I never realized how virulent this guy was in his attacks of R Slifkin until I saw a link to a letter R Slifkin wrote to him where he quotes many of his speeches. Check it out here. The quotes from this Rabbi who is generally considered rather "modern" in the Chareidi world because he has a Phd. in mathematics is so dissapointing as to almsot make one cry.
But that's not what I'm posting about. What I'm posting about are some of the comments on Rationalist Judaism about the book. To his credit Rabbi Slifkin usually does not speak with such blatant cognitive dissonance but some of his commenters sure do let's take a look and then watch me go XGH on them and "tweek" them a bit.
That being said, his book is just more of the same ideas that some Rabbis put forward. Whoever reads what he has to say most likely already agrees with him. People who don't read him most likely already disagree with him.I am curious at how much he will say that is easily refutable, semi-intellectual and, even, correct. But in truth, there is no waaaay I am wasting my time reading something like that. If I want to learn about science and Torah I will read something written by people who do research in science as well as Torah.wave the skeptic wand and pretend I am reviewing a book defending TMS...
That being said, his book is just more of the same ideas that some Rabbis put forward. Whoever reads what he has to say most likely already agrees with him. People who don't read him most likely already disagree with him.I am curious at how much he will say that is easily refutable, semi-intellectual and, even, correct. But in truth, there is no waaaay I am wasting my time reading something like that. If I want to learn about history and Torah I will read something written by people who do research in history, and archaeology as well as Torah.Hmmm awfully similar no? Next...
Those who believe the world is literally 5770 years old and that this belief is a fundamental principle of Judaism will hail his book as a great work of religious literature, a strong defence of authentic Torah Judaism, blah, blah.
Those of us with our brains turned on to a higher voltage than that will either ignore the book (given that I have lots of other stuff to read) or write eloquent rebuttals (that would be you) that will amount to preaching to the choir.
and now a little wave of the skeptic wand and once again pretend I'm reviewing a books on TMS...
Those who believe that the Torah was litterally written by Moshe and that this belief is a fundamental principle of Judaism will hail this book as a great work of religious literature, a strong defence of authentic Judaism, blah, blah.
Those of us with our brains turned on to a higher voltage than that will either ignore the book (given that I have lots of other stuff to read) or write eloquent rebuttals (that would be you) that will amount to preaching to the choir.
The resemblance is uncanny!
Sorry I couldn't resist.
Read the comments over here:
And a Shabbat Shalom!
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16 comments:
"wave the skeptic wand and pretend I am reviewing a book defending TMS...
That being said, his book is just more of the same ideas that some Rabbis put forward. Whoever reads what he has to say most likely already agrees with him. People who don't read him most likely already disagree with him.I am curious at how much he will say that is easily refutable, semi-intellectual and, even, correct. But in truth, there is no waaaay I am wasting my time reading something like that. If I want to learn about history and Torah I will read something written by people who do research in history, and archaeology as well as Torah. "
Are you serious, this is not a skeptics statement. Have you ever heard of Lawrence Kaplan? Or any of the other scholars who fit this criteria? How is this a statement of a skeptic?
Skeptics would say they want to read a book written by someone who doesn't value Torah at all. I don't understand how you could confuse the two.
Just by the by, Lawrence Kaplan has written several books and they are excellent. If you don;t know who he is, he is the head or one of the heads of the NYU History department, I believe, and one of the foremost scholars on the dead sea scrolls.
E-Man, he's also a total apikorus.
All I'm saying is just like Meiselman is probably gonna write unintellectual rubbish to defend his silly young earth beliefs so too Jewish apologists do the same thing for their untenable beliefs.
I just think it's interesting that one can criticize one group of apologists while subscribing to the opinions of another group of apologists who don't know history, archaeology, or philosophy.
I'm yet to read a good book defending Orthodox dogma in the face of all the problems against it in light of history, philosophy, and archaeology (recommendations?)
That point is lost on the statement that I am arguing on. The Skeptic would not say that since, I said, one can not have a real discussion on two subjects unless they study both subjects. Therefore, the work is WORTHLESS. I was not talking about someones problems with beliefs. He can believe whatever he wants, but the problem is when you try to be an authority on a subject that you have only read about one of the two subjects that you are talking about.
After shabbos I will link you to a few good books that show how history and archeology is congruent with the Bible, if you want. Not really sure about the philosophy. What are you looking for in philosophy? There are a few different philosophies behind orthodox Judaism.
E-man
good point there are different levels
However my impression is that all of the Orthodox defenses against the DH and of modern Biblical analysis are JUST THAT written by people unfamiliar with the subjects.
Archaeology is not my main concern but I appreciate the links anyway.
As for philosophy what I mean primarily is the inability of anyone to effectively show that OJ (or any religion) is more likely than atheism or even deism.
Do me a favor, see if you can find this book online for free http://www.amazon.com/Documentary-Hypothesis-Umberto-Cassuto/dp/9657052351#reader_9657052351 it seems like a good read, but I don't really want to buy it.
Unfortunately, I realized that the three or four archeology books that I had saved on my computer are now lost since my computer crashed a few months ago. Sorry, maybe next break i have I will look for them again.
I mean for philosophy purposes you could read the Ralbag's sefer milchamos Hashem which is translated by seymor feldman. Some of his ideas are outdated, but some are not.
I've read Cassuto's book you can read it (and all his works) for free online by signing up to this http://www.publishersrow.com/JDL/
Gottlieb (*retch*) wrote a summary of that book over here
http://www.dovidgottlieb.com/comments/Documentary_Hypothesis.htm
Just a caveat Cassuto did not believe AFAIK in Orthodox TMS the basic difference between him and the DH is he believes that the text itself is uniform but the oral traditions preceding it were not.
How's your Hebrew? Here's a summary of Cassuto's approach to the Torah
http://www.daat.ac.il/daat/vl/betmikra/betmikra025.pdf
The Ralbag is almost as completely outdated as the Moreh Nevuchim they don't really deal with any modern issues (although they are both very interesting reads.)
"Just a caveat Cassuto did not believe AFAIK in Orthodox TMS the basic difference between him and the DH is he believes that the text itself is uniform but the oral traditions preceding it were not. "
So, do you disagree with Cassuto and believe the DH to be right? We are only discussing the Torah itself. There is no way I can prove the Oral Torah has always been the same, but there is no way there is proof against it. There is no written oral Torah. To assume one way or the other is just that, an assumption. But I will read his book, thanks.
The simple question is this, does Cassuto dismantle the DH or not, in your opinion?
Shilton that website costs money, it is not free.
>but there is no way there is proof against it.
There are IMHO good reasons to think otherwise אין פה מקום להאריך
> The simple question is this, does Cassuto dismantle the DH or not, in your opinion?
I wasn't so convinced but there definitely is merit to some of his arguments. The truth is his only books available in English only deal with the beginning of Genesis. I have always felt that the indications of the DH are much more acute in other parts of the Torah so Cassuto doesn't really deal with the sections that interest me. Garnel says he wrote a massive work in Italian on the whole Pentateuch but I don't know.
> Shilton that website costs money, it is not free.
I think there might be a free trial or something try this
https://www.publishersrow.com/ebookshuk/cart/payment/custnewShort.asp?lib=0&jdl=1&cdy=1&NextPg=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.PublishersRow.com%2FJDL%2F&o=1278883661674
or preview on Google Books
http://books.google.com/books?id=7a-a4-WMaa8C&printsec=frontcover&dq=umberto+cassuto&hl=en&ei=yTg6TJG4MsL38AbdrMWnBg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCUQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false
Yeah, I tried it isn;t the full thing. I just glanced at Wikipedia about cassuto. it mentions there he as a big work that he continuously refers to throughout his smaller book on the DH. There are books in English on Shemos and Genesis from what it looks like.
I said lawrence kaplan earlier, I meant lawernce Schiffman. Sorry.
that would explain why I couldn't find the guy ANYWHERE ;)
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