atheist perspectives
My friend Razib, one of the most intellectually rigorous atheists I have ever met, asks a thought-provoking question: is modern Judaism a creation of Christianity? I admit to being only marginally aware of the hellenistic/rabbinical distinction he alludes to, so I need to do some background reading before I am even qualified to opine.
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It’s an interesting notion and one that’s crossed my mind a few times, although to me he’s underemphasizing the Muslim contribution to that. Judaism has for at least 1,500 years had to define itself in large part by what it is not, and in the East that almost always meant "not Muslim" and in the West that almost always meant "not Christian." Judaism is a tribal religion that defines itself by its people, and its people defined by their tribal religion; where the religion dies out, the Jews eventually die out within a generation or three due to cultural assimilation.
Christianity and Islam are also theologically disturbing to Judaism, as both claim to be worshiping exactly the same God and honoring most of the same prophets, but both claim things that are fundamentally incompatible with Torah (both oral and written), at least from their perspective.
Judaism has also found itself very much a religion of the minority, usually a quite small minority, in big seas of believers who think a lot of the same things but are (to the Jewish mind) just too different on too many big things. They not only have to define where and how they’re different, but if they don’t explain that to their kids and make sure they get it, the kids will just become Muslims, Christians, or something similar, which to them means the death of the Jewish people and the abrogation of their Covenant with God.
Hellenistic Judaism was certainly interesting, and produced all sorts of interesting groups, and I think Razib may be on to something; Hellenistic judaism would be particularly vulnerable to all of those assimilationist forces, with it universalist mentality. The same knock is made on Reform Judaism today, which is for the most part dying on the vine because it lacks any firm "this is us and this is why we’re fundamentally different" philosophy.
The knock on the Catholic church he makes is somewhat over the top, as Protestants during the Reformation era were quite a bit nastier to Jews in a number of ways than the Catholics. Martin Luther was especially a virulent Jew-hater; early on, Protestantism did not usher any new age of religious freedom, they believed the church in Rome was not the legitimate Church but they were, and they sought as much if not more political power than the Catholic church already had.
But the century and a half of war between Protestants and Catholics, and between various flavors of Protestants, did eventually produce a movement toward freedom of conscience which the Jews obviously benefited from.
Efforts by religious authorities in the West (Catholic or Protestant alike) and in the East (mostly Muslim) to define what was or was not acceptable Judaism would actually have been done in a spirit of support for the Jewish community–at least in the mentality of those eras.
Dean, do cross post your comment and address it direcltty to Razib, I am positive you two will have an interesting and infrmative exchange, that I can vicariously observe from the sidelines
The only thing I have to offer is the observation that Islam postdates Christianity by 600 years, so it is posisble that whatever frmative impact Christianity had upon Judaism, it was already solidified by the time Islam arrived on the scene. I could be wrong, however, if the impact of Christinaity took a millenium to truly take hold on Judaism, I just dont know enough about the timeline.
If anything I think Islam is an echo of Judaism, partly in response to Christianity - after all, despite the significant differences, Islam and Judaism have far more in common with each other than they do to their middle sibling.
Already cross-posted. Although I don’t know how much time I’ll have to participate because, now that the packing is almost done, we have to go get the truck, pack it up, and then drive for at least 3 days to Michigan.
Nevertheless, to answer your objections–which aren’t without merit–I would note that the first 3 centuries of Christianity were marked by persecution by Roman authorities and Jewish authorities. It was a minority, outlaw religion. Its 4th century or so marked its shocking ascendance to being the official religion of the Roman Empire, thanks in large part to the Emperor Constantine.
Arabia, from which Muhammed sprang, was (so far as I know) never more than a backwater province on the edges of that Empire. Nevertheless it was right near "Jew Central," with the Jews a major influence in the Levant and Egypt. This is also the region which gave us by far the most important Bible of that era, and the one Jesus and the apostles used almost exclusively: the Septuagint (a.k.a. "the LXX"), arguably a product of Hellenistic Judaism all by itself, still respected a great deal by Catholics, some Protestants, and many Jewish authorities, and revered by all Orthodox Christians as THE Old Testament.
It has long struck me that the Koran emerged at a time and place when Jews and Christians were struggling to define themselves and where they differed, and Christianity was attempting to define itself against what were viewed as false teachings (that’s what "heresy" means by the way: "false teaching"). Debates between Trinitarian and non-Trinitarian Christians raged heavily in that era–often with great violence. It’s quite obvious where the Muslims came down: firmly with the anti-Trinitarian forces, and therefore also firmly on the side of the Jews.
Judaism often flourished under Islam, and the most important and revered figured in Judaism today, Maimonides, conducted his most important theological work, the Mishneh Torah, while working for Muslim rulers as a physician and scholar. He’s still deeply respected by a number of Muslim scholars, some of whom have said that if they didn’t know he was a Jew they’d think he was a Muslim because so much of what he said was so compatible with Islam–and, I would argue, that work was probably carefully tailored to avoid giving offense, whenever possible, to the non-Jews around him.
My point being, the many Jews of the Levant, and the East in general, from the 6th Century onward would have had to define themselves in large part as being "Not-Muslim". Here in the West (aha, now maybe Aziz starts to see SOME use for that term!) we think very seldom of the Sephardic Jews and the Jews who never left the Levant, but they too were an indispensible part of defining what is and is not modern Judaism, and that shouldn’t be ignored.
(Anyone feel free to fact-check me on any of this, but I think on the facts I’m by and large correct on all of the above, if not necessarily interpretation.)
dean, tx for the response.a few points.1) yes, i overfocused on christianity. in large part because i am weighting toward the jewish experience between 1800 and 1950, when the shape of judaisms as we understand them took place. before the holocaust 90% of the jewry was ashkenazi.2) as a point of fact rabbnical judaism was shaped by a non-christian milieu to a greater extent than a christian one during its formative period. the talmud was codified in its present form in the 6th century, and the most authorative version was produced by the jews of persia, resident mostly in what is today iraq. even in the roman empire, the talmudic production was mostly during periods of non-christian rule, and christian anti-semitism and assertiveness really didn’t kick in as a constraining force until the late 300s.3) that being said, since the rise of islam jews have mostly been affected by christian and islam. the jews of india and china are marginal cases, and in the chinese case the kaifeng community was assimilated by the 19th century. that shows that rabbnical judaism doesn’t seem to be able to maintain its coherency in the face of a majority which is totally not invested in jewish identity in any way. the records suggest that many prominent jewish males outmarried and entered the mandarinate. there just weren’t enough of them in the end to save themselves from a freak natural disaster (flood). in india the case is different because they turned into a caste, and, received rather continuous infusions from the outside world until as late as the 17th and 18th century (from as far away as jewish refugees expelled from german cities!).4) i would argue that jewish tribalism in the form of an endogamous society is to a large extent a product of their embedness within christianity and islam. conversion to judaism was a capital crime generally from these religions. this is one reason that christian authorities constrained jewish slave ownership; they were worried about judaizing trends among slaves owned by jews from christian backgrounds.5) i disagree that reform judaism is dying on the vine. in fact, it is the largest movement in america, and has recently been "eating into" the conservative movement. it is not jewish in a way that he orthodox is jewish, there are many interfaith families, and temples are filled with people from non-jewish backgrounds, often as spouses. i think reform judaism is appropriately analogized to "christianity with curly hair"
the original german reform movement quite explicitly was mimicking christian confessionalism in germany at the time, where individuals belonged to lutheran, calvinist and catholic churches. that is why the reform repudiated jewish peoplehood early on, they viewed themselves as a religion and not a nation. they’ve recently reaccepted the nationhood proposition, but it points to the reality that reform is very fluid and by its nature will be affected by a lot of "churn." just like christian denominations.6) please note that the rabbinical commentaries do treat christianity and islam differently. both are false religions, but there is not great debate that muslims are monotheists. there is on the other hand debate whether christians are monotheists because of their trinity. this crops up in practical considerations; are jews allowed to worship in churches and mosques? are they allowed to use as a synagogue a building which was once a church or mosque? in the case of a mosque it is much less contentious than a church, because there is debate among jews whether christians are pagan idolaters are (i.e., is the trinity monotheistic? are uses of statues and icons idolatrous?).7) so there are differences between how jews related to these two groups, though for the purposes of my discussion i don’t think they matter that much. the points you’ve alluded to are more salient; jews are a small minority who lack power vis-a-vis the majority. and, the majority religion in the case of christianity and islam have a relationship to judaism which treats it not as "just another religion."8) let me make something explicit here: the rabbnical authorities did use christian and muslim authorities to persecute "heretical" jews. in medieval spain for example they suppressed the karaites, sometimes in collusion with the christian state. with the enlightenment and the opening of the ghetto some rabbis complained bitterly that they no longer had authority to impose punishment upon jews for deviation from "orthodoxy."9) i wasn’t making a statement vis-a-vis anti-semitism and catholicism and protestantism. i was rather giving one explicit example of where the christian authorities were taking a proactive interest in moulding and shaping jewish religious practice.10) and the reason is as you give above, that practice served some role in the religious practice of the majority community. excessive deviation from rabbinical judaism might have been a new religion, and christianity would have felt that that was competition or heresy. on the other hand, rabbinical judaism, for all its vitality within its constraints, was perceived to be a useful fossil. their error was sometimes claimed to be a teachable moment for genuine believers.11) on the jews of islam, and the relationship between islam and judaism.a) it seems to me that arabia itself was a religiously pluralist domain, and the whole region of the levant and mesopatamia was characterized by a host of cults. on a minor point, by the time of the rise of islam anti-trinitarianism in the form of arianism was not an issue, it was rather anti-chalcedonian christianity that was more an issue; monophysite (the coptic, jacobite syrian and armenian churches descend from this) and nestorian (the persian church of the east) theologies had/have some differences with chalcedonian forms of christianity in terms of the nature of christ. but the differences are relatively minor when set next to arian anti-trinitarianism.b) maimonides did reside in egypt, but he was by provenance a sephardic jew from spain. it seems that the center of the jewish world shifted several times in terms of intellectual production. in 600 it was mesopatamia. in 1200 it was spain (though rashi might argue against this). in 1600 it was east-central europe. after the jews were expelled from spain the sephards resettled in the ottomman empire, but note that they generally took a position of dominance vis-a-vis the indigenous jews. and no offense to the mizrachi, but they really haven’t had much of an impact outside of their own communities for the past 1,000 years until the rise of shas in israel.
Modern western non-orthodox Judaism is sliding along a transition that is essentially a jewish-flavored version of the same general protestantism of so many of what used to be tradional faiths.
But the same thing happened to the modern western Roman Catholic Church in this country, and I think it inevitable that modern western Islam in this society will wind up doing the same. Although there, the forces of cultural secularization will have a harder bunch of nuts to crack become of the general tightness of control of islamic families.
But in the end, this secularist culture rots almost all religions that come in contact with it. So adopt to your fate here, or take it elsewhere, where you can use the police powers of a state to enforce the theory and practice of sanctity.
Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI
Hey Arnold,
are you free sometime for coffee? I’m a but limited in my range because I have the baby to deal with, but if you’re up for a drive to Verona one of these days, then it would be great to meet face to face. drop me an email!
I’m at least free for decaf, Aziz. I just got my plumbing re-arranged with removal of an infected gall bladder, last week at UW-Madison Hospital (UWMH).
As part of the medical upshot, I’m trying to remove also all the medical reasons for having to control cholesterol with simvastitin and high blood pressure with hydrachlorothiazide. As part of the fix, I’m taking warfarin for blood thinning and diltiazem as a calcium blocker to open up blood vessels in some new magical way.
The bottom line from all this is a that I havn’t had much of what you would call ordinary food for two weeks, and I’ve got a self-inflicted (Stefi inflicted?) diet possible more absurd that anything undertaken by the strictest Muslims, Jews, or whomever.
But results? Wow! I was down to 175.0 lbs when I weighed myself at the Princeton Club in Madison this morning. Which would be about 187-188 with shoes on, the way they weigh me at Group Health Cooperative.
And for a fact, I weighed at 188.5 at GHC on Tuesday morning, and I weighed only 181,75 in exactly the same clothes on Thursday morning. By the way I think I’m running out of veins to tap for blood samples for these good folks.
——
As for the coffee. There used to be this great little european-american bakery, La Brioche, next to the Sequoia Library on Midvale and Tokey boulevards. But with a nice new condo going in there, all the old businesses are on their way out. They opened a new "La Brioche" up north on University Avenue down the hill from Shorewood. They still set the bakery goods, but at $1/roll more expensive than at the old location, along with pour your own coffee at $3/cup.
So the better place to go in Madison for this kind of stuff these days is either of the two EVP coffee houses; one on east Washington Ave halfway out to the east side, the other is on Mineral Point just before you make the angled turn onto Speedway.
Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI
I meant to report my clothed weight, ready for the GHC electronic scale, as probably 177-178 lbs today. I’d have to be wearing old fashioned diving gear for shoes that would weigh more than a couple of pounds.
Sorry to hijack your thread, Aziz, in the process of saying
"Hi, Aziz."
Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI
I’d be interested in hearing a Jewish opinion on this. I hope Ron or Naftali responds.
Arnold,
You are a good deal more interesting that the brainiac from razibia who seems to have undiscovered the use of capitalization in his long winded tome to no wheresville that would never make it through first year high school english class.
Presumably, the readership is supposed to respect his
cow plop writing style for the masses with all the fourteen letter historical buzz words from antiquity.
Anyhow, good health to you Arnold and remember weight like age is only a number.
Your pal in NorCal,
McK
"the masses with all the fourteen letter historical buzz words from antiquity."they’re not buzz words if you know stuff. just sayin’.
Hello, McK.
I suppose this is off-topic, but I don;t get to talk to you too much, and there’ssomething on my mind that I used to argue with you about. That’s abortion.
I’m one of the millions of people around this country that bonded instantly with Governor Sarah Palin, that very first day she showed up with Senator McCain in Dayton, Ohion. Since, that moment, she is just about the only candidate among the four I’m really interested in.
I was entranced as she intrdoced her husband and her children one at a time. And not just Trac the soldier who will be joining an infantry unit for service in Iraq or maybe Aghanistan. It was Sarah and her baby boy, Trig.
In my expected and normative world, Trig never would have gotten to be born because of the extra chromosome hardwired into his genetic picture. Most such fetuses never get to become babies, because the stantard practice has been to destroy the fetus rather than let such a baby come to term.
There’s somethng about this strong-spirited American woman that has changed my perspective on some of that. Yes, I would still defend the right of the mother to be to make a choice. But I find myself cheering longest and hardest for the one who made the choice for the life of her infant. And I never ever have seen a greater outouring of family love for a sibling, as the Palins have shown for Trig, predamaged though me may very well be.
And who knows for sure, among the wonders of medical research available to us today, that some form of genetic repair work can never be done, so Trig may enjoy something a lot closer to the normality of the rest of us?
I sincerely hope Governor Palin gets elected not only to the vice presidency, but in some future election to the presidency as well. She, her husband, her parents, bespeak the best and truest of the American nation, with not so much as a hint of the pretentious phoniness of most other candiates for high office I’ve seen in many years. The truth is, she reminds me of a mix of Theodore Roosevelt and Harry S Truman, both of whom came seemingly out of nowhere but provided this country two of its most distinguished presidencies.
Take care, McK.
Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI
Thank you, Arnold,
It has not gone unnoticed that your stance on abortion has shifted if slightly. That’s reasonable since abortion kills any child that comes its way.
Okay, yes,
I’m Voting for McCain/Palin.
Now for some levity.
Know how to get rid of an atheist ?
Accuse them of using fourteen letter historical buzz words and they all disappear.
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