17 Aug 2017

Judaic Topics
In Chapter 31 of the Book of Numbers, God speaks to Moses in verse 2 saying: “Avenge the Israelite people on the Midianites; then you shall be gathered to your kin.” (In Parashat Balak at Numbers 25:1, we read that the Israelite men had profaned themselves with Moabite women while encamped in Shittim. But it is a Midianite woman who was involved in the episode at Numbers 25:6, being k...
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16 Aug 2017

Direct Path Project, Judaic Topics
Eight times in Parashat Re’eh we read of “the place where God will choose to establish His name”. This is a formulation so unusual that it would attract notice if encountered once. Finding it eight times in one parashah demands attention. The making of an image of God, as we know, is prohibited. And in this parashah the Israelites are even commanded to destroy all of the physical r...
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14 Aug 2017

Judaic Topics
Deuteronomy 8:10 reads in Hebrew: “v’achalta v’savata u’verachta et Adonai Elohecha al ha’aretz ha’tovah asher natan lach.” This verse is the proof text for the commandment to offer thanks (blessing) after a meal. That blessing is known as Birkat Ha’Mazon. It is often said that all translation is midrash and, because of its many structural ambiguities, translation from Hebrew of...
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09 Jul 2017

Ethics Project
I continue to work through “The Golden Rule” by Jeffrey Wattles (Oxford University Press, 1996), which is one of the few works acknowledged as a truly comprehensive scholarly treatment of the subject. There’s no question that it is thoroughly researched and representative of a deeply thought engagement with the topic. I want to stop here to make a couple of interim points that I think...
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30 Jun 2017

Ethics Project
Having spent some time now studying the work of the secular philosophers, I'm now going to spend some time on the work of those scholars who have made specific study of the golden rule; its place in world religious and ethical study; its strengths and weaknesses as a universal ethic; and, proposals to cure the weaknesses observed. It could be argued that I should have started at this ...
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20 Jun 2017

Direct Path Project, Ethics Project
As I prepared to do further reading on the Utilitarian successors to Bentham and Mill I ran across a comment about the importance of the work of Ludwig Wittgenstein to the 20th century philosophy. The writer made a brief comment about the unusual mystical “hints” in Wittgenstein’s work, which I found intriguing. So, I have spent some time in a Wittgenstein diversion from the Utilitari...
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13 Jun 2017

Ethics Project
In an earlier post on the thinking of Immanuel Kant, we found that Kant believed that the measure of the morality of an action was to be found only in the intention of the person acting. He argued that we can never know with certainty what outcome an action will produce and so we cannot be held responsible for outcomes, only intentions. Utilitarians, as we’ve seen, though, are “conseq...
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09 Jun 2017

Others
I ran across a reference yesterday to the “group mind” phenomenon documented by Thomas D. Steeley in his decades-long study of honey bees. Having no particular interest in honey bees but a long-standing interest in the potential power of group consciousness, I bought a “Kindle Shorts” version of one of his books to see if it might help me understand his findings. Seeley, Thomas D.. Th...
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06 Jun 2017

Ethics Project
In an earlier post I briefly reviewed the ideas of Immanuel Kant, particularly his notion of the Categorical Imperative. Kant’s “Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals”, in which the Categorical Imperative was first proposed, was published in 1785. Roger Scruton, writing about Kant, has said: “The Critique of Pure Reason (published in 1781, 4 years before The Metaphysics of Morals...
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01 Jun 2017

Ethics Project, Judaic Topics
As I write this, the Jewish Festival of Shavuot is about to begin. The Festival is rooted in a celebration of the springtime grain harvest but has also become the time Jews recall and commemorate the giving of the Torah at Mt. Sinai. It is customary to read the Book of Ruth during synagogue services on Shavuot. The custom is an old one, being mentioned in a non-canonical Talmudic work...
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