Responsible Men

By: Jonathan Seidel

The Torah text does speak of a difference between natural and revelational man but it is even in revelational man that can be distinguished. 

The midrashim of Abraham’s youth seek to translate not only his early heroics but his prestige. How could Abraham be chosen? He wasn’t regarded explicitly as a righteous man. The midrashim add in the missing pieces. He quested for God unlike his predecessors. He yearned for the divine. He preached and preached. God eventually reciprocated with lech lecha. The medievalists sought to replicate the Abrahamic syllogism. The rabbinic lingo much more simplistic than the medievals complex factorisation. The logic imbued from the analytic formulation is highly complicated but it is a measure of truth. Abraham deduced the possibility that a deity resided beyond the sun and moon. Beyond the social reality. Yet he couldn’t comprehend the depth nor conceptualise. He figured it made the most sense but until the divine called he was preaching on faith. The greatness of Abraham is that his absolute faith precedes the calling. A necessary spark in a rabbinic world bereft of prophecy. One day God will call so too, God will return and the prophetic voice repopulated. 

This is a far cry from the intent of the medievals. They weren’t trying to produce a naturalised asset for religious thinking nor hope. The logical facet of religious possibility was to prove. Can the human mind comprehend the divine. While it was conceded in the negative they pushed the length of the theological enterprise. Redefining various biblical passages by science or mystical ideals. Each drew their own metaphysic by virtue of a rational or spiritual dictum. Depending on the cosmological view, God could intervene or not, God could know all or not. The inquires of the medievals was the latitude of theological discussion. Even those unrelenting in their anti-philosophical program provided their thoughts. Still, even if not theology about God himself, other aspects were debated concerning tradition and scientific plausibility. The task of rectifying the world and the divine text was the natural aspiration. Man can figure God by virtue of the scientific mind. Once gifted with the text he can probe the landmine of rational discourse with divine affinity. 

It would be hard pressed to call medievals natural men. While they naturalised much of religiosity it was only after reading through the traditional book. It was working backwards not starting from scratch. The difference is that while demythologising is a tactic for comprehension it does not enable the rational link to God absent tradition. Even Spinoza worked backwards. Maimonides prioritisation of the intellect worked insofar as he carried tradition with him. Maimonides did not use his intellect to find God and while he placed it at the forefront, like Abraham, absent prophecy he could only estimate the divine godhead. Moderns at times entered the scene with a more naturalist perspective with secularism being an environmental persona. The proposals of the modernists saw faith as a leap of acceptance. There was no proven logic but tradition in its simplicity. Unlike medievals, the modernists were caught in a secular bind only periodically able to distance and seek assistance. With tribal exclusion, the moderns were tapped into a dual identity. While this part is heavily more recent it does engender an interesting hypothesis into the scientific atypical perspective. For many, natural man is a steeped reality. It is not religion that is the first taste of identity but secular culture. 

The modern is a little more favourable to the Abrahamic experience only because the death of god and rejected proofs. Yet this is relevant to understanding the biblical narrative. The Torah clearly prioritises the revelational hold. Yet the entire biblical record is riddled with prophetic experience. That was the life of the biblical man. Prophecy and magic were aspects. Incarnations and incantations are mentioned even if adverse to the genuine divine truth. The onslaught of prophecy paves the way for a more mystical perspective. Maimonides undermined this but his perspective is imposing his own view not the one derived from the text. If the text is reclaimed it does provide a more mystical encounter. One that raises prophecy. It is important to stay away from modernist revisions of text under the light of existentialist philosophy. While there are at times similarities, a Sartrean or Heideggerean reading is a failed explanation that draws on similar themes. On its own terms, the Torah is a book of God seeking out man and imploring with wisdom. Advising him and guiding him. It is the most non-theological-theological book. A book about God’s journey rather than God himself. In this vein, natural man is but a far cry from the highly religious antiquity. 

It is partially unfair to even recommend a natural man of the bible with the exception of rabbinic Abraham. Jacob didn’t know God to that extent and Moses barely knew God but they knew other Gods. They weren’t atheists. They were either non-Hashem believers like Jethro or immature believers like Jacob. To take it further there is believing God and believing in God’s will. This is Buber’s famous 'believe that' versus 'believe in'. Believing that something exists versus believing in someone’s will. One can believe that something exists without putting any more interest in it. While believing in someone’s will is an interest to that person. While this is nice modernist trope it also doesn’t fit too well with the biblical record. There may be characters like Pharaoh and his magicians or other fearsome foes but this is an uncommon trope. Since for Pharaoh they accept God’s existence but they have a different deity they pray to. They believe in a different will. For Buber, belief that God existed and believing in his will were two different things. The idea of irreligious is akin to recognising that a God may exist but not concern oneself with the archaic rituals. The fact he exists is of little concern. The death of God contains also a disconnect with the traditional mould. By traditional standards heritage is important but not actually participating in any of it. 

Instead the common trope is the prophetic aspect grounded in divine agency. Whether in Abraham or Bilaam. Even the biblical wording is identical for their journeys. Eagerly heading out on the quest. Bilaam does expand his own capability and autonomy but he follows the word of God. He listens to God. He is a prophet. He was a wicked man but believed in God and followed his way. God came to Laban and he listened to him as well. Laban wasn’t Bilaam but still it is relevant to recognise that even non-Jewish actors followed the divine word. In this aspect prophets lived on both sides of aisle. Both received revelation and interpreted it for themselves or the masses. Private communions with God. There is a difference between Bilaam and Moses. Between Jacob and Sinai. Yet it is a spectrum. Prophecy is the word transmitted through the chosen agent. The receiver is imbued with the divine will. This is the heart of biblical cosmology. The false prophet is he who contradicts the divine will.  Revelation is constant but in accordance with certain terms. The prophetic world is one of mysticism. A place of preachers ridiculing the monarch and criticising the people. Revelation was profound but it was part of the ethos. Unique and overwhelming but an experience in the prophetic time period. 

The rabbinic world changed the paradigm. No more prophecy so they needed a new way. Yet unlike later generations they didn’t seek to naturalise too much. The Abraham stories are a nice touch but it their sequential narration that opposes the Kierkegaardian leap of faith. It isn’t just simple faith but consecutive ideas published together. The story of Abraham figuring God is part of an extended novella of his rise to stardom. Even so, the whole point of Abraham’s story is that his faith is absolute to the idol shop and the furnace. Him finding God is only the first step to lech lecha. He was chosen because he completed the trials and proved he was worthy. The rabbinic world absent prophecy relied on absolute faith. Extrapolating verses to cater to a new worldview. One that relied on personal ambition and commitment. This was most warmly represented in the halakha. Sermonic teachings were nice ways to catalogue the inquires but the core what the legal compilation. The fervent discussion of law. The dialogical illustration is baked with legal action and divine will. The basis of the halakha was not bland legal action but concretising valued ideals. Underlying the law with profound insights. It wasn’t stricture but vision. What Jesus did not see was the interconnected web of divine will.

The rabbinic version of revelational man was not revelational man of the Torah. For the Rav, there are two covenants: one of fate/Egypt and one of destiny/Sinai. One is born into the tribe and chooses the commandments. Though there is another version one found in the Gemara: the covenant of Sinai and the covenant of Purim. The former was coerced acceptance and the second was free acceptance. Megillah presents the coercive illustration (har gigit) but it also resembles the heteronomous obligation of the prophetic age. Sinai to the prophets. The prophets through the divine breath polemicised the people for their idolatry. Constantly berating their insolence and insubordination. It was only with transference to the men of great assembly that idolatry was overcome (though there is also an industrial-historical reason). Why is a Sage greater than a prophet because it was the Sages who rid idolatry not the prophets. Only by taking ownership. Only through victory at Purim could Jews overcome idolatry. The teachings of the Great Assembly were cautious in judgement, educate many students and make a fence around the Torah. An age of responsibility and exposure. The goal is not to hear but learn. To embody and identify with Torah.

The new model of revelational man, a world of rabbinic discourse not of prophecy. The fateful community of Sinai is not the destiny community of Purim. As the Sages pointed out if God will not call to man, man will call to God. The paradigm shift is the profoundly unique model of revelational man. Natural man is irreligious. Yet revelational man comes in two parts: the prophetic and the rabbinic. The heteronomous and the autonomous. The prophetic imposes and the rabbinic proposes. Revelational man becomes entrenched in the divine will through intense care to tradition. Revelational man is linked to tradition by his commitment to the cause. His commitment to expounding on the divine word is less about experience and more about knowledge. Meaning, it isn’t about the spiritual sensation but legal transformation. In proto-medieval fashion, uncovering the divine will via the hermeneutical vein is a step above the naturalised cultivation. Logic is used but it is at the heart of expounding the divine word. Drawing parallels and analogies to the truth. Divulging the divine will is about theory and practice. Not moments of elation but moments of embodiment. Lost in legal discussion is a mindful eternity in the traditional logos. A method of pondering the divine through his will rather than his direct word. 

This type of revelational man relies on tradition. For him, direct experience is not the goal. The goal is the backbone of tradition. The law is the bedrock of his foundation. The halakocentric model is a far more elated model. It doesn’t ring of overwhelming supernaturalism but it does presuppose a metaphysical art. The relation of law to will is reminiscent of the brisker methodology. Engulfed in the legalistic experience is a mystical oeuvre  of divine connection. The rabbinic revelation is about electrifying tradition. Oral teachings anthologise the history of tradition. It is the word of the human mouth rather than the divine mouth. Sages educated their students for them to continue the tradition. It was an enterprise of social connectivity. The law bound in the study halls and on the streets. The law was always a part of the Jewish mind. The biblical record is replete with laws but there is a stronger emphasis on wisdom on ideals than legislation. It is Jesus’ critique that ponders the law as order rather than wisdom. Yet for the rabbinic mind the law of the prophets was empowering but insufficient to route out the evil. The evil could only be overturned with a rigid spiderweb of demanded obedience. The experience of law is tradition of divine will embodied. The preoccupation only heightens the religious consciousness. Rabbinic revelational man is one of duty bound to history and to community. A man of the people with God. 

The entirety of the rabbinic experience need not become a metaphysically oriented brisker worldview but the personification of a theocratic based order overlaying the social partnership. Every facet of life is conditioned by the divine will. Every action is sacred by virtue of the divine emblem. It is religiously discussed and scholarly analysed but the result is an automatic divine seal. God’s trust in man’s pursuit of the purity of his will permits the final product. It isn’t necessarily about seeing a spiritually filled chair or seeing divinity in the soul of the chair but rather linking the chair to the halakhic program. It is a renewed sight. One that rectifies the entirety of existence under the halakhic limelight. This is not some law code this is the divine program. The social memory of the Jewish people and its commitment to one another. A bastion of observance handled by devoted participation. The difference between “naaseh venishma” and “kimu vekiblu” is the facilitation of Jewish observance. While the singular in unison is perceived as higher for the sake of prophecy, there is an equal elevating experience of a diverse group accepting the same authority. Not accepting it under the divine call but under the divine banner. Each to their own skill level and each to their own ability. 

The performance of the divine attitude differs graciously from its prophetic predecessor. The story of Purim tells of a man named Mordecai. Abraham was called the Ivri and Mordecai was called the Yehudi. Abraham was a foreigner and Mordecai a Judahite or merely a Jew. The rabbinic world was splintered into a single nationality the Jewish people. The Megillah mentions the title of the rabbinic Jews not the children of Israel who experienced prophecy. Israelites was the children of prophecy but Judahites were children of rabbinism. Hillel argues that people will do the right thing because the Jewish people are sons of prophets while R Yehoshua ben Levi says if the halakha is uncertain go see how the congregation acts. On the one hand there is a prophetic enlightenment and on the other hand there is a communal acceptance. Yet sons of prophets do not receive divine intervention. It is the post-prophetic tradition to which Hillel and R Yehoshua ben Levi approve. It is the world of communitarian validation. Revelational man is more revelational men. The rabbinic world was a community of halakha rather than a single or singular supernal experience. The world of the Sages is a congregational unity. A world of practice rather than providence. Revelation is about communal adherence not mystical rebuke. 

Between the prophetic and rabbinic world revelation was deciphered and approached differently. The prophetic world focused on the divine word while the rabbinic world focused on the divine will. Both exemplified the divine spirit. Yet it was the latter that embodied an autonomous responsibility and rabid dedication to heritage.