Tinkering?
The late Louis Jacobs was a versatile scholar, prolific author, innovative and profound thinker, and noted rabbi.[1] Lehrhaus published (November 18, 2024) a review by Steven Gotlib of Miri Freund-Kandel’s book, Louis Jacobs and the Quest for a Contemporary Jewish Theology. The review is titled “Ought Judaism Be Tinkered With?” and the term “tinker” in one form or another appears 17 times in the review.
A few examples:
Freud-Kandel takes on a framing that Jacobs himself did not – and likely never would – use: a “tinkering” model which “encourages the individual to find a Judaism that can make sense to them” . . . Reclaiming Jacob’s approach as a call for personal tinkering . . . The tinkerer is not a professional craftsman to create some ideal form . . . Freud-Kandel’s tinkerers have already made the decision to live as informed, observant Jews in a similar way to Jacobs . . . Such people can even go so far as to reject the notion of objective truth completely . . . There is not much room to argue in principle with the theological thinker that she recommends to her readers from a Modern Orthodox perspective.
My problem is not with Jacobs, Freud-Kandel, or Gotlib, but only with the term “tinkering” in the context of the intellectual and spiritual challenges facing modern Jews committed to a life of Jewish practice as well as the values of intellectual freedom, inquiry, and honesty. It seems to me that the term “tinker” is unfortunate, both because it is inaccurate, and because it is, in some respects, pejorative.
The Oxford English Dictionary (reflecting British usage) defines “tinker” (as a noun) as “a clumsy or inefficient mender… a botcher,” and as (a verb) “to work as a tinker; to mend metal utensils… to work at something clumsily or imperfectly… to occupy oneself about something in a trifling or aimless way.”
Webster’s Third New International Dictionary (reflecting American usage) defines “tinker” (as a noun) as an “itinerant repairman who mends kitchen or household utensils… an unskilled mender and (as a verb) “to repair or adjust something in an unskilled… manner.”
In light of what the term “tinker” means, is it appropriate to describe the attempts of thinkers (whether Maimonides in his day, or significant contemporary thinkers like Jacobs and others) to synthesize their Jewish commitment with what they saw as serious intellectual challenges as “tinkering?” However, besides the questionable terminology, there’s a more fundamental problem.
Is “Judaism” (however defined) an inert object, like a broken pot or machine in need of repair, however skilled or unskilled? Is not Judaism a living, evolving, and organic civilization?[2] After a given number of years (depending on the organism and the types of cells), an organism replaces all of its billions of cells; no original cell remains. And yet, it is the same organism, with the same DNA. By analogy, the same Judaism that has changed drastically over more than 3,000 years, in its encounters with internal and external challenges, is yet the same Judaism. Consider the story of Moses, “our Rabbi” (certainly an anachronistic term) visiting the academy of Rabbi Akiba[3] and not understanding what was being discussed – but the discussion concerned “a law of Moses from Sinai” (halakhah le-Moshe mi-Sinai).[4] The more things change, the more they stay the same… or, in the words of Rav Kook, ha-yashan yitḥadesh veha-ḥadash yitkadesh (“the old will become renewed and the new will become sanctified”).[5]
The only way for a living organism to survive is to grow and change. The attempts of Jewish philosophers – whether Philo in ancient Alexandria, Maimonides in 12th-century Spain and Egypt, or contemporary thinkers like Louis Jacobs – to find an intellectually honest and compelling synthesis between “faith and reason,” or between their Jewish commitment and their scientific-philosophical understandings, are the way this civilization has survived and thrives. These attempts should not, I suggest, be denigrated as mere “tinkering.” Whether we agree or disagree with this or that philosopher, they were and are “thinkers” and not “tinkers.”
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Jerusalem, Israel
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[1] The Encyclopaedia Judaica (first and second editions) contains no less than 24 wide-ranging entries by Jacobs in a variety of areas of scholarship: Akedah; Halakhah; Halakhah Le-Moshe Mi-Sinai; Ḥasidism; Hermeneutics; Judaism; Montefiore, C.J.G.; Moses; Passover; Peace; Prayer; Preaching; Purim; Righteousness; Rosh Ha-Shanah; Sabbath; Shavuot; Shema, Reading of; Sin; Study; Sukkot; Theology; Torah, Reading of.
[2] One need not be a follower of Mordecai Kaplan’s philosophy to find his terminology apt.
[3] Menaḥot 29b.
[4] As it happens, Jacobs wrote the entries on both Moses and “Halakhah le-Moshe mi-Sinai” for the Encyclopaedia Judaica.
[5] Rav Kook, Iggerot I:214.
Response to Yitzchak Blau: Teshuvah is the Hardest Mitzvah
I want to thank R. Yitzchak Blau for his response, as I know him to be one of the most thoughtful and nuanced thinkers of Religious Zionism in the English-speaking world today.
The goal of my essay was to draw attention to an idea Rav Kook and Rav Shagar felt to be crucial. In a time of crisis and catastrophe, such as war, Jews have a fundamental religious responsibility to look inward, engage in heshbon ha-nefesh, and do teshuvah. According to Rav Shagar, this process must even include a willingness to ask difficult and uncomfortable questions about our most deeply held beliefs. Too often, he felt, Religious Zionism had failed to do this, in part because it believed that the establishment of Israel was endowed with messianic significance. As long as one believes they are on the path to redemption, how much teshuvah can one really do? Of course, to be honest, even on this point, Religious Zionism is not unique. Regardless of one’s political or religious beliefs, few of us are willing to rethink our commitments, even when faced with events that deeply challenge them.
For this reason, I want to thank R. Blau for highlighting the example of R. Yehuda Amital, whose understanding of Religious Zionism underwent a dramatic transformation over the course of his life. In my eyes, he very much serves as a model for the kind of teshuvah Rav Shagar aspired to, and he shows how one can critique and rethink Religious Zionism as an act of love without abandoning it.
Nevertheless, when reading R. Blau’s response, I couldn’t help but feel a sense of disappointment. More than twenty years ago, he wrote an important article which, to some extent, inspired my own essay, titled “Ploughshares Into Swords: Contemporary Religious Zionists and Moral Constraints.” In it, he seriously critiques leading rabbis in Religious Zionism who have advocated for militarism and a loosening of moral constraints against Israel’s enemies. Though his response to my essay seems to indicate that he feels differently, it is my opinion that these voices have only grown in prominence over the last two decades. Even more, over the past year, it has become increasingly clear that they are not limited to a few select batei midrash but have achieved far greater acceptance within Religious Zionism as a whole. It may be that R. Blau will not take my word for it, but perhaps he will listen to R. Mosheh Lichtenstein, who said as much in a powerful derashah delivered just a few months ago on Yom Yerushalayim. Rather than singling out a few bad apples as being the source of the problem, R. Lichtenstein took aim at Religious Zionism as a whole for normalizing figures like Itamar Ben Gvir and his party, Otzma Yehudit:
We have transformed from the Judaism of Moses and Aaron to Yiftah and Bar Kokhba…to a place where power becomes a value in its own right… Where R. Kahane and his clenched fist has pushed away R. Zvi Yehuda [Kook] and his love for the Land of Israel, not to mention R. Amital and his humanity… When religious Zionism, or most of religious Zionism, gives legitimacy for all kinds of reasons, and does not ostracize and exclude a group that emphasizes power, then we are in a serious problem.
If anything, I only regret not including R. Lichtenstein’s words in my original essay, as his call for heshbon ha-nefesh and teshuvah is exactly what I had in mind. More importantly, the spirit of much of what I wrote can even be found in the opening words of R. Blau’s article from two decades ago, which are worth citing here in full. If they were true then, their relevance has only increased today, even amidst all the pain Religious Zionism carries from the events of October 7 and the war that has followed:
When Jewish communities are threatened, we rightfully incline towards communal unity and are reluctant to engage in internal criticism. In the wake of recent events in Israel, some of which I have witnessed firsthand, one might question the appropriateness of publishing this article. Nevertheless, the article remains timely. It attempts to correct a perceived misrepresentation of yahadut, irrespective of political issues, and such a step is always relevant. Furthermore, the decision to delay our own moral questioning during difficult times could lead in modern Israel to a de facto decision never to raise such questions. Finally and most significantly, times of heightened anger, frustration and fear can cause cracks in the moral order to widen into chasms. I hope the reader will agree that the issues analyzed in the article remain very much worthy of discussion.
I am willing to accept that, at least in R. Blau’s eyes, my essay did not achieve these intended goals. But, at the very least, I sincerely hope that after two decades have passed since his words were written, he still feels that such efforts are of the utmost importance. Crisis and catastrophe have a tendency to change us all, and, as Rav Shagar reminds us, it’s not always for the better.
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Jerusalem, Israel
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