29 Mar 2009

Giving 'spirituality' a bad name

Summary of post: We should all be more spiritual

Post: When I talk about halacha (and thus, Judaism) being essentially 'this-worldly', the false dichotomy brigade come out in full force.  The view that Judaism addresses man as a physical creature in the world, is contrasted with the so-called 'spiritual' explanations.  I am thus accused of seeing the commandments as "this is what G-d says", as opposed to looking for the deeper reasons.

Now, what is so deep about doing gematria, talking about 'essences', discovering the 'auspicious', magical effects of the commandments or dreaming of far-off worlds, I'm not sure.  Gematria (etc) may aid us in finding the relevance of a commandment, but certainly does not constitute its relevance.  "Wow, this action effects 67.876 dimensions and may help your wife to get pregnant" doesn't cut it and isn't deep.

The equation of the "spiritual" with the "non-natural", gives spirituality a bad name.  Where beliefs are, to the proud pronouncements of its adherents, "non rational", why should we hold them?  When beliefs cut off from our experience of this world, what exactly are we believing in?  Ex Cathedra announcements about auspicious times may be beneficial for some mysterious "soul-stuff" but is not relevant for me.  They can lead to irrelevant nonsense but also to outright falsity or a perversion of values.  Potentially anything can be said which I wouldn't be allowed to challenge on the grounds that they are not rational.  For if I did, I would be denying the 'spiritual' knowledge which is not derived from rationality.

You shouldn't take the above as a defence of my position, but merely as a statement of it.  If spirituality requires knowing all about this 'deep' other-worldly stuff, then I want nothing to do with it!  However, does that mean I don't think one should be spiritual?  If spirituality means any of the points listed below, I am all for spirituality:

  • Understanding what I say and do, rather than doing it by rote or by habit.
  • Cultivating more lofty desires, and pursuing higher goals than merely feeding my every whim or desire.
  • Seeing a meaning and purpose in my life.
  • Having a theocratic motivation for my actions rather than simply being focused on what worldly benefits I can accrue from them.
  • Utilising the whole of my spirit to the best of my ability- thought, feeling, physical skills, good sense and judgement, intuition, personality etc.  (Study the sources to find all the potentialities included in terms such as "ruach", "nefesh" and "neshama" and act on them.)
  • Trying to maximise 'peak experiences' rather than merely surviving or getting by.
  • Having a sense of G-d in my life.
  • Trying to raise myself above the level of a member of the species homo sapien, and become an singular adam. 
  • Transcend my status as an entirely natural creature created by circumstances external to myself, and choose to act in a way that makes me worthy of being b'tzelem Elokim. 

23 Mar 2009

Say what, Mr. Shakespeare?

Shakespeare is the plague of every child's English lessons.  His language makes it so hard for anyone to understand what he is trying to say.  He might be the stuff of night-time fantasies for the English teacher but more likely to infest the nightmares of everyone else. The sentiment is heartily expressed in 'Back and Forth' where Blacadder (having gone back in time) punched Shakespeare and said:

This is for every schoolboy and schoolgirl for the next four hundred years.  Have you any idea how much suffering you are going to cause.  Hours spent at school desks trying to find one joke in A Midsummer Night’s Dream?  Years wearing stupid tights in school plays and saying things like ‘What ho, my lord’ and ‘Oh, look, here comes Othello, talking total crap as usual’. 

However, it is funny that he should raise 'lack of jokes' as the cause of suffering.  There are, for some, too many jokes in Shakespeare.  I know an English teacher in a Beis Yaakov school who has to teach Shakespeare as he is on the National Curriculum.  She has said how she has been instructed to skip over all the sexual innuendos and hope they don't ask any questions!  Here though, is where the terse language is an advantage for the Bais Yaakovs, if not the Edmund Blackadders, of this world.

As for the 'talking total crap as usual' , one might presume this is a result of the language being very old and no longer understandable.  Rather like with Bible translations, we are subjected to pathos at the expense of  understanding what is being said.  However, I very much doubt that there is a direct correlation between a decline in understanding and time passing.  I wonder: Did those who paid their penny to stand at the Globe have any idea what was going on or did they just go to leer at men in womens' clothing?  Was the theatre a place of high culture or a mere alternative to the bear baiting ring?

It is quite possible that those in Shakespeare's day wouldn't have understood his language.  The problem for them wouldn't be the antiquarian nature of his language.  In fact, the opposite would be true.  They would have been justified had the exclaimed "That guy is just making up words".   Words found for the first time in Shakespeare include:

abstemious, antipathy, critical, frugal, dwindle, extract, horrid, vast, hereditary, excellent, eventful, barefaced, assassination, lonely, leapfrog, distinguishable, well-read, zany, countless

This is not to mention all the words he made up by being the first person to add un- in front of words, such like unlock, untie and unveil (unsufflicate?). Given that many of these are common words, I could (and will) exaggerate and say the only words they would have understood are the one we don't understand today!

As David Crystal (Shakespeare scholar in Bill Bryson book) says, "Most modern authors, I imagine, would be delighted if they contributed even one lexeme to the future of the language".  Shakespeare, however, was prolific.  One thing we can take comfort in, however, is that we can actually spell our name, whilst Shakespeare was a little more unsure.  In six extant signatures of his that we have, no two are spelt the same and none how we spell it!

18 Mar 2009

The Death Penalty

Today, amazingly, a man was released from prison after 27 years incarceration for a crime he never committed. Sean Hodgson was convicted of rape and murder but DNA testing of the sperm at the scene has revealed that it was not his. Possibly, and this is a matter for an inquiry, the court should not have accepted the confession of a 'pathological liar'. However, they cannot be faulted for overlooking forensic evidence, as DNA testing didn't exist then (or at least not in the way it is now). As such, it may be that locking him up was the just thing to do, on the basis of what was known at the time.

One thing that it does confirm in my mind is the unacceptability of the death penalty and my relief and being under English rule where it no longer exists. Had the death penalty been in effect, an innocent man would have been put to death and a subsequent 'clearing of his name' wouldn't have been unable to undo this. Of course, far back in English history, the death penalty could be given for something as small as stealing bread. With the advent of the Human Rights Act, however, not even High Treason is punishable in this way.

This is not to say that 'in theory' death is not the appropriate response to particular crimes (not stealing bread though!). If I couldn't reconcile myself, in some way, to the idea of the death penalty, it would most certainly put me at odds with Judaism. Biblical law prescribes death for a large array of different crimes. The Hebrew Bible is a seemingly gruesome book suggesting stoning, strangling, drowning etc. We pray on Yom Kippur, in an inappropriately happy tune, for our sins that deserve these punishments to be commuted.

The logic of the death penalty- at least in the case of murder- is clear. The value of a person's life is the potential to do good deeds and, where one has done wrong, do teshuva (repentance). Repentance in the bible is "eye for an eye": like-for-like reparation is needed to undo the effects of the sin. In certain cases, the perpetrator further needs to experience the wrongdoing themselves. As such, certain forms of stealing require paying double- undo the sin by paying back the money and to then feel what it is like to be without that amount.

Here the law aims not at being punitive but at educating the perpetrator and arousing a sense of sympathy with the victim. They will then be able to go on and live a meaningful life. Bad actions can only be counteracted by good actions, and not by the grace of G-d. Murder, however, is the ultimate crime where the effects of the sin cannot be undone and where the wrong can not be 'righted'. Here, the murderers life is forfeit as there is no potential to do good deeds that can outweigh the evil done. Not even G-d can forgive such a sin.

Despite this "theory", it was never thought to be practically workable proposal for most of those convicted of murder. The Talmud records the following opinions:

"a Sanhedrin [highest law court] that effects an execution once in seven years is branded a destructive tribunal." Rabbi Eliezer Ben Azariah said "once in seventy years." Rabbis Tarfon and Akiba said, "If we were members of a Sanhedrin, nobody would ever be put to death."

The conditions put on the death penalty were so hard that it was virtually impossible to put someone to death this way.

If 2000 years ago they were circumspect about the standard of evidence in murder cases, how much more so should we be? The technological advances we have seen can lead one generations "safe cases" to be overturned in the next. This should not lead to impotence in carrying out justice. As I started by saying, it may have been absolutely the right thing to do, to lock this person up. However, it should lead those who advocate the death penalty to think twice about doing something that cannot be undone.

17 Mar 2009

And which 'Diary of Anne Frank' is that?

I never knew that the Anne Frank diary we have today is not exactly what Anne Frank herself wrote.  Those she shared with were not the Van Daans and there wasn't a Mr. Dussel either!  Or, to be more specific, they were made up names.

There is, in fact, an A, B and C edition of the diary and numerous versions in between.  A is what she originally wrote as she went along.  However, late in the war she heard over the radio that the Dutch government wanted to collect memoirs of war-time experiences.  Having heard this she started to edit her diary ready for publishing!  She took out items that were too personal, added the now-famous "Dear Kitty" to all the passages, changed everyone's names and revised some of the more harsh entries about her mother.  This is version B.

When the war was over, Otto Frank decided to fulfill his daughter's requests to publish her diaries.  However, he edited the diary further.  He took out anything that wouldn't be "becoming" of a young girl in early 20th Century Britain, as well as the more unflattering remarks about other members of the annexe. He reinstated his families names but left everyone else's pseudonyms.  This version- the one to become "A Diary of a Young Girl" - was made up of a mix of A and B and thus, became C.

The interesting question is which one is the most definitive edition or the one we should read today?  Is it A because this is Anne's unadulterated thoughts?  Alternatively, is it B because this is how Anne wanted it to be read? Or is it C because this is the diary that many generations have come to know, love and draw inspiration from?

12 Mar 2009

The Quality Street of Facebook Quotes

Most people use their Facebook status message as an emotional cry for help:  "I'm feeling abandoned".  I must say I have succumbed once or twice but generally resisted temptation.  Instead, here is the pick of the quotes, sayings or jokes that I put up instead for people's delectation and/or just to show thoroughly witty, cad and bounder I am.  These ain't no Cadbury's Roses.

To me, About me, By me

Mohammed T to me: "you cant just sit around waiting for Moshiach mate, you gotta do shit. Where would the Jewish people be if they were all zombies?"

Neil Clarke is according to Nikk Effingham, "one of those WEIRD atheists who assents to all kinds of theistic sentences"

Me to anyone who couldn't care less: "yore? yore! yadin? yadin! yatir? yatir! yatus? probably not (Red Bull hypothesis fails)"

Just 'ha'

Socrates, "By all means marry; if you get a good wife, you'll be happy. If you get a bad one, you'll become a philosopher."

The Jews were a proud people and throughout history they had trouble with unsympathetic genitals

Nietzche: "it is not their love for men but the impotence of their love for men which hinders the Christians of today from - burning us."

Religious in-jokes

A Rosh Yeshiva of Brisk "Der mishna berurah iz for yesoimim, ich hob a tattah".  (The Mishna Berurah is for orphans, I have a dad)

Chief Rabbi Sir Jonathan Sacks, "What do you get when you cross a yekker with a chabadnik? A Moshiach who arrives on time."

Kotzker Rebbe "What's the difference between a Hasid and a Mitnaged? The Hasid has fear & trepidation before G-d whilst the Mitnaged has fear  trepidation before the Shulchan Arukh"

Pure truth

Hitchcock, "The length of a film should be directly related to the endurance of the human bladder."

Iris Murdoch- "Almost anything that consoles us is a fake"

We must respect the other fellow's religion, but only in the sense and to the extent that we respect his theory that his wife's beautiful and his children smart

From Quality Street to Revels

Y-Love- "Subs constitute an intrusion of secular values? Can one get onions with secular values? How fragile is the community that has to protect itself from sandwiches?"

R' Hirsch-aggadic sayings do not have Sinaitic origin.. someone whose opinion differs from that of our sages in a matter of aggadah shouldn't be deemed a heretic

The Streets "it's hard enough remembering my opinions without remembering my reasons for them"

R' Schneerson "It is not possible to ask a question about a [Rebbe being a] go-between, since this is God Himself, as He has clothed Himself in a human body"!

Neil Clarke didn't know where to look for all the blood and cleavage (in Sweeney Todd that is...)

A window into my (past) soul: "Dear Rabbi Hodges..."

"A ghost just walked over my grave" seems like a pithy remark to open a post and whatever its correct context, it feels the appropriate thing to say. 

I was just having a look over at random files that I retrieved from my old computer.  There was some cringe-worthy lyrics to songs I half-wrote, a rather surprising opinion I expressed on gender differences in a psychology essay, a cracking critique of Louis Jacob's doctrines, an entertaining musical I wrote for a Hanoar program and some interesting sources.  Oh yes... and that letter which (for better or worse) remains between me, the recipient and G-d.

I

However, there was another letter which was never finished off and never sent.  It was this letter that is the cause of the aforementioned (hopefully metaphorical) ghost and grave.  Apart from giving me an indication of my previous preference of font size, it gave me an eerie look at my past.  It is basically a letter I was writing to the then chaplain- Rabbi Hodges- to decide once and for all my thoughts regarding Jewish observance.  As I say in the letter I have set myself a modest task: "questions of the divinity of the whole Torah is the main purpose of this letter"!!!

Having articulated that the 'meaning of life' has been a top priority for years, I declare of Judaism: "Either it is right or wrong".  I want to know which and want the decisive reason that will tell me so.  Reasonable enough, no?  Well.  Today, I would see that as the wrong question to ask.  It is not a particularly Jewish question, is unfruitful and can lead to some fundamentalist conclusions.  However, the fact that I asked such questions should lead me to examine my sometimes unintentionally condescending attitude to people who insist on such a straight-out answer.

II

Apart from personal mussar, the letter helps to understand what prompts such questions and how this affects the type of answer given.  What's the purpose of such a "true-false" question?

From what I say, I think I must have written the letter in my second term of my first year at university.  By this point I had 'come out' to my parents.  Not in relation to my sexuality but as to my shabbat observance.  As challenging (and frankly boring) as Shabbat must have been in my first term, it was nothing to having to go through a readjustment with my parents.  Only after having spent time at home, could I realise just what a radical step in my life I had taken.  I now thought "It is getting to the point where increasing my religiosity any more could cause problems with the family".  Whilst up to then I could take on mitzvot on the probability that Judaism is true, now I needed to know that it was true.

The above was possibly my primary motivation but the letter - as far as it goes- is filled with other reasons.  The second reason I can empathise with as well.  I use the word 'empathise' as it is as if from another person- such a reason would be utterly strange from the philosophical perspective I currently inhabit.  Yet, I can understand the emotion behind it:

Without such an assurance I would see no point of even studying the oral law. I occasionally look at English versions of the Talmud and it strikes with irrelevance and of hair picking. For example, 7 pages of commentary/ gemarra on a single mishna which in itself goes into everyone who can have a valuation and who can make a vow. I have no motivation to study this. This is, of course, a fault on my behalf. However, without being sure that this was something that G-d says I can’t forsee making the effort to correct this fault. 

Of course, it is certainly a serious issue to ask the relevance of such 'nitpicking'.  

The third reason is frightening because of its desperation and because, in many ways, the way it is expressed is morally abhorrent:

As a third reason for needing to be assured of the torah’s divinity, is the need to be able to say “G-d said so”! Many things in the Torah seem unpalatable and are certainly against social norms. For example, stoning someone to death or even animal sacrifices. If I’m in the mindset that “G-d said so”, then this is not a problem. Under the authority of the supreme being then social norms are worthless and anything is justified. Without that mindset which I lack, reading passages like that of stoning can make me feel uncomfortable.

Now I certainly believe that G-d's word overrides social norms and that certain things aren't palatable because they are not the 'done thing' in modern society.  However, presumably, animal sacrifices and stoning people weren't bothering me because they were 'social norms' or 'unpalatable' .  They would have done so because of concerns they were morally wrong.  I felt like I couldn't justify certain religious values without a psychological certainty in their validity.  However, no 'mindset' could or should dictate moral standards.

All these reasons seem to demand a theoretical reason for Judaism's truth and do so in relation to real intellectual problems.  Under what circumstances does religious authority overcome familial authority? What is the cognitive or spiritual value of law and the text study of it?  What is the relationship between eternal values and a particular time?  However, the letter shows that the demand for these theoretical reasons were prompted by an emotional or psychological need. I need to be sure.

III

A third interesting thing about the letter is a purely theoretical one.  On what grounds did I think that one should be observant of Judaism?  What were my beliefs at the time through which I justified my observance?

I just wrote a massively long piece (now deleted) to go into this section about how hard it is for someone like myself to answer that question.  That is, someone who started my journey of observance so young but whose development was so gradual.  There is no one reason that I can identify as the reason, as I have had to think about the authority of Judaism every step of the way.  Nor if I could point to a reason would I be able to express it in anything like the way I would have done at the time. 

How could I give authentic voice to my views at the time when anything I now say is so filtered through writers or works that I would never had a clue about at the time?  I sometimes need reminding that I never knew anything about Rambam (besides his existence) until the end of my second year, or even heard of Soloveitchik until half way through my third year.  Up until that point my entire Jewish diet was Kiruv Judaism.  Every lecture, every book, every rabbi; everything!  I had a look at my first year philosophy essays and it is Rabbi Dessler that I quote.  There is nothing wrong with this but it is an eye-opener.

The problem of giving an authentic voice to my beliefs is less about what they beliefs were, than how I would talk about them.  Having only been exposed to kiruv Judaism and secular philosophy, I could only frame my beliefs in terms of things such as 'evidence', 'objectivity' and the like.   Now, the very way I would talk about any beliefs- ones I agree or disagree with- is completely transformed. 

So there's a dilemma.  Either I manage to correctly adduce the content of my past beliefs, but in my new language.  However, this wouldn't resemble my thought processes at the time, or how I would have verbally reasoned them out.  Or I could try and mimic how I would have talked about Judaism at the time (i.e. about evidence).  This, however, is at the great risk of just caricaturing myself and play-acting.  What I now mean by 'evidence', would be different to what I was then trying to say using that word.

The piece I wrote argued that only through letters such as these could I get closest to what I actually believed.  Only there would there be the best fit between philosophical 'thought' (i.e. what I believed) and the psychological 'thought' (i.e. what went through my head).  If this doesn't make sense, don't worry.  I deleted the passage and explanation.  The reason being is that in the letter I don't really get to any coherent statement of belief.  I flail around using words like 'evidence' without being able to express my point of view with them.  I intuit that answers to my questions will bring me peace of mind without being able to formulate what kind of answers they would have to be. 

IV

Despite not giving me a positive statements of belief, the following are worth noting:

1.  It is clear that what is at issue for me is not some 'fact' or other.  Even when expressing myself in the way I did in my letter, I do not ask for confirmation of a historical event or some scientific proof.  With all the references to "G-d says so", what is at issue when asking about the divinity of the Torah is a reason for its authority.  What constitutes me accepting it as G-d's word?

2.  Despite my wishes at that moment for absolute assurance, neither my observance before or after was grounded on one.  Whilst always concerned about why I should accept it as divine, this didn't rely on first having all the answers.

3.  Dropping the letter didn't mean dropping the issues.  I had many subsequent discussions with R' Hodges trying to 'get at' what I was trying to say.  I remember from these discussions that my concern wasn't in showing that G-d literally spoke the whole oral Torah, for example.  In fact, the recourse to such an answer was precisely the wrong approach.  Why would the authority of a halacha depend on Moses being literally told that it could be derived thus?  Instead, I want to know what is it about halacha itself that means I should accept its particular outputs as divine?

I remember saying to him something like- and I really wish I could remember exactly what I meant by it- "If only you could tell me that particular halachot were a result of  what the Rabbis did, and not from G-d, I could accept that they were something I have to do".  He replied something like "I know what you are getting at but it is not something that I can say".

I don't think it was 'I know what you are saying, but I think you are bonkers and absolutely wrong'. No, instead he pointed me to a book : "Dynamics of Dispute: The Makings of Machlokess in Talmudic Times" by Zvi Lampel.  This shows that one need only accept that certain halachot were there 'potentially' in what Moses heard. The reason it was something R' Hodges "could not say" is because it would be the wrong formulation to say "the rabbis made it up"- I agree.  Maybe the Rabbi, who I have tagged on this note, will remember more than me about these conversations.

V

So, anyway, the letter doesn't clear up all the issues of why and what I believed but does give me some food for thought

The letter, however, has conclusively cleared up one piece of information.  I could never remember the number of my room in halls.  Whenever I tried to think what it was,  I would only ever come up with '613'.  I thought this must have been 'wish-fulfillment' but couldn't get that number out of my mind.  As it happens, the letter is addressed '609 Charles Morris Hall'.

Close but no cigar!

3 Mar 2009

The Dark Knight

Whilst wanting to see the latest Batman film, I was dreading it.  How could Heath Ledger beat Jack Nicholson?  Why does Batman suddenly develop a silly voice when he puts on the Bat Mask?  What's with the Karate?  And the car!  I could go on.  However, there was one reason more than all the others, why I thought it was going to be terrible. 

That is, it got the unanimous praise for being "gritty and realistic".  Usually, that is the death knell for a movie.  It could mean one of two things.  First, it could be like with the new James Bond films which are "gritty, realistic" and just downright awful.  Take away anything interesting or "out of the ordinary" about the character; make the character an out-of-control but quite plain "hard man"; be a bit more graphic than normal; and make a convoluted or confusing plot that no-one understands. 

The second way to be "gritty or realistic" is the way of any good drama by the time its gets to its fourth series or so.  Like casualty, say.  Starts off with interesting self-contained stories but eventually (to be more realistic) start to focus on the characters.  We start to learn about their 'private lives', their troubles and the turbulent nature of their existence which has zilch to do with the present story.  In other words, it becomes a soap.  The main character can't do his job because he slept with his cat's second cousin-in-law and his son is playing truant.  I don't care.

Thankfully, however, I did enjoy the film.  The very reason I enjoyed the film was because it wasn't realistic in any shape or form.  It was utterly unbelievable, very comic book and you couldn't have any characters identical to those in the real world. 

It wasn't just entertainment though, as it's unrealism made it myth.  It's story-in-a-vacuum (thank G-d) and distinct characters unbogged down by the 'realities' of life (once again, thank G-d), meant you were projecting onto a blank canvas.  You only look at just the one element of reality and use this simplified model to ponder the ultimate thought experiments about our very own lives.  The film asked "What happens when a person's liberty is absolute, without any control or order restricting it?"  "Is it rational to choose to co-operate with a group who you don't trust to co-operate?" And many more.  Whilst the 'medium' is unrealistic (as with all myths), the questions are extremely relevant.  This is why, by the end, "The Dark Knight" could sound profound.

Of course, it's attempt at exploring such questions got things all wrong.  Never mind.