{"id":117,"date":"2006-10-05T19:17:49","date_gmt":"2006-10-05T19:17:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/summametaphysica.com\/ge\/90010-contraction-of-divine-consciousness\/90012-grounding\/90012d-integration-of-divine-hester-self-limitation-contraction\/"},"modified":"2018-04-23T21:11:22","modified_gmt":"2018-04-23T21:11:22","slug":"90012d-integration-of-divine-hester-self-limitation-contraction","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.summametaphysica.com\/ge\/90010-contraction-of-divine-consciousness\/90012-grounding\/90012d-integration-of-divine-hester-self-limitation-contraction\/","title":{"rendered":"900.12d Integration of Divine Hester<\/i>; Self-limitation; Contraction (pps.129-131)"},"content":{"rendered":"

hard cover page 129<\/p>\n

Jewish theologians carry forward the interrelated themes of Hester<\/em>, Self-limitation, and contraction of the Divine.510<\/sup><\/p>\n

. . . in a sense, God restricts Himself from seeing evil, as the Prophet exclaims, “Your eyes are too pure to look upon evil, You cannot gaze upon wrongdoing” [Habakkuk 1:131].
\n-Aryeh Kaplan511<\/sup><\/p>\n

. .. one of the basic concepts of man’s predicament was that God should hold back His Light and hide His presence.
\n-Luzzatto512<\/sup><\/p>\n

God hides Himself, putting aside His essential infiniteness and withholding His endless light to the extent necessary in order that the world may exist.
\n-Steinsaltz513<\/sup><\/p>\n

The Bible knows of God’s hiding His face, of times when the contact between Heaven and earth seems to be interrupted. God seems to withdraw Himself utterly from the earth and no longer to participate in its existence. The space of history is then full of noise, but as it were, empty of divine breath. For one who believes in the living God, who knows about Him, and is fated to spend his life in a time of His hiddenness, it is very difficult to live.
\n-Buber514<\/sup><\/p>\n

. . . the distinction between two types of Divine punishment, Hester<\/em> Panim<\/em> and Middat Hadin<\/em>. . . . In Deut. 31:17. the Torah describes the ultimate punishment of Hester<\/em> Panim<\/em>:
\nThen My anger will flare up against them in that day and I<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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510 <\/sup>See also Merton, The New Man,<\/em> pp. 123 and 127. “One, who infinitely hidden and transcendent . . .”;”the Lord is hidden in the clouds of an infinite and inexorable transcendency.”<\/p>\n

511 <\/sup>Kaplan, The Infinite Light, p. 57.<\/p>\n

512 <\/sup>Luzzatto, The Way of God.<\/em> p. 123.<\/p>\n

513 <\/sup>Steinsaltz, The Thirteen Petalled Rose,<\/em> p. 37.<\/p>\n

514 <\/sup>Buber, “God and the World’s Evil,” in Noveck, Contemporary Jewish Thought<\/em>, vol. 4, p. 256.<\/p>\n

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will abandon them and hide My face from them, and they shall be devoured and many evils and distress shall befall them; so that they will say in that day, “Are not these evils come upon us, because our God is not in our midst?” Hester<\/em> Panim<\/em> involves a temporary abandonment of the world, a suspension of His active surveillance, as Rashi clearly explains, “as though I do not see their distress.”
\n-Soloveitchik515<\/sup><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The Holocaust, in Rav Soloveitchik’s view, is a case of Hester<\/em> Panim<\/em>.516<\/sup><\/p>\n

In the context of post-World War I1 Jewish philosophical thought, the Hester<\/em> Panim<\/em> of Rav Soloveitchik is not radical. However, in the context of the flow of Jewish rabbinic theological doctrine, the attribution of Hester<\/em> Panim<\/em> to any discrete event is a major statement, if not challenge, and a courageous attempt to grapple with the theological conundrum posed by the Holocaust. Indeed, most Jewish philosophers seem unwilling to grapple with the whole subject, and when doing so, tread very carefully. The introduction of the concept of Hester<\/em> to the Holocaust, however, opens a Pandora’s box of theological questions, as was probably not unforeseen by Soloveitchik.<\/p>\n

By employing Hester<\/em> Panim<\/em>, one is indeed opening the entire matter of Providence to examination, elaboration, and extension. For the concept is too highly charged when not carefully and satisfactorily delimited. Our own Unified Formulation, which is quite broader in its delimiting of Providence, will indeed cite the attribution of Soloveitchik and others of Hester<\/em> Panim<\/em> to the Holocaust in support of our formulation.<\/p>\n

Ascribing the Holocaust to periodic Hester<\/em> Panim<\/em>, as Soloveitchik seems to do, or, along similar lines, to an “eclipse of God” a la Fackenheim or Buber, opens a further gamut of extremely problematic questions: What was the demarcation line, before and after, and why? If the Hester<\/em> was punishment, for what sin(s)? Were six million people, including a million children, so guilty? Was a warning given, and, if not, why not? Even if the forebears were the sinners, was the denouement commensurate? Under what possible moral schema should innocents born<\/p>\n

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515 <\/sup>Besdin, Reflections of the Rav<\/em>, p. 35.<\/p>\n

516 <\/sup>See ibid., p. 37. “The Holocaust, in contrast, was Hester Panirn,<\/em> We cannot explain the Holocaust but we can. at least, classify it theologically, characterize it, even if we have no answer to the question, ‘why?’ The unbounded horrors represented the tohu vavohu<\/em> anarchy of the pre-yetzirah<\/em> state. This is how the world appears when God’s moderating surveillance is suspended.”<\/p>\n

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during the Holocaust period be forced to pay so horribly for others’ sins? Does not humankind deserve some Divine protection in spite of its failings? Why did the Divine (suddenly) effectuate Hester<\/em> Panim<\/em> in the mid-twentieth century? Did the Hester<\/em> neatly end just in time for the establishment of the State of Israel, and if so, why?51i Does Jewish philosophy neatly turn the Divine on a dime to reconcile the historic turnaround in Israel’s fortunes? Or does the Hester<\/em> continue? Is there din v’mishpat <\/em>(judgment and sentence) for those living during a time of Hester<\/em>? Was there hashgachah<\/em> (Providence) outside of Europe, while there was Hester<\/em> in Europe? If the Hester<\/em> was not punishment, why indeed was there Hester<\/em>?<\/p>\n

If, during the tragedy, Hester<\/em> Panim<\/em> is the prevailing state, would not prayer then seem to be efficacious only when it is least needed, and not efficacious when it is most needed? Or is the concept of prayer itself not indeed much more complex and much more difficult than previously accepted by mainstream Jewish theology?<\/p>\n

Can one simply declare Hester<\/em> Panim<\/em> for a discrete, horrific, inexplicable sequence of events without fully addressing the accompanying theological issues?<\/p>\n

Thus, providing Hester<\/em> Panim<\/em> as the neat solution to the problem of the Holocaust, or of evil in general, without providing a complete and synchronous theology to house it, would seem to leave untenable philosophical and theological chasms. When a cataclysmic tragedy befalls the Jewish people, do we conveniently pull out the Hester<\/em> Panim<\/em> rabbit, only to about-face when dire tragedy is not transpiring and then admonish the masses that their every thought, let alone deed, is currently being monitored by the Deity?<\/p>\n

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517 <\/sup>According to Soloveitchik. “The State of Israel, however, reflects God’s return to active providence, the termination of Hester Panim.<\/em>” Besdin, Reflections of the Raw, p. 37.<\/p>\n

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hard cover page 129 Jewish theologians carry forward the interrelated themes of Hester, Self-limitation, and contraction of the Divine.510 . . . in a sense, God restricts Himself from seeing evil, as the Prophet exclaims, “Your eyes are too pure to look upon evil, You cannot gaze upon wrongdoing” [Habakkuk 1:131]. -Aryeh Kaplan511 . .. 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