GEN1023 Even if we are convinced that we should adhere to Jewish moral norms, how do we know what they are? Classical Judaism defines the moral in terms of God’s will as articulated in God’s commandments. Some modern theorists, however, have challenged the nexus between God’s will and Jewish law, and some humanist Jews have even denied that we should look to God’s will in any form to define the right and the good. Even those who believe that Jewish moral norms are to be defined in terms of God’s will and that Jewish law is the proper vehicle for knowing what God wants of us cannot rest with Jewish law alone, for the Talmud itself declares that the law is not fully sufficient to define morality, that there are morals (
lifnim m’shurat ha-din).
For example, B. Baba Metz’ia 30b…Since, for Reform Judaism, Jewish law is, according to Freehof (1960), 22, “not directive, but advisory” and involves “our guidance, but not our governance,” moral norms, however they are construed, always take precedence over Jewish law, because moral norms are binding but Jewish law is not. Beginning, then, with Abraham’s challenge to God, “Shall the Judge of all the earth not to justice?” [this verse] one ethical question addressed throughout Jewish history has been relationship between moral norms and God’s word. Another, more modern question, is this: If we assume that God’s will defines that which is morally right and good, how shall we discern what God wants us to do now? Reform theories, such as that of Eugene Borowitz,
Borowitz [1991], 284-299 maintain that individual Jews should make that decision. They should inform themselves as much as possible about the relevant factors in that case and about the Jewish sources that apply, but ultimately individual Jews, rather than rabbis, should determine what God wants of us on the basis of their knowledge and conscience. This Reform methodology raises major questions about how to identify any Jew’s decision as being recognizably Jewish. Indeed, it makes it possible and even likely that there will be multiple, conflicting moral decisions, all claiming to be Jewish, because each and every Jew has the right to articulate a “Jewish” position on a given issue. This challenges the coherence and intelligibility of the Jewish moral message. Moreover, Borowitz’s methodology depends crucially on the assumption that individual Jews know enough about the Jewish tradition and about how to apply it to carry out this task, an assumption that regrettably does not comply with reality. Positively, though, Reform methodology empowers individual Jews to wrestle with the Jewish tradition themselves, and it encourages—even demands—that Jews learn more about their tradition in order to carry out this task. DORFFLOV 16
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