RELIGIOUS OBSERVANCE AND DAILY LIFE: THE DYNAMIC DUO

The Pope says it. Many Rabbis for whom I have great respect and regard say it and often! Many ministers and Imams and various clergy and religious people within many different traditions claim and live it. We need to be in both worlds – the world of our faith and the world of our daily dealings and each should inform and be informed by the other. This is the only way this religion thing will work constructively. Clearly, that is why Jews have tomes and tomes of text explaining what it is exactly that the Torah says and how we are to apply it in our lives. Acknowledged are the dynamics that there are often conflicting issues and dynamics and that a standard that will work in one context is not the one to apply in another context even though they may look similar – the difference is definitely determined by the details – requiring an equal dose of knowledge of the world that is as well as the religious standards by which one lives. It is ONLY at this intersection that Jewish law or Halacha is crafted and intended to be practiced.

Throughout my career I have focused on bringing together the texts and teachings of my religious heritage (as well as others that I find so instructive and inspiring), the critical issues of the day, and the learners in the room. This is how our lives, as people of faith and observance, are meant to be lived. In my daily learning of Gemara, this is reinforced. Recently as I am in the middle of Baba Kamma, I came across the following statement that would challenge that sentiment:

"But is learning Greek wisdom really prohibited? ... Shmuel stated in the name of Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel, “I can apply this to what I saw myself. A thousand young men were in the household of mu father. Five hundred of them studied Torah and five hundred studied Greek wisdom, and no one remains from this second group except for myself and my cousin ….The members of Rabban Gamliel’s household were different in that they spoke the language and learned Greek wisdom, for they were close to the Roman monarchy.” [Baba Kamma 82b - 83a]

I am well aware of those in the more right pitched part of the Orthodox Jewish community who do not value nor pursue secular (or general) fields of knowledge. It would appear that here they have strong support for that position and in other such statements of a seemingly similar sentiment, which do exist. Further, one could (and many do) make the case that this would bolster the position of those in this same part of the Orthodox Jewish world who aschew any contact with the outside world in a meaningful way or any steps that would take them away from Torah, so to speak. There are similar groups with similar reasons in other religious groupings as well.

So how do I reconcile this seeming validation for such a closed worldview with the intellectual and sophisticated stance I so often find in the Gemara and other Jewish texts. I go to context and look at the larger text within which such statements appear; which is really the only way to understand them and their intended message. In this case, my comfort is found in the last statement about proximity, physically and culturally, and in so many ways to the Roman monarchy. The students and members of Rabban Gamliel did NOT live in isolation in their closed monochromatic village, but were part of the larger world. It was in that context that this knowledge was sought, needed and valuable. In fact, it was Rabban Gamliel in Maseches Rosh Hashanah 2:8, who had the charts of phases of the moon in his upper office which would be used to help the witnesses who would proclaim the New Moon for the community. Rabban Gamliel knew well that he and all those he influenced had to be part of both the secular world of living and the Jewish world of observance; and that it was only in bringing these two together in a symbiotic interaction that each would be actualized in daily life. This was particularly critical in understanding the science of the phases of the moon as this was, you will remember, before printed calendars, and communities depended on this information for the very rhythm of their lives.

I watch and am continually honored and heartened to hear, many years after our shared learning experience, students of mine report that they are following this formula daily in their lives. My own children honor and awe me daily as they bring their Jewish knowledge and foundational values to their work, community involvements and all that they do to try to make our world a better, kinder place. Doctors, lawyers, community organizers, educators, business people and all of us are concerned today about the state of our secular world. In response, there are too many in the more closed and isolated parts of our religious spectrum who will say, “See, the students who dabble in secular knowledge are only going to destroy or be destroyed,” echoing what they might want to read into this text from Baba Kamma. Yet, my contention is that it is precisely these people who can bring so much healing and good energy to our fractured world. Further, those who feel an obligation or responsibility to do so will indeed make a profound difference. This is what I believe Rabban Gamliel understood and why he approved of such a bringing together of the secular and the religious.

In the Jewish cycle of Torah readings we finished several weeks ago reading about Yoseph (Joseph) who did precisely that in his role as Viceroy of Egypt and simultaneously bringing his family back together, insuring the continuation of the Jewish nation as he did so. Some of his actions are questioned and reasonably so, but what is one of the most important takeaways from this narrative is his bringing together these two worlds within the reality of his life. Then we moved on to the narrative of Moshe (Moses), who clearly brought together his Jewish sensibilities and what he had learned due to his proximity to, actually privileged residence, in the Egyptian world. Today, think of the many leaders in our world who are speaking out from a profound sense of this interfacing of the secular and the religious and compare them to those who would separate these two spheres, focusing excessively on the one or the other.

In Yoma 72b we read as follows: "If one is deserving, [the Torah] becomes for him an elixir of life; if undeserving, a deadly poison." As I often write in this blog and in so many other places, this is a matter of balance. Our bodies need our souls, we are better with our partners and friends in life than alone, we accomplish so much more together than separate. It is no different with our knowledge from these two spheres. This was understood by our teachers of the Mishnah and Gemara and so many others to come. This is the beauty of Jewish knowledge. Remember that much more of the Talmud and so many sources of Jewish law are precisely about how we live our lives day to day than our ritual practice. What does that tell us? It confirms what the Pope, Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, and so many teachers of so many faith communities confirm and teach today – that the purpose of religious teaching is not to scare us into hiding, but rather to help us bolster and make our world a better and more reasonable place for all.