Re: Psychological Theory
MChelemer@aol.com
Fri, 21 Nov 1997 09:34:14 -0500 (EST)
Jonathan Shapiro writes that Torah and psychological theory are
incompatible. I disagree. I believe one could apply many psychological
theories to the actions of individuals in the Torah, and that other
philosophies also are applicable. For instance, one could construct a long
tract about Kayin and Hevel and their relationship to their parents as a
means for trying to understand the first murder and fratricide. Perhaps
the parents favored one over the other. Perhaps they weren't great parents
(they were new at it, after all, and Hashem didn't seem to give many
instructions about child-rearing) and the children grew to dislike each
other. Just because the story is in the Torah doesn't mean we can't
ascribe "modern" impulses to their actions. Psychology simply provides a
means for examining and studying the actions long ago in order that we
might learn today.
Even the Akedah could be viewed, from one lens, as an existential
experience, one moment to the next, two men "walking on together" to face
their destiny, and literally living each moment on Sartre's knife edge of
time, with no past and no future. Does this make existentialism
incompatible with Torah? I think not.
I have no love for Nazi sympathizers or cults, but to lump all of modern
psychology and philosophy into some giant anti-Torah collection of
knowledge seems to me to dismiss a great body of thought and a great many
tools we could bring to bear to try to understand the mysteries of our holy
book. Even if a tool doesn't do everything one wants, isn't applicable in
some cases, or, worse yet, is used for bad purposes sometimes, that doesn't
mean the tool itself is inherently evil.