{"id":764,"date":"2015-10-16T07:51:19","date_gmt":"2015-10-16T07:51:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thetravellerslastjourney.com\/shai\/perceptions-of-wisdom-in-the-talmud-with-emmanuel-levinas"},"modified":"2019-09-27T04:29:16","modified_gmt":"2019-09-27T04:29:16","slug":"perceptions-of-wisdom-in-the-talmud-with-emmanuel-levinas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thetravellerslastjourney.com\/shai\/2015\/10\/16\/perceptions-of-wisdom-in-the-talmud-with-emmanuel-levinas\/","title":{"rendered":"Perceptions of wisdom in the Talmud with Emmanuel Levinas"},"content":{"rendered":"

Editorial notes<\/strong>:
\nOn this day Shai publishes his\u00a0first post\u00a0dedicated specifically to Judaism. This is significant as it is the beginning of the fourth phase in Shai\u2019s intellectual journey. After having first devoted a substantial body of writing to scientific inquiry and to the study of ancient and classical Western philosophers, and having recently commenced his study of Eastern Wisdom, Shai begins slowly at first but then, from August 2016, with gathering intensity, to document his study of Jewish philosophical sources.
\n<\/span>\nFurther analysis of Shai\u2019s writing during this period reveals that his study of Jewish sources is also achieved through three mini subjourneys:
\n1. Study of the Talmud<\/strong><\/a> (and the Mishnah).
\n2. Study of Jewish mysticism \/ Kabbalah<\/strong><\/a>.
\n3. Study of the Torah<\/strong><\/a> (by applying lessons learned from the first two).
\n<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

\"1\"The Jews revere the Torah as the word of God inscribed, and the Talmud as the word of God made explicit. Explicit in the sense of \u2018made tangible by engagement\u2019. The Talmud is a series of discussions, predicated on the memories of an oral tradition (Mishnah), and the rigorous obsessions of rational minds seeking perfection.<\/p>\n

Emmanuel Levinas was a post-war French philosopher, operating in the tradition of Husserlian phenomenology, and once a student of the wondrous mystery and mystic Monsieur Chouchani<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Language, ideology, universality<\/h3>\n

The Jewish sages perceived transcendental significance in their language. God \u2013 they taught \u2013 created the world with language, and so to understand words is to understand the world. As one learned more languages one became closer to perceiving wisdom. But translation was also a risk, and meaning could be both lost and preserved in the very shapes and sounds of letters, as well as the words whose meanings were always greater than anyone could know.<\/p>\n

\"2\"<\/a>The early Rabbis translated their Torah into Greek with great trepidation. Greek was wise in abstractions, in universal communication, but in doing so it reduced everything to forms and ideas. All men are equal because all men are the same (rational, mortal, animals). Not so for the Hebrew, on two counts.<\/p>\n

Firstly because this Semitic transmission expressed its universality through the unique and singular, insisting upon\u00a0\u201canalyses that never lost themselves in generalities but returned to their examples \u2013 resisting invariable conceptual entities<\/em>\u201d. Every biblical story projects itself into meanings and interpretations, but these never become new anchors for thought; the perennial source and vista of truth is always the original text (and its words and stories).<\/p>\n

And secondly (and similarly) because the Hebrews saw universality of personhood as a formation that devolves from exception; they perceived \u201cthe universal insofar as it unites persons without reducing them to an abstraction in which their singularity of unique beings is sacrificed to the genus; universality in which uniqueness has already been approached in love<\/em>\u201d. The proof that all men are brothers is made manifest by the very individuality of the Hebrew, and the ability to sympathize with the Other (nations) whose difference need not be bridged.<\/p>\n

Universality and transcendence of meaning, whether in persons or in their language (and the Hebrews might have thought this distinction redundant), is dependent on the exploration of that which occurs (in history, in life, in the world), and that which occurs is necessarily sui generis<\/em>.<\/p>\n

But if everything \u2013 every story and every person \u2013 is an unprecedented entity, where and how is one to find wisdom? Can the wandering gaze of the egocentric eye discover infinity when confronted with a world of infinite heterogeneous monads, each promising absolute truth within their own realm?<\/p>\n

Texts that draw out their own meaning across the canvas of a tautological history<\/h3>\n

The following is a matter of faith for the Jew: The Torah is a product of God, and it is both a container and reflection for all truths, including individuals\u2019 truths, including truths that unfold through time.<\/p>\n

A legend says that God read the Torah<\/em> and then created the world. Thus: the minutiae, tedium, and transience of the biblical stories are simultaneously narrations (of the events therein described), and also encoded reflections and refractions of era upon era, name upon name, within an arrow of time that spans the invariably shortest distance between the first point and the last moment.<\/p>\n

The proof that an event was ordained by the Torah\u2019s blueprint is that it happened in history. The Rabbi studying the Torah<\/em> sees its imprint seeping through every frame and at every scale.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The Torah<\/em> thus becomes the atemporal stage, never changing ever manifesting. Every act and scene in the bible is an archetype for every act and scene of history. The secret of transmuting the singular perfection of the Torah<\/em> is an exercise in transmutation into the myriad and particular.<\/p>\n

If the Torah<\/em> is the word of God then the Jews know that its meaning is a translation of a singular will and vision and idea, made manifest through the divisions and fractures of words. If the whole is to be seen then every mote must be understood in relation to every other, and every pattern a template reimagining every other.<\/p>\n

In the Talmud the sages engage the will of an inscribed god<\/em>, seeking to press their minds against the veins\u00a0and grains that are the metaphors overlaying the metaphors ad infinitum<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The individual qua chosen thus becomes a channel that \u2013 when perceived by a perspective that itself is a will subsumed against the asymptote of a sublime will \u2013 paradoxically reveals a universal truth.<\/p>\n

Conclusion: The nexus of hermeneutics, individuality, and an unfolding tradition<\/h3>\n

In its raw form, the Talmud<\/em> appears as a set of legalistic arguments, surrounded by a thick tangle of commentators who seek to clarify and direct. To study the Talmud<\/em> is to pit one\u2019s own mind (reason and imagination) against the contours of the necessities of logic (if a then b, but why mention c?) and meaning (why the parallels of vocabulary, or the trajectories of ethos?), forever challenging the text, seeking to test oneself by confronting and absorbing everything.<\/p>\n

\"3\"The giant tomes\u00a0of the Talmud<\/em> are crisscrossed by names; the elders and schools of the Talmud<\/em> itself, and the giant commentators whose fine print fills the giant margins and appendix upon appendix. Every name is a synecdoche for a maelstrom of opinions, perceptions, experiences, all of which have been honed and focused against the primary text. To join these individuals in their engagement of the text is to see the universal through the angles of their prism.<\/p>\n

Every generation is presented with the eternal words of the Torah and the Talmud. And every generation is presented with a chronology of perspectives on those words. Every generation comes to terms with the meaning of eternity concentrated into a singularity that is the manifested present. And every generation learns to see that even the very manifestation of a present is also a manifestation of a continuing past.<\/p>\n

To study the Talmud is to believe and perceive the possibility of an Aleph<\/a> <\/em>\u2013 an Archimedean point of infinite truth \u2013 and to know that the only way of ever coming to know that Aleph<\/em> is by aligning one\u2019s will as best one knows with the shapes overlaying\u00a0fathomless depths; and then projecting that intelligence outwards towards (the\u00a0very Aleph\u2019s<\/em> wills\u2019) fathomless presentations. The outcome might be a wisdom.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Editorial notes: On this day Shai publishes his\u00a0first post\u00a0dedicated specifically to Judaism. This is significant as it is the beginning of the fourth phase in Shai\u2019s intellectual journey. After having first devoted a substantial body of writing to scientific inquiry and to the study of ancient and classical Western philosophers, and having recently commenced his […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[159,90,103,167,190,293,106],"tags":[248,104,320,105],"metadata":[300],"class_list":["post-764","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-all-posts","category-blog-posts","category-essay","category-judaism","category-religion","category-talmud","category-the-traveller-is-the-journey","tag-borges","tag-judaism","tag-levinas","tag-philosophy","metadata-fourthphase"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":2915,"url":"https:\/\/thetravellerslastjourney.com\/shai\/2014\/01\/13\/philosophy-bites-podcast-a-person\/","url_meta":{"origin":764,"position":0},"title":"Philosophy bites Podcast- A Person","author":"Pala","date":"January 13, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Editorial notes: This is Shai\u2019s first reference to the French philosopher of Lithuanian Jewish ancestry, Emmanuel Levinas. Levinas\u2019 ideas appear to have made an impact on Shai\u2019s outlook as he refers to him 11 more times in the following three and a half years, most notably in a post entitled\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "All Posts"","block_context":{"text":"All Posts","link":"https:\/\/thetravellerslastjourney.com\/shai\/all-posts\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":889,"url":"https:\/\/thetravellerslastjourney.com\/shai\/2015\/11\/20\/wisdom-in-the-talmud-as-will\/","url_meta":{"origin":764,"position":1},"title":"Wisdom in the Talmud as will","author":"Pala","date":"November 20, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Editorial notes: This post was found in 'Draft' mode in the original blog and may be incomplete. It is published here in its original state. It was last updated on 20\/11\/2015 This is a variation-on-a-theme. Where I previously wrote on reading Talmud with Levinas, here I revisit the issue, simplifying\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "All Posts"","block_context":{"text":"All Posts","link":"https:\/\/thetravellerslastjourney.com\/shai\/all-posts\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3174,"url":"https:\/\/thetravellerslastjourney.com\/shai\/2017\/08\/31\/howl\/","url_meta":{"origin":764,"position":2},"title":"Howl","author":"Pala","date":"August 31, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Editorial notes: This is one of Shai\u2019s longest essays, written in seven instalments, six within a period of just ten days in 2016 (from 13th October to 23rd October 2016) and the seventh, a year later, on August 31 2017. Reflecting on Shai\u2019s complete collection of writings, this can be\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "All Posts"","block_context":{"text":"All Posts","link":"https:\/\/thetravellerslastjourney.com\/shai\/all-posts\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thetravellerslastjourney.com\/shai\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/06\/kisspng-black-and-white-monochrome-grey-divider-5ab8b367372326.6136383115220539912259-300x15.png?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1242,"url":"https:\/\/thetravellerslastjourney.com\/shai\/2016\/12\/23\/what-is-talmud-1-1-1\/","url_meta":{"origin":764,"position":3},"title":"What is Talmud 1-1-1","author":"Pala","date":"December 23, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"Mimatai korim shema b\u2019arvit\u2026[I] Sof ma\u2019ase[1]\u2026 The Mishnah was packaged to ensure the survival of key structures within the oral tradition, which although requiring great losses of wisdom, was deemed necessary for the great journey ahead. The terrible voyage had not yet hinted the breadth of its passages, nor depths,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "All Posts"","block_context":{"text":"All Posts","link":"https:\/\/thetravellerslastjourney.com\/shai\/all-posts\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":960,"url":"https:\/\/thetravellerslastjourney.com\/shai\/2017\/04\/24\/a-fools-race\/","url_meta":{"origin":764,"position":4},"title":"A Fool’s Race","author":"Pala","date":"April 24, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"[Editor\u2019s Notes: Nice of me to finally put some of these thoughts into writing, but shame I didn\u2019t care for any further development. 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