Elliot Dorff, Matters of Life and Death, 1998
The Contribution of Judaism to Moral Theory and Practice
"The second half of my argument-- namely, that Judaism can contribute significantly to morality-- applies to both moral theory (or "ethics") and moral practice ("morality").

On a theoretical level, Judaism affirms a particular picture of the world as it is and as it ought to be. It defines who we are as individuals, as a community, as parts of the environment, and as partners of God; and it provides ideals toward which we can and should strive. In so doing, Judaism places our moral decision into the context to f a larger vision of the world and our goals within it. Judaism thereby gives meaning to each of our moral efforts and provides motivation to meet our moral challenges. The beliefs of Judaism thus establish moral moorings for our specific judgments and acts.

Judaism also contributes to our moral behavior on a pragmatic level by strengthening the family and self-worth of both ourselves and others, as well as our moral restraints and aspirations. Through values, stories, rituals, and laws, Judaism reinforces the cohesiveness and moral effectiveness of our families and communities.

Another pervasive feature of Judaism that contributes mightily to our moral framework but is less often acknowledged in that capacity is Jewish law. Like Judaism as a whole, Jewish law does not guarantee moral sensitivity or behavior, but it makes their presence more likely in a number of ways. Since Judaism focuses so much on the legal expression of its views and values, much of our treatment of Jewish bioethics must be framed in legal terms. It is therefore worth spelling out here some of the ways in which Jewish law as a whole, and Jewish bioethical law in particular, helps to make people behave morally.

1.  Establishing a moral bottom line.....
2.  Translating moral goals into concrete rules....
3.Seting priorities among conflicting moral goals....
4. Appreciating the reality, nuances, and immediacy of moral issues....
5.Preserving the integrity of moral intentions...
6. Balancing continuity with flexibility....
7.Preserving the coherence of a moral system....
8. Establishing and preserving the authority of moral norms....
9. Teaching morality...."

The Mishnah

If, in the postmodern age, we do live in what has been called a recessionary erotic economy brought about by fear of disease and a fetishization of fitness, the erotic cannot but be part of that general problematizing of the body and its sexuality. -- p. 142

"For all its [Judaism's] heavy intellectualism it set morality above logic, the pursuit of justice and mercy over the possession of the correct idea."

"It is written in Proverbs: 'In all thy ways know Him.' Nowhere is it written: 'In all His ways know Him.'" p. 39

"At the same time and with even greater practical import their monotheism constituted a declaration of war against spiritual idolatry in all its forms: the worship to which man is addicted of the self and its desires, or of caste and group interest, or of the state and the autarch in whom it may take on symbolic embodiment. Having proclaimed the Lord alone to be God, they asserted in effect that to Him only and to His law of righteousness supremacy is to be ascribed and unreserved loyally to be accorded." p. 43

"Dualism makes an absolute of evil; Judaism regards evil as contingent to a prior and more basic good. Dualism despairs in advance of half of reality and half of human nature. Judaism holds that there is nothing which cannot be retrieved for the good. The most sinful impulses is man, as the rabbis point out, and the very forces which properly directed, motivate the virtues." p. 44

"... the medieval philosopher-poet, Solomon ibn Gabirol, enumerating the 'three things which stand together to bring the awareness of Thee ever before me,' lists fist the heavens and second the earth in its expanse, but as a climactic third 'the stirring of my heart when I look inward.' p. 46

On Anthropomorphism:
"The truth is that the pictorialization of abstract ides is unavoidable. this is the way the mind functions: with images gross or delicate." p. 50

"...the Kabbalistic and Hasidic pictorializations of Him as the Seed to which physical reality is the pod, or the Spark from which the flame of the universe outflares." "It is written in Psalms, 'Bless the Lord, O my soul.'
Why did David bid his soul in particular to praise God? Because he said, 'As the soul pervades the body, God pervades the world.... As the soul sustains the body, God sustains the world.... As the soul survives the body, God survives the world.... As there is a unitary and single soul in the body, so there is a unitary and single God to the world... . Wherefore let the soul of the body praise Him who is, as it were, the soul of the world.'" p. 52

"It [Judaism] expects a man, no matter what else he may think about evil , to recognize it as something to be fought and to go out and fight it." p. 56

"Companionship, whether with God or anyone else, must be immediate or it is not companionship. In sum, there is and can be no vicarious salvation. Each man must redeem his own soul." p. 58

"What is man?
A creature of dust; a thing of transience whose days fly by faster than a weaver's shuttle; a fragile being crushed sooner than a moth; a body, sustaining and reproducing itself after the fashion of the beast; a vessel filled with shame and confusion, impelled by pride and self-love, driven by passions." p. 60 This is particularly powerful for me considering the shortness of his life and yet what and impact he made! Certainly of the few books of his I've read, he's changed the world (generally and me, as well).

On Free Will: "This is the point of a bold, penetrating aphorism struck off by the third century Palestinian rabbi, Hanina ben Pappa, who held that before a human being is conceived in his mother's womb God has already ordained concerning him ' whether he shall be strong or weak, intelligent or dull, rich or poor. But whether he shall be wicked or virtuous is no pronounced. Nor can even God predetermine this, since [as was taught by another and somewhat earlier Rabbi Hanina] 'all things are in Heaven's hands except man's reverence for Heaven.''" p. 61

Some Quotes from Tradition:
"The bashful learneth not, the impatient teacheth not."
"Why is Torah compared to water? To teach thee that as water floweth away from the lofty and gathereth only in the lowly places, so with wisdom among men." p. 67

Quote: "He who sees a legitimate pleasure and does not avail himself of it is an ingrate against God who made it possible." p. 73

Quote:  "It happened once that men sat together in a boat at sea.
Whereupon one of them drew forth an awl and began to bore in to the boat's bottom.
'Stupid one,' the others cried at him, 'what are you doing?'
'And what concern is it of yours?' he answered.  
            'Is it not under my own seat that I am making a hole?'"  p. 84
  Live your life as if you make an impact (because you do).

"The traditionalist is almost as wary of addition s to the Tradition as of subtractions. In illustration of this distrust the eighteenth century folk preacher, Jacob Kranz of Dubno, wove a shrewd homily. Taking as his text the Torah verse: 'Thou shalt not add thereto [i.e. God's ordinance] nor diminish from it,' the lecturer inquired with what logic the Torah might object to adding got its commandments? If one Day of Atonement a year be spiritually salutary, why is a person enjoined against undertaking the observe two? Which question the homilist answered with a parable. A man, he said, once borrowed his neighbor's silver candlesticks. Promptly at the time stipulated he returned them together with a little candlestick which, he related, had been born to the originals and therefore properly accompanied them. Now, the owner knew full well that candlesticks do not procreate. "Before him, however, lay a windfall. And so, not disputing his neighbor's tale, he accepted his own property and its supposed increase. The next week, another borrowing-- this time of silver forks,-- and another restoring, again with progeny. In this fashion, incident followed incident, the lender congratulating himself with mounting fervor on his inexplicable good fortune. Then came a day when the borrower asked for all his neighbor's silver at once, parents and children alike. This time, however, nothing at all was repaid. Neither the loan nor increment. For, a as the borrower solemnly informed the owner, a plague had broken out in the silverware; the candlesticks, the forks, the goblets, and son on had all died. And indeed, if metallic object can have children, certainly it must be assumed of them that they are liable to mortality. So, said Jacob of Dubno, the danger of adding to Jewish usage lies no in the adding to Jewish usage lies not in the adding, but in the fact that he who has once accustomed himself to be free with additions will in the end take liberties as to subtractions." p. 142 A view between Modernists and Traditionalists.

"I wish I had listening to my mother when I was young."
"Why, what did she say?"
"I don't know."

"What's wrong with being drunk?"  
"You ask a glass of water." 

"The Galaxy's a fun place. You'll need to have this fish in your ear."

"The ships hung in the sky exactly the same way that bricks don't."

Men were real men, women were real women, and small, furry creatures from Alpha Centauri were REAL small, furry creatures from Alpha Centauri. Spirits were brave, men boldly split infinitives that no man had split before. Thus was the Empire forged.

"He is a prodigy, Anna. A prodigy in payos."

[six-year-old  Asher asking his father what dies, looking at a dead bird.]
        I couldn't grasp it.  I forced myself at the look at the bird.
Everything would one day be as still as that bird?
        "Why?" I asked.
        "That's the way the Ribbono Shel Olom made His world, Asher."
        "Why?"
        "So life would be precious, Asher.  Something that is yours forever is never precious."

"'A pledge unpaid is like thunder without rain.'"
--as quoted in Chaim Potok, _In the Beginning_

'Where is the dwelling of God?'
    This is the question with which the Rabbi of Kotzk surprised a number of
learned men who happened to be visiting him.
     They laughed at him:  'What a thing to ask! Is not the whole world full
of his glory?'
     Then he answered his own question:
      'God dwells wherever man lets him in.'

  'In the time I am brooding over it [my sin] I could be stringing pearls for
the delight of Heaven.  That is why it is written:  "Depart from evil and do
good"  --turn wholly away from evil, do not dwell upoon it, and do good. You
have done wrong?  Then counteract it by doing right.'  

"When I have taught this material at the Seminary and in various settings around the country, the two most frequently voiced criticisms remain first, "How can you be so critical of the Seminary?" and second, "How can you be so optimistic about the future of the Movement?" The fact that my thinking inspires such contradictory responses suggests to me that I am just about where I should be. I am conducting a lover's quarrel with both the school and the Movement. "

	he hits the nail on the head here. i believe in conservative judaism
because i believe in its ideology and its achievements, not its mistakes.
if i dismissed it for a more consistent but what i feel is flawed version
of judaism i am gaining nothing and losing everything. at least here, we
can still make progress.

" My conviction--and all of my teaching and writing is grounded in this conviction--is that of all of the varied readings of Judaism on the contemporary scene, Conservative Judaism provides the most honest and the most fruitful setting for that inquiry. "

	precisely what is good about conservative judaism is tolerance.
we recognize more than one way in judaism while setting standards within
which that discussion takes place.
--Rabbi Neil Gillman, Conservative Judaism, Introduction

on meaninglessness of life (the author is purposely being cynical)
"He loved his beloved feverishly, what else did empty hateful time permit?"

"The human scene is not some philospher's garden, but a confusing, dark struggle."

	"[Charles] Fourier, to be polite, was an eccentric; to be accurate,
he was probably off his rocker.  His world was a fantasy: the earth,
he believed, had been given a life of eighty thousand year; forty
thousand of ascending vibrations and the same number of descending.
In between (never mind the arithmetic) lay eight thousand years of the
Apogee du Bonheur. We lived in teh fifth of eight stages of advancement,
having pushed through Confusion, Savagery, Patriarchism, and Barbarousness.
Ahead lay Guaranteeism (not a bad bit of insight), and then the upward
slope of Harmony.  After we reached utter bliss, however, the seesaw
would tip and we would work our way right back down through all the
stages to the beginning.
	"But, as we worked our way ever deeper into Harmony, things would
really begin to pop:  a Northern Crown would encircle the Pole, shedding
a gentle dew; the sea would become lemonade; six new moons would replace
the old solitary satellite; and new species would emerge, better suited
to Harmony: an antilion, a docile and most serviceable beast; an antiwhale,
which could be harnessed to ships; an antibear; antibugs; and antirats.
We would live to be one hundred and forty-four years old, of which one
    hundred and twenty years would be spent in the unrestricted pursuit
of sexual love.
	"All this plus a firsthand description of the inhabitants of
other planets gives to Fourier's writings the air of a madman.  Perhaps
he was.  But when he turned his starry vision to this earth he saw in
it chaos and unhappiness, and he saw, as well, a way to reorganize society."

"Demens judicio vulgi,
Sanus fortasse tuo.

Mad in the judgement of the mob,
Sane perhaps in yours."
-Horace, Satires, Bk. I, 6.

Some people are born mediocre, some people achieve mediocrity, and some 
people have mediocrity thrust upon them.

Where are the Snowdens of yesteryear?

"I do not respect myself. Can a man of perception respect himself at all?"

"Although our life, in this manifestation of it , is often worthless, yet it is life and not simply extracting square roots." chVII p.191

"Beware of the man who works hard to learn something, learns it, and finds himself no wiser than before," Bokonon tells us.  "He is full of murderous resentment of people who are ignorant without having come by their ignorance the hard way."

God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater

   Harry [a fisherman, a real man's man] gave no 
indication that he'd heard. He scowled at a picture of a 
French girl in a bikini.
    Fred, understanding that he seemed a bleak, sexless
person to Harry, tried to prove that Harry had him
wrong.  He nudged Harry, man-to-man.  "Like that, 
Harry?" he asked.
    "Like what?"
    "The girl there."
    "That's not a girl. That's a piece of paper."
    "Looks like a girl to me." Fred Rosewater leered.
    "Then you're easily fooled," said Harry. "It's done
with ink on a piece of paper. That girl isn't lying there
on the counter. She's thousand of miles away, doesn't
even know we're alive. If this were a real girl, all I'd
have to do for a living would be to stay home and cut out
pictures of big fish." p. 109

Fred, thinking Lila wasn't paying any attention to him, now put down Better Homes and Gardens, picked up what looked like on hell of a sexy paperback novel, Venus on the Half-shell, by Kilgore Trout. On the back cover was an abridgment of a red-hot scene iside. It went like this:

    Queen Margaret of the planet Shaltoon let her gown fall to the floor. She was wearing nothing underneath. Her high, firm, uncowled bosom was proud and rosy. Her hips and thighs were like an inviting lyre of pure alabaster. They shone so whitely they might have had a light inside. 'Your travels are over, Space Wanderer,' she whispered, her voice husky with lust. 'Seek no more, for you have found. The answer is in my arms.'
    'It's a glorious answer, Queen Margaret, God knows,' the Space Wanderer replied. His palms were perspiring profusely. 'I am going to accept it gratefully. But I have to tell you, if I'm going to be perfectly honest with you, that I will have to be on my way again tomorrow.'
    'But you have found your answer, you have found your answer,' she cried and she forced his head between her fragrant young breasts.
    He said something that she did not hear. She thrust him out at arm's length. 'What was that you said?'
    I said, Queen Margaret, that what you offer is an awfully good answer. It just doesn't happen to be the one I'm primarily looking for.'

"Death is beyond man's control, but the pursuit of life is not."
-Kolatch, _The Jewish Book of Why_, p.50

Halakha For Our Time: A Conservative Approach to Jewish Law

by Rav David Golinkin

  "But however great the literary value of a code may be, it does not
   invest it with infallibility, nor does it exempt it from the
   student or the Rabbi who makes use of it from the duty of examining
   each paragraph on its own merits, and subjecting it to the same
   rules of interpretation that were always applied to Tradition".
        Solomon Schechter "Studies in Judaism", First Series
        p.211, London, 1896

The obvious has never been so blindingly stated as on the sides of cartons and cans, according to an international list compiled by consumers. One bottle of flavoured milk gravely warns buyers: "After opening, keep uprights." And a packet of Sainsbury's peanuts states: "Contains nuts." An American airline offers passengers a sachet of peanuts bearing the message: "Instructions: Open packet, eat contents." The list, compiled by _New Scientist_ magazine with the help of Internet users, also cites the Swedish chainsaw manufacturer that advises customers: "Do not try to stop chain with hands." John Hoyland, editor of the Feedback column, attributes the outbreak of the obvious to an increased nervousness about legal action. "Some of these warnings are so bizarre that you think they are a joke," he said. "But in America, for instance, people sue if they do something that they were not warned about. "That is why we have had a cigarette lighter adviseing users not to light flame near the face." Marks & Spencer sells a pudding in packaging that points out: "Product will be hot after heating." Rowenta, the electrical manufacturer, instructs those who purchase its irons: "Do not iron clothes on body." And a camera on sale in Europe has the warning: "This camera only works when there is a film inside." Mr. Hoyland concludes: "Either companies think we are really stupid-- or people really are stupid."