Religion and the Humanities (1)
The archenemy of religion is often portrayed to be Sciences. But the fact is that science and religion often can manage amicable relations, while the relationship between the Humanities to religion is truly stormy. Exploration.
Just a nice dabble
A Shabbat dinner in center of Tel Aviv. The Rabbi, a young married man, asked each participant about their profession. I certainly made a different impression when I said I was studying political philosophy, in a crowd of engineers and finance boys and girls. The Rabbi asked: what is that for? His look and his tone seemed like an innocent question, but I couldn’t manage to avoid feeling the challenge, maybe even the mischief: “What is that for”? was really more like “how that is relevant?” Alright. I answered that I am studying fundamental theoretical questions in political theory, and the meaning of fundamental ideas, like “sovereignty”, “democracy”, “power”. “–And how is that important, useful? What do you do with that?”, he continued. Didn’t we live in the same world? Didn’t he lived in democracy, didn’t he go to vote?
Studying the humanities in a religious environment is challenging. Surely, it is so too in a non-religious environment, but for very different reasons — reasons that mainly comes to down to whether studying the humanities is a good financial choice — surely, today, it isn’t. But no one will challenge that, on an emotional, spiritual or simply personal level, humanities can be a fulfilling choice. Not so in the religious world. Sorry for you, Humanities, but in the religious world spirituality, personality, emotions and self-expression are already taken. Mr. Bible, Mr. Communal dinners and Mr. church-attendance are taking your spot.
It is hard for a religious person or a religious community to accept that not all answers to the personal aspects of life are not given by religion. Some religious persons would readily that religion does not answer scientific questions, like the origins of men and the world, and the best way to be healthy. But they grant this only in so far as sciences are useful. Science definitely builds better houses, makes better medicines and saves more lives than religious precepts ever did (though some would even contradict that!). But the Humanities? Its usefulness to life is not proven. Therefore, it is a pure waste of time. Art? A nice feel-good dabble, but nothing serious.
One needs to ask : why does this attitude seem unavoidable when you become a devout Jew? Can you study humanities and yet, be religious?
