Sermon: Rosh Hashanah 5767, Day 2
Rabbi Asher Lopatin

Shana Tova!

Friends, a funny thing happened on the way to the University of Regensburg in what seemed to have been a delightful visit for a academically oriented Pope. Just ten days ago Pope Benedict the 16 th got himself into big trouble with the 1.2 billion Muslims for quoting as the Pope said: “the erudite Byzantine emperor Manuel II…on the theme of the holy war… with a startling brusqueness: “Show me just what Mohammad brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached.”

When we look around at the world, at Islamic terrorism, at killings from Darfur to terror against Israel, to sectarian violence in Iraq – we have to see Emperor’s point: It seems that the Pope was finally speaking up against Jihad, in a way the rest of European Christendom has not. And from the reaction to the Pope’s speech it seems that Manuel II is not so off: note the mobs calling for attacks on Rome and to re-instate Jihad against Europe. Manuel II knows from Islamic conquests as he wrote what the Pope quoted as he was besieged in Constantinople, now Istanbul.

The Pope continues: “The emperor, after having expressed himself so forcefully, goes on to explain in detail the reasons why spreading the faith through violence is something unreasonable … and not acting reasonably is contrary to God’s nature.”

The Pope goes on to quote Professor Theodore Khoury that for the Byzantine emperor Manuel II it is self evident that God’s very nature is reason and logic. But not only for the Byzantines: Pope Benedict declares that Christianity sees a profound harmony between Greek logic and faith in God. In fact, the Gospel of John starts with the Logos Hymn: In the Beginning was logos – which the Pope says means both reason and word. In the beginning was logos – reason – and, to quote Pope Benedict, logos is God (!). Thus for the Pope Christianity believes in worshipping reason – human reason – qua God. They are one and the same. And if you will ask – what about faith? Isn’t Christianity all about faith in the savior, faith in God – and not logic or reason. The Pope would answer: faith and reason are one and the same. Thus the postulates of Christianity which are established through faith will take on the appearance of reason: They feel real to the Christian and thus they must be reasonable, and thus they become part of God.

But Judaism has never made a religion out of human reason: it has always recognized that faith and reason are two different things, and sometimes can contradict. The Pope’s Catholocism de-ifies reason – and demands us to worship it; it stretches reason beyond where it may safely go.

When the greatest Jewish Aristotelian rationalist, Moses Maimonides, the Rambam, discusses the creation of the universe – or whether it was created at all – he rejects the logic of Aristotle who believed that the world always existed, not only rational grounds, but because the Rambam feels that faith in God the creator would be destroyed by such a view. Even when it come to Plato’s reasoned view of creation, the Rambam says that while it might make a lot of sense – it might be perfectly reasonable – it still needs to contend with Jewish tradition which suggests radical creation from nothing. We do not deify reason the way Catholicism does; it is open to be challenged by our prophetic and oral tradition.

In Islam, on the other hand, also according to the Pope, God’s will is not bound up with … rationality. God is not even so logical as to be bound by God’s own word. Human reasoning and logic means nothing. In some ways the Pope is on the mark regarding the way Islam has developed. Sunni Islam which most Muslims practice, has evolved to take on an anti-rational, anti-philosophical position – but it wasn’t always that way.

In the 8 th century the Mu’tazilite school dominated the Muslim political scene: Pope Benedict would like them; they were very logical. They were subservient to Greek thinking, and could not escape the need for humans acting independently of God – of their own free will. If God were pulling all the strings, how could we rationally, logically explain God punishing humans for the deeds they bore no responsibility for. Islamic Philosophy held reason and logic as the standard by which to determine religion. Sunnni Islam began to reject reason in the ninth century.

By the time of Rav Sa’adya Gaon, the radical anti-rational Hanbali school began to emerge, and this school eventually predominated Sunni Islam. Ibn Hanbal claimed that you were not even allowed to discuss reason or logic or any of those Greek innovations. He and his disciples were as angry at those who argued with the Philosophers as they were with the Philosophers themselves: Any discussion of reason, even for the sake of rejecting it in favor of tradition, was innovation and the wrong direction. All you could do was read the stories of the Prophet Muhammad and follow his ways and the ways of his companions. From the death of Ghazali – in 1111 – and onwards, Sunni Islam has been a religion that scorns any connection with reason or logic.

But just as Judaism does not worship reason we do not reject it either as a way of connecting to Hashem. From our early theologians in the ninth century, Rav Sa’adya Gaon, through the Rambam, Rabbi Yehuda Halevi, and Rav Yosef Albo, Jewish thinkers embraced the opportunity Greek Aristotelian logical thought provided in understanding Hashem’s Torah and our tradition. Like those early Muslim Mutazilites, Jewish thinkers were unanimous that human beings could only be punished if they had free will. Even Rav Hasdai Crescas who claimed people did not have control over their own thoughts, believed that they were rewarded and punished for their actions, over which they did exert personal autonomy. Sunni Islam forcefully rejected free will which it felt minimized God’s power as depicted in the Qur’an – and it scorned any logical arguments.

Maimonides understands that human beings need to connect to God through reason every bit as much as through faith: “Yesod Hayesodot ve’amud ha’amudim who leida sheyesh ...” the Rambam begins his great Halachik work of the Yad Hachazaka by demanding we seek an understanding of God through reason and logic and science.

But if we Jews today as 1000 years ago are walking in between super rationality and anti-rationality , how do we do it? How do we respect reason, but not give it full reign in determining what we believe? And how do we challenge reason, without rejecting it and ultimately divorcing from it, as Sunni Islam believes is necessary? How do we balance faith and reason as two different things, both important, but neither one God nor anti-God?

I think we can find the answer in today’s reading. What do we read about? We don’t read about the Logos hym – all about “The Word” or “reason and logic”. We begin our reading: “Achar Had’varim Ha’ela” – After the words – or, “Beyond these things” Beyond logic and reason and faith, “God made an experiment.” What does Rashi say: … after the words of Satan. Ahah! The Pope would not like this Rashi: The Satan is the bearer of logic. But Rashi challenges faith as well: Faith that if God tells you to sacrifice your child, that is what you do. Is that really what you do? Listen to this Rashi where Avraham gives God Musar: Avraham said to God: I wish to clarify to You my complaint…So not only was God testing Satan’s logic and Avraham’s faith – but Avraham was tasting his own faith: Does faith in this God work? And is my faith in God accurate?

As it turns out: Faith in God did work – Yitzchak survived and the Jewish people continue – but, according to this Rashi, Avraham’s faith needed a corrective. God – at least according to this Rashi – did not want Avraham to slaughter his child, but, rather, to “raise him up.” The story of the Akeida is about testing our understanding: testing reason, testing faith, testing how we understand our world and our God. We are not told to test God: we are told to test our own logic, to test what has made sense to us in the past, and even to test our beliefs – our faith. Faith is not reason and neither is synonymous with God: God and God’s message is perfect– as Rashi’s Midrash quotes: “I will not profane my covenant nor alter the utterance of my lips” – but our understanding of that message, through logic, reason, rational thought, and through faith and tradition always needs to be challenged, it always needs to be taken for the three day walk that Avraham took with Yitzchak – and after we experiment with it, we will know better how perfect is our faith and how lasting is our logic.

My father, a”h, was a PhD. polymer chemist, and he always emphasized the dangers of the worshipping science. We cannot turn reason or faith into God –that will stunt our spiritual growth, prevent our entering on a personal journey to mount Moriah to get closer to God. Faith and reason are tools, as the Rambam says, to reach God: but they are only tools, and they constantly need to be re-examined.

In Judaism we don’t follow anything blindly. “Achar had’varim ha’eleh” – after reason has its say, and faith takes hold, they both need to be tested. God was testing Avraham, and was not accepting any logical arguments about him or Yitzchak as put forward by Satan. And, Avraham was testing his faith in God: Would it hold, and would it work, would it make sense at the end of the day, or the end of three days. And perhaps that is why Abraham didn’t want to argue logically with God, based on violence being unreasonable as Emperor Manuel II argued, because Abraham wanted to show that reason had its limits. Both Abraham and God formed an eternal bond by testing, by experimenting with the tools that connected them, faith and reason.

So where does all this philosophy lead us before we hear the Shofar on Rosh Hashanah? It leads us to ask: What are we going to test in ourselves this year? What element in our life that makes sense – whether it is because it makes rational sense or whether it is because of deep-seated fears or reservations –can we challenge this year? What inertia or complacency in our life – the way we’ve always been doing things – needs to be challenged this year: Is it really working? Does it really make sense?

The Torah is telling us that we must break down the godliness of reason and of faith and test it. We must be experimenters. Yes, when Avraham tested his faith in God by bringing his son up to Mt. Moriah to sacrifice him – he took a great risk. But he gained an eternal covenant and relationship for his children with God. Do our lives make sense? Do they really make sense, or are we just worshipping the reasoning we have followed for so long, but which really has not been tested or experimented with.

Do we know what it would be like to do a little bit more Shabbat, a little bit more Kashruth, a little bit more learning or davening. For so many of us, coming to shul on a weekday morning doesn’t make sense: either just because it doesn’t – sort of a faith argument – or it doesn’t fit in logically with our lives. Well, on this Rosh HaShana we are entering “Achar haD’varim Ha’ele” we are in the post reason, post faith era, and it is time we put our preconceived notions of what our life must be like to the test.

Now of course you may say, well maybe I will see what not being religious is like; what it feels like to give up some part of the religion I was just doing on faith, or because of inertia. I am not advocating giving things up, but, I am advocating, as Rav Moshe Chayim Luzzato did three hundred years ago, that we not do things just because we did them before “mitzvat adam milimudo” – through habitual religiosity – but, rather, because we did the Abrahamic walk, we pushed ourselves and forced ourselves to answer: Why do I do this? And Why have I not done this yet?

We love and care for our dear ones not just because we have in the past, but because we have really thought on all levels: What makes this person I love so special?

I have faith that if we treat our reasoning and our loyalty to our habitual life not as gods, nor as sin, but as tools to be tested and honed, we will find that middle path that Judaism treasures so much. We will be able to be full partners in the scientific, rational world, while at the same time maintaining and strengthening our faith and our beliefs. We will be able to grow, and change, and become better, different people each year, each Rosh Hashanah because we worship not the vehicles to get closer to God, but God alone.

May God and those we love give us the strength and courage to experiment a little and test our prior assumptions, and together with those around us, move the Jewish people, and, afterwards, perhaps even the other great religions, to understand that God wants us to grow, God wants us to try new things, Vahashem nisa et Avraham: God tested Abraham in order to allow Abraham to test his own way to the Almighty.

May this be a year of good changes and growth surrounded by the love of those we care for and who care for us.

L’shana tova, a gut, g’benchta yor