JUNE 27 • 2024 | 39

out among Muslims in 
Morocco, where it was found 
that people were more likely 
to give generously to charity 
if they lived in a place where 
they could hear the call to 
prayer from a local minaret.
Nazorayan’s conclusion is 
that “religion is more in the 
situation than in the person,” 
or to put it another way, 
what makes the difference to 
our behavior is less what we 
believe than the phenomenon 
of being reminded, even 
subconsciously, of what we 
believe.
That is precisely the 
psychology behind the 
mitzvah of tzitzit in this week’s 
parshah of Shelach Lecha: 
“This shall be your tzitzit and 
you shall see it and remember 
all the Lord’s commandments 
and keep them, not straying 
after your heart and after 
your eyes, following your own 
sinful desires. Thus, you will 
be reminded to keep all My 
commandments, and be holy 
to your God.” (Num. 15:39)
The Talmud (Menachot 
44a) tells the story of a man 
who, in a moment of moral 
weakness, decided to pay a 
visit to a certain courtesan. He 
was in the course of removing 
his clothes when he saw 
his tzitzit and immediately 
froze. The courtesan asked 
him what the matter was, and 
he told her about the tzitzit, 
saying that the four fringes 
had become accusing 

witnesses against him for the 
sin he was about to commit. 
The woman was so 
impressed by the power of 
this simple command that she 
converted to Judaism.

A MORAL SENSE
We sometimes fail to 
understand the connection 
between religion and morality. 
Dostoevsky is reputed to 
have said to that if God 
did not exist, all would be 
permitted. This is not the 
mainstream Jewish view. 
 According to Rabbi Nissim 
Gaon, the moral imperatives 
accessible to reason have been 
binding since the dawn of 
humanity. We have a moral 
sense. We know that certain 
things are wrong. But we also 
have conflicting desires. We 
are drawn to do what we know 
we should not do, and often 
we yield to temptation. 
 Anyone who has ever tried 
to lose weight knows exactly 
what that means. In the moral 
domain, it is what the Torah 
means when it speaks of 
“straying after your heart and 
after your eyes, following your 
own sinful desires.” (Numbers 
15:39)
The moral sense, wrote 
James Q. Wilson, “is not a 
strong beacon light radiating 
outward to illuminate in sharp 
outline all that it touches.” It is, 
rather, “a small candle flame, 
casting vague and multiple 
shadows, flickering and 
sputtering in the strong winds 
of power and passion, greed 
and ideology.” He added: “But 
brought close to the heart” 
it “dispels the darkness and 
warms the soul.” 
Wittgenstein once said 
“the work of the philosopher 
consists in assembling 
reminders.” In the case of 
Judaism, the purpose of the 
outward signs — tzitzit, 

mezuzah and tefillin — is 
precisely that: to assemble 
reminders, on our clothes, our 
homes, our arms and head, 
that certain things are wrong, 
and that even if no other 
human being sees us, God sees 
us and will call us to account. 
 As a result of recent 
research, we now have the 
empirical evidence that 
reminders make a significant 
difference to the way we act.
“The heart is deceitful above 
all things and desperately 
wicked; who shall know it?” 
said Jeremiah. (Jeremiah 17:9)
One blessing and curse 
of human nature is that we 
use our power of reason 
not always and only to 
act rationally, but also to 
rationalize and make excuses 
for the things we do, even 
when we know we should not 
have done them. 
That, perhaps is one of 
the lessons the Torah wishes 
us to draw from the story of 
the spies. Had they recalled 
what God had done to Egypt, 
the mightiest empire of the 
ancient world, they would not 
have said: “We cannot attack 
those people; they are stronger 
than we are.” (Num. 13:31) But 
they were gripped by fear. 
Strong emotion — fear 
especially — distorts our 
perception. It activates the 
amygdala, the source of our 
most primal reactions, causing 
it to override the prefrontal 
cortex that allows us to 
think rationally about the 
consequences of our decisions.
Tzitzit, with their thread 
of blue, remind us of heaven, 
and that is what we most need 
if we are consistently to act 
in accordance with the better 
angels of our nature. 

The late Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks 

was chief rabbi of the United Hebrew 

Congregations of the Commonwealth, 

1991-2013. Find more at rabbisacks.org. 

AROUND THE 
SHABBAT TABLE

• Do all people need reminders 
of what is right and wrong, 
even good people? 
• Do we need religion to teach 
us how to be moral? 
• What does religion add to 
our lives as moral people and 
moral communities? 

JEWISH NEWS

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