly) that women should be viewed as human beings rather than as objects, in fact much of our popular culture promotes women as objects of sexual attraction. Female models, movie stars, and television personalities often are dressed in highly provocative clothing. Even women reporters on local television news programs wear sleeveless, or low-neckline, or overly tight clothing. Whether they are required to dress in this fashion, or whether they do so on their own, the fact is that women present themselves in immodest dress (or undress!).  The goal—stated or unstated—seems to be: I need to be sexually attractive.

Popular women’s fashions promote the view of women as objects. Women’s clothing is often too revealing or too tightly fit to be classified as modest. Why do women wear such clothes? Why do designers keep designing such clothes, unless there is a market for them?

For men and women to operate on an I-Thou basis rather than an I-It basis, we need to avoid the extremes of prudery and promiscuity. We need to focus on the nature of modesty--tseniut.

Tseniut is not simply a system of prevention from sin. Rather, it encompasses a positive philosophy relating to the nature of human beings. While acknowledging the power of human sexuality, tseniut teaches that human beings are more than mere sexual beings.  By insisting on modest dress and behavior, tseniut promotes a framework for human relationships that transcends the physical/sexual aspects.

Non-tseniut behavior signals a person’s desire to be seen as an object of sexual attraction. When people dress provocatively, what they are communicating is: notice me, I crave your attention, please don’t ignore me. Underlying this non-vocalized plea is the feeling that one will not be noticed unless prepared to become an object of attention or unless one conforms to the prevailing fashions, even if those fashions violate one’s sense of decency and propriety.

It is normal and natural for people to want to appear pleasing to others. That is why they spend so much time and money on clothing and grooming. Dressing nicely, neatly, and modestly is a sign of self-respect as well as respect for others. If, though, one specifically dresses or behaves in a manner that is aimed at arousing sexual attention, this crosses into the non-tseniut mode. One has chosen to be an It rather than a Thou.

Human beings all have feelings of insecurity; we need to be needed, appreciated, and loved. Although these tendencies are often exacerbated in teenagers, they continue to exist throughout adult life. Exhibitionism is a short-cut to gaining the attention—and hopefully the affection—of others. Yet, underneath the veneer of showiness is a layer of essential insecurity, loneliness, and dissatisfaction with self. Exhibitionism may gain the attention of others, but it does not gain their respect and love.

Tseniut should be understood as a framework for maintaining our human dignity. It teaches us to treat ourselves and others as valuable human beings, not as objects. Non-tseniut behavior and dress serve to diminish our full humanity, reducing us to the level of objects of sexuality. Tseniut is a manifestation of holiness. Exhibitionism is a manifestation of crudeness and feelings of insecurity.

Genuine modesty avoids the extremes of prudery or promiscuity. It fosters self-respect and respect for others. In a real sense, tseniut is not “old fashioned;” it is the avant garde of those who wish to live as dignified human beings.

(For a fuller discussion of tseniut, please see my article, “A Modesty Proposal: Rethinking Tseniut,” on the website of jewishideas.org   The direct link is: https://www.jewishideas.org/article/modesty-proposal-rethinking-tseniut)

What does it mean to say that the State of Israel is the “State of the Jews” or, more accurately, the “Jewish State”? The State’s Declaration of Independence defines it as a “Jewish State.” It goes on to promise that “it will be based on freedom, justice and peace as envisaged by the prophets of Israel,” “will ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race, or sex,” and “guarantee freedom of religion, conscience, language, education, and culture.” I read these words as meaning: Since our State is a Jewish state based on the vision of our Prophets, it guarantees liberty and equality to all its citizens. In other words, the Jewishness of the State guarantees its liberal democratic commitment. Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Amos mean democracy.

Israel is the State of all its citizens, Jews and non-Jews. It is thus awkward to speak of it as “the State of the Jews,” for this phrase may be misconstrued to mean that a Jew in Brooklyn or Antwerp is more of an Israeli than a Muslim in Kafr Qara, a Christian in Nazareth, or a Druze in Daliyat al-Karmel. The phrase could be justified by saying that it means only that all Jews should consider Israel to be their cultural center, as it is written “for out of Zion shall go forth the Law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem” (Isaiah 2:3). Nonetheless, it is less confusing to speak of a “Jewish State,” as did the Declaration of Independence. Moreover, the State is constitutionally defined as “Jewish” in its Basic Laws (Human Dignity and Liberty, 1992; Freedom of Occupation, 1994; cf. The Knesset, amendment, 1985). But in what sense is it Jewish?

In terms of numbers, Israel today has almost 8 million citizens, roughly three-quarters of whom are Jewish. If one includes the Arabs living in Judea, Samaria, the Golan Heights, and the Gaza Strip, then Israel has almost 12 million subjects, but only about half are Jewish. It goes without saying that if Israel loses its Jewish majority, it will be difficult for it to remain a Jewish State in any meaningful sense. This demographic consideration will have to be taken into account when Israel negotiates its permanent borders with its neighbors. However, I am not concerned here with demography, but with content. In what respects should the State privilege or advance Jewish content?

Certainly the State’s laws must not discriminate in any way between Jew and non-Jew, since the Declaration of Independence guarantees “complete equality” to all citizens. The Law of Return (1950) might be considered an exception to this. However, it does not discriminate between citizens but between applicants for citizenship. Moreover, the Declaration explicitly promises that the State is “open to Jewish immigration.” That promise had at the time of Israel’s birth a vital significance for stateless Holocaust refugees who could then enter the Land as free and enfranchised citizens. Had the State been proclaimed only one decade earlier, who knows how many Jews could have been rescued from the Topheth?

It cannot be overemphasized that the principle of the equality of citizens in the State of Israel is not a grudging compromise that Judaism has made with modern secular ideologies, but it derives from within Judaism—from the vision of its Prophets. Indeed, in the years before the establishment of the State, leading rabbinic authorities, including the illustrious Chief Rabbis Ben-Zion Meir Hai Uziel and Isaac Halevi Herzog, planned for the future Jewish State to be governed in accordance with Jewish law, and ruled that the halakha ensures the equality of all citizens (see, for example, Rabbi Uziel, Mishpetei Uziel, Hoshen Mishpat, 1940, no. 17; Rabbi Herzog, “Rights of Minorities according to Halakhah,” Tehumin 2 [1981], pp. 169–179).

Unfortunately, the principle of equality has not always been carefully guarded by Israel's Knesset and Supreme Court, especially in the past few years. One example of an infringement upon the principle of equality is the Knesset’s legislation of Hatikvah as the national anthem of Israel in 2004. This stirring poem, written by Naphtali Herz Imber in 1877 (with later revisions by him and others) and put to music by Samuel Cohen in 1888, has been the beloved anthem of the Zionist movement since its early days. It speaks of the age-old yearning of the "soul of the Jew" (nefesh Yehudi) for Zion, and proclaims the Jewish people's desire to be a "free nation in our Land" (`am hofshi beArtsenu). As the anthem of the Zionist movement, it was a superb choice. However, it is not appropriate as the national anthem of the State of Israel, since non-Jewish citizens lack the "soul of the Jew." Even though Hatikvah had always functioned as the Israeli national anthem de facto, its status was not made official until 2004. There had been serious objections to it because of its exclusionary nature and also for other reasons (for example, it’s too secular, too Ashkenazi, and simply anachronistic in speaking of “the hope” of a stateless people). Many alternatives have been suggested to replace it as Israel’s national anthem—including biblical texts, medieval poems by Rabbi Judah Halevi and others, and modern poems by Bialik, Tchernichovsky, Naomi Shemer, and others. It has also been suggested that the melody of Hatikvah be retained but new words substituted. Hatikvah will always be the cherished anthem of the Zionist movement, but the State of Israel deserves an anthem that can be sung with equal commitment and passion by all its citizens.

To be sure, the Declaration of Independence’s guarantee of “freedom of religion, conscience, language, education, and culture” applies not only to Muslims, Christians, Druze, and other non-Jews, but also to Jews. This means that Jewish religious coercion is unacceptable, and Jews may freely pursue all brands of Judaism: Orthodox, Ultra-Orthodox, Conservative, Reform, Reconstructionist, and the sundry forms of Atheism, Agnosticism, and Secularism. In this connection, it should be mentioned that Israel’s laws concerning personal status (marriage, divorce, conversion, and so forth), which derive from the old Ottoman millet system, are very problematic, especially as interpreted by a Chief Rabbinate that is increasingly estranged from the people. Rulings of Israeli Rabbinical Courts are often discriminatory against women, converts, and the non-Orthodox. These laws are in need of revision.

The rejection of religious coercion is fundamental to the Zionist project. Zionism, from its beginning, was a political movement, not a religious one. It has always been open to religious and non-religious alike. It is a project of the entire Jewish people, including all groups and sectors, all ideologies and all philosophies, all theologies, and all heresies. Rabbi Isaac Jacob Reines, the visionary founder of the Mizrahi faction of Zionism in 1902, explained to his fellow religionists how it was possible that the movement’s leader, Theodor Herzl, was not religious. He begins by noting that the great Jewish leaders of yore were all distinguished by their holiness and piety, and then writes: “Yet here we see a political man who has not gone out to meditate in the deserts or forests, who has not sanctified himself by ablutions of the body, who does not adorn himself with prayer shawl and phylacteries, who does not ponder over the divine Torah, who does not afflict his soul by fasting, who has not rolled about in the snow or slept among ants, and who nonetheless is succeeding!” Rabbi Reines asks, “Is this not an astonishing thing?!” And he answers: No, not at all, it is a “very simple thing.” It is simple, he explains, because those previous Jewish leaders were spiritual leaders concerned about spiritual redemption, while Herzl is nothing but a political leader concerned about political redemption.

The Zionist movement, continues Rabbi Reines, is not spiritual but “material, economic, and political.” It is not a spiritual movement of religious Jews but a political movement of all Jews. It may thus have non-religious leaders, since its policies are to be determined wholly in accordance with material, economic, and political considerations, and not in accordance with spiritual genius or messianic faith (Or Hadash `al Zion, X, 2).

In short, in our desire to cultivate the Jewishness of the State of Israel, we must be careful not to do so at the expense of the equality and liberty of its citizens; and we must remember that many citizens are not Jewish, and many of the Jewish citizens are not religious.

I would like now to say some words about three areas in which the Jewish dimension of the State may be beneficially promoted: (1) the Hebrew language, (2) the Hebrew calendar, and (3) Jewish law.

The Hebrew Language

The revival of Hebrew as the primary spoken language in the Land of Israel is an amazing phenomenon. Israeli children grow up today speaking the language of the Prophets and Sages. They read the Hebrew Bible with a naturalness that is impossible even for learned rabbis in the Diaspora. The treasures of classical Jewish literature are accessible to them in a way they were not accessible to their ancestors who were not native Hebrew speakers. It may be said, with only a modicum of exaggeration, that the most Jewish thing about the State of Israel is its use of the Hebrew tongue.
However, mention of the Jewishness of Israeli Hebrew raises a serious question; for contemporary Israeli Hebrew is every day moving further and further away from its biblical, rabbinic, and medieval roots. I just wrote that Israeli children read the Bible in a natural way and the Jewish classics are open before them. While this is still true, it was truer in the past, and becoming less and less true all the time.

Maimonides taught us that the principle for determining correct usage in any language is the practice of its native speakers. Not the grammarians but the native speakers are the authorities on what constitutes proper usage (Commentary on the Mishnah, Terumot 1:1). Correct Hebrew is thus determined by its native speakers, the Israelis; and the language of the native speakers is obviously influenced by the speech they have heard and the literature to which they have been exposed. Israelis who have been educated on classical Hebrew literature will speak a Hebrew that is connected to that literature, while those who have not been educated on it will speak a Hebrew disconnected from its roots.

I have been teaching in Israel at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem since 1977, when I moved to Israel from North America. Over the years, I have noticed a steep decline in the familiarity of my students with the Hebrew Bible. This decline reflects the progressive neglect of biblical studies in Israeli schools. In response to the dramatic erosion of the ability of young Israelis to comprehend the Hebrew Bible, there is now being published in Israel a “translation” of the Bible into “Israeli Hebrew” by the veteran educator Avraham Ahuvia. The “translation” is known as Tanakh Ram, and thus far the Pentateuch (2008) and Major Prophets (2011) have appeared. One may debate the pedagogic value of Ahuvia’s “translation,” but it cannot be denied that contemporary Israeli Hebrew is undergoing a process of disengagement from classical Hebrew. It is, in other words, undergoing a process of disengagement from Judaism.

I am convinced that contemporary Israeli Hebrew, i.e., what is sometimes called “tzabbarit” or, in the term coined by the poet Avot Yeshurun, “Tel-Avivrit,” is still essentially the same language as biblical, rabbinic, and medieval Hebrew. One can still today see an Israeli child pick up a Hebrew Bible and read it fluently and joyfully. I believe the regrettable process of disengagement of Israeli Hebrew from its historic sources can be reversed. All that is needed is a return—even a partial return—to the old Israeli educational ethos, which gave priority to the teaching of the Hebrew Bible and other classical Hebrew texts. Needless to say, I am not talking about theology or ideology, but literature. I am not talking about teaching “Judaism” or “Zionism,” but Hebrew and its literature. I’m talking about language.

It is the native speakers, according to Maimonides’ principle, who determine the nature of a language. If Israeli children are given a solid education in classical Jewish literature, then their Israeli Hebrew—no matter how vibrant and innovative— will remain Hebrew, that is, it will remain Jewish; and few of them will want a crutch like Tanakh Ram.

The Hebrew Calendar

The public use of the Hebrew calendar in the State of Israel is important, as it provides a temporal Jewish framework for everyday life in the State. The rhythm of the year is that of the Jewish Sabbaths, feasts, and fasts.

The general public day of rest in Israel is the Jewish Sabbath, not Sunday or Friday (although, according to the 1951 law, Muslims and Christians have the right to observe Friday or Sunday). Spring vacation is every year during the week of Passover. The celebration of the New Year occurs in Tishre, not January. Visitors to Israel on the Christian New Year are often surprised to discover it is a regular workday, and those looking for a gala New Year’s Eve ball must be content if they can find a little Sylvester party. Hardly anyone in Israel knows that the holiday of Sylvester is named for a fourth-century pope, and many mistakenly associate it with the more famous cartoon cat. In any case, according to the Jewish calendar, the New Year celebrates the Creation of the World, not the birth of Jesus or the hijra of Muhammad. In this sense, the Hebrew calendar is more secular than the Christian or Muslim calendars, since it does not commence with birth or deeds of the founder of a religion but with the beginning of the universe.

In Israel today, the Hebrew calendar is generally used alongside the Christian calendar, sometimes one is preferred and sometimes the other. The Muslim calendar is also used in many contexts. In business letters, it is customary to write both the Hebrew and Christian dates. Similarly, books often give both Hebrew and Christian years on the title page. Academic years at Israeli universities are commonly cited by the Hebrew date alone. This is probably for convenience sake, since the academic year begins right after the holidays of Tishri, and since it is elegantly designated by only one Hebrew year (e.g., 5773) but inelegantly designated by two hyphenated Christian years (e.g., 2012–2013).
The Hebrew calendar thus gives a Jewish rhythm to life in the State. However, some Israeli politicians would like to see the Israeli public calendar brought closer into line with the Christian calendar. For example, some politicians would like the State to adopt a Saturday-Sunday two-day weekend, as in many countries in the Christian West. Other politicians agree that a two-day week-end is desirable, but, sensitive to the interests of the Muslim minority, prefer that it be on Friday and Saturday—and this makes more sense since Friday is already effectively a half-holiday in Israel, with many people either not working or working only part-time.

However, a still better idea was proposed more than four decades ago by Rabbi Norman Lamm in his article, “The Rosh Hodesh Plan” (National Jewish Monthly 85, July–August, 1971, pp. 24–25). He suggested that the first day of each Hebrew month, that is, Rosh Hodesh, be observed in Israel as a legal day of rest. His plan was championed at the time by the then young National Religious MK Zevulun Hammer. According to the Lamm-Hammer initiative, only one day of Rosh Hodesh would be observed as a legal holiday each month, even when Rosh Hodesh is two days. Since Rosh Hodesh sometimes falls on Sabbaths and holidays, the plan would add about seven to nine days of rest each year. If it were decided to have two legal holidays in months when Rosh Hodesh is two days, then it would add 10 to 12 days. It is now time to reconsider the Lamm-Hammer initiative. It would answer the Israelis’ desire for more legal days of rest, give new relevance to the ancient Jewish celebration of the New Moon, and enhance the Jewish rhythm of life in the State.

Jewish Law

At the time of the creation of the State of Israel, those who proposed it be governed according to Jewish law offered a simple argument: If Britain is governed by British law and France by French law, then should not the Jewish State be governed by Jewish law? The proposal received some support, but was not adopted. Israeli law was instead concocted out of an ad hoc mixture of British law, Ottoman law, German law, and other diverse elements. Nonetheless, the importance of giving Jewish law—or as it is called in Israel “mishpat `ivri”—a place in the legal system of the Jewish state was recognized by early jurists and politicians, and they appointed leading experts in Jewish law to Israel’s Supreme Court: Rabbi Professor Simcha Assaf (appointed 1948), Professor Moshe Zilberg (appointed 1950), and Professor Menachem Elon (appointed 1977). In addition, Chief Justice Haim Cohn (served on the Court, 1960–1981), a skilled talmudist, often cited rabbinic sources in his decisions. In recent years, however, the importance of having major authorities of Jewish law on the Supreme Court has not been widely recognized. One exception to this tendency was Chief Justice Aharon Barak, who in 1994 sought unsuccessfully to appoint the distinguished dayyan Rabbi Shlomo Dichovsky to the Supreme Court as a replacement for the retired Justice Elon.

Today almost no one speaks of the necessity of having experts in Jewish law on the Supreme Court. Instead, it has become fashionable to speak of the “religious seat” or “religious seats” on the Supreme Court. In the elections to the Supreme Court in 2011, Religious Zionist politicians worked very hard to elect a “religious” judge to the court, but, as far as I could see, they made no attempt at all to get an expert in Jewish law elected. The subject apparently did not interest them. As a believer in the enduring value of Jewish law, I would like to see outstanding experts in Jewish law on Israel’s Supreme Court—whether or not they are “religious.” Truth to tell, I couldn’t care less how many “religious” justices are on the court. I have no desire to know which justices don’t eat pork, which shut off their computers on the Sabbath, or which fast on Yom Kippur. However, I think it is important that Jewish law have a firm place in Israeli law, and this is only possible if there are men and women in the legal system who are well versed in it—and, in particular, if there are experts in Jewish law on the Supreme Court.

The place of Jewish law in the Israeli legal system was given a formal definition in the 1980 Foundations of the Law Act. According to this document, whenever the courts are in doubt regarding a decision, they shall “decide it in the light of the principles of liberty, justice, equity, and peace of the Jewish heritage [moreshet Yisrael].” This flowery dictum has been interpreted in many ways, but some jurists have seen in it an invitation to make use of Jewish law. Now, whether or not it is an invitation to use Jewish law, it is surely a license to do so; for although it is true that “Jewish heritage” does not necessarily mean Jewish law, it is undeniable that Jewish law is part of the “Jewish heritage.”

Let me give one example that illustrates the place of Jewish law in Israel today and the attitudes Israelis have toward it. The example concerns a 1986 law forbidding the public display of hametz on Passover (except in non-Jewish neighborhoods). This law was for years not enforced. However, when in 2001 a religious Interior Minister threatened to enforce it, he stirred up angry opposition. Non-kosher restaurants and food-stores, which legally served non-kosher food all year round, were now suddenly required by law to obey certain particular dietary laws. The requirement seemed at times absurd. For example, Italian eateries that sold pizza pepperoni were told to make it from unleavened dough—the pork and cheese were fine, as long as served on matzah! Many rebelled against the law and ridiculed it. Journalists denounced it as one of the most obnoxious examples of religious coercion in Israel’s history, and argued that it discriminated against the non-religious and prevented them from making a fair living. Professors of law argued that it was unconstitutional. Knesset members organized to repeal it. It seemed quite clear that its days were numbered.

Then on Passover 2007, in Jerusalem, special officers raided a grocery store, two restaurants, and a pizzeria, and gave them summonses for selling hametz in public. The case attracted much media attention, and was tried in the Jerusalem court of Judge Tamar Bar-Asher Zaban, who had clerked for Justice Elon on the Supreme Court. Her astute ruling is exemplary for two reasons: first, she succeeded in giving the unreasonable law a new reasonable definition, and thus saved it from being repealed; and second, in redefining the law, she made use of the Talmud and Rashi’s Commentary.

The judge acquitted the four defendants. Her decision was based on a distinction between two senses of “public,” designated by two different Hebrew words: “pumbi” and “tzibburi.” The law, she explained, forbids display of hametz “in public” (pumbi), that is, in a place visible to passers-by. A restaurant or food store is “public” (tzibburi) in the sense that it is not private, but not “public” (pumbi) in the sense that passers-by can see what’s going on inside. The law, thus, does not forbid the sale of hametz inside a restaurant or store, but would forbid it on the street in a place visible to passers-by. Supporting her distinction between the two senses of “public,” she cited a 1998 Tel-Aviv case in which a man was acquitted of the charge of committing an indecent act “in public” (pumbi) in a stall of a public rest room, since the stall, although public (tzibburi), was not “public” (pumbi). In order to provide a theoretical basis for her decision, she referred to the talmudic definition of “reshut haRabbim” (“public domain”) in BT Shabbat 6a: “What is reshut haRabbim? A thoroughfare, a big plaza, and alleys open at both sides,” such as, according to Rashi, an intercity highway, an urban market, and streets at least seven meters wide. The judge reasoned: just as not all public roads or markets are considered “reshut haRabbim” by the Talmud, so not all public places are considered “pumbi” by Israeli law.
The hametz law, as now redefined by Judge Bar-Asher Zaban, seems acceptable to most Israelis, and talk of repealing it has ceased. One would think that religious Jews, concerned about preserving the spirit of Passover in the public domain, would have praised the judge’s decision that prevented the law from being repealed. However, the religious politicians and journalists vociferously attacked her for not convicting the four defendants.

The case illustrates how an Israeli judge knowledgeable in Jewish law found a helpful discussion in the Talmud that enabled her to turn an unreasonable law into a reasonable one. It also illustrates that non-religious Israelis, although adverse to religious coercion, are willing to accept laws concerning the public celebration of Jewish holidays, provided they do not impinge on their basic freedoms.
If we want mishpat `ivri to play a meaningful role in Israeli jurisprudence, it is necessary to strengthen its study in Israeli law schools. Judges who have been educated in Jewish law will be able to refer to it when appropriate.

Conclusion

What is the role of Judaism in the State of Israel? It provides the prophetic vision that is at the foundation of the State’s values of justice, liberty, and equality. The Hebrew language spoken by Israelis gives them a uniquely intimate access to the classical texts of Judaism. The Hebrew calendar used in Israel gives a Jewish rhythm to life in the State. Jewish law, when cited in Israeli courts, adds a Jewish dimension to Israeli law. The State must not teach Jewish religion but it must teach Hebrew language and literature—and I believe that if it does that effectively the many and various expressions of Judaism will flourish in it.

When addressing a halakhic question, each posek (halakhic decisor) attempts to arrive at a decision that is objectively true. The posek will study and analyze the available halakhic literature, with the goal of understanding the halakha as clearly and accurately as possible.

At the same time, halakhic literature is characterized by a variety of decisions regarding the same questions. Different posekim arrive at different conclusions—even though they generally rely on the same source literature. Sometimes these differences are based on alternate readings or interpretations of the source texts. Or, one posek may attribute greater authority to certain halakhists, while another may prefer to depend on others. Differences in local conditions, halakhic traditions, educational backgrounds, hashkafa (religious worldview)—these and many other factors may also result in different decisions from different posekim.

The interrelationship of hashkafa and halakha may be illustrated in how two recent posekim—Rabbi Avraham Yitzhak Kook and Rabbi Bentzion Meir Hai Uziel—dealt with issues involving the understanding of the nature of Jewishness.

Rabbi Kook (1865–1935) was born in Latvia and studied at the yeshiva of Volozhin. In 1904, he emigrated to Israel, where he became the Chief Rabbi of Jaffa. In 1919 he was appointed as the Ashkenazic Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem, and in 1921 he became the first Ashkenazic Chief Rabbi of Erets Yisrael. Rabbi Uziel (1880–1953) was born in Jerusalem and studied under the Torah scholars of the city, including his own father, Rabbi Yosef Raphael Uziel, who was the Av Bet Din (chief justice) of the Sephardic community. In 1911, Rabbi Uziel became Chief Rabbi of Jaffa, where he worked closely with Rabbi Kook. In 1921 he became Chief Rabbi of Salonika; in 1923 he returned to Israel to serve as Chief Rabbi of Tel Aviv; and in 1939 he became Rishon leTzion, the Sephardic Chief Rabbi of Erets Yisrael.

Both Rabbi Kook and Rabbi Uziel were strong advocates of religious Zionism. They were outstanding communal leaders, teachers, and scholars. Both were prolific writers who made major contributions in the fields of halakha and hashkafa.

But despite these external similarities, their attitudes toward several vital issues are radically different. Their disparate understandings of the nature of Jewish peoplehood are manifested in a number of their halakhic decisions.

Conversion

Let us begin with a discussion of how they dealt with the question of conversion to Judaism. How does a non-Jew enter the Jewish fold? What is the nature of the Jewishness which the convert accepts?

Rabbi Kook and Rabbi Uziel studied the same talmudic and rabbinic sources. That their rulings were diametrically opposed to each other reflects their different hashkafot, their different understanding of the nature of Jewish peoplehood.

Both dealt with the serious problem of what to do with individuals who requested conversion to Judaism, even when it was believed that the converts were not likely to observe all of the mitzvoth. For the most part, such converts were interested in gerut (conversion) for the sake of marrying a Jewish person, and were not motivated by theological concerns. Obviously, neither Rabbi Kook nor Rabbi Uziel thought that such converts represented the ideal. On the contrary, everyone would agree that it was preferable for converts to choose to join the Jewish people from a belief in the truth of Judaism and a total commitment to observe the mitzvoth. However, a great many converts do not come with these ideal credentials.

Rabbi Kook was adamant in his opposition to accepting converts who did not accept to observe all the mitzvoth. Even if a convert followed the technical procedure for conversion, but lacked the absolute intention to observe the mitzvoth, his conversion is not valid. When the Talmud states (Yebamoth 24b) that kulam gerim hem (“they are all converts”; this passage refers to individuals who converted for the sake of marriage or because of other external factors), this refers only to those who did have the intention to accept the mitzvoth in full. Rabbis who accept for conversion those candidates who come for worldly reasons, but who will not fulfill the mitzvoth, are making an error. Much evil will befall such rabbis. They are guilty of bringing thorns into the house of Israel.

Rabbi Kook argues that rabbis who accept such converts are transgressing the prohibition of lifnei ivver (placing a stumbling block in the path of a blind person; by extension, this prohibition includes acts of misleading others). If the conversions are not halakhically valid, then the rabbis are misleading the Jewish public by calling such individuals Jews when in fact they are not Jewish. Such negligence will lead to many problems, including possible intermarriage. On the other hand, if these individuals are to be considered valid converts, then the rabbis are misleading them by not stressing how they will be subject to punishment for violating the mitzvoth.1

In another Responsum, Rabbi Kook again emphasizes that converts who do not commit themselves to keep the mitzvoth should not be accepted. If unqualified individuals (hedyotot) accepted them, no rabbi should perform weddings for them even after they have been converted in this way. “And happy is the one who stands in the breach to guard the purity of Israel, may a good blessing come to him.”2

For Rabbi Kook, then, the acceptance of mitzvoth is the essential ingredient in Jewishness. One who does not accept to observe the mitzvoth simply cannot become part of the Jewish people, even if he or she were to go through the technical rituals of conversion. And even if one were to find halakhic justification to validate these conversions, we still should not allow such converts to marry Jews.

Rabbi Uziel also wrote a number of Responsa dealing with would-be converts whose commitment to observance of mitzvoth was deficient. While acknowledging that it was most desirable that converts accept all the mitzvoth, Rabbi Uziel noted that in our times many individuals seek conversion for the sake of marriage. Instead of disqualifying such conversions, however, Rabbi Uziel actually encouraged them. He felt that it was necessary for us to be stringent in matters of intermarriage, i.e., we should do everything possible to prevent a situation where a marriage involves a Jew and a non-Jew. If we can convert the non-Jewish partner to Judaism, then we have preserved the wholeness of that family for the Jewish people, and we can hope that their children will be raised as Jews. Given the choice of having an intermarried couple or performing such a conversion, Rabbi Uziel ruled that it is better to perform the conversion. He, of course, believed that rabbis should do everything in their power to break off the projected intermarriage. They should resort to conversion only when it is clear that the couple would not be dissuaded from marriage to each other.3

In another Responsum, Rabbi Uziel explains that the obligation of rabbis is to inform candidates for conversion of some, not all, of the mitzvoth (Yoreh De’ah 268:2). It is impossible for a bet din to know with certainty that any convert will keep all the mitzvoth. Conversion, even initially, does not require that the convert accept to observe all the mitzvoth. Indeed, the procedure of informing a non-Jew about the basic beliefs and mitzvoth is required initially. But if this procedure were not followed, and the non-Jew was converted ritually (circumcision and ritual immersion) without such information, the conversion is valid notwithstanding (Yoreh De’ah 268:2, 12).

Rabbi Uziel concludes that it is permissible—and a mitzvah—to accept such converts, even when it is expected that they would not observe all the mitzvoth. Our hope is that they will come to observe the mitzvoth in the future. We are obligated to give them this opportunity. If they fail to observe the mitzvoth, the iniquity is on their own shoulders, not ours. Rabbi Uziel rejects the argument that since a vast majority of converts do not observe the mitzvoth, we should not accept converts at all. On the contrary, he argues that it is a mitzvah to accept these converts. We are obligated not only to do these conversions to prevent intermarriage, but we have a special responsibility to the children who will be born of these marriages. Since they are of Jewish stock, even if only one parent is Jewish, they should be reclaimed for our people. Rabbi Uziel writes:

"And I fear that if we push them [children] away completely by not accepting their parents for conversion, we shall be brought to judgment and they shall say to us: 'You did not bring back those who were driven away, and those who were lost you did not seek'" (Yehezkel 34:4).4

Whereas Rabbi Kook saw the acceptance of mitzvoth as the sine qua non of entering the Jewish fold, Rabbi Uziel thought it was not an absolute requirement at all. Whereas Rabbi Kook believed that the mitzvoth are the defining feature of the Jewish people, Rabbi Uziel stressed the importance of maintaining the wholeness of the Jewish people, even when the observance of mitzvoth was deficient. The halakhic difference between them can be apprehended on a deeper level if we consider their difference in hashkafa.

The act of conversion, according to Rabbi Kook, requires the convert to join the soul of Kenesset Yisrael (a metaphysical representation of the “congregation of Israel”). This can be accomplished only via total acceptance of the mitzvoth, which are the essence of the Jewish soul. Rabbi Kook sees Kenesset Yisrael as the highest spiritual manifestation of human existence. He propounds a notion found in kabbalah that there is an essential difference between Jews and non-Jews. Rabbi Kook writes:

"The difference between the Jewish soul, its self, its inner desires, aspirations, character and status, and that of all nations, at all their levels, is greater and deeper than the difference between the human soul and the animal soul; between the latter there is merely a quantitative distinction, but between the former an essential qualitative distinction pertains."5

Each Jew is connected spiritually to Kenesset Yisrael through the fulfillment of mitzvoth and the ethical demands of Torah. The nourishment of the Jewish soul “is the study of Torah in all its aspects, which also includes historical study in its fullness, and the observance of the commandments with deep faith illuminated by the light of knowledge and clear awareness.” 6

In stressing the distinctiveness of the Jewish people and its essential difference from all other nations, Rabbi Kook appears to downplay the ethical universalism implicit in the classic Jewish teaching that human beings were created in the image of God. Instead of focusing on the universal spiritual dignity of all people, Rabbi Kook asserts a radical distinction between Israel and the nations.

On the other hand, Rabbi Kook did recognize the existence of select individuals among the nations who can reach great spiritual heights. Whereas the supreme holiness specific to Israel is not shared by the nations, it is possible for individual non-Jews to imbue themselves with the holiness of Torah and to join the people of Israel.7

Rabbi Kook’s hashkafa, thus, plays itself out in the halakhic issue of conversion. For him, a non-Jew needs to undergo a transformation of his soul in order to become part of Kenesset Yisrael. Conversion is not just a matter of following a set of prescribed rules and guidelines; rather, it is an all-encompassing spiritual transformation, possible only for a select few spiritually gifted individuals.

Rabbi Kook’s hashkafa is imbued with mystical elements. Given his understanding of the nature of the Jewish soul, it follows that he takes an elitist position vis-à-vis accepting converts. Only those who are truly qualified spiritually may enter the fold of Israel. To accept converts who are not absolutely committed to mitzvah observance is, for Rabbi Kook, a travesty.

Rabbi Uziel, too, stressed the distinctiveness of the people of Israel. Indeed, his hashkafa is close to Rabbi Kook’s in that he also saw the people of Israel as the ideal model of humanity, embodying the highest form of harmony and spiritual unity.8

Although Rabbi Uziel recognized the distinctiveness of the people of Israel, he did not make the same sharp distinction between Jews and non-Jews as did Rabbi Kook. Rather, Rabbi Uziel stressed the connection between Jews and non-Jews, and the responsibility of Jews to set a good example from which the non-Jewish world can learn.

Rabbi Uziel was critical of those Jews who taught that one’s Jewishness should be a private matter observed in the home, and who said that one should be a “human being” when in public. He rejected such a notion as being absurd, “since Judaism and humanity are connected and attached to each other like a flame and its coal.” The goal of Judaism is to have Jews be the finest possible human beings so that they could influence humanity for the better. Judaism was not a private matter, but was for application in the world at large.9

Rabbi Uziel also rejects the position of those who claimed that Judaism was merely a faith. Clearly, the people of Israel constitute a nation with a distinctive national character. Neither the Torah nor our sages ever divorced Jewish faith from Jewish peoplehood.10

Rabbi Uziel rejects the notion that Judaism could survive only if Jews isolated themselves from the rest of society. Those who limited Jewish life to synagogues and study halls thereby were constricting the real message of Judaism. Rabbi Uziel argues that the Torah was quite capable of confronting all cultures and all peoples, without needing to surrender or hide. A living culture has no fear of borrowing and integrating concepts from other cultures, and it can do so without losing its own identity. Jews can learn from the non-Jewish world and still remain faithful to their own distinctive mission of holiness and righteousness. Moreover, as a living culture, Judaism has a message to teach others as well. To constrict Judaism into a spiritual and intellectual ghetto is not true to the mission of Israel. The Torah contains within it a full worldview on the individual and the nation; therefore it is our obligation to recognize and teach our spiritual ideal, and to try to increase our spiritual influence on humanity as a whole.11

For Rabbi Uziel, then, the distinctiveness of the Jewish people is not seen as a mystical concept which separates Jews ontologically from non-Jews. Rather, the Jewish people have a positive responsibility of reaching out to the non-Jewish world, to bring them closer to the religious ideals of Judaism.

This hashkafa manifests itself in a greater tolerance and openness when it comes to the halakhic question of conversion. Certainly, it would be best if all Jews and all converts to Judaism observed the mitzvoth in full. But since we do not live in an ideal world, we need to strive to attain the best results possible. Our first concern has to be to maintain the integrity of the Jewish people, Jewish families. Non-Jews who wish to become part of the Jewish people are thereby testifying that they wish to come closer to our teachings and traditions. Since Jews and non-Jews are all created in the image of God, the conversion process does not entail an absolute spiritual transformation of the convert’s soul, but rather a pragmatic decision to join the Jewish people and to come closer to the ideals and teachings of the Torah. This hashkafa gives greater leeway to the rabbis who must make specific decisions regarding conversion, based on the particular situation of each case. Universalism and pragmatism on behalf of the Jewish people, rather than mystical and metaphysical considerations, should guide the conversion process.

Autopsies

The hashkafic difference between Rabbi Kook and Rabbi Uziel concerning the nature of Jewishness also may be demonstrated in another halakhic area: autopsies. In 1931, Rabbi Kook was asked whether it was permissible to perform autopsies as part of the training of doctors in medical schools. With the expanding Jewish settlement in the land of Israel, there certainly was a need to train Jewish doctors.
Medical training entailed autopsies.

Rabbi Kook ruled that disgracing a dead body (nivul haMet) is a prohibition unique to the Jewish people, since the Almighty commanded us to maintain the holiness of the body. He then went on to say that there is a sharp difference between Jews and non-Jews with regard to their bodies. Non-Jews consider their bodies only as biological structures. They eat whatever they wish, without restriction. They have no reason to be concerned with the issue of disgracing the dead body, so long as the autopsy was done for a reasonable purpose such as medical study. Rabbi Kook, therefore, recommended that the medical programs purchase non-Jewish bodies for the purpose of scientific research. He then stated that the whole category of disgrace of the dead body stems from the fact that humans were created in the image of God. But this image of God is manifested particularly in Jews due to the holiness of the Torah.12 The Jewish attachment to Torah and mitzvoth, thus, not only characterizes the Jewish soul, but also imparts holiness to the Jewish body.

Rabbi Uziel wrote a lengthy Responsum on the subject of autopsies, although he specified that his Responsum was theoretical rather than a formal legal ruling (leHalakha veLo leMa’aseh). In reviewing the halakhic literature on nivul haMet, Rabbi Uziel concluded that this category applies only when a dead body is treated disrespectfully. Autopsies performed in a respectful manner for the sake of medical knowledge do not constitute, according to Rabbi Uziel, nivul haMet. He points out that there have been many rabbinical sages throughout Jewish history who were also medical doctors. They could not have learned their profession without having performed autopsies. Rabbi Uziel states that “in a situation of great benefit to everyone, where there is an issue of saving lives, we have not found any reason to prohibit [and on the contrary, there are proofs to permit].

Rabbi Uziel considers the question of whether it would be preferable to obtain non-Jewish bodies for the purpose of autopsies. His response is sharp and unequivocal:

"Certainly this should not even be said and more certainly should not be written, since the prohibition of nivul stems from the humiliation caused to all humans. That is to say, it is a humiliation to cause the body of a human—created in the image of God and graced with knowledge and understanding to master and rule over all creation—to be left disgraced and rotting in public. There is no difference between Jews and non-Jews, in the sense that all are created in the image of God. The Jew has no claim to higher status in this regard. If one were to prohibit autopsies, then no autopsies could be performed on any body—Jewish or non-Jewish. The result would be that no doctors could be trained, with a consequent result of an increase in illness, suffering, and death."13

It is clear, then, that Rabbi Kook understood the nature of Jewishness in kabbalistic, metaphysical terms. For him, there is a definite and almost unbridgeable gap between the people of Israel and the non-Jewish nations. This hashkafa influenced his halakhic decisions in the areas of conversion and autopsy. On the other hand, Rabbi Uziel stressed the human quality of the Jewish people, the essential Godliness of all people. His generally universalistic outlook recognized the distinctiveness of the Jewish people. But the distinctiveness of Israel is manifested not by separating Jews absolutely from everyone else; rather, it is shown when Jews serve as models to draw others closer to the ideals of the Torah. This hashkafa pervades his discussions of conversion and autopsy.

Women in Civic Life

Rabbi Kook and Rabbi Uziel also differed in matters pertaining to the role of women in civic life. Their halakhic decisions reflected their different attitudes toward the role of women in a traditional society.

Women’s rights to vote and to be elected to public office were the subject of heated controversy among the Jewish community in the land of Israel in the early part of the twentieth century. In the struggle over women’s suffrage (1918–1921), the rabbinical leadership of the old Yishuv generally opposed extending to women the right to vote and hold public office. In contrast, the Sephardic rabbinic leadership generally favored granting women those rights.

Rabbi Kook, the leading Ashkenazic rabbinic personality in this debate, argued that the Torah tradition relegated civic authority only to men, and that women were to remain in the private, domestic domain. He rejected the “modern innovation” calling for an expansion of women’s role, believing this was a threat to traditional morality and family life.14

Rabbi Uziel, the leading Sephardic voice in this debate, argued that innovation was not necessarily bad. On the contrary, it was fine to innovate where there was no clear Torah prohibition involved. On the question of whether women should be permitted to vote, Rabbi Uziel stated that

"We have not found any clear foundation to forbid. It is unreasonable to deprive women of this human right, since in these elections we choose our leaders and give our elected representatives the power to speak in our names, to arrange the affairs of our settlement and to tax our property. Women, directly or indirectly, accept the authority of those elected, and obey their rulings and communal and national laws.”15

Rabbi Uziel thought it was unjust to expect women to be bound to decisions over which they had no say.
Some opponents of women’s suffrage suggested that women’s understanding was limited, and they were not competent to vote. To this, Rabbi Uziel noted that many men had limited understanding: Should they, too, be deprived of the right to vote? Moreover, Rabbi Uziel wrote that women were endowed with intelligence and sound judgment, no less than men. Experience demonstrates this to be true.

Rabbi Uziel rejected the argument that letting women vote would be a threat to morality and family life. This is a baseless claim and should carry no weight in this debate. One opponent thought that women should be excluded from voting or holding office, based on women’s status in biblical times. Rabbi Uziel brushed this objection aside, noting that it had no bearing on the question at hand. Women, as well as men, were created in God’s image. They had a basic right to be able to vote for those who would have authority to pass laws which would affect them. Not only was there no prohibition to women’s suffrage, but depriving women of this right would be unjust and would cause them humiliation and pain.

Having concluded that women had the right to vote, Rabbi Uziel then turned to the question of whether women had the right to be elected to public office. Halakhic literature includes the notion that women should not hold positions of authority over men. After analyzing these sources carefully,
Rabbi Uziel found that there was no objection to women being in positions of authority—if the community willingly accepted them in these offices. Therefore, women who were elected to office exert authority on the basis of communal approval. Rabbi Uziel stated that although men and women would be sitting together during the public deliberations, this was no breach of modesty or morality. These were not social events, but serious discussions and debates in which participants would participate with all due propriety.

In another Responsum, Rabbi Uziel offered halakhic grounds to allow women to serve as civil judges, as long as the community accepted their authority to judge. He did not personally think it was a good idea for women to serve as judges because of their innately compassionate natures, but he presented the halakhic justification for them to be judges.16

In presenting the opinions and decisions of Rabbi Kook and Rabbi Uziel, it has not been our purpose to determine who is right or who is wrong, or if both are right—ellu veEllu divrei Elokim hayyim (“both positions are acceptable in the eyes of God”). Rather, it has been our purpose to illustrate the interrelationship between hashkafa and halakha. The philosophy and worldview of a posek are not only reflected in halakhic decisions—they help shape those halakhic decisions.

Notes
1. Da’at Kohen, Jerusalem, 5745, no. 154. The discussion on conversion and autopsies is drawn from my article, “A Discussion of the Nature of Jewishness in the Teachings of Rabbi Kook and Rabbi Uziel,” in Seeking Good, Speaking Peace: Collected Essays of Rabbi Marc D. Angel, edited by Rabbi Hayyim Angel, Ktav, Hoboken, 1994, pp. 112–123.
2. Ibid., no. 155.
3. Mishpetei Uziel, Jerusalem, 5724, no. 18.
4. Ibid., no. 20. For a discussion of Rabbi Uziel’s rulings on conversion, see my article, “Another Halakhic Approach to Conversions,” Tradition, 12 (Winter–Spring 1972), 107–113.
5. Orot, Jerusalem, 5745, p. 156. See the article by Rabbi Yoel Ben-Nun, “Nationalism, Humanity and Kenesset Yisrael,” in The World of Ray Kook’s Thought, published by the Avi Chai Foundation, New York, 1991, pp. 210 f.
6. Orot, p. 145; Rabbi Yoel Ben-Nun’s article, p. 224.
7. Rabbi Yoel Ben-Nun’s article, p. 227.
8. A series of articles by Nissim Yosha, under the title “Yahid ve Umah,” appeared in the journal ba-Ma ‘arakhah, nos. 300–306, dealing with Rabbi Uziel’s understanding of Jewish peoplehood. See also my book, Voices in Exile, Ktav, Hoboken, 1991, pp. 202 f.
9. Hegyonei Uziel, vol. 2, Jerusalem, 5714, p. 122.
10. Ibid.
11. Ibid., p. 125
12. Da’at Kohen, no. 199.
13. Piskei Uziel, Jerusalem 5737, no. 32, especially pp. 178-179.
14. Ma’amarei ha-RaAy’aH, Jerusalem, 1984, pp. 189-194. See Zvi Zohar’s article, “Two Halakhic Positions on Women’s Suffrage,” pp. 119-133, in Sephardi and Middle Eastern Jewries, ed. Harvey E. Goldberg, Indiana University Press, Bloomington, 1996. See also the discussion in my book, Loving Truth and Peace: The Grand Religious Worldview of Rabbi Benzion Uziel, Jason Aronson, Northvale, 1999, pp. 204f.
15. Piskei Uziel, Mossad haRav Kook, Jerusalem, 5737, no. 44.
16. Ibid., no 43.

Angel For Shabbat, Parashat Vayikra

by Rabbi Marc D. Angel

“One who transgresses any positive or negative commandment of the Torah, whether intentionally or unwittingly, must confess before God when repenting and turning from sin” (Laws of Repentance 1:1). In this statement, Maimonides echoes the passage in this week’s Parasha calling for confession of sins by those who bring sin offerings.

But why is confession so important? Why not allow the penitent to atone silently without actually verbalizing the sins?

Oral confession compels one to actually articulate the sins. Until one is able to state things specifically, it is likely that the atonement will remain vague. To say something aloud requires forethought.

But there can be (and often is) a gap between our words and what’s in our hearts. We may say “I’m sorry,” but not really feel sorry inside ourselves. For confession to be real, it has to be honest.

Confession isn’t intended primarily to make us feel guilty for our shortcomings. Rather, it is intended to help us face up to personal responsibility. God doesn’t need our confession: we do! Among the most difficult statements to make are: I erred. I sinned. I should have done better. It’s my fault.

Human beings tend to excuse themselves for their shortcomings. I failed because others caused me to fail; I fell short because the system is unfair. It’s someone else’s fault that I didn’t do well.

Not only do individuals transfer responsibility to others, but communities tend to do so also. If our group isn’t doing as well as others, it must be because of discrimination, racism, or systemic injustice. It’s not our fault: it’s yours, it’s theirs; we aren’t responsible. But such an attitude is self-defeating. Instead of blaming outside sources for our problems, we first need to evaluate our own deficits and how we can improve our own situation.

The first step for real advancement—personal and communal—is to confess our own shortcomings. Until we come to grips with our attitudes and behaviors, we cannot be spiritually healthy human beings. Yes, there are others who may contribute to our personal failures; but ultimately it is our responsibility to do our best to be our best.

Maimonides points out that confession is not only an expression of regret for past sins. It also entails a commitment to do better in the future. Confession is intended to be a moral “cleanser”: it is to be an honest evaluation of where we’ve strayed and how we can move forward in a constructive, healthy way.

Honest confession is not a simple matter. But without it, we undermine our own spiritual and ethical development.