Provocation: D'var Mahloket

Abstract

It is as if multiplicity of persons--and is this not very meaning of personal?--were condition for plenitude of absolute truth; as if each person, by his uniqueness, were guarantee of revelation of a unique aspect of truth, and some of its points would never have been revealed if some people had been absent from mankind.... [T]he totality of true is constituted from contribution of multiple people; uniqueness of each act of listening carrying secret of text; voice of Revelation as inflected, precisely, by each person's ear, would be necessary to Whole of Truth. --Emmanuel Levinas Jews, three opinions. --Jewish saying This piece is about argument. It is about a scholar's commitment to and Judaism's commitment to living in dark times, and connection between darkness and argument. (1) These things easily go together, but their being-togetherness is not easy. Jim Aune wrote about these things in his essay Justice and Argument in Judaism: A D'var Torah on Shofetim. In revisiting this essay, I find it difficult to move beyond two epigraphs he chose for this essay. I reprint them here because they have taken on a new meaning for me. I will take second quote first: Jews, three opinions. I have heard this saying many times and it was meaningful to me as someone who came to Judaism through conversion. My family are evangelical Christians, and argument as a culture was not part of my childhood experience. Debate had a limited place at our tables, worship sites, family spaces, and in writing that we shared with each other. I began my process of conversion after graduate school, however, when argument and debate had already become a significant part of my When my rabbi told me that I would need to prepare a D'var Torah at conclusion of my study, I found it helpful to remember his earlier lessons about Jewish tradition of debate, argument, and even disagreement. (2) Judaism has been built upon a history of innumerable debates between rabbis (and everyone else) about meanings, effects, and ethics of everything from death to whether or not you can tear toilet paper on Sabbath. I could not get D'var Torah wrong, in other words, because goal was not correctness at all. My challenge was to create D'var (a word, a speaking. telos was to join Jewish community as a member, which means participating in joyous and tumultuous event of debate. In years that followed my conversion, I found myself laughing whenever someone would jokingly mutter Jews, three opinions after a heated squabble spilled out from a synagogue committee meeting. It took me some time to adjust to my husband's Jewish family and their habits of arguing at table (and everywhere else) without any negative consequence. As Jim writes in Justice and Argument in Judaism, when he was asked by a student to explain the Jewish view of homosexuality, he told student that there could never be such a thing. Any given Torah text may thus yield multiple readings, writes Jim. This is a much more eloquent way of saying Jews, three opinions, but weighty significance of these two insights are same. goal of studying Torah is not to conclude any arguments. In fact, concluding argument would mean shutting down Judaism as a living activity. Two Jews, one opinion is not only in conflict with Judaism; it is work of Judaism to prevent that from happening. Jim's essay excavates an important difference about debate within Christianity and Judaism. He meditates on Paul's proclamation in 2 Corinthians, The letter killeth, but spirit giveth life. In writes Jim, we might very well flip Paul's statement. spirit killeth, but letter giveth The Jewish approach reads letter in such as way as to maximize human freedom within divine command, he writes. …