Letter from Lhasa, number 154. (Sacks 2000): A Letter in the Scroll
by Roberto Abraham Scaruffi
Rabbi Sacks, J., A Letter in the Scroll. Understanding Our Jewish Identity and Exploring the Legacy of the World’s Oldest Religion, The Free Press, 2000.
(Sacks 2000).
Rabbi Jonathan Sacks
This book is a philosophical reflection about the meaning of existence and about the meaning of being Jews.
“Judaism is a uniquely restless faith. Jews are always traveling, dissatisfied with the status quo and never quite merging with new environment. The midrash suggests where and how these traits began. For Judaism, faith is cognitive dissonance, the discord between the world that is and the world as it ought to be. That tension has been the energizing mainspring of Jewish life from the time of Abraham to today.” (Sacks 2000, p. 58)
“To be sure, Judaism is a religion of law and justice between human beings, because only where there is law can there be a just society, and Judaism is nothing if not a religion of society. But between God and man there is a bond of love.” (Sacks 2000, p. 86)
“Judaism has not one political theory but two. Not only does it have its own theory of the state, possibly the earliest of its kind, but it also has a political theory of society, something quite rare in the history of thought, and to this day a vision unsurpassed in its simplicity and humanity.” (Sacks 2000, p. 122)
“So biblical Judaism has a carefully elaborated theory of the state. Oddly enough, though, this is only its secondary concern. Far more fundamental is its theory of society and its insistence that the state exists to serve society and not vice versa. The state came into existence with the appointment of a king. Israelite society came into being centuries earlier at Mount Sinai. The difference between them is that the state is created by a social contract, but society is created by a social covenant.” (Sacks 2000, p. 125)
The last chapter “Why I Am a Jew” is perhaps rhetorical, as when one need to find some “justification”. Perhaps people are what they are or, paraphrasing the Torah, they are that they are.
Rabbi Sacks, J., A Letter in the Scroll. Understanding Our Jewish Identity and Exploring the Legacy of the World’s Oldest Religion, The Free Press, 2000.
