Dear Jeremy,



The study of ancient nations and cultures is one of the most fascinating areas of the humanities: how myths and rituals are created, why most of the tribesmen or nation devote maximal energy to preserve ceremonies and beliefs.

More than that, any who stray from preserving these ceremonies and beliefs are severely punished.

Another fascinating question is in the area of psychology. What motivates people to give up their free and open lives and join a closed society, all of whose resources are devoted to preserving the old?

Your cousin is one of many examples of this phenomenon.

Pay attention to his claim: “it is impossible to come to a nation…and have that nation believe the story to be true.” He supposes that which he wishes to prove. How does he know they came to the nation? Perhaps it was a gradual process, just as Christianity spread from individuals to the larger public until the Roman Empire, which had initially opposed Christianity, adopted it.

How does he know “the nation believed it”? Maybe there were many who opposed the idea, as is written in the Scriptures themselves. Many opponents, like Yeruvam the son of Navat, arose. In the First Temple period the kings worshipped idols and did not accept the rebuke of the prophets.

In the Second Temple period there were three cults: the Essenes, the Pharisees, and the Sadducees. The Sadducees rejected the Oral Torah and did not accept the opinion of the Pharisees, who uprooted, distorted, and twisted the text of the Written Torah. There were many such examples.

Your cousin accepted a claim which he heard from religious believers, without checking whether their words were true. He did not go to an academic institution and ask experts in the humanities “Has the phenomenon of a large group believing nonsense ever occurred?”

To learn more about this odd phenomenon — people steadfastly clinging to a belief which causes them hardship and difficulties — you should look at the Charedi community. The Charedi community cuts its students off from the enlightened world. Rabbi Menachem Man Shach, head of the Ponevich Yeshiva, even forbade his students reading the translated Talmud of Professor Adin Steinsaltz. How much more so the work of Daat Emet; if a boy is caught with one of the Daat Emet pamphlets he would find himself thrown out of the study hall.

This is the question you must present to your cousin: If the “Divine truth” is in the pocket of the Charedi, why are they so afraid to teach their students Biblical criticism, the results of archeological research, and to teach them whether their faith passes the test of reasonable critique?



On the story of the Revelation see the portions of Vaera and Yitro.

About the prohibition against research and critique of the Jewish beliefs system, see the portion of Beshalach.



Sincerely,



Daat Emet