Has Modern Orthodoxy Failed?
The Final Exam: Letters to Our Students (Koren Publishers, Maggid Books, 2023) first circulated around YU as a pdf while I was a student at RIETS. It’s a collection of letters to incoming Yeshiva University undergraduates that is beautifully written and passionately argued by the president of the institution. Rabbi Dr. Ari Berman intended for the letters to serve as “a current exposition of [YU’s] educational philosophy and worldview that speaks to the wholeness of each individual student as well as the depth of our multi-millennial tradition.” He begins with a fascinating piece of Talmud (Shabbat 31a):
Rava Said: After departing from this world, when a person is brought to judgment for the life he lived in this world, they say to him:
Did you conduct business faithfully?
Did you designate times for Torah study?
Did you engage in procreation?
Did you anticipate the redemption?
Did you engage in the dialectics of wisdom?
Did you understand one matter from another?
Our answers to these questions, Rabbi Dr. Berman writes, “express the way in which we lived, worked, loved, studied, and built a better tomorrow. They challenge us and guide us at crossroads in our lives and in our day-to-day decisions.” Importantly, Rabbi Dr. Berman strongly believes that “education at Yeshiva University uniquely prepares you - and me - for this final exam, and in that context this book acts like a study guide to help you understand the purpose of a YU education.” In that such an education is important for every person who will one day need to take this final exam, and in that YU represents the flagship of Modern Orthodox Judaism, it’s important to examine what makes such an education so important through Rabbi Dr. Berman’s most well-known addition to YU: The Five Torot (now called the Five Core Torah Values to clarify that “there is only one Torah and 613 commandments”). These serve as “not simply a conceptualization of foundational principles of Jewish life; they are a basis on which every student - and every person - can live a life of profound Jewish significance:”
Torat Emet (Seek Truth)
Torat Adam (Discover Your Potential)
Torat Chaim (Live Your Values)
Torat Chesed (Act With Compassion)
Torat Tzion (Bring Redemption)
Living out these five values serves to expand Torah U’Madda from “an educational philosophy that prioritizes Torah while simultaneously recognizing the religious value of worldly wisdom” by combining “the best of Torah study and practice with a rigorous academic education to give you a spiritual, intellectual, and professional foundation” into a “more comprehensive and holistic approach to your education and to your religious life.” But why, exactly, was Torah U’Madda deemed unable to thrive without re-articulating it through these five values? Was it not already capable of providing a “comprehensive and holistic approach” to learned education and lived religiosity? Rabbi Dr. Berman answers this question by tracing Torah U’Madda’s development, beginning with a summary of Rav Soloveitchik’s conviction that
Torah addresses all aspects of humanity: our drives, ambitions, hopes, and dreams. The Torah addresses our primal need for companionship and our preference, at times, for solitude. Our reverence for our past is coupled with our natural impulses to build a better future. The comfort of God’s presence accompanies our human quest for excellence.
Thus far, it certainly seems to provide such an approach. But how did Torah U’Madda evolve from there? Learning from his teacher, but wanting to fully articulate a widely accessible vision, Rabbi Dr. Norman Lamm presented six justifications for such an outlook:
Rationalist
Cultural
Mystical
Instrumental
Inclusionary
Chasidic
Rabbi Dr. Lamm himself acknowledged that there is “no model of Torah U’Madda that is exclusively valid for all people at all times. There is a plurality of versions or paradigms to choose from.” For Rabbi Dr. Lamm, though, Torah U’Madda does not seem to have just been a pedagogy (or, for that matter, several pedagogies) but an all-encompassing way of life. In fact, he wrote that Torah U’Madda has much to offer not only in the lecture hall, but also existentially and psychologically. When properly applied, Rabbi Dr. Lamm wrote that Torah U’Madda should lead its adherents towards a sense of personal wholeness, greater religious growth, and openness to a comprehensive vision of themselves and their life in context. In the words of Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks (In the afterward to Torah U’Madda’s 20th Anniversary Edition),
Torah U’Madda is a process rather than an ideology. It is the ongoing dialogue in which Jews reflect on the meeting between Torah, experienced as timeless command, and the time-and-place-specific culture in which they have been set. That meeting has usually enriched both sides. Jews have taken and have given in return. New environments have allowed Jews to discover new dimensions of Judaism, always implicit but never before realized…. There are times at which Jews have sensed a deep kinship between their values and those of their non-Jewish neighbors; others at which they have been aware of mutual antagonisms. But in both cases they have been shaped by the encounter and the way they perceived it. The process of discernment, by which Jews saturated in Torah determine which developments are an enhancement of Judaism and which are a diminution of it, is perhaps the highest task of judgments to which we are called. This is the ongoing imperative of Torah U’Madda.
Viewing Torah U’Madda as a general category of educational philosophies rather than an all-encompassing life orientation and process of holistic integration often leads to a feeling of insecurity, or what Rav Aharon Lichtenstein termed “intellectual schizophrenia” when torah and secular life find themselves misaligned. Those least prone to such a side-effect, historically, have been those who were most intellectually complex. Many people were most likely to be unable to sustain the nuance and commitment that proper Torah U’Madda requires. See, for example, Eitan Gross’ now infamous Times of Israel article. To combat such a state of being, Rabbi Dr. Berman summarizes three guiding principles from Rav Lichtenstein’s approach to navigating this inevitable confrontation:
Torah is always our primary and supreme value.
The achievement of a life of Torah is dependent on an ongoing commitment to Torah study.
We recognize the value of academic studies, not only as they contribute to the development of professional and vocational training, but also as a “general orientation toward the innumerable pragmatic exigencies of life.”
Rav Lichtenstein himself was not the biggest proponent of the term “Torah U’Madda” because “in modern usage… the term madda has a scholarly and even academic connotation which does not capture either the quality or scope of general culture - as expressed through both secular disciplines and creative arts.” In other words, Rav Lichtenstein felt that the term madda was too exclusive as opposed to too inclusive. His conclusion, though, was to be drawn towards
two complementary and yet possibly contradictory conclusions. My sense of the need for Torah U’Madda has sharpened… So, however, has my awareness of the difficulties in realizing it; of the very considerably spiritual and educational cost - regrettably far in excess of what is inexorably necessary - which the proponents of Torah U’Madda often pay for their choice. Jointly, these conclusions - and I am not alone in subscribing to both - pose a challenge which needs to be conscientiously and creatively confronted.
Rabbi Dr. Berman also sensed this tension and wrote that “the motto of Torah U’Madda is critical but insufficient to capture our spiritual complexities. While Torah U’Madda remains core to our definition, we are better served when we can understand the background values that inform this educational model.” Hence, he articulated the Five Core Torah Values. But what does articulating these values actually achieve in the long-run, especially when their articulation only exacerbates this community’s perennial language and label problem? Indeed, Rabbi Dr. Berman notes that
many people still talk about YU as if we were in the sixties and seventies, using language and ideas that do not resonate with an emerging generation of students. Even more problematic is that these labels at times create unnecessary divisions. The labels of “Modern” and “Centrist” Orthodoxy are terminologies and outmoded frameworks that diminish the kind of thinking we need for the twenty-first century.
This frustration is similar to that voiced by Rav Sacks, who felt that the term “Modern Orthodoxy” was overrated and only caused those who identify with it to place themselves in a self-limiting position. Rabbi Dr. Berman offers a few potential solutions: “As we are religious Zionists, maybe a more apt phrase is Torani Tzioni as it communicates our commitment to Torah, Israel, and redemption. I am also partial to “Torah Judaism,” as our educational philosophy comprises the full complement of Torah values.” While Rabbi Dr. Berman does not himself offer a lasting solution to this problem, he invites his readers to be part of the solution by finding the words and language to describe “a Judaism - not a denomination - that is rich in mitzvot, study, ethics, tefilla, piety, and chesed, while engaging with the larger world in the quest to bring redemption… the Judaism of the future; one that is deeply engaging and inspiring, demanding and loving.” To that end, he offers three practical strategies to actualize the Five Torah Values in one’s life:
Balancing and calibrating your values throughout your life
Accounting for your specific personality, character traits, and circumstances when making decisions
Surrounding yourself with the teachers, friends, and loved ones who will enable your best self to emerge and develop.
Such strategies, coupled with an understanding of the core values, will lead one to leave YU “for a lifetime of Torah and self-discovery, purpose, and joy, meaning and mission.” With that, readers are well on their way to joining the conversation.
One must still ask, though, what is accomplished by Rabbi Dr. Berman’s pushback against phrases like “Modern Orthodoxy,” “Centrist Orthodoxy,” and “Torah U’Madda” in favor of the Five Torah Values? Perhaps one can argue that changing the language in this way allows for today’s synthesis-seeking Jews to apply the values to their lives in personal ways as opposed to feeling the need to fit into a particular box. If that is the reason, though, one can respond that it is a bug rather than a feature. As Rav Sacks wrote,
The lack of appeal of Torah U’Madda in our time is a symptom of one of the most devastating effects of secularization: the privatization of religion. Judaism is experienced as a phenomenon of private life. There - in the home, school, and synagogue - it makes sense. But we are far less sure as to what Judaism might mean in the public domain.
The Five Core Torah Values, indeed, are easy to apply in one’s head or on a university campus where 90% of the students share the same general background and beliefs but are seem much harder to apply in the diversity of the secular world. Torah U’Madda, on the other hand, provides clear guidelines of how to integrate all sides of one’s life while group-identification with Modern or Centrist Orthodoxy provide a badge of honor and feeling like part of a movement beyond oneself.
More likely is the reason that Rabbi Dr. Berman himself articulated in The Final Exam’s introduction: “our students… have trouble articulating our distinct outlook” and experience intense feelings of “confusion, misunderstanding, and even defection” due to their “struggle for the language to define… verbalize… and to communicate” YU’s worldview of Torah U’Madda. In asking students about Torah U’Madda and Modern/Centrist Orthodoxy Rabbi Dr. Berman was met largely with blank stares, confusion, and uncertainty. Rather than inviting these students to read and properly understand the words of Ravs Soloveitchik, Lichtenstein, and Lamm for themselves, it was deemed better to provide terminology that was on their level and would be more useful to them in the moment. So, while still introducing students to these towering figures, their words are simplified to prioritize “understand[ing] the background values that inform” Torah U’Madda rather than understanding Torah U’Madda itself.
This makes a good deal of sense given that the book’s primary audience is not intellectuals, rabbis, rabbinical students, or even Orthodox undergrads at secular universities. For a book targeted specifically at Yeshiva College, Stern College, and Sy Syms undergraduates, it speaks their language perfectly and challenges them to look into the words of Ravs Soloveitchik, Lamm, and Lichtenstein for themselves by summarizing their views in digestible chunks. So there are certainly positive things to say about the approach. However, it is not an approach that I can personally get behind.
Anyone who has spent time studying for final exams can affirm that there are multiple ways to go about it. One way is slow and methodological, with a focus on familiarizing oneself with concepts early on and constant review in order to ensure proper knowledge acquisition. Another is cramming in as much material as possible last minute and coming up with catchy mnemonics and simplifications to facilitate quick recall and the best result given limited time and resources. Both ways work, but I prefer not to cram - and reading The Final Exam felt a little too much like cramming for me to properly enjoy it. But of course, it needs to be said that I write all of this as someone who spent my undergraduate years at Rutgers and only attended YU for rabbinical school after being so impressed with Torah U’Madda as articulated by Rabbis Lamm and Lichtenstein.
At the end of the day, readers might agree or disagree with his direction, but it is impossible to ignore the call that Rabbi Dr. Berman sends out to each of us to take part in shaping the future of our community from the ground-up. I may question the general utility of the Five Core Torah Values over sticking with good old Torah U’Madda, but they are an innovative and thoughtful new way to encourage the new generation to actualize the Modern Orthodox values that our great thinkers have written about for generations. In starting that conversation, The Final Exam is a rousing success for all sides. It is available here.