The Spinoza Problem (16 page)

“Such questions
should
be asked,” encouraged Bento. “Let me offer a few further thoughts about miracles. We must keep in mind that there are
always attendant natural circumstances that are omitted in miracle reporting. For example, Exodus tells us, ‘Moses stretched forth his hand and the seas returned to their strength . . .’ but
later
in the song of Moses, we read additional material: ‘Thou didst blow with thy wind and the sea covered them.’ In other words, some descriptions omit the natural causes, the winds. Thus, we see that the scriptures narrate them in the order that has the most power to move men, particularly uneducated men, to devotion.”

“And the sun stood still for Joshua’s great victory? That too was fiction?” asked Jacob, straining to remain calm.

“That miracle is most wobbly. First, remember that the ancients all believed the sun moved and the Earth stood still. We know now that it is the Earth that revolves around the sun. That error itself is evidence of the human hands behind the Bible’s construction. What’s more, the particular form of the miracle was shaped by political motivations. Was not the sun god worshipped by the enemies of Joshua? Hence, the miracle is a message trumpeting that the Hebrews’ God was more powerful than the Gentiles’ God.”

“That is wonderfully explained,” said Franco.

“Don’t believe everything you hear from him, Franco,” said Jacob. “So, Bento,” he asked, “is that the whole explanation of the miracle in Joshua?”

“That’s only part. The rest of the explanation lies in the idioms of the day. Many so-called miracles are only manners of expression. It’s the way people talked and wrote in those times. What the writer of Joshua probably meant when he said the sun stood still was simply that the day of the battle seemed long. When the Bible states that God hardened Pharaoh’s heart, it only means that Pharaoh was obstinate. When it says that God clave the rocks for the Hebrews and water gushed forth, it merely meant that the Hebrews found springs and quenched their thirst. In the scriptures almost anything unusual was attributed to an act of God. Even trees of unusual size are called trees of God.”

“And,” Jacob asked, “what about the miracle of the Jews surviving whereas the other nations have not?”

“I see nothing miraculous in it, nothing that cannot be explained by natural causes. The Jews have survived since the Diaspora because they have always refused to blend in with other cultures. They have remained separate by virtue of their complex rites, their dietary rules, and the sign of circumcision, which they scrupulously observe. Thus they survive, but at a cost: their stubborn adherence to separateness has drawn down upon them universal hatred.”

Bento paused and, seeing the shocked faces of both Franco and Jacob, said, “Perhaps I give you indigestion by serving up too many difficult things for you to swallow today?”

“Do not worry about me, Bento Spinoza,” said Jacob. “Surely you know that listening is not the same as swallowing,”

“I may be mistaken, but I believe you nodded at least thrice to my words. Am I correct?”

“Most of what I hear is arrogance. You believe you know more than countless generations of rabbis, more than Rashi, Gersonides, more than Maimonides.”

“Yet you nodded.”

“When you show
evidence
, when you show two statements in Genesis that contradict one another,
that
I cannot deny. Yet, even so, I am certain there are explanations for that beyond your knowledge. I am certain it is
you
, not the Torah, that is mistaken.”

“Is there no contradiction in your words? On the one hand you respect evidence and at the same time remain certain of something for which there is no evidence.” Bento turned to Franco. “And you? You have been unusually silent. Indigestion?”

“No, no indigestion, Baruch—do you mind my calling you by your Hebrew rather than your Portuguese name? I prefer it. I don’t know why. Perhaps it is because you are unlike any Portuguese man I ever saw. No indigestion—you give me the reverse. What would that be? Soothing, I think. Stomach soothing. Soul soothing too.”

“I remember how frightened you were during our first talk. You risked so much by sharing your reaction to rituals in both the synagogue and the cathedral. You referred to them both as madness. You remember?”

“How could I forget? But to know that I am not alone, to know that others—especially you—share them. That is a gift that saves my sanity.”

“Franco, your answer gives me the fortitude to go further and teach you more about ritual. I have reached the conclusion that rituals of our community have nothing to do with divine law, nothing to do with blessedness and virtue and love, and everything to do with civic tranquility and perpetuation of rabbinical authority—”

“Once again,” Jacob interrupted, his voice rising, “you go too far. Is there no limit to your arrogance? A schoolchild knows that the scriptures teach that observation of ritual is the law of God.”

“We disagree. Again, Jacob, I do not ask you to believe me. I appeal to your reason and simply ask you to look at the words of the Holy Book with your own eyes. There are many places in the Torah that tell us to follow your heart and not take ritual too seriously. Let us look at Isaiah, who teaches most plainly that the divine law signifies a true manner of life, not a life of ceremonial observances. Isaiah plainly tells us to forego sacrifices and feasts and sums up the whole of divine law in these simple words”—Bento opened the Bible to a bookmark in Isaiah and read—“Cease to do evil, learn to do well; seek judgment, relieve the oppressed.”

“So you’re saying that rabbinical law is not the Torah’s law?” asked Franco.

“What I’m saying is that the Torah contains two kinds of law: there is moral law, and there are laws designed to keep Israel together as a theocracy separate from its neighbors. Unfortunately the Pharisees, in their ignorance, failed to understand the difference and thought that the observance of the state laws was the sum total of morality, whereas such laws were merely intended for the welfare of the community. They were not meant to instruct the Jews but instead to keep them under control. There is a fundamental difference in the purpose of each of the two kinds of laws: observation of ceremonial law leads only to civic tranquility, whereas observation of divine or moral law leads to blessedness.”

“So,” said Jacob, “do I hear correctly? Do you counsel Franco not to heed ceremonial law? Not to attend the synagogue, not to pray, not to observe Jewish dietary laws?”

“You misunderstand me,” said Bento, drawing on his recently acquired knowledge of the views of Epicurus. “I do not negate the importance of civic tranquility, but I do differentiate it from true blessedness.” Bento turned to Franco. “If you love your community, wish to be a part of it, wish to raise your family here, wish to live among your own, then you must participate agreeably in community activities, including religious observances.”

Turning back to Jacob, he asked, “Can I be more clear?”

“I hear that you say we should follow ritual law only for the sake of appearances, and that it really doesn’t count for much because the only thing that matters is this other divine law that you still have not defined,” said Jacob.

“By divine law, I mean the highest good, the true knowledge of God and love.”

“That’s a vague answer. What is ‘true knowledge’?”

“True knowledge means the perfection of our intellect that permits us to know God more fully. Jewish communities have penalties for failing to follow ritual law: public criticism by the congregation and the rabbi or, in extreme instances, banishment or
cherem
. Is there a penalty for failing to follow divine law? Yes, but it is not some particular punishment; it is the absence of the good. I love the words of Solomon, who says, ‘When wisdom enters into your heart and knowledge is pleasant to thy soul, then shalt thou understand righteousness, and judgment, and equity, yea, every good path.’”

Jacob shook his head. “These high-sounding phrases do not conceal the fact that you are challenging basic Jewish law. Maimonides himself teaches that those who follow the commandments of the Torah are rewarded by God with bliss and happiness in the world to come. With my own ears, I have heard Rabbi Mortera himself emphatically declare anyone who denies the divinity of the Torah will be cut off from immortal life with God.”

“And I say his phrases—‘the world to come’ and ‘immortal life with God’—are human words, not divine words. Moreover, these words are not to be found in the Torah; they are the phrases of rabbis writing commentaries on commentaries.”

“So,” insisted Jacob, “do I hear you deny the existence of the world to come?”

“The world to come, immortal life, blissful afterlife—I repeat, all such phrases are the inventions of rabbis.”

“You deny,” Jacob persisted, “that the righteous will find everlasting joy and communion with God and that the evil will be vilified and doomed to eternal punishment?”

“It is against reason to think that we, as we are today, will persist after death. The body and the mind are two aspects of the same person. The mind cannot persist after the body dies.”

“But,” Jacob spoke loudly, now visibly agitated, “we know the body will be resurrected. All of our rabbis teach us that. Maimonides stated this clearly. It is one of the thirteen articles of Jewish faith. It is the ground of our faith.”

“Jacob, I must be a poor guide. I thought I had fully explained the impossibility of such things, yet now you’re once more wandering into the land of miracles. Again, I remind you these are
all
human opinions; they have
nothing
to do with the laws of Nature, and
nothing
can occur contrary to the fixed laws of Nature. Nature, which is infinite and eternal and encompasses
all substance in the universe, acts according to orderly laws that cannot be superseded by supernatural means. A decayed body, returned to dust, cannot be reassembled. Genesis tells us this most clearly: ‘You will eat your bread until you return to the earth, from which you were taken, because earth you are and to earth you shall return.’”

“Does that mean I will never be reunited with my martyred father?” asked Franco.

“I, like you, yearn to see my blessed father again. But the laws of Nature are what they are. Franco, I share your longing, and when I was a child, I too believed that all time would come to an end and someday after death we should be reunited—I with my father and my mother, even though I was so young when she died that I can hardly remember her. And of course they would be reunited with their parents and they with theirs, ad infinitum.”

“But now,” Bento continued in a soft, teacherly voice, “I have given up these childish hopes and have replaced them by the certain knowledge that I hold my father inside me—his face, his love, his wisdom—and in this manner I am already united with him. Blessed reunion must occur in this life because this life is all we have. There is no eternal blessedness in the world to come because there is no world to come. Our task, and I believe the Torah teaches us this, is to attain blessedness in this life
now
by living a life of love and of learning to know God. True piety consists in justice, charity, and love of one’s neighbor.”

Jacob stood and gruffly pushed his chair aside. “Enough! I’ve heard enough heresy for one day. Enough for one lifetime. We’re leaving. Let’s go, Franco.”

As Jacob grabbed Franco’s hand, Bento said, “No, not yet. Jacob, there’s one remaining important question that, to my surprise, you have neglected to ask.”

Jacob let go of Franco’s arm and looked warily at Bento. “What question?”

“I have told you that Nature is eternal, infinite, and encompasses all substance.”

“Yes?” Jacob’s face was furrowed and quizzical. “What question?”

“And have I not told you that God is eternal, infinite, and encompasses all substance?”

Jacob nodded, entirely bewildered.

“You say you have been listening, you say you have heard enough, but yet you have not asked me the most fundamental question.”

“What fundamental question?”

“If God and Nature have the identical properties, then what is the difference between God and Nature?”

“All right,” said Jacob. “I ask you: what is the difference between God and Nature?”

“And I give you the answer you already know: there is no difference. God is Nature. Nature is God.”

Both Jacob and Franco stared at Bento, and without another word Jacob yanked Franco to his feet and dragged him into the street.

When out of sight, Jacob put his arm around Franco and squeezed him. “Good, good, Franco, we got just exactly what we needed out of him. And you regarded him a wise man? What a fool he is!”

Franco yanked himself away from Jacob’s embrace. “Things are not always what they seem to be. You may be the fool to think him a fool.”

C
haracter is destiny. The new wave of psychoanalytic thought embraced by Friedrich agreed with Spinoza that the future is determined by what has gone before, by our physical and psychological makeup—our passions, fears, goals; our temperament, our love of self, our stances toward others.

But consider Alfred Rosenberg, a pretentious, detached, unloving, unlovable philosopher-manqué who lacked curiosity about himself and, despite his gerrymandered sense of self, walked the earth with a smug sense of superiority. Could Friedrich, could any student of human nature, have predicted the meteoric rise of Alfred Rosenberg? No, character alone is insufficient for prophecy. There is another core and unpredictable ingredient. What shall we term it? Fortune? Chance? The sheer good luck of being in the right place at the right time?

The right time? November 1918. The war was ending, and Germany, weeping and staggered by defeat, was in chaos awaiting a savior. And the right place? Munich. Alfred Rosenberg would soon be on his way to that chosen spot, whose back alleys and popular beer halls were incubating a momentous drama and awaiting only the arrival of its preternaturally malignant cast.