Heresy? Spinoza and Rabbi Dweck

On reading about the hot water Rabbi Dweck has found himself in after expressing his views candidly, I couldn’t help but see parallels with the extreme reactions Spinoza experienced. So I thought I’d use this example to illustrate what I have in mind when interpreting Spinoza as remaining an Orthodox Jew throughout his life.¹

Both Spinoza and Rabbi Dweck put forward what people take to be a “reinterpretation of traditional teachings” in Judaism². Both incurred the wrath of the Orthodox Jewish world they were in and both are labelled “heretics” with “false and misguided” views³. Given that rabbi Dweck is an orthodox rabbi, his views would hardly be out of a disrespect for or ignorance of Judaism or any latent atheistic leanings. They are his genuine, heartfelt interpretation of how he feels and believes that Orthodox Judaism should be applied to the era he lives in. So why should we assume any less of Spinoza? 

Interestingly, the language used against Rabbi Dweck echos that used against Spinoza. The Guardian newspaper⁴ sums up some of the main reactions against Rabbi Dweck:

‘Bassous said: “When is it dangerous? When you have someone who comes in front of you with two hats. He’s got the hat of an Orthodox [rabbi] and the hat of a Reform [rabbi]. From the outside, he’s Orthodox, but his mouth spouts Reform.

‘Bassous said the London Beth Din should rule on Dweck’s views, “and if, in their view, [Dweck] is not an Orthodox rabbi, doesn’t spout Orthodox views … his Orthodox hat should be removed from him.”’

‘Since the lecture, Dweck’s views and teachings on a range of issues have been called into question, with some critics saying he had abandoned orthodoxy for liberalism.’

Indeed, even Rabbi Dweck’s suggested explanations for this controversy express the same concerns as Spinoza is often thought to have felt, including that representations of his views were “an exaggeration”. The Guardian⁵ summarises his response:

‘Dweck claimed his words had been “misunderstood and misinterpreted”

These sentiments are seconded by Sabah Zubaida, who mostly put it down to “misunderstandings, some deliberate and some not”⁶. Some have also viewed the backlash as being influenced by political agendas. Rabbi Dweck himself considers the possibility that the controversy is politically motivated. This is something Spinoza is explicitly worried about in his TTP⁷. He argues for a demarcation between clerical and political roles and that no one should hold positions in both fields⁸. I wonder whether this view came out of his experiences of synagogue politics rather than being something he always thought.  

As can be seen by Rabbi Dweck, Spinoza could have had an excellent, full rabbinic education and the social status of a rabbi within his community yet still have received the same sort of backlash against him anyway. Rabbi Dweck certainly is not wishing to disassociate himself from his Jewish identity and considers himself to be just as orthodox Jewish as he always was. It is the institutional structure which expresses a desire to strip him of his Jewish identity, not Rabbi Dweck himself. So I think one must not conflate religious authorities’ labelling and treatment of an individual as indicative of the intentions and identity of that individual. Indeed, if anything should be treated with great suspicion, it is the use of social isolation rather than the exploration of religious interpretation. Exclusion, ostracism and isolation are known to cause harm so, I think, should never be used as a recourse in societal disputes⁹. So, having experienced the dark side of religious institutions, and especially as a young adult, Spinoza was bound to have some reservations and scepticism about, in particular, religious authority. So I think this cannot be read as being symptomatic of an outright rejection of his heritage and Jewish identity. At the very least, I think we should give Spinoza the benefit of the doubt and look for an unbiased, benevolent reading of his texts rather than continue to impose assumptions and labels onto him and his philosophy.

It also begs the question: what is heresy? In Judaism, unlike Christianity, this is a difficult concept to define because dissent, having differing views, is part and parcel of the religion. What do boys and men learn at Yeshiva¹⁰ but to argue about The Torah, The Talmud and other central religious texts. These are skills which, incidentally, Jewish orthodox women never have the chance to develop. Therefore, they are always at a disadvantage when it comes to intricacies of the religion and Judaism, which is a highly complex and intellectual religion that gives reason a high status, as Spinoza does in his works. Is heresy, therefore, just a label applied to people whose views are seen as liberal or simply applied to those whose opinions are different from the prevailing ones at the time, especially of those in authority? Is it used as a type of pressure to make people with different views conform to the dominant views? If we look at the case of Rabbi Dweck we can easily see that it is a way of condemning so-called liberal views. Hence, Rabbi Dweck is accused of wearing ‘the hat of a Reform rabbi’¹¹ when, indeed, he is doing nothing of the sort. Besides, Chief Rabbi Mirvis had already declared that gays were to be welcomed into the orthodox community exactly a year previously, in 2016, after the tragic shooting incident in a gay club in Orlando, America¹². So, just as Spinoza saw nothing wrong in taking on the views of a more liberal-minded rabbi who was one of his main influences in the synagogue he attended, so Rabbi Dweck probably thought it was perfectly acceptable to say what he did because it was along the lines of what the Chief Rabbi had already expressed. So, I think, this clearly shows that Spinoza was unlikely to be a heretic just as Rabbi Dweck is not a heretic.

¹However, I am not attempting to do this in a teleological way, a method that Susan James argues against, (James, S., “Why Should We Read Spinoza?” (07/11/2014) Royal Institute of Philosophy Talk (RIP), available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5cAxJCz1Xk ), for instance, projecting modern circumstances onto a past philosopher or by using a past philosopher to establish a view about the contemporary world. I am merely drawing parallels for pedagogical aims to help clarify what I have in mind when I say that Spinoza was and remained an orthodox Jew at heart, especially since it involves holding apparent contradictions in one’s head.

²Harriet Sherwood, 18/06/17,

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jun/18/jewish-leader-intervenes-in-row-over-rabbis-remarks-on-homosexuality   

³ibid

⁴ibid

⁵ibid

⁶ibid

⁷“Spinoza, Benedict de., ‘A Theologico-Political Treatise and A Political Treatise’, translated by Elwes, R. H. M., Dover Philosophical Classics, Dover Publications Inc Mineola New York (2004)

⁸ibid

⁹See Kimberley Brownlee’s work on the harm done by social exclusion and the ethics of being treated as a valuable social contributor.

https://homepages.warwick.ac.uk/staff/K.Brownlee/index.php?page=home

¹⁰ Yeshiva: Orthodox Jewish institution focusing on the study of religious texts using an unique style of learning, involving debating in pairs, called Havruta

¹¹Harriet Sherwood, 18/06/17,

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jun/18/jewish-leader-intervenes-in-row-over-rabbis-remarks-on-homosexuality   

¹²http://jewishnews.timesofisrael.com/shuls-must-embrace-gay-jews-says-chief-rabbi/

The Analytic Approach in Philosophy

I started writing my third post for this blog but it ended up becoming a draft paper on my philosophical methodology¹ so there’s been a gap of time since my last blog post.

(I’ve also accidentally been on Pacific Time apparently, according to my blog settings, so my times are wrong but I’ve corrected it for this post.)

Here I want to carry on from a fuller version of the last quote, which I cite in that draft paper, namely:

‘There is a sense of community among contributors to these debates, however overtly critical analytic philosophers can seem of each other’s work. Progress comes through criticism, often in the form of unexpected counterexamples to general theses. Jenefer Robinson’s paper on “Expression and Arousal of Emotion in Music” (Part XI) nicely illustrates how a debate advances. She enters into a dialogue with other contributors and defines her own position in relation to theirs. This is the familiar analytic mode. The cumulative effect of such debates is a sense of concentrated effort on carefully circumscribed ground”²

I like the way Lamarque and Olsen have chosen a female philosopher as an example of someone who successfully demonstrates how analytic philosophy goes about constructive debate. This, I think, helps bust the myth that women are not naturally suited to debates structured around counter-argument. Surely, to assume that this style of argumentation requires male traits is, in itself, a sexist assumption? Attributing aggressive, antagonistic and adversarial intentions to the analytic approach to philosophy is unfounded and misleading. If philosophy is conducted as a general humanities style discussion, then philosophy loses its distinctive flavour and contribution as a discipline. It makes it indistinguishable from intellectual history which effectively merely states and reproduces what people have thought down the ages. This eradicates the valuable tools of philosophy which uses logic and features of scientific discourse to dissect, investigate, evaluate and critically assess arguments in philosophy/philosophical texts to arrive at the truth and to engage in independent thinking. It also begs the question which ideas, which groups of people are these historians picking out. This makes it just as susceptible to being influenced by bias and ideology as any other subject. The History of Ideas must not be confused with the History of Philosophy. The latter focuses on philosophy whereas the former is rooted in history. Analytic philosophy also helps us to understand the approach of philosophers of the so-called long early modern period which is roughly from the seventeenth century through to the mid-nineteenth century. As Scruton sums up Spinoza’s attitude:

“Spinoza would have condemned the practice (known nowadays as the ‘history of ideas’) whereby a study of the ancestry of ideas takes precedence over an enquiry into their truth and meaning.”³

Hence, when I go about researching a philosopher I have my analytic philosophy hat on. I don’t read the texts of eg Spinoza as though they are a novel to be discussed or a history book containing factual information which may or may not be disputed as to its accuracy. I read Spinoza to understand his philosophical arguments and where his independent thinking took him. I go on a journey with him in a way that does not superimpose my own modern perspectives. Nor do I wish to ‘box him in’ into a confined, narrow cultural, time-ridden space because he wished to transcend thought-time. He saw Judaism as not confined by certain present day strictures of his era but as a religion open to independent thought and discourse while keeping its fundamental religious principles. I think Spinoza was able to keep things like this in tension without confusion. Maybe this is a situation that is often experienced by those reading Spinoza, that what appears to many as a contradiction, for Spinoza, is not.

So, I strive to strike a balance between appreciating philosophical arguments in themselves while bearing in mind Walton’s comment⁴ which I cross-apply to the History of Philosophy, that ‘It cannot be correct… to perceive a work in categories which are totally foreign to the artist and his society…’, or as in this case, foreign to the philosopher and his environment.

     

¹You can read it on my academia page at: https://www.academia.edu/33536608/Spinoza_Paper_on_Methodology_2017_draft_

²Lamarque, Olsen (ed) (2004), General Introduction to “Aesthetics and the Philosophy of Art: The Analytic Tradition: An Anthology” edited by Lamarque and Olsen, Blackwell Publishing p5

³Scruton, R., (1986) “Spinoza”, Past Masters Oxford University Press p21

⁴Walton, K., “Categories of Art” in “Aesthetics and the Philosophy of Art: The Analytic Tradition: An Anthology” (2004), edited by Lamarque and Olsen, Blackwell Publishing p154