Spero (Jewish thought, Bar Ilan U., Israel) introduces German- born, American Modern Orthodox Rabbi Soloveitchik (1903-1993; Halakhic Mind) as a rare yeshiva "Rav" (teacher) who sought to reconcile Talmud and Western philosophy. In nine essays, he discusses the Rav's teachings which take an epistemological pluralistic approach to the basic themes of Jewish theology and the philosophy of halakha (Jewish law). Existentialism's influence is evident in his The Lonely Man of Faith. The book includes a useful glossary of names and terms. Annotation ©2010 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Aspects of Rabbi Joseph Dov Soloveitchik's Philosophy of Judaism

An Analytic ApproachBy Shubert Spero

KTAV Publishing House, Inc.

Copyright © 2009 Shubert Spero
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-60280-125-7

Contents

Preface........................................................................viiAcknowledgments................................................................ixIntroduction...................................................................1Chapter 1: Is There an Indigenous Jewish Theology?.............................27Chapter 2: Is Judaism an Optimistic Religion?..................................47Chapter 3: The Role of the Ethical.............................................65Chapter 4: The Philosophy of Halakha...........................................93Chapter 5: Descriptive Hermeneutics in the Ray's Thought.......................123Chapter 6: Belief in God.......................................................141Chapter 7: "Knock, Knock! Who Is There? What Do You Want?".....................169Chapter 8: The Tale Told by the Heavens........................................175Chapter 9: The Aesthetic in Jewish Theology....................................189Glossary.......................................................................213Works by the Rav Cited in the Notes............................................231Index..........................................................................233

Chapter One

Is There an Indigenous Jewish Theology?

I wish to defend the claim that there is an indigenous Jewish theology. Of the several words that comprise this assertion, the most misleading is the two-letter word "is" in the sentence "There is an indigenous Jewish theology". For while "indigenous" and "Jewish" and "theology" might be vague, the word "is" is systematically ambiguous. No single word has given rise to more confusion and discussion in contemporary philosophy than this simple copula. There are, to name a few, the "is" of predication and the "is" of identity, and the is of existence, of which our own sentence is an instance. Bertrand Russell once said that "it is a disgrace to the human race that it has chosen to employ the same word 'is' for so many entirely different ideas."

In what sense, then, am I asserting that there is an indigenous Jewish theology? Consider the question: Is there a prime number greater than one hundred? Clearly the answer to this question is not to be found by empirical investigation based on observation, but by logical analysis based on the rules for the introduction of new expressions in the system of natural numbers. Analogously, when I claim that there is an indigenous Jewish theology, I do not mean that it necessarily exists as an explicitly formulated system of propositions, suitably labeled, to be discovered in a book of some sort. What I am asserting is that, given a commitment to the beliefs and practices of Judaism and an acceptance of the Bible and the Talmud, there follows by logical entailment a commitment to certain theological propositions. The individual adherent of Judaism may never have reflected upon the theoretical presuppositions of his faith or, if he has, may never have taken the trouble to articulate these propositions in an explicit manner. But that is of no consequence for this question. Jewish theology is there. It is implicit. It is logically entailed by the beliefs and practices of Judaism, by the assertions of the Chumash and the expressions of the Midrash. It is there, waiting to be unpacked, to be drawn out, to be formulated in a systematic way. And, as I will indicate later, for many areas of Judaism this has already been done. If an individual Jew, confronted by the articulated implications of his commitment, chooses to ignore them, refuses to recognize them, or rejects them he does so at the cost of forfeiting his claim to coherence, consistency, and rationality. While the Ravad may have been right in his acerbic stricture against Maimonides that many greater and better people than he believe the One God to have corporeal attributes, he was right only in the sense that perhaps we cannot say of them, that they are to be considered heretics or unworthy of a share in the world-to-come. On the other hand, Maimonides was undoubtedly correct that logically the unity of God implies His incorporeality, and that to affirm one and deny the other is a self-contradiction. The others referred to by the Ravad may have been greater and better than Maimonides, but they were certainly less logical.

What is theology? I use the word interchangeably with the phrase "religious philosophy." There is one distinction between the two that is not really relevant for our purposes, namely, that the theologian operates from within the faith, from a posture of commitment, while the philosopher of religion may be a professional thinker who examines religion from the outside, with no personal attachment. However be it, theology or religious philosophy, one is engaged in it as soon as one becomes reflective about one's religious beliefs and puts into words, either for one's own benefit or in order to communicate to others, what it is that one believes in or why one is engaged in certain religious practices.

When Rav said: "The mitzvot were given only for the purpose of refining mankind," he was laying the groundwork for a philosophy of the mitzvot.

When Rabbi Akiva said, "Everything is foreseen [by God] but free will is given [to man]," he was pointing up a profound paradox resulting from two opposed religious principles.

When the schools of Hillel and Shammai for two and a half years debated the question of whether a man would have been better off if he had not been created, they were debating a theological issue with great existential candor.

But even the Bible itself is a mine of Jewish theology. The simple answer to Rashi's opening question of why the Torah did not begin with the words "this month is to you ..." is obviously and precisely, as pointed out by Nachmanides, that the Torah is not merely a halakhic code but is concerned to impart a theology, an anthropology, a philosophy of history, and that is indeed the material to be found in these early portions.

In fact, the case for Jewish theology seems to me to be so strong and so indubitable that perhaps we should ask why it became a question in the first place. Why should anyone have thought that Judaism does not have a theology?

A number of pertinent considerations come to mind:

(1) We erroneously learned to equate philosophy and theology with the style of Greek thought which was systematic, speculative, and formal. Because our people "did" their theology in a different key and with a different style, we sometimes failed to recognize it as such. Jewish theology was enunciated spasmodically, more by impulse, and never, in our primary sources, worked into a formal system.

(2) Judaism's emphasis upon deeds, the Halakha, and external behavior weakened concern with theology. As Schechter put it so aptly: "With God as a reality, revelation as a fact, the Torah as a rule of life and the hope of redemption as a most vivid expectation, they felt no need for formulating their dogmas into a creed - which is repeated - not because we believe but that we may believe." In short, Judaism apparently believed that it is the sign of a healthy religion to have a theology and not to be aware of it.

(3) There were some technical objections to the assertion that Judaism had a theology. Strictly speaking, theology means "the science of God."...