While I was thinking through my dissertation, Robert Gimello suggested I read an intriguing article in the conservative journal First Things by Rabbi Meir Soloveichik, entitled The Virtue of Hate – I think because Soloveichik’s views are in some respects the polar opposite of Śāntideva’s. Soloveichik makes the provocative suggestion that a key difference between Jewish and Christian traditions is their attitude toward hatred: contrary to the Christian advocacy of forgiveness, some people – those, like the Nazis, who have committed truly heinous crimes – genuinely deserve our hate. For Soloveichik, even the sincerest of repentance cannot wash away a serious crime.
I don’t know enough about Judaism to say how pervasive Soloveichik’s approach is in the tradition, or enough about the Tanakh to know how much it pervades there. But I find his view intriguing for a number of reasons, even if it is little more than Soloveichik’s own idiosyncrasy. First among these is the afterlife; for when I read Soloveichik’s article on this subject, I found it made me consider myself significantly more Buddhist.
Soloveichik believes a Christian is committed to saying that Hitler or Pol Pot, if they sincerely repented their evil deeds moments before death, they would then end up in heaven. Richard John Neuhaus, creator of First Things, suggested that perhaps “Hitler in heaven will be forever a little dog to whom we will benignly condescend. But he will be grateful for being there, and for not having received what he deserved,” just as “we will all be grateful for being there and for not having received what we deserve.” Such a view is unacceptable in Soloveichik’s Judaism. He instead presents a view from Maimonides, according to which “souls are never eternally punished in hell: the presence of the truly wicked is so intolerable to the Almighty that they never even experience an afterlife. Rather, they are, in the words of the Bible, ‘cut off’: after death, they just… disappear.” [ellipses are Soloveichik’s]
The point got me thinking: what would I like to think about the afterlife of the wicked? What would seem to be a fair view, if I were designing the cosmos? And I thought: neither the Christian instant forgiveness, nor the (presumed) Jewish elimination, seemed right to me – and eternal damnation for those who don’t repent seemed even worse. Rather, I thought, I would want to see something more like the Buddhist view: they would get punishment for a long time, but eventually get a clean slate. I realized that said something about my own ethical views on the treatment of evildoers in this world: forgiveness is a worthwhile goal, but it has to be to some extent earned; a moment of repentance isn’t good enough.
The point helped me learn to pay more attention to the supernatural dimensions of the traditions I study. I have generally Yavanayāna sympathies myself – I don’t generally believe in the supernatural and tend to think most traditions would be better off without it. But it’s worth paying attention to any thinker’s view of the supernatural – whether the afterlife, God, or karma – because it will wind up telling you a lot about that thinker’s view of everything else.
Some relevant notes on Judaism:
1) Forgiveness comes from other people, not the divine. In normal cases, there is a procedure one follows if forgiveness is refused; eventually it gets to the point where “If you’ve done A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, and J, and they still don’t forgive you, they’re clearly being stubborn, you’ve done enough.” However, that seems consistent with the idea that some truly heinous crimes, or crimes that affected enormously many people (which may be more important than their severity, for reasons I won’t digress into here) may not be forgivable.
2) Afterlife issues are very weird in Judaism. It is extremely understated, in part because it was a much later development in Judaism, a response to one of the exiles. There is zero mention of afterlife in the Tanakh, save for prophets declaiming about the resurrection of all dead in the Messiah’s days (which is a far cry from christian afterlife conceptions); instead, the religion focuses on what you do while you are alive.
There are plenty of later traditions (Talmudic, etc) about the afterlife. The one I’ve heard as most “standard” is that the righteous enjoy the presence of god, but the punishment for unrighteousness is being sent back to earth to try again in a new life. Like the Buddhist version, punishment is not eternal. It’s actually not even intended as “punishment”- rather, your soul is sent back to continue its long unfinished path towards purification and development.
Thanks, Ben. The idea that forgiveness comes from other people is a difficult one – it makes things a lot tougher, demands a lot more responsibility of us, which I suppose is exactly the point. It gives an added poignancy to the story Soloveichik tells of Simon Wiesenthal, where an aging former Nazi on his death bed begged Wiesenthal to forgive him. Wiesenthal refused, but brushed a fly off the old man’s face when it caused him suffering – he had compassion without forgiveness. Wiesenthal’s reaction seemed pretty appropriate to me – though the refusal to forgive takes on an added significance if forgiveness must come from those you have wronged. (Soloveichik, on the other hand, approvingly quotes others who thought Wiesenthal was being too kind, saying “Let the man go to hell. Better the fly to God than he.”)
I had seen some of the afterlife issues. I was reading Ecclesiastes with my class, and people were struck by the fact that there’s no afterlife at all there – the dead go to “Sheol,” but there’s no specification what Sheol means, and it’s said that the dead know nothing. It sounds like “Sheol” just means “the grave” – they disappear, as in a materialist view.
To keep up the hatred which sustained tribal rules of engagement and to lay it off on God as in the case of the Amalekites is a neat way of saying as the gunfighter manque said in ‘Unforgiven’ – ‘they had it coming’. I go with Clint who responded said ‘son, we all got it coming’. Was it genocide then? No probably not, these were the understood rules of war in those times. No more were the slaughters of Cromwell in Ireland against the rules. At a certain point you were offered surrender and if you didn’t take it so much the worse for you all.
Having kept up that hatred what of the other codes that are sanctioned, the stoning of homosexuals and adulterous women? Does the venerable Rabbi have any thoughts on this? Grim.
Amod:
I missed your query about ‘santosh’. This may be relevant here. I heard it in Telegu used by a well known teacher in Andra who is regarded as self-realised. It has the meaning of ‘content’, ‘satisfaction’. It’s a common name for men and I presume it has a Sanskrit root. There is Santosh Ma who is the Goddess who favours your lottery ticket.
The relevance for this post is that ‘santosh’ is one of the 5 niyamas of Yoga. A neat definition I got from an internet site is :
A rabbi who elevates hatred into a virtue is in a very bad place. Israel seems to have a few and it’s a poor look out for peace as long as they have influence.
You might be interested in the concept of apocatastasis in Christianity. The idea, condemned as heretical but resurfacing a few times over the course of Christian history, seems to match your “ideal” pretty closely. This seems to make you something of an Origenist. (A good thing, IMO; I love Origen. :) )
Also on this topic, have you read Julian Barnes’ A History of the World in 10½ Chapters? The final chapter (the ten-and-a-halfth, I guess) imagines an afterlife where everybody goes to heaven and nobody is punished; it’s really interesting and a little uncanny.
I haven’t read either. But I guess I wouldn’t be surprised to find myself an Origenist. A great deal of what I’ve found in Asian tradition has turned out to be there in the classical West too (especially in Epicureanism). It’s just a lot more easily accessed in Buddhism.
The Babylonian Talmud Sanhedrin 96b relates how the Babylonian general Nevuzadran was filled with remorse after his sacking of Jerusalem so much so that he converted to Judaism. Clearly Judaism will admit even the most heinous of criminals if they sincerely repent. What Rabbi Soloveitchik argues is that Judaism does not expect its adherents to embrace the unrepentant sinner especially if his/her crimes raise him/her to the level of arch-villiain
Thanks, Gary, and welcome to the blog. I think Soloveichik actually wishes to go further than this. In my reply to Ben above, I had mentioned how Soloveichik tells of Simon Wiesenthal’s encounter with an aging former Nazi on his deathbed. The Nazi had begged for Wiesenthal’s forgiveness; as far as I can tell, neither Wiesenthal nor Soloveichik doubted his sincerity in repenting. Rather, the heinousness of his crimes were such that, even repentant, he could not deserve forgiveness. Wiesenthal still showed the dying man a little compassion by brushing an irritating fly off his face, without offering forgiveness; Soloveichik suggests that even that is giving the criminal too much.
Now none of this is to say that Soloveichik or even Wiesenthal have taken an ideally or even characteristically Jewish position on this problem. I know little enough about Judaism that I should remain neutral on that question. Certainly Soloveichik got a number of replies from Jews who (quite reasonably, I think) took issue with his characterization of Judaism, and stories like the one you describe suggest good reasons why. I would be very interested to hear what Soloveichik would say about the story you describe.