A couple of nights ago I witnessed a brilliant debate about God.
Once again arguing the Atheistic perspective was Christopher Hitchens.
http://www.hitchensweb.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Hitchens
In previous debates he has tangled with Dennis Prager and Dinesh D’Souza. This fine evening had him grappling with Rabbi David Wolpe.
(Full disclosure: Rabbi Wolpe was my professor in college)
http://www.sinaitemple.org/temple/staff_president_bios.php#wolpe
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Wolpe
In 1990 I debated Rabbi Wolpe, and I was definitely not the winner. I was an 18 year old freshman, and his exam had an essay question asking who was best equipped to run the Roman Empire. The choices were between men like Julius and Augustus Caesar or men like Horace and Cicero. While the question was subjective, “no one right answer” does not mean “no wrong answer.”
I wrote that Horace and Cicero were best equipped to run the Roman Empire. It is not just the notion of the pen being mightier than the sword (a stance I have since disavowed), encapsulated in the notion of “writers over fighters.” It is that “the warriors could make it work, but the intellectuals could understand and explain why it worked.” If there were problems regarding management and bureaucracy, it was necessary to have fine minds to fix and maintain the Empire.
Rabbi Wolpe gave me an A- on that question, explaining that “This was a very good stab at the question, but I do not need to know how to make my car run or understand the intricate nature of every car part that causes it to run. I just need the car to run.”
I was not a student that argued about grades, especially not high ones. I was very deferential, and explained that the grade was not the issue, just the idea that I disagreed with him. He allowed me to present my case. I explained to him that if his car breaks, he needs to know maintenance. He replied that his mechanic handles that. I took one last shot.
“Ok, but what happens if you are stranded on a cold winter morning?”
He calmly replied, “I have Triple-A.”
I did my best impersonation of a deer in the headlights as he calmly smiled and let me know that the discussion had reached its conclusion.
I am still humble around him, which is not a common trait for me. Perhaps the reason I am so deferential is that no matter how much time goes by, as I expressed to him on a couple of occasions, he will always be the teacher and I will always be the student.
Yet Rabbi Wolpe had a tougher task the other night than debating an 18 year old who only thought he knew everything. Christopher Hitchens might not know everything, but he sure knows a lot. I have met him once before, and met him again several minutes before this event started.
As he autographed my book, I said to him, “You enrage me, and yet I thank you for it.” He laughed, and let me know that he truly did like making people think. I told him that I walk away from his speeches having thought deeply. He told me that his father was named Eric, and that Eric is his middle name. He asked me if I spelled it the proper way with a “c,” and I explained that of course I did. He said, “good, because some people spell it with a “k.” I told him that “I am not a Viking.”
The last thing I said thoroughly amused him. “Mr. Hitchens, Rabbi Wolpe was my professor in college. He gave me an A- instead of an A, so please shred him this evening.” Mr. Hitchens then had some very complimentary words about Rabbi Wolpe.
The moderator for the debate was Rob Eshman, the editor of the Jewish Journal. While I have met Mr. Eshman personally and been in his office, his opening remark will be an entire separate column unto itself. In a debate about God, he opened his remarks saying that he “believes God exists, with the proof being November 4th.”
The audience, consisting of many elderly liberal Jews that still think FDR is God himself, reminded me of why I support euthanasia. They clapped wildly, reminding me that ideological bigotry is alive and well among those that have suffered the worst intolerance of life. As I said, I will address that remark separately.
Despite the fact that the Jewish community leans politically to the left, this was a debate about God, not politics. Both men left their personal politics out of the debate, which was most appreciated.
With that, below is the debate between Monotheist David Wolpe and Atheist Christopher Hitchens.
DW: “Sorry for the delay getting started. Backstage I almost persuaded him.
Being a non-believer does not make the world simpler. It makes the world meaningless. Free will comes from God. It is not from our genes. For a non-believer, the person next to you is a product of chemical accidence. There is not a soul in them or us. Belief not only makes sense…it makes us better. Believers give more blood and vote more often. Humans are meant to be noble. We are meant for better things.”
CH: “I trust when Rabbi Wolpe states that religious people vote more often that he is not talking about fraud. I suspect he means to say that they vote more diligently.
Life would be terrible if we were constantly supervised. If there is a just God, why do people tremble about things? If God was just, everything would be proportional.
Overcoming badness does not require religion. How do we end slavery? We invoke humanism. It is much more noble, logical, and ethical, as opposed to a supernatural totalitarian, a celestial dictator.
This week a 13 year old girl was beaten and sodomized in Somalia. She was then convicted of adultery, and stoned to death. Her abusers were not against religion. They were acting within their holy texts. With a celestial dictator, badness is required. Suicide bombers and genital mutilators act based on religion.”
DW: “Human society without religion leads to serial genocides. Rome fell because Christianity is too peaceful. Explicit murders of people occurred due to Stalinism and Nazism, whi9ch embrace secularism.
Fanatics exist inside and outside of religion. Humanism is not anti-slavery. Moses freed the slaves of Egypt. Abolitionist John Brown was an evangelical.
We are not animals. The 20th century tested the idea that power was more important than God. This led to the most awful century, filled with wars and savagery.”
CH: “Genital mutilation should not be taken lightly. Nothing about my penis should be taken lightly.
How much crime and misery has occurred due to sexual repression? Take out the word Facism, and you have Catholic Right Wingism, or Vatican Right Wingism. It is the same thing. From Franco to Mussolini, there was Catholicism. The Vichy regime had Vatican support. Hitler never renounced his Catholicism. Stalin graduated from the Seminary in Georgia.
You should not be a dictator if you cannot exploit. Stalinism was religious. North Korea is the most religious state in the world.”
DW: “Epicureus was a poet. Galileo was a believer. Religion did not invent otherness. The new kid on the playground is treated differently. This is built into the human system.
Why did religion need to be taken out of the equation to produce Hitler and Stalin? North Korea worships a person, not a God. South Korea is religious and democratic.”
CH: “South Korea has no official religion. North Korea is ruled by a dead man. It is a “necrocracy.” They have the father and the son, and are one short of a trinity. They also walking around thanking each other for everything.
When a non-believer dies, they can escape everything. When religious people die, God is just getting started with them.
Picture a Saudi Arabian child today. Is it better that they grow up a Wahhabiist or secular?”
DW: “I will decline your offer to defend the Trinity. The choices are not only between atheism and religious fanaticism. An average approach in the Saudi Arabian example is to be a moderate Muslim, and influence Saudi Arabia for the better.”
CH: “That is a warm and fuzzy sentiment.”
DW: “It is not just about atheism or being a conservative Jew. There are other choices.”
RE: What is wrong with liberal Judaism?
(This is about Judaism that is not Orthodox and doctrinaire. There is flexibility and a belief in an evolving Torah. It has nothing to do with political liberalism, although liberal Judaism is on the left politically. In Judaism, the Conservatives are the centrists, and the orthodox are on the right.)
CH: “For one thing, there is not enough to argue with.
Also, it is cowardly. Things may or may not be important. It is morally ‘slushy.’ This is equivalent to being a ‘Cafeteria Catholic.’ We simply pick the bits we like. Is this ethics or doing God’s will?”
DW: “The irony in this argument is that atheists say that fundamentalists follow everything in the bible. Then they turn around and say that they feel that religious people should follow everything in the bible.
Life is complicated and slushy. This is a partnership with God. Moses wrote the second set of tablets.”
CH: (After much applause, which both men received throughout the evening) “Rabbi, your congregation is in here somewhere.”
DW: “They are all getting dues reductions.”
CH: “Liberal Judaism teaches that if you don’t like what you consult, just ignore it. It is easier to just be secular.”
DW: “I agree with Mr. Hitchens regarding his Talmudic citations.
Rebellion against God is impossible if there is no God to rebel against.”
CH: “That is like saying that my not believing in God proves that there is God I don’t believe in. This is logically fallacious.
Jews are secular worldwide since their own religion teaches them to be like the Greek Hellenists.”
RE: “Why is religion worse than other tools such as politics?”
CH: “Religion teaches compulsory love. You love what you fear.”
DW: “That describes Jewish mothers.”
CH: “God is not a father. Tyranny, unlike fatherhood, never goes away. You never break away.”
DW: “My congregation is charitable by nature.
God is not a human parent. God is a creator who loves us. This is consoling and meaningful, not terrifying.
People in the hospital crying their deathbed wishes do not hope for no God. This is the opposite of tyranny. This is love.”
CH: “Some say God is dead. Freud said God is dad.
How about evidence? Evolution does not know we are here. There is zero evidence to suggest otherwise.
It is immoral to preach to ill and dying people that Daddy God will care for them. I won’t listen to such rubbish.”
DW: “How can God be stern, and yet also point out that a loving God is wishful thinking?
We have consciousness. Consciousness proves that the world knew that we were coming, and made provisions, and is glad that we are here.”
CH: “Benevolence and dictatorship are not contradictory. We are not needed. We are just here to applaud God.
We may have something now, but there is a great deal of nothingness headed our way? This suggests that any creator of this is capricious, cruel, or incompetent. He did not leave a nice table spread.
Do you think the Jewish people have a covenant with God?”
DW: “Judaism does not teach quiescence. We are here to do good deeds. There is a moral order.
Eye rolling is fine, my congregation does it.
We are not here to just applaud. In 500 million years we may not be here, but that does not invalidate belief. Jews have a special covenant, but so do other religions. I argue Judaism’s excellence, not its superiority.”
RE: “Why do religions rely on stories over history?”
DW: “One does not preclude the other. They are interdependent.”
CH: “Hanukkah has been discredited as a historical event. Walking away from Hellenism was simply best.”
DW: “That brought slavery and the Pelopenesian War.”
CH: “The best achievements of the Jewish people have come during the Diaspora and secular society.”
DW: “What about achievements based on the Torah?”
CH: “Jewish achievements came after executing Spinoza, and leaving behind the Rabbinate.”
RE: “How did prayer affect 9/11? How does one explain the prayers of the hijackers? What should the victims have done?”
DW: “Prayer is not about magical intervention. It is not a slot machine.
You pray to not be alone. The Talmud states that there is no reward for Mitzvahs (good deeds). We pray to change ourselves, not God. There is good and bad prayer. The prayers of the hijackers distanced themselves from God. The prayers of the victims brought them closer to God.”
CH: “Faith is another form of fanaticism. It defies reason, and reduces us to primates. We are one half of one chromosome away from being a chimpanzee.
As for United 93, the three men that took back the plane did not pray. They acted. Had they been invoking God on their knees, the plane would have hit the Pentagon.
I am not saying Hitler shouldn’t be judged. I am saying he won’t be.
We tremble at the thought that God is not just. The irony is that we agree that the hijackers won’t get to paradise. I wish they could be like, ‘D@mn, there’s nothing.'”
We should be ashamed until and each and every one of us does something to help kill one terrorist. We should each contribute to killing one Islamofacist murderer.
(Yes, I clapped wildly, and only stopped when it was clear that the debate was continuing. Mr. Hitchens then went completely in another direction that was as out of left field as it was provocative.)
I did pray once…for a hard-on.”
RE: “Is there a middle ground?”
DW: “Pluralistic and democratic religious societies are good. They lead to more stable families and more charitable behavior. Religion works.
People speak of secular Europe, but the Swedes and Danes are Christians. They baptize their children. They are not secular.
We are all one people because of moral obligations due to being children of God. Why should I care about you if we are just chromosomes and not images of God?”
CH: “I have a challenge for you that I have presented before, that nobody has taken me up on. If you are a believer, I challenge you to think of one positive statement or one good action that I as a secularist cannot do. Yet many wicked deeds require religion.
I give blood, but I don’t lose it. They gain. Secularists have the Golden Rule. Human solidarity is not divine.
Divinity is needed to shed blood. Only divinity could make a people make their penis bleed.
I look for contradiction and polarization, not common ground. It is how we learn. Thinking requires confrontation, which brings intellectual combat. Heat produces light.”
(Rabbi Wolpe mentioned the word “Shiva” in his reply. After a person dies in Jewish culture, families “sit Shiva,” or mourn, for seven days. Every evening during those seven days a prayer service is held.)
DW: “Believers and non-believers have the same physiology. Yet Shiva meetings, as well as comforting the dying, helps the dying.
Religion has brought us beautiful religious poetry and religious music.
Heat is not the only source of light. There is non-chemical light. It exists inside all of us. Religion inspires. Atheism diminishes us. Feeling that our self is less than eternal makes us unnoble. Insulting our self is not permitted.”
CH: “Only religion can lead to beauty and aesthetics? Not so. Painters, writers, and thinkers who did not believe were murdered.
Praying at deathbeds is not a tautology.
The supernatural and the superstitious leads to the barbaric.”
After a well deserved standing ovation for both men, they went to sign autographed copies of their books. While neither man needs my help getting promoted, they both deserve it.
Christopher Hitchens’s book is, “God is not great: How religion poisons everything.”
David Wolpe, author of “Healer of shattered hearts,” has now authored “Why faith matters.”
(In college, a lighthearted mocking of David Wolpe as a seven year old budding intellectual has him hawking his book, “Healer of broken toys.” I did not participate in the mocking since I did not want to lower my A-. Rabbi Wolpe was a benevolent dictator. The mocking went unpunished, but I did get a better grade.)
Since I had already had Mr. Hitchens autograph my book before the debate, after the debate I sought out Rabbi Wolpe. I let others go in front of me since his Synagogue is one block from my home. I can see him any time. When he autographed my book, I told him “I will be at your Friday night service, but I was not going to ask you to autograph this on the Sabbath.”
He then laughed when I told him, “I told Mr. Hitchens that you gave me an A- in college instead of an A, and that he was to shred your arguments.” As expected, he had complimentary words for Mr. Hitchens.
On the way out, I saw both men sitting next to each other autographing their respective books. I simply told Mr. Hitchens that I found his arguments brilliant. He thanked me.
As for Rabbi Wolpe, he is giving his sermon tonight. It will involve the Jewish effect of the election of our next President-Elect. Even though it is a public speech, I was concerned about blogging about it since it might be off the record. Also, it will be given on a Friday night, the Jewish Sabbath. Writing is not allowed, so I would have to rely on my memory.
Rabbi Wolpe explained that a copy of the sermon might be on his website, and that I should check. I did have permission to blog about it, and he appreciated my ethics in checking with him first.
Smart aleck that I am, I asked him, “Am I allowed to manipulate it?”
He laughed, and I let him get back to the throngs of fans that engulfed both men.
I may have gotten the last word with both men, but that hardly means I “won” anything except significantly deeper insight into complex and important issues.
Besides, I will always have the A-. They both get an A+ from me. I disagree with them both on politics, but remain deferential. After all, students can disagree with their teachers, but must always respect them.
I have much in life to learn, and David Wolpe and Christopher Hitchens are both stellar teachers.
eric