~ What is the connection between memory and and our reading?
~ Why are we not supposed to oppress the stranger? How many times does the Torah reminds us of that particular mitzvah? (36 or 46, see below)
Hamurabi's Codex (1728-1686 BCE) epilogue
So that the strong might not oppress the weak (and so as)
To give justice to the orphaned (homeless) girl and to the widow.
I was a father to the orphans,
a helper of the widows.
(Found in an inscription of Montuwser, a steward of Pharaoh Sesostris I, who ruled from 1971 BCE to 1926 BCE)
In an epic story, King Keret, who has fallen seriously ill, is confronted by his grasping son with these words: "You did not judge the cause of the widow, you did not adjudicate the case of the wretched, you did not drive out them that preyed upon the poor; you did not feed the orphan before you or the widow behind you. Since you've become a brother of the sickbed, a companion of the bed of suffering, come down from the kingship I will be king I will sit in your authority!" (Text found by Gordon, Babylonian Wisdom Literature, ~ 1000 BCE)
~ All texts brought by Patterson, R. " The Widow, Orphan, and the Poor in the Old Testament and the Extra-Biblical Literature" in: Bibliotheca Sacra (July 1973) 223-34 - there are more, and you can read the study at:
https://faculty.gordon.edu/hu/bi/ted_hildebrandt/OTeSources/20-Proverbs/Text/Articles/Patterson_Widow_BSac.pdf
~ Another study: Fensham, F.C. "Widow, Orphan, and the Poor in Ancient near Eastern Legal and Wisdom Literature", in: Journal of Near Eastern Studies Vol. 21, No. 2 (Apr., 1962), pp. 129-139
(can be found at: https://www.jstor.org/stable/543887)
~ So when one compares the bulk of these texts, there is much in common and one thing *really* missing: the stranger. Only the Torah enjoins Israel to take care of the stranger. And it is not "our" stranger, but "all" stranger. And not just to care, but to love - in our translation "befriend".
There are two possible reactions we can have to our suffering:
The first is to say that since we've suffered in horrific ways, we don't owe anyone anything; the other is to say that since we've suffered in horrific ways, we want to make sure no one else has to endure what we did.
In truth, I suspect that many people who have been traumatized feel both of those voices inside them. The Torah invites us (commands us) to nurture the second voice and rein in the first. (Shai Held)
For the last couple of years, when people ask me what I’ve been up to, I say that I’m writing a book. They ask for details and I tell them, “It’s about empathy.” They tend to smile and nod when I say the word, and then I add: “I’m against it.”
This usually gets a laugh. I was surprised at this response at first, but I’ve learned that being against empathy is like being against kittens—a view considered so outlandish that it can’t be serious. It’s certainly a position that’s easy to misunderstand. So I’ll be clear from the start: I am not against morality, compassion, kindness, love, being a good neighbor, being a mensch, and doing the right thing. Actually, I’m writing this book because I’m for all those things. I want to make the world a better place. I’ve just come to believe that relying on empathy is the wrong way to do it. (Paul Bloom, Against Empathy, introduction)
Bloom gives five reasons:
- Empathy induces us to identify with the situation, task or challenge of a single person; you can’t shoe-shift into the shoes of multiple people. Empathy means we can be transfixed by the plight of a single baby girl stuck in a well (Jessica McClure, Texas, 1987) or missing (Madeleine McCann, 2007), but indifferent to thousands of faceless and preventable deaths. This is known as the “identifiable victim effect” - we tend to give too much to one single person in detriment of all the others in a similar plight.
- Empathy can be blind to concerns of future generations – such as those who may suffer from the consequences of global warming.
- Empathy tends to reflect our own biases, prejudices and parochial concerns. We find it easy to feel empathy for people we identify with, the people like us, but it’s more difficult with strangers. This can make empathy prejudiced.
- Empathy can be exploited and used to incite an emotional rather than rational response: feeling the pain or injustice of another can motivate an emotional, irrational or violent responses. Think media images and ‘human interest’ stories of a particular individual’s plight used to justify war or incite anti-immigrations sentiment.
- Empathy can promote caring and altruism but because of all the above it renders our altruistic acts less effective. This is because empathic action is guided by emotional impact, rather than the material impact of what we do.
Bloom then asks us to replace Empathy with Rational Compassion, and read the book to know more about it. But what I want us to focus is in how Bloom's poking holes into the empathy idol actually helps us to understand a feature of the Torah, and of our own tradition. There is an enormous danger in looking out only for our own, and caring only for our own tribe. That sentiment, as Bloom points out, can be manipulated and transformed in a mass movement - because it transforms the other in "not us", into something that can be made suffer so "our people" do not suffer. I'm sure you can think of many historical examples on your own.
~ Add the story on Invisibilia, "The End of Empathy" - the peril of empathy is that we are constantly being pulled into feeling empathy only for our own, and not for the others. Listen to the podcast or read its transcript here: https://www.npr.org/2019/04/12/712282120/the-end-of-empathy
And some say 46 - there are those who explain this because they count "because you were strangers in Egypt" and similar ones.
The Bible's moral revolution is that it expanded that category to include the ger, the vulnerable outsider. In other words, we are summoned to love not just *our* vulnerable but *the* vulnerable.
Good people can disagree about what that concretely ought to look like in this day and age; but they cannot in good faith disagree about its importance. (Shai Held)