JULY 20 • 2023 | 9

because it’s the exception, it’s 
not the rule. If there is a rad-
ical injustice being perpetrat-
ed — and I felt, for example, 
[the denial of] gay marriage 
was a radical injustice — then 
you speak up. But everything 
becomes a question of radi-
cal injustice now, everything, 
every political issue. Civil 
Rights was a uniquely morally 
urgent issue, about which I 
really believe it was right to 
speak up, but those are few and 
far between. 

You’ve been writing frequent-
ly in the journal Sapir about 
the ethics of dialogue. And 
in one essay you ask, “How 
should we respond when 
someone promulgates a view 
with which we disagree, or 
one that we find offensive, 
repugnant, even dangerous?”
 The first way you respond 
is you ask the person, “Why 
do you believe that?” Because 
you’ll learn much more and 
you might discover interesting 
facts both about the person 
and about the belief that you 
didn’t know at first. I’ve had 
this discussion many, many 
times with people who have 
political beliefs that differ from 
my own and once you actually 
interrogate the belief, then you 
can respond to it. But we’ve 
become a culture in which the 
way you respond is by attack-
ing the person. I also want to 
say that, in my experience, 
most of the political diatribes 
that we hear change nobody’s 
mind. Instead, they make your 
team feel good. And the other 
team doesn’t even listen to you. 
The Talmud is filled with 
argument and debate. And the 
reason you listen to the house 
of Hillel and not the house of 
Shammai [two famous antago-
nists in the Talmud] is because 
of the way they conducted 

themselves during the debate. 
They let Shammai express 
their opinion first. They lis-
tened. They were kind. They 
were understanding. So, this 
is a multifaceted question. It’s 
not just a question of abstract 
opinion. It’s also a question of 
the way you bear yourself in 
the public square.

What if one side isn’t really 
willing to play by the rules?
 First of all, I’ve seen both 
sides indulge in conspiracy 
theories and false facts. And 
while one side may be more 
egregiously guilty of this than 
the other, I’m always suspicious 
of someone who thinks their 
own side doesn’t do this. So, 
if you’re willing to fess up and 
say, “we do this,” and then 
you turn to the other person 
and say “I see your side doing 
this,” that’s the beginning of a 
dialogue. Instead, what I hear 
is, “My side does facts. Your 
side does conspiracy.” That’s 
not going to start a dialogue. 
So, if you’re willing to look at 
your own shortcomings, then 
you have the possibility of 
actually starting a dialogue. 
I had this proposal that 
I don’t know will ever be 
realized. I wanted everybody to 
have a politics dinner. And the 
idea was, you had to take the 
other person’s position. You 
could not express the opinion 

you believed in. You just had 
to take the other person’s 
position and see how well you 
could articulate what you think 
the other believes. Because 
when you start to do that, you 
start to realize that the other 
side actually has things that are 
worth hearing, and truth never 
resides entirely on one side of 
the argument. 

Are there red lines that Jewish 
organizations shouldn’t be 
expected to cross?
 I wouldn’t invite an anti-
Zionist, but if a Jewish 
organization did, I would not 
say that they should never have 
done that. But I would say 
that they have an obligation to 
have somebody speak to the 
other side of that question. 
Because anti-Zionism to me 
often shades into antisemitism 
— they’re not exactly identical, 
but they’re closer than second 
cousins. 
My general predisposition is 
that the way you combat bad 
ideas is with good ideas, not 
by saying those bad ideas can’t 
be heard, because we know 
this strategy doesn’t work. 
All it does is give fuel to the 
people who have bad ideas [to 
say] “Oh, you see, you don’t 
even want to engage with me. 
That’s because my idea is so 
dangerous that you can’t stand 
to hear it.”

People say there are political 
questions that are moral 
questions, and if we overdo 
the idea of trying to learn 
from the other side, we are 
conceding a moral, just 
stance.
I hear this all the time. But 
what you don’t understand 
is that you hear it from both 
sides.
That’s not the question. The 
question is how do we conduct 
public dialogue so it’s not just 
two people shouting at each 
other? And believe me, as soon 
as you say to the other side, 
“I’m just, right and moral and 
you’re just wrong” you have 
just closed down the possibility 
that you can talk.
And if you want to do that, 
you can, but realize that that 
will just mean that everybody 
in your camp will agree with 
you, and everybody in our 
camp won’t listen to you, and 
nothing will get done. 
People always hear listening 
as giving up on your own 
moral position. But it’s not. 
It’s listening. It’s being able to 
hear that someone else also 
has a moral position, even if 
you disagree with it. And if 
you really understand, if you 
can express the other person’s 
opinion really well — if you 
can do that well, then I think 
you’re ready to say, “and this is 
why I disagree with it.” But if 
you’re going to caricature it as 
just, well, “you’re an immoral 
jerk,” then honestly, you 
don’t understand what you’re 
arguing against. 

Andrew Silow-Carroll is editor at 

large of the New York Jewish Week 

and managing editor for Ideas for the 

Jewish Telegraphic Agency. Read a 

long version of the interview on jta.org. 

After serving as senior rabbi of Sinai Temple in Los Angeles for over 
25 years, David Wolpe became rabbi emeritus on June 3.

COURTESY SINAI TEMPLE/JTA

