10+?
TIME TO STAND UP FOR LIBERALISM
John D. Rayner
four months since I last had the privilege of talking to you from this pulpit.
So I am a bit out of practice, and there is a lot of catching up to do. But on the
other hand, I have been living like a recluse, trying to finish the work on the new
prayerbook, and therefore paying less attention than usual to what has been
going on in the world, so that, if you were to ask me what I have been thinking
about of late, apart from liturgy, the honest answer would have to be: Not a lot.
Except perhaps that I have been vaguely conscious of a worrying tendency, more
or less everywhere in the world, and that is the still rising tide of
fundamentalism. So let that be our subject this morning.
What is fundamentalism? In the narrow sense it is simply another word for
scholasticism, that is, the belief that a particular body of scriptures or traditions is
divinely guaranteed to be true throughout, with the corollary that any contrary
view is ipsofacto false. In a broader sense, it is the militant assertion of any set of
beliefs - religious, political or otherwise — that are held on dogmatic grounds and
in defiance of reason.
In both senses, fundamentalism seems to be on the increase, or at least gaining
in self-confidence.
In the Arabic-speaking countries of North Africa and Asia, Muslim
fundamentalism, in so far as it is not actually in control, poses a constant threat to
political stability. And Salman Rushdie is still in hiding.
The Middle East peace process is still being opposed by fundamentalists on
both sides of the conflict. It is particularly shocking? and, to my mind, a terrible
indictment of Orthodox Judaism - that many of its leading rabbis both in Israel
and in the Diaspora have been, and continue to be, among the opponents.
In Central and Eastern Europe, Marxist fundamentalism is no longer in
command, but other fundamentalisms, of a nationalist kind, are fast flooding into
the vacuum.
In Britain, the Prime Minister‘s "back to basics" call, however commendable in
itself, has encouraged the re-asserfion of old certainties, both good and bad. Our
state schools are being required to give greater emphasis to Christianity, which
creates a serious quandary for non-Christians. The Bishop of Durham is retiring,
which may be good for the fabric of York Minister, but he is being succeeded by
a fundamentalistically inclined evangelical. Indeed, as the new curate of St.
John‘s Wood Church told me this week, the liberal wing of the Church of
England no longer has a powerful spokesman.
But what concerns us most directly is the resurgence of fundamentalism in
Anglo-Jewry, and of that I have recently had some eigperience which I would like
to tell you about.
Indirectly, it concerns the Chief Rabbi, Dr Jonathan Sacks, for whom, I must tell
you, I have a very high regard. Although, unlike David Goldberg, I can claim no
mishpochological connection with him, I have known him since his
undergraduate days in Cambridge, where he read the same subject as I did a
generation earlier, and we have always got on extremely well.
It is
LEO T‘tzflfitn
.
.
‘
J.“
1
“3,1.”
k.".15.rL-s.:ru)-".
Now Jonathan Sacks vehemently
disclaims being a fundamentalist. Certainly
the elegance and sophistication of a very British
he speaks and writes with all
university professor. But it is a fact that he rejects Bible criticism, not indeed as
wrong but as irrelevant. It is a fact that he has much sympathy with right-wing
Orthodoxy, including the Lubavitcher movement. It is a fact that he denies the
legitimacy of any kind of Judaism other than Orthodoxy, for he has said so quite
plainly in his books. And it is a fact that he authorises his Beth Din to send out
letters telling people that if they marry in a non-Orthodox synagogue their
marriage will not be valid. Perhaps, therefore, it would not be too unfair to say
of him: The voice is the voice of a liberal, but the hands are the hands of a
fundamentalist.
His current project - brilliantly conceived and expounded, as all his projects are
- is called "Jewish Continuity“. It amounts to an unprecedented effort in the field
of Jewish education of every kind, with a multi-million-pound annual budget, in
the hope of stemming and reversing the demographic decline of Anglo-Jewry. In
principle it is wholly to be applauded, especially as it is intended to benefit all
sections of the Community. But there are one or two problems about it. One is
that so far all attempts to ensure that the Progressive community is consulted in
the shaping of the project have failed.
The other problem relates to the man who has been put in charge of the project
as Chairman of the supervisory committee, Dr Michael Sinclair. Now I must
hasten to add that he is one of the nicest people I have ever met: sincere,
intelligent, courteous, friendly, charming, and as generous as he is wealthy. But
he is also one of those "born-again" Orthodox Jews totally brainwashed by the
Lubavitcher movement, as I have found out in the course of several
conversations and a long correspondence with him.
We talked about various laws, upheld by Orthodoxy, which seem unreasonable
or unjust. He agreed that there were difficulties, things he didn't fully
understand. But, he added mysteriously, soon everything will be made clear.
And when I pressed him, he confirmed what I suspected. Soon, he believes, the
Messiah, in the person of nearly-ninety-two—year-old Rabbi Menachem Mendel
Schneerson of New York ("), will reveal himself and resolve all our perplexities.
At one point in our discussion I asked Dr Sinclair whether he really believed in
the rebuilding of the Temple and the restoration of the sacrificial cult. He did.
And when I asked him what advice he had for those of us who don't share that
belief and therefore can't with integrity recite the traditional prayers to that
effect, and whether he didn't agree that therefore we had no choice but to revise
the liturgy, he didn't answer my question. Instead, he told me something very
interesting.
Although, he said, the idea of slaughtering animals as a form of worship seems
repulsive to us, we can't imagine how we shall feel about it when it actually
happens. Why? Because in a rebuilt Temple the laws of physics will not apply,
and therefore everything will be different from normal experience.
And how do we know that in the rebuilt Temple the laws of physics will not
apply? Simple! Because the Mishnaic tractate Avot, otherwise known as "The
Ethics of the Fathers", tells us that in the ancient Temple ten miracles occurred,
and one of them was this, that no matter how crowded it got - even when the
worshippers were packed together like sardines - there was always ample room
for them to prostrate themselves (5:5). QED.
Such is the mentality of fundamentalists. They read the ancient texts with
dead-pan seriousness; without a critical sense, without a historical sense, without
a sense of humour, without recognising mythology when it stares them in the
face.
that line. Some stop short of giving that
kind of credence to the aggadic, or narrative, parts of the Talmud. But even they
ascribe complete authority to the halachjc, or legislative, parts. And some of the
key passages on which they base themselves occur in today‘s Torah portion.
There is a covenant ceremony, sealed by the sprinkling of sacrificial blood both
on the altar, representing God, and on the people; Between the two sprinklings
the people make a solemn pledge to observe God's law, saying
mm, "We
will do and obey“ (Ex. 24:7). And what does God's law comprise? The chapter
continues with a phrase which, as interpreted by the Rabbis, reads as follows:
on the mountain, and I will give you the
God says to Moses, Come up to
that is, the Ten Commandments, the Torah - that is, the
tablets of stone
Pentateuch, the commandment - that is, the Mishnah, which I have written -‘ that
refers to the Prophets and Hagiographa, that you may teach them - a reference to
the Talmud (Ber. 5a).
80, at one stroke, the entire literature, biblical and rabbinic, is declared
sacrosanct, and any Jew who deviates from its legislation, violates the pledge of
loyalty given by our ancestors at Mount Sinai. That is what Orthodox Judaism is,
and it therefore involves upholding all kinds of laws which are both antiquated
and unjust and therefore, in our view, cannot be divine. Among other things, it
involves maintaining the hope for the restoration of the sacrificial cult — in spite of
the fact that, as we have heard in our Haftarah, already the Prophets questioned
Of course, not all Orthodox Jews take
mm
Me
its
value and doubted whether
God ever intended it.
But to come back to Dr. Michael Sinclair: I don‘t know to what extent his
personal fundamentalism will influence the educational programmes to be
carried out under his chairmanship. Maybe very little or not at all. Nevertheless
there is, I think, a real danger, unless we are very careful, that under the guise of
all sorts of worthy and self-commending schemes, Lubavitcher medievalism will
infiltrate increasingly into Anglo-Jewish life, and more and more of our
members, especially our young people, will become exposed to its
indoctrination.
I believe, therefore, that the time has come for those of us who are liberal - with
a small "1", that is, the Liberal, Reform and Masorti movements, as well as Jewish
academics and secularists — to assert ourselves a great deal more vigorously than
we have done in recent years.
But there are two provisos. The first is that we must do it respectfully. For
however strongly we disagree with Orthodoxy, we regard it as a legitimate
expression of Judaism, and we don't want to stir up communal strife. But we
must not therefore allow ourselves to be intimidated into silence. Somehow, we
must find a way of being both forthright and polite.
And the second proviso is that we must do it humbly. For however sound our
theory may be, our performance is not that wonderful. Where, in our section of
the community, are the Michael Sinclairs? Where are the business tycoons who
are prepared to devote endless time to the study of Talmud and to give huge
proportions of their personal wealth to Jewish religious causes? If we had had
just half a dozen Michael Sinclairs in our Movement in the last ninety years,
Liberal Judaism would surely be by now the norm in Anglo-Jewry.
And so, however much we may deplore fundamentalism, we must take our
hats off - if that is the appropriate metaphor - to its devotees for their zeal. And
only when we match their zeal will we be entitled to claim that our contribution
to Jewish continuity is as great as theirs.
’
Liberal Jewish
Synagogue
Shabbat Mishpatim
5th February 1994
M
This identification of the Messiah with Rabbi Schneerson was based on a
mistaken assumption; as Dr Sinclair has since pointed out, it is
the view he
(*)
holds.