A couple of weeks ago, on a Sunday morning, I turned on the car radio and scanned for a station when a sentence from Yeshayah (40:12) caught my ear – as JPS renders it, "Who hath measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, and meted out heaven with the span, and comprehended the dust of the earth in a measure, and weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills in a balance?"
The speaker, a minister I assume, charged his audience: Gd is so great that He can hold the mountains in His hand! We can't even lift a heavy rock, and He can pick up all of the mountains and put them on a scale! How amazing He is! How mighty He is! We should all worship Him! How can we do anything but worship Him?!
I was left absolutely cold, and I wondered how anyone living in North America today could be left anything but cold by this call. Because Gd is big and strong, therefore we should worship Him?
First, the logic itself is poor. By this argument, should I also worship some person who is stronger than me? What about a person with a bigger gun than me? True, Judaism's classic approach is to be wowed by Divine might. We praise Gd for His might. But we don't use it as a reason for worship (I think, although I am not certain).
But beyond the logical argument, I see a cultural problem which might be endemic to North America but which poses a challenge to all Gd-centered religion: The whole idea of Worship is passe. Unmitigated devotion and respect and awe, dedicating myself to the service of another, is weird and out of place in our society. Even as our religious identity is informed by Psalms and framed by prayer, our cultural identity finds Psalms curious and prayer uncomfortable. Even were we to accept the minister's "Might makes right" philosophy, we could not easily go from "Right" to "Serve the One who is Right".
What happens when people read Psalm 150 in translation: "Praise Him with the shofar blast, Praise Him with the lyre and the harp, Praise Him with drum and dance, Praise Him with…"? I wonder how many people, particularly those unfamiliar with the synagogue and new to Jewish prayer, have trouble relating to those sentences.
To me, this discomfort is a product of our individualistic culture. Our cultural icons of the past 60-70 years have made much of their rebellious streaks; would James Dean worship? Elvis? How about Brando? Wayne? Bronson? De Niro? Pacino? Eastwood? Stallone? Clooney? Crowe? Jackman? 1940's Captain America would worship - but modern Batman? Never. [For some reason, I could imagine some of the parallel females being worshipful; the tough-guy character is not always seen in them. And, I'm not as familiar with them.]
Many of us find our way to Worship despite this problem, but I sense it is more an exercise of free will and choice than a sense of obligation, along the lines of gratitude and recognition of Goodness. I'm not entirely convinced this is ideal, though.
What do you think? Am I off-base? What is the driver for your worship?
Showing posts with label Judaism: Awe and Fear of Gd. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Judaism: Awe and Fear of Gd. Show all posts
Thursday, November 17, 2011
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
Daf: Sotah 31-32
Some interesting points here, both in terms of gemara approach and in terms of philosophy. Enjoy, preferably with a gemara in front of you.
31a
The gemara debates whether to read Yeshayah 63:9 as בכל צרתם לא צר or as בכל צרתם לו צר, whether Gd is troubled, or not troubled, when are are troubled. Why doesn’t the gemara point out that the word itself is subject to קרי and כתיב variation in the Masoretic text? We know that קרי and כתיב variants are employed throughout the gemara.
Also: It’s odd that the gemara here omits from the לא-לו discussion the most famous such variant, from Vayyikra 25:30. That variant is discussed in the gemara, just not here.
The gemara here seems to shift gears in its translation of יראה – at first it refers to fear of punishment, but then it seems to shift to awe of Gd. See the Torah Temimah to Devarim 7:10, note טו; he is adamant that יראה as used in this context refers not to fear of punishment, but to awe of Gd.
31b
It seems odd that we would believe a single witness here, particularly one who has an axe to grind. I would remind the reader, though, that this is a case of רגלים לדבר, the equivalent of a driver pulled over for erratic driving, with an open beer in the car. Even before the breathalyzer, there is a circumstantial-evidence argument to support the contention that he was driving drunk. Here, too, קינוי and subsequent סתירה establish a suspicious fact pattern before we ever arrive at the single witness to a sexual act.
32a
Although one may be able to fulfill certain obligatory prayers in English, that’s only fine for the first time or the second – one should still work to learn to daven in the original!
32b
Note that Rashi (at the top) has a different text in our gemara, using the pasuk of ואמר אל האשה.
Rashi here, on ארמי אובד אבי, varies from his commentary on the Torah. On the Torah he assumes that אבי is Yaakov, but here he says it is Lavan who is “my father”! Of course, in his commentary to the Torah he is citing the Sifri and explaining it, and the Sifri varies from our gemara, but I still find his version here very interesting and worth further analysis.
Our gemara here provides one reason for the silent Amidah; the more famous reason is in Berachot 33 or so, from Chanah.
Note that Chullin makes it clear that an observer in the Beit haMikdash will still know which korban a person is bringing, despite the fact that the location for חטאת and עולה are the same. We still try to provide whatever concealment is possible.
Here, once again, we find the tension between public acknowledgement of sin and concealment of error. Yehudah was praised earlier in Sotah for publicly acknowledging error (הודה ולא בוש), but as we have pointed out in earlier Daf comments (such as here), we also say אשרי נשוי פשע כסוי חטאה, better not to admit sin aloud, if the sin is not already commonly known, lest that admission de-sensitize people to wrongdoing.
31a
The gemara debates whether to read Yeshayah 63:9 as בכל צרתם לא צר or as בכל צרתם לו צר, whether Gd is troubled, or not troubled, when are are troubled. Why doesn’t the gemara point out that the word itself is subject to קרי and כתיב variation in the Masoretic text? We know that קרי and כתיב variants are employed throughout the gemara.
Also: It’s odd that the gemara here omits from the לא-לו discussion the most famous such variant, from Vayyikra 25:30. That variant is discussed in the gemara, just not here.
The gemara here seems to shift gears in its translation of יראה – at first it refers to fear of punishment, but then it seems to shift to awe of Gd. See the Torah Temimah to Devarim 7:10, note טו; he is adamant that יראה as used in this context refers not to fear of punishment, but to awe of Gd.
31b
It seems odd that we would believe a single witness here, particularly one who has an axe to grind. I would remind the reader, though, that this is a case of רגלים לדבר, the equivalent of a driver pulled over for erratic driving, with an open beer in the car. Even before the breathalyzer, there is a circumstantial-evidence argument to support the contention that he was driving drunk. Here, too, קינוי and subsequent סתירה establish a suspicious fact pattern before we ever arrive at the single witness to a sexual act.
32a
Although one may be able to fulfill certain obligatory prayers in English, that’s only fine for the first time or the second – one should still work to learn to daven in the original!
32b
Note that Rashi (at the top) has a different text in our gemara, using the pasuk of ואמר אל האשה.
Rashi here, on ארמי אובד אבי, varies from his commentary on the Torah. On the Torah he assumes that אבי is Yaakov, but here he says it is Lavan who is “my father”! Of course, in his commentary to the Torah he is citing the Sifri and explaining it, and the Sifri varies from our gemara, but I still find his version here very interesting and worth further analysis.
Our gemara here provides one reason for the silent Amidah; the more famous reason is in Berachot 33 or so, from Chanah.
Note that Chullin makes it clear that an observer in the Beit haMikdash will still know which korban a person is bringing, despite the fact that the location for חטאת and עולה are the same. We still try to provide whatever concealment is possible.
Here, once again, we find the tension between public acknowledgement of sin and concealment of error. Yehudah was praised earlier in Sotah for publicly acknowledging error (הודה ולא בוש), but as we have pointed out in earlier Daf comments (such as here), we also say אשרי נשוי פשע כסוי חטאה, better not to admit sin aloud, if the sin is not already commonly known, lest that admission de-sensitize people to wrongdoing.
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