With respect to R. Adlerstien, I believe he is misunderstanding and misapplying R. Samson Raphael Hirschs approach, which, in my view, is actually consistent with the apporach R. Adlerstien is criticising. R. Hirsch was thoroughly convinced that the Torah is not the exclusive repository of all Truth (capital T). On the contrary, he views history as a continual path of upward development in which mankind becomes (or should become) ever more refined and truly human true to its calling to be tzelem Elokim by discovering, creating, and developing True values. Indeed, in his essay on Chanuka and rabim byad matim, (Collected Writings Vol. II, pp. 233-248), R. Hirsch spoke of the dangers of thinking that the Torah is the exclusive repository of Truth, or that all Truth can only be derived from the Torah itself. R. Hirsch wrote: There is one other particular danger which is to be feared by a Jewish minority. It is what we would call a certain intellectual narrow-mindedness. This danger becomes especially acute the more closely a minority clings to its cause and the more anxious it is to preserve that cause. . . . it may easily come to regard all other knowledge in outside domains as unnecessary, or even as utterly worthless. it may reject all intellectual activity in any field outside its own as an offense against its own cause, as an inroad upon the devotion properly due to that cause [Torah]. . . . Once this attitude has taken hold in a Jewish minority, that minority will be unable to form a proper judgement and a true image of those intellectual pursuits which are not cultivated in its own ranks but pursued mainly by its opponents. . . . The minority may come to regard these outside pursuits in themselves as the roots of the spiritual error which deplores the majority. . . . Rather, it has cause to regard all truth, wherever it may be found on the outside, as a firm ally of its own cause, since all truth stems from the one Master of truth. R. Adlerstien wrote that Rav Samson Raphael Hirsch summed up much of his methodology in explaining mitzvos in the phrase Judaism “aus sich selber heraus,” a Judaism that emerges inexorably from its own sources. He insisted on accepting only such explanations that grew organically from the entire corpus of halacha, including (and in this he took exception to the Rambam in the Moreh) its details. This is, of course, correct. However, it refers specifically to R. Hirschs theory of taamei hamitzvos, which he insisted must be developed inductively (from its own soruces) rather than deductively. As a perusal of Horeb demonstrates, in practice, this meant that when developing his theories of the lessons to be learned from various mitzvos, R. Hirsch did not begin with a reason of the mitzva and make the mitzvah fit the theory, but instead began with the halakhic details prescribing the performance of the mitzva and sought to articulate a purpose for the mitzva that adequately accounted for all these details. This approach to taamei hamitzvos, however, has nothing to do with adopting or integrating external values. R. Hirsch, I think, would agree that TORAH values and hashkafa must be developed organically from within the sources of the Torah itself, but he is also firm in thinking that TORAH values are particular to our JEWISH existence, and that there is a whole world of HUMAN existence that is broader than Torah and which we cannot ignore (see his pshat on why Avraham had to wait until he was an accomplished human being before receiving a bris and becoming a Jew). Furthermore, R. Adlerstien referenced R. Horschs famous quote, “Did you set the values of the time to the Torah, or did you make the Torah fit into the times?,” and applies this quote to the instant issue as asking “Did you make your modern values submit to the scrutiny and limitation of the Torah, or did you insist that the Torah conform to your modern values?” This is all well and good, so far as it goes, but it seems to me that something is missed in R. Adlerstiens interpretation. For R. Hirsch, the Torah of course must be the yardstick with which we measure the times and the values of the times (i.e., we can not use contemporary values to evaluate the viability of the Torah). But this is a negative limit, and R. Hirsch says explicitely many times that the way we make this evaluation is by rejecting anything that CONFLICTS with the Torah. In other words, if an externally developed value or idea or knowledge seems good (in that it furthers human development as emulations of the Divine), then the burden of proof is on the Torah to show that this value cannot be squared with Torah, rather than on the external value to show that it is contained in or derived from the Torah. cross-currents/archives/2014/09/04/modern-orthodoxy-can-do-better/
Posted on: Thu, 04 Sep 2014 16:24:37 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015