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February 13, 2012
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Menachem Wecker: Business Schools Teach Real Estate Despite Troubled Housing Market
February 10, 2012
Lisa M. Krieger: Man with defibrillator demands access to his own heart's information
David G. Savage: Why activists may not be in a hurry to have High Court rule on alternative marriage
February 9, 2012
Laura McMullen: 10 Least Expensive Public Schools for Out-of-State Students
Kimberly Palmer: How to actually enjoy -- relaxing, financially -- your vacation
February 8, 2012
Warren Richey: Why momentous Prop. 8 ruling might not satisfy gay-rights groups
Menachem Wecker: Though Controversial, LL.M.'s Can Lead to Specialized Legal Jobs
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February 7, 2012
Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.: Caught off-guard? President's Super Bowl interview with Matt Lauer gives those who need a reason not to vote for him, a darn good one
Suzanne Bohan: Leaping lizards! Tiny reptiles advancing robot design
February 6, 2012
Jonathan Tobin: Iran Threatens Israel With Destruction, But the New York Times Doesn't Hear It
Jeffrey Fleishman: In newly democratic Egypt, tens of democracy activists jailed, to stand trial; their groups are 'threatening the stability of the homeland'
Julie Deardorff : Researchers say antioxidants may not be that effective and could do more harm than good
Mark Clayton: How did Anonymous hackers eavesdrop on FBI and Scotland Yard?
February 3, 2012
Edmund Sanders : Israeli official says Iran is creating missile that could reach East Coast of US
Victoria Kim: Immigrant-smuggling ring used black drivers to avoid racial profiling
February 2, 2012
Jim Carney: Wrong number call may have saved her life
Reza Kahlili : Ex-CIA spy in Iran's Revolutionary Guard: What Obama doesn't grasp about striking deals with Tehran
Tina Susman: For woodchuck rescuer, every day is Groundhog Day
February 1, 2012
Brian Bennett: US officials see increasing threat of domestic attack from Iran
Emily Brandon: How to Take Advantage of New 401(k) Fee Disclosures
January 31, 2012
January 30, 2012
Paul Richter and Ramin Mostaghim: Misreading Teheran's limits -- deadly and economically devastating as they may be -- is a risk administration, Europe seem willing to take
Suzanne Bohan: Warning: Nap-deprived tots missing more than sleep, study finds
Meg Handley: Banks Revamping Rewards Programs to Woo Customers
January 27, 2012
Caroline B. Glick: Obama: Of course I intend to prevent a nuclear holocaust . . . in a few months
Yochonon Donn: In liberal New York City, fervently-Orthodox Jews may soon be getting a district to call their own
Jeannine Stein: An inflated ego and thinking you're 'all that' doesn't just make others sick of you, it can make you ill
Katy Hopkins: New budget rules may affect how much money you get for college
January 26, 2012
Ed Koch: To the New York Times, calling for the murder of Jews by those capable of having their incitement taken seriously isn't news
Jeannine Stein: Mental illness struck one in five U.S. adults in 2010: Report
January 25, 2012
Richard Simon: House passes two bills endorsing the use of religious symbols at military memorials
Fred Weir: Putin: Multiethnic Russia cannot survive as a US-style 'melting pot'; must find its own way
Susan Johnston: 5 Sneaky Coupon Strategies Consumers Should Watch Out For
January 24, 2012
Carol Clark: The price of your soul: How your brain decides whether to 'sell out'
Caroline B. Glick: America lost most in 'Arab Spring'. Sadly, many voters still don't grasp the extent
Warren Richey: Drug criminal scores win in GPS ruling from conservative-leaning high court
Erika Bolstad: Black conservatives gather to talk about gaining strength
January 23, 2012
Melissa Dribben: Jewish voters to play a key role in Florida's Republican primary
Jordan Rau: In quest to grow, Catholic hospital system will announce this morning its break from church
Ali Safi: U.S. envoy gives Taliban terms for peace talks
January 19, 2012
January 18, 2012
January 17, 2012
Frank J. Gaffney Jr.: No-kidding red lines: U.S. response to an Iranian nuke may be bluster, but Israel's won't be
David G. Savage: They sued their principals after slandering them online --- now the cases are headed to the Supreme Court
David Francis: Where to Invest in 2012: With stocks expected to rebound, opportunity abounds for investors
January 13, 2012
Ben Lynfield: Israeli lawmakers move to annex Jewish Judea, one museum at a time
Alexia Elejalde-Ruiz: Thriving through touch: Gentle massage helps older people with low mobility improve in mind and body
January 12, 2012
Warren Richey: Landmark Supreme Court ruling a 'resounding win' for religious groups
Warren Richey: Supreme Court says no to new rule on eyewitness testimony
John Fauber : Statins found to raise diabetes risk in postmenopausal women
Katy Hopkins : Consider This Before You Pay for an Online Degree
The Kosher Gourmet by Joseph Erdos: This mushroom and barley soup has an intense -- almost nutty -- flavor that mixes robust with Middle East. It has creaminess without cream
January 11, 2012
Shari Roan: Millions of atrial fibrillation sufferers at risk for devastating, but preventable, stroke
Tom Hussain: Pakistan -- recipient of more than $21 billion in civilian and military aid -- speeds pursuit of Iranian pipeline, defying US
David G. Savage: High court signals it won't be loosening TV's 'indecency' rules
Stephen Ceasar: Oklahoma's Islamic law amendment can't go into effect, court rules
January 10, 2012
Reza Kahlili: From an ex-CIA spy: US must exploit new split in Iran's Revolutionary Guard
Karen Kaplan: Study: Nicotine replacement products ineffective when used in real-life situations
January 9, 2012
Michael Doyle: Put through legal hell over dream home, couple fought back hard --- all the way to Supreme Court
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Jewish World Review
Forget Me not
By
David Hazony
Reason and logic offer the weakest motivation for being good A reconsideration of the true root of evil on this earth
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
Last week's Torah reading contained a couple of verses destined to thrill theologians for generations to come. The Divine's laws, Moses tells the Israelites, are "your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the nations, who shall hear all these statutes, and say … 'what nation is so great …that has statutes and judgments so righteous as all this Torah?'"
Now that's a powerful assertion: the biblical laws are not merely right by the Almighty's authority, they're so self-evidently right that the nations of the world will be blown away by their wisdom. Indeed, religious philosophers have repeatedly cited this passage to justify the claim that sincere philosophical exploration will uncover the universal truth of the biblical commandments.
Perhaps the Torah does contain universal wisdom. But in fact that is not the main thrust of either last week's or this week's reading. Both focus on something entirely different: namely, the importance of memory in the formation of human goodness. Immediately after these verses, for example, we read: "Only take heed to yourself …lest you forget the things that your eyes have seen." The horrible consequence of such forgetfulness is that the Israelites will come to imitate the idolatrous and corrupt nations they are displacing.
This week's reading presents no fewer than four key reasons to rely not only on righteous laws but also a strong memory:
1. Memory helps overcome fear. The Israelites, about to invade the Promised Land, are terrified at the prospect of their first-ever war of conquest. The last time they'd considered it, their loss of will was punished by forty years of wandering. Now G-d tells them not to be afraid, but to "well remember what the Lord your G-d did to Pharaoh and to all Egypt." In overcoming fright, no amount of abstract reasoning can uplift the spirit so well as the memory of past success.
2. Memory motivates good behavior. After the horrors of Egypt, and the trials of the desert, Israel accepted the Ten Commandments at Sinai and committed themselves to Moses' moral leadership. "Your fathers went down to Egypt," Moses now reminds them, "with seventy persons; and now the Lord your G-d has made you as the stars of Heaven for multitude. Therefore you shall love the Lord your G-d, and keep His charge." The key word is "therefore": the commitment to goodness begins with gratitude and the recollection of salvation.
3. Memory gives humility. "And you shall remember all the way which the Lord your G-d led you these forty years in the wilderness," we read, "and fed you with manna …that He might make you know that … by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord does man live." Goodness is not found in the human mind but exists outside us—a fact, it seems, that can't be known by people who, forgetting the humbling experiences of life, come to believe that they themselves are the measure of all things. Especially in times of prosperity, the temptation is to "say in your heart, 'My power and the might of my hand have gotten me this wealth.' But you shall remember the Lord your G-d."
4. Memory gives love. "Love therefore the stranger," we are told, "for you were strangers in the land of Egypt." This commandment appears so often in the Torah that one wonders if it, rather than the Ten Commandments, is not the moral core of the entire biblical program. It is grounded in the memory of enslavement—without which, it suggests, love itself is impossible.
The central message, it seems, is that codes of law, no matter how self-evidently true, are useless unless accompanied by a rich battery of memories and experience. And so we learn that "when your son asks you" the meaning of the commandments, the correct reply is neither that G-d said so, nor that these are the best possible laws, but rather that "we were slaves of Pharaoh in Egypt; and the Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand."
Reason and logic offer the weakest motivation for being good. Unless you are a Vulcan or a computer, life is a complex jumble of emotions, burdens, and aspirations—products of the very irrational thing that is life itself. As even Kant taught, good rules may come from reason, but the motivation to follow them has to come from somewhere else—somewhere transcending reason.
There is a deeper answer. Without memory, experience, and the wisdom that come from them, we can't begin to know how to be good. True, not everybody has the experience of being a stranger, or of having his property stolen, or of worshiping idols. But that is where tradition, and the relentless telling of stories that dominates the Bible, come in. And both these stories and the laws accompanying them have to be repeated at virtually every moment of our lives: "And you shall lay up these My words in your heart and in your soul, and you shall teach them to your children, speaking of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise up."
Is forgetfulness the true root of evil on this earth, and wise and informed memory the true source of good? So it would seem.
Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in uplifting articles.
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David Hazony's first book, The Ten Commandments: How Our Most Ancient Moral Text Can Renew Modern Life, will be published by Scribner in September.
Previously:
• Answering WWMD --- What Would Moses Do?
© 2010, David Hazony. From Jewish Ideas Daily
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