David Hartman (1931–2013)
Author of A Living Covenant: The Innovative Spirit in Traditional Judaism
About the Author
David Hartman is founder of the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem, the world-renown center for the study of classical Jewish sources and of contemporary Israeli and Jewish issues. He is the author of A Living Covenant: The Innovative Spirit in Traditional Judaism and Israelis and the Jewish show more Tradition: An Ancient People Debating Its Future. Dr. Hartman received his rabbinical ordination from Yeshiva University and his PhD in philosophy from McGill University. show less
Series
Works by David Hartman
Love and Terror in the God Encounter: The Theological Legacy of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik (2001) 40 copies, 1 review
"Mia's Stand" 2 copies
A walk through Queens 1 copy
Jackie Chan Adventures 1 copy
A walk around Staten Island 1 copy
Heart of many rooms 1 copy
The David Hartman Album. 1 copy
Associated Works
The Life of Meaning: Reflections on Faith, Doubt, and Repairing the World (2007) — Contributor — 132 copies, 5 reviews
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Legal name
- Hartman, David
- Birthdate
- 1931
- Date of death
- 2013-02-10
- Gender
- male
- Education
- Yeshiva University, Rabbi Issac Elchanan Theological Seminary
McGill University (PhD) - Occupations
- rabbi
- Relationships
- Krauthammer, Charles (student)
- Short biography
- David Hartman was born in 1931 in Brooklyn, New York and attended Yeshiva Chaim Berlin and the Lubavitcher Yeshiva. He studied with Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik at Yeshiva University`s Rabbi Isaac Elhanan Theological Seminary, where he received his rabbinic ordination. He earned his Ph.D. in philosophy from McGill University. Emigrating to Israel in 1971, Dr. Hartman was the founder of the Shalom Hartman Institute, and is a personal advisor to the director-general of the Ministry of Education. He is the co-author, along with Abraham S. Halkin, of Crisis and Leadership: Epistles of Maimonides.
- Nationality
- USA
- Birthplace
- Brooklyn, New York, USA
- Place of death
- Jerusalem, Israel
- Associated Place (for map)
- USA
Members
Reviews
David Hartman points out that Modern Orthodox Judaism has in many respects been frozen in suspended animation, refusing to budge and grow despite moral imperatives and logic, resulting in many people being harmed. A prime example of this phenomenon is the failure of Modern Orthodox leaders to address the problem of the aguna, the wife whose husband refuses to give her a Jewish divorce. The rabbis refuse to resolve this problem because of an ancient, now no longer true, presumption about show more women. I describe this issue, which deserves extensive discussion in an article about what Hartman considers “Rabbi Soloveitchik’s Mistake,” which can be found, among other sites, in my website at www.booksnthoughts.com.
The reason for the stultification of Judaism is the commitment of leading Orthodox rabbis to now outdated presumptions about human nature and their refusal to recognize the right of modern rabbis to develop creative solutions to modern problems. Jews, they insist, must accept illogical commands based, as Rabbi Soloveitchik claims, borrowing a phrase from the nineteenth century Protestant Soren Kierkegaard, on a “leap of faith.”
The yeshiva world seems to worship halakha, the Jewish legal system, rather than God. While the Torah teaches love of neighbor and even stresses love of a stranger 36 times, these rabbis focus on halakha. They teach that Jews must realize that generations decline in intellect. The further Jews are removed from Mount Sinai the weaker their intellect is and the less able they are to know the truth. Thus Jews dare not reject the views of former rabbis, and must unthinkingly accept what they say.
Thus a Russian immigrant to Israel who always thought he was Jewish and who followed Jewish law, who served in the Israeli army as a commander, who was killed defending his country, Israel, was refused permission to be buried in a Jewish cemetery because some rabbi discovered that his grandmother was not Jewish. The rabbis apparently didn’t consider the Torah mandates of love, respect, and thankfulness. Thus a middle aged Jewish man whose family tradition was that he is a kohein, a priest, a descendant of Aaron, Moses’ brother, was refused permission to marry the woman he loved, who had long ago converted to Judaism, because of the ancient rule that a kohein cannot marry a convert.
Thus, yeshivas and many synagogues refuse to allow the Torah commentary of Rabbi Joseph Hertz in their building and even toss it on the floor yelling treff, “unkosher,” simply because it contains the views of non-Jewish scholars along with those of traditional commentators. Some of these misguided people did the same to the books of Moses Maimonides for the same reason. Hartman points out, as did Maimonides, that the truth is the truth no matter what its source and “without a grasp of the worlds of Christian and Muslim…out of which (the Jewish) commentators emerged, it was impossible (for rabbis and students) to fully understand their interpretations and halakhic verdicts.”
Thus women are still excluded from many Jewish practices. Hartman asks, “Could I worship a God who considered half of the Jewish community to be not fully human and responsible?”
Hartman states that the rabbis who hold these views generally acknowledge “the gender discrepancy within traditional Judaism, (but then claim) that the discrepancy actually favors women.” Some say that women don’t need the commands; they lack the baser instincts that men have; and, therefore, men need the biblical commands to keep “them off the streets.” The rabbis argue that, as stated in Genesis, women were created as a helper to men. She was meant to be servile, “subservient to his (her husband’s) will.”As disturbing as these views are, it is even more disturbing to note that many women have been brain washed to believe such notions. Who is guilty if these halakhot are violated – the Russian soldier, the kohein, the woman, the aguna - or the rabbis who have an opportunity to treat people properly and refuse to do so?
Hartman notes that: “For Maimonides, halakha plays an important, but secondary, role in the religious process, its function is to create the conditions of individual and social character optimal” for growth. He writes: “We find within halakhic history divergent attitudes…based on distinct theological conceptions of God, covenant, and the nature of the soul. The choice of which of these attitudes to emphasize as we create our own halakhic history is in our hands.” Differences of opinion should be respected, but not when people are harmed. Will we allow certain views of halakha to stifle our growth and the rights of every human being? show less
The reason for the stultification of Judaism is the commitment of leading Orthodox rabbis to now outdated presumptions about human nature and their refusal to recognize the right of modern rabbis to develop creative solutions to modern problems. Jews, they insist, must accept illogical commands based, as Rabbi Soloveitchik claims, borrowing a phrase from the nineteenth century Protestant Soren Kierkegaard, on a “leap of faith.”
The yeshiva world seems to worship halakha, the Jewish legal system, rather than God. While the Torah teaches love of neighbor and even stresses love of a stranger 36 times, these rabbis focus on halakha. They teach that Jews must realize that generations decline in intellect. The further Jews are removed from Mount Sinai the weaker their intellect is and the less able they are to know the truth. Thus Jews dare not reject the views of former rabbis, and must unthinkingly accept what they say.
Thus a Russian immigrant to Israel who always thought he was Jewish and who followed Jewish law, who served in the Israeli army as a commander, who was killed defending his country, Israel, was refused permission to be buried in a Jewish cemetery because some rabbi discovered that his grandmother was not Jewish. The rabbis apparently didn’t consider the Torah mandates of love, respect, and thankfulness. Thus a middle aged Jewish man whose family tradition was that he is a kohein, a priest, a descendant of Aaron, Moses’ brother, was refused permission to marry the woman he loved, who had long ago converted to Judaism, because of the ancient rule that a kohein cannot marry a convert.
Thus, yeshivas and many synagogues refuse to allow the Torah commentary of Rabbi Joseph Hertz in their building and even toss it on the floor yelling treff, “unkosher,” simply because it contains the views of non-Jewish scholars along with those of traditional commentators. Some of these misguided people did the same to the books of Moses Maimonides for the same reason. Hartman points out, as did Maimonides, that the truth is the truth no matter what its source and “without a grasp of the worlds of Christian and Muslim…out of which (the Jewish) commentators emerged, it was impossible (for rabbis and students) to fully understand their interpretations and halakhic verdicts.”
Thus women are still excluded from many Jewish practices. Hartman asks, “Could I worship a God who considered half of the Jewish community to be not fully human and responsible?”
Hartman states that the rabbis who hold these views generally acknowledge “the gender discrepancy within traditional Judaism, (but then claim) that the discrepancy actually favors women.” Some say that women don’t need the commands; they lack the baser instincts that men have; and, therefore, men need the biblical commands to keep “them off the streets.” The rabbis argue that, as stated in Genesis, women were created as a helper to men. She was meant to be servile, “subservient to his (her husband’s) will.”As disturbing as these views are, it is even more disturbing to note that many women have been brain washed to believe such notions. Who is guilty if these halakhot are violated – the Russian soldier, the kohein, the woman, the aguna - or the rabbis who have an opportunity to treat people properly and refuse to do so?
Hartman notes that: “For Maimonides, halakha plays an important, but secondary, role in the religious process, its function is to create the conditions of individual and social character optimal” for growth. He writes: “We find within halakhic history divergent attitudes…based on distinct theological conceptions of God, covenant, and the nature of the soul. The choice of which of these attitudes to emphasize as we create our own halakhic history is in our hands.” Differences of opinion should be respected, but not when people are harmed. Will we allow certain views of halakha to stifle our growth and the rights of every human being? show less
The photograph of a sailor kissing a nurse on the day Japan surrendered and ended World War II is one of the most iconic images of that time, but who are the people in the photo? Over the years, many people have stepped forward, but do their claims really stand up to the evidence? Lawrence Verria and George Galdorisi take on the challenge in their book, "The Kissing Sailor." Through piles of evidence, photographs, stories and interviews, Verria and Galdorisi make the case for a show more Portuguese-American fisherman and an Austrian dental assistant. Although the narrative gets bogged down with evidence from forensic studies, the book is a relatively easy read and the cast of characters is engaging. Have Verria and Galdorisi cracked the case? Perhaps. But no matter what, you'll never look at this photo - or the media - the same way again.
Amy R. / Marathon County Public Libraryshow less
Find this book in our library catalog.
A good mix of history and detective story as it traces the controversy over the identity of the people in the iconic photo. Sorting out the impostors from the real parties made for very interesting reading.
Love and Terror in the God Encounter: The Theological Legacy of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik by David Hartman
Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik (1903-1993) was and still is the leading rabbinical figure of Modern Orthodox Judaism. He was the Rosh Yeshiva of Yeshiva University, the senior lecturer on Talmud. He was the advisor to the Rabbinical Council of America, the organization of about 1,000 Orthodox rabbis. Since many of today’s Modern Orthodox rabbis graduated from Yeshiva University and belong to the Rabbinical Council of America, his influence upon the rabbis and, hence, upon their congregations show more has been great. Who was this man? David Hartman, one of today’s leading thinkers, a rabbi and Ph.D., evaluates the thinking of Rabbi Soloveitchik in this interesting and revealing book.
This volume was first published in 2001 and reissued in 2004. It was the winner of two National Jewish Book Awards. In his more recent book about Rabbi Soloveitchik, The God Who Hates Lies, Confronting & Rethinking Jewish Tradition, published in 2011, Dr. Hartman points out that Modern Orthodox Judaism has in many respects been frozen in suspended animation, refusing to budge and grow despite moral imperatives and logic, resulting in many people being harmed. A prime example of this phenomenon is the failure of Modern Orthodox leaders to address the problem of the aguna, the “chained one,” the wife whose husband refuses to give her a Jewish divorce and who is unable to remarry. This situation exists because of an interpretation of the Torah that only a man can give a divorce. It exists today because of the ruling issued by Rabbi Soloveitchik, Dr. Hartman points out, that the age-old interpretation and practice should not be changed despite the harm that it inflicts upon many women. I described this issue in my review of this book and in an article about what Dr. Hartman considers “Rabbi Soloveitchik’s Mistake,” which can be found, among other sites, in my website at www.booksnthoughts.com. The problem, in short, is that despite his profound learning, Rabbi Soloveitchik was very conservative in his thinking and practices and insisted that even when matters do not seem to make sense Jews must, as the Protestant theologian Soren Kierkegaard stated, take a leap of faith.
In this earlier book, Dr. Hartman analyses several of Rabbi Soloveitchik’s writings. According to Rabbi Soloveitchik, the Halakhic Man, the title he gave one of his most influential writings, is a Jew who follows the teachings of the Torah as interpreted by the ancient rabbis. A Jew, in his view, “studies halakhah (Jewish law) simply because it is an extension of God’s word.” Not because, as the great sage Moses Maimonides (1138-1204) wrote, to acquire true ideas and to improve oneself and society.
Dr. Hartman explains that Rabbi Soloveitchik’s Halakhic Man “is surrounded by clear normative principles. His perception of the world is firmly anchored.” He “is controlled by the normative halakhic framework…. Halakhah defines not only what halakhic man will see, but also the emotions with which he responds to prosperity and tragedy,” even to the terrible tragedy of the “chained woman.”
Rabbi Soloveitchik gives as his model the story of Rabbi Elijah Pruznu whose beloved daughter was dying, who asked her doctor how many minutes his daughter had until she would die. When he received the doctor’s reply, he returned to his room to put on the tefillin, which Orthodox Jews wear for the morning service, because once his daughter died he would, by the halakha, be unable to wear them until she was buried. Then he took them off and went to his daughter’s room just in time to see her die.
Hartman comments, “There is something abnormal – one might even say inhuman – about R. Elijah’s behavior. One would normally expect a father to want to be with his daughter in her final moments. When a child is dying, one would not expect a father to worry about such a question as, What mitzvot (biblical commands) will I be unable to perform when my status changes to a mourner?” This is the kind of indifference that prompted Rabbi Soloveitchik to rule that the chained woman must stay shackled.
Rabbi Soloveitchik sees the Halakhic Man as not “the harmonious individual…but the torn soul and the shattered spirit…involved in an irresolvable contradiction.” The Jew, according to his view of Judaism acknowledges “total dependency and helplessness before God, that only God is mighty and not they, that God is holy and they are but dust and ashes.”
These are the views of Rabbi Soloveitchik and he has many followers. But they are not the teachings, as he admits, of many others, such as Maimonides. His critics, who are mentioned in this book, say that he misunderstood Judaism. show less
This volume was first published in 2001 and reissued in 2004. It was the winner of two National Jewish Book Awards. In his more recent book about Rabbi Soloveitchik, The God Who Hates Lies, Confronting & Rethinking Jewish Tradition, published in 2011, Dr. Hartman points out that Modern Orthodox Judaism has in many respects been frozen in suspended animation, refusing to budge and grow despite moral imperatives and logic, resulting in many people being harmed. A prime example of this phenomenon is the failure of Modern Orthodox leaders to address the problem of the aguna, the “chained one,” the wife whose husband refuses to give her a Jewish divorce and who is unable to remarry. This situation exists because of an interpretation of the Torah that only a man can give a divorce. It exists today because of the ruling issued by Rabbi Soloveitchik, Dr. Hartman points out, that the age-old interpretation and practice should not be changed despite the harm that it inflicts upon many women. I described this issue in my review of this book and in an article about what Dr. Hartman considers “Rabbi Soloveitchik’s Mistake,” which can be found, among other sites, in my website at www.booksnthoughts.com. The problem, in short, is that despite his profound learning, Rabbi Soloveitchik was very conservative in his thinking and practices and insisted that even when matters do not seem to make sense Jews must, as the Protestant theologian Soren Kierkegaard stated, take a leap of faith.
In this earlier book, Dr. Hartman analyses several of Rabbi Soloveitchik’s writings. According to Rabbi Soloveitchik, the Halakhic Man, the title he gave one of his most influential writings, is a Jew who follows the teachings of the Torah as interpreted by the ancient rabbis. A Jew, in his view, “studies halakhah (Jewish law) simply because it is an extension of God’s word.” Not because, as the great sage Moses Maimonides (1138-1204) wrote, to acquire true ideas and to improve oneself and society.
Dr. Hartman explains that Rabbi Soloveitchik’s Halakhic Man “is surrounded by clear normative principles. His perception of the world is firmly anchored.” He “is controlled by the normative halakhic framework…. Halakhah defines not only what halakhic man will see, but also the emotions with which he responds to prosperity and tragedy,” even to the terrible tragedy of the “chained woman.”
Rabbi Soloveitchik gives as his model the story of Rabbi Elijah Pruznu whose beloved daughter was dying, who asked her doctor how many minutes his daughter had until she would die. When he received the doctor’s reply, he returned to his room to put on the tefillin, which Orthodox Jews wear for the morning service, because once his daughter died he would, by the halakha, be unable to wear them until she was buried. Then he took them off and went to his daughter’s room just in time to see her die.
Hartman comments, “There is something abnormal – one might even say inhuman – about R. Elijah’s behavior. One would normally expect a father to want to be with his daughter in her final moments. When a child is dying, one would not expect a father to worry about such a question as, What mitzvot (biblical commands) will I be unable to perform when my status changes to a mourner?” This is the kind of indifference that prompted Rabbi Soloveitchik to rule that the chained woman must stay shackled.
Rabbi Soloveitchik sees the Halakhic Man as not “the harmonious individual…but the torn soul and the shattered spirit…involved in an irresolvable contradiction.” The Jew, according to his view of Judaism acknowledges “total dependency and helplessness before God, that only God is mighty and not they, that God is holy and they are but dust and ashes.”
These are the views of Rabbi Soloveitchik and he has many followers. But they are not the teachings, as he admits, of many others, such as Maimonides. His critics, who are mentioned in this book, say that he misunderstood Judaism. show less
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Statistics
- Works
- 46
- Also by
- 5
- Members
- 656
- Popularity
- #38,460
- Rating
- 4.3
- Reviews
- 7
- ISBNs
- 45
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