Elliot N. Dorff: In Search of the Good Life

214 Pages·2014·0.775 MB·English

by  Hava Tirosh-Samuelson, Aaron W. Hughes (eds.)

Elliot N. Dorff
Library of Contemporary Elliot N. Dorff
Jewish Philosophers
In Search of the Good Life
Editor-in-Chief
Hava Tirosh-Samuelson, Arizona State University Edited by
Hava Tirosh-Samuelson and Aaron W. Hughes
Editor
Aaron W. Hughes, University of Rochester
VoLumE 5
LEIDEN • boSToN
The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/lcjp 2014
Elliot N. Dorff
In Search of the Good Life
Edited by
Hava Tirosh-Samuelson and Aaron W. Hughes
LEIDEN • boSToN
2014
The series Library of Contemporary Jewish Philosophers was generously supported by the
baron Foundation.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Elliot N. Dorff : in search of the good life / edited by Hava Tirosh-Samuelson and Aaron W. Hughes.
  pages cm. — (Library of contemporary Jewish philosophers, ISSN 2213-6010 ; volume 5)
 Includes bibliographical references.
 Summary: “Rabbi Elliot N. Dorff, the Sol and Anne Dorff Distinguished Professor of Philosophy
and Rector of American Jewish university in Los Angeles, is one of today’s leading Jewish ethicists.
Writing extensively on the intersection of law, morality, science, religion, and medicine, Dorff
offers an authoritative and non-orthodox interpretation of Jewish law. As a leader in the Rabbinical
Assembly’s Committee on Jewish Law and Standards, he has shaped the religious practices of
Conservative Jews. In serving on national advisory committees and task forces, he has helped to
articulate a distinctive Jewish voice on contested bioethical and biomedical issues. An analytic
philosopher by training, Dorff has endorsed pluralism, arguing that Jewishness best flourishes in
the context of American pluralism, and he has worked closely with non-Jews to advance religious
pluralism in America”—Provided by publisher.
 ISbN 978-90-04-27901-8 (hardback : alk. paper) — ISbN 978-90-04-27902-5 (e-book)
1. Jewish law—Philosophy. 2. Jewish philosophy—20th century. 3. Dorff, Elliot N.—Teachings.
4. Conservative Judaism. I. Tirosh-Samuelson, Hava, 1950– editor. II. Hughes, Aaron W., 1968– editor.
 bm520.6.E45 2014
 296.1’8—dc23
2014018701
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ISSN 2213-6010
ISbN 978-90-04-27901-8 (hardback)
ISbN 978-90-04-27902-5 (e-book)
This hardback is also published in paperback under ISbN 978-90-04-27903-2.
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CoNTENTS
The Contributors  ............................................................................................. vii
Editors’ Introduction to Series  .................................................................... ix
Elliot N. Dorff: An Intellectual Portrait  .................................................... 1
 Jonathan K. Crane
In Search of God  ............................................................................................. 35
 Elliot N. Dorff
Applying Jewish Law to New Circumstances  ......................................... 49
 Elliot N. Dorff
The Interaction of Judaism with morality: Defining, motivating,
 and Educating a moral Person and Society  ....................................... 61
 Elliot N. Dorff
Donations from Ill-Gotten Gain: A Jewish Legal Perspective  ........... 93
 Elliot N. Dorff
Interview with Elliot N. Dorff  ..................................................................... 121
 Hava Tirosh-Samuelson
Select bibliography  ......................................................................................... 189

The ConTribuTors
Jonathan K. Crane (Ph.D., university of Toronto, 2009; rabbinic ordi-
nation, hebrew union College-Jewish institute of religion, 2003) is the
raymond F. schinazi scholar in bioethics and Jewish Thought at emory
university’s Center for ethics. he is the author of Narratives and Jewish Bio-
ethics, co-editor with elliot Dorff of The Oxford Handbook of Jewish Ethics
and Morality, founder and co-editor of The Journal of Jewish Ethics, and cur-
rently serves as president of the society of Jewish ethics.
hava Tirosh-samuelson (Ph.D., hebrew university, 1978) is irving and
Miriam Lowe Professor of Modern Judaism, the Director of Jewish studies,
and Professor of history at Arizona state university in Tempe, AZ. her
research focuses on Jewish intellectual history, Judaism and ecology, sci-
ence and religion, and feminist theory. in addition to numerous articles and
book chapters in academic journals and edited volumes, she is the author
of the award-winning Between Worlds: The Life and Work of Rabbi David
ben Judah Messer Leon (1991) and the author of Happiness in Premodern
Judaism: Virtue, Knowledge, and Well-Being in Premodern Judaism (2003).
she is also the editor of Judaism and Ecology: Created World and Revealed
World (2002); Women and Gender in Jewish Philosophy (2004); Judaism and
the Phenomenon of Life: The Legacy of Hans Jonas (2008); Building Better
Humans? Refocusing the Debate on Transhumanism (2011); Hollywood’s
Chosen People: The Jewish Experience in American Cinema (2012); and Jewish
Philosophy for the Twenty-First Century (2014). Professor Tirosh-samuelson
is the recipient of several large grants that have funded interdisciplinary
research on religion, science, and technology.
Aaron W. hughes (Ph.D., indiana university bloomington, 2000) holds the
Philip s. bernstein Chair in Jewish studies at the university of rochester.
hughes was educated at the university of Alberta, The hebrew university
of Jerusalem, and oxford university. he has taught at Miami university
of ohio, McMaster university, the hebrew university of Jerusalem, the
university of Calgary, and the university at buffalo. he is the author of over
fifty articles and ten books, and the editor of seven books. his book titles
viii the contributors
include Abrahamic Religions: On the Uses and Abuses of History (oxford,
2012); Muslim Identities (Columbia, 2013); The Study of Judaism: Identity,
Authenticity, Scholarship (sunY, 2013); and Rethinking Jewish Philosophy:
Beyond Particularism and Universalism (oxford, 2014). he is also the editor-
in-Chief of Method & Theory in the Study of Religion.
eDiTors’ inTroDuCTion To series
it is customary to begin studies devoted to the topic of Jewish philosophy
defining what exactly this term, concept, or even discipline is. We tend not
to speak of Jewish mathematics, Jewish physics, or Jewish sociology, so why
refer to something as “Jewish philosophy”? indeed, this is the great para-
dox of Jewish philosophy. on the one hand it presumably names something
that has to do with thinking, on the other it implies some sort of national,
ethnic, or religious identity of those who engage in such activity. is not phi-
losophy just philosophy, regardless of who philosophizes? Why the need to
append various racial, national, or religious adjectives to it?1
Jewish philosophy is indeed rooted in a paradox since it refers to philo-
sophical activity carried out by those who call themselves Jews. As philoso-
phy, this activity makes claims of universal validity, but as an activity by a
well-defined group of people it is inherently particularistic. The question
“What is Jewish philosophy?” therefore is inescapable, although over the
centuries Jewish philosophers have given very different answers to it. For
some, Jewish philosophy represents the relentless quest for truth. Although
this truth itself may not be particularized, for such individuals, the use of
the adjective “Jewish”—as a way to get at this truth—most decidedly is.2
The bible, the Mishnah, the Talmud, and related Jewish texts and genres
are seen to provide particular insights into the more universal claims pro-
vided by the universal and totalizing gaze of philosophy. The problem is
that these texts are not philosophical on the surface; they must, on the con-
trary, be interpreted to bring their philosophical insights to light. Within
this context exegesis risks becoming eisegesis. Yet others eschew the term
“philosophy” and instead envisage themselves as working in a decidedly
1 Alexander Altmann once remarked:
it would be futile to attempt a presentation of Judaism as a philosophical system, or
to speak of Jewish philosophy in the same sense as one speaks of American, english,
French, or German philosophy. Judaism is a religion, and the truths it teaches are
religious truths. They spring from the source of religious experience, not from pure
reason.
see Alexander Altmann, “Judaism and World Philosophy,” in The Jews: Their History,
Culture, and Religion, ed. Louis Finkelstein (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication society of
America, 1949), vol. 2, 954.
2 in this regard, see norbert M. samuelson, Jewish Faith and Modern Science: On the
Death and Rebirth of Jewish Philosophy (new York: rowman and Littlefield, 2008), e.g.,
10–12.
x editors’ introduction to series
Jewish key in order to articulate or clarify particular issues that have direct
bearing on Jewish life and existence.3 between these two perspectives or
orientations, there exist several other related approaches to the topic of
Jewish philosophy which can and have included ethics,4 gender studies,5
multiculturalism,6 and postmodernism.7
Despite their differences in theory and method, what these approaches
have in common is that they all represent the complex intersection of
Judaism, variously defined, and a set of non-Jewish grids or lenses used to
interpret this rich tradition. Framed somewhat differently, Jewish philoso-
phy—whatever it is, however it is defined, or whether it is even possible—
represents the collision of particularistic demands and universal concerns.
The universal or that which is, in theory, open and accessible to all regard-
less of race, color, creed, or gender confronts the particular or that which
represents the sole concern of a specific group that, by nature or definition,
is insular and specific-minded.
because it is concerned with a particular people, the Jews, and how to
frame their traditions in a universal and universalizing light that is believed
to conform to the dictates of reason, Jewish philosophy can never be about
pure thinking, if indeed there ever can be such a phenomenon. rather
Jewish philosophy—from antiquity to the present—always seems to have
had and, for the most part continues to have, rather specific and perhaps
3 see, e.g., strauss’s claim about Maimonides’ Guide of the Perplexed, perhaps one of
the most important and successful works of something called Jewish philosophy ever
written. he claims that one “begins to understand the Guide once one sees that it is not a
philosophic book—a book written by a philosopher for philosophers—but a Jewish book:
a book written by a Jew for Jews.” see Leo strauss, “how to begin to study The Guide of the
Perplexed,” in The Guide of the Perplexed, trans. shlomo Pines, 2 vols. (Chicago: university
of Chicago Press, 1963), vol. 1, xiv.
Modern iterations of this may be found, for example, in J. David bleich, Bioethical
Dilemmas: A Jewish Perspective, 2 vols. (vol. 1, new York: Ktav, 1998; vol. 2, new York:
Targum Press, 2006).
4 see, e.g., David novak, Natural Law in Judaism (Cambridge: Cambridge university
Press, 1998); elliot Dorff, Love Your Neighbor and Yourself: A Jewish Approach to Modern
Personal Ethics (new York: Jewish Publication society of America, 2006).
5 e.g., the collection of essays in Women and Gender in Jewish Philosophy, ed. hava
Tirosh-samuelson (bloomington, in: indiana university Press, 2004).
6 e.g., Jonathan sacks, The Dignity of Difference: How to Avoid a Clash of Civilizations
(London: Continuum, 2003); Jonathan sacks, To Heal a Fractured World: The Ethics of
Responsibility (new York: schocken, 2007).
7 e.g., elliot r. Wolfson, Language, Eros, Being: Kabbalistic Hermeneutics and Poetic
Imagination (new York: Fordham university Press, 2004); elliot r. Wolfson, Open Secret:
Postmessianic Messianism and the Mystical Revision of Menahem Mendel Schneerson (new
York: Columbia university Press, 2009); elliot r. Wolfson, A Dream Interpreted within a
Dream: Oneiropoiesis and the Prism of Imagination (new York: Zone books, 2011).