The Sin of Protesting God in Rabbinic and Patristic Literature

• In Event: Eschatology and Divine Justice

Abstract

Scholars of rabbinic literature have often noted the widespread tendency to question and argue with God in rabbinic literature. Oddly, however, with the exception of Arthur Marmorstein (1882-1946), they have largely passed over the unequivocal anti-protest traditions found in these writings. There seems to be a scholarly penchant to engage the permissive voices over the prohibitive ones. Responding to this scholarly lacuna, this paper collects anti-protest traditions of the Midrash and Talmud, and explicates their exegetical and conceptual basis. In the process, the paper makes two central arguments. First, I posit that later anti-protest texts intensify or radicalize their opposition. While early anti-protest rabbinic traditions merely prohibit one from challenging God, later aggadot tend to attach harsh punishments to that prohibition. Second, from a comparative perspective, I posit that rabbinic anti-protest sentiments diverge from similar sentiments voiced by the Church Fathers. While both critique the act of protest on exegetical and (similar) conceptual grounds, they have different ways of harmonizing their restrictive attitudes with a shared biblical tradition that tolerates, even celebrates, confronting God. More specifically, I demonstrate that whereas the rabbinic position tends to retell the biblical confrontation by having God castigate or punish the protester, early Christian thinkers reject the literal reading of Scripture altogether: any apparent protest by a biblical hero is deemed a dangerous misreading. This divergence further supports the contention that unlike the Church fathers who typically portray biblical heroes as paradigmatic followers of God, rabbinic Jews, on the other hand, have less compunction about highlighting the sins and misconducts of their vaunted prophets and patriarchs.

author

• Dov Weiss, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign