I had no idea how I was related to my cousin Saul. He was someone’s brother’s son or something like that. A real tangle of branches there. But no matter. I knew that he was a professor and was working on a book about one of our ancestors who was a rabbi. Finally, a rabbi! I had been hoping for one in the family like I once did for a real toy in the CrackerJack box instead of those dumb decals.
So I decided to pay Saul a visit.
I envisioned him as an old scholarly type, crumbs in the beard and that sort of thing. But entering that brownstone in Brooklyn, I was surprised to find that Saul was about my age, tall and trim, more legal than academic. He was standing near the window in the living room with his eyes closed, rocking slightly, muttering under his breath. I had yet to encounter anyone in the family who was particularly religious but of course Saul was researching some old Talmudist, in which case praying by the window made some sense.
As for me, worry was the only form of prayer I understood; aggravation the only faith. Loosing patience, I had to cough three times to snap him out of it.
“Sorry,” I said. “I didn’t realize you were praying.”
“God forbid,” he joked. “I was just wondering. Come in. I have some tea ready.”
As we sat down on the couches near the fireplace with its fake log, he explained his project to me. It was a biography – the definitive one he hoped – of this famous rabbi from Vilna from the 19th century to whom both of us could be traced.
“His name was Meyer Shapiro,” Saul said with a bit of opera, “but he was known as the Tipsch Gaon of Letz.”
“This him?” I asked pointing to the cameo on his mantle.
“Who knows. It’s someone.”
“Gaon. I’ve heard that word.”
“In ancient Hebrew it meant arrogance or pride. But came to refer to a genius.”
“And tipsch?”
“A fool.”
“So he was a genius fool?”
“Yes. How cool is that? They called him that because he was a brilliant rabbi but he was also an adeist.”
I thought that was some kind of dental assistant, which made no sense at all, until Saul explained in that unctious tone he adopted when he was explaining something, that adeism meant one who did not need God in order to be righteous or even spiritual.
“So he was an atheist,” I said proudly. “So am I.”
“No one in their right mind becomes an atheist. They have no holidays!”
“Ha.”
“No, no, no. Atheism is an ism. An ideological rejection of God. A simple switcheroo.”
“Of what with what?” I asked.
“Of one ism for another. You reject God or Deism because you think you have a better ism. Like Scientism or Marxism or Totalitarianism. Materialism.”
“But Rabbi Meyer…” I said with prunes for lips, “rejected it for a much better reason.”
“Bingo!” he said, missing my sarcasm like a dodged pie. “He did not reject the idea of God at all; he simply did not accept it. He had no use for it. He devoted himself to leading a spiritual life without the big You-Know-Who in his way.”
“You’re losing me. You either believe on God or you don’t. Don’t you?”
“Rebbe Meyer had the – what…chutzpah? – to ask the question: Can we have a meaningful, compassionate, even spiritual life without having to resort to the concept of God? You can see how even posing God as a concept rather than a fact would get him in some hot water with the muckymucks.”
“He was in hot water?”
“They tried to boil him in it. But he was fearless. And his answer was...yes. In fact all too often – as the sad history of the planet proves – the notion of God seems to stand in the way of such a life.”
“But if he believed in adeism isn’t that just another ism?”
“Ah. I can see you have his questioning spirit within you. As do I. And the answer is…no. Adeism – as Meyer conceived it – is not an ideology. It is an attitude towards life, towards spirituality, towards living compassionately. Not by relying on God to tell us what to do but by being fully human.”
“But that’s just what atheists believe,” I said, speaking for myself.
“Atheism rejects the spirit of God as well as the being. But to Meyer we need to love God without God, if you see what I mean. We need to understand that there is more to life than just atoms dancing. That’s my image, not his, by the way. He was ignorant of science. But he believed that there was more to life than just material existence. A spiritual component if you like. But without a man behind the curtain. A Prime Mover. A Holy Moley.”
Sitting there with a rather smug look, I had the feeling that Saul was a bit of a pedant. One of those professors who challenge you to think for yourself by telling you just what to think. On the other hand, what he was saying made sense. I had believed in not believing in God for a long time. Was that an isn’t or an ism or wasm…I had no idea. But it did not seem to be stopping me from living a decent life. Or trying to anyway. Common sense was better than burning bushes as far as I was concerned and there were better commandments than the ones on tablets. Like Duke Ellington’s Four Freedoms: freedom from hate, from self-pity, from the fear of doing something that would help someone else more than you, from the pride that makes you think you are better than anyone else.
Stuff like that.
“Meyer,” he went on, “asked the question: what does it mean to live the spiritual life? The answer…it simply means an awareness beyond one’s own selfish needs. It means being open to moments of compassion, of wonder, of delight. He said God is nothing but a middleman and the Old Testament just a faulty contract. He was a real Tipsch Gaon, our Meyer. Here…take that picture for your album. Maybe it will inspire you.”
“But you don’t even know if it’s him.”
“How perfect then!”
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