We live in times in which, I believe, we in the Orthodox world need to open ourselves to new ideas and new thinking that will help enhance our love and appreciation for God and His Torah. Maybe the best example of a contemporary thinker who has opened the doors of perception while remaining fully committed to Torah, halacha, the Jewish people and the Land of Israel is Rabbi Shimon Gershon Rosenberg, colloquially known as Rav Shagar.
I spoke with Rabbis Zachary Truboff and Yehoshua Engelman about Rav Shagar in episode 133, over two years ago. Today, as a special Chanukah presentation, I’m honored to speak to Rabbi Levi Morrow about Rav Shagar. Rabbi Morrow recently published Living Time: Festival Discourses for the Present Age which is an English language collection of some of Rav Shagar’s essays on the Jewish holidays. Because both he and I have found that some of Rav Shagar’s most impactful writing was on the subject of Chanukah, I was excited to speak to Levi about Rav Shagar’s philosophy in general, and to learn from him about some of Rav Shagar’s ideas regarding Chanukah.
Among the topics we addressed are the difference between the human and divine viewpoints; why some people don’t relate to Rav Shagar’s philosophy; the importance of “choosing” to be religious, rather than being compelled by facts – and why this existential choice is essential to our religious identity; how Rav Shagar understands the concept of religious obligation; his embracing of contradiction; whether we should be critical of those who leave Judaism, or if we need to respect that choice, as well; if there a place for interfaith dialogue, or learning about other religions; whether Rav Shagar should be thought of as a “Religious Zionist” or a “religious Zionist,” and what he might think about the State of Israel today; if he believed that the State of Israel has religious value, and if so, whether the State of Israel is also part of the redemption; what would he say about the reality of Israel today; and more.
Of course, we also dealt with Chanukah – specially how the Shabbat candles and Chanukah candles represent two types of holiness: meaningfulness and fulfillment on the one hand, versus sacrifice without any obvious meaning on the other; the candle of the commandment along with the candle of the human soul; the ways that mitzvot contain divine light – but also that the earthy vessels of the mitzvot are even holier than the light they contain; the way that the mitzvot don’t come from divine wisdom, but from His will (and what that means); what we mean when we say that God is beyond human categories; the relationship between Torah and the outside world and outside ideas; and the way that translation is a valuable method for bringing outside ideas into Torah thought.
This is not a typical episode of the podcast. For those, however, who are looking for new approaches that are grounded in our sources but which also deal forthrightly with the challenges Orthodox Jews face today, it offers a different perspective that hopefully you’ll find very meaningful. And perhaps most crucially, it opens up the possibility that others will also forge new Torah paths that forthrightly deal with reality as it is, not as we wish it were.
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Music: “Happy Rock” by bensound.com