I’ve come across a beautiful passage from Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch, the coolest guy this side of Christendom. It is one of the quotes that manages to articulate something so fundamental and yet so rarely said. Something so inspiring and something that there is a desperate need to internalise. It focuses on the very core of Jewish philosophy, the Biblical narrative and the people we are called on to be.
But first, let’s consider that fundamental tenet of Judaism: man is not G-d! Moreover, it is the most beautiful message of Judaism that need not (nay, should not) aspire to be so. Neither is man an angel. All man can aspire to be is man and that is enough! There is no being perfect or transcending our status as men (our soul escaping our body, so to speak); there is only living up to, as best we can, our potential as human beings. Yes- human beings, homo sapiens, humans animals. “Perhaps more than man-as-divine-person, man-as-an-animal needs religious faith and commitment to a higher authority. G-d takes man-animal into His confidence and reveals to him His moral will” (Soloveitchik).
Judaism does not see man as divine-person torn by satanic revolt, falling away from his G-d-Father. There is no Original Sin whereby our very nature precludes us from having a relationship with G-d. No… it is man as an animal, with his animal drives, pleasures and instincts that is called upon to serve G-d. Just consider that it is the very same things that constitute our evil inclination, are the very same things that are our ‘good inclination’. If we sin, that says absolutely nothing about our nature, and everything about the sin.
“Man’s haughtiness becomes for Christianity the metaphysical pride of an allegedly unconditioned existence. Jewish biblical pride signifies only overemphasis upon man’s abilities and power.” (Soloveitchik)If our nature is not other-worldly, then we are not at fault for not being so. The problem is that we are not being properly and morally this-worldly. Note that we- physical beings- are tzelem Elokim: in the image of G-d. Does this mean being the same spiritual ‘stuff’ as G-d? Of course not. It means precisely being an image, a reflection, a receptacle of G-dliness on earth. This means we are commanded to ‘walk in G-d’s ways’: to visit the sick, to help the poor, to be a creator of worlds etc. We are commanded to find G-d a makom (a place) on earth. And through our actions, we are that makom. G-d’s presence rests ‘within the four cubits of halakha’: i.e. with mans’ actions on earth. To be tzelem Elokim is to be the opposite of other-wordly. Not to be G-d but the image of G-d i.e. do what you have to be quintessentially human.
Judaism’s notion of man-as-animal is the great leveller. Of course, we aren’t (or better, don’t need to be) just man-as-animal. We, if we so choose, can be an animal but have a soul. Or if we want we can just be man as a random example of the species homo sapien. But the fact that, as philosophers would say, we are all ontically the same (the same in essence) means we all start from the same place and can all reach the same heights:
As it says in Judges, “I call heaven and earth to witness, be a man a Jew or a non-Jew, man or woman, manservant or maidservant, only according to their actions will the spirit of G-d rest upon them”.
This applies, and this is my point in this piece, quite generally. There is no essential difference between Moses and you or the Gedolei Torah and the woman down the local fish-market. They have just the same yezer hara- the same physical drives- as Joe Bloggs, Plonie Ben Plonie and Jane Doe.
Consider the following: The Torah doesn’t tell us where Moses was buried. Why? Our tradition tells us that it is so that no-one will make a pilgrimage to that site or be inclined to make Moses, as such, central to the religion (i.e. he will not turn into an object of worship or an aid to worship). Moses as-such is no different to anyone else. In fact, he points out himself that “I am slow of speech and tongue”. We learn that he is ‘a very humble man, more so than anyone else on the face of the earth’. We see hear that there is no equivalent to the Christian ‘son of G-d’ because his leadership wasn’t based on any specific set of ‘natural’ or ‘supernatural’ qualities. It is not vested in his personal authority, charisma, or essential nature. It is not in the person of Moses (as Christians believe it is in the person of Jesus) but in the message- in the Torah. It is not because of any special attribute of his person that he became leader but because he became a receptacle of G-d’s will and G-d’s word. And that is incumbent on each of us!
There is no need for the Torah to hide Moses’ human nature from us. He sinned. The greatest man (ani ma’amin) that ever lived or will live (contra Chassidus, moshiach will not be at his level), sinned. Fell short. He got punished. He got buried who knows where, outside of the Land of Israel. So, on the one hand, we agree with Nietzsche that we are “human, all too human”. Yet this isn’t a cause for denigration of Moses’ personality or as an excuse to have a ‘will to power’, to assert our dominance and to inanely follow our desires (i.e. the very opposite of Moses). It is not the case that if we cannot live up to an ideal, that it shouldn’t be pursued. No- the story is there to teach us the very opposite. Despite- and maybe because of- his human nature, he was the only person to see G-d ‘face-to-face’. If human-Moses can have that relationship with his fellow men and with G-d, then we can to. It does not need a demi-G-d or son of G-d to do so.
So now the quote from Rav Hirsch:
“Our ancestors were never presented to us as angelic models to emulate in every respect; indeed, had they been presented to us as angelic creatures, their example for us to follow in our own lives would have been far less ideal and instructive than it actually is. If we were to discover no shortcomings in their personalities, they would appear to us like higher beings who, free from all human passions and weaknesses, never had to struggle against sin and were never in need of an incentive to virtue. We could conclude that, given our own human imperfections, any effort on our part to emulate their saintly qualities would be doomed to failure. Precisely by not concealing their shortcomings from us, the Word of G-d has brought our patriachs and matriachs closer to us as human beings, humans like us exposed to the same struggles and temptations. And if, nevertheless, they attained that high sense of morality and loyalty to their calling that made them worthy of G-d’s nearness, they thereby demonstrated the heights that are within our power to obtain, depite our weaknesses and imperfections”
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This is a message that greatly needs to be ‘eaten up’ in modern times where we do portray Biblical figures as basically blameless (e.g. see the Mussar treatment of ‘the sins of great men’) and where we have hagiographies where gedolim are ‘different kind of people’ who never struggle, who are always right, and are moulded into whatever the writers would like their demi-god to be. It takes us away from the great men they actually are and the reasons why they are such great man. It takes us towards the ‘person’ and away from the message. They are not great because their message is correct (because their Torah learning is great) but their message is right just because they say it (G-d forbid). Something is not seen as forbidden because it is not the right way to live but invoking the authority and charisma of the gedolim (and bending or manipulating what they actually say) to ban what they (i.e. not what the gedolim) want banned. An example of this is the following written by Rabbi Moshe Tendler (son in law of Rabbi Moshe Feinstein):
"Occasionally intentional falsehoods are included [in biographies of gedolim] to pervert the truths of their lives. . . . By [a biography of my father-in-law, Rabbi Feinstein] perpetuating such falsehoods as Reb Moshe never reading the newspapers when in fact he read them “cover to cover” daily, they sought to remake him into their perverted image of what a gadol should be. The fact that neither I nor my wife or children were interviewed by them nor shown the galleys confirms the intentional plan to present a fraudulent life story for some less than honorable purposes.
[Instead R. Moshe:] read the newspaper every morning at the breakfast table, whatever newspaper it might be—the socialistic Forward, or the Tag, or the Morning Journal and then the Algemeiner Journal.
Consider the following from an interview with R' Nosson Sherman:
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How do you respond to critics who accuse ArtScroll biographies of whitewashing history by characterizing great rabbis as saints without faults?
Our goal is to increase Torah learning and yiras shamayim. If somebody can be inspired by a gadol b’yisrael, then let him be inspired. Is it necessary to say that he had shortcomings? Does that help you become a better person? What about lashon hara? You know in today’s world, lashon hara is a mitzvah. Character assassination sells papers. That’s not what Klal Yisrael is all about.
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Does this fit with what R’Hirsch said? Does yirat shamayim (fear of heaven) come from being inspired by an ideal figure? Are we to be inspired to become a better person by their charisma, or to come to G-d through them? Is it really character assassination to say people had shortcomings and they played a part in their decisions? I don’t think so, let’s look at the great people our gedolim really are and maybe we can follow their example and walk in G-d’s ways. Maybe, just maybe we, like them can be “human, all too human”.
Were our patriachs saints? Chas ve-Shalom!
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