The Tragedy of Chabad-Lubavitch Responding to the Unthinkable

The Tragedy of Chabad-Lubavitch Responding to the Unthinkable While there’s been a great deal written concerning the acceptability of some beliefs held by some members of the Chabad community, I think it’s worthwhile examining the rhetorical strength of their actual claims. It seems to me that there are four main classes of belief that distinguish Chabad Jews from mainstream orthodox Judaism. While not all Chabad members will agree to all four, there are many who feel that these classes represent the core claims of modern Chabad (Click here for selected background sources). w that Rabbi Schneerson was the greatest Torah scholar and righteous man of his generation (nasi hador) and perhaps of all generations, a prophet (navi) and infallible. w that Rabbi Schneerson was (or is) the Jewish messiah. w that a Chassidic rebbe can nullify himself before God to the point where he becomes “indistinguishable from Him.” Many Chabad Chassidim believe that Rabbi Schneerson was such a man (and therefore is alive, divine, all-knowing, all-powerful and worthy of our prayers). w that Chabad Chassidism is the only completely authentic branch of Judaism and that all Jews are obligated to study and live by the tenets of the Chabad movement. Put in their own language: any Jew who doesn’t learn Toras Chabad (i.e., who doesn’t live and study the principles and curriculum of Chabad Chassidism as manifested by the teachings of their grand rabbis and especially Rabbi M. Schneerson) is holding back the redemption – God’s ultimate goal for all creation. Now, let us approach these claims as honest and open-minded skeptics. I’m not going to discuss whether, in theory, any of these things could actually come to be. Rather, I’ll assume for the moment that they’re all possible. But a skeptic has the right to demand evidence before he accepts such far-reaching and radical claims. To convince me, a Chabad believer would therefore have to provide evidence showing that Chabad is the only true manifestation of Judaism, that Rabbi Schneerson was a navi and history’s greatest scholar and its most righteous individual or that he was the messiah (or even God). Rabbi Schneerson as the greatest scholar of his generation. In the world of science, a claim has no value without support from positive evidence. Even if one can’t conclusively demonstrate that a given claim is untrue, still, since no positive evidence has been offered, it possesses no scientific value. The existence or non-existence of UFO’s illustrates the point: we can’t prove they’re not there but most people don’t waste a lot of time worrying about it. That’s not to say it’s not an important issue (if they’re really out there, we’d like to know about it), but in the absence of proof, we don’t feel obligated to purchase elaborate home defense systems to protect ourselves from the threat. Or, in other words, we don’t see cause to radically change our lifestyles. Now, what positive evidence could be found to prove that a given rabbi was the greatest of his peers? I can imagine only one relatively accurate method: w find one student (or a group of students) who thoroughly and seriously studied the entire body of work (both oral and written) of each of a generation’s hundreds of ranking Torah scholars (both known and obscure). w Develop a checklist of desirable academic qualities (eg., verbatim familiarity with all the Talmud and codes, ability to connect disparate halachic and non-halachic sources to arrive at credible chiddushim, intimate familiarity with the work of their predecessors and peers etc.). w Check each rabbi’s life’s work against the list and compare the results. w Repeat using the observations of as many students as possible (to increase accuracy). Clearly, from a practical perspective, accurately and objectively ranking great rabbis can’t be done. It’s simply too much work for any one person (or group) to deeply analyze and quantify the Torah greatness of hundreds of scholars – many or all of whom have already passed on. Perhaps, you might suggest, a scholar of equal or near-equal qualities could be expected to know who was the greater or greatest scholar. Perhaps. But how, then, are we to know which scholar ranks highly enough to make such a categorical statement? And even if such a rabbi were to state his opinion, how do we know he wasn’t just being polite or humble in his assessment (or if he was even accurately quoted)? In any event, no such clear and unequivocal statement from a universally accepted source has yet been (verifiably) uttered, so the point is moot. The bottom line: the statement, “Rabbi Schneerson was the greatest scholar of his generation” cannot be proven. Righteousness. To prove that he was the generation’s most righteous individual (its greatest tzadik) is even harder: for what objective standards could possibly be created to measure and compare righteousness? How could one human being ever possibly know what lies in his fellow’s heart (see I Samuel 16; 7)? One can’t claim that purported performance of wonders, predictions or other supernatural feats is evidence of righteousness for two distinct reasons: w Pharaoh’s magicians performed wonders (Exod. 7; 22) and Bilaam was a prophet of God Himself (Num. 22) and yet none was notable for his righteousness. w Wonders, of course, can also be contrived (and predictions can be lucky – witness the weather office). So unless a particular event is of the historical and public quality of the splitting of the Reed Sea or the revelation at Sinai, its usefulness should be approached with some suspicion. In other words, for all practical purposes, relative righteousness is a hidden matter known to God alone. The rest of us can’t possibly know. So claims of righteousness must also remain inadmissible as evidence. You might ask: but don’t mainstream orthodox movements also claim their rabbis are righteous? Yes and no. Mainstream orthodoxy uses the term “tzadik,” but not, in my experience, as an absolute, all-encompassing theological statement describing a man’s supernatural powers. Rather, they feel they’ve identified in their leaders certain exemplary qualities which they seek to emulate. Infallibility isn’t on the list (there’s even a complete tractate of the Talmud – Horayos – that mostly deals with cleaning up for errors committed by a high priest, king or supreme court). Was he infallible? Let’s discuss it. Was anyone present at every moment of Rabbi Schneerson’s life (or at least from, let’s say, the time he became an adult) to testify? Is anyone (or any group of people) able to say categorically that everything the rabbi did, said (and even thought!) was correct in a measurable way? A person, throughout every moment of his life, is constantly experimenting, pushing limits and testing himself: is it reasonable to believe that some stranger could be aware of every single detail of those experiments (and of their significance and context)? Would the “fact” that he was a navi somehow automatically make Rabbi Schneerson infallible? Let’s look at historical precedents: Moshe was unmatched in the clarity of his prophecy (see Deut. 34; 10), yet he erred (see, for example, Levit. 10; 16 et. al. with Rashi) and, indeed, his brother was correct in pointing out his error (ibid. verse 20)! King Shaul was a navi (see I Samuel, 10; 11) and a brilliantly righteous man as well (see the Rashi to I Samuel 29; 19) yet he erred in the destruction of Nov, City of Kohanim. Not only that, but two officers who stood in open opposition to his murderous orders (Avner and Amassa) were later praised as tzadikim (see I Kings 2; 32) for that very opposition (see Sanhedrin 49a)! Prophecy, even on its highest levels, is, therefore, no guarantee of infallibility. In truth, it is my understanding that those followers of Rabbi Schneerson who think him infallible draw that conclusion not from empirical evidence, but as a direct application of his assumed divinity. This we’ll (briefly) discuss later. So the skeptic says: Rabbi Schneerson might have been a great man; he might have been the greatest of men. But there’s no way you can prove it more of him than of a hundred thousand other men (or women). “May have been” is not enough to make me change my life and beliefs. There is another possibility: perhaps Rabbi Schneerson actually claimed these remarkable qualities for himself. If he truly was the greatest living scholar etc., then he would be in a position to know, right? Why can’t we trust his own word on the subject? I’m afraid that won’t work. If the only evidence we have of his greatness lies in his own claims, then the claim itself is required for its validation. That’s something we just can’t do …it’s tautological (circular reasoning). Not to mention suspicious. Divinity. Addressing the astounding and horrifying claim that Rabbi Schneerson has become one with God would prove a diversion from this essay’s stated purpose (although you might like to read this “techinical note.“). Obviously, according to the standards of proof we’ve already set, such an assertion is inadmissible. For more on this, you could see Dr. David Berger’s book, “The Rebbe, the Messiah, and the Scandal of Orthodox Indifference” Can’t Rabbi Schneerson’s followers simply claim to be following their own rabbis? Doesn’t the Torah require us to listen to the sages (see Deut.

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