THE FREEDOM TO DOUBT

Carl Sagan and the Cosmos

Carl Sagan and the Freedom to Doubt
by Jeff Jacoby

At the intersection of science and public policy, nothing is more hazardous than dogmatism enforced through the squelching of dissenting attitudes.

In astronomy, “Sagan’s number” refers to the number of stars in the observable universe. That’s a value easier to define than to calculate, but in round numbers, according to a 2010 study by Yale astronomer Pieter van Dokkum, it comes to 300,000,000,000,000,000,000,000, or 300 sextillion. (Depending on the meaning of “observable,” that number may now be out of date.)

Sagan’s number is named for Carl Sagan,* the American astronomer, planetary scientist, cosmologist, and science communicator who died in 1996. He achieved extraordinary renown in the 1970s and 1980s, especially after PBS broadcast his 13-part television series “Cosmos,” which became one of the most widely watched series in the history of American public television.

His scientific achievements were considerable. He published more than 600 papers and books in the areas of astrobiology, planetary conditions, the origins of life on earth, the greenhouse effect, and extraterrestrial intelligence. He played a role in numerous NASA planetary space probes and helped write the so-called Arecibo message, an interstellar radio signal incorporating information about humanity that was beamed from earth in the direction of the M13 star cluster in 1974.

The honors and awards he received numbered in the dozens; they ranged from the NASA Distinguished Public Service Medal to the George Foster Peabody Award for his television work.

As part of his campaign to increase scientific literacy among the general public, Sagan repeatedly emphasized the importance of skepticism and non-dogmatic thinking. He was adamant that extraordinary claims require extraordinary levels of proof and derided pseudoscience and its peddlers. (One of his favorite cartoons, he wrote, showed “a fortune-teller scrutinizing the mark’s palm and gravely concluding: ‘You are very gullible.’”)

Yet while he cast a cold eye on the supernatural claims of religion, he was equally firm that scientists must not fall in love with scientific claims that aren’t supported by convincing evidence. “If the ideas don’t work, you must throw them away,” he wrote in The Demon-Haunted World, the last book he published before his death. “Don’t waste neurons on what doesn’t work. Devote those neurons to new ideas that better explain the data.” He warned against succumbing to confirmation bias — what the pioneering 19th-century English physicist Michael Faraday described as the temptation

to seek for such evidence and appearances as are in the favor of our desires, and to disregard those which oppose them. . . . We receive as friendly that which agrees with [us], we resist with dislike that which opposes us; whereas the very reverse is required by every dictate of common sense.

The lure of confirmation bias is if anything more powerful today, when social media and political polarization relentlessly turn scientific matters into culture-war flashpoints. Too many ideologues on both the right and the left approach public health and science questions through a political lens. News organizations increasingly freeze out or belittle scientific opinions that don’t fit an accepted narrative. Leading politicians support or oppose health-care practices on the basis of party politics.

Steven Pinker

Were Carl Sagan still alive, he would surely be among those pushing back against such blind antiscientific bias. Alas, he was just 62 when he died from complications brought on by a long struggle with bone marrow disease. But in a recently unearthed speech he gave to the Illinois chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union in 1987, Sagan expressed warnings that are even more relevant today than they were at the time. The speech was obtained and transcribed by Harvard scientist Steven Pinker* and civil liberties lawyer Harvey Silverglate, both of Cambridge, Mass., who published it this month in the online journal Quillette.

In his address, write Pinker and Silverglate in a brief introduction, Sagan “spoke prophetically of the irrationality that plagued public discourse, the imperative of international cooperation, the dangers posed by advances in technology, and the threats to free speech and democracy in the United States.” If those threats raised concerns in 1987, they have grown dire today. Some excerpts from Sagan’s remarks:

Science has devised a set of rules of thinking, of analysis, which, although there are exceptions in individual cases (scientists being humans just like everybody else), nevertheless, on average, are responsible for the remarkable progress of science.

And you all know, certainly, what these rules are. Things like arguments from authority have little weight. Like contentions have to be demonstrable. Like experiments must be repeatable. Like vigorous substantive debate is encouraged and is considered the lifeblood of science. Like serious critical thinking and skepticism addressed to new and even old claims is not just permissible, but is encouraged, is desirable, is the lifeblood of science. There is a creative tension between openness to new ideas and rigorous skeptical scrutiny.

These are axiomatic to the scientific method, yet they are flouted routinely, even aggressively. Sagan properly noted that “arguments from authority have little weight” — yet how often are controversial matters now declared immune to dispute because “the science is settled” or “ 97 percent of scientists agree” or we must “listen to the experts”?

Skepticism, said Carl Sagan, is "the lifeblood of science."

What is true of science is true of everything, Sagan argued. Mistakes are inevitable, which is why it is urgent to allow space for “settled” conclusions to be challenged:

In public affairs, this sort of error-correction machinery in our society is institutionalized in the Constitution. It’s institutionalized, first of all, in the separation of powers, and secondly, in the civil liberties, especially in the first 10 amendments to the Constitution: the Bill of Rights.

The founding fathers mistrusted government power, and they had very good reason to, as do we. This is why they tried to institutionalize the separation of powers, the right to think, the right to speak, to be heard, to assemble, to complain to the government about its abuses, to be able to vote or impeach malefactors out of office…

Despite our best efforts, some things we believe are probably wrong. We certainly are very keen on recognizing the errors of past times and other nations. Why should our nation, why should our time, be different? If there are things that we believe, if there are institutions in our society that are in error, imperfectly conceived or executed, these are potential impediments to our survival. How do we find the errors? How do we correct them?

I maintain: with courage, the scientific method, and the Constitution.

Richard Feynman

At the intersection of science and public policy, nothing is more hazardous than dogmatism enforced through the squelching of dissenting attitudes. A generation before Sagan voiced his warning, an equally renowned scientist, the theoretical physicist Richard Feynman,* raised similar alarms. In a 1955 lecture to the National Academy of Sciences, Feynman — who a few years later would be awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics — addressed what he called “the value of science.” He ended with a warning, more desperately needed now than it was then, against closed-mindedness in science and against the urge to demonize those who challenge popular views.

“If we want to solve a problem that we have never solved before, we must leave the door to the unknown ajar,” Feynman told his listeners.

In the impetuous youth of humanity, we can make grave errors that can stunt our growth for a long time. This we will do if we say we have the answers now, so young and ignorant as we are. If we suppress all discussion, all criticism, proclaiming “This is the answer, my friends; man is saved!” we will doom humanity for a long time to the chains of authority, confined to the limits of our present imagination. It has been done so many times before.

It is our responsibility as scientists, knowing the great progress which comes from a satisfactory philosophy of ignorance, the great progress which is the fruit of freedom of thought, to proclaim the value of this freedom; to teach how doubt is not to be feared but welcomed and discussed; and to demand this freedom as our duty to all coming generations.

Of all scientific values, Sagan and Feynman both knew, the most invaluable is the freedom to doubt. That freedom is no less indispensable to a healthy civic culture. In a universe of 300 sextillion stars, we will never know everything we don’t know. Even here, on the pale blue dot that is the only home humankind has ever known, there are so many unsolved dilemmas, so many questions with only uncertain answers. Those who demand that heterodox thoughts be censored — or self-censored — are playing with fire. For when skeptics aren’t safe, all of us are at risk.

* All three scientists are of Jewish descent from Eastern Europe (Ukraine, Poland, and Belarus).

_____________________________________

➤Also check out these two posts of mine on Cosmos and astronomy:

• STARGAZING INTO YOURSELF...

• “We are a way for the cosmos to know itself.” (Carl Sagan)

DIVINE GENDER?

An article by Dr Esther Shkop, published on Aish.com on November 29, 2022

Judaism's feminine and masculine imagery of God.

Much has been made of male dominance in Judaism which, it is argued, is rooted in the biblical and liturgical conception of God in masculine images. Indeed, when Jewish sources wish to represent God as the ultimate force, that power is represented in the metaphor of Gibor (Hero) and Ish Milchamah (Man of War). When the representation is meant to indicate that God is the source of righteous judgment, He is depicted as a Shofet, the masculine word for judge; when as a benign yet stern father, God is described as Avinu sh'ba'Shamayim, our Father in Heaven. These images are undoubtedly masculine. And they are meant to be.

However, in essence, God is neither feminine nor masculine. God's essence is indescribable in any human terms, as Maimonides' fourth principle of faith states: The Creator... is not physical and is not affected by physical phenomena (Commentary to the Mishnah, Sanhedrin, ch. 10). The descriptive references, then, are for our benefit, to allow us to relate to the Divine. Undoubtedly women can and should relate to God as envisaged in masculine imagery.

However, if the imagery used in Judaic texts were solely masculine, one might be led to believe that there is a uniquely masculine approach to Judaism's conception of God. Judaic theology would thus foster a closer affinity with the world of men than that of women. Indeed, some contemporary women feel disconnected from their heritage, convinced that it simply does not speak to them as women.

In truth, masculine imagery represents only one portion of references to God in Jewish texts. The Tanakh (the five books of the Bible and the Prophets and Writings) is, in fact, replete with feminine imagery.

The Torah relates that God created the first being, Adam, "in His image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them" (Genesis 1:27). The great commentator known as the Malbim (in his work Ayelet HaShachar, ch. 31) states that wherever the concept of Adam is used in biblical and Talmudic writings, it denotes both male and female. In other words, when God first created Adam -- the first being created in the image of God -- he was formed with both female and male aspects, as an androgynous being.

Only later does the Bible describe the separation of the male and female in the formation of Adam and Eve. Henceforth, the Divine image is as intrinsic in the woman as it is in the man, and, indeed, in the absence of either man or woman, there is no complete image of God.

When describing the unconditional love that cannot and will not be extinguished by betrayal and abandonment, Moses evokes the image of maternal compassion with the description of God as El Rachum, "the Merciful God, Who will not fail you, nor destroy you" (Deuteronomy 4:31). The great 19th-century commentator Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch illuminated the fact that the concept of rachum, mercy, is rooted in the noun rechem, which means womb. The Jewish conception of compassion and love is grounded in the essentially feminine image of the womb, which holds, nurtures, and protects the fetus -- be it perfect or malformed, pretty or ugly, worthy or undeserving.

➤Related Article: The Gender of God

Maternal Imagery

Inspired by the words of the Torah, the prophet Isaiah adds more drama and depth to the maternal imagery. He renders God as the loving Mother of Israel who can never forget the child She bore and suckled, who then asks incredulously,

"Can a woman forget her babe, cease loving the son of her belly? Indeed, these may forget, but I will never forget you." (Isaiah 49:15)

In a similar vein, Isaiah presents God as the Source of life and peace. With a descriptive personification of a nursing mother, he portrays the great metaphor of Gods comfort:

"I stretch out to her like a river of peace, like a stream flowing with the honor of the nations, and you may suckle. You will be carried on the side and played with on the knees. As one whose mother comforts him, so I will comfort you; and you will be comforted in Jerusalem." (Isaiah 66:12-13)

Often in his prophecies of comfort, Isaiah presents God in woman-to-woman dialogue with the collective of Israel, Zion, who is complaining about her long years of suffering. God soothes the despairing Zion like a sympathetic midwife, explaining that her pains are but the travails that precede birth and asking rhetorically, "Will I bring you to the breaking point and not bring forth? If I am the deliverer [midwife], will I stop [the birth]...?" (Isaiah 66:9)

Similarly, the maternal imagery of God can be found throughout Psalms, the primary source of Jewish liturgy. This is quite explicit in chapter 22 (written by King David about four centuries before Isaiah), in which the poetry transposes the babe's reliance on the mothers breast with its reliance on God:

"For You are the One Who drew me out of the belly, the One Who secured me on my mothers breasts. Upon You I have been cast from the womb; from my mothers belly You have been my God." (Psalms 22:10-11)

This image of God's relation to the Jewish people as that of the nonjudgmental, unconditionally loving Mother flowers in the poetic renditions of the later prophets. In his description of the Exodus from Egypt and the birth of Israel as a nation, Ezekiel employs the concept of God as a high-soaring eagle who takes note of Israel, depicted as an unwanted, abandoned female infant wallowing in blood (Ezekiel 16:6). The hovering Presence, resolute that the infant will live, is contrasted to the parents and midwives who had rejected her. While they had cast her off, still attached to the afterbirth, God embraces, washes, and swaddles the baby girl.

The warmth with which Ezekiel describes the dressing and adorning of the growing babe sheds a new and warm light on the rituals with which mothers bestow gentle affection on their children. There is no more intimate and tender act of giving than that of a woman when she cleanses her baby and dresses it in pretty clothes. To be able to adore a baby despite its filth, to coo and sweet-talk a child while wiping its bottom, to wash and anoint its skin, and then cover it with embroidered swaddling probably does more for building a child's self-esteem than we can ever know. That God ascribes to Himself such loving, albeit mundane acts speaks more to the value of what has been called "women's work" than all the exhortations of modern literature.

➤Related Article: God: An Introduction

Female Strength

Lest it seem that the use of the feminine metaphor is limited to depictions of nurturing and tender motherhood, Isaiah confounds our prejudices. Not only does the woman personify the collective of the Jewish people in its relation to God, but the prophet directly envisions God as a woman of strength.

Isaiah describes, in the third person, the vengeance of God against our enemies:

"As a mighty man He will go out; like a man of war He will stir up jealousy. He will blare, even scream, as He overcomes His enemies." (Isaiah 42:13)

However, in the development of that same prophetic vision, the voice moves to the first person, as God speaks of long-simmering fury. The Man of War undergoes a metamorphosis and emerges in the strength and cries of a birthing woman in the throes of labor:

"I have forever held my peace, I have hushed and refrained Myself; now, like a birthing woman, I will cry out, panting and gasping at once." (Isaiah 42:14)

The Malbim, in his commentary on this verse, differentiates between the words eshom, rapid, panting exhalations, and eshaf, which refers to gasping inhalations. In what might be the first description of the Lamaze method, the prophet transforms the allegorical meaning inherent in the image of the birthing woman. She is no longer seen as a victim of forces she cannot control; instead, she is rendered as the symbol of strength, of creative force. Interestingly, the Hebrew word chayil, valor or force, which connotes labor contractions, is the root of the Hebrew words for military forces and soldier.

The Divine Name

In English translations of Judaic texts, the Divinity is referred to as God, Lord, or Hashem (literally, the Name). Yet God has a Name, the famous tetragrammaton, the four-letter Name, which is made up of the letters yud-heh and vav-heh. This ineffable Name is a contraction of the Hebrew verb "to be" in the past, present, and future, denoting Gods existence before time, in the present, and after the end of time, and is therefore often translated as the Eternal. In the Hebraic source, this Name is written as a feminine noun and signifies the aspect of rachamim, mercy, which, as indicated above, is quintessentially feminine. Thus every blessing and prayer we say, every evocation of the Eternal Presence, kabbalistically called the Shekhinah, is in fact an evocation of the feminine concept -- the unconditional love of the Creator.

Moreover, this feminine four-letter Name is used throughout the Torah and all of our liturgy to suggest hashgachah pratit. Hashgachah pratit, commonly translated in English as Divine Providence, follows each person like a shadow, protecting and guiding each human being and according infinite value to each individual. Its presence is invisible, but it is the One with which we commune, for it is with us at all times. This concept is unlike the concept of Elokim, another of God's Names, which is written as a plural masculine noun and signifies the forces and multiple powers manifest in nature visible yet uncontrollable, relentless, and impersonal.

One can only be impressed by the majestic beauty and profound emotion that Jewish sources, especially the prophets, conjure through the use of feminine imagery. The numerous and various strong feminine images more than balance out the masculine ones. While we must remember that the Divine is beyond form and gender, human language by necessity conceives even the most abstract in visual images. The multiplicity of feminine images alongside the masculine, and the context in which one or the other is used, requires close study and often mystical understanding.

Careful analysis of the Hebraic texts will reveal that religious experiences and the immediacy of God are to be found in the world of women no less than in that of men. It would be a tragedy and a travesty to castrate the language, for it would then remove God from the experiential milieus of both men and women, rendering us mortals mute, unable to commune with or communicate about our Creator.

________________________________________

About the Author of this article:

Dr Esther Shkop is Dean of the Blitstein Institute of Hebrew Theological College, and Associate Professor of Bible. She has a Ph.D. in Public Policy Analysis, a Masters in Biblical Studies and a B.A. in English Lit and Philosophy.

EHYEH-ASHER-EHYEH

אֶהְיֶה אֲשֶׁר אֶהְיֶה‎ (’ehye ’ăšer ’ehye) - the Hebrew text with niqqud

I've always been intrigued and bewildered by this biblical Hebrew expression. Wikipedia reports "I Am that I Am" as a common English translation of the Hebrew phrase אֶהְיֶה אֲשֶׁר אֶהְיֶה‎‎ (’ehye ’ăšer ’ehye; pronounced [ʔehˈje ʔaˈʃer ʔehˈje])– also "I am who (I) am", "I will become what I choose to become", "I am what I am", "I will be what I will be", "I create what(ever) I create", or "I am the Existing One". The traditional English translation within Judaism favours "I will be what I will be" because the imperfective aspect in Modern Hebrew is normally used for future tense and there is no present tense with direct object of the verb "to be" in the Hebrew language.

This is Rabbi Jonathan Sachs' interpretation of the phrase:

[The Hebrew expression] is often translated as ‘I am who I am’, or ‘I am He who is’. Early and medieval Christian thinkers understood it to mean God was saying He was ‘Being-itself, timeless, infinite and purely spiritual. The source of all life’.

But this is not a Jewish definition of God, and

Ehyeh asher ehyeh means none of these things.

It means ‘I will be what, where, or how I will be’. What is important here (and what is missed by all other translations) is the future tense. God is defining Himself as the Lord of history who is soon to get involved in human history like never before, to make great change, to set free a group of slaves from the mightiest empire of the ancient world and lead them on a journey towards freedom.

“I will be what I will be” means that God was about to history and transform it. God was telling Moshe that there was no way he or anyone else could know in advance what God was about to do, but that if they would just have trust in God, they were about to see the future that He will bring about.

God defined Himself in the phrase “I will be what I will be”, meaning, “I will be what, where and how I choose” 一 hence the God who defies predictability and probability.

~ ⭖ ~

• And this is how scholar Gerardo G. Sachs further interprets:

Ehyeh-Asher-Ehyeh is the ambiguous and even contradictory answer Moses receives when he asks God to tell him His Name (Ex. 3:14). All the classical commentators related to this question, and this short notation aims to take a fresh look at the scene. To this end, it reviews Moses' background, tries to explain his attitude, and then expands on the subject proper. 

This is not the first time God speaks with man. Indeed, from the very start He addresses His creatures. It is always He who takes a straightaway initiative, and from Adam through Abraham none seems surprised or hesitant; they listen and eventually reply. But with Moses, it was not straightaway. First, Moses' curiosity is provoked, and not until he is drawn to the Burning Bush is communication established. Moses at first tries to evade the mission put upon him, and before going on from that he poses a fundamental question: Who is calling to him? Why is Moses the first to ask this? 

In regard to this, we recall his special circumstances; he had been raised at the court of the principal power of the time, and in that ancient time a name was much more than just a means to identify a person. As to his own background, according to Exodus 2:11-14 he must have known his origins. But we do not know what this meant to him. We do not know how much of Hebrew tradition endured after several hundred years of the sojourn in Egypt, how many stories of the Patriarchs and their meetings with God were recalled in his family, and whether Moses, separated from his parents from earliest childhood, would have learned them. 

We may assume that at the Egyptian court he learned all the worldly arts and sciences of the time, and was trained to make critical evaluation of the kinds of situations and challenges he would meet as a member of the governing class. He was also familiar with the god-like status of the reigning Pharaoh he was to serve. Taking this into account, Moses' cautious reaction is understandable. 

But why does he ask for the name? It is now little more than a formality for a person to introduce himself by name. The name by itself does not express anything. Traditional Jewish parents may still honor a deceased forebear by bestowing the name on a descendant, but even then the meaning of the name has nothing to do with the personality of its bearer. Besides this, most people select a first name for a child that goes well with the last name, or according to what is in vogue, to the extent that sometimes you can even guess the approximate age of a person by his or her first name. 

In antiquity, each person had but one name, and its meaning had much to do with its bearer. It carried something of a characterization, or a pattern for the forthcoming life, as is often noted in the Book of Genesis. Also, it was believed that the name of a demon, spirit, or deity conveyed its essence, strengths and weaknesses. Pronouncing it could make it appear and was thus dangerous. (A reminder of this belief stands behind the Third Commandment, prohibiting the thoughtless use of God's name, and the later prohibition of pronouncing it at all.) Therefore, when Moses asks the name of the Unknown who introduces Himself as the God of his Patriarchs, he needs this information as part of the message he is to transmit to Pharaoh, but he also seeks firm ground for himself when dealing with the pantheon of Egyptian deities with which he is familiar. And the answer he receives is terrific, authentic, and impressive: "Ehyeh Asher Ehyeh." 

To comprehend the significance of this, it is necessary to know that Hebrew verbs, unlike verbs in the Indo-European languages, have no present, past, and future tenses. There is a gerund form for an ongoing action of undetermined duration, and two other forms which in modern usage apply to "past" and "future," but essentially indicate only whether an action has or has not been concluded. If the letter or word which represents the personal preposition stands before the verbal root, the action has not yet concluded; if it stands after the verbal root, the action has been concluded. 

In this instance, the personal preposition letter of ehyeh is an aleph that stands for the first person singular pronoun. The other three letters come from the root h-y-h that connotes "to be." Hence, "ehyeh" signifies an action not yet concluded and can mean likewise "I am" or "I shall be." So, Ehyeh Asher Ehyeh can be understood in four very different ways of self-definition: 

1. 'I AM WHO I AM' – referring to an eternally unchanging Being. Such understanding corresponds to a "static" philosophy, the idea that since the World was created everything remains unchanged as it came from the Hand of God. 

2. 'I AM WHO I SHALL BE' – standing for a fundamental constancy regardless of variations. Such a conception of the Eternal does not ignore the evident changes that occur in nature in the course of time, but considers them of secondary importance without affecting the eternally unchanging essence of God.

3. 'I SHALL BE WHO I AM' – is the idea that evolution is inherent to the essence of God. It is in agreement with present scientific knowledge of the universe, the formation of the galaxies, the evolution of living creatures on earth, and particularly to the possibilities of the genetic techniques with its crossings and "new models" of plants and animals. In line with this interpretation, the contemporary Jewish naturalist Lutz Zwillenberg wrote, "The purpose of the Universe is the realization of all the possibilities inherent in it." 

4. 'I SHALL BE WHO I SHALL BE' – can have two meanings: "To every one I am something else," or "each person has a different idea of Me," as masterfully expressed by the author of Shir ha-kavod, a well-known synagogue hymn, or to a theistic thinker it could read as if God continuously realizes Himself. 

These four interpretations are not only different but also mutually exclusive. Contradictory possibilities are anchored in this marvelous Ehyeh, which He presents as being His true name. Its form is different according to who is speaking: When God presents Himself he says "I" (beginning with aleph). When man speaks of Him he says "He" (beginning with yod). Therefore, His name from His side is written aleph-hei-yod-hei and from our side yod-heivav-hei. (Yod and vav are similar in form and sometimes interchanged in biblical Hebrew.) 

Thereafter Moses demands Let My people go that they may worship Me in the wilderness (Ex. 7:16). Worship Whom? The Absolute beyond our comprehension, the dimensionless and timeless Ehyeh Asher Ehyeh. 

• Moreover, here's my Wikibook in Italian about The Name of God in Judaism:

➤Da Wikibooks, manuali e libri di testo liberi scritti da Monozigote:

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IL NOME DI DIO NELL'EBRAISMO

Il Nome santo nelle tradizioni mistiche ebraiche
Nr. 4 della Serie misticismo ebraico

Autore: Monozigote 2021

ויאמר אלהים אל־משה אהיה אשר אהיה ויאמר כה תאמר לבני ישראל אהיה שלחני אליכם׃

« DIO disse a Mosè: «IO SONO COLUI CHE SONO».
Poi disse: «Dirai così ai figli d'Israele:
"IO SONO mi ha mandato da voi"» »
(Esodo 3:14)

Indice

Copertina

⇒ Introduzione

— 1 - Presenza e discorso

— 2 - Perdere il Nome

— 3 - Il Nome intenzionale

— 4 - I settanta volti di Dio

— 5 - L'albero dei nomi

— 6 - Nome e lettera

— 7 - Redenzione nel Nome

— 8 - Conclusione

⇒ Appendice: Hagiga 15a

Bibliografia

PREMESSA

Una delle tradizioni più potenti del fascino ebraico per il linguaggio è quella del Nome. In effetti, la tradizione mistica ebraica sembrerebbe una meditazione lunga due millenni sulla natura del nome in relazione all'oggetto e su come il nome media tra soggetto e oggetto. Anche nel corso della svolta linguistica del ventesimo secolo, l'aspetto più notevole nei filosofi ebrei – quasi tutti secolari – è quello del nome personale, qui d'importanza fondamentale nell'articolazione dei rapporti umani e del dialogo.
Questo mio studio esamina i testi dell'ebraismo relativi al Nome di Dio, offrendo un'analisi filosofica di questi come mezzo per comprendere il ruolo metafisico del nome in generale, in termini di relazione con l'identità. Lo studio inizia con la formazione dell'ebraismo rabbinico nella tarda antichità, viaggiando attraverso lo sviluppo del motif nella Cabala medievale, dove il Nome raggiunge la sua dichiarazione più grandiosa e sistematica — e quella che ha maggiormente contribuito a formare le idee dei filosofi ebrei nel ventesimo e ventunesimo secolo. Questa indagine metterà in evidenza alcune idee metafisiche che si sono sviluppate all'interno dell'ebraismo dalle fonti bibliche e che presentano un contrasto diretto ai paradigmi della filosofia occidentale. Quindi un mio sottotesto più ampio è una critica alla metafisica greca dell'essere che l'Occidente ha ereditato e che i filosofi ebrei spesso sottopongono a sfide di varia sottigliezza; sono questi filosofi che spesso assegnano un'enfasi particolare al nome personale, e questa enfasi dipende dall'influenza storica della tradizione metafisica ebraica del Nome di Dio.

~ * ~

Wikibooks e libri di testo liberi scritti da Monozigote, nella Serie misticismo ebraico:

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WIKIBOOKS DELLA SERIE MISTICISMO EBRAICO

Numero d'ordine	SERIE MISTICISMO EBRAICO	Stage
1	Messianismo Chabad e la redenzione del mondo — Il messaggio messianico di un movimento ebraico moderno
2	Introduzione allo Zohar — Gli aspetti profondi del misticismo ebraico nel Libro dello Splendore
3	Isaac Luria e la preghiera — Innovazioni lurianiche nella preghiera Shema Yisrael
4	Il Nome di Dio nell'Ebraismo — Il Nome santo nelle tradizioni mistiche ebraiche
5	Rivelazione e Cabala — Crisi della tradizione mistica nella Cabala
6	Storia intellettuale degli ebrei italiani — Ebraismo italiano nella prima età moderna
7	Abulafia e i segreti della Torah — Esoterismo, Cabalismo e Profezia in Abramo Abulafia
8	Israele – La scelta di un popolo — Elezione e Consacrazione nell'Ebraismo
9	Nahmanide teologo — La teologia di Moshe ben Nachman, il Ramban

THE AMAZING UKRAINIAN JEWS

Volodymyr Zelensky

President Zelensky joins a long list of amazing Ukrainian Jews who have made the world a better place.

In the weeks since Russia invaded Ukraine, sparking untold suffering and destruction and causing the largest refugee crisis since World War II, Ukraine’s Jewish President, Volodymyr Zelensky has emerged as a hero. Zelensky has rallied nations and individuals across the world and he’s been open about his Jewish background, explaining to journalists that he is the grandson of Holocaust survivors and grew up in “an ordinary Soviet Jewish family.”

Zelensky isn’t the only Ukrainian Jew to inspire people around the world and change history. Here are 11 other Ukrainian Jews who made the world a better place.

Ba’al Shem Tov

Yisrael ben Eliezer was born in 1700 in Poland, close to the Ukrainian border. He became a renown mystic leader and is the founder of the Jewish Hasidic movement, which emphasizes worshiping God with intense joy. He amassed a devoted following of Jews who called him the “Ba’al Shem Tov,” the “Good Master of the (Divine) Name”. He settled in the Ukrainian city of Medzhybizh sometime in the 1730s and taught Jews there that even the most simple Jew is able to reach the heavens with simple, heartfelt prayers.

He incorporated elements from Jewish mysticism into his teachings, emphasizing that every single element of the world contains a Divine spark. Huge numbers of Ukrainian Jews embraced the Hasidic movement which later spread throughout Europe and the world.

Ze’ev (Vladimir) Jabotinsky

Ze'ev Jabotinsky

Born in 1880 in the city of Odessa, Ze’ev Jabotinsky grew up completely assimilated. He had no connection to Judaism until he was an adult. He became a celebrated Russian journalist, filing stories from across Europe.

In 1903, the infamous Kishinev Pogrom changed the course of Jabotinsky’s life. Over three days of rioting, beginning on Easter Sunday, hundreds of Jews in the Moldovan city of Kishinev were attacked, injured, and killed. Their property was destroyed and Jews cowered in fear as the murderous mob rampaged unchecked. Hundreds of Jewish women were violently assaulted. It became clear that Jews had little future in Europe.

Jabotinsky was convinced Jews needed a Jewish state to be secure and became an ardent Zionist. He helped found the Jewish Legion to help British forces during World War I, and advocated tirelessly for a Jewish state in the land of Israel. Expelled from the land of Israel in 1929 by the British authorities, Jabotinsky continued to advance the cause of Jewish liberation, founding the underground Irgun military force and insisting on Jewish statehood. He died in exile in 1940.

Golda Meir

Golda Meir

Israel’s 4th Prime Minister was born in 1898 in Kyiv. Her family was destitute. She recalled her father looking for work and having only bread and herring to eat. Golda Meir wrote in her memoirs, “Despite everything, on Friday nights our house was always full of people, members of the family mostly. I remember swarms of cousins, second cousins, aunts and uncles. None of them was to survive the Holocaust, but they live on in my mind’s eye, sitting around our kitchen table, drinking tea out of glasses and, on the Sabbath and holidays, singing for hours - and I remember my parents’ sweet voices ringing out above the others.”

Meir went on to become one of the architects of the Zionist movement. She worked for Israel’s Federation of Labor; after World War II she negotiated with the British authorities to let in desperate Jewish refugees, and conducted diplomacy with Jordan’s King Abdullah I, trying (in vain) to convince him to refrain from attacking a future Jewish state.

Golda Meir was one of the signatories of Israel’s Declaration of Independence on May 14, 1948, and served as Israel’s ambassador to Russia, as Israel’s Foreign Minister (she was the world’s only female foreign minister at the time), and in became Israel’s Prime Minister in 1969, serving until 1974.

Otto Preminger

Otto Preminger

The groundbreaking film noir director Otto Ludwig Preminger was born in 1905 in Vyzhnytsia, Ukraine. He started his career as a theater director, and later became one of the most famous movie directors in the world. In his long movie career, he directed over 40 films, including Laura, Carmen Jones, The Man With the Golden Arm, Bounjour Tristesse, Porgy and Bess, Anatomy of a Murder, Exodus and Tell Me You Love Me Junie Moon.

Natan Sharansky

Natan Sharansky

The famous former Soviet refusenik and Israeli politician Natan Sharansky was born in Donetsk, Ukraine in 1948. As a young man he worked as an interpreter for the Soviet dissident Andrei Sakharov. As Natan explored his Jewish identity, he became a spokesman for the Soviet Jewry dissident movement. He became a refusenik in 1973 after his application to emigrate to Israel was denied, and was arrested on trumped-up charges of treason and spying in 1977.

Sentenced to 13 years in a labor camp in Siberia, Natan coped with his imprisonment by focusing on his Jewish life. He later observed that in prison, as he embraced his Jewish identity, he found himself feeling like a free man.

Natan Sharansky was finally allowed to emigrate in 1986. He moved to Israel and later served as President of the Zionist Forum and editor of the Jerusalem Report. He formed a new political party in 1995, and was elected to Israel’s Knesset, eventually serving in various ministerial roles and as Deputy Prime Minister from 2001 to 2003. He served as Chairman of the Executive for the Jewish Agency from June 2009 to August 2018.

Simon Wiesenthal

Simon Wiesenthal

The famed Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal was born in 1908 in Buchach, Ukraine. During the Holocaust he was imprisoned in five Nazi concentration camps. After surviving the Holocaust, he dedicated his life to bringing Nazi criminals to justice and to educating future generations about the Holocaust.

In the days after his liberation from Mauthausen concentration camp, Wiesenthal handed American prosecutors a list of Nazis and offered his personal testimony to their crimes. In 1960 Weisenthal, his wife Cyla, and their daughter Paulinka set up the Jewish Documentation Center in Vienna. Working out of a tiny office with little help, they scoured telephone directories to locate Nazi war criminals. Their efforts led to the 1963 arrest of Karl Silberhauer, who helped arrest Anne Frank and her family, Franz Stangl, the commandant of Treblinka and Sobibor death camps, and many others. In 1977, the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles carried forward his vision; it is a global Jewish human rights center that researches the Holocaust and educates people about its horrors.

Selman Waksman

Selman Waksman

Born in 1888 in Kiev, Selman Waksman became one of the world’s most foremost biochemists. He not only discovered many antibiotics, he coined the term as it’s used today. A teacher at Rutgers University for 40 years, Dr. Waksman was awarded the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 1952. He’s credited with developing over a dozen antibiotics, including those that treat tuberculosis. He used the proceeded of his Nobel Prize to fund the Waksman Institute of Microbiology at Rutgers to continue research.

Vladimir Horowitz

Vladimir Horowitz

One of the greatest pianists of the 20th century, Vladimir Horowitz was born in 1903 in Kyiv. He redefined many of the most famous pieces of classical music, interpreting standards by Chopin, Brahms, Liszt, Rachmaninoff and Tchaikovsky using his prodigious talent and flamboyant style. Horowitz used to say he wanted to continually evolve as an artist, and “grow until I die.”

Sholom Aleichem

Sholom Aleichem

Sholom Aleichem (which means the traditional Hebrew greeting “Peace to you”) was the pen name of Sholom Rabinovitsch. He was born in 1859 in the Ukrainian town of Pereyaslav-Khmelnitsky. Though he originally wrote in Hebrew and Russian, Sholom Aleichem later began to write exclusively in Yiddish.

His first Yiddish story appeared in 1883, and he went on to publish more than 40 Yiddish books, including plays, short stories and full-length novels. His stories of Tevya the milkman formed the basis of the 1964 musical Fiddler on the Roof. A wealthy man, Sholom Aleichem used his personal fortune to underwrite Yiddish publishing and support struggling Yiddish authors.

Mila Kunis

Mila Kunis

The actress Milena Markovna "Mila" Kunis was born in Chernivtsi, Ukraine in 1983 and immigrated to the United States when she was seven years old. Despite the fact that her husband Ashton Kutcher isn’t Jewish, Mila has been open about the fact that her family, including her two children, Wyatt and Dimitri, celebrate Shabbat. “We do Shabbat at our house,” she’s told reporters. When her daughter Wyatt was young, she used to wake up excited every Friday morning, looking forward to the family’s Friday night Shabbat dinner.

“I love the idea of - regardless of where we are in the world, regardless of what we’re doing, on Friday night, we take a minute to just acknowledge one another, to acknowledge our children; to acknowledge our family, say I love you… And that’s how I look at Shabbat,” she’s explained.

Mila led a moment of silence in solidarity with Ukraine at the Oscars ceremony this year, and she and her husband have been publicly thanked by Ukrainian President Zelensky for helping Ukraine in its hour of need.

Jan Koum

Jan Koum

The billionaire founder of WhatsApp was born in Kyiv in 1976. After the fall of Communism, Jan and his mother moved to California, but life was far from easy in their new home. His father remained behind in Ukraine, and soon after moving to America, Jan’s mother became ill with cancer. Jan worked as a janitor while he was still a teenager, and he and his mother struggled to make ends meet with the help of food stamps and public housing.

Jan taught himself programming and worked for Ernst and Young and Yahoo. He got the idea for WhatsApp, a free telephone and messaging system, from his own experiences as a teenager, when he found it prohibitively expensive to call relatives. Jan teamed up with friends and fellow programmers and launched WhatsApp Inc. in 2009. The business’ first headquarters was the very building in Mountain View, California, where Jan used to go to collect his family’s food stamps.

The company hit many roadblocks. Jan and his partners persevered and ironed out many of the kinks in their business model. In 2014, Facebook bought WhatsApp for $19 billion. Since selling WhatsApp, Jan has founded The Koum Family Foundation, which gives grants to higher education, as well as to Jewish and Israeli charitable causes.

The Author of this article:

Dr. Yvette Alt Miller

Dr. Alt Miller lives with her family in Chicago, and has lectured internationally on Jewish topics. Her book Angels at the table: a Practical Guide to Celebrating Shabbat takes readers through the rituals of Shabbat and more, explaining the full beautiful spectrum of Jewish traditions with warmth and humor. It has been praised as "life-changing", a modern classic, and used in classes and discussion groups around the world.