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| Jonathan Rosenblum (Mishpacha) |
‘Daas Torah’ also explains why so many of their ‘biographies’ about great religious figures of the past are really just hagiographies – citing only the most flattering stories about them which are often exaggerated while omitting vital truths about their past that show their, humanity, uniqueness, and growth which ‘Daas Torah’ deems so unflattering that they censor it. That’s why so many of ArtScroll’s biographies sound read like clones of each other. But I digress.
My point is that just like everything else in the world of ‘Daas Torah’ nothing is done at ArtScroll without their approval.
Which brings me to another adherent of ‘Daas Torah’ Mispacha Magazine columnist, Jonathan Rosenblum. He is one of the most prolific authors in ArtScroll’s arsenal. There is a reason for that. He is an excellent writer that raises the quality of their output. They would be foolish not to use him.
It is only because of the considerable and intelligence and knowledge he brings to the table. Knowledge he gained via his education. Which includes graduating from 2 of the most prestigious universities in the country: The University of Chicago and Yale University Law School.
As a self identified Charedi, one might think Jonathan would minimize those experiences and the knowledge he gained there. Because that is how the world of ‘Daas Torah’ treats it. It is no secret that college is at best discouraged if not outright forbiden by the arbiters of ‘Daas Torah’. Not only they look down at the kind of education Jonathan received, these days they are even opposed to it at the high school level. If they can get away with it they avoid or minimize teaching it in their schools. Unlike just a few decades ago when it was seen as having enough value to treat it more seriously as was reflected in their curricula. Today that kind of thinking hardly exists.
So why did they seek a graduate filled with knowledge he gained at the very institutions they consider of so little value? It’s because they value the skills he gained in those school without granting where he got them any validity. In other words there is a disconnect from the reality.
One might presume that since Jonathan is a Baal Teshuva who now looks to ‘Daas Torah’ for guidance that he too would have picked up the disdain for his past education. But one would be grossly mistaken. Here is what he said about it in last week’s column dealing with how universities have changed – having been overtaken by left wing politics:
...earlier generations of students came to college with high expectations of a new world of ideas about to open up before them.
I know I did. And I was not disappointed. Not only did I love college, but I feel it provided me with a base for much of my subsequent life. My classmates and I came to college to learn, to be exposed to new ideas and perspectives. Today’s students, according to Princeton’s Robert George, come into college already thoroughly indoctrinated and prepared to be offended at whatever challenges that indoctrination. By contrast, at the University of Chicago, in my day, the dictum of former president Hanna Holborn Gray, “The purpose of education is not to make people comfortable; it is to teach them to think,” still reigned supreme.
When I think of the intellectual ferment of those years, and the sheer joy of reading for hours on end in the library, I am filled with sadness for all those young people today who will never experience the same love of learning, largely because they think they have nothing of importance yet to learn.
How is it possible for someone who is an avowed adherent of ‘Daas Torah’ to value his secular education so much? And why is such praise tolerated by the editors of Mishpacha who are also adherents of ‘Daas Torah’?
For me the answer is clear. The tremendous benefit one can get from a university education is very real. And should not be treated the way ‘Daas Torah’ treats it. In fact that experience can actually enhance one’s Torah knowledge and devotion to God. As it did for Jonathan:
I believe my college education predisposed me to give an open ear to the Torah, a few years later. The University of Chicago still upheld the idea of the Western canon of great ideas that had shaped our civilization. How, then, could I dismiss out of hand an even more ancient canon?
Though my politics in those years were typically liberal, the college reinforced the conservative temperament of my family: respect for tradition and the accumulated wisdom of mankind. I did not come into college thinking that I knew everything I needed to know, and I left even more convinced that there was much more to learn.
Something still remained of the old Great Books curriculum from my parents’ days in the College, including the focus on a handful of eternal questions: the definition of a good life; the nature of Man; the meaning of citizenship. The Torah, in many cases, offered different answers, but I had heard the questions before.
Let me let everyone in on a little secret. Jonathan is an adherent of TIDE (Torah Im Derech Eretz). That is the world view of Rav Shamshon Raphael Hirsch who believed that valued secular knowledge as a means of better appreciating God and His Torah . R’ Hirsch believed that this was the ‘Emes’ of Torah and that other Hashkafos - while valid - were secondary to TIDE.
That is unlike how most of today’s ‘Daas Torah’ treats TIDE. They will begrudgingly grant that it is a legitimate Hashkfa, but secondary to their ‘Torah only’ Hashkafa. And therefore not to be sought as a priority. Claiming that R’ Hirsch intended it that way. Which has been proven to be a false reading of R’Hirsch’s TIDE (as per Rav Schwab in his later years).
But today’s ‘Daas Torah’ still holds on to that false belief. And does not recognize much value in a secular education. (Except for - maybe - as a means to a decent livelihood if one has a financial knife at his throat and must leave the Beis HaMedrash. And in some cases even that does not qualify for leaving the Beis HaMedrash!)
So, what does all this mean? Not exactly sure. Perhaps this is part of the quiet rebellion now taking place among many Charedi Jews that I described not long ago. But I think it is more than that. I believe the majority of the mainstream Charedi world privately already recognized the value of a good secular education by virtue of the fact that so many Charedim have become professionals by attending those schools. (Perhaps with some guilt? I’m not so sure anymore.)
My own communication with Jonathan long ago confirmed what he wrote in his column this week. He told me personally how much he valued his university education and how much it bnefits him. But this is the first time I am aware of that he placed such a high value on it publicly.
To this I say, thank you, Jonathan. You have done a great service to the Jewish people by ‘coming out’ like this.
I just hope that his views aren’t dismissed as being the views of a Baal Tehuva that never really privy to the ‘benefit’ of an intense education (indoctrination) o someone that was FFB (Frum From Birth).