No, Rabbi Cardozo, The Torah Is Not Flawed

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By Rabbi Avrohom Gordimer

Rabbi Dr. Nathan Lopes Cardozo’s The deliberately flawed divine Torah is by far the most problematic article yet by this writer. Whereas Rabbi Cardozo has written that he did not fully observe Tisha B’Av this year, and has called for dispensing with the Codes of Jewish Law and the abolition of Halacha that strikes him as regressive (please also see here), Rabbi Cardozo has now accepted the approach of the Conservative Movement, which postulates that Halacha is not objective divine truth, is not fixed, and that it must change in accordance with the values of the times and with various needs.

Rabbi Cardozo’s position is that this is all somehow part of God’s plan — yet it is difficult to distinguish this from the “Divinely Inspired/Ongoing Revelation” theology of Conservative Judaism. Rabbi Cardozo’s introductory verbiage underscores this notion (notwithstanding his invoking a Hasidic source which most certainly did not mean that the Jewish People were not present for the Giving of the Torah):

I believe that the Torah is min hashamayim(“from heaven”) and that its every word is divine and holy. But I do not believe that the Torah is (always) historically true (sometimes it seems like divine fiction), or that it is uninfluenced by external sources. On top of this, I am reminded of the observation by the famous Hasidic leader Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Rimanov, who suggested that the children of Israel heard only the alef of Anochi of the Ten Commandments, which means that they did not hear anything since one cannot pronounce the alef!

Rabb Cardozo continues:

Nor do I believe that its laws, literally interpreted, are all morally acceptable. They are not. Rather, I believe that the Torah is often morally, deeply, and deliberately flawed, and that furthermore, God Himself intentionally made it flawed.

Rabbi Cardozo proceeds to argue that the Sages invented axioms to correct the Torah’s flaws — flaws that signal the Torah’s defective morality — as part of a divine scheme for humans to perfect the Torah on their own. In other words, maintains Rabbi Cardozo, the role of the rabbis is not to objectively interpret the Torah and draw forth its rules, rooted in Sinaitic principles; rather, the rabbis had a progressive agenda to correct the Torah and bring it up to date. Please see Rabbi Cardozo’s article for his full presentation of this hypothesis.

Early Conservative rabbis promoted this same exact idea by claiming that the Oral Law, Torah Shebe’al Peh, was a rabbinic invention, such that Oral Law/talmudic interpretations of biblical precepts were really fabrications of the Sages, responding to contemporary values and needs. The Conservative argument was that since the talmudic Sages of antiquity could “reinterpret” the law in accordance with their subjective goals, so too can modern rabbis, for there is no tradition of fixed law.

The mechanism of prozbul was especially cited by Conservative rabbis as “proof” that talmudic law represented progressive reinterpretation and even abolition of “problematic” Torah concepts, so as for these Conservative rabbis to thereby grant themselves similar license to modify Halacha in modern times. Hence did the Conservative Movement in the mid-20th century permit driving to synagogue and permit kohanim to marry women whom the Torah forbids to them. We see today how far the Conservative Movement has strayed from fidelity to Halacha, and it is largely based on the movement’s early stance toward the Oral/talmudic Law.

Rabbi Cardozo likewise claims that the Sages of the Talmud fabricated exceptions and loopholes which are not permitted by the Torah itself. While it is interesting that Rabbi Cardozo does not cite prozbul as an example of such, the Talmud (Gittin 36) specifically addresses our point, bothered and refusing to accept the fact that the Sages (Hillel, in this case) could institute something that violates the Torah. The Talmud takes pains to explain that of course, Hillel’s enactment of prozbul did not violate anything in the Torah, and the talmudic discourse spans a full page elaborating why prozbul is not a violation of Torah Law and is not an inauthentic fabrication.

In his introduction to his Commentary on the Mishnah, the Rambam writes that every talmudic interpretation of biblical law is Sinaitic. For example, the Written Torah does not specify how kosher slaughter, shechitah, must be done, but the Talmud explains that there are five basic rules of shechitah; these five rules — and all other talmudic interpretations of the Written Torah — are Sinaitic, and one is not allowed to claim that they are mere fabrications of the Sages.

In this light, the Talmud presents the four example cases cited by Rabbi Cardozo (“an eye for an eye” being monetary punishment, ben sorer u’moreh/rebellious son, etc.) as part of the Sinaitic Oral Law; there is absolutely no basis in our tradition to claim otherwise, and to do so places one squarely into the camp of the Conservative Movement.

Yet there is something even more fundamental going on.

We read in Tehillim 19:8: “The Torah of God is perfect, restorative to the soul.” The claim that the Torah is flawed, even as part of a divine scheme, contravenes our entire tradition and is certainly without source or basis from the perspective of Orthodox Judaism. One of the major themes expounded upon by Rav Joseph B. Soloveitchik, of blessed memory, is that of surrender to the values of the Torah, even when these values stand in conflict with contemporary morality. Rav Soloveitchik presents this concept with great detail in his discussions of the Akedah, the Binding of Isaac, and elsewhere. But it is not merely a belief of Rav Soloveitchik. The total perfection of the Torah as a moral code, in terms of both its regulations and values, and the Jew’s duty to yield, submit and lovingly accept the Torah’s regulations and values as perfect, are the basis for all that Torah tradition represents. For Rabbi Cardozo to deny this concept and assert that the Torah is flawed and partially immoral, even as part of a divine scheme that Rabbi Cardozo creatively hypothesizes, is a smack in the face of the Torah and our mesorah(religious tradition). It is not the Torah that is flawed, but it is rather Rabbi Cardozo’s critique of the Torah that is flawed.

I have friends who were profoundly impacted by Rabbi Cardozo in his early days as a master hashkafah (Jewish philosophy) instructor at a famous Jerusalem yeshiva. I think that all of us one way or another benefited from Rabbi Cardozo’s early writings, as an expositor par excellence of authentic Torah perspectives, using scholarly academic tools to reach the minds of those who otherwise would not appreciate the material. We are quite saddened by Rabbi Cardozo’s departure from this model and his embarkation on a path of subverting Torah teachings and Torah authority. We long for the previous Rabbi Cardozo to reemerge and again spread the light of genuine Torah wisdom.

This article first appeared at Times of Israel and is published on Matzav with permission of the author.

{Matzav.com}


13 COMMENTS

  1. Rabbi Gordimer’s article is outstanding, but I question whether Matzav should print this article since it contains pert of “Rabbi’ Cardozo’s comments which is undiluted kefira.

  2. Weapon of choice for a conservative rabbi… doubt and strong hate.

    Torah is perfect. Handed down by G-d strength and hope.

    Do you really think a King would let the precepts become his mockery? We must have an end of the conservative and reform hate for the careful future of the soul of Israel.

    This evil is any lazy determined mind of hate in Israel. It means we who are Torah orientated are not ourselves stronger as we must be.

    Torah grows. The enemy knows jews are holy.

  3. One of the examples R. Cardozo brings is slavery. Whatever you may say of ‘an eye for an eye’ the tradition is entirely clear that Jews kept slaves in past times.

    Are you of the view that this is entirely moral, that when Mashiach comes, slavery will be restored?

    If you do think that then I rather prefer R. Cardozo’s morality to your morality.

    In addition you are attempting to assign guilt by association. The conservative movement said some of these things and that led to them allowing X. Therefore R. Cardozo must be a conservative and will lead to X.

    This is just flawed logic.

    • Geoff Melnick ,

      How will you explain
      several pesukim in Nach that
      “melachtan naasis al yidei acheirim”

      or

      Gemara in Berachosדף ל“ה ע“ב ,et.al

      when Mashiach comes?

      Geoff Melnick mistakes ‘having servants’ for ‘slavery’
      ‘Having servants’ is about raising people up
      ‘slavery’ is about holding them down

  4. Yahser Koach R’ Avraham! Glad to see that you’re still writing. Your clarity of thought, expressed so eloquently in the written word is breathtaking!

  5. I agree. There is no reason we have to see what Mr. Garbanzo Beans has to spew forth from his peh hatachton. Unadulterated kefira.

  6. Rabbi C. Did not go to shul to hear Eicha. And so what? Its a Din in the Tzibur. There is no chiyuv on the person. Nor to say Kinnos either.

    Rabbi G. might spend more time learning about Sheker, Loshon Hara, Richulus and publicly humiliating a Talmid Chochom.

  7. The “commentators” should take a course in the history of the Hebrews outside of Torah and Talmud. Calling someone who seeks truth accomplishes nothing. Rabbinic Judaism or the religion derived from the Pharisees, consists of changes that altered life of the Hebrews. Jews is a term derived from Judahites who only represented the people of Judea, not Israel. Many Israeli Hebrews did settle in Judea and were not lost. We speak and write in Hebrew signifying we are Hebrews , not what others call us. We do not have an original Torah. The Masoretic one now in use is not even close to prior versions.earlier versions , we know of at least 4, have many differences than the current version. how do you celebrate Chanukah without the books of the Maccabees? How do you read the book of Esther omitting her pleas to God? The Talmud contents concern discussions not rules that are binding. Why does one man’s version of the laws of judaism make us his obedient followers and what brain equates the tithing of cattle, and the growth of plants with a biblical holy day? We are called “am haaretz” BY THE Sages, yet we know more of our world and the history of our people than they ever did. Saadia ha gain wrote that the earth was the center of the universe. He was brilliant but mot all-knowing. The sages were brilliant, bur they too were not all-knowing.

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