The Tanya's Critique of Modernity pt.1

Below are 5 passages from the Tanya compared to 5 secular philosophical sources characterizing different aspects of modernity. The purpose of comparing these is to highlight the Tanya's less obvious challenges to modernity. Each set of passages is followed by a set of discussion questions intended to engage with the implications of these possible limitations of modernity for Jewish community and practice.

1) From the very start the Alter Rebbe reflects on the inadequacy of books as a medium implicitly highlighting the limitations of the mass print Enlightenment culture of Europe.

הִנֵּה מוּדַעַת זֹאת, כִּי מַרְגְּלָא בְּפוּמֵי דְאִינְשֵׁי בְּכָל אַנְשֵׁי שְׁלוֹמֵנוּ לֵאמֹר כִּי אֵינָהּ דּוֹמָה שְׁמִיעַת דִּבְרֵי מוּסָר לִרְאִיָּיה וּקְרִיאָה בַּסְּפָרִים,

כִּי אֵין כָּל הַשְּׂכָלִים וְהַדֵּעוֹת שָׁווֹת, וְאֵין שֵׂכֶל אָדָם זֶה מִתְפָּעֵל וּמִתְעוֹרֵר מִמַּה שֶּׁמִּתְפָּעֵל וּמִתְעוֹרֵר שֵׂכֶל חֲבֵירוֹ,

It is well known that all Anash are wont to say that hearing words of moral guidance is not the same as seeing and reading in books,...

Those books on piety founded on human intelligence surely do not affect all people equally, for not all intellects and minds are alike, and the intellect of one man is not affected and aroused by that which affects and arouses the intellect of another.

-Tanya, Compiler's Foreword

The strength of the oral tradition and the relative simplicity of the alphabet checked the possible development of a highly specialized profession of scribes and the growth of a monopoly of the priesthood over education. A military aristocracy restricted the influence of a priestly class and poets imposed control over public opinion.
The Greeks had no Bible with a sacred literature attempting to give reasons and coherence to the scheme of things, making dogmatic assertions and strangling science in infancy. Without a sacred book and a powerful priesthood the ties of religion were weakened and rational philosophy was developed by the ablest minds to answer the demand for generalizations acceptable to everyone.
-Harold Innis, Empire and Communications (p.88, (2007 ed.))

Q1. What are ways in which you find Jewish community too centralized? What are ways you find it too decentralized?

Q2. Is learning possible without teachers? What are the limitations of relying on our own understanding of texts?

Q3. Does the written Torah meet the description of the Bible that Innis points to? What does your answer imply for how we study the Torah?

2) One of the most challenging aspects of the Tanya is its (at times) seeming all or nothing approach. But in doing so, it reflect other forms of revolutionary thought that see potential for community building everywhere, that see the importance of challenging domination in even its minutest aspects.

תניא, חלק ראשון, ספר של בינונים א׳:ז׳

(ז) ועוד, שהרי בשעה שעושה עוונות נקרא רשע גמור, [ואם אחר כך עשה תשובה נקרא צדיק גמור]. ואפילו העובר על איסור קל של דברי סופרים מקרי רשע, כדאיתא בפרק ב' דיבמות ובפרק-קמא דנדה...

Tanya, Part I; Likkutei Amarim 1:7

(7) Additionally, [an intermediate person cannot be one who is half sinful, for] in the moment that one sins he is considered completely wicked [complete rasha]. (If afterwards he returns to righteousness [he repents from his sin] he is considered completely righteous.) Even someone who violates a minor rabbinic prohibition is considered wicked [rasha], as it is written in the second chapter of Yevamot (Yevamot 20a) and in the first chapter of Niddah (Niddah 12a)...

We’ve mostly picked topics by two methods: In a small group it is possible for us to take turns bringing questions to the meeting (like, Which do/did you prefer, a girl or a boy baby or no children, and why? What happens to your relationship if your man makes more money than you? Less than you?). Then we go around the room answering the questions from our
personal experiences. Everybody talks that way. At the end of the meeting we try to sum up and generalize from what’s been said and make connections. I believe at this point, and maybe for a long time to come, that these analytical sessions are a form of political action.
-Carol Hanisch, The Personal is Political

Q1. What's a minor mitzvah? How did you decide it was minor?

Q2. What would happen if people took it seriously? Could there be any systemic effect?

3) Despite the Tanya's intended popular audience, it very quickly turns to fundamental metaphysical premises. The insistence on the necessity of metaphysics for a person to properly appreciate their own significance is in sharp contrast to the post-metaphysical tendencies of our time.

כָּךְ כִּבְיָכוֹל נִשְׁמַת כָּל אִישׁ יִשְׂרָאֵל נִמְשְׁכָה מִמַּחֲשַׁבְתּוֹ וְחָכְמָתוֹ יִתְבָּרֵךְ, דְּאִיהוּ חַכִּים וְלָא בְחָכְמָה יְדִיעָא, אֶלָּא הוּא וְחָכְמָתוֹ אֶחָד, וּכְמוֹ שֶׁכָּתַב הָרַמְבַּ"ם, שֶׁהוּא הַמַּדָּע וְהוּא הַיּוֹדֵעַ כוּ', וְדָבָר זֶה אֵין בִּיכוֹלֶת הָאָדָם לַהֲבִינוֹ עַל בּוּרְיוֹ כוּ',

so, too (to use an anthropomorphism), is the soul of every Jew derived from G‑d’s thought and wisdom. For “He is wise—G‑d possesses the quality of wisdom—but not with a wisdom that is known to us created beings, because He and His wisdom are one, and as Maimonides writes,” “He is Knowledge and simultaneously the Knower… Maimonides continues: “And this is not within the power of any man to comprehend clearly,”

-Tanya Chapter 2

Whereof one cannot speak, one must pass over in silence.
-Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus

Q1. How far are you willing to question before you think it's a waste of time?

Q2. Is there any point in studying parts of Torah that we can't understand?

4) Tanya psychology posits that reason can govern the emotions. However, only if an often overlooked middle step is completed and ideas are actually internalized to the point of actually necessitating certain emotions. This seems to demand an approach to education and thinking which involves, in a sense, experiencing the ideas.

כִּי אַף מִי שֶׁהוּא חָכָם וְנָבוֹן בִּגְדוּלַּת אֵין־סוֹף בָּרוּךְ־הוּא, הִנֵּה אִם לֹא יְקַשֵּׁר דַּעְתּוֹ וְיִתְקַע מַחֲשַׁבְתּוֹ בְּחוֹזֶק וּבְהַתְמָדָה – לֹא יוֹלִיד בְּנַפְשׁוֹ יִרְאָה וְאַהֲבָה אֲמִיתִּית, כִּי אִם דִּמְיוֹנוֹת שָׁוְא. וְעַל כֵּן, הַדַּעַת הוּא קִיּוּם הַמִּדּוֹת וְחַיּוּתָן, וְהוּא כּוֹלֵל חֶסֶד וּגְבוּרָה, פֵּירוּשׁ, אַהֲבָה וַעֲנָפֶיהָ וְיִרְאָה וַעֲנָפֶיהָ:

For even one who is wise (by utilizing his faculty of chochmah) and understanding (by exercising his faculty of binah) in the greatness of the blessed Ein Sof, yet, unless he applies his daat and fixes his thought firmly and diligently he will not produce in his soul true fear and love, but only vain fancies. Thus, daat provides the substance and vitality of the middot. It comprises chesed and gevurah, that is to say, love with those other middot that are its offshoots and fear with its offshoots.

-Tanya, Chapter 3

We speak not strictly and philosophically when we talk of the combat of passion and of reason. Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions, and can never pretend to any other office than to serve and obey them.
-David Hume, Treatise of Human Nature (III:III:III)

Q1. What does it mean for moral responsibility for reason to be the slave of the passions?

Q2. Do you think the relationship between them can be altered by training?

Q3. What relationship between reason and emotion do you see as most conducive to mitzvahs?

5) Liberal conceptions of liberty posit law as necessarily a constraint of the self. Consequently, communal and individual demands must be in conflict to the extent that law is needed, the best we can do is balance these. The Tanya presents the Torah, in the unique way it is practiced by each individual, as a mode of self-expression.

וְעוֹד יֵשׁ לְכָל נֶפֶשׁ אֱלֹהִית שְׁלֹשָׁה לְבוּשִׁים, שֶׁהֵם מַחֲשָׁבָה דִּבּוּר וּמַעֲשֶׂה שֶׁל תַּרְיַ"ג מִצְוֹת הַתּוֹרָה; שֶׁכְּשֶׁהָאָדָם מְקַיֵּים בְּמַעֲשֶׂה כָּל מִצְוֹת מַעֲשִׂיּוֹת, וּבְדִבּוּר הוּא עוֹסֵק בְּפֵירוּשׁ כָּל תַּרְיַ"ג מִצְוֹת וְהִלְכוֹתֵיהֶן, וּבְמַחֲשָׁבָה הוּא מַשִּׂיג כָּל מַה שֶּׁאֶפְשָׁר לוֹ לְהַשִּׂיג בִּפְשַׁט־רֶמֶז־דְּרוּשׁ־סוֹד הַתּוֹרָה – הֲרֵי כְּלָלוּת תַּרְיַ"ג אֵבְרֵי נַפְשׁוֹ מְלוּבָּשִׁים בְּתַרְיַ"ג מִצְוֹת הַתּוֹרָה.

every divine soul (nefesh Elokit) possesses three garments. They (the garments) are: thought, speech, and action as they find expression in the 613 commandments of the Torah. For, when a person actively fulfills all the precepts which require physical action and with his power of speech, he occupies himself in expounding all the 613 commandments and the laws governing their fulfillments, and with his power of thought, he comprehends all that he is capable of understanding in the Pardes of Torah, then all of his soul’s 613 “organs” are clothed in the 613 commandments of the Torah.

-Tanya, Chapter 4

where law ends, liberty begins. Provided that you are neither physically nor coercively constrained from acting or forbearing from acting by the requirements of the law, you remain capable of exercising your powers at will and to that degree remain in possession of your civil liberty.
-Quentin Skinner explaining the views of Thomas Hobbes, Liberty Before Liberalism (1998:5)

Q1. What mitzvahs do you most identify with? Why?

Q2. How does the study of Torah change when it becomes a study of ourselves?

Q3. What are the limitations of viewing law through a Hobbesian lens?