Our Gemara on Amud Beis recounts a remarkable story about how the officials of the Reish Galusa took murderous revenge against Rav Zvid. (The Reish Galusa is the Jewish person appointed by the Babylonian authorities to lead the Jewish community and depending on the era, could be more or less God fearing.) In this story, Rav Zvid imposed a prohibition upon eggs roasted by a gentile (which at the time was unclear if it was a sufficiently distinct food to fall under the rabbinic ban of food prepared by a gentile). Apparently, the officials resented this restriction so greatly that they poisoned Rav Zvid!
Let us take a moment to reflect upon this incident. Here you have a subset of government sanctioned thugs who hew enough to rabbinic authority such that a decree about the kashrus of eggs matters to them, yet they can also commit murder! Religious and moral inconsistencies, are a part of the psychology of living.
How do we understand this? It is important to understand the difference between magic and superstition versus religion. Religion worships, serves, makes sacrifices to a deity. In particular, ours serves a God that expects us to behave with morality and emulate His compassion and other qualities, to “Walk in His ways.” (Shabbos 133b.) Magic or superstition is not about morality or correct behavior, rather it harnesses some particular mechanistic force with the spiritual world, if you will, cosmic cheat codes. It’s a charm, formula or incantation. In the words of Sanhedrin (67b), “Sorcery contradicts the divine process.”
Psychologically it is easy to confuse and conflate religion to superstition. That is, the function of religious practices become more like magic and mechanistic instead of a providential connection to a god of justice and truth. Keeping kosher then is not about morality, obeying God’s will, learning restraint and sanctification, it is merely a good luck, charm or a bribe to the god. Those thugs could have kept kosher and still murdered Rav Zvid. Another great example comes from Mishna Nedarim (3:4, Bartenura). The Mishna states that if one is accosted by bandits, he may make a false oath declaring his produce as Terumah, so bandits will leave him alone. Incredibly, this implies that a bandit, who has no qualms robbing and murdering, will not want to transgress the boundary of defiling Terumah. At least in the Talmud, there is honor among thieves! Here too, the bandits gave Terumah bread and ritual purity, a magical quality, but did not deeply connect it to devotion to God or higher morality. That is why they could rob and steal, but still feel compelled to maintain ritual purity and abstain from defiling the Terumah bread.
There is an old joke: It’s too bad “thou shalt not steal” was written on the Luchos. If instead it was a footnote in the biur halacha, stating “yesh lehachmir” no frum person would dare violate it. Such inconsistencies occur on the observance of the Commandments when they become a ritual instead of a psychological, spiritual and developmental process.
Translations Courtesy of Sefaria, except when, sometimes, I disagree with the translation
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Rabbi Simcha Feuerman, Rabbi Simcha Feuerman, LCSW-R, LMFT, DHL is a psychotherapist who works with high conflict couples and families. He can be reached via email at simchafeuerman@gmail.com