Some books are able to convey the essential point of the book just in their title alone. An excellent example of that is Professor Leora Batnitzky’s book How Judaism Became a Religion. The premise of her book is that “religion” came to mean something very specific in 18th century Europe. In the emerging modern west, religion came to be understood as an independent private realm that was distinct from one’s nationality, citizenship, language, law, culture, and politics. This was a departure from the premodern world in which all of these realms were mixed together and this is a departure from the ways that other civilizations understand themselves even today. Batnitzky’s book “How Judaism Became a Religion” is the story of those who turned Judaism into a religion in precisely this same model. If you want to know precisely who did this and how – go read the book. But the title alone tells the story. Judaism became a religion
By turning Judaism into a religion, much was gained. We became free citizens in the states in which we lived and found a pathway to safety and dignity and freedom and prosperity. But something was lost in this transition as well. By thinking of Judaism as a religion we are implicitly accepting a modern Protestant model of what a life of service of God entails, and what it does not entail. Yes, those who share a common religion should pray together. Yes, those who share a common religion should read their scriptures together. But we put that aside when we leave our homes or places of worship. We dress alike and work side by side, and all swear allegiance to the flags of the countries in which we are citizens. In the First World War, Jews fought and killed one another alongside their fellow citizens when European civilization embarked on a generation-long spasm of suicidal violence.
Judaism as a religion is fragmentary. It contains the portions of Orach Chaim, the section of the Shulchan Aruch, the Code of Jewish Law, that is focused on the daily, weekly, and annual cycle of prayers but it’s a bit harder to understand the detailed observance of Shabbat and holidays using the framework of “religion.”. It’s even harder to include Yoreh De’ah, which includes the ritual laws of the Torah including the various food prohibitions of the Torah. A “religion” in the model of Protestant Christinaity is about belief and prayer, not about what and how we eat, or when and how we serve hot food at Shabbat meals. A Muslim would appreciate the need for detailed laws about how to brew tea on Shabbat. A Hindu would understand the importance of the laws regulating the construction of a mikveh. A Protestant Christian might struggle to understand both. Even though Orthodox rabbis and philosophers took part in the process of turning Judaism into a religion, it should be easy to see that the six hundred thirteen mitzvot of the Torah do not easily fit into the framework of modern western religion. And we experience that dissonance every day. Any form of Judaism that can easily be understood as a “religion” is, at best, fragmentary Judaism.
The classic commentaries on Parashat Kedoshim speak of two other forms of fragmentary Judaism and these forms of fragmentary Judaism are also still with us centuries later and still need to be confronted in order for our connection to the Torah and its mitzvot to be complete.
Chapter 18 of Sefer Vayikra, which we read last week, contains the detailed list of prohibited sexual relationships, included the elaborate list of forbidden forms of incest that some of us have been examining in daf yomi this past month. Our parasha begins with Chapter 19, with the phrase:
קְדֹשִׁים תִּהְיוּ כִּי קָדוֹשׁ אֲנִי ה אֱלֹהֵיכֶם׃
The LORD spoke to Moses, saying: Speak to the whole Israelite community and say to them:
You shall be holy, for I, the LORD your God, am holy.
What is the meaning of קְדֹשִׁים תִּהְיוּ in the aftermath of the prohibitions contained in the immediately prior chapter?
Ramban, Nachmanides, writes that there is a mandate to strive for holiness, קְדֹשִׁים תִּהְיוּ as an independent mitzvah which is distinct, and above and beyond what the mitzvot ask of us. The Torah tells us, for example, not to eat non-kosher food, but that is not sufficient to prevent a life of gluttony, or as one of my teachers phrased it, “glatteny” – for glatt kosher gluttony, something that was on display at some of the finest Pesach programs across the world just weeks ago. The command קְדֹשִׁים תִּהְיוּ comes to preclude the possibility of being a נבל ברשות התורה, a gross and coarse person – with the full permission of the Torah. The mitzvot of the Torah are not sufficient to ensure a holy life. The Torah itself commands us to go beyond the basic requirements of the Torah to fashion a life that is holy and refined and admirable.
What is the “hava amina” what is the rejected hypothesis that Ramban is arguing against? Ramban is arguing against a version of fragmentary Judaism which says, “if it isn’t forbidden then I can do it.” This fragmentary form of Judaism asserts that the Torah is a checklist and if I can check all the right boxes I can live the rest of my life without concern and without reflection: “Don’t tell me what to do,” I may have been told on occasion, “just tell me is it assur, is it forbidden. If not, I have no further questions.”
Ibn Ezra paints a picture of another form of fragmentary Judaism in his commentary to Parashat Kedoshim. Chapter 19 follows on Chapter 18 so that we not come to think, שלא יחשבו כי בעבור שמירת העריות לבדם יעמדו בארץ, that our enduring presence in Eretz Yisrael can be maintained solely through observance of the Torah’s sexual restrictions. Lest we think that the rules about with whom we can and cannot partner is sufficient to ensure a Jewish future, the Torah follows up those prohibitions with the mitzvot of Chapter 19 which incorporate every possible genre of mitzvah, from the ritual to the ethical to the economic, all jumbled together under the heading of being holy.
The rejected hava amina is a form of religious expression that is exclusively focused on regulated sexuality. There is a Christian version of this phenomenon with which we are all familiar, and there is also a Jewish version of this phenomenon. . The Jewish community’s obsession with Jewish continuity and demographics is a modern iteration of this form of fragmentary Judaism. It means absolutely nothing if Jewish parents make Jewish babies if there is no Jewish content to be transmitted from one generation to the next. And because sexuality is such a potent human drive, it is tempting to wrap up all of our religious striving in that sphere of sexuality. The Torah, according to Ibn Ezra, warns against that by immediately telling us that there is so much more we must tackle to ensure our presence in Eretz Yisrael.
The boldest and most successful attempt to push back against turning Judaism into a religion was undertaken by Zionism. The State of Israel, whose birthday we celebrated this past Wednesday night and Thursday, offers us a chance to make Judaism a force, not only in the private realm of “religion” but in statecraft and economics and art and music and all of the spheres of human life that full under the rubric of the Torah and its mitzvot. Speaking just a few weeks after the establishment of the State of Israel, Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik, spoke about the opportunity that Jewish independence offered for us to effectuate a redemption of the Shekhina, to allow God’s very presence to be felt more fully on earth.
In exile, Rav Soloveitchik wrote, “the ignorant masses, classify the Torah as organized religion, which has no right to exist in a society of social justice.” But Jewish independence, allows for redemption:
Only when the vision is total—not only of laws of kosher meat and the prayer-book, but also of Hilkhot Melakhim and Sanhedrin, financial law concerning corporations and the employment of workers, the individual and public Torah, at home, in the street, and in the factory—does the whole Torah reveal itself.
This is celebration of a Zionist vision rooted in Ki Mitzion Tetzei Torah, and a form of redemption which is not dependent on territorial sovereignty whatsoever, but rather on the independence to build a full and non-fragmentary Jewish life.
Rabbi David Wolkenfeld 