Teshuva and its relation to the material world

We have been doing a lot of studying on the theme of teshuva, as one might expect at this time of year. We have looked at a huge range of sources, and to try to dump all that information on you at once would be a clear violation of my late resolution. As such, I will try to get out a couple of short posts before Yom Kippur on particular sub-topics.

First, the relation to the material world. As is the case with many facets of Judaism, there is a spectrum of opinion that I prefer to structure either as thesis-antithesis-synthesis, or as a search for the mean between extremes if a true synthesis proves elusive.

On the one hand, we have the Breslover Rebbe being very nearly Gnostic in his description of the material world as an illusion that obscures our view of Torah and Hashem. He brings a mushal from the Besht of a man who has his little finger immediately in front of his eye, and therefore cannot see things of vastly greater scale and import that are right in front of him, although in his retelling Rabbi Nachman replaces the finger with a small coin for obvious symbolic reasons. Naturally, the solution is that we must remove this impediment that blinds us to the truth.

On the other, Rav Kook argues that the first step is a healthy diet, proper sleep, moderate exercise, breaking chemical addictions, etc etc, and that intellectual and spiritual teshuva is ineffective or impossible on its own. The fact that he follows with more mainstream intellectual and spiritual processes does prevent him from constituting a proper antithesis, but we haven't covered anyone who roots teshuva more deeply in the physical. Perhaps the more extreme antinomian early Hassidim, but they are rarely looked to as anything but a cautionary tale.

As I consider further, I realize that what I have framed as a single continuum is in fact the intersection of two broader spectra: the extent to which teshuva is a turn inward vs outward, or alternatively and with a dramatically different meaning, a return to yourself as you are meant to be vs a return to God from whom you have been separated; and the spiritual value of the physical world and involvement therein. Looked at that way, what I saw as diametric poles are in fact only two of four potential extreme positions. Rabbi Nachman comes across very strongly on the side of rejection of the material and on the side of a denial of the ego as you return to God. Rav Kook is at the opposite end of both spectra. Let us examine what the missing corners would look like and see if we can match them to any tradition.

The inward turned anti-materialist -- probably something along the lines of Yisroel Salanter, with a strong focus on character perfection through study and taking small steps to undermine the yetzer hara.

The outward turned materialist -- the Maharal cites a gemara that lists four or five ways to avert harsh judgment: give tzedaka, cry out in supplication, change your name, change your behavior, and according to some opinions change your place of residence. Some of those are outward oriented material behaviors, but I am quite reluctant to place the Maharal as a proponent of deep involvement with such matters, relative to other opinions. Perhaps we would be better off with a more kabbalistic approach, questing for sparks of holiness hidden in the mundane world, although that is usually put in terms of tikkun olam rather than teshuva.

Anyway, this has become rather long despite my intentions. Failure number one as I try to find a topic within Judaism that is narrow and self-contained enough to write about concisely without abandoning content. Thus, rather than trying to find my place in this newly described spectrum, I will leave it at that and move on to yeshiva life tidbits.

Main fact of life the past few days has been exhaustion. I realized that some significant portion of my success to date is attributable to performance enhancing drugs, in that whatever absurd number of cups of tea per day have been more than enough to quickly develop a serious caffeine addiction, which I am determined to quit cold turkey. Thus, my accumulated sleep debt from weeks of five hour nights has not just caught up with me, but chased me into a dark alley and hit me in the face with a shovel. But at least we have slichot now, so that should help me catch up, right? Right?!

Other than that, our class had its weekly shiur with the rosh yeshiva, and it was awesome. He very subtly and devastatingly critiqued the tzniut police. We were learning the gemara relating to blowing terua, shevarim, and shevarim-terua. Turns out, the former two are both supported by a tannaitic sources, and the latter is brought by the amora who says to do all three. What is an amora doing making a new side in a tannaitic machloket? Well might you ask. Comes Hai Gaon to say, there was actually no machloket. There were different regional minhagim that were universally acknowledged as equally valid ways to fulfill the mitzva, but our amora was concerned that the ignorant might be confused and believe that their way was correct, so he institutionalized the whole range. Comes along our rosh yeshiva and slips in there, "These ignoramuses might end up throwing stones, or putting up posters, and he wanted to avoid that. We don't have many issues like that today, where there is no machloket, just different minhagim that are universally held to be equally valid by those in the know." And that was it. Just enough to be clear if you were listening. Not enough to stir controversy. Brilliant man.

Shalom,
-Ethan