Healing and Health – Parshat Mishpatim

Printable PDF available here. Previous years’ pieces on Parshat Mishpatim are available here and here.

**Rav Kook (Ein Ayah, Gemara Berachot 60a)**

Rav Acha taught that if one is about to engage in bloodletting [a basic medical procedure in pre-modern times], he should say “May it be Your will, O Lord my G-d, that this enterprise be for healing and that You should heal me. As You are a faithful G-d of healing and Your healing is truth. Because it is not the [proper] way that people should heal, but they have become accustomed to it.” [I.e., people should ideally not practice medicine, and healing should rather be left to G-d.]

Abaye objected that one should not say this. As it was taught in the academy of Rabbi Yishmael, from the verse [in Parshat Mishpatim] “And he shall cause him to be thoroughly healed” (Shemot 21:19), we derive that permission is granted to a doctor to heal. [I.e., the practice of medicine is in accordance with the will of G-d.]

The human body is a complex entity, with various organs and faculties bound together. The soul is similarly comprised of various emotional and intellectual components, which are bound together in a wondrous manner with the physical body. No person can pridefully declare that he has fully mapped out the full complexity of the human body or that he understands its full depth.

From this perspective, medical science is an ultimately unreliable discipline. Even if a doctor can heal a specific illness within the purview of his or her narrow expertise, who can assure that the treatment administered will not have undesirable and unforeseen side-effects? Perhaps these side-effects will throw the patient into disequilibrium and prove to do more harm than good. In light of our imperfect knowledge, no medical treatment can be guaranteed to be totally and unqualifiedly beneficial. This was the perspective expressed by Rav Acha, who cast aspersions on the reliability of medical knowledge. “Because it is not the [proper] way that people should heal, but they have become accustomed to it.” At the same time, experience demonstrates that medicine does frequently discover important truths that bring about healing and improve human welfare. How are we to reconcile these competing perspectives? According to Rav Acha, we must relate to medicine as a wonder of Divine governance and something that is ultimately out of our hands. We do the best we can but remain aware that our efforts are meager and our knowledge is fragmentary. Healing is ultimately in G-d’s hands. His “healing is truth,” while ours is inherently falsifiable, incomplete and liable to do more harm than good.

However, our sacred tradition contains other perspectives as well. Not all of the Sages agreed that the discipline of medicine is somehow religiously illegitimate or compromised. R. Yishmael maintained that we do not need to concern ourselves with contingencies or eventualities that lie beyond the scope of human understanding. Caution and humility are important values, but not in overabundance. A constant wariness against unforeseen consequences or side-effects undermines human initiative, and suffocates the religious imperative for humanity to improve the world – both the physical world and the inner dimension of the spirit. Man must live by the principle that הנסתרת לה׳ אלקינו והנגלת לנו ולבנינו עד־עולם לעשות את־כל־דברי התורה הזאת (Devarim 29:28) – “Hidden things are the concern of the Lord our G-d, but the revealed is for us and our children.”

R. Yishmael maintained that “a judge can only adjudicate based on what is own eyes see.” The Torah gave permission to a doctor to heal, without needing to constantly question or suspect the efficacy of his or her craft. A competent doctor does not usurp the Divine prerogative, but acts as a messenger of G-d to bring healing to His creations and improve His world. Far from being illegitimate, medical science is a Divine gift that flows down from heaven, as is every application of human intellect to the development and improvement of the world.“And he shall cause him to be thoroughly healed” (Shemot 21:19), from here we derive that permission is granted to a doctor to heal. In the words of Kohelet (7:19), “Wisdom affords strength to the wise” (Kohelet 7:19).

Food for Thought

Rambam (Commentary to the Mishnah, Pesachim 4:10): [Some maintain that seeking medical treatment indicates a lack of faith in G-d.] According to their faulty and foolish imagination, if a person is hungry and he turns to bread and eats it, undoubtedly relieving himself from that great distress, would we say that he has removed his trust from G-d? Fools, say to them, just as I thank G-d at mealtimes for providing me with something to remove my hunger and maintain me, so too we should thank Him for providing a cure that heals my illness when I use it.

The Wings of the Sun – Traditional Jewish Healing in Theory and Practice: After having been immersed in Rebbe Nachman’s profound and moving teachings about simchah and healing, his emphatic warnings against doctors may seem almost jarring. He urged his followers to avoid medicine even in cases of serious illness. He said that the majority of doctors have no understanding of the art of healing. Being far more likely to cause damage than to do any good, most doctors are nothing but agents of the Angel of Death (Rabbi Nachman’s Wisdom #50)…

Rebbe Nachman’s essential point in this teaching is that the true meaning of the rabbinic dictum that “the Torah gave the doctor license to heal” can be understood only in relation to the talmudic teaching that the sick person is healed “through a particular drug and a particular doctor on a particular date” (Avodah Zarah 55a). This second statement of the Rabbis defines and limits the extent of the doctor’s license to heal. Illness is seen as a heavenly decree, a “judgment.” Unless the decree is mitigated through pidyon nefesh, redemption of the soul, the illness will run its course, and only when its required duration is complete, as laid down in the decree, will the patient recover. In order for the illness to continue until a particular day and hour, the decree governs the very means by which the patient will eventually be cured: through “a particular drug and a particular doctor.” Thus if the doctor has “license to heal,” it is only as Heaven’s agent to release the patient from the decree of illness when its duration is complete. The doctor is like a prison warden who is given the key to open the cell only after the sentence has run its course. The only other circumstance in which the doctor has license to heal is when the decree against the patient has been revoked or mitigated through pidyon nefesh.

Rebbe Nachman’s response to the objection that many people receive medical treatment and recover is that the treatment itself is an incidental factor. The essential reason why the patient recovers is that the decree has reached its end, and therefore a heavenly-ordained chain of events ensures that his body heals. On the other hand, as long as the heavenly decree is in force, no matter what the patient or the doctors may try, nothing will avail. This would explain the common phenomenon of patients who wander from doctor to doctor in search of a cure, but nothing seems to help – until one day, often unexpectedly, a cure comes about through some quite simple remedy, or even spontaneously.

Shaar HaMitzvot (Parshat Ekev p. 60): Once a man came to the Ari and said that for two days he had been suffering intense pain in his shoulder. The Ari looked at him and said the reason for the pain was that instead of reciting the Grace after Meals directly after washing his hands at the conclusion of his meal (mayim acharonim), he had paused to study some Mishnah. The Rabbis said, “Recite the blessing directly (teikhef) after washing” (Berakhot 42a). TeiKheF, had turned into KaTeF), a “shoulder,” and this was why he felt the pain in his shoulder.

Permission Given to a Doctor to Heal (Rabbi Dr. Benjamin Gesundheit, MD PhD): It should be noted that the Posekim decided the law in accordance with the position of Rabbi Yishmael: Rif (Berakhot 44a), Maimonides (Hilkhot Berakhot 10:21), Rosh (Berakhot 9, no. 21), Tur and Shulchan Arukh (Orach Chayyim 230:4) codify only part of the talmudic passage in Berakhot 60a: “One who goes in to have his blood let should say: ‘May it be Your will, O Lord, my G-d, that this operation may be a cure for me, for You heal without payment.’ And when he goes out, he should say: ‘Blessed are you, O Lord, who heals the sick.’” The continuation of the prayer (“and may You heal me, for You are a faithful healing G-d, and Your healing is true”) and the Gemara’s explanation (“since men have no power to heal, but this is the common practice”), they all omit from their rulings. Rabbi Yishmael’s opposition (“A man should not speak thus…”) was accepted as law.

Questions for Discussion

As noted above, poskim decided the law in accordance with the position of Rabbi Yishmael. Does this mean that Rav Acha’s position is decisively rejected, or are there elements of truth to his position?
Is it a Torah value to take care of your health?
Rav Kook states that “Caution and humility are important values, but not in overabundance.” Can you think of examples that illustrate this point?
Why does the Torah need to give explicit “permission” to a doctor to heal? Why wouldn’t it be permitted by default?
See Rebbe Nachman quoted in “Food for Thought” above. Why does he disagree with Rav Kook?
Why do a disproportionate amount of Jews go into the medical profession?

Law, Doubt, and the Dew of Light – Parshat Mishpatim

**Rav Kook (Orot haTeshuva, 13:5)**

(as translated in Song of Teshuva, Vol. 3)

Printable PDF available here.

The best and most authentic way of engaging in teshuvah, a way that flows from the light of Torah within the world, is to learn and review the monetary laws and all other laws regarding interpersonal interactions, as found in Choshen Mishpat. This study should be undertaken with clarity, breadth of knowledge, and profound and straight incisiveness.

This rectifies all of the obstacles of the heart that occur in a person’s life, establishes Divine justice upon its most stable basis, and removes the wound of doubt and confusion from a person’s soul. Its clear light illuminates one’s pathway in practical, day-to-day living.

However, a person must also develop his heart and mind by means of the other parts of Torah – in particular, by means of the moral and contemplative influence… found in the “dew of light.” He must train his inner thoughts in lofty, Divine modes of comprehension. As a result, his soul will be capable of clinging tightly to the Divine justice within the legal portion of the “Torah of life” (lit. תורת חיים). Then this field of technical, legal study of Choshen Mishpat will uplift and elevate him.

**Commentary (R. Moshe Weinberger, Song of Teshuva)**

There are two ways in which people may be persuaded to adhere to a code of moral conduct. The first is through a society’s use of governmental authority to enforce a body of law. Every civilized society creates thousands of laws whose purpose is to inculcate in its citizens a respect for other people and their property. A person who does not abide by these regulations is subject to punishment. In this approach, human beings are seen as wild animals, which the government must prevent from destroying each other. This perspective is alluded to in our Sages’ statement, “If not for fear of the government, one person would swallow up another alive” (Pirkei Avos3:2).

A person who is motivated by such laws alone does not improve internally. He refrains from misbehaving only if he believes that he might otherwise get in trouble, and he may seek out ways in which he can get away with doing wrong. Government does not attempt to transform a person so that he will be in touch with and express the essence of who he is. It does not address his inner core. Rather, it imposes an external framework that determines proper behavior. Although governmental laws and regulations can prevent a person from taking somebody else’s possessions, they cannot force him to become holy and truly upright. They cannot even keep him from engaging in all kinds of behavior – subtle or not so subtle – that hurts others. Such an imposition of laws has brought about tremendous improvement in civilization – particularly in the drive to create more just and equal societies. But this is an artificial effort that cannot bring about a fundamental inner transformation. The second way in which a person comes to adhere to a code of moral conduct, is by carefully and thoroughly learning Choshen Mishpat, which provides Hashem’s guidelines for proper conduct between Jews.

Practically speaking, not everybody can learn Choshen Mishpat in the original. There are various alternative ways to learn these laws: simpler renditions, abridgments, and presentations in English. A person must learn to the best of his ability how Hashem’s Torah guides us in our relationships with each other. Only Torah can change a person’s will and transform his desires until he reaches a point where “the property of your fellow should be as dear to you as your own” (Pirkei Avos2:17).

For instance, in order to overcome his feelings of jealousy, a person must learn that wealth consists of the ability to rejoice with whatever Hashem has given him (Pirkei Avos4:1). The Torah is not just concerned with the effect of a person’s actions on others. Rather, it is concerned with his underlying inner being. This is reflected in the fact that the rabbinic compendium on moral behavior, which deals primarily with how people treat each other, is not called Chapters of the Sages but Chapters of the Fathers (Pirkei Avos). It presents the sort of wisdom that comes from a parent. A parent is not only concerned that his children should refrain from hurting other children, that they should not grow up to be thieves or liars. Rather, a parent’s deepest wish and dream is that his children should be great people.

Only Hashem’s Torah, which offers instruction on how to love and respect other Jews, can elevate a person from his naturally selfish state. In particular, Choshen Mishpat reveals G-d’s righteousness and truth through its body of law, which reflects an absolute truth that is not subject to Supreme Court decisions or votes by self-interested politicians…

The verse states that “the inclination of a person’s heart is evil from his youth” (Bereishis 8:21). From an early age, human beings get so caught up in this world that they lack a higher perspective. As a result, they are inclined to be dishonest. The Torah is a Jew’s only source of moral clarity, which can raise him up. As he learns G-d’s laws, he gains access to absolute truth, which removes the confusion and uncertainties in his soul regarding what is good. And that makes it possible for him to influence others as well – in particular, the next generation. Children learn to be upright when they see adults acting with integrity – when, for instance, they see their parents talk to each other in a sweet and respectful way. Traditionally, when boys begin to study Talmud, they learn Nezikin – the tractates of Gemara dealing with the laws that are codified in Choshen Mishpat. These tractates teach a person how to be righteous. He comes to appreciate that something that belongs to one person may not be taken by someone else. As he continues to learn Nezikin and Choshen Mishpat throughout his life, his mind becomes attuned to the mind of G-d. The halachos that guide our treatment of others do not leave the determination of right and wrong to our imagination. They direct us on a path that forces us away from our preoccupation with our ego, with what is good for us, and lead us to focus on those around us. They direct our attention to issues such as how loud we may play music at night and whether an extension that we want to build onto our house will bother the neighbors. These halachos, which come from “a faithful G-d without iniquity, Who is just and straight” (Devarim 32:4), straighten out all that is crooked within us, and remove our inclination for falsehood.

They provide us with a perspective that is without haziness and doubt. Although they seem dry, they are filled with G-dly life and vibrancy. A person’s doubt and bewilderment, which stem from his confused ideas of right and wrong, separate him from G-d. When he studies Choshen Mishpat, his mind is illuminated by G-d’s absolute definitions, and so his doubts dissipate.

For some people, Choshen Mishpat is intellectually exciting. They may formulate beautiful structures of halachic thought and be scrupulous in their observance of halachos. Yet, at the same time, their hearts might be empty and their learning sterile. [However] G-d’s presence suffuses every halachah, which expresses His absolute truth and righteousness. But since halachah does not openly express G-dliness, the soul of a person who learns little else is not prepared to be spiritually uplifted. And then halacha seems to be no more than a complicated and at times overwhelming legal system.

Therefore, a person who wishes to mind to spirituality must sensitize his heart and learn the “dew of light” – the parts of Torah that contain aggados, midrashim, and deeper explanations of our Sages teachings…. Then he sees that all parts of Torah – even the most technical teachings of halacha and Gemara – are beautiful and alive.

Unfortunately, there are many Jews who, although they learned for years in yeshiva and kollel, can barely force themselves to attend a Daf Yomi shiur. When a person is young, the competitive aspect and intellectual enjoyment of learning Torah can keep him in the beis medrash for fifteen hours a day. He is inspired by talks about the dedication of [great gedolim]…. He spends as many years in yeshiva and kollel as he can, until the necessities of life catch up with him and force him to go to work. Twenty years pass and he is now a middle-aged… man caught up in the need to earn a living, to devote his mind to outsmarting his competition and winning new customers. He is weary, bitter, and disappointed. At home, his children are not the children that he wanted, and his wife is not the wife that he expected.

After the day’s work and complications of family life, he is too tired to learn halachah or Gemara with the strength and excitement that he had possessed at the age of seventeen. And so he learns for perhaps an hour, and on his days off he barely manages to learn more. He is disgusted with himself. Now stories about how R. Isser Zalman learned until his last breath only serve to remind him of how worthless he is. He is battered and beaten by the world, no longer spiritually alive. He no longer has a passion for learning. The fire is no longer burning.

But he can revive himself with the inner aspect of Torah, which is the dew of life. Then he can reclaim the youthful excitement that he had once possessed when he had learned Shulchan Aruch and Gemara. When a person constantly learns the inner teachings of Torah, then the dry, legal areas of Torah moisten, lift up, and strengthen the essence of his soul.

Questions for Discussion

Rav Kook describes the study of monetary and interpersonal halacha as “the best and most authentic way of engaging in teshuvah.” But we don’t typically associate Choshen Mishpat with teshuva. Why is that? And how is Rav Kook approaching the concept of teshuva differently than we usually think of it?
Look through Parshat Mishpatim – can you identify some areas of bein adam l’chaveiro where the Torah’s ethical demands are higher than those of the society we live in?
What part of the Torah’s “dew of light” inspires you and makes you excited about Torah Judaism?
How do we teach Torah in a way that makes even the most technical and legal aspects seem beautiful and alive?
Every civilized society has laws to govern interpersonal relationships and ensure a semblance of order. What makes the Torah’s laws unique?
What is an area of monetary or interpersonal halacha that you are interested in learning more about, or can be more careful about observing?
Below is a comment from Rashi on the first pasuk of Mishpatim. How does it support Rav Kook’s insights above?

* And these are the ordinances… “And these” means this is adding to what has been previously stated. Just as what has been previously stated [i.e., the Ten Commandments] were from Sinai, these too were from Sinai. Now why was the section dealing with laws juxtaposed to the section dealing with the altar? To tell you that you shall place the Sanhedrin adjacent to the beit hamikdash.

* That you shall set before them… G-d said to Moses: Do not think of saying, “I will teach them the chapter or the law two or three times until they know it well, as it was taught, but I will not trouble myself to enable them to understand the reasons for the matter and its explanation.” Therefore, it is said: “you shall set before them,” like a table set [with food] and prepared to eat from, placed before someone.

Seeking G-d, Seeking Justice – Parshat Mishpatim

Printable PDF available here.

**Rav Kook (Orot, ישראל ותחייתו ג)**

Excerpted from Bezalel Naor’s excellent English translation of Orot, published by Maggid.

The center of life of the soul of Israel is in the source of holiness. Through truth and faith we were born and thereby we grow. We do not have disparate values; unity rests in us and the light of the One Lord lives within us. The laws, laws of the Living G-d’s Torah, distinguish us from every other nation. Holiness is at work on us internally, the great aspirations of our life are directed to it. There are inklings of holiness in every nation, but not all of their life values stem therefrom. This is not so in Israel. “In all of your ways know Him” (בכל דרכיך דעהו), that small passage that encompasses the entire corpus of Torah, which is actualized by rare individuals, is actually the inheritance of all Israel. In Israel, every life’s aspiration and life’s desire – acquisition, wealth, honor, dominion, expansion – flowfrom the source of holiness. Therefore, the laws are holy-of-holies in Israel, and therefore the semikhah (institution of rabbinic ordination) that bears the name of G-d is so vital to us and essential to our national character. The evil Syrian-Greeks intuited the value of this great treasure and forbid the semikhah, on pain of death. One of our Sages (Rabbi Judah ben Bava) even gave his life to preserve it, and the effect of that martyrdom redounds, for it deepened the special character of Israel, holy to the Lord.

Moses our Teacher grasped the power of the law when it was first instituted in the nation, and uplifted all the values of law until the end of generations, to the divine content to which the laws of Israel reach, and the search for G-d became inseparable from Israelite jurisprudence. [As we read in Parshat Yitro, when Moshe explains to his father in law,] “When the people will come to me to seek G-d, when they will have a matter come to me, I shall judge between a man and his neighbor. And I shall make known the laws of G-d and His precepts.” (Shemot 18:15-16) The G-d-quest of Law has remained an Israelite treasure…

However, Christianity abandoned law, rooted herself in apparent mercy and love that undermines the world and destroys it. By emptying law of its divine content, the law becomes seized by the grossest wickedness. The poison invades the private law of the individual and spreads through the souls of nations, becoming the foundation of national hatred and the depth of evil of bloodshed, without removing the yoke from man’s neck. The eyes of all must be lifted to the light of the world, the light of the Lord, which will be revealed through the Messiah of the G-d of Jacob. “And He shall judge earth righteously, nations justly.” (Tehillim 9:9)

Food for Thought

Rabbi Jonathan Sacks (Covenant and Conversation, 5767): just as the general principles of Judaism… are Divine, so are the details. In the 1960s the Danish architect Arne Jacobson designed a new college campus in Oxford. Not content with designing the building, he went on to design the cutlery and crockery to be used in the dining hall, and supervised the planting of every shrub in the college garden. When asked why, he replied in the words of another architect, Mies van der Rohe: “G-d is in the details.”

That is a Jewish sentiment. There are those who believe that what is holy in Judaism is its broad vision, never so compellingly expressed as in the Decalogue at Sinai. The truth however is that G-d is in the details: “Just as the former were given at Sinai, so these [the civil laws] were given at Sinai.” The greatness of Judaism is not simply in its noble vision of a free, just and compassionate society, but in the way it brings this vision down to earth in detailed legislation. Freedom is more than an abstract idea…

The second principle, no less fundamental, is that civil law is not secular law. We do not believe in the idea “render to Caesar what is Caeser’s and to G-d what belongs to G-d”. We believe in the separation of powers but not in the secularisation of law or the spiritualisation of faith. The Sanhedrin or Supreme Court must be placed near the Temple to teach that law itself must be driven by a religious vision….

The Jewish vision of justice, given its detailed articulation here for the first time, is based not on expediency or pragmatism, nor even on abstract philosophical principles, but on the concrete historical memories of the Jewish people as “one nation under G-d.” Centuries earlier, G-d has chosen Abraham so that he would “teach his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord, by doing what is right and just.” (Bereishit 18:19) Justice in Judaism flows from the experience of injustice at the hands of the Egyptians, and the G-d-given challenge to create a radically different form of society in Israel…

From earliest times, Judaism expected everyone to know and understand the law. Legal knowledge is not the closely guarded property of an elite. It is – in the famous phrase – “the heritage of the congregation of Jacob.” (Devarim 33:4) Already in the first century CE Josephus could write that “should any one of our nation be asked about our laws, he will repeat them as readily as his own name. The result of our thorough education in our laws from the very dawn of intelligence is that they are, as it were, engraved on our souls. Hence to break them is rare, and no one can evade punishment by the excuse of ignorance.” That is why there are so many Jewish lawyers. Judaism is a religion of law – not because it does not believe in love (“You shall love the Lord your G-d”, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself”) but because, without justice, neither love nor liberty nor human life itself can flourish. Love alone does not free a slave from his or her chains.

Tehillim (147:20): He tells His words to Ya’akov, His statutes and His judgments to Israel. He did not do so for any nation, and they do not know the law (lit. mishpatim).

Rabbi Shlomo Zuckier (What Is Jewish Law?): Throughout human history, the realm of law has been given multiple purposes. In some societies, the law is a statement of a society’s values, how one ought to live; among this set of ideals is an account of how society deals with those who violate the law, and the creation of an administrative or executive system. In other societies, there is less of an idealistic view of the law, and law’s function is simply to create order. The goal of law is not to educate but simply to discipline, to put into line those who diverge from its norms, with the goal of creating a safe, organized society. What is the perspective of Jewish law on this issue?

The account of law provided by the Tur (Spain, 1300s) strikes a highly universalist note. For example, the Mishnah from Avot that he explicates establishes that justice is a pillar upon which the entire world stands. He offers a historical trajectory of law that begins with the creation of the world and explains, among other things, why the (pre-Jewish) generation of the deluge failed to properly dispense justice and caused the world to be destroyed. The judge is lauded for his efforts “to break the outstretched arms of evil doers, taking from them their spoils and returning it to its owns,” which “upholds the world.” There is nothing specifically Jewish about this account of the value of law and the judge, although of course Halakhah charges Jewish society to ensure the rule of law. This, of course, is consistent with his position that the goal of Jewish law courts, just like any law court, is to ensure law and order. This is a challenge to society for all times, for all peoples, and Jews participate in it like any other nation.

On the other hand, the Ran (Spain, 1400s) goes out of his way to mention that the court’s role is a special one, unique to the Jewish people and Jewish law. He acknowledges that “the human species” and “every nation” has a need for some form of governance, so as to avoid anarchy and destruction. However, this aspect of governance is not the goal of mishpat, or Jewish law in its classical sense. The Ran is careful to attribute such a role to the king, who does whatever is necessary to create order, regardless of its coherence with Torah, rather than to the Jewish courts, which rule on the basis of Halakhah. While the king is recruited to fill a role “like all the other nations around” Israel (Deuteronomy 17:14, I Samuel 8:5), Jewish law is particularly Jewish, its basis in the Torah, which “is unique among all the laws of the nations of the world as to its laws and commandments.”

For the Ran the goal of applying Jewish law is bringing G-d into the world through implementing G-d’s law. This not only is important in itself, but also because it causes G-d’s will to be manifest in the world. The judge, then, is partner to G-d in the sense that he serves as a conduit bringing G-d’s law from the theoretical realm into the practical, day-to-day world.

Shulchan Aruch (Choshen Mishpat 26:1): It is forbidden to appear for trial before non-Jewish Judges and in their courts, even regarding a matter that they adjudicate the same as the halacha… And whoever does so is considered a wicked person and is as though he blasphemed, reproached and rebelled against the Law of Moshe.

Questions for Discussion

Can you think of any instances in Jewish life where love and justice clash? How does the Torah reconcile those competing demands?
How do the parshiot that come after the narrative of matan Torah emphasize the centrality of law in Judaism?
Rav Kook argues that Christianity embodies the danger of love untethered from any notion of law. Where do you think he is coming from?
People often talk about the ‘spirit of the law.’ What does this mean? And how do we determine what it is?
See the excerpt from Rabbi Shlomo Zuckier above in “Food for Thought.” Which position do you think is more correct?
What can you do to cultivate a greater appreciation of and understanding for the laws of the Torah?

The Law of the Spirit – Parshat Mishpatim

Printable PDF version available here.

Translation (Orot, 3:3): [1]

Therefore the laws are holy-of-holies in Israel… Moses our Teacher, of blessed memory, upon grasping the power of the law when it was first instituted in the nation, uplifted all the values of law until the end of generations, to the divine content to which the laws of Israel reach, and the search for God came together with Israelite jurisprudence. “When the people will come to me to seek God, when they will have a matter come to me, I shall judge between a man and his neighbor. And I shall make known the laws of God and His precepts.” [2] The God-quest of Law has remained an Israelite treasure, which is manifest in the divine character that encompasses eternity, and shines forth in the Land of Israel, [3] the land of His portion, the place of light of the holy treasure.

Christianity abandoned law, rooted herself in apparent mercy and love that undermines the world and destroys it. By emptying law of its divine content, it becomes seized by the grossest wickedness. The poison invades the private law of the individual and spreads through the souls of nations, becoming the foundation of national hatred and the depth of evil of bloodshed, without removing the yoke from man’s neck. The eyes of all must be lifted to the light of the world, the light of the Lord, which will be revealed through the Messiah of the God of Jacob. “And He shall judge earth righteously, nations justly.”[4]

Commentary

Many think that the main differences between Judaism and Christianity are theological. We believe in one God, they believe in a Trinity. We believe God is incorporeal, they believe He took human form. We maintain that the messianic redemption has yet to come, they believe it has already arrived. Rav Kook takes a very different approach. What distinguishes Judaism from Christianity is halacha, our focus on law. Every dimension of individual and communal life is guided, addressed and legislated by an intricate system of obligations and restrictions. We are so used to this that we tend to forget how unique it is. Consider the following incident recounted by Rabbi Chaim Saiman, a contemporary Orthodox rabbi, about a class he gave to a Christian audience:[5]

The topic of the lecture was how the rabbis read the Bible…. After a short discussion, I told the group that the Talmudic rabbis maintain that the first “commandment for generations” (applicable beyond Adam and Eve) was to “[b]e fruitful and multiply.” The group nodded in approval, and I sensed we were then on the same page. Next, I asked a simple, almost inevitable, question from a Talmudic perspective, but one deeply foreign to my audience.

Me: “How many?” Group: “How many what?” Me: “How many children?” Group: “What do you mean, how many children?” At this point I realized that we reached a bit of a brick wall, so I backed up. Me: “Do you believe the Bible is the word of God that expresses His Will?” Group: “Yes.” Me: “Do you believe you have to follow it?” Group: “Yes.” Me: “Well, then how do you know when you have done it? How do you know when you have been sufficiently fruitful?”

Again, blank stares from the audience. It was clear that the last question produced some discomfort. I proceeded to explain that when the rabbis read the Bible, they look to put it into practice, to operationalize it. Thus, most of their questions, and the rabbinic discourse as a whole, look to define the nature and scope of various provisions in the Bible and Talmud. And much like a good law professor, the rabbis dream up some rather bizarre hypotheticals to test the limits of each rule. When the rabbis read the verse “be fruitful and multiply,” they immediately attempt to define the properties and scope of this commandment, or mitzvah. [H]ow many children are required to fulfill the Biblical command[?]…. What if the children were capable of reproducing at birth, but sustained genital defects later in life? Must a couple have more children if the first set of children die? If the deceased children themselves had children, are the grandchildren counted in lieu of their parents?

Not surprisingly, at this point I was beginning to lose the group. I got the bug-eyed, “you’ve got to be kidding,” expression from nearly everyone…” I then paused, saying, “Let’s leave the rabbinic answers to these questions for now, but let me hear how in your tradition, you reason towards the answers. Surely you want to fulfill the word of God, so how do you know when you have done it?”

The most obvious and telling response was the ensuing silence. The uneasy quiet indicated that the group had never thought to break down this question into the level of detail found in the Talmud. The command was not conceptualized as binding or operational in quite the direct way the rabbis assumed. While all agreed that the Biblical directives are binding, in the churchgoers’ minds the Biblical commandments took on a less concrete form. The assembled group did not interpret the verses as having the same degree of presentness and immediacy as assumed by the rabbis.

Many basic principles of our hashkafaare rooted in the centrality of law, a fact that is noted not only by Rav Kook, but other modern thinkers as well. The quotes below are from R. Eliezer Berkovits, who gives an extraordinary analysis of this point in God, Man and History:

In giving law to man, God affirms his dignity. A concept of original sin is not just foreign to the Torah, but a contradiction to its very system. “[The law] is an expression of God’s continued concern with man. That God commands man is the proof that he considers man. The law represents the highest affirmation of man, as well as his crowning dignity. By giving man the law, his Maker declares: I do care how he lives and what he does with his life. Charging him with the law, God testifies, as it were, that man is man enough to live under. The law is the sign that God has a measure of conﬁdence in man. The command of God implies the encouragement: I order you because I know you can do it.” (God, Man and History, pg. 89-90)
Divine law is not impossibly harsh and unforgiving, as Jesus maintained. It alone guides man to ethical and loving conduct, while a religion of the spirit inevitably gives rise to unthinkable evil. “This, indeed, is the noble formula for the historic bankruptcy of all “natural,” as well as “spiritual,” religions. The invisible service of God is the prerogative. of invisible creatures. When man adopts such service for himself, he makes the dualism of his nature itself a religion. He will expect …[sentiment] and noble intentions of the soul, and will readily forgive the profanity of the body; he will have God “in his heart” and some devil directing his actions. He will serve God on the Sabbath and himself the rest of the week. He will worship like angelic being in the speciﬁed places of worship and follow his self—regarding impulses everywhere else.” (God, Man and History, pg. 125)
A ‘spiritual’ religion is an irreconcilable contradiction to human nature. “The spirit itself is powerless; it may act only in union with the vital or “material” forces in the cosmos. No one has ever accomplished anything by merely contemplating an idea. All conscious action is the result of some form of cooperation between the mind and the body. Matter whatever its ultimate secret without the mind is inanity; mind without matter is, at best, noble impotence. Power by itself is purposeless; purpose on its own is powerless… What the idealism of numerous religions and philosophies overlooks is that man without a body is as little to be considered human as man without a soul… [M]an is a composite being, consisting of mind and matter, of soul and body. That God made him that way means that he has to make sense of his He in the form in which he was granted life. Any rejection of the body is a rejection of man himself of man as God created him for the tasks of this world. (God, Man and History, pg. 107, 120)

Questions for Reflection and Discussion

Do you agree with Rav Kook and Rabbi Berkovits that the primary difference between Judaism and Christianity relates to law, as opposed to theology?
Have you ever had an experience like Rabbi Chaim Saiman, where you had to explain the concept of a halacha to a non-Jewish friend of colleague?
Rabbi Berkovits lists a number of hashkafic ramifications of the Torah’s focus on law. Can you think of any others?

About this Piece

Orot is a collection of essays, many analyzing Israel’s national rebirth. It was first published in Rav Kook’s lifetime, in 1920. It contains many provocative and complex insights. Rav Kook’s son referred to it as the “Holy of Holies” compared to Rav Kook’s other works. The Hebrew in Orotis extremely difficult, but an excellent English translation has been published by Bezalel Naor.

[1] Translated by Bezalel Naor, in Orot (Maggid, 2015).

[2] Shemot 18:15-16.

[3] Rav Kook is referring to the halacha that semikhah, which entitles one to serve in the Sanhedrin, can only be given in the Land of Israel. True semikhah involves an uninterrupted chain of transmission from Moshe, and has been defunct for many centuries. When we refer to contemporary rabbinic ordination as semikhah, we are using a borrowed term.

[4] Tehillim 9:9.

[5] Rabbi Chaim Saiman, Jesus’ Legal Theory, Journal of Law and Religion, Vol. 23, No. 1 (2007/2008), pg. 102-104. Rabbi Saiman has written an excellent book-length treatment of this subject.