Changing the Tal Law?

I'm not sure what I think of this new effort by Israel's Finance Ministry. While of course, everybody sympathizes with the effort to get charedim to work, or alternatively get them to work legitimately and report their earnings to the tax authorities. The current arrangement forces the charedi community to basically starve or cheat the government, which everyone can agree is a negative thing. On the other hand, is it the government's responsibility to change their demands to prevent a community from imploding just to thwart them? I mean, if they enforce the current law, then maybe it's just the charedim's problem is they choose to starve rather than give a year to National Service. Cruel, but true. Although they're currently a burden on welfare, so I suppose it's in the government's interest to get them to work. If, of course, it is the threatened army service and not their ideology that is keeping them in yeshiva.

But it seems like the main thing being incentivized here is having two children by the time you're 23. Granted, charedi men marry early, but that means that you would have to marry by 21 and really hurry. Given that wives pretty much have to be younger than the husbands, you're encouraging the community to marry people off before they're out of their teens, which they do anyway to some degree, but hardly as much as you're encouraging them to do.

At the same time, the movement basically acknowledging that charedim don't have to/won't
serve in the army, which defeats the ideological purpose of the Tal Law and is bound to make the secular outraged for pretty legitimate reasons.

And from a legal point of view (it's fun to actually know stuff!) I am extremely dubious that the Supreme Court is going to let the arrangement stand even should it be fortunate enough to get passed. The Tal Law barely survived the Barak Court (then, specifically Barak himself). I can't see this one doing much better.

Basically, when a law is challenged as unconstitutional (or contrary to the Basic Laws) and found to actually infringe upon rights or equality or some such, it's tested according to 3 criteria: 1)That it fits Israel's values as a democratic and Jewish state: it's anybody's guess what that one means. But judges usually let laws slide past this test as law as there's some legitimate-ish purpose going on- which is the third test
2)It has a worthy purpose: Probably met here, what with the incentivizing into the workforce. But quite possibly not-the court doesn't tend to think that religious sensibilities are legitimate concerns, so they could be annoyed with any exemption at all.
3)It's proportional- which is interpreted to mean that a)it is effective at attaining the purpose, b)that the benefits outweigh the costs and c) that it is the means of achieving the goal that involves the smallest possible infringement. Basically, any time that a judge can think of a law that he likes better than the current one, he can strike down the law. And for judges, money isn't an issue- several cases have stated that when it's a choice between rights and money, rights always win.

Of course, you could employ these rules and let the law stand. But the Tal Law itself only squeaked by Barak because he liked the fact that it was aimed at integrating charedim into the army and therefore decided that the infringement on equality (and slight injury to everyone else in the country who has to serve in reserves a bit longer each year) is justified. I'm not sure that the court is going to be as fond of this law. And the above rules are certainly wide, vague, and flexible enough for them to express their disapproval by declaring the arrangement unconstitutional, either because they don't like the purpose, or don't see it as proportional.

Tisha B'Av

I like to think that there is Tisha B'Av in heaven.

That all the tears and screams
and questions that are too big for their answers
of every woman who slit her baby's throat
or felt it die of hunger as it tries to nurse
or ate its flesh
or caught its blood in her skirts
and every maiden who mourned a slaughtered groom
and every groom who held his bride as she collapsed
and every woman raped
and every husband and father forced to watch
and every priest burnt alive
and every elder whose corpse was spread like dung across the streets
and every blind man stumbling in blood
come before G-d.

And they say
You know what the worst part was?
Beyond the pain and shame and loneliness and sorrow?
It was You.
Behind every sword and gun and flame and knife
and hunger and rapist and disease and massacre.
It was always Your face,
looking down like an abusive father.

And G-d says Yes.

And the tears and anger and questions
look at Him and say And?

And G-d says nothing.

And all the angels look scandalized and shout
Answer them!
You have answers! You have a plan!
You have rationales and explanations and larger pictures
and greater goods!

And G-d says Not today.

And then He sits down among the victims
and cries in pain.

Musing

Reading over various classmates' notes in preparation for exams, I find that not only do they refer to the professor by his first name, but they also seem to be on a first name basis with the authors of every article mentioned. Does this say something significant about the Israeli mentality, or have they just never had composition teachers beating them over the heads and telling them that an author is referred to by both names at first mention and only last name thereafter?

Screwtape on Prayer

While reading these semi-recent posts (although I know that this wasn't Miri's focus), I kept thinking of a certain passage from The Screwtape Letters, C. S. Lewis' semi-humorous theological work, down in the style of a senior devil writing advice on tempting to his nephew:

If this fails, you must fall back on a subtler misdirection of his intention. Whenever they are attending to the Enemy Himself we are defeated, but there are ways of preventing them from doing so. The simplest is to turn their gaze away from Him towards themselves. Keep them watching their own minds and trying to produce feelings there by the action of their own wills. When they meant to ask Him for charity, let them, instead, start trying to manufacture charitable feelings for themselves and not notice that this is what they are doing. When they meant to pray for courage, let them really be trying to feel brave. When they say they are praying for forgiveness, let them be trying to feel forgiven. Teach them to estimate the value of each prayer by their success in producing the desired feeling; and never let them suspect how much success or failure of that kind depends on whether they are well or ill, fresh or tired, at the moment.

But of course the Enemy will not meantime be idle. Wherever there is prayer, there is danger of His own immediate action. He is cynically indifferent to the dignity of His position, and ours, as pure spirits, and to human animals on their knees He pours out self-knowledge in a quite shameless fashion. But even if He defeats your first attempt at misdirection, we have a subtler weapon. The humans do not start from that direct perception of Him which we, unhappily, cannot avoid. They have never known that ghastly luminosity, that stabbing and searing glare which makes the background of permanent pain to our lives. If you look into your patient's mind when he is praying, you will not find that. If you examine the object to which he is attending, you will find that it is a composite object containing many quite ridiculous ingredients. There will be images derived from pictures of the Enemy as He appeared during the discreditable episode known as the Incarnation: there will be vaguer—perhaps quite savage and puerile—images associated with the other two Persons. There will even be some of his own reverence (and of bodily sensations accompanying it) objectified and attributed to the object revered. I have known cases where what the patient called his "God" was actually located—up and to the left at the corner of the bedroom ceiling, or inside his own head, or in a crucifix on the wall. But whatever the nature of the composite object, you must keep him praying to it—to the thing that he has made, not to the Person who has made him. You may even encourage him to attach great importance to the correction and improvement of his composite object, and to keeping it steadily before his imagination during the whole prayer. For if he ever comes to make the distinction, if ever he consciously directs his prayers "Not to what I think thou art but to what thou knowest thyself to be", our situation is, for the moment, desperate. Once all his thoughts and images have been flung aside or, if retained, retained with a full recognition of their merely subjective nature, and the man trusts himself to the completely real, external, invisible Presence, there with him in the room and never knowable by him as he is known by it—why, then it is that the incalculable may occur. In avoiding this situation—this real nakedness of the soul in prayer—you will be helped by the fact that the humans themselves do not desire it as much as they suppose. There's such a thing as getting more than they bargained for!

Which is all very brilliant and theological, but you have no idea how unhelpful when you're trying to pray. Because if we don't navel gaze, check our feelings, indulge in human understandable imaginations- what's left? Just saying the words?

Final Bow

The final act is about to start,
and everyone knows their part by heart,
and you know what you'll do though you don't know how.
And you can't react and you can't turn back,
you've gone too far for you to change tracks,
and you gotta keep going right through to the final bow.

Well, David was a youth and then grew old,

covered in blankets and he shivers with cold,

but he keeps getting encores from the madding crowd.

And Elijah exits left off the world too tame,

returning to the fire from which he came.

He leaves his mantle and makes the storm his shroud.

And Agag can see that the die is cast,

shrugs and says that death's pain has passed,

stands there watching as the prophet strikes him down.

And Saul, finally done with making amends

tries to act surprised but he always knew how it ends,

and someone comes by to take the fallen crown.

And they prop Ahab up against the flood

and all the while runs the blood,

and he stands repeating I'm sorry, but I can't go now.

And Jezebel took what she could get,

says I may be damned, but I'm not dead yet,

And puts on her face to take that final bow.

And the curtain will fall on a silhouette

and the crowds will clap and then forget,

and you've gotta go on, though you don't know how

until the curtain falls on that final bow.

My Life at Templars

Wow. Chana tells about how my high school treated her. Although I know none of the details of her personal story, it certainly does not sound like something wildly inconsistent with the personalities involved. The fact is, there are few things more merciless and terrifying than sweet, well-meaning, condescending people determined to save your soul.

I was talking to Miri over the fast, desperately trying to remember my own high school experience. I know, for example, that Templars neither quashed me nor attempted to do so. I remember being largely happy. And yet at the same time, without remembering the content, I am reasonably sure that I constantly asked questions. So really, the question becomes, why wasn't I quashed?
]There are two basic reasons. The first is: my massive ego. Really, I think that this was the principle cause. You see, I spent high school convinced that I was a heck of a lot more clever than any of my teachers (I am not saying that this is true- ego rarely allows for objectivity). I was similarly convinced that I was right, about really just about everything. Thus, arguments posed no threat to me- if I was unable to convince them, it's because they didn't understand me. If I failed to win an argument, it had no impact on my practice. Even if they had presented me with brilliant, powerful, and irrefutable arguments that my beliefs were wrong, I was strongly shielded with the walls of ego and would shrug and skip off my merry way.

So why did I argue? Because, quite simply, my largest problem in high school was not quashing, but sheer intolerable boredom. I wrote stories and poems in the margins of my notebooks; I took notes in script, fancy colors, or mirror writing; I memorized poems and speeches from Shakespeare; I wrote stories on my calculator; but mainly I asked questions. Good questions, argumentative questions, pointed questions, whatever. As long as my mind would be on, would be fencing or grasping or doing something.

Of course, I exaggerate somewhat. I was involved in the sides that I argued, often really trying to understand what the teacher was saying. (A snippet of memory where I earnestly insist that Ramban and Rashi can't both be right if they disagree) I had the Zionism argument, and the free will one about a billion times, and a couple of bad-things-good-peoples, and I really did care about what I was saying. But, I am ashamed to say, I cared very little about what my teachers had to say about the matter. This granted me a lovely combination of not objecting to stopping when the teacher demanded it and also not acting as if I were particularly vested in the case- as if it were all an intellectual game. Thus, people tended not to realize that I needed quashing, and when they tried it to some degree, I sort of didn't notice/care. Just like I didn't care enough about the argument to try it when not only their points, but their entire philosophies, perspectives, everything, annoyed me. Sometimes it just wasn't worth the trouble, because I just didn't care. That's not a boast, mind you- a more idealistic, honest, passionate, deep person (like Chana) would have cared, would have invested herself in them or their philosophy or even our arguments. But I was too practical, too egotistical, too bored, too sardonic. They could frustrate me, confuse me, enrage me, insult me, but they couldn't get close enough to quash me.

The second reason is my group of friends. I hung out with the good girls- the ones who went on to Michlala or BJJ. And to their everlasting credit, they had no problem hanging out with me, for all of my crazy arguingness. They even argued a bit themselves. And, more impressively, they hung out with the girls who wore pants and talked to boys, just so long as they were geeky enough to want to play word games or discuss books at the lunch table with the rest of us. So first of all, I had a lovely smoke screen- everyone assumed that I was with the good girls and would eventually shape up, settle down, and marry a kollel boy. And secondly, there were enough thinkers in the group- including those who went to BJJ and also people like Miri- that whenever I got a little quashed, they were there to tell me how darn right I was, and also give the old ego another pat by assuring me that I was clever and justified. We would argue amongst ourselves, quite a lot, but they tended to respect me, or at least tolerate that quirky Tobie. I was blessed to have them.

I don't know if I would have had the courage to actually fight them. I'm not a fighter by nature. I tend to smirk quietly on the sidelines and then go off and do my own thing. You can call it discretion, or cowardice, but there it is. But because I never really suffered, I do feel obligated, just briefly, to mention this point:

They were good people. Probably not every single one of them, but in general, they tended to be sweet and well-meaning. I feel as if I know them, because some of my friends or classmates are probably going to be them in a generation. Most would cook all night for you if you needed a meal. Most were living difficult, stressful lives for their ideals. Most really wanted you to straighten out because they just didn't know what would be with you, and it would be a tragedy, rachmana litzlan, if you turned out wrong, because you were such a smart girl, such potential, such a good heart. Most were willing to go above and beyond to help you, devoting their lunches and breaks to talking to you. They may not all be smart, or tactful, or sensitive. Few of them are open-minded or understanding. Fewer still treat you as an equal. But they are sweet and they mean so very, very well.

The Ran on Secular Government

Want to hear an utterly brilliant Ran? Of course you do. And because I am such a good bloggress, you are even going to get a translation and not a paraphrase:

But in my eyes, the simple explanation of the verse is thus: It is obvious that the human species needs a judge to judge its members, because without it, each man would swallow his fellow alive, and the entirety will be destroyed. And every nation needs for this purpose a civilized state (bad translation- ישוב מדיני), until the wise man said "Even a band of thieves agreed on justice between them." And Israel needs it like all the other nations. Separate from that, they need this for another purpose, and that is to firmly establish the laws of the Torah and to punish those liable for lashes or death by the court who transgress the words of the laws of the Torah, although these transgressions may not harm the state's civilization at all.
There is no doubt that for both of these sides there will be two issues. One will obligate to punishment every man according to the true law. The other, when he is not liable to punishment according to the true just law, but will obligate him to be punished according to improve the national order and according to the needs of the time.
And G-d assigned each of these issues to a special body. And commanded that judges be appointed to judge the true, just law, as it says "And they shall judge the people a just law."...And since the national order will not be complete with this alone, G-d added its repair, in the commandment of the king....
It says in the Mishna in the chapter Hayu Bodkin [that they asked the witnesses] "Did you recognize him?....Did you warn him and did he accept that warning, freeing himself for death? Did he kill within seconds afterwards?" There is no doubt that all this is right from the perspective of justice. For how can a man be killed if he did not know that he was entering into something for which there is a capital penalty and still transgressed?...But if , the transgressors are punished only in this way, the national order will be completely lost, for murderers will be numerous and will not fear punishment. And therefore G-d commanded for the sake of settling the world that a king be appointed...
And the king may judge without a warning as he sees necessary for the national welfare. Thus, the appointment of a king is the same for Israel and for the other nations that need national order, and the appointment of judges is unique and more necessary for Israel...

Awesomeness, no? I'll tell you what I thought was so cool and fun for a modern reader.
1) He frankly acknowledges what everybody tries to apologetics away: The Torah's legal code is not all that effective in the real world.
2) He breaks things down perfectly into how legal theorists divide the purposes of law: the deontological and the utilitarian. All legislation is trying to strike a balance between the two, and he makes the Torah system be just the same way.
3) Under his system, the religious norms- the victimless crimes of the religion- are designed to be basically unenforceable (okay, he has a paragraph that raises the option that the court can be extra-legal for those things, but I choose to go with his other opinion), while those things needed for society are left flexible and in human hands, to sort out with the changing state of society.
4) I like the idea of there being a body who just represents justice. Even though everybody knows that the final result isn't going to be the same, it's good to have them around reminding what strict justice would say. Kind of like the role of a largely powerless religious force in a secular country.
5) According to my Mishpat Ivri teacher, there was a great debate on this Ran between R' Chaim Ozer Grodzensky and R' Herzog. R' Herzog, I think the first chief Rabbi of Israel, wanted the Israeli legal system to incorporate aspects of Jewish law. R' Chaim Ozer, charedi and anti-Zionist, suggested using this Ran to establish a completely independent, completely secular system of criminal and civil law in the state of Israel. R' Kook seems to have taken the Ran much the same way.
6) According to the Ran's perspective, the king is a very practical, earthly sort of role. There is nothing all that divine about his purpose and therefore no reason that it should actually be an anointed, hereditary king. In fact, both R' Grodzensky and R' Kook extend the Ran to any sort of head of state, including a democratically elected one. After all, it's just like what all the other countries are doing to cater to their civilization needs. Which means that Mashiach could, in theory, be a democratically elected leader operating a thoroughly secular legal system. Which is actually just a little freaky.

Blocks

I built myself a castle out of blocks,
I made each column straight and corner tight,
And brightly colored letters on the sides
Spelled out words like normal, safe, and right.

I sat and read the writing on my walls,
And slept and dreamt that it was real,
That all my words had meaning
And that all my walls were steel.




Really, angsty existential poetry almost writes itself...all you need is a boring class, a malleable metaphor, and a complete shamelessness regarding cliches. Go on, try it.... it's fun....

How to Vote

My Constitutional Law professor raised an interesting argument today in an otherwise not particularly interesting class, which meant that I had a good hour or so to mull it over. He said that citizens, when voting, should not pick the candidates best for themselves (that is, the voters) personally, but rather the candidates best for everyone as citizens. His reasoning was that if everybody picks the person who will help them the most, then things will necessarily not be good for everyone, because everyone's personal interests necessarily conflict. If everybody picks the person best for them as citizens, on the other hand, than nobody's interests need conflict and everyone can go home happy.

What? I mean, really, what? I didn't raise the question with him, due to constraints of English, time, and energy to try to argue around any point that he has already settled in his head, but I really can't decide whether I like his argument or his conclusion less.

First the argument: Okay, maybe I just don't understand what he was saying, but the whole basis seems flawed. Do people have entirely different sets of interests as individuals and as citizens? Does government have a goal other than increasing the personal joy of all of the citizens? So either everybody's best interests necessarily conflict, in which even a candidate who really just wants what's best for everyone is going to have to favor the welfare of the majority of citizens over that of the few. Or else they don't conflict and a set of representatives chosen selfishly, given adequate representative-ness (actually, even more applicable in Israel than America), will include sufficient people pushing for everyone's selfish interests that the minority will get as much as it is efficient in terms of general happiness for them to get, via wheeling and dealing and alliances and all that good political jazz.

But even assuming his argument is correct and that more total happiness is achieved via candidates chosen for the benefits to the voter "as a citizen", I don't think that it's a smart way to vote. For one thing, you have a giant prisoner's dilemma, with every single other voter in the country having a lot of incentive to vote selfishly. If you look out for the public good only, you're probably going to end up left out. Secondly, who the heck knows what is in the public good? Can the average voter take a survey of the entire country and see which policy benefits the majority of them the most? Or perhaps is the exact same result achieved if everybody just picks the guy best for them? (It's like a survey, only easier!) Thirdly, you assume that most of the things that benefit people personally are going to be in conflict, while I think in reality at least 90% of differences in voting are based not on different selfish interests, but on different values, opinions, and beliefs about reality. Everybody wants a secure country; nobody agrees about how to get it. And so no situation is going to make everyone happy no matter how you want to slice it, and you can't pretend that less selfish voters will solve anything. Fourthly, I think the question assumes that interests 'as a citizen' are more important than 'selfish' interests- that it's more morally proper to vote your political agenda than your pocketbook. I don't buy it- the whole genius of democracy is that you get a system best for everybody by having everybody look out for themselves. Pork isn't inherently morally wrong, it's wrong because it causes more harm to the whole than it earns to the individuals and sufficiently intelligent and selfish voters will stop it just as well as altruistic ones. Democracy, certainly from the perspective of the voters, isn't about weighing the good of society, it's about a perfect balance of selfishnesses.

Yes, I acknowledge that the above statements are a bit extreme, trending towards all sorts of icky utilitarian calculus and tyranny of the many, but the principle is sound. And anyway, the flaws would in no way be solved by voters who try to guess at the greater good instead of simply taking a vote and finding it out.

Giyus

So I finally got my draft notice in the mail. I thought that it had been a little long, considering that I've been a citizen for around ten months by now, but apparently another notice had been sent to an old address (my ulpan dorms), so that this one was officially entitled "Last Warning Before Imprisonment." Charming.

Tomorrow I'm going to the base to present my letter from the Rabbinate affirming that I am just too darn religious of a female to be able to serve in the army and earning my official exemption once and for all.

I feel horribly guilty.

I mean, be honest. My religiosity is not such that it would interfere with my army service. But beyond the whole lying on official documents thing, I really and firmly believe that all citizens of Israel ought to serve in the Army. I certainly don't approve of people who say that they're too religious to serve the country, or girls who claim to have a problem with the army but refuse to do National Service either. I would have a bit of a problem dating a guy who finked out of the army in the way that I am doing.

But what can I do? I'm in the middle of university, not really at a stage in my life where I have the time or will to put my life on hold for a year or so. I have plans, I have a schedule, I'm a real-live grown-up person and just can't see myself stopping, no matter what ideological ideas I throw at myself.

I know. It's a really lame excuse. I have better ones. I have the "oh, please, does the army really desperately need another bureaucrat?" one. I have the "I'm giving this country my entire life, not to mention living a couple continents away from my family and earning half the salary I could have" one. I have one about "I couldn't do it anyway, the language barrier blah blah blah." I have one that says that had I taken potential army service into account I would never have made aliyah. I have one that blames my parents.

I don't buy any of them. The fact is, I could serve in the army. And I'm not going to. For really no good reason whatsoever.

Circles and Lines

The guided tour of the Israeli Supreme Court loves to harp on the architecture of the court and the philosophy thereof. A favorite line- much mocked among my friends and family- is "Circles and lines, circles and lines," pointing out the use of circles to symbolize justice (מעגלי צדק) and lines to symbolize law (לפנים משורת הדין). (Mocked because really, what other shapes are there to make things out of, if not circles and lines?)

Anyway, sitting in a boring ConLaw class, I decided that the metaphor really works as yet another way for me to formulate my legal/halachic/rambling philosophy. As follows:

Justice is a circle. Now, there are two ways that you can try to draw a circle. The surer way is to construct a polygon made out of lines. The more lines you use, the closer you'll get to an actual circle. But as long as you're using lines, there are going to be gaps between your polygon and the circle of justice. You can keep adding lines, but you can only use as many lines as your 'program' can support. The original Nintendo graphic circles were octagons; now they're something like 96 sided figures, maybe more. But even then you have gaps, and programs like that take up a not of memory, and you have to be really careful to make sure you're adding in the lines right, so that your figure is still transcribed inside the circle and not bulging out all over outside of that.

The other option is to try to draw your circle free-hand. Which is very tempting when you have a octagon and are sitting there staring at the gaps. But actually, it's virtually impossible for a person to draw a real perfect circle. It's bound to bulge over the real circle here, and have a huge gap there, not to mention being different every time. It may well happen that your free-hand drawing- if you're good at it- is better than the octagon, but then again maybe not. It all depends on the person drawing.

I personally like the first model better. Not only is it sure, predictable, and easy to apply, but as your system's 'memory storage' or sophistication of thought, tools, or institutions improves, you can keep drawing in more lines, or very delicately breaking up the ones you have. As opposed to the free-hand style, which is simply chaos.

Which means that law not only is not always just, but it cannot be. Because a circle cannot be perfectly matched using straight lines, especially when the number is limited by the capacity of the system. No matter how clever (or Divine) the drawer of the lines happens to be.

Zaken Mamre

Deutoronomy 17:8-13
If there arise a matter too hard for you in judgment, between blood and blood, between plea and plea, and between stroke and stroke, being matters of controversy within your gates, then shalt you arise and go up into the place which the LORD your God shall choose. And you shall come unto the priests, the Levites, and unto the judge who shall be in those days, and inquire; and they shall show you the sentence of judgment. And you shall do according to the sentence, which they of that place which the LORD shall choose shall show you; and you shall observe to do according to all that they inform you.According to the sentence of the law which they shall teach you and according to the judgment which they shall tell you, you shall do. You shall not stray from the sentence which they shall show you to the right hand nor to the left. And the man who will do presumptuously, and will not hearken unto the priest who standeth to minister there before the LORD thy God, or unto the judge, even that man shall die; and you shall put away the evil from Israel. And all the people shall hear, and fear, and do no more presumptuously.

Mishna Sanhedrin 11:2
A judge rebelling against the Great Sanhedrin is commanded in the Scripture as in Deut. xvii. 8-13: If there arise a matter too hard for you in judgment...cases come before your court that are too difficult... And in case a judge in the country had a dispute about the law with his colleagues... all of them came to the Great Sanhedrin which was in the Temple treasury, from which the law proceeds to all Israel as it reads [ibid., ibid. 10]: "From that place which the Lord will choose, and thou shalt observe to do according to all that may instruct thee." Then if the judge returns to his own city and continues his lectures as before, he is not culpable. If, however, he gives his decision for practice, he is subject to capital punishment. As it reads [ibid., ibid. 12]: "And the man that will act presumptuously," etc., which means that he is not culpable unless he decides for practice.



I testify against him, modeling my composure after the blankness of his face. I tell them what he said when we warned him of his sin: I know, my sons, I know, but what should I do? Should I hang myself on this High Court, to follow the logic of the servants and transgress the words of the Master?

I do not know how to describe the tears in his voice when he asked the question, and anyway, it is not relevant.

The judges whisper sagely to each other as if they have something to say.

We feel like school-children making solemn games out of the day's lessons. He withdraws into an invisible glass box, watching the earnest young faces debate, balanced on the knife-edge between suicide and perversion of justice.

The sentence is given in a carefully level voice, as though the judge reads a text in an unfamiliar language. The teacher nods once, with grave restraint. The glass bowl is broken in some indefinable way, and it is only then that we realize how firmly he kept himself in check. The judges stand before him for a moment uncertainly. Then the hour of departure arrives and they go their separate ways, they to live and he to die.

Before the trial, he was compactly intense, treating his prison cell as though it were his study hall. He discussed the laws of prayer in prison, the ruling on a maternal aunt’s co-wife married to a brother, questions of how to purify ovens. He committed and recommitted the crime for which they would try him, citing logic, tradition, sources to back his opinion, his colleagues looking awkwardly away. We did not know if believing that his ruling was wrong would have made it easier or not.

But after the trial, he refuses to teach his students, saying that we should not study with one whom the court has convicted. Still we hang around the prison, not knowing where else to go.

They lead him to the execution through frozen crowds that shy away from the procession as though we are lepers or seraphim, but follow behind us, another set of unwilling actors. I want to wake up and go to the study hall and have somebody explain my dream favorably. A dream of a teacher's execution, they would say, is a portent for future greatness. And then we would fall silent and wait for the lecture to begin...

A little before the end, they instruct him to confess, the passages from Joshua intoned as they have been intoned to hardened criminals and sobbing convicts. He listens as though hearing them for the first time. He asks them to help him to bow and they gently lower him onto his face.
This is his confession in the cold damp wind:

Master of the Universe, I am before Thee like a vessel full of shame. For Thy Name is desecrated daily and Thy commandments are transgressed, because I did not succeed in having my words accepted by my fellows, in punishment for my many sins. Let my death atone for all my sins and let Thy Name be sanctified through me.

Someone prompts him to confess the sin for which he will die. Should I confess, he asks, and then wait until you ask me to rule again? He who says ‘I shall sin and repent, I shall sin and repent…’

But, Rabbi, says a judge, at least confess conditionally, for who can say whether you have ruled correctly?

And he replies: And you who follow the ruling of the High Court and act as they have permitted- do you confess conditionally?

Four cubits before the end, they remove his clothes. We cannot bear to watch or look away.

They sink him in the dung up to his elbows and we tear our clothes as we would if a Torah scroll were flung to the ground. I hold my hands to keep them still.

They wrap the scarf around his neck, hand the ends to the witnesses so that our hands will be first against him. He looks up at me and quotes softly: There are two paths before me- one to heaven and one to hell and I do not know which one they will lead me on. Should I not cry?

We bury him among the adulterers, murderers, and false prophets, and our tears burn like coals in our throats.






This stab at Tannaitic fiction was brought to you by this shiur (audio file), this post, and my Mishpat Ivri class. I am aware of the anachronisms in the quotes and allusions, but I'm okay with that.

Sotah

Just a quick thought. The crazy thing about sotah is that it works about equally well if it kills nobody at all. Think about it- it is only used when there are only two people who know whether or not the woman is guilty, and both of them have a vested interest in keeping the information secret. If the woman is actually guilty and nonetheless gets away with it, she's hardly going to tell anyone. She goes off, perhaps with her faith challenged, perhaps thinking at her husband cheated on her, but the husband is happy and the society continues to function thinking that everything works.

The more important use of the water is to keep everybody scared off, both of adultery and later of failing to admit it and agreeing to go through the ritual. Even if nobody ever dies, belief in the efficacy of the whole thing is probably not going to be shaken- firstly, because there's a general presumption that only the innocent would dare to go through with something that they know will kill the guilty and is besides shameful and scary, and secondly, because the whole thing is probably so rare that nobody thinks that there's an overwhelming trend (after all, they stopped the practice when there were a lot of adulterers.) And when everyone really does believe in it, only the innocent will dare to go through with it, so that there becomes absolutely no practical impact to the question of whether it would kill the guilty.

Everyone avoids adultery to a large degree, chooses uncompensated divorce the rest of the time, and the truly innocent have a foolproof way of convincing their communities and husbands of their innocence, all without actually ever requiring open miracles. Not that I'm saying that it didn't actually work the way the text claims- miracles and all- but it doesn't need to. (And after all, the gemara says that even G-d lies for shalom bayit....)

Random Philosophical Question

Question for thought and discussion*:

Would you pay for a pleasure that you will not remember after having experienced?

Example: You are offered the choice of two meals, equal in nutritional value. One is entirely bland- not unpleasant, not pleasant. The other is extremely yummy. You can pay a small sum of money and receive the second, which you will enjoy quite a lot. The catch: as soon as you have finished eating, you will not remember what decision you made and will have no memory of any pleasure you experienced. Would you pay for the pleasure?

If yes: Would you pay to have a really pleasant dream that you will not remember upon waking?

If no: What if you remembered your decision for ten minutes following the meal? Twenty? An hour? A day?

Would it make a difference whether there was an objective record of your decision which you could not access? What if you could access the record or otherwise deduce which decision you made but you would still not remember the experience of pleasure? Does it matter whether or not you notice and/or derive pleasure from the money saved? Does the kind of pleasure make a difference? In continuity a factor- does it matter if you will remember a point when you remembered the pleasure without memory of the pleasure itself?

I have absolutely no answers, myself. And I'm not looking less for philosophical answers than for some clues as to how people are wired, because it is a fact that we pay for pleasures that we know we will remember only in the short term- is this merely because we choose to ignore that fact in making our pleasure-related choices or is the experience of pleasure itself sufficient without any impact on later memory?

*preferably in my comments, because I love comments

Inspiration

and inspiration hits
like an itch in the back of the throat
and you cough up words

lego towers shaking with their own weightiness,
spiral staircases of ever-metaing cliches,
trackless trains thundering to no point whatsoever,
collages of actual genius,
pictures worth about three words each

Shavuot Potpourri

Not a real post, but I have school tomorrow (at last!) so scattered thoughts from over my Shavuot:

• When speakers introduce a paradox into their philosophical lectures, how often do you think it's really a question of having a source that doesn't agree with their theses that they have to do something with?
• My favorite Megillat Rut thought is still the one I read on vbm.com during seminary: Rut and Job are actually pretty similar stories- a person who lost everything, who feels that G-d has turned against them. The difference? In Job, the victim spends some 40 very long-winded chapters pondering the reason for his tragedy, trying to dissect and analyze the workings of G-d. In Rut, humans take the tragedy and deal with it and get on with life- painfully, but resolutely, and most importantly with kindness. It's an oddly areligious book- there is nothing divine nor superanatural; instead, humans deal with tragedy by making the world a better place for other humans. Job ends with G-d coming down and basically saying that the whole discussion is pointless- humans cannot understand Him and there's really no point in trying. Rut ends with birth and hope for the former victims, leading to royalty and, of course, Mashiach.
• So the above dvar torah has a really funny story attached to it. I was called upon to deliver it at 8 am Shavuot morning, without notice, after having stayed up all night, when we all really wanted to stumble back the 40 minute walk to seminary and sleep until havdala, but the seminary instead forced us all to come to a kiddush that a very sweet donor was throwing for the school, which was really very nice except that nobody could eat because of the aforementioned exhaustion. So anyway, I gave this dvar torah because it was the only one I knew and besides I really did like it, and after I finish one of the madrichot comes over and says, "Oh my gosh, that was so perfect. This family- their son died and they got really involved in tzdaka organizations." To which I said, "Oh" in a tone that I hope conveyed all of the my-freaking-goodness- are-you-kidding-me- why-didn't-somebody-blinking-tell-me- do-you-think-I-would-have-had-the-I-don't-know-what- to-actually-say-that- holy-mackeral-I-can't-look-at-them-blast-blast-blast feeling that it was intended to convey.
• So I went to a wedding on Monday night and it was so very nice and my favorite bit was watching the chosson watch the kallah coming down the aisle with this wubbly little look on his face, and of course I had the girly moment of wanting there to be somebody who looked at me wubbly and then last night it occured to me- G-d looks at me wubbly. That's right, G-d- the one with the lightning and fire and rainbowness and inscrutibility and all manners of infinitude- He looks at me wubbly. And frankly, He thinks I'm adorable. (I know it's cliche, but addiction to nonconformity is itself a cliche)
  
• Talmud is so funny when it's being ironic. It supports the general thesis that all really intelligent people have finely honed senses of ironic humor.
• Did you know that there is a street called Rut in Katamon and the explanation line on it reads "Wife of Boaz, grandmother of David?"
• Do you know who's a cool character? Yoav ben Tzruriah. Someday, I want to give a shiur on him. He keeps popping up here and there doing insane things and getting away with them.
• I sometimes think that if I were not so painfully self-aware I could easily become a performer. You know the type- the one whose quirkiness dominates every conversation; who will do shtick at every wedding, regardless of talents or closeness to the principles; of whom it is constantly said "I love him, he's such a character"; who really doesn't mind when everyone is looking at them or wonder what's being thought behind the faces or worry that he looks like an idiot. It sounds like it would be wonderously refreshing, but perhaps from the inside it's completely different.
  

For the love of G-d, world!

It's= it is
Its= belonging to it

Exactly

A terribly fun article, mostly because it accords with my personal ire.
Favorite quote:

Israel is an immature democracy, poorly governed; its political class is mediocre and corrupt; it floats precariously in a lethally hostile Muslim sea; and it really could use a constitution.

Did you know that yesterday I was at a forum about the EU and when one of the speakers said "ICompared with its neighbors, Israel is low on corruption", every single person in the room snickered quietly? In unison.

Chinuch

I was sicced onto this article by Yoni, since apparently I have not been getting ired enough in the recent past. The approach of the author is not, I may say, unfamiliar to me, although I had never had the whole thing spelled out in quite so much detail- R' Grossman was the principal of my former high school and I may well recognize the people behind some of his anecdotes. (I don't seem to have made it in there myself.)

Well, first of all, let me say that there's a lot valid there. I think that he is correct that people do not stop being frum because of the temptations, seductions, and lures of the 'Goyish' street, but rather because they are dissatisfied with what they are being offered in their schools. I certainly agree that harsh discipline is the wrong approach the problems and everyone should go for understanding and discovering underlying issues whenever possible. I think that he is also correct that it is time to fight the battle that is in front of us instead of the one that we fought in the past, or would like to be fighting now.

I do not, however, agree on what that battle is. I do not think that 'mussar haskel' and warm life lessons are insufficiently emphasized in our chumash and nach classes; the conclusion that many people are intellectually dissatisfied with Judaism but stay for emotional reasons does not, for me, naturally lead into the conclusion that we must create emotional bonds so that people will stay. I do not believe that students are being educated with too large an emphasis on the cognitive and intellectual, and I do not believe that suitable gentle peer pressure will be enough to make everybody realize that everything they are taught is 100% right. I can't say that I think that a question about why tzniut is emphasized so much more than other midot is necessarily indicative of deep rebellion, as the article seems to assume we will assume. I don't really think that the goyish street is actually a cesspit of stupidity, emptiness, and fleeting pleasures, but that's a bit of a different issue

And- perhaps this is bias speaking- I certainly not believe that children are simply 'empty shells, waiting for the right teacher to fill the vacuum'.

I'm not sure that I believe that I have the answer for the chinuch problems, but I certainly have a novel suggestion: Why don't we try assuming that the students are intelligent, reasonable people, who are bothered by genuine cognitive and intellectual concerns? It's not, of course, always true. Most teenagers are pretty dumb, and those that aren't are so young and proud and earnest and confused and simplistic that they might as well be. (I speak primarily of myself).

But maintaining this illusion will 1) give them the feeling that you view them as actual people with minds and thoughts and contributions and so forth, instead of charming little tabula rassa's just waiting to be filled up with lovely sketches of kollel husbands and wives, 2) will let them know that questions- their questions- are valid and not necessarily contradictory to being Orthodox and that nobody is going to run after them screaming "An atheist! Burn her!" and 3) might actually give them some useful answers or tools to discover them.

I sat through 4 years of high school and I had inspiration and gushiness and love and morals and trust until they poured out of my ears. My heart was played on day after day, and my notebooks managed to look after themselves, but nobody was really doing much to deal with the head.
What I didn't get was answers. Or a license to ask questions. Or a reassurance that I was respected by those who claimed to hear me but who poured my words into their molds and boxes so that they could help the only ways that they knew (more love and so forth).What I didn't really get was a sense that my religion actually was valid and brilliant. Which is a pity. 'Cuz I tend to think it is.

*All this relates to the intellectual style rebel. The behavioral rebel- the kind who wants to act out and talk to boys or wear pants or both (maybe even at the same time)- they usually straightened out in seminary unless they had been turned off by censure and harsh discipline- another point that I agree with in the article- or had the intellectual issues as well.

Sefer Shmuel

So this afternoon I read the end of Sefer Shmuel I for a shiur. The shiur focused on the chronology, which is problematic and confusing, but preparing, I was more struck with the tragedy of the whole story. All the characters are so miserable in their own complicated ways.

I mean, obviously we feel bad for David, who is not only described as perfect and holy, horribly tormented and oppressed, but also gets all of Tehillim for us to feel his pain. But all of the other characters have their own twisted storylines of tragedy interweaving so that the sefer is like a really good novel, but not a very happy one.

Take Michal: falls in love with David, gets lucky enough to marry him. Early in the marriage, her father tries to kill him, forcing her to turn against her father and not see her husband again for quite a while. Meanwhile, she gets handed off to another husband as revenge against her husband's 'rebellion'. The new husband seems quite fond of her and maybe she's vaguely happy. In any case, soon enough she gets taken back to David in another power statement. Yay, true love. Except that he's picked up another couple of wives in the meantime, who already have kids by him and everything. The only other time we see her, she's trying to assert her dignity and acting very acerbic to the husband that we were told she loved; he snaps back at her and mentions that G-d likes him better than her and her father's household (all meanwhile dead). She has no more children to her dying day, possibly because her husband no longer likes her. Oh yeah, and fun little point- her five children, as survivors of Shaul, are given by her husband to be murdered to buy off Shaul's blood guilt.

Or Yonatan: he may have gotten the hang of it that David will be the next king, but he's willing to accept that. He doesn't believe that his father would really try to kill David, but when convinced, he's takes David's side and gets cursed out in front of the whole court. Other than meeting David in secret from time to time, he has no contact with him until his last battle, where he probably dies under the impression that David is fighting on the other team.

Or Shmuel, who selects Shaul as king and then is told by G-d to reject him. He is upset but still has to be the one to yell at Shaul pretty forcefully. While still feeling bad about this, he is told to get over Shaul and commit treason against him by picking somebody new.

But Shaul is really the most tragic character of all. He's really like the figure in Greek myths who tries to thwart the oracle and never does. It's not clear whether he believes Shmuel that he's been rejected as a king- maybe he thinks it's later down the generations, or that he'll die early, or that he can repent. But in any case, as soon as this happens, G-d deserts him- something we probably can't imagine never having had G-d rest upon us- and instead a depressed, raving sort of mental illness attacks him. The harp player he finds helps out, except that pretty soon he becomes a national hero, that everybody seems to like better than him, who can fight the battles that the king should be handling, but can't since G-d doesn't like him anymore. He sees everybody in the nation falling in love with David- his own son, his daughter, the people, and probably he remembers the prophecy and gets freaked out. But there's nothing he can do. He tries to fight it. He sends people to get David and finds that his daughter and son and personal prophet who anointed him and (he thinks) all the priests are with David. He tries to chase him himself and ends up naked, raving in public and being mocked by the entire nation. For years, he tries to catch David, occasionally coming to himself beset by remorse. The whole effort just sends away his best warriors so that they're not there for the final battle that kills him. Maybe if he hadn't, he or one of his sons might have survived. Maybe if he had been willing to let David be king, it would simply have been a son-in-law coming to power instead of the son, who seems sort of okay with the whole idea. But he can't accept it, partially because a king can't accept people rebelling, especially when their fatal flaw has been to not be assertive enough, and partially because he can't, physically can't survive assuming that G-d really has rejected him.

His death is perhaps the only heroic part. He realizes that G-d has entirely left him- no prophets, no priests, no spirit of G-d- and he turns to witchcraft that he feels are so evil that he tried to anihilate them. And he is told that he will lose the war, that he and his sons will all die. Everything he wanted to deny is true, undeniably so. It is with a sort of tragic grandeur that he goes to field, knowing that he will die, determined to do so with the modicum of dignity left to him. He dies alone, killed by himself, possibly finished off and certainly looted by a passing stranger, but I think that his death was as a king.