A Case Study- Some thoughts on my interests in Torah

The other day, I commented to my wife how glad I was that the seforim on our shelves are being used so frequently. While this was perhaps, in some small measure, an attempt to justify my frustrating habit of not returning sefarim to the shelf and putting sefarim back in a fairly messy way, there was much more behind my comment. To me, it is sad to walk into a house and see from the sefarim that they are positioned in a way that suggests that they are hardly ever used. Essentially, I was saying that no one would ever make that mistake by looking at our shelves. Thinking about it a little more, that’s only half true. It depends upon which of our shelves one looks.

We have about 6 bookcases packed with sefarim in our living room, with three on one wall, and the other three on the adjoining wall. Along one wall, are the sefarim that deal with Tanach and machshava/philosophy. On the other shelves, are sefarim that deal with gemara and halacha. Of course, being that these sefarim are mine, it’s not quite that neatly divided, but I digress. The first set of shelves look as if they have been hit by a tornado. Sets are somewhat broken up, sefarim lay horizontally on top of other sefarim, and everything looks used. By contrast, the Shas and halacha shelves are, if not collecting dust, way too ordered and neat. It’s hard for me not to think about what this means.

For a long time, my learning interests tended to be talmudic and halachic, as were the shiurim I gave. I loved tracing a topic from its talmudic roots through modern day posekim. I would often pick up a SHU’T (Shailos and Teshuvos) to see how a modern posek dealt with a particular subject. All of that has changed. While I continue to be fully observant and enjoy hearing halacha shiurim when the chance comes up, that is not the area that draws my mind and heart. These days, I am more likely to pick up Rav Kook rather than Rav Moshe, the Moreh rather than the Mishnah Torah, and the Tzidkas HaTzaddik rather than the Mishnah Berura.

This was brought home to me last night when I posted a comment that contained a few sloppy mistakes about halacha. While it was by no means part of a serious Torah post, I couldn’t help but realize that I wouldn’t have made that same mistake five years ago. Whereas a number of friends took the opportunity to push me to return to a more balanced approach, I’m not yet ready to find the middle ground. For now I simply recognize that I traded one pole for its opposite. I know the middle exists, and I will one day find it, perhaps by looking at the interplay between the two poles, but for now, I am not yet ready.

Reaching Out- God, Avraham and choice (Audio shiur)

In Lech Lecha, God commanded Avraham (Avram at that point) to leave his land to go to Canaan. Absent from the story is any reason for Avraham being selected for his special role.

In the shiur, we explore various possibilities as to whether God chose Avraham or Avraham chose God. In the process, we explore the concept of what it means to be chosen, and the relationship between God and mankind.

Below are the links (the shiur is in two parts due to technical reasons)

Running time 1:10

Part I

Part II

The Middle Ground- Finding the balance in our relationship with God

“Yedid Nefesh, Av Ha Rachaman…”

The other night after my shiur on parshat Noach, I got into an interesting conversation with a student. We somehow ended up discussing the danger of viewing God as one who can be manipulated through things like davening, Tehillim and baking challah. I pointed out to him, that the rationalist side, a side that has become very common within the world of modern-orthodoxy, has its dangers as well. He asked what they were, and I responded off the cuff with a quick answer. What follows is an attempt to give a more complete answer to the question.

Rav Eliezer Berkovits zt”l wrote about the fact that the God of Aristotle is not the God of the Torah. Aristotle spoke of the Unmoved Mover, a God with whom man can not truly engage. On the other hand, the Torah speaks of a God who listens, commands and gives rewards and punishments. In short, a God who cares. While Rambam attempted to somehow merge the two ideas, for many he created a supercomputer of sorts with whom it is difficult for us to relate. While he moved Judaism away from a God who could be seen as too human, he left us with a God with whom it is hard to connect.

Rav Shimshon Raphael  Hirsch in his commentary on Bereishis, took note of this difficulty. On the pesukim found at the end of parshas Bereishis (6:6), God, in advance of the flood, is described as regretting the creation of man and feeling sad.

וַיִּנָּחֶם ה' כִּי־עָשָׂה אֶת־הָאָדָם בָּאָרֶץ וַיִּתְעַצֵּב אֶל־לִבּוֹ:

Rav Hirsch notes:

Let us here make a general remark about anthropomorphic expressions in Scripture. Scholars have philosophized about these expressions, in order to keep us far from ascribing to God material features.

He continues by noting:

This gives rise, however, to the danger that the Personality of God will become increasingly blurred and indistinct to our perception. Had that been the Torah's intention, it could easily have avoided such expressions. Rather, the second danger (that of blurring the Creator's Personality) is greater than the first (that of anthropomorphizing the Creator). (Emphasis added)

...All this affirms the Personality and freedom of God and preserves the purity of faith. This is also the view of the ראב''ד, the distinctively Jewish thinker: Belief in the Personality of God is more important than the speculations of those who reject the attribution of material features to God.

While it can be argued that in Rambam’s time the greater danger might have been in the opposite direction, it seems to me that Rav Hirsch is correct in noting that the pendulum has swung too far in our community. Why daven when God is unchanging and uncaring? How can we relate to His mitzvos when we can’t relate to Him at all? If all we know is what he is not, how can that be enough for the basis of a relationship?

It is time to think about finding a proper balance. While the God of the Torah is not a gumball machine from which we can receive what we want whenever we want, he is also not a supercomputer running the world. It is time to return to language that speaks not only of God’s perfection, but also of His concern, and for us to not see him as merely the creator, but also as a God who loves and cares about us.

Deluge-ions of Grandeur- Was there really a worldwide flood in the time of Noach?

Last night I spoke about Noach and the flood in light of what is known today. I touched on some issues of biblical criticism, and offered three different approaches to deal with the episode of the flood. For some, the third approach, which is the one that I prefer, might be difficult to accept. I welcome all comments and thoughts as long as they are respectful. If you are uncomfortable with the ideas of biblical criticism, please do not listen, as I do not wish to challenge or damage anyone’s faith.

Here is the link to the shiur. (Running time 1:04)

Post by Pesach Sommer.

Bayom HaHu- The redemptive meaning of Shemini Atzeret

Here is the link to the shiur I gave last night about Shemini Atzeret. In it, I try to explain the meaning of the day given its enigmatic status in that it has no mitzvot hayom or historical connection, At the end, I suggest what I hope is not just an interesting interpretation based on the Vilna Gaon, but one that I think might be correct.

Running time (55 minutes)

Chag Sameach!

HaLomeid Mi V'Im Kol Adam- Ruth Calderon's important message

I struggle to find the right words to describe the speech and shiur that I heard from MK Dr. Ruth Calderon last evening. I am not interested in writing a summary, although to be sure, I will share some of what she said. I am trying to avoid any judgment good or bad of her or her approach. To judge is to miss the point of what Calderon represents.

My first thought is of Rav Kook, Rav Nachman and Rav Tzadok. Through their thought I might find some way to take her secular view and somehow make it religious or holy. Still, this would be  wrong. Her words need no redemption. She needs no Orthodox imprimatur of approval for her ideas. Here’s the thing. If we in the Orthodox, or frum, or religious or whathaveyou world are to learn from and with Jews like Calderon, we need to recognize a simple, but some sometimes not so obvious truth. The Torah is not ours to share. It is Gods. He has given it to us, but to us in the broadest sense. To the whole Jewish people. We can not and must not insist on controlling it. We can refuse to learn Torah with anyone who will not do so on our terms and in our way, but in doing so, we not only cheat others. We also cheat ourselves.

The truth is, I’m not so sure we want to refuse. Calderon movingly told the story of a charedi man who saw her learning dafy yomi  while they were waiting at a pharmacy and decided to give her a faher (oral exam). She not only passed, but discovered that, at least for a few moments, a gemara could serve as common ground between any two Jews.

I have heard people object to her teaching Torah that is disconnected from God. That can not be further from the truth. She constantly speaks of God in very real ways, ways that feel almost shocking when I think of how rarely I and other Orthodox Jews might talk about God when we learn or teach. She is not halachically observant (although even that needs to be qualified, and a large degree of nuance) but that is not the same thing as being Godless. In fact, I can’t imagine that I am the only one who sometimes loses God in the details of halacha.

Allow me to suggest a different way that we might look at Dr. Calderon’s Torah ideas, one that is based on something she said last night in her shiur. As with her more famous shiur that she delivered in the Knesset, Calderon shared her creative reading of a piece of aggadah. As much as I was impressed by the content of the shiur, I was equally impressed by the way she described her relationship to Torah. She spoke about the aggadot of the gemara as art, and how each one speaks to her about many of the most important parts of her life. As with any good teacher, Calderon is an artist. Rather than discussing the painting that we would paint, or the one some might rather she paint, try to take in the image she is creating. Her ideas about God, Judaism religion and Torah will challenge you. They will make you think. Even more than we owe it to her, we owe it to ourselves to listen to her Torah.

Ayeka- A Poem

I could not find you today,

in the three times that I prayed,

or in the bright autumn leaves,

or even in my wife's smile.

Perhaps, alone, late at night,

I might yet find you,

deep within myself.