The Essential Agus. Steven T. Katz
268)
The second theological paper deals with the absolutely essential and Jewishly unavoidable issue of “Torah Mi-Sinai,” that is, the nature and claims of revelation. Rejecting the rejection of faith while affirming the authenticity of revelation, yet aware of the philosophical problems that the traditional, literalist notion of revelation has engendered in the modern world, Agus attempts to steer a middle ground that argues for the reality of nonpropositional revelation. God speaks to us in our ethical intuition, in our religious feeling (piety), and in moments of inspiration—our ethical intuitions being the most “objective” category (Guideposts, 288)—rather than in the literal legal and historical formulations of the Bible:
Since revelation occurs between man and God, it is obviously unscientific and therefore untruthful to assume that the human or particular element is not felt in the content of revelation. Inevitably, the “Torah speaks the language of men,” in all its finiteness, limitation and particularity. Thus, objectively, God’s speech is not verbal expression; God’s command is not a specific precept; God’s behest is not the fire, clamor and whirlwind of dogmatic rivalries. (Guideposts, 291–92)
What makes Judaism distinctive—what makes Judaism, Judaism—is that it translates this encounter with God into legal categories—“the command of God,” (296), the halakah:
Halachah is for us the way in which God’s word is progressively being shaped into ways of life. This view is in perfect harmony with our historical knowledge of the evolution of Halachah. The laws of Halachah were not only consciously ordained for the purpose of fostering the “normative” consciousness; they were also in part subconsciously evolved out of the inner religious drive, to translate “feeling” into “law.” In this way, the regimen of Halachah made the observant Jew feel that the whole world was encompassed by the sway of Divine Law. (Guideposts, 297)
However, the halakah is, like all products of revelation, an admixture of human and divine elements:
We must make it clear from the objective viewpoint that the revealed character of Jewish legislation refers to the general subconscious spritual drive which underlies the whole body of Halachah, not to the details of the Law. The vital fluid of the Torah-tree derives from the numinous soil of the Divine, but the actual contours of the branches and the leaves are the product of a variety of climatic and accidental causes. It is of the very essence of the reasoning process to recognize that the particular is accidental and contingent. . . . All that we can and do affirm is the Divine character of the principle of Halachah. From the viewpoint of history, we know that the Shulchan Aruch did not spring fullblown from the mind of Moses. It is the product of gradual evolution, in which diverse social and economic factors were conjoined with those of a purely religious character.(Guideposts, 298–99)
And the outcome of this complex, evolutionary, historical process, according to Agus’ criteria, allows for change, modification, and innovation in the halakah—but not for the rejection of the Law itself, that is, a full denial of the category of halakah per se.
Agus then applies this understanding of the halakah in the next three essays, which are devoted, respectively, to (1) “Law in Conservative Judaism”; (2) “Laws as Standards”; and (3) “Pluralism in Law.” He rightly recognizes the fundamental difference between his understanding of halakah (also that of the Conservative movement) and that of the Orthodox tradition. With honesty he acknowledges, “Manifestly, then, the Conservative movement cannot be described as falling within the limits of ‘Halachah’—true Judaism. On the other hand, it does not reject ‘Halachah’ in the slightest in theory and it does not accept Halachah very largely in practice” (Guideposts, 310—11). Alternatively, he contends that, for the Conservative movement, “the present is more determinative than the past” (312); and therefore the movement must depend on the legitimacy of its own considered takkanot (rabbinical enactments), in order to modernize the halakah as it deems necessary. To aid in this process, Agus supported the creation of a modern Sanhedrin, empowered to make halakic change as necessary:
I would therefore suggest the creation of a Synhedrin-Academy to consist of Jewish scholars and leaders in every field of culture and achievement, chosen from among the world-wide community of Israel. Meeting annually, this convocation of the best representatives of the spirit of Judaism would deal with the moral and spiritual problems of the land of Israel, of the Jewish people, and of humanity. Its discussions and decisions would, of course, not be binding upon the government of Israel, though it would no doubt take up for review and critical appraisal the moral issues involved in the debates and proceedings of the Kenesset.
The discussions of the Synhedrin-Academy, constituting as they would a running commentary upon the varied problems of the Jew in particular and of man in general, would in time perhaps come to form a new Talmud, expressive of the best thought of our time. World Jewry, through its leading representatives, would be given the opportunity to think together, and to unfold the implications of Jewish tradition for the understanding of the crises of our own day and age.(Guideposts, 376—77)
Guideposts’ collection of essays ends with two critical book reviews: the first of Mordecai Kaplan’s The Future of the American Jew (New York, 1948), the second of The Theology of Paul Tillich, volume 1 in the Library of Living Theology (New York, 1953).
R. Agus’ fourth major publication was Evolution of Jewish Thought (1959). Growing out of a variety of teaching contexts, this study sets out to provide an educated review of the main historical stages of Jewish thought. It opens with chapters on the Bible and the Rabbinic period—including, interestingly, a chapter on “The Secession of Christianity” (chapter 4)—and then moves through “The Rise of Jewish Rationalism” (chapter 6), “The Decline of Rationalism” (chapter 7), cabala (chapter 9), Hasidism (chapter 10), and “The Age of Reason.” This last chapter analyzes the work of Baruch Spinoza and Moses Mendelssohn and the repercussive intellectual and political issues that arose from the debate over Jewish emancipation after the French Revolution. The specific character and the academic strengths and weaknesses of individual aspects of this long and fascinating history, as retold by Agus, are treated at length in several of the original essays in the companion volume to the present anthology. For my part, I would call attention not only to Agus’ wide erudition and mastery of the entire range of rabbinical philosophical, and cabalistic materials but, more importantly, to his methodological insight:
In this volume, we propose to show that Judaism in nearly every age resembled an Oriental tapestry in the plenitude of colors and shades it embraced and unified. The comparative unity of law and custom concealed the great diversity of thought and sentiment. Within the authentic field of Jewish consciousness we recognize an unending struggle between the self-exaltation of romantic nationalism and the self-dedication of prophetism; between the austere appeal of ruthless rationality and the beguiling seduction of self-flattering sentiments; between the gentle charm of moralistic and pietistic devotions and the popular preference for routinized rites and doubt-proof dogmas. The mighty tensions within the soul of contemporary Western man were reflected faithfully and clearly in the currents and cross-currents of the historic stream of Judaism. (Evolution, 6)
In contradistinction to older, monolithic renderings of the Jewish past, Agus here expresses the most important insight generated by the best modern Jewish scholarship, namely, that Judaism is a “rich spectrum of colors ranging from the twilight moods of mysticism to the stark clarity of rationalism, from the lofty heights of universal idealism to the dark depths of collective ‘sacred egoism’” (400).
Yet despite this diversity, this absence of a central authority, this tolerance of various intellectual approaches and understandings, there was an abiding “unity of the Jewish tradition.” This lay
in the text, the context and the emphasis of all schools in Judaism. The unity of a river consists of the bedrock and banks of the channels through