[Avodah] Blind Obedience

[Micha Berger]

Over on Areivim, there is a discussion going on about what one would do
if HQBH, e.g. via nevu'ah, told you to do something that to human reason
appears cruel or violent. E.g. what would you do if you found and
identified an Amaleiqi newborn?

I started composing a reply when I realized that what I was writing
really belongs here.

My first post said (in part):
    Ani maamin beemnnuah sheleimah that the RBSO doesn't want Crusades
    or terrorism. That He hid the identity of those Amaleiqi babies back
    in the days when our neighbors ceased being a bunch of barbarian
    warring tribes and civilization came in the form of the Babylonian
    Empire for a reason.

[Clipping the joke for Avodah.]
    A guy was once nervous about going on a date, so he asked a buddy
    what he should talk about....
    So, he goess on the date, and the conversation runs dry...
    "If you had a brother, would he like noodles?"

    Yes, we are fundamentalists. But the content of the belief that we are
    fudamentalist about is different in kind[, from that of contemporary
    Islamic terrorists, the Inquisition or the Crusades]. If G-d had
    asked us to blow up civilians... -- that's just not my religion. The
    hypothetical changes the entire thing I am now loyal to. Asking me
    to answer is just as meaningless as the question this guy posed on
    his date.

In another post:
    ... [T]he Torah makes my very point in the Aqeidah. Hashem shows
    Avraham that he would never really ask such a thing.

    BTW, Avraham already had some indication that something was
    up. Perhaps techiyas hameisim perhaps something else. But since
    "ki miYitzchaq yiqarei lekha zara" requires that Yitzchaq be around
    after the Aqeidah somehow to start a nation, Avraham knew there was
    more to the whole thing that he is being told.

More on Amaleiq:
    If one remembers that the G-d of Sinai is the G-d of History, there
    is no question. HQBH ended the mitzvah of mechiyas Amaleiq; and it
    was only in effect at a time when nations would only respond to other
    nations that acted that way. Kol hameracheim al ha'achzarim... it
    was net-net rachmanus, as hard as that is for those of us who live
    in a more civilized world.

    Similarly, Hashem not commanding anything aqeidah-like today doesn't
    just make the question theoretical. It is in part in order to avoid
    the problem raised by the question!

Notice here my thesis -- Hashem would only command cruely in order to
prevent greater cruelty.

Along similar lines, Hashem killed dor hamabul but only stopped dor
hahaflagah. The former was cruel, the latter's agression was against
HQBH. (Except according to RSRH, who places in the center the medrash
about crying over a fallen brick and not a fallen person. Turning the
migdal into an archtype of ruthless totalitarian statism. But in the
manner most understand dor hahaflagah, the comparison is as I put it.)

Notice that as soon as civiliation, in the form of the Babylonians,
reached those Kenaani tribes, Hashem erased the command. Because mechiyah
wasn't the best way to eliminate the Amaleiqi threat.

As for the internal fighting after the eigel... Egypt had a god named
Apis, a bull. The cult of Apis had two temples, one in either side of
the country, their holiday was the full moon of the eighth month. And so
it really looks like Yerav'am was imitating that cult. He also said "Zeh
elohekha Yisrael", echoing Aharon's "eileh elohekha Yisrael". In short,
the notion that the eigel was an echo of that aspect of Egyptian religion
is quite tenable. And the cult of Apis practiced human sacrifice. There is
a machloqes as to whether sacrifices to Molekh were passed over a fire,
or placed in the belly *of a statue of an iron bull* and roasted alive
within it, the metal turning their screams into something resembling
the roar of a bull.

So, distinction #1 -- it is rachmanus on one vs rachmanus on more.
It's not placing another value ahead of lift.

And in fact, even with the three yeihareig ve'al ya'avor, that's
"yeihareig", not "yaharog". We have no calling to kill somoene to
prevent sinning.

Distinction #2, with the exception of those G-d-hidden barbaric tribes,
it would take nevu'ah to have such a command. Halakhah doesn't have any.
No one could *deduce* that such cruelty was Ratzon haBorei, he would have
to be told and defy nature in ways that show we are required to follow
him. This criterion would also be sufficient to prevent fundamentalist
terrorism.

This question also touches on the relationship between halakhah and
natural morality.
<http://www.aishdas.org/asp/2009/05/morality-n-halakhah.shtml>
    One can accordingly translate Hillel's famous words to the prospective
    ger, "That which you would loathe [if in their shoes] don't do to
    others. Now go and learn" into "All of the Torah is an elaboration of
    natural morality. However, you would never figure out how to reach the
    right conclusions from those principles unless you go study Torah."

And as I wrote before, I have an article of emunah that Hashem wouldn't
tell anyone that. It defies the purpose of creation (as far as shitos
as diverse as R' Saadia Gaon and the Ramchal) "raq leheitiv es harabim"
(R' Shimon Shkop's words). It defies Hillel's understanding of kol
haTorah kulah.

Being nice really underpins everything.

I can't really entertain the question of "what would I do if". Or, to
quote my original post to Areivim:
    Would you bother answering:
    If you found out that God was really three-in-one, would you still be
    Jewish?

    Isn't the question posed just as absurd?

:-)BBii!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             Today is the 38th day, which is
micha at aishdas.org        5 weeks and 3 days in/toward the omer.
http://www.aishdas.org   Tifferes sheb'Yesod: How does reliability
Fax: (270) 514-1507           promote harmony in life and relationships?