Judaism and the Secular State

Abstract

The traditional Jewish attitude toward states is inevitably dialectical. It cannot be categorically propositional for biblical Judaism affirms fundamentally both that God is undisputed Sovereign of all creation and yet he fulfils his sovereignty in human history through individual men and social institutions (without thereby infringing on man's freedom). The first belief sets limits to the authority of human governments; the second authorizes them. The universality of God's sovereignty in early Israelite belief is still a matter of debate among students of the Bible. Minimalist estimates concede only that he was already in the days of the Judges the exclusive God of the Hebrew people; others now argue that Hebrew monotheism originates with the Patriarchs.' More important is the dimensional question. This God, apparently from the earliest days, transcends nature and may not be identified with anything in it. That is in many ways his most characteristic attribute. It gives rise to the unrelenting fight against idolatry which some consider central to the biblical experience.2 It is equally the source of that other unprecedented biblical passion,