No Touching, or MO Touching?

I believe that it was Bangitout that broke the story about the Hareidi ban on visiting Miami Beach a couple of weeks ago. At the time I chose not to comment on the issue – frankly, I wasn’t even sure that the ban was real! Since then I actually had a chance to visit Miami Beach, and I’m not sure that I disagree with the Hareidim, at least as far as they go.

Miami Beach, and the Miami area in general, is one of the least-dressed places I’ve ever been to. It’s not just that the weather is hot. I’ve been to hot cities before, but I’ve never seen quite what I saw in Miami. I fully agree that there is a culture of immodesty in Miami Beach that exceeds most other cities (though it may be matched – I’ve never been to LA, but I hear it’s pretty bad). I mean, even the mannequins in the stores featured larger endowments than most private universities! I think that for the Hareidi community it is perfectly appropriate to limit or ban trips to Miami Beach. As to the extreme extent of the ban, I just don’t feel like I’m in a position to make the determination of whether that has gone too far.

In a related matter, the New York Jewish Week had a cautionary article by Alisha Abboudi and Debbi Frankel about the unsupervised antics of Jewish day school students vacationing in Miami Beach. Even if you don’t read any other part of the article, you can’t miss this excerpt:

The interaction between the girls and boys was grotesque. Hands and mouths were everywhere. Nothing was private, no body part untouchable. A small boy of 15, walking around in a daze searching for his older sister, was easily deterred from his mission by a “friend” who smacked him on the back and said, “Come on, let’s go find us some chicks!” He followed.

The article is a little over-the-top, with its descriptions of virtually unclad teenage girls, drug-dealing children, and bare-bottomed, drunken boys. And surely, whatever these young Jews are up to, it pales in comparison to the debauchery of non-Jewish teens at spring break or Mardi Gras. Nevertheless, the concerns are real, particularly given the almost nonexistent level of parental supervision over these week-long breaks.

I’m not a regular reader of the Jewish Week, and I probably would have missed this article if not for Harry Maryles over at Emes Ve-Emunah. His take? That the deplorable behavior observed at Miami Beach is a result of a failure by parents to transmit proper Jewish values to teens. Here’s the relevant passage:

But another very important factor is the near lack of proper Torah values being transmitted about interacting with the opposite sex in their homes. It is an unfortunate truth that most Modern Orthodox Jews are more in the category of Orthoprax… or my favorite term for them, MO-Lite. These are Jews who are basically Shomer Shabbos and Kashrus and attend Orthodox Shuls. But they are more concerned with lifestyle issues than they are with Halacha. Their values are not centered in Torah but in other things. Typically, the parent of this type is more concerned with getting his child into an ivy league university than he is with his level of Mitzvah observance. Not they they aren’t committed to observance. They are. They want their children to be Frum. But it is a secondary concern.

I have an alternative theory, that is simpler and I believe more accurate. (I might say it’s less slanderous, but I’ll leave that to you to judge.) A large segment of the Modern Orthodox community simply doesn’t hold by Shomer Negiah. To some this might seem an extreme statement. I’m reminded of a post I saw on Rabbi Yitzchak Abbadi’s controversial website, Kashrut.org. A questioner asked for age-appropriate information for a 9-year old interested in becoming shomer negiah. Rabbi Abbadi’s response (by way of his son) was that “it’s not an issue of “Shomer Negiah,” but rather keeping the Laws of the Torah. By labeling it Shomer Negiah, we have given the ones who are not Shomer, a license to do that. What if I am not Shomer Retzichah? That would mean I don’t follow the laws of not murdering.”

Compelling as the answer may sound, it bears witness against itself. No one claims to be both frum and not shomer retzicha! Yet there are many otherwise-observant Jews who proudly proclaim that they are not shomer negiah. This is not a case of acknowledging an obligation even while failing to meet it. Rather, an impossible-to-ignore segment of the MO community simply does not believe that refraining from touching members of the opposite sex is a mandated halachic practice. Moreover, while some consider the practice a meritorious stringency, others consider the practice of shomer negiah a perversion of the proper relationship between the genders.

Is there room in halacha to not be shomer negiah? I’m no expert in the matter, but it does seem that laws intended to prevent a menstruating woman from having sex with her husband might not apply to unmarried teens who may or may not be ritually impure. Certainly, the existence of exceptions for touching that is not affectionate indicates that some skin-on-skin contact is okay.

The above is really just halachic apologetics though. The community that rejects, or even repudiates shomer negiah isn’t doing so to preserve the rights of men who wish to shake hands with women. Rather, this community embraces what they consider a more natural set of rules to govern contact between the sexes. This community fully expects that teens will date, hold hands, and kiss. Premarital sex is still considered out-of-bounds, but sexual experimentation on some controlled level is expected, and even encouraged. Together with that is a more permissive attitude towards other avenues of teenage experimentation such as drugs and alcohol.

What can we make of all this? Are teens who are engaging in this mild form of teenage rebellion doomed to a life bereft of proper Torah values? Perhaps parents are more permissive because they expect their teens to return to the straight and narrow after a year or two of study in Israel. Maybe parents simply remember the less-stringent days of their youth, when Young Israels sponsored mixed dances and nobody had yet heard of shomer negiah.

What’s certain is this. Bad behavior by teens while on unsupervised vacations is not a problem specific to one denomination, or even one religion. It’s the nature of adolescence. The Miami Beach scene is populated not only by the Modern Orthodox. Syrian youth, Yeshivish teens, and many other sects and subgroups can be seen walking the boardwalks and frequenting the hotel lobbies and bars. The vices of drinking, smoking, and drug use have also penetrated all of our communities. As for sex, while its true that MO girls are more likely to be found in bikinis, more extreme problems like molestation and prostitution, though rarer in general, appear to be a greater problem in communities to the right of Modern Orthodoxy.

Before we run around blaming the hashkafot of one group or another, and before we accuse parents of negligence, let’s just ask one question. Is the Miami Beach scene really a problem? In the words of a good friend of mine, and a keen observer of human behavior, are we just lamenting the tail-end of a normal distribution? Maybe 99% of kids go to Miami and have a good, reasonably wholesome time. Maybe it’s only that last 1% who are acting out, engaging in risky behaviors, and calling out for attention through their misbehavior. It would be tragic if we forgot about actually dealing with that troubled 1% because we got caught up in a game of hashkafic Gotcha!

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YCT-Yated Ne’eman Dustup

Yated Ne’eman recently published a screed against Yeshivat Chovevei Torah. You can read the article over at Yeshiva World. By now many bloggers have weighed in with various comments, so I’ll keep my comments brief.

In case anyone wasn’t sure, I do not agree with the content of Yated’s critique, nor do I agree with their Jewish philosophy in general. I was happy to see the article though, because it proves to me that Chovevei has survived its infancy and has made enough of an impact nationally that it must be reckoned with by the Orthodox world. That’s quite an achievement, regardless of whether you applaud or decry it.

In the spirit of respectful disagreement I’m not going to critique the Yated’s critique, nor will I try to disprove or refute their arguments. What I am going to do is air my disappointment.

My feelings towards the Chareidi community are conflicted and complex, but I always felt that I could at least rely on Chareidim to be serious learners. And that’s why I’m so disappointed. The article I read was just filled with poor logic. I’m not talking about making good deductions from debatable premises. I’m talking about using kindergarten logic!

Here’s a quick example:

Rabbi Berman also writes, “When [certain rabbanim] favored Orthodoxyworking [sic] alongside Reform in common community organizations, they saw the divine command of ahavat Yisrael as applying to all Jews.”

He is clearly insinuating that Rav Aharon Kotler, Rav Moshe Feinstein, and all of the Roshei Yeshiva who unequivocally prohibited collaboration with these movements were lacking in the requisite Ahavas Yisroel! He also implies that Rabbi Soloveitchik’s love of his fellow Jews was incomplete. Does Rabbi Berman really believe that he and his sympathizers have a monopoly on Ahavas Yisroel?

Is it even possible to clearly insinuate something? Isn’t that oxymoronic? But beyond the diction problems that litter the article, the logic is missing. Rabbi Berman’s claim that working with Jews of the Reform community is a fulfillment of the mitzvah to love Jews is turned into an attack on rabbanim both dead and living! Surely one could understand Rabbi Berman’s comments in a way that did not cast aspersions on anyone at all!

Here’s another example:

YCT seems to have unlimited resources, does not charge tuition and even gives financial stipends to its students. It is obviously being funded by those who seek to be called Orthodox, but who are interested in halacha conforming to their pre-conceived notions of what is right and not the opposite.

Reading this, one would think that YCT has thousands of students who are supported by wealty patrons who are seeking a hechsher for whatever chazer-treif they are involved in. The truth is that Chovevei accepts no more than twenty students per year, and stipends are often not even sufficient to cover housing costs in New York City. Is the situation different in a Chareidi yeshiva? I’m no expert, but it was my understanding that Chareidi yeshivot and kollels also offered salaries to smicha students. As for the donors, they include such notable and honorable persons as Howard Jonas, Dov Zakheim, and Charles Feldman, and serve on the boards of organizations including Yeshiva University, Yad Vashem, Ohr Torah Stone Institute, and the Bet-Din of America.

I’ll tell you what really broke it for me though. All the above, egregious as it is, might be forgivable, given how passionately the Yated feels about YCT. Consider how they frame their decision to run the article:

It was with great reservation and heartache that we undertook to expose to our readers to [sic] the terribly destructive conduct of YCT. It is a responsibility that we undertook with great trepidation. As a Torah newspaper we hesitate to expose and pain our readership by enumerating the terribly distressing things contained within this article.

No, what’s unforgivable, what’s so damaging to credibility, what makes all the indifferent editing, haphazard grammar, fuzzy logic and regrettable diction pale in comparison is this:

Nevertheless, after watching YCT develop and spread with barely a peep of public outcry from the Modern / Centrist Orthodox establishment we felt compelled by the injunction of our sages, that state, “Bemakom she’ein ish, hishtadel lihiyos ish: In a place where there are no leaders; strive to be a leader (Avos 2-6).”

How can you write a piece like this and then get the one piece of actual Torah you cite wrong? The actual quote, as I thought every Orthodox Jew knew is “Uve’makom she’ein anashim hishtadel lihiyot ish!” One thing is certain, just because you try to be an ish, a leader, doesn’t mean that you succeed. Come on! Get the basics right! How are you not ashamed! How dare you disrespect your audience like that? What a failure! Do you take us for fools? Exactly how many people laid eyes on this article before it was published? How serious could your reservations truly have been if you let such a glaring error through? The Yated isn’t a blog, and its making a serious charge. Is it too much to ask that you at least quote correctly from Pirkei Avot?

What have I learned? Only this: whatever the Yated is on about, it is not about defending truth, or Torah, and it is not about macholoket l’shem shamayim – a dispute for the sake of Heaven. Truly, it’s a pity that such a beautiful community that is so devoted to avodat Hashem has such a disgraceful mouthpiece.

Abortion Proof-Text, or Internal Allusion?

Last week, I posted about a passage in Parshat Mishpatim that is often used to show that Judaism does not equate the life of a fetus with that of a baby. There, I discussed how Christians use the same text to prove the opposite point. I promised at the end of that post to give a midrashic interpretation of these verses. I confess that I may have misspoken.

The interpretation that I am about to give is one that I came up with on my own, based upon a method of Torah analysis that I have heard attributed to the Vilna Gaon. I’ve said over this dvar Torah a few times in various contexts, and while a few people have told me that they heard or read it before, and attributed it to one Hassidic rabbi or another, I have never gotten a citation. If anyone has a citation, I’d love to hear it. If it turns out that this is my own learning, well, caveat lamdan!

First, the text, from Genesis Exodus 21:22: (Thanks Steg!)

כב וְכִי-יִנָּצוּ אֲנָשִׁים, וְנָגְפוּ אִשָּׁה הָרָה וְיָצְאוּ יְלָדֶיהָ, וְלֹא יִהְיֶה, אָסוֹן–עָנוֹשׁ יֵעָנֵשׁ, כַּאֲשֶׁר יָשִׁית עָלָיו בַּעַל הָאִשָּׁה, וְנָתַן, בִּפְלִלִים.	22 And if men strive together, and hurt a woman with child, so that her fruit depart, and yet no harm follow, he shall be surely fined, according as the woman’s husband shall lay upon him; and he shall pay as the judges determine.
כג וְאִם-אָסוֹן, יִהְיֶה–וְנָתַתָּה נֶפֶשׁ, תַּחַת נָפֶשׁ.	23 But if any harm follow, then thou shalt give life for life,
כד עַיִן תַּחַת עַיִן, שֵׁן תַּחַת שֵׁן, יָד תַּחַת יָד, רֶגֶל תַּחַת רָגֶל.	24 eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot,
כה כְּוִיָּה תַּחַת כְּוִיָּה, פֶּצַע תַּחַת פָּצַע, חַבּוּרָה, תַּחַת חַבּוּרָה. {ס}	25 burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe. {S}

We’ve already talked about how the words Ones and Veyatzu Yeladeah can be translated in a number of different ways, each of which significantly alters the fact-pattern of the case. At first glance perhaps we miss an obvious question, but now that we’re looking at our text a second time it’s a little easier to formulate the question: Why isn’t the Torah clearer about what exactly happened? The Torah could have written the facts of the case unambiguously, as it does through the rest of the cases in Parshat Mishpatim!

Perhaps the Torah has chosen to be somewhat mysterious because the verses relate to more than one case. It’s impossible to avoid reading Mishpatim as a halachic text, and in doing so we sometimes forget that it is also a narrative text that continues the story of the Exodus. My theory is that these verses are actually alluding to an early event in the story of the descent to, enslavement in, and redemption from Egypt.

The Vilna Gaon taught that the first time a word is used in the Torah provides insight into the word’s meaning. When I first began to explore this subject, I looked up the word Ason, and discovered that the word is used only five times; twice in Mishpatim, twice in Mikeitz, and once in Vayigash. We’ve already seen the pesukim in Mishpatim, so let’s take a look at the pesukim in Sefer Bereishit:

א וַיַּרְא יַעֲקֹב, כִּי יֶשׁ-שֶׁבֶר בְּמִצְרָיִם; וַיֹּאמֶר יַעֲקֹב לְבָנָיו, לָמָּה תִּתְרָאוּ.	1 Now Jacob saw that there was corn in Egypt, and Jacob said unto his sons: ‘Why do ye look one upon another?’
ב וַיֹּאמֶר–הִנֵּה שָׁמַעְתִּי, כִּי יֶשׁ-שֶׁבֶר בְּמִצְרָיִם; רְדוּ-שָׁמָּה וְשִׁבְרוּ-לָנוּ מִשָּׁם, וְנִחְיֶה וְלֹא נָמוּת.	2 And he said: ‘Behold, I have heard that there is corn in Egypt. Get you down thither, and buy for us from thence; that we may live, and not die.’
ג וַיֵּרְדוּ אֲחֵי-יוֹסֵף, עֲשָׂרָה, לִשְׁבֹּר בָּר, מִמִּצְרָיִם.	3 And Joseph’s ten brethren went down to buy corn from Egypt.
ד וְאֶת-בִּנְיָמִין אֲחִי יוֹסֵף, לֹא-שָׁלַח יַעֲקֹב אֶת-אֶחָיו: כִּי אָמַר, פֶּן-יִקְרָאֶנּוּ אָסוֹן.	4 But Benjamin, Joseph’s brother, Jacob sent not with his brethren; for he said: ‘Lest peradventure harm befall him.’

(Genesis 42:1-4)

We’re joining the story in the middle of the action. Yosef has already been sold and is in Egypt. With the arrival of famine in the land of Canaan, Yakov sends his sons to purchase food in Egypt, but keeps Binyamin at home. Note that although all of Yakov’s sons are referred to as Yosef’s brothers, but Binyamin is singled out from among his ten other brothers, even as he too is called Yosef’s brother. Let’s look at the next instance, where a pattern will begin to emerge.

לו וַיֹּאמֶר אֲלֵהֶם יַעֲקֹב אֲבִיהֶם, אֹתִי שִׁכַּלְתֶּם: יוֹסֵף אֵינֶנּוּ, וְשִׁמְעוֹן אֵינֶנּוּ, וְאֶת-בִּנְיָמִן תִּקָּחוּ, עָלַי הָיוּ כֻלָּנָה.	36 And Jacob their father said unto them: ‘Me have ye bereaved of my children: Joseph is not, and Simeon is not, and ye will take Benjamin away; upon me are all these things come.’
לז וַיֹּאמֶר רְאוּבֵן, אֶל-אָבִיו לֵאמֹר, אֶת-שְׁנֵי בָנַי תָּמִית, אִם-לֹא אֲבִיאֶנּוּ אֵלֶיךָ; תְּנָה אֹתוֹ עַל-יָדִי, וַאֲנִי אֲשִׁיבֶנּוּ אֵלֶיךָ.	37 And Reuben spoke unto his father, saying: ‘Thou shalt slay my two sons, if I bring him not to thee; deliver him into my hand, and I will bring him back to thee.’
לח וַיֹּאמֶר, לֹא-יֵרֵד בְּנִי עִמָּכֶם: כִּי-אָחִיו מֵת וְהוּא לְבַדּוֹ נִשְׁאָר, וּקְרָאָהוּ אָסוֹן בַּדֶּרֶךְ אֲשֶׁר תֵּלְכוּ-בָהּ, וְהוֹרַדְתֶּם אֶת-שֵׂיבָתִי בְּיָגוֹן, שְׁאוֹלָה.	38 And he said: ‘My son shall not go down with you; for his brother is dead, and he only is left; if harm befall him by the way in which ye go, then will ye bring down my gray hairs with sorrow to the grave.

(Genesis 42:36-38)
By now, the sons of Yakov have returned from Egypt, but without Shimon, who is being held in prison by Yosef, and whose release is conditional upon Binyamin journeying to Egypt. What’s notable for our purposes is that the word Ason is again used to describe what might befall Binyamin, and that Binyamin is again distinguished from his other brothers when Yakov says “My son shall not go down with you”, even as he is speaking to his other sons. Okay, on to the next instance of the word:

כה וַיֹּאמֶר, אָבִינוּ: שֻׁבוּ, שִׁבְרוּ-לָנוּ מְעַט-אֹכֶל.	25 And our father said: Go again, buy us a little food.
כו וַנֹּאמֶר, לֹא נוּכַל לָרֶדֶת: אִם-יֵשׁ אָחִינוּ הַקָּטֹן אִתָּנוּ, וְיָרַדְנוּ–כִּי-לֹא נוּכַל לִרְאוֹת פְּנֵי הָאִישׁ, וְאָחִינוּ הַקָּטֹן אֵינֶנּוּ אִתָּנוּ.	26 And we said: We cannot go down; if our youngest brother be with us, then will we go down; for we may not see the man’s face, except our youngest brother be with us.
כז וַיֹּאמֶר עַבְדְּךָ אָבִי, אֵלֵינוּ: אַתֶּם יְדַעְתֶּם, כִּי שְׁנַיִם יָלְדָה-לִּי אִשְׁתִּי.	27 And thy servant my father said unto us: Ye know that my wife bore me two sons;
כח וַיֵּצֵא הָאֶחָד, מֵאִתִּי, וָאֹמַר, אַךְ טָרֹף טֹרָף; וְלֹא רְאִיתִיו, עַד-הֵנָּה.	28 and the one went out from me, and I said: Surely he is torn in pieces; and I have not seen him since;
כט וּלְקַחְתֶּם גַּם-אֶת-זֶה מֵעִם פָּנַי, וְקָרָהוּ אָסוֹן–וְהוֹרַדְתֶּם אֶת-שֵׂיבָתִי בְּרָעָה, שְׁאֹלָה.	29 and if ye take this one also from me, and harm befall him, ye will bring down my gray hairs with sorrow to the grave.

(Genesis 44:26-29)

Here we have Yehuda appealing to Yosef for Binyamin’s release after Yosef plants a silver chalice in Binyamin’s pack, and then siezes him as a thief. Just as in the other two instances, we see Binyamin differentiated from his brothers, and we also see the occurrence of an Ason as a hypothetical possibility, not a description of an actual calamitous event.

Let’s try and put all the pieces together. It appears that the word Ason, as used in Bereishit, refers to the death of a woman and her children – in this case, Rachel, who died on the journey back to Israel from Padan Aram, Yosef, whom Yakov believes is already dead, and Binyamin, whose death would complete the Ason. How does this shed any light on our text in Mishpatim? I believe that the word Ason is telling us that the sample case presented in Mishpatim is not only a halachic text but a narrative text that is using the literary technique of allusion to layer an additional meaning on the text.

Consider: The story in Mishpatim tells of two men struggling with one another, but accidentally striking a pregnant woman. Perhaps the text is obliquely referring to Yakov and Lavan! They struggle over the very identity of Yakov’s family; Yakov cleaves to the God of his father Yitzchak, while Lavan carries on the Aramean tradition of the gods of Nachor. So ferocious is their struggle that the Torah later (Deut. 26) describes their interaction as אֲרַמִּי אֹבֵד אָבִי – an Aramean (Lavan) attempted to destroy my father (Yakov). This passage is later interpreted by the Haggadah to show that Lavan was in some ways worse than Pharaoh!

In the course of the struggle between Lavan and Yakov, an awful and dramatic moment changes the course of Jewish history. When Yakov packs up his family and leaves Lavan’s house, he is careful to take nothing that is not his, and admonishes his household to be equally fastidious. Unfortuantely for him, and for reasons not fully understood, Rachel steals the Teraphim, her father’s household idol-gods. After Lavan catches up to Yakov, he demands these idols back. Yakov responds with a curse:

לב עִם אֲשֶׁר תִּמְצָא אֶת-אֱלֹהֶיךָ, לֹא יִחְיֶה–נֶגֶד אַחֵינוּ הַכֶּר-לְךָ מָה עִמָּדִי, וְקַח-לָךְ; וְלֹא-יָדַע יַעֲקֹב, כִּי רָחֵל גְּנָבָתַם.	32 With whomsoever thou findest thy gods, he shall not live; before our brethren discern thou what is thine with me, and take it to thee.’–For Jacob knew not that Rachel had stolen them.–

(Gen. 31:32)

As Rashi and others tell us, the curse of a righteous man can take effect in unintended and unexpected ways. In this case, Yakov’s curse dooms Rachel, but God has mercy and takes her only after she gives birth to Binyamin.

Finally, the story is clear. The two men fighting in the pasuk are Yakov and Lavan. Yakov, through his curse, accidentally strikes the pregnant woman, Rachel, and kills her. What should be his penalty? According to the pasuk, assuming no Ason happens, then the husband of the pregnant woman evaluates the damage, but the actual penalty is determined by the court. In our case, the husband of the pregnant woman is Yakov, who already submitted that the penalty should be death, but the court, God, determines that Rachel should live long enough to give birth to Binyamin. By doing so, she fulfills the words veyatzu yeladeah, because now she has two children who have emerged alive (it’s an odd phrase in the halachic context, given that it is plural when the standard pregnancy is a single fetus).

When Yakov tries to resist sending Binyamin to Egypt, he recognizes that his own fate is in the balance. When Yakov lost Rachel, he at least had her children. Terrible though the loss was, it was not an Ason. With the loss of Yosef, Yakov found himself on the brink of a precipice. Should Binyamin be lost, the rest of the passage in Mishpatim would come into play – should an Ason happen, you must pay a soul in place of a soul. That’s why Yakov describes the consequences of losing Binyamin as resulting in sending Yakov to Sheol – the grave. For all that Yakov would still have many sons left to him, the deaths of Rachel and all her children would be laid at this feet, and Yakov would be chayav b’nafsho – guilty at the cost of his soul.

It’s notable that in this interpretation, which may be somewhat imaginative, the key word Ason shares the same meaning as in the halachic case – the death of the mother and the child (or children). Admittedly though, the words veyatzu yeladeah mean different things in the different contexts. In the halachic context it means the death of the fetus, while in the narrative context it means the survival of Yosef and Binyamin. The Christian interpretation is different still – Ason refers to the fetus, and veyatzu yeladeah refers to premature birth of a fetus.

It may be that this sort of analysis can be further extended. Chapter 21 of Exodus is quite suggestive – the laws of the Eved Ivri, the Hebrew manservant, are suggestive of Yakov’s experiences with Lavan, and the laws of unplanned killing and fleeing to refuge is reminiscent of Moshe’s flight from Egypt after killing the Egyptian taskmaster. Or I’m overreaching. But I feel pretty good about the section above, because of the word Ason. It’s the linchpin that holds everything together, especially because it isn’t used in any other context besides the two we mentioned.

So what do you guys think? Is this a reasonable way to approach Torah analysis? I like that it doesn’t do any violence to the halachic analysis even as it explains certain difficulties in the text. Does anyone have a source for this? How about other teachings in a similar style? Post in the comments, or email me at rejewvenator [at] gmail.com

What May A Teacher Believe?

Last week, I wrote about scientists who believe in the idea of a young Earth. This week, the New York Times is covering what in my mind is a similar topic – the beliefs that a teacher may express in the classroom (Patrick McGeehan, February 20, 2007).

Matthew LeClair, a 16-year old high school student in Kearny, NJ is threatening to sue the Kearny Board of Education over religious views expressed by his history teacher, David Paszkiewicz. Evidently, Mr. Paszkiewicz had been recording (without his knowledge or permission, and against explicit school policy) espousing religious views including that people who did not believe in Jesus would go to Hell, that dinosaurs were on Noah’s Ark (out of curiosity, is the problem that there were dinosaurs on board, or is talking about Noah’s Ark itself a religious conversation?), and that the Big Bang and the theory of evolution have no scientific basis.

I’m not all that interested in the details of this case, not least because after carefully reading the article it appears to be about how the school handled its student whistleblower, not the larger question of how the separation of Church and State plays out in the classroom of the most densely-populated state in the Union. I guess we’re not in Kansas anymore.

In some ways I’m the last person who should be commenting on this issue, or at least the last person you should be listening to. I never attended a public school in any US state, I never taught a day of class in a public school – heck, the only time I ever see the inside of a public school is on Election Day! I don’t really understand and have never personally experienced a separation between religion and education. I attended only religious schools while growing up, and professionally I teach in Jewish environments for Jewish institutions.

In a way though, the idea of verboten topics in the classroom is not foreign to my experiences at all. In a Modern Orthodox high school, for example, you will most certainly learn about the Big Bang and evolution in science class. In the ninth grade I even remembering hearing a disclaimer from my science teacher that I need not believe these things, but that I would certainly be tested on my knowledge of them. While these topics were openly taught, discussed and even sometimes addressed by our rabbis, some topics were beyond the pale, like the idea of three Isaiahs, or the Documentary Hypothesis. Beyond the realm of Biblical criticism, topics like intermarriage or interdenominational relations not to be discussed, even as intermarried teachers taught a largely-Orthodox student population fringed by Conservatives.

Maybe it’s strange, given the above, that it was in this environment that I was exposed on the one hand to the non-observant, intermarried math teacher’s view that a sect which would consider his wife a donkey has some serious moral failings¹, and on the other hand to the Israeli, observant, owner of both a doctorate in Tanach and rabbinical ordination (though he preferred, or perhaps even insisted, on the title ‘Mister’) and his heterodox views on the authorship of the Tanach. These conversations, and others like them, were often preceded by a quick peek outside the door and down the hall, and were conducted in hushed voices with conspiratorial overtones. Out teachers would swear us to secrecy, explaining that their jobs were on the line and that they would be disciplined and even fired if it was revealed that they were sharing these views.

I don’t want to make too much of these moments. They didn’t inspire me to great intellectual heights, nor did they plant a seed of cross-denominational tolerance in my breast. I do remember them though, and there are not many educational moments from my high school years that I can now remember, some fifteen years later. But I don’t remember them for their content as much as for the personalities of the teachers themselves.

I’m a teacher myself, and if there’s one thing I’ve learned over the years it’s that you can’t be an effective teacher if you don’t make personal connections with your students. That means bringing your personality to your work in every phase, from formal exams to informal chit-chat with students. Kids don’t have a great respect for knowledge, but they do have a great respect for teachers who are genuine. In order to really connect with students you must share yourself, including your values and your beliefs.

Maybe I’m the crazy one here, but does it strike anyone else as absurd that in this country we have decided to entrust our children’s educations into the hands of teachers whose world-views are potentially so different from our own? That we created an education system that strives to inculcate only the broadest of societal values (even as some of those values, e.g. egalitarianism, run contrary to the beliefs of many)?

So back to Mr. Paszkiewicz. I confess that when I first read his name, I braced myself for a Jewish-flavored controversy, and breathed some small sigh of relief at the Christian nature of his beliefs. Unlike in the past though, this time my small sigh did not carry with it my indignation over the issue. What did Mr. Paszkiewicz say? That he’s a Christian? And that by extension he believes that non-Christians will go to hell? Isn’t this standard Christian dogma? It is Evangelical dogma that the Earth is young, that the Bible is literal, and that by implication, dinosaurs were on Noah’s Ark! Whatever his claims on the science behind the Big Bang and evolution might have been, Mr. Paszkiewicz is a history teacher, not a science teacher, and his statements should not be considered ex cathedra.

What’s a teacher to do? I’m sure, like most teachers, Mr. Paszkiewicz is asked about his faith by students. Is he supposed to lie, or to sugarcoat his answers? Is he meant to recuse himself from such questions? I know that I wear my Jewish identity on my sleeve, and it would be impossible for me to shunt if to non-school hours only. It’s a part of who I am and how I experience and relate to the world.

I’m not trying to teach students or test them on my religious beliefs, and I got no sense that Mr. Paszkiewicz was trying to do that either. From the facts reported, it does not appear that his opinions were expressed as part of his history curriculum, but as past of the year-long relationship that teachers and students evolve together. Is this unconstitutional?

In my opinion teachers must be allowed to share their beliefs with students. Sure, some lines must be drawn, and I’m not advocating for Jerry Falwell to do a nationwide elementary school tour. Nevertheless, teachers cannot be expected to be effective as teachers, role-models, and meaningful influences on their students if they cannot honestly live their beliefs and wear them proudly in a school. My best teachers never backed away from their beliefs, and more than any fact I learned from them, I learned how to be true to yourself even in an environment that was not welcoming to your values and closely-held truths. It may be that Mr. Paszkiewicz has already taught Matthew LeClair that lesson, and I suspect that it’s a living lesson he will remember far longer than Mr. Paszkiewicz’s by-the-numbers Evangelical dogma.

So what do you folks think? What is and is not appropriate for a teacher to discuss in class?

—-
1.See Gil Student for a traditional view on the status of Gentiles in Jewish marital law, and a refutation of the claim made by my math teacher. The straight-faced title of the linked article is Gentiles Are Human, and it’s the second of a two-part series on this question. Here’s Part I.

Ma’arava, Then and Now

The Talmud can be difficult to study because it assumes that its readers will have a broad base of shared knowledge, both religious and political. Without contextual knowledge it can be virtually impossible to understand this terse document, but those same requirements make it difficult to see the text with new eyes.

The thought occurred to me as I considered the appellation ‘Ma’arava’ – a word JRR Tolkien might have translated as ‘Westernesse’, but which is commonly used in the Talmud to refer to the land of Israel. I must have learned this in the fifth or sixth grade, and never considered the name further, other than to make the obvious connection that relative to the Jewish community of Babylon, Israel was to the west.

Then I read an article about assimilation and the Greek-speaking Jewish world in the Jerusalem Post last week. In the article, Haviv Rettig reports on a study by Prof. Doron Mendels of the Hebrew University and Dr. Arye Edrei of Tel Aviv University published in the January issue of The Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha.

According to Drs. Mendels and Edrei, the data show that the Rabbinic authority that emerged in latter Mishnaic times, perhaps from the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE and on from that point, did not extend over the Greek-speaking Jewish world and its population centers in Alexandria, Greece, Rome, Turkey, and lands that would one day be known as France and Spain. These populations spoke Greek and Latin, not the Aramaic of Eastern Judaism, and evidenced the characteristics of Hellenistic culture under Roman rule.

The good doctors go on to explain that these western Jewish populations were to ultimately assimilate in droves into Christianity, and that, by Dr. Mendels guesswork – he freely admits that numbers are hard to come by – at least half of Western Judaism was lost to Christian assimilation.

Why? The answers, say Edrei and Mendels, lie in the language. Eastern Judaism spoke in Hebrew and Aramaic, and shared a canon consisting of the Tanakh as well as a coalescing oral tradition of Mishna in Hebrew, and later, Talmud, in Aramaic. The rich fruits of a 700-year literary fluorescence helped to create a diverse but roughly unified culture out of Asian Jewery , stretching from the land of Israel to the farthest eastern reaches of the Persian Empire.

Western Judaism, by contrast, had none of these. The Septuagint, the writings of Philo and Josephus, books authored in Greek which were later viewed as extra-canonical: these were the sacred texts of Western Judaism. With no translation of the Midrash, Mishna, Gemara, or even Haggada, and with alternate versions of relatively new books like Esther, Western Judaism did not develop the highly formalized halachic system that was to define Judaism for two thousand years. These communities were essentially Biblical communities, relying on the supremacy of the Pentateuch as a religious document rather than the interpretations and restatements of the Law that burst out of Babylon.

Maybe that’s why the Gemara refers to Israel as Ma’arava. The anti-Hellenist stance of the Tana’im is well-documented, and it appears that whatever might be made of figures like Antigonus Ish Socho (one of the zugot, and with a Greek name, no less), neither the rabbis of the Misna nor of the Gemara prioritized reaching the Jewish communities of the West. The rabbis of the period did not translate from Aramaic to Greek, they did not exchange teachers or scholars with Western communities, as the Babylonian and Palestinian Jewish communities did, nor do we see that these Western communities sought the advice or leadership of the rabbis of Babylon and Israel.

Perhaps Ma’arava doesn’t mean the land to the west. Maybe it means “the West.” Perhaps the Babylonian rabbis were just drawing a line and saying that the communities further west were beyond the pale of normative Judaism. Hellenism had taken hold and could not or would not be rooted out. While contact was not quite as limited as it may appear from what has been said so far (the Talmud does report, for instance, about prayer customs in the great synagogue of Alexandria) it appears that Rabbinic Judaism no longer viewed Hellenistic Judaism as an authentic expression of Judaism at all, and indeed, those communities grew ever more marginal to Jewish culture with the continued decline of the Roman Empire.

The article in the JPost goes on to say that while the question of whether this historical analogy might hold today was presented, none of the experts interviewed saw an appropriate application. I was tickled in particular by the words of Dr. Mendels, who explained that today “Rabbinic Judaism has authority over all the Jews in the world. I’m not talking about a specific chief rabbi, but Rabbinic Judaism, with its texts and habits and usages and so on, is central to the whole of Judaism. […] Basically, Rabbinic Judaism, in its various forms, whether Orthodox or Reform, was lacking in the Greek- and Latin-speaking Diaspora”

Maybe the situation isn’t so different. Whatevevr Drs. Mendels and Edrei might think, my sense is that Orthodox Jews do not consider Reform Jews to be heirs to Rabbinic Judaism at all, and that Reform Judaism self-identifies as a non-Halachic movement that looks with disfavor on most of the legal corpus produced by Rabbinic Judaism over the last 2000 years. Perhaps even today, the western extent of Rabbinic Judaism is only to the shores of the eastern seaboard of the US and its Orthodox Jewish population centers. Perhaps even today, when so much of Jewish literature is available in English translation the Western half of Judaism is not a part of the intellectual dialogue of the East.

I hope in the future to write more about Jewish denominationalism, but for now I leave you with a question. Has anyone ever seen an Artscroll Shas in a Conservative or Reform synagogue? (An exemption from answering this question will be granted to all those readers for whom entering such a place is forbidden.)

The Abortion Proof-Text Debate

This week’s Parsha, Mishpatim (starting at Exodus 21) contains a brief but highly controversial passage that is often a starting point for debates concerning abortion.  I’ll cite the passage in its entirety (as always, Torah quotes are from Mechon Mamre):

כב  וְכִי-יִנָּצוּ אֲנָשִׁים, וְנָגְפוּ אִשָּׁה הָרָה וְיָצְאוּ יְלָדֶיהָ, וְלֹא יִהְיֶה, אָסוֹן–עָנוֹשׁ יֵעָנֵשׁ, כַּאֲשֶׁר יָשִׁית עָלָיו בַּעַל הָאִשָּׁה, וְנָתַן, בִּפְלִלִים.	22 And if men strive together, and hurt a woman with child, so that her fruit depart, and yet no harm follow, he shall be surely fined, according as the woman’s husband shall lay upon him; and he shall pay as the judges determine.
כג  וְאִם-אָסוֹן, יִהְיֶה–וְנָתַתָּה נֶפֶשׁ, תַּחַת נָפֶשׁ.	23 But if any harm follow, then thou shalt give life for life,
כד  עַיִן תַּחַת עַיִן, שֵׁן תַּחַת שֵׁן, יָד תַּחַת יָד, רֶגֶל תַּחַת רָגֶל.	24 eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot,
כה  כְּוִיָּה תַּחַת כְּוִיָּה, פֶּצַע תַּחַת פָּצַע, חַבּוּרָה, תַּחַת חַבּוּרָה.  {ס}	25 burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe. {S}

The passage relates to abortion only indirectly, in that it places a value on a human fetus without reaching the question of whether abortion is permissible or not. More on this point later.

First, we need to understand the verses. Let’s start with the Orthodox approach. To make any sense of the scenario, we need to understand the meaning of the word Ason, which the JPS 1917 translation renders as ‘harm’, but which in modern Hebrew is more closely translated as ‘disaster’ or ‘calamity’. L’Halacha (Sanhedrin 79a), the word is taken to mean the death of the mother.

The second phrase with an equivocal meaning is V’yatzu yeladeha -‘her fruit depart’. Once again,  the gemara (this time Baba Kamma 49a) tells us that this means that woman miscarries and the fetus dies.

Putting the two together, we now have a clear picture of the halachic story: two men come to blows, with the intent to kill, and one accidentally strikes a pregnant woman. The verses in the Torah talk about two alternatives. In the first, ason, tragedy, is averted as the woman lives, and her fetus dies. In such a case, the man who struck her is obliged to pay a fine meant to provide restitution for the difference in value between a pregnant woman and one who is not pregnant. (The Talmud explains that such values may be found in the market for slaves – evidently pregnant slaves were more expensive, since their children would also be slaves. The process by which the husband makes the initial evaluation, subject to the ultimate approval of the courts is a bit odd, but let’s not get into it here.)

The other alternative discussed in the text is the case of ason, where the woman herself is killed, along with her fetus. In such a case, the man who struck here must pay a soul for a soul. The Talmud records a debate as to whether this means capital punishment or blood-money, and l’halacha we decide that capital punishment requires the specific intent to murder a person not just general intent to kill – a notable distinction between Jewish criminal law and criminal law in many, if not, all US states. The man would be charged a blood-price, but would not be subject to corporeal or capital punishment.

Regardless of this last issue, we can infer from the passage that killing a fetus is not the equivalent of killing a human, which is where we enter into the abortion deabte. The parsha provides that in case of accidental murder, the killer must flee to a special city of refuge that has been designated for exactly such purpose(ir miklat, see Numbers 33:11-28), and must remain there until the current Kohen Gadol passes away. If he fails to flee, blood-relatives of his victim may take their vengeance upon the killer. Clearly, the penalty for accidental killing of a human is much more severe than for accidental killing of a fetus, and thus, as the reasoning goes, whether abortion is or is not permitted, it certainly is not murder.

For years, I never really thought twice about the subject, until I encountered an Evangelical Christian, seminary-educated, with whom I corresponded for a few years. The topics of our correspondence were wide-ranging, and the intellectual and religious growth we both experienced is itself an argument for being more ecumenical (though both of us originate in exclusionary, monistic denominations).

When we discussed these verses and their connection to abortion, we discovered a great surprise! Christians have an entirely different interpretation of the verses. Christians interpret v’yatzu yeladeah as premature delviery, and ason as miscarriage. Thus, the Torah discusses two possible cases, one in which there is a premature live birth, and the other a miscarriage. In the case of premature live birth, a fine is assessed against the man who struck the woman, to compensate for the premature birth. In the case of miscarriage, the man is liable for his soul. I was unable to pin my friend down on whether this meant capital punishment or financial restitution, and whether one could extend the punishment regime, whatever it was, to the next verses, commonly referred to as the Lex Taliones, the law of retribution.

What did emerge was that the very same verses that Jews understand to mean that abortion is not equivalent to murder is used by Christians to understand the reverse! The interpretation of the entire passage rests on understanding the word ason, a word used only twice more in the Torah, in reference to one other subject, and understanding the phrase v’yatzu yeladeah, itself mysteriously plural.

Anyone out there have similar experiences with Biblical interpretations? (Yup, if that’s not evidence that this is a niche blog, I don’t know what is…) That’ll do for now, but stay tuned for a midrashic interpretation of these exact same verses next week.

Shabbat Shalom!

Milk, Men, and Miracles

The Gemara below is a relatively famous one that play a key role in the long-running debate throughout the Talmud about the theological value of miracles. The dispute arises in many places and inflects the views of our greatest scholars on many key events in Jewish history, including the seminal moment of Exodus:

 

מסכת שבת פרק ה

דף נג

(link)

ת”ר מעשה באחד שמתה אשתו והניחה בן לינק ולא היה לו שכר מניקה ליתן ונעשה לו נס ונפתחו לו דדין כשני דדי אשה והניק את בנו אמר רב יוסף בא וראה כמה גדול אדם זה שנעשה לו נס כזה א”ל אביי אדרבה כמה גרוע אדם זה שנשתנו לו סדרי בראשית אמר רב יהודה בא וראה כמה קשים מזונותיו של אדם שנשתנו עליו סדרי בראשית אמר רב נחמן תדע דמתרחיש ניסא ולא אברו מזוני

Talmud Bavli Tractate Shabbat 53b (link)

Our Rabbis taught: It once happened that a man’s wife died and left a child to be suckled, and he could not afford to pay a wet-nurse, whereupon a miracle was performed for him and his teats opened like the two teats of a woman and he suckled his son. R. Joseph observed, Come and see how great was this man, that such a miracle was performed on his account! Said Abaye to him, On the contrary: how lowly was this man, that the order of the Creation was changed on his account! Rab Judah observed, Come and see how difficult are men’s wants [of being satisfied], that the order of the Creation had to be altered for him! R. Nahman said: The proof is that miracles do [frequently] occur, whereas food is [rarely] created miraculously.

Let’s start by dealing with this story on its face. Last week, Scientific American published an article reporting that human males can lactate! Turns out that this is not such an unknown phenomenon, having been reliably observed by both scientists and laymen in humans and other mammals. A brief Internet search yielded plenty of corroborating stories, (this one not work safe/not tzniusdik).

Most of the articles talk about some combination of taking the hormone prolactin, which spurs lactation, and stimulating the nipple in order to induce male lactation. Historically speaking, male Nazi concentration camp survivors were observed to lactate during their recovery – evidently, the glands that produce hormones, including prolactin, healed faster than the liver, which breaks down excess hormones in the body. These recovering survivors were generating lots of hormones, which their livers were not yet capable of absorbing. Still, other reports suggest that lactation can be achieved only through stimulation of the nipple, or in one case, through the power of positve thinking alone!

Though some might dispute this point, I would think it churlish to claim that these examples, even if undeniably true, indicate that male lactation is part of the ‘order of Creation.’ Whatever the innate physiological possibilities of the male body, the ability to lactate has gone unactualized in all but the smallest scintilla of the human population. For some it may be comforting to have found a rational basis for the miracle reported in the Talmud, while others may view it as another ax-blow to the roots of faith in God and miracles. That’s not my issue, or at least, not today’s issue.

Abaye and Rabbi Yosef are simply continuing a long line of debate regarding the role of miracles. This debate goes back at least as far as the Tana’im who lived through the destruction, and was an issue particularly for Rabbi Elazar ben Azaryah, who miraculously aged prematurely after being appointed to replace Rabban Gamliel as head of the yeshiva at Yavneh. Though he was only eighteen years of age when he took the job, he miraculously assumed the appearance of a 70-year old man overnight. See Haggadat Beit Halevy for an interesting connection between this topic and the section of the Haggadah that begins “Amar R. Elazar ben Azaryah”.

But what of the responses of R. Yehuda and R. Nachman? Rashi comments that they are responding to the fact that God specifically enacted a miracle to enable this man to feed his child, rather than simply “opening the gates of earnings for him.” In other words, God could have arranged that the man be matzliach in his business, which would have allowed him to hire a nursemaid. R. Yehuda is suggesting that it is in some way more difficult for a man to earn a living than it is for God to change the orders of Creation. R. Nachman points out that miracles occur all the time, but only rarely do miracles create food of themselves.

I’m sure that there’s a lot that can be said on these last two points, especially with regards to the Man that fell in the desert, and I wish I had the time to explore them more fully. Maybe we’ll get some good comments on this aspect of the story. Go on, don’t be shy now.

Today, it seems like we are able to manipulate the orders of Creation with ever-greater ease. In the Western world, we have unprecedented control over how we and our favorite species of animals and plants live, die, and reproduce, and with each passing day we extend our natural order, sometimes blithely ignoring the moral responsibilities that are inseparable from these awesome powers.

Yet even in a society with such power, we find that the statement of R. Yehudah remains true. As a species, mankind still fails to feed himself. Starvation is a problem in even some of the wealthiest countries in the world, and is epidemic among the less fortunate countries. Though rarely, a miracle, a change in the orders of Creation can solve the problems of one man, the greater problems of the world are not often unsolved for lack of tools, but for lack of want. The human orders of Creation – fear, greed, envy and hatred – these lie at the roots of the difficulties that Man faces in meeting his wants, in earning his daily bread. Technological solutions are tools that must be wielded wisely, justly, and most importantly, kindly.

Games in the Mikdash

This one comes at you from Mississippi Fred McDowell over at On the Main Line, by way of Baalbatish, who adds some great illustrations.

It all started with the article from Dan Rabinowitz in Hakira, showing that contrary to the ahalachic illustrations of the new edition of Mishanyot Meirot, Kohanim did not wear a kippah underneath their migba’at. Rabinowitz tells us that, as recorded in the Mishna, the Kohanim serving in the Mikdash would have a lottery of sorts to determine how to split up the jobs, some of which were more desired than others because they came with segulah for wealth or other benefits.

Basically, the Kohen Gadol would think of a number and the Kohanim interested in the job would stand around him in a circle and put out some number of fingers. The Kohen Gadol would then count fingers until he reached his predetermind number, and the Kohen belonging to that finger would get the job. The Mishna states that in order to keep track of where they started counting, the first Kohen counted would remove his migba’at from his head, thus baring his head. Tosfot comments that the lottery must have taken place outside of the courtyard, because it is disgraceful to stand bareheaded in the courtyard of the Temple.

As a side note, prior to the lottery practice, one job, that of removing the ashes from the  large altar in the courtyard (terumat hadeshen) was free for the taking, but if two priests wanted it, they would race up the ramp of the altar.

Most of what I’ve read so far has been in response to the idea that the kohanim didn’t wear a kippa, but I actually think the lottery part of the story is more compelling. As kids we used to play Twenty-First  Finger Is It (everyone puts in a few fingers and you count to the twenty-first) as a decision rule, but it was one of the first to be abandoned because everybody soon learns that barring knowledge of how anyone else was going to play, it was in your best interest to put out as many fingers as possible and give yourself as many chances to win as possible. How could the Kohanim use such a primitive system? Were they not smart enough to figure out its flaws? Couldn’t they come up with another method?

It also seems like a relatively undignified method of distributing the labor, which is only exacerbated by having a Kohen take off his migba’at, thus forcing the whole lottery to be moved otudoors. Why couldn’t the first guy to be counted have raised his hand, or any other method to differentiate himself that would not have forced them to leave the courtyard, as Tosfot says they did?

I think I would rather talk about these questions than ask whether the Kohanim actually wore kippot or not.

What Must A Scientist Believe?

The New York Times had a great article in today’s paper about Young Earth Creationists earning science degrees at regular universities. I’m always interested by mainstream media coverage of conservative Christianity because Orthodox Judaism shares many of the same beliefs, but is rarely covered in quite the same way.

The article dealt with whether doctorates should be awarded to students who do legitimate scientific work while harboring non-scientific beliefs, especially if those beliefs are specifically related to their fields of study. Can a university legitimately award a degree in, say, paleontology to a student who doesn’t actually believe that the fossils she studies are billions of years old? How can we accept the scholarship of a person who decries the same work from another scientist as false?

It’s interesting that the article doesn’t cover how the Christian scientists integrate their beliefs or resolve the dissonance between their two life choices. We get a quote from Dr. Marcus Ross, a creationist and geoscientist, who explains that he views the world through two separate paradigms, one religious, and the other scientific. I wish the author of the article,or perhaps Dr. Ross himself, had gone into more detail.

Orthodox Jews don’t always fall into the Biblical literalist camp. Enough opinions within the Mesorah allow for a more allegorical view of the seven days of creation, but even then, specifics of belief vary. Some attempt to reconcile the order of the days of creation with current evolutionary theory. Most don’t acknowledge that Genesis 1 and Genesis 2 are different and incompatible stories of Creation, regardless of their views on a young or old earth. Still others claim that though the earth is young, it was created to appear old, despite the issues raised by the duplicitous God that they must posit.

Perhaps none of these accommodations to scientific reality hold much water. I’m no expert, that’s for certain. Personally, I believe in an allegorical approach to Genesis rather than an historical approach, but as a person who venerates Midrash as an impressively encoded repository of knowledge, the title of allegory is high praise indeed, and the story of Genesis earns a reverence no less than the account of the parting of the sea, the giving of the Torah, or the conquest of the land of Israel. What seems clear is that Orthodox Jews who honor and respect science as a tool for discovering truth have found means by which to fervently believe in the early chapters of Genesis without rejecting science.

I think a difference exists between the Christian and Jewish approaches, though. Whereas Jews often seek to create a space for belief in science within their theology, Christian theology, or at least fundamental Christian theology, is well, fundamentalist. Jews are more likely to reinterpret their understanding of their own texts and traditions in light of scientific evidence rather than undermining science to buttress their faith-based claims. Christian Young Earth Creationist tend to take the opposite tack, perhaps because belief in literal Biblical inerrancy makes reinterpretation impossible.

Whatever the differences, the question regarding degree-granting remains. If a mathematician seeking a doctorate explained that because of his faith he did not believe that two and two made four (an idea akin to disbelieving evolution in many scientific circles) would he qualify for a doctorate? Perhaps the analogy overstates the case, but I can understand a PhD review board insisting that a candidate submit a doctoral thesis that she believes is true.

What are some of the ways in which Jews compartmentalize these beliefs? Any Young Earth Creationsts want to further explain what Dr. Ross meant when he spoke of two paradigms?

Corporations Aren’t People, Are They?

Recently on Hashkafah.com, someone asked about how to get a cell-phone charge reversed. Another poster commented that it was unethical to try to get out of paying this charge, so long as the charge was honestly incurred. Accusations were hurled, but the long and short of it was this: though halacha may insist that we treat the unethical ethically, does halacha mandate that we treat companies like humans?

On the one hand, if ethics is a guide for our own behavior, why should it matter that we are interacting with a company and not a human? Why does the existence of an abstraction like a corporation change what’s expected of us as ethical humans?

Yet, as all of us who have been through a punishing round of “customer service” can attest to, dealing with a corporation can be tremendously frustrating. But it’s not the frustration that makes me believe that the rules should be different. It’s that the interaction between company and consumer has a very different set of rules that govern it, and these rules flow as much from the imbalance of power between the parties as from a desire to limit the context of the conversation solely to the business relationship.

I had an illuminating experience dealing with Citibank once. At the time I was poor, and lived month-to-month. Unexpected expenses were back-breaking, and I often needed to know exactly when checks would clear or expenses would be deducted. In a crunch, I received a check that I wanted to deposit, but I was concerned that the funds would not be made available immediately. I considered going to a check-cashing facility, but I knew that their fees were high, and I was only hurting myself in the long run by using them.

I decided to call Citibank and find out how quickly I would have access to my funds. Customer service explained to me that the first $100 of my check would be credited to my account instantly, and the rest would clear over the next few days. I was delighted! I went to the bank and deposited the check. Of course, no money was credited to my account, and I was forced to call customer service again.

After fighting through layer after layer of ever more demonic reps, I finally reached the top of the pyramid. I was informed by the person at the top of the pyramid that basically, nobody was empowered to make the changes to my account that I requested. Evidently, they were only empowered to promise results, not to achieve them. I could lodge a complaint, but only via snail mail. In other words, the entire customer service structure was set up to divert customers and frustrate them, not to resolve genuine problems.

I had a similar experience with Kitchenaid over a faulty stand mixer. Calls and complaints through customer service yielded no reasonable responses, and for months I was at an impasse. A friend advised me to write a letter to the CEO or other corporate official at Kitchenaid and see what might happen. I figured I’d try one more shortcut, and eventually found the email address for Kitchenaid’s brand manager at the parent company, Whirlpool. One well-worded email was all it took. The next day I got a phonecall and an offer to replace my mixer, completely free of charge. Customer service was simply not empowered to solve customer problems!

These experienced, de riguer when dealing with large corporations, are nearly non-existent when dealing with mom-and-pop shops. That’s not to say that privately-owned stores are giving away the farm; it’s that they never hide behind a corporate veil. When the owner of a store looks you in the eye and says “sorry buddy” to your request, you know that he’s not saying he can’t help you, he’s saying that he won’t help you. He’s not running from the confrontation, he’s meeting it head on, and paying the price of his choice. A corporation, on the other hand, is abdicating responsibility, or worse, actively attempting to keep you from speaking to anyone who could actually help you. How many of us have learned, when calling customer service, that the first question we need to ask is whether the person we are speaking to is empowered to resolve our issue?

There’s another aspect to this that further separates business dealing with a corporation from business dealings with an individual. If an individual is in business and doesn’t do well, he makes less money. The incentive to treat customers well is obvious and immediate. If a corporation loses money the impact of that loss is not felt quite as immediately. Employees get paid. Sure, they may also get fired if things are dire, but largely, a company absorbs the loss and carries on. This financial resiliency is crucial to our economic health, but it changes the context of our business relationships.

I think that two things underlie our halachic requirements to act ethically. First, it is our duty to God and to ourselves to act in a manner consistent with holiness, honesty, and a person seeking to be worthy of a personal relationship with God. But we are also charged to act ethically so that others will act ethically. We are meant not only to set an example, but to create expectations, to create a living context of ethical behavior.

When an individual acts unethically, we respond ethically to attempt to influence that person, to acculturate that person, to reinforce the importance of ethical behavior. It’s not as though we ignore the transgressions of the unethical actor! We apply whatever penalties might have been incurred. But we do not cheat them back, because to do so would be to accede to a world in which we all must cheat.

This reasoning does not hold true for corporations, because when we interact with customer service we are not engaging in a real form of communication. We are instead being funneled into a system that allows the corporation to choose what it wishes to hear and what it wishes to ignore. Our choice to be polite or impolite, honest or dishonest has little or no impact on the script that the service rep is reading.

So what’s the answer? Do we abandon business ethics and try to take what we think we deserve, perhaps by manipulating customer service scripts? Do we try and end-run around customer service like I did with Kitchenaid? Or do we take our business elsewhere and then badmouth the offending company to our friends and on our blogs? What do you guys think? What are the right ethics for dealing with corporations?