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Incompatible Parallels: Soloveitchik and Berkovits on Religious

Experience, Commandment and the Dimension of History

Jonathan Cohen

Modern Judaism, Volume 28, Number 2, May 2008, pp. 173-203 (Article)

Published by Oxford University Press

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Jonathan Cohen

INCOMPATIBLE PARALLELS:SOLOVEITCHIK AND BERKOVITS ON

RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE, COMMANDMENT AND THE DIMENSION OF HISTORY

INTRODUCTION

I believe it can be said that Joseph B. Soloveitchik and EliezerBerkovits were the premier intellectual leaders of modern Orthodoxyin the United States in the late twentieth century. Both benefited froman extensive Torah education, were mentored and inspired by greatEastern European rabbinic figures, and then went on to pursuedoctorates in philosophy at the University of Berlin in the earlythirties. Eventually, both immigrated to the United States, where each

took up a position of spiritual leadership in their respective com-munities (Soloveitchik in Boston and New York and Berkovits inChicago), achieving broad recognition as theologians and Judaicscholars. While Soloveitchik was doubtless the more renowned andrepresentative figure, and was regarded as the most authoritativeleader of American modern Orthodoxy, Berkovits also established awidespread reputation as an original thinker and as an Orthodoxcritic from within. Towards the end of his career, Berkovits madehis home in Israel, where he continued to publish important works in

Jewish law and theology.1In a discussion with a friend some thirty years ago I remember

saying that R. Soloveitchik had not, in my view, internalized modernhistorical consciousness and its implications for contemporary Jewishself-understanding. I contended at the time that the massive influenceof historical context on the development of Jewish belief and practiceseemed to have had no impact on R. Soloveitchiks theology. Histhought seemed to me to be cast in a matrix of timeless typologies thatallowed no significant place for the historical dimension in theological

or halachic discourse. My friend could not countenance the possibilitythat there was a serious intellectual challenge that R. Soloveitchik hadnot thought through, and intimated that I probably had not lookeddeeply enough.

doi:10.1093/mj/kjn002Advance Access publication April 3, 2008

The Author 2008. Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For permissions,please e-mail: [email protected].

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Some years after this, Prof. Michael Rosenak, my teacher andmentor, said to me, almost in passing, that in his view Eliezer Berkovitswas the only Orthodox thinker who took history seriously. This

sounded accurate to me at the time. In the very same issue of Traditionwhere Soloveitchiks famous essay The Lonely Man of Faith originallyappeared (Summer, 1965), immediately following, there also appearedan important essay by Berkovits called Orthodox Judaism in a World ofRevolutionary Transformations.2 While Soloveitchik, in The LonelyMan of Faith, placed emphasis on the trans-historical character ofprimordial religious experience (as crystallized in Jewish halachicpractice), and cautioned the community against being swept away bythe modern ethos, (although he considered certain elements of the

modern project to be legitimate and even charged with religious value)Berkovits cautioned Jewry against complacency in the face of theprofound changes that modernity had brought in its train, changes thatcould not but affect the very substance of Jewish thought and practice.For Soloveitchik, nothing seemed to be essentially wrong with thehalachah as such, while Berkovits wrote of the halachah as subsisting in astate of Galut from which it had to be redeemed.3 While Soloveitchikwrote, in Kol Dodi Dofek,4 that suffering could not be explainedwithin the framework of a metaphysical teleology, and that the proper

Jewish response to the problem of theodicy was to look to ones deeds,Berkovits, in his book Faith After the Holocaust,5 took up preciselythis task, namely: the attempt to integrate the Holocaust within ateleological philosophy of history.

In the time that has passed since I first became concerned withthese issues, the problem of the interaction between Orthodoxy andhistoricity has not diminished in importance. Since then, however,Soloveitchiks early essay The Halakhic Mind6 has been published,giving evidence that he did indeed think through the issue of histo-

ricity and religion quite seriously. Soloveitchiks orientation to therelationship between religious experience, halachic practice and thequestion of history could no longer be written off as mere dogmatism.Positions merely asserted in The Lonely Man of Faith and otheressays were found to be theoretically grounded in The Halakhic Mind.

Interestingly, this essay, while written in 1944, was only publishedin 1986, when the Rav was nearing the end of his active career.We might never really know the reason why he chose to release thisessay so late in life. Perhaps he thought that some of the more

abstruse discussions of twentieth century developments in mathe-matics, physics, and philosophy contained in it would not be accessibleeven to the most educated of his readers. It could also be thatSoloveitchik, like Maimonides in his time, was wary of the implicationsthat might be drawn from some of the views expressed in the essay.

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Perhaps as he grew older he felt that, whatever the risks, his legacyshould include an explicit theoretical grounding of his lifelong project,namely: the articulation, by way of concepts drawn from philosophic

discourse, of what appeared to him to be certain fundamentalreligious impulses underlying the halachic system.

Whatever the case, it will be our contention that a careful readingof The Halakhic Mind reveals R. Soloveitchiks perspective on religioussubjectivity, revelation, commandment, and history to be highly origi-nal and not easily classifiable as orthodox in the conventional sense.From a systematic point of view, however, it is precisely Soloveitchiksmost original understanding of the foundations of Jewish religiousexperience and practice that precludes an evolutionary or linear-

historical approach to halachic development.Some of Eliezer Berkovits early theological writings are now

becoming the focus of a renewed interest.7 Although Berkovitsprofessed what could be termed a more progressive approach tohalachic development,8 his understanding of religious experience,revelation, and commandment seems to be much closer to that ofclassical Orthodoxy. Precisely because of that, however (and perhapssurprisingly for some readers), within the framework of his approach,the halachah becomes much more susceptible to the impact of

historical developments.In this essay, we will restrict ourselves to an analysis of some of the

major theological writings of Soloveitchik and Berkovits, and not makeany claims as to the continuity or discontinuity obtaining betweentheir theological and halachic writings.9 As we know from researchconducted by others, the actual halachic dispensations of activerabbinic figures do not always reflect the spirit or even the letter oftheir theological reflections.10 All we permit ourselves to say is thatSoloveitchiks theology, while remarkably innovative qua theology,

introduces an ideational framework that is most congenial to whatmight be called halachic perennialism, while Berkovits theology,though perhaps more traditional (although not exclusively so) containselements that have the potential to beget a more dynamic approach.

SOLOVEITCHIK ON RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE, RELIGIOUS FORMS,AND HISTORY

Soloveitchiks The Halakhic Mind provides the reader with a mostsystematic account of the relationship between religious experience,religious forms and the dimension of history. At the outset, it shouldbe remarked that The Halakhic Mind is written from a decidedlyanthropocentric perspective, wherein religion is portrayed as a species

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of human consciousness and activity, comparable in certain respects toethics and aesthetics.11 According to Soloveitchik, all these realmsmust be approached by way of a cognitive method appropriate to

the human sciences, as distinguished from the natural sciences.Following Dilthey, Soloveitchik differentiates between a hermeneuticsof explanation, proper to the natural sciences, and a hermeneuticsof understanding, proper to the human sciences.12 A hermeneutics ofexplanation purports to give a genetic, causal account of empiricalphenomena in the external world, phenomena that do not derive fromthe human spirit. The category of cause and effect is employed incharacterizing the antecedentconsequent relations between physicalevents taking place outside of human consciousness. The cause and

effect continuum is conceived as subsisting within a dimension ofquantified, linear time. Time is understood either, in the Aristoteliansense, as the measure of motion and therefore as derivative fromphysical motion, or, in the Newtonian sense, as a void (like space),forming the background wherein the drama of the interactivemotion of matter takes place. In either case, time is seen to be asystem of reference, related in some way to physical change in theempirical world.

In the human sciences, on the other hand, the subject matter

consists of works or actions conceived to have their origin in thehuman spirit. The phenomena that are the proper concern of thehumanities have their own species and vector of motion. Insteadof moving only within the spatio-temporal realm from causes toeffects, they move from the internalspiritual realm outwards tothe spatiotemporal realm. In addition, they often reflect a time-consciousness very different from the one assumed by the scientist inhis quest to bring quantitative order to the welter of qualitative data athis disposal. Internal time-consciousness is not experienced as con-

stituted by atomic moments, separated from each other such that itcan later be said that one influences the other. Neither is suchexperience divided into discrete historical periods, the differencesbetween which are considered to be constitutive and more importantthan any continuity that may obtain between them. The internal senseof time can sometimes be characterized in terms of Bergsons under-standing of duration, wherein time is experienced as an essentialcontinuity and flow.13 Past, present and future can sometimeseven be sensed as contemporaneous. Within that continuity and flow

qualities, rather than quantities, can often be perceived andarticulated.14 When this happens, time takes on an almost tangible,rather than analytic quality. In the world of religious experience, weknow of cases whereby the sacred time wherein a certain event takesplace is part of the substance of that very event. When externalized

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in the spatiotemporal realm, this phenomenon becomes accessibleby way of the religious calendar, when the time of a given com-memoration is part and parcel of its experiential quality (the time of

repentance and forgiveness, or the time of anticipation of theredemption).

What course, then, does this motion from the internal to theexternal follow? At this point, let us listen to R. Soloveitchiks ownwords, and then analyze them closely (emphases mine):15

. . . there is a process of objectification, however imperfect, in the realmof inwardness. Thus, ethical subjectivity is converted into proposi-tions, norms, values, etc., which are nothing but objectified correlatesof an elusive subjective stream. In the aesthetic sphere, subjectivity finds

expression either in the discipline of aesthetics or in works of art.Both are objectified aspects of ephemeral subjectivity. Religion, which is perhaps more deeply rooted in subjectivity than any other manifestation ofthe spirit, is also reflected in externalized phenomena which are evolvedin the objectification process of the religious consciousness. The aggregateof objective religious constructs is comprised of ethico-religiousnorms, ritual, dogmas, theoretical postulates, etc.

Already at this point, certain features of Soloveitchiks account ofreligious experience and externalization are surprising from a conven-tionally orthodox point of view. First of all, religion is dealt with as amanifestation of the spirit in much the same fashion as ethics andaesthetics. On the one hand, Soloveitchik is hard at work, both in The Halakhic Mind and other essays, to emphasize the uniqueness of thereligious dimension and its irreducibility to other realms of humanconsciousness and activity.16 He insists that religious phenomena notbe explained by reducing them to functions of historical, political orsociological developments. He also insists that religion differs fromethics in featuring cult and ritual and not remaining content with

ethos. Yet, when he compares religion to ethics and aesthetics inthis context, he finds a structural similarity in the way these spiritualpursuits originate and then externalize themselves. With regard toethics and aesthetics, at least, religion is not regarded as beingpossessed of an extraterritorial status, calling for an exclusivemethodology of interpretation not relevant to other forms of spiritualexpression.

Secondly, the process of objectification, whether in ethics,aesthetics or religion is imperfect. The constructs (!) of institutiona-

lized religion only imperfectly reflect the subjective, experiential basefrom which they are derived. No religious system, then, is a perfectreflection of the interaction between the human and the divine, whichis elusive and ephemeral and takes place in the deepest and leastaccessible recesses of human subjectivity. Here, too, religion is


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different from ethics and aesthetics not in essence, but in degree.Religion is more deeply rooted in subjectivity than ethics andaesthetics, but does not operate with an entirely different set

of rules. Further on, Soloveitchik will also say that the halachah of Judaism is a species of the religious externalization processnotessentially to be distinguished from the overall religious gesture, akind of religion, only more so: Objectification reaches its highestexpression in the Halachah. Halachah is the act if seizing thesubjective flow and converting it into enduring and tangiblemagnitudes.17

Finally, objectification is a process that evolves. Now it is clearthat Soloveitchik does not mean by process and evolution what is

conventionally described as historical development. On the con-trary, Soloveitchik explicitly distances himself from the conception ofdevelopment usually assumed in historical studies, whereby the histo-rical and cultural context, embedded in the coordinates of space andtime, decidedly determines the character of the phenomena underinvestigation. Still, even from the perspective of an organic-continuousrather than atomistic-causal conception of time, it would appear that,for Soloveitchik, there is a passage of time wherein the apparatus ofinstitutional religion unfolds and crystallizes. It is not dropped

from heaven in one fell swoop.Let us now consider two more passages from The Halakhic

Mind, wherein the transition from subjectivity to objectivity isdescribed in more detail. First, the following (again, emphasesmine):18

To illustrate, we may analyze the triad in the Godman relation:first, the subjective, private finitude-infinity tension; second, theobjective normative outlook; and third, the full concrete realizationin external and psychophysical acts. A subjective Godman relation

implies various contradictory states. These are wrath and love,remoteness and immanence, repulsion and fascination (on the partof divinity), tremor and serenity, depression and rapture, flight andreturn (on the part of man), etc. This subjective attitude in man is inturn reflected either in the form of logico-cognitive judgments or inethico-religious norms, e.g., God exists; He is omniscient; He isomnipresent; He is omnipotent; He is merciful; He is vengeful; He isthe Creator, etc. You shall love God; you shall fear Him; you shallworship Him; you shall love your fellowman, etc. These judgmentsand norms lying in the immediate proximity of the psychophysical

threshold tend to externalize themselves. They find their concreteexpression in articles of faith, in prayers, in physical acts of worship,and in other practices and observances, all of which lie in theexternal world. Ostensibly, religion, though flowing in the deepestsubliminal ego-strata, is an eternal quest for spatialization andcorporeal manifestation.

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If we look closely at the beginning of the passage, we see that onceagain Soloveitchik places the fundamental religious experience, theencounter between the divine and the human, or revelation, in the

private, subjective sphere. It is not placed in the external world as adiscrete historical event. This internal realm is a sphere of inchoateand indeterminate flow. It is a stratum that is characterized bycontradictions and paradoxes. First and foremost, the encounter isdescribed as a finitude-infinity tension. Soloveitchik, however, is notspeaking only of a formal, logical contradiction. The encounter hedescribes is personal and relational, begetting contradictory emotionsin both God and the human being. Most importantly, the experienceis located in man. God is experienced within as approaching and

withdrawing, approving and rejecting, etc. No doubt, for Soloveitchikthe man of faith, this encounter is not regarded as a mere subjec-tive illusion. Certainly, Soloveitchik is sincere in bearing witness to anactual encounter, however mysterious, between the eternal, transcen-dent God and the God-thirsty soul19 of the human being. This pri-mordial encounter, however, does not take place in the full light ofday. It rather takes place within the human soul. It is then translatedfrom the realm of the indeterminate, inchoate and paradoxical to thecoherent, determinate and realizable as it passes through a human prism.

The objectification process takes place in the religious consciousnessand not beyond it. Only in the realm of the most subjective recesses isGod described as having a role in the encounter (on the part ofdivinity, on the part of man, etc.). Logico-cognitive judgments orethico-moral norms are a reflection of a subjective attitude inman. These judgements and norms are then described as havingan inherent drive to externalization. This drive, for Soloveitchik, hereas elsewhere, is the sign of a mature and responsible religiosity20

that does not remain content with the inner experience but seeks to

give it form and stability within the external coordinates of space andtime. Nowhere, however, is God described as taking an active, director exclusive role in specifying even the overall articles of faith ormoral maxims of Judaism, not to mention the details of halachicpractice.

Yet, this is only part of the story. If we were to base ourselves onthe above passages alone, the implication might be drawn that thehuman being should strive to place him/herself in a position of directencounter with God, and this at the level of private subjectivity.

Theology, ethics, and ritual would then be regarded as mere,idiosyncratic reflections of a particular encounter, while eachperson would be called upon to recreate the encounter in the recessesof his/her individual soul. Nothing could be further fromSoloveitchiks purposes. Soloveitchik repeatedly and expressly rejects


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any attempt to intuit a pure spirituality as distinct from the articlesof faith, ethical maxims and concrete spatio-temporal manifestationsthat reflect it. According to Soloveitchik, inward spirituality is

accessible only by way of its external manifestations.21

In justifying this claim, Soloveitchik has recourse to two bases ofargument: one cognitive and one ethical. From a cognitive point ofview, he describes subjective inwardness as mysterious, clan-destine, enigmatic, and unfathomable. In this sense, subjectivityis comparable, for Soloveitchik, to the Aristotelian concept ofmatter.22 Matter was postulated by Aristotle as the formless substratethat is the carrier of all the forms. Yet pure matter can never beexperienced or known, for it always comes to us within the matrix

of form. Similarly, religious subjectivity is unavailable to us in itspure state. Even if we think we have succeeded in articulating thestructure of an inner experience, that articulation must itself beregarded (if only by virtue of its linguistic character), as a surfacephenomenon, a kind of form in its own right.23 Further penetrationis always called for, and the process of reconstructing the subjectiveexperience that gave birth to the principles, maxims or practices ofa given religion is endless. This is true even if we begin the recon-struction process from a phenomenological analysis of objective

religious forms. A fortiori, any jumps into subjectivity that disregardthe actual psycho-physical forms that embodied human beings havegenerated in order to give expression to inner religious states andconflicts must miss the mark. While the motivation for some such

jumps may have been salutary, namely the need to protect theparticularity of religious experience from reductions to ethics,psychology or sociology, they eventually lead to a kind of pietism ormysticism devoid of any rational corrective.

In addition, writes Soloveitchik, pure religious subjectivismof

the kind valorized by Schleiermacher and Kierkegaard24

turns the reli-gious persons attention away from ethical questions that are part andparcel of the religious domain itselfsuch as: What must I do in mydaily life in order to live in a way that is acceptable to God? There is aretreat from practical decision making and the implementation ofnorms to the realm of inwardness, leading to a kind of spiritual self-preoccupation. While it is true for Soloveitchik that the primordialencounter with God is buried in the recesses of subjectivity, it shouldnot be arrested there, thereby degenerating into a kind of religious

sentimentalism and extravagant individualism. The religious impulseis universal, and must be made equally accessible to all persons inthe public realm. Further, when religion is separated from thesocial, communal and normative dimensions, the result is not merely

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spiritual elitism. A religious inwardness that alienates itself fromethical authority, moral awareness and the gesture of uncondi-tioned obedience to collective norms can become corrupted, and even

barbaric.25

Having come this far, a most important question presents itself:who is the subject that is the carrier of religious subjectivity?Whose consciousness is the fountainhead of entire religious systemscreeds, maxims and commandments? Four alternatives come to mind:(1) great religious personalities, (2) a kind of Kantian (or Husserlian)universal transcendental ego (3) the collective subjectivity of a givengroupsuch as the Jewish people or (4) the mind of God Himself. Twoof these possibilities can be discounted immediately, based on remarks

made by Soloveitchik in this text and elsewhere. For Soloveitchik, aswe have seen, the religious phenomenon is exoteric, and demo-cratic to its very core.26 No single human consciousness, not eventhat of figures such as Moses or Rabbi Akiva, should be regarded asthe creative source of the Judaic religious system, or of any religioussystem. A universal, transcendental ego also does not seem to be anoption, at least as far as Judaism is concerned.27 True, certainoverarching features of religious experience, as testified to by peopleof different faiths (fascination and repulsion, self-worth and self-

abnegation, etc.) and as articulated by the likes of Rudolf Otto,28

wereseen by him to lie at the root of universal religious gestures, suchas prayer and ritual. Yet Soloveitchik seems to be most earnestlysearching for the subjective roots of the particularities of the Jewishreligion, the most mature religion whose ramified objectificationsprovide a counterweight to the corruptions attendant upon religiousanarchism.

Now, it might be expected that for an Orthodox Jewish thinkerlike Soloveitchik the origin of creative religious subjectivity would be

located in the consciousness of God. It would then be He who, inHis encounter with Israel, externalizes, from the recesses of Hisconsciousness, the various religious forms that the Jewish people arecalled upon to realize in their individual and collective lives. Sucha view, although still subjectivistic, and not historical-empirical,could nonetheless be regarded as a species of classical Orthodoxy,namely a view that sees God as the explicit source of the explicit formsof Judaism. Yet, surprisingly, nothing either in the tone or the contentof The Halakhic Mind would seem to support such a view. First of all,

as we mentioned, the text of The Halakhic Mind refers to religionthroughout as a human phenomenon, albeit the fruit of a genuine,inner encounter between the divine spirit and the human spirit. Evenpassages that would seem to present religion as the creation and


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dispensation of divinity, ultimately refer back to human subjectivity.Let us examine one such passage: At the end of Part Three of The Halakhic Mind, Soloveitchik writes as follows:29

The objective religious order is identical with the psycho-physicalreligious act in which the living historical religious consciousness comes toexpression. Just as the most concrete expression of art is to be foundin books, paintings, etc., so are the most reliable sources of religiousobjective constructs to be found in religious literature containingnorms, dogmas, postulates, etc. The canonized Scriptures serve as themost reliable standard of reference for objectivity. Through themethod of reconstruction, Gods word, the letter of the scriptures,becomes an inner word, a certainty, insight, confession of the God-thirsty soul. Deus dixit is the only objective source of all apocalyptic

religion.

If we were to isolate the last sentence of this most remarkablepassage from its context, we would have before us a statement typicalof classical Orthodoxy. We could then plausibly interpret it as follows:we should not seek the source of apocalyptic religion (namely, thatreligion that holds out redemptive promises to a historical peoplebased on a living revelatory encounter) in finite, subjective humancreations but rather in the objective, absolute word of God. Oncethe sentence is read in the context of the paragraph as a whole (and ofthe text of The Halakhic Mind as a whole), however, its meaningchanges most significantly. True, the canonized scriptures are themost reliable standard of reference for (religious) objectivity. Yet weknow from all that we have gleaned from The Halakhic Mind thus farthat, for Soloveitchik, the ultimate source of the religious phenom-enon lies in the realm of subjectivity, not objectivity. Admittedly, aswe have seen, Soloveitchik insists that the pathway to subjectivitymust begin with objective religious phenomena, and like many other

modern students of religion, he encourages us to seek the sourcesof religiosity in the forms of lived religions.30 He also describesthe canonized scriptures (a historical-communal phenomenon) asGods word. But we have seen that for Soloveitchik anything that isarticulated as a word, a text, or a canonized work is ultimatelyderivative, since the actual encounter with God is inchoate, paradox-ical and ultimately inexpressible. Through reconstruction we workback from those texts that have been objectified by the canonizingcommunity as the word of Godto the subjective encounter with God

that takes place in the recesses of the God-thirsty soul. Soloveitchikcertainly trusts the Judaic tradition of canonization and interpretationas the most reliable source of religious objectivity that he knows.

Yet the event of revelation, that actual encounter between Godand the God-thirsty soul, does not take place in the text, or in

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the commandment, or in spatio-temporal history, but rather in thesubjective consciousness that externalized it.

By process of elimination, but not only by process of elimination,

we are left with a fourth possibility for the characterization of thesubjective consciousness that is the source and carrier of significantreligious forms for Soloveitchik. In the above paragraph, this source isdescribed as the living historical religious consciousness. From herewe know that we are speaking of a consciousness located withintemporality, yet one that has experienced what Soloveitchik calls theintrusion of eternity upon temporality. Earlier in The Halakhic Mind,he writes, Revealed religion rests upon the idea of a charismatic socialego that is the living incarnation of the faith.31 The subject, then, of

Soloveitchiks religious subjectivity is what could be called (and iscalled by Soloveitchik elsewhere) Knesset Yisrael32the charismaticsocial ego of the Jewish people.

To understand this point, it might be helpful if we examine onceagain what Soloveitchik has taken from Dilthey and what he has omittedor consciously changed. Dilthey, it will be remembered, wished todistinguish between the methodology of the natural sciences and amethodology, not less scientific, but more appropriate to the analysisof works of the human spirit. He proposed that the understanding of

works of the spirit, as opposed to the explanation of the lawfulrelations obtaining between physical phenomena, proceed by an analysisof human externalizations to a recapitulation of the inner creativeprocess that gave birth to them. By way of historical-philological analysis,the researcher was to move from the linguistic and historical context ofthe work to the individual subjectivity of the creative artist. It wouldappear that Soloveitchik, in order to distinguish between the study ofreligion, and certain other forms of scientific investigation, appropriatedDiltheys method of reconstruction, namely a pathway wherein the

external objectified phenomenon is understood such that itmight provide clues to the internal creativity by way of which it cameinto being. Yet Soloveitchik was not primarily concerned with uncover-ing the clandestine egos of great religious individuals.33 Nor was heconcerned with locating the creative process of those individualswithin a historical context which would then be traversed in an actof interpretive empathy.34 As will be remembered, as far as religioussubjectivity is concerned, time is often experienced as continuous andsimultaneous. It is not necessary first to isolate a particular religious

consciousness in a particular time and place in its radical uniqueness andspecificity, only then to overcome this distance by a leap of universalhuman empathy. The individual and the universal are not the onlycategories we have at our disposal. It is within particular religiouscommunities that we find, ready-to-hand, a legitimate and distinct


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experience of temporal continuity and contemporaneity, enablingindividuals to link up with their collective past with immediacywithoutthe need to pass through what Ravidovicz has called alienation and

Ricoeur has called distanciation.35

At the conclusion of our analysis, it would appear that we havecome upon a somewhat paradoxical situation. Soloveitchik, perhapsthe representative figure of modern Orthodoxy, would seem to haveborne witness to a kind of religious experience that cannot readily beexpressed within the rubric of conventional Orthodox narratives.

Yet the very substance of his unconventional testimony regardingthe fundament of religious experience would seem to provide thetheoretical grounding for a most conservative orientation to Halachic

development. How so? On the one hand, it is clear from the aboveanalysis that the category of Mitzvah, an ethico-religious norm, alreadyobjectified out of the inner experience of religious encounter, thentranslated into a psycho-physical practice, is ultimately a derivative,and not a primary religious category. There is nothing in The HalakhicMind that might reinforce the classic Orthodox belief that thedetails of the Mitzvot were revealed to Israel at Sinai in broad daylightin an historical-empirical encounter. Something very different wouldappear to be the case. The Bible, which is the canonized Scripture

of the charismatic social ego known as Knesset Yisrael, tells thestory of Sinai in such a fashion that it provides a window into a verydiscrete and private religious experience whereby the people felt bothoverwhelmed and supported, where they sensed themselves as goingup and God as coming down. Biblical metaphors and narrativesconvey the sense of a covenantal, mutual self-revelation, as articu-lated so beautifully in The Lonely Man of Faith.36 The Bible, with itsnarratives and laws, including the narrative of revelation, is an objectivecorrelate of the collective religious subjectivity of the Jewish

people. This trans-historical, trans-geographical religious conscious-ness, wherein God has been encountered, and is still encountered, iswhat is religiously primary for Soloveitchik.

So much for Soloveitchiks heterodoxy. Still, it would seem thattwo components of Soloveitchiks understanding of Jewish religiosityplace a kind of systematic limitation on halachic innovation. First, aswe have seen, Soloveitchik depicts the time-experience of Knesset

Yisrael as continuous and contemporaneous. It is not cut up intodiscrete periods each characterized by its own zeitgeist. Even

revolutionary transformations in the external, spatio-temporalworld need not necessarily touch upon the primordial, internalsource of Jewish certainty, insight and confession. Second, thereis another organic continuum proceeding from the realm of religiousexperience, to that of objectified articles of faith and ethical norms,

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then again to that of psycho-physical practices. It could perhaps besaid that while the Mitzvot are not primary, and derive ultimately fromthe welter of religious experience, they are nonetheless the outer

husk of an internal religious subjectivity. They are mediators betweenreligious insight and the psycho-physical world. But, like the Freudianego, they grow organically out of religious libidinal energies. Since,then, both historical time and the vector of objectification from theinternal to the external are characterized by Soloveitchik as contin-uous (in keeping with the experience of the charismatic social egoof the Jewish people), it would be most incongruous if modernhistorical consciousness, with its quantified, periodized and causalisticexperience of time, were to be given the normative authority to deter-

mine the character and future course of halachic development.

BERKOVITS ON RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE, MITZVAH, AND HISTORY

In attempting to articulate the difference between Soloveitchiks andBerkovits understanding of the primordial religious experience under-lying Jewish faith and practice we might compare the way they addressed

this foundational issue with the manner in which it was approached bythe two great medieval Jewish thinkers: Maimonides and YehudahHalevi. On the one hand, one could say that Soloveitchiks discussion ofthe constitutive experiences of Jewish religion is more experientialistand less intellectualist than that of Maimonides. Maimonides was notone to celebrate paradox, or to valorize conflict as compared withpsychological and philosophical harmony.37 Further, Maimonides didnot appropriate philosophy as a mere resource for the articulation and

justification of experiences that he considered to be of pre-philosophical

or extra-philosophical origin. It would appear, or so some scholars ofMaimonides maintain, that he was concerned with weaving philosophi-cal rationality into the very fabric of Jewish religiosity,38 or so othersmaintain, with undertaking a relentless examination of the foundationsof Jerusalem and Athens from an uncompromisingly philosophicalperspective.39 Still, in one important respect of concern to us here,Soloveitchik can be regarded as a Maimonidean. Both Maimonidesand Soloveitchik describe the substance of the divine-human encounteras a state of soul rather than as an external, historical event. For

Maimonides, in the Guide of the Perplexed, II: 33,40

the essence ofrevelation consists in the apprehension of intellectual truths. In hisaccount of the gathering at Sinai, both Moses and the Israelite people aredescribed as comprehending truths, although Moses understanding ofthe principle of Gods unity and existence is on a higher level than that


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of the people. Due to the perfection of his intellect and imaginativefaculty, Moses was more acutely aware than any human being beforeor after him of the vastness of the expanse separating the knowledge of

nature from the knowledge of God.41

He also gained understandingconcerning the ways in which the divine wisdom is embedded in theworkings of nature. These internal, theoretical insights were thentranslated into a practical, ramified life-system that was meant to weanthe Israelite people away from idolatry and gradually lead the moreenlightened among them in the direction of a disinterested love of God.

For Yehudah Halevi, on the other hand, revelation is an actual,external historical event, enacted on an empirical, spatio-temporalstage, before an entire people. It is a real, almost physical encounter

between God and the people of Israel.42

This encounter then becomesthe paradigm for a mode of religious experience that is accessible inprinciple to all Jewseither directly, or by way of the re-enactments ofearlier encounters prescribed by the Torah. Regarding this distinctionbetween internal religious subjectivity and external religious encoun-ter, Berkovits not only explicitly invokes Yehudah Halevi;43 he placeshimself squarely in Halevis theological tradition.

On first reading, it would seem that there are many parallelsbetween Soloveitchiks and Berkovits accounts of the fundamental

religious experience. As distinct from other well-known modern Jewish thinkers like Buber and Rosenzweig, both Soloveitchik andBerkovits speak not only of love and fellowship as features of thedivine-human encounter, but also of danger, terror and a sense ofinsignificance in face of the overpowering presence of the Divine.44

It could be that in doing so they bear witness, as heirs of a long-standing Eastern European religious ethos, to some of the moreaustere aspects of classical Jewish religiosity, aspects that were alien tothe mode of spirituality represented by Buber and Rosenzweig.45

Similarly, they are both influenced by Ottos description of theparadoxical character of the religious encounter, in which the humanbeing is both overwhelmed and sustained, crushed and supported,forced to retreat and encouraged to advance.46

Despite these important parallels, there remains a basic incompat-ibility between the accounts of Soloveitchik and Berkovits. ForSoloveitchik, as we have seen above, the drama of the paradoxicalrelationship between the divine and the human, between the finiteand the infinite, is enacted within the confines of the subjective

religious consciousness. The stage of the religious drama is thehuman soul, although, in the case of Jewish religiosity, Soloveitchikwould seem to speaking of some kind of collective Jewish soul. Fromthis core, the dynamic of religious experience is transposed fromthe soul to the body. The event of the encounter does not take

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place originally within the coordinates of space and time. Rather it isenacted in a dimension wherein these coordinates, and theirstabilizing influences, have no effect. It is only in a kind of second

gesture that the unstable, chaotic and perhaps even anarchic featuresof the encounter are translated into communicable theological princi-ples, formulable ethical maxims, well-defined canonical texts anddiscrete religious practices. For Berkovits, on the other hand, theencounter takes place in broad daylight. It is to be compared to anactual meeting between two human beings, possessed of both abody and a soul. In the original encounter, both body and soulparticipate, and the stage of the encounter is historythe space-timematrix.47

Following are some of Berkovits formulations concerning what hecalls the event of encounter between God and man. It will bereadily visible that for Berkovits, such events have a structure similarto that of meetings between human beings. In this respect,Berkovits follows not only the medieval thinker Yehudah Halevi, butalso the modern Jewish thinker Martin Buber (emphases mine):48

In the Bible, God and man face each other, as it were: God doeswant something of man and man may entreat God . . . .The founda-tion of Biblical religion, therefore, is not an idea but an event, which

may be called the encounter between God and man. . .

. Again andagain, the children of Israel are admonishedtake heed lest youforget what you have seen and heard, what has been shown to you.There is a continual reference to sense perception . . . The text insists,of course, on the incorporeity of God; but it also stresses, and withhardly less fervor, the importance of the sense impressions at thestand at Sinai.

As we can see from above, it is very important to Berkovits toemphasize that the whole person (as Buber would have it), body and

soul, senses as well as consciousness, is involved in the encounter.We are not dealing with an inward event, taking place in the soul,which is then later translated into cognitive principles and eventuallyinto physical gestures. For Berkovits, revelation is an external event,taking place from the first in the open spaces between God and man.

As we mentioned, both Soloveitchik and Berkovits refer to theprimordial religious experience as paradoxical. Yet Berkovits accountis unique in that it couches its description of the paradox in stark,physical terms:49

The peril that emanates from contact with the divine Presence hasnothing to do either with the sinfulness of man or with the judgmentof the Almighty. It is something quite physical, almost natural ifone may say so. A man wilts in the heat of the midday sun, or dies ofexhaustion if he is exposed to long to cold weather . . . How, then,


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dare he hope to stand in the presence of the ultimate source of allenergy and all power in the cosmos; how dare he approach it andsurvive! . . . divine nature is so charged with primordial forcefulnessand vitality of being that its nearness naturally overwhelms all indivi-

dual existence.

If the encounter between God and the human being were toremain at this physical, natural level, it would not really be anencounter at all. In order for God and man to meet face to face, thehuman being must not be crushed, overwhelmed or consumed bythe divine energy. The human being must become a true partner inthe encounter, and be possessed of the kind of free will that wouldallow him either to respond to the divine call or to resist it. Since God

is desirous of an actual relationship with humans, and since, in thenatural situation, human beings would not be able to face God, Godmust allow the meeting to transcend its physical dimensions. InHis care for the human being, God limits Himself, hides Himself, andthereby sustains the human being. He thereby adds a moral dimensionto the relationship, a dimension of care and concern, beyond merepower and energy. Berkovits, following Biblical, prophetic accounts ofthe encounter, puts it thus:50

The hiding God is, therefore, not only a physical necessity, as it

were, in order to protect the human being against the consumingfire; it is a moral necessity too that He should be hiding, so as topreserve the personal identity of man, without which no encounter ispossible. Man may confront the Divine Presence only because Godcurbs and constrainsas it wereHis transcendence. God deniesHimself in order to affirm man. By an act of divine self-denial man ismade free to deny Him.

In spite of divine humility and self-denial, however, the sensualdimension of the encounter is never entirely dissipated. Since the

encounter itself involves both body and soul, the norms demanded ofman in the encounter address both body and soul. The Mitzvah that isaddressed to the human being in the encounter is not a derivativecategory, a mere outer reflection of a religious drama that takesplace in the inner recesses of the soul. It is part and parcel of theprimordial event of encounter. In placing the Mitzvah at the root ofprimordial religious experience, as the very stuff of the God-manencounter, rather than characterizing it as a secondary gesture meantto stabilize the religious phenomenon in the framework of space and

time, Berkovits would seem to be closer to what is commonlyconceived as classical Orthodoxy.51

Let us examine this proposition, as well as its practical implica-tions, more closely. On the one hand it would appear that Berkovitsalso wishes to create a separation between the encounter or

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meeting with God in itself, and what can be learned from theencounter:52

The encounter itself is revelationin it God reveals His presence tomanbut it is not teaching. It is, of course, hardly possible not tolearn something of importance from the encounter; however itsimmediate significance lies not in what may be imparted to the mind,but in the event itself, that it actually happens between God and thiscreature, man. The truly overwhelming element in all revelation isthat God should address Himself to man, that the two may meetat all. The fact that God does speak to man is the basically religiousconcept and is in itself of far greater significance than even the truthwhich He communicates. The most wonderful aspect of revelation isnot so much its contentsthe Word of Godbut its possibility, the

encounter itself with God.

On first reading, it would appear that Berkovits, like Rosenzweig andFackenheim, is decisively differentiating between revelation and law.53

What God reveals is his caring Presence, that he is for us, concernedfor us and desires that we love Him in return. The teaching, truthor content that we take from the encounter is of secondary signif-icance, when compared with the wonder of the meeting itself.Berkovits, however, does not go so far as to say that all suchcontent is shot through with human interpretation while only therevelation of the Presence involves the Divine. True, the mostunexpected and improbable aspect of revelation is the very possibilitythat the transcendent God would approach human beings in order toaddress them; it is this aspect that represents the unique dimension ofliving religion, as distinguished from metaphysical speculation. In thismatter, however, Berkovits does not actually go beyond what hasalready been written by Yehudah Halevi:54

But the human mind cannot believe that God has intercourse with

man, except by a miracle which changes the nature of things. . .

.Then it is possible that the mind might grasp this extraordinarymatter, viz. that the Creator of this world and the next, of theheavens and lights, should hold intercourse with this contemptiblepiece of clay, I mean man, speak to him, and fulfill his wishes anddesires.

The fact that the encounter itself is the primary religious datum doesnot exclude the possibility that certain very definite teachings arewoven into the original meeting itself, and not derived or translated

by human beings in a supplementary gesture. First of all, according toBerkovits, the structure of the encounter-event per se carries animperative within it. In the encounter, it is revealed that God cares forHis creatures and that He delights in this caring orientation.55 Themanner of His approach to human beings becomes a paradigm and


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prototype for the way human beings are to relate to the world and toothers. It becomes crystal clear that this orientation, exemplified byGod, is also the will of God. Such an imperative need not be seen as

an austere and stern dispensation, as legal imperatives are often felt tobe among those who value spontaneity above all. It is the object ofGods desire, and in fulfilling it, we express our own desire that ourown conduct reflect His desire. For Berkovits, then, The encounteritself reveals not only Gods concern, but what He desires of man.56

Now, this is all well and good, and fits well with Rosenzweigsnotion of commandment, as distinguished from his notion oflaw.57 Commandment, for Rosenzweig, represents an imperativeexperienced in immediacy as coming from God, as opposed to law,

which is the humanly articulated formalization of the implications ofcommandment. Yet Berkovits wishes to claim that not only com-mandment is experienced in the immediacy of the encounter; lawis experienced as a divine gift as well:58

The law is the bond that preserves the relationship of divineconcern beyond the fundamental religious experience of theencounter itself. The encounter passes quickly, but the law of theLord remains forever. As the crystallization of what God desires ofman, the law is the guarantee of Gods continued interest in man. As

long as the law of God stands, He too remains involved in the destinyof man. When the mystery of the encounter has faded away, God isstill related to man by way of His law. When the precious moment inwhich man is granted the certitude of the actualization of thePresence has sunk into the dark womb of the past, the fellowshipwith God may still be maintained by doing the will of God. The law isthe avenue of contact beyond the point of encounter.

In the above-quoted paragraph, Berkovits implicitly questions a com-monly held distinction. Many moderns, perhaps under the abiding

influence of the Romantic ethos, distinguish between the charis-matic founding of religions and the inevitable routinization andbureaucratization that sets in after the founding experience haspassed.59 Naturally, charisma has more appeal than formalization.Even Rosenzweig would seem to have fallen prey to this assumption inhis distinction between commandment and law. It seemed toRosenzweig to be contrary to authentic religious experience that Godshould encounter human beings as a Lawgiver, as distinguished from aLover who commands us, as lovers often do, to love Him in return.

According to Rosenzweig, human beings then draw the implicationsof this commandment for the whole matrix of human life andactivity, and so the Law is born. Although, for Rosenzweig, the lawsof the Torah have the potential to become commandments whenthey are experienced and performed as genuine expressions of the

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commandment to love God, the basic distinction between law andcommandment remains. Berkovits, on the other hand, has noreservations about including the Law in the original revelatory

experience. For him, the formalization of the immediate imperativeto imitate Gods care, and the very fixity of the law that results fromthis formalization, is simply an augmentation of the original Divinegift. God wishes to be accessible to human beings always, and not onlywithin the framework of peak-experiences.60 He therefore prolongshis care and involvement with humans beyond the infrequentmoments of encounter by allowing for a constantly accessible renewalof relationship.

In light of the above, we see that Berkovits orientation to the

category of Mitzvah is different from that of Soloveitchik. First of all,we have seen that for Berkovits the stage of revelation is history, notreligious inwardness. In history, in the original founding experience,God already gives His desire the form of Law. Law is not a secondaryor tertiary category representing a translation of chaotic religiousexperience into reliable forms. It is a primary category, appearingwithin the foundational religious experience itself. It is not the bodilycorrelate of an experience that originates in the depths of the soul.It is rather that category that makes the interaction of the body and

soul possible, especially after the immediacy of the encounter haspassed.

According to Berkovits, we can know nothing of the religion of apure soul,61 and we are not charged to search for such a religion,working, as it were, back from external religious forms to inter-nal religious experience. Not only, as Soloveitchik also tells does,does the understanding of religion begin with an analysis of practice;any religious investigation of Judaism will always end by describing aphenomenon that represents an integration of intention and practice.

Religious experience and religious practice are not to be understoodas subsisting on a continuum of inner to outer or depth tosurface. According to Berkovits, both body and soul are equalpartners in striving for the God-orientation of all life and theproliferation of the religious awareness in history. The soul, the seatof ethical and religious consciousness, is by itself historically impotent.Plato and Kant to the contrary, intellectual understanding, no matterhow penetrating and all-encompassing, cannot by itself generatedesire, motivation and action.62 The body must be made to cooperate.

Yet the body, although accepted and valued by the Jewish tradition asindispensable for the infusion of ethics and religion into the fullmatrix of human life, seems to be inherently egocentric, concernedwith its own survival, pleasure, and power. A means must be found,then, wherein the body itself may willingly participate in both ethics


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and religion in its own terms. The awareness of limitation by another, or by another order of relatedness to God, must somehowbecome second nature for the body, and not just a desideratum for

the soul. The body must become possessed of an almost instinctivesensitivity to the needs or requirements of the other.63 This cancome about, as we know from Aristotle and Maimonides, only by wayof repeated deeds exemplifying the ethical or religious disposition tobe cultivated.64 Such a result, writes Berkovits, can be attained only byway of the Mitzvah, that comprehensive gesture that unifies bothsoul and body in directedness toward an other, whether human ordivine.

For this reason, the very legal character of the law is part of the

Divine gift and the Divine plan from the very beginning. The law mustbe ramified and ubiquitous, regularizing and stabilizing the other-awareness of the body itself. It is only through such cooperationbetween consciousness and practice that ethics and religion have anyhope of being realized in the world. Otherwise, the trend that hascharacterized human history until now will persist, namely: theattainment of religious bliss in cloistered settings by spiritual virtuosos,while the arena of history is left wide open for egocentricity, powerand violence.

In some of the writings of Soloveitchik, the impression is createdthat the human being, though certainly charged with the imperative ofcivilization in the surface world of human interaction and history,finds greater spiritual significance in the inner depths of religiousexperience and within the framework of an intimate covenantalcommunity.65 The Mitzvah is judged not so much by its historicalefficacy, but by its ability to reflect or invite a primordial andperennial structure of religious experience. For Berkovits, on theother hand, one of the most important reasons for the advent of the

holy deed, or Mitzvah, as well as one of the chief criteria for judgingits worth, is the possibility of its historical efficacy. The Mitzvahdoes not invite the Jew to participate in a discrete, alternative, innertime-consciousness, characterized by continuity and duration. TheMitzvah is meant first and foremost to contribute to the proliferationof ethics and religious relatedness in that very external dimensionof time that houses the movements and interactions of bodies,including and especially human bodies.

The reasoning offered by Berkovits for this perspective is as

follows: the Jewish tradition presents us with the option of the holydeed, a deed that allows the religious consciousness to take root in thematerial-biological world, and provides material-biological life withspiritual direction. The deed, by its very nature, is social, and not merelythe social expression of a private consciousness, or the external

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reflection of a state of intimacy.66 Religious acts are not to be com-pared to works of art, works that are judged by their authenticity asthe outer expression of an elusive inner consciousness. They are to be

compared to historical events, and as such they are judged by theirability to affect other historical events. For a deed to be, accord-ing to Berkovits, it must be effective in the external world. It cannotmerely function as the necessarily distorted reflection of anunworldly religious consciousness; it must be born in the worldand at home in the world. As Berkovits writes, deeds are the stuff ofwhich history is made.67 The origin of the Mitzvah is historicaltheactual event of the encounter at Sinai, and the end of the Mitzvah ishistoricalto infuse all human activity with the paradigm of care and

sanctity.68

Deeds performed by individuals, as intrinsically valuable as theymay be in themselves, cannot always be relied upon to change theoverall course of power history in the direction of care and concern.The deed, in order to insure its ethical and religious impact, must,according to Berkovits, be integrated into the life-forms of ahistorically efficacious group.69 In Soloveitchiks Lonely Man of Faith,one gets the impression that what he calls covenantal community isa mere extension of the intimacy of the I-Thou-He relationship. The

community is the arena for the expression of true care, concern,and willingness to sacrifice for the other on a somewhat larger scale.The Jew lives out the care-imperative on the plane of communalintimacy. He relates to comprehensive, universal human concerns,however (the eradication of disease, ecology, etc.), by way ofAdam 1 categories: cooperation, collegiality, neighborliness, etc.70

For Berkovits, on the other hand, the group wherein the genuine careorientation is to be first implemented is not the community, but thepeople or the nation. Communities do not necessarily make

history; peoples and nations do. In order for the deed to become whatBerkovits calls history-making, it must shape the life-patterns of aliving society in reasonable control of its general order of life.71 Thismeans a sovereign nation living in its own land. In order that Godsdesire for care and concern in history should be realized, one muststart with the smallest unit of living reality within which the deedof Judaism may be history-making.72 The Jewish group, then, forBerkovits, is not a matrix for the enactment of divine-human, or inter-human intimacy. It rather provides the basis for what Buber has called

an order of life for a future mankind.73

It is not the largest possiblegroup that could still feel like a family, but rather the smallest possiblegroup that has the potential to be a universal historical force.

This important difference between Soloveitchik and Berkovitsconcerning the theological status of the historical dimension can be


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extrapolated from some of their other writings as well. One couldconceivably make the case that Kol Dodi Dofek, is Soloveitchiksmost explicitly historical essay. How could anyone say that

Soloveitchik did not take history seriously when, in this essay, heinterprets momentous, concrete historical events as normative callsto the Jewish community?

The unusual constellation of votes at the United Nations thatallowed for partition, the victory of the few over the many in the Warof Independence, the message spread abroad that Jewish blood will nolonger be spilled indiscriminately, the fact that no other nation madethe wilderness bloom until modern-day Jews undertook to cultivatethe land of Israel, the vindication of Jewish nationhood and sover-

eignty in the face of Christian claims that the Jews are a ghostpeople, the reawakening of Jewish identity as a result of the success ofthe Zionist projectall these are portrayed by Soloveitchik as knockson the door of the beloved people Israel, in order to awaken her toactive participation in the building of a new society with commongoals and strivings, not only a common fate.74 Is not this a mostconvincing example of a vital regard for history?

So it would seem. Upon closer reading of Kol Dodi Dofek,however, especially when compared to Berkovits book Faith after the

Holocaust, a different perspective emerges. First of all, Soloveitchikresponds only to the events surrounding the advent of the State ofIsrael, and steadfastly refuses to offer a theological interpretation ofthe Holocaust. All a Jew can do in the face of the Holocaust is toask how will I live from now on with this unspeakable suffering?No meaning-structure can contain the event of the Holocaust, andit cannot and should not be integrated into a teleological philosophyof history.75 It would seem that only positive historical events aretheologically interpretable, while extreme negative events are not.

Further, the events surrounding the establishment of the State do notform an immanent pattern. History itself contains no immanentpatterns of meaning. History is more like a sounding board for thepulsations of a trans-historical, transcendent love dynamic betweenGod and the Jewish people. First God was hidden and we desperatelysearched for Him. Now God is calling us and we are hiding.76

In addition, historical events are cast as representations of timelesshalachic and aggadic paradigms. Joining the fray against Israelsenemies is a case of Lo taamod al dam reechah (you shall not stand

aside while the blood of your companion is being spilled).77

HitlersGermany was a reincarnation of Amalek, as are the Arabs who seekIsraels destruction.78 The imperative of Jewish self-defense is aninstance of the halachic category of Kvod Hatzibbur (the honor ofthe community), etc.79 History, then, is not the framework wherein the

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pattern of contemporary events originates. History is merely theexternal screen that reflects the inner vicissitudes of the relationshipbetween Knesset Yisrael and the Divine Presence, as experienced in

the collective Jewish soul.Berkovits Faith After the Holocaust presents a very different orien-

tation to history.80 For Berkovits, history is not merely the externalstage upon which a deeper theo-human psychodrama is played out.The course of world history and Jewish history can be seen to revealan immanent dialectic. It is both the origin and locus of a this-worldly,concrete and highly embodied Messianic drama. Within history, twoopposing forces are at workthe desire for power and the desire forcare. Most peoples and nations have striven, in the course of history,

for the aggrandizement of their own power and control over others.This drive (a most prosaic, yet ubiquitous and destructive impulse) isthe force that has animated the massive attempts at empire-buildingwith which world history has been replete. One nation, however,experienced, in the course of its history, an encounter with a caringGod. They emerged from the encounter with a desire to realizethat which God desiresjustice, mercy, lovingkindnessin history.Certainly, this people Israel did not always live up to the vision towhich they dedicated themselves. Yet they never entirely abandoned

their vision of a world predicated on care rather than power.81

As a care-oriented people, the people of Israel found itself atcross-purposes with the dominant historical forces. For Berkovits, itwas only natural that such a people should find itself cast aside bythe power-oriented majority, living in a state of Galut without apower-base of its own. In contradistinction to Soloveitchik, Berkovits isprepared to account for the Holocaust within the framework of acomprehensive philosophy of history. The Holocaust represents theinner logic of power history taken to its final conclusion.82 The

Jewish people, the living reminder of the possibility of the founding ofhistory on an alternative basis, on the basis of care rather than power,represents the ultimate threat to the unlimited proliferation of power,both as a guiding principle and as a real political force. As soon astechnology made it possible, then, one of the premier representativesof both the theory and practice of power, Nazi Germany, took it uponitself to eradicate this people from the face of the earth.

As we have seen, then, for Berkovits, the overall course of humanhistory discloses an inner, immanent dynamic. This, however, does not

mean that Berkovits does not experience a guiding Divine hand atwork behind the natural dynamic of power and Galut. On the onehand, Berkovits maintains, both in his theology of the encounter andin his philosophy of history,83 that man has been given free will so thathe might decide for faith without duress. In order to enable free will,


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(as opposed to blind obedience or obedience on the basis of fear), tobe expressed, God diminishes Himself, as it were, and does notintervene when individuals and nations bent on evil go about their

bloody business. God is not only the mighty One; He is mighty inHis silence and restraint.84 Yet, He does take overall responsibilityfor history. He will not allow power history to overwhelm faithhistory, or the principle of care in the world, altogether. Thefounding of the State of Israel represents, for Berkovits, a reassurancegranted by God, by way of the historical course of events, that theoption of faith history is still alive.

This reassurance, however, though experienced as an act of graceon the part of God, is not so much an episode in a trans-historical

love-narrative between God and the Jewish people, as Soloveitchikwould seem to portray it. Berkovits does not speak of this smile onthe face of God85 by way of a commentary on selected passages fromthe Song of Songs, as Soloveitchik does. The divine response comesonly at a time when the natural dynamic of history has run itscourse. Paradoxically and dialectically, power history contains itsown nemesis within it. Once the unlimited quest for power is givenunlimited reign, and technology progresses to the point wherecivilization can actually be wiped out, power history cancels itself

out.86

The total quest for power, with the tools of total warfare, meansthe end of history and the end of human life on earth. The humanrace has arrived, then, according to Berkovits, at a Messianic juncture.Either the principle of power will be replaced by the principle ofcareor humanity will be wiped out, and there will be no one left todominate. In our very own times, the human race is faced with itsgreatest free choice ever. Either abandon the principle of poweras the governing principle, and subordinate power to care, or beresponsible for world destruction. It is absolutely uncertain what

course humanity will take, and therefore there is no pre-determinedassurance of redemption. Yet the empowerment of the Jewish peoplerepresents a hint as to the direction things should and must take. Thisdevelopment also places a tremendous burden on the Jewish people,as the people that must represent the principle of care in its collectivelifeand offer it as a serious option to the world.

For Berkovits, this historical turning point bears comprehensiveimplications for the halachahthat legal crystallization of the care-orientation meant to serve as a world-historical force. When the Jewish

people did not have reasonable control of its general order of life,in the Galut, the halachah was not challenged to confront and informall the public pursuits of a sovereign society. Neither was it calledupon to face the world at large, and to make its message bothconcretely visible and intellectually communicable to the nations.

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At this historical juncture, for Berkovits nothing less than a Messianicemergency, the halachah is enjoined to emerge from its own Galut,and to address, while making full use of its native legal and inter-

pretive categories, all the issues on the agenda of a modern sovereignsociety charged with the responsibility of representing the careoption in common cause with the nations of the world.87 Such acharacterization of the contemporary condition of the Jewish peoplecannot but constitute an implicit goad to halachic development andinnovation.

SUMMATIVE REMARKS

As we have seen, Soloveitchiks theology would seem to provide amplegrounding for a criterion of halachic authenticity (namely thedegree to which a certain halachic practice reflects the timelessstructure of collective Jewish religious experience) while providing lessgrounding for a criterion of historical efficacy (the degree to whichsuch a practice might contribute to the institution of care not onlyas a communal norm, but as the basis for the conduct of a sovereignpeople in active intercourse with the nations of the world). Berkovits,

on the other hand, wishes to provide theological grounding fora criterion of historical efficacy that can serve as a counterweightto the criterion more commonly valorized in orthodox circlesauthenticity.

Within the framework of this essay, we could not explore thedegree to which these different weightings and groundings actuallyfind expression in the halachic discourses and pronouncements ofthese two religious figures. Nonetheless, we might have shed somelight on the potential for halachic innovation allowed for by their

understandings of central theological issues, namelythe structure offundamental religious experience, the category of mitzvah, and thematrix of history.

For Soloveitchik, fundamental religious experience is internal tothe collective Jewish soul, and has the structure of a love-relationship,with all its vicissitudes of rapturous intimacy and lonely despair.It does not take place in full light of history, but in the dark recessesof the human spirit, most particularly the collective Jewish spirit.Mitzvah is a derivative category, representing the outer husk of

religious experience as translated into the timespace matrix. Thismatrix is the external screen upon which the internal dynamic iscast, but the screen itself is not possessed of a religiously significantdynamic of its own. What others see as the linear dynamics of history,then, cannot, for Soloveitchik, serve as a genuine stimulus for motion


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in the halachic sphere. The continuous, uninterrupted ebb and flow ofthe eternal love-relationship between God and Israel is what informs,and must continue to inform, the repetitive motion of the halachah.

Even the seemingly novel events that have both traumatized andinspired the Jewish people in our own times are to be understood, tothe degree that they can be understood, in terms of that selfsame lovedynamic.

For Berkovits, on the other hand, the encounter with God takesplace in the open spaces of history. In the encounter, the orientation ofcare as represented by Gods turning to man, is experienced as bothsustaining and commanding. Mitzvah, then, is not a derivative category;it is woven into the very experience of the encounter. Like the

encounter itself, it originates in history, and is not merely reflected inhistory. As we said, it is born in history, and lives in history. For that veryreason, it is manifestly exposed to history. Without a robust interactionbetween the soul of care and the embodied dynamic of history, themitzvah, as the union of the body and the spirit, withers and dies.History does have its own religiously significant inner dynamic: theconflict between power and care. Power has dialectically cancelled itselfout, and care must be vigorously pursued and exemplified in thesovereign life of the Jewish people, by way of the regularities of Jewish

law, so that it might provide a compelling alternative to the norm ofpower. The inner dynamics of world history and Jewish history havereached a point where they can and must serve as a stimulus for atransformation of the halachahfrom a Galut phenomenon to a Torahfor a sovereign nation and a threatened world.

HEBREW UNIVERSITY OF JERUSALEM

NOTES

1. For summaries of the life, thought and works of Soloveitchikand Berkovits see Steven T. Katz (ed.), Interpreters of Judaism in the LateTwentieth Century (Washington, D.C., 1993), pp. 115, 325342.

2. See Tradition: A Journal of Orthodox Jewish Thought, Vol. 7, No. 2(Summer, 1965), pp. 567, 6888. The Lonely Man of Faith willhenceforth be referred to as LMOF.

3. See also Eliezer Berkovits, The Galut of Judaism, Judaism, Vol. 4,No. 3 (Summer, 1955), pp. 225234.

4. The essay Kol Dodi Dofek (henceforth KDD) by Soloveitchikappears together with a Hebrew translation of LMOF in a Volume entitled Ish HaEmunah (Jerusalem, 1975), pp. 65106.

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5. (Jerusalem, 1973), henceforth FAH.6. (New York, 1986), henceforth HM.7. Recently, some of Berkovits important essays are being repub-

lished in English, translated into Hebrew and discussed in academicarticles. See, for example David Hazony, Eliezer Berkovits and theRevival of Jewish Moral Thought, in Azure, No.11 (Summer, 2001),pp. 2365 and idem., Eliezer Berkovits Theologian of Zionism, inAzure, No. 17 (Spring, 2004), pp. 88119; and Eliezer Berkovits, Essential Essays on Judaism, David Hazony (ed.), (Jerusalem, 2002).

8. See in particular Berkovits book Not In Heaven: The Nature and Function of Halakhah (New York, 1983).

9. For an examination of the connection between features ofSoloveitchiks philosophic thought and his halakhic orientation see

Avinoam Rosenak, Hashpaot Shel Modelim Philosophiim AlHaChashivah HaTalmudit Shel Harav Yosef Dov Soloveitchik, unpub-lished M.A. thesis (Jerusalem, Hebrew University, 1994).

10. For an illustration of this point with regard to the thought ofR. Avraham Yitzchak HaCohen Kook see Yitzchak Herman, AdamChadash: Tirgum Hagut HaRaayah Kook MiTorat Adam LeTeoriaChinuchit, unpublished doctoral dissertation, ( Jerusalem, HebrewUniversity, 2000).

11. HM, p. 67.12. HM, pp. 6374. See also Wilhelm Dilthey, Hermeneutics and the

Study of History (Princeton, 1996), pp. 229234, and idem., Introduction tothe Human Sciences (London, 1988), pp. 7788.

13. See Henri Bergson, An Introduction to Metaphysics (London, 1913).14. See Soloveitchik, LMOF, pp. 4548.15. HM, p. 67.16. HM, pp. 6970, 9399. See also Soloveitchik, Halakhic Man

(Lawrence Kaplan trans.), (Philadelphia, 1983), pp. 68 and p. 144, note7 for his views on the cognitive independence and uniqueness of religiousperceptions.

17. HM, p. 85.18. HM, pp. 6869.19. HM, p. 81.20. HM, pp. 6768. See also LMOF, p. 35 where he writes that the

total faith commitment always tends to transcend the frontiers of fleeting,amorphous subjectivity and to venture into the outside world of thewell-formed, objective gesture.

21. HM, pp. 5152, 7781.22. HM, pp. 7576.23. See LMOF, p. 23, where Soloveitchik writes: the communication

lines are open between two surface personalities engaged in work,dedicated to success and speaking in cliches and stereotypesand notbetween two souls bound together in indissoluble relationeach onespeaking in unique logoi. The in-depth personalities do not communicate,let alone commune with each other. See also pp. 4445.


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24. See Friedrich Schleiermacher, The Christian Faith (Philadephia,1976), pp. 1220; and Soren Kierkegaard, Concluding Unscientific Postscript,Vol. 1 (Princeton, 1992), chap. 2, pp. 189251.

25. HM, p. 80.26. LMOF, p. 40. See also Halakhic Man, p. 44.27. For the notion of the transcendental ego, see Edmund Husserl,

Logical Investigations, Vol. 2, (London, 1970), pp. 540542.28. See Rudolf Otto, The Idea of the Holy, (New York, 1958).29. HM, p. 81.30. See for example Julius Guttmann, On the Philosophy of Religion

(Jerusalem, 1976), pp. 13, 18.31. HM, p. 79.32. See Soloveitchik, On Repentance (Pinchas Peli trans.) (Jerusalem,

1980), pp. 130137.33. Soloveitchik does compare the works of great individual thinkers,such as Maimonides and Thomas Aquinas, yet he does so only to showthat their clandestine egos are radically dissimilar and ultimatelyinaccessible, despite the superficial similarities that seem to presentthemselves in the Guide and the Summa. See HM, pp. 7274.

34. For the concept of empathy in interpretation, see Wilhelm Dilthey,Selected Writings H.P. Rickman, (ed.), (Cambridge, 1976), pp. 226228.

35. For the sense of alienation as a crucial moment in interpreta-tion, see Ravidovicz, Simon, On Interpretation, in Simon Ravidovicz,

Studies in Jewish Thought (Philadelphia, 1974), p. 47. For the concept ofdistanciation, see Paul Ricoeur, Hermeneutics and the Human Sciences(Cambridge, 1981), pp. 131144.

36. See LMOF, pp. 4445.37. See, for example, the fourth and sixth chapters of Maimonides

Eight Chapters, where he clearly favors a well-balanced and harmoniousstructuring of the soul, according only limited value to inner conflict(concerning statutes that seem to the uninitiated to have no rational justification. In the Guide, III: 31, however, we are assured that all thestatutes have a rational justification). See Isadore Twersky (ed.), AMaimonides Reader (New York, 1972), pp. 367379.

38. Julius Guttmann is partial to this view. See his Philosophies ofJudaism (Philadelphia, 1964), p. 155.

39. This is the view of Leo Strauss. See his Persecution and the Art ofWriting (Chicago), 1968, pp. 108109, concerning the issue of theradical and relentless examination of teachings undertaken by thegreat minds.

40. See the translation by Shlomo Pines (Chicago, 1963), pp. 363366.Maimonides discussion of revelation in this chapter is many-faceted and

enigmatic. Yet a reading consistent with the text, as well as with whatMaimonides writes elsewhere, would seem to indicate that since Mosesperceptions were of a higher order than that of the people, he understoodthe principles of the existence and uniqueness of God in a more penetra-ting way than they didalthough they, too, are depicted as understanding

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rather than witnessing. All of the other commandments, apart fromthe first two of the Decalogue, are described as belonging to the classof generally accepted opinions and those adopted by virtue of

tradition. These, by their very nature, are not acquired by intellectualpenetration, but, rather, are put in place by the prophet in order toensure the proper political and psychological conditions for theintellectual quest for God.

41. I owe this insight to my teacher Prof. Eliezer Schweid. See hiscommentary on Maimonides Eight Chapters called Iyyunim BeShemonah Perakim LaRambam (Jerusalem, 1969), in particular his commentary onChap. 7.

42. It should be noted that Maimonides also seems to describerevelation in this way in his Mishneh Torah, Hilchot Yesodei HaTorah, Ch. 8,

Halakhah 1. Yet his more authentic view, in my opinion, is to be found inthe Guide, written for readers with a philosophical education. There, hisstatements, and their implications, point clearly to the view that thesignificance of the Sinai revelation is not to be found in its historical-empirical character, but rather in theoretical insight that was attained toby its participants.

43. See Berkovits, Eliezer, God, Man and History (Middle Village, NY,1959), p. 10, henceforth GMH.

44. For an analysis of the elements of terror and danger as features ofthe divine-human encounter in the thought of Soloveitchik, see David

Hartman, Love and Terror in the God-Encounter (Woodstock, VT, 2001),pp. 182187.

45. For a critique of the lack of sternness and austerity and anexcess of granting and liberation in the thought of Buber andRosenzweig see Leo Strauss introduction to the English edition of hisbook Spinozas Critique of Religion (New York, 1965), p. 14.

46. See Otto, op cit., pp. 1240.47. GMH, pp. 116117, 141155.48. Ibid., pp. 1415. For the kinship between Berkovits understanding

of a personal, unmediated encounter between God and human beingsand that of Yehudah Halevi, see Halevis Kuzari I:91. For an indication ofthe influence of Buber, see Martin Buber, The Way of Response, N. Glatzer(ed.), (New York, 1966), pp. 138, 140.

49. GMH, p. 32.50. ibid., p. 35.51. For some typical, classic yet contemporary understandings of

revelation, see Milton Himmelfarb, (ed.), The Condition of Jewish Belief(New York, 1966), especially the views of Norman Frimer, Norman Lammand Aharon Lichtenstein.

52. GMH, p. 16.53. For this differentiation between revelation and law, see Franz

Rosenzweig, On Jewish Learning Nahum Glatzer (ed.), (New York, 1955),pp. 117118; and Fackenheim, Emil, Quest for Past and Future (Boston,1968), pp. 8081.


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54. The quote is from H. Slonimskys translation of the Kuzari(New York, 1971), p. 43.

55. GMH, p. 102

56. ibid., pp. 8687.57. See Rosenzweig, op. cit., p. 116.58. GMH, p. 87.59. For these concepts, see Max Weber, Essays in Sociology, H.H. Gerth

& C. W. Mills, trans. (London, 1947), pp. 245252.60. For the concept of peak-experiences, see Abraham Maslow,

The Farther Reaches of Human Nature (New York, 1971), pp. 168179.61. GMH, p. 119.62. Ibid., pp. 9395, 100101.63. Ibid., pp. 112114.

64. See, for example, Aristotle, Ethics, J.A.K. Thomson, trans. (London,1959) Book 2, pp. 5556. See also Maimonides, Eight Chapters, Chap. 4 inTwersky (ed.), A Maimonides Reader, pp. 367376.

65. See LMOF, pp. 2030.66. GMH, p. 134.67. ibid.68. Ibid., p. 136. It would appear that Soloveitchik, in LMOF,

pp. 5052, is propagating the same ideal calling for the unification ofthe holy and the profane realms, namely: the infusing of the of theprofane with holiness thereby sanctifying history. It should be noted,

however, that for Soloveitchik, this model of infusion can be realizedonly in Messianic times, in the indefinite future. As for the present,however, the Jew is called upon to oscillate between holy (having todo with community intimacy) and profane (having to do with world-building and civilization) activities. See LMOF, pp. 4850, 5455.

69. GMH, pp. 133137.70. See LMOF, pp. 2133.71. GMH, p. 134.72. ibid., p. 137.73. See Martin Buber, Hebrew Humanism, in his Israel and the World

(New York, 1963), pp. 240263. The phrase quoted is from p. 251.74. KDD, pp. 7782.75. Ibid., p. 68.76. The same pattern can be discerned in the way that Soloveitchik

interprets the transition from prophecy to prayer in the sacred historyof Knesset Yisrael. See LMOF, pp. 3443.

77. KDD, pp. 100101.78. Ibid., pp. 101102.79. Ibid., p. 82.

80. A full section in FAH, entitled A Jewish Philosophy of History,Chap. 4, pp. 8697deals explicitly with the dimension of history.81. See FAH, pp. 112, 158169.82. Ibid., pp. 116119.83. GMH, pp. 3435, 7980. FAH, pp. 61, 104106.

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84. FAH, pp. 94, 108.85. Ibid., p. 156.86. Ibid., pp. 137143.

87. In GMH, p. 137, Berkovits speaks of the Jewish people as a nationthat must make common cause with the nations of the world inrealizing an ethic of care. In FAH, written after Israels splendidisolation in the Six-Day War, and under the specter of the Holocaust,Berkovits portrays Israel and the nations as dichotomous opposites(representing care as opposed to power) and seems much lessoptimistic about the possibility of international cooperation. See FAH,pp. 114115.


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