Pluralism in Judaism

Welcome to Madlik. My name is Geoffrey Stern, and at Madlik, we light a spark or shed some light on a Jewish text or tradition. Along with Rabbi Adam Mintz, we host Madlik Disruptive Torah on your favorite podcast platform and now on YouTube. We publish a source sheet on Sefaria, and a link is included in the show notes.

This week’s Parsha is Korach, and we are joined by Mark Friedman, an ex-attorney now practicing political philosophy and theology without a license! In one of the pivotal chapters of his recently published book, Mark uses the Korach story to explore the place of disputation and disruption in our tradition. Mark is a fellow student of philosophy who has a lifelong love for Jewish texts. So it is with great pleasure that I welcome him to Madlik for this week’s episode, “Arguing the Truth.” Welcome, Rabbi. And welcome, Mark. It’s great to have you here.

Mark Friedman [1:40 – 1:44]: Thank you very much. I’m looking forward to a very interesting conversation.

Geoffrey Stern [1:44 – 2:02]: So there’s a link to your book in the show notes, but maybe you can just give us a little bit of a background on your journey. I mentioned that you’re an ex-attorney and and practice philosophy and theology without a license, so why don’t you put a little texture into that?

Mark Friedman [2:03 – 4:21]: Sure. Happy to. I grew up in what is probably a typical Jewish environment. My parents were both Jewish. They were very proud of being Jewish. I would say they were in many ways culturally Jewish in terms of the values that we associate with the religion, but they weren’t really observant. So I grew up Reform. I was bar mitzvahed Reform, and pretty much at that point, I abandoned any kind of observance of Judaism. I, like my parents, were very proud to be Jewish, and I welcomed all the accomplishments that we could claim. But in terms of actual practice, I was pretty much disassociated with it.

This started to change when I met my wife. She, I believe, is substantially more spiritually attuned and inclined than I am. So we started going at least to high holiday services. We were living in Los Angeles at the time, and we would buy tickets to the high holiday services and go to one of the mega synagogues in Los Angeles with thousands of other people. Eventually, we moved to a small city outside of Tacoma, Washington, and through various circumstances, hooked up with the Chabad rabbi in Tacoma and became regular congregants.

We attended services on a very regular basis. We started becoming much more observant, keeping the dietary laws and other things, not in exactly the way of the Orthodox, but respectful of tradition and moving sort of in that direction. I attended the Rabbi’s Torah study class pretty much every week for those 15 years. So I think in the course of that, I got a pretty good overview of Hasidic Judaism, or at least as it was practiced by Chabad. That experience was, I would say, the genesis of my research and then the writing of the book.

Geoffrey Stern [4:21 – 5:08]: You mentioned, well, I feel like I’m talking to a modern-day Rabbi Akiva. Because your book is scholarly, the sources that we’re gonna quote are just from three or four pages. So this is really gonna give Madlik listeners just a taste of what you put in here. Some amazing sources. So hats off to you, or I should say kippah off to you. You’ve done a wonderful, wonderful job. So let’s dive into your reference to the Parasha. What you start by doing is quoting Pirkei Avot. Pirkei Avot talks about something called a Makhloket L’shem Shamayim and Shelo L’shem Shamayim. Why don’t you walk us through what it has to do with Hillel and Shammai and Korach.

Mark Friedman [5:09 – 6:39]: Sure. I believe it relates back to your introduction, which is the value of controversy, and controversy being an essential element of progress. Because if we just had no controversy, we wouldn’t evolve new theories and different ways of looking at the world. So I think Judaism regards controversy as an essential element, almost a required element. The Parsha, or at least the Talmudic references, are to the value of controversy. It is said if the Hillel-Shammai dispute, the dispute of their academies was for the sake of heaven. Even though they had much different views about the law, they were arguing in good faith. They were arguing to try to get to the answer, whereas Korach was arguing for a dishonest, devious purpose. He was not interested in the truth; he was interested in a power grab.

So, in one case, it says the Hillel-Shammai controversy will endure, which I take to mean we’ll continue to have that kind of controversy. But the Korach controversy will not endure because it wasn’t for the sake of truth. And as you both well know, it ended in a rather sudden and tragic fashion as God had the last word about Korach.

Geoffrey Stern [6:39 – 6:57]: Rabbi, isn’t it amazing that the reward for having a dispute that is well-intentioned is that the dispute will last, endure the ages, so to speak? In a sense, the legacy we want to leave are not answers, maybe not even questions, but disputations.

Adam Mintz [6:58 – 7:35]: Well, I mean, I think. Thank you, Mark, so much for this. It’s really interesting that, you know, makhloket plays such a central role in Jewish history. All of Rabbinic Judaism is makhloket, is dispute. So I think the Mishnah is dealing with that. We like makhloket. So if we like makhloket, if we like Hillel and Shammai so much, why don’t we like Korach? What was wrong with Korach? So I think you have to see it against the backdrop of the fact that generally speaking, we like makhloket.

Geoffrey Stern [7:36 – 9:32]: I heard a joke recently that said, you know, arguments that are based on theology, they never end. They are kayam forever. It wasn’t in a complimentary fashion, but we’ll see in a second that also appears. The idea is sha’einu l’shem shamayim zu machloket Korach v’chol adato. That a makhloket that is not for the sake of heaven will not survive like Korach and his ilk. Almost, it could mean those who were with him, and it could mean those going into the future who follow that type of approach.

It seems to me that you first set out to lay the groundwork and you do try to characterize a little bit what was wrong with Korach. I think it’s fascinating, and really the subject matter today is not going to be what’s wrong with Korach, but what was right about Shammai and Hillel. But nonetheless, it’s fascinating that the rabbis learned from our Parasha, from what not to do. Their takeaway was what to do. I think what you do is you bring the Midrash and you basically ascribe the insincerity of Korach to two things.

Number one, he was looking for his own personal gain. He was complaining about the choice that was made in terms of Aaron and the firstborn, the second born. He said, my father was a second born. He should have been chosen over the third born, who ultimately was picked to be the Levites. So that was one problem. I think an argument that is based on kind of your private needs and ulterior motives is not great. It’s also really not a makhloket if you think about it. You’re just posing. You’re just trying to position yourself in a certain way.

Mark Friedman [9:34 – 11:30]: I think you’re right on track. The interesting thing about Korach being swallowed up by the earth is it’s a dramatic finish to him because I think his sins were in more than one direction.

It was first, I think, that, as you said, he was arguing for an improper purpose. He wasn’t arguing ideas; he was using ideas to try to get his own way. But, as I mentioned in the book, it’s interesting what he chose to argue about because, as you know, two very interesting things.

Okay, so you need a tassel to make a garment, to sanctify it. And so he says, well, okay. Well, then logically, if the entire garment is of the same color as the tassel, then I don’t need the tassel, right? Because if the tassel could do it, why wouldn’t the entire garment do it? And Moses says, well, no, you still need the tassel. And what’s fascinating is he’s picked an example of something that is not logical. You can’t argue about it because it’s not a matter of logic to begin with. It’s a matter of a divine command that you either choose to accept or you don’t. Like the Red Heifer, or, you know, why we can’t have a cheeseburger. There’s not a logical explanation that it’s this way and not that way. It’s just a command. And the same thing with the mezuzah. He says, well, if you have a whole bunch of holy books in your house, you sure don’t need a mezuzah, do you? Because you’ve got way more than a mezuzah. And again, Moses just says, well, no, you need the mezuzah. Moses doesn’t try to argue with him logically because there really is no argument he can make. It’s just, this is the way it is. You either take it or leave it.

Geoffrey Stern [11:31 – 12:22]: You know, part of what you said made me start thinking about one of the problems of asking a question and then going into a mahloket, a dispute, is the question has to fit the material. And what you just said is, you can ask a question about anything. But when you’re talking about a chok, when you’re talking about a ritual, when you’re talking even about anthropology, there’s some way that you fashion your question and you don’t take Newtonian laws to dissect the Tekhelet and tzitzit. I think that’s kind of fascinating. It’s misapplied. And I think it’s also really, we can never undervalue the importance of how a question is framed. And all of his questions here are kind of misapplied questions is what you’re really saying.

Mark Friedman [12:23 – 13:11]: Right? They were gotcha questions. They were trying to embarrass Moses by saying, well, you know, you have these very illogical—you’ve transmitted to us very illogical commandments, and therefore, everything you’ve said is illogical, and we shouldn’t follow any of it because you can’t justify these two commandments. But as we know, there are some commandments that can be understood rationally. Some are commemorating the miracles that God performed for us, and then some are just commandments that, you know, there’s no rational justification for. And you’re right, there are different ways to frame the question that are designed either to provoke an honest, thoughtful answer, or it’s a gotcha. I’m asking you a question that I know you can’t really answer.

Adam Mintz [13:12 – 15:34]: It’s interesting that you talk about the fact that the question is misapplied. I mean, it’s not only asked in the wrong way. The whole idea of the question is wrong. Like you said, the idea that God’s laws have to make sense to us, that’s a mistake. Rabbi Soloveitchik has a famous title to the chapter in which he talks about this Parsha. He calls it the Common Sense Rebellion. And he says that’s the mistake. Religion is not always common sense. Now, we like to make it as common sense as we can, but to narrow religion to common sense, Rabbi Soloveitchik says that’s what Korach did wrong.

I’ll just say, now, Mark, maybe you’re going to say this, but I’ll beat you to it. The Malbim, who was a great 19th-century biblical commentator, he says, if you go back, Geoffrey, to the Mishnah, it says, what’s a bad mahloket? A bad machloket is Korach va’adato. Now, Geoffrey, you very keenly said, I don’t know what adatoh means. Does that mean his group, or does that mean the people who follow them in every generation? The Malbim says that the problem with Korach was he couldn’t even get along with his own people. His dispute with Moses doesn’t even make it into the Mishnah. His dispute with Moses was a common sense rebellion, which is wrong. He was just fundamentally wrong. But the reason that Korach didn’t have a leg to stand on, says the Malbim, is because he couldn’t get along with his own people. You know, Datan and Abiram were his co-conspirators, but actually, they weren’t interested. They had their own concern. They came from Reuben; they come from another tribe. They had a whole completely different concern from Korach. So, that’s what it’s saying. If you want to have, if you want to make a good argument, you want to create a group, you have to make sure that you agree among yourselves. And obviously Geoffrey and Mark, that resonates today. Right? If you have arguments among yourselves, you’re not going to be a success.

Mark Friedman [15:35 – 15:39]: Absolutely. And unfortunately, in Judaism, we have those kinds of arguments.

Geoffrey Stern [15:40 – 18:20]: Yeah. I mean, Mark, you even reference the case that although Shammai and Hillel married amongst themselves, which of course is always a critical criteria when we talk about sectarianism and the division of peoples. However, there were times where there were murders, and there were times. Getting back to what I said earlier about sometimes when you’re fighting about Shamayim, they do actually last forever. But I want to move on because one of the things I said about that I loved about your book was the sources that you quote and what you do is you segue directly from Korach to the Tower of Babel of all places. And I was scratching my head as to what they have in common. And what actually they do have in common is that both of them were challenging God or God’s representative. Korach was challenging Moses, and the Tower of Babel was challenging God. They wanted to go up to heavens. And normally you would think that their problem was they were arguing with God. If anything, they were on the side of dissent. And you quote an amazing commentary on the whole story of the Tower of Babel, and it’s from one of our favorite commentaries. It is the Netziv. And what he says is he flips it on its head in terms of the Tower of Babel, similar to the way we’re flipping Korach. Korach is not the one who wanted disputes; he wanted to put an end to disputes. He wanted to grab power. But in the case of the Tower of Babel, the Netziv takes the verse in Genesis 11:3-4 that they say, let us build a city and a tower with its top to the sky to make a name for ourselves, else we shall be scattered all over the world. He says they wanted to create this tower to stop the diversity of opinion, and in fact, that God didn’t punish them with multiple languages. He defeated them. They were going for unanimity of opinion and language. And he said, no. I mean, Netziv says it. And since the opinions of people are not identical, they feared that people might abandon, abandon this philosophy and adopt another. So both the Tower of Babel and the Korach story, through the eyes of Avot, are literally celebrating disputation. I love that you made that connection.

Mark Friedman [18:22 – 19:03]: Thank you. Yes. I mean, I think he makes a brilliant insight that you turn it around. What was really happening was some core group like Korach, if he had been able to, some core group was enforcing its philosophy on everybody else. We’re going to build this tower whether you guys like it or not. And it helps us accomplish this end by having only one language. So God, seeing all this in play, says, well, I’m not going to let you do that. And it’s not quite as dramatic, I guess, as the earth swallowing up Korach, but it’s a pretty important point.

Geoffrey Stern [19:04 – 20:41]: You are an ex-lawyer, but you’re also someone who in his youth, like myself, studied philosophy.

And what I want to do for the remainder of our conversation today is to follow your segue from these ancient stories to the modern perception of what is truth and how. Because I think most people’s knee-jerk reaction is that if, if God represents anything, if theology represents anything, it’s that there’s only one answer to every question. There’s one emet. And therefore, it’s surprising that the Tower of Babel and Korach are, in fact, supposed to be metaphors or have a moral lesson that no, the last thing we want is one answer.

And what you do is you quote the famous Mishnah in Ediyot that explains why we have multiple opinions. And Rashi, a famous Rashi that you quote, says the reason we have to retain minority views and the reason why the Talmud is chock full of varying opinions is you never know when a dog is going to have its day. And what he quotes is the most famous rendering of that, that “this and this,” meaning this opinion and that opinion, are the words of the living God. And your takeaway from that is that that sounds very similar to modern philosophers such as Karl Popper, who talk about a nuance of truth. So maybe walk us through that transition.

Mark Friedman [20:42 – 22:44]: Sure. Well, I think if you had to summarize Popper’s philosophy in a nutshell, it’s the idea that we’re probably not going to get to the ultimate truth. There’s no sense in trying to formulate a theory that gets to the ultimate truth once and for all, and then we’re done. We can close down all the science departments because we’ve arrived at the ultimate truth. His point is that we shouldn’t strive for that because it may be out of our reach, but what we can practically strive for are better theories that are better supported by the evidence that we have before us.

Over time, if we do that repetitively, we will get closer and closer to the truth, even if we never get there. And controversy is an essential part of that, obviously, because you have the regnant theory, the Newtonian theory. And then Einstein comes along and says, well, I’ve observed some anomalies that Newton can’t quite explain. So let me put forward a better theory that retains the good parts of Newton’s philosophy but gives us a better overall explanation. Then quantum mechanics comes along and questions some of Einstein’s basic assumptions. So it’s a never-ending process by which we try to get closer to the truth. But at any one time, we don’t have an ultimate truth. We have competing theories about the truth. We hope that over time we can have good reason to prefer one theory to the other. But for all we know, it’s possible at least that the theory that gets rejected at time X might be rehabilitated at time Y. So you’re never really sure. You can’t just say, well, this theory’s done. We’re going to forget that anybody ever held it because it may come back and there may be elements of it that you have to adopt again. So it’s a never-ending process with a radical skepticism about knowing the truth at any one moment.

Geoffrey Stern [22:45 – 25:36]: And you do give credit to Menachem Fish who you believe is one of the first Talmudists who made the connection to Popper. I will add that you make a strong point that Popper still believed that there was objective truth, only that man with his five senses and limited knowledge is not capable of finding that truth.

So truth-seeking, in a sense, really comes down to theorizing, and one theory is going to be better than another for some arbitrary reasons. What’s fascinating is he really says the most important thing about a theory is being able to test it. You can have two equal theories that represent the facts and explain the facts equally. But if one can be tested and the other can’t be tested, the one that can be tested is better.

Now, that’s arbitrary in the sense that we like theories that you can test. But the point is that I think. And maybe I’m misreading, but even if you didn’t believe there was truth, because we’re splitting hairs. If we say that man is not capable of knowing what truth is, then the fact that there actually is truth is really irrelevant because we’re human beings. We’re talking with our… with the knowledge that we’re in doubt of. It’s like we can’t really fathom what it is.

I think there are equal amounts of people who could say actually there is no truth, or at least no truth from a human perspective. But what’s important is… And you say that Fish looks at it from the perspective of practical nature. How can we use these tools that modern science has given us to understand our own texts, for instance. But the way you go is, how does that determine our understanding of arguments? And I find that just fascinating because if you think about it, you know, some of the things that he says are not only is it testable, but he says, if you have two theories and one is simpler than the other, a simpler theory is better. Well, because we can use it more easily. But again, the old theory might come back one day. We are engaged in this Machloket that will continue practical use. Clearly, if you have two theories and one you can use to build an airplane, that has value to it. And I think all of these concepts have. And you’ve kind of brought them out in our texts. How? In the Talmud, they’re looking for practical results sometimes. They’re looking for moral lessons sometimes. But I do think it’s a fascinating way to look at the confluence of the way the Talmudic Machloket is and modern science and theory of science. What things you. Adam.

Adam Mintz [25:37 – 25:55]: So I want to go back to “Elu v’Elu Divrei Elohim Chayim.” Both are the words of a living God. So, Mark, do you think that that means that both are truth, or you think that the rabbis are not really interested in truth per se?

Mark Friedman [25:56 – 27:21]: That’s a very interesting question. I think reverting back to Popper at that given moment, we don’t know which of those two groups has the correct objective theory. But what we do know is that the Hillelites are much more flexible in their approach to theory. And it’s pretty clear when the heavenly voice speaks that one of the things it’s saying is the Hillelites, the truth is according to them. Because in the future, we will need to revise these laws and bring truth into the future. And if we go, if we say the law is according to the Shammites, they’re not willing to change their mind. So whatever the theory they have at that moment, that’s likely to be the theory into the infinite future, because they’re never going to change it.

Whereas the Hillelites would be willing, if the social conditions change radically and a law that made sense at the time of the Torah no longer makes sense, then they will change the law to not inflict harm on their fellow Jews, whereas the Shammites might not. That’s my interpretation of why God said the law is according to the Hillelites.

Adam Mintz [27:21 – 28:26]: So that. So I think that’s brilliant, Geoffrey. That’s a great explanation, but that has nothing to do with truth. That doesn’t mean that Hillel is more correct than Shammai. That’s a practical consideration that we, we have to follow Hillel because he’s more flexible. But you see that. And that would support what I asked you. And that is the rabbis. Truth is not what the rabbis want. It might be that “Shema Yisrael,” that that is true, that’s a verse in the Torah. But when Shammai and Hillel argue about, you know, exactly how you take the Lulav or how you blow the Shofar on Rosh Hashanah, that’s not a question of truth, that’s a question of interpretation. And interpretation, there are a lot of factors in determining what you’re going to do, but that’s interpretation, not truth. So I think there, obviously, a lot of people have spoken about this. I think there the philosophy of Halacha might be different than Western philosophy, Philosophy.

Mark Friedman [28:26 – 29:22]: On this question of truth, it’s interesting.

I mean, there’s one exception that Popper, I think, makes about questioning the truth, never being sure that you’ve arrived at the truth, which is, Geoffrey, you’re probably familiar with this idea. The analytic statements, statements that are true by their own definition. A bachelor is an unmarried man. Two plus two equals four. These, I think even Popper would say, you can’t argue about them because they’re true by virtue of the meaning of the words that express them.

So the Shema, in transferring it to religious jargon, the Shema might be one of those necessary truths that you have to have to get the religion off the ground. And so you can’t question the existence of God or the religion means nothing. So maybe that’s the analogy.

Geoffrey Stern [29:23 – 29:53]: So I want to finish up. I mean, a lot of what you just said now, in terms of a priori truths, you can’t say them without them not being true. They have to do with language. Once you have this language and you define one as one and two as two, one and two becomes three. These are all traditions.

What I think the flip side, and a philosopher called Paul Feyerabend actually pointed this out, is that what really Popper is doing is he’s describing the tradition of modern science and theory. Therefore, a theory is for arbitrary reasons. I said before, it’s better if it’s simpler, better if you can test it, and better if you can use it.

But what he said, and I’m going to read a little bit from him, maybe this will be for your next volume. He says there is no idea however ancient and absurd, that is not capable of improving our knowledge. The whole history of thought is absorbed into science and is used for improving every single theory. Nor is political interference it may be needed to overcome chauvinism.

What he argued for is you cannot look at, for instance, the Torah. He even says we should regard the worldviews of the Bible, the Gilgamesh epic, the Iliad, the Edda as fully fledged alternative cosmologies. The point is, we have to understand that all of these traditions that our forebears had spent hours and lifetimes analyzing have gems within them, have truths within them. And our choice of science for when we construct our cars and airplanes is one choice that we make. But when we look at our texts, those are alternative truths.

And I think it’s not necessarily, I think it would be wrong to say that this suggests a relativist view of truth because that is normally taken to diminish truth. I think the truth is important because whether it actually exists or it motivates us to continue searching is always going to be important.

But I do think what we learn from the Pirkei Avot that we started with and from the treatment of Shammai and Hillel that you have in your book is we have to value other opinions, alternative opinions, minority opinions, because of their richness and because of what they can add to our life. At the end of the day, what your book argued for is pluralism.

Pluralism within our tradition, not as an alternative. Because what we saw in the Tower of Babel was, God forbid, there should be unanimity as the only alternative. That’s the only thing we can agree upon. And I will say to our listeners, if you have a chance, go ahead and get this book, because it has amazing sources and it is so well researched. Now that I’ve met Mark, I just really appreciate your dedication and life story for putting this together and sharing with us today and sharing with the world in your book.

Mark Friedman [32:32 – 33:06]: You’re very kind, Geoffrey. I appreciate that very much because it’s coming from somebody who actually, I think, understands the issues and understands the things I’m trying to articulate. I’ve appreciated listening to your podcasts. I think you and the rabbi have really insightful discussions, and I learn a lot when I listen, and I’m thankful that I might be able to return the favor in a small way. So thank you very much for having me on your podcast.

Adam Mintz [33:06 – 33:16]: So much for joining us. This is really a true, Geoffrey. Fantastic, fantastic topic. So much to think about. Shabbat shalom, everybody. It’s a hard parsha, but enjoy the parasha.

Mark Friedman [33:17 – 33:18]: Thank you.

Geoffrey Stern [33:18 – 33:19]: Shabbat Shalom.

Mark Friedman [33:19 – 33:21]: Shabbat Shalom.