Honest Reporting
by: Reb Arie on July 16th, 2009 | 4 Comments »
I subscribe to HonestReporting.ca, which gives a very different perspective than that offered by Tikkun‘s Michael Lerner.
Michael Lerner and I disagree on more than a few matters with respect to Israel. I am, after all, fundamentally Orthodox. That aside, and it is a small matter, Michael’s prophetic voice sings to me and influences me.
Honest Reporting is, I suppose, a neoconservative Jewish media monitor. There are quite a few “Honest Reporting” wesbites, so they represent a coordinated effort of some type. Whose? I’ve never really been certain. I love a mystery.
Michael Lerner has asked us to fast — that is, to respond spiritually and prophetically to the brave reports of brave soldiers who are themselves, whether or not they know it, behaving prophetically.
If Honest Reporting had a sense of spiritual mission — I know from personal encounters that it does not — it would likely want to think of the TD bloggers as false prophets. There is some Torahitic mandate for this in Dvarim -Deuteronomy 13:1-5.
In Bamidar – Numbers 11:29, though, we read an interesting exchange that Mo’sheh (Moses) has with Yehoshu’a (Joshua):
“Don’t be jealous on my account! Would that all G!d’s People were prophetic, accepting upon themselves the burden that is G!dliness.”
Moe'sheh Blesses Yehoshu'a (Dvarim 31:7)
Some readers will note that I use G!d to render the English Name that in Hebrew is usually Yhvh יהוה or Elohim אלוֹהים. I understand the Divine as an exclamation, a custom given me by a student of Reb Zalman Schachter-Shalomi.
I am someone with a serious, spiritual program of recovery from addiction. I thus understand the English Name as an abbreviation –
G(ood) O(rderly) D(irection)
Understanding G!d in that fashion means, I hope, that those of you who identify as atheists can see a paradigm of Divinity that fits you.
It is essential that we all accept upon ourselves the burden that is G!dliness.
Reb Arie,
Why have you included these two divine names in Hebrew? Does not this pose a problem with regard to saying His name in vain? Is this not possibly an averah (i.e., sin)?
Interesting question and an opportunity for a teaching moment. Thank you!
Rav Ezra Bick at the Virtual Beit Midrash of Yeshivat Har Etzion (a beit midrash is a study centre and a yeshiva is a college of higher Jewish education) permits writing the Name in English on a computer because what we see on the screen is really only characters based on binary numbers — one can’t “erase” because one isn’t really “writing”.
An avera is not a sin. Avera literally means “crossing”, in this sense crossing boundaries, which is better rendered by English “transgression”. While the Hebrew “heht” seems to mean “sin” it is actually based on the mitzva (imperative) of the hah’taht, a type of offering made to help one overcome transgressive behaviour. The stem from which hah’taht grows is “hayt”, which means “disinfect”, a meaning quite consonant with the idea of overcoming transgression. In Hebrew, both “hayt” and “heht” are spelled identically. Only the pronunciation differs, which is to say that “heht” derives from the name of the offering, not the other way around.
Reb Arie,
Thank you for you informative answers particularly the literal meaning of avera and heht.
I still have a couple of questions about the use of Hebrew with regard to the divine names:
Is Rav Bick’s position also applicable to the Hebrew usage as well?
While the behind-the-scenes composition of characters are binary numbers they have the appearance of real characters that can be copied, printed, and unfortunately misused placing the burden of responsibility upon the end-user. Would this in any way imply a shared responsibility between the publisher of such characters and the end-user?
I’m grateful for such interesting questions.
I don’t see any limitation in Rav Bick’s opinion — a Hebrew character set does not differ from English, Korean, Urdu, or whatever. Typing characters into a computer is not “writing”, irrespective of the language. Speaking as someone who has set type manually (I’ve had an interesting past) I can tell you from personal experience that “publishing” is completely different today than it was when I began learning the ropes 30 years ago.
Publishing until very recently imposed permanence. It was grossly expensive to correct even small mistakes after something was typeset. Hebrew publishing as we conceive it was written on “qluf” — animal hide — that met specific halakhic standards. Manually writing the Name of G!d required precision because a mistake could not be easily and inexpensively corrected. Torah scrolls, for example, are written and are justified manually — by hand. It is incorrect, bythe way, that the Name cannot be erased. There are specific reasons to erase the Name and specific conditions to meet in doing so.
In contrast, there is no permanence whatever, for example, to these comments. Even after I submit them and you have read them I am free to sign in to the Dashboard and make changes. The ethics of this may (or may not) be dubious.
You are correct, I think, to suggest a responsibility exists to treat the Name respectfully. The Name is not something mundane and must not be subjected to casual crumpling up or discard. I can foresee that one might print an online article. How am I to impose the solemnity use of the Name requires? I can be aware of the need for solemnity, and I am, but even if I were to use a disclaimer (which some people do) adjuring respect for the Name how am I to monitor it? Respect (or lack of it) could not be imposed in the analog world and even less so now.
I do hyphenate the Name in English but it is not my custom to abbreviate the Name in Hebrew, as perhaps most do, because it seems to me that this is an excessive piety. People tend to see the abbreviation as the Name, which it is not, and in our times we must teach a great deal more to a great many more. I cannot explain the inherent mysticism of the letter hei, for example, as symbolic of G!d but I can do so with the Yod-Hei-Vav-Hei. It is a common Sefardic teaching custom, by the way, to write the Name with those letters, each separated by a mark. You will see this custom followed also in Hasidic texts.