It's for when i have time, but it's twopronged: it's easy to compare Judaism to other religions (here, catholicism) and assumed you've explained something, when such methodology would be laughed at in Judaism. There are parallels with perhaps some midrashim, but those aren't meant to be literal. Most members of Chazal did care about the facts. Second, I disagree that the default position should be from the outside. Sam Lebens makes a solid argument that for someone who is culturally Jewish, his starting point should be from the inside. Have you read his book, the Guide for the Jewish Undecided?
I strongly disagree about chazals methodology, (and the methodology of virtually all Jewish thinkers since then), but it's an a discussion in its own right. Maybe I'll make a post analyzing various examples sometime.
Regarding Sam lebens epistimology, he defends his case as far as it could go, but it's clearly influenced by postmodernism and other philosophical positions which I don't like on philosophical grounds, and don't relate to on a personal level. But thats also a whole discussion in its own right.
Oh, and one more point: I would NEVER trust Dawkins about any fact about any religion, especially when i see what he fabricated about mine. The fact that you accept him as reliable speaks volumes about your so called skeptical methodology and it's apparent selectiveness.
And generally speaking he's extremely ignorant about Judaism but he's less so about Christianity and in particular the Anglican and Catholic churches. It's all about exposure. (And he spent a lot of time researching the Catholic church for his documentary the root of all evil)
Sure, Dawkins seems wholly unfamiliar with Judaism, as does Harris, and as did Dennett and to a lesser extent Hitchens, but they're not trying to debate the power of חז"ל to uproot a biblical law or some other intricacy of הלכה. They are asking how you know what you and showing you that:
1) The way you thought was a good way of knowing something isn't a good way at all.
2) That you ought to wait for good reasons to do something before doing it, rather than signing up for belief and kicking the can down the proverbial road when it comes to justification.
I think your post does a better job deconstructing skepticism than deconstructing religion. I wouldn't use Dawkins as a starting point for the analysis of any religion, let alone Judaism.
I specifically disagreed with dawkins' analysis. I used him simply for the facts about what happened. If you wouldn't get triggered by the mere mention of a name who you disagree with you would see that clearly and understand my argument. Not sure how it deconstructs skepticism in any way.
Ah, it looked to me like you agreed with his analysis. From the wikipedia page on the assumption of Mary, it seems like that dogma is much more rooted in early Christian theology than the impression he gives.
When I said deconstruction of skepticism, I meant reasons to doubt skepticism, which sounds kind of paradoxical, but it is what it is. Specifically the second, third, and fourth paragraphs, were written quite nicely. But a real deconstruction of skepticism would be an investigation of social, psychological, cultural, and historical factors which drives some people to be skeptical. Like, what could be the social, psychological, cultural, and historical factors that cause some people to say things like "The default position of a historical analysis of Judaism should be one of deconstruction of its grand narratives and unweaving of its masterful theological edifices"?
It's true that the assumption of the virgin is an idea that has been circling throughout the catholic world for a while, but it has never been officially accepted as church doctrine until very recently. That is sufficient to be able to question the pope's basis for doing so, while at the same time providing a path to understand his own thought process, which was exactly my point.
If we are studying skepticism as a phenomena, I 100% agree that such an analysis is proper. Every cultural institution, construct, or pattern is deserving of such a breakdown. However, since I am studying Judaism and not skepticism, that is irrelevant to the discussion.
You are assuming that a deconstruction assumes a priori that the phenomenom is not justified. That is incorrect. I specifically stated that such a discussion must be taken place after the deconstruction, I was merely demonstrating why it is faulty to make such an analysis before deconstruction. However, in this respect I would differentiate between direct arguments which can stand on thier own merit and arguments from incredulity or ignorance, which simply argue that the paradigm is so immense and complex that it's assumptions are necessarily true. This is why many people don't question grand narratives, and is difficult for one living in an echo chamber of that narrative to see the justification for skepticism.
One can question the pope's basis for doing so, but this paragraph from Dawkins leaves out all of that historical context, which would be a good avenue of investigation should one want to pursue it. It doesn't seem like a good example of the point you are trying to make. In fact, it may lead one to wonder in the opposite direction, what are the psychological or ideological factors that causes Dawkins to write so sloppily, so misleadingly?
I may not have mentioned the historical aspect, but that was definitely the avenue I was pursuing if you read my theological take on it. It's exactly the right case becasue it makes tons of sense to a theological mind but no sense outside of that paradigm.
Now you're just nitpicking to find minor issues with your nemesis. If you really must know, in another artice he says this point while addressing the history, but in the particular artice i was quoting from he was simply contrasting the idea of evidence between theology and science, so it would be irrelevant to bring up the history as it doesn't relate to evidence, merely theology. Actually, in the same article he describes a similar process to the belief in purgatory which is a very traditional belief.
Cut with the ad hominems, if you have a serious objection to any argument that was made, go for it. Your hated and vitrol are not signs of rational truth-seeking.
And I was just saying that by omitting all the historical context, his "deconstruction" seems shallow and misleading, so I don't believe this is a great example for somebody who wants to show people how to deconstruct Judaism. Just my opinion.
Dawkins is not my nemesis, he is not even on my radar, in the ~80 articles I wrote on Irrationalist Modoxism, I maybe mentioned him once. What ad hominems? What hatred? What vitriol? It was just criticism of that passage from Dawkins, and criticism of your choice of this passage to illustrate your point.
Of course the traditionalists condemn critical thinking. Once studied, they tend to undermine the grand narratives presented in Judaism. Saying that rabbis x, y, and z criticized this approach is no answer to their arguments. In christianity they say that Judaism over the years has come up with many questions on the church and the gospels, but saint x y and z already answered their questions. That is not a valid dismissal.
If we're degenerating to the point that we're arguing from authority, here's a list of 100 names of very respected scholars who 'disprove rabbis hirsch, hoffman, and gottlieb. Many are connected in some way or another to the poisitive-historical school, some are orthodox, some other denominations, and some not religious at all. But what they all have in common is that they take historical analysis seriously.
Gershom Scholem, Jacob Neusner, Moshe Idel, Ismar Schorsch, Daniel Boyarin,Susannah Heschel, Moshe Halbertal, Judith Plaskow, Yosef Hayim Yerushalmi, Shaye J.D. Cohen, Elliot R. Wolfson, Menachem Kellner, David Biale, Michael Fishbane, Rachel Adler, Arnold Eisen, Aviezer Ravitzky, Alan Brill, Lawrence Schiffman, Marc B. Shapiro, Martha Himmelfarb, Martin Buber, Emmanuel Levinas, Abraham Joshua Heschel, Hillel Levine, Israel Knohl, Tzvi Abusch, Steven Katz, Richard L. Rubenstein, Tikva Frymer-Kensky, Judith Hauptman, Emil Fackenheim, Marvin Fox, Yochanan Muffs, Robert Alter, Barry W. Holtz, Jon D. Levenson, Arthur Green, Ze’ev Falk, Ellis Rivkin, David Berger, Ephraim E. Urbach, Jonathan Sacks, Louis Jacobs, Jacob Katz, Moshe Greenberg, George Foot Moore, Yitzhak Baer, Raphael Patai, Alexander Altmann, Haym Soloveitchik, Lawrence Fine, Chaim Potok, Elliot Dorff, Jeffrey Rubenstein, Baruch Levine, Benjamin Sommer, Avraham Grossman, Efraim Karsh, Steven T. Katz, Avraham Weiss, Adele Berlin, Aaron Hughes, Reuven Kimelman, Menachem Elon, Michael Wyschogrod, Norman Lamm, Judith R. Baskin, Rachel Elior, James Kugel, Deborah Lipstadt, S.D. Goitein, Yitzhak Arad, Amos Funkenstein, Michael Satlow, Irving Greenberg, Mordechai Kaplan, Jacob Milgrom, Elliot N. Dorff, Howard Wettstein, Rivka Ulmer, Shaul Magid, Harvey E. Goldberg, Moshe Weinfeld, Judith Butler, William Dever, Yosef Kaplan, Eva Illouz, Emmanuel Tov, Joshua Berman, David Ruderman, Tamar Ross, Yosef Tobi, Deborah Dash Moore, Jay Harris, Eliezer Berkovits, Ephraim Kanarfogel, Edward Breuer, Marc Zvi Brettler, Daniel Gordis
What I meant was that Rav Hirsch and others have countered the Historical Positive approach with such detailed and scholarly thoroughness to the point where I am surprised people can still take it seriously. I don't think religious bias can account for how persuasive I found their takedown of Frankel's method to be. But I admit I could be biased even with that assessment.
Same is true with D.H.
There is so much scholarly literature attempting to demonstrate the unity of Torah Shebichtav and Torah Shebaal peh--The Malbim, Netziv, Hakesav Ve'hakabboloh, Meshech Chochmoh, RDZ Hoffman etc. that it is impossible to dismiss all of them as feeble hand-waving or apologetics.
It wasn't meant it as an argument from authority as much as a challenge to you to show me that
a. you are aware of the scholarly literature which has claimed to counter the Positive Historical method and DH.
b. you studied this literature (starting with Rav Hirsch's Collected Writings Vol V. and Rabbi Gottleib's Appendices for his book) and still think it compares to Christian hand-wavings.
First of all, allow me to clarify that when I referenced frankel positive historical school I was not necessarily referring to the positions of him or other members. I was more generally discussing the attitude he introduced of analyzing judaism from a historical-critical perspective, while still mantaining a respect for tradition and understanding it's methodologies without stripping them of all value. If you have specific problems with specific arguments from one scholar or another, that's great. The malbim may have counteracted the evidential power of some specific arguments. Ditto for hoffman and others.
However, if we present it as a dichotomy- one the one side we have a position which believes there is no history behind the narrative, and the narrative itself is the history with no stages or development, and on the other we have a living vibrant community which evolves and reacts to various pressures through assorted mechanisms and innovations, and the sum total of all of this wove the brilliant tapestry we know as Judaism, I would completely ignore the first school and buy the second approach any day. I know from a cumulative case of thousands of individual pieces of data that judasim is not and never was static, and I find it infinitely more rational to include judaism on the grand stage of history instead of as an apathetic bystander. If that is the end goal of any work, it is weak apologetics and not worth pursuing. When I was younger I did avidly consume such works, especially the malbim, avigdor miller, and haksav vehakabala, but now I find it futile. They are poking little holes without recognizing the metanarrative at play.
There are serious scholars who present seriouos challenges to many theories, for example joshua berman's objection to the DH, and I take it very seriously and come with no preconceptions. But with someone like gottlieb I can't bring myself to do that. He may be more sophisticated and educated than the various crazed kiruv gurus who only sell absolute BS, but his methodology is fatally flawed. How many chances do I have to give that school of that (of a static unchanging judaism directly from god) before I throw in the towel?
I can wholeheartedly agree that Judaism has developed throughout history and is still developing today and at the same time maintain that this development is a built-in feature of a Divine system that provided a rigorous and consistent framework for many (but not all) aspects of this development.
Here is one of my favorite clips of RYBS discussing the development of halacha and positive historical method and what is wrong with taking this approach too far.
That's an awesome recording!!! I can't believe I haven't heard it in the past!
Even from a completely non-believing historical perspectives, his point remains true. We cannot ignore the halachic through which the great halachists of history developed halacha. We cannot hypothesize near historical pressures as the source of various aspects of Judaism unless we understand the generations that experience them to have had an understanding either consciously or subconsciously we should allow them to incorporate the new developments into their existing religion.
From the viewpoint of a believer, which is the point the Rav was driving home, we must recognize that this will place some otherwise plausible limitations on historical research. Would the rav allow for a model which presents the very idea of halacha as an emergent sociological process? What about the biblical texts and the theology within? Are we obligated to say that TSBP dates back to Moses? The academic consensus on these questions are generally in tension with traditional ideas. I'm not saying traditional ideas are indefensible, but the Rav's point seems to limit all studies to assumptionsn align with these beliefs. That doesn't seem like honest scholarship.
For example, when looking at the writings of malbim or gottlieb, they are unwilling to accept certain conclusions even if they are willing to admit a small degree of change. Other religious scholars, such as shadal, Berman, Brettler and Shapiro, are more flexible with the idea of a changing Judaism. Non-orthodox scholars have even less limits.
I'm not arguing for any specific conclusion, but I am arguing for open mindedness and honest research.
So yes, static can be understood in Many shades of Gray, and some can delegitimitize scholarship, placing it in the category of kiruv propaganda such as Lawrence kelleman, Gavriel Friedman and other non-scholars, which I believe gottlieb and Schroeder and malbim and others fall into, while other approaches are real scholarship worthy of being taken seriously.
>>>a big component can be that to dismiss the works of innumerous giants throughout thousands of years seems to strain credulity
Isn't this counting the hits and not the misses? As there were no giants of scholarship among the Christians, Muslims, Hindus, Zoroastrians and secular humanists?
Dawkins speaks about how religion is essential like baseball is essential; without it, you won't understand so many cultural references and idioms. But this can perhaps be more precisely stated that understanding religion (and baseball) are important. Without understanding religion you can't understand people, but this is not at all to say that religion is good and we can just read about it but never practice it.
Dennett takes this one step further; he thought that everyone should be exposed to all religions in the form of comparative religion education. Only when you dilute your narrow focus on Judaism within a broad exposition of many other religions will you fully avoid denominator neglect and see that the themes so often portrayed as special and unique only appear that way because one is ignorant of all the other people claiming that they are special and unique.
I mentioned this point, but it is insufficient in terms of its explanatory power; it merely presents a paradox. The actual explanation is to be understood through deconstruction, which is the primary point of this post.
I personally am a big fan of comparative religion, and I try to read up on what I can, but since the focus of this blog is specifically judaism, I will attempt to address the specific claims of Judaism. (Additionally, the tradition one was raised with creates a specific emotional bias towards the greats of that tradition, deeming it more relevant to address in such a forum. For example, in my drafts for post on the cosmological and teleological arguments, I try to analyze the formulations of Rambam, Saadya Gaon, Rabbeinu Bachye, and other specifically Jewish sources, although many other religions have their own formulations of the same arguments.)
Oh...I was not recommending we turn this into a blog about comparative religions. But I was remarking that it's Daniel Dennett's contention that if people were more informed about other religions...
1) People would more thoughtfully recognize that the special claims they make for themselves are similarly made by so many others. When your wife and your boss say that you're such a great guy, it's easy to get cocksure and self-congratulatory. But when you see that so many other people's wives and bosses say the same thing, you can more easily appreciate that maybe you're subjectively great but not objectively great.
2) People would more thoughtfully recognize that the formidable rebuttals they make against the silly claims of others are just as applicable (if not more so!) against their own claims. Imagine visiting Christianity Explained and Islam Explained and observing how the claimants there make weak arguments but fail to recognize their own biases. And then consider, for real, if your support for the claims of Judaism are type 1 errors.
I'm a freethinker who was raised frum. I mantain a positive attitude towards Judaism, and attempt to understand even viewpoints I may disagree with, so I am attempting to have more of a balanced take, but ultimately my position is at odds with traditional belief. I'm trying to lay out different ideas which are thought provoking and can help readers who themselves arent sure either way, or are looking to understand other viewpoints.
Your contrast between Christian theology and rabbinic theology is a fascinating topic that is definitely worth exploring, although I don't see how you are showing the superiority of rabbinic theology. You seem to be arguing that because Christianity had a problem as they were superimposing a new theology somehow that shows the success over rabbinic theology. Not seeing how the conclusion follows from the premise.
While I admire tovia singer for his passion and knowledge of Tanakh, I strongly feel that he uses a double standard to criticize Christianity which he does not hold at Judaism accountable to.
That's where we disagree. Indo think chazal retcon a new narrative of rabbinic Judaism on top of Tanakh which personified Israelite religion, which was a precursor to both Judaism (in all it's various second temple forms) and Christianity.
There's a lot we don't know about the authors of Tanakh, and a lot we do. The pentateuch (חמשה חומשי תורה) is a collection of various writing somewhere between the 10th century BCE and the fifth century BCE, and was canonized into something closely resembling the Masoretic text by the early 4th century at latest, and possibly as early as the 6th century. The traditions which formed the basis of pharasaic traditions which later evolved into rabbinic Judaism and was given the me Torah shbaal peh began forming approximately the time of the Roman conquest in 63 BCE (although it culled from older traditions as well including from the hasmonean era and earlier), so they most definitely represent very different strata in Jewish history (and was especially influenced by the Hellenic revolution and other metamorphosis which took place during the intervening centuries which greatly reshaped things).
@ash Looking forward to your rebuttal!!
And thnx for the reccomendation!!
It's for when i have time, but it's twopronged: it's easy to compare Judaism to other religions (here, catholicism) and assumed you've explained something, when such methodology would be laughed at in Judaism. There are parallels with perhaps some midrashim, but those aren't meant to be literal. Most members of Chazal did care about the facts. Second, I disagree that the default position should be from the outside. Sam Lebens makes a solid argument that for someone who is culturally Jewish, his starting point should be from the inside. Have you read his book, the Guide for the Jewish Undecided?
I strongly disagree about chazals methodology, (and the methodology of virtually all Jewish thinkers since then), but it's an a discussion in its own right. Maybe I'll make a post analyzing various examples sometime.
Regarding Sam lebens epistimology, he defends his case as far as it could go, but it's clearly influenced by postmodernism and other philosophical positions which I don't like on philosophical grounds, and don't relate to on a personal level. But thats also a whole discussion in its own right.
Oh, and one more point: I would NEVER trust Dawkins about any fact about any religion, especially when i see what he fabricated about mine. The fact that you accept him as reliable speaks volumes about your so called skeptical methodology and it's apparent selectiveness.
And generally speaking he's extremely ignorant about Judaism but he's less so about Christianity and in particular the Anglican and Catholic churches. It's all about exposure. (And he spent a lot of time researching the Catholic church for his documentary the root of all evil)
I did not agree with his analysis at all
Hmm...what did you make of his discussion with Sacks?
Are you asking me?
I suppose you can answer as well.
Sure, Dawkins seems wholly unfamiliar with Judaism, as does Harris, and as did Dennett and to a lesser extent Hitchens, but they're not trying to debate the power of חז"ל to uproot a biblical law or some other intricacy of הלכה. They are asking how you know what you and showing you that:
1) The way you thought was a good way of knowing something isn't a good way at all.
2) That you ought to wait for good reasons to do something before doing it, rather than signing up for belief and kicking the can down the proverbial road when it comes to justification.
Why does the historical context add any reliability to the actual claim? It's not like there are claims of witnesses or something of that sort
I think your post does a better job deconstructing skepticism than deconstructing religion. I wouldn't use Dawkins as a starting point for the analysis of any religion, let alone Judaism.
I specifically disagreed with dawkins' analysis. I used him simply for the facts about what happened. If you wouldn't get triggered by the mere mention of a name who you disagree with you would see that clearly and understand my argument. Not sure how it deconstructs skepticism in any way.
Ah, it looked to me like you agreed with his analysis. From the wikipedia page on the assumption of Mary, it seems like that dogma is much more rooted in early Christian theology than the impression he gives.
When I said deconstruction of skepticism, I meant reasons to doubt skepticism, which sounds kind of paradoxical, but it is what it is. Specifically the second, third, and fourth paragraphs, were written quite nicely. But a real deconstruction of skepticism would be an investigation of social, psychological, cultural, and historical factors which drives some people to be skeptical. Like, what could be the social, psychological, cultural, and historical factors that cause some people to say things like "The default position of a historical analysis of Judaism should be one of deconstruction of its grand narratives and unweaving of its masterful theological edifices"?
It's true that the assumption of the virgin is an idea that has been circling throughout the catholic world for a while, but it has never been officially accepted as church doctrine until very recently. That is sufficient to be able to question the pope's basis for doing so, while at the same time providing a path to understand his own thought process, which was exactly my point.
If we are studying skepticism as a phenomena, I 100% agree that such an analysis is proper. Every cultural institution, construct, or pattern is deserving of such a breakdown. However, since I am studying Judaism and not skepticism, that is irrelevant to the discussion.
You are assuming that a deconstruction assumes a priori that the phenomenom is not justified. That is incorrect. I specifically stated that such a discussion must be taken place after the deconstruction, I was merely demonstrating why it is faulty to make such an analysis before deconstruction. However, in this respect I would differentiate between direct arguments which can stand on thier own merit and arguments from incredulity or ignorance, which simply argue that the paradigm is so immense and complex that it's assumptions are necessarily true. This is why many people don't question grand narratives, and is difficult for one living in an echo chamber of that narrative to see the justification for skepticism.
One can question the pope's basis for doing so, but this paragraph from Dawkins leaves out all of that historical context, which would be a good avenue of investigation should one want to pursue it. It doesn't seem like a good example of the point you are trying to make. In fact, it may lead one to wonder in the opposite direction, what are the psychological or ideological factors that causes Dawkins to write so sloppily, so misleadingly?
I may not have mentioned the historical aspect, but that was definitely the avenue I was pursuing if you read my theological take on it. It's exactly the right case becasue it makes tons of sense to a theological mind but no sense outside of that paradigm.
Now you're just nitpicking to find minor issues with your nemesis. If you really must know, in another artice he says this point while addressing the history, but in the particular artice i was quoting from he was simply contrasting the idea of evidence between theology and science, so it would be irrelevant to bring up the history as it doesn't relate to evidence, merely theology. Actually, in the same article he describes a similar process to the belief in purgatory which is a very traditional belief.
Cut with the ad hominems, if you have a serious objection to any argument that was made, go for it. Your hated and vitrol are not signs of rational truth-seeking.
And I was just saying that by omitting all the historical context, his "deconstruction" seems shallow and misleading, so I don't believe this is a great example for somebody who wants to show people how to deconstruct Judaism. Just my opinion.
Dawkins is not my nemesis, he is not even on my radar, in the ~80 articles I wrote on Irrationalist Modoxism, I maybe mentioned him once. What ad hominems? What hatred? What vitriol? It was just criticism of that passage from Dawkins, and criticism of your choice of this passage to illustrate your point.
Matt Dillahunty describes skepticism as "wanting to believe as many true things as possible and as few false things as possible."
Are you suggesting that increased skepticism is bad?
Interesting that Mr. Furst places Zachariah Frankel's Positive-Historical approach on such a high pedastal.
His approach has been thoroughly criticized by Rav Hirsch and Rav David Hofman over a century ago.
And Jacob Nusener's approach has been thoroughly criticizedby Rabbi Dovid Gottleib here:
https://www.dovidgottlieb.com/appendices/ (See appendix 3--I'm curious to know what Mr. Furst thinks of Rabbi Gottleib's other appendicies as well.)
Of course the traditionalists condemn critical thinking. Once studied, they tend to undermine the grand narratives presented in Judaism. Saying that rabbis x, y, and z criticized this approach is no answer to their arguments. In christianity they say that Judaism over the years has come up with many questions on the church and the gospels, but saint x y and z already answered their questions. That is not a valid dismissal.
If we're degenerating to the point that we're arguing from authority, here's a list of 100 names of very respected scholars who 'disprove rabbis hirsch, hoffman, and gottlieb. Many are connected in some way or another to the poisitive-historical school, some are orthodox, some other denominations, and some not religious at all. But what they all have in common is that they take historical analysis seriously.
Gershom Scholem, Jacob Neusner, Moshe Idel, Ismar Schorsch, Daniel Boyarin,Susannah Heschel, Moshe Halbertal, Judith Plaskow, Yosef Hayim Yerushalmi, Shaye J.D. Cohen, Elliot R. Wolfson, Menachem Kellner, David Biale, Michael Fishbane, Rachel Adler, Arnold Eisen, Aviezer Ravitzky, Alan Brill, Lawrence Schiffman, Marc B. Shapiro, Martha Himmelfarb, Martin Buber, Emmanuel Levinas, Abraham Joshua Heschel, Hillel Levine, Israel Knohl, Tzvi Abusch, Steven Katz, Richard L. Rubenstein, Tikva Frymer-Kensky, Judith Hauptman, Emil Fackenheim, Marvin Fox, Yochanan Muffs, Robert Alter, Barry W. Holtz, Jon D. Levenson, Arthur Green, Ze’ev Falk, Ellis Rivkin, David Berger, Ephraim E. Urbach, Jonathan Sacks, Louis Jacobs, Jacob Katz, Moshe Greenberg, George Foot Moore, Yitzhak Baer, Raphael Patai, Alexander Altmann, Haym Soloveitchik, Lawrence Fine, Chaim Potok, Elliot Dorff, Jeffrey Rubenstein, Baruch Levine, Benjamin Sommer, Avraham Grossman, Efraim Karsh, Steven T. Katz, Avraham Weiss, Adele Berlin, Aaron Hughes, Reuven Kimelman, Menachem Elon, Michael Wyschogrod, Norman Lamm, Judith R. Baskin, Rachel Elior, James Kugel, Deborah Lipstadt, S.D. Goitein, Yitzhak Arad, Amos Funkenstein, Michael Satlow, Irving Greenberg, Mordechai Kaplan, Jacob Milgrom, Elliot N. Dorff, Howard Wettstein, Rivka Ulmer, Shaul Magid, Harvey E. Goldberg, Moshe Weinfeld, Judith Butler, William Dever, Yosef Kaplan, Eva Illouz, Emmanuel Tov, Joshua Berman, David Ruderman, Tamar Ross, Yosef Tobi, Deborah Dash Moore, Jay Harris, Eliezer Berkovits, Ephraim Kanarfogel, Edward Breuer, Marc Zvi Brettler, Daniel Gordis
Sorry I wasn't clear.
What I meant was that Rav Hirsch and others have countered the Historical Positive approach with such detailed and scholarly thoroughness to the point where I am surprised people can still take it seriously. I don't think religious bias can account for how persuasive I found their takedown of Frankel's method to be. But I admit I could be biased even with that assessment.
Same is true with D.H.
There is so much scholarly literature attempting to demonstrate the unity of Torah Shebichtav and Torah Shebaal peh--The Malbim, Netziv, Hakesav Ve'hakabboloh, Meshech Chochmoh, RDZ Hoffman etc. that it is impossible to dismiss all of them as feeble hand-waving or apologetics.
It wasn't meant it as an argument from authority as much as a challenge to you to show me that
a. you are aware of the scholarly literature which has claimed to counter the Positive Historical method and DH.
b. you studied this literature (starting with Rav Hirsch's Collected Writings Vol V. and Rabbi Gottleib's Appendices for his book) and still think it compares to Christian hand-wavings.
First of all, allow me to clarify that when I referenced frankel positive historical school I was not necessarily referring to the positions of him or other members. I was more generally discussing the attitude he introduced of analyzing judaism from a historical-critical perspective, while still mantaining a respect for tradition and understanding it's methodologies without stripping them of all value. If you have specific problems with specific arguments from one scholar or another, that's great. The malbim may have counteracted the evidential power of some specific arguments. Ditto for hoffman and others.
However, if we present it as a dichotomy- one the one side we have a position which believes there is no history behind the narrative, and the narrative itself is the history with no stages or development, and on the other we have a living vibrant community which evolves and reacts to various pressures through assorted mechanisms and innovations, and the sum total of all of this wove the brilliant tapestry we know as Judaism, I would completely ignore the first school and buy the second approach any day. I know from a cumulative case of thousands of individual pieces of data that judasim is not and never was static, and I find it infinitely more rational to include judaism on the grand stage of history instead of as an apathetic bystander. If that is the end goal of any work, it is weak apologetics and not worth pursuing. When I was younger I did avidly consume such works, especially the malbim, avigdor miller, and haksav vehakabala, but now I find it futile. They are poking little holes without recognizing the metanarrative at play.
There are serious scholars who present seriouos challenges to many theories, for example joshua berman's objection to the DH, and I take it very seriously and come with no preconceptions. But with someone like gottlieb I can't bring myself to do that. He may be more sophisticated and educated than the various crazed kiruv gurus who only sell absolute BS, but his methodology is fatally flawed. How many chances do I have to give that school of that (of a static unchanging judaism directly from god) before I throw in the towel?
False dichotomy.
I can wholeheartedly agree that Judaism has developed throughout history and is still developing today and at the same time maintain that this development is a built-in feature of a Divine system that provided a rigorous and consistent framework for many (but not all) aspects of this development.
Here is one of my favorite clips of RYBS discussing the development of halacha and positive historical method and what is wrong with taking this approach too far.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p4j9dauWOKs&t=46s
That's an awesome recording!!! I can't believe I haven't heard it in the past!
Even from a completely non-believing historical perspectives, his point remains true. We cannot ignore the halachic through which the great halachists of history developed halacha. We cannot hypothesize near historical pressures as the source of various aspects of Judaism unless we understand the generations that experience them to have had an understanding either consciously or subconsciously we should allow them to incorporate the new developments into their existing religion.
From the viewpoint of a believer, which is the point the Rav was driving home, we must recognize that this will place some otherwise plausible limitations on historical research. Would the rav allow for a model which presents the very idea of halacha as an emergent sociological process? What about the biblical texts and the theology within? Are we obligated to say that TSBP dates back to Moses? The academic consensus on these questions are generally in tension with traditional ideas. I'm not saying traditional ideas are indefensible, but the Rav's point seems to limit all studies to assumptionsn align with these beliefs. That doesn't seem like honest scholarship.
For example, when looking at the writings of malbim or gottlieb, they are unwilling to accept certain conclusions even if they are willing to admit a small degree of change. Other religious scholars, such as shadal, Berman, Brettler and Shapiro, are more flexible with the idea of a changing Judaism. Non-orthodox scholars have even less limits.
I'm not arguing for any specific conclusion, but I am arguing for open mindedness and honest research.
So yes, static can be understood in Many shades of Gray, and some can delegitimitize scholarship, placing it in the category of kiruv propaganda such as Lawrence kelleman, Gavriel Friedman and other non-scholars, which I believe gottlieb and Schroeder and malbim and others fall into, while other approaches are real scholarship worthy of being taken seriously.
Thanks @Ash for the recommendation; first solid Jewish theological piece I've read in a while!
To Simon, keep up the good work, I'm looking forward to hearing your thoughts moving forward! Great articulation of complex ideas!
Thanks!!
>>>a big component can be that to dismiss the works of innumerous giants throughout thousands of years seems to strain credulity
Isn't this counting the hits and not the misses? As there were no giants of scholarship among the Christians, Muslims, Hindus, Zoroastrians and secular humanists?
Dawkins speaks about how religion is essential like baseball is essential; without it, you won't understand so many cultural references and idioms. But this can perhaps be more precisely stated that understanding religion (and baseball) are important. Without understanding religion you can't understand people, but this is not at all to say that religion is good and we can just read about it but never practice it.
Dennett takes this one step further; he thought that everyone should be exposed to all religions in the form of comparative religion education. Only when you dilute your narrow focus on Judaism within a broad exposition of many other religions will you fully avoid denominator neglect and see that the themes so often portrayed as special and unique only appear that way because one is ignorant of all the other people claiming that they are special and unique.
I mentioned this point, but it is insufficient in terms of its explanatory power; it merely presents a paradox. The actual explanation is to be understood through deconstruction, which is the primary point of this post.
I personally am a big fan of comparative religion, and I try to read up on what I can, but since the focus of this blog is specifically judaism, I will attempt to address the specific claims of Judaism. (Additionally, the tradition one was raised with creates a specific emotional bias towards the greats of that tradition, deeming it more relevant to address in such a forum. For example, in my drafts for post on the cosmological and teleological arguments, I try to analyze the formulations of Rambam, Saadya Gaon, Rabbeinu Bachye, and other specifically Jewish sources, although many other religions have their own formulations of the same arguments.)
Oh...I was not recommending we turn this into a blog about comparative religions. But I was remarking that it's Daniel Dennett's contention that if people were more informed about other religions...
1) People would more thoughtfully recognize that the special claims they make for themselves are similarly made by so many others. When your wife and your boss say that you're such a great guy, it's easy to get cocksure and self-congratulatory. But when you see that so many other people's wives and bosses say the same thing, you can more easily appreciate that maybe you're subjectively great but not objectively great.
2) People would more thoughtfully recognize that the formidable rebuttals they make against the silly claims of others are just as applicable (if not more so!) against their own claims. Imagine visiting Christianity Explained and Islam Explained and observing how the claimants there make weak arguments but fail to recognize their own biases. And then consider, for real, if your support for the claims of Judaism are type 1 errors.
I'm a freethinker who was raised frum. I mantain a positive attitude towards Judaism, and attempt to understand even viewpoints I may disagree with, so I am attempting to have more of a balanced take, but ultimately my position is at odds with traditional belief. I'm trying to lay out different ideas which are thought provoking and can help readers who themselves arent sure either way, or are looking to understand other viewpoints.
Your contrast between Christian theology and rabbinic theology is a fascinating topic that is definitely worth exploring, although I don't see how you are showing the superiority of rabbinic theology. You seem to be arguing that because Christianity had a problem as they were superimposing a new theology somehow that shows the success over rabbinic theology. Not seeing how the conclusion follows from the premise.
While I admire tovia singer for his passion and knowledge of Tanakh, I strongly feel that he uses a double standard to criticize Christianity which he does not hold at Judaism accountable to.
That's where we disagree. Indo think chazal retcon a new narrative of rabbinic Judaism on top of Tanakh which personified Israelite religion, which was a precursor to both Judaism (in all it's various second temple forms) and Christianity.
There's a lot we don't know about the authors of Tanakh, and a lot we do. The pentateuch (חמשה חומשי תורה) is a collection of various writing somewhere between the 10th century BCE and the fifth century BCE, and was canonized into something closely resembling the Masoretic text by the early 4th century at latest, and possibly as early as the 6th century. The traditions which formed the basis of pharasaic traditions which later evolved into rabbinic Judaism and was given the me Torah shbaal peh began forming approximately the time of the Roman conquest in 63 BCE (although it culled from older traditions as well including from the hasmonean era and earlier), so they most definitely represent very different strata in Jewish history (and was especially influenced by the Hellenic revolution and other metamorphosis which took place during the intervening centuries which greatly reshaped things).