Judaism's Supreme Role in Advancing
Human Principles and `Natural Laws'
Evaluated in Gordis' Root and Branch'
the primitive church rested
upon the thought and practice
of post-biblical Judaism . • ."
While the conception of a
Judeo-Christian tradition is not
an imaginary notion, Dr. Gordis
states, there are basic differ-
ences, and in outlining them he
asserts that "Judaism has its
own distinctive contribution to
make."
Here Dr. Gordis points to an
internal Jewish cause for con-
cern, to the fact that Jews,
while being "in the forefront
of the battle for interfaith un-
derstanding,, social progress,
civil rights and international
peace," frequently "the most
idealistic among them are the
most uprooted, totally alienated
from the sources of their being."
This is ascribed to "the
d i s e a,s e of 'self-hatred,' "
which "in varying degrees of
virulence has often attacked
the most gifted and creative
sons and daughters of the
Jewish people."
Dr. Gordis does not look ask-
ance at missionary activities by
Jews for the conversion of non-
Jews to Judaism. Analyzing the
Noachide Laws, their command-
ments against idolatry, murder
and theft; prohibition of cruelty
to animals, establishment of law
and order and other fundamen-
tal moral principles, he states
that they represent "in essence
a theory of universal religion
binding upon all men."
"There is more than academic
interest," he adds, "in this rab-
binic adumbration (`of the
equality of all men in the rab-
binic formulation') of •a theory
of religious • tolerance resting
upon a concept of 'natural law.'
•This .doctrine of the Noachide
Laws was not the product of
religious indifference. It arose
among devotees of a traditional
religion which loved their faith
and believed that it alone was
the product of authentic revela-
tion. Yet they found room for
faiths other than their own in
the world, as of right and not
merely on sufferance."
A basic fact emphasized
about Judaism by Dr. Gordis
is that "the nexus binding
the Jewish group together is
a common historical. experi-
ence rather than a confession
of creed. From its inception,
Judaism has been the distil-
lation of a group experience,
including within its confines
a vast variety of attitudes, in-
sights and temperaments."
There is a truly enlightening
"Christian-Jewish Dialogue" in
Dr. Gordis' book that throws
light on contrasts between Tes-
taments. He states that the so-
called process of placing lower
elements of the Old Testament
by the side of higher aspects
of the New is "misleading." He
calls for the surrendering of
another practice, "that of re-
ferring to Old Testament versus
quoted in the New • as original
New Testament passages," and
discusses the Golden Rule claim.
"Many years ago," Dr. Gor-
dis writes, "Bertrand Russell,
whose religious orthodoxy is
something less than total, de-
scribed the Golden Rule
`Thou shalt love thy neighbor
as thyself' — as New Testa-
ment teaching. When the Old
Testament source (Leviticus
Stops Itch—Relieves Pain 19:18) was called to his at-
tention, he blandly refused
For the first time science has found
a new healing substance with the as-
to recognize his error. This,
tonishing ability to shrink hemor-
in spite of the fact that both
rhoids and to relieve pain -- without
the Gospels and the Epistles
surgery. In case after case, while
gently relieving pain, actual reduc-
are explicit in citing the
tion (shrinkage) took place. Most
Golden Rule as the accepted
amazing of all — results were so thor-
Scripture. Jesus refers to it
ough that sufferers made astonishing
statements like "Piles have ceased to
as `the first and great com-
be a problem!" The secret is a new
mandment written in the law'
healing substance (Bio-DyneS)— dis-
(Matthew 22:38; Luke 10:27),
covery of a world-famous research
institute. This substance is now avail-
and Paul describes it as 'a
able in suppository or ointment form
commandment comprehended
called Preparation
At all drug
in this saying' (Romans
'punters.
Having set out "to explore
the resources of the Jewish tra-
dition in the quest for insights
and attitudes
that can help
meet the chal-
lenges to the
world order
arising from
the boundless
variety in hu-
man nature,"
Dr. Roberts
Gordis, one of
the most dis-
tinguished of
Jewish schol-
ars, in "The
Root and the
Branch
Judaism and
the Free So-
ciety," pub-
Dr. Gordis
lished by Uni-
versity of Chicago Press (5750
Ellis, Chicago 37), provides the
results of a thorough research
into- the history of Jewish re-
ligious libertarian contribu-
tions.
Many current problems —
church-state issues, racial ten-
. sions, Christian-Jewish relations
— undergo analytical review in
a fashion that adheres to the
painstaking studiousness of the
eminent author, and the result
is a distinct contribution to re-
ligio-sociological thinking and
interfaith exchange of ideas.
Dr. Gordis makes a strong
point in emphasizing the role
played by Jewish tradition
in the modern era. Affirming
that men are exploring with
increasing seriousness the in-
sights afforded by Christian-
ity "for dealing with the prob-
lems and tensio n.‘s of a
. pluralist society," he' deploreS.
that "in all this significant
Intellectual activity, the po-
tential contribution of Juda-
ism is almost totally missing."
He adds: "This state of af-
fairs is particularly to be de-
plored, because it is clear
that in its highest and most
creative hours Judaism was
firmly rooted in its own coun-
try but its vision embraced
the world. This is true not
only in the biblical period
to which we owe the Law of
Moses, the Prophets, and the
Wisdom literature, but also in
the talmudic era and in the
medieval epoch."
The claim made in the resort
to the phrase "the Judeo-Chris-
tian tradition" as meaning that
Christianity has "carried furth-
er" the inheritance from Juda-
ism is -discredited. Calling this
assumption "m is t a k e n,'.' Dr.
Gordis writes: "Judaism - con-
tinues to bear a twofold sig-
nificance, one historical, the
other contemporary . • . In re-
ferring to Christianity -and, in
lesser d e _g r e e, to Islam as
`daughter religions' of Judaism,
we are underscoring an impor-
tant historic truth. Christianity
did not derive directly from the
Old Testament, but from rab-
binic Judaism, which was al-
ready flourishing in the days
of Jesus, the Apostles, and Paul.
Thus, the faith represented in
.
Shrinks Hemorrhoids
Without Surgery
13:9)."
Proceeding with his discus-
sion of the Golden Rule prin-
ciple, Dr. Gordis states: "The
second-century scholar and mar-
tyr Rabbi Akiba declared that
the Golden Rule enunciated in
Leviticus 19:18, which is, in-
cidentally, pointed specifically
to aliens in verse 34, was the
greatest principle in. Scripture."
Quoting Matthew 5:43 — "Ye
have heard that it bath been
said, Thou shalt love thy neigh-
bor, and hate thine enemy" —
Dr. Gordis asserts: "No scholar
has ever been able to cite a
passage in normative Jewish
sources that preaches or even
condoned hating one's enemy.
The classic teaching is of quite
the opposite tenor . . ." and he
proceeds to prove the latter
with references to applicable
sources.
Turning to a discussion of the
natural -law in the modern
world, as a major trend of the
age, Rabbi Gordis declares that
"the Hebraic sources of natural
law are all explicit in linking
the ethical imperatives they set
forth to a belief in a Supreme
Being. Basic to the biblical
world view is the conviction of
the unity of God, so that the
natural order and the moral
order represent two facets of
the same divine nature."-
Diseussing the prohibition
of cruelty to animals, one of
the Noachide L a w s, as "a
principle written large in
biblical thought," Dr. Gordis
explains: "Such laws as those
forbidding ploiing with a
mixed team of an ox and a
donkey (Deuteronomy, 20:10)
or muzzling- an animal during
the threshing season (25:4)
or taking a mother bird and
her young from the nest at
the same time (22:6f.) or
slaughtering a cow and her
calf on the same day (Leviti-:
cus 22:28) reflect a deep
feeling of pity for the lower
creatures.• The Hebrew dietary
laws represent a complex of
sources, practices and values
which have as yet been in-
completely explored. None-
theless, the humanitarism mo-
tive is unmistakable among
them, as in the insistence
upon the speedy and accurate
slaughtering of animals for
food to minimize the pain."
"Cruelty to animals is gen-
erally accepted as e v i 1," he
adds. "Much slower has been
the recognition of the duty that
man owes to the natural world,
to the rivers and forests, to the
mountains and valleys that are
man's hearth and home . . .
The biblical phrase used in the
passage, 'Thou shalt not destroy'
(bal tashhet), later becomes
the basis in rabbinic law of a
far-reaching doctrine, the pro-
hibition of destroying any ob-
ject, be it natural or man-
made."
Dr. Gordis refers to the
Eichmann case as serving "to
highlight the role of natural
law in the modern world." Re-
viewing the case, he states: "The .
nub of the Eichmann case lay
precisely (in) the defendant
contending that he was merely
obeying orders and thus acting
legally and was not properly
subject to punishment, the pro-
secution insisting that antece-
dent to all other regulations
stood a higher law which should
command obedience and which
Eichmann had violated. It was
upon this doctrine and not upon
the Israeli statute of 1950 mak-
ing genocide a crime that the
prosecution built its case. Thus,
natural law, though not men-
tioned by riame in the proceed-
ings, constituted the gravamen
of the Eichmann trial."
• Verdiets by Israeli judges
in the Kfar Kassem case, ruling
as Justice Moshe Landau did,
that "A soldier, too, must have
a conscience," is offered as
proof of Jewish adherence to
the natural law in relation to
Eichmann's claim of superior
orders.
Activities at the Center for
the Study of Democratic Insti-
tutions, conducted last year in
California, in which Rabbi Gor-
dis participated, are referred
to in this book.
Dr. Gordis, in introducing his
subject, states at the outset:
"Isaiah, the greatest poet
among the Hebrew prophets,
depicted the preservation of
the Saving Remnant of his
people and the destruction of
the useless and corrupt ma-
jority by comparing Israel to
an oak tree in the autumn
season, whose leaves fall
away, while the stock, or holy
seed, remain. He proceeded
to foretell the advent of the
Messiah, the redeemer of Is-
rael and of mankind, who will
be descended from the House
of David, in the words, 'There
shall come forth a rod out
of the stem of Jesse, and a
branch shall grow out of his
roots.' The direst of curses in
the ancient Semitic world was
that a man might have his
roots cut off from below and
his branches from above. The
Hebrew term for `offspring'
was `seed' or 'sprout' and
even the ordinary term for
`son,' was used as a vine."
How appropriate, in intro
ducing "The Root and the
Branch" as the title for his
book!
University of Michigan stu
dents can learn 22 differen
languages in the University Ian
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