Science and the Range of Jewish Values

Dear beloved fellow members of Harvard’s Jewish community,

I hope my message finds you, and those you love, well.

The two words one hears most often from senior professors and administrators to describe the escalating, high-stakes confrontation between Harvard and the federal government are, “existential,” and “war.” As in every conflict, one must take a position: sitting on the sidelines may not be possible, and even when it is, is no less of a choice than joining the fray. This is doubly true when the government justifies its punitive steps as necessary responses to Harvard’s handling of campus anti-Semitism, claiming the role of protector and champion of our community.

With extensive input from many of you, this morning I published a statement, on behalf of Harvard Hillel and our entire community, rejecting the fight against anti-Semitism as justification for the government’s most recent actions.

The letter that follows is not a statement, but a (partial) statement of values. I know from the many, many concerned messages you all have sent me over the past three weeks that thousands of members of this community share a basic conviction: in addition to defending ourselves and looking out for one another, which we should neither apologize for nor shy away from, there are other Jewish values at stake in this moment, ones that we as a community should name and, when necessary, defend. No single message could address all of them. This week, I want to focus on one in particular: the Jewish significance of the project of scientific research. When we sense that something ineffable is lost when Harvard’s labs are shuttered and breakthroughs are delayed (or, God forbid, lost) – that sensibility is not only correct, but is a Jewish sensibility of the highest order. Here our Rabbis of blessed memory have given voice to our thoughts and convictions better than any of us could have on our own.

At Bavli Shabbat 75a, the Talmud’s scholars boldly assert the religious significance of, and imperative to, study astronomy. It will become clear that their position on astronomy – the only ancient discipline we would recognize as a precursor to today’s empirically and mathematically grounded STEM – generalizes to all modern hard sciences:

Shimon ben Pazi said in the name of Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi, who said in the name of Bar Kappara, “Anyone who knows how to calculate the paths of the stars and constellations, but does not do so – about him, the Torah says, ‘They look away from God’s work, and take no note of God’s designs’ (Isaiah 5:12).”

Bar Kappara, in common Talmudic style, conveys a positive aspiration through double negation: saying that the Torah criticizes a person who neglects the movements of the stars is our way of saying that the Torah prizes the study of motions of the heavens. One may react to Bar Kappara’s statement with intuitive assent, surprise, or both. On the one hand, granting the familiar premises that (1) the heavens are God’s handiwork, and (2) Judaism directs us to come to know God through careful study of God’s works, the conclusion is inescapable: Judaism must recognize the study of the stars (and plant biology, and the chemistry of the earth’s surface, and all other areas of scientific research) as an act of religious significance. At the same time we should register surprise, since traditional courses of Jewish study focus exclusively on the textual revelation of the Torah vouchsafed to the Jewish people and preserved in Hebrew (and Aramaic) texts – relegating humanity’s study of the stars and the rest of nature to the status of ‘secular.’ (The history of this distinction, and Maimonides’s heroic struggle against it, are for another time.)

Bar Kappara offers us a formulation of what I understand many – I hope, all – of us feel in human exertion, collaboration, and triumph of science: devoted analysis of God’s world is not merely instrumental, but spiritually and existentially significant “for its own sake” (a term for the purest and highest form of Torah study). I will never forget my wonder in first grasping the beauty of the proof that the Gaussian integrates to 1 – and I imagine many of you share similar moments of awe not just at the magnitude of nature, but at its sublime order that can be perceived only through careful and strenuous application of God-given reason. There is something about coming face-to-face with the mystery of the distribution of the primes, the nature of transcendental numbers, the elegance of physics (Newtonian, Lagrangian, or quantum), the incomprehensible improbability of the Krebs Cycle or the visual cortex or an entire ecosystem, and on and on and on – that brings us very near the heart of a transcendence presence, or even Presence.

Were this all the Talmud had to say in praise of science we would say, as we do at the seder, ‘Dayyeinu!’ – ‘it is enough!’ But for the Talmud, enough is never enough. The Talmud’s next paragraph reads:

Rabbi Shmuel bar Nachmani said in the name of Rabbi Yohanan, “What is the source of a person’s obligation to study the paths of the stars and constellations? The Torah says, ‘Observe them faithfully, for that is your wisdom and insight in the eyes of the [other] nations’ (Deuteronomy 4:6). What wisdom and insight is appreciated by [all] nations? None other than the paths of the stars and constellations.”

Here the positive Jewish value of astronomy (and other sciences) is formulated differently, on two levels. First, what Bar Kappara framed as praise, Rabbi Yohanan makes into a binding normative obligation (it is obvious to him that Jews are obligated to study science, the question is only the source of the obligation). Second, and of greater consequence: we are obligated to participate in science because we are called on, as Jews, to contribute to humanity’s shared intellectual project, cultivating wisdom and distilling insight that are legible across boundaries of language, culture, and identity.

Even after a quarter-century of studying the Talmud, I still find myself overwhelmed and delighted by Rabbi Yohanan’s characterization of scientific collaboration spanning centuries, continents, and civilizations. It is remarkable enough when an ancient religious insight stands the test of time; it is something else entirely when words spoken in the Galilee 1,800 years ago come to life nineteen centuries later in ways their author could scarcely have imagined. Imagine Rabbi Yohanan’s awe at Harvard’s laboratories, where thousands of scientists collaborate with colleagues across the globe to probe the universe’s secrets.

I am hard-pressed to come up with a more apt or parsimonious account of the sciences than the synthesis of Bar Kappara and Rabbi Yohanan: the collective human investigation of God’s handiwork.

Imagine the pride that Bar Kappara and Rabbi Yohanan would have felt – and that we ought to feel – in knowing that Jewish scientists have been leaders in every branch of science, expanding our understanding of God’s works and building the fields that collaboratively carry that exploration ever-forward. As the Jewish community of Harvard, our connection is deeper yet: we have the merit of participating in, and leading, the institution that, perhaps more than any on the face of this earth, makes real the sacred practice of the shared exploration of the structure of God’s world. The honor and the responsibility that come with this are not merely vast, they are metaphysical.

No one can tell us what the coming weeks will hold – for our community, our university, or our country. I want to share, as we enter the final days of Passover, what an honor it is to be navigating these unprecedented and uncertain times with each of you, and with all of you. Your messages consistently shape my thinking, touch my heart, and remind me of our community’s principled goodness and boundless potential. Together, I look forward to considering and advancing the other first-order principles at stake – where, like Harvard’s scientific research, we have the great merit and weighty responsibility of not only observing and commenting, but of speaking and acting. May we always do so with integrity and wisdom.

Shabbat shalom and Mo’adim le-simcha,

Rabbi Jason Rubenstein
Executive Director