Woolf- Time Awareness and Spirituality in Rav Soloveitchik's Thought

Jeffrey R. Woolf

TIME AWARENESS AS A SOURCE OFSPIRITUALITY IN THE THOUGHT OF RABBI

JOSEPH B. SOLOVEITCHIK*

A tense, dialectical relationship between religion in essence and reli-gion in manifestation is at the core of the Jewish religious conscious-ness- its legal configuration and its historical experience. Halakah isthe indispensible manifestation and prescribed concretization of anunderlying and over-riding spiritual essence, a volatile, magnetic andincompressible religious force designated as Judaism.1

With these words, the late Isadore Twersky sought to defineJudaism’s central dynamic as an eternal, Heraclitean struggle betweenSpirituality and Law. Inherent in his model is the axiomatic indepen-dence of each of these antipodes. On the one hand, he posited thatJewish Law (Halakhah) moves according to its own inner logic andrules. At the same time, it must reflect and express, teach and instillthe deeper spiritual and moral values of Judaism. Twersky continuesthat Judaism is marked by ‘‘the painful awareness that manifestationand essence sometimes drift apart, from the sober recognition that acarefully-constructed, finely chiseled normative system cannot regu-larly reflect, refract or energize interior, fluid spiritual forces andmotives . . . If Halakha is a means for the actualization and celebrationof ethical norms, historical experiences, and theological postulates,then external conformity must be nurtured by internal sensibility andspirituality.’’2 The means by which this goal may be achieved hasvaried over the ages. Different disciplines have, in different timesand places, presented themselves as candidates to fill this vivifyinginteraction with Halakhah.3 Their task, however, was essentially inter-pretive. Philosophy and Mysticism, Ethics and Pietism infused theLaw with meaning, and fashioned the sacred canopy within whichits dictates were fulfilled. Halakhah’s essential autonomy, however,was a given.4 Twersky’s characterization of the interplay of Law and

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Spirituality closely approximates two major themes in the writings ofhis father-in-law, Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik (referred to by hisstudents and admirers as ‘‘the Rav’’).5 First, and foremost,R. Soloveitchik posited that Jewish Law, or Halakhah, is absolutelyautonomous. It operates according to a closed universe of discourse,and functions according its own a priori concepts, logic, and textualanalysis.6 It sets its own intellectual pathways and creates its ownreality.7 Objective reality, therefore, must be approached and appre-ciated through the a priori lens of Halakah. As he notes in HalakhicMan:

Halakhah has a fixed a priori relationship to the whole of reality in allof its fine and detailed particulars. Halakhic man orients himself tothe entire cosmos and tries to understand it by utilizing an idealworld which he bears in his halakhic consciousness. All halakhic con-cepts are a priori, and it is through them that halakhic man looks atthe world.8

Consistent with his belief in Halakhah’s autonomy, RabbiSoloveitchik studiously avoided historical explanations of halakhic con-cepts or to rabbinic legal texts. This was true whether he was expound-ing Talmudic texts in his role as Rosh Yeshiva at Yeshiva University, orwhen interpreting them in a homiletical or philosophical context.9

Doing so, he asserted, would relativize Halakhah, open it up to reduc-tionism, and destroy its essential integrity.

All of this is well known to those familiar with R. Soloveitchik’sformal philosophic oeuvre. Less well known, however, is the fact forthe last thirty-five years of his active career, he devoted enormous at-tention to the need for cultivating the inner spiritual, emotional, andreligious aspects of Jewish religious life and observance. He did so, itwould appear, precisely for the reasons noted by Professor Twersky inthe above-noted article; because ‘‘external conformity must be nurturedby internal sensibility and spirituality.’’ Otherwise, ritual observancewould become nothing more than mechanical, meaninglessceremonies.10

R. Soloveitchik gave early expression to this concern in a relativelyunknown, but important essay that was published late in 1959.11

Entitled ‘‘Al Ahavat ha-Torah u-Ge’ulat Nefesh ha-Dor’’ (‘‘On the Loveof Torah and Redeeming the Soul of the Generation’’), the essay waswritten in response to an earlier published interview with him, whichhad appeared in the Israeli daily, Yedi’ot Aharonot. R. Soloveitchikwished to clarify some of the points that had been attributed tohim, and took the opportunity to share some of his thoughts on thestate of Orthodox Judaism in America.12

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In response to the question, whether he was satisfied with thepresent state of Torah education, R. Soloveitchik replied that whilehe had much cause for satisfaction, nevertheless:

I regret three negative phenomena, which prevent the realization ofthe entire dream. First, the number of young people who are actuallystudying in Yeshivot is extremely small. And, while it is true that thenumber grows from year to year, the overall situation is far fromsatisfactory. Second, we have yet to educate truly outstandingTorah scholars (Gedolei Torah), in whom we may take real pride.There are learned circles, and Talmidei Hakhamim, but no Torahscholars of real stature. ‘‘The flowers have appeared on theearth,’’13 but the vine has yet to emerge in its glory.14

At this point, the Rav turns to his major point, which occupies alarge portion of the remainder of the essay.

‘‘Third, and here I spoke at great length . . ., I unintentionallytouched upon a serious educational-philosophical problem that hasbeen of great concern to me for quite some time. I said that forOrthodox young men, the Torah reveals itself in the form ofmodes of Talmudic analysis (lamdut),15 rational awareness and coldlogic. However, they have yet to be privileged with the living, ‘sensual,’experience, which both gladdens the heart and causes it to tremble.They know the Torah as an idea, but they do not encounter it as anunmediated ‘‘Reality,’’ that is felt through ‘taste, sight and touch.’’’16

The need for a deeply felt, emotional element in the act of Torahstudy became a leitmotif of the Rav’s subsequent discussions of thesubject. He inveighed against detached, arid Talmud study and ad-monished his students to be acutely aware of the whispers of eternity,and the inter-generational dialogue that vivifies and energizes study.17

On another occasion, he expatiated on the nature of this emotional–experiential dimension of Torah study, describing it as ‘‘a total, allencompassing, all embracing experience,’’ ‘‘an ecstatic experience, inwhich one meets God.’’18

Greater even than his desire to deepen the experience of Talmudstudy, R. Soloveitchik was profoundly concerned with the fate ofJewish observance. He devoted formal public lectures, eulogies,Yahrzeit presentations, class time and countless impromptu remarksto the absolute, emphatic and critical necessity for the Jew to infuseritual observance with a deeply emotional, experiential dimension.This emphasis has, perhaps, evaded the eyes of researchers of histhought because, until recently, almost none of the loci in which headdressed this topic have been published.19 One exception, though, isfound in his eulogy for Mrs Rebecca Twersky, a’h, the TalnerRebbetzin.20 Speaking of the education passed on to him by his ownparents, R. Soloveitchik posits that there are two mutually dependent,

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and mutually fructifying, modes of tradition that make up Jewish reli-gious life. In typically typological form, based upon Proverbs 1, 2,he refers to them as ‘‘your father’s instruction’’ (mussar avikha) and‘‘your mother’s teaching’’ (torat imekha), respectively.21

Regarding the former, he observes that ‘‘one learns much fromfather: how to read a text - the Bible or the Talmud - how to compre-hend, how to analyze, how to conceptualize, how to classify, how toinfer, how to apply, etc. . . . One also learns from father what to do andwhat not to do, what is morally right and what is morally wrong.Father teaches the son the discipline of thought as well as the disci-pline of action. Father’s tradition is an intellectual-moral one. That iswhy it is identified with mussar, which is the Biblical term for disci-pline.’’22 In other words, the ‘‘Paternal tradition’’ is attractive, yetinsufficient.

Torat Imekha, however, is very different.‘‘What is Torat Imekha? What kind of a Torah does the mother

pass on? I admit that I am not able to define precisely the massoreticrole of the Jewish mother. Only by circumscription I hope to be ableto explain it. Permit me to draw upon my own experiences. I used tohave long conversations with my mother. In fact, it was a monologuerather than a dialogue. She talked and I ‘‘happened’’ to overhear.What did she talk about? I must use a halakhic term in order toanswer this question: she talked me-inyana de-yoma. I used to watchher arranging the house in honor of a holiday. I used to see herrecite prayers; I used to watch her recite the sidra every Fridaynight and I still remember the nostalgic tune. I learned from hervery much.’’

‘‘Most of all, I learned that Judaism expresses itself not only informal compliance with the law but also in a living experience. Shetaught me that there is a flavor, a scent and warmth to mitzvot.I learned from her the most important thing in life—to feel the pres-ence of the Almighty and the gentle pressure of His hand resting uponmy frail shoulders. Without her teachings, which quite often were transmit-ted to me in silence, I would have grown up a soulless being, dry and insen-sitive.’’ (Emphasis added)

‘‘The laws of Shabbat, for instance, were passed on to me by myfather; they are a part of mussar avikha. The Shabbat as a living entity,as a queen, was revealed to me by my mother; it is a part of ToratImekha. The fathers knew much about the Shabbat; the mothers lived theShabbat, experienced her presence, and perceived her beauty andsplendor.’’23

The upshot of this touching description is that with all of theemphasis that R. Soloveitchik placed upon the autonomy of JewishLaw, and the centrality of rigorous analysis of the sources thereof,

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the absence of a deeply emotional, experiential element inJewish religiousity, renders Judaism ‘‘soulless,’’ ‘‘dry and insensitive.’’This is a far cry from the picture of ‘‘Halakhic Man,’’ for whomTalmudic analysis alone satisfies both his intellectual curiosity andhis inner life.

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This drive to balance observance of the Law with emotional, spiritual,and intellectual content, led R. Soloveitchik to place heavy emphasisupon the need to experience and identify with religious observance. 24

Interestingly, many of the most important discussions of this subjectare to be found not in his philosophical or his broadly homileticalwritings, but were enunciated in the context of expounding halakhictexts and themes. This fact underscores the inseparability, the mutualdependence, of Mussar Avikha and Torat Imekha, even if the method-ology employed in each might be different. It should also cautionstudents of R. Soloveitchik’s thought of the perils inherent in bifurcat-ing his corpus scriptorum between the ‘‘Philosophic’’ and the‘‘Halakhic.’’ As with Maimonides, there is far more integrity betweenthe two areas than has been hitherto granted.25

One particular type of experience that played a persistently centralrole in his teaching was the need to transcend the boundaries of Timeand Space and to relive critical moments in the Jewish Historical past.The quintessential example of this, one to which he returned on manyoccasions, is the obligation to recount the Story of the Exodus onPassover Eve (Sippur Yetzi’at Mitzrayim).26 He observed that the word‘‘story’’ (sippur) implies far more than a mere, emotionally detached,narrative. It must contain, by definition, a profoundly experiential el-ement; an experience of profound self-identification. Telling a storydoes not simply pass on information. It requires that one participatetherein, and reexperience it.27 The act of narration smashes the wallsof time and space that divide the narrator and the event being de-scribed. As he states:

The commandment to remember ‘‘this day when you leftEgypt’’. . . obligates one to be perpetually aware of the Exodus fromEgypt, that one be totally immersed in this event, as the Mishnah(Pesahim 166b) sets forth: ‘‘A Person is required to see himself as ifhe went out of Egypt.’’ And Rambam, when citing the words of theMishnah, even added, ‘‘as if he, himself, had now left Egypt,’’ totallymoved, totally shaken, absolutely glowing . . . This commandment de-mands much more: feeling both slavery and freedom, and feeling, asMaimonides emphasized, as if he himself had just been there; as if hewere now living the events that he is recounting.28




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While, this dimension of the Passover Seder is not new, per se, R.Soloveitchik made it a leitmotif of his teaching, applying it in numerousother connections.29

In his comment to Exodus (19, 1), Rashi states that ‘‘words ofTorah should be new for you as if they were only given today.’’30

For R. Soloveitchik, Rashi’s statement was both an interpretive key,and a spiritual mandate.31

For example, in a series of shi’urim that were devoted toMaimonides’ discussion of the Laws regarding the Public Reading ofthe Torah, the Rav zeroed in on the Talmudic passage (B. Megillah21b) upon which Rambam had based his ruling.32 The Mishnah, there,rules that three men are called up to the reading of the Torah onMondays, Thursday, and Saturday afternoons.33 The Talmud asks:‘‘What do these three represent? — R. Assi said: The Pentateuch, theProphets and the Hagiographa. Raba said: Priests, Levites, and layIsraelites.’’34

Consistent with the canons of Brisker analysis, wherein both sidesof defining arguments are deemed to be fundamentally correct, R.Soloveitchik assumed that both R. Assi and Raba were correct.35

The reason, he declared, was because every public reading of theTorah constitutes a veritable reenactment of the Revelation at Sinai.Therefore, just as the entire Jewish People was present then, all sectorsof the nation must be represented when the Torah is read publically:Priests, Levites, and Israelites (Raba). Furthermore, since the entireTorah is one undifferentiated whole, as was the initial act ofRevelation, so too each of its three subsections must also be repre-sented whenever it is invoked (R. Assi).36

This scripting was not merely a symbolic action. It is meant todrive home to the Jew that he is duty-bound to reexperience the actof revelation every time the Torah is read or studied. He expressedthis idea in a speech that he delivered to the Rabbinic Alumni ofYeshiva University in 197537:

Teaching has a very strange impact upon me. I simply feel that whenI teach Torah, I feel the breath of eternity on my face . . . Therefore,the study of Torah has never been for me a dry, formal, intellectualperformance. No matter how important a role the intellect plays inLimmud ha-Torah. You all know very well that I place a great deal ofemphasis upon the intellectual understanding and analysis of theHalakha . . . So there is no doubt that the intellect plays a tremendousrole in Limmud ha-Torah.

‘‘However, Talmud Torah is more than an intellectual performance.It is a total, all-encompassing and all-embracing involvement; mindand heart, will and feeling, the very center of the human person-ality38 . . . Talmud Torah is basically, for me, an ecstatic experience, in

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which one meets God. And, again, I want to say that whatever I toldyou now is not just mysticism, or due to my mystical inclinations.It isn’t so. The Gemora says so. Hazal have equated Talmud Torahwith Revelation. The great events, the drama, of Giluy Shkekhinah(Theophany) is reenacted and restaged and relived every time a Jewopens a gemora. The Talmud in Berakhos, while discussing the prob-lem of a Ba’al Qeri39 . . . expressed itself as follows:40 ‘‘But makeknown to thy children and thy children’s children’’ . . . ‘‘The day onwhich thou didst stand before the Lord thy God in Horeb’’ (Deut.4, 9–10). So the Torah didn’t say, ‘‘Make known the Halakhos.’’More than that! Make known, simply, your rendezvous with God. Itmeans they should experience exactly what you experienced whenyou stood before your God in Horeb. How did your people standbefore God at Horeb? With fear, awe, with a tremor in the heart;trembling. So must every Jew who engages in Talmud Torah standbefore God, with fear, awe and tremor . . . to experience Revelationevery time he engages in study.’’

The Rav maintained that the obligation to return to Sinai and toreexperience the original Sinai Revelation is not only an essential,inseparable element of the fulfillment of the commandment to studyTorah, but (further on in his remarks) he maintained that its absencecan actually bar an individual (e.g., a ba’al qeri) from the supremecommandment of Torah study.

These last remarks presume the ability of an individual to actu-ally reenact and reexperience the past. This capacity, he asserts, isbased upon a specific definition of Time and of Time Awarenessthat varies from that which is commonly sensed by contemporarypeople. As the late Eliezer Goldman noted, R. Soloveitchik positedthat the Jew lives in two, very different time frames and time expe-riences.41 One is physical time. It is chronometric, uni-directional,and irreversible. However, alongside this mode of time perceptionthere is another, wherein past, present, and future blend into oneanother. This mode of Time creates a perceptual and experientialspectrum in which past and future are both accessible andreversible.42

The Rav first addressed this distinction in print, in his discus-sion of the Jewish concept of Repentance (Teshuvah) in his essay,Halakhic Man.43 His point of departure was his contention thatHalakhically sin has a double impact upon the sinner. On the onehand, it requires of the sinner to make amends for the damage orhurt that he may have caused.44 However, sin also impacts directlyupon the sinner’s inner persona. His iniquity categorizes him asbeing ‘‘evil’’ (rasha), and per se legally invalidates anything hemight say (pasul la-edut).45 Only through repentance can the sinner’s




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persona be cleansed of this disability. For that, the Rav declares, it isnot enough to simply go through the standard stages of penitence(acknowledgement of the sin, regret, confession, and commitmentnot to sin).46 One must transform one’s personality, and emerge atotally new individual. He writes:

There is a living past and there is a dead past. There is a future whichhas not yet been ‘‘created,’’ and there is a future already in existence.There is a past and there is a future that are connected with oneanother and with the present only through the law of causality- thecause found at moment a links up with the effect taking place atmoment b, and so on. However, time itself as past appears only as‘‘no more’’ and as future appears as ‘‘not yet.’’ From this perspectiverepentance is an empty and hollow concept. It is impossible to regreta past that is already dead, lost in the abyss of oblivion. Similarly, onecannot make a decision concerning a future that is as yet ‘‘unborn.’’Therefore, Spinoza [Ethics IV, 54] and Nietzsche [in Genealogy ofMorals]- from this perspective- did well to deride the idea of repen-tance. However, there is a past that persists in its existence that doesnot vanish and disappear but remains firm in its place. Such a pastenters into the domain of the present and links up with thefuture . . . From this perspective we neither perceive the past as ‘‘nomore’’ nor the future as ‘‘not yet’’ nor the present as ‘‘a fleetingmoment.’’ Rather past, present, future merge and blend togetherand this new three-fold time structure arises before us adornedwith a splendid unity.

The entire concept of Repentance is predicated upon the conceptionof Time as a continuum, wherein the tenses maintain a ‘‘true symbi-otic, synergistic relationship.’’ The contiguity and accessibility of thePast from the Present allows the individual to retroactively change theformer, and wipe one’s sin from his personal history. Such a daringtransformation is only possible, according to R. Soloveitchik, becauseHalakhah does not limit its definition of time and causality to theirreversible reality that is most familiar to western man.

He returned to this subject a few years later, in The HalakhicMind,47 and a year later in a lecture delivered in memory of his father,R. Moses Soloveitchik.48 In the latter essay, the Rav appliedhis dual-model of time-awareness to Judaism generally. Explicitlyacknowledging his debt to Henri Bergson, he observes that‘‘Bergson speaks of fleeting time, living and immeasurable, beyondthe scientist’s mesh. No clock can be applied to this qualitative time,which is transient, intangible, and evanescent, and, on the other hand,creative, dynamic, and self-emerging. In this ‘time’ there are nomilestones separating past, present, and future. It is not uni-dimensional, as is physical time, but multidimensional, compenetrat-ing and overlapping past, present, and future.’’49 However, these two,contradictory, modes of time-perception co-exist in human experience

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and create the type of dialectical reality that is so characteristic of theRav’s thought.

There are some people who live in quantitative, dead time. Theymeasure time by the clock and by the calendar. For them there is nomerger of the past and the future. The present itself is a lost moment.A year is endless. How much more so centuries and tens of centuries!These people are deprived of an historical consciousness; for history isthe living experience of time.

The man, however, who lives in qualitative time has a differentcriterion of the experience of time than the quantitative experience.He measures time not by length-extension but by pure quality, crea-tivity, and accomplishment. While for the man with a quantitative ap-prehension all fractions of time are equal because all representphysical ‘‘t’s’’; for the man of qualitative apprehension, there is noequality among temporal fractions of time. Moments are heteroge-neous. One may live an entire life span quantitatively, not havinglived even a moment qualitatively. And, contrariwise, one may havelived a moment quantitatively and have lived through an eternityqualitatively.

This alternative, ‘‘qualitative,’’ time leads the individual to a signif-icantly different view of and relationship to both the objective past,and refashions one’s spiritual life.

R. Soloveitchik sums up the confluence of time perception andmemory; of religious observance and historical reexperience, in a re-cently published essay entitled ‘‘Avelut Yeshanah and Avelut Hadashah;Historical and Individual Mourning.’’50 R. Soloveitchik contrasts theexperience of personal mourning and grief that is engendered by theloss of a loved one, with the national mourning that is observed forthe destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, over 1900 years ago.The first, he observes, is a natural response to evil, bereavement,and pain. The latter which, prima facie, is so distant from contempo-rary man as to be irrelevant, can only be understood in light of the‘‘qualitative’’ mode of time-awareness that he referred to in ‘‘Sacredand Profane.’’51 As the passage repeats some of the earlier points,I will confine myself to his newer emphases.

‘‘Judaism developed a very peculiar philosophy of memory—indeed, an ethics of memory. Memory and forgetfulness are subjectto ethical determination. Memory is not just the capacity of man toknow events which lie in the past. Memory is experiential in nature;one does not simply recollect the past or just remember bygones, butreexperiences that which has been, and quickens events that are seem-ingly dead.’’

Many mitzvot are based upon this idea. The Passover seder is, ofcourse, the prime example: ‘‘In each generation a person is required




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to see himself as if he had gone out of Egypt’’ (Haggadah). So too iskeri’at ha-Torah, the institution of the public reading of the Torah,which is not simply limmud—study and instruction—but an experientialevent meant to restage and reenact Mattan Torah, the giving of theTorah . . . .When Rambam speaks about the obligation of Hakhel, thepublic reading of the Torah performed by the king in Jerusalem everyseven years, he writes that the king is the representative of the kahal,the congregation, and the entire kahal must pay close attention to thekeri’at ha-Torah. Even the wise and great, as well as converts who donot understand the Hebrew text, must concentrate and hearken withdread and trepidation in the same manner as the Jews hearkened tothe words of God when the Torah was given at Sinai—as if the lawwere being proclaimed now for the first time, as if the person werehearing it from the Almighty, listening to the voice of God Himself(Hilkhot Hagigah 3:6). Rambam actually has spelled it out in plainterms. The rubric of ‘‘In each generation a person is required to seehimself as if he had gone out of Egypt’’ is applicable not only tothe Exodus, but to all events which the Torah has commanded us toremember and not forget.

‘‘Experiential memory somehow erases the borderline separat-ing bygone from present experiences. It does not just recollect thepast, but reexperiences whatever has been. It quickens events whichman considered dead and it actually merges past with present—orshifts the past into the present. Judaism has recommended what Iwould call a ‘‘unitive time consciousness’’—unitive in the sense thatthere is a tightening of bonds of companionship, of present andpast . . . .’’

Since Jews have a unitive time consciousness, the gap of centuriessimply cannot separate them from the past. They do not have to relivethe past, as the past is a current living reality. Memory opens up newvistas of the time experience, and the companionship of the presentand past is tightened, growing in intimacy and closeness. As a matterof fact, our relationship to our heroes—such as Rabbi Akiva and RabbiYohanan ben Zakkai, or even the Patriarchs and the Prophets—is com-pletely different from that which the nations of the world have to theirheroes. To us, they are not just ancient heroes. Usually history isdivided into antiquity, the Middle Ages, and the contemporaryperiod. However, the word ‘‘antiquity’’ does not exist in our history.The story of Joseph and his brothers, the story of the destruction ofthe Temple, the story of Moses’ death—all used to move me to tears asa boy. It was not just because I was a child; it was not an infantilereaction on my part. It was very much a human gestalt reaction. Thesestories do not lie in antiquity; they are part of our time awareness, partof our historical experience. Similarly, there is no archaeology in

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Judaism. There is history but not archaeology. Archaeology refersto something remote, a dead past of which I am no part. It arousesmy curiosity; I am inquisitive to know about the origins. But history tous means something living, past integrated into sent anticipatingfuture.

We all know the aphorism, ‘‘He-avar ayyin (the past is no more),ve-he-atid adayyin (the future has not yet come), hoveh ke-heref ayin (thepresent is fleeting).’’ However, in my opinion this is wrong. The past isnot gone; it is still here. The future is not only anticipated, it is alreadyhere, and the present connects the future and the past. That is what Imean by a unitive time consciousness.

Tish’ah be-Av, the Ninth of Av, would be a ludicrous institution ifwe did not have the unitive time consciousness. We say in the Kinnot,‘‘On this night, be-leil zeh, my Temple was destroyed.’’ ‘‘This night’’means a night 1900 years ago; ‘‘be-leil zeh’’ means tonight.Apparently, that night, years ago is neither remote nor distant fromus; it is living—as vibrant a reality as this fleeting moment in the pre-sent. The unitive time consciousness contains an element of eternity.There is neither past nor future nor present. All three dimensions oftime merge into one experience, into one awareness. Man, heading ina panicky rush toward the future, finds himself in the embrace of thepast. Bygones turn into facts, memories into living experiences andarchaeological history into a vibrant reality.52

II

According to R. Soloveitchik, ‘‘unitive time consciousness’’ constitutesa critical element in the fulfillment of historically based religious ob-servances. It provides the critical experiential element to the technicalobservance of various commandments, without which those obser-vances (e.g., the Passover Seder), would be legally deficient.53 In thisregard, his approach parallels insights that emerge from the work ofreligious and historical anthropologists such as Mircea Eliade, AronGurevich, Jacques Le Goff, and Jonathan Z. Smith.54 These scholarsemphasize that traditional societies cultivate a fluid sense of time andplace. This renders formative events and central places accessible, ir-respective of the time and place in which a member of that society.Furthermore, as Eliade noted in his pioneering study, The Mythof the Eternal Return, the capacity to return to and reexperienceformative events in the past is a critical component of traditionalreligious life.

The emphasis that R. Soloveitchik placed upon this type ofreexperiencing as the vivifying (and validating) element of the




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Passover Seder, the act of Torah Study and the Public Reading of theTorah; found special emphasis in his interpretation of the fast of TishaB’Av.

According to rabbinic tradition, Tisha B’Av commemorates fivedisasters that occurred on the Ninth of Av. Of these, the most impor-tant are the destruction of the First and Second Temples in 586 BCEand 70 CE, respectively.55 A central element of the commemorationson that day is the recitation of elegiac poems (Qinot) which describeand evaluate the events that occurred on that day.56

Over time, elegies were added to the Ashkenazic liturgy that re-called later disasters and persecutions, especially the massacres thataccompanied the First Crusade.57 R. Soloveitchik attributed specialsignificance to the fact that these events, which occurred in thespring and early summer of 1096, were nevertheless marked at theend of the Summer, on Tisha B’Av.58 For him, all Jewish suffering anddisaster were a direct result of the destruction of the Temple, andtherefore must be subsumed and understood under the rubric ofmourning the over the destruction of the Temple, the ultimate expres-sion of Hester Panim, of the Deus Absconditus.59 Thus, in addition toexperiencing past events anew, the Rav subsumed historical eventsunder the aegis of ur-experiences and catastrophes.60

Every year, during all-day study sessions that were dedicated to therecitation cum elucidation of the Tisha B’Av liturgy, he would hammeraway at this point. His point of departure was always an elegy by theeleventh century scholar, R. Qalonymos b. Judah, describing the at-tacks on Speyer, Worms and Mainz during the First Crusade.61

Entitled, ‘Mi Yiten Roshi Mayim,’ the relevant passage reads62:

Take this to heart, and compose a bitter eulogy.For their murder is worthy of morning and lying in the dust;To a degree equal to that for the burning of the House of or God,the ante-room and the PalaceHowever, because it is improper to add a day of breach and conflagration,And wrong to advance the date; rather to postpone it.In its place, therefore, I will today arouse my grief and lament and wail,

And cry with bitter soul,With sighs weighing heavily from dawn to dusk,For the house of Israel and the people of the Lord who have fallen bythe sword.63

R. Soloveitchik understood the words ‘‘because it is improper to adda day of breach and conflagration,’’ as reflecting a binding legal normthat barred the possibility of adding commemorative days to the cal-endar.64 This conviction, based upon a confluence of law and philos-ophy, led him to consistently oppose the creation of Israel’s Holocaust

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Remembrance Day (Yom ha-Sho’ah); all the while insisting that the onlyappropriate date was the Ninth of Av.65 As he noted on one occasion:

In fact, Hurban Yisrael is a part of Hurban Beit ha-Mikdash because ifthe Beit ha-Mikdash were standing, or destiny would have been differ-ent. Hurban Beit ha-Mikdash is an all-inclusive concept. If the HurbanBeit ha-Mikdash deserves mourning, it is incumbent upon us to men-tion and feel a sense of mourning onTish’ah B’Av for all the catastrophes, tragedies, sufferings and disas-ters that happened to the Jewish people during our more than nine-teen hundred years of Exile, because all of them are a direct result ofthe Hurban Beit ha-Mikdash. Had the destiny of the Beit ha-Mikdashbeen different, all the catastrophes and disasters would never havehappened. If not for the Hurban Beit ha-Mikdash, the Crusades and theHitler Holocaust, for example, would not have taken place. Everything, everydisaster, is a result of Hurban Beit ha-Mikdash; that destruction is respon-sible for everything.66

III

The desire to cultivate historical awareness and a sense of perpetualhistorical present and collective memory, led R. Soloveitchik to inte-grate historical data, anecdotes and analyses in his lectures, shiurim,and presentations.67 The purpose was to demonstrate the essentialcontinuity of Jewish National and Religious experience, on the onehand, and to dramatize that experience, in order to stimulate an ap-propriate emotional response on the part of his audience, on theother. Historical data constituted raw material for his educational ef-forts. Nevertheless, despite his summary rejection of academic histor-icist explanations of Jewish Law and Lore, historical knowledge didplay an implicitly positive role in his thought.68

His interpretation of the origins and significance of Hanukkahprovide a case in point. In a Saturday Night lecture that he deliveredin Boston in 1971, he highlighted the fact that Maimonides opens hisdiscussion of the holiday not with the well-known story of the cruse ofoil,69 but with an historical description concerning the background tothe Hasmonean revolt and the subsequent liberation of Jerusalem andthe rededication of the Temple.70 Maimonides did so, he explained,because the central reason for lighting the candles is to publicize themiracle (pirsum ha-nes). Indeed, he concluded, telling the story of theMaccabean revolt is a halakhic requirement, as part of the obligationof pirsum ha-nes.71

However, the central miracle is not, as commonly thought, themiracle of the oil that lasted eight days, but the historical events ofwhich the latter is only a part. He drove that point home by offering adetailed description of the historical, cultural and religious factors that




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lay behind Antiochus IV’s decrees, and the Jewish reaction. This in-cluded a long, detailed scholarly analysis of Hellenistic culture andphilosophy which emphasized the aggressive, imperialist character ofthe Hellenist mindset.72 By implication, all of this purely historicalknowledge is also part of the mitzvah of publicizing and experiencingthe miracle of Hanukkah.73

IV

The inclusion of historical data and analysis in philosophic andsemi-halakhic contexts raises a broader question regarding R.Soloveitchik’s epistemological assumptions.

When interpreting a Talmudic or Halakhic text, in the context ofa traditional Shiur, he hied, nigh on exclusively, to the categories andmethods that he inherited from his father and grandfather, a closeddiscourse if ever there was one.74 He scrupulously avoided citingnon-Rabbinic sources in his presentations.75 He was even averse toemploying the interpretations of ‘‘out of the way’’ medieval commen-tators, R. Menachem Ha-Meiri or R. Moses Halawa.76 His Talmudic sitzim leben was that of the tradition of Volozhin and Brisk.

When interpreting Halakhah, he employed a more nuanced ap-proach.77 Thus, when characterizing the prominent role played byWestern Thought and Literature in R. Soloveitchik’s writings,Professor Isadore Twersky noted:

What is distinctive is the fact that the Rov does not preach or cajole,persuade or brainwash; he does not present an elaborate rationalefor the study of philosophy. The latter simply appears as part of hisintellectual capital; he uses it freely and wisely and effectively in hisvarious expositions and explorations of Jewish thought. The Rov’sphilosophic and homiletical corpus has no apologetics; there is noattempt to argue and demonstrate the importance of general learn-ing as an abstract proposition just as there is no attempt to defend orglorify western culture.

Similarly, there is no attempt to demonstrate that traditional Judaismis with philosophy (or any part of it). This truly noteworthy feature isa result of the fact that for the Rov there was nothing essentiallyproblematic about the Masorah; he did not feel compelled to provethat Torah and philosophy or science are compatible. Neither Kantnor Kierkegaard, Hegel or Husserl, are a source of authoritativenorms or principles to which Judaism must conform. Rather Kantand Kierkegaard, Bergson and James and many other figures fromclassical to contemporary thought provide a reservoir of ideas andinsights, concepts and categories to be used critically and construc-tively in the analysis and clarification of aspects of the masorah-indeed, in the attempt to portray and explain the traditional,often-maligned Talmudist or to enhance one’s appreciation for the

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unique religious significance of Halakhah. The cliches of the historyof Jewish thought: synthesis, symbiosis, harmony, reconciliation - aremissing from his vocabulary and are not applicable to his teaching.His all-encompassing philosophic, scientific and humanistic knowl-edge served him for his own purposes, for creative, enthralling expo-sition, for urbane, intelligent discourse, for subtle, sophisticatedcommentary on Torah ideas.78

Twersky is stressing that R. Soloveitchik rigorously maintained thetraditional division of labor between ‘Religion’ and ‘Law,’ that he had,himself, described some twenty-five years earlier. Extra-halakhicsources and insights served a critical role in cultivating JewishReligious experience. Their interaction with Halakhah, however, wasinterpretive, not normative.

Upon closer examination, however, it emerges that the rigor withwhich R. Soloveitchik maintained that distinction was rooted in anepistemological model that represented a fundamental break withthat of medieval Jewish philosophical tradition.79 The latter proceededfrom the assumption that the paths of Reason and of Revelation, ofGreek Philosophy and Torah, were essentially coterminous, bothhaving been ‘‘bestowed by the same Shepherd.’’80 The task of the phi-losopher was, then, to integrate the two sources of knowledge and toresolve the apparent points of conflict between them. Different think-ers, albeit, reached different results on this score. Sometimes the primafacie claims of Philosophy were rejected. On other occasions, Jewishsources were recast, reinterpreted or relegated to the role of necessarypopular beliefs. The fundamental pattern, however, was the same: syn-thesis, symbiosis, harmony, and reconciliation.

This stance, however, could have serious implications. Consider, forexample, the case of Maimonides.81 He posited that man’s summum bonumis the perfection of the intellect, which is the portion of the soul that earnsperpetual bliss in the Hereafter. The observance, and rational under-standing, of the commandments brings the individual to that state. Inthat connection, Maimonides assigned teleological reasons to the com-mandments (Ta’amei Mitzvot). However, in doing so, he potentially sub-ordinated the observance of the Law to its overall intention. That, in turn,raised the specter of anti-nomianism. In order to prevent this and main-tain the integrity of the Jewish Legal system, Maimonides introducedmethodological brakes, such as his dogma of the uniqueness of MosaicProphecy. According to this postulate, Moses’ prophetic powers were suigeneris, with the result that only he was entitled to legislate in that capacity.Thus, as advanced as one might be intellectually, one could never, bydefinition, abolish Biblical Laws despite one’s awareness of their telos.82

R. Soloveitchik’s modus operandi avoided such potential pitfalls.Since Halakhah is a priori, conceptually and intellectually autonomous,




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it could never become subject to any system of thought outside ofitself (e.g., Philosophy, History, Psychology, or Anthropology).83

Freed of concern for possible antinomian consequences, the Ravwas actually more liberal and more intellectually liberating than thatof the medievals and their followers. He was free to bring to bear thebroadest gamut of General Culture as ‘‘a reservoir of ideas and in-sights, concepts and categories to be used critically and constructivelyin the analysis and clarification of aspects of the masorah,’’84 in orderto deepen the spiritual and emotional experiences that inhered toObservance of the Commandments.

BAR ILAN UNIVERSITY

NOTES

*This study is derived from certain emphases in a lecture that wasdelivered at a conference dedicated to Rabbi Soloveitchik’s thought,held at Jerusalem’s Van Leer Institute in December 2003. The originalpaper was published in, Rav be-Olam Hadash: Iyyunim be-Hashpa’ato shelHa-Rav Yosef Dov Soloveitchik al Tarbut, al Hinukh ve-al MahshavahYehudit, edited by Naftali Rothenberg and Avinoam Rozenak(Jerusalem, 2010), pp. 323–38. In its present form, it greatly expandstwo or three points that were not fully developed in the originalpaper. Unless otherwise noted, all translations are mine.

1. Isadore Twersky, ‘‘Religion and Law,’’ in Religion in a Religious Age,(ed.) Shlomo D. Goitein (Cambridge, MA, 1974), p. 69.

2. Ibid., pp. 69–70.3. Ibid. The analysis of the interaction between Law and Spirituality

became the leitmotif of Twersky’s research. See, inter alia, Isadore Twersky,‘‘Talmudists, Philosophers, Kabbalists: The Quest for Spirituality inthe Sixteenth Century,’’ in Jewish Thought in the Sixteenth Century, editedby B. Cooperman (Cambridge, MA, 1983), pp. 431–59; idem, ‘‘Law andSpirituality in the Seventeenth Century: A Case Study in R. Yair HayyimBacharach,’’ in Jewish Thought in the Seventeenth Century, edited by IsadoreTwersky and Bernard Septimus (Cambridge, MA, 1987), pp. 447–67 andthe magisterial discussion in idem, Introduction to the Code of Maimonides(Mishneh Torah) (New Haven, 1980), VI: Law and Philosophy.

4. Jacob Katz, ‘‘The Rule of Halakhah in Traditional JewishSociety: Theory and Praxis,’’ in his Divine Law in Human Hands;Case Studies in Halakhic Flexibility (Jerusalem, 1998), pp. 171–90 andidem, ‘‘Post-Zoharic relations between Halakhah and Kabbalah,’’ ibid,pp. 31–55. Katz, himself, noted that Medieval Philosophers were farmore respectful of Halakhic autonomy than were Jewish mystics.

5. Twersky explicitly acknowledged R. Soloveitchik’s profound impactupon his work (and life) in the preface to his first book, Rabad of

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Posquieres: A Medieval Talmudist, 2nd ed. (Philadelphia, 1980), p. viii. Ibelieve that his concentration upon this specific theme is a prominentexample of that influence. See Bernard Septimus, ‘‘Isadore Twersky as aScholar of Medieval Jewish History,’’ in Be’erot Yitzhak: Studies in Memory ofIsadore Twersky, (ed.) Jay Harris (Cambridge, MA, 2005), pp. 12–27.

6. See also Avraham Buckstein, ‘‘Halakhic Epistemology inNeo-Kantian Garb: J. B. Soloveitchik’s Philosophical Writings Revisited,’’Jewish Studies Quarterly, Vol. 5 (1998), pp. 346–68.

7. See Dov Schwartz, Religion or Halakha: The Philosophy of RabbiJoseph B. Soloveitchik, trans. Batya Stein (Leiden and Boston, 2007),pp. 194–222.

8. Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik, Halakhic Man, trans. Lawrence Kaplan(Philadelphia, 1991), p. 23. See Schwartz, Religion or Halakha, ibid andWilliam Kolbrener, ‘‘Towards a Genuine Jewish Philosophy: ’‘HalakhicMind’s’ New Philosophy of Religion,’’ Tradition, Vol. 30 (1996), pp. 21–43.

9. It is commonly assumed that in Halakhic Man, R. Soloveitchikwas enunciating, in neo-Kantian terms, an underlying principle ofthe method of Talmudic analysis that is identified with his grandfather,R. Chaim Soloveitchik (1853–1918), the so-called Brisker Derekh.See Shlomo Tykocynski, Darkhei ha-Limmud be-Yeshivot Lita ba-me’ahha-19, MA thesis, Jerusalem: Hebrew University 2004. Recently, Aviadha-Kohen has demonstrated that R. Soloveitchik’s deep involvement inneo-Kantian thought had little, if any, impact upon his method ofTalmudic interpretation. See Aviad ha-Kohen, ‘‘‘Ma Nishtanah?’Qavim le-Heqer Mishnato ha-Lamdanit shel ha-Rav Soloveitchik,’’ in Ravbe-Olam Hadash: Iyyunim be-Hashpa ‘ato shel Ha-Rav Yosef Dov Soloveitchik alTarbut, al Hinukh ve-al Mahshavah Yehudit, (eds.) Naftali Rothenberg andAvinoam Rozenak (Jerusalem, 2010), pp. 299–322. On the other hand,when it came to actual halakhic decision-making, R. Soloveitchik was will-ing to acknowledge the role of subjective judgment. See Lawrence Kaplan,‘‘The Religious Philosophy of Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik,’’ Tradition, Vol.14 (1973), p. 52, n. 44.

10. Cf. Joseph B. Soloveitchik, Community, Covenant, andCommitment: Selected Letters and Communications of Rabbi Joseph B.Soloveitchik, (ed.) Nathaniel Helfgot (Hoboken, 2005), passim. Heonce remarked to me (in this connection) that pure ceremonialism is,essentially, pagan.

11. Ha-Do’ar, Vol. 40 (1959), pp. 519–523. It was reprinted, in full, inJoseph B. Soloveitchik, Be-Sod ha-Yahid ve-ha-Yahad, (ed.) Pinchas Peli(Jerusalem, 1976), pp. 403–32. Subsequent publications of the essay havebeen edited, to one degree or another. All references here will be to thePeli edition.

12. The reporter was a young journalist named Eliezer Wiesel, wholater became famous as the Nobel Prize winning author, Elie Wiesel.

13. Cant. pp. 2 and 12.14. Pinchas Peli (ed.), Joseph Soloveitchik, Be-Sod ha-Yahid, (Jerusalem

1976), p. 407. Cf. Todd (Tzvi) Pittinsky, ‘The Role of Teacher and Student




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in Jewish Education According to Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik,’ Ten Da’at,Vol. 18 (2006), pp. 94–104.

15. ‘‘Lamdut’’ usually refers to the modes of Talmudic analysis culti-vated in the Yeshivot of Lithuanian provenance. See Tykocynski, Darkheiha-Limmud, passim and Yosef Blau (ed.), The Conceptual Approach to JewishLearning (New York, 2006).

16. Ibid. pp. 407–8.17. See ‘‘Uniting the Generations’’ (http://download.bcbm.org/

Media/RavSoloveitchik/MachshavaOther/Uniting_Generations_Karasik_Pidyon_Haben_-_3-20-74_r.mp3). A precis was published as ‘‘The FirstJewish Grandfather,’’ in Abraham R. Besdin, Man of Faith in the ModernWorld: Reflections of the Rav, Volume Two (Hoboken, 1989), pp. 15–24.

18. See the discussion below.19. Much of the material remains in unpublished manuscripts or in

tape recordings of his various presentations. In recent years, a significantamount of this material has become available through the efforts of theToras HoRav Foundation and through websites such as the BergenCounty Bet Midrash (http://www.bcbm.org).

20. The eulogy was first published in the Boston Jewish Advocate(January 1, 1977). It was subsequently published as ‘‘A Tribute to theRebbetzin of Talne,’’ Tradition, Vol. 17 (1978), pp. 73–83.

21. Ibid. p. 76.22. Ibid.23. Ibid. pp. 76–7.24. The type of experiential dimension that was desired differed ac-

cording to context. Prayer and Sabbath Observance demanded differentsensitivities than did the observance of Holidays and Holy Days. See JosephB. Soloveitchik, Service of the Heart, (ed.) Shalom Carmy (Hoboken, 2003).

25. Two important exceptions to this tendency to bifurcate the Rav’swritings are: Professor Gerald Blidstein. See, for example, ‘‘On the HalakhicThought of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik: The Norms and Nature ofMourning,’’ Tradition, Vol. 30 (1996), pp. 115–30; and Professor DovSchwartz (Religion or Halakhah, passim and idem, Me-Heqer ha-Toda’ahle-Te’ur Ishiyut ha-Qiyyum (Ramat Gan, 2008). Despite the presence of sub-stantive and pervasive tensions within both Rambam’s and R. Soloveitchik’soeuvres, I believe that they both possess a fundamental unity.

26. Ex. 13, 8. See, inter alia, ‘‘Mitzvat Qeri’at Shema u-Zekhirat Yetzi’atMitzrayim,’’ Shi’urim le-Zekher Abba Mari, I (Jerusalem, 1983), pp. 1–19;‘‘Be-Inyan Sippur Yetzi’at Mitzrayim,’’ ibid., II (Jerusalem, 1985), pp. 153–63; David Schreiber, Sefer Nora’ot ha-Rav, VIII (New York, 1998), pp. 1–50;Yehiel Michel Shurkin, Sefer Hararei Qedem, II (Jerusalem, 2004), pp. 162–7and David Shapiro, Rabbi Soloveitchik on Pesach, Sefirat ha-Omer and Shavu’ot(Jerusalem, 2005), pp. 53–67.

27. The source is found at: http://download.bcbm.org/Media/RavSoloveitchik/Moadim/SipurYetziasMitrzrayim_1_77.mp3 and http://download.bcbm.org/Media/RavSoloveitchik/Moadim/SipurYetziasMitrzrayim_2_77.mp3.

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28. ‘‘Be-Inyan Sippur Yetzi’at Mitzrayim,’’ pp. 153–4.29. According to a recently published memoir, he emphasized experi-

ential religiosity as early as the late 1930s. See Zev Eleff, Mentor of Generations:Reflections on Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik (Jersey City, 2008), p. 9.

30. Ibid. s.v. ba-yom ha-zeh.31. As Avraham Grossman has noted, this interpretation reflects

Rashi’s own outlook. Cf. Avraham, Grossman, Emunot ve-De’ot be-Olamoshel Rashi (Alon Shvut, 2008), pp. 83–91.

32. Mishneh Torah, Hil. Tefillah pp. 12, 16. Cf. Joseph B. Soloveitchik,Shi’urim le-Zekher Abba Mari, I (Jerusalem, 1983), pp. 157–78 and http://download.bcbm.org/Media/RavSoloveitchik/GemaraHalacha/Kriyas_Hatorah_Pt1_1975.mp3.

33. M. Megillah 3, 6.34. B.T. Megillah 21b.35. Differences of opinion are more a question of emphasis, rather

than substance. See, e.g., Hiddushe Rabbenu Hayyim ha-Levi al ha-Rambam,Hil. Me’ilah pp. 8, 1 and Shlomo Tykocynski, Darkhe ha-Limmudbe-Yeshivot Lita ba-me’ah ha-19, PhD diss., Hebrew University 2004, pp.52–66.

36. See ‘‘Qeri’at ha-Torah be-Shabbat, ba-Sheni u-va-Hamishi,’’ Shiurimle-Zekher Abba Mari, I (Jerusalem, 1984), p. 29. The Rav addressedthe same text, with added emphasis, in a series of classes that he deliv-ered in August 1975. The lecture is located at: http://download.bcbm.org/Media/RavSoloveitchik/GemaraHalacha/Kriyas_Hatorah_Pt2_1975.mp3.

37. http://download.bcbm.org/Media/RavSoloveitchik/GemaraHalacha/Gerus_Mesorah_Pt1_1975.mp3. The transcription hasbeen lightly edited. This speech is better known for its implications forthe question of resolving the plight of women who are denied religiousdivorces by their husbands (Tav le-meitav), and for its polemical critique ofR. Emanuel Rackman. My student, Ms Aliza Bazak, is presently completinga doctorate in which she examines the legal implications of R.Soloveitchik’s remarks. The latter point was recently discussed byLawrence Kaplan, ‘‘From Cooperation to Conflict: Rabbi ProfessorEmanuel Rackman, Rav Joseph B. Soloveitchik, and the Evolution ofAmerican Modern Orthodoxy,’’ Modern Judaism, Vol. 30, No. 1 (2010),pp. 46–68.

38. Cf. ‘‘Al Ahavat ha-Torah,’’ pp. 409–11.39. According to Talmudic tradition, a man who has experienced a

seminal emission may neither pray nor study Torah until he immerseshimself in a miqveh. Cf. Encyclopedia Talmudit, IV, pp. 130–48 s.v. ba’al qeri.

40. B.T. Berakhot 22a. The Rav cited the passage in Hebrew and thenoffered an English paraphrase.

41. Eliezer Goldman, ‘‘Teshuvah va-Zeman be-Hagut ha-RavSoloveitchik,’’ Emunah be-Zemanim Mishtanim, (Jerusalem, 1997),pp. 175–90. The point was briefly alluded to by L. Kaplan, ‘‘ReligiousPhilosophy of Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik,’’ Tradition, Vol. 14 (1974), p. 57.




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42. Cf. Halakhic Man, pp. 117–8. Goldman notes (ibid., pp. 176–84)that R. Soloveitchik’s ideas betray the influence of Husserl and Schiller.As we shall soon see, the Rav, himself, highlights his debt to Bergson.An expansive discussion of this dual time model is found in an addressdelivered in 1970 to the Boston Jewish Community, entitled: ‘‘TheChallenge to the Traditional Jew’’ (http://download.bcbm.org/Media/RavSoloveitchik/MachshavaOther/Challenge_to_Traditional_Jews_Part_1_4-5-70_r.mp3).

43. Halakhic Man, pp. 110–7.44. Cf. M. Yoma pp. 8, 9.45. Cf. B.T. Sanhedrin 27a; Mishneh Torah, Hil. Edut 10, 1; and

Shulhan Arukh, Hoshen Mishpat sec. 34 paras 1–2.46. Mishneh Torah, Hil. Teshuvah 2, 1; 2, 4; and 7, 6.47. Joseph B. Soloveitchik, The Halakhic Mind: An Essay on Jewish

Tradition and Modern Thought (New York, 1986), pp. 47–50. SeeSchwartz, Religion or Halakha, pp. 295–7. The essay was actually writtenin 1944.

48. The non-halakhic portion was published as ‘‘Sacred and Profane:Kodesh and Hol in World Perspectives,’’ Ha-Tzedek (May–June, 1945),pp. 1–24. It was republished in Gesher (Sivan, 1966), pp. 5–29.

49. ‘‘Sacred and Profane,’’ pp. 10-11. He already anticipated part ofthis discussion in Halakhic Man, pp. 117ff.

50. Joseph B. Soloveitchik, Out of the Whirlwind: Essays on Mourning,Suffering and the Human Condition, (eds.) David Shatz, et al. (Jersey City,2003), pp. 9–31.

51. Here, as in ‘‘Sacred and Profane’’ (10), he explicitly acknowledgeshis debt to Bergson’s Matter and Memory (New York, 1990).

52. Pp. 16–17. Cf. Joseph B. Soloveitchik, The Lord is Righteous in all HisWays: Reflections on the Tish’ah be-Av Kinot, (ed.) Jacob J. Schacter (Hoboken,2006), pp. 70–2; and The Koren Mesorat Harav Kinot: Tefilla for Tisha B’Av,Kinot, Eikha / with Commentary on the Kinot Based Upon the Teachings of JosephB. Soloveitchik , (ed.) Simon Posner (New York, 2010), passim.

53. A proper evaluation of the legal implications of the cognitiveand spiritual components of ritual observance requires considerationof Rabbi Soloveitchik’s interpretation of the role of intent (kavannah)therein. This requires a separate discussion. In the interim, see Iggerotha-GriD ha-Levi ad Hil. Qeri’at Shema 2, 1 and Shi’urei ha-Rav al InyyaneTefillah u-qeri’at Shema, (ed.) Menachem Genack (New York, 2010),pp. 55–7.

54. Mircea Eliade, The Myth of the Eternal Return,or, Cosmos and History, trans. W. Trask (Princeton, 1991); AaronGurevich, Categories of Medieval Culture, trans. G. L. Campbell(London, 1985); Jacques Le Goff, History and Memory (New York, 1992);and Jonathan Z. Smith, To Take Place (Chicago, 1987).

55. M. Ta’anit 4, 6. On the development of this, and the other com-memorative fasts, see Joseph Tabory, Mo’adei Yisrael be-Tequfat ha-Mishnahve-ha-Talmud (Jerusalem, 1995), pp. 396-406.

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56. See Ezra Fleischer, Shirat ha-Qodesh ha-Ivrit Be-Yeme ha-Baynayim,2

(Jerusalem, 2007), pp. 71-72; 204-206, and 444-442.57. See Daniel Goldschmidt, Seder ha-Qinot le-Tisha b’Av (Jerusalem,

1972), pp. 7–16 and Simha Goldin, The Ways of Jewish Martyrdom (Leiden,2008).

58. Cf. Robert Chazan, European Jewry and the First Crusade(Berkeley, 1987), pp. 50–84.

59. The comment concerning Hester Panim is taken from my ownnotes of R. Soloveitchik’s lectures on Tisha B’Av, 1975.

60. Cf. Yerushalmi, Zakhor. passim.61. My student, Matania Ben Ghedalia, has collected and examined

the available information concerning him. See M. Ben Ghedalia, TheRabbinic Sages of Speyer in the Era of the First Crusade: Their Lives,Leadership and Works at the end of the 11th century and the beginning of the12th century, PhD dissertation, Bar Ilan University 2007, p. 18.

62. Goldschmidt, Seder ha-Qinot le-Tisha b’Av (Jerusalem, 1972), 96 l.55–62.

63. The translation is based upon that found in The Koren MesoratHarav Kinot, p. 456, emphasis added. I have, however, made a numberof changes to better reflect both the Hebrew original, and R.Soloveitchik’s understanding thereof.

64. Cf. Sefer Hararei Qedem, II, (ed.) Yehiel Michel Shurkin (Jerusalem,2004), p. 310. In this, he was following a classical Ashkenazic practiceof using piyyut as a legal source. See Yisrael M. Ta Shma, ‘‘Hitabdutve-Retzah ha-Zulat al Qiddush Ha-Shem: Le-She’elat Meqoma shel ha-Aggadahba-Massoret ha-Pesiqah ha-Ashkenazit,’’ Yehudim mul ha-Tzelav: Gezerot TaTNUbe-Historiya u-ve-Historiografiya, (eds.) Yom Tov Assis, et al. (Jerusalem,2000), pp. 150–6.

65. See Herschel Schachter, Nefesh Ha-Rav (Jerusalem, 2006), pp.197–8. See also, Judith Baumel-Schwartz, Kol Bekhiyot: Ha-Sho’ah ve-ha-Tefillah (Ramat Gan, 1992); and Roni Stauber, ‘‘Ha-Vikkuah be-Shenotha-Hamishim beyn ha-Tziyyonut ha-Datit le-veyn ha-Smol ha-Tziyyoni al Mo’edYom ha-Zikkaron la-Sho’ah,’’ in Medinah ba-Derekh: Ha-Hevra ha-Yisraelitba-Asorim ha-Rishonim, (ed.) Anita Schapira (Jerusalem, 2001), pp. 189–203.

66. Cf. The Lord is Righteous in all His Ways, pp. 211–4, especiallypp. 289–301. Emphasis added.

67. The texts on Tisha B’Av are rife with proof of this contention.68. On the other hand, his decidedly utilitarian approach to historical

data could lead to (what could charitably) only be seen as chronologicalinaccuracies. Thus, on one occasion, he assumed that R. Gershom Me’orha-Golah (d. 1028) was a contemporary of Charlemagne.

69. B.T. Shabbat 21.70. Mishneh Torah, Hil. Megillah ve-Chanukkah 3, 1–3. The most con-

centrated presentation is found at: http://download.bcbm.org/Media/RavSoloveitchik/Moadim/AlHanisim_Chanuka_Boston_71.mp3.

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he also made this point in purely halakhic context. See Hararei Qedem, I(Jerusalem, 2000), p. 271.

72. The point has been highlighted in recent historiography. SeeFrank E. Peters, The Harvest of Hellenism: A History of the Near East fromAlexander the Great to the Triumph of Christianity (New York, 1971) andUriel Rappaport and Yisrael Rogen (eds.), Medinat ha-Hashmona’imle-Toldoteha al Reqa ha-Tequfa ha-Hellenistit, (Jerusalem, 1993).

73. For a similar discussion, see the discussion of the Burning of theTalmud in 1242 (The Lord is Righteous in all His Ways, pp. 287–8) and themanner in which it is integrated into an excursus on Catholic Theologyand its attitude toward the Jew. It seems to me, that this material must betaken into consideration when evaluating R. Soloveitchik’s manifesto onInter-faith dialogue, ‘Confrontation.’ Cf. http://www.bc.edu/dam/files/research_sites/cjl/texts/center/conferences/soloveitchik/index.html.

74. The late Professor Isadore Twersky noted that the Rav’s innova-tion in the field of Talmudic exposition lay in the expansion of the textsand subjects that he studied, not in the methodology applied thereto (I.Twersky, ‘‘The Rov,’’ Tradition, Vol. 30 (1996), p. 12).

75. See above, n 9. This was true both of his shiurim at YeshivaUniversity and of his ‘‘popular’’ Talmud classes in Manhattan and inBoston. So striking was this dichotomy that students who attended theformer for many years could honestly assert that they never heard himmention anything not strictly Talmudic in class. See Eleff, Mentor ofGenerations, p. 65 and Herschel Schechter, Nefesh Ha-Rav,2 (New York,1999), pp. 1–3.

76. This is borne out by recordings of his lectures, written notes bystudents and by my own almost ten years in his class.

77. Scholars are, indeed, divided on the question as just how to char-acterize R. Soloveitchik’s non-Talmudic writings. See, most recently,Shubert Spero, Aspects of Rabbi Joseph Dov Soloveitchik’s philosophy ofJudaism, (Jersey City, 2009).

78. I. Twersky, ‘‘The Rov,’’ pp. 32–3.79. See Alexander Broadie, ‘‘The Nature of Medieval Jewish

Philosophy,’’ in History of Jewish Philosophy, edited by Daniel Frank andOliver Leaman (London and New York, 1997), pp. 65–71. A modern ex-emplar of this model was R. Eliezer Berkowits. See Eliezer Berkovits,Essential essays on Judaism, (ed.) David Hazony (Jerusalem, 2000).

80. See, for example, R. Sa’adiah Gaon’s introduction to The Book ofDoctrines and Beliefs, trans. Alexander Altmann, Three Jewish Philosophers,pp. 36–47.

81. The following is heavily indebted to Isadore Twersky, Introductionto the Code of Maimonides (Mishneh Torah), (New Haven, 1980), Ch. VI.

82. Mishneh Torah, Hil. Yesodei ha-Torah 8-9 and Guide for the Perplexed2, 35. Cf. Marc Shapiro, The Limits of Orthodox Theology: Maimonides’Thirteen Principles Reappraised (Cambridge, 2004), Ch. 6.

83. Above, n 6.84. I. Twersky, ‘‘The Rov,’’ p. 32.

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Woolf- Time Awareness and Spirituality in Rav Soloveitchik's Thought

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