Judaism Straight Up: Why Real Religion Endures

Our beliefs are, in aggregate, like an operating system: they sit in the background and serve as a framework within which it is possible to organize our lives.

It is a myth that we seek truth for its own sake; we seek truth in order to live coherent lives.

people can’t live coherent lives without certain unfounded beliefs.

Unlike Shimen, Heidi aspires to base her beliefs solely on evidence and to choose her commitments based on these justified beliefs. She specifically aspires for her most deeply held beliefs to transcend the particular culture in which she lives.

The anticipatory nature of redemption in Jewish belief paradoxically softens eschatological fervor and prevents the calamities associated with “hastening the end” that afflict societies in which messianic longing is either too overt or too repressed.

Attempting to prove the truth of the canonical Jewish historical narrative from outside Jewish practice is nothing but a fool’s errand. In Judaism, belief can only be the residue of practice.

We can’t default to the belief that the society we belong to is a link in a directed process that connects our past with our future unless we have a very strong sense of which society we belong to: Gerer Hasidim, committed Jews, all Jews, educated Westerners, human beings, sentient beings?

Yirat shamayim is almost orthogonal to the issue of one’s opinions: you can formulate clever arguments in favor of Jewish belief and yet lack yirat shamayim, and you can formulate clever arguments against Jewish belief but nevertheless have yirat shamayim.

Jewish belief is only coherent and meaningful to those already committed to the Jewish way of life, who experience its vitality viscerally.