1 00:00:06,720 --> 00:00:10,720 Welcome to Judaism Demystified, a podcast for the perplexed. 2 00:00:11,440 --> 00:00:15,840 We are joined by JJ Kimchi. JJ is a PhD candidate at Harvard 3 00:00:15,840 --> 00:00:18,960 University, where he specializes in the intersection between 4 00:00:18,960 --> 00:00:20,760 European and Jewish intellectual history. 5 00:00:20,760 --> 00:00:23,800 During the post Enlightenment period, JJ received his 6 00:00:23,800 --> 00:00:26,480 undergraduate education at Chilean college Jerusalem, where 7 00:00:26,480 --> 00:00:29,040 he double majored in Western philosophy and Jewish thought. 8 00:00:29,480 --> 00:00:32,680 Prior to that, he studied at Ishivatar Etcion and completed 9 00:00:32,680 --> 00:00:35,880 his military service in the 101st division of the ID FS 10 00:00:35,880 --> 00:00:39,360 Paratroopers Brigade. JJ has taught courses on Jewish 11 00:00:39,360 --> 00:00:42,120 thought in a wide array of institutions, including at 12 00:00:42,120 --> 00:00:45,160 Harvard, Brandeis and MIT. His works have been published 13 00:00:45,160 --> 00:00:48,040 across a wide array of scholarly and academic platforms. 14 00:00:48,320 --> 00:00:51,640 He has ghost written two books on Jewish ideas and his first 15 00:00:51,640 --> 00:00:54,760 academic book is due to be published in 2024. 16 00:00:55,040 --> 00:00:58,600 JJ is also the host of Torah and Motion's podcast of Jewish 17 00:00:58,640 --> 00:01:02,280 Ideas. Without further ADO, JJ Kinfi. 18 00:01:09,600 --> 00:01:12,320 Thank you for joining the Judaism Demystified podcast. 19 00:01:12,320 --> 00:01:15,320 It's great to have you back. JJ Kimchi Akham. 20 00:01:15,320 --> 00:01:18,280 JJ Kimchi. At this point you might have, 21 00:01:18,440 --> 00:01:20,440 you might have to move in with us because you know we're doing 22 00:01:20,440 --> 00:01:22,280 this. It's great. 23 00:01:22,280 --> 00:01:23,760 Really. We're getting great feedback 24 00:01:23,800 --> 00:01:26,960 from your podcast and we're very excited for this one. 25 00:01:26,960 --> 00:01:30,760 In particular, we're going to be discussing the Goose Tanakh 26 00:01:30,840 --> 00:01:34,000 method. So we want to discuss what 27 00:01:34,000 --> 00:01:36,720 particular method are we talking about. 28 00:01:37,160 --> 00:01:39,920 If you could provide us with a background of who uses this, 29 00:01:39,920 --> 00:01:42,640 where it stems from, and how widespread it is. 30 00:01:43,400 --> 00:01:45,960 OK, firstly, can I say once again, it's great to be here. 31 00:01:46,160 --> 00:01:47,960 I'm a big fan of yours. I love what you guys do. 32 00:01:48,440 --> 00:01:50,440 I listen to your other stuff and I'm always happy to be back. 33 00:01:50,440 --> 00:01:52,280 And yes, you're right, this is now a third time and people 34 00:01:52,520 --> 00:01:54,360 might be, might, might begin to suspect something. 35 00:01:54,560 --> 00:01:58,080 So but I hope, I hope this is not our last time and there's 36 00:01:58,080 --> 00:01:59,680 many, many interesting things to discuss tonight. 37 00:02:00,240 --> 00:02:02,480 So let's jump into it. Before we get into discussing 38 00:02:02,480 --> 00:02:05,480 what I'm going to discuss a couple of quick caveats just for 39 00:02:05,480 --> 00:02:07,320 the audience and and for everyone to know the first thing 40 00:02:07,320 --> 00:02:09,000 is that what we're going to be speaking about. 41 00:02:09,000 --> 00:02:12,400 I can't claim to be really an expert in it in the sense that 42 00:02:12,400 --> 00:02:16,160 I'm a consumer of the sorts of writings that get put under the 43 00:02:16,160 --> 00:02:19,080 Guptanac Method banner. I I've been reading it for many 44 00:02:19,080 --> 00:02:20,640 years and I speak to people about it, et cetera. 45 00:02:20,640 --> 00:02:24,120 But it's not really an area of my research as it were and 46 00:02:24,120 --> 00:02:26,160 really the area of nobody's particular research. 47 00:02:26,160 --> 00:02:28,080 I mean there's I, I don't know of anyone who's done very 48 00:02:28,080 --> 00:02:31,440 serious academic work in this and therefore this is everything 49 00:02:31,720 --> 00:02:34,720 I I will be saying is the words of an enthusiastic amateur 50 00:02:34,920 --> 00:02:37,120 rather than someone who's been you know sitting in the 51 00:02:37,120 --> 00:02:39,040 libraries and and swatting up on all this. 52 00:02:39,040 --> 00:02:40,640 This is the first thing. The second thing of course is 53 00:02:40,640 --> 00:02:43,640 that we're going to be talking about a a school of scholarship, 54 00:02:43,640 --> 00:02:44,960 right. And the problem always we're 55 00:02:44,960 --> 00:02:47,120 talking about a school of scholarship, no matter what it 56 00:02:47,120 --> 00:02:49,680 is, is that you have to generalize if you're going to 57 00:02:49,680 --> 00:02:52,400 say anything coherent. But of course you will always 58 00:02:52,400 --> 00:02:55,560 find scholars in the school who sort of buck the trend and who 59 00:02:55,560 --> 00:02:57,760 don't fit particularly into the boxes in which you're 60 00:02:57,760 --> 00:02:59,320 generalizing. And therefore, so I wanted to 61 00:02:59,320 --> 00:03:02,120 say this mirage that the the things and the generalization 62 00:03:02,120 --> 00:03:05,160 that I'm about to make might not encompass every single member of 63 00:03:05,160 --> 00:03:07,160 the Gushnach method. And there's an open question as 64 00:03:07,160 --> 00:03:10,680 to whether this particular method is in fact a global 65 00:03:10,680 --> 00:03:12,480 method or whether there are important differences between 66 00:03:12,480 --> 00:03:13,680 the Israel and the American branch. 67 00:03:13,880 --> 00:03:17,280 I don't think so, but others do and therefore, you know, so 68 00:03:17,360 --> 00:03:18,520 let's get into it. But. 69 00:03:18,680 --> 00:03:20,800 You attended the the Israel. Branch. 70 00:03:20,880 --> 00:03:21,640 Correct. Say again? 71 00:03:22,040 --> 00:03:23,520 You attended the Israel. Branch. 72 00:03:23,520 --> 00:03:26,280 Yeah, so, So I guess my own background is that yes, I spent 73 00:03:26,280 --> 00:03:29,520 two years in the Gush itself. I also lived in the yeshiva and 74 00:03:29,520 --> 00:03:32,360 yeshiva tharatiyan known as the Gush for for the year and a half 75 00:03:32,360 --> 00:03:35,520 in which I served in in Sahel. And therefore, you know, I I 76 00:03:35,520 --> 00:03:38,920 have a lot of, obviously, you know, many roots there and still 77 00:03:38,920 --> 00:03:40,600 keep up with their literature and still keep up with the 78 00:03:40,600 --> 00:03:42,760 people there. And so therefore, you know those 79 00:03:42,760 --> 00:03:44,520 are my basic qualifications to speak on the matter. 80 00:03:44,680 --> 00:03:46,680 But of course many others have the same qualifications as me. 81 00:03:47,120 --> 00:03:49,800 So, you know, I can't, I can't claim any superiority on that. 82 00:03:51,280 --> 00:03:55,200 So yeah, so this is a method of studying and writing about and 83 00:03:55,200 --> 00:03:58,200 reading Tanakh that is known colloquially as the gush Tanakh 84 00:03:58,200 --> 00:04:00,520 method because it's associated with the gush yeshiva, Yeshiva 85 00:04:00,520 --> 00:04:03,240 Harrison in Alan. She was a very large religious 86 00:04:03,240 --> 00:04:06,240 Zionist at Hesde Yeshiva. It's also associated with the 87 00:04:06,240 --> 00:04:08,960 college that's in the yeshiva. This was the lower levels of the 88 00:04:08,960 --> 00:04:10,200 Shiva. There's a colleague, Mclet 89 00:04:10,200 --> 00:04:12,880 Herzog or Herzog College and many of the teachers who teach 90 00:04:12,880 --> 00:04:14,240 in should Harrison also teach there? 91 00:04:14,240 --> 00:04:18,120 And that's also a world centre of this particular method in on 92 00:04:18,120 --> 00:04:21,959 the American scene there are this is generally known as the 93 00:04:21,959 --> 00:04:24,840 literary theological method and this is, this is just something 94 00:04:24,840 --> 00:04:28,800 that is generally spoken about. But within something that I've 95 00:04:29,040 --> 00:04:31,520 observed in the last 10 or 15 years that I've I've been around 96 00:04:31,520 --> 00:04:35,280 to observe is its spread and its ubiquity within the Modern 97 00:04:35,280 --> 00:04:36,800 Orthodox, religious Zionist world, right. 98 00:04:37,000 --> 00:04:39,440 That really in the last couple of decades you've had the the 99 00:04:39,560 --> 00:04:43,560 tremendous success of this way of of rings, the Tanakan, 100 00:04:43,560 --> 00:04:46,240 obviously part of it is the fact that places like Gush and 101 00:04:46,240 --> 00:04:48,960 Yeshiva University where there are some, you know, some 102 00:04:48,960 --> 00:04:50,680 important members, some important figures within this, 103 00:04:50,680 --> 00:04:53,440 within this school they have produced many teachers. 104 00:04:53,480 --> 00:04:55,320 Many of these teachers teach in seminaries, they teach in 105 00:04:55,320 --> 00:04:57,200 yeshiva, they teach in in high schools. 106 00:04:57,200 --> 00:04:59,600 They teach everywhere that they are, you know become pulpit 107 00:04:59,600 --> 00:05:01,720 rabbis. They write on popular websites 108 00:05:01,720 --> 00:05:04,560 on the VBM or Allitera other such other such websites and 109 00:05:04,560 --> 00:05:07,880 therefore this has spread. Another very big agent of the 110 00:05:07,880 --> 00:05:10,360 spread of this method is Korean mugged publishing. 111 00:05:10,360 --> 00:05:12,080 Right. They publish a lot of books. 112 00:05:12,120 --> 00:05:14,000 I've just you know a couple. So for example holding up to the 113 00:05:14,000 --> 00:05:17,600 camera here the book is slightly blurred but this is Yadel 114 00:05:17,600 --> 00:05:20,600 Ziegler's book on route actually very good book from alienations 115 00:05:20,600 --> 00:05:22,200 and monarchy. Again these sort of these white 116 00:05:22,720 --> 00:05:25,760 books on of Korean and they were producing one each part of it's 117 00:05:25,760 --> 00:05:28,000 enough so. So within Israel I mean I'm just 118 00:05:28,000 --> 00:05:30,080 going to throw out some names because it's very possible some 119 00:05:30,080 --> 00:05:32,240 of the audience would have come across them. 120 00:05:32,440 --> 00:05:35,040 In Israel we're talking about people like Ravyakov Maidan, one 121 00:05:35,040 --> 00:05:38,240 of the Russia Shiva of the Ghosh, Raviol Binnun Rav Amnon 122 00:05:38,240 --> 00:05:41,840 Bazak, who wrote this excellent book called Adhayam Hazare, 123 00:05:42,040 --> 00:05:44,040 which I thought was very good, even if I, you know, don't. 124 00:05:44,200 --> 00:05:45,640 Nominal. Yes, I have that. 125 00:05:45,640 --> 00:05:46,960 I have the translated translated. 126 00:05:47,400 --> 00:05:50,760 Version Yes, it's an important book to read and also to take 127 00:05:50,760 --> 00:05:53,280 issue with to some degree, but we'll put that to one side for 128 00:05:53,280 --> 00:05:55,840 the moment. And also other names. 129 00:05:55,840 --> 00:05:59,760 For example, Yonatan Grossman, Dr. Yoni Grossman, Maryland and 130 00:05:59,760 --> 00:06:01,080 Yal Ziegler, who I just mentioned here. 131 00:06:01,080 --> 00:06:02,480 She's. Broken on Samit. 132 00:06:03,720 --> 00:06:05,960 Exactly. More in the English speaking 133 00:06:05,960 --> 00:06:07,880 world, you have people like Menachem Libtag who also teaches 134 00:06:07,880 --> 00:06:10,320 very widely. In the United States, you have, 135 00:06:10,920 --> 00:06:13,880 you know, Sharon Kami from Outreach University or Haim 136 00:06:13,880 --> 00:06:16,960 Angel or you had to hear David Foreman of Alabita the other 137 00:06:16,960 --> 00:06:19,040 week who uses sort of a version of this method. 138 00:06:19,240 --> 00:06:22,600 And these, all these scholars constitute to a broad degree 139 00:06:22,800 --> 00:06:26,760 this this school which which will be called which generally 140 00:06:26,760 --> 00:06:28,240 locally known as the Gushtenach method. 141 00:06:28,440 --> 00:06:30,800 Although of course some of those who some of the people who use 142 00:06:30,800 --> 00:06:33,040 it don't, don't belong to the gush. 143 00:06:33,040 --> 00:06:35,400 And one of the most important people, actually underratedly, 144 00:06:35,400 --> 00:06:38,520 who did use this method a lot was Lenny Rabbi Jonathan Sacks. 145 00:06:39,040 --> 00:06:41,400 And of course his stuff, his conversation, even though 146 00:06:41,400 --> 00:06:43,920 includes, you know some of his own expertise and his background 147 00:06:43,920 --> 00:06:46,280 philosophy. But that was, that was something 148 00:06:46,280 --> 00:06:49,200 at the very heart of his exegetical process. 149 00:06:49,400 --> 00:06:52,200 And because, you know, 10s of thousands have read his books 150 00:06:52,200 --> 00:06:54,240 and read his covenant conversation, so you know, he 151 00:06:54,240 --> 00:06:56,280 was also a very important voice in all this. 152 00:06:56,640 --> 00:06:59,560 You asked me a little bit about the historical background to 153 00:06:59,560 --> 00:07:03,720 this and well, I've been giving this some thought and it seems 154 00:07:03,720 --> 00:07:06,880 to me that there are three important processes, historical 155 00:07:06,880 --> 00:07:10,600 processes, which are worth noting and must be understood in 156 00:07:10,600 --> 00:07:12,680 order to to sort of contextualize the Gustanach 157 00:07:12,680 --> 00:07:14,880 method before we actually get to the characteristics of the 158 00:07:14,880 --> 00:07:17,040 method itself, which I want to outline a bit more in depth 159 00:07:17,040 --> 00:07:19,160 later on. So the historical backdrop and 160 00:07:19,160 --> 00:07:21,920 there are three of them. The first one is to my mind the 161 00:07:22,080 --> 00:07:26,640 the return to Tanakh commentary and Toro commentary in the 19th 162 00:07:26,640 --> 00:07:28,640 century. OK, let me explain a little bit 163 00:07:28,640 --> 00:07:30,520 what I mean. If you look at the history of 164 00:07:30,520 --> 00:07:33,840 Toro commentary, so it has Toro commentary as we know it, 165 00:07:33,840 --> 00:07:39,400 meaning line by line analysis and and and mini essays or or or 166 00:07:39,400 --> 00:07:42,520 or little comments sort of on the biblical text. 167 00:07:42,720 --> 00:07:45,320 So I had basically a beginning date which was Sadia gone who 168 00:07:45,320 --> 00:07:48,120 was the 1st to write in many of the different genres that we 169 00:07:48,120 --> 00:07:50,360 were familiar with today as he wrote his tafsir, his 170 00:07:50,360 --> 00:07:53,800 translation and his and his commentary. 171 00:07:54,040 --> 00:07:55,640 And then you have the development of different 172 00:07:55,640 --> 00:07:57,560 schools, the development of the French school with Rashi and 173 00:07:57,560 --> 00:08:01,000 Rashbaum and Bahar and developments of various various 174 00:08:01,000 --> 00:08:03,160 luminaries in Spain, the Rambandi, even Ezra etcetera. 175 00:08:04,160 --> 00:08:06,960 And then you have and you have sort of a high point in the 176 00:08:06,960 --> 00:08:10,160 medieval period which roughly comes to an end in the in the 177 00:08:10,160 --> 00:08:12,880 early 1500s, roughly in the 1500s where you have a Barber. 178 00:08:12,880 --> 00:08:16,680 Now let's say the last very major example, the last of 179 00:08:16,680 --> 00:08:18,840 canonical example of this. And you also have others such as 180 00:08:19,240 --> 00:08:21,960 Ovadios for now. And a little bit later on you 181 00:08:21,960 --> 00:08:25,520 have also the clay a car right and these the from lunches and 182 00:08:25,520 --> 00:08:28,840 you have these figures. But then in the about the 1500s 183 00:08:28,880 --> 00:08:31,240 after the Eurospara, then after about an, you know, the rise of 184 00:08:31,240 --> 00:08:33,840 of of Kabbalah and side etcetera, you basically have an 185 00:08:33,840 --> 00:08:38,960 end to this, to this process, an end to the production of 186 00:08:38,960 --> 00:08:41,280 commentaries which we would consider canonical, which we 187 00:08:41,280 --> 00:08:43,640 would consider, you know, major central commentaries at the 188 00:08:43,640 --> 00:08:46,040 heart of the of the Jewish Canon. 189 00:08:46,280 --> 00:08:49,320 And we have a few 100 years of very little writing in this 190 00:08:49,320 --> 00:08:51,200 regard. Actually it takes a break more 191 00:08:51,200 --> 00:08:54,560 or less through the through the 1600s to the 1700s and through 192 00:08:54,560 --> 00:08:59,000 until the mid 1800s, where suddenly from 1840s onwards you 193 00:08:59,000 --> 00:09:04,800 have an explosion of really novel and really exciting and 194 00:09:04,800 --> 00:09:06,800 you're powerful and impactful Parsha, Not right. 195 00:09:07,000 --> 00:09:09,520 So you have Shadal with Hamish Dadell and you have Rashim 196 00:09:09,520 --> 00:09:13,760 Shrofal Hirsch and you have Talit Sri Harsh Berlin, the 197 00:09:13,760 --> 00:09:17,960 native, and you have the Malbim and you have the Katavaha 198 00:09:17,960 --> 00:09:22,840 Kabbalah and later on you have Hoffmann in in Berlin and 199 00:09:22,840 --> 00:09:24,840 basically have a series of really important Parsha Nim 200 00:09:24,960 --> 00:09:28,040 writing once again on the tour. In other words, that that in the 201 00:09:28,040 --> 00:09:30,640 mid 19th century, due to a variety of factors, due to 202 00:09:30,640 --> 00:09:33,760 partly the Enlightenment, partly to the spread of Jewish texts 203 00:09:33,760 --> 00:09:37,160 generally in the in Europe, due partly to the attack on the 204 00:09:37,160 --> 00:09:40,520 Tanakh by biblical critics, due partly to the secularization, 205 00:09:40,720 --> 00:09:43,160 the growing importer and the secularization of Jews in Europe 206 00:09:43,160 --> 00:09:45,400 in general. And you suddenly had a series of 207 00:09:45,400 --> 00:09:48,480 very again very important, very impressive, very multi talented 208 00:09:48,880 --> 00:09:52,040 rabbinic figures, Eliabana Mosaic, another one who are 209 00:09:52,040 --> 00:09:56,200 writing, who not only writing important works on Judaism but 210 00:09:56,200 --> 00:10:00,280 using commentary on the Tanakh as a medium through which to 211 00:10:00,280 --> 00:10:03,600 provide a a Jewish worldview. Right, Because that's really 212 00:10:03,600 --> 00:10:04,920 what characterized medieval Parashanov. 213 00:10:04,920 --> 00:10:07,440 Neil Parashanov, you read, you know, not all of them, of 214 00:10:07,440 --> 00:10:10,080 course, but if you read the great ones from Ban Ibn Ezra, 215 00:10:10,080 --> 00:10:13,480 Ababanel, these commentary stand as statements of Jewish 216 00:10:13,480 --> 00:10:15,600 philosophy, statements of what Judaism is like. 217 00:10:15,600 --> 00:10:18,800 You can get a whole course on Jewish belief and Jewish 218 00:10:18,800 --> 00:10:21,120 practice and Jewish everything by reading these great 219 00:10:21,120 --> 00:10:24,400 Prashanthi. Whereas and again, sort of took 220 00:10:24,400 --> 00:10:26,200 a break. And from the 1840s, eighteen 50s 221 00:10:26,200 --> 00:10:27,680 onwards, you suddenly had this explosion. 222 00:10:27,680 --> 00:10:31,160 Again, there's this return to to commentary on the Tanakh, and 223 00:10:31,160 --> 00:10:34,480 specifically commentary on the Torah as a method through which 224 00:10:34,480 --> 00:10:39,120 to explore and discuss and and and state Jewish ideas writ 225 00:10:39,120 --> 00:10:40,040 large. OK. 226 00:10:40,040 --> 00:10:43,120 And this is something very important, you know, perhaps one 227 00:10:43,120 --> 00:10:46,080 day, that's one day I'll actually devote a book to this 228 00:10:46,080 --> 00:10:47,360 phenomenon. It's actually a very important 229 00:10:47,360 --> 00:10:50,920 phenomenon that sort of gone under, you know, underratedly, 230 00:10:51,680 --> 00:10:53,880 underratedly important and has gone somewhat unnoticed 231 00:10:54,120 --> 00:10:56,440 certainly within the academic world and should be sort of 232 00:10:56,440 --> 00:10:59,880 focused upon more a part of the modernization of Judaism and 233 00:10:59,880 --> 00:11:02,200 certainly rabbinic culture was this return due to commentary 234 00:11:02,200 --> 00:11:04,080 itself. That's sort of that's the first 235 00:11:04,080 --> 00:11:05,920 point, the first historical process that I wanted. 236 00:11:05,920 --> 00:11:07,720 And of course this continues a little bit into the 20th 237 00:11:07,720 --> 00:11:08,880 century. And your figures like as I said, 238 00:11:08,880 --> 00:11:12,080 obviously Hoffman, Chief Rabbi Hertz with the Hertz, Gromach, 239 00:11:12,080 --> 00:11:13,840 et cetera, et cetera. And this sort of continues, 240 00:11:13,840 --> 00:11:16,240 continues, and then and eventually ends up where we are. 241 00:11:16,240 --> 00:11:19,480 This is the first one. The second historical element 242 00:11:19,760 --> 00:11:25,760 is, is the centrality of Tanakh learning in the Zionist world 243 00:11:25,760 --> 00:11:27,240 and specifically the religious Zionist world. 244 00:11:27,240 --> 00:11:28,960 Right. So in fact within the early 245 00:11:28,960 --> 00:11:33,040 Zionists and there was a bit of a disagreement among the early 246 00:11:33,040 --> 00:11:36,480 major Zionists thinkers as to whether the Tanakh specifically 247 00:11:36,480 --> 00:11:39,120 should be at the center of their, you know, should be 248 00:11:39,120 --> 00:11:40,600 something that the the the new Jew. 249 00:11:40,600 --> 00:11:44,160 So the whether the new Jew ought to be reading the Tanakh not to 250 00:11:44,160 --> 00:11:46,040 be paying attention into it, not to, you know, include it, have 251 00:11:46,040 --> 00:11:48,720 it on their bookshelf and study it and and basically you have to 252 00:11:48,720 --> 00:11:49,720 dwell in different schools of thought. 253 00:11:49,840 --> 00:11:53,560 So for example had Haram as Ashad Sieginsberg and his pupil 254 00:11:53,600 --> 00:11:55,520 Khan Naham Bialik. They were among those who loved 255 00:11:55,520 --> 00:11:57,960 the Tanakh, who wrote about the Tanakh who wrote poetry. 256 00:11:58,040 --> 00:11:59,840 You know, interweaving the Tanakh and really felt the 257 00:11:59,840 --> 00:12:02,960 Tanakh to be should be the basis of Hebraic thought and culture 258 00:12:02,960 --> 00:12:04,800 going forward. And Gershomme Charlam and 259 00:12:04,800 --> 00:12:06,560 others. Whereas you have on the other 260 00:12:06,560 --> 00:12:08,640 side but the chef skin and others who basically said no, 261 00:12:08,640 --> 00:12:10,160 no, we want to get rid of all that. 262 00:12:10,160 --> 00:12:12,120 We want to push that, put that all away. 263 00:12:12,600 --> 00:12:14,840 But again, within the Zionist movement you still had many like 264 00:12:14,840 --> 00:12:16,440 Ben Guri who really, really loved it. 265 00:12:16,480 --> 00:12:20,760 However, the religious Zionist movement as such really got 266 00:12:20,760 --> 00:12:24,200 going only after in 1967, four 67 was very, very small. 267 00:12:24,400 --> 00:12:26,840 You showed America Sarab and a little bit surrounding it but 268 00:12:26,840 --> 00:12:29,680 actually it was only after the six day one, only after the 269 00:12:29,680 --> 00:12:32,440 conquest of Udan Shamran and your Shalim et cetera. 270 00:12:32,440 --> 00:12:35,640 Where suddenly had this explosion of this new this new 271 00:12:36,480 --> 00:12:38,440 section of the population, new type of Judah. 272 00:12:38,440 --> 00:12:41,040 The new sector called Religious Zionism in its own schools and 273 00:12:41,040 --> 00:12:44,560 its own Yeshiva and its own seminaries own Curricula and and 274 00:12:44,560 --> 00:12:46,640 Tanakh learning over those decades. 275 00:12:46,640 --> 00:12:49,920 Or let's say 70s, eighties, 90s became at the center of the 276 00:12:49,920 --> 00:12:52,720 Religious Zionist movement. First because distinguished them 277 00:12:52,760 --> 00:12:55,040 from the Haredi counterparts. Obviously the Haredi well-being 278 00:12:55,040 --> 00:12:57,720 much more interested in rabbinics and and in Talmud and 279 00:12:57,720 --> 00:13:01,480 its commentaries but also because the Tanakh is the 280 00:13:01,600 --> 00:13:05,000 religious but also the cultural and linguistic and historical 281 00:13:05,280 --> 00:13:07,720 artifact at the center of the religious Zionist world view. 282 00:13:07,720 --> 00:13:08,960 Right. So you're you're walking through 283 00:13:08,960 --> 00:13:11,840 Udan Shamran and you know you're you want to be part of the land 284 00:13:11,840 --> 00:13:14,000 and develop the land and and what is what is the book that 285 00:13:14,000 --> 00:13:15,400 you whip out. You obviously whip out the 286 00:13:15,400 --> 00:13:18,640 Tanakh and you say here is the battle of David Tamela, 14 and 287 00:13:18,640 --> 00:13:21,480 here is where you know, Shmoel did this and this, you know. 288 00:13:21,560 --> 00:13:24,720 And you, you connect yourself to the history of the land through 289 00:13:24,720 --> 00:13:25,920 the reading through the study of the Tanakh. 290 00:13:26,200 --> 00:13:29,920 And that became central for the, for the educational. 291 00:13:30,640 --> 00:13:33,480 It's a curriculum, educational ideology of the religious 292 00:13:33,480 --> 00:13:35,040 Zionist movement. And again it was a return to 293 00:13:35,040 --> 00:13:36,880 Tanakh. And return to not not just 294 00:13:36,880 --> 00:13:39,880 Tanakh through, you know, not necessarily through its 295 00:13:39,880 --> 00:13:42,520 commentaries, but just the very words and the very, you know, 296 00:13:42,800 --> 00:13:46,320 the basic data, the basic, the names and the places and the 297 00:13:46,320 --> 00:13:49,160 people. That was what grounded those who 298 00:13:49,160 --> 00:13:51,640 were resettling the lands of Israel to the land itself was 299 00:13:51,760 --> 00:13:53,680 part of the Tanakh that assumed of central imports. 300 00:13:53,680 --> 00:13:57,840 That's point #2. A third historical sort of 301 00:13:57,840 --> 00:14:01,160 context, which I think extremely important, is a development 302 00:14:01,160 --> 00:14:04,680 within academic biblical studies as such, because for many 303 00:14:04,680 --> 00:14:08,000 decades from the mid 19th century onwards, or even really 304 00:14:08,000 --> 00:14:10,480 from the early 19th century, from the 19th century onwards, 305 00:14:10,920 --> 00:14:14,360 much of academic biblical studies, especially in the 306 00:14:14,360 --> 00:14:17,520 Germanic lands, was focused mainly on source criticism. 307 00:14:17,520 --> 00:14:19,440 What I mean, what I mean about that is you take the Bible, you 308 00:14:19,440 --> 00:14:21,960 take it to the home as a whole, and you try and break it down 309 00:14:21,960 --> 00:14:24,960 and see, you know, which which sources are in which text. 310 00:14:24,960 --> 00:14:27,040 You know, take the first few chapters of operations of 311 00:14:27,040 --> 00:14:29,360 Genesis, Okay, what is AJ text, What is an E text? 312 00:14:29,520 --> 00:14:31,920 What is AP text? You know, what are the 313 00:14:31,960 --> 00:14:34,280 ideologies, different ideologies of JE and P? 314 00:14:34,280 --> 00:14:35,880 Where were they situated historically? 315 00:14:36,080 --> 00:14:38,840 You know, in in in which era were they written, in which 316 00:14:38,840 --> 00:14:40,280 circumstances? How do they relate to each 317 00:14:40,280 --> 00:14:41,520 other, Etcetera, etcetera, etcetera? 318 00:14:42,120 --> 00:14:45,560 Like a more sophisticated DH? Say again? 319 00:14:46,440 --> 00:14:48,600 Documentary hypothesis. But you know, you know, correct, 320 00:14:48,880 --> 00:14:50,200 correct. So if you had the documentary 321 00:14:50,200 --> 00:14:52,120 that that was exactly documentary hypothesis what I'm 322 00:14:52,200 --> 00:14:54,440 talking about, let me is actually one of of several 323 00:14:54,440 --> 00:14:56,680 hypothesis that abounded. Then you also had the the 324 00:14:56,680 --> 00:14:59,400 supplementary hypothesis and the the fragmentary hypothesis. 325 00:14:59,560 --> 00:15:01,640 But basically, yes. So source criticism in. 326 00:15:01,640 --> 00:15:05,600 In other words, finding slicing down the to, not slicing down 327 00:15:05,720 --> 00:15:06,760 the to write into different. Sources. 328 00:15:06,760 --> 00:15:09,760 How are the four supposed authors interwoven with, you 329 00:15:09,760 --> 00:15:10,920 know, their different? Correct. 330 00:15:11,200 --> 00:15:12,160 Correct. Yeah. 331 00:15:12,160 --> 00:15:13,520 Yeah. How how the different source and 332 00:15:13,520 --> 00:15:16,040 of course you know we know four but actually you know P is 333 00:15:16,040 --> 00:15:18,000 made-up of of their various different sources and and 334 00:15:18,000 --> 00:15:20,120 etcetera etcetera. You know many others positive, 335 00:15:20,120 --> 00:15:21,600 many others. We know the four source because 336 00:15:21,600 --> 00:15:24,200 that's the picture from Julian Velhausen that sort of conquered 337 00:15:24,200 --> 00:15:25,000 the world. But. 338 00:15:25,160 --> 00:15:26,320 But there were many arguments on this. 339 00:15:26,320 --> 00:15:31,200 However, in round about the 1970s, nineteen 80s, they became 340 00:15:31,200 --> 00:15:34,680 they became a shift within a small part of the biblical of 341 00:15:34,760 --> 00:15:38,200 the world of biblical studies. Basically said as follows. 342 00:15:38,680 --> 00:15:41,400 Let's leave aside the source questions for a moment because 343 00:15:41,400 --> 00:15:43,560 that's actually very technical and quite boring often. 344 00:15:43,840 --> 00:15:45,680 Right. And let's look at the Tanakh. 345 00:15:45,680 --> 00:15:48,400 Let's look at the books of Tanakh as as we have them, as 346 00:15:48,400 --> 00:15:51,680 finished artifacts, OK. As pieces of literature that we 347 00:15:51,680 --> 00:15:53,720 have sitting in front of us. And what can we say about them? 348 00:15:53,960 --> 00:15:55,880 Right. And and basically applying the 349 00:15:55,880 --> 00:15:59,400 tools of literary analysis, literary criticism to the text 350 00:15:59,400 --> 00:16:01,240 that we have in front of us without worrying too much. 351 00:16:01,240 --> 00:16:03,240 You know, was this half of the chapter written by this one? 352 00:16:03,240 --> 00:16:04,480 This half of the chapter written by that one? 353 00:16:04,480 --> 00:16:06,320 Forget it. Just the book. 354 00:16:06,320 --> 00:16:09,000 As is the book of Genesis, as is the book, you know, How does the 355 00:16:09,000 --> 00:16:11,320 book of Genesis seek to to tell its stories? 356 00:16:11,320 --> 00:16:14,800 What, what methods does it use? You know, what kinds of themes 357 00:16:14,800 --> 00:16:15,920 are there? What kind of, you know, how are 358 00:16:15,920 --> 00:16:17,880 parallels used and and and leading words. 359 00:16:17,880 --> 00:16:22,160 And you know, and and structure of stories and vocabulary and 360 00:16:22,680 --> 00:16:24,760 all the things that go into analyzing, let's say a text from 361 00:16:24,760 --> 00:16:26,840 Plato or Shakespeare or Dostoevsky, whatever it is. 362 00:16:26,840 --> 00:16:28,480 Treating it as a real text, it's. 363 00:16:28,480 --> 00:16:31,160 Treating it as a text, fragmentary, correct. 364 00:16:31,160 --> 00:16:35,920 Treating it as a phantext. Now of course, this is, this is 365 00:16:35,920 --> 00:16:41,240 decidedly more friendly to the to, to to the religious world, 366 00:16:41,240 --> 00:16:44,360 right, Because many in the religious world could say, ah, 367 00:16:44,440 --> 00:16:46,440 you know, we also believe it's a finished text and and you know, 368 00:16:46,680 --> 00:16:49,880 trying to find, let's say, you know, interesting literary 369 00:16:49,880 --> 00:16:52,120 structures and brace it. Well, you know that that's 370 00:16:52,120 --> 00:16:54,000 actually not a million miles away from what some of the 371 00:16:54,000 --> 00:16:56,480 classic Parashani were doing. And that's something that we can 372 00:16:56,480 --> 00:16:57,320 get involved in as well. So. 373 00:16:57,440 --> 00:17:00,200 So is this turn in in academic Google studies. 374 00:17:00,200 --> 00:17:02,120 And I have another book here. The problem is I'm blurred. 375 00:17:02,320 --> 00:17:03,840 So I'm sort of trying to show you this here. 376 00:17:03,840 --> 00:17:07,000 I don't know. You can see it called the lit 377 00:17:07,000 --> 00:17:10,599 the literary what else that was. It called back. 378 00:17:10,880 --> 00:17:13,319 Back, yeah. Yeah, no, it's not going to his 379 00:17:13,319 --> 00:17:15,280 background. Oh, it's Delivery Guide to the 380 00:17:15,280 --> 00:17:17,119 Bible. The Literary Guide to the Bible, 381 00:17:17,599 --> 00:17:19,240 edited by Robert Alton Frank Commode. 382 00:17:19,480 --> 00:17:21,520 It was written in the 80s or something, and it's a whole 383 00:17:21,520 --> 00:17:24,480 series of essays now, exactly on this point. 384 00:17:24,480 --> 00:17:26,960 It's a series of essays from different authors on on every 385 00:17:26,960 --> 00:17:29,120 book of the Bible, again from a literary perspective. 386 00:17:29,120 --> 00:17:33,840 But the literary perspective can yield great sort of great 387 00:17:33,840 --> 00:17:36,800 treasures of of insight, right? Especially to some of the more 388 00:17:36,800 --> 00:17:39,960 literarily rich books of the Tanakh, let's say the book of 389 00:17:39,960 --> 00:17:41,720 Ruth or the book of Samuel or the book of Job. 390 00:17:41,720 --> 00:17:45,560 I mean these are, these are very finely woven and brilliant works 391 00:17:45,560 --> 00:17:47,800 of literature in addition to being a holy scripture, 392 00:17:47,840 --> 00:17:51,320 etcetera, whatever they can be. One of the main leaders of this 393 00:17:51,320 --> 00:17:54,920 was was Robert Alter and I've had him on my podcast, the 394 00:17:54,920 --> 00:17:57,960 podcast The Jewish Ideas and a very interesting man. 395 00:17:57,960 --> 00:18:02,840 He's still sharp as anything at the age of 88 and and really one 396 00:18:02,840 --> 00:18:05,160 of the great biblical translators of our age. 397 00:18:05,280 --> 00:18:08,320 But what's fascinating is if you read his, he, you know, 398 00:18:08,320 --> 00:18:10,400 translated the entire Tanak with the commentary, The altar 399 00:18:10,400 --> 00:18:11,800 Bible's a phenomenal achievement. 400 00:18:11,880 --> 00:18:15,400 But if you read that Tanakh, so on the one hand it is based on 401 00:18:15,400 --> 00:18:17,520 source criticism and he'll mention it occasionally. 402 00:18:17,840 --> 00:18:21,240 But actually the vast portion of it is noting again the literary 403 00:18:21,240 --> 00:18:24,760 qualities and and and techniques and and structures and and 404 00:18:24,760 --> 00:18:26,760 everything used within within these books. 405 00:18:27,000 --> 00:18:29,720 And actually because of that, he will invoke things like 406 00:18:29,720 --> 00:18:32,160 Midrashim, he'll invoke Ibn Ezra, he loves Ibn Ezra and 407 00:18:32,240 --> 00:18:34,360 occasionally invoke Russia because these people were also 408 00:18:34,360 --> 00:18:35,560 noticing this sort of thing. So. 409 00:18:35,720 --> 00:18:38,880 So in the biblical the world, the world of biblical studies, 410 00:18:38,880 --> 00:18:43,000 there was a turn on the part of some figures towards this this 411 00:18:43,000 --> 00:18:46,480 literary way of of reading the Tanakh. 412 00:18:46,720 --> 00:18:49,520 OK, so those are basically the three as far as I can tell, to 413 00:18:49,520 --> 00:18:50,840 understand the gush method properly. 414 00:18:51,080 --> 00:18:53,520 I would say to to note that within the 19th century there 415 00:18:53,520 --> 00:18:56,640 was a return in general to commentary and study of Tanakh 416 00:18:56,640 --> 00:19:00,560 as the basis for making great statements and you know, drawing 417 00:19:00,840 --> 00:19:04,040 a philosophy of Judaism as such And also the centrality of the 418 00:19:04,040 --> 00:19:06,840 Tanakh in the religious Zionist world and and you know, the 419 00:19:06,840 --> 00:19:08,840 return to it at the centre of the curriculum. 420 00:19:09,120 --> 00:19:13,880 And thirdly, the development in Bible studies among academics 421 00:19:14,080 --> 00:19:16,800 that opened a door. I wouldn't say that this is 422 00:19:16,800 --> 00:19:19,000 mainstream academic biblical studies. 423 00:19:19,000 --> 00:19:22,120 And you know, a lot of people, a lot of biblical scholars 424 00:19:22,120 --> 00:19:25,200 nowadays consider this kind of, you know, just froth on the 425 00:19:25,200 --> 00:19:27,600 waves of of real biblical biblical studies. 426 00:19:28,080 --> 00:19:31,200 However, that definitely opened the door for a more religious 427 00:19:31,200 --> 00:19:36,680 way of viewing the text. All right, so let's talk about 428 00:19:36,680 --> 00:19:39,880 the Gooch method itself. Right. 429 00:19:40,000 --> 00:19:45,200 OK. So I have outlined 3 broad 430 00:19:45,200 --> 00:19:48,520 characteristics, I believe of the gush method. 431 00:19:49,440 --> 00:19:51,000 It's funny because I seem to be working in threes. 432 00:19:51,560 --> 00:19:53,680 I don't always do that but you know, it's it's a nice number. 433 00:19:53,680 --> 00:19:56,680 We'll we'll go with that three board characteristics if anyone 434 00:19:56,680 --> 00:19:58,480 wants. I actually wrote an essay about 435 00:19:58,480 --> 00:20:01,400 this about seven or eight years ago, which I published in a 436 00:20:01,400 --> 00:20:03,640 festive that was dedicated to my father and his retirement from 437 00:20:03,640 --> 00:20:05,840 the rabbinant. But maybe on the podcast I can 438 00:20:05,840 --> 00:20:07,280 put a link to it to a PDF or something. 439 00:20:07,280 --> 00:20:10,280 Anyone wants to read it where I outline what I'm saying a bit 440 00:20:10,280 --> 00:20:11,520 more. Having said that, it was written 441 00:20:11,520 --> 00:20:13,400 about seven or eight years ago and my opinions have changed a 442 00:20:13,400 --> 00:20:16,200 little bit, but you know. That's what we have. 443 00:20:16,760 --> 00:20:19,640 OK, so main characteristics. The characteristic #1 that I 444 00:20:19,640 --> 00:20:22,680 think is most salient within many of the writings, again 445 00:20:22,680 --> 00:20:26,880 generally, generally of this good school is the is the 446 00:20:26,880 --> 00:20:30,600 primacy of pshat okay the primacy of the plain text 447 00:20:30,600 --> 00:20:35,320 reading of of the miracle text and really the. 448 00:20:35,680 --> 00:20:38,400 So firstly, the effort to find out what the pshat is, what 449 00:20:38,520 --> 00:20:41,080 Makaga like what actually happened, what is you know what 450 00:20:41,080 --> 00:20:44,680 is the what information is there to try and understand it and 451 00:20:44,680 --> 00:20:48,320 also to have a direct encounter with the text. 452 00:20:48,320 --> 00:20:52,800 In other words the method of a a Gushanach teacher is to first 453 00:20:52,800 --> 00:20:55,760 and foremost read thoroughly the the biblical passage that you're 454 00:20:55,760 --> 00:20:57,600 trying to read the the book or the chat or whatever it is. 455 00:20:57,840 --> 00:21:00,640 Read it properly, thoroughly notice it, all of it before you 456 00:21:00,640 --> 00:21:03,120 touch a single Purush, right before you touch a single 457 00:21:03,120 --> 00:21:05,040 Midrash. Now, of course this is very much 458 00:21:05,040 --> 00:21:08,360 contrary, let's say, to the more classic Harry D way of doing 459 00:21:08,360 --> 00:21:10,520 things that that's practiced even till today, which is that 460 00:21:10,520 --> 00:21:14,080 you, you learn homage with one finger in rushing. 461 00:21:14,160 --> 00:21:17,080 Right or or one finger on on the note the article note to the 462 00:21:17,080 --> 00:21:18,920 bottom. Why Because it's unthinkable to 463 00:21:19,000 --> 00:21:23,400 to read a bunch of sukim without it's you know without the 464 00:21:23,400 --> 00:21:25,000 Targum. Whichever Targum you use you 465 00:21:25,000 --> 00:21:28,920 know without time you right. Whereas the with Nerna read the 466 00:21:28,920 --> 00:21:32,600 book of Root as is just the book surface level and and on that 467 00:21:32,600 --> 00:21:36,320 surface level make sense of it. What is it trying to tell you? 468 00:21:36,800 --> 00:21:41,000 And because again this is Sean Carmi called this method the the 469 00:21:41,000 --> 00:21:43,040 literary theological method. This is the point. 470 00:21:43,360 --> 00:21:45,840 It's literary and it's theological in the sense that we 471 00:21:45,840 --> 00:21:48,920 we are we are trying to to find out what's going on but but we 472 00:21:48,920 --> 00:21:52,400 believe that what is written in the shut is is the foundational 473 00:21:52,400 --> 00:21:55,440 message of the book And therefore to find out what is 474 00:21:55,440 --> 00:21:57,560 the message that God or the prophet or whatever it was 475 00:21:57,560 --> 00:22:00,720 wanted us to know you have to find out what that book is 476 00:22:00,720 --> 00:22:03,440 actually saying, right. It is an essential religious 477 00:22:03,440 --> 00:22:04,760 thing. It's not just a literary thing, 478 00:22:04,760 --> 00:22:06,680 not just, oh, I want to understand, but no, actually the 479 00:22:06,680 --> 00:22:09,440 main message is contained in what the book actually says or 480 00:22:09,440 --> 00:22:12,440 the book actually says, requires an understanding of the chat. 481 00:22:12,440 --> 00:22:17,720 Now, now, part of the gush method is to to keep to a 482 00:22:17,720 --> 00:22:23,680 certain degree this, this, this endeavour on the Tanakhi level. 483 00:22:23,680 --> 00:22:26,800 What I mean by that is, is a phrase that's often invoked by 484 00:22:26,800 --> 00:22:29,720 many who use this, which is a Tanakhma Faresha Tatma, right? 485 00:22:29,880 --> 00:22:32,360 The Bible. It explains itself and what that 486 00:22:32,360 --> 00:22:35,240 means is. And again, this is hardly new. 487 00:22:35,240 --> 00:22:38,200 It's used by Similar ideas are used by Hazam, by the 488 00:22:38,200 --> 00:22:41,520 commentaries, which is that sukim in other places of the 489 00:22:41,520 --> 00:22:46,920 Tanakh can shed a great deal of light on, you know, let's say 490 00:22:46,920 --> 00:22:50,320 textual quandary that you have at the moment or or something 491 00:22:50,320 --> 00:22:52,680 like that, right? So basically your classic gush 492 00:22:52,680 --> 00:22:55,920 teacher will read the read the passage or read the book, try 493 00:22:55,920 --> 00:22:58,400 and understand it as best as possible just from reading that, 494 00:22:58,400 --> 00:23:02,120 but also bring in other sukim, other methods and other ideas 495 00:23:02,120 --> 00:23:04,400 from the Tanakh itself from the biblical books, because that is 496 00:23:04,400 --> 00:23:08,360 seen as as the first port of call in order to try and 497 00:23:08,360 --> 00:23:11,080 understand something. Right now, let's be very clear. 498 00:23:11,240 --> 00:23:13,760 They aren't against the use of the use of piroshim. 499 00:23:14,040 --> 00:23:17,520 But that use comes after you've read it, thought about it, 500 00:23:17,520 --> 00:23:20,080 discussed it, asked questions, tried to answer it, and then 501 00:23:20,120 --> 00:23:20,840 let's see. Yeah. 502 00:23:21,120 --> 00:23:21,840 Supplement. Exactly. 503 00:23:21,960 --> 00:23:23,960 Let's see what the rumban says about this and let's see what 504 00:23:24,120 --> 00:23:25,600 you know. See if any interesting Midrashim 505 00:23:25,600 --> 00:23:28,200 that that that sort of open our eyes. 506 00:23:28,200 --> 00:23:30,720 And the truth is that if you approach that method and then 507 00:23:30,720 --> 00:23:33,280 read them with Hashim, so you often discover them of Hashim 508 00:23:33,440 --> 00:23:35,480 that that that you've anticipated them, that you've 509 00:23:36,200 --> 00:23:37,760 they. Asked the Famous famously. 510 00:23:38,000 --> 00:23:42,680 Get on with the Story of Avraham and and the Fire Furnace, the 511 00:23:42,680 --> 00:23:45,360 Midrash, which we talked about previously on the podcast. 512 00:23:47,600 --> 00:23:49,560 There's an intertextual link. He. 513 00:23:50,240 --> 00:23:51,520 Draws the intellectual links everywhere. 514 00:23:51,600 --> 00:23:53,480 Let me give you a good example, which I quite like. 515 00:23:53,480 --> 00:23:57,240 So for example with Mordechai and Esther, right? 516 00:23:57,400 --> 00:24:00,120 So Esther, they have this whole back and forth in whichever 517 00:24:00,120 --> 00:24:03,680 chapter, Chapter 4 or whatever it was of the Magilla of you 518 00:24:03,680 --> 00:24:10,160 know, you know you have to go to the king and plead on behalf of 519 00:24:12,200 --> 00:24:15,880 your people. And as I said, no and then 520 00:24:16,040 --> 00:24:19,520 etcetera. You know salvation will come to 521 00:24:19,520 --> 00:24:22,040 the Jews from another place but you and your your father's house 522 00:24:22,040 --> 00:24:25,320 will be annihilated. Your father's house will will 523 00:24:25,320 --> 00:24:28,120 you know will not live to tell the tale and and you know so so 524 00:24:28,120 --> 00:24:31,040 this has been it's been pointed out again by tears that I had So 525 00:24:31,040 --> 00:24:34,720 for instance reading this in the context of the battle between 526 00:24:34,720 --> 00:24:37,120 Shaul and Agag right show the first king of Israel and Agag 527 00:24:37,120 --> 00:24:39,440 that Amalekite and basically seen the Mordechai and Esther 528 00:24:39,440 --> 00:24:43,520 story as a second chance of the House of Shaul because Mordechai 529 00:24:43,520 --> 00:24:47,120 who's who's as his uncle is shown as he's described as as 530 00:24:47,120 --> 00:24:48,960 Ben Kish Ishimini right from the same tribe. 531 00:24:48,960 --> 00:24:51,680 He's also Ben Kish he's on the line of Shaul and they're having 532 00:24:51,680 --> 00:24:54,880 a sort of a second chance to be able to destroy Amalek in the 533 00:24:54,880 --> 00:24:55,720 form of Haman. Right. 534 00:24:55,960 --> 00:24:57,520 And see. And then you. 535 00:24:59,120 --> 00:25:02,240 Exactly. And then you understand you and 536 00:25:02,240 --> 00:25:03,320 your father's house be destroyed. 537 00:25:03,320 --> 00:25:05,840 Meaning if you don't take this chance, then the House of Shah 538 00:25:05,840 --> 00:25:07,760 will have absolutely failed in his mission. 539 00:25:07,960 --> 00:25:08,960 And. And basically, there's no way 540 00:25:08,960 --> 00:25:11,560 back for it, right. And again, this is sort of an 541 00:25:11,560 --> 00:25:14,400 intertextual link, but it sheds tremendous light on sort of a 542 00:25:14,400 --> 00:25:17,720 broader psychological political drama that's going on between 543 00:25:17,720 --> 00:25:19,040 the protagonist in the book of Esther. 544 00:25:20,280 --> 00:25:24,560 So yes, that is that's sort of characteristic #1 is a focus on 545 00:25:24,600 --> 00:25:28,520 shat and a use of of the Tanakh itself. 546 00:25:28,520 --> 00:25:31,000 Other places in the Tanakh in order to shed light on the shat 547 00:25:31,200 --> 00:25:34,320 before going to any refresh him before going to to any madrasim 548 00:25:34,400 --> 00:25:37,240 which which are generally brought in as a court of sort of 549 00:25:37,240 --> 00:25:39,200 a post hoc to the analysis that you've already done. 550 00:25:39,520 --> 00:25:42,640 OK, that is point #1. The 2nd characteristic is very 551 00:25:42,640 --> 00:25:46,560 important. Is has been expressed by by one 552 00:25:46,560 --> 00:25:50,800 of the main teachers of Moshe Lichtenstein as Torat Adam, OK, 553 00:25:51,040 --> 00:25:54,000 the Torah of man. In fact, he he expressed it as 554 00:25:54,000 --> 00:25:56,920 such in this book here called Hisihati I. 555 00:25:56,960 --> 00:25:59,120 Love that book? It's an important book. 556 00:25:59,120 --> 00:26:06,040 This is, this is the major book of essays by central figures 557 00:26:06,040 --> 00:26:09,880 within the Gushtonach world. So somewhat self reflecting on 558 00:26:09,880 --> 00:26:11,280 that methodology etcetera, etcetera. 559 00:26:12,160 --> 00:26:15,640 By the way, it includes sections from a speech given by of Aaron 560 00:26:15,640 --> 00:26:20,200 Ecklestein at Stern College in 1962 already saying that we 561 00:26:20,200 --> 00:26:24,720 should encourage the use of of of literary criticism in our 562 00:26:24,840 --> 00:26:25,920 study of the Tanakh right. So this. 563 00:26:26,160 --> 00:26:29,120 So in a way he actually anticipates and predates alter 564 00:26:29,120 --> 00:26:31,800 and others who who only you know came into this in the 70s and 565 00:26:31,800 --> 00:26:33,360 80s and this is a very very early instantiation. 566 00:26:33,560 --> 00:26:35,560 Anyway, that's sort of a piece of trivia as neither here nor 567 00:26:35,560 --> 00:26:36,880 there just thought your audience might enjoy that. 568 00:26:37,080 --> 00:26:41,120 But Ravoj Nekancine draws attention to the fact that that 569 00:26:41,440 --> 00:26:45,680 Torah Adam, what I mean by that is that human concerns and human 570 00:26:45,680 --> 00:26:49,640 questions and stories about human beings are at the very 571 00:26:49,640 --> 00:26:52,520 centre of the of the story, right. 572 00:26:52,520 --> 00:26:55,200 This is the major, this is one of the major concerns of the 573 00:26:55,200 --> 00:26:57,720 Tanakh. So, you know the Tanakh gives us 574 00:26:57,720 --> 00:27:01,640 stories after stories about love and hatred about parents and 575 00:27:01,640 --> 00:27:05,320 children, about birth and death, about, you know, loyalty versus 576 00:27:05,320 --> 00:27:08,120 treachery, about, you know the development of various Midot and 577 00:27:08,120 --> 00:27:10,640 you know and and cycles of Chuva numbers. 578 00:27:10,800 --> 00:27:14,480 It's a it's a very intensely human drama and as such it 579 00:27:14,480 --> 00:27:17,520 should it should be studied as such and and again the literary 580 00:27:17,520 --> 00:27:19,480 theological method. If you presume that this is the 581 00:27:19,480 --> 00:27:23,680 case, that means that one of the main messages of the text is to 582 00:27:23,680 --> 00:27:26,560 be found in the shot, but also to be found in the deeply human 583 00:27:26,560 --> 00:27:29,000 stories that exist within the Tanakh, right? 584 00:27:29,160 --> 00:27:31,640 So if you study the, the stories of Yosef and his brothers, for 585 00:27:31,640 --> 00:27:34,920 instance, or of Yakov or of of David Hamela, a lot of these are 586 00:27:35,560 --> 00:27:38,040 are not necessarily great religious stories as such. 587 00:27:38,040 --> 00:27:39,680 You know, they go places and they fight people and they have 588 00:27:39,680 --> 00:27:41,240 conversation. There are many stories, but 589 00:27:41,240 --> 00:27:44,040 within those stories are embedded very deep and important 590 00:27:44,040 --> 00:27:45,480 religious messages. These are the messages that 591 00:27:45,480 --> 00:27:47,800 Tanakh wants us as Jews to have, right. 592 00:27:48,000 --> 00:27:49,880 And again, it's almost an astonishing discovery. 593 00:27:49,880 --> 00:27:53,200 In other words, trying to really understand the the root of the 594 00:27:53,200 --> 00:27:57,080 fight between Joseph and his brothers or of, I don't know, 595 00:27:57,080 --> 00:28:00,200 pick any other characters in Tanakh, you know or the fight 596 00:28:00,200 --> 00:28:02,680 between Benjamin, the Civil War between Benjamin and and the 597 00:28:02,680 --> 00:28:06,400 rest of the end of Shaft team. So but that is that human drama 598 00:28:06,400 --> 00:28:09,080 is at the very center of the Tanakh and therefore the center 599 00:28:09,080 --> 00:28:11,000 of the message that Tanakh are trying to get home to us and 600 00:28:11,000 --> 00:28:13,160 therefore we must study it and try to understand it. 601 00:28:14,760 --> 00:28:17,160 And to be honest, there's a little bit of of that in the 602 00:28:17,160 --> 00:28:18,680 first from bun of the Torah, right. 603 00:28:18,680 --> 00:28:21,880 Because famously, Rashi, the first Rashi on Torah, asks the 604 00:28:21,880 --> 00:28:24,680 question, you know, a possibly slightly tongue and cheek 605 00:28:24,680 --> 00:28:27,400 question, which is why the Torah didn't begin with the first 606 00:28:27,400 --> 00:28:31,120 mitzvah in you know, the first mitzvah given to the Benet 607 00:28:31,120 --> 00:28:33,120 Israel. So why doesn't the Torah begin 608 00:28:33,120 --> 00:28:34,680 in in the middle of chapter whatever. 609 00:28:34,680 --> 00:28:38,120 It's 12/13 of Exodus right? Why doesn't it do that And and 610 00:28:38,120 --> 00:28:41,520 Ramban counters on Rashi immediately says what do you 611 00:28:41,520 --> 00:28:43,520 mean miss out the whole of of the book of Genesis. 612 00:28:43,760 --> 00:28:45,560 You know, with all the stories and all the lessons and all the 613 00:28:45,960 --> 00:28:48,760 Marseille vote and all, you know, all the dramas that 614 00:28:48,760 --> 00:28:50,440 they're in. These are crucial elements of 615 00:28:50,440 --> 00:28:52,440 what the Tanakh is. They're crucial elements of the 616 00:28:52,440 --> 00:28:54,920 message of the Tanakh wants to give over to its adherents. 617 00:28:54,920 --> 00:28:56,320 Right. And that's a central part also 618 00:28:56,320 --> 00:28:58,880 of the English method of paying attention to the human drama. 619 00:28:59,720 --> 00:29:02,200 And one again I'll get a brief example of this again from the 620 00:29:02,200 --> 00:29:03,880 book of Romosa Lettenstein on Moses. 621 00:29:03,880 --> 00:29:07,480 He wrote a book about Moses first in Hebrew then it 622 00:29:07,480 --> 00:29:10,000 translates to English envoy of God envoy of his people. 623 00:29:10,000 --> 00:29:12,720 I think the subtitle is. And basically he portrays the 624 00:29:13,080 --> 00:29:17,200 the, the story of Moshe Arbeno, you know, so he's born in Egypt, 625 00:29:17,200 --> 00:29:20,280 grows up in Egypt. When he's in Egypt, you know, he 626 00:29:20,280 --> 00:29:25,080 finds an Egyptian beating a Jew and he, he kills the Egyptian 627 00:29:25,200 --> 00:29:26,320 and then runs away to the desert. 628 00:29:26,320 --> 00:29:28,240 The bash of Moshe. He gives his whole, I think, 629 00:29:28,240 --> 00:29:31,600 very brilliant disposition on on Moses as basically having given 630 00:29:31,600 --> 00:29:33,880 up on on mankind giving up on human society. 631 00:29:33,880 --> 00:29:36,360 You know, he sees that there's no justice in human society that 632 00:29:36,360 --> 00:29:38,320 he, he stops the Egyptian beating the Jew. 633 00:29:38,320 --> 00:29:40,720 And then therefore he and because of that he's haunted 634 00:29:40,720 --> 00:29:42,200 basically for his life as he says. 635 00:29:42,200 --> 00:29:45,000 You know I've I've had it up to here with with with human 636 00:29:45,000 --> 00:29:46,120 society. I'm going to the desert. 637 00:29:46,320 --> 00:29:48,240 I'm going to meditate. I'm going to have this kind of 638 00:29:49,080 --> 00:29:53,240 intimate awesome connection with God by myself without the dross 639 00:29:53,240 --> 00:29:55,600 of human society around to get in the way of me. 640 00:29:55,760 --> 00:29:57,720 Anyone else. I'm I'm going to become you know 641 00:29:57,760 --> 00:30:01,120 a a sort of a guru meditating on top of a mountain basically the 642 00:30:01,120 --> 00:30:03,080 whole point of the revelation of the of the burning Bush is to 643 00:30:03,080 --> 00:30:04,600 tell them no you have to go back. 644 00:30:04,840 --> 00:30:09,080 Actually the, the, the the salvation is not to be found in 645 00:30:09,080 --> 00:30:11,280 the desert, is to be found among the people and deliberate the 646 00:30:11,280 --> 00:30:13,520 people and give, you know commandments to the people and 647 00:30:13,520 --> 00:30:15,440 and that's the whole. And again, I'm obviously not 648 00:30:15,440 --> 00:30:17,080 doing justice within the 60 seconds I described it. 649 00:30:17,240 --> 00:30:19,440 But I thought it was quite a brilliant way again of reading 650 00:30:19,440 --> 00:30:22,480 the character of Moshe, of understanding his own inner 651 00:30:22,720 --> 00:30:26,040 crisis when being expelled from Egypt, his his rationale for 652 00:30:26,040 --> 00:30:28,280 going to the desert and the rationale for calling him back 653 00:30:28,280 --> 00:30:30,840 and basically saying no, actually Moshe, you've misread 654 00:30:31,200 --> 00:30:34,520 the situation and what God wants isn't gurus meditations of the 655 00:30:34,520 --> 00:30:37,360 mountainside, rather it's people who actually who lead the masses 656 00:30:37,600 --> 00:30:39,640 and and and lead them to a better place. 657 00:30:39,640 --> 00:30:42,920 So that's another example, again to Rata Adam, the human story, 658 00:30:42,920 --> 00:30:46,720 human concerns, human lessons, and stories about human beings 659 00:30:46,720 --> 00:30:49,240 being at the very center of of the Gushtonach method. 660 00:30:49,880 --> 00:30:52,840 And and I think that's important because part of the tendency, I 661 00:30:52,840 --> 00:30:56,720 think, especially in Ishibot, is that we sort of give the 662 00:30:56,720 --> 00:31:02,600 characters in Tanakh almost we we kind of dehumanize them in a 663 00:31:02,600 --> 00:31:05,520 way, if you know what I mean, There's a dehumanization a 664 00:31:05,520 --> 00:31:07,640 little bit. And so we kind of like we're 665 00:31:07,960 --> 00:31:12,200 there's a certain vantage point of like, you know, Moshe can do 666 00:31:12,200 --> 00:31:15,120 no wrong. Therefore you're already taking 667 00:31:15,200 --> 00:31:19,160 a sort of biased angle and not really, not really allowing the 668 00:31:19,160 --> 00:31:21,680 text to kind of develop his story. 669 00:31:21,960 --> 00:31:23,400 You know what I mean? It's almost like you kind of 670 00:31:23,400 --> 00:31:25,200 have to, you know, make up you're white. 671 00:31:25,200 --> 00:31:27,840 Washing you're. White Washington and and these 672 00:31:27,840 --> 00:31:29,360 things are coming from good intention. 673 00:31:29,360 --> 00:31:36,240 But it's you're missing so much that way. 100% and and this goes 674 00:31:36,240 --> 00:31:39,400 back to a debate that that was really raged more more or less a 675 00:31:39,400 --> 00:31:42,080 couple decades ago in Israel surrounding the phrasal concept 676 00:31:42,080 --> 00:31:43,440 of Tanakh Gova E naim. Right. 677 00:31:43,440 --> 00:31:45,600 Learning Tanakh at what they call at eye level and basically 678 00:31:45,600 --> 00:31:48,760 treating the major protagonist of the Tanakh, as you say much 679 00:31:48,760 --> 00:31:51,120 more as human beings than as you know some sort of angels or some 680 00:31:51,120 --> 00:31:54,240 sort of you know a different breed who can do no wrong. 681 00:31:54,600 --> 00:31:56,880 But but that's very important and really the the funnily 682 00:31:56,880 --> 00:32:00,000 enough, the Gush Tanakh method, because it's focused on human 683 00:32:00,000 --> 00:32:03,280 beings, is much more willing to to act to to, let's say. 684 00:32:05,040 --> 00:32:07,120 Knowledge. Part of the tradition, yet to be 685 00:32:07,120 --> 00:32:09,000 part of the tradition that acknowledges folks because of 686 00:32:09,000 --> 00:32:11,240 course there are some. For example, Rumban has no 687 00:32:11,240 --> 00:32:14,720 problem stating that the avatar did you know sins here or this 688 00:32:14,760 --> 00:32:16,040 you know he's sometimes critical of them. 689 00:32:16,760 --> 00:32:18,640 Others as well. And then see others as well who 690 00:32:18,640 --> 00:32:21,280 who have, who do do this from time to time and again done 691 00:32:21,280 --> 00:32:23,480 respectfully and done, you know with the awareness they are 692 00:32:23,480 --> 00:32:25,480 supposed to be religious heroes and role models etcetera, 693 00:32:25,480 --> 00:32:27,520 etcetera. Having said that, it's again 694 00:32:27,520 --> 00:32:32,560 much more, much more sensitive to the possibility and the 695 00:32:32,560 --> 00:32:33,720 people were dealing with the human beings. 696 00:32:33,720 --> 00:32:36,040 But it's specifically the human trajectories. 697 00:32:36,040 --> 00:32:39,200 For example, the the process of Chuva, of Yahuda and Reuven and 698 00:32:39,200 --> 00:32:40,840 others in the story of Genesis. Like that's part of their 699 00:32:40,840 --> 00:32:42,360 greatness. That's part of the religious 700 00:32:42,360 --> 00:32:44,720 message that that is at the center of those stories. 701 00:32:45,360 --> 00:32:48,240 That's characteristic #2, characteristic #3. 702 00:32:48,240 --> 00:32:53,280 And this one has also been the subject of many, many, a lot of 703 00:32:53,280 --> 00:32:55,440 discussion. Also, a lot of criticism is the 704 00:32:55,440 --> 00:32:58,720 methodology and what I call methodological omnivorousness, 705 00:32:58,880 --> 00:33:02,360 meaning the tendency to basically make use of any and 706 00:33:02,360 --> 00:33:08,840 every method of analysis that you can Right so many, many sort 707 00:33:08,840 --> 00:33:12,760 of protagonists of teachers of the Gustanak method will use, 708 00:33:12,760 --> 00:33:17,360 you know, history, philology, archaeology, linguistics, you 709 00:33:17,360 --> 00:33:20,120 know, whatever you like, all the possible different methods that 710 00:33:20,120 --> 00:33:22,680 are used to to study the text and study the historical 711 00:33:22,680 --> 00:33:24,400 appearance and you try and make sense of it. 712 00:33:24,920 --> 00:33:27,080 These appear if you look at the footnotes of many of these many 713 00:33:27,120 --> 00:33:29,960 of the texts, you know they'll refer to this academic study or 714 00:33:29,960 --> 00:33:32,600 this thing in the Israel Museum or or this part of the geography 715 00:33:32,600 --> 00:33:35,200 and topography of the Land of Israel And this theory about the 716 00:33:35,560 --> 00:33:37,040 you know, the the place names etcetera, etcetera. 717 00:33:38,440 --> 00:33:40,240 And especially, and this is something I've noted before, 718 00:33:40,400 --> 00:33:42,200 especially tools of literary criticism. 719 00:33:42,200 --> 00:33:46,280 In other words tools of of looking at a text and noting OK, 720 00:33:46,480 --> 00:33:50,960 what are the the parallels the classic structures the, the, the 721 00:33:50,960 --> 00:33:53,720 main words that accompany each story was called the light vote 722 00:33:53,720 --> 00:33:56,480 in in German. You know ambiguities, 723 00:33:56,480 --> 00:33:59,280 repetitions, all the various things that a story does in 724 00:33:59,280 --> 00:34:01,040 order to capture the attention of the reader. 725 00:34:01,200 --> 00:34:02,840 They will say, ah, this exists in the Tanakh. 726 00:34:02,840 --> 00:34:05,720 But again, the literary theological method, it exists in 727 00:34:05,720 --> 00:34:08,120 the Tanakh in order to capture to the reader's attention for 728 00:34:08,120 --> 00:34:10,320 what end? To the end of, you know, 729 00:34:10,320 --> 00:34:12,679 understanding the message, the religious message in the text. 730 00:34:12,679 --> 00:34:14,719 And therefore that's supposed to, you know, speak to to, to 731 00:34:14,719 --> 00:34:16,520 the adherent that they do today, right? 732 00:34:16,639 --> 00:34:18,639 It's not just understanding it for the sake of understanding. 733 00:34:18,639 --> 00:34:20,320 It's understanding it for the sake of getting some sort of 734 00:34:20,320 --> 00:34:23,920 religious message or inspiration or or instruction, you know, 735 00:34:23,920 --> 00:34:27,400 thousands of years later. You. 736 00:34:27,880 --> 00:34:31,080 Want to come in on this? Forgot what I was going to say. 737 00:34:31,239 --> 00:34:33,199 Go on. I was, I was going to mention. 738 00:34:33,199 --> 00:34:36,760 I was going to mention the fact that you know, people who are, 739 00:34:37,000 --> 00:34:42,480 let's say, adherence of the biblical source criticism method 740 00:34:42,840 --> 00:34:45,960 will view that as kind of cherry picking because. 741 00:34:46,600 --> 00:34:48,120 You're jumping the gun. We're going to get. 742 00:34:48,600 --> 00:34:50,560 I want to. So we'll get to the critiques 743 00:34:50,560 --> 00:34:52,360 because the critiques of the gush method are very important 744 00:34:52,360 --> 00:34:53,760 part of understanding the gush method itself. 745 00:34:54,120 --> 00:34:57,400 And and one thing I will say about the the teachers of the of 746 00:34:57,400 --> 00:35:01,720 the of this school and 100% of their credit is that they're 747 00:35:01,720 --> 00:35:03,680 very aware of these criticisms and they speak about them, they 748 00:35:03,720 --> 00:35:05,600 write about them and they acknowledge them and they try 749 00:35:05,600 --> 00:35:07,400 and struggle with them. Because the truth is that 750 00:35:07,720 --> 00:35:11,000 there's no method of teaching and learning to knock which is 751 00:35:11,000 --> 00:35:13,680 which is flawless which is without its its downsides, 752 00:35:13,680 --> 00:35:15,680 without its difficulties And we're going to get to the 753 00:35:15,720 --> 00:35:17,440 advantages and disadvantages in one moment. 754 00:35:17,440 --> 00:35:19,440 I just want to lay out the characteristics and then jump in 755 00:35:19,440 --> 00:35:21,760 because all all three characteristics that I mentioned 756 00:35:21,760 --> 00:35:25,400 now are open to quite serious and scathing critique which I 757 00:35:25,400 --> 00:35:26,640 want to outline when the time comes. 758 00:35:26,880 --> 00:35:29,160 Before you, I remember what I wanted to say before you get to 759 00:35:29,160 --> 00:35:34,640 the to the critiques. This method with all the 760 00:35:35,400 --> 00:35:40,400 literary constructs and you know, the chiasms and keywords 761 00:35:40,400 --> 00:35:44,120 and all that to say differently, this would be a very 762 00:35:45,080 --> 00:35:48,640 sophisticated understanding of Debra Torbil Shamane Adam. 763 00:35:49,240 --> 00:35:51,440 Yes. That I mean essentially the 764 00:35:51,480 --> 00:35:56,440 would mean that God, that Hashem, made the Torah in a way 765 00:35:56,440 --> 00:36:01,360 where it can be looked at from a critical vantage point in order 766 00:36:01,360 --> 00:36:05,600 to unearth its its messages. 100% Let me give you actually a 767 00:36:05,600 --> 00:36:07,600 little example which doesn't come from the Grishinak method, 768 00:36:07,600 --> 00:36:09,680 but it's such it is a brilliant essay. 769 00:36:09,680 --> 00:36:13,800 Everyone should read it, which is an essay written by a 770 00:36:13,800 --> 00:36:16,960 professor of literary criticism called shortly after the Second 771 00:36:16,960 --> 00:36:18,760 World War called Eric Orbach, right? 772 00:36:18,800 --> 00:36:22,360 So it's a famous, famous essay and it's called Odysseus Scar. 773 00:36:22,800 --> 00:36:26,720 OK, Odysseus Scar. And basically it is a it is a 774 00:36:26,760 --> 00:36:33,000 brief comparison of the literary methods used by by by Homer, by 775 00:36:33,000 --> 00:36:35,560 the great Greek playwright Homer in his, in his work on DC and 776 00:36:35,560 --> 00:36:38,680 his epic poem The Other Odysseus. 777 00:36:38,680 --> 00:36:40,480 I learned it in Hebrew. That's the problem in Shalim 778 00:36:40,480 --> 00:36:41,720 college. I actually can't remember what 779 00:36:41,720 --> 00:36:47,400 it's called in English. Odysseus and Odysseus and and 780 00:36:47,520 --> 00:36:49,480 the Book of Christians and the. What do you say? 781 00:36:49,480 --> 00:36:50,480 The. Odyssey. 782 00:36:50,720 --> 00:36:51,720 The Odyssey. That's the one. 783 00:36:52,320 --> 00:36:53,640 Odyssey. Odysseus is the person. 784 00:36:53,640 --> 00:36:55,120 OK, fine. The problem is I did my 785 00:36:55,120 --> 00:36:58,040 undergrad in Hebrew and so a lot of, a lot of the stuff cycles 786 00:36:58,040 --> 00:37:00,760 around my head in Hebrew. Yes, so. 787 00:37:00,760 --> 00:37:03,200 So this is a brilliant essay and he points out the following 788 00:37:03,320 --> 00:37:07,000 which which which I thought was very thought provoking, which is 789 00:37:07,000 --> 00:37:10,400 that so he talks about an episode in the book of of the 790 00:37:10,400 --> 00:37:16,120 Odyssey in which so so Odysseus returns to his mansion after his 791 00:37:16,120 --> 00:37:18,680 Kingdom after many decades. I'm wondering didn't recognize 792 00:37:18,680 --> 00:37:21,040 him, etcetera, etcetera. And basically he's he's treated 793 00:37:21,040 --> 00:37:24,240 as a guest and then another nurse basically bathes him and 794 00:37:24,240 --> 00:37:28,960 notices a big scar on his leg and thereby identifies him 795 00:37:28,960 --> 00:37:33,080 because only Odysseus had that scar And and Homer goes into a 796 00:37:33,160 --> 00:37:37,800 digression of hundreds of lines describing the hunt in which 797 00:37:37,840 --> 00:37:40,760 Odysseus got that scar right. And and basically shows how 798 00:37:40,760 --> 00:37:44,520 Homer uses every description he never said just says Odysseus he 799 00:37:44,520 --> 00:37:49,640 you know the fleet footed you know strong bodes brave or this 800 00:37:49,640 --> 00:37:52,880 is and who describes everything goes into every protagonist's 801 00:37:53,120 --> 00:37:57,080 emotional state and state of mind and basically uses enormous 802 00:37:57,080 --> 00:37:59,960 amounts of description describe actually very simple you know on 803 00:38:00,000 --> 00:38:02,240 a hunter with a boar and basically how he got the scar. 804 00:38:02,840 --> 00:38:05,760 Whereas in contrast of this too, the story of Akila Jitskak, 805 00:38:05,760 --> 00:38:09,560 right in Genesis 22, because that story is such a powerful 806 00:38:09,560 --> 00:38:13,080 and poignant story and is told with such unbelievable economy 807 00:38:13,080 --> 00:38:15,480 of phrase and economy of expression, right, the whole 808 00:38:15,480 --> 00:38:18,920 story. You firstly, you never have any 809 00:38:18,920 --> 00:38:22,120 insight whatsoever into the minds of of the protagonist 810 00:38:22,120 --> 00:38:23,640 involved. You don't know what Avram was 811 00:38:23,640 --> 00:38:25,040 thinking. You don't know what Yitzhak was 812 00:38:25,040 --> 00:38:26,880 thinking. You don't know the rationale 813 00:38:26,880 --> 00:38:29,720 behind why God told him to do what he did and and you know you 814 00:38:29,720 --> 00:38:33,920 just have very almost almost laughably shop sukim where says 815 00:38:33,920 --> 00:38:36,320 you know Yitzhak turns to the fact that everyone says you know 816 00:38:36,320 --> 00:38:39,200 where's the where's the where's the lamb oh God will show us the 817 00:38:39,200 --> 00:38:42,160 lamb you know where's the knife is the knife like you have very 818 00:38:42,160 --> 00:38:47,200 brief short absukim and and basically the Urbak's point was 819 00:38:47,360 --> 00:38:49,520 these are two very different ways of telling a story because 820 00:38:49,520 --> 00:38:53,160 the Homeric way of telling the story leaves no room for the for 821 00:38:53,160 --> 00:38:54,600 the for the reader for the interpreter. 822 00:38:54,600 --> 00:38:56,000 Right. It tells you everything you 823 00:38:56,000 --> 00:38:58,000 could possibly know. You can't know any more than 824 00:38:58,000 --> 00:38:59,680 what's told you because it filled the detail. 825 00:39:00,000 --> 00:39:02,840 Whereas the Akina Gitzhak story is so lacking. 826 00:39:02,840 --> 00:39:05,440 Detail is so open to interpretation. 827 00:39:05,440 --> 00:39:10,200 Is so sort of invites the reader in, in order so that the reader 828 00:39:10,200 --> 00:39:13,240 can participate and sort of put themselves in the shoes of the 829 00:39:13,240 --> 00:39:15,520 characters of the story and try and imagine, you know, what was 830 00:39:15,680 --> 00:39:17,440 Adam thinking? Was he start thinking, you know, 831 00:39:17,440 --> 00:39:20,720 was Adam happy to do this or or devastated, you know, what was 832 00:39:20,720 --> 00:39:23,360 going on here? You know, was he trying to delay 833 00:39:23,360 --> 00:39:25,840 or he trying to do it quickly? So there are. 834 00:39:26,040 --> 00:39:29,000 In the world of writing, it's called show versus tell. 835 00:39:29,680 --> 00:39:32,280 Yes, yes, in, in many ways, yeah, it's. 836 00:39:32,400 --> 00:39:35,000 Really it's it's really showing us. 837 00:39:35,000 --> 00:39:36,520 It's not getting into the detail. 838 00:39:37,040 --> 00:39:40,520 And and of course that, you know, so. 839 00:39:40,520 --> 00:39:42,240 So Arbach's interests were purely literary. 840 00:39:42,240 --> 00:39:44,520 In other words, just showing, OK, two different very ancient 841 00:39:44,520 --> 00:39:47,440 authors from 3000 years ago who are trying to tell us different 842 00:39:47,440 --> 00:39:48,760 stories. But of course the point is that 843 00:39:49,400 --> 00:39:52,560 that analyzing stories from this literary perspective, according 844 00:39:52,560 --> 00:39:54,760 to, again, the Gutanachment is literally theological, that it's 845 00:39:54,880 --> 00:39:56,440 supposed to give over religious messages. 846 00:39:56,440 --> 00:39:58,600 Why is Akhil I just have told so sparsely? 847 00:39:58,600 --> 00:40:01,080 And what are the the, the, what are the what are the the 848 00:40:01,080 --> 00:40:02,720 midrashim? What are the relative of Hashim 849 00:40:02,720 --> 00:40:04,600 and readers supposed to do? And how they supposed to insert 850 00:40:04,600 --> 00:40:06,560 themselves in the story and participate in it every year 851 00:40:06,560 --> 00:40:08,560 when it's read again on Rosh Hashanah And anyway? 852 00:40:09,320 --> 00:40:12,800 As an example of a literary analysis of a certain story. 853 00:40:13,040 --> 00:40:14,640 But let's move on. Let's move on to the advantages 854 00:40:14,680 --> 00:40:17,000 and disadvantages, if that's OK. All right. 855 00:40:18,160 --> 00:40:22,640 So the advantages of this system is quite obvious and that's why 856 00:40:22,640 --> 00:40:25,480 it's spread with such tremendous success. 857 00:40:26,000 --> 00:40:29,080 One of them is, I mean it presents very much a coherence 858 00:40:29,080 --> 00:40:32,520 and a unity to the Tanakh itself, right, and shows the 859 00:40:32,520 --> 00:40:35,080 brilliance behind the Tanakh. Now, you had on here a couple 860 00:40:35,080 --> 00:40:39,080 months ago, Rabbi David Foreman of the Alabita website, and 861 00:40:39,080 --> 00:40:42,360 basically that's what he does, he all of his stuff. 862 00:40:42,360 --> 00:40:46,560 And it's very much part of the gush Tanakh world, even if he 863 00:40:46,840 --> 00:40:50,360 not exactly, but very much adjacent to it, basically 864 00:40:50,360 --> 00:40:53,000 showing the intimate, intricate connections to different 865 00:40:53,000 --> 00:40:54,760 stories, the Tanaka, the language and the structures and 866 00:40:54,760 --> 00:40:56,920 the characters and this and that, and basically showing how 867 00:40:56,920 --> 00:41:00,160 the whole thing fits together so brilliantly and so beautifully. 868 00:41:00,720 --> 00:41:04,480 And that gives, of course, the religious, you know, June 869 00:41:04,480 --> 00:41:07,240 nowadays a lot of comfort and a lot of encouragement, right. 870 00:41:07,360 --> 00:41:08,920 This is the holy book. This is supposed to be telling 871 00:41:08,920 --> 00:41:11,240 us and giving us the instruction that we need, the religious 872 00:41:11,240 --> 00:41:14,000 instruction. And it's nice to know that it is 873 00:41:14,080 --> 00:41:18,320 also a phenomenal work of literary genius, you know. 874 00:41:18,840 --> 00:41:21,720 And in fact the more you study it, the more you discover layers 875 00:41:21,720 --> 00:41:24,320 upon layers upon layers and put layers of of of different levels 876 00:41:24,320 --> 00:41:27,960 of interconnection and and and significance which and again 877 00:41:27,960 --> 00:41:30,440 this is the sort of thing you might expect from a divine text 878 00:41:30,440 --> 00:41:32,600 let's say or you know a very important religious text. 879 00:41:32,720 --> 00:41:34,960 And therefore the Guchtenach method it gives its gives its 880 00:41:34,960 --> 00:41:37,960 readers that very strong, that very strong feeling without 881 00:41:37,960 --> 00:41:39,680 resorting to the Farshim. Because the problem is you can 882 00:41:39,680 --> 00:41:42,360 always use Midrashim and Farshim to sort of plug gaps. 883 00:41:42,360 --> 00:41:46,920 If you're constantly trying to plug holes in the text, you feel 884 00:41:46,920 --> 00:41:50,560 like the Tanakh itself is somewhat deficient as it stands, 885 00:41:50,760 --> 00:41:53,000 whereas. No, Yes, I'm agreeing. 886 00:41:53,000 --> 00:41:53,560 Yeah. Exactly. 887 00:41:53,560 --> 00:41:56,320 Whereas the Guchtenak method is the exact opposite neuro the 888 00:41:56,320 --> 00:42:00,240 Tanakh is incredibly rich and suffused with meaning and and 889 00:42:00,240 --> 00:42:03,680 you know is constantly playing this game of of drawing in the 890 00:42:03,680 --> 00:42:06,240 reader and having them participate in the act of of 891 00:42:06,240 --> 00:42:09,200 exegesis and and again you know for someone who's hoping for 892 00:42:09,200 --> 00:42:11,920 religious meaning from that book that is extremely encouraging 893 00:42:12,000 --> 00:42:15,480 right. It's you know it lays it it 894 00:42:15,480 --> 00:42:17,000 gives us all purity and simplicity to that. 895 00:42:17,040 --> 00:42:20,280 It also serves a little bit and and you or I form and mentioned 896 00:42:20,280 --> 00:42:25,480 this a little bit as well, let's say an implicit rejoinder to the 897 00:42:25,480 --> 00:42:26,320 biblical critics. Right. 898 00:42:26,320 --> 00:42:28,720 Because the biblical critics say, look at this, look at this 899 00:42:28,720 --> 00:42:31,200 mess, look at this anthology of different texts from different 900 00:42:31,200 --> 00:42:33,040 time periods and different authors, and none of them really 901 00:42:33,040 --> 00:42:34,560 fit together very well. And you can clearly see the 902 00:42:34,560 --> 00:42:36,640 seams between them. They're all contradictory and 903 00:42:36,640 --> 00:42:38,400 they're all, you know, they're full of redundancies and full 904 00:42:38,400 --> 00:42:41,480 of, you know, different, you know, issues and problems with 905 00:42:41,480 --> 00:42:44,400 the text where the problem comes along, the Guchtenach method 906 00:42:44,400 --> 00:42:46,320 comes along and basically says no, the opposite is actually the 907 00:42:46,320 --> 00:42:48,400 case. The case is that it's not full 908 00:42:48,400 --> 00:42:50,840 of, you know, difficulties and redundancies, actually full of 909 00:42:51,120 --> 00:42:57,360 very subtle and very brilliant sort of, you know, methods, 910 00:42:58,520 --> 00:43:01,400 techniques and content and and basically something that is 911 00:43:01,400 --> 00:43:05,680 sufficient for the religious seeker to gain from. 912 00:43:05,960 --> 00:43:07,840 To a tremendous degree. It is an implicit rejoin and 913 00:43:07,840 --> 00:43:10,560 that's why I do, I think it spreads so well. 914 00:43:10,720 --> 00:43:13,240 It also spreads so well because it is quite sophisticated in the 915 00:43:13,240 --> 00:43:15,840 sense, as I mentioned before, that if it is methodologically 916 00:43:15,840 --> 00:43:19,000 broad, if it's omnivorous, if it does, you know, take a bit from 917 00:43:19,280 --> 00:43:21,920 from history and from linguistics and from archaeology 918 00:43:22,040 --> 00:43:25,440 and from, you know, geography of Israel, from flora and fauna and 919 00:43:25,440 --> 00:43:27,960 science and that and you know, and literary analysis and and 920 00:43:27,960 --> 00:43:30,600 and all of that. So, so you feel like you're in 921 00:43:30,600 --> 00:43:34,040 this very vast and exciting conversation with many different 922 00:43:34,040 --> 00:43:35,240 disciplines. You're kind of sewing everything 923 00:43:35,240 --> 00:43:37,280 together. And again, that that is to a 924 00:43:37,280 --> 00:43:41,240 large degree intellectually satisfying for many. 925 00:43:42,160 --> 00:43:45,040 It's also like built on the on the shoulders of giants. 926 00:43:45,040 --> 00:43:49,120 You know, it's it's really, it's like like the the the fact that 927 00:43:49,120 --> 00:43:52,440 we have technology today to find intertextual links, for example, 928 00:43:52,440 --> 00:43:55,960 or chiastic structures that didn't exist, you know, 100 929 00:43:55,960 --> 00:43:58,800 years ago, 200 years ago. So that advantage we have today 930 00:43:58,800 --> 00:44:00,560 is even I think that's why it's so popular. 931 00:44:01,120 --> 00:44:04,560 Yes, that it does play quite well to the, yes, you're right 932 00:44:04,680 --> 00:44:07,440 to to new discoveries all the time in in in you know 933 00:44:07,440 --> 00:44:08,600 archaeology and history etcetera. 934 00:44:08,800 --> 00:44:11,880 But also new discoveries in the text due to you know search 935 00:44:11,880 --> 00:44:14,240 engines and AI and all the things that we can do now with 936 00:44:14,240 --> 00:44:16,480 text that we couldn't, that would that were incredibly 937 00:44:16,480 --> 00:44:18,480 difficult to do back in the days of our computers. 938 00:44:18,480 --> 00:44:20,640 Because you had to have someone who knew the entire text back 939 00:44:20,640 --> 00:44:23,040 and forth in order to to start to even start doing that. 940 00:44:24,320 --> 00:44:26,760 I should OK, I should also should have probably done this 941 00:44:26,760 --> 00:44:29,960 at the beginning but I shouldn't make a point that many of the 942 00:44:29,960 --> 00:44:32,160 elements one of the characteristics of the Gustanach 943 00:44:32,160 --> 00:44:36,200 method. You can find elements of in 944 00:44:36,200 --> 00:44:37,960 Khazal. Find elements of it among the 945 00:44:37,960 --> 00:44:40,440 the Rashonim among the acronym. You want to mention that, yes. 946 00:44:40,800 --> 00:44:43,560 Yes, correct this is. This is perhaps something I 947 00:44:43,560 --> 00:44:44,680 should have mentioned a long time ago. 948 00:44:44,920 --> 00:44:48,960 I'm not claiming the Gustanach method is anything I would say 949 00:44:48,960 --> 00:44:51,680 radically new. It is a synthesis of various 950 00:44:51,680 --> 00:44:54,600 things that were there, that have been there all along, but 951 00:44:54,800 --> 00:44:57,200 to a much, you know, much sharper, a much more 952 00:44:57,200 --> 00:44:59,480 self-conscious degree as well. And then that's something 953 00:44:59,480 --> 00:45:01,720 important, that's something important to mention. 954 00:45:02,960 --> 00:45:04,040 Yes. So, so, yeah. 955 00:45:04,040 --> 00:45:06,400 So these are the major elements I think of advantage, the 956 00:45:06,400 --> 00:45:09,000 coherence, the implicit rejoinder to a little criticism, 957 00:45:09,160 --> 00:45:11,120 the the kind of the air of sophistication. 958 00:45:11,120 --> 00:45:16,600 And and this to a certain degree to my mind is what is behind its 959 00:45:16,760 --> 00:45:19,200 tremendous spread among the religious Zion as well among 960 00:45:19,200 --> 00:45:21,000 modern author as well in the United States and England. 961 00:45:21,520 --> 00:45:23,760 And rabbis are using it, teachers are using it. 962 00:45:23,960 --> 00:45:27,160 You have Jonathan Sacks and you have the foundation, the VBM 963 00:45:27,160 --> 00:45:28,600 website. You have a ton of stuff that 964 00:45:28,600 --> 00:45:30,360 I'll have beat all these things that are using it. 965 00:45:30,400 --> 00:45:32,920 OK those are the those are the advantages. 966 00:45:32,920 --> 00:45:34,200 Now what? What are the critiques that 967 00:45:34,200 --> 00:45:36,040 could possibly be levelled against this And this is 968 00:45:36,120 --> 00:45:39,160 obviously there's a lot and again I want to go through three 969 00:45:39,160 --> 00:45:42,520 of them, one to each of the major characteristic dimensions. 970 00:45:42,520 --> 00:45:44,920 The first characterization that I mentioned is is pshat. 971 00:45:45,040 --> 00:45:46,600 OK. The the the pursuit of pursuit 972 00:45:46,600 --> 00:45:50,760 of the Pshat level and the and the major critique to be 973 00:45:50,760 --> 00:45:55,840 levelled here is well who is to say that understanding the pshat 974 00:45:55,840 --> 00:45:59,160 of the Sukim is actually the main thing you should be doing. 975 00:45:59,920 --> 00:46:02,400 Who's to say that that is the most important that the sort of 976 00:46:03,120 --> 00:46:07,680 the level of of of significance that is most important. 977 00:46:07,720 --> 00:46:09,680 Right. I'll read you a short passage in 978 00:46:09,680 --> 00:46:13,120 Zohar actually which is brought which is quoted by Remote 979 00:46:13,120 --> 00:46:15,600 Lichtenstein his his essay here in the book Hisi Khati. 980 00:46:16,040 --> 00:46:18,320 I'll first translate it in. I'll first I'll first read a 981 00:46:18,360 --> 00:46:23,560 little bit of it in in in the original Aramaic of the Zohar. 982 00:46:23,680 --> 00:46:27,160 Because basically there's upon the Zohar which says that the 983 00:46:27,240 --> 00:46:30,280 the words of the Torah, the word that we have written are merely 984 00:46:30,280 --> 00:46:35,200 the garment, right. Whereas the actual whereas the 985 00:46:36,440 --> 00:46:38,880 whereas the actual kabbalistic meaning, the deep meaning that 986 00:46:38,880 --> 00:46:41,840 is again proposed in Propanza and the Zohar that is the real 987 00:46:41,840 --> 00:46:42,760 from that, that's sort of the goof. 988 00:46:42,760 --> 00:46:45,360 That's the the main thing underneath it's the thing which 989 00:46:45,360 --> 00:46:48,760 is enclosed and of course the the implication being that that 990 00:46:48,960 --> 00:46:52,040 only fools would take a look purely at the garment and not 991 00:46:52,040 --> 00:46:54,240 take a look and not focus on what is what is beneath. 992 00:46:54,480 --> 00:46:59,240 And and you know the line here I want to read is afterwards a 993 00:46:59,240 --> 00:47:02,480 high gufa midlabscha bill vouchin the inland spur in the 994 00:47:02,480 --> 00:47:07,080 high Alma Tipschin fools the alma long mystically. 995 00:47:07,080 --> 00:47:13,400 Ella Baha hava levusha the ehus for the orator Velo yad E yatir 996 00:47:13,400 --> 00:47:18,320 Velo Mr. Klim Bamad the ehu takat hahu levusha right in yad 997 00:47:18,320 --> 00:47:28,360 in yatir lo Mr. Klim Belusha. Ella Begufa the ehu tahat hahu 998 00:47:28,360 --> 00:47:37,320 lavousi, you know on the surface level it's actually to be found 999 00:47:37,520 --> 00:47:40,480 in the deepest deepest you know substrata of meaning namely the 1000 00:47:40,480 --> 00:47:44,560 Kabbalistic significance is given to the the words of sukim 1001 00:47:44,880 --> 00:47:49,160 and and and you know the which is essentially the interactions 1002 00:47:49,160 --> 00:47:51,440 between the various sphere art and the the four worlds etcetera 1003 00:47:51,440 --> 00:47:53,120 etcetera. And and that for the Kabbalists 1004 00:47:53,120 --> 00:47:57,960 is the main point and therefore stating or or learning to not as 1005 00:47:57,960 --> 00:48:02,520 if the main religious messages to be found are to be found on 1006 00:48:02,520 --> 00:48:04,440 the Prashad level from the Kabbalistic level. 1007 00:48:04,640 --> 00:48:06,520 From a Kabbalistic perspective is is absolutely wrong. 1008 00:48:06,720 --> 00:48:10,400 And also might I add from the Maimonides and philosophical 1009 00:48:10,400 --> 00:48:12,360 level it's also wrong to a certain degree. 1010 00:48:12,360 --> 00:48:14,480 Because even though both the Kabbalists and Maimonides would 1011 00:48:14,480 --> 00:48:19,080 give some degree of legitimacy to learning the shots, but they 1012 00:48:19,080 --> 00:48:21,160 would say that actually the main meat and potatoes of the main 1013 00:48:21,160 --> 00:48:24,720 message is to be found in the the the deeply submerged wisdom. 1014 00:48:24,720 --> 00:48:27,600 And for Maimonides, that was of course physics and metaphysics 1015 00:48:27,640 --> 00:48:29,520 of his time, the neo Aristotelian philosophy of his 1016 00:48:29,520 --> 00:48:32,160 time, yeah. But even then, Maimonides 1017 00:48:32,160 --> 00:48:36,640 doesn't do violence to the text, whereas Kabbalah does violence 1018 00:48:36,640 --> 00:48:38,560 to the text. So we're talking about two 1019 00:48:38,560 --> 00:48:41,800 completely different ways of going about that. 1020 00:48:42,040 --> 00:48:45,440 I'm afraid while I sort of agree with you, I sort of agree with 1021 00:48:45,440 --> 00:48:47,280 you. It depends very much who you ask 1022 00:48:47,280 --> 00:48:50,720 because many would say that for example, Maimonides depiction of 1023 00:48:50,720 --> 00:48:54,520 God as not only not having a body but not having emotions. 1024 00:48:55,320 --> 00:48:57,560 That's the my modern team perspective for some that's 1025 00:48:57,560 --> 00:48:59,920 doing tremendous violence. The text, the text repeatedly 1026 00:48:59,920 --> 00:49:03,760 said God gets angry, God regrets God does this, God does that. 1027 00:49:03,960 --> 00:49:06,000 You know, and and my mother basically says none of this. 1028 00:49:06,200 --> 00:49:08,240 I don't know if you can call that violence. 1029 00:49:08,240 --> 00:49:14,400 That's more something that doesn't fit within within our 1030 00:49:14,400 --> 00:49:16,440 sensibilities. It has to be worked out. 1031 00:49:16,440 --> 00:49:20,480 Listen, violence is when you say the text doesn't mean what it 1032 00:49:20,480 --> 00:49:25,640 says for no other reason than we have a secret tradition. 1033 00:49:25,640 --> 00:49:26,760 So. Right. 1034 00:49:26,840 --> 00:49:30,720 So, so I I understand your point even though I stand by what I 1035 00:49:30,720 --> 00:49:34,120 said before that that one man's reinterpretation is another 1036 00:49:34,120 --> 00:49:37,440 man's violence. It really depends on which side. 1037 00:49:37,440 --> 00:49:39,320 You're right. Meaning, you know, it's it's a 1038 00:49:39,320 --> 00:49:41,560 matter at the end of the day of of personal ideological 1039 00:49:41,560 --> 00:49:43,720 proclivity. But I want to just if I can play 1040 00:49:43,720 --> 00:49:47,200 devil's advocate for a moment which is that for the from the 1041 00:49:47,200 --> 00:49:50,880 kabbalistic perspective, there's also another problem with with 1042 00:49:51,040 --> 00:49:53,680 sort of chasing Prashad, which is there's some parts of the 1043 00:49:53,680 --> 00:49:56,760 Tanakh where the Pshad level seems strange. 1044 00:49:56,960 --> 00:49:59,960 OK. For example, the last third 1045 00:50:00,080 --> 00:50:02,920 quarter or no, I don't know exactly how much of partial by 1046 00:50:03,240 --> 00:50:06,880 Vaishlax, but four tips or Kim just detailing the the AL Uffet 1047 00:50:06,880 --> 00:50:09,760 Edom, The Chieftains of Edom, what's that doing there? 1048 00:50:10,280 --> 00:50:12,880 You know, in in Genesis where you have tons and in fact 1049 00:50:12,880 --> 00:50:14,440 different, I mean other places you have a lot, a lot of 1050 00:50:14,440 --> 00:50:16,080 genealogies. What's it doing there? 1051 00:50:16,680 --> 00:50:20,200 You know, who cares if if you're going to defend everything, say 1052 00:50:20,320 --> 00:50:22,480 shut level is the most important and that's where you have the 1053 00:50:22,480 --> 00:50:24,000 religious significance. So that's fine. 1054 00:50:24,000 --> 00:50:25,560 When you're talking about Akira Yitzhak, that's fine. 1055 00:50:25,560 --> 00:50:28,840 When you're talking about, you know, there's some very meaty 1056 00:50:29,280 --> 00:50:31,360 parts to the Tanakh, but also parts the Tanakh. 1057 00:50:31,360 --> 00:50:34,760 You're not entirely sure what is going on and why it's there. 1058 00:50:34,760 --> 00:50:37,720 And it doesn't seem to have really a good explanation of 1059 00:50:37,720 --> 00:50:39,360 shuttle. However the capitalists say no, 1060 00:50:39,360 --> 00:50:42,120 you don't understand and the the chiefs of Edom that you know the 1061 00:50:42,120 --> 00:50:45,360 Citra Accra and this symbolizes that and this is this fear and 1062 00:50:45,360 --> 00:50:48,600 you know and they they they weave A tremendous sort of 1063 00:50:49,200 --> 00:50:52,040 cosmos of of significance. And if you buy it, if you're 1064 00:50:52,040 --> 00:50:54,800 willing to swallow that pill, then those parts of the torrent 1065 00:50:54,800 --> 00:50:56,160 parts of the tunnel become very meaningful. 1066 00:50:56,480 --> 00:50:59,000 In other words, the another problem with with chasing the 1067 00:50:59,000 --> 00:51:01,760 Shard or centralizing the Shard is the Shard doesn't always, at 1068 00:51:01,760 --> 00:51:05,600 least to us, to our minds in 21st, it doesn't always appear 1069 00:51:05,720 --> 00:51:08,000 as if it's the most satisfying. These were religiously 1070 00:51:08,000 --> 00:51:11,360 meaningful part of, you know, part of the Torah. 1071 00:51:11,360 --> 00:51:14,440 Which it's a critique, again, doesn't need to be a devastating 1072 00:51:14,440 --> 00:51:18,080 one, but it's there, should be acknowledged, and it's there. 1073 00:51:18,520 --> 00:51:22,600 OK, so that's point #2. That's point number one. 1074 00:51:22,600 --> 00:51:24,760 Sorry, that's the critique Contra the deep shot. 1075 00:51:24,760 --> 00:51:28,000 Now there's another critique Contra Contra to the Torah 1076 00:51:28,000 --> 00:51:29,920 tadam, Torah tadam. Again, the centrality of the 1077 00:51:29,920 --> 00:51:33,400 human story in the human drama is what I call the historicist 1078 00:51:33,400 --> 00:51:34,920 critique. Historicist critique goes a 1079 00:51:34,920 --> 00:51:37,600 little bit as follows. It's that. 1080 00:51:38,520 --> 00:51:43,040 It's that basically to say, let me put it as follows to say that 1081 00:51:43,440 --> 00:51:45,320 that we should be reading the Tanakh and following the human 1082 00:51:45,320 --> 00:51:50,440 drama sort of presupposes there are a set of of human questions 1083 00:51:50,440 --> 00:51:54,280 or human quandaries which which are universal and timeless, 1084 00:51:54,280 --> 00:51:56,960 right. And which were were present in 1085 00:51:56,960 --> 00:51:59,800 the Tanakh and could be understood and and you know, and 1086 00:51:59,800 --> 00:52:00,680 wrestled with today. Right. 1087 00:52:00,680 --> 00:52:03,480 So we read the story of Yosef and his brothers and we see, you 1088 00:52:03,480 --> 00:52:06,280 know, the the, the, the hatred of the brothers and the 1089 00:52:06,280 --> 00:52:08,040 fratricides and the arc of Chuvan. 1090 00:52:08,040 --> 00:52:10,520 You know, we can read it. We can understand it. 1091 00:52:10,520 --> 00:52:12,240 We can take lessons from it. That's the that's the whole 1092 00:52:12,240 --> 00:52:14,200 point of it. But that presupposes there is a 1093 00:52:14,280 --> 00:52:17,800 timeless quality to those stories which which can be fully 1094 00:52:17,800 --> 00:52:21,440 empathized with today. OK, the problem is that the 1095 00:52:21,440 --> 00:52:24,000 Tanakh took place a long time ago in a very foreign 1096 00:52:24,000 --> 00:52:25,800 environment, right? To place over three, you know, 1097 00:52:25,920 --> 00:52:30,040 between the time and Tanakh, between 3 1/2 and 2 1/2 thousand 1098 00:52:30,040 --> 00:52:32,320 years ago, give or take. That's when it was supposed to 1099 00:52:32,320 --> 00:52:35,360 have taken place. And and the assumptions and and 1100 00:52:35,360 --> 00:52:38,560 the world of that time was just incredibly different, right. 1101 00:52:38,560 --> 00:52:39,680 Let's take the the figure of Yaakov. 1102 00:52:39,800 --> 00:52:42,120 Right. The sorts of things that Yaakov 1103 00:52:42,120 --> 00:52:43,680 goes through in his life. Very difficult for us to 1104 00:52:43,680 --> 00:52:46,240 understand or sympathize with today and the fact that his 1105 00:52:46,240 --> 00:52:49,400 brothers willing to kill him over the birthright you know 1106 00:52:49,400 --> 00:52:52,600 marrying 2 Sisters but the but the father-in-law switching them 1107 00:52:52,600 --> 00:52:55,400 out, you know favouring one child over the other. 1108 00:52:56,680 --> 00:52:59,360 You know fleeing and and and basically you know when the 1109 00:52:59,360 --> 00:53:02,040 father-in-law comes in searching for the idols the one searching 1110 00:53:02,040 --> 00:53:05,120 the idols he says oh whoever has it will kill them because he's 1111 00:53:05,120 --> 00:53:06,400 the father. He can just do what he likes. 1112 00:53:06,560 --> 00:53:08,920 You know the the Shimon and Levy killing. 1113 00:53:09,320 --> 00:53:13,160 There's all sorts of things going on in the story of Yakov, 1114 00:53:13,160 --> 00:53:17,240 which which many would say the the region in the 21st century 1115 00:53:17,240 --> 00:53:18,680 can't make head or tails of this, right. 1116 00:53:18,680 --> 00:53:21,680 Can't make head or tails If the relationship between parents and 1117 00:53:21,680 --> 00:53:25,560 children are so different or the relationships between let's say 1118 00:53:25,560 --> 00:53:28,400 a king and a subject in the 21st century is so different. 1119 00:53:28,640 --> 00:53:32,040 The relationship between family members or or or, you know, the 1120 00:53:32,040 --> 00:53:34,560 the religious experience in general of people in the 21st 1121 00:53:34,560 --> 00:53:36,520 century is so radically different that it's actually 1122 00:53:36,520 --> 00:53:40,840 sort of fruitless to try and, you know, read the Tanakh and 1123 00:53:40,840 --> 00:53:45,840 gain exactly the messages that were there 2000 years ago, 1000 1124 00:53:45,840 --> 00:53:46,960 years ago and are now here today. 1125 00:53:47,120 --> 00:53:49,880 And what the the argument is that our world's a bit too 1126 00:53:49,880 --> 00:53:52,400 different. And the truth is that this is a 1127 00:53:52,400 --> 00:53:54,360 critique that's level, not just at the Tanakh. 1128 00:53:54,360 --> 00:53:56,360 So for example, let's take Shakespeare, right. 1129 00:53:56,560 --> 00:53:59,400 There are wonderful plays of Shakespeare, you know, many 1130 00:53:59,640 --> 00:54:06,000 works of absolute genius and some of them do, some of them do 1131 00:54:06,600 --> 00:54:09,160 broach very universal human themes, the plays of 1132 00:54:09,160 --> 00:54:10,800 Shakespeare. But some of them broach the 1133 00:54:10,800 --> 00:54:13,560 sorts of themes, you know, Henry the fifth, let's say, or 1134 00:54:13,560 --> 00:54:15,360 whatever, which would be difficult for us to understand 1135 00:54:15,360 --> 00:54:17,720 today, right. The the, the expectation of a 1136 00:54:17,720 --> 00:54:21,120 soldier to follow his king to the death, let's say, or or or 1137 00:54:21,120 --> 00:54:23,800 to the kings of absolute power of life and death of anyone 1138 00:54:23,800 --> 00:54:25,160 else. And you know, uneasy is the 1139 00:54:25,160 --> 00:54:27,640 head, the rest of the crown or pick out whatever quote you 1140 00:54:27,640 --> 00:54:29,520 might. And these are, these are things 1141 00:54:29,520 --> 00:54:32,320 that actually aren't so readily transferable today, right? 1142 00:54:32,480 --> 00:54:33,960 And if it's Shakespeare, we can put that to one side. 1143 00:54:34,160 --> 00:54:36,960 But if the whole point of the Gushnach method is to to 1144 00:54:37,000 --> 00:54:40,960 understand the Torata Adam, to to tease it out and to to sort 1145 00:54:40,960 --> 00:54:43,000 of say that those situations and those questions, those 1146 00:54:43,000 --> 00:54:45,440 quandaries are directly transferable to us three and 1147 00:54:45,440 --> 00:54:48,200 1000 years later, well, that might be asking a little bit too 1148 00:54:48,200 --> 00:54:50,680 much of of those texts and of those ideas. 1149 00:54:50,680 --> 00:54:53,160 Because people change. We we no longer have the 1150 00:54:53,160 --> 00:54:56,080 relationships between fathers and sons and and kings and 1151 00:54:56,080 --> 00:54:57,400 subjects and social norms change. 1152 00:54:58,360 --> 00:54:59,840 Sorry. Social norms. 1153 00:55:00,240 --> 00:55:01,880 Social norms have changed. Technology has changed. 1154 00:55:02,000 --> 00:55:05,040 You know, can we can we relate to a world in which in which, 1155 00:55:05,280 --> 00:55:08,400 you know, 50% of infants die before the age of three, or in 1156 00:55:08,400 --> 00:55:10,600 which one in four women die of childbirth? 1157 00:55:10,880 --> 00:55:13,640 Or in which, you know, people really believed animistic 1158 00:55:13,640 --> 00:55:16,240 spirits to be alive and really, you know, sacrificed human 1159 00:55:16,240 --> 00:55:17,520 children to try and appease gods again. 1160 00:55:17,640 --> 00:55:20,400 So the point is so much the Tanakh seems so foreign to us 1161 00:55:20,640 --> 00:55:23,960 that if Toronto Adam is at the very centre of your Tanakh 1162 00:55:25,160 --> 00:55:28,960 Tanakh sort of learning, then then maybe you're you're 1163 00:55:28,960 --> 00:55:32,680 throwing your students into a world which which just doesn't 1164 00:55:32,680 --> 00:55:34,640 speak to people so well that doesn't have the same 1165 00:55:34,840 --> 00:55:36,760 assumptions and therefore what are the kinds of lessons we can 1166 00:55:36,760 --> 00:55:41,240 draw from it and you don't seem very happy, but yes. 1167 00:55:41,840 --> 00:55:44,960 Forgive me, but I I, I I don't know. 1168 00:55:44,960 --> 00:55:48,840 I don't see it that way from the standpoint that yes, the 1169 00:55:48,840 --> 00:55:53,840 expression, the context, the time has its own way of 1170 00:55:53,840 --> 00:55:56,360 expressing human nature in certain, in a certain way at 1171 00:55:56,360 --> 00:55:59,160 that time. But human nature is still human 1172 00:55:59,160 --> 00:56:01,200 nature. Just even if you want to say we 1173 00:56:01,200 --> 00:56:05,000 have social norms changed, human nature is still being applied. 1174 00:56:05,000 --> 00:56:07,800 It's just being applied to in a different context. 1175 00:56:08,200 --> 00:56:12,280 You know, people might not believe in, you know, you know, 1176 00:56:12,280 --> 00:56:16,000 1000 demons running around around us, but people believe in 1177 00:56:16,000 --> 00:56:20,040 other superstitions today, maybe more sophisticated than it used 1178 00:56:20,040 --> 00:56:23,160 to be, but the ideas are sort of still timeless to me. 1179 00:56:23,560 --> 00:56:27,400 And another thing also with the gush method is that a lot of the 1180 00:56:27,400 --> 00:56:30,440 things that you mentioned is actually they do a great job 1181 00:56:30,440 --> 00:56:36,280 going into it and and bringing out what is actually consistent 1182 00:56:36,280 --> 00:56:38,400 within those stories that we can apply to ourselves today. 1183 00:56:38,800 --> 00:56:41,440 So I don't know about that. You know, so the truth is that 1184 00:56:41,440 --> 00:56:44,200 that that would have to be the response of those who who are 1185 00:56:44,360 --> 00:56:46,040 part of the gush method. In other words, the critique 1186 00:56:46,040 --> 00:56:49,640 that I levelled, I'm not sure I fully believe in it myself, but 1187 00:56:49,680 --> 00:56:51,800 but, but you can see where they would be coming from, right? 1188 00:56:52,080 --> 00:56:54,840 Where they're coming from, yes. I can hear you're coming from. 1189 00:56:54,880 --> 00:56:57,040 Let me let me sort of the reason why I called it the Historicist 1190 00:56:57,040 --> 00:56:58,560 Critique is because historicism is. 1191 00:56:58,560 --> 00:57:00,120 I mean, it means various different things actually, 1192 00:57:00,120 --> 00:57:02,040 depending on the context. One of the things it means is 1193 00:57:02,040 --> 00:57:04,800 it's a, it's a way of reading history which basically says 1194 00:57:04,800 --> 00:57:09,120 that all people or all you know, processes and events are product 1195 00:57:09,120 --> 00:57:10,080 of their time. Right, right. 1196 00:57:10,080 --> 00:57:13,520 So, you know, whatever Shakespeare was a product of his 1197 00:57:13,520 --> 00:57:15,440 time and Julius Caesar was a product of his time and Napoleon 1198 00:57:15,440 --> 00:57:18,040 was a product of the social and economic for and you know, 1199 00:57:18,480 --> 00:57:20,800 religious forces of his time and etcetera, etcetera, etcetera 1200 00:57:20,800 --> 00:57:23,520 going there wherever you want. You don't have people who stand 1201 00:57:23,520 --> 00:57:24,920 on their own. Everything's sort of a product 1202 00:57:24,920 --> 00:57:27,040 of their time. And the sources critique is to 1203 00:57:27,040 --> 00:57:30,120 say that the stories in the Tanakh, you know, are part of 1204 00:57:30,120 --> 00:57:34,960 their time share in a great deal of the assumptions and and 1205 00:57:34,960 --> 00:57:36,520 background information of their time. 1206 00:57:36,800 --> 00:57:39,960 And since things are so radically different in the West 1207 00:57:39,960 --> 00:57:42,720 in the 21st century from the Middle East of of the the 10th 1208 00:57:42,720 --> 00:57:44,600 century BCE. So it's actually very difficult 1209 00:57:44,600 --> 00:57:47,640 to make the the, the transition. And The funny thing is, is that, 1210 00:57:47,640 --> 00:57:50,400 and this is a little bit underrated, is that the Rumbum, 1211 00:57:52,280 --> 00:57:54,720 some of the Rumbums philosophy actually dives into this. 1212 00:57:54,720 --> 00:57:57,520 The Rumbum becomes in some parts of the guide and even in 1213 00:57:57,520 --> 00:58:00,280 mission, Torah becomes whatever. An amateur historian, 1214 00:58:00,280 --> 00:58:01,160 anthropologist. Right. 1215 00:58:01,360 --> 00:58:03,880 So, for example, when he talks about, you know, why is there 1216 00:58:03,880 --> 00:58:05,120 that is? So why is there the prohibition 1217 00:58:05,120 --> 00:58:06,880 of cutting off the payouts, of cutting off the sort of the 1218 00:58:06,880 --> 00:58:10,280 corners of the head? Because ancient idolatrous 1219 00:58:10,280 --> 00:58:12,640 priests used to have shaved heads on the side and therefore 1220 00:58:12,640 --> 00:58:16,160 we can't do that now, right. Or similar with the Korba, not 1221 00:58:16,160 --> 00:58:17,440 similar with the sacrifices, right. 1222 00:58:17,440 --> 00:58:19,960 You know, there were these sacrificial cults and the Torah 1223 00:58:19,960 --> 00:58:21,960 sort of participated in Enable, wasn't so happy about it and 1224 00:58:22,000 --> 00:58:23,520 therefore slowly abolish it, blah blah. 1225 00:58:23,920 --> 00:58:28,160 Now this is actually very interesting and actually quite 1226 00:58:28,800 --> 00:58:30,960 radical and daring of the Rambam to say something like that, 1227 00:58:31,000 --> 00:58:33,440 because what he's saying is at least some of them is at least 1228 00:58:33,440 --> 00:58:36,880 part of the Torah system, is mired in a distinctly ancient 1229 00:58:36,880 --> 00:58:39,720 Near Eastern milieu. It has a very strong context and 1230 00:58:39,880 --> 00:58:41,720 and we cannot understand it without the context, right? 1231 00:58:41,920 --> 00:58:44,760 In other words, had the Torah been given, let's say 1000 years 1232 00:58:44,760 --> 00:58:48,120 later in ancient Greece or ancient Rome or medieval France, 1233 00:58:48,240 --> 00:58:50,800 so maybe he wouldn't have had the sort of to shave the the 1234 00:58:50,800 --> 00:58:52,840 pale to not to do sacrifices, because that wouldn't have been 1235 00:58:52,840 --> 00:58:55,720 relevant to the time. He was also not responding to 1236 00:58:55,960 --> 00:58:59,160 like like archaeological findings where you feel like you 1237 00:58:59,160 --> 00:59:01,720 have to answer these things. He he just did it on his own, 1238 00:59:01,720 --> 00:59:02,560 you know, it's like it's. Great. 1239 00:59:03,000 --> 00:59:05,400 Well the truth is the rumble was basing on the best information 1240 00:59:05,400 --> 00:59:07,520 he had at the time, which to be honest wasn't very good. 1241 00:59:07,800 --> 00:59:12,720 But you know copies in Arabic he had of of ancient Babylonian or 1242 00:59:12,720 --> 00:59:15,320 Greek historians basically and sort of very ancient very sort 1243 00:59:15,320 --> 00:59:18,200 of vague anthropologist And and it's actually one of the 1244 00:59:18,200 --> 00:59:20,560 fascinating things of of what I mentioned at the beginning of 1245 00:59:20,560 --> 00:59:22,800 this podcast some of the pirishim of the 19th century. 1246 00:59:22,800 --> 00:59:26,120 You know people like Shadal or Benamos egg or others. 1247 00:59:26,480 --> 00:59:29,160 They were very in tune to the fact that they were living in a 1248 00:59:29,160 --> 00:59:31,280 time where a lot of great discoveries coming out about the 1249 00:59:31,280 --> 00:59:34,960 ancient Near East and they tried to to include it within their 1250 00:59:35,000 --> 00:59:37,400 within that commentary in Torah because they took this sort of 1251 00:59:37,400 --> 00:59:40,400 maimonity in line which is hey, as much as the Torah is sort of 1252 00:59:40,400 --> 00:59:43,040 a time, you know, treated as the time has document and you know, 1253 00:59:43,040 --> 00:59:46,480 hopefully it's it's values, let's say or its commandments 1254 00:59:46,480 --> 00:59:49,480 are timeless. However, there is a time bound 1255 00:59:49,600 --> 00:59:53,960 sort of a contextual element to the Torah, namely the ancient 1256 00:59:53,960 --> 00:59:57,560 Near Eastern, Canaanite, Israelite, you know, or Egyptian 1257 00:59:57,560 --> 00:59:59,560 or Babylonian context in which it existed. 1258 01:00:00,320 --> 01:00:02,200 And anyway, so that would be the nature of that particular 1259 01:00:02,200 --> 01:00:04,160 critique. Once again, not saying and none 1260 01:00:04,160 --> 01:00:06,240 of these critiques that I'm saying are devastating. 1261 01:00:06,440 --> 01:00:10,000 What I am saying is that they are they're there. 1262 01:00:10,080 --> 01:00:11,840 One has the background where I'm trying to. 1263 01:00:12,160 --> 01:00:14,600 You know, when I I say I'm going to read the story of Yosef and 1264 01:00:14,600 --> 01:00:17,600 his brother Zuyak or whatever, and and and deduce timeless 1265 01:00:17,600 --> 01:00:22,200 human sort of morals and lessons and religious lessons from it. 1266 01:00:22,480 --> 01:00:24,760 Well, you know, maybe you're sort of getting the wrong end of 1267 01:00:24,760 --> 01:00:27,640 the state, because your world is not the world of someone who, 1268 01:00:27,800 --> 01:00:30,440 you know, would sacrifice his Son if God told him to. 1269 01:00:30,640 --> 01:00:33,440 But even in the examples you gave, OK, so there's the mitzvah 1270 01:00:33,440 --> 01:00:36,200 of the Pieta Roshan, because you know, the the the adultery. 1271 01:00:36,200 --> 01:00:40,400 You still we don't do it. The idea is still timeless 1272 01:00:40,400 --> 01:00:42,920 within the mitzvah. That applies to us very much 1273 01:00:42,920 --> 01:00:45,240 today in terms of what it's trying to tell us. 1274 01:00:45,240 --> 01:00:50,160 Sure, it has a context because the Torah has to start. 1275 01:00:50,760 --> 01:00:54,320 The vision of the Torah has to start where it is, right? 1276 01:00:54,320 --> 01:00:56,840 That's the only way to get people out of idolatrous 1277 01:00:56,840 --> 01:01:00,160 thinking is to work within the confines of the context that the 1278 01:01:00,160 --> 01:01:04,280 Torah began with. That doesn't mean that the ideas 1279 01:01:04,280 --> 01:01:09,120 are not relevant anymore. Maybe the the the specific act, 1280 01:01:09,360 --> 01:01:10,800 OK, could have been different or not. 1281 01:01:10,800 --> 01:01:15,600 You know the the the specific mitzvah or or Isul, right? 1282 01:01:15,720 --> 01:01:20,280 Because it's based on a specific context, was done a certain way 1283 01:01:20,600 --> 01:01:22,040 right? And maybe could have been done 1284 01:01:22,040 --> 01:01:23,560 differently if not, like you said. 1285 01:01:23,960 --> 01:01:27,880 But the idea in itself of removing ourselves from all 1286 01:01:27,880 --> 01:01:32,480 idolatry very much alive and strong, the idea still carries 1287 01:01:32,480 --> 01:01:33,680 over. So. 1288 01:01:34,440 --> 01:01:37,760 It doesn't bother me so much these are all these are all very 1289 01:01:37,800 --> 01:01:40,120 I would say good counter arguments and and because look 1290 01:01:41,480 --> 01:01:44,120 because I'm sort of on the side of the Gushman again I have my 1291 01:01:44,120 --> 01:01:46,600 my reservations with it and I think it's perfect blah blah but 1292 01:01:46,760 --> 01:01:51,640 but the truth is that you know there are I think reasonable 1293 01:01:51,640 --> 01:01:55,520 responses to some of these criticisms but but but I would 1294 01:01:55,520 --> 01:01:57,720 hope that you admit at least a little bit the force of some of 1295 01:01:57,720 --> 01:02:01,080 these criticisms that the world of the Torah isn't always an 1296 01:02:01,080 --> 01:02:04,720 easy world for us to jump into or to understand. 1297 01:02:04,720 --> 01:02:08,120 I mean you know this comes to this certainly comes to a four 1298 01:02:08,400 --> 01:02:10,520 you know in the in the stories of let's say Yoshua and Shaftim 1299 01:02:10,520 --> 01:02:14,360 where battles ensue and people just massacre entire cities back 1300 01:02:14,360 --> 01:02:16,520 left right and centre. I mean even cities within Israel 1301 01:02:16,520 --> 01:02:20,320 or even you know it's just it's the sort of world where that 1302 01:02:20,320 --> 01:02:22,320 thing would happen where if you're going up against the 1303 01:02:22,320 --> 01:02:25,000 neighbour you do in fact wipe them entirely off the face of 1304 01:02:25,000 --> 01:02:25,960 the earth. It's just something that 1305 01:02:26,960 --> 01:02:29,040 difficult for us to get ourselves into that mindset. 1306 01:02:29,040 --> 01:02:30,640 Modern sensibilities don't, really. 1307 01:02:31,200 --> 01:02:35,320 Modern sensibilities yes and and just different assumptions about 1308 01:02:35,720 --> 01:02:37,920 what what is what is even conceivable like what is on our 1309 01:02:37,920 --> 01:02:40,880 radar. The cloud is I think different 1310 01:02:41,960 --> 01:02:43,560 the the. So that's that's critique #2. 1311 01:02:43,560 --> 01:02:45,720 So that is that is the historicist critique which which 1312 01:02:45,720 --> 01:02:47,960 goes against the the idea of Torah Adam. 1313 01:02:47,960 --> 01:02:50,720 The the problem of of centralized Torah Adam is is 1314 01:02:50,720 --> 01:02:53,280 that and the third critique is one that you mentioned Ben 1315 01:02:53,320 --> 01:02:56,080 earlier. You know against the, I would 1316 01:02:56,080 --> 01:03:00,560 say methodological eclecticism of the Gustanak method. 1317 01:03:00,760 --> 01:03:04,280 Is is the obvious academic critique right, Which is that 1318 01:03:04,400 --> 01:03:06,480 you can't pick and choose. You can't pick and choose. 1319 01:03:06,480 --> 01:03:12,120 You're not allowed to to plunder different different disciplines 1320 01:03:13,320 --> 01:03:18,880 in search of of things that you already in search of, of a of a 1321 01:03:18,880 --> 01:03:20,920 conclusion that you decided beforehand, right? 1322 01:03:22,000 --> 01:03:25,160 It has to fit your narrative. So to me, this is the strongest 1323 01:03:25,360 --> 01:03:27,000 I'm I'm saying all the arguments are important. 1324 01:03:27,000 --> 01:03:30,480 But it's only strong if you're looking at it as whether 1325 01:03:30,480 --> 01:03:33,920 something is evidence versus non evidence. 1326 01:03:33,960 --> 01:03:36,280 Can you consider this enough evidence or not evidence? 1327 01:03:36,560 --> 01:03:40,240 But when you're using it as supportive evidence, people do 1328 01:03:40,240 --> 01:03:42,760 that all the time. So let him explain what what? 1329 01:03:42,840 --> 01:03:44,320 It is, yes. But OK, so here's the problem. 1330 01:03:44,480 --> 01:03:48,160 The problem basically is, is that either when you're 1331 01:03:48,160 --> 01:03:52,520 approaching academic discipline, either you submit yourself to 1332 01:03:52,520 --> 01:03:56,440 the to sort of to the methods and the findings of a certain 1333 01:03:56,440 --> 01:03:59,240 discipline, or you don't, right? In other words, if you're in the 1334 01:03:59,240 --> 01:04:01,880 Haredi position, you say, I don't care what historians say, 1335 01:04:02,080 --> 01:04:03,600 historians ancient history is nonsense. 1336 01:04:03,600 --> 01:04:06,360 Archaeology is just what they happened to find on a Tuesday 1337 01:04:06,480 --> 01:04:08,920 when they once dug in the thing. They've actually no idea how 1338 01:04:08,920 --> 01:04:10,560 ancient civilizations really look like in any way. 1339 01:04:10,560 --> 01:04:12,840 Half of them are are crooked or anti religious anyway. 1340 01:04:12,840 --> 01:04:14,000 Whatever. I'm just going to ignore 1341 01:04:14,000 --> 01:04:16,280 archaeology, I'm ignore history. Linguistics as well, Very 1342 01:04:16,280 --> 01:04:18,400 speculative. Who knows how they really spoke, 1343 01:04:18,400 --> 01:04:20,800 who knows where really the lexical origins of origins of 1344 01:04:20,880 --> 01:04:23,360 various words are from and therefore, you know, I'm going 1345 01:04:23,360 --> 01:04:26,960 to push it to one side. So that is in a funny way a sort 1346 01:04:26,960 --> 01:04:29,760 of an internally coherent way of approaching the world, right? 1347 01:04:29,760 --> 01:04:31,760 You're saying this discipline is Tref. 1348 01:04:32,040 --> 01:04:33,600 I'm not going to touch it. It's nonsense. 1349 01:04:33,600 --> 01:04:36,280 It contravenes, but I believe to be true and therefore I won't 1350 01:04:36,280 --> 01:04:39,520 dismiss it entirely. Or the other way of approaching 1351 01:04:39,520 --> 01:04:42,280 the world is saying, listen, I believe that history and 1352 01:04:42,280 --> 01:04:45,760 historians are, you know, are doing serious work and based on 1353 01:04:45,760 --> 01:04:48,080 good evidence and you know, and the archaeologists and the 1354 01:04:48,080 --> 01:04:49,640 lingual linguists. And therefore I'm going to 1355 01:04:49,640 --> 01:04:52,280 follow wherever the archaeological and historical 1356 01:04:52,280 --> 01:04:55,640 evidence is strongest, leads us best like, you know, with the 1357 01:04:55,640 --> 01:04:57,640 reasonable caveat that you know historians sometimes get it 1358 01:04:57,640 --> 01:04:59,040 wrong and archaeologists sometimes get it wrong. 1359 01:04:59,040 --> 01:05:01,720 But basically submit yourself to the proposition that all 1360 01:05:01,720 --> 01:05:04,760 academics submit themselves to, which is that I'm going to start 1361 01:05:04,960 --> 01:05:06,680 with the premises of the discipline. 1362 01:05:06,960 --> 01:05:08,600 I'm going to follow wherever the evidence leads and my 1363 01:05:08,600 --> 01:05:12,440 conclusions will simply be where the where the where the evidence 1364 01:05:12,440 --> 01:05:13,480 currently leads us. Right. 1365 01:05:13,720 --> 01:05:16,480 Whereas the gush, those who follow the Gushnach method and 1366 01:05:16,480 --> 01:05:20,840 again generalizing but the ethos of that method is that we have a 1367 01:05:20,840 --> 01:05:24,160 prefabricated view of what this book is the Tanakh or this 1368 01:05:24,440 --> 01:05:27,520 library this anthology is, this is divine word. 1369 01:05:27,640 --> 01:05:32,560 It is historically accurate. It is, you know it is what it 1370 01:05:32,560 --> 01:05:36,400 says it is essentially And if I can find you know a good 1371 01:05:36,440 --> 01:05:38,920 artifact in the Israel Museum I'll, I'll bring it in. 1372 01:05:39,080 --> 01:05:41,200 If I can find you know an archaeological Finder is very 1373 01:05:41,200 --> 01:05:43,440 much to my liking. Oh, I'll bring that in if I can 1374 01:05:43,440 --> 01:05:46,920 find you know a clever piece of linguistic play that oh you 1375 01:05:46,920 --> 01:05:48,840 know, I'm going to bring that I'm going to basically take from 1376 01:05:48,840 --> 01:05:52,040 all the discoveries that have and and use it towards my 1377 01:05:52,040 --> 01:05:53,960 prefabricating conclusions was the academics. 1378 01:05:53,960 --> 01:05:54,840 Listen, you can't do that, buddy. 1379 01:05:55,040 --> 01:05:57,760 You either you take history seriously or you don't. 1380 01:05:57,760 --> 01:05:59,680 If you take it seriously then you must say listen, this is the 1381 01:05:59,680 --> 01:06:01,520 evidence that we have and the evidence that we have. 1382 01:06:01,520 --> 01:06:06,920 Let's say Nagir points to, you know, for example, one important 1383 01:06:06,920 --> 01:06:08,280 theory. I mean, it's one theory, many. 1384 01:06:08,280 --> 01:06:11,720 But one strong theory among ancient historians in Israel is 1385 01:06:11,720 --> 01:06:14,600 that there was no massive influx of people at any time. 1386 01:06:14,600 --> 01:06:16,080 Otherwise denies the Exodus narrative. 1387 01:06:16,080 --> 01:06:19,000 It simply says that we don't have any evidence of this 1388 01:06:19,000 --> 01:06:21,240 massive influx. All we have is evidence of a 1389 01:06:21,240 --> 01:06:25,880 slow incremental growth of of indigenous people in the Land of 1390 01:06:25,880 --> 01:06:28,160 Israel, and that's and that's basically how the people of 1391 01:06:28,160 --> 01:06:30,040 Israel came to be. This whole idea of a massive 1392 01:06:30,040 --> 01:06:31,960 influx of people coming from the outside, that would leave 1393 01:06:31,960 --> 01:06:33,040 evidence. We don't have the evidence, 1394 01:06:33,040 --> 01:06:34,920 etcetera. Now if you're a gush or 1395 01:06:35,040 --> 01:06:37,680 basically a religious Jew, you'll say, OK, that's nice that 1396 01:06:37,680 --> 01:06:40,080 the history historians don't have the evidence now, but the 1397 01:06:40,080 --> 01:06:41,280 truth is that I believe in something else. 1398 01:06:41,280 --> 01:06:43,480 I believe all Tanaka is true and I believe in the Exodus. 1399 01:06:43,480 --> 01:06:45,400 There's a huge influx of Jews and that's just it. 1400 01:06:45,600 --> 01:06:47,760 I'm not interested in. Evidence it's not evidence of. 1401 01:06:48,160 --> 01:06:48,880 Right. Exactly. 1402 01:06:49,160 --> 01:06:52,240 But that's the point, though, since there's no actual evidence 1403 01:06:52,240 --> 01:06:56,240 one way or another. Well then, what exactly are you? 1404 01:06:56,720 --> 01:07:01,480 I'm supposed to be 100% loyal to a system that doesn't have all 1405 01:07:01,480 --> 01:07:03,040 the answers. No, from an academic 1406 01:07:03,040 --> 01:07:04,720 perspective. So for example let's say I'll 1407 01:07:04,760 --> 01:07:09,320 I'll, I'll try to give an example and maybe go but one one 1408 01:07:09,320 --> 01:07:11,840 academic. You know I would say unanimous 1409 01:07:11,840 --> 01:07:15,960 academics understanding of of the Bible would say that Judaism 1410 01:07:15,960 --> 01:07:20,080 evolved from a minolitrous kind of belief in God. 1411 01:07:20,480 --> 01:07:22,720 Well they're because they'll base it on archaeological 1412 01:07:22,720 --> 01:07:26,000 findings of but statues of different gods fine. 1413 01:07:28,240 --> 01:07:31,160 But he's I'm trying to explain what the critique is OK whether 1414 01:07:31,160 --> 01:07:34,240 we obviously we don't agree with all of them but at the same time 1415 01:07:34,240 --> 01:07:37,920 then we'll we'll say that you know we'll we'll we'll focus on 1416 01:07:37,920 --> 01:07:40,800 the Moshe's name as you know coming from an Egyptian name 1417 01:07:40,800 --> 01:07:43,000 because it's it's it's from Moses and at Moses see a 1418 01:07:43,000 --> 01:07:44,000 problem. With that. 1419 01:07:44,320 --> 01:07:46,120 I don't it's not about seeing a problem. 1420 01:07:47,160 --> 01:07:50,440 What I'm trying to say is, is that they're also theorizing. 1421 01:07:50,440 --> 01:07:53,280 They're also it. It's not a science. 1422 01:07:53,280 --> 01:07:57,440 And I don't see what I'm trying to say is if you had clear 1423 01:07:57,440 --> 01:07:59,040 proof. Clear proof. 1424 01:07:59,200 --> 01:08:00,560 Oh, by the way, JJ, we lost you. You. 1425 01:08:01,520 --> 01:08:02,960 There. I'm here. 1426 01:08:03,280 --> 01:08:04,640 Your screen is frozen. Oh, you're still there. 1427 01:08:04,640 --> 01:08:05,520 OK. I'm here. 1428 01:08:05,680 --> 01:08:06,840 My screen is free. I'm terribly sorry. 1429 01:08:06,840 --> 01:08:08,560 I'm trying to turn my camera off and on again. 1430 01:08:08,560 --> 01:08:11,600 One second. OK, there you go. 1431 01:08:11,800 --> 01:08:15,440 My apologies, OK, I was. Maybe I'm misunderstanding. 1432 01:08:15,440 --> 01:08:19,399 It could be. But in order to critique 1433 01:08:19,439 --> 01:08:23,680 against, look, if you follow, if you follow this discovery of 1434 01:08:23,680 --> 01:08:25,960 mine, you got to follow everything I say. 1435 01:08:26,240 --> 01:08:29,160 That would mean that what that person says has to have been 1436 01:08:29,160 --> 01:08:32,600 fully proven true, and that he's not actually theorizing about 1437 01:08:32,600 --> 01:08:34,720 anything. He's taking certain evidence 1438 01:08:34,720 --> 01:08:38,080 that he's found, and then he's putting his own spin or his own, 1439 01:08:38,520 --> 01:08:41,040 his own dialect around his findings. 1440 01:08:41,399 --> 01:08:45,640 But is that a fact? What he his theories are not 1441 01:08:45,760 --> 01:08:47,960 facts towards what he finds. I agree with that. 1442 01:08:47,960 --> 01:08:50,200 I. Can't say also use that for 1443 01:08:50,200 --> 01:08:52,399 their theory, so I'm trying to. I agree with you. 1444 01:08:52,399 --> 01:08:55,640 But what he would say is OK, I have my I have my theories based 1445 01:08:55,640 --> 01:08:58,760 on the evidence that we have. If you want to counter it, if 1446 01:08:58,760 --> 01:09:02,359 you want to, you know, prove it wrong, then prove it wrong 1447 01:09:02,359 --> 01:09:04,680 within the boundaries of our discipline, within the 1448 01:09:04,680 --> 01:09:06,160 boundaries of history. In other words, come at me with 1449 01:09:06,200 --> 01:09:10,359 alternative, historically based theories based on your own 1450 01:09:10,359 --> 01:09:12,720 archaeology, or based on your based on your own linguistics, 1451 01:09:12,720 --> 01:09:15,160 or based on your own findings. Whatever it is, don't come to me 1452 01:09:15,160 --> 01:09:17,840 and say I have a religious tradition that that contravenes 1453 01:09:17,840 --> 01:09:20,399 it, because again, the academic might not even get angry with 1454 01:09:20,399 --> 01:09:21,160 you. They're just saying you're 1455 01:09:21,160 --> 01:09:22,720 playing a different game. And if you're playing a 1456 01:09:22,720 --> 01:09:25,760 different game, don't come into my game and borrow things from 1457 01:09:25,760 --> 01:09:27,439 my game. If you want to play your game, 1458 01:09:27,439 --> 01:09:28,760 be the huraidy guy and play your game. 1459 01:09:29,120 --> 01:09:31,680 But don't. Don't borrow from from me 1460 01:09:32,120 --> 01:09:34,160 because I'm playing my own game. If you want to come into my 1461 01:09:34,160 --> 01:09:39,120 thing fair enough but respect my rules respect my time and that's 1462 01:09:39,200 --> 01:09:44,359 that's again. Now again it's it's it's a it's 1463 01:09:44,359 --> 01:09:47,520 a good critique but it's not absolutely a knock down critique 1464 01:09:48,120 --> 01:09:51,399 because again you you could well there are various ways of of 1465 01:09:51,399 --> 01:09:52,720 countering. One of them is to point out 1466 01:09:52,720 --> 01:09:57,320 again the the essential we're not tendentious, but but 1467 01:09:57,360 --> 01:10:00,800 precariousness or the precarity of some of these or some of 1468 01:10:00,800 --> 01:10:02,320 these ancient disciplines, right? 1469 01:10:02,520 --> 01:10:03,920 What do we know really about archaeology? 1470 01:10:03,920 --> 01:10:05,280 What do we know really about ancient history? 1471 01:10:05,280 --> 01:10:06,760 That was my point. Still discovering things all the 1472 01:10:07,000 --> 01:10:09,600 time, and that's not an unreasonable thing to say, but 1473 01:10:09,600 --> 01:10:12,160 nonetheless, there, you know. There's a minimalist, there's 1474 01:10:12,160 --> 01:10:13,800 maximalist, there's so many different. 1475 01:10:13,800 --> 01:10:15,320 Approaches. You're talking about a field 1476 01:10:15,320 --> 01:10:18,440 that is, so it's still developing and we have within 1477 01:10:18,440 --> 01:10:20,840 the field itself. There's such a split, like you 1478 01:10:20,840 --> 01:10:23,920 said, minimalist, maximalist to now tell. 1479 01:10:24,440 --> 01:10:29,080 It's just weird to me like that. You're basically saying that you 1480 01:10:29,080 --> 01:10:32,840 have to you, you have to take a certain sector of how this 1481 01:10:32,840 --> 01:10:37,000 discipline has been unearthed and you have to give it full 1482 01:10:37,000 --> 01:10:41,000 legitimacy in order to borrow any idea out of it, in order to 1483 01:10:41,000 --> 01:10:43,920 use as supporting evidence towards your own theory. 1484 01:10:43,920 --> 01:10:46,400 To me that's a little bit much, but that's. 1485 01:10:47,360 --> 01:10:49,200 It. I understand where you're coming 1486 01:10:49,200 --> 01:10:54,160 from, but you know, you know, I. But again, this is a point I 1487 01:10:54,160 --> 01:10:56,840 think made by James Kugel which was recorded in an essay by 1488 01:10:56,840 --> 01:10:59,880 Tamara Ross where he basically says, look, it's very nice. 1489 01:10:59,880 --> 01:11:04,240 You know, religious Bible scholars like this like using 1490 01:11:04,240 --> 01:11:09,200 sometimes Uguritic or Acadian or other languages to to to shed 1491 01:11:09,200 --> 01:11:11,200 light to illuminate what Hebrew words mean. 1492 01:11:11,200 --> 01:11:12,960 Right. So an excellent example of this 1493 01:11:12,960 --> 01:11:18,920 is is, you know the famous phrase, right, forget Jerusalem, 1494 01:11:19,040 --> 01:11:20,760 let my right hand forget. Right. 1495 01:11:20,840 --> 01:11:23,000 It's a bit of an awkward phrase translating English forget what? 1496 01:11:23,000 --> 01:11:25,640 So the King James my right hand forget it's cunning or something 1497 01:11:25,640 --> 01:11:28,480 like that but but actually but apparently so I've been told, 1498 01:11:29,000 --> 01:11:30,800 according to I think one of his Angel language Ugaritic or 1499 01:11:30,800 --> 01:11:33,560 something, the word thakka that the sort of the verb means to 1500 01:11:33,560 --> 01:11:36,240 wither, right. Imagine Tishka Kamini. 1501 01:11:36,240 --> 01:11:39,320 It's a pun meaning if I forget Jerusalem made my right hand. 1502 01:11:39,320 --> 01:11:41,480 Shakka in that case made my right hand wither May it just 1503 01:11:41,600 --> 01:11:45,040 sort of like full limp basically and that's how it actually 1504 01:11:45,040 --> 01:11:46,280 translated in some modern bibles. 1505 01:11:46,280 --> 01:11:47,720 And that's sort of a more satisfactory thing. 1506 01:11:47,720 --> 01:11:52,760 And again, this is, this is a way of using an external 1507 01:11:52,760 --> 01:11:54,720 discipline. However, if you go to an ancient 1508 01:11:54,720 --> 01:11:57,520 linguist and say, you see, I'm, I'm just borrowing, I'm 1509 01:11:57,520 --> 01:12:01,720 borrowing some parts of your lexicon to to to to base what 1510 01:12:01,720 --> 01:12:04,680 I'm what I'm saying, they'll say, well, I assume you'll turn 1511 01:12:04,680 --> 01:12:07,720 the page in the lexicon and see what what is the academic 1512 01:12:07,720 --> 01:12:10,560 consensus on, let's say, the origins of the word ivory, you 1513 01:12:10,560 --> 01:12:13,280 know, and where the Eve room come from and what and the 1514 01:12:13,280 --> 01:12:14,680 implications of that on Jewish history. 1515 01:12:14,880 --> 01:12:17,360 And you'll say, no, I don't fancy turning the page of that 1516 01:12:17,360 --> 01:12:19,600 lexicon, thank you very much. I'm just going to use page 20 1517 01:12:19,600 --> 01:12:21,640 and not page 21. It's, it's. 1518 01:12:21,800 --> 01:12:23,920 You're right, you're right. But again. 1519 01:12:23,920 --> 01:12:26,000 Might not be very happy with you say stop using my lexicon. 1520 01:12:26,320 --> 01:12:29,600 If they were more disciplined about their discipline, I'd I'd 1521 01:12:29,600 --> 01:12:32,640 appreciate that argument more. But when you have, you know, 1522 01:12:32,640 --> 01:12:35,400 it's not like, it's not like biblical criticism is like 1523 01:12:35,760 --> 01:12:39,840 uniform in the way it thinks. We have such a spectrum over 1524 01:12:39,840 --> 01:12:41,040 here. You know what I mean? 1525 01:12:41,120 --> 01:12:43,720 There is rabbinics. Now there's rabbinics, That's 1526 01:12:43,720 --> 01:12:47,680 why there's well, the Gooch method is is not necessarily 1527 01:12:47,680 --> 01:12:50,600 rabbinics, right? It it, it allows for its own to 1528 01:12:50,640 --> 01:12:52,840 for its own interpretation to be put in. 1529 01:12:53,200 --> 01:12:58,440 What I'm trying to say is though is that the discipline itself is 1530 01:12:58,640 --> 01:13:03,520 is heavily argued in terms of its content in its within its 1531 01:13:03,520 --> 01:13:04,600 own school. So. 1532 01:13:05,240 --> 01:13:07,400 Yeah, no, I would agree to a certain degree that that's 1533 01:13:07,400 --> 01:13:10,800 definitely true with regards to to source criticism, because so 1534 01:13:10,800 --> 01:13:13,000 at the moment that the picture of source criticism is actually 1535 01:13:13,000 --> 01:13:14,800 quite a grim 1. Otherwise, there's enormous 1536 01:13:14,800 --> 01:13:17,520 amount of disagreement among the various scholars or it's 1537 01:13:17,520 --> 01:13:21,360 something more like, let's say archaeology or sort of ancient. 1538 01:13:21,360 --> 01:13:23,560 Archaeology, But then again. Then. 1539 01:13:23,600 --> 01:13:28,240 Again, then again, with archaeology, it's hard to take a 1540 01:13:28,240 --> 01:13:31,360 text like the Torah and to try to fit in an exactly with 1541 01:13:31,360 --> 01:13:34,320 archaeology, because what? How exactly do we even 1542 01:13:34,320 --> 01:13:37,520 understand what the is the Torah completely historical text? 1543 01:13:38,000 --> 01:13:40,760 We don't know. OK, so so we're not even. 1544 01:13:40,960 --> 01:13:42,440 Kind of worms that that I haven't. 1545 01:13:42,440 --> 01:13:43,120 OK, I'm not. Gonna do that. 1546 01:13:43,120 --> 01:13:45,520 We're not gonna do that, I mean. Maybe in the future we can 1547 01:13:45,520 --> 01:13:48,280 discuss that because that that's that's that's an important point 1548 01:13:48,280 --> 01:13:49,480 as well that's what. I'm saying it doesn't 1549 01:13:49,480 --> 01:13:51,960 necessarily have to disagree. That's what I'm trying. 1550 01:13:52,360 --> 01:13:54,800 Oh, no, no, not at all. But, but that's part of The 1551 01:13:54,800 --> 01:13:59,880 thing is that is that the gush, the advantage of the gush method 1552 01:13:59,880 --> 01:14:01,840 is now turned on its head because one advantage of the 1553 01:14:01,840 --> 01:14:03,960 gush method is it does use these external disciplines. 1554 01:14:03,960 --> 01:14:06,760 Like I want to talk about a battle that happens. 1555 01:14:06,960 --> 01:14:09,160 I can say, hey, guess what, they actually dug up this battle. 1556 01:14:09,800 --> 01:14:12,240 You know, and we have evidence of, you know, the kind of tools 1557 01:14:12,240 --> 01:14:13,720 they used. And we have the kind of, you 1558 01:14:13,720 --> 01:14:16,120 know, the coroner now putting out these, these volumes of 1559 01:14:16,120 --> 01:14:19,160 Tanakh Eretis or whatever it's called, exactly where, you know, 1560 01:14:19,400 --> 01:14:21,360 all sorts of artifacts and all sorts of things have been done. 1561 01:14:21,360 --> 01:14:24,120 You know, the discipline of archaeology in some respects and 1562 01:14:24,120 --> 01:14:26,920 in some ways is fantastic for the study of the Bible. 1563 01:14:26,920 --> 01:14:29,640 And actually we'd be forced to ignore it because hey, you know, 1564 01:14:29,680 --> 01:14:32,160 they've dug up some phenomenal things and and you know, 1565 01:14:32,160 --> 01:14:34,760 they've, they've shed incredible light on ancient Israelite 1566 01:14:36,360 --> 01:14:38,440 civilization and and what it was fighting against, et cetera. 1567 01:14:39,000 --> 01:14:41,920 And however, it's opening a Pandora's box. 1568 01:14:41,920 --> 01:14:43,680 I think that's the best way of putting this criticism to open 1569 01:14:43,680 --> 01:14:46,760 the Pandora's box and that is hard and you can't shout it from 1570 01:14:46,760 --> 01:14:52,400 that so, so much out regular. Just to reiterate, the the three 1571 01:14:52,400 --> 01:14:55,600 characteristics are the centralization of chat or the 1572 01:14:55,600 --> 01:15:00,240 focus on chat is the main locus of of of content and of 1573 01:15:00,240 --> 01:15:02,560 religious messages. The centralization of torata 1574 01:15:02,560 --> 01:15:05,880 Adam, the human concerns and the the methodological 1575 01:15:06,720 --> 01:15:10,040 omnivorousness or eclecticism within the heart of the of the 1576 01:15:10,040 --> 01:15:11,760 gush method and the critiques of each one. 1577 01:15:11,760 --> 01:15:15,520 And the critique of the of the shat is, you know, maybe shat so 1578 01:15:15,520 --> 01:15:18,200 not all that cracked up to be. And maybe actually there are 1579 01:15:18,440 --> 01:15:20,600 deeper levels of meaning which should really be focused on and 1580 01:15:20,600 --> 01:15:23,440 only according to Zohar, only a fool would focus on shat. 1581 01:15:24,000 --> 01:15:25,920 And who's to say that shat is so satisfying anyway? 1582 01:15:26,640 --> 01:15:28,680 And of course the Torata Adam, Well, is the historicist 1583 01:15:28,680 --> 01:15:30,520 critique. Well, maybe the Adam we're 1584 01:15:30,520 --> 01:15:33,160 talking about 3 1/2 thousand years ago is difficult to talk 1585 01:15:33,160 --> 01:15:35,680 about difficult to read about difficult to transpose neatly 1586 01:15:35,680 --> 01:15:38,760 into three millennia later. And and finally which is the the 1587 01:15:38,760 --> 01:15:40,800 methodological point which is that OK, if you're opening a 1588 01:15:40,800 --> 01:15:42,800 Pandora's box and and if you're not going to be consistent, then 1589 01:15:42,800 --> 01:15:43,800 maybe you shouldn't do it at all. 1590 01:15:44,120 --> 01:15:49,560 That is my reading the map and and I will say to the to the 1591 01:15:49,560 --> 01:15:53,040 listeners and to the to the audience who are we're listening 1592 01:15:53,040 --> 01:15:56,880 to this which is that as I said before I'm merely a an 1593 01:15:56,880 --> 01:16:00,760 enthusiastic amateur analyst of this thing and I'd be very 1594 01:16:01,000 --> 01:16:04,640 pleased indeed if there are any. You know if any of you have have 1595 01:16:04,720 --> 01:16:07,120 different readings or different understandings of what this 1596 01:16:07,120 --> 01:16:09,600 method is or maybe I've missed something out or maybe I've 1597 01:16:09,600 --> 01:16:11,040 overstated something or understated something. 1598 01:16:11,040 --> 01:16:13,480 I'd be very happy. Because again I want to 1599 01:16:13,480 --> 01:16:15,760 understand this phenomenon as best as I can and I don't 1600 01:16:15,760 --> 01:16:18,000 believe that my reading is necessarily superior to anyone 1601 01:16:18,000 --> 01:16:21,720 else's and therefore you know please please do come at me with 1602 01:16:22,240 --> 01:16:24,680 with with anything you want. And the second thing and and you 1603 01:16:24,680 --> 01:16:26,920 know with this I sort of, I guess I'll finish my piece, is 1604 01:16:26,920 --> 01:16:30,920 that if anyone who understands Hebrew, there's a wonderful 1605 01:16:32,040 --> 01:16:34,960 series of videos that Yashiro Harrison puts out every week 1606 01:16:35,080 --> 01:16:36,800 which is called Khedush Mehagush. 1607 01:16:37,160 --> 01:16:41,200 OK. And it is is 2 scholars of the 1608 01:16:41,200 --> 01:16:44,080 Ghosh, namely Raviako Mehdan of Amnon Bazak sitting together and 1609 01:16:44,080 --> 01:16:46,120 for about 5 or 10 minutes just discussing the Parsha. 1610 01:16:47,200 --> 01:16:48,680 And they have, they've been doing this for a few years. 1611 01:16:48,680 --> 01:16:50,360 They have a few of these little videos on each parsha. 1612 01:16:50,920 --> 01:16:56,520 So you put, you know whatever it is and and it is in those 1613 01:16:56,520 --> 01:16:59,200 discussions that you'll see some you know, the gush method as 1614 01:16:59,200 --> 01:17:01,560 sort of in action as they're talking about, as discussing. 1615 01:17:01,560 --> 01:17:04,080 And you'll see what are they interested in discussing and and 1616 01:17:04,080 --> 01:17:06,000 how do they reach their conclusions, what is considered 1617 01:17:06,000 --> 01:17:08,640 a good piece of data and what isn't etcetera, etcetera. 1618 01:17:08,640 --> 01:17:11,880 And you know, I mean if you have the Hebrew it's it's just a 1619 01:17:11,880 --> 01:17:14,040 wonderful experience, a great way to prepare for the parsha 1620 01:17:14,040 --> 01:17:18,040 anyway and and also to my mind the best way to see this sort of 1621 01:17:18,040 --> 01:17:22,880 inaction as it's developing. So again, I would recommend to 1622 01:17:22,880 --> 01:17:26,760 all who who can and yeah, I think that's. 1623 01:17:27,080 --> 01:17:29,280 I think that was a really amazing, but it's almost like we 1624 01:17:29,280 --> 01:17:31,120 we watched you play chess against yourself. 1625 01:17:31,560 --> 01:17:33,920 You really just, you know, you you showed. 1626 01:17:33,920 --> 01:17:34,840 You pulled the shut. Down. 1627 01:17:34,880 --> 01:17:36,720 Yeah, you pulled the shut down. Yes, yes, you. 1628 01:17:37,120 --> 01:17:38,720 Pulled the shut down. Exactly. 1629 01:17:38,720 --> 01:17:41,760 And and and honestly, it's very important because you know, in 1630 01:17:41,760 --> 01:17:44,840 this century especially we're, we need to know what we're up 1631 01:17:44,840 --> 01:17:47,520 against and we need to also be intellectually honest in 1632 01:17:47,520 --> 01:17:50,920 understanding or that like there are shortcomings to every single 1633 01:17:50,920 --> 01:17:52,960 method. And it's OK. 1634 01:17:52,960 --> 01:17:54,240 Sometimes we don't have an answer. 1635 01:17:54,360 --> 01:17:57,800 We're digging, we're looking. I think that obviously we didn't 1636 01:17:57,800 --> 01:18:00,360 respond, we didn't really critique the critiques like for 1637 01:18:00,360 --> 01:18:01,920 example, the Kabbalah point that you brought up. 1638 01:18:02,160 --> 01:18:05,040 But again, these are things that we've discussed on other 1639 01:18:05,040 --> 01:18:06,960 episodes. I think Rabbi Foreman, for 1640 01:18:06,960 --> 01:18:12,160 anybody who wants to understand the response against biblical 1641 01:18:12,160 --> 01:18:13,840 criticism, check out that episode that we did. 1642 01:18:13,880 --> 01:18:17,080 Yes, absolutely Foreman. And you know, I think this was 1643 01:18:17,080 --> 01:18:18,880 an amazing breakdown. Really enjoyable. 1644 01:18:18,880 --> 01:18:20,400 Fantastic. And by the way, the reason why I 1645 01:18:20,400 --> 01:18:22,720 was I was trimming it over there is because I'm very passionate 1646 01:18:22,720 --> 01:18:24,520 about this. As you could tell, it's a good 1647 01:18:24,760 --> 01:18:27,560 thing to be passionate about. And if and if someone reaches 1648 01:18:27,560 --> 01:18:29,880 out to you maybe who has, you know another take on this or or 1649 01:18:29,880 --> 01:18:31,800 critiques of the critiques as you said or something else, you 1650 01:18:31,800 --> 01:18:34,120 know this is this is very much a conversation worth having. 1651 01:18:34,640 --> 01:18:36,200 I I fully agree. So. 1652 01:18:37,000 --> 01:18:38,200 Yeah, go ahead. You were gonna say something? 1653 01:18:38,200 --> 01:18:39,000 No, no. Yeah. 1654 01:18:39,000 --> 01:18:43,360 I was gonna just ask you what is, what do you think the future 1655 01:18:43,360 --> 01:18:45,320 of this is? Because we're noticing actually 1656 01:18:46,480 --> 01:18:49,240 there's like a shift right now. It's exploding. 1657 01:18:49,240 --> 01:18:53,520 Like you go to you go to any farm store and they have like a 1658 01:18:53,520 --> 01:18:57,040 whole the front, the the window section is all like you know the 1659 01:18:57,320 --> 01:19:00,480 the Magid studies on Tanakh. We love, I mean. 1660 01:19:01,480 --> 01:19:05,640 We're trying to, we, we we we're trying to, you know, we want to 1661 01:19:05,640 --> 01:19:07,920 eventually interview every single author if we can. 1662 01:19:08,760 --> 01:19:10,040 We've interviewed a few of them already. 1663 01:19:10,040 --> 01:19:14,760 And you know, I'm seeing that there's people are a lot like 1664 01:19:14,760 --> 01:19:16,960 even these conversations that we had in the past about like 1665 01:19:17,160 --> 01:19:19,640 rationalism versus mysticism and all that there. 1666 01:19:20,040 --> 01:19:25,040 I think a lot of it is just like part of that same fervor for, 1667 01:19:25,040 --> 01:19:28,600 you know, it's it's kind of there's some, I don't know if 1668 01:19:28,600 --> 01:19:31,040 you if you agree with me on that, but I feel like people are 1669 01:19:31,040 --> 01:19:35,480 more interested in, in getting to the fundamentals and they 1670 01:19:35,480 --> 01:19:37,280 were maybe 20 years ago. I don't remember anyone talking 1671 01:19:37,280 --> 01:19:39,520 about the Rambam 20 years ago. I don't remember people talking 1672 01:19:39,520 --> 01:19:42,160 about, you know, intertextuality. 1673 01:19:42,160 --> 01:19:44,240 I never heard that phrase growing up, you know. 1674 01:19:45,720 --> 01:19:48,480 I I 100% agree with you. There's a growing fast for this 1675 01:19:48,480 --> 01:19:50,880 stuff. One understand I will say that 1676 01:19:50,880 --> 01:19:53,240 that certainly with the Korean maggot thing, this whole gush 1677 01:19:53,240 --> 01:19:56,320 method a lot of it is down to the the vision of of Matthew 1678 01:19:56,320 --> 01:20:00,480 Miller who's the owner and and the director of of of Maggot 1679 01:20:00,480 --> 01:20:03,880 Press of anyone who knows him. He's a very sort of, I mean he's 1680 01:20:03,880 --> 01:20:07,680 a great guy, but very, you know, he has a vision and he really 1681 01:20:07,680 --> 01:20:10,200 follows through with it. And basically he's he's, he's 1682 01:20:10,200 --> 01:20:12,400 brought this from this kind of fringe. 1683 01:20:12,960 --> 01:20:15,400 Yeshiva approach. You know a few scholars approach 1684 01:20:15,400 --> 01:20:18,800 to you know if you put it in really attractive books and you 1685 01:20:18,800 --> 01:20:21,760 know and and make sure the high quality and and edited very 1686 01:20:21,760 --> 01:20:23,640 well, etcetera and then put them on everyone's bookshelf. 1687 01:20:23,640 --> 01:20:25,560 The same with the Stein's art such as basically everything the 1688 01:20:25,560 --> 01:20:27,920 maggot are doing. It's really in a funny way 1689 01:20:27,920 --> 01:20:34,640 creating almost a a, a maggot and Karan have created a kind of 1690 01:20:34,640 --> 01:20:37,640 space for Modern Orthodox communities to be their own 1691 01:20:37,640 --> 01:20:38,680 community. Because I don't know if you 1692 01:20:38,720 --> 01:20:41,600 remember this growing up in Modern Orthodox Schulz, all the 1693 01:20:41,600 --> 01:20:45,040 Sidoruma Art Scroll and all the Humashima arts grow, right, But 1694 01:20:45,040 --> 01:20:46,240 which is a hurriedly thing, right? 1695 01:20:46,440 --> 01:20:48,200 And basically you sort of you imbibed that growing up. 1696 01:20:48,200 --> 01:20:50,960 I mean some had hurts or whatever, but basically they 1697 01:20:50,960 --> 01:20:53,960 dominated whereas because of this new part of the publishing 1698 01:20:53,960 --> 01:20:54,720 industry. So. 1699 01:20:54,720 --> 01:20:57,400 So you have you know Modern Orthodoxy is creating its own 1700 01:20:58,320 --> 01:21:00,560 Tanakh method, has its own machine, its own Shas. 1701 01:21:00,560 --> 01:21:03,160 Now with the Stein's thing, it has its own Sidorim for 1702 01:21:03,160 --> 01:21:04,960 Yomatsmojami Richelaim. I don't know if you've seen this 1703 01:21:05,200 --> 01:21:07,400 like it has its own Mahzorim with the Jonathan Sacks 1704 01:21:08,000 --> 01:21:11,120 introductions and and it's really, it's carving out for 1705 01:21:11,120 --> 01:21:13,440 itself its own niche. Now regarding the future of it, 1706 01:21:13,680 --> 01:21:16,600 I think the Tanakh, the Gush Tanakh method will always remain 1707 01:21:16,600 --> 01:21:19,760 unsatisfying to some. It will always remain a little 1708 01:21:19,760 --> 01:21:23,280 bit too daring and a little bit too modern for some. 1709 01:21:23,280 --> 01:21:25,240 Out-of-the-box, it's a little bit out-of-the-box. 1710 01:21:25,520 --> 01:21:26,680 Yeah, yeah. It's too out-of-the-box. 1711 01:21:26,680 --> 01:21:30,320 It's too leaves too much up to personal creativity and and to 1712 01:21:30,320 --> 01:21:32,680 sort of innovation. And innovation is something that 1713 01:21:32,680 --> 01:21:34,480 a lot of people don't like nowadays and therefore it will 1714 01:21:34,480 --> 01:21:37,360 always not appeal to them. And it always won't appeal to 1715 01:21:37,360 --> 01:21:40,480 the more academic purists who will say, listen, if I'm if I 1716 01:21:40,480 --> 01:21:42,200 want to find that ancient history, I'm going to read 1717 01:21:42,200 --> 01:21:45,000 ancient history and that's it. And it always won't appeal to 1718 01:21:45,000 --> 01:21:46,920 them. But there are a lot of, there's 1719 01:21:46,920 --> 01:21:49,400 a lot of people in the centre for whom it will appeal to. 1720 01:21:49,400 --> 01:21:52,280 And I agree with you, it's growing and as I can foresee in 1721 01:21:52,280 --> 01:21:54,160 the future, I think it will grow precisely this reason people 1722 01:21:54,160 --> 01:21:58,400 like the sophisticated, multifaceted, you know, 1723 01:21:58,400 --> 01:22:03,600 interesting, curious, innovative form of Tanakh study and you 1724 01:22:03,600 --> 01:22:05,800 know, and there's an enormous amount of potential certainly 1725 01:22:05,800 --> 01:22:09,240 for educating young people also just of of keeping and retaining 1726 01:22:09,240 --> 01:22:11,320 interest among adults. I I I think it's going to grow. 1727 01:22:11,760 --> 01:22:13,920 But nonetheless, it should be thought about. 1728 01:22:13,920 --> 01:22:17,400 It should be critiqued. It should be ruminated over like 1729 01:22:17,400 --> 01:22:20,360 like any set of ideas. Absolutely. 1730 01:22:20,360 --> 01:22:29,320 And one thing about it also, I feel that even like you 1731 01:22:29,320 --> 01:22:33,400 mentioned the rationalist versus mysticism, or let's put it into 1732 01:22:33,400 --> 01:22:35,960 different context, let's say already versus Modern Orthodox, 1733 01:22:36,720 --> 01:22:42,400 I feel like this method does have a potential to creep into 1734 01:22:42,400 --> 01:22:45,160 the Haredi world. I do. 1735 01:22:45,520 --> 01:22:51,040 And I actually see it because when when it's presented in a 1736 01:22:51,040 --> 01:22:54,960 way where the fact that it's out-of-the-box is not so much 1737 01:22:54,960 --> 01:22:58,960 said, it's not so much pronounced and you you let's say 1738 01:22:58,960 --> 01:23:03,960 just dress it as a normal, you know, Drasha, I actually see 1739 01:23:03,960 --> 01:23:08,080 that like Kariti people, they're they they they really love it, 1740 01:23:08,320 --> 01:23:10,160 you know. And like if you take Rabbi 1741 01:23:10,160 --> 01:23:12,960 Foreman and you give Rabbi Foreman and you just, you're 1742 01:23:12,960 --> 01:23:16,080 talking to just a regular yeshivish guy, maybe Haredi, but 1743 01:23:16,080 --> 01:23:17,800 let's call a yeshivish guy, right. 1744 01:23:17,800 --> 01:23:21,240 He listens to an idea from form and he doesn't understand all 1745 01:23:21,240 --> 01:23:24,120 the things that are behind it. He's just, you know, the idea 1746 01:23:24,120 --> 01:23:25,600 with the with the presentation everything. 1747 01:23:26,400 --> 01:23:29,280 They love it. He's he's he's really, really 1748 01:23:29,280 --> 01:23:33,600 able to to connect because the guz method more than just being 1749 01:23:33,600 --> 01:23:37,160 a method, it, it talks to the soul to rata dam like you're 1750 01:23:37,160 --> 01:23:38,400 saying. You know what I mean? 1751 01:23:38,920 --> 01:23:42,080 So I do think that it has potential if people can get past 1752 01:23:42,080 --> 01:23:45,560 certain barriers of really opening up to a wider sector. 1753 01:23:46,040 --> 01:23:48,240 My opinion I could be wrong. I could be very wrong. 1754 01:23:48,600 --> 01:23:51,000 I I I tend to agree with you, and I think it raises the 1755 01:23:51,000 --> 01:23:55,200 intriguing possibility of having a sort of haredi translator of 1756 01:23:55,200 --> 01:23:55,880 the gush method. So. 1757 01:23:56,160 --> 01:23:58,760 It. Could be that you'll have, I 1758 01:23:58,760 --> 01:24:01,120 don't know, maybe someone like Shmuley Phillips or one of these 1759 01:24:01,120 --> 01:24:04,280 people who you've had a yes. He sort of dresses it a bit. 1760 01:24:04,440 --> 01:24:07,040 Yeah, dresses a bit. He straddled the two worlds and 1761 01:24:07,040 --> 01:24:10,480 is able to to sort of put it in a way, in a manner that's 1762 01:24:10,480 --> 01:24:13,680 palatable for more. I wonder if we'll see maybe a 1763 01:24:13,680 --> 01:24:17,080 rise of like Art scroll dressed version. 1764 01:24:17,080 --> 01:24:19,720 I was thinking that I was thinking about that as you was. 1765 01:24:19,800 --> 01:24:22,240 I really think that that is a real possibility. 1766 01:24:22,520 --> 01:24:27,520 It is that good and it is. It's it's it's it's an not just 1767 01:24:27,520 --> 01:24:30,440 in terms of the method itself, but the ideas that are being 1768 01:24:30,440 --> 01:24:34,400 produced through the method is just incredible sometimes. 1769 01:24:35,200 --> 01:24:38,000 So I think that it has potential you know to really grow as we're 1770 01:24:38,000 --> 01:24:40,360 saying. And I just wanted to mention if 1771 01:24:40,600 --> 01:24:45,320 if if our listeners have not listened to J JS podcast, The 1772 01:24:45,320 --> 01:24:48,560 Podcast of Jewish Ideas or Jewish Ideas or of. 1773 01:24:49,280 --> 01:24:50,840 Of Jewish ideas of Jewish. I apologize. 1774 01:24:51,520 --> 01:24:54,560 Podcast of Jewish ideas. They are. 1775 01:24:54,720 --> 01:24:57,720 You guys are missing out. I've listened to quite a few. 1776 01:24:58,720 --> 01:25:02,040 It is. It is high level, very, very 1777 01:25:02,240 --> 01:25:07,880 intellectual and the conversations are extremely well 1778 01:25:07,880 --> 01:25:12,240 done and the topics are amazing. The guests are amazing. 1779 01:25:12,240 --> 01:25:15,360 Please listen to this podcast and you also have an upcoming 1780 01:25:15,360 --> 01:25:18,680 book which we hope to have you back on again for time. 1781 01:25:19,480 --> 01:25:22,560 Yes, thank you very much and I really appreciate this and you 1782 01:25:22,560 --> 01:25:24,200 know, I appreciate what you guys are doing as well. 1783 01:25:24,200 --> 01:25:27,080 So I hope we're all very successful in what we do. 1784 01:25:27,320 --> 01:25:28,200 Amen. Thank you. 1785 01:25:28,360 --> 01:25:30,000 We brief you everything. Thank you. 1786 01:25:30,440 --> 01:25:33,640 I had a lot of fun with this. You too see you. 1787 01:25:40,640 --> 01:25:42,880 Hey guys, thanks so much for tuning into the Judas and 1788 01:25:42,880 --> 01:25:45,880 Demystified podcast. We really appreciate all your 1789 01:25:45,880 --> 01:25:49,760 support and your feedback. If you wanna help us grow the 1790 01:25:49,760 --> 01:25:53,400 podcast, keep spreading the word, Share with your friends, 1791 01:25:53,400 --> 01:25:55,400 family or whoever you think would be interested. 1792 01:25:56,160 --> 01:25:59,720 We also opened a Patreon so you can become a patron. 1793 01:25:59,920 --> 01:26:02,720 Contribute any small amount you'd like, which would really 1794 01:26:02,720 --> 01:26:06,200 help us grow the show. Our Patreon is 1795 01:26:06,560 --> 01:26:12,720 www.patreon.com/judaism. Pretty easy to remember. 1796 01:26:13,120 --> 01:26:16,280 Thank you again and we hope to keep putting out great shows for 1797 01:26:16,280 --> 01:26:27,280 you guys. Before we go, we want to thank 1798 01:26:27,280 --> 01:26:31,760 our Patreon supporters by name. Those are the supporters that 1799 01:26:31,760 --> 01:26:34,960 are helping make this show happen because frankly Benty and 1800 01:26:34,960 --> 01:26:38,440 I are full time workers who don't really have so much time 1801 01:26:38,440 --> 01:26:41,680 on our hands because we have families, we have kids and it's 1802 01:26:41,680 --> 01:26:45,600 just a passion project that got way bigger than we expected. 1803 01:26:46,080 --> 01:26:49,520 So we're dedicating more time to this and obviously our 1804 01:26:49,520 --> 01:26:52,040 production value up until this point hasn't been great 1805 01:26:52,480 --> 01:26:56,440 considering that we film this in Benzie's basement using a green 1806 01:26:56,440 --> 01:27:00,280 screen and a crappy little microphone and not such great 1807 01:27:00,840 --> 01:27:03,200 equipment to be honest, I'm sure you all realize that. 1808 01:27:03,560 --> 01:27:08,040 So we are hoping to up our quality and to get better 1809 01:27:08,040 --> 01:27:12,160 equipment and part of that process is going to be due to 1810 01:27:12,160 --> 01:27:14,000 you guys, the listeners and supporters. 1811 01:27:14,880 --> 01:27:20,360 If you go to our Patreon page, patreon.com/judaism, you will 1812 01:27:20,360 --> 01:27:22,640 see all the different tiers of ways you can help us out. 1813 01:27:22,640 --> 01:27:26,000 So first of all, we want to thank our super patron Jordan 1814 01:27:26,000 --> 01:27:30,600 Carmeli, our platinum patron Craig Gordon, our Gold patrons 1815 01:27:31,120 --> 01:27:35,520 David Khayev, Laser Cohen, Travis Kruger, Vasily Volkov, 1816 01:27:36,480 --> 01:27:41,440 Silver patrons Ellen Fleischer, Daniel Maximov, Rabbi Penny 1817 01:27:41,440 --> 01:27:43,400 Rosenthal, and Jeffrey Wasserman. 1818 01:27:43,880 --> 01:27:47,920 Thank you all for supporting the show and we hope you guys enjoy.