Rationalism Reviewed

The latest issue of Tradition has a review of my new book Rationalism vs. Mysticism: Schisms in Traditional Jewish Thought, by Rabbi Alex Ozar. Interestingly, he present a sustained critique that my approach is not rationalist enough! He also argues that my justifications of the charedi community banning the rationalit approach are inadequate. This reminds me of the time that I got into a heated argument with the prominent rabbi of a Young Israel where I was giving a lecture, in which he was yelling that the Gedolim had no right to ban my books and I was countering that they absolutely did!

While I will leave it to you to decide whether his critiques of my position are correct, there is one part of the review which I must comment upon:

"As written, Slifkin’s book admirably serves its purpose in securing a space for traditionalist Jews inclined toward rationalism—they, at least, will know that they stand on firm (and holy) ground. For most readers of Tradition, I would expect, this is unnecessary..."

I would agree that for most readers of Tradition this is unnecessary. However, I would like to point out that none other than one of the permanent writers in Tradition itself is a staunch anti-rationalist who has insisted, in the pages of Tradition, that it is forbidden to believe that Chazal based laws on scientific errors (and that spontaneous generation has not been disproved!) and who also argues that Rambam "does not explicitly deny the possibility" that some people can perform magic. 

In addition, I would like to say that even for those who already know that the rationalist approach stands on firm theological grounds, I believe that it is still important and enlightening for them to see the extent to which the rationalist and mystical approaches diverge - which is far, far greater than people believe.

The review is freely available online at this link, and you can buy Rationalism vs. Mysticism directly from the museum website at this link (please do NOT buy it on Amazon!), with free shipping in the US.