Back to Ethics

Judaism as a religion, as a nationality, as a culture and as a civilization has frequently been confronted by hurdles and challenges, by altercations and disputes, by threats and reactions. These have ranged from outright physical decimation to the amok pursuit of absolute modernity, from rigidity of rite to abandon of ritual, from moribund thinking to dilapidated acceptance or decrepit rejection of the new. In every age throughout the ages modernity has challenged Jewish leadership. It challenged Moses and Ezra and Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi. It presented hurdles before Maimonides and Buber and Heschel and Soloveitchik. Once, codification was the preferred solution – and it was followed at a later time by re-codification and by de-codification. When spiritualization was seized upon as opium for the masses, it was vehemently met from within by with catholicization. Enlightenment brought with it freedoms heretofore unknown to Jews, and the unknown brought forth denominationism, as Jews sought to redefine themselves yet again. And into the twentieth century there rushed Orthodox Jews and Conservative Jews, Reformed Jews and Reconstructed Jews, Secular Jews and Humanistic Jews and Atheistic Jews, a multiplicity of Hasidim and Haburot, Jews by Birth and Jews by Choice, Intermarried Jews and Intermarried non-Jews, all seeking – nay, demanding – a place, by right and not through charity, at the table of Jewish peoplehood.

Is this of essence a problem?

We have been an argumentative people ever since our inception. We are by definition stiff-necked. Our greatest religio-legal-philosophical work, and our most significant human contribution to humanity, the Talmud, is born and borne of argumentation. There has never been a single interpretation of Judaism. Elu VaElu Divrei Elokim Haim – These and These are the words of the Living God. A plethora of thoughts and opinions and ideas and views and judgments have historically been our strengths, not our weaknesses. Why then does it come as a very small surprise that at the outset of the twenty-first century there has arisen once again a desire for a New Big Jewish Idea?

I believe that despite the inherently positive cacophony that we observe around the Jewish table, we have not found yet a common language with which we can all address one another. In many ways denominationism has turned to demonization. Many in the Orthodox establishments, feeling ever threatened, have become more insular. Reform Judaism is extending a new embrace to traditions, creating puzzlement as to why it previously divested itself of them. Conversion is looked upon as a solution to the problem of Jewish Demographics, and is also looked upon as the problem of Jewish Demographics. Even Israel, once the great unifier of the Jewish Diaspora, too frequently is found in the role of dissembler of Jewish unity. There are too many around the Jewish table would gladly cancel another’s invitation.
None of this is new when viewing Judaism in an historical perspective. We will remain an argumentative people. The challenge is to reduce the level of acidity in the argument, to raise the level of respect within the row, to find the common in the conflict, and the familiar within the family.

Michael Steinhardt, in 2005 outlined a suggested solution to Jewish disunity with a proposal to create what he terms “Post-Denominational Common Judaism”. He rightly points out that the current denominationalism of Judaism has created fissures that appear unbridgeable, and thus a solution is a Judaism that is non-denominational. However, the question is how will this differ from Orthodox, Reform, Conservative or Reconstructionist Judaism? How will it not become yet another denomination?

Denominational Judaism is here to stay. So much time, thought, effort and tradition had been invested in each of Judaism’s denominations, that none of them are going anywhere. That is a given.

However, there is a common thread that runs across the entire Jewish peoplehood spectrum. It is widespread among Haredi Jews as it is among intermarried Jews. Orthodox Jews are as familiar with it as are Reform Jews, Conservative Jews and Reconstructionist Jews. It is prevalent among Secular Jews as it is among Hassidic Jews.

What is it?

It is Judaism’s basic commitment to ethics. To treating, judging, behaving toward one’s fellow man in an ethical, decent, charitable and righteous manner. It is the one singular universal concept that is the foundation for the normal functioning of a society –every society. And it is a Jewish idea – the one that makes us all partners in what Jewish philosophers from Maimonedes to Soloveitchik call Tikkun Olam, making the world a better place. It’s an ideal that unites us all, even though we may participate in an endless variety and sometimes even seemingly contrary ways. It’s an ideal that Jews as a people have brought to all of humanity - even to the peoples of the east, who at some stage in history matured separately and without connection to western development.

The Torah, as the foundation stone of Jewish civilization, is choc-full of ethical practices that form the basis of a properly functioning society. It taxes according to ability and distributes according to need. It defends the disadvantaged in the same manner as it protects the powerful. It demands justice as vehemently as it does righteousness. Tzedek Tzedek Tirdof and Ve’Ahavta LeRe’acha Kamocha are its mainstays.

These concepts are so familiar, so common, so universal that there is hardly a person walking the planet who is not aware of them. So what’s the big deal? The big deal is that they are concepts brought to the plaza of humanity by the Jewish people. And if we seek a Big Idea, a New Theme, a sense of commonality that all can identify with, that can be a bond between and among all Jews, that can reunite the unaffiliated with the community, it’s that we already have so much in common! The very ideas and ideals that are the basis of our society as we function today are already the ideas and ideals that we all have in common.

So, if this idea is already in everyone’s head and is already practiced universally, then – as in the famous Wendy’s commercial – “Where’s the Beef?” The answer is that the proverbial beef is missing. We all know how it tastes, we chew it and swallow it and enjoy it – but we don’t have an overt knowledge of where it comes from.

And here is where the common ethical ideal comes in.

It requires:

• The development of a mass-awareness program, one that permeates schools and universities, the written and electronic media and the internet, with analyses of current events and how the underlying ethical requirement in any given situation, suggests solutions that are indeed the ones chosen or those avoided, and explaining how those very ethical requirements that most Jews unknowingly and subconsciously hold as dear, have their origins in Jewish civilization.
  
• The development of curricula parallel to those already being taught, in Social Studies and Economics and Law and Medicine and Business Management, to teach and explain the ethical basis of the issues and their origins in Jewish civilization.

In this manner it can be made apparent to all that the very ideal and values that we all hold in common anyway, are in fact Jewish ideals and values, and thus the connection with Jewish heritage can be strengthened, the distant can be drawn closer on the basis of commonality and shared principles, and our peoplehood will be fortified as it faces the future reinvigorated.