Thinking Tanach - Why?

"Just as a bride is bedecked with twenty-four ornaments, so too a scholar is bedecked with (knowledge of) the twenty-four books of Bible" - Rashi, Sh'mot 31:18.

" 'In that day, the fair virgins shall faint from thirst...' (Amos 8:13). “Reliance on bread – this is halachic study. Reliance on water – this is the study of Aggadata” (Hagiga 14). The young generation does not faint from hunger. It is the lack of water that stunts the growth of their emotions and intellect. This need can not be filled unless the scholars open up the sealed wells of Bible" - Rabbi A.I.Kook - Ikvei haTzon, p. 144.

Why another blog, and why Tanach?

We live in exciting times. With the advent and anonymity of the blogsphere, a new avenue has been opened for serious Jews, especially those committed to their tradition, yet uneasy with much of what passes for thought and intellect within what is called Orthodoxy. Many serious, intellent people are writing blogs on all topics (check the range of issues covered at www.hirhurim.blogspot.com or www.mavenyavin.blogspot.com alone). Why another, and why specifically Tanach?

Well, why not?

Seriously, though, I want this blog to serve a different purpose. For over fifteen years, I’ve had the priveledge of teaching Tanach to amazing students from around the world, in a variety of settings – from the hallways of the Community Hebrew Academy of Toronto, yeshivas and seminaries in Israel, a remarkable group of adults in Minnesota, to programs from Sweden, Australia, Holland, England. Everywhere, there seems to be a thirst for Tanach (at least, real Tanach - not the boring repetitive read a verse/Rashi/commentary/go to next line/repeat/spit back on test that unfortunately passes for Tanach education). Like the clothing of the jewish people in the desert, real Tanach grows along with the reader. What I understood in Bible stories classes at age 5 did not satisfy my questions at age fifteen. Answers that I found at age 25 I’ve discarded a dozen years later. Twenty years ago, I chose to move from the Talmud-intensive program at Yeshiva University to a program that satisfied my desire to know our people’s basic texts. It’s that passion that I want to share with you here.

Still, why Tanach? Sad that the question even needs to be asked. In reality, though, despite the lip service, most people don’t take Tanach too seriously. Ask any yeshiva graduate. The reasons for this I’ll hopefully be able to address in a later blog. But the cost is immense, and shows itself in the skewered world that we live in today, where kids may know what to do, but not why. The Oral tradition is the source of our laws, but laws ultimately serve values. A person without Tanach lacks the fundamentals of what life is about. Read Isaiah’s rants against hyper ritualism and über-religiosity. Our prophets’ energies were dedicated towards social justice and righteousness – not skirts’ lengths or the quality of the rabbinical supervision at the pizza store.

Fortunately, and most importantly, the Tanach of today is not the Tanach of a generation ago. No longer is it just reading a verse, a Rashi, a Ramban. Now, thanks to Nechama, a whole new generation of Tanach scholars has arisen in Israel. Even in secular universities, the movement is towards literary readings – instead of trying to dissect the text into its “original sources” (what Robert Alter rightfully called “trying to identify the original eggs in an omelet), secularists are concentrating on the text, what it says and its poetics (how it says it). Today, Tanach study is exciting, challenging, and thought-provoking. This blog will try to convey that feeling. I hope to regularly provide ideas and articles that range from discussing the issues of Biblical Criticism to close textual readings of different texts to overviews of the themes of basic books to simple divrei Torah and ideas that catch my fancy. Thank you for reading - I hope you enjoy the ride, and most importantly, feel free to comment on anything and everything!!