Cutting religion down to size seems to be in vogue these days. Robert Wright (The Evolution of God) is no Christopher Hitchens or Richard Dawkins whose anti-religion diatribes seem decidedly venomous. Instead, Wright explains Judaism--and, for that matter, the other great faiths--as the evolution of humanity's moral impulses.
I just sung Adon Olam to my children as they went to sleep. Why? I want them to know in their soul that God is near and great. From a surprising quarter (The New York Review of Books) I was happy to read a thoughtful take-down of Wright's thesis. Professor of Biology H. Allen Orr's article, "Can Science Explain Religion?" can be read here.
You will be unsurprised to hear that my answer is no. Lots of cheap arguments are made in defence of religion usually along the lines of "there are no atheists in the foxhole". I am not in that camp. I grant respect to persons of all faiths and of no faith and have always scorned the the atheist-foxhole idea as cheap to both those of faith and those of no faith. What I will not accept is the mystery of the Jews, Israel and their God reduced to moral determinism. Thank you Professor Orr!
(But you can blame NYRB for this being such a late night post--same edition also includes Tom Segev's review of Avi Shlaim's new work, Israel and Palestine: Reappraisals, Revisions, Refutations. Segev, not really known as a representative of Israel's political right, offers a full and piercing critique.)
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