Academics, Rabbis and the Community

(Written for a scholarly Judaic studies list on the Internet.)

Date: Wed, 10 Jan 1996
From: Stan Tenen <meru1@well.com>

[GLOSSARY provided at the end.]

This subject is of vital concern to me. Let me first introduce
myself. I work for a small non-profit educational foundation, Meru
Foundation. We have recently moved from Marin County just north of San
Francisco to Sharon, MA. just south of Boston. (No jokes about the recent
weather please -smile-)

Meru was set up in 1983 to enable us to continue research that I
started in 1968. We have made some spectacular and unexpected discoveries
that seem to interest and offend nearly everyone. Personally, I was
raised in a Conservative home (Orthodox shul, but no mechitza) and as soon
as I was bar mitzva, I stopped all Jewish learning. For me, at that
time,. Judaism was "damned by the faint praise" of faith (of what appeared
to me to be "true believers") which I, as a person interested in the
sciences, was offended and put off by. (I have a B.S. in physics from
what was then Brooklyn Polytech and eventually I worked in the electro-
optics industry and as a consultant.)

Since beginning my (unexpected) investigation of B'Reshit and the
alphabet, I have naturally needed to make contact with both academic and
religious scholars. What follows is my reaction and some suggestions.
Please take this as the view of somewhat of an outsider and please do not
be personally offended by my frank, and possibly undiplomatic language.
Given how really bad things appear to be (to me), I feel that this is
warranted. Obviously I would not take the time to post this if I did not
already respect the learning and sincere intentions of those here.
In my opinion and from my perspective both the rabbinic and
academic scholarly communities are working with half a deck. While each
has its strengths (some of which have been graciously outlined by previous
posters) and each has its weaknesses and deficiencies, without the
scholarship of both communities I certainly could not have done what I
have done. But both communities (and perspectives) have one common
failing that I believe is critical.

With extremely rare exceptions I have found that neither
academically trained and oriented Jewish scholars nor their rabbinically
trained and oriented colleagues are doing serious intellectually honest
investigations of "the science of Judaism". In fact, all concerned seem
to have given up on there being any (real, hard) science.

The rabbinic community operates on presumptions based on faith,
while, correspondingly, matters of faith are not admitted in academia.
The rabbis seem to feel that all that is needed is ritual and halacha and
repetition and learning of Torah and Talmud. They do not seem to care if
what they are doing has drifted into superstition (for want of a better
word). They are happy if we just take and believe Torah as a "true" myth.
Scientists like myself, however, do not like to take anything on faith -
particularly faith. Issues of faith are ultimately issues of life and
death. As a modern scientifically minded person, I am simply not
sufficiently trusting to take anyone else's word on matters affecting my
mortality from any second hand source no matter how noble.

The academic community does not have a problem with "mythology"
and "superstition" because in academia, the idea that God is a myth is an
acceptable one. To me, academic scholars seem to be saying, let us humor
the myth and study it. Judaism is like a museum curiosity. We can study
its history and customs and we are proud of our heritage, but did HaShem
really communicate with an historical Moshe at Mount Sinai? Who knows?
Who cares? It is an old-fashioned, tired and pointless argument anyway.
This too offends me. If we attempt to evaluate and understand a
spiritual tradition whose integrity relies on the absolute belief in One
God, then if we remove this central belief and study what is left, we
study in a partial light that is insufficient to see by. Academia studies
the "bath water" (Jewish history and traditions) after it has removed the
"baby" (HaShem.) Any scientist knows that this sort of procedure is doomed
to provide partial, enigmatic and unconvincing results.

But what Meru Foundation has found changes the terms of the
discussion and should force a reappraisal from both camps.
We believe that it is possible to demonstrate to the highest
academic and rabbinic standards that the Hebrew alphabet and the text of
B'Reshit are exactly what they claim to be - but in a highly unexpected
way.

We can show that when the letters of (the beginning of) B'Reshit
are paired-off, the text string of B'Reshit folds itself (topologically)
onto a Tefillin strap in the form of a model human hand (intended to be
bound on the hand.) When various gestures are made, the 2-dimensional
outline of the model hand looks like different (Meruba Ashurit) Hebrew
letters. The gesture that displays the letter has the same natural
meaning as the name of the letter: You can only see a Pe when you point
towards your mouth; Pe means "mouth', and etc.

When you spell out Hebrew words using these gestures, a naive person
watching you will know what you are saying. This is a simple solution -
with real spiritual and technical meaning - to the story of the Tower of
Babel. Made this way, the Hebrew letters correspond to a minimum set of
pointing vectors from which _any_ quantum state vector can be assembled.
This means that the letters can enable a physicist to "navigate" in
physics. (No, we do not believe that the ancients had quantum physics.
That is silly. But they did know how to weave and to make thread and
knots and they did have a pretty good understanding of the calendar. -
This is all that is needed, and it was all available technology in the
ancient world.)

Likewise, because we can see anything held in our hands in our mind's
eye, we can see the Hebrew letters in our mind's eye when we make the
gestures. Because each gesture corresponds to a feeling (that is what
human gestures express, after all), a meditational exercise could be
recorded and reconstructed from a sequence of Hebrew letters. This is
what we believe was done. The meditational exercises of the Abrahamic
faiths appear to be woven into the sequences of letters in canonized
scriptural texts. (The recent work on equal interval letter skip
patterns that is being presented by Aish HaTorah's Discovery seminars,
and as reported on by Prof. Satinover in the Oct. '95 Bible Review
magazine, are easily explained by the meaningful woven structures we
have found in Torah.)

So, understood this way, the Hebrew letters enable one to "navigate" in
consciousness also. This confirms the kabbalistic teaching that the
only link between chochma and binah are the letters of the alphabet. It
also makes immediate sense of some of the most arcane and problematic
kabbalistic, rabbinic and Talmud discussions. With the models we have
found in B'Reshit, Sefer Yetzira becomes unambiguously readable and its
meaning becomes clear. Likewise with Mishneh Ain Dorshin in Tractate
Hagiga (BT) and sections of Zohar and Bahir as well. (I do not read
Hebrew or Aramaic with knowledge of grammar or syntax. These
understandings come from reading the letter sequences, not from the
narrative descriptions.)

But how is anyone in either the academic or the rabbinic communities
going to be able to evaluate my work? I have found that both rabbis and
academic scholars are positively insulted by my attempts, however
diplomatic, to tell them that they simply _cannot_ properly read Torah,
Talmud or Kabbalah without a working knowledge and appreciation of
geometry, topology and mathematical logic. This is considered an
outrageous idea mostly because neither academic nor religious scholars
have any real appreciation for mathematics. Persons whose expertise is
in bible studies or paleography or archeology, etc., are usually
interested in words, not in mathematical abstraction.

Worse, yet, I have found to my shock and surprise that most persons who
learn by words actually believe that that is the only possible way to
learn. The Torah is language, isn't it? - Well, yes and no. There
are stories in Torah; Kabbalistic texts can be read as narratives, but
their deep meaning is NOT at the Pshat, story level, it is in the
sequences of letters. Likewise "word chauvinism" seems to be endemic in
all but the hard sciences. Do we really believe that intelligent and
educated persons in the ancient world did not have formal languages for
communicating and preserving practices that cannot be adequately
described in words? We have formal languages - without phonetic or
narrative meaning - for dance and music and, now, for computer
programming. Is it not natural to use a formal language for recording
and preserving a meditational practice - particularly when we know that
spiritual experience is notoriously personal and not able to be conveyed
by narrative or descriptive language? Spiritual experience is
ineffable. Ergo, record the exercise and not the discussion.

These ideas seem to offend everyone. Christians think they are too
Jewish; Torah Jews think they are too gentile, academics think they are
too mystical, mathematicians think they are too religious and religious
persons think they are too mathematical. Unfortunately reality
sometimes demands that we look where we are uncomfortable if we are
going to rise above the banal and gain new understanding.

In my opinion it is about time that both the academic and religious
scholars of Judaism took the teachings of Judaism seriously. When we
are taught that the letters are holy and elements of creation, we should
not dismiss this as the confabulation of religious wishful thinking or
mythology. We should ask how, in a non-trivial sense, could this be
true. When we are taught that B'Reshit is a "template" of creation we
should not dismiss this just because the words of the creation story are
not an adequate modern cosmology. We should look for how such a claim
could be true.

Judaism, in my opinion, includes a science of consciousness every bit as
robust and real as the meditational and mystical practices of the
eastern faiths (Buddhism, etc.) These are not "mystical" teachings in
the pejorative sense that word has taken on, but real in that they
convey real knowledge of psychological health and healing.

The reason to believe in HaShem-Elokim as the One-God is not because our
parents and teachers tell us to believe, but rather because it is an
extremely useful belief for emotional and mental health. By whatever
name, there is a unifying consciousness that permeates the universe.
Whether it is some grand unification in physics or a person's personal
perception of Unity in a meditational or ego-death experience, the
principle - and the Principle - is the same. The reason to believe in
and teach Torah Judaism is that Torah really is "a tree of life for
those who grasp it." This does not mean that everyone needs to follow
the minutia of halachic Judaism, but it does mean that we must stop
believing (or not believing) out of superstition, lack of understanding,
emotional immaturity, fear of death, etc. or any other rationalization
or apologia. Instead we can do honest "archeology" on the text data
base that has been preserved for us and thus learn for ourselves by our
own real experience what is true and real and what is fantasy and myth.

One final note. I am not a person who takes to ritual easily. I am
also not a hypocrite. So how and why can I support and practice Torah
Judaism? For all its failings, halachic Torah Judaism has succeeded in
doing its job and I have personally benefited from this. I could not do
my research if "true believers" had not kept Torah Judaism intact by
their daily practice all these centuries. So, while I do not believe
that HaShem will strike me down if I do not keep Shabbos, and I do not
believe that our sages have been inerrant, I still honor (by my
practice) halachic Judaism. It is as if I were the healthy, mature
citizen of a village where I and my parents and children all drank the
sweet water of the town well. Regardless of how I feel about the
architecture or politics of the town well, I am still obligated to help
with its maintenance. Halachic Judaism is the proper vessel for keeping
"the science of consciousness" alive and well throughout many perilous
centuries. It is the vessel for retaining Jewish spiritual experience.
It is not the experience (the science, the meditation) per se, but it is
the only reliable means of preserving it until it can be seen. Thus I
try to be shomer mitzvot to the extent of my knowledge and ability. I
highly recommend this "avodah" for anyone who would speak for or about
Judaism.

I apologize for the unusual nature of this posting. Many thanks in
advance for allowing these ideas to be considered. Those interested in
receiving a short videotape sampler of my lectures and a packet of
introductory information and (professional academic and rabbinic)
evaluations of our work need only ask and email their US mail address.

Stan Tenen,
Director of Research,
Meru Foundation
meru1@well.com

GLOSSARY

B'Reshit: "Genesis"; literally, "In the beginning."

Halacha: The body of Jewish religious rules.

Torah: The five Books of Moses.

Talmud: Rabbinic "Oral Torah".

HaShem: Literally, "The Name";- Lord.

Moshe: Moses.

Tefillin: Phylactery boxes with scriptures, worn during morning prayers.

Meruba Ashurit Hebrew letters: Square-shaped, Babylonian style Hebrew letters.

Chochma and Binah: Wisdom and Understanding, two levels on the "Tree of Life".

Sefer Yetzira: Book of Formation, a Kabbalistic text.

Mishneh Ain Dorshin in Tractate Hagiga (BT): Part of the Babylonian Talmud.

Zohar: (Book of) Spendor, a Kabbalistic text.

Bahir: (Book of) Illumination, a Kabbalistic text.

Pshat: Literally, "simple".

HaShem-Elokim: Stand-in words for two of G-d's names: "The Name" and "G-d".

A Tree of Life for Those who Grasp It: A traditional rabbinic teaching.

Shabbos: The Sabbath.

Shomer Mitzvot: Observant of religious obligations

Avodah: Spiritual work; "Dharma".