JULY 29 • 2021 | 29

word shema.
This may seem like a small difference, 
but it is, in fact, a huge one. For the 
Greeks, the ideal form of knowledge 
involved detachment. There is the one 
who sees, the subject, and there is that 
which is seen, the object, and they 
belong to two different realms. A person 
who looks at a painting or a sculpture or 
a play in a theater or the Olympic Games 
is not himself part of the art or the 
drama or the athletic competition. He or 
she is a spectator, not a participant.
Speaking and listening are not forms 
of detachment. They are forms of 
engagement. They create a relationship. 
The Hebrew word for knowledge, da’at, 
implies involvement, closeness, intimacy. 
“And Adam knew Eve his wife and she 
conceived and gave birth” (Gen. 4:1). 
That is knowing in the Hebrew sense, 
not the Greek.
We can enter into a relationship with 
God, even though He is infinite and 
we are finite, because we are linked by 
words. In revelation, God speaks to us. 
In prayer, we speak to God. If you want 
to understand any relationship, between 
husband and wife, or parent and child, 
or employer and employee, pay close 
attention to how they speak and listen to 
one another. Ignore everything else.
The Greeks taught us the forms of 
knowledge that come from observing 
and inferring, namely science and 
philosophy. The first scientists and the 
first philosophers came from Greece 
from the sixth to the fourth centuries 
B.C.E.
But not everything can be understood 
by seeing and appearances alone. There 
is a powerful story about this told in the 
first book of Samuel. Saul, Israel’s first 
king, looked the part. He was tall. “From 
his shoulders and upward he was higher 
than any of the people,” (1 Sam. 9:2, 
10:23). He was the image of a king. But 
morally, temperamentally, he was not a 
leader at all; he was a follower.

IGNORE APPEARANCES
God then told Samuel to anoint another 
king in his place and told him it would 

be one of the children of Yishai. Samuel 
went to Yishai and was struck by the 
appearance of one of his sons, Eliav. 
He thought he must be the one God 
meant. But God said to him, “Do not 
be impressed by his appearance or his 
height, for I have rejected him. God does 
not see as people do. People look at the 
outward appearance, but the Lord looks 
at the heart” (1 Sam. 16:7).
Jews and Judaism taught that we 
cannot see God, but we can hear Him 
and He hears us. It is through the word 
— speaking and listening — that we 
can have an intimate relationship with 
God as our parent, our partner, our 
sovereign, the One who loves us and 
whom we love. We cannot demonstrate 
God scientifically. We cannot prove 
God logically. These are Greek, not 
Jewish, modes of thought. I believe that 
from a Jewish perspective, trying to 
prove the existence of God logically or 
scientifically is a mistaken enterprise. 
God is not an object but a subject. 
The Jewish mode is to relate to God in 
intimacy and love, as well as awe and 
reverence.
One fascinating modern example 
came from a Jew who, for much of 
his life, was estranged from Judaism, 
namely Sigmund Freud. He called 
psychoanalysis the “speaking cure,” but 
it is better described as the “listening 
cure.” It is based on the fact that active 
listening is in itself therapeutic. It was 
only after the spread of psychoanalysis, 
especially in America, that the phrase 
“I hear you” came into the English 
language as a way of communicating 
empathy.
There is something profoundly 
spiritual about listening. It is the most 
effective form of conflict resolution I 
know. Many things can create conflict, 
but what sustains it is the feeling on the 
part of at least one of the parties that 
they have not been heard. They have 
not been listened to. We have not “heard 
their pain.” There has been a failure of 
empathy. That is why the use of force — 
or for that matter, boycotts — to resolve 
conflict is so profoundly self-defeating. 

It may suppress it for a while, but it will 
return, often more intense than before.
Job, who has suffered unjustly, is 
unmoved by the arguments of his 
comforters. It is not that he insists on 
being right: What he wants is to be 
heard. Not by accident does justice 
presuppose the rule of audi alteram 
partem, “Hear the other side.”
Listening lies at the very heart of 
relationship. It means that we are open 
to the other, that we respect him or 
her, that their perceptions and feelings 
matter to us. We give them permission 
to be honest, even if this means making 
ourselves vulnerable in so doing.
A good parent listens to their child. 
A good employer listens to his or her 
workers. A good company listens to 
its customers or clients. A good leader 
listens to those he or she leads. Listening 
does not mean agreeing, but it does 
mean caring. Listening is the climate in 
which love and respect grow.

LEARN TO LISTEN
In Judaism we believe that our 
relationship with God is an ongoing 
tutorial in our relationships with other 
people. How can we expect God to 
listen to us if we fail to listen to our 
spouse, our children or those affected 
by our work? And how can we expect to 
encounter God if we have not learned to 
listen?
On Mount Horeb, God taught Elijah 
that He was not in the whirlwind, the 
earthquake or the fire but in the kol 
demamah dakah, the “still, small voice” 
that I define as a voice you can only hear 
if you are listening.
Crowds are moved by great speakers, 
but lives are changed by great listeners. 
Whether between us and God or us and 
other people, listening is the prelude to 
love. 

The late Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks served as the 

chief rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of 

the Commonwealth, 1991-2013. He has made his 

teachings available to all. This essay was originally 

published in August 2016.

