Mishpatim

"For My thoughts are not your thoughts," declared the Lord. "And My ways are not your ways." - Isaiah 55:8

Then he took the Book of the Covenant and read it to the people. And the people said: "All that He has commanded, we will do, and we will listen." - Ex 24:7

If one spends a while exploring the problem of theodicy - how evil can exist under God's auspices - one inevitably encounters the old defense from Isaiah: "His ways are not our ways."

This is a game-changer. All attempts to square a God-filled Universe with our ethical impulses instantly crumble, for what we consider right and wrong is not what He considers right and wrong. So we opt for a humble devotion. Since our finite minds cannot grasp the Infinite, we reason, all we can do is serve Him as best we are able and trust that He has it all figured out.

This does not sit well with me. Consider a contract, the archetypal agreement between two parties. For me to enter into a contract with another, I must have confidence that he will honour his end of the deal. This confidence must be borne of one (or both) of two factors: either I feel sure that the other guy will keep his end of the deal because he is a man of integrity and character, or I feel sure that, even if he is not such a man, the law will step in and ensure I am not shortchanged.

You see where I'm going with this. There's a deal going between man and God (several deals actually - all but one of which must necessarily be forgeries): we live moral lives, and He will bless our crops; we engage in prayer, and He will reward us with eternal paradise. This contractual agreement is the cornerstone of religious faith.

But why are we so confident that God will do as He says? God is obviously immune to outside force; "the law" cannot impel Him to act justly, nor punish Him if he refuses. We self-evidently cannot rely on any third party to ensure that God keeps his word. But if we look to His moral character for reassurance, we are less than impressed. He opens this parashah with guidelines for keeping slaves; and a few verses in He shares with us His plans to engage in multiple genocides. If He's using the same moral yardstick that we are, then He's clearly not doing a very good job of it. But if, as Isaiah implies, He has a different moral yardstick, then why trust Him at all? If He's alright with slavery and genocide, what possible reason do we have to think Him averse to dishonesty and betrayal?

Why do we trust God?

Yitro

And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, "Go to the people and sanctify them today and tomorrow, and let them wash their clothes. Let them be ready for the third day, for on the third day the Lord will descend in the sight of the entire people on Mount Sinai." - Ex 19:10-11

The various modes of worship, which prevailed in the Roman world, were all considered by the people, as equally true; by the philosopher, as equally false; and by the magistrate, as equally useful. - Edward de Gibbon, "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire"

Let's assume that you are a religious Jew. Now imagine I take you in a time machine back to the supposed date of the Revelation at Sinai, and show you that it did not, in fact, take place - that there was no Revelation at Sinai. Will you still be a religious Jew?

Consider your answer for a while. Ruminate on it a bit. Go for a walk, get a coffee, stare out the window and think. Go ahead, I'll wait.

~~~~~

For those of us who weren't raised on a generous serving of Biblical instruction, the Revelation at Sinai was the most defining moment in the history of the Jewish faith - that fateful day exactly 3,322 years ago when the Lord Himself descended upon a mountaintop and gave unto the newly formed Jewish nation the Ten Commandments. According to midrashic thought, the Almighty on that day gave the entire Torah to the Jews, a Torah which has allegedly remained in its precise original form, until this present day.

The Revelation at Sinai is especially significant to modern Jewish polemics and apologetics, because it provides an answer to the ever-awkward question: "Why should I follow your God?" The one element that sets the Jewish faith apart, this argument goes, the one single defining advantage that Judaism has over Islam, Hinduism, and Flying Spaghetti Monsterism, is mass tradition. In every other religion, the original revelation occurred to only a few people: a shepherd here, some disciples there, perhaps a science fiction writer, maybe a pirate or two somewhere along the way. But the Jews witnessed the original revelation en masse, as a nation of several million, and have faithfully passed the story of this original phenomenon from generation to generation until the present day.

So now that we understand Sinai's importance, let us return to our original inquiry: if you and I went back in a time machine, and I were to show you that the Revelation did not take place, would you continue to be a religious Jew?

Write your answer down. Speak it aloud. Call a friend or family member over and say, "hey, random thought, but if I were to go back in time and find out that Sinai didn't happen I would do such and such because blah blah blah..." Explain your reasoning. Sort out your thoughts. Know thyself.

Once you have your beliefs in order, come back here and I'll share my own findings.

~~~~~

I find that people to whom I ask this question to tend to fall into one of three categories:

1) "I would stop being a religious Jew, because the foundation of my belief system has been removed."

These are the Biblical literalists with academically rigourous minds. The people for whom picking a religion is a rational matter, like choosing a stockbroker or an insurance policy. To them, Judaism is a religion which is superior to all other beliefs (and non-beliefs) by strength of logical argument.

2) "I would continue to be a religious Jew, because your time machine is broken."

Category 2 contains those for whom Judaism is so self-evidently true that no argument can be brought against it. This belief can be predicated on cosmology ("the only way of understanding why there is something rather than nothing is through belief in God, and moreover, the Jewish God"), weight of evidence ("my cousin who had cancer received a blessing from our Rebbe, and the doctors found no trace of it a week later; it had simply vanished") or personal revelation ("if you had ever properly experienced a farbrengen, you'd be just as sure as I am"). Since Judaism simply cannot be false, the problem must necessarily lie elsewhere.

3) "I would continue to be a religious Jew, because my belief system does not rest on the historical reality of the Revelation."

This category is profoundly interesting to me. To a young me, (and to an old Bertrand Russell), this category was simply unfathomable. You believe something because it's true, not because it's convenient (please resist the urge to make an Al Gore joke). Studies in human psychology have shown me again and again that this simply isn't the case: beliefs are far from the binary, clearly-delineated artifacts we might like them to be; religious beliefs, and religious practice, doubly so. Those in category 3 understand this, and they understand that their own religious observance has as much, if not more, to do with their family, friends, society and their own wish-thinking and comfort zone, than it does with the fundamental truth or falsehood of the religion's underpinnings.

So how'd you go? Do you fit into one of the above categories? Do the categories themselves require tweaking? Or do you fall completely outside the listed options, in a fourth category which I missed entirely?

I'd love to know what (and how!) you think.