Understanding the Yetzer Hara - The Screwtape Letters

Several years ago, I read "The Screwtape Letters," by C.S. Lewis. In it, he presents a series of letters from a senior devil, Screwtape, to his nephew, a younger devil, assigned to his first "patient." In this series of letters, C.S. Lewis takes readers on a tour into the mind and strategy of the yetzer hara, the evil inclination, as he sees it. It's a very very insightful, short book. Reading it has made me think, over the past few years, of writing a Jewish version of the book, taking some insights of his, and others from various seforim, and applying that style of writing to a Jewish audience. I thought this would help me and others better understand the manipulations and illusions created by the yetzer hara, done to fool us into either doing aveiros, or making our avodas Hashem dry, and done for ulterior motives.

Here is a dramatic reading (about 3 minutes) of one chapter from the book:

Recently, I read something that said that such investigations into the workings of the Yetzer Hara would not be a good idea. It said that focusing on such things, even if done for good motives, brings a person down, and it is therefore a dangerous endeavor. I was unable to find what I had read, though, in order to see the source. In response to my inquiry about this idea, Rav Micha Golshevsky offered up some ideas, which I will post in a couple of days.

Although if I were to seriously consider such an endeavor, I would consult with my rebbe, I'd be interested to see if any of y'all have any thoughts about whether or not such a project would be ill-conceived.

-Dixie Yid

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"The Party" from 1984 vs. Yiddishkeit - Compare/Contrast/L'havdil

In George Orwell's book, 1984, he describes a world in which the totalitarian government ("The Party") seeks to have such total and complete domination over everyone in the country that their ultimate goal will not be acheived until even the innermost thoughts and beliefs of the Party members are competely defined by The Party's will.

This is true in the book ad kedei kach (to the extent) that when The Party says that something that happened yesterday didn't happen, the Party member must instantly change his memory of what happened yesterday and then erase his memory of the fact that he changed his memory at all. Winston, the main character's, sense of having a concrete perception of reality is so ingrained that he bristles and denies any possiblity of changing his own knowledge about realty just because of the will of The Party.

Mentally and physically, The Party breaks down any and all sense of self that Winston had, and fills up the empty shell that was previously occuppied by Winston's own sense of self, with the will of The Party.

The differences between anything in Yiddishkeit and the world of 1984 are obvious. The Party seeks to reconstruct people's conception of reality by replacing emes with sheker (truth with falsehood). Whereas Yiddishkeit teaches that we must correct our thinking from sheker to emes. The Party is motivated by and utilizes hate (Two Minutes Hate). Whereas Yiddishkeit's self-elevation program is synonymous with the ideas of Chesed and Ahava, kindness and love. The Party seeks to dominate the people. Whereas in Yiddishkeit, Hashem only desires to elevate and give goodness and truth to people.

One thing that strikes me about the book is that there is one similarity. The Party asserts that its reality is true, and that one must overcome their own personal perception of reality. L'havdil, in Torah also, we must know that the world and the reality that we see around us is the least real conception of reality. The world is merely the mask that hides the true nature of the universe which is that Ein Ode Milvado, there is nothing besides Him.

In Yiddishkeit, the idea is that the highest ideal is not to be wedded to our concrete, finite perception of reality. But rather, to nullify our perceptions to the Oneness of the Creator. The ideas of Bitul and Hiskalelus, total self-nullification and inclusion in the Divine Oneness, are the highest ideal!

I read this book about 12 years ago, and what struck me about it is that there is a similarity, l'havdil, in the thought process that O'Brian (the main antagonist in the story) forced upon Winston, and the thought process involved in letting go one one's ego and starting to perceive the Oneness of G-d that lies behind and within all of reality, and letting one's self go, in order to merge one's perception with the Divine reality.

-Dixie Yid

(Picture courtesy of madisonpubliclibrary.org)

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What's the Yetzer Hara behind Historical Tanach Reading?

I heard a sadening interview with Robert Alter, a professor who's come out with his new translation of the book of Psalms on wnyc.org's website, which you can listern to here. From the interview, it is apparant that the author's main purpose in the translation was to de-spiritualify (I made up that word!) the book of Psalms. One example is how he strictly avoids the word "soul" when translating the word "Nefesh," holding that the author(s) of the Psalms do not believe in the eternality of the soul.

Another interesting thing to consider is looking behind the obvious relish he displays when reading his translation of the following psukim from Tehilim perek 82, in a way depicting the Psalm as describing polytheistic belief.

מִזְמוֹר, לְאָסָף:אֱלֹהִים, נִצָּב בַּעֲדַת-אֵל;
בְּקֶרֶב אֱלֹהִים יִשְׁפֹּט.
ו אֲנִי-אָמַרְתִּי, אֱלֹהִים אַתֶּם; וּבְנֵי עֶלְיוֹן כֻּלְּכֶם. ז אָכֵן, כְּאָדָם תְּמוּתוּן; וּכְאַחַד הַשָּׂרִים תִּפֹּלוּ.

My question is this: Why would someone invest so much time and effort in the de-spiritualification of Sefer Tehillim? What emotion underlies such a sacrifice of time and resources in trying to hard to remove, by hook or by crook, any reference to any transcendant spirituality or relationship to G-d? Although he rationalizes this approach with the assertion that spiritual references are a recent interjection into the Psalms, that explanation is merely the means he must use to get to his goal. It's especially interesting that someone who is knowledgable enough in Hebrew to accomplish such a task would be motivated to do this.

My feeling is that such a person must such spiritual potential which creates a vacuum in his soul which must be filled with a relationship with Hashem. I think that the ability to invest personal resources, to the extent that he has, is the result of the natural desire of a Jew to connect to Hashem. However, since he has invested himself in a life which is not in connsonance with that spiritual search, he must find some way of quieting that spiritual hunger for something greater than himself and something greater than our world.

The method he chose is work tirelessly to limit and consign "religion" to the small limited space of our world. By taking out any reference to the transcendant from Psalms and glibly asserting Dovid Hamelech's belief in a pantheon of gods, he is attempting to soothe his inner turmoil and emptiness by telling himself that there really isn't anything higher than this world to which his inner longing could be directed.

In the process, the writing of these books also serve as consecutive temporary attemps at achieving some repreive from his soul's need to fill the void and thirst that it feels.

His efforts at concealing and covering up the existance of a higher spiritual connection with G-d, that man requires, are not so different from what the rest of of do on a less visible scale. We do the same type of thing in various ways. Perhaps I may tell myself that a certain madreiga in Avodas Hashem is not really for people "like me." Rather, that is for special individuals, yechidei segulah. Or I may tell myself that the purpose of certain mitzvos is merely for a worldly purpose, without any specific intention of connecting me to Hashem.

In all of these cases, this is the work of the yetzer hara. Rather than soothing the cognitive dissonance that I feel when I know that my life does not measure up to its great potential by seeking to become personally greater and connect to the Infinite Light, I soothe it by denying the existance of that transcendant reality.

That is why it is especially ironic that he choose to humanize G-d in his translation of Psalm 82. He interpreted those verses talking about "Bnei Elohim" as refering to gods. When really, it is an answer to his essential problem. The psukim are actually saying (paraphrasing), You [the Jewish people] are Bnei Elyon, people with huge, lofty potential! But when you lower yourselves to rip out your transcendant relationship with G-d from your lives, then you will die like some "Joe" in the street.

May we all merit to never negate our infinite potential to connect to G-d through every detail in life and never shortchange our potential in exchange for temporary emotional comfort!

-Dixie Yid

Does This Mean That A Society's Morals Can Improve?

In order to stay sane while doing the mindless portions of my job, I use my mp3 player to keep my mind occupied while my hands are busy on the keyboard. Sometimes I listen to shiurim but I like to put more intellectual attention into listening to a shiur than I am able to while working. Therefore, since I have always liked literature, I have listened to a couple of free mp3 books that I got for free online at AudioBooksForFree.com. I recently listened to Alexandre Dumas' books, The Count of Monte Cristo, and The Three Musketeers. I had an observation, to be taken with a grain of salt since it assumes some similarity between the reality of the norms of French society and the picture of that society that the author portrays.

I noticed in The Count of Monte Cristo, which takes place in the first half of the nineteenth century, that ideas of religion and moral propriety were very deeply ingrained in French society in general at that time (which was current with the authorship of the book, which was in 1844). That atmosphere was in stark contrast with the moral environment portrayed in The Three Musketeers (which took place in the 1600s), which was much looser, much less formal, and things were done publicly in that world which would never have been acceptable in the world of The Count of Monte Criso.

It is apparent to me that Dumas expected his readers to be shocked by the conduct of the characters in the Musketeers book because he makes an off-hand comment to explain the difference between the readers' sensibilities and those of the characters he portrays in seventeenth century France. He briefly states that his readers should not be shocked at the behavior of some of the characters, as the morals in those days were not as strict as they were today (early 1800s)

If this general picture is somewhat reliable, then my impression is that the values and propriety improved markedly in France between the 1600s and the 1800s. Now, it seems that every year, the morals in today's society get worse. And each year, I think that we've hit the rock bottom. But things continue to get even worse. It seems like there is an inertia which makes the attainment or re-attainment of a moral society in America seem impossible. Perhaps there is hope for American society though. If the French people can do it between the 1600s and the 1800s, perhaps we in America can do it as well! (Any ideas on how this could realistically happen?)

-Dixie Yid

P.S. Here's another interesting quote from The Count of Monte Cristo.

"[T]he application of the axiom, 'Pretend to think well of yourself, and the world will think well of you,' [is] an axiom a hundred times more useful in society nowadays than that of the Greeks, 'Know thyself,' a knowledge for which, in our days, we have substituted the less difficult and more advantageous science of knowing others."

(The picture above is of Alexandre Dumas [Sr.])