Benedict XVI has just left, and soon our Israeli chief rabbis will follow suit. The difference is that Benedict left on his own accord, much to the dismay of many in the Church, while our chief rabbis, whose terms of office have ended, are forced to step down—sadly, very much to the delight of many Israelis.
Benedict had a hard time with himself, so he decided to call it a day. Besides the many internal church problems, for the most part he felt sandwiched between the Old Catholic teachings according to which he was raised, and the new Christianity, which his great predecessor John Paul II initiated and which he himself was partially responsible for introducing, though he didn’t want to admit it. This gnawed at his conscience and eventually led to his resignation.
Our chief rabbis have not yet realized what Benedict already understood. They too are sandwiched between a new religious Jewish world and the old manifestation of Judaism. They have not yet recognized the fact that a vast new horizon has opened up, which demands a new and bold religious Judaism that will inspire and make itself and Halacha the love of thousands of Israelis. Benedict understood that his guidelines were no longer what the Church needed. He realized that the Church would move on without him, but he didn’t want to compromise his principles, so he stepped down. That shows courage and integrity.
Benedict’s predecessor, the late John Paul II, was a man with broad shoulders who sometimes ignored Catholic fundamentals and changed the rules of the papacy. He traveled his own way, literally and figuratively. He could do this because he was not the typical Catholic theologian; he was too great for that. John Paul was involved with too much ad extra, working outside the church, and too little ad intra, dealing with issues within the Church—its dogmas and “facts of faith.” But it worked wonders. He brought millions back to Catholicism.
In contrast to Rav Avraham Yitzchak Kook, Chacham Benzion Uziel and some other great and innovative Israeli chief rabbis, those who were in office during the last two generations have shown to be dedicated followers of Benedict’s approach, not of John Paul’s. They believed in the conventional and were scared of innovation. They did not stand up against rabbinical rulings and ideologies that would no longer work. Like Benedict, they, who were meant to lead, brought their religion to an impasse and showed a lack of courage when it came to making necessary changes such as finding a solution to the agunah problem.
The difference however is that Benedict is a much greater theologian than any of our later chief rabbis. He has shown an incredible amount of theological creativity. But this was his undoing. What does a man do with such brilliant new insights when he needs to compress them into mainstream Catholicism and conservatism? In the end, he drowned in his own knowledge and then discovered that he needed to start swimming in order to stay afloat, only to realize that his conservatism again began to gnaw at his conscience and pulled him under once more.
Our later chief rabbis, some of them very righteous and willing to make great personal sacrifices, have lacked theological and philosophical background. They have remained exclusively in the dalet amot of Halacha (the four cubits of Jewish law) and have seemingly never studied secular or general religious philosophy. Nor have they learned any Jewish theology (no doubt the wrong terminology for Judaism!) in a really serious way. Consequently, they are unable to compete with Jewish or non-Jewish philosophers and clergy. This is also the reason why they have not the slightest influence on the academic world, unlike Rav Kook who never set foot in a university but influenced generations of academics who wrote many doctoral theses on his philosophy.
Our chief rabbis have not accomplished anything even close to what Benedict did. Benedict wrote masterpieces of Catholic theology, all of which reflect his creative thinking. His famous Ratzinger Report is one of the finest works ever written. His diagnosis of the problems facing the church is mind-boggling, though he took a very conservative stand. Yet, profound works on the state of Judaism today have never been penned by our chief rabbis.
John Paul II was a “Christian Chabad-nick” (lehavdil) and started a worldwide ba’al teshuva movement, aiding the disintegration of Communism and bringing his message to millions of people by traveling to all corners of the earth. But to do so effectively he knew he had to bend the rules and realized that novelty had to be his trademark. He simply suspended himself over the planet and landed wherever he wanted. Archbishop Michael Miller said that “from the moment John Paul II stepped out onto the central balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica, ‘He simply dominated that space. He looked like he had been pope forever.’ In the press coverage from those early years, the Pope was dubbed ‘God’s athlete.’ He skied, climbed mountains, swam, and had an undying passion for the outdoors” (*).
Sure, on his many travels he sometimes missed the runway, but he didn’t care so much. He just took his plane elsewhere and landed right on the mark. He inspired, had immense chutzpah and drew crowds as no one else ever did in Catholic history. True, he was condemned for focusing too much on the messenger and not enough on the message. But he had good reason to do so. His teachings were the outgrowth of his personality; they depended on him and not on the long-running and constant tradition of the Church. Not only did he have the ideal personality for this, but he realized that Catholicism had to be reshaped. It had to do away with its “theology of contempt” toward the Jews, its hatred for anybody who did not believe in the canon of Catholicism. He knew that it needed a complete overhaul and that it had to admit to the “truth possibility” of other religions—first and foremost, of Judaism—and even forms of secularism.
But where have our chief rabbis been? Have they ever dominated the world with startling new insights, or with remarkable ad hoc humor such as John Paul’s? Have they surprised us with their audacity, reaching far beyond the borders of the Jewish people, causing shock waves the world over? Have they studied—in depth—Christianity, Hinduism, Buddhism, the teachings of the Reform and Conservative movements, the works of Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, the important works of Buber, Heschel, Mordechai Kaplan, David Hartman, Tamar Ross, and Arthur Green? Have they tried to learn from them even if they don’t agree with some of their ideas?
Did they climb intellectual mountains, have the chutzpah to go their own way, and see the need for an overhaul of Orthodox Judaism? Did they ever work through religious doubt and feel the pain? And if not, how can they guide the tens of thousands of Israelis who do experience doubt, but still love Judaism and wish to connect to it? Do the chief rabbis realize that it is entirely impossible to apply Halacha, as developed in the galut, to conditions in the State of Israel, and that there is much more to Halacha than what is stated in its traditional codes?
Perhaps they should take an example from Chief Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks, about to retire from the British Chief Rabbinate (what a loss!), who is at home in today’s intellectual climate; who is prepared to have an open debate with Jewish and gentile secular thinkers and scientists; and who has been conveying the great message and relevance of Judaism to top intellectuals, members of the British Government including prime ministers, and even to archbishops.
It is true that our chief rabbis are victims of an education that did not challenge or stimulate them to see far beyond the limited horizons of those institutions where they studied. But the time has come for the Knesset to ensure that we do not repeat this mistake. It is the government’s obligation to appoint chief rabbis who combine the powerful personality and chutzpah of John Paul II with the intellectual creativity of Benedict XVI.
And if there is nobody to choose from, we should build yeshivot of a different kind, where students’ leadership and intellectual abilities can be nurtured, so that at the election in a few years time there will be a list of splendid candidates to choose from. And would it not be equally prudent to choose a chief rabbi whose wife is an outstanding personality, someone who can carry her own weight in this important position? This, we admit, cannot (yet) be asked of the next pope!
* John L. Allen Jr., The Rise of Benedict XVI: The Inside Story of How the Pope was Elected and Where He Will Take the Catholic Church (New York: Doubleday, 2005) p. 17.
How can any assessment of John Paul II’s papacy or character omit any mention of his complicity in the Church’s child sex abuse cover up? Yes, Jon Paul II acknowledged and apologized for the Church’s past sins against the Jews, but he did not “overhaul” Church ideology. He defended the Church’s conservative positions on birth control, abortion, celibacy, and the role of women in the Church hierchy. The message of the piece seems to be, he was a rock star and he was good for the Jews, so therefore was a good Pope.
Dear Andrew,
Thanks for your observations on my piece on the Chief Rabbinate and the Pope.
You are right that John Paul was in many ways not enough forthcoming. Still he clearly was breaking in many ways with the old Christian tradition. He could not always push his ideas through but in his writings one can clearly see his doubts. Like in our orthodoxy, lehavdil, things move very slowly.
In many ways he was too big for the Church. He got suffocated in its institution. The Church could not handle him. Whether he was responsible for the sex abuse incidents is obviously questionable.
He was indeed something of a rock star when one just learns about his enormous influence. He was definitely better for the Jews then many of his predecessors. Whether he was a good pope, I doubt.
No pope really can be good by our standards, but he was better than the others.
Kol tuv, nathan cardozo