Against the certain: Solomon Schechter’s theology and religion in his British years, 1882–1902

Abstract

In 1894 Solomon Schechter delivered a series of lectures on rabbinic theology, first as a guest at University College London and later in Philadelphia. He set modest expectations for the occasion, noting at the outset they were only "Some Aspects of Rabbinic Theology", that is, neither systematic nor fully comprehensive. Part of his diffidence reflected a learned appreciation for the vastness of the "Sea of the Talmud" -the sheer scale and scope of rabbinic textuality that defied full coverage by any analyst. Part of his modesty constituted a riposte to Jews and non-Jews alike who claimed knowledge that they did not have to mis/characterize and deprecate Judaism. His humility about his project probably also reflected what he thought the ancient rabbis believed about their project, and what he felt about that project. "I have rather found", he noted, "when approaching the subject a little closer, that the peculiar mode of old Jewish thought . . .[is] 'against the certain' and urge upon the student caution and sobriety." 1 That humility, his wariness of the "certain" in relation to theology, forms the theme of this paper. Schechter circled warily around the subject of theology his entire adult life. He viewed it as Christian and Hellenistic and therefore alien if not fully antagonistic to Judaism. He regarded it as too modern and narrow to do justice to the full range of Jewish history, textuality, and thought, the totality of which constituted a civilization, a combination of nomos and narrative, one that tied together the Jewish people, their religious culture, and their God, in time and in space.I believe that Schechter avoided theology because he felt himself a sojourner in Jewish life. The scion of Hasidic parents born in small-town