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Opinion & Comment
Finding Hashem In Nature—Losing Hashem In Science

By R' Dovid Kornreich

There seems to be a contradiction in two different works of the Maharal of Prague. In his Chidushei Aggodos to Menochos 64b he discusses the statement, "Cursed is the one who teaches his son Greek wisdom." The Maharal is quite emphatic that the study of the natural sciences (chochmas hateva) that is divorced from any relationship with Torah, is forbidden. He explains the statement of the mishna in Ovos of Ben Bag Bag, "Hafoch boh hafoch boh dekuloh boh," in a way similar to many classic meforshim: All true wisdom is found in the Torah.

But we have an apparently antithetical statement of the Maharal in Nesivos Olom, Nesiv Hatorah chapter 14, where Greek wisdom is very narrowly defined as "melitzah veloshon." This is understood to mean the parables and symbolic metaphors that the Sava Debei Athuna (the Elders of Athens) employed to couch deep philosophical insights and arguments (similar to those mentioned in Bechoros 8b where the gemora records how Rabbi Yehoshua ben Chananya bested them at their own game). The Maharal in Nesiv Hatorah uses this narrow definition of Greek wisdom in order to make the study of nature halachically permissible.

But what of his objections to the Greek study of nature clearly stated in Chidushei Aggodos? Nature and philosophy are presumably two totally separate disciplines.

This recalls a similar quandary involving the Greek-Torah interface.

One of days observed every year is Asoro BeTeves. It marks (among other things) the tragedy of the Greek emperor Ptolemy's fateful decree to have the Torah translated into Greek. The details of this translation by the seventy-two sages at the Emperor's behest, called the Septuagint, are recorded in the gemora Megilla 9.

In conclusion there, the gemora issues a surprising ruling. Based of Noach's blessing to his son Yeffes, "Yaft Elokim leYeffes veyishkon be'oholei Shem," the gemora allows only one other language besides Hebrew to be employed in writing a kosher Torah scroll: Greek. Furthermore, Chazal understand that when the Torah tells us that Moshe explained the Torah "very well" (ba'eir heiteiv), it required a translation of the Torah into the seventy languages—one of them being Greek! But what of the supposed tragedy of the Greek translation of Ptolemy?

This is a classic problem discussed by the ba'alei machshovoh. I was privileged to hear one explanation that can possibly shed light on the true view of the Maharal to the study of nature.

The difference is as follows: The translation of the Torah by Moshe, at Hashem's command, constituted a spiritual endeavor. It was the attempt to subsume the diverse wisdom of the nations of the world — symbolized by their languages — under the all-encompassing divine wisdom of the Torah. This translation would be a refraction of the singular, absolute eternal truth into the various colors and hues of the complex, multi-faceted world of human civilization. This was one step in the direction of "lesakein olom bemalchus Shakai," and would contribute towards unifying the nations of the world in subordination to the will of Hashem and to fulfilling His design for all of creation as a whole.

But Ptolemy's goals for his translation were quite the opposite. His objective was to put the Torah (lower case "t") into his library of quaint literature to be studied academically along with all other obsolete ancient cultures.

Chazal saw the tragedy of this translation as an ongoing one. A serious setback was incurred to the cause of the Torah's historic mission to expand the borders of malchus Shomayim to encompass the worldly wisdom. Instead of refracting the Divine light of the Torah outward, it was darkened and confined by the Greeks to serve the agenda of an atheistic culture that worshiped the human mind and body. The mistress had been usurped by her hand-maiden.

This crucial distinction perhaps can shed light on the difficulty in the Maharal mentioned above.

Looking more carefully at the second reference in Nesiv Hatorah, one finds the recurrent phrases "chochmas ha'umos" (in distinction to "chochmoh Yevonis"), and "la'amode al hametzius." The Maharal says that to merely observe reality and note its patterns and structure is the wisdom available to every person. It is, undoubtedly, the wisdom that Hashem has implanted in the very substance of His creation, awaiting our discovery and appreciation.

In a simple observation of the marvels of the natural world, one is immediately filled with inspiration and closeness to the unfathomable mind of its Creator. One stands in awe and rapture at the subconscious feeling that Hashem had us and our puny capacity to appreciate this vast wisdom in mind when he designed our amazing universe. (See the Rambam in Hilchos Yesodei Hatorah, chapter 2.) This, says the Maharal, is chochmas ha'umos, not chochmoh Yevonis.

What is Greek Wisdom/Science?

It has been noted that the ultimate agenda of Greek civilization from the very beginning, starting with Alexander the Great, was global domination. The Greeks engaged in aggressive efforts to Hellenize the ancient world and become the dominant culture.

Similarly, the underlying objective of all Western understanding of nature is to eventually obtain absolute mastery over our universe. Scientific knowledge is the key to power over all nature (for good or for evil). It is in the pursuit of that power (which the Western world has inherited from the Greeks) that the recognition of Divine Providence in our world is diminished.

Let us not be naive to think that the scientific pursuit of knowledge is simply for the love of knowledge or to marvel at the wonders of creation. See Shiurei Daas vol. 2 and his penetrating analysis of the Dor Haflogoh by means of parallelism to the overarching scientific theme of Western culture. There was a similar collaboration of all mankind in pursuit of delving into nature to harness its powerful secrets and to thereby become self-sufficient beings who are masters over their own destiny. It was a conscious universal effort to set the universe "free" from all Divine "interference" with their humanistic agendas.

The drive to master nature guides all scientific inquiry; and it is obvious that it cannot be trusted to know its place in G-d's scheme for humanity. Science has no immunity to heresy, and history has proven the opposite to be true. We need to find ways to immunize ourselves against the corrosive G-d- absent world-view that science seeks to impose on reality.

Many religious academics mistakenly confuse the two types of natural science distinguished by the Maharal above. They assume there is theological validity to all legitimate science — as if nature and the modern scientific understanding of nature are synonymous.

This false equation naturally leads to an erroneous conclusion: If all current established theoretical science can be accepted as the Torah truth—since the wisdom invested in nature is Hashem's wisdom — then what follows is that our understanding of the Torah must be adjusted to conform to this other source of Hashem's truth.

This mistake has led to tragic misunderstandings of the clear facts recorded in the Torah and a severe distortion of our unbroken Mesorah. The mistress has again been usurped by her hand-maiden.

HaRav Elchonon Wasserman dealt with this problem from a different angle. He raises the question of how a Jewish youth can be commanded to believe in G-d, which even the brilliant Aristotle didn't manage.

Some have put his solution rather simplistically. They say his answer is that faith just requires one to draw the logical conclusions from the evidence that surrounds us; if great minds slip up, that is because of personal agendas. It is easy enough to conclude that there is a Creator; one need only survey the magnificent world in which we live.

But I think it's more complicated than that. HaRav Wasserman was discussing the evidence of design in nature that clearly point to an intelligent Designer Who has a purpose for what He designed. Aristotle and his heretical belief in an infinitely old universe challenged that purposefulness.

But let's not overlook one important fact. This rejection of creation and purposefulness was not totally blind irrationality. It was based on the overwhelming evidence up until 60 years ago that the world runs like a self- sufficient closed system. It was this evidence from the natural world that provided the excuse for Aristotle and many scientists for centuries to irrationally ignore the more obvious and conclusive evidence for a purposeful creation.

Rather than trust the physical evidence in favor of heresy, Rav Elchonon implies, all these scientists (who lived and died before the evidence of "the Big Bang" was accepted) were supposed to ignore one type of heretical evidence and instead accept the other forms of evidence pointing to a purposeful creation as fact. Now this can only be rational and reasonable if you say that the heretical evidence could be fundamentally questioned while the other type cannot. How can ironclad evidence of a closed system of matter and energy be rationally questioned?

The answer is quite simple. All this type of evidence relies on the assumption that the regularity we can prove exists only today should also exist infinitely into the past. That is an assumption that can be reasonably questioned. This assumption is then possible to definitively discount by relying on the objective unbiased report of the Torah tradition and its classic interpreters to inform us of what really happened in the past.

In the end of the rational process that Rav Wasserman plots out for the non-Jew to avoid heresy, one eventually has to seek the conclusive truth about the world from the Torah as well.

See the Rambam in Hilchos Melachim chapter 8 (Halochoh 11) where he rules a non-Jew must be convinced of the truth of monotheism and proper conduct specifically through the Torah of Moshe. Choosing to dismiss the straightforward understanding of Torah and Chazal and stubbornly rely on unaided human observation and reason alone, is the result of what Rav Wasserman called "personal agendas."

True, the non-Jews weren't given the Torah. Nevertheless they are responsible to deny star and nature worship (or heretical theories about them) — in spite of all the empirical evidence of their efficacy — simply because of the Divine command to Moshe in the Torah which is accessible to everyone through honest investigation.

As Rav Wasserman points out, a heretic can be executed without prior warning. He has an obligation to arrive at the truth about the world and avoid the scientific misinterpretations of nature by filtering his assumptions through our tradition that, the Kuzari and the Ramban say, originated from Odom, to Noach, to Moshe Rabbenu, all the way till our time.


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