[Avodah] Fwd: Re: [Areivim] Humanistic Rabbis and humor about death

[saul mashbaum]

RTK:
I'm not so sure that the attitudes expressed in Tanach and Chazal 
towards whose who deny G-d are only meant for those who deny Him 
AND worship other gods as well.  Denying G-d and worshipping yourself 
would count, I believe, as  A'Z
RDIsrael:
>>
To count halachically as AZ I think it would require actual self-
worship in the sense of bringing korbanos or doing other acts of 
avoda (or getting other to do so).  I don't think humanistic 
prayers celebrating the greatness of man would count.  Prayers 
claiming some sort of divine powers (a la Pharoh's claim to be the 
source of bounty in Egyptian agriculture) would be necessasy.  IMHO.
>>

I believe that RDI is entirely correct in his halachic observations. An atheist who worships no divine power at all is not an oved AZ, as described in the gemara Sanhedrin 61 and the Rambam Hilchot Avodah Zara chapter 3. The gemara there delineates the actions of worshipping and serving a false god which constitute Avodah Zara. It seems clear to me  from the gemara's discussion that AZ always involves worshipping and serving  *something*; mere denial of the true God is *not* AZ in the strict halachic sense.
" Worshipping yourself "  when used referring to a humanist is clearly a literary phrase, not a literal one. In this way it is similar to "worshipping money" or "worshipping power" etc. In this context "worship" refers to placing something in the very center of one's value system, and dedicating all one's energies to that goal. These are examples of profoundly flawed value systems, but are not AZ in, again, the strict halachic sense.
I think that it is fair to say that humanism, as it arose in the time of the Renaissance, was to a large extent considered inimitable with the established religions of the time, and indeed served as a harbinger of the decline of the influence of said established religions in Europe and the New World that we have seen in the modern era. One may surely claim that this is a negative development, but neither atheism or humanism constitute in and of themselves AZ.
Saul Mashbaum
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