Judaic man

About this book

With crime, drug addiction, nihilism, pornography, and alienation chipping away at the moral fiber of Western society, many people have turned to classical Greek philosophy and to Christianity to restore private and public morality. However, Professor Eidelberg argues, the Greco-Christian tradition contains certain inherent dichotomies - for example, the individual vs. society, freedom vs. authority, morality vs. the law, reason vs. revelation, the physical vs. the spiritual - that have contributed to the malaise of contemporary society. Since these dichotomies are foreign to Torah Judaism, the author takes the revolutionary step of applying Torah concepts to the present ills of Western civilization as he portrays the Torah as the paradigm of knowledge and of how mankind should live. In developing his thesis, Professor Eidelberg explores the Torah's conception of human nature and history by interfacing religion, philosophy, cosmology, psychology, and politics. He articulates a Judaic psychology that, contrary to virtually all modern schools of psychology, affirms the primacy of reason over the passions. He thus prepares the ground for providing rational and ethical constraints on democracy's two cardinal principles: freedom and equality. This done, Eidelberg formulates Judaic principles of education to enhance the role of reason and morality in public life.