Jewish Ideas Weekly www.jewishideasdaily.com September 14-28, 2012

Wednesday, September 19 the Talmud. nine, his family fled the impending Nazi In the 19th century scholars saw these doom and moved to Palestine. Fraenkel Story Master from Ashkenaz stories as sources of historical information. attended Rabbi Moshe Zvi Neriah’s yeshiva They believed that if they could clear away at Kfar Haroeh, the progenitor of Religious By Moshe Simon-Shoshan the layers of distortion and interpolation Zionist yeshivot in Israel today. There he Today, the use of literary theory and criti- that had been added over the years, the sto- studied Talmud with Rabbi Yitzhak Gilat, cism to study Midrash and Aggadah—non- ries would provide a front row seat at many who would become a leading scholar of hal- legal and interpretive rabbinic literature—is events in the rabbis’ lives and allow scholars akhic history at Bar Ilan University. a well-established and even popular en- to reconstruct the history of the rabbinic Fraenkel’s roots in the world of cultured deavor. Each year sees the publication of movement as a whole. Frankel completely German Orthodoxy informed much of his numerous books and articles seeking to rejected this idea. He argued that the sto- life, scholarship, and teaching. He was a understand rabbinic texts as literary and ries must first and foremost be treated as consummate Yekke, insistent on punctuali- cultural artifacts and many more academic, literary works. Moreover, the tools needed ty, decorum, and abiding by the rules. More religious, and popular courses and lectures to analyze the texts lay in the importantly, he held himself on similar themes. But this was not the theories and methods devel- and his students to the high- case when the young Talmud teacher Jonah oped and practiced in aca- est possible standards. It was Fraenkel first entered Hebrew University in demic departments of litera- not always easy or pleasant to the mid-1950s. In those days, the study of ture. be Fraenkel’s student. Midrash and Aggadah belonged to histori- Fraenkel developed a meth- For Fraenkel there was no ans and philologists. No one thought these od of formal analysis and distinction between academic texts should be viewed through the same “close reading” akin to the work and engagement in Tal- lens used to understand Shakespeare or practices of the New Critics mud Torah: His scholarship Dostoevsky. whose methods dominated was both an act of religious Perhaps more than any other individual, the Anglo-American critical devotion and a search for the Jonah Fraenkel, the Hebrew literature pro- scene in the mid-20th cen- truth as he defined it. In his fessor and Israel Prize laureate who died tury. For Fraenkel as for the readings of the Talmud, the last week at the age of 84, was the moving New Critics, the literary text and were, force behind this dramatic shift in the study is a closed hermeneutic structure in which like Fraenkel himself, non-mystical and fo- of Midrash and Aggadah in the academy artistic form and ideological content are cused on matters of ethics and interpersonal and the broader Jewish culture. With the inexorably intertwined. Fraenkel showed relations. In particular Fraenkel was skilled 1991 publication of his magnum opus, the that the “sage” stories were not artless anec- at drawing out the educational themes in two-volume Darkhei Ha-Aggadah VeHa- dotes but miniature works of narrative art rabbinic stories, arguing that many stories Midrash (The Ways of the Midrash and the that deserved the same careful attention of- concerned the teacher-student relationship. Aggadah), an encyclopedic guide to the ten lavished on more extended stories. He Fraenkel was himself a consummate teach- study of these texts, Fraenkel established particularly emphasized the way in which er; over the course of his long career he himself as master of all their forms and the rabbinic storytellers infused their works taught every level of student, from elemen- genres. Fraenkel made his greatest impact, with irony and paradox in order to shed tary school children to doctoral candidates. however, through more than three decades light on the fraught nature of interpersonal Fraenkel’s commitment to the lost heri- of studies culminating in his Sippurei Ha- relations and the human condition itself. tage of his childhood was even more pro- Agaddah—Ahdut shel Tokhen ve-Zurah Fraenkel was born in Munich in 1928 to nounced in his academic studies dealing (The Aggadic Narrative—Harmony of Form an Orthodox family in the best German tra- with the culture of Ashkenaz, the Jewish and Content), focusing on the single genre dition of Torah im Derekh Eretz. He grew up community that arose in the Rhine valley of “rabbinic sage” stories, which record the immersed in the study and practice of both and lasted a millennium until it was oblit- deeds and lives of the Tannaim and Amo- Torah and the best of Western culture and erated by the Nazis. Fraenkel’s first book, raim—the rabbis whose teachings make up scholarship. In 1937, when Fraenkel was based on his dissertation, was a monumen-

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Jewish Ideas Weekly, published by Jewish Ideas Daily, is a project of Bee.Ideas. To contact us, please email [email protected]. tal study of the methodology of Rashi, the Fraenkel also had a progressive side such as Daniel Boyarin and, later, Jeffery greatest scholar ever produced by the ye- to him. He was an early and enthusiastic Rubenstein, began to integrate Fraenkel’s shivot of western Germany. Fraenkel also adopter of Macintosh computers in an Is- insights into new and different approaches. devoted considerable energy, especially to- rael that is still heavily dominated by Win- Thus, Fraenkel’s work assumed a place in ward the end of his career, to the study of dows. More significantly, he was a strong the next generation of scholarship. Ashkenazic liturgy and piyyut (liturgical proponent of teaching Talmud to women Fraenkel himself remained steadfast in poetry). After the death his father-in-law, and girls. He personally his trained his his commitment to formalist, ahistorical Daniel Goldshmidt, the great scholar of lit- daughters in Talmud just as he did his sons. readings. However, my sense is that Fraen- urgy and a fellow product of Germany’s en- After the death of his wife Chava, he created kel well understood that as a teacher, his job lightened Orthodox community, Fraenkel a women’s Gemara class in her memory. was to help students reach a stage at which continued Goldschmidt’s project of creat- By the time I arrived at Hebrew Universi- they could develop ideas and approaches of ing critical editions of Makhzorim for festi- ty to study with Fraenkel in the early 1990s, their own. If only we, his students, could be vals, motivated both by his commitment to his rationalism and formalism had begun to blessed with his unstinting commitment to his father-in-law and to the collective his- look quaint. Yet it was around this time that Torah, scholarship, and the pursuit of truth, tory of Ashkenaz, of which he was among his work began to have perhaps its greatest which for him, of course, were all one and the last remnants. impact. A younger generation of scholars, the same.

Thursday, September 20 es, such as the Heikhalot literature, which Rahamim remains in Orthodox prayer books are full of angelic ascensions and entreaties. with its unusual “theological hazard” warn- “I, and Not an Angel” ing sign, with some (like myself) skipping it, Yet the notion of turning to angels to others reciting it on purpose, and many, alas, By Shlomo M. Brody supplicate on our behalf ruffled many theo- unknowingly mumbling their way through “Warning: The Following Prayer May Be logical feathers in the medieval era. Mai- the theological minefield. Dangerous to Your Spiritual Health. Recite monides, in the fifth of his 13 principal with Caution, and Only with the Proper dogmas of Judaism, asserts that only God I have always wondered why so many Intention.” should be worshiped and praised. “Do not,” people, scholars and laypeople alike, con- he continues, “seize upon intermediaries in tinue to embrace this prayer, to the point at When was the last time you saw this kind order to reach Him but direct your thoughts which it has recently been popularized in of warning in a prayer book? Yet in most toward Him, may He be exalted, and turn a striking song by the Hasidic singer Mor- S’lihot prayer books, including the one that away from that which is oth- dechai Ben David. Leaving is most popular in the Israeli market, that is er than He.” Some scholars, aside the many halakhic and the message (OK, my translation is a bit of including Nahmandies and theological questions, do you a dramatic paraphrase) that actually accom- the Maharal of Prague, tried really want to roll the dice by panies one of the hymns. to ban such prayers, even as participating in an arguably other prominent scholars de- heretical rite while the Books The hymn in question is known by its fended their continued recita- of Judgment are open? Af- first words,Makhnisei Rahamim or “Ushers tion. Debates on the question ter all, there is no shortage of of Mercy.” It is the best known of the many continued into the early mod- prayers to recite; why place intercessory prayers, composed for this time ern period, with some schol- your bets on one that Mai- of the year, which call upon angels to deliver ars trying to placate both sides monides thinks can lose you our supplications to God: by suggesting grammatical your place in the World to emendations or apologetic Come? O you who usher in [pleas for] mercy, interpretations to make the may you usher in our [plea for] mercy, hymns theologically acceptable. More substantively, there are theological, before the Master of mercy. O you who philosophical, and existential arguments cause prayer to be heard, may you cause A turning point occurred in the 19th cen- against the idea of intercessory prayer by our prayer to be heard before the Hearer tury, when Reform leaders sought to excise angels. The theological argument is fairly of prayer. . . . Exert yourselves, and multi- angelic hymns from the prayer books. In re- simple: In our mission to spread monothe- ply supplications and petition, before the sponse, many Orthodox scholars mounted a ism, we not only worship God exclusively King, God. . . . (ArtScroll translation) stalwart defense of these prayers against the but avoid creating the mistaken appearance “heresies” of the Reformers, though some that there are intermediaries possessing any There are many such prayers in prayer confessed that they privately omitted Makh- form of independent power. Indeed, some books dating back as early as the 10th cen- nisei Rahamim while allowing their own con- opponents of Makhnisei Rahamim argued tury. It is possible that they were composed gregants to recite it. Other scholars remained that intercessory prayers mimicked non- under the influence of, if they did not actu- steadfast in their public opposition, leaving us Jewish rites; one 18th-century polemicist ally originate in, even earlier mystical sourc- with the contemporary situation: Makhnisei even cited Christian Hebraists in arguing

Jewish Ideas Weekly September 14-28, 2012 2 that genuine Jewish ritual includes only di- angels do have some independent powers, the gift of prayer. Logically, one might think rect supplication to God. a sentiment which is found in a few select that a God who is Omniscient would be un- sources. Yet the more likely and simpler interested in the petitions of mortal, sinful But supporters of Makhnisei Rahamim response is to agree that God is the only men; nonetheless, our tradition teaches, all had some strong theological rebuttals. First, worthwhile object of our petitions; that is individuals, no matter what their spiritual they said, intercessory prayers themselves why the angels serve as mere intermediaries, state, can turn directly to God and beseech assert that God is the exclusive sovereign nothing more. Him for help. Indeed, the talmudic text of the world: Even the angels must beseech If that is the case, though, why bother most often cited by opponents of interces- Him, and His angelic entourage only in- with the angels? This question, I believe, is sory prayer does not make a theological or creases His glory and grandeur. Equally the reason the proponents of Makhnisei Ra- philosophical argument but takes the exis- significant, the Talmud implies in several hahim introduced the existential aspect of tential approach. A king of flesh and blood, places that Jews indeed employ intercessory petitionary prayer. the Palestinian Talmud ( 9:12) methods using angels and others, possibly teaches, has an extensive staff to determine including the deceased; talmudic authority, The penitent, seeking atonement for his or whether a person in need will be allowed to said the supporters, legitimizes these hymns. her sins from an Omnipotent God, feels un- see him. Yet God asserts, “If trouble besets a On the philosophical level, scholars like worthy of approaching the King of all Kings. person, let him cry neither to Michael nor to Rabbi Yosef Albo argued that intercessory In this humble moment, the penitent turns Gabriel, but rather directly to me, and I will prayer is illogical: It only makes sense to pe- to Michael and Gabriel for help, hoping their answer immediately.” tition the entity—i.e., God—who holds the intercession will make the petition worthy of The essence of prayer, it would seem, is a power to grant the request, whether it be for God’s ear. In this view, the call for interces- direct relationship between man and God— health, atonement, or livelihood. Angels do sory prayer, far from being idolatrous, is an honest, direct, and unmediated. Repentant not possess free will or determine anything act of humility from remorseful souls fearful souls, however shamed they might be, must on their own; therefore, they are not wor- that God will not heed their cries. stand directly before God and beseech Him. thy of being involved in the process. Some Confrontation and a direct plea for mercy intellectual historians have speculated that Yet it is precisely on the existential level are the means by which the repentant can proponents of intercessory prayer believed that the idea of intercessory petitions betrays heal the breach with his Maker.

Friday, September 21 bor; compromised fatally by a West grown Others are more circumspect in their dec- weary “of a quarrel in a far-away country be- larations. No longer is the destruction of Is- At Last, Zion tween people of whom we know nothing”; rael the unanimous goal of the Arab League, left truncated and defenseless, succumbing as it was for the thirty years before Camp By Charles Krauthammer finally to conquest. When Hit- David. Syria, for example, no Nearly 15 years ago in the Weekly Standard, ler entered Prague in March longer explicitly enunciates it. Charles Krauthammer wrote that “the end of 1939, he declared, “Czechoslo- Yet Syria would destroy Israel Israel means the end of the Jewish people.” His vakia has ceased to exist.” tomorrow if it had the power. reasons are perhaps even more relevant in to- Israel too is a small country. (Its current reticence on the day’s atmosphere of nuclear threat than they This is not to say that extinction subject is largely due to its were when the article was first published. The is its fate. Only that it can be. post-Cold War need for the essay is reprinted here by permission of the Moreover, in its vulnerabil- American connection.) author. —The Editors ity to extinction, Israel is not Even Egypt, first to make ______just any small country. It is the peace with Israel and the only small country—the only presumed model for peace- I. A SMALL NATION period, period—whose neigh- making, has built a vast U.S.- bors publicly declare its very equipped army that conducts Milan Kundera once defined a small nation existence an affront to law, mo- military exercises obviously as “one whose very existence may be put in rality, and religion and make its extinction designed for fighting Israel. Its huge “Badr question at any moment; a small nation can an explicit, paramount national goal. Nor is ’96” exercises, for example, Egypt’s larg- disappear, and it knows it.” the goal merely declarative. Iran, Libya, and est since the 1973 war, featured simulated The United States is not a small nation. Iraq conduct foreign policies designed for crossings of the Suez Canal. Neither is Japan. Or France. These nations the killing of Israelis and the destruction of And even the PLO, which was forced into may suffer defeats. They may even be occu- their state. They choose their allies (Hamas, ostensible recognition of Israel in the Oslo pied. But they cannot disappear. Kundera’s Hezbollah) and develop their weapons (sui- Agreements of 1993, is still ruled by a nation- Czechoslovakia could—and once did. Pre- cide bombs, poison gas, anthrax, nuclear al charter that calls in at least fourteen places war Czechoslovakia is the paradigmatic missiles) accordingly. Countries as far away for Israel’s eradication. The fact that after five small nation: a liberal democracy created in as Malaysia will not allow a representative years and four specific promises to amend the ashes of war by a world determined to let of Israel on their soil nor even permit the the charter it remains unamended is a sign of little nations live free; threatened by the cov- showing of Schindler’s List lest it engender how deeply engraved the dream of eradicat- etousness and sheer mass of a rising neigh- sympathy for Zion. ing Israel remains in the Arab consciousness.

Jewish Ideas Weekly September 14-28, 2012 3 II. THE STAKES destruction and exile at the hands of Rome birth rates declining with rising education in 70 A.D., and finally in 132 A.D. They can- and socio-economic class. Educated, suc- The contemplation of Israel’s disappearance not survive another destruction and exile. cessful working women tend to marry late is very difficult for this generation. For fifty The Third Commonwealth—modern Israel, and have fewer babies. years, Israel has been a fixture. Most people born just fifty years ago—is the last. Add now a second factor, intermarriage. cannot remember living in a world without The return to Zion is now the principal In the United States today more Jews marry Israel. drama of Jewish history. What began as an Christians than marry Jews. The intermar- Nonetheless, this feeling of permanence experiment has become the very heart of the riage rate is 52 percent. (A more conserva- has more than once been rudely interrupt- Jewish people—its cultural, spiritual, and tive calculation yields 47 percent; the demo- ed—during the first few days of the Yom Kip- psychological center, soon to become its de- graphic effect is basically the same.) In 1970, pur War when it seemed as if Israel might be mographic center as well. Israel is the hinge. the rate was 8 percent. overrun, or those few weeks in May and early Upon it rest the hopes—the only hope—for Most important for Jewish continuity, June 1967 when Nasser blockaded the Straits Jewish continuity and survival. however, is the ultimate identity of the chil- of Tiran and marched 100,000 troops into Si- dren born to these marriages. Only about nai to drive the Jews into the sea. one in four is raised Jewish. Thus two-thirds Yet Israel’s stunning victory in 1967, its III. THE DYING DIASPORA of Jewish marriages are producing children superiority in conventional weaponry, its three-quarters of whom are lost to the Jew- success in every war in which its existence In 1950, there were 5 million Jews in the ish people. Intermarriage rates alone would was at stake, has bred complacency. Some United States. In 1990, the number was a cause a 25 percent decline in population ridicule the very idea of Israel’s imperma- slightly higher 5.5 million. In the interven- in every generation. (Math available upon nence. Israel, wrote one Diaspora intel- ing decades, overall U.S. population rose 65 request.) In two generations, half the Jews lectual, “is fundamentally indestructible. percent. The Jews essentially tread water. would disappear. Yitzhak knew this. The Arab leaders In fact, in the last half-century Jews have Now combine the effects of fertility and on Mount Herzl [at Rabin’s funeral] knew shrunk from 3 percent to 2 percent of the intermarriage and make the overly optimis- this. Only the land-grabbing, trigger-happy American population. And now they are tic assumption that every child raised Jew- saints of the right do not know this. They are headed for not just relative but absolute de- ish will grow up to retain his Jewish identity animated by the imagination of catastrophe, cline. What sustained the Jewish population (i.e., a zero dropout rate). You can start with by the thrill of attending the end.” at its current level was, first, the postwar 100 American Jews; you end up with 60. In Thrill was not exactly the feeling Israelis baby boom, then the influx of 400,000 Jews, one generation, more than a third have dis- had when during the Gulf War they entered mostly from the Soviet Union. appeared. In just two generations, two out of sealed rooms and donned gas masks to pro- Well, the baby boom is over. And Rus- every three will vanish. tect themselves from mass death—in a war sian immigration is drying up. There are One can reach this same conclusion by a dif- in which Israel was not even engaged. The only so many Jews where they came from. ferent route (bypassing the intermarriage rates feeling was fear, dread, helplessness—old Take away these historical anomalies, and entirely). A Los Angeles Times poll of Ameri- existential Jewish feelings that post-Zionist the American Jewish population would be can Jews conducted in March 1998 asked a fashion today deems anachronistic, if not smaller today than today. In fact, it is now simple question: Are you raising your children reactionary. But wish does not overthrow headed for catastrophic decline. Steven as Jews? Only 70 percent said yes. A popula- reality. The Gulf War reminded even the Bayme, director of Jewish Communal Af- tion in which the biological replacement rate most wishful that in an age of nerve gas, fairs at the American Jewish Committee, is 80 percent and the cultural replacement rate missiles, and nukes, an age in which no flatly predicts that in twenty years the Jew- is 70 percent is headed for extinction. By this country is completely safe from weapons ish population will be down to four million, calculation, every 100 Jews are raising 56 Jew- of mass destruction, Israel with its compact a loss of nearly 30 percent. In twenty years! ish children. In just two generations, 7 out of population and tiny area is particularly vul- Projecting just a few decades further yields every 10 Jews will vanish. nerable to extinction. an even more chilling future. The demographic trends in the rest of Israel is not on the edge. It is not on the How does a community decimate itself in the Diaspora are equally unencouraging. brink. This is not ’48 or ’67 or ’73. But Israel the benign conditions of the United States? In Western Europe, fertility and intermar- is a small country. It can disappear. And it Easy: low fertility and endemic intermarriage. riage rates mirror those of the United States. knows it. The fertility rate among American Jews is Take Britain. Over the last generation, Brit- It may seem odd to begin an examination 1.6 children per woman. The replacement ish Jewry has acted as a kind of controlled of the meaning of Israel and the future of the rate (the rate required for the population experiment: a Diaspora community living Jews by contemplating the end. But it does to remain constant) is 2.1. The current rate in an open society, but, unlike that in the concentrate the mind. And it underscores is thus 20 percent below what is needed for United States, not artificially sustained by the stakes. The stakes could not be higher. zero growth. Thus fertility rates alone would immigration. What happened? Over the last It is my contention that on Israel—on its cause a 20 percent decline in every genera- quarter-century, the number of British Jews existence and survival—hangs the very exis- tion. In three generations, the population declined by over 25 percent. tence and survival of the Jewish people. Or, would be cut in half. Over the same interval, France’s Jewish to put the thesis in the negative, that the end The low birth rate does not stem from population declined only slightly. The rea- of Israel means the end of the Jewish people. some peculiar aversion of Jewish women to son for this relative stability, however, is a They survived destruction and exile at the children. It is merely a striking case of the one-time factor: the influx of North African hands of Babylon in 586 B.C. They survived well-known and universal phenomenon of Jewry. That influx is over. In France today

Jewish Ideas Weekly September 14-28, 2012 4 only a minority of Jews between the ages of precedented. If anything, the trends augur lar late-20th century, assimilation merely twenty and forty-four live in a conventional an intensification of assimilation. means giving up the quaint name, the ritu- family with two Jewish parents. France, too, It stands to reason. As each generation be- als, and the other accoutrements and identi- will go the way of the rest. comes progressively more assimilated, the fiers of one’s Jewish past. Assimilation today “The dissolution of European Jewry,” ob- ties to tradition grow weaker (as measured, is totally passive. Indeed, apart from the trip serves Bernard Wasserstein in Vanishing for example, by synagogue attendance and to the county courthouse to transform, say, Diaspora: The Jews in Europe since 1945, “is number of children receiving some kind of (shmattes by) Ralph Lifshitz into (Polo by) not situated at some point in the hypotheti- Jewish education). This dilution of identity, Ralph Lauren, it is marked by an absence cal future. The process is taking place before in turn, leads to a greater tendency to inter- of actions rather than the active embrace our eyes and is already far advanced.” Un- marriage and assimilation. Why not? What, of some other faith. Unlike Mendelssohn’s der present trends, “the number of Jews in after all, are they giving up? The circle is children, Seinfeld required no baptism. Europe by the year 2000 would then be not complete and self-reinforcing. We now know, of course, that in Europe, much more than one million—the lowest Consider two cultural artifacts. With the emancipation through assimilation proved figure since the last Middle Ages.” birth of television a half-century ago, Jew- a cruel hoax. The rise of anti-Semitism, par- In 1990, there were eight million. ish life in America was represented by The ticularly late-19th- century racial anti-Semi- The story elsewhere is even more dispirit- Goldbergs: urban Jews, decidedly ethnic, tism culminating in Nazism, disabused Jews ing. The rest of what was once the Diaspora heavily accented, socially distinct. Forty of the notion that assimilation provided es- is now either a museum or a graveyard. years later The Goldbergsbegat Seinfeld, the cape from the liabilities and dangers of being Eastern Europe has been effectively emptied most popular entertainment in America Jewish. The saga of the family of Madeleine of its Jews. In 1939, Poland had 3.2 million today. The Seinfeld character is nominally Albright is emblematic. Of her four Jewish Jews. Today it is home to 3,500. The story is Jewish. He might cite his Jewish identity grandparents—highly assimilated, with chil- much the same in the other capitals of East- on occasion without apology or self- con- dren some of whom actually converted and ern Europe. sciousness—but, even more important, erased their Jewish past—three went to their The Islamic world, cradle to the great Sep- without consequence. It has not the slightest deaths in Nazi concentration camps as Jews. hardic Jewish tradition and home to one- influence on any aspect of his life. Nonetheless, the American context is third of world Jewry three centuries ago, Assimilation of this sort is not entirely un- different. There is no American history of is now practically Judenrein. Not a single precedented. In some ways, it parallels the anti-Semitism remotely resembling Eu- country in the Islamic world is home to pattern in Western Europe after the emanci- rope’s. The American tradition of tolerance more than 20,000 Jews. After Turkey with pation of the Jews in the late 18th and 19th goes back 200 years to the very founding 19,000 and Iran with 14,000, the country centuries. The French Revolution marks the of the country. Washington’s letter to the with the largest Jewish community in the turning point in the granting of civil rights synagogue in Newport pledges not toler- entire Islamic world is Morocco with 6, 100. to Jews. As they began to emerge from the ance—tolerance bespeaks non-persecution There are more Jews in Omaha, Nebraska. ghetto, at first they found resistance to their bestowed as a favor by the dominant upon These communities do not figure in pro- integration and advancement. They were the deviant—but equality. It finds no parallel jections. There is nothing to project. They still excluded from the professions, higher in the history of Europe. In such a country, are fit subjects not for counting but for re- education, and much of society. But as these assimilation seems a reasonable solution to membering. Their very sound has vanished. barriers began gradually to erode and Jews one’s Jewish problem. One could do worse Yiddish and Ladino, the distinctive lan- advanced socially, Jews began a remarkable than merge one’s destiny with that of a great guages of the European and Sephardic Dia- embrace of European culture and, for many, and humane nation dedicated to the propo- sporas, like the communities that invented Christianity. In A History of Zionism, Walter sition of human dignity and equality. them, are nearly extinct. Laqueur notes the view of Gabriel Riesser, an Nonetheless, while assimilation may be a eloquent and courageous mid-19th-century solution for individual Jews, it clearly is a di- advocate of emancipation, that a Jew who saster for Jews as a collective with a memory, IV. THE DYNAMICS OF ASSIMILATION preferred the non-existent state and nation of a language, a tradition, a liturgy, a history, Israel to Germany should be put under police a faith, a patrimony that will all perish as a Is it not risky to assume that current trends protection not because he was dangerous but result. will continue? No. Nothing will revive the because he was obviously insane. Whatever value one might assign to as- Jewish communities of Eastern Europe and Moses Mendelssohn (1729-1786) was a similation, one cannot deny its reality. The the Islamic world. And nothing will stop harbinger. Cultured, cosmopolitan, though trends, demographic and cultural, are stark. the rapid decline by assimilation of Western firmly Jewish, he was the quintessence of Not just in the long-lost outlands of the Di- Jewry. On the contrary. Projecting current early emancipation. Yet his story became aspora, not just in its erstwhile European trends—assuming, as I have done, that rates emblematic of the rapid historical progres- center, but even in its new American heart- remain constant—is rather conservative: It sion from emancipation to assimilation: land, the future will be one of diminution, is risky to assume that assimilation will not Four of his six children and eight of his nine decline, and virtual disappearance. This accelerate. There is nothing on the horizon grandchildren were baptized. will not occur overnight. But it will occur to reverse the integration of Jews into West- In that more religious, more Christian age, soon—in but two or three generations, a ern culture. The attraction of Jews to the assimilation took the form of baptism, what time not much further removed from ours larger culture and the level of acceptance of Henrich Heine called the admission ticket today than the founding of Israel fifty years Jews by the larger culture are historically un- to European society. In the far more secu- ago.

Jewish Ideas Weekly September 14-28, 2012 5 V. ISRAELI EXCEPTIONALISM (read: American) influences on Israeli cul- bean revolt of 167-4 B.C., now celebrated as ture is to say nothing more than that Israel Hanukkah, was, among other things, a reli- Israel is different. In Israel the great tempta- is as subject to the pressures of globalization gious civil war among Jews. tion of modernity—assimilation—simply as any other country. But that hardly denies Yes, it is unlikely that Israel will produce does not exist. Israel is the very embodiment its cultural distinctiveness, a fact testified to a single Jewish identity. But that is unneces- of Jewish continuity: It is the only nation on by the great difficulty immigrants have in sary. The relative monolith of Rabbinic Ju- earth that inhabits the same land, bears the adapting to Israel. daism in the Middle Ages is the exception. same name, speaks the same language, and In the Israeli context, assimilation means Fracture and division is a fact of life during worships the same God that it did 3,000 years the reattachment of Russian and Romanian, the modern era, as during the First and Sec- ago. You dig the soil and you find pottery Uzbeki and Iraqi, Algerian and Argentin- ond Commonwealths. Indeed, during the from Davidic times, coins from Bar Kokhba, ian Jews to a distinctively Hebraic culture. It period of the First Temple, the people of and 2,000-year-old scrolls written in a script means the exact opposite of what it means Israel were actually split into two often war- remarkably like the one that today advertises in the Diaspora: It means giving up alien lan- ring states. The current divisions within Is- ice cream at the corner candy store. guages, customs, and traditions. It means giv- rael pale in comparison. Because most Israelis are secular, howev- ing up Christmas and Easter for Hanukkah Whatever identity or identities are ulti- er, some ultra-religious Jews dispute Israel’s and Passover. It means giving up ancestral mately adopted by Israelis, the fact remains claim to carry on an authentically Jewish his- memories of the steppes and the pampas and that for them the central problem of Dias- tory. So do some secular Jews. A French critic the savannas of the world for Galilean hills and pora Jewry—suicide by assimilation—sim- (sociologist Georges Friedmann) once called Jerusalem stone and Dead Sea desolation. That ply does not exist. Blessed with this secu- Israelis “Hebrew-speaking gentiles.” In fact, is what these new Israelis learn. That is what is rity of identity, Israel is growing. As a result, there was once a fashion among a group of transmitted to their children. That is why their Israel is not just the cultural center of the militantly secular Israeli intellectuals to call survival as Jews is secure. Does anyone doubt Jewish world, it is rapidly becoming its de- themselves “Canaanites,” i.e., people rooted that the near- million Soviet immigrants to Is- mographic center as well. The relatively high in the land but entirely denying the religious rael would have been largely lost to the Jewish birth rate yields a natural increase in popu- tradition from which they came. people had they remained in Russia—and that lation. Add a steady net rate of immigration Well then, call these people what you will. now they will not be lost? (nearly a million since the late 1980s), and “Jews,” after all, is a relatively recent name Some object to the idea of Israel as carrier Israel’s numbers rise inexorably even as the for this people. They started out as Hebrews, of Jewish continuity because of the myriad Diaspora declines. then became Israelites. “Jew” (derived from splits and fractures among Israelis: Ortho- Within a decade Israel will pass the Unit- the Kingdom of Judah, one of the two suc- dox versus secular, Ashkenazi versus Sep- ed States as the most populous Jewish com- cessor states to the Davidic and Solomonic hardi, Russian versus sabra, and so on. Israel munity on the globe. Within our lifetime a Kingdom of Israel) is the post-exilic term for is now engaged in bitter debates over the majority of the world’s Jews will be living in Israelite. It is a latecomer to history. legitimacy of Conservative and Reform Ju- Israel. That has not happened since well be- What to call the Israeli who does not ob- daism and the encroachment of Orthodoxy fore Christ. serve the dietary laws, has no use for the upon the civic and social life of the country. A century ago, Europe was the center of synagogue, and regards the Sabbath as the So what’s new? Israel is simply recapitu- Jewish life. More than 80 percent of world day for a drive to the beach—a fair descrip- lating the Jewish norm. There are equally Jewry lived there. The Second World War tion, by the way, of most of the prime min- serious divisions in the Diaspora, as there destroyed European Jewry and dispersed isters of Israel? It does not matter. Plant a were within the last Jewish Commonwealth: the survivors to the New World (mainly the Jewish people in a country that comes to a “Before the ascendancy of the Pharisees and United States) and to Israel. Today, 80 per- standstill on Yom Kippur; speaks the lan- the emergence of rabbinic orthodoxy after cent of world Jewry lives either in the United guage of the Bible; moves to the rhythms the fall of the Second Temple,” writes Har- States or in Israel. Today we have a bipolar of the Hebrew (lunar) calendar; builds cit- vard Near East scholar Frank Cross, “Juda- Jewish universe with two centers of gravity ies with the stones of its ancestors; produces ism was more complex and variegated than of approximately equal size. It is a transi- Hebrew poetry and literature, Jewish schol- we had supposed.” The Dead Sea Scrolls, tional stage, however. One star is gradually arship and learning unmatched anywhere in explains Hershel Shanks, “emphasize a hith- dimming, the other brightening. the world—and you have continuity. erto unappreciated variety in Judaism of the Soon an inevitably the cosmology of the Israelis could use a new name. Perhaps late Second Temple period, so much so that Jewish people will have been transformed we will one day relegate the word Jew to scholars often speak not simply of Judaism again, turned into a single-star system with a the 2,000-year exilic experience and once but of Judaisms.” dwindling Diaspora orbiting around. It will again call these people Hebrews. The term The Second Commonwealth was a riot be a return to the ancient norm: The Jewish has a nice historical echo, being the name by of Jewish sectarianism: Pharisees, Saddu- people will be centered—not just spiritually which Joseph and Jonah answered the ques- cees, Essenes, apocalyptics of every stripe, but physically—in their ancient homeland. tion: “Who are you?” sects now lost to history, to say nothing of In the cultural milieu of modern Israel, as- the early Christians. Those concerned about similation is hardly the problem. Of course the secular-religious tensions in Israel might VI. THE END OF DISPERSION Israelis eat McDonald’s and watch Dallas re- contemplate the centuries-long struggle be- runs. But so do Russians and Chinese and tween Hellenizers and traditionalists during The consequences of this transformation are Danes. To say that there are heavy Western the Second Commonwealth. The Macca- enormous. Israel’s centrality is more than

Jewish Ideas Weekly September 14-28, 2012 6 just a question of demography. It represents the ultra-Orthodox right and far left—Zion- be the sheer demoralization. Such an event a bold and dangerous new strategy for Jew- ism became the accepted solution to Jewish would simply break the spirit. No people ish survival. powerlessness and vulnerability. Amid the could survive it. Not even the Jews. This is For two millennia, the Jewish people sur- ruins, Jews made a collective decision that a people that miraculously survived two vived by means of dispersion and isolation. their future lay in self-defense and territo- previous destructions and two millennia of Following the first exile in 586 B.C. and the riality, in the ingathering of the exiles to a persecution in the hope of ultimate return second exile in 70 A. D. and 132 A.D., Jews place where they could finally acquire the and restoration. Israel is that hope. To see spread first throughout Mesopotamia and means to defend themselves. it destroyed, to have Isaiahs and Jeremiahs the Mediterranean Basin, then to northern It was the right decision, the only pos- lamenting the widows of Zion once again and eastern Europe and eventually west to sible decision. But oh so perilous. What a amid the ruins of Jerusalem is more than the New World, with communities in prac- choice of place to make one’s final stand: a one people could bear. tically every corner of the earth, even unto dot on the map, a tiny patch of near-desert, Particularly coming after the Holocaust, India and China. a thin ribbon of Jewish habitation behind the worst calamity in Jewish history. To have Throughout this time, the Jewish people the flimsiest of natural barriers (which the survived it is miracle enough. Then to sur- survived the immense pressures of persecu- world demands that Israel relinquish). One vive the destruction of that which arose to tion, massacre, and forced conversion not determined tank thrust can tear it in half. redeem it—the new Jewish state—is to at- just by faith and courage, but by geographic One small battery of nuclear- tipped Scuds tribute to Jewish nationhood and survival dispersion. Decimated here, they would sur- can obliterate it entirely. supernatural power. vive there. The thousands of Jewish villages To destroy the Jewish people, Hitler needed Some Jews and some scattered communi- and towns spread across the face of Europe, to conquer the world. All that is needed today ties would, of course, survive. The most de- the Islamic world, and the New World pro- is to conquer a territory smaller than Vermont. vout, already a minority, would carry on — vided a kind of demographic insurance. The terrible irony is that in solving the prob- as an exotic tribe, a picturesque Amish-like However many Jews were massacred in the lem of powerlessness, the Jews have necessarily anachronism, a dispersed and pitied rem- First Crusade along the Rhine, however put all their eggs in one basket, a small basket nant of a remnant. But the Jews as a people many villages were destroyed in the 1648- hard by the waters of the Mediterranean. And would have retired from history. 1649 pogroms in Ukraine, there were always on its fate hinges everything Jewish. We assume that Jewish history is cyclical: thousands of others spread around the globe Babylonian exile in 586 B.C., followed by re- to carry on. turn in 538 B.C. Roman exile in 135 A.D., This dispersion made for weakness and VII. THINKING THE UNTHINKABLE followed by return, somewhat delayed, in vulnerability for individual Jewish com- 1948. We forget a linear part of Jewish his- munities. Paradoxically, however, it made What if the Third Jewish Commonwealth tory: There was one other destruction, a for endurance and strength for the Jewish meets the fate of the first two? The scenario century and a half before the fall of the First people as a whole. No tyrant could amass is not that far-fetched: A Palestinian state is Temple. It went unrepaired. In 722 B.C., the enough power to threaten Jewish survival born, arms itself, concludes alliances with, Assyrians conquered the other, larger Jew- everywhere. say, Iraq and Syria. War breaks out between ish state, the northern kingdom of Israel. Until Hitler. The Nazis managed to destroy Palestine and Israel (over borders or water (Judah, from which modern Jews are de- most everything Jewish from the Pyrenees to or terrorism). Syria and Iraq attack from scended, was the southern kingdom.) This is the gates of Stalingrad, an entire civilization a without. Egypt and Saudi Arabia join the the Israel of the Ten Tribes, exiled and lost thousand years old. There were nine million battle. The home front comes under guerilla forever. Jews in Europe when Hitler came to power. attack from Palestine. Chemical and biologi- So enduring is their mystery that when He killed two-thirds of them. Fifty years later, cal weapons rain down from Syria, Iraq, and Lewis and Clark set off on their expedi- the Jews have yet to recover. There were six- Iran. Israel is overrun. tion, one of the many questions prepared teen million Jews in the world in 1939. Today, Why is this the end? Can the Jewish peo- for them by Dr. Benjamin Rush at Jefferson’s there are thirteen million. ple not survive as they did when their home- behest was this: “What Affinity between The effect of the Holocaust was not just land was destroyed and their political inde- their [the Indians’] religious Ceremonies & demographic, however. It was psychologi- pendence extinguished twice before? Why those of the Jews?” “Jefferson and Lewis had cal, indeed ideological, as well. It demon- not a new exile, a new Diaspora, a new cycle talked at length about these tribes,” explains strated once and for all the catastrophic of Jewish history? Stephen Ambrose. “They speculated that the danger of powerlessness. The solution was First, because the cultural conditions of lost tribes of Israel could be out there on the self-defense, and that meant a demographic exile would be vastly different. The first ex- Plains.” reconcentration in a place endowed with iles occurred at a time when identity was Alas, not. The Ten Tribes had melted away sovereignty, statehood, and arms. nearly coterminous with religion. An expul- into history. As such, they represent the his- Before World War II there was great de- sion two millennia later into a secularized torical norm. Every other people so con- bate in the Jewish world over Zionism. Re- world affords no footing for a reestablished quered and exiled has in time disappeared. form Judaism, for example, was for decades Jewish identity. Only the Jews defied the norm. Twice. But anti-Zionist. The Holocaust resolved that But more important: Why retain such never, I fear, again. debate. Except for those at the extremes— an identity? Beyond the dislocation would

Jewish Ideas Weekly September 14-28, 2012 7 Monday, September 24 may not be possible. Rabbi Aharon Lich- who are not penitents, even if the non- tenstein notes that full restoration is nearly penitents are perfectly righteous (Talmud Teshuvah: Progress or Return? impossible, for example, once a human re- Bavli 99a). More specifically, the By Jonathan Ziring lationship has been betrayed. The Torah Talmud ( 86b) teaches that when one recounts in painstaking detail the building repents out of fear, his willing transgressions While in theory the blowing of the High of the tabernacle as God’s home on earth will be treated as if they were inadvertent; Holiday shofar should be enough to “awaken among his people; from this we learn that but when one repents out of love, teshuvah us from our slumber” and move us to repen- God was willing to restore his relationship meiahavah, his transgressions are actually tance, in practice most people need to look with the Jewish people fully despite their considered righteous deeds. Rabbi Aryeh to other sources to enable them to rethink treachery in creating the Golden Calf. In Klapper, analyzing another statement of this the way they live or their understanding of contrast, if a betrayal of this magnitude had principle in one of his weekly communica- repentance itself. Those sources may be sec- occurred between two human beings, such tions, asks, “How can a sin retrospectively ular rather than religious, like the essay by as a husband and wife, their relationship, become a virtue?” His explanation: philosopher Leo Strauss titled “Progress or even if saved, would never be exactly the Return? The Contemporary Crisis of West- same. Every human choice forecloses some ern Civilization.” Even where full restoration is not possible, avenues of redemption, and makes oth- The essay is framed by Strauss’s analysis of however, teshuvah may succeed if its goal is ers more accessible. Teshuvah meiaha- the concept of teshuvah, or repentance. He vah involves assuming responsibility for writes, “Repentance is return, meaning the past misdeeds by finding the paths to- return from the wrong way to the right one.” ward redemption inevitably, if acciden- This meaning, Strauss says, implies that “de- tally, opened up by those choices. These viation or sin or imperfection is not origi- include finding the ways in which you nal. Man is originally at home in his father’s personally are capable of making bet- house” but “becomes a stranger . . . through ter choices, of helping others, of having sinful estrangement.” Thus, repentance is a deeper relationship with G-d—finding “home-coming”; it is “the restoration of the the place that you as a baal teshuvah can perfect beginning.” In this beginning, “men stand that goes beyond where you could did not roam a forest left to themselves, un- have as an unblemished tzaddik. protected and unguided. The beginning is the Garden of Eden. . . . The great time—the Thus, in realteshuvah there is progress: classic time—is in the past.” Leo Strauss. the person who emerges did not exist be- In other words, teshuvah is, simply, resto- fore—or, more powerfully, could not have ration. The ideal man existed in the Garden not restoration but transformation. Ram- existed before. To paraphrase Rabbi So- of Eden; we attempt only to return men to bam (ibid. 5) writes that when one repents, loveitchik, this is the type of teshuvah that that state. The modern West, Strauss argues, in effect he changes his name; he becomes a fulfills the divine command of imatatio is obsessed with progress, with moving for- different person. Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveit- Dei, imitating God. It is the type of prog- ward; but the idea of teshuvah reminds us chik often stressed that the greatness of te- ress that allows the penitent a richer return that moving forward does not always mean shuvah lies specifically its creative aspect, as to his Creator. moving in the right direction. in this passage from Halakhic Man: In order to fulfill his purpose—to use the Indeed, this kind of progress may also idea of teshuvah as a critique of the modern The desire to be another person, to be dif- mitigate the crisis of the contemporary glorification of progress—Strauss chooses to ferent than I am now, is the central motif West that rightly concerns Strauss. A fa- speak only of the restorative component of of repentance. . . . When [halakhic man] mous aphorism attributed to secular figures teshuvah. And certainly there are also rab- finds himself in a situation of sin, he takes from Bernard of Chartres to Isaac Newton, binic and prophetic sources that emphasize advantage of his creative capacity, returns and found in Jewish sources as well, is that teshuvah’s restorative aspect. For example, to God, and becomes a creator and self- human beings should see themselves as Rambam (Laws of Repentance 2:2), in de- fashioner. . . . He does not regret an ir- dwarfs who stand on the shoulders of gi- finingteshuvah, uses a passage from Isaiah: retrievably lost past but [sees] a past still ants. Our accomplishments may be small; “Let the wicked forsake his way, and the in existence, one that stretches into and but if they are integrally connected to a man of iniquity his thoughts; and let him re- interpenetrates with the past and the fu- constructive tradition, they can leave the turn unto God” (55:7). The same emphasis ture. . . . human condition just a little better than it is found in many other verses cited in rela- was before. In this view, we should view tion to teshuvah, such as 3:14 and The man who emerges is not simply re- the crisis of the West as demanding not re- its commentaries. stored; instead, he is a new person. turn but small steps forward, building on Yet within the concept of teshuvah there is what is good in human history and recog- also an element of progress. Similarly, Rabbi Abahu argues, though nizing that only by standing on great shoul- some disagree, that the place reached by ders do we gain the perspective needed to To begin with, in many cases restoration true penitents cannot be reached by those take those steps.

Jewish Ideas Weekly September 14-28, 2012 8 Tuesday, September 25 tween the heavenly angels and God (Erkhin on other goals. Abstinence is not mourn- 10b): ing, and seriousness is not sadness. Within Happy Yom Kippur to You? the reverential environment of the Temple or The angels asked God, “Why does Israel synagogue, we deny ourselves central physi- By Shlomo M. Brody not chant songs in front of You on Rosh cal pleasures in order to allow ourselves to “Happy” is certainly not the first word that Hashanah and Yom Kippur? God an- focus on our spiritual selves. Yom Kippur is a comes to mind for most of us when we de- swered, “Is it possible that the King sits on day for self-reflection and repentance, when scribe our Yom Kippur experience. After all, His throne of judgment with the Books of we put aside our lattes and Blackberrys and the Torah commands us to afflict ourselves Life and Death open before Him, and the work on the things in life that really matter: on this day (Leviticus 23:26-31). The fasting people should recite song?” our relationship to God, family, community, makes us weak and famished, while the day’s nation, and humanity as a whole. other prohibitions—against bathing, anoint- The Days of Awe, in other words, are no To a certain extent, the goal of the day is ing, wearing leather, and intimate relations— time for song or other expressions of joyful pragmatic: to forgive and be forgiven, to con- remind us of mourning practices. The me- festivity. fess genuinely and be pardoned. The joy felt dieval Karaites went still further, interpreting Yet in another passage on such an occasion is not one the Torah as requiring the wearing of ashes (Ta’anit 30), the Talmud records of song and dance. Instead, it and sackcloth, sleep deprivation, and similar that there was no happier occa- is the excitement of rejuvena- practices. While today’s traditional Jewish sion than Yom Kippur, the day tion and catharsis, of receiv- practice rejects unlimited or undefined an- on which, according to rabbinic ing another chance, of being guish (synagogue air conditioning systems tradition, God granted forgive- empowered by the knowledge are regularly checked before the fast!), even ness and exoneration for the that one can do better and our more limited asceticism clearly creates sin of the Golden Calf and gave achieve more. Rabbi Jonah of a feeling of deprivation. For good reason, the Jewish people the second Gerona (13th century, Spain) Yom Kippur is colloquially referred to as a set of tablets of the Ten Com- went so far as to suggest that Day of Awe, not a holiday. Indeed, the day mandments. This historical the Yom Kippur eve feast re- most similar to Yom Kippur, at least in ritual event became the paradigmatic flects our joy at having the op- practice, is Tisha b’Av, the summer fast day Yom Kippur, when the Jewish portunity for such atonement. considered the saddest day on the calendar. people receive forgiveness for Yet, even beyond expatia- Yet when we examine the Bible carefully, their own iniquities. The same sentiment is tion and repentance, the joy of Yom Kippur we see that Yom Kippur is included in the expressed in concrete halakhic terms. Upon stems from the opportunity to stand before regular list of holidays—designated, like the the arrival of Yom Kippur, the laws of mourn- God and recognize that our decisions in life others, a “sacred occasion.” The Sages or- ing—for example, sitting shivah for a loved matter. Will we receive forgiveness of our dained that on Yom Kippur, as on all festivals, one—are suspended, just as they are for other sins? Is our repentance truly genuine? Ul- one must wear special clothing to mark the festivals. One’s personal sadness must be put timately, only God knows. Yet our willing- occasion properly. In early medieval times, aside when confronted with the communal ness to stand in prayer before God, engage some argued that the Yom Kippur joy of the Day of Atonement. in self-reflection, and admit to our failings prayers should include the customary bless- The need to express a sense of joy in some is an acknowledgment that human actions ing added to the festival Amidah, which be- manner on Yom Kippur was aptly noted by are worthy of examination. As painful as the gins, “Bestow on us, Lord our God, the bless- Rabbi Abraham Halevi, an early 18th century remorse of repentance might be, and as diffi- ings of Your festivals . . . .” While this is not scholar in Cairo, where Jews had adopted the cult as it is to genuinely mend our ways, Yom the contemporary practice, we do recite the custom of sniffing an aromatic tobacco— Kippur reflects our belief that we have obli- she-heheyanu blessing chanted at joyful mo- snuff—on Yom Kippur and other fast days. gations and responsibilities—that we have a ments or events: “Blessed are You . . . Who Some scholars condemned the practice as an mission in life to fulfill—and, therefore, must has kept us alive, sustained us, and brought inappropriate form of physical pleasure. Ha- scrutinize ourselves to see whether we are us to this moment.” Some scholars even take levi, however, contended that it was perfectly working toward accomplishing this goal. the position that the meal we eat on Yom emblematic of the conflicting emotions of The process of standing before God on Kippur eve, usually understood merely as Yom Kippur: It allowed for an expression of Yom Kippur—concentrated, without the dis- preparation for the fast, actually fulfills the festival pleasure without violating the com- tractions of the physical world—affirms that holiday requirement of a feast. mandment of affliction. our lives have meaning and purpose. Such The tension between these two themes, af- These contradictory sentiments might be affirmation, ultimately, provides the greatest fliction and joy, is reflected in two salient tal- said to reflect a dialectical tension in the Yom inner satisfaction and happiness. It is a feel- mudic passages. In one of them, the Sages, Kippur experience. Fasting and other forms ing that might not lend itself to the merriness discussing the question of why we do not of self-deprivation might weaken us physi- of song and dance, but it does render Yom recite the Hallel prayer of thanksgiving on cally; but, like all healthy doses of temporary Kippur the happiest day of the year. the High Holidays, record a conversation be- asceticism, they teach us to concentrate fully

Jewish Ideas Weekly September 14-28, 2012 9