National Scholar Updates

Learning from and Living our History:

Lessons from the Exodus in Tanakh[1]

Introduction

The Haggadah is a remarkable compilation of texts that helps us relive the exodus from Egypt.[2] While there are several biblical verses and passages cited in the Haggadah, they are subsumed under a larger midrashic framework.

            Not surprisingly, many of the central themes in the Haggadah are rooted in biblical thought. Among other teachings, the exodus forms the basis for the singular covenantal relationship between God and Israel; it highlights God’s greatness in history; it is central to the religious education of children; it teaches that we must be eternally grateful to God; and it serves as the model for the future redemption. In this essay, we will survey examples from various sections of Tanakh to see how these and related themes are developed. Interested readers are encouraged to learn the full biblical passages in depth to gain a greater appreciation of their respective contexts.

The Early Prophets

A. Crossing the Jordan

The Book of Joshua is replete with parallels to the Torah, as well as parallels between Moses and Joshua. One striking example is the crossing of the Jordan. This miraculous event, where the waters formed a great pile to enable Israel to cross on dry land, established Joshua’s credibility as God’s agent: “The Lord said to Joshua, ‘This day, for the first time, I will exalt you in the sight of all Israel, so that they shall know that I will be with you as I was with Moses’” (Josh. 3:7). Moses gained similar credibility during the splitting of the Red Sea (Exod. 14:30-31).

            The crossing of the Jordan also parallels the exodus by using similar formulations for educating future generations regarding God’s greatness and involvement in history:

…This shall serve as a symbol among you: in time to come, when your children ask [ki yishalun benekhem mahar], “What is the meaning of these stones for you [mah ha-avanim ha-elleh lakhem]?” you shall tell them, “The waters of the Jordan were cut off because of the Ark of the Lord’s Covenant; when it passed through the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan were cut off.” And so these stones shall serve the people of Israel as a memorial for all time (Josh. 4:6-7).

In time to come, when your children ask their fathers [asher yishalun benekhem mahar], “What is the meaning of those stones [mah ha-avanim ha-elleh]?” tell your children: “Here the Israelites crossed the Jordan on dry land.” For the Lord your God dried up the waters of the Jordan before you until you crossed, just as the Lord your God did to the Sea of Reeds, which He dried up before us until we crossed. Thus all the peoples of the earth shall know how mighty is the hand of the Lord, and you shall fear the Lord your God always (Josh. 4:21-24).

These passages parallel the verses in the Torah cited in the Haggadah for the education of the four children (Exod. 12:26-27; 13:8-9, 14-16; Deut. 6:20-21).

            More generally, the splitting of the Red Sea and crossing of the Jordan illustrate God’s power over nature coupled with God’s special relationship with Israel. The Hallel reflects this dimension as well:

When Israel went forth from Egypt, the house of Jacob from a people of strange speech, Judah became His holy one, Israel, His dominion. The sea saw them and fled, Jordan ran backward (Ps. 114:1-3).

B. Deborah and Gideon

As with the crossing of the Jordan, the Deborah story in Judges chapters 4-5 also is modeled after the exodus. Exodus chapter 14 contains the narrative of the splitting of the Red Sea and is followed by Moses’ song in chapter 15. Similarly, Judges chapter 4 contains the narrative of Deborah’s victory and is followed by her song in chapter 5. There also are literary parallels between the two accounts, most strikingly God’s instilling the Egyptians with panic during the splitting of the Red Sea (va-yahom et mahaneh Mitzrayim, Exod. 14:24) parallel to God’s doing the same to Sisera’s camp (Jud. 4:15); and the complete wipeout of the enemy (lo nishar bahem ad ehad, not one of them remained, Exod. 14:28; cf. Jud. 4:16). Explicitly modeled after the exodus, the Deborah narrative highlights God’s power and intervention in history, and the people’s expression of gratitude to God through song.

During the exodus from Egypt, God acted alone, and the Song at the Sea likewise reflects God’s exclusive role. In contrast, Deborah, Barak, Yael, and some 10,000 soldiers helped defeat Sisera and the Canaanites. Therefore, Deborah’s song praises God as well as the human heroes of the story. The Haggadah makes this contrast even more dramatic by its near total elimination of Moses’ role during the exodus so that God’s role becomes even more absolute.[3]

            In the generation following Deborah, there was confusion regarding the lessons one should derive from the exodus. The people reverted to their sinfulness, bringing about Midianite oppression. An anonymous prophet came to rebuke the people:

Thus said the Lord, the God of Israel: I brought you up out of Egypt and freed you from the house of bondage. I rescued you from the Egyptians and from all your oppressors; I drove them out before you, and gave you their land. And I said to you, “I the Lord am your God. You must not worship the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell.” But you did not obey Me (Jud. 6:8-10).

            Although nobody responded directly to the prophet’s rebuke in the text, Gideon’s response to the angel who subsequently appeared to him seems to address the concerns of the prophet, as well. Gideon defended his nation by shifting the blame to God for not performing any more miracles as He did during the exodus:[4]

Please, my lord, if the Lord is with us, why has all this befallen us? Where are all His wondrous deeds about which our fathers told us, saying, “Truly the Lord brought us up from Egypt”? Now the Lord has abandoned us and delivered us into the hands of Midian! (Jud. 6:13).

Gideon’s complaint is particularly ironic, given that Deborah’s victory in the previous generation is modeled after the exodus, as discussed above. Israel’s memory of God’s beneficence was short-lived indeed.

More fundamentally, Gideon appears to wonder why his generation should be obligated to be faithful to God given that only the generation of the exodus received such overt divine intervention. Yisrael Rozenson explains that Gideon’s assumption is theologically incorrect. The exodus forms the basis for Israel’s relationship with God for all later generations, and this is how the anonymous prophet refers to the exodus as well. The exodus never was intended as a promise of constant overt divine intervention as Gideon and others evidently expected.[5]

Gideon’s question was not lost on the compilers of the Haggadah, who offer an alternative response when they state (in avadim hayyinu) that if God did not redeem our ancestors from Egypt, we would still be enslaved to Pharaoh in Egypt. According to the Haggadah, we benefit directly from the original exodus and therefore owe God our allegiance. Elsewhere (hi she-amedah), the Haggadah praises God for the many times God has saved us from our enemies throughout the ages.

C. The Ark Narrative

Eli’s sons Hophni and Phinehas were wicked and helped bring about Israel’s downfall (1 Sam. 2:27-36; 3:11-14). Instead of repenting, the Israelites mistakenly believed that simply bringing the Ark into battle would provide victory since God’s Presence would be with them (Radak, Malbim). Their error cost the nation thousands of lives, and the Ark was captured as well (1 Samuel chapter 4).

            As an ironic contrast to Israel’s wickedness and confusion, the pagan Philistines did learn lessons from Israel’s history. They stood in awe of God when the Ark approached:

Woe to us! Who will save us from the power of this mighty God? He is the same God who struck the Egyptians with every kind of plague [makkah] in the wilderness! (1 Sam. 4:8).

They also avoided Pharaoh’s mistake of hardening his heart after God had plagued them:

Don’t harden your hearts as the Egyptians and Pharaoh hardened their hearts. As you know, when He made a mockery of them, they had to let Israel go, and they departed (1 Sam. 6:6).

After this ironic contrast, the prophet Samuel taught Israel that they needed to improve their behavior and then God would help them. In chapter 7, Samuel led the nation in repentance and prayer, and then God helped Israel defeat the Philistines.

      To summarize: The crossing of the Jordan in the Book of Joshua is a direct parallel to the exodus. It glorified God to Israel and to the nations, created another model for the religious education of children, and established Joshua as God’s agent. The Deborah narrative in the Book of Judges also is modeled after the splitting of the Red Sea, illustrating God’s intervention in history and the people’s religious gratitude. Gideon misunderstood the purpose of the exodus and thought God should miraculously intervene in each generation. In the Ark narrative in the Book of Samuel, the Israelites believed in God’s power but misunderstood their covenantal relationship with God until Samuel corrected them. As an ironic contrast, the Philistines learned proper lessons from the exodus.

The Latter Prophets

The prophets frequently modeled prophecies after the exodus. Sometimes God promises that the redemption will be like the exodus (Mic. 7:15). On other occasions the redemption will even eclipse the exodus (Jer. 16:14-15; 23:7-8).

            There are times when prophets model their prophecies after the exodus from Egypt with greater detail and literary allusions. We will briefly consider three such examples: Isaiah chapters 11-12, Jeremiah chapter 2, and Ezekiel chapter 20.

A. Isaiah Chapters 11-12

The Lord will dry up the tongue of the Egyptian sea. He will raise His hand over the Euphrates with the might of His wind and break it into seven wadis, so that it can be trodden dry-shod. Thus there shall be a highway for the other part of His people out of Assyria, such as there was for Israel when it left the land of Egypt. In that day, you shall say: “I give thanks to You, O Lord! Although You were wroth with me, Your wrath has turned back and You comfort me. Behold the God who gives me triumph! I am confident, unafraid; for Y-ah the Lord is my strength and might, and He has been my deliverance [ozzi ve-zimrat Y-ah Hashem vayhi li li-yeshuah]” (Isa. 11:15-16, 12:1-2).

In his celebrated prophecy of redemption, Isaiah predicts a return of the exiles. Like the original exodus, the future redemption will involve the splitting of bodies of water so that the exiles can return. The people also will sing out of religious gratitude, paralleling the Song at the Sea. The expression ozzi ve-zimrat Y-ah Hashem vayhi li li-yeshuah (Isa. 12:2) is drawn from the Song at the Sea, ozzi ve-zimrat Y-ah vayhi li li-yeshuah (Exod. 15:2)—but Isaiah adds God’s full name, Hashem.

Rashi interprets this discrepancy in light of the battle against Amalek that followed the exodus (Exod. 17:8-16). There, God declared ongoing war against Amalek: “ki yad al kes Y-ah milhamah la-Hashem ba-Amalek mi-dor dor, hand upon the throne of Y-ah….” Rashi there explains that God’s name and throne will be incomplete as long as Amalek exists, hence the abridged words kes instead of kissei and Y-ah representing the first half of God’s full name. Applying this concept to Isaiah’s prophecy, Rashi (on Isa. 12:2) explains that in the messianic future, human evil finally will be eradicated. Therefore, those singing the religious song of gratitude will be able to use God’s full name, which at long last will be complete. Similarly, Amos Hakham (Da’at Mikra) suggests that God’s Presence will be manifest even more overtly than it was during the original exodus.

In the Haggadah, this theme is manifest most directly following the Grace after Meals. By reading the verses “pour out Your wrath” (Ps. 79:6–7), we express the truism that we cannot fully praise God with Hallel until we sigh from enemy oppression and recognize contemporary suffering. Many communities customarily open the door at this point for Elijah the Prophet, also expressing hope for redemption.

B. Jeremiah Chapter 2

Go proclaim to Jerusalem: Thus said the Lord: I accounted to your favor the devotion of your youth, your love as a bride—how you followed Me in the wilderness, in a land not sown. Israel was holy to the Lord, the first fruits of His harvest. All who ate of it were held guilty; disaster befell them—declares the Lord (Jer. 2:2-3).

What wrong did your fathers find in Me that they abandoned Me and went after delusion and were deluded? They never asked themselves, “Where is the Lord, Who brought us up from the land of Egypt, Who led us through the wilderness…” (2:5-6).

            In his first recorded prophecy to the people, Jeremiah offers a prophecy reminiscing about God’s beautiful relationship with Israel at the time of the exodus. Israel lovingly trusted God and entered the wilderness, but then sullied the relationship when they began to sin.

To correct this problem, they needed to circumcise their hearts, that is, to remove their outer layer of sin to recover their underlying pure and loving heart and restore the original relationship: “Circumcise your hearts to the Lord, remove the thickening about your hearts…” (4:4). Jeremiah draws this terminology from the Torah’s description of repentance (Deut. 10:16; 30:6). In Jeremiah’s prophecy, Israel’s trust in God during the exodus represented a pristine moment in the relationship.

C. Ezekiel Chapter 20

In his scathing rebuke in chapter 20, Ezekiel addresses a generation that wanted to assimilate into Babylonian culture. He surveys history to demonstrate that Israel had been sinful throughout its history but God saved them to avoid the desecration of His name. There never was a romantic layer of purity as described by Jeremiah. Rather, God redeemed the Israelites from Egypt despite their idolatry in order to avoid the desecration of God’s name (Ezek. 20:7-9).

            Ezekiel then presents a frightening prediction of redemption from the Babylonian exile. Even if the Jews wish to assimilate into the dominant Babylonian culture, God will forcibly redeem them. Strikingly, this prophecy casts Israel’s redemption as a punishment:

As I live—declares the Lord God—I will reign over you with a strong hand, and with an outstretched arm, and with overflowing fury [be-yad hazakah u-be-zeroa netuyah u-be-hemah shefukhah]. With a strong hand and an outstretched arm and overflowing fury [be-yad hazakah u-be-zeroa netuyah u-be-hemah shefukhah] I will bring you out from the peoples and gather you from the lands where you are scattered, and I will bring you into the wilderness of the peoples; and there I will enter into judgment with you face to face.… I will remove from you those who rebel and transgress against Me; I will take them out of the countries where they sojourn, but they shall not enter the land of Israel. Then you shall know that I am the Lord (Ezek. 20:33-38).

            In addition to the shockingly negative description of the redemption, Ezekiel also does not refer to a Babylonian downfall in this prophecy. In his introduction to the book, Abarbanel submits that since Ezekiel lived in Babylonia, it would be dangerous to prophesy the demise of his host nation. Therefore God did not reveal to Ezekiel prophecies about Babylonia’s downfall.

Beyond this utilitarian reason, there also appears to be a more fundamental purpose for Ezekiel’s omission of Babylonia. Babylonia is not the new Pharaoh in this exile-redemption model. Israel has replaced Pharaoh, and God therefore must rescue Israel from itself and its own hardened heart of stone (Ezek. 11:19; 36:26). Consequently, Israel will be plagued and some even killed in the “wilderness of the peoples.” Some then will be redeemed “with a strong hand and an outstretched arm and overflowing fury”—similar language as that used to describe the exodus from Egypt (Deut. 5:14; 26:8; Ps. 136:12). Just as the Torah repeats the expression “and the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord” (e.g., Exod. 7:5; 10:2; 14:4, 18), a refrain of the Book of Ezekiel is “and they shall know that I am the Lord” (approx. sixty times).

Additionally, Jeremiah and Ezekiel employ different heart imagery to illustrate their respective lessons derived from the exodus. Jeremiah depicts Israel’s relationship with God at the time of the exodus as pure, and then Israel’s sins created a barrier with God. If they would repent and circumcise their hearts, they could restore the underlying pristine state of the relationship. For Ezekiel, however, Israel always was sinful, so her heart was stone with no underlying healthy layer. Therefore, Ezekiel describes God’s giving Israel a heart transplant in the future and providing them with a healthy heart of flesh so that they finally may serve God properly.

To summarize: Isaiah models his prophecy of redemption after the exodus. He refers to bodies of water splitting, Israel will sing a song of gratitude, and God’s complete name will be fully manifest in the messianic era. In contrast, Ezekiel shockingly employs exodus terminology to describe a forcible process whereby Israel must be redeemed from itself rather than from an external enemy. Jeremiah appeals to Israel’s pristine faith at the time of the exodus that began a beautiful relationship with God that later was corrupted by Israel’s sins. He laments Israel’s forgetfulness of the covenant, but appeals to God’s enduring love of Israel and desire that they circumcise their hearts in repentance to restore the original relationship. In contrast, Ezekiel describes Israel as sinful from Egypt until his time. Their deadened hearts were of stone, and therefore they needed a divine heart transplant to serve God properly.

Psalms 78, 105-107

He established a decree in Jacob, ordained a teaching in Israel, charging our fathers to make them known to their children, that a future generation might know—children yet to be born—and in turn tell their children that they might put their confidence in God, and not forget God’s great deeds, but observe His commandments, and not be like their fathers, a wayward and defiant generation, a generation whose heart was inconstant, whose spirit was not true to God (Ps. 78:5-8).

Our forefathers in Egypt did not perceive Your wonders; they did not remember Your abundant love, but rebelled at the sea, at the Sea of Reeds (Ps. 106:7).

Psalm 78 focuses on Israel’s past lack of gratitude to God for all the goodness bestowed upon Israel and the desire to learn from and correct that error. Psalm 105 surveys history to teach that God always has protected Israel while in exile, and Israel in turn should serve God. Psalm 106 again focuses on Israel’s sins and ingratitude to God despite God’s goodness, and shows how God saved Israel whenever they prayed. These psalms draw heavily from the exodus account as a paradigm of God’s goodness to Israel and demonstrate Israel’s obligation to be grateful and faithful to God in return.

            Rabbi Elhanan Samet explains that Psalm 107 is a universal prayer that teaches gratitude to God for all kindnesses and forms the basis for the ha-gomel blessing. However, in the context of following Psalm 106, it also corrects the errors of the past. In the future redemption, when there is ingathering of the exiles, Israel will finally thank God:

“Praise the Lord, for He is good; His steadfast love is eternal!” Thus let the redeemed of the Lord say, those He redeemed from adversity, whom He gathered in from the lands, from east and west, from the north and from the sea (Ps. 107:1-3).

This prediction follows the account in Psalm 106 of the failure of previous generations to express gratitude to God. These psalms teach that unfaithfulness and ingratitude are fundamentally linked, and with proper gratitude to God comes faithfulness.[6]

            In a similar vein, the Haggadah draws from Midrash Psalms on Psalm 78, citing opinions that God brought 50, 200, or 250 plagues onto the Egyptians at the Red Sea. When one understands the context of the psalm as referring to Israel’s ingratitude despite God’s acts on their behalf, this section in the Haggadah rectifies that ingratitude. The Haggadah follows this midrashic selection with the Dayyenu, expressing gratitude to God for every step of the redemption.

Loving the Stranger

As we have seen, many biblical references to the exodus highlight God’s greatness and intervention in history; the foundation for Israel’s eternal covenant with God which includes faithfulness, gratitude, and education of children; the template for the future redemption; and the opportunity to learn from and correct mistakes of previous generations. These themes all are central to the Haggadah. Their common denominator is Israel’s unique covenantal relationship with God.

One element we have not considered, and that also is not featured as prominently in the Haggadah, is the universalistic lesson of the exodus. Many Torah laws require us to be particularly sensitive to downtrodden members of society and to love the stranger:

When a stranger resides with you in your land, you shall not wrong him. The stranger who resides with you shall be to you as one of your citizens; you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I the Lord am your God (Lev. 19:33-34).

You shall not subvert the rights of the stranger or the fatherless; you shall not take a widow’s garment in pawn. Remember that you were a slave in Egypt and that the Lord your God redeemed you from there; therefore do I enjoin you to observe this commandment (Deut. 24:17-18).[7]

Israel’s experience of slavery should teach them humility and the sensitivity to be ethical to all humanity. While the Haggadah focuses on our special relationship with God, a broader consideration of the biblical picture reminds us of our universal obligations to the underprivileged as well.

            To some extent, the invitation of the hungry to our Seder in the ha lahma anya echoes this theme. For the most part, however, the Haggadah focuses on Israel’s particularistic story and halakhah, creating an inward vision for the Seder night. When contemplating the exodus, however, it also is critical to remember the many halakhot in the Torah that shape our religious-moral vision directly from our experience as slaves in Egypt.

            All of these themes have profoundly impacted on rabbinic teachings, which stress that we are a living part of this ongoing story of the relationship between God and Israel, and that we must view ourselves as having left Egypt. Our moral responsibility, religious experience, transmission of our tradition to the next generation, and longing for the messianic era similarly manifest themselves as extensions of the foundational event of the exodus.

NOTES

“What are our capabilities if our critical patients develop renal failure and all the hospitals in town have no capacity to absorb them?”

As the chief of the nephrology department in a small hospital in a small city, this question has occupied me all week.  If a person’s kidneys fail, there is a fallback procedure, a miracle of modern science, with which physicians are capable of cleaning that person’s blood when the kidneys are no longer capable of doing so.  A technology available for little more than the past half-century, dialysis has saved the lives of countless individuals.  However, for critically ill individuals whose bodies are incapable of generating a strong blood pressure, the added stress caused by normal dialysis can be more than the person can tolerate.  For these critically ill patients, removing the amount of blood necessary to filter through the machine can be deadly if done in the standard way. 

Fortunately, we are still able to perform dialysis on the medically labile among these critically ill patients, but continuously instead of in a discrete session.  Running the procedure at a slower, gentler pace produces less of an adverse effect on blood pressures.  However, continuous dialysis requires 24/7 monitoring by physicians, nurses, and technicians comfortable administering this different modality.  Small hospitals normally transfer patients who require continuous dialysis (commonly referred to as CRRT – continuous renal replacement therapy) to larger hospitals nearby that perform this procedure routinely.

Now the world finds itself in the midst of a pandemic the likes of which has not been seen for more than a century.  Severe acute respiratory syndrome Coronavirus 2, the virus causing Coronavirus disease 19 (COVID 19), has been associated with hundreds of thousands of infections and thousands of deaths worldwide.  As of earlier this week, we now have confirmed cases in our city.

For weeks now the media has been haranguing us non-stop with COVID 19 news.  Wuhan, China, a city with a population of more than 11 million, is basically becoming a ghost town.  Deaths are occurring in Italy because the healthcare system lacks the capacity to treat as many critically ill patients as the country currently has.  Meanwhile, selfish individuals hoard medical supplies, hand sanitizers, and toilet paper.  The media, foreign governments, and even our own government have disseminated so much misinformation that it is difficult to separate truth from error.  Facebook, a bastion of spreading pseudoscience and medical bunk, has been an infuriating mess of confusing nonsense, with dozens of useless pieces of advice for every good one.

During this crisis, I have already been barred from traveling to take our planned vacation for Pesach.  My wife and I were already resigned to being unable to visit with our families for the holiday, but now it is likely that I will be working in the hospital during arguably the most family-oriented holiday in the Jewish calendar.  On occasions when I find myself in the hospital, in front of a computer working (activities that would normally be forbidden) on Shabbat, I sometimes think of Vayikra chapter 18, verse 5, which states, “And you shall keep My statutes and My ordinances, which Man shall do and live by them – I am Hashem.”  The Talmud famously states that “live by them” means that you, and others, shall not die by them.  Thus, a potential loss of life and health supersedes nearly every commandment, even one as important as Shabbat.  Although driving in to work to treat ill patients seemed extremely odd years ago when I was still a junior physician starting training, those feelings have vanished. 

Any rabbi worth his salt (which is an important measurement when one is a nephrologist) will be immeasurably better versed than I in the Halachot pertaining to a health crisis.  Nevertheless, I called the rabbi of my shul last evening to discuss plans for this Shabbos’s Davening and classes, mainly to give my opinion that the shul should close.  After a short discussion, the rabbi agreed with my opinion and decided to suspend all classes and services.  This decision has precedent, as other synagogues across the world have been making similar decisions over the past several weeks.  Additionally, there are countless stories of rabbis suspending services, closing synagogues, and mandating restrictions on fasting, even on Yom Kippur, the holiest and most important fast day of the year, because of previous medical emergencies. 

There will be no minyan in my shul this week, partly from my advice.  Living in a small Jewish community, I have said many times in shul, “Heaven forbid that we have no minyan here because of me.”  I try my utmost to be present whenever possible, but this situation is different.  Despite knowing that closing was the correct course of action, I spent many hours last evening contemplating my advice, and my part in the shul closing still haunted me when I awakened in the morning.

Every day I arrive at my hospital prior to sunrise, so I have generally work for several hours before I am able to don my Tallit and Tefillin and say the morning Tefilot.  With the current pandemic and the needed flexibility to change protocols instantly to keep up with an ever-evolving understanding of SARS-COV-2, my days this week have been very long and never standard.  I have had days in the past when I have had to miss Z’man Tefilah, but not even having time to eat or sit for more than a few minutes to answer a critical email has been the standard so far this week.  Today I made an additional mistake – I checked Facebook before coming to work.  In one group where physicians and mid-level practitioners come together to share COVID 19 information and updates, multiple individuals talked about hoarding supplies of one medicine with potential benefits for personal use.  I rushed all morning from meeting to meeting, calling patients, and drafting policies, all while being absolutely infuriated by the behavior described in those posts.

Thankfully, around noon today, more than seven hours after I arrived at work, I was able to grab a few minutes to daven.  When one can relax and stand before the One Who “makes peace and creates all,” the high stress of the day melts away.  How can it be that an individual would feel less anxiety when speaking to his Creator?  I remind myself that although our illusion of control now appears shattered, Hashem is here for us and always will be.

Si’man 336 of the Shulchan Arukh Yoreh De’ah opens with the statement, “The Torah has granted the physician permission to heal, and it is a religious duty which comes under the rule of saving an endangered life.”  Saving the life of a fellow human being is such a great imperative that it supersedes everything else in Jewish law.  If so, why by healing does “Hashem grant permission” to perform the commandment (especially one deemed so very important), but not by any other commandment do we require this permission? 

As we sit in judgement during the high holidays, we say in Unetanneh Tokef that it is Hashem who determines our fate: “How many will pass from the earth and how many will be created; who will live and who will die.”  If Hashem makes this determination, we might therefore say that health and disease are fully under the will of Heaven, and thus we are forbidden to interfere.  Therefore, the Shulchan Arukh teaches us that Hashem wants us to do everything in our power to save a life, even if it would mean having to break nearly any and every other commandment to do so.  Because we are given permission to heal, we must do everything in our power to do so, exerting ourselves in this pursuit to our utmost.  In fact, we healthcare workers are partners with Hashem in bringing patients back to health.  Just as Hashem originally created in the world a single human life, the Mishna in Sanhedrin teaches us that one who saves a life is like one who has saved the whole world.

So, what do we do if the hospitals in town are at capacity and our patients need CRRT?  When the community standard of care is not available, how do we step up and do our part to save those who need us?

We do every darn thing possible. 

Unsurprisingly, doing everything possible is the unified thought and feeling of everyone in my hospital.  I have been an exceedingly small part of bringing this goal to fruition, and seeing everyone step up to be prepared to handle anything that comes our way has been a truly humbling and inspiring experience.  Every nurse, technician, physician, and other healthcare worker on the ground is running at full force to do his or her part, while our administrators and support staff work seemingly non-stop to address the needs for patient care that their clinicians bring to them.

With Hashem’s help, this crisis too shall pass.  Until it does, your health care workers are all braving this pandemic to treat the ill.  So too everyone must do his and her part to protect the most vulnerable among us.  In this pursuit, we are all healers and partners with Hashem in saving the world.  We do not want, Heaven forbid, the blood of our loved ones to be on our hands by inadvertently spreading a highly infectious and potentially life-threatening disease to those who cannot fight it.  Please, follow the recommendations from the CDC.  Practice social distancing as much as humanly possible.  Even with Pesach coming in the near future, minimize the number of people at your Seder and do your best to avoid hoarding household goods, cleaning supplies, or food. 

Contact your doctor if you have medical questions, and everyone, stay safe.  B'hatzlacha.

Introduction 

    Openness to travel seems basic to the Jewish soul. Just as Jews are said to be “The people

of the Book,” they may be aptly described historically as “The people of the journey or voyage.”

As recent works such as Pilgrimage and the Jews by David Gitlitz and Linda Kay

Davidson and Reorienting the East by Martin Jacobs reveal, voluntary travel has long

held a vital part in Jewish communal history. Lesser known to Judaic scholars, however,

is the role of travel in early Hasidism to promote individual well-being. Especially in light of

growing psychological interest in how travel strengthens such desirable traits as gratitude,

kindness, and contentment, I’d like to highlight the intriguing technique of early Hasidic

counseling which I call directed travel. This paper will explore its basic features, the

possible underlying dynamics that contributed to its success, and implications for adaption today. 

The historical backdrop  

    Life was hard for Jews in 19th-century Eastern Europe. Especially for the majority who

resided in impoverished shtetls, economic and political hardship, combined with social

immobility, caused widespread despair. Stagnation was not only a communal phenomenon

but also experienced psychologically by many individuals who saw no possibility of opportunity

or change. In this milieu, early Hasidic leaders were highly concerned about identifying

symptoms of melancholy (depression in today’s terminology) and its resulting dangers. Even a

casual perusal of their sermons and tracts indicates this outlook.

    For example, Rabbi Nachman of Breslov stated that “One who is sad brings upon oneself

many afflictions” and “Sadness leads to quarrels; joy to peace.” Similarly, Rabbi Yechiel

Danziger asserted that “Sadness is the worst quality in a person…To the one obsessed by

sadness, one’s very body feels heavy to carry around. One cannot abide oneself or others.”

More pointedly, the Chabad-Lubavitch founder Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liady observed

in his major work Tanya that “Melancholy renders a person unresponsive and unable to

act. It deprives him of his capabilities and strips him of his energy.”       

    To help congregants overcome such distress, Hasidic rebbes forged a variety of

interventions. Some were relatively traditional in scope and format, such as relying on prayer

combined with ritual objects to bolster religious faith and hope in general. However, one of the

most innovative techniques, with particular relevance today for positive psychology and

counseling, used travel as a way to break emotional stagnation and spur decision-making. This is

how it worked.

      At least twice per year, hasidim would typically meet individually with their rebbe in an

encounter known as yechidus. The term refers to a private meeting between rebbe and Hasid, and

is linked to the Hebrew word for “unity”).  In the yechidus, which was imbued with deep

meaning for its participants, hasidim sought a blessing and sometimes specific guidance

concerning troubling circumstances, such as involving livelihood or family matters. A

dialogue would take place, often comprising question-and-answer between rebbe and hasid. The

“advice” phase of the yechidus was known as the etzah (a cognate of the Hebrew root-word etz

or tree), in which the rebbe would prescribe a remedy for action. Hasidic imagery depicted the

etzah as a method by which the rebbe directs a hasid, just as an expert gardener turns or bends a

tree for more fruitful growth; for this reason, Rabbi Nachman of Breslov poetically described the

rebbe as the “master of the orchard.”

    Within the etzah or action-remedy phase of yechidus that followed heartfelt dialogue, the

rebbe’s advice to supplicants was sometimes to travel alone to a particular, unfamiliar location

and “there you will find the answer to your problem.” That was all. Nothing more specific was

provided in the rebbe’s directive and no time-frame for attaining the redemptive solution was

given. In conveying this etzah, the rebbe’s tone was wholly supportive and confident. No matter

if the stipulated location seemed irrelevant in relation to the hasid’s perceived adversity, the

rebbe’s wisdom was viewed as transcending common-sense criteria, and rebuttal was therefore

rare.     

    Regarding the rebbe as virtually infallible due to his holiness, the hasid would depart in

an emotional state of high expectation, and often, with renewed hope and long suppressed

optimism about the future. The assigned destination was not only unfamiliar, but also one in

which he or she was a stranger. Trusting implicitly in the rebbe’s visionary ability, the

hasid would be far more conscious than usual of surroundings: that is, in contemporary

English usage, behaving with much greater mindfulness.

    Upon arrival at the assigned locale, the hasid was guided by the teaching that the divine is

hidden within the ordinary aspects of everyday life. A related notion was that divine messages

are often communicated by symbols, rather than direct and obvious statements, and lastly, that

all people are potential messengers in a higher plan; whether they’re consciously aware of their

role isn’t necessary or important. With ardent belief in these theological concepts, the hasid was

sure that seemingly random events might harbor deep mysteries, revelations, and, ultimately, the

“answer to your problem.” And so, the hasid confidently opened his or her sensibility to observe

and ponder the deeper meaning of commonplace, even trivial happenings.  

   How might the epiphany be catalyzed? Through an overheard conversation between

strangers, an unexpected encounter in the marketplace with a past acquaintance, a beautiful

natural vista, or a vivid dream that night in the inn? Possibly any or none of those. Instead, it

might come as the hasid gazed at unfamiliar faces and scenes--and suddenly longed for home. Or

it might come after experiencing hours of slow-moving time dissociated from all of one’s

familiar, daily routines. Whatever the specific spark, it would ultimately bring the “answer to

your problem.” When the grateful, newly-empowered hasid (or other individual) would return to

the rebbe and extol his uncanny guidance, the rebbe’s gentle reply was frequently reported as:    

“You already had the answer inside you. I simply helped you to find it.”         

Why was directed travel effective?   

    Of course, it’s unlikely that every case of directed travel in early Hasidism was successful.   Undoubtedly, some supplicants including the most ardent hasidim failed to gain an epiphany with transformative power; as to what the next step might have been for such persons is historically unclear. However, from the commonality of this technique in early Hasidic counseling, we can safely assume its general effectiveness, and more importantly for us today, unravel the underlying reasons why. This latter task is necessary because Hasidic rebbes did not produce any texts that explicated the theory and practice of directed travel as a means to empower individuals feeling emotionally blocked or stymied, or to paraphrase Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liady, those “unable to act and stripped of energy.” Based on concepts from positive psychology, however, it’s possible to construct a viable explanatory model, one with relevance for contemporary application. Four overlapping considerations seem most relevant. 

    Firstly, the rebbe’s warm, empathic encouragement during the yechidus encounter can be seen as strengthening hope--a quality that scientific research has linked to such beneficial outcomes as increased happiness, greater personal achievement, and even lowered risk of death. Empirical studies have shown that hopeful people have a greater sense that life is meaningful, and that emotional hope in particular is connected to happiness. Indeed, an entire body of positive psychology, known as hope theory, emphasizes the vital role of hope in bolstering daily well-being.    

     Secondly, the rebbe’s directive to travel alone for several days allowed the hasid to escape, at least temporarily, from the tight, often constricting, network of social relations that characterized Jewish life during that era.

Indeed, this getaway for some may have marked their   first time to be unfettered from constant interaction with social intimates, however well-meaning,

who imposed their own perceptions and values on the hasid’s life. Such a sense of freedom,

whether consciously or unconsciously felt, must surely have been uplifting and helped generate 

an epiphany.

    Thirdly, the process of journeying alone for several days can be identified as creating a

precious “space” for mental de-cluttering and self-reflection.  Certainly, this phase would have

complemented that of physical disengagement just described. It may be no coincidence that

Jewish mystical theology, such as conveyed in the 13th-century Zohar and embraced by Hasidic

leaders, taught that the physical universe was created by a “vacated space” in which the divine

essence was withdrawn. In the esoteric branch of Judaism known as Kabbalah, this classic

theological concept is called the tzimzum. Thus, deeply embedded within early Hasidism was the

notion that even at the highest levels of existence, creation requires “space” or “room” for

growth. Guided by this notion, rebbes may therefore have deliberately sought to foster mental

detachment (and subsequent creative problem-solving) by mandating several days of solo travel.

    Fourthly, in considering the hasid’s heightened sense of awareness in arriving at the

assigned destination, where everything seen and heard is potentially meaningful, the 

concept of mindfulness advanced by Dr. Ellen Langer of Harvard University seems highly

relevant. That is, based on the socio-cognitive notion that people often go through daily life in a

mental state akin to “autopilot,” she has defined mindfulness “as the process of paying attention

on purpose to the present moment, of being aware of novelty in experiences and contexts and

events.” Dr. Langer emphasizes its importance in constructive thinking and learning,

and additional researchers have linked such mindfulness to fewer symptoms of emotional

distress including anxiety, depression, and obsessive-compulsive tendencies.

    Thus, it seems likely that by experiencing a wholly unfamiliar locale in a state of heightened

awareness, the hasid could transcend his or her usual condition of “autopilot” functioning

and achieve a state of intense mindfulness, in which insight and epiphany could emerge. 

This third phase of the hasid’s journey might be called that of discovery. Involving a heightened

interest in one’s surroundings, it also appears relevant to mounting research in positive

psychology on curiosity as a motivating force contributing to personal meaning and well-being.

 Implications for Application 

      Can the technique of directed travel be transferred successfully from such a different cultural

milieu to our own time? After all, mental health professionals are hardly regarded as holy

figures, and for most of us, travel is less arduous and adventurous than it was in 19th-century

Eastern Europe. Nevertheless, I’m convinced that meaningful adaptations are indeed possible to

spur personal growth and decision-making; these particularly relate to Langer’s concept of

mindfulness versus auto-pilot functioning. Indeed, people today may have an even greater need

to transcend their daily routine than those during the early Industrial Age. Of course, nowadays

it’s constant dependency on the Internet and smart phone usage that negate self-reflection and

encourage passivity, rather than the social pressures of small-town life.

     Firstly, as a method of personal growth, individuals can self-initiate directed travel: that is,

without the necessity for obtaining a mandate from a rebbe-like, external guiding figure.

Self-initiated directed travel can be undertaken whenever decision-making is needed on a

pressing matter, or when feels chronically bored, stagnant, or emotionally adrift. Rather than

responding to an external directive, one chooses an unfamiliar location at least several hours

away by transportation, preferably where extended strolling or hiking is possible, and goes there

alone. Certainly, before embarking, it’s useful to plant the “seed thought” through deep

relaxation that within the self-assigned locale, “the answer to my problem will be found.” To

avoid the possibility of egoistic influence in selecting the destination, one can invite a friend to

suggest it, or with eyes closed, make a random choice on a regional map.  

    To enhance receptivity to events large and small, it’s preferable to use public transportation,

since automobile driving tends to narrow rather than expand our attentiveness to surroundings.

No advance itinerary should be scheduled, and it’s important to bring a journal for writing

observations, insights, or epiphanies. As much as possible, it’s best to adopt the early

Hasidic outlook that witnessed events and overhead conversations of all types can be interpreted

symbolically; sometimes “the answer” will lie precisely in such symbolism. What make

self-initiated directed travel experientially different from ordinary tourism is the necessity for

choosing an unfamiliar place, dispensing with an itinerary, and deliberately “seeding” an attitude

of utmost mindfulness. 

    Secondly, directed travel can be used as an adjunct in counseling. In this situation, the

counselor suggests a specific destination based on content from previous counseling sessions

including the client’s dreams. The crucial consideration is that the prospective destination is

unfamiliar to the client from past experience, and one in which ample strolling or hiking is

possible. For both self-initiated and counseling forms of directed travel, the ease of airplane

usage allows for much more distant journeys than were common in the early Hasidic era.   

     Not all counseling cases may lend themselves well to the early Hasidic technique of

directed travel. Of course, clinical judgment is necessary. But growing research from positive

psychology and allied fields suggests a solid scientific basis for its efficacy in spurring personal

growth and epiphanic experience. 

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Several years ago, for Pessah, I visited the "lost tribe of Ephraim" in Southern India.
For more info about them check out this helpful wikipedia article https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bene_Ephraim

This clan of about 150 people claim to be descendants of the lost tribes of Israel. They practice Jewish traditions, celebrate most of the holidays, and have started to practice many Mitzvot, often in their unique style!

For example, in their tradition, on Erev Pessah they slaughter a goat and put the blood on their doorposts! They were shocked to discover that most of the Jewish world doesn't do that! In general they were thrilled to learn more about how "mainstream Judaism" is being practiced in the rest of the world. Many even dream of a day when they could move to the holy land of Israel.

While I came to help lead Seder, I ended up learning much from our Indian experience! Here are a few lessons and highlights!

Lesson #1 The Power of Music

About 10 minutes after our arrival at the South Indian village in Chebrolu, I realized we had a problem. They don’t speak English!! OK, so we had a translator, and a few spoke English, but in general, how were we supposed to share the depth of our Torah traditions…when they can’t understand us?

The answer of course…was through the magic of music.

Music is the language which can break down all barriers, and so, during the seder, during kabbalat Shabbat, before during and after shiurim…we made sure to sing and dance…a lot.
Reb Shlomo Carlebach teaches that in the end of days, music will be the vehicle to bring the world back to the knowledge of God!

One night, after a long class with the villagers, 4 youthful Indian friends escorted us back to the hotel. (After 5 nights of bucket showers in 120 degree weather, and “natural” bathrooms, we had decided to splurge on an Indian hotel for the last nights of our stay.)

Our late night voyages was sweet, the weather was cooler, and the roads were slightly less chaotic. But as our translator wasn’t there, we sat silently together in the car.
Until one Indian boy, with a big smile on his face asked “Rav Keith... you know “Shabcheey”? And of course I did. And suddenly the Indian roads, with temples, churches and mosques on all sides, were filled with 6 souls singing every Jewish song we could think! We sang, Am Yisrael Chai, Kol Haolam Koolo and even Hatikvah at the top of our lungs. My wife and I were in shock, but they knew every word. It truly was a night we will not forget!

Lesson #2: The Power of Sincerity

After each night of Q and A, we would stand up to fulfill the Mitzvah of counting the Omer.
I had explained to them the details of how this Halakha was carried out, and sprinkled in some of its spiritual significance. After counting the Omer, I still felt, that we were missing something. I wasn’t ready to end the class.

And so I added on a new tradition: a Chassidic-Telugu blend. After the counting, we would add on 3 minutes of silent prayer. As most of the Telugi could not read Hebrew, formal texts were hard for them to grasp, but personal prayer…that was something that these people truly excelled at!

After two minutes of prayer, I sneakily opened my eyes, to see how everyone was doing. Soon my eyes were in tears. Perhaps they were praying for a job, or for their sister to find a suitable marriage match, or maybe they were praying to one day come to Jerusalem, but whatever it was, they were all completely immersed in sincere Tefillah.

And I kept thinking to myself…imagine if we had this type of sincerity in our communities' prayer services!

OK, so we may have some of the rituals down…but if we could only incorporate these peoples' sincerity into our Mitzvot, what a different Judaism we would have!

Lesson # 3 The Power of Thanks

In Hebrew, India is called “Hodu”. Hodu means to thank. At first, I was convinced, that the meaning of this was: “India has truly made me thankful and appreciative that… I don’t live in India!!!”

For example:
Thank God, I have a normal shower that doesn’t consist of a bucket of lukewarm water!
Thank God, I can walk across the street in Jerusalem without almost being run over by a motorbike, a beggar and a cow!
Thank God, I have enough money to afford basic medical needs, like asthma containers.
Thank God, I don’t have to live in a place so hot that one is forced to hibernate from 10am to 5 pm, and thank God I’m not stuck working in those conditions just to eke out 5 dollars a day, to support my family.

I truly felt blessed and thankful that I have been born into such a life of relative luxury.

And yet, as our Indian journey continued, my wife and I realized that there may be a totally different way of understanding why India is called Hodu. Ironically these people actually walked around and gave thanks far more than their richer Westernized counterparts. Virtually everyone in India has a religion. And virtually everyone makes a time for prayer, and thankfulness in their lives. Ironically, the ones who seem to have the most to be thankful for, are the ones who are most negligent of this basic obligation.

And so, India has come to symbolize the land of thankfulness, as it reminds me of my obligation, of the privilege to say thanks…even when life is tough.

So thank you Hashem, for giving me the amazing privilege of learning from these "Telugu Jews", and I hope that readers of this essay have learned something too!

QUESTION:

According to Orthodox Judaism in all of its iterations, the Torah is the word of God that was given to and was accepted by the people Israel. The only vote to which the Torah contract was subject was taken when Israel agreed to accept that Torah as its Constitution as a whole package. Once in force, the Torah’s parts are equally sacred and uniformly binding.

     This Torah Constitution’s narrative also proclaims that humans are created in God’s “image,” with each individual carrying an equal and infinite moral worth.

     Democracy is the rule, the kratos, of the people, the demos. How can the rule of “the people,” who are mortal and finite, be compatible with the rule of God, Who is infinite and eternal? How might Judaism, with its immutable Torah, embrace democracy, the ever-changing will of the people?

ANSWER:

     The Jewish State of Israel is self-defined as both democratic and Jewish. “Judaism” and “democracy” are abstract nouns with distinct semantic fields of meaning. Israel, the nation-state of the Jewish people, stands for some values and excludes others. Democracies also have limits, which distinguish between citizens who are full members of the polity, and resident non-citizens, minors, and incarcerated prisoners, who are not full members of the polity.

The argument that Orthodox Judaism and democracy are incompatible value systems is grounded in some very compelling claims:

• God’s ways and laws are not human inventions. God’s law is absolute and eternal, while human law is finite, fallible, and ephemeral.
• God’s laws cannot and may not ever be changed; in contrast, democracy often reflects the ever changing mood of the public. Hence, the two systems cannot be merged.
• “Democracy” is not mentioned, much less endorsed, in the Torah Constitution. Before we perform an act, we require a heter, a release, permission, and dispensation of a Rav, a duly recognized Orthodox rabbi, because we dare not defy the Divine will, even inadvertently.
• Democracy falsely deludes people with the fantasy called “rights,” which nurtures an egotistical, autonomous individualism that undermines the modest submissiveness that necessarily accompanies the dutiful compliance that Torah law demands. Accordingly, Torah Judaism imposes obligations; there is no place for “rights” in a Law issued by the most absolute of monarchs.
• Last, democracy advances the freedom of the autonomous individual, while Torah law requires that Jews remain the submissive “servants of the Holy One,” deferring to God’s will as it is understood and interpreted by the Great Rabbis, who are singularly authorized to read and apply Torah. 
   

These arguments reflect a popular—but flawed—view of the Orthodox Judaism embedded in the Oral Torah, Orthodox Judaism’s “official religion,” as will be explained below.

• God’s ways are indeed not human inventions or conventions, and God’s will is absolutely and eternally binding. But God does not act as a tyrant. God’s law is no longer in Heaven )Deut. 30:12); Torah’s wisdom is evident even to non-Israelite observers (Deut. 4:6); and there are no normative, secret Torah doctrines (Deut. 29:28). God’s Divine Torah law contains positive, i.e., “to do” rules, and negative, i.e., “not to do” rules. In addition, the Jewish Supreme Court, the Bet Din haGadol, is authorized and empowered to legislate Torah law (Deut. 17:8–11). This post-Mosaic law is called (a) “Torah” and (b) is also “the word of the Lord’” (Isaiah 2:3). The wisdom of this law is manifest in its transparency. Deuteronomy 1:1 reports that “these are the words that Moses spoke.” The word “these” is a demonstrative pronoun, implying that the Torah refers to “these words” that are recorded in Scripture, to which one may neither add nor subtract. Prophets and visionaries who claim that God commanded anything else to Israel commit a capital offense (Deut. 13:1–6). This Divine law has a human component; after all, it is written in understandable human language (Midrash Sekhel Tov, Bereshith, VaYetsei 30:13), whose plain sense meaning is accessible to the Israelite public (bShabbat 63a), which is authorized to hold its leaders to account (Ruth Rabba 1:1), thus outlawing tyranny. These Torah facts empower Jewry to hold its elites to account based upon the Torah’s readable benchmarks. These doctrines are not taught in Orthodox schools, synagogues, camps, and youth groups because Orthodoxy’s institutional leadership does not wish to be held to account. Those who believe that Judaism and democracy are incompatible suppress Judaism’s democratic qualities; those who take the religion prescribed in Judaism’s sacred library seriously will celebrate democracy and the independent, conscience-driven heroes that Torah narrative commends.

• There are some rules, specifically the 613 Torah commandments and those ancient Laws that were given from the moment (not just the place) of Sinai, that are not subject to change or dispute. Other rules may undergo, and indeed have undergone, change. We are informed that there is a “tradition” that women may not slaughter animals. But (a) the Oral Law explicitly permits women to slaughter animals, and (b) the reason given for the post-talmudic restriction, that the holy community has not seen women slaughtering, is not a valid rule or reason to forbid an act according to m’Eduyyot. 2:2. (See the conversation at Bet Yosef Yoreh Deah 1:1.) Here, a culture “tradition” changed a law by disallowing women’s slaughter and this change, we are told, is now no longer subject to change. Although bBetsa 30a forbids dancing and clapping on Jewish Holy Days, Tosafot (ad. loc.) contends that the reason for the law’s enactment, that people may come to repair musical instruments on Holy Days, no longer applies in Tosafist times. At Iggrot Moshe Orah Hayyim 2:100, R. Moshe Feinstein concurs with this change that overrides a formal, legislated rabbinic law. Changes that do not violate valid rabbinic norms are halakhically valid. Yet sometimes anomalies and inconsistencies do occur. The merits of these changes in Jewish Law are beyond the scope of this study. These citations show that in practice, Orthodox Judaism does tolerate change by taking popular practice, taste, and habit into account. While Jewry is required to obey Torah rules, Israel is not commanded to preserve culture traditions that are not formal norms.  Accordingly, what affiliating Jews do is part, but not the entirety, of the Divine equation. The Talmud (bBetsa 30a) reminds zealous rabbis that “it is preferred that people sin in ignorant error than to be tempted to sin in wanton disregard for God’s command.”  The Law’s pedagogic agenda reminds rabbis to reprove wisely and appropriately but not obsessively.

• God’s perfect Torah is complete. Any act that is neither commanded nor forbidden is authorized and permitted. Although some religions allow its clergy to forgive sin, sell indulgences, or issue heterim, or dispensations, the contemporary Orthodox Rav is a judge and teacher, not an oracle, magician, or legislator. Therefore, if the Talmud does not forbid an act, like going to college in order to obtain a professional education, then Orthodox rabbis may not declare, with apodictic certainty, that acquiring a secular education or developing critical thinking skills are forbidden activities. Those aspects of collegiate culture that are halakhically problematic, like some professors’ “militant secularism” and the collegiate culture of sexual license, require address; but acquiring earning power or gaining a broader education is not forbidden by God’s perfect law. In the gaps in the Law, where there is no formal, recorded statutory restriction, personal religious autonomy trumps rabbinic policy preferences. When filling these gaps in Torah legislation, democratic deliberations are the preferred Torah response.

• Unless a norm is legislated and memorialized in the Oral Law library, it is not a binding halakhic norm. Democracy is not forbidden by Jewish law. It is therefore a permitted form of government (a) simply because democracy is not forbidden by statute and (b) if democratic decisions do not abolish or contradict Torah law, those decisions have met the benchmark of a Jewishly valid ruling. In American law, rights are what Ronald Dworkin calls “trumps” possessed by individuals or by a minority in order to protect them against the tyranny of the majority. These rights empower the individual to be a citizen who is capable of being an active moral agent. Individual rights restrict the blind will of the majority. For Orthodox Judaism, rights derive from the legal fact that an act is permitted if it is not forbidden. So if an act is neither commanded nor forbidden, it is fair game for democratic legislation. The biblical Edah may also be described as a primitive democracy because it does not vote on the validity of Torah, but does vote on policy, budget, social services, and defense. In point of fact, democracy is also memorialized in Torah law as majority rule (Exodus 23:2 and bBaba Mezi’a 59b). By permitting what is not forbidden, the Torah Constitution carves out areas of personal and communal discretion, autonomy, and freedom. Like the American Bill of Rights, which limits majority rule in order to create a citizen who is a proactive moral agent endowed with personal dignity and conscience, the Torah allows its adherents to make their own, informed moral judgments. Since democracy and Torah both nurture their subjects to be politically and socially equal, democracy is actually the preferred form of Jewish self-government. God trusted Israel with the Torah to apply it appropriately.

• There are people who are unable to endure what R. Abraham Joshua Heschel called “the insecurity of freedom.” These voices maintain that it is better to obey the human leadership blindly, and not make mistakes due to limited human understanding, perspectives, and knowledge. After all, the charismatic rabbinic leadership is blessed, we are told, with the Holy Spirit, and faith in God demands faith in these charismatic rabbis’ virtual infallibility. In his Collected Letters 3:92, R. Abraham Karelitz claims that the Great Hareidi Rabbis must be obeyed in matters of Law and policy, because their opinion is presented to be Torah incarnate.

According to this view, democracy violates the sovereign authority—and immunity—of the Great Rabbis. While it is true that the Torah’s norms are not subject to vote, Torah opinion must be argued and defended by appealing to a rational reading of a shared Torah canon (Deut. 33:4) and by demonstrating how and why suggested changes do or do not violate legislated Oral Torah norms. Halakhic authority does not reside in charisma, intuition, or non-appointed office holders who lay claim to special inspiration, and authority. This power is not given to any elite other than the Bet Din haGadol sitting in plenary session at the yet to be rebuilt Jerusalem Temple (bSota 45a), not in any rabbinic committee, organization, or association. If Torah law were truly inviolate for anti-democratic Orthodoxy, R. Karelitz would require rather than forbid military service of men and women, as reported at and required by bSota 44b. R. Karelitz passionately opposed Orthodox military service at his Collected Letters 1:111. An informed Jewish citizen will rightly ask, “If the Oral Law is not subject to change, then by what authority does R. Karelitz forbid what the Torah canon requires?” Democracy empowers its citizens with rights, allowing Jewry to ask its leaders, “Why did you decide the Law as you did?” R. Karelitz is able to forbid a universal draft because for him the Law is the means of control that only the Great Rabbi is authorized to apply. But for R. Karelitz and his cohorts, “tradition” is the received—or remembered—culture of the Hareidi street, which is ruled by the Great Rabbis whose charisma invests them with religious infallibility and political immunity. Orthodox rabbis who disapprove of democracy shift the locus of Torah authority from the plain sense reading of the canonical text to the inspired charisma of their own canonical persons. After all, since their teachings are “the way of Torah,” no one may comment on what the Torah requires but them. Alternatively, Orthodox rabbis who approve of democracy believe that the Torah library is readable, and that rabbinic leaders may be held to account for their decisions. The Jew praises God every morning “for not making me a slave.” The Torah law that was given to all Israel liberates Jewry from being mental slaves by teaching Jews to judge their judges if and when they deserve to be judged. The fact that the Torah was engraved (harut) on stone generates political freedom (herut) because the Torah laws do not tolerate manipulation or misrepresentation so that the Jew knows when, where, and how to legitimately assert one’s autonomy. The Torah’s moral agenda aims to produce a population committed to a Law that is both a prescriptive code and a liberating descriptive map. The committed Jew is bound by the Torah’s legal norms, not the policies of any oligarchic elite.

• Last, Torah law requires that Jewry remain the “servants of God” by complying with the norms recorded in the Torah documentary trove. Those who believe that Orthodox Judaism and democracy are not compatible maintain that (a) since God’s word is unreadable, (b) His will is inscrutable, and (c) Jewry must take direction from its Great Rabbis, who are singularly qualified to issue Da’as Torah, or apodictic Torah opinions. The ideal Jew is a submissive, obedient, compliant individual who faithfully and unquestionably defers to the Great Rabbis, who are guided by God’s inspiration. And those who believe that democracy and Orthodox Judaism are compatible take God at His word, that the Torah is readable, God’s will is revealed in the plain sense of the sacred canon, the post-talmudic rabbi explains what the sacred canon says, but is neither a canonical person nor legislator for anyone who does not reside within his geographic jurisdiction.

For democratic Orthodoxy, the ideal Jew is a moral agent who knows how to determine “what is right and good” (Deut.  6:18), who is prepared to hold her or his Jewish leaders to account, and for whom God’s will is no more and no less than fidelity to Torah’s norms and to one’s own Torah informed moral compass. The democratic Orthodox Jew has the courage to challenge human authority if and when that authority conflicts with Torah’s norms. Non-democratic Orthodoxy is reflected by the Torah’s portrait of Joshua as a young man. When Eldad and Medad were prophesying in the camp without an official commission, Joshua begs Moses to arrest them. Moses asks his squire rhetorically, “Are you really jealous for me” (Numbers 11:26–29)?” Moses here teaches Joshua that Torah truth is not a franchise owned by an oligarchy; it is a gift that God in principle gives to all Israel. Learning this lesson very well, Joshua is willing—and able—to publicly contradict the ten spies who lacked the faith and courage to take God at His word, that Israel is capable of conquering Canaan. Joshua is able to defy the Israelite elite simply because this elite defied and denied God’s commission to scout the Promised Land )Numbers 14:6–9) in preparation for a Divinely assured conquest. The spies were not commissioned or authorized to pass judgment on the content of God’s promise. The Torah democracy’s “hidden curriculum” nurtures religiously independent moral consciences, not robots who defer to their fears or to the social franchise of institutional Orthodoxy. Put in contemporary terms, when scandals like sexual abuse arise in the Orthodox community, some have an instinct to protect Orthodox institutions, franchises, and leadership, so as not to embarrass its supposedly infallible elite. But we should have a reflexive response to protect the innocent, to uproot evil, and to call the authorities in order “to remove the evil from our midst.” When a person is pursuing or endangering the Jewish public, the civil authorities are called immediately. When there is danger of profaning God’s Name, respect for rabbinic elites must be suspended (bBerakhot 19b and elsewhere). Democratic Orthodoxy challenges its adherents to become moral agents; anti-democratic Orthodoxy infantilizes its affiliates by demanding social compliance and conformity to whatever folkways its rabbinic elite believes will generate a shared communal sense of sectarian otherness. The modern political “right” is called “zekhut” in contemporary Hebrew, and in rabbinic Hebrew the concept is called reshut, literally “permission.” By denying that there are Jewish rights, Orthodoxy’s democracy-deniers blur the halakhic boundary between prohibition (issur) and permission (heter). Since democratic Orthodoxy empowers its Jewry with God -given rights, it is the right course for contemporary Orthodoxy to take, because the rights that God gives no one may take away.

All of us are deeply concerned by the Covid 19 pandemic. We worry about health…physical, spiritual, mental, emotional, financial etc.  Most of us are sheltering in place; our world is contracting.

The ancient Israelites were enslaved in Mitsrayim—the Hebrew name for Egypt. The word mitsrayim comes from the root tsar, meaning “narrow and confined.” The Israelites were not only in physical servitude, but they suffered from the psychological pains of being in bondage. They lacked freedom to go where they wanted when they wanted. It was a depressing, anxiety-ridden time.

We now find ourselves in a modern-day mitsrayim. We are dealing with the narrowing of options and with confinement.

Rabbi Benzion Uziel, late Sephardic Chief Rabbi of Israel, offered an explanation of the Korekh “sandwich” eaten during the Seder. This custom goes back to Hillel the Elder who used to put together the matzah and maror and eat them together. This was based on the verse (Bemidbar 9:11) that instructed people to eat the Pessah offering with matzah and maror.

Rabbi Uziel noted that the matzot were eaten after the Israelites left Egypt, and are therefore a symbol of freedom. The bitter herbs, maror, are eaten as a reminder of slavery in Egypt. We eat both of them together to remind us that freedom and slavery are intertwined elements of life. We always find ourselves between exile and redemption. But even at a time when we are experiencing the bitter herbs of life, we should be awake to the possibility of redemption; we must maintain hope.

Today when we are in a sort of mitsrayim--when our lives are increasingly confined and narrowed-- we need to strengthen ourselves as much as possible. Each word of comfort and consolation is helpful. Each prayer to the Almighty is important. We need to reach out as often as possible to relatives and friends, to those who may be feeling excessive isolation and loneliness. We push back at the powers of mitsrayim by trying to enlarge our lives through communication with others (while strictly observing the social distancing rules). Phone calls, emails, online interactions help bring light into our lives.

This year’s Sedarim will indeed be different from all other Pessah nights. We pray that the Almighty will give strength and wisdom to all the health care professionals and scientists who are working so diligently to combat the pandemic. We pray that the Almighty will bless all of us with all manner of good health. We pray for a speedy end to this world wide plague.

May we soon emerge from this time of mitsrayim and may we soon enter a period of freedom and redemption.

(Jeremy Rosen is a graduate of Cambridge University in philosophy and studied at and received semikha from Mir Yeshiva in Jerusalem. He has worked in the Orthodox rabbinate, Jewish education, and academia, and currently is the rabbi of the Persian Jewish community of Manhattan.)

The Torah is quite clear in its condemnation of magic and superstition. So, too, is the Talmud and most certainly and explicitly, Maimonides. Magic, spells, and superstitions are universal and have been since the earliest record of human cultural activity. They are to be found throughout Jewish history and sources. In many respects, our present Jewish world seems to have regressed to the Middle Ages in its embrace of the paranormal. Sometimes I wonder if there is any room in the world of Torah for rationalism anymore.

Biblical Terminology

The Torah uses a lot of different words for what we subsume under the general term “magic.” Laban uses the word leNahesh, which in modern Hebrew means something like “I took a risk in employing you.” But the Chaldeans of whom he was one, were well known for their interest in the supernatural and that was probably Laban's world. He will have consulted some kind of magic or oracle. There is even a Midrash that says that the rabbis agreed with Chaldean methods.[1] The same word, leNahesh is used of Joseph telling them that he is able to guess, or to divine the real truth about the brothers. Its root suggests lahash, to whisper or talk or even nahash, meaning a snake, with its hissing and slyness. This is the word favored by Balaam when he was invited to curse the Children of Israel. When he realized that he could not countermand God he no longer returned to consult his nahashim. Balaam declared that “There is no witchcraft [nahash] in Jacob and no magic [kessem] in Israel.” Kessem seems to be more a description of objects used in magic rather than a system. When the elders of Moab come to Balaam, they bring kessamim, carrying charms. Someone who uses charms is called a kossem. The word kessem also means a stick—possibly the art of casting down sticks or wooden dice and reading their signs.

 In Egypt, Pharaoh had disturbing dreams and called upon his hartumim, commonly translated as magicians, to interpret them. Most scholars take the origin of the word to come from heret a stylus or engraver and so the hartumim could be those who interpreted texts, perhaps the scientists of those days. It is used in Egypt together with wise men and so must have been one of their sciences: “And Pharaoh called to his wise men and his magicians, mekhashefim,” in which case it could be a synonym for hartumim.

When Moses met God at the burning bush, God used a variety of methods to persuade Moses to take on the assignment of going down to Egypt to get the Children of Israel out. There was a burning bush that did not burn up, a staff that turned into a snake, and an arm that turned leprous. We might have put all these down as miracles performed by God were it not for the fact that the Egyptian hartumim could, initially at any rate, imitate many of Moses's miracles, including the snake trick.

Another word that is used in connection with nahash is onen which might mean telling the future by reading the clouds (since the word for cloud is identical), or it could come from another similar word ana for answering, replying with words to requests for information. Onen is used later in respect of the dead as well. Then there is the word now commonly used for magic, kishuf, which indicates the ability to reveal secrets.

There is another category that involves making something, either an effigy or raising up an image of someone. The words are ov and yidoni, and the Torah talks about not turning toward them (for answers). “Do not turn to the ovs and the yidonis. Do not ask things of them.” There the text adds the prohibition against “asking of the dead.” So it would appear that these elements were part of a procedure of calling up the spirits of the departed. An ov might be an image, figurine, or effigy, and a yidoni might be a spirit or a less material form having some special knowledge (given that yidoni has the same root (y-d-a) as the word for knowledge).

Deuteronomy adds another category, that of the “hover haver.” Literally this means befriending a friend. One can only assume it is a confidant or a private consultant on the affairs of the occult. It could also mean someone who has a special relationship with spirits or is on a higher level, like the honorific term later given to scholars haver.

These are a series of very different categories in the Torah that are forbidden under the general rubric of turning to forces, oracles, symbols, or objects to guide one in one’s actions and decisions. This looks like a very clear objection to magic, witchcraft, astrology, and the various pseudo-sciences that are just as prevalent today as they were 3,000 years ago.

In those days they were associated with idolatry. When it comes to the specific laws of the Torah, there are laws that deal with the penalties for magic and its allied areas. In Exodus there is a specific command to get rid of witches: “A witch (mekhashefa) should not be allowed to live.” Why only a witch and not the others mentioned above? The death penalty as prescribed in the Bible was reserved only for the most serious and existential of threats and even so, rarely exercised. And although the word is most commonly used of a female, it is also used of a male wizard.

There are specific commands against individuals to try doing these things. “Do not try to make charms or tell the future” and “Do not turn (for answers) to an image or a spirit, and do not contaminate yourselves with them, for I am God.” Here we go a step further in specifying that this approach is a form of contamination that goes against God directly. The implication is that one should accept God's instructions and no one else's. The same text goes on “Do not eat over blood, do not make charms or tell the future.” Eating blood was strictly forbidden in the Torah. It was a very important part of idolatrous rites in Canaan and has continued to play a role in magic rites supposedly passing on the qualities of the previous “owner” of the blood. We have a clear indication that these practices were rooted in idolatry and the opposition is to the context as well as the act itself.

The clearest evidence of the idolatrous context of these practices comes toward the end of the Torah:

When you come into the land which the Lord your God gives you, do not learn to do the abominations of those nations. There should not be amongst you anyone who passes his son or daughter through fire, a charmer of charms, a reader of clouds, a fortune teller or a magician. A friendly fortune teller or someone who asks of an image or a spirit or asks of the dead. Because God despises anyone who does these things and it is because of these abominations that the Lord your God is driving them out before you. You should be straight with the Lord your God. For these nations that you will displace, they listen to fortune tellers and charmers, but you should not do so.

Then the Torah goes on to talk about the prophet as the prototype of spiritual leadership and spiritual direction. He is the one the Israelites were instructed to turn to for advice and for help in dealing with the unknown, the frightening and the uncertainty of the future. And that was because he or she functioned within the constraints of Torah.

Oracles

Oracles were very much part of the ancient world, in Greece and Rome, using humans, animals, and inanimate objects. The Bible approved of the oracle of the Urim and Tumim that were part of the breastplate of the High Priest. They were occasionally consulted before and during the First Temple period. Interestingly they were also called the ephod, which was as well the name for the basic priestly garment that was also used to describe idolatry objects. However, the Torah ordained that Urim and Tumim were a way of consulting God through the medium of the priest, rather than other forces.

And this was what differentiated them from other pagan forms of oracles. If the message comes from the One God, the vehicle of revelation may vary. This after all is the message of Balaam, a renowned and successful magician, but unable to do anything without God’s approval.

A striking story involves King Saul. Desperate for guidance after the prophet Samuel died, he asked his servants to find him a ba’alat ov, a woman who could produce and communicate with images of the dead. The spirit of Samuel does indeed appear to rise. This seems to indicate that magic in one form or another can achieve results. Yet it was clearly regarded as forbidden.

The very name of Purim is based on what one assumes was a Persian word for the magic lots that Haman cast to determine the appropriate time to destroy the Jews. Haman is portrayed as trying to use this “magic” for his own ends. In contrast, divine influence, even though hidden, is not obvious. Esther's name means “hidden,” and perhaps that is also why God's name is not mentioned directly in the story of Esther. Forces at work behind the scenes are referred to by Haman's wife and his wise men (a parallel with the wise men and magicians of Pharaoh) when they tell him, “If you have begun to fall before him (Mordecai) you will not be able to overcome him.” This is an obvious contrast to the Jewish historical experience, which often has included a decline before rising. This was an assertion of the superiority of the Jewish way of responding to challenges over the pagan way of feeling determined how to act and therefore more passive in the face of adversity.

The Torah, interestingly, does not say that magic is baseless, empty, or primitive. Its instructions are simply not to get involved in it in any way that might have some influence or power over a person. But clearly these practices were so ingrained and popular that they were all but impossible to wipe out as the history of both Israelite Kingdoms illustrate. King Hezekiah had to destroy the serpent from the time of Moses because it was being abused[2] as well as censoring a “Book of Cures.”

The Talmudic Era

By the time of the Talmud, the serious debate centered more on astrology and mazal. There is a difference of opinion as to whether these skills count as part of idolatrous practices and therefore are banned under the general prohibition of anything to do with idolatrous practices, Darkei HaEmori, Emorite, or pagan practices,[3] or whether they count as wisdom: “The men of the east know about mazalot and astrology.” Non-Jewish wisdom that had no heretical connotations was not prohibited, and, on the contrary, was something to be appreciated (there is even a blessing to be said over wise men of all races).[4]

There is also a major difference of opinion as to the extent to which the constellations or various forms of mazalot did or did not influence human behavior. It was at the time a universally accepted idea that there were 12 signs of the Zodiac that were an integral part of the way God's universe was made up and influenced the natural and supernatural world. It was not until modernity that such an idea transitioned from science to superstition.

The term mazal, initially meant no more than the constellations. At some stage, the role changed into one of determining the future in ways bound up with magic and other non-rational esoteric practices. “What did they do wrong? They consulted the stars (signs of the Zodiac), magicians who look at birds and those expert in reading signs. “Tayar,” say some commentators, are the auspices of Roman tradition, the innards of birds, others suggest symbols, the origin of Tarot).”[5]

In the creation process described in Genesis, there is no mention of mazalot. The Torah talks about the sun, the moon, and the stars. But by the Second Book of Kings there is one passage where mazalot replace the stars.[6] The fact that the mazalot are not mentioned in the Torah leads one to argue that the idea of mazalot came later into Israelite life because they were significant in Egyptian and Mesopotamian culture and then in Roman and Christian societies. This may be why Balaam thought they had no impact on the Israelites. But the Talmud is happy associating Abraham with astrology. “Abraham said to God I can see the future in my mazal, that I will only have one son. God took him outside and showed him the heavens and said to him 'Ignore your astrology; mazal has no power over Israel.’”[7]

            The main discussion on mazal in the Talmud above, has R. Yohanan, Rav, R. Yehuda, R. Nahman Bar Yitzhak, R. Akiva, and Shemuel all agree with different sources that mazal has no power over Jews. On the other hand, R. Hanina says there that both wisdom and wealth are influenced by mazal and that every hour of the day has its mazal exercising control over it.[8] The most famous passage from the Talmud that supports the influence of mazal is that “Life (how long a person lives), children (how many or how they turn out), and income do not depend on a person’s deserts but on mazal.”[9] And “There is not a blade of grass that does not have a mazal in the heavens.”[10] “Mazal affects people” seem to assert that something extraterrestrial has an influence, whether it is the constellations or the power of God working through various processes before it reaches humankind. If a person suddenly feels frightened, it may be because although he hasn't seen anything dangerous, his mazal has. But the Talmud responds by saying that the answer is to say the Shema. In other words, having a direct connection to God is a protection against any sub-divine powers or influences. The compromise position is that mazalot exist and have influence. But God controls everything. “There are 12 mazalot God created in the heavens,”[11] or “God controls the mazal.”[12]

            The ayin hara, the evil eye, as well as the fear of curses, played and still plays an enormous part in many people’s lives. Initially a bad eye meant only an attitude, a way of looking at the world negatively. “A bad eye (outlook) and a bad inclination can destroy a person’s world.”[13] The rabbis give different meanings to this: feelings envy, hatred, or negativity. The Hebrew Beli Ayin Hara and the Yiddish expression kenayinhora, may there be no evil eye, are widespread among some Jews…as if just looking at another person really can do harm.

Despite the illogicality of it, the Talmud refers a great deal to its negative effects. For example, there is reference to Joseph protecting one from the evil eye based on a verse in the Bible[14] that Joseph is pleasing to the eye which can be mistranslated as overcoming the (evil) eye. The very concept that a random look or putting a hex on someone can affect a person defies logic. But then logic and superstition are opposite poles. People who feel they are cursed can find it turning into is a self-fulfilling source of anxiety. The pure halakhic response is that if one behaves according to the Torah one should have nothing to fear.

Spirts and Demons[15]

The Talmud continued the biblical polemic against witchcraft. R. Shimon Ben Shetah is reported to have executed 80 women when he waged a campaign against witches. The Talmud records that their families paid him back by framing his son. Yet the Talmud is full of stories of magicians, spells, demons, spirits, and the whole paraphernalia of the ancient and medieval world.

The spirit Ketev Meriri is covered with scales and anyone who sees him cannot survive.[16] If one wants to see the spirits around, he should “get the placenta of a black cat the offspring of another black cat, the firstborn of a firstborn, roast it and grind the ashes, and put them on his eyes and he will see them. Then put the left over into an iron sealed container so that they do not steal it and keep his mouth closed throughout.[17]

Cures

Lists of fanciful cures abound. Here is one example amongst many. “If one has a fever, one should take seven thorns from seven palms, seven chips from seven logs, seven pegs from seven bridges, seven ashes from seven ovens, seven amounts of earth from seven sockets, seven samples of pitch from seven ships, seven pinches of cumin, seven hairs from an old dog, and tie them together to the garment of the sick person with a white thread.”[18] One wonders if in the time it takes to gather all this, the fever might have passed. Perhaps the effort in itself was therapeutic.

So is the prevalence of the ancient idea of charms or in talmudic language, a kameya. The Talmud discusses being able to carry a kameya around one’s neck on Shabbat. It distinguishes between a kameya that “works” and one that has not proven its effectiveness.

Medieval mysticism drew heavily on the non-Jewish world of magic, astrology, and alchemy. Once one leaves rationality or philosophy behind, the gates of superstition are thrown wide open. For them, this was still a world of evil spirits, devils as well as angels; and given the absence of universal health systems it is not surprising that any tool would be used when faced with a crisis of health or wealth.

There are many such charms used in the past and today, written in Hebrew, Aramaic, and local languages, often combining Hebrew letters, quotations from Psalms, kabbalist combinations of letters, not to mention blood, plants, and bones. Of course, in days before modern scientific health provision, people turned to magic for cures, and still do in many parts of the world.

The rabbis completely reject the idea of using sources from religions outside Judaism to bring about cures.[19] Yet if the same methods are used by rabbis acting in the name of God, they become legitimate. Nevertheless, it seems they understood and condoned the placebo effect.

Why Is It Not Acceptable?

Idolatry requires obedience to corrupt practices and symbols that damaged the fabric of a moral, caring society. It delivered people into the random and unpredictable power of priests and magicians who had control over life and death. This conflicts with the Jewish concept of a clear commitment to a known constitution that preserves rights and protects the weak.

The important principle lying behind opposition to magic was the issue of responsibility of a person to decide how to act. The opposition to these practices is because a person is handing over the decision-making process either to another or is subjecting the decisions to random or unknown criteria. This is not the same as asking for advice or seeking out expertise because there, one still has responsibility for the final decision. In Judaism, the expert advice of a great rabbi is still based on clear set of assumptions and criteria. It is handing oneself over to unknown powers that conflicts with the Jewish principle of obedience to God and Torah.

Despite these very definite prohibitions, it is hardly surprising that many Jews around the world still do pay a great deal of attention to good luck charms, things that protect from harm, evil spirits, and demons. And they can point to talmudic and medieval sources to justify their beliefs. Superstition is deeply imbedded in all societies. Sometimes it is associated with and part of the local religion. And even where officially the religion may deny the role of superstition, people often treat the religion in a superstitious way.

Why Does It Continue?

To this day, many people pay attention to astrological charts and go to see miracle workers to discover the appropriate times for business deals and betrothals. It seems that almost everything Maimonides specifies as being wrong and prohibited is popular in many Jewish circles. And what of those who regard the mezuzah as a charm to protect homes? What is more, many people have had experiences with mind readers, palm readers, or psychics that are remarkably correct both about the past and the future. Besides, the Torah does not say these things are all nonsense, just that we should avoid them. And if the Bible can record Samuel's body returning doesn't this prove that there is something to it?

Just because people do things, this does not make them right. The mezuzah is not a charm. It simply reminds us of the principles and the commandments that each home should be dedicated to. The word on the exterior is the name of God. It is God who protects us, not the mezuzah. Yes, we have all heard of “wonders” that happen when we check a mezuzah and find a letter missing, but like all “miracles” there are other ways of seeing what actually happened. We hear about the coincidences and the wonders but not of the cases where nothing happens at all. People are very gullible. That is precisely why so much of the Torah is devoted to attacking these sorts of practices.

The current nostalgic return to the past has led to a roaring trade in our times in wonder rabbis and others offering cures (for money usually). Checking texts for errors, a mezuzah or a ketubah, to explain why things went wrong for a household or a couple. Combining names, all the tricks of astrologers, mind readers, and card sharps are all part of the game. The lines between religion and magic and superstition can be very blurred.

Science and technology have made life so much easier in so many ways. And yet, societies have become so materialist, so stressful, so soulless, and so devoid of human interaction that more and more people look for comfort, solutions, and answers. The human need for a placebo is so strong that this is an area where religion, tacitly if not officially, has capitulated.

The Torah is clear that one can intercede directly with God and that the best protection one can have is to behave according to the commandments. An ability to cope with pressures, to be positive and strong are the only honest answers. But if superstitious beliefs and actions give people hope, it is difficult to wean people from them.

There is room to study these phenomena, to try to understand what is going on and to better understand the universe we are part of. However, the guiding principle is “Be straight with the Lord Your God.”[20]

We have the possibility of a direct and personal relationship with God, and this is the route we should aspire to follow. It is, to give an analogy, the difference between having direct access to the President, instead having to make appointments with his secretaries and assistants. We have no need of intermediaries.

There are practices and some beliefs in Judaism that most people today would define as superstitions. My aim here is to investigate some of these in order to see to what extent these practices or beliefs are coeval with what was considered science at the time of our Sages.

            A source that suggests that the Sages were interested in what may be described as the science of their time appears in bPesahim 94b. The source also indicates that there was interest in the science of the non-Jewish world, though the Sages were not always in agreement with its findings:

Our Rabbis taught: The sages of Israel say, “The orbit (of the constellations) is fixed, but the constellations shift.” But the sages of the nations say, “The orbit (of the constellations) moves, but the constellations are fixed.” Rabbi said, “There is a response to their words: We have never seen Ursa Major in the South and Scorpio in the North….” The sages of Israel say, “During the day the sun travels beneath the firmament (and therefore is visible), and at night it travels above the firmament (and therefore cannot be seen).” But the sages of the nations say, “During the day the sun travels below the firmament, and at night it travels beneath the earth. Rabbi said, “Their words appear more logical than ours. For during the day springs (deep in the earth) are cold, and at night they are hot (relative to the external temperature).”

As it turns out, modern science would invalidate all of these theories since our perception of the movement of the sun through the zodiacal constellations is just that: perception, but not reality. What is moving is the earth. But the ancients, just like us, did not feel the earth turning and therefore assumed it was stationary. What they could see was what appeared to be the movement of the sun, sometimes through the constellations, sometimes during its daily “risings” and “settings.”

More important than the accuracy of what we might call ancient science, this talmudic source points to interest in the nature of the universe in the ancient world as a matter of human curiosity. Jews and non-Jews engaged in what they considered scientific observation, and there was a Jewish willingness to accept a logical explanation of a phenomenon from whatever source it came.

This willingness to accept what was believed to be scientific truth in antiquity led, as so many scientific findings do, to actions based on these beliefs. Just as the record of astronomy preserved in Pesahim is now known to be incorrect, so, too, are other “scientific” ideas in the Talmud that are derived from Greco-Roman and Persian sources. Nevertheless, these ideas affected Jewish law, behaviors, and belief in their time and sometimes beyond. Some of these practices and beliefs still are observed in the observant Jewish community, while others have fallen by the wayside, often with the aid of significant halakhic authorities and Jewish thinkers. We will inspect some instances of what the Sages in antiquity would have considered scientific truth but today would be dismissed as superstition.

A Fatal Application of Numerology

            A host of societies believed in the power of specific numbers. In those societies, numerology was considered a science. In our case, the Greeks, like so many other peoples including our own, assumed seven to be a particularly powerful number. In a Hippocratic work called Peri Sarkon, in English “Of Flesh,” the writer states:

The seventh month child is born according to logic and lives. It has reason and invariable counting in regard to numbers divisible by seven; but the eighth month’s child never lives. The child of nine months and ten days also lives; it has invariable counting in regard to numbers divisible by seven” (Hippocrates, Peri Eptamenou (On the Seventh Month Embryo) and Peri Oktamenou (On the Eight-Month Embryo) 

            It seems this notion entered into rabbinic thinking as well and is expressed in a halakha that the overwhelming majority of present-day Jews and others would consider not only the result of ignorant superstition, but a cruel and heartless ruling.

            The halakha begins with a Mishnaic rule: “One does not violate Shabbat for a child whose birth date is in doubt nor for an androgyne… (mShabbat 19:3).

            This rule is stated in the context of activities one may do on Shabbat related to healing a circumcision wound. In some cases, these activities are permitted because the circumcision itself would be permitted on Shabbat, and these activities prevent dangerous side effects generated by that act.

            According to the Mishnah, circumcision on Shabbat is prohibited in two cases: When a child’s birth date is in doubt, and when a child is an androgyne, that is, a child exhibits both male and female characteristics.

            There are several possible ways of understanding what the Mishnah meant when it spoke of the case of the child whose birth date is in doubt. One way, perhaps the simplest one, is to say we are not sure whether the child was born on Shabbat. If so, the next Shabbat would be his circumcision day. If, however, the child was born on Sunday, his circumcision would not override Shabbat. In such a case, rather than potentially violating Shabbat by circumcising the child earlier than the eighth day of his birth, we defer the circumcision by one day.

            This, however, is not the Talmud’s understanding of the Mishnah. Rather, it states:

“Nor does (the circumcision) a child of a doubtful birth date allow for the overriding of Shabbat”—What does this include? It includes that which our Rabbis taught, “A child born in the seventh month of gestation, we violate Shabbat on his behalf. A child born in the eight month of gestation, we do not violate Shabbat on his behalf. We do not violate Shabbat for a child about whom we are in doubt as to whether he was born in the seventh month of gestation or in the eighth month. (This is because) a child born in the eighth month of gestation is like a stone. It is prohibited to move it on Sabbath. Its mother, however, may bend over and suckle it because of the danger (to her)” (bShabbat 135a).

            It is interesting that the Talmud chooses to understand the notion of “a child whose birth date is in doubt” as related to months of gestation rather than to a doubt about the day on which the child was born. It seems the Talmud takes this tack because a doubt about a day of birth is clearly easier to determine than the month of gestation, and the word “doubt” could cover both cases.

            More to the point in this presentation is the idea that a child born in the seventh month of gestation is considered viable and all activities that would require overriding Shabbat may be done for him. A child born in the eighth month of gestation, however, is regarded as dead (“it is like a stone”), and like any corpse, may not be moved on Shabbat due to the rules of muktzeh. These rules prohibit the movement of items that have no use on Shabbat or holy days. The child’s mother may not move him. The most she can do is suckle the baby so that she does not become endangered due to an excess of breast milk.

            It is obvious that this halakha at least shares the Greeks’ ideas about numerology and most likely drew its conclusions on the basis of Hippocratic medicine. In the classical world and late antiquity, Hippocratic medicine and numerology would have been viewed as science, and there would be no reason for the rabbis to ignore these “facts” in deciding the law. Indeed, the medical profession was still accepting the idea that seventh-month babies live and eighth-month ones die from the classical period through late antiquity, the middle ages, and into early modernity (Dr. Rosemary E. Reiss, MD and Avner D. Ash, PhD, “The Eight-Month Fetus: Sources for a Modern Superstition,” Obstetrics and Gynecology, 71:2, 1988, Ohio University, pp. 270–273).

            Our experience with gestation based on observation rather than reliance on numerology has made us aware that babies who gestate for eight months have as much a chance of survival, if not a better one, than babies with less gestation time. It is no wonder that today we consider the science of the rabbis in this halakhic case, and the numerological science of their predecessors, the Greeks, superstition. But as my title suggests, one person’s science is another’s superstition. This transition takes place as more and more sophisticated scientific methodologies supplant older ones.

            This analysis is less a defense of the sages than it is a study of cultural interplay and the use of what were deemed reliable facts when one culture learns from another. As our opening source about the scientific discourse between the rabbis and the sages of the nations indicated, the rabbis were interested in how the world works and Rabbi Judah Hanasi, the preeminent rabbinic figure of the late second century, defended Jewish scientific perceptions when he felt those observations were correct. He was, however, willing to concede that sometimes the perceptions of non-Jewish wise men, most likely Greco-Roman philosopher-scientists, appeared to be more reasonable than the Jewish ones. To the extent that that was generally true in the world of formative rabbinic Judaism, it is not surprising that what was considered scientific fact in the world at large impacted the thinking of the rabbis in the world of the Bet Midrash. Nevertheless, as scientific knowledge of gestation has progressed, it is clear that maintenance of the life of an eighth month fetus is a given (Rebecca Garber, “The Eighth Month Conundrum,” YU Torah, www.yutorah.org › lectures › lecture.cfm › the-eighth-month-conundrum, pp. 1–2.)

The Efficacy of Incantations

            Virtually every society in antiquity and well beyond believed in the efficacy of incantations. Egypt, Sumer, Akkad, Greece, and Rome all used and believed in the power of incantations. This belief was considered to be based on “facts” like the incontrovertible existence of gods, the connection between humans and the natural world they inhabited and over which they had some control, and similar factors. In that respect, incantation was “scientific” and the formulation of incantations was certainly a science, often delegated to expert practitioners.

            One of the bases for the belief in the power of incantations finds its roots in the belief in the power of words. According to the Torah, God’s words caused every created thing to emerge. Hence, Judaism and its interpreters would very naturally consider the power of the word effective in incantations. Beyond the overall belief in incantations held by many rabbis, the different societies that surrounded the rabbis contributed measurably to the formulae they thought worked.

            First, we will consider some of the earliest rabbinic sources dealing with incantations in general. We will then turn our attention to specific incantations and their origins.

            Some rabbis represented in rabbinic literature considered incantations for the purpose of healing effective. One early source, the Mishnah in mSanhedrin 10:1, discusses those who do not enter the World to Come and mentions “one who incants over a wound.” The larger context of this Mishnah is a rabbinic discourse on what qualifies as a prohibited belief or a failure of appropriate belief.

             Is the one who incants involved in one of these problematic beliefs? It seems not, since he uses a verse of the Torah as the powerful element in his incantation. The denial of a portion in the World to Come to one who uses an incantation over a wound lies elsewhere.

            It is Rabbi Akiba who opines that “one who incants over a wound” is excluded from the World to Come. It is not clear, however, that Rabbi Akiba did not believe in the power of incantations and therefore opposed them as superstitious beliefs. Rather, opposition to incantation, at least as the Mishnah records it, appears restricted to the use of the Torah verse, “All the diseases I brought upon Egypt I will not bring upon you, for I am the Eternal, your healer” (Exodus 15:26). Both Talmuds (bSanhedrin 101a, bShevu`ot 15b and pSanhedrin 10:1, 28a–b) understand Rabbi Akiba’s prohibition as resulting from a lack of honor to the Torah, either because incantation includes spitting along with the use of a verse including God’s name, or because the Torah’s sanctity is devalued by secular use.

            It seems that with the Mishnah’s notable exception, rabbinic sources viewed incantations in general as effective. Indeed, a Baraita which the Talmud cites permits “an incantation against snakes and scorpions on Shabbat” (bSanhedrin 101a). The commentators understand this incantation as an effective prophylactic against the damage these poisonous animals can cause.

            The special permission to use this incantation on Shabbat is related to the Shabbat prohibition of hunting or trapping animals. Since the authors of this permissive halakha viewed the incantation against snakes and scorpions as effective, snakes and scorpions would be dsequestered somewhere away from the one using the incantation. One might think this was a form of trapping these animals, which is forbidden on Shabbat. The Baraita negates that idea. Though the incantation may be effective, it does not constitute the physical act of sequestering the snakes and scorpions which would indeed entail violating Shabbat.

A Zoroastrian Influenced Incantation and Cure for Rabies in the Talmud?

            As an example of incantations, this extended talmudic passage on attempted cures for contact with rabid dogs or for their bite is instructive. Incantations and attempted cures for rabies are well attested for Sumer and Akkad, two Ancient Near Eastern societies (Wu Yuhong, “Rabies and Rabid Dogs in Sumerian and Akkadian Literature,” Journal of the American Orientalist Society, 121:1, January–March, 2001, pp. 32–43). Obviously, given the likelihood of recovery from this disease, invocation of the gods or other supernatural powers or adjuring them was a last-ditch effort to save the patient. Incantation, often along with medication of some sort, was, as we have seen, believed to be a potent force for healing by the world community in general and by the Jews in particular.

            In mYoma 8:6 there is a discussion about someone whom a rabid dog bit. The Mishnah addresses the question of whether one may feed this individual a lobe of the dog’s liver, which was considered a possible cure. The anonymous Mishnah forbids feeding this to someone on Yom Kippur on the grounds that it is an uncertain cure. Rabbi Mattiyah ben Heresh allowed it because he considered it a true cure (bYoma 84a). A talmudic passage discusses the rabid dog and how to deal with its touch or bite:

One who touches a rabid dog endangers himself, and one who is bitten dies. If one touches a rabid dog and is endangered, what is his cure? He should throw of his clothes and run. A rabid dog touched Rabbi Huna the son of Rabbi Joshua in the marketplace. He threw off his clothes and ran. He said, “I fulfilled in regard to myself, ‘Wisdom preserves its master’ (Ecclesiastes 7:12).”

The one who is bitten dies: What is his cure? Abbaye said, “He should bring the skin of a male hyena and he should write on it, “I, so-and-so the son of my mother, so-and-so, have written on a male hyena’s skin ‘To you, Kanti, Kanti, Qaliros,’ and there are those who say: ‘Qandi, Qandi, Kalurus,’ Yah, Yah, the Lord of Hosts is His name.’” He should then remove his clothes and bury them in a cemetery for a year. He should then retrieve them, burn them in an oven, and spread the ashes on a crossroad.

What should he do for the year’s time? When he drinks water, he should drink only through a brass straw lest he see a demon and endanger himself….(bYoma 84a)

            One wonders how many people survived rabies by using the cures and incantations the Talmud suggests, but one can begin to understand why at least some of the talmudic suggestions were at least reasonable to a degree. For example, the sages acknowledged danger caused by touching a rabid dog. This may have been due to the sages’ belief that the disease infecting the animal could infect humans by contact, which in the case of many diseases is true. The sages’ remedy consisting of casting away the garments which came in contact with the dog would almost suggest a rudimentary germ theory: What the diseased animal touches becomes a source of infection from which one needs to be distance oneself. This might also explain why the one who touches or is touched by a rabid dog must run from his garment. If the garment is a source of infection, the best idea would be to distance oneself from it, just as we would distance ourselves from someone whose disease could be spread aerially.

            We know today that simple contact with a rabid dog will not cause rabies. Only the entry of its saliva or matter from its brain or nervous system into the human body by bite, through a scratch, or through a mucus membrane can cause the disease. So, the “science” of the ancients would be considered superstitious today.

            Turning to the case of a bite by a rabid dog, which even the Talmud initially declares fatal, if there is a remedy at all for the bite, it is by incantation and a variety of rites supposed to provide healing. Here, too, we see what will be a cross-cultural sharing of healing or protective techniques.

            Most immediately noticeable is the incantation formula “Kanti, Kanti, Qaliros” or “Qandi, Qandi, Kalurus” alongside the abbreviated form of the Tetragrammaton and the phrase “the Lord of Hosts is His name” which the bitten individual writes on hyena skin. According to Alexander Kohut in his `Arukh Completum, these foreign words are actually in Middle Persian and refer to Kunda, or in some talmudic manuscripts as Kundis. In the case of Kunda/Kundi, this is a reference to the Zoroastrian demon of madness and destruction, Kundag. If the reference is to Kundis, this is Kundizha, the feminine form of Kundag. The last word of the incantation, Qaliros or Kalurus, may be a combination of the last letter of Kundag’s full name plus liros or lurus, which according to Kohut has the double meaning of madness and female dog in Middle Persian. Thus, this incantation is very much a mixture of a Zoroastrian belief in demons of destruction and madness and the power of the God of Israel to overcome them.

            In regard to the hyena skin, the hyena was considered in antiquity and until this day an animal with magical powers. This was true around the world: in Europe and Western and Southern Asia (J. W. Frembgen, “The Magicality of the Hyena: Beliefs and Practices in West and South Asia,” Asian Folklore, 57: 2, 1998, pp. 331–344). Its skin was believed to possess the power to heal, but mostly people used its body parts as love and fertility charms. Therefore, its use as part of the cure for rabies is not at all surprising. Rather, it is another instance of Jews sharing the cultural norms and “scientific” beliefs of the society in which they lived.

            No doubt the other rites and recommendations that this talmudic passage contains are part of the general society’s best practices for attempting to cure rabies. The Talmud’s remedy is more hopeful in terms of results than the reality is likely to have been. Most people died if a rabid dog bit them, and a year’s survival and full cure as described in the Talmud would have been miraculous.

Spontaneous Generation

            Spontaneous generation is best defined as the production of a living organism from non-living matter. Starting with the Greek philosophers who studied living things, especially Aristotle who summarized the theory, and into the nineteenth century, spontaneous generation was considered a scientific fact that explained such things as the generation of maggots. In that case, it was believed they sprung from rotting meat. The Talmud also accepted the theory of spontaneous generation and even based a Shabbat halakha on it.

            A Mishnaic passage leads into the talmudic discussion that includes the reference to spontaneous generation:

The eight creeping things that are mentioned in the Torah: one who hunts them or wounds them [on Shabbat] is liable; But [as for] other abominations and creeping things, one who wounds them is exempt. One who hunts them for use is liable; Not for use, is exempt…. (mShabbat 14:1)

            The Torah lists eight “creeping things” in Leviticus 11:29–30, and it is to these things the Mishnah refers. According to the Mishnah if one hunts them or wounds them one is in violation of one or the other of two Shabbat prohibitions. Somewhat surprisingly though, someone who wounds other “abominations and creeping things” is exempt, and depending on the reason for which one hunts them is either liable for a Shabbat violation or exempt.

            The Talmud discussion takes its cue from the Mishnaic exemption from Shabbat violation for wounding “abominations and creeping things” other than the eight listed in the Torah:

“…Other abominations and creeping things, one who wounds them is exempt”: However, if one kills them, one violates Shabbat.

Who is the one who teaches this? Rabbi Jeremiah said, “It is Rabbi Eliezer’s teaching,” as it is taught in a Baraita: “One who kills a louse on Shabbat is as one who killed a camel.”

Rav Yosef raised an objection: “Up until this point the Sages did not argue with Rabbi Eliezer (about the violation of Shabbat for killing a creeping thing) except for a louse, which does not reproduce sexually. But the Sages did not dispute his ruling regarding other creeping things that do procreate sexually….”

Abbaye responded (to Rav Yosef), “Is it so that lice do not reproduce sexually? Has it not been said, ‘The holy Blessed One sits and sustains everything from the horns of the wild ox to the eggs of lice’ (b`Avodah Zarah 3b)”

(Anonymous response to Abbaye): “There is a specific species called ‘lice eggs’ (but lice themselves do not procreate sexually)….”

            In antiquity, the general view about the generation of lice was that they were produced by sweat or dust. For Jews, the Torah’s description of the plague of lice brought on Egypt would substantiate this view since “all the dust became lice” (Exodus 8:13).

            By the nineteenth century, Pasteur had proved conclusively that spontaneous generation has no scientific basis. Yet, in an age when no microscopes were available and mere observation was all one could rely on, the appearance of creatures apparently emerging from rotting meat or sweaty parts of the body became the scientific explanation for the source of their existence.

            Anyone believing in spontaneous generation today would be viewed as mistaken at best or foolish at worst. But in antiquity, such a person would have been considered reasonable. Again, one man’s science becomes a later man’s superstition.

Ruach Ra`ah, Evil Spirits, Possession, and Mental Illness

            The Tanakh records one case of ruach ra`ah, which I will translate as “evil spirit,” that affected the emotional state of an individual. That individual was Saul. After Samuel secretly anoints David as king, God’s spirit departs from Saul, “…and an evil spirit (ruach ra`ah) from the LORD began to terrify him” (I Samuel 16:14). The last days of Saul were filled with anxiety, paranoia, and often unreasonable anger directed at David and even his own son. In sum, God caused Saul’s possession by an “evil spirit.”

            The idea of a form of possession by a deity as the cause of mental illness was held by the Mesopotamians. They called various mental illnesses the “Hand of Ishtar” or the “Hand of Shamash” in which the hand of the god seized the victim of the disease (Wikepedia, The History of Mental Disordershttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_mental_disorders).

            Other ancient societies, however, did not view mental illness as possession by a god or demon. Egypt sought the source of disease in the heart or brain. The Greek physicians were divided as to whether mental illness was an imbalance in the so-called “humors,” black bile, yellow bile, phlegm, and blood. Asclepiades rejected the humoral theory as a source for mental illness, while Galen, whose medical opinion eventually won, held that an imbalance of the humors in the brain caused mental illness.

            We are quite aware today that possession by a god or demon is not the cause of such ailments as depression, bipolar disorder, or schizophrenia. Rather, these diseases are due to a multiple possible causes: imbalances in the chemicals of the brain, problems in intra-brain communication, malformations of the brain, and a range of external conditions such as genetics, drug use during pregnancy, abuse, and the like.

            Yet, in late antiquity, rabbinic Jewish sources assigned the cause for these conditions to what we may call “Saul’s original ruach ra`ah.” Here are a few examples of Mishnaic uses of “ruach ra`ah” and halakha based on it:

            In a Mishnaic section we read on Erev Shabbat we find:

One who extinguishes a Shabbat lamp because he fears non-Jews, highwaymen, a “ruach ra`ah,” or for a sick person is exempt (from full Shabbat violation)…. (mShabbat 2:5)

            Similarly, in m`Eruvin 4:1 we find:

Someone who was forcibly taken outside the Shabbat limit (of 2,000 cubits from the city limits) by non-Jews or by a “ruach ra`ah” has only four cubits (in which he may move about on Shabbat). If they returned him (into the Shabbat limit), it is as if they had never taken him outside (the limit)….

            In both sources the term “ruach ra`ah” appears, but what does it mean? Since the sources themselves do not say, we turn to the commentators for clarification.

            In relation to the first Mishnah, Shabbat 2:5, Maimonides and Bertenuro both define “ruach ra`ah” as mental illness. Maimonides seems to equate it with depression in which the depressive finds light uncomfortable and seeks a dark, preferably, lonely place to get rest. Maimonides’ diagnosis seems to fit the symptoms of what he describes in Arabic as “melancholia.” Therefore, to mitigate the torment of a depressive, one could extinguish a Shabbat lamp without violating the Shabbat.

            The second Mishnah, `Eruvin 4:1, indicates a similar meaning for “ruach ra`ah.” If the first mishnaic case seems to indicate some sort of mental illness, here, too, it seems that a one-time, short psychotic episode is implied. Indeed, there exists a phenomenon called somewhat inaccurately “single episode schizophrenia” (Kate Rosen, M. Phil., Phillipa Garrety, PhD, Schizophrenia Bulletin, 31:3, 2005, pp. 735–750) since it appears to turn into full-blown schizophrenia within a few years. But any sort of temporary mental disorientation could easily push someone out of the Shabbat limit, and the same disorientation could bring one back into it. Whether that was due to a single episode of schizophrenia or something else, the law allows full use of the Shabbat limit as long as one was forced out of and back into the Shabbat limit against his will. Obviously, “ruach ra`ah” was seen as a psychological force majeure that could not be resisted any more than non-Jewish attackers.

            While mental illness has been part of the human experience from the earliest times, the notion that the various psychiatric ailments are the product of demons and evil spirits has seen its day. Yet, for the ancients, how could they explain the frequently sudden changes in behavior mental illness caused? Everything from humoral imbalance, not that far from the theory of chemical imbalance as the cause for mental illness, to possession explained the phenomenon. So, once again, one person’s science is another’s superstition.

Conclusion

            This article has pointed to a number of phenomena that the ancient world held to be scientific, though today we know they have no scientific basis at all and are, at least in our opinion, superstitions. Many of these phenomenon are not at all worthless since they show that rabbinic Jews took part along with all of humanity in the attempt to explain their world. Indeed, if they had not, where halakha required knowledge of nature, they would have been not been prepared for the work that was quintessentially theirs.

            Further, the examples assembled here show the sages intersecting with their surroundings. Whether it was the Greco-Roman or Sassanid Babylonian world, Jews, rabbinic or otherwise, participated in the scientific “best practices” of their time. Cross-cultural knowledge was not foreign to them nor eschewed by them.

            Last, but not least, we should be aware that what we consider normal Jewish practice is, in fact, often superstition. On the parchment of your mezuzah you will find what is more or less an incantation—kuzu b’mukhsaz kuzu based on a letter transference of “the Eternal our God is the Eternal” (Hashem Elo-henu Hashem). Even Sha-dai on the mezuzah may be a protective name to ward off a shed, a demon, who shares two letters of God’s Holy name. And when did an observant caterer ever serve fish with meat or not provide different silverware for each? Why? Because the mixture of the two could cause halitosis, or worse, davar aher, usually understood as leprosy (bPesahim 76b).

            Of course, science has a stronger hold on the human consciousness today than ever before. Nevertheless, as much as human beings seek to be rational beings, there is a side of us that assumes or hopes that there are forces, especially the power of God, that we can call on when all else fails. When what is palpably superstition harms us, rather than having out hopes dashed by trust in that which won’t help, perhaps we should put our trust in the best science can do and the God who guides the hand of the practitioner. Yet, human nature being what it is, a red string tied around one’s wrist may give enough spiritual solace to give some people longer life than expected.

            For all that rationality is significant, the irrational also has shown to be powerful. What many of us would deem one person’s superstition may indeed turn out to be not totally lacking in what we will discover to be based in psychological science.

QUESTION:

In response to the devastating Coronavirus pandemic,   Israel’s  government has outlawed public gatherings in order to reduce the spread of a contagion that is particularly lethal for the elderly and those with compromised immunity systems.  In spite of the mandatory lockdown, there have been numerous instances of non-compliance with the government’s directives. In a south Jerusalem apartment building, a ground floor apartment was converted into a Chabad shteiblel which continued to convene on holy days after the Israeli government outlawed these public gatherings.  Some members of a gated Israeli Orthodox community that complied with the governmental order discovered to their chagrin that rogue minyanim, prayer quorums of ten adult men, were convening within the community, in violation of the governmental order.

On one hand, minyan attendance is a worthy and legitimate Halakhic mandate, but so is the obligation to preserve health and life.  The relative weights of these two occasionally conflicting concerns requires clarification.  Furthermore, there is a prohibition against mesira, of delivering and informing on a Jew to the secular authorities.  Does this prohibition apply to those who join minyanim in violation of the law?    To whom should Halakhically committed people turn for relief  from those who ignore the  lockdown  directives?

ANSWER:

1. When the legitimate, lawfully elected ruling government forbids public gatherings in order to limit the spread of disease, the government is doing its job, which is to preserve the peace, public safety, and domestic tranquility.  If attending public gatherings under current circumstances is deemed by the government and the medical community to pose a danger to public health and safety, the minyan quorum must be suspended.  Even if the minyan quorum were an absolute religious obligation, which it is not, it is Halakhically proper to report those who violate the rules forbidding these gatherings to the civil authorities because public safety is being compromised by the offenders’ non-compliant, selfish, and unsafe behavior.
2. At https://www.ynetnews.com/article/Bkfd9CKDI#autopla it is reported that the Haredi Jerusalem Faction protested the Israeli Health Ministry lockdown directives which, to its view, outlaws Jewish observance by forbidding the prayer minyan on the pretense that there is a medical health emergency.  This particular sect does not recognize the religious or political legitimacy of the Israeli polity because its own rabbinic elite does not control the organs of State.  The Haredi Jerusalem community, which was only partially compliant with the governmental directives, has nine times the Coronavirus infection rate of the general population.  And the Haredi community is not the only offending population.  The “Hilltop Youth,” politically Right Wing political radicals, also refused to comply with the isolation order, and rioted in protest [https://www.ynetnews.com/article/S12OtG9PU].   At https://www.jta.org/2020/03/18/israel/were-not-scared-some-haredi-orthodox-jews-in-israel-are-ignoring-coronavirus-social-distancing-rules, it is reported that a Satmar affiliated Hassidic school in Bet Shemesh was operating in defiance of the lockdown directives, and that “Rabbi [Chaim] Kanievsky [the leader of the non-Hassidic camp of Israel’s Haredi society and son of R. Yaakov Kanievsky, the “Steipler Rov,” who insisted on implementing a stridently parochial version of Orthodoxy, says “canceling Torah study is more dangerous than corona,”   and that an eighteen year old yeshiva student claimed that “[t]he Torah protects us and saves us. We’re not scared…. I’m young. People in the yeshivas aren’t afraid because we won’t get sick and anyone with a fever is sent home. We learn Torah, so it won’t happen.” As the pandemic spread, Kanievsky reversed himself and enforced the directives. It is suggested that the Haredi community’s insularity, avoidance of computers and televisions, and its disdain for the secular media underlies its unwillingness to implement governmental directives—and authority. The Haredi community looks to its own religious leadership for both religious and political guidance, and does not turn to the secular, non-Haredi authorities unless their rabbis direct them to do so.  The Haredi adherent is socially conditioned to obey the orders of his/her rabbinate before the Israeli government’s directives.  The individual Haredi must see him or herself as a disciple of a great rabbi before considering oneself to be a citizen of the State of Israel.
3. The following incident received wide coverage in Israel, because an ideologically distinct minority population was found to be ignoring the discipline and expectations of the rest of the population:

“An estimated 300 people participated Saturday night in the funeral of Rabbi Tzvi Shinkar in the predominantly ultra-Orthodox city of Bnei Brak in central Israel, defying social distancing restrictions issued by the government. Sources in law enforcement are pinning the blame directly on Tel Aviv district police commissioner David Bitan, saying he chose to avoid clashes with the community, rather than enforce the law. The coronavirus is now spreading fastest in ultra-Orthodox communities in Israel, according to internal Health Ministry figures obtained by Haaretz. The police initially requested to limit attendance but then agreed to allow the general public to participate after organizers promised people would maintain social distancing rules. In effect, mourners congregated closely and ignored police directions.” [https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-mass-ultra-orthodox-funeral-held-in-israel-despite-coronavirus-pandemic-1.8720614]

For full disclosure, PM Benjamin Netanyahu’s 25 year old son, Avner, observed the Seder with his father, against the same governmental directives that the Haredi dissidents ignored  [https://www.timesofisrael.com/netanyahu-holding-passover-seder-with-his-son-leads-to-criticism/].  The Israeli  President Reuben Rivlin also hosted his daughter for Seder, also against these rules [https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/rivlin-celebrated-passover-with-daughter-against-coronavirus-laws-report-624269], but Rivlin, an elderly widower, needs family help and is a special case:

“His office said that since his wife died, a family member was always with him on the Sabbath, holidays and flights overseas. Rivlin has four children. The report did not say which of his two daughters was with him.” [https://payments.jpost.com/paywall/paywallpersonaldetails?utm_source=jpost&utm_medium=site_banner&utm_campaign=premium]

4. The funeral of Rabbi Yaakov Perlow, the President of Agudath Israel of America, tells another story. Before his own passing from the Coronavirus, he proclaimed,
       

        “’We must be informed about the facts of this disease and    

what the expert doctors, the infectious disease specialists, are telling us, in a unanimous way,’ he said in a video message. ‘We cannot behave today like we did last week or two weeks ago. We are told that the Jewish law is that we must listen to doctors whether it’s about a sick person on Yom Kippur or a sick person that requires desecrating Shabbat and so on.’” [https://www.jta.org/quick-reads/yaakov-perlow-leader-of-novominsker-hasidim-and-a-top-orthodox-rabbi-dies-of-coronavirus-(at-89]

R. Perlow taught his constituency by personal example. His funeral was consistent with his directive:

“The Levayah (funeral) of the Novominsker Rebbe will take place privately at 10:00 A.M. due to this coronavirus epidemic. Tehillim (Psalms) and Hespedim (eulogies) will be available live by telephone. The family has requested that there should be no gathering at the Levayah” [https://vosizneias.com/2020/04/07/funeral-of-novominsker-rebbe-rabbi-yaakov-perlow-ztzl-to-be-broadcast-live-by-telephone-at-10-am/]. 

However, upon being diagnosed with the virus, Israel’s Haredi Health Minister, Yaakov Litzman was subject to criticism for having himself attending an illegal rogue minyan, against his own directives.  [https://www.jta.org/2020/04/07/israel/israels-health-minister-has-the-coronavirus-hes-also-under-fire-for-allegedly-defying-his-own-departments-orders]. Litzman opposed the extradition of Malka Leifer to Australia to face charges of sexual abuse and he is also facing bribery charges for intervening on behalf of a food business for sanitation violations.  Turning to the secular authorities for legal relief from other Jews is portrayed as a violation of the Jewish law that forbids tattling on Jews to the civic authorities or seeking relief from other Jews by any organ other than rabbinical courts that Haredi society deems to be legitimate.  At stake in this policy is the doctrine, originating in the medieval kehillah, or autonomous Jewish corporation, that the Haredi affiliate ought to be governed by Torah law as it is understood by its rabbinate, and not the secular State of Israel. Because the Jewish state is not governed by Jewish law as it is understood by the Haredi rabbinic elite, the State lacks Jewish legitimacy. Israel is only an ethnically Jewish polity but not a legitimately Jewish state, which would require a government whose constitution is Torah law as understood by the theologically Right, reverend rabbis. Israel’s secular leaders have no standing to restrict, restrain, or even regulate the conscience-driven behavior of true believing Orthodox Jews.  The regulations enacted by Israel’s secular leadership are not accepted to be binding unless the Haredi elite endorses them. This is why extraditing Malka Leifer to face her accusers or informing the Israeli police of unlawful religious assemblies, to this line of thinking,  is  unacceptable. 

This cultural divide between pre-modern Traditional Judaism and secular medical science is explored in Y.D. Berkowitz’s Hebrew short story, ha-Talush [The Detached One], which describes how the well-intentioned, well-educated, but religiously alienated  Dr. Vynik fails to connect with the Yiddishkeit [the “Jewishness” of Yiddish language traditional Jewish culture] and Yidn [Jews who live Yiddishkeit] of old world Traditional  Jewry that was not shaped or corrupted by secular modernity. Vynik is “detached” from and no longer a part of that Jewry’s pre-Enlightenment Jewish culture.   This anti-physician attitude finds antique precedent in Kiddushin 4:14, which proclaims that “the best of physicians are destined to Gehinom” [perdition]. Since this tannaitic phrase is a semantic observation and not a prescription, it should not and generally was not taken to be a hard, inviolate, legal norm. Norms are “to do” or “not to do” statements; descriptions do not prescribe, and many medieval great rabbis earned their livelihood by practicing medicine. In modern times, the education required for practicing medicine and the learning expected of a Torah authority hardly ever overlap. Sensing the secularity in the medical profession’s training, expertise, and professional culture, many Haredim do not trust physicians to follow the Torah’s directives unless those physicians are vetted by their Rabbinic leaders. 

5. The Haredi position is not monolithic. R. Perlow’s funeral instructions are fully consistent with Monsey’s Olympia shul’s Rabbi Chaim Levitan, who wisely taught the following to his community:

“Gedolei Yisroel have paskened not to have Minyanim. To make or be part of a Minyan, even outside, makes you a rodef, also a nirdaf. This means our neighborhood also. All of the excuses are shlugged up by anyone on the chevra kaddisha. I am going to follow their issur. How could anyone take the chance of making someone sick, to die alone? If anyone cannot resist being frummer than Rav Chaim Kanievsky, do not come to me to sell your chometz. If already submitted the form, bli neder I will not buy it back from the goy and since you gave reshus to do as I see fit, I will sell all your chometz for a total of one dollar. Using your chometz after that will make you a gonif, whose gehinom is much less than being a rodef. The road to corona is paved with good intentions. Do not make Minyanim. It's clear that no nachas ruach comes from it. Yizkor can be said without a Minyan. Your compliance IY'H will keep all of us safe BS'D [with Heaven’s help].”

On one hand, R. Levitan’s position is both correct and unambiguous.  However, unaddressed is the Haredi predilection of preserving past patterns of behavior and its insisting that life continues as did in the remembered past unless its own great rabbis say otherwise.

This tension between risking lives and allowing non-Haredi politicians to determine—and govern—Haredi culture policy can be teased out of Agudath Israel of America’s delicately nuanced statement:

“Those over 50 or 60, those with cardiovascular disease (including high blood pressure), diabetes, chronic respiratory disease, or certain other chronic or immunocompromised conditions, are especially vulnerable to complications from COVID-19. All such people should take precautions beyond those listed below. Those who care for, or have close interaction with such individuals, should also adopt a more careful approach.
If you have any symptoms of COVID-19 – fever, cough, shortness of breath, or sore throat, STAY HOME. Call your physician. This includes anyone with a fever or a cough without another known cause….
Tefilah betzibur (public prayer) and krias haTorah (public Torah reading) are definitive requirements and an important component of Jewish life. A community may reach a threshold of infectious activity that necessitates shul closings, but few communities are at this point now. However, all shuls should make every effort to create circumstances that enable social distancing. For example, on weekdays, perhaps adjoining sections can be opened to spread mispalelim (praying people) over a larger area; perhaps a larger building auditorium can be temporarily used; minyanim times can be altered to reduce traffic, etc. Agudath Israel also recommends that all shuls redouble their cleaning procedures, especially on high-touch surfaces like door knobs. Soap and hand sanitizers should be made readily available. A shul that can only function in a manner that would force its congregants to be tightly squeezed together should ask a shailah about its continued operation. It should also consult intra-communally to not unduly increase capacity on other shuls. The elderly, and those with the above noted health conditions, should think carefully before appearing in public settings such as a shul, shiur, or simchah. Talk to your doctor and Rav to ascertain your fact-specific risk level and psak.” Y[https://www.theyeshivaworld.com/news/headlines-breaking-stories/1839881/agudath-israel-of-america-updated-coronavirus-guidance-to-communities.html].  While the original Haredi resistance to the lockdown restrictions cannot and is not denied, the Haredi leadership now concedes the need to adjust its policies. And this change is a significant and welcome change of direction.

6. Given this background, we may now address our question, is it proper to turn to the State for relief from those Orthodox identifying Jews who refuse to observe governmental decrees requiring social distancing because they do not recognize the legitimacy of the State of Israel? At Shulhan ‘Arukh Hoshen Mishpat 425:1, it is taught that   a rodeif, or “pursuer,” a person whose behavior poses an immediate public danger, must be stopped, not as punishment for wrongdoing but to protect the innocent public from dangerous behavior.  The   threatening danger may be to life and limb, sexual impropriety, or even for grand larceny, which could endanger the standing and safety of the Jewish community. A person who acts in a way that threatens the lives, sexual integrity, or property of others is not unlike  someone who might be infected with the Coronavirus virus yet refuses to take the governmentally mandated precautions, like wearing protective masks and practicing social distancing, that limit  the danger of transmitting the disease to others. A “pursuer” whose unsafe behavior presents a clear and present danger to others must be stopped at all cost, as explained by R. Lavitan.  If there are accusations of wrongdoing regarding  Laufer’s behavior, then Laufer should not be permitted to exploit Torah principles to escape criminal accountability. Similarly, if someone may be carrying the Coronavirus knowingly violates the lockdown decree which was put into force to protect life, that person is considered to be a pursuer who presents a clear and present danger to the general public.  Even conceding the most restrictive standard regarding informing the civic authorities of Jewish misbehavior, Jewish law privileges the law of the pursuer and public safety over the law of the informer and Jewish self-government. Therefore, the Jewish community is required to inform the civil authorities in order to restrain the pursuer, not to punish the offender but to protect the innocent. It is on these grounds that Laufer deserves her day in court to confront her accusers, and congregating in groups where Coronavirus contagion may be spread must also be prevented. If bad behavior may have transpired, an accounting must be given and, when appropriate, consequences must occur.
7. The minyan is a desirable but not necessarily required format for Jewish prayer.  So too are holy day communal kiddushim, fundraising charity dinners, public lectures, weddings, and funerals. One may not risk one’s life, and/or the lives of others, in order to participate in these events. Therefore, the Orthodox rabbi, the expert on Jewish law, must first defer to the medical experts to understand the physical reality and the dangers now posed to which Torah’s values are applied. We may not assume that biological threats may be ignored because medically untrained rabbinic eyes are blind to the presence of those threats.
8. A colleague recently called my attention to Shabbat 32a, where it is taught that one must always distance oneself from danger, and not count on being protected by miracles. And should such a person have risked danger and emerged whole because of a miracle, the person will still have to give account for the irresponsible choices that was made.
9. If a person opens, or even attends, a minyan, or for that matter, participates in any medically forbidden public gathering during a pandemic lockdown, violating the governmental directives requiring social distancing, that person has the status of rodeif, a pursuer who must be stopped in order to preserve public safety.  Since the civil authorities are authorized to apply coercive force to in order to ensure compliance with those directives, the Shulhan ‘Arukh actually requires informing the civil authorities when bad behavior threatens others. The highly regarded Haredi authority, R. Asher Weiss, who combines intellectual clarity, an appreciation of the complexity of Oral Torah texts and norms, and empathy for the human condition, has earned the ear and respect of all Halakhic communities, reminds his readers that when life is in danger, even remote risks may not be tolerated.  [Minhat Asher, (Jerusalem, 2020), p. 6].
10. Why do some Haredi Jews have difficulty with non-Haredi governance and control over their society?  As explained above, Haredi society’s legitimate leadership is its own cadre of great rabbis, not any secular government and for sure not the secularized, Jewish scientific knowledge class that does not defer to the charismatic authority and parochializing policies of the Haredi rabbinic leadership. Since the Haredi great rabbi is endowed with legitimating religious charisma, and secularists do not value charismatic religious claims, the great rabbis inspire a loyalty much more intense and much greater voluntary compliance from their constituency. The sanction of exclusion, resulting in anomie and identity loss, is a very powerful deterrent that discourages challenging the elite in any way.
11. At https://www.ynetnews.com/article/Hkl00mpYvI, Ben Dror Yemini reports that the political commentator Rina Matzliah finds the Israeli Government’s forbearance for Haredi society’s flaunting the laws of the State and by endangering the public by ignoring the pandemic lockdown instructions, to be intolerable. The Haredi response to non-Haredi critique is to dismiss any and all criticism as anti-Semitism and racism. Following the guidance of its rabbinic leadership, the Haredi community initially ignored government directives regarding social distancing, which resulted in Haredi contagion rates at least six times the national average.  As a consequence, PM Netanyahu, himself sympathetic to Haredi needs—and votes—felt it necessary further restrict movement to and from  Haredi neighborhoods.  David  Israel reports [at https://www.jewishpress.com/news/israel/religious-secular-in-israel-israel/utj-attacks-netanyahus-closures-say-they-discriminate-against-haredim/2020/04/13/] that Litzman rebuked Netanyahu, arguing that “[c]lear and equal criteria must be set for all cities, regions and neighborhoods in Israel – regardless of the nature of the population…. the definitions whereby movement should be curtailed in the Haredi enclaves are mistaken and besmirch an entire community that obeys the law and the rabbis.”  The same Litzman who attended an illegal minyan here invokes “democracy” as well as the claim that Haredi society is a victim of anti-religious prejudice, without addressing the fact that rabbinically prescribed Haredi  behavior is the immediate cause of the exponentially higher incidence of contagion in  Haredi neighborhoods. 
12. Litzman‘s UTJ  [English acronym for the Israeli political party named United Torah Judaism, not  to be confused with the American  UTJ, the Union for Traditional Judaism] colleague, MK Israel Eichler complained, “[a]ny discrimination in imposing rules on the public or in the treatment of patients constitutes a hate crime.”  But Bnei Brak’s “continued closure continues in its full severity, even though the infection level there is decreasing day by day, while Arab and secular cities where the level of infections is rising at an alarming rate are still open to all.”  Eichler presents the enhanced lockdown  of Haredi neighborhoods to be expressions of anti-Haredi prejudice when these lockdowns represent a defensive response  to  the doleful consequences of  Haredi behavior.  Although culturally self-isolated in the Haredi world he faithfully represents, Eichler is sufficiently urbane to reference liberal secular culture’s politically correct buzz words and dogmas.  Eichler demands equal treatment for Haredim when there has not been an equality of behavior or illness incidence.  The usually clever Eichler argues for egalitarian political treatment in spite of Haredi non-compliance with expert medical directives as well as the resultant explosion of Coronavirus causes caused by that non-compliance. In other words, Haredi commitments, we are informed, should generate Haredi entitlements.
13. What is the real religion, as opposed to the “official” religion, of the Haredi community that Litzman and Eichler represent, and what is at stake in this ideological clash between “secular modernity” and what claims to be the “old time religion” which we are told is the only authentically “orthodox” Judaism worthy of the name? We find the answer at https://www.kupat.org.il/news/235?source=kikr15, a Haredi site articulating normative Haredi policies and ideology. R. Kanievsky is said to have endorsed the following claim, “one who contributes a significant sum [of money]  to the [charity  foundation] ‘I  [referring to God] Shall Remove Illness from Amongst You,’ [the idiom is taken from Exodus 23:25] which will  be distributed by Kuppat ha-‘Ir [B’nai B’rak’s rabbinically endorsed public assistance charity fund] to the families of  the ill [victims of the Coronavirus] and who will earn merit commensurate [to amount of their  donation that] they will not become ill with Coronavirus and  there will not be ill persons in their homes.”  This solicitation concludes with the assurance that “all contributors will receive for their homes a ‘document of special protection’ signed by the holy hand of our master, his excellency, R. Chaim Kanievsky, may he have good, and long life [literally long days], amen.”  The “document of protection” claims that “one who possesses this document has contributed charity to the ‘I  [referring to God] Shall Remove Illness from Amongst You Foundation,’ so that by [the efforts of]  Kuppat ha-‘Ir,  may provide rescue and salvation of the infirmed.” The fact that this “charity” has not been condemned by the Haredi rabbinic elite indicates that this fundraising gambit meets with their approval. How these great rabbis know that the giving charity to them, that is providing the great rabbis with patronage funding, i.e.  filling Kuppat ha-‘Ir’s rabbinic coffers, will necessarily heal those afflicted with the Coronavirus, is not stated  [https://www.jpost.com/Israel-News/Rabbi-Chaim-Kanievsky-promises-coronavirus-immunity-for-donors-of-NIS-3000-625053].  Jewish law regards universal Torah education and medical care to be entitlements; they are not commodities to be traded and acquired in a free market. If these great rabbis have the power to read and control God’s mind as this solicitation implies, why do they require significant contributions to heal the ill people of the community over which they preside?  If someone makes a significant contribution to Kuppat ha-‘Ir and then contracts the Coronavirus anyway, given the assurances made by the solicitation, will the aggrieved client be allowed to sue in beit din for service guaranteed to be rendered but not delivered? 

R. Natan Slifkin, also found these claims problematic.  At http://www.rationalistjudaism.com/2020/04/daas-torah-on-how-to-avoid-getting.html?spref=fb&fbclid=IwAR3MzCJqPP1LkRhveaqbPndFOVsvtt7EdNBWqDouuz2k-wQ2q2NH05mAPBQ, he writes

“The economic situation of haredi society, always in bad shape because of the low rate of employment, has gotten much worse with coronavirus. In an effort to raise larger donations, the Vaad HaRabbonim has launched a new campaign. They are enticing people to donate substantial sums with an incredible lure:  A promise from the Sar HaTorah, Rav Chaim Kanievsky, that they will not get sick from coronavirus! As the ad says..., 'He will not be sick!' A straightforward answer in a time of uncertainty."

Slifkin originally thought that for a price, Kanievsky would pray on behalf of the patient.  Kanievsky affirmed that this is not the case:

“Yitzchak Shaul Kanievsky, attesting to his father saying that you and your family can be saved from coronavirus, provided that you donate a ‘substantial sum’ to Kupat HaIr, which they defined as three thousand shekels. The donation will get you a ‘protection contract.’"

 This iteration of Orthodoxy’s fund raising techniques are not only jarring and alienating for most Jews, it is also unattested in the Written and Oral Torah.  Just as Martin Luther found the Roman Catholic Church’s selling of indulgences to be theologically problematic, appealing to supernatural power, and speaking in God’s name when  appealing for funds is dubious [Deut. 13:1-6].

When challenged that Orthodox rationalists find Chaim Kanievsky’s “guarantee” incredible, Yitzchak Kanievsky first objected to the term “rationalist,”

"I wouldn't call them "rationalists", rather these are people to whom a stain of heresy and enlightenment has become attached. This was the way of the maskilim [the Jewish advocates of the Enlightenment, who did not accept the right of the Traditional Orthodox rabbinate to rule the Jewish people in matters  of public policy] in every locale, to mock and render ridiculous the words of our rabbis, the Gedolei haDor, may their merit protect us."

Slifkin identifies the real outrage of Kanievsky’s claim, “if you question this promise, you're an apikores”   [heretic]. Unbelief in the claims of the great rabbis is presented as unbelief in God.  Holding great rabbis to account for their decrees, policies, and directives is seen as disrespectful and, and a consequence, condemned as heresy.  Official Orthodox Judaism reflects the neo-Kantian sociologist Max Weber’s rationalist law and leadership, which is based on what is taken to be God’s revealed law, memorialized in an accessible, canonized, public law.  A legitimate opinion is one that does not violate the norms of that canon, even though popular practice and expectations may be subject to review.

In contrast, Kanievsky’s governance style reflects Max Weber’s traditional and charismatic leadership models, which does not require the consent of those governed. Appeals to the Jewish canon in order to assess great rabbis’ leadership are inadmissible because rationality is insufficient because for them, the Torah may be revered but not understood. To the Haredi view, a divine law requires a divinely inspired mediator; those who are not  endowed with a charismatic intuition are not entitled to express an opinion. Kanievsky believes that world Jewry is obliged to defer to his divinely guided, subjective intuition.  For him, Jewry must remain secularly uneducated, politically docile, and unquestionably compliant to the rules and rulings that he, the great rabbi, deems appropriate.  The divinely inspired Torah scholar is entitled, authorized, and empowered to rule world Jewry with the assumption of infallibility and sovereign immunity.  In contrast, Oral Torah “orthodoxy’s” only restriction on dissent  is that an ordained sage sitting the Sanhedrin’s plenum  may not rule to disobey in practice a decision of the Sanhedrin,  the Supreme Court authorized by the Torah [Deut. 17:8-12] to interpret and legislate Torah law. According to Oral Torah “orthodoxy,” it is not forbidden to argue [a]  I disagree with the decision of the Beit Din ha-Gadol [b] but accept the authority of the court [bSanhedrin 88a].

R. Kanievsky’s initially claimed that  synagogue and yeshiva attendance are sufficiently sacred acts to override the danger of Coronavirus, and his charismatic authority is adequate to read God’s mind, apply God’s will, and issue a dispensation to ignore the advice medical experts in this moment of pandemic crisis is unorthodox  in the extreme.   At stake in this debate is the identity and essence of what is anachronistically called Jewish “orthodoxy.”  Some suggest that “orthodoxy” is defined by the charismatic intuitions of an inspired elite; others argue that “orthodoxy” is defined by the most reasonable reading of a revealed, and readable, Torah.  According to the canonical Torah evidence, the Torah is readable, the judges subject to judgment, and not even God gets sovereign immunity from assessment. Those who believe the Torah is readable will have the audacity to challenge  dubious claims; those who rule from charisma would have Jewry believe that God revealed a Torah that is unreadable.   In charismatic Orthodoxy, modesty is demanded of the ruled; in the Orthodox religion of the Written and Oral Torah library, modesty is reflected in the claims, character, and behavior of those who rule.

To our members and friends

We congratulate our Campus Fellows for their ongoing programming through this difficult time of COVID-19. They have transitioned to Zoom and other technologies to reach their peers, and now their programs are available to students on other campuses. We appreciate how our Ideas and Ideals are bringing meaningful discussion to students everywhere.

Looking ahead to next year, if you know of college students who might be good representatives for our Institute on their campuses, please have them contact me, [email protected].

Here are the latest programs from our Fellows.

Rabbi Hayyim Angel

National Scholar

Institute for Jewish Ideas and Ideals

Yona Benjamim (Columbia)

In my initial proposal I outlined two events, one on the memory of the history of the Mishnah, and one on the uses of text criticism in learning. This changed slightly wherein I instead chose to have the two topics be both related to text study. One being lower criticism, and the second being higher criticism. I hosted both gatherings in the dorms and each had about 13-15 attendees.

The first event began with a discussion of what lower criticism entails (explaining the manuscript traditions and the ways in which they can be compared.) We then discussed why this mode of criticism has at times been more acceptable in traditional circles, as it does not threaten the aura of the text but rather discusses its recension through time.  However I brought a case in which lower critical observations show that traditional understandings of a topic in the Mishnah are perhaps misinformed due to very early scribal errors. This case was meant to show that the insights the method provides are large and should be invited, but that one should not think that one will not be challenged by what one learns. We discussed the idea of Yeridat-Hadorot as a way to understand the potential failures of textual transmission in our tradition. 

The second event largely concerned higher criticism, which I disseminated some prior reading about. We discussed how it might initially seem to be antithetical to a reverential attitude towards Rabbinic texts and Halacha, however I offered a Shamma Freidman article I had read in a previous class which outlines what I consider to be a positive take on what text study can offer. I also taught a series of Mishnayot and their parallel texts which I was writing my final research paper on so as to explain what learning with a source critical perspective can look like. 

Overall both events were a success. I discussed the institute at both and explained how I felt the values of the institute were reflected in the learning we were doing. This was received well and I expect similar enthusiasm could be had for more events like this in the future. 

Zac Tankel (McGill University)

Last semester, we had two Institute events. The first was on October 3^rd, and it was a shiur by David Chaim Wallach, a Judaic studies teacher from one of the local high schools. The topic was religiously observant Jews in prison and repentance. You can see the social media page for the event here: https://www.facebook.com/events/2473512592698137/. 

The second was a discussion group that I ran on November 28^th, based on Afterlife in Jewish Thought from Keys to the Palace.  https://www.facebook.com/events/474138363453231/

Ayelet Rubenstein (University of Pennsylvania)

I am planning on leading a discussion about different models of Jewish leadership over Zoom. In addition, I am working on planning a Pesach-oriented discussion related to the topic of freedom in our lives today.

Avi Siegal (Princeton University)

Rabbi Yitzchak Blau's class on "Women in the Exodus Narrative" on 3/2 was a success. It was publicized as "Co-sponsored by the Institute for Jewish Ideas and Ideals." The class was well-attended given our community's size: around 20 students came. Before Rabbi Blau began speaking, I said a few words about the Institute and then passed around a sheet on which students could write down their names in order to subsequently receive information from me about signing up for the University Network. I later followed up with those students.

For my second event this semester, I'm thinking of leading a Zoom chaburah on the topic of triage in Halakhah.

Marta Dubov (Ryerson University)

On February 15, we organized about 12 students to come together and experience a community-wide Shabbaton together. A number of them have expressed interest in joining the university network, as well as potentially taking on the role as fellows on their own campuses.

Ari Barbalat (University of Toronto)

In partnership with Rabbi Aaron Greenberg of JLIC, we hosted scholar Roy Doliner. He spoke on the topic: “The Ox and the Donkey: The Secret Meaning of the Bible’s Odd Couple.”

Eli Hyman, Ora Friedman (Yeshiva University)

We’re working with Steven Gotlib (RIETS) to plan two panel discussions (see Steven Gotlib’s report below).

Additionally, the event that we were planning on doing (a Shiur followed by a discussion/Q and A with Rabbi Hajioff), is still on.  We hope to have it over Zoom early in May, and the topic will be “Five Signs We Are Close to Mashiach and the End of Days.”

Steven Gotlib (Rabbi Isaac Elhanan Theological Seminary, Yeshiva University)

For this semester's events, I'll be transitioning online and hosting two panel discussions on "Reimagining Jewish Community in the Wake of COVID-19." Each panel will be framed by some words of Torah I give, followed by a discussion on how we've can make the best of the situations we find us in. 

The first panel, scheduled for next Thursday evening from 8:30-10pm will be framed with "Zooming into the Future: R. Shagar, R. Nachman and the Matrix" followed by a panel discussion with speakers representing the four corners of Jewish community: Yeshiva, Day School, Campus, and Synagogue. 

The second panel, Date TBD, will be framed around "Love, Romance, and Covenant Across Social Distance" and will focus more on interpersonal and intrapersonal relationships from both a psychotherapeutic and rabbinic perspective.