Lenn E. Goodman Library of Contemporary Jewish Philosophers

Lenn E. Goodman Library of Contemporary Jewish Philosophers Editor-in-Chief Hava Tirosh-Samuelson, Arizona State University Editor Aaron W. Hughes, University of Rochester VOLUME 9 LEIDEN • BOSTON The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/lcjp 2015 Lenn E. Goodman Judaism, Humanity, and Nature Edited by Hava Tirosh-Samuelson and Aaron W. Hughes LEIDEN • BOSTON 2015 Cover illustration: Provided by Steven Green. The series Library of Contemporary Jewish Philosophers was generously supported by the Baron Foundation. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Lenn E. Goodman : Judaism, humanity, and nature / edited by Hava Tirosh-Samuelson and Aaron W. Hughes. pages cm. — (Library of contemporary Jewish philosophers, ISSN 2213-6010 ; Volume 9) Includes bibliographical references. ISBN 978-90-04-28074-8 (hardback : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-90-04-28076-2 (e-book) — ISBN 978-90-04-28075-5 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Goodman, Lenn Evan, 1944– 2. Jewish philosophy—20th century. I. Tirosh-Samuelson, Hava, 1950– editor. II. Hughes, Aaron W., 1968– editor. B5800.L46 2015 181'.06—dc23 2014038152 This publication has been typeset in the multilingual “Brill” typeface. With over 5,100 characters covering Latin, IPA, Greek, and Cyrillic, this typeface is especially suitable for use in the humanities. For more information, please see www.brill.com/brill-typeface. ISSN 2213-6010 ISBN 978-90-04-28074-8 (hardback) ISBN 978-90-04-28076-2 (e-book) This hardback is also published in paperback under ISBN 978-90-04-28075-5. Copyright 2015 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands. Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill, Brill Nijhoff and Hotei Publishing. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal use is granted by Koninklijke Brill NV provided that the appropriate fees are paid directly to The Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Suite 910, Danvers, MA 01923, USA. Fees are subject to change. This book is printed on acid-free paper. CONTENTS The Contributors ............................................................................................. vii Editors’ Introduction to the Series ............................................................ ix Lenn E. Goodman: An Intellectual Portrait ............................................ 1 Alan Mittleman Value and the Dynamics of Being ............................................................. 23 Lenn E. Goodman Respect for Nature in the Jewish Tradition ............................................ 41 Lenn E. Goodman Leaving Eden .................................................................................................... 71 Lenn E. Goodman Time, Creation, and the Mirror of Narcissus .......................................... 113 Lenn E. Goodman Interview with Lenn E. Goodman ............................................................. 177 Hava Tirosh-Samuelson Select Bibliography ......................................................................................... 231 THE CONTRIBUTORS Alan Mittleman (Ph.D., Temple University, 1985) is Professor of Modern Jewish Thought at the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York. He is the author, most recently, of Human Nature and Jewish Thought (Princeton University Press, 2015), A Short History of Jewish Ethics (Wiley-Blackwell, 2011), and Hope in a Democratic Age (Oxford University Press, 2009). He works in the fields of ethics, political theory, and German-Jewish intellectual history. Hava Tirosh-Samuelson (Ph.D., Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 1978) is Irving and Miriam Lowe Professor of Modern Judaism, the Director of Jew- ish Studies, and Professor of History at Arizona State University in Tempe, Arizona. Her research focuses on Jewish intellectual history, Judaism and ecology, science and religion, and feminist theory. In addition to numer- ous articles and book chapters in academic journals and edited volumes, she is the author of the award-winning Between Worlds: The Life and Work of Rabbi David ben Judah Messer Leon (1991) and the author of Happiness in Premodern Judaism: Virtue, Knowledge, and Well-Being in Premodern Judaism (2003). She is also the editor of Judaism and Ecology: Created World and Revealed Word (2002); Women and Gender in Jewish Philoso- phy (2004); Judaism and the Phenomenon of Life: The Legacy of Hans Jonas (2008); Building Better Humans? Refocusing the Debate on Transhumanism (2011); Hollywood’s Chosen People: The Jewish Experience in American Cin- ema (2012); and Jewish Philosophy for the Twenty-First Century (2014). Pro- fessor Tirosh-Samuelson is the recipient of several large grants that have funded interdisciplinary research on religion, science, and technology. Aaron W. Hughes (Ph.D., Indiana University Bloomington, 2000) holds the Philip S. Bernstein Chair in Jewish Studies at the University of Rochester. Hughes was educated at the University of Alberta, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and Oxford University. He has taught at Miami University of Ohio, McMaster University, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, the University of Calgary, and the University at Buffalo. He is the author of over fifty articles and ten books, and the editor of seven books. His book titles include Abrahamic Religions: On the Uses and Abuses viii the contributors of History (Oxford, 2012); Muslim Identities (Columbia, 2013); The Study of Judaism: Identity, Authenticity, Scholarship (SUNY, 2013); and Rethinking Jewish Philosophy: Beyond Particularism and Universalism (Oxford, 2014). He is also the Editor-in-Chief of Method and Theory in the Study of Religion. EDITORS’ INTRODUCTION TO THE SERIES It is customary to begin studies devoted to the topic of Jewish philosophy by defining what exactly this term, concept, or even discipline is. We tend not to speak of Jewish mathematics, Jewish physics, or Jewish sociol- ogy, so why refer to something as “Jewish philosophy”? Indeed, this is the great paradox of Jewish philosophy. On the one hand it presumably names something that has to do with thinking, on the other it implies some sort of national, ethnic, or religious identity of those who engage in such activity. Is not philosophy just philosophy, regardless of who philosophizes? Why the need to append various racial, national, or religious adjectives to it?1 Jewish philosophy is indeed rooted in a paradox since it refers to philosophical activity carried out by those who call themselves Jews. As philosophy, this activity makes claims of universal validity, but as an activity by a well-defined group of people it is inherently particularistic. The question “What is Jewish philosophy?” therefore is inescapable, although over the centuries Jewish philosophers have given very different answers to it. For some, Jewish philosophy represents the relentless quest for truth. Although this truth itself may not be particularized, for such individuals, the use of the adjective “Jewish”—as a way to get at this truth—most decidedly is.2 The Bible, the Mishnah, the Talmud, and related Jewish texts and genres are seen to provide particular insights into the more universal claims provided by the universal and totalizing gaze of philosophy. The problem is that these texts are not philosophical on the surface; they must, on the con- trary, be interpreted to bring their philosophical insights to light. Within this context exegesis risks becoming eisegesis. Yet others eschew the term “philosophy” and instead envisage themselves as working in a decidedly 1 Alexander Altmann once remarked: It would be futile to attempt a presentation of Judaism as a philosophical system, or to speak of Jewish philosophy in the same sense as one speaks of American, Eng- lish, French, or German philosophy. Judaism is a religion, and the truths it teaches are religious truths. They spring from the source of religious experience, not from pure reason. See Alexander Altmann, “Judaism and World Philosophy,” in The Jews: Their History, Cul- ture, and Religion, ed. Louis Finkelstein (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of Amer- ica, 1949), vol. 2, 954. 2 In this regard, see Norbert M. Samuelson, Jewish Faith and Modern Science: On the Death and Rebirth of Jewish Philosophy (New York: Rowman and Littlefield, 2008), e.g., 10–12. x editors’ introduction to the series Jewish key in order to articulate or clarify particular issues that have direct bearing on Jewish life and existence.3 Between these two perspectives or orientations, there exist several other related approaches to the topic of Jewish philosophy, which can and have included ethics,4 gender studies,5 multiculturalism,6 and postmodernism.7 Despite their differences in theory and method, what these approaches have in common is that they all represent the complex intersection of Judaism, variously defined, and a set of non-Jewish grids or lenses used to interpret this rich tradition. Framed somewhat differently, Jewish philosophy—whatever it is, however it is defined, or whether definition is even possible—represents the collision of particularistic demands and universal concerns. The universal or that which is, in theory, open and accessible to all regardless of race, color, creed, or gender confronts the particular or that which represents the sole concern of a specific group

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