PaRDeS and Berei**** 1:20-25

[Jayhawker Soule]

The order of creation offered in Berei**** 1:20-25 is at odds with the overwhelming consensus of science. This invites two extreme positions: the literalist, i.e., science got it wrong, and the secular, i.e., the Torah got it wrong. When faced with similar challenges (such as the 6-days of creation or Vayikra on homosexuality) there seems to me to be a valiant effort at a third response, that being appeals to PaRDeS suggesting that the Torah really didn't mean what it very much appears to mean. How might this approach be applied to this case?

 

[Levite]

I think both the creation stories in the first couple of chapters of Bere**** are mythologized. The Torah may present details which are literally incorrect as to cosmology and so forth, but the point of the stories is entirely accurate: that God is the sole author and source of all things, ourselves included.

But in close interpretation, I prefer the Kabbalistic approach: that everything in the "order of Creation" is to be understood as Sohd, actually esoteric references to the way in which shefa (the outpouring of Divine energy) flows out from Ein Sof through the Ten Sefirot, into the Created universe.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

The Torah may present details which are literally incorrect as to cosmology and so forth, but ...

Why would they be literally incorrect? What would have prevented what you presume to be "the point" coexisting with a literally correct ordering of creation?

 

[Levite]

Why would they be literally incorrect? What would have prevented what you presume to be "the point" coexisting with a literally correct ordering of creation?

My go-to response to this issue is that even if Torah is written by nevi'im, they are still nevi'im who are products of their time and place. Their revelation is filtered through the lenses of what they were capable of comprehending, and their cultural norms and literary aesthetics for how to present what they did comprehend. So the accurate message that they relay-- that God (YHVH) is the sole author and source of all things-- is couched in the style that their audience was prepared to receive, and the details are either fuzzy or arranged to suit the aesthetics of the authors. I believe that this is at the heart of the Rabbinic teaching dibrah Torah ki'l'shon b'nai adam (the Torah speaks after the fashion of human speech).

The narrative we have is enough to both get across the central message, and to provide ample resource for midrash and Kabbalah in order to find higher spiritual truths about God and Creation.

I think it was more important to God that His prophets provide those things than that they author a Creation story convincingly consistent with modern cosmological physics. God blessed the human race with the capacity to investigate nature and systematize knowledge: the science we can (and do) figure out for ourselves. I think the purpose of Bere**** isn't science: it's theology,mysticism, and midrash-- which is good, as science does not provide those things.

 

[TheKnight]

The order of creation offered in Berei**** 1:20-25 is at odds with the overwhelming consensus of science. This invites two extreme positions: the literalist, i.e., science got it wrong, and the secular, i.e., the Torah got it wrong. When faced with similar challenges (such as the 6-days of creation or Vayikra on homosexuality) there seems to me to be a valiant effort at a third response, that being appeals to PaRDeS suggesting that the Torah really didn't mean what it very much appears to mean. How might this approach be applied to this case?

I've found that such an approach generally starts from a point wherein one does not believe that the Torah is meant to be a book of history telling us factual things about the past, but that it is primarily a book of study to guide our understanding in how we conduct ourselves on a day to day basis. With that approach, the accuracy of the story is less relevant than the answer to the questions of why God would include such a story in the Torah given its contradiction with what we know from science, and what can the inclusion of this story tell us about how we should conduct ourselves on a day to day basis?

I'd argue that the reason for its inclusion, despite its scientific shortcomings, is that it properly contextualizes the material which follows it, and is also the product of the limited understanding of its authors.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

My go-to response to this issue is that even if Torah is written by nevi'im, they are still nevi'im who are products of their time and place. Their revelation is filtered through the lenses of what they were capable of comprehending, and their cultural norms and literary aesthetics for how to present what they did comprehend. So the accurate message that they relay-- that God (YHVH) is the sole author and source of all things-- is couched in the style that their audience was prepared to receive, and the details are either fuzzy or arranged to suit the aesthetics of the authors. I believe that this is at the heart of the Rabbinic teaching dibrah Torah ki'l'shon b'nai adam (the Torah speaks after the fashion of human speech).

To "speak after the fashion of human speech" neither explains nor requires getting the order of creation wrong.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

I've found that such an approach generally starts from a point wherein one does not believe that the Torah is meant to be a book of history telling us factual things about the past, but that it is primarily a book of study to guide our understanding in how we conduct ourselves on a day to day basis. With that approach, the accuracy of the story is less relevant than the answer to the questions of why God would include such a story in the Torah given its contradiction with what we know from science, and what can the inclusion of this story tell us about how we should conduct ourselves on a day to day basis?

Again, that is all well and good, but all you've said is that the Torah has value and purpose despite "getting it wrong" and I agree with this. What I disagree with is this persistent need to sidestep the fact that it did, indeed, get it wrong.

Let's see if we can start by embracing this fact and then see what it might say about the logic of classic rabbinic exegesis.

 

[dantech]

Though I do believe in many things Pardes, I still believe that this type of verse was meant to be true when read literally as well. I do once in a while, perhaps naively, believe in the Torah rather than modern science when it comes to some issues. An example would be the age of the earth.
For this particular question, my logic is pulling me towards the scientific explanation whereas my Orthodox grown heart is pulling me towards the Torah's version.
I can't say either are wrong, simply because we don't know for sure, do we? But one of them is definitely wrong, since they can't co-exist.

 

[Levite]

To "speak after the fashion of human speech" neither explains nor requires getting the order of creation wrong.

It may not require, but it can explain, if the revelation of the nevi'im who wrote the original narratives was to the central message of God as sole creator and maker of all, but the details of the "how" were left to the literary aesthetics of the authors, who simply modeled the "how" part after the fashion of creation myths they were already familiar with.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

It may not require, but it can explain, ...

In my opinion, you are simply avoiding the issue.

You are exceptionally well versed, Levite, and you know better than most that there are hundreds if not thousands of examples of rabbis going to great lengths to explain (or try to explain) every line, word, context and nuance of Torah text. The presumption is that nothing -- NOTHING -- is wrong, accidental, or in any way frivolous or superfluous, and it is this presumption that underlies much or what accounts for classic rabbinic exegesis.

My question to you is: Is the sequence of creation posited in 1:20-25 accurate or inaccurate? If you don't wish to answer that is, of course, fine. I would just greatly prefer that you do not pretend to answer while leaving the sequence of creation unaddressed on the grounds that Berei**** 1 has value anyway.

To put the issue more succinctly: Why do you find it so hard to simply acknowledge that the author got it wrong?

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

I can't say either are wrong, simply because we don't know for sure, do we? But one of them is definitely wrong, since they can't co-exist.

What it means to "know something for sure" is a fairly complicated discussion in and of itself. This is particularly true once one accepts the 'supernatural' since, at that point, knowledge becomes effectively impossible. That said, the general age of the earth and the general contour of evolution (including, e.g., Evolution of Birds) is as close to a sure thing as were likely to get. To choose YEC is to throw an enormous amount of science out the window.

But this, of course, is one of the options, namely: "science got it wrong." I fully support your right to hold such a faith-base position.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

At this point there are 96 views, 11 replies, and only 2 votes, with mine the only vote asserting an error in the text. Frankly, I find that to be remarkable … and a bit sad.

 

[dantech]

. To choose YEC is to throw an enormous amount of science out the window.

I know, and this is one of my biggest quandaries at this point.

But this, of course, is one of the options, namely: "science got it wrong." I fully support your right to hold such a faith-base position.

This precisely is the conundrum. At this point, I don't feel like science got it wrong, yet I don't feel capable of saying that the Torah got it wrong either.

 

[Flankerl]

At this point there are 96 views, 11 replies, and only 2 votes, with mine the only vote asserting an error in the text. Frankly, I find that to be remarkable … and a bit sad.

Hey it was nice outside today.


@Topic
As i'ver never understood the whole creation in a literal sense i dont really see the problem.

I mean seriously, the earth is 6000 years old? There is pottery from all over the world which is older.
Also iam not so sure if ancient sheepherders would have understood the truth if Hashem had told em.
They build an idol because someone was running late on an imaginary appointment, what would they'd have build if they had heard about black holes or radiation that could set the atmosphere(hey another thing they didnt know about) on fire in a matter of seconds?


I wouldnt have told them.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

Hey it was nice outside today.

Very … although rendered less than perfect by a shiva call.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

This precisely is the conundrum. At this point, I don't feel like science got it wrong, yet I don't feel capable of saying that the Torah got it wrong either.

dantech, I deeply appreciate your honesty and clarity.

 

[metis]

I take the accounts as allegory, although I have no idea whether the author(s) meant it that way, and I think it's most likely a Babylonian creation narrative that was reworked to reflect our morals and values.

 

[Akivah]

I'm get amazed at the legs of this sort of discussion. The Torah is not a science book, it devotes one paragraph to the creation of the Earth. Exactly how the Earth was created doesn't affect our behavior, which is what the Torah is really all about.

I didn't vote since I don't like any of the choices. I would go with Both are correct.

 

[Jayhawker Soule]

The Torah is not a science book, it devotes one paragraph to the creation of the Earth. Exactly how the Earth was created doesn't affect our behavior, which is what the Torah is really all about.

I totally agree, and I have both defended and applauded the Torah on many occasions. But, again, that is not the question here.

Being probed here is epistemology and the validity of the propositions/presumptions underlying the 'logic' of PaRDeS.

 

[Levite]

In my opinion, you are simply avoiding the issue.

You are exceptionally well versed, Levite, and you know better than most that there are hundreds if not thousands of examples of rabbis going to great lengths to explain (or try to explain) every line, word, context and nuance of Torah text. The presumption is that nothing -- NOTHING -- is wrong, accidental, or in any way frivolous or superfluous, and it is this presumption that underlies much or what accounts for classic rabbinic exegesis.

My question to you is: Is the sequence of creation posited in 1:20-25 accurate or inaccurate? If you don't wish to answer that is, of course, fine. I would just greatly prefer that you do not pretend to answer while leaving the sequence of creation unaddressed on the grounds that Berei**** 1 has value anyway.

To put the issue more succinctly: Why do you find it so hard to simply acknowledge that the author got it wrong?

I don't think I was avoiding the issue. I indicated that the pshat meanings vis-a-vis the scientific nature of cosmological development may be inaccurate, but the sohd meanings vis-a-vis the flows of shefa through the Sefirot into the Created universe may be accurate. And that is in addition to the value of Bere**** for midrash (both aggadah and halachah), which would seem to cover remez and drash.

There are any number of verses in Torah where Our Rabbis teach us that the applied meaning is not the pshat. I see no reason why these should be different.

I dislike setting forth a binary framework, where Torah is either right or wrong. Such a framing seems designed to demand that the response either be rejectionist or literalist-- but part of the fundamental point of an interpretation-centric tradition is to avoid precisely that framing, and those responses.