Donniel Hartman

R' Hartman has given his new book a provocative title, but the content is much less dramatic. While he calls for the primacy of the ethical imperative, in a sense it's a call for balance between extremes that demand absolute obedience to God without concern for wider meaning, or alternatively, ethics that exist without the religious dimension. It's primarily a call for religion to right itself and recognize that it's through ethics that we demonstrate our commitment to faith.

The message isn't radical, but it's well argued, though brief.… (más)

This was a good contribution to our modern discussion of relgion vs morality. The tension between religious tradition and secular morality is a source of suffering and discord in the modern world, and I think this is a very important discussion to be having right now.

I like the author's willingness to limit himself to discussing the problems in his own religious tradition, rather than searching for the mote in his neighbor's eye. Although obviously this problem is universal among religious traditions, the author's willingness towards self-searching is a strength of his arguments. I also appreciated his interest in working on differentiating between dogma and moral righteousness.

This discussion cannot just be -about- religion; it must be created with the participation of religious people. Rabbi Hartman has offered valuable insights and contributions to the discussion that we all need to have.… (más)

_Putting God Second_ is written from a distinctively Jewish point of view, but its lessons apply to other religions as well. Rabbi Hartman finds two problems that appear to be the result of the attitude that God must be put first in human life. The first he calls God Intoxication, a state of mind in which immersion in thoughts of God are so central to an individual's personality that they perceive little or no meaning in other human activities, motives or even other individual humans. The everyday concerns of earning a living, maintaining a family or running society are seen as inferior, if necessary, activities. This is not exclusive to Judaism, of course. Both Christian monasticism, and Buddhist thought encourage the believer to abandon the ordinary world rather than to work for its benefit. The second tendency that Hartman outlines is God Manipulation. This is the use of interpretations of God's will to justify manipulation of other people and even killing of those who interpret God differently. The central Jewish identity as God's Chosen people might make it seem as though this is exclusively Jewish problem. However, Christianity and Islam have also taken up the idea of having been given an exclusive set of truths about God's will.

Hartman points out, through stories from the Bible and from the Talmud, that Judaism has another strain of thought. God Himself is held to an external standard of justice, as when Abraham challenges God's plan to destroy Sodom. The idea that good is defined outside of the preferences of God or Gods is also found in the thought of Plato. The prophets also proclaim a God who is more interested in human kindness than in sacrifices, directing His people to clothe the naked, feed the hungry, give justice to widows and orphans.

This book is thought provoking and informative. It addresses the question of interpretation and application of Scripture and of the nature of a truly religious life in ways that can be applied to any set of beliefs.

Anyone concerned about the role of religion in society should find this book interesting.… (más)

Putting God Second is a book on "How to Save Religion from Itself" (per the subtitle). Although the argument is constructed by a rabbi with reference to Judaism and drawing on Jewish sources, it is also addressed to other religions, all of which the author understands to be at risk from the same "auto-immune" problems that he sees afflicting his own tradition and community of faith. In particular, he is concerned with the relationship of religion to ethics, seeing ethical behavior as the highest aspiration of religion, but also observing that religion itself can motivate profoundly unethical conduct.

With respect to Judaism, author Donniel Hartman is unsurprisingly on solid ground. He makes a good case from the Tanakh and the Talmud to support the supremacy of ethics and social conscience over the received codes of religious conduct and even over conviction of the existence of the Jewish God. This particular religion, in addition to being the one which the author can address with authority, supplies particularly sore and evident contemporary cases of the failings that the rabbi seeks to highlight. Although it is not made an explicit site of the conversation, the injustice of the Jewish Israeli state's dispossession of the non-Jewish inhabitants of that region is a constant presence in the background.

The other two Abrahamic religions, Christianity and Islam, are also vulnerable to the basic criticisms and cautions that Hartman raises. He discusses "God-intoxication," where a sense of being commanded by the transcendent leaves adherents careless about the well-being of mere humans, and "God-manipulation," where believers leverage their religious identities and dedication to "deserve" privilege and dominance over others. In a further section, he focuses on the range of cases "when scripture is the problem," recognizing that the most revered texts contain words preserved for millennia that nevertheless clearly sanction unjust and appalling conduct. No matter how a clever exegesis may recuperate such passages for the benefit of sincere believers, ingenious readings do not remove the indelible hazard (and recurring damage) from a sentiment like Psalm 137:9: "Blessed be he that shall take and dash thy little ones against the rock" (in reference to the Babylonian oppressors).

Augustine of Hippo rationalized that the babies of the psalm were a figure of the germinal desires that would lead to sin. Curiously, Aleister Crowley took very much the same tack when first grappling with Liber Legis II:21. In explaining "Stamp down the wretched and the weak," he proposed: "But 'the poor and the outcast' are the petty thoughts and the qliphothic thoughts and the sad thoughts. These must be rooted out, or the ecstasy of Hadit is not in us." So, even for Thelemites, scripture can still be "the problem." Nevertheless, I think that Thelema includes some useful countermeasures against the sources of Hartman's concern. The danger of scriptural justifications and "God-manipulation" is decidedly blunted by the "Short Comment" to Liber Legis: "The study of this book is forbidden. ... Those who discuss the contents of this book are to be shunned by all ...." Likewise, "God-manipulation" is undercut by the essential privacy of the key attainment to which Thelemites aspire: the Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy Guardian Angel. And the doctrine of O.T.O. that "There is no god but man" should inoculate against both "God-intoxication" and "God-manipulation." It is in no way clear, however, that ethical integrity is the ultimate goal of Thelema or of the general glut of religious systems, although it is common for many of them to justify themselves with ethical claims.

Although its arguments pertain especially to Western monotheisms, this fairly brief work is worth the contemplation of anyone interested in religion, and most particularly of clergy, who must concern themselves with the social consequences of the teachings they promote.… (más)