Presence

Hobbes and the Jews

Philosophy Bites' latest podcast interviews Quentin Skinner on Hobbes' view of the State. It's really interesting. I'm not really as adept a student of philosophy as I'd like, but it seems like Hobbes was, more or less, attempting to transition what had been traditionally a theological system of government into a humanized system. The idea of the absolute rule of the sovreign is very reminiscent of the narrative of Rosh HaShannah.

On a related note, Hobbes states in Leviathan: "Do not that to another, which thou wouldst not have done to thyself," which is notable as it follows Hillel's, rather than the Gospel's, formulation of the Golden Rule. There's also a book that explores the relationship between Maimonides, Hobbes and Nietzsche. The author is a frum Jew and a student of R. Soloveitchik.

Judaism and Harry Potter

R. Natan Slifkin's article in the Jewish Press, entitled Harry Potter's Fabulous Jewish Monsters examines the biblical, talmudic and midrashic sources for some of the creatures found in the Harry Potter novels.

Apart from Anthony Goldstein (a Ravenclaw, quite appropriately), one has to look carefully to find Judaism at Hogwarts. While much has been written on this subject, most is at the superficial level, using examples from the stories as starting points for discussions of quaint, and often jejune, simplistic Jewish moralisms.

The fundamental question to address is the main theme of the Potter books: that Love is the only force capable of withstanding the Will to Power. Despite the fact that the novels are not evangelical in nature, they are Christian in this respect. Judaism, on the other hand, would posit that Law would be the ideal vehicle through which not only the individual, but also the community, triumphs over the Power of Evil. Rowling is characteristically critical of governments as incapable of effectively combating true Evil. There is an interesting dichotomy between the personal and the communal, which, from my limited understanding, also seems to be a major point of contention between Judaism and Christianity.

Other connections to Judaism include the Philosopher's Stone (Nicholas Flamel's guide in creating the stone was purported to be the Book of Abraham, attributed the patriarch), and the obvious parallels between Nazi Germany and Voldemort's reign of terror.

The Imaginary Jew and the Unimagined Jew

Michael Chabon's new novel The Yiddish Policemen's Union, which takes place in a fictionalized present in which the State of Israel never was, the Jews instead living in a giant ghetto in Alaska, has sparked some interesting commentary regarding the contemporary Jewish experience. In an article in The Nation entitled The Imaginary Jew, William Deresiewicz writes:

But over the past three decades, the dense particularity of American Jewish life has, outside the Orthodox community, largely disappeared. No one speaks Yiddish anymore, or even English that sounds like Yiddish. There may be suburbs with a lot of Jews, but there are no Jewish suburbs as there were once Jewish neighborhoods. With Jews as senators and governors and Ivy League presidents, the wounding, binding sense of exclusion has melted away. Communal institutions remain strong, traditions are still cherished, but American Jewish experience is now, by and large, simply American experience. Jewish mothers don't say "Ess, ess" anymore; they say, "Do you want me to call Sophia's mom to make a playdate?"

While there are young Jewish writers aplenty, no important voice has emerged to speak about contemporary Jewish life. Jonathan Lethem's The Fortress of Solitude, perhaps the finest recent novel by a young Jewish writer, is not about being Jewish at all; it's about the quintessentially American subject of race. But there have always been Jewish writers who have chosen to speak about things other than being Jewish (most notably, in the Bellow-Roth generation, Norman Mailer and J.D. Salinger). What's really telling about the current state of Jewish fiction is that even those prominent young writers who do speak about Jewish experience don't speak about contemporary experience.

It's true; "Jewish" fiction is either about the past (mostly the Holocaust), or the early struggles of Jews in America. There is hardly anything in the contemporary Jewish experience, outside the Orthodox world, that can be called uniquely Jewish.

On the flip side, there remains little to no work within the Jewish community that attempts to understand and reflect on the contemporary Orthodox Jewish experience in America (there likely is some such stuff in Israel, but I'm not familiar with it). There's a lot to be said on this, both on the fact that this kind of literature is not seen as valuable by the community leaders, and the fact that it's not really sought after by the general public.

Preemptive Justice in the Torah

In the book The Minority Report (The Collected Stories of Philip K. Dick, Vol. 4), by science fiction legend Philip K. Dick (and the subsequent film starring Tom Cruise), future criminals are arrested before they commit a crime. In Dick's future world, new precognition technology allows law enforcement to see into the future and stop a bad guy before he commits a heinous act. The bad guys are locked up without every having committed a crime. I won't spoil the book for you, it's an excellent read, but it does bring up an interesting question: is it just to hold someone morally responsible for a crime he has yet to commit?

The instinctive response is that this is unjust. How can one be convicted of a crime without having done anything? However, in fact, we do already punish some individuals for only thinking or planning on committing a crime; conspiracy to commit murder and reckless driving are some examples where we punish even though nothing happened. In these cases, the behavior exhibited shows that the offender would have committed a greater offense, and so punishment is justified even though nothing was actually done (part of this depends on how you view the function of punishment, but that's a post for another day).

Beyond this, however, a deeper question arises: wouldn't it be possible that, although this person planned on committing a crime, that they would, at the last minute, for some inexplicable reason, decide not to? How can we punish, or hold responsible, someone who might, at the last minute, change their mind?

Of course, this gets into a broader discussion of man's free will, or perhaps his perception of his free will, which is a topic for another time. The question I would like to address here is: what is the Torah's perspective?

I was a bit surprised to find that the Torah, in fact, addresses this topic directly. In Devarim 21:18-21, the Torah states:

18 If a man have a stubborn and rebellious son, that will not hearken to the voice of his father, or the voice of his mother, and though they chasten him, will not hearken unto them; 19 then shall his father and his mother lay hold on him, and bring him out unto the elders of his city, and unto the gate of his place; 20 and they shall say unto the elders of his city: 'This our son is stubborn and rebellious, he doth not hearken to our voice; he is a glutton, and a drunkard.' 21 And all the men of his city shall stone him with stones, that he die; so shalt thou put away the evil from the midst of thee; and all Israel shall hear, and fear.

The famous case of the Ben Sorer, the Rebellious Child. The Mishnah goes to great lengths to show that a case of Ben Sorer is extremely unlikely to ever occur; the parameters for qualification are so specific that the Talmud goes so far as to propose that the whole parsha is simply a thought experiment. But what is the thought?

The Mishneh in the eight chapter of Sanhedrin makes this clear:

בן סורר ומורה, יידון על שם סופו--ימות זכאי, ואל ימות חייב: שמיתתן של רשעים--הניה להם, והניה לעולם; ולצדיקים--רע להם, ורע לעולם.

The Rebellious Child is judged by his future deeds; better for him to die in merit, than to die after committing a crime. For death, for evildoers is a benefit to them, and to the world, while death for a righteous individual is bad for them, and bad for the world.

We see that the purpose of the passage of the Ben Sorer is to teach that, in certain circumstances, we are so certain of the future path of a particular individual, we take preemptive action to prevent it from occurring. If we have enough information as to his background, which will inevitable inform his future actions, the Torah tells us that we can, with certainty, take preemptive measures. In the case of the Rebellious Child, those circumstances are so many and specific to the point that they will never happen, but that's not the point; for some people, the Torah feels, their past completely determines their future actions, with no hope of their exercising free will to change it. In this case, it's better to act preemptively than to let the evil transpire.

As further proof that preemptive justice is the point of the parsha of Ben Sorer, take a look at the last two mishnayos in the eighth chapter of Sanhedrin. The penultimate mishnah uses the same language that was previously used to describe the Ben Sorer: "A tunneling burglar is judged by his future deeds." In this case, as the burglar has gone to so much trouble to break into a house, if confronted by the owner, he won't hesitate to commit murder. One is, therefore, allowed to kill a tunneling burglar without fear of reprisal [this case is interesting in that the burglar is destined to commit murder only if he is confronted; so there is a potential that he will not do anything - yet preemptive justice is still sanctioned]. And the final mishnah lists those the cases where one is allowed to kill another person to prevent them from harming another, the classic example of which is the rodef, one who is chasing another person with intent to kill. Again, the example shows the sanction, in this case, of preemptive action to prevent a crime from being committed.

As strange as it may sound, we see that preemptive justice is sanctioned in specific cases by the Torah. When an individual's past, a combination of his biology and experiences, unfold in specific ways, their future actions are certain, beyond the realm of choice. In these cases, the Torah instructs that it is better to prevent the certain future event from taking place, than to allow events to unfold on their own.

Jew vs. Jew in Lemburg

On September 6, 1848, a young Orthodox Jew with the very inauspicious name of A.B. Pilpel (Hebrew for pepper), bearded with sidelocks and dressed in a black hat and a long caftan, entered the kitchen of the district rabbi of Lemberg, Abraham Cohen, and, pretending to light his cigar from the stove, poured arsenic into the Cohen family’s soup. Within hours of their supper later that evening, the entire Cohen family was severely ill. And by 3 o’clock the next morning, Rabbi Cohen and his infant daughter, Teresa, were dead.

The book chronicles the case of what might have been the first Jewish assassination by another Jew since the times of the Second Temple. It's a tale of Jew vs. Jew that seems to have application for today.

Nadler concludes his review with:

Stanislawski has written not only an important historical morality tale about the dangers of religious extremism, but also a cautionary tale about the unforeseeable perils unleashed when governments try to force modernity, or, for that matter democracy, on a deeply traditional religious society.

Against Scientific Interpretations of Genesis

From Understanding Genesis, by Nahum Sarna:

It should be obvious that by the nature of things, none of [the creation] stories can possibly be the product of human memory, nor in any modern sense of the word scientific accounts of the origin and nature of the physical world.

Biblical man, despite his undoubted intellectual and spiritual endowments, did not base his views of the universe and its laws on the critical use of empirical data. He had not, as yet, discovered the principles and methods of disciplined inquiry, critical observation or analytical experimentation. Rather, his thinking was imaginative, and his expressions of thought were concrete, pictorial, emotional, and poetic. Hence, it is a naive and futile exercise to attempt to reconcile the biblical accounts of creation with the findings of modern science. Any correspondence which can be discovered or ingeniously established between the two must surely be nothing more than mere coincidence. Even more serious than the inherent fundamental misconception of the psychology of biblical man is the unwholesome effect upon the understanding of the Bible itself. For the net result is self-defeating. The literalistic approach serves to direct attention to those aspects of the narrative that reflect the time and place of its composition, while it tends to obscure the elements that are meaningful and enduring, thus distorting the biblical message and destroying its relevancy.

See also my previous thoughts, somewhat similar but much less eloquently articulated.

The Deathly Hallows

I'm sure you've heard the news about the title for the seventh Harry Potter book's title, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Penny and I have been covering it quite extensively over on Harry Potter Prognostications, so if you're interested, please do check it out.

In my latest post, entitled: How Harry Potter Will End - The Deathly Hallows, I explain how I think the story will end, based on ideas gleaned from the title of Book 7. The religious significance of the theory I'm proposing is fairly obvious, and should not be understated.

The Best Science Book Ever

From The Guardian:

Primo Levi's haunting memoir of life as a Jew in Mussolini's Italy told through the unlikely metaphor of chemistry has been named the best science book ever written.

The Periodic Table, published in 1975, fought off competition from Richard Dawkins, DNA legend James Watson, Tom Stoppard, Bertolt Brecht and Charles Darwin to win the vote at an event organised by the Royal Institution in London.

It beat out Richard Dawkins' The Selfish Gene, among others. I'm a surprised that Kuhn's The Structure of Scientific Revolutions didn't even make the list.

On Jewish Fiction

A while back I meant to compose a post about the paucity of religious Jewish fiction. I did a little research and found very little in the way of serious, introspective literature that dealt with life as a contemporary Orthodox (or even traditional/affiliated) Jew.

Then I found an article by Yoel Finkelman entitled, "Medium and Message in
Contemporary Haredi Adventure Fiction" (via the now-defunct AJHistory, who also links to a bunch of good reads). I was all in a twitter. I read the article two weeks ago, and was very impressed; I would say that this article is about 40% as important as Rupture and Reconstruction. It provides a very cogent analysis and deconstruction of modern haredi culture by focusing on the kind of literature (and, by extension, popular culture) it supports. In addition, the insight into the idiom of Yair Weinstock is fascinating; when first approaching this subject, I dismissed Weinstock's work as insignificant due to it's pop/pulp nature. After reading this article, I think Weinstock's works are central to understanding modern haredi popular culture (and, if you read the article, you're spared having to read any of it).

Anyway, give the article a read, it provides excellent insight into modern haredi culture, as well as affirms and presents what I have been thinking for a while about the Orthodox Jewish world. Triumphilism be damned. Good stuff.

Kosher Magic

Menachem Kellner (with the help of his daughter, Rivka Kellner) has gone and combined two of my favorite topics: Rambam and Harry Potter. At a recent conference they presented a paper entitled, "The Magic of Science and the Science of Magic: Harry Potter and Maimonides." In the paper, the Kellners discuss whether the magic used at Hogwarts is of a scientific or supernatural nature; the upshoot being that Rambam would acknowledge the possibility of the former, and disapprove of the later.

"Nothing in Harry Potter's world is based on anything that is in principle impossible to know," according to the Kellners. "The magic of that world is not supernatural. It is based on aspects of the natural universe of which we humans are simply unaware. There are no occult properties or forces beyond investigation. In principle, there is an explanation for everything, even if Albus Dumbledore [headmaster of the Hogwarts School] himself doesn't always know what it is."

I agree, to some extent, but to characterize the magic of Hogwarts as purely scientific is incorrect. There is no question that JK Rowling's magic is scientific in nature, and does not dabble in the occult or pagan (and pshaw to anyone who says that it does). It manifests itself as a technology, which can be studied and learned to some extent by any individual. But unlike our science and technology, there is an additional aspect to this magic that is not present in our technology. Modern science allows even the most numbskulled of persons to wield unimaginable power, without regard to any personal virtue. The Magic of Potter, on the other hand, is highly correlated to the individual's level of self-awareness and social conciousness. Although the basics of magic can be learned by just about anyone, just as you or I can surf the web or drive a car, the higher levels of magic require expression in one's soul before they can be accessed.

The perfect example: Harry is unable to cast an "avada k'dabra" curse, because he lacks sufficient hatred. In contrast, our science has enabled us to take another's life from a distance, with a bomb or a missle, without manifesting the requisite hatred in our souls; killing someone in cold blood, on the other hand, does. Rowling's magic is scientific, but not mechanical; it is pshchological.

For more, see this post on Harry Potter Prognostications.

If by chance anyone reading this has access to the Kellner's paper, and could arrange an owl to deliver it to me, I would be much obliged.

[via KesherTalk; hat tip SoccerDad]

Banner Books - Part 1

I thought I'd start a new series of posts on the books in the banner; I selected each for a specific reason, and their order, in some cases, conveys something as well. There are some books that are left out, I suppose I will either redo the shot, or make a second edition.

First off, Foundation by Isaac Asimov. Although I've been into science fiction since high school, and actually had this book from way back then, I actually never read the Foundation series until recently. What I love about Asimov is the way his stories are all cleverly contrived logic puzzles; there is always an answer, it just takes some deduction to figure it out. The Foundation series, on top of the logic, is a well-crafted epic with great characters, always a little too confident in themselves (for all you Star Wars fans, Lucas stole Han Solo, both the name and the character, directly from Asimov). One other thing which the series does which is unique is convey how ideas and culture are passed down through the generations, how myths and legends are created, preserved and reconstituted. It presents, in my opinion, a plausible picture of how things may have happened in our own culture with various documents of significance. The whole Second Foundation thing is just too cool.

The Hungry Soul by Leon Kass is next. I actually haven't made it all the way through this book yet; the writing is quite tedious, and the content, at least in the beginning, is even more so. The last chapter (I skipped ahead), in which Kass presents his interpretation of the meaning of the kashrus system, is pretty good. After reading it, make sure to check out R. Meir Soloveitchik's article. As you may know, I'm just a bit obsessed with food and the role it plays in our culture, both from a religious and secular perspective. This book does a good job of addressing many of those issues. I am still looking for a good book on the history of eating, the meal, the restaurant, etc. If anyone knows of one, let me know.

And last for tonight, The Basic Kafka. The story of how I got this book is kind of funny. Shomrei has a big cache of books, many from R. Joshua Shapiro's library. Every once in a while, Marvin Diamond pulls them out of storage and runs a book sale. The last time he did this, several books were set aside as "kefira" by some overzealous individuals who had obviously not read what they confiscated. I found the pile, asked Marvin what he was going to do with them. He said he would just throw them out, so I gave him a dollar for each one. That day I picked up two Fackenheims, a Baeck, a Fromm and a few Bubers (not all of these were marked kefira, by the way). Many have R. Shapiro's stamp on the inside cover. Oh, how the times have changed.

Anyhoo, Kafka's writings, at least to me, seem like modern-day midrashim. They have that plausible yet impossible tone to them that forces your mind to step back and evaluate the story from a non-literal perspective (if I had to offer an example, check out some of Adderabbi's posts on various midrashim; that's the kind of thing I'm talking about). I'm not an expert in his writings, I've just found that I can return to them time and again and still enjoy them.

John Grisham Should Check his Facts

While I was recovering from my tonsillectomy, I read John Grisham's The Broker. It was a pretty bad book. Besides that, I found a glaring factual error that completely ruined any sense of realism to the story. On page 227 (Hardcover edition), Mr. Grisham writes:

After work, Helen Wang stopped at a Kroger store in Bethesda.

But as you can clearly see, there are no Kroger's in Bethesda! Or in the entire state of Maryland, for that matter.

John Grisham, I own you. I'll expect a complimentary copy of your next book, along with a mention in the acknowledgements. Next time you write a novel that takes place in DC, get in touch with me and I'll fill you in on all the local grocery chains.

Shabbos in Vermont = Lots of Reading

I'm heading up to Vermont tomorrow, sans Peninah and the kids, for my first cousin's Bar Mitzvah. The service is in Burlington; I'm set up about two miles away in a hotel with the rest of the family. It's supposed to rain, which will make the walk to shul less than fun, but such is what we do for family. The party afterwards is on a boat, so I won't be able to attend; I'll head back to the hotel and spend the day reading, which, hopefully, will not drive me out of my mind.

The reading list for this weekend, not including Parshas Behar-Bechukosai (Lev. 25-27) is:

• The Azure article on Eliezer Berkovits and Zionism - I read the first page, and it promises to be very interesting, not only because Berkovits thought of my whole Presence approach about 40 years ago.


• From Commentary Magazine, Jews, Christians, and "The Passion", by David Berger. I can't get this article to Furl.


• The Illusion of Technique, by William Barrett. You probably know Barrett from Irrational Man, the book that introduced Existentialism to America in the '50s. He hasn't written much, but what he did is gold. Besides the overarching thesis of each one of his treatments, a Barrett book inevitably provides a thorough, practical walkthrough of the thought of usually at least three major philosophers. This time around, it's Wittgenstein, Heidegger and William James. I've been picking away at this book for a few months now, and I'm hoping to get some solid time in reading it this weekend; there is a lot of stuff in here, not to mention the fact that he uses Presence with a capitol "P" a whole bunch. The basic premise of the book is a look at philosophy's recent attempts to capture Truth within some kind of system or technology. Whether this is Descartes in the mind, or Russell in language, the end result has always been a system that promises more than it can return. The aforementioned philosophers all played a part in developing thought that extracts Truth from within the confines of these systems, and locates it somewhere in the world. If you've read the Berkovits article above, you might be able to draw some connections between the ideas expressed in the first few pages and this stuff. Or I might be a complete heretic.

That's about all I have for now. I'm thinking I might need some fiction as well, perhaps I'll pick something up in the airport, or my brother will have something interesting.

Historical Fictions

When I read The Da Vinci Code, I was at once intriguied and skeptical; while the theories presented in the book were fascinating, little red lights started going off as well. While I'll admit to being close to ignorant of a lot of the history the book deals with, the small bits of Jewish lore that, as far as I know were incorrect, led me to believe there might be some issues with the rest of the information. Turns out, others think so too.

That is not to say that parts of the book might not be correct; some of it likely is. The greater issue, I think, is the massive amount of people ready and willing to believe, with religious-style leaps-of-faith, anything popular as fact, particularly when the subject matter touches the ever-present and possibly tedious, such as history or Bible studies, where levels of ignorance are at their highest. The general public makes no effort in researching the issues presented, preferring the spoon-feeding of pop-culture. This is so dangerous, it makes me dizzy just thinking about it.

On the other hand, Dan Brown's got a dynamite formula; say what you will about the books' veracity, they are great stories, and Brown does an admirable job of building multi-faceted puzzles and plots. And for those who do take history seriously, the books are excellent starting points for learning about new topics (after reading Angels and Demons, I have a new found appreciation for Roman sculpture - just where are all those statues pointing, anyways?). There's got to be a way to transform my knowledge of Judaism into a best-selling thriller. Perhaps an American Yeshiva bachur visiting Israel teams up with a young, attractive Bar Ilan graduate student to uncover the centuries-old mystery behind the lost volumes of the Babylonian Talmud, which contain the long-lost commentaries on Tractate Demai, which relates the rise to power of the Pharisees and details their often-rumored but never-confirmed fabrication of an "Oral Law," essentially hijacking Judaism from its traditional roots and subjugating the masses of Israel to their will?

History be damned, I want the money.

On Vice Did He Act

Like all good culture sheep, I started reading The Da Vinci Code over the holiday. I'm about 200 pages in, and so far I'm having a good time. The writing is so-so; this guy is no Stephen King, but he does a good job. I like the book's mingling of fact and fiction; in some ways, it reminds me of the AI web game, only much less interactive. I checked out the website of Opus Dei (actually, I went to the ODAN website, a watchdog group), as well as a few sites about the Priory of Sion.

Here's a question: anyone notice the similarity in the knotting of the Discipline and Sephardi tzitzit? I can't find a picture, but the tying process is described here: "A Sephardic tying adds another dimension to the pattern: each time the shammash is brought around, take it under the previous wind before winding it further. This will produce a curving ridge around the tzitzit." Where is Babani when you need him?

Title created with Anagram Generator.

Orthodoxy vs. Orthopraxy

Steven I. Weiss, the man behind Protocols, has an article in the Forward discussing Marc Shapiro's new book, "The Limits of Orthodox Theology: Maimonides' Thirteen Principles Reappraised." I haven't read the book yet, but I will. It sounds similar, in more than a few ways, to Menachem Kellner's Must a Jew Believe Anything?.

It seems, from the article, that Shapiro is approaching the question of whether or not Maimonides 13 Principles of Faith are relevant today from a historical perspective; the question is whether or not the Jewish community (or communities) accepted these beliefs as dogmatic. I'm hoping that, in addition to this, Shaprio discusses Maimonides rationale for formalizing on these specific beliefs. Maimonides certainty in proclaiming these 13 articles as dogmatic did not stem from a historical tradition (quite the contrary, in fact); he proved, to himself, using the methods available to him at that time (Aristotiliean physics and metaphysics) that these statements were incontrovertably true. His position was a product of the entire intellectual climate of his time. Understanding Maimonides position requires understanding the underlying assumptions to all of his thought.

Most of the physics and metaphysics of Aritstotle has been wholy rejected by science. Maimonides motivation in affirming these beliefs stemmed from his belief that the science of his time was correct and true. If he were alive today, and knew what we know, would he write the same thing? I'm fairly certain that, without revisiting the proofs to see if they still stand, Maimonides would be hesitant to assert anything.

The other issue is the interpretation of the 13 principles. The best example is the resurrection of the dead. Looking in the original source, Maimonides makes a very curt statement as to what this belief entails. Basically he says, "The dead can be resurrected." Part of the reason why his works were set aflame with such regularity was because of this ambigious description. Not until the [Kesef | Lechem] Misheh, who re-explains Maimonides position on resurrection according to the prevailing conceptualization, do we have anything from Maimonides that seems to fit with present-day accepted dogma.

More work definetly needs to be done here. Reframing Judaism as an orthopraxis is not enough; the connection between action and belief is, at least for children of the West, too strong to sever so resolutely without setting adrift many who are already, perhaps without even knowing it, lost at sea. The ramifications for Orthodoxy's interaction with its Reform and Conservative brothers is also an important consideration.

Books Free? (Not 'Free as in Beer')

(Make that four...although I never really considered actually doing this...)

Netflix for Books: Booksfree.com.

What I love about these services (Netflix included) is the ability to structure your consumption. I do this with Netflix all the time; place three or four movies that are conceptually linked in some way (same director/remakes/inspirations/sequels) together, so I get not only the film itself, but some sort of context to contemplate it in. Going to Blockbuster or the library is becoming too haphazard. Why go to Blockbuster, where they basically carry only new releases, when I can get anything under the sun in a few days from Netflix?

Booksfree, however, is going to have to come down in price a bit (their most affordable plan is two books at a time for $7.99 a month), since they are competing with the library system. They need to make a years-worth subscription cost about what the average person pays in late fees to the library, plus a little. I would say that's about $40. They might also consider doing like Netflix does; in addition to limiting the number of books you can have out at one time, limit the number of books per month.

The big advantage of these services is in the selection. It's practically impossible to find anything worth listening to in the Books-on-Tape section of my library, not to mention the atrocious selection of Books-on-CD. This service looks to have a wide selection, which could be a big plus. And they are selling their used inventory at discounted prices. Smart move. This could be a keeper.

Prisoner of Azkaban Trailer

[via Maphet via HPANA]

HPANA has a new Prisoner of Azkaban trailer to download.

Looking good! For those interested in the "real" story behind Prisoner of Azkaban, I refer you to this article.

Controversy, Shmontroversy

We have already received complaints about the book club selection. I'm in the process of compiling a list of online resources that detail the history of the book and the controversy surrounding it, to set the record straight.

Either way, do you think we would have done this without the Rabbi's approval?

I should note that the positive comments have far outnumbered the negative ones.

Stay tuned.

The Last Laugh will be mine

When we started the Shomrei book club, I got comments from a few people who wanted to let me know that they thought the book club was a stupid idea. Various arguments were presented, some said that they thought social events in the context of the shul were extemporaneous, others thought that reading as a form of group education was a waste of time. My response to most of them was, "If it doesn't interest you, then don't come." Many of them didn't (in the end, we had to turn people away, as we had much more interest than anticipated).

But, as they say, "I know something you don't know." The next book is going to be one that no one is going to want to miss. We probably won't be able to have the discussion in someone's home, and I'm betting that we are going to have to turn people from other shul's away. This type of book, with a discussion led by either the author or a recognized expert on the subject matter, is really what we had in mind from the beginning.

What book, you ask? I can't say just yet, as we are still finalizing the details. But it should be pretty easy to figure out.

Either way, I'm already laughing.

America Behind the Color Line

I happened to be watching The Today show on Martin Luther King Day (observed), and saw an interview with Robert Louis Gates, Jr., a professor at Harvard University, who recently published a book entitled "America Behind the Color Line" about the divisions in the black community in the US. MSNBC has an excerpt online, which I'm still reading. According to the interview on the Today show, the book is really meant to accompany an documentary that is airing sometime in the next month (not sure where or when).

The book looks interesting; it's a topic that intrigues me, mainly because I live in Baltimore (growing up on the mean streets of the NoPo/MoCo suburbs didn't really provide exposure to these issues). Despite the author's credentials, which are top-notch as far as I can tell, I'm a tad skeptical. Something about the mass-marketing of the book sets off alarms that there wont be much conveyed that I don't alreay know. I'm sure it's available at the library so I'll probably check it out.

Grama-tical Error

The big news over the weekend was the Forward's story on R. Saadya Grama's book:

Leaders of the country's most prominent ultra-Orthodox yeshiva are scrambling to distance themselves from a book by one of their disciples, which argues that gentiles are "completely evil" and Jews constitute a separate, genetically superior species.

Written by Rabbi Saadya Grama — an alumnus of Beth Medrash Govoha, the renowned yeshiva in Lakewood, N.J. — the self-published book attempts to employ classical Jewish sources in defense of a race-based theory of Jewish supremacy. Grama's book, published in Hebrew under the title "Romemut Yisrael Ufarashat Hagalut," includes flowery endorsements from the most revered religious scholars at the renowned Lakewood yeshiva, including the institution's foremost religious leader, or rosh yeshiva, Rabbi Aryeh Malkiel Kotler.

Yet, in a statement issued Tuesday in response to queries from the Forward, Kotler rejected Grama's philosophy and said that he had not carefully reviewed the text prior to endorsing it.

Full Story

For completness' sake, the New Jersey Jewish News has an article that quotes the Agudah's statement that the Forward exaggerated and mistranslated Grama's statements regarding the genetic advantage of Jews, and an editorial in the Yated decrying, amongst other things, R. Lamm's classification of the work as, "a book by someone who has obviously taken leave of his senses.." (the Yated doesn't appear to be online, so I don't have a link to the full editorial).

The main issue here, to me anyways, is not the fact that this book was written. As much as I would like to believe that exposure to Torah for a significant portion of one's life would prevent one from uttering such nonsense, we've seen time and again that to not be the case. The real issue is the fact that R. Kotler gave his approbation to this book without reading it. What should be called into question here is not the opinions of R. Grama (which despite what anyone else might think about them, he is entitled to have), but the antiquated process of Haskomah for Torah books that is in place in the Orthodox world.

Most Orthodox Jews realize what a Haskomah represents: a simple testimony by a noted Torah personality of the author's moral credentials. Many haskamot openly state that the book was not reviewed in its entirety; many simply attest to the author's overabundance of "fear of Heaven" and don't give any information as to whether or not the book was even opened, skimmed, let alone read. But most outside the community take the haskomoh as an official stamp of approval, attesting to the text's value by the approving institution. Without R. Kotler's haskamoh, this whole story would have been nothing more than the ravings of the lunatic fringe. With the hastily stamped seal of Lakewood, it has become a major embaressment for America's largest Torah institution. Just as Yitro proposed an overhaul to Moshe for the Jewish legal system, a similar overhaul is needed for the haskomah system. It needn't be formal or elaborate, but it must be honest.

A final note: the author of the editorial in the Yated takes R. Lamm to task for his comments about the supposed views of Grama's book. Well, R. Lamm was simply provided with excerpts by the Forward, and asked to comment on their confluence with normative Jewish tradiation. In this, he gave his honest opinion, never representing to have examined the work in depth. R. Kotler, on the other hand, apparently signed off on the entire work as normative with nothing more than a cursory examination of the text. Which one is worse?

Book Clubs

Recently I've been working on starting a new program at shul. The Shomrei Book Club launched a few weeks ago, with our first selection, "Words that Hurt, Words that Heal," by Joseph Telushkin.

Initially, I was a bit skeptical about the book; it seemed a bit simplistic, in the vein of Pliskin or Artscroll. Telushkin offers a neutralized rational explication of the laws of Lashon HaRah (evil speech) and other interpersonal commandments. While it certainly wasn't a challenging read, it was enjoyable. Telushkin writes in a journalistic style, bringing examples from current events as support for the traditional laws.

There was one bit of philosophy touched upon: Telushkin quotes the position of Kant (and St. Augustine, I believe) that lying is, no matter the circumstances, wrong. He explains this to be contrary to the Jewish law. The example that comes to mind is from the Talmud in Kesubos. Beis Hillel's statement that, at a wedding, we tell a groom that his bride is 'beautiful and kind,' irrespective of her actual physical or personal accidents, clearly shows that lying is preferable in some situations. More proof of the underlying existential character of Halacha.

We need to come up with our second selection of the year. I just started "Yosl Rakover Talks to God," by Zvi Kolitz. Six pages in, and he mentions Hester Panim (hiding of the face). Nice.

In other Book Club news, Baraita mentions the possibility of starting up a "completely disorganized Book Discussion Group For Jewishly Interested Bloggers." I'm game, but no one seems to be doing anything about it (I guess that is the 'completely disorganized" part). I say, someone pick a book, and let's start reading. I'll even set up a trackback category so those with trackback can send pings in to aggregate the posts. That might be a bit too organized ;)

Certainly for Every person

Ronald H. Isaacs: Every Person's Guide to Jewish Philosophy and Philosophers

Overall, this book is a bit on the light side, but gives a good overview of the positions and influences of the major Jewish philosophers. The book even covers modern personalities, including Fackenheim, Soloveitchik and Berkovits (who, apparently, thought of my whole Presence/Hester Panim theory). No source material is quoted, just a few pages on each topic. The book does a decent job in showing the connections between Jews working within the tradition (and some without) in the context of the major philosophical movements of their time. Overall, this is a good introduction, not too deep, very good for the beginner. I would have liked a bit more detail, perhaps some quotes from primary sources (there were none). But it is a good reference for quick information. [Posted via blam!]

Library Lookup

I've been dreaming about something like this for a while: Library Lookup. Basically, this is a tool to create bookmarklets (bookmarklets are little javascript tools that are easy to use; they look like links, but they don't take you anywhere. You drag them into your Links section of your browser, and then you can click on them. Call me for more info).

What this bookmarklet does is, let's say you're browsing Amazon.com, and come across a book. You would like to see if your local library has that book available. What I do is open up a new window, go to my library's home page, enter their search engine, type in the name or ISBN number of the book, and sort through the results (as I usually go to the Baltimore County Public Library the result is usually, "We don't have that book."). With the bookmarklet, all I do is mouse over to my Links list, click on the bookmarklet, and I am automatically taken to the results page at my local library. Very, very cool!

The one small issue is that BCPL's library catalogue software only takes POST requests, not GETs, so I can't create a bookmarklet for them (not that it really matters, as they are unlikely to have the book I'm looking for anyway). I'll have to check into BHU and Baltimore City.

A related application: I was on Abebooks.com and I did a search that came up with nothing. They presented me with a link to "Find it at my local library." I clicked through to an application provided by the Online Computer Library Center (OCLC), which prompted me for my zip code. The subsequent search returned results from lots and lots of libraries in the area, including Baltimore City, BHU and Hopkins. I set about feverishly to create a bookmarkelt for this site, but alas, their application is only available through partner's websites.

I remain in search of the perfect Library Lookup tool for my local libraries.

By the way, I've got some BookMarklets for Blogdigger. Drag these guys to your Links menu: Blogdigger Search for Highlighted Text and Blogdigger LinkSearch for Current Page

Book Suggestions

I'm sitting on three (3) $25 Amazon gift certificates, and I need some suggestions. I've already decided on the Billy Elliott and Two Towers DVD's, but I want to get some books as well. In particular, I'm looking for suggestions in the realm of Jewish Philosophy. I'd like some sort of text that goes through each of the major commentators and outlines their positions, either by the individual or in the context of philosophical movements.

A quick Amazon search reveals two likely candidates: Every Person's Guide to Jewish Philosophy and Philosophers, by Ronald Isaacs and The Jewish Philosophy Reader. The former looks pretty comprehensive, but a bit on the beginners side; the latter looks to be a collection of readings rather than an analysis, which isnt a bad thing. It is also pretty hefty, both in terms of price and pages. Amazon couldn't come up with anything else that seemed germaine, so if anyone who reads this has any comments on these books or others that are similar, it would be much appreciated.

New HPProgs post

I've got a new post up on Harry Potter Prognostications, dealing with truth in history. Two different approaches are presented; I'm not sure which, if either, I believe. I'm probably leaning more towards the subjective view (I generally don't do well with the correspondence theory of truth). But it does raise the question of how Judaism views history. I haven't the time or the inclination to tackle this one right now, but one source that comes to mind is Parshas Shelach (Num 13-16), the story of the spies, wherein the post-Exodus Israel doubts the historical promise of God to Avraham, et. al., that the Land of Israel will be a great place to live. As such, they appoint a group of spies to scope out the land. To make a long story short, big mistake (huge, in fact), and Israel spends the next thirty-eight years meandering in the Sinai Peninsula, waiting for the doubting generation to die off. The Torah's description of the method of reconnoitering employed by the spies relies heavily on the use of the word "li'roat," to see, and various conjugations thereof.

My basic understanding is that the spies used their "sight" to offer up their interpretation of the quality of the Land, taking advantage of the subjective nature of truth in a community setting. Their description became fact for their generation and turned the people away from the historical truth/promise given them. Of course, we end the parsha with the commandment of Tzitzis (fringes on garments), of which the Torah states, "And it shall be unto you for a fringe, that ye may look upon it (u'reitem), and remember all the commandments of the LORD, and do them; and that ye go not about ("taturu"; same word as used for spying in the beginning of Num 13, "la'tur") after your own heart and your own eyes, after which ye use to go astray," which seems to be telling us not to fall prey to the subjective historical explanations, and to remember the historical imperative of the Exodus.

So it would seem that history is really important to Judaism. Of course, my predilection for the subjective tells you how well I fit in with traditional Judaism. Hopefully I've quite a few years left to sort it all out ;)

Know of any books, essays, etc., that discuss this? Leave 'em in the comments.

Amazon Search in the Book makes things troublesome

Ok, so I've got me two (2) Amazon gift certificates, and I'm all ready to purchase a book, I know the author, and type in his name, and get back...lots of crazy stuff. The problem seems to be that the author I'm looking for (Walter Kauffmann, in case your interested), is quite well-known and referenced in loads of books. With Amazon's new Search in the Book feature, I can find references to him that I didn't know existed. But here is the problem. I don't care what other books he was referenced in. I can't find his books. They aren't listed in the first three (3) pages.

It appears that Amazon has thrown the baby out with the bath water. I like the new Search in the Book feature, but I still need to be able to get to authors and titles fast. Amazon needs to find some way to exclude the textual results, or propagate the author and title matches to the top of the list. Otherwise, I'm going to go to Buy.com, where the books are cheaper anyway, and I can find them in an eighth of the time.

Wired on Amazon Search

Wired discusses Amazon's Search in the Book feature. Good article.

The more I think about it, the more mind-boggling it becomes. As an example, Amazon lists 138 books that mention "blogs". Imagine if Amazon would give you full-text search, along with cut/copy/paste permission, for all the books you purchase from them. And if Amazon extends the Search in the Book feature to their Web Services API...you won't hear from me for days...

I kick myself every night for selling my Amazon stock. Big mistake. Huge.

Whoah

This is nothing short of astounding.

Not only does their book search return books that match the search terms you are looking for, but within most books you can search on the full text, and Amazon returns for you the page number and context of the search terms.

Incredible.

I've been playing around with this Amazon thing some more. For those of you who are Amazon-philes, as I am, you will know that Amazon had a feature called "Look Inside the Book," where you could view the cover, table of contents, and usually a short excerpt. For books with "Search Inside the Book," it seems they have the entire text online, retrievable when you get a search hit on that page.

Phrase searching does not work.

More updates as they develop.

Why read the book...

The Guardian, a decidedly British paper, has published their list of the Top 100 Greatest Novels of All Time.

I havent read most of these, so hopefully the boys down in Hollywood will get busy. I think I've seen more of them as movies than read as books. Oops.

The only question

Jewsweek has an article about Benjamin Blech's new book, If God Is Good, Why Is The World So Bad?.

Check the article above for Blech's introductory chapter, which explains the issue at hand; You may have also heard of another book that address the same issue: Harold Kushner's "When Bad Things Happen to Good People." I don't want to reiterate the argument, but suffice it to say, it is, as far as I can tell, the best argument for the non-existence of God (if that is what you are trying to prove) out there. No other argument is as cogent. And if you are sold on the existence of God, it is the most difficult question you will face in understanding the world you live in.

That being said, the response of both of these authors (Blech and Kushner) appears to be (I say appears, since I have not read Blech's book; yet) a re-rationalization of the ways of God. [Kushner is famous for his assertion that God is not all-powerful, that there are somethings that He can not do; hence Evil. As Blech says, this is an unacceptable answer as far as Judaism is concerned (I can not answer for other faiths, but the consequences of such an outlook are not encouraging). A simple perusal of the High Holiday liturgy is enough to convince even the most stalwart of objectors.]

I think taking a rational approach is misleading, and creates more problems than it solves.

The question presented is an existential one, the answers given rational: how does what I experience fit in with my rationalization of God. As long as this approach is taken, the explanation will never be compelling because it is simply that: an explanation. As Job retorts to his friends, you can explain all you want, but what I experience doesn't fit with your conceptualization.

My current approach to this is to understand the problem in existential terms. The Torah provides for us a picture of what life is like in God's Presence. The Torah (here I mean the five (5) books of Moses) is the story of Israel, from its conception by Avraham, to its culmination upon entering the Land of Israel. The Jews are the people who merit God's Presence among them, and their lives are different because of it. Life and Death have a different, enhanced meaning; suffering has a cause, a moral message, when God's Presence resides in the midst of your community.

How is the Divine Presence brought down into the midst of the people? Again, the Torah points us to our forefathers, Avraham, Yitzchak and Yaakov, as exmaples. The various concepts they represent (Chesed [kindness], Din [justice], Emet [truth]) are what it takes to bring God's Presence down to live with amongst a people. Jews believe that the concretization of this is the Torah, and the path towards implementing it is the Mitzvot (understood here to mean 'commandments', not 'good deeds').

So what happens when a society loses sight of these values, ostensibly by abandoning the Mitzvot? The Divine Presence withdraws, and all hell breaks loose. God hids His face from us, until we return to Him (check out the end of Devarim/Dueteronomy for an explication). When God's face is hidden, all the suffering, all the Good and the Bad, still happen, only this time, there is no moral message. No one is making sure the good people get the Good things, and the Bad people get the bad things; life loses its meaning. Which brings us back to where we are today.

I will admit that my answer is no less a rational explanation of how God and world work than Kushner's or (ostensibly) Blech's. But there is one difference, and that is how we move forward. We have to look at the world as a place that we can bring God's Presence into. We know the basic foundations we need: kindness, justice and truth. And we know the process for extrapolating a practical political system from those foundations: by living and learning Torah. Our response to the question is not an answer, but action. The world where bad things happen to bad people, and good to good, is our vision of the future, not our present situation.

Kushner presents a rational depiction of a God that fits with his experience. But his solution leaves us empty. Kushner's God provides no vision of the future, no potential existence worth striving for. It leaves us alone and helpless, uselessly praying to a deity that can not help us. This, I would suggest, is antithetical to Judaism. We believe there is a better world, and it is our job to build it, no matter how immense the task. The work may be great, but it is not our choice to refrain from the task.

Those are my current thoughts, albeit in a much abridged form. I'm hoping on exploring them further in future posts. I would love to hear any comments you might have, as this is a topic I spend much time thinking about. As I said, for me it's the only question.

Book-A-Minute

I love to read.

But let's face it; there are lots of great books at there, and who has the time?

That's why I read Book-A-Minute. They have everything from the Classics to Children's stories, all condensed down into a few short, easy-to-digest lines.

Take, for example, War and Peace. The real book is over 1000 pages long. Whoah, that would take me forever to get through. But thanks to Book-A-Minute, I'm done in no-time-at-all:

Leo Tolstoy
History controls everything we do, so there is no point in observing individual actions. Let's examine the individual actions of over 500 characters at great length.
THE END

See that? Easy as pie. I personally read over 75 books, just in the last two days!

It works for kids as well. Thanks to Book-A-Minute Bedtimes, I no longer have to suffer through 20-minute bedtime stories with my kids. Now, when my son asks to read Dr. Suess' Horton Hears a Who, I whip out my Books-A-Minute Bedtime Condensed Version, and he's asleep in minutes!

Horton
I hear voices on this clover.
Other Animals
Let's take the clover and step on it.
Dr. Seuss
Small people are people too.
(A SMALL person saves the day.)
THE END

Check out Book-A-Minute today, and you'll have plenty of free time to thank me later!