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Rabbi Meir Soloveichik: Is America Losing its Soul?
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- [00:00]
Larry Arnn
Hello. Welcome to the Larry Arn Show. That would be I. I am the president of Hillsdale College, and today I have with me a delightful man, Rabbi Meir Solovechik, who's from New York. He teaches at Yeshiva University. He's the author of four or five books, and you're going to enjoy him and learn some things as I have done. Be right back.
- [00:27]
Narrator/Announcer
Great books, great people, great ideas. Learning about these things is critical to being a well educated human being. And we can help with the Hillsdale Dialogues. Each week, Hillsdale College president Larry Arne joins radio veteran Hugh Hewitt to discuss topics of enduring relevance. And from time to time, they also talk about current events, but always with an eye toward more fundamental truths. And they want you to tune in to a conversation like no other. The Hillsdale Dialogues are posted every Monday on the Hillsdale College Podcast Network at Podcast Hillsdale. Edu. That's Podcast Hillsdale Edu, or listen via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you find your audio.
- [01:11]
Narrator/Promoter
Charlie Kirk understood that before he could lead, he needed to learn. He didn't need a degree, but he did need a teacher. Hillsdale College was there to teach him wherever and whenever he wanted to learn. Charlie took many of Hillsdale's free online courses, studying the classics, the American founding, and the Bible. And you can learn like Charlie at Hillsdale Edu Network. That's Hillsdale Edu Network. Charlie Kirk strengthened his knowledge and courage by studying the greatest thinkers, writers and leaders of history, all with Hillsdale College. Visit Hillsdale Edu Network and you too can learn like Charlie. That's Hillsdale Edu Network.
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Larry Arnn
Welcome, Rabbi President Arne.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
It's a joy to be with you.
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Larry Arnn
Great to be with you. So I mentioned, and I'll say it again, you're one of the most fun guys I know. And so I think we're going to have a party today. And you're also a learned man. Tell me about the life of a rabbi. What does a rabbi do?
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Well, the term rabbi is a Hebrew word which means my teacher. And it was originally linked to a specific form of ordination that existed in the ancient and classical Jewish world. Now it's applied to anyone who receives ordination. And then a rabbi can work in a pulpit, in a congregation, a rabbi can teach, a rabbi can engage in a variety of forms of pastoral work. My own work happens to cover several of these different realms. I'm the rabbi of the Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue in Manhattan, the oldest Jewish congregation in the United States. We don't like to talk about that, except Pretty much every day. And I also work in Yeshiva University, and so I'm gifted with the privilege of teaching students as well.
- [03:15]
Larry Arnn
That's great. And this congregation, this is the one to which George Washington wrote the great letter. Is that true?
- [03:22]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
No. So actually, and I'm going to be speaking at Hillsdale right now about this to students, George Washington wrote three letters, actually. Because, you see, when Washington was inaugurated in April 1789, the rare presidential inauguration in April, every minority faith community got together and sent Washington a letter. They wanted to ensure their equality in the nascent nation that was the United States. So all the Catholics came together and sent Washington letter. All the Quakers came together and sent Washington letter. And the Jews couldn't really agree who had sent Washington the letter. So they sent them three letters. So first, the Jews of Savannah sent Washington letter. And Washington's probably wondering why these crazy people keep sending me letters. But he was a gentleman, as you know. So he writes back each time, and thank God he did, because each one is special. So he wrote to the Jews of Savannah first, and then the letter to the Jews of Newport happened. And I know you love that letter, and I believe you put that letter on your Christmas card.
- [04:23]
Larry Arnn
Part of it.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Yeah, Yeah. I love that you put a letter to the Jews on your Christmas card. That itself is great. But what happened was, is. And this is a great trivia. Do you know why he visited Newport, Rhode island, in 1790? August 1790. Oh, this is fantastic. Because, you see, originally, Rhode island had refused to ratify the Constitution, so they weren't really part of the United States. You know, that current. This is the original version of that hashtag notmypresident. In fact, the person with whom the Jew with whom Washington corresponds, Moses Sachius, when originally the Jews in America write to him and say, do you want to join in our letter to Washington? He says, I can't do that. I'm in Rhode island, where we don't recognize this presidency. Because the way he puts it is Rhode island hasn't congratulations to George Washington becoming president. They didn't ratify the Constitution. So once they ratify the Constitution, Washington says, okay, now I got to go there because. And this is part of what I'm talking about to your students. Central to Washington's greatness was that he's constantly thinking, whether you're talking about a small state like Rhode island, whether you're talking about a small religious community like the Jews, how do I make them feel as if they're equally part of the United States? So he journeys there. Once they're there, the Jewish lay leader who's there, Moses Sachas, sends Washington a letter, celebrates the Constitution, especially the clause that there will be no religious test for public office as a government which gives to bigotry no sanction, persecution, no assistance. And Washington writes back saying, you're absolutely right that this is a government that gives bigotry no sanction, persecution, no assistance. And then he adds, and I know you love this, he says, and you probably can remember this better than me. He says something like, it is no longer toleration that is spoken of as if it was by another that a person is given his natural rights.
- [06:14]
Larry Arnn
Indulgence of some, that others enjoy their inherent natural rights.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
That's exactly it. And so he's basically saying, yes, in Europe, at best, Jews may have experienced religious toleration. We are giving you equality. You're just as American as me. That's what he's saying. And then when he moved to Philadelphia, when the Capitol moved to Philadelphia, then all the other Jewish communities said, hey, we better get Washington letters. So they sent him a third letter. And by that time, his third letter was not as good. I think he was at that. You know, I don't want to say he was phoning it in, but by that point, he was probably wondering, why do I keep getting letters from the Jews? Enough is enough.
- [06:50]
Larry Arnn
Enough is enough. Anyway, the other thing is, he wrote, he gives them a blessing, which I happen to have here. This is Savannah blessing.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Yes.
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Larry Arnn
May the same wonder working deity who long since delivering the Hebrews from their Egyptian oppressors, planted them in the promised Land, whose providential agency has lately been conspicuous in establishing these United States. May he give you temporal and spiritual blessings. And all of us, right, he says
- [07:22]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
we have to see how incredible what he's saying actually is. We can safely say that no head of state, no non Jewish head of state has ever written a letter to the Jews like this. He's saying he's not just saying, you're equals.
- [07:36]
Larry Arnn
Right?
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
He could have just finished the letter earlier where he says, you're all equals because Washington knows whatever he's going to send this Jewish community, they're going to publicize. And so Washington could have ended with that. But instead he adds this biblical point where he says, essentially, your story inspires our story. The God who took you out of Egypt, whose providence has been so manifest in the recent birth of America and the recent revolution. What you see here is that America sees itself. This is part of what I'm speaking about here. At Hillsdale, the founders saw themselves as creating a covenantal society inspired by the original biblical social compact, which we get from Biblical Israel, which is in Hebrew, British or Covenant. America is a covenantal people born around a creed. And Washington is saying, your story inspires our story. The story of Egypt inspires us. Just like Franklin's suggestion for the seal of the United States was Moses and Pharaoh at the splitting of the sea with the model rebellion to tyrants, obedience to God. So I actually, personally, this will surprise you, but I don't send out a Christmas card. But if I were sending out a card, I would think about putting on the Savannah Letter because to me, I have a certain personal affinity to that one. Because as incredible and important as the Newport letter is, in a certain sense more important in terms of its statement of rights, the Savannah Letter has this incredible biblical allusion, a comparison between the Exodus and the American Revolution. And that's just wonderful.
- [09:17]
Larry Arnn
Isn't it, though? You've written a book under the title what America Owes the Jews and the Jews Owe America.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Yeah, we produced that, but my center helped produce the book. I have a piece in it. I see.
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Larry Arnn
Explain that. What does America owe the Jews, and what do the Jews Owe America?
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Well, each one of these, I assume we have, like, a couple hours for each one of these. But in terms of America being linked to the Jews, there we see what Washington is describing. And this is a point that I make often, and I quote often, and I'm for sure going to say this to your students. It's a point that was made by my very much misfriend, Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, the former chief Rabbi of Britain. He described when he was the age of your Hillsdale students, college students, and he came to America for the first time and he visited Washington, D.C. he said that what was so striking to him is the memorials. Now, why the memorial is striking. You've been to London once or twice, I think, and, you know, you may be aware they have memorials there. And he said the difference is that when you go to a memorial in America, you have a statue of the figure being remembered, but you also have etched in stone words that person's ideas. Jefferson's memorial has Declaration of Independence, Virginia Statute for Religious Liberty, Lincoln, Gettysburg Address, Second Inaugural. If you go to London, he said, you go to the memorial for David Lloyd George has three words. David Lloyd and George Churchill. What's etched into the Churchill statue? Just Churchill. Now, I don't know if you know this, but words were kind of important to Churchill. He came up with A few here and there. He had some ideas you could share.
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Larry Arnn
That is interesting, isn't it?
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Yeah. And all it says is Churchill. So why. So what Raysac said was he said England, I'm paraphrasing at least used to be a tradition based nation, which meant. Or class based. That's what he means, I think, which means that those who belong know, those who don't know show that they don't belong. Whereas, and as Harvey Sachs put it, America's the rarest examples. A covenantal nation, he said, from the Pilgrims, from the Pilgrim Fathers on. Some of the early Americans were Calvinists inspired by covenantal politics, which they drew from Exodus and Deuteronomy. And that's why as a race exodus, we have so many covenantal rituals. As Americans, we're a nation built around a creed. Think about it. Who else celebrates a founding around a document? Or as put it, America and Israel, ancient and modern, are the only examples of nations founded in conscious pursuit of an idea. So above all, that's not just biblical but Hebraic impact on America. The gratitude the Jews owe America is enormous because they did not just receive political equality like they had offered to them, let's say in post revolutionary France, what they were offered was the ability to be simultaneously fully American and simultaneously fully Jewish, including in civic society. Benjamin Rush. Are you a fan of Benjamin Rush? Oh, yeah, yeah. Benjamin rush is great. Dr. Benjamin Rush. And though whenever I speak, I speak about him often, I always get like a Jewish doctor who comes over and complains that he did bleeding and this and that, like they have all sorts of complaints about his medical methods. Be that as it may, he was at the signer of the Declaration of Independence. Benjamin Rush, very good friend of both Adams and Jefferson, reunited them after they were enemies. And he witnessed the July 4th parade in Philadelphia, 1788, to celebrate the ratification of the Constitution, Pennsylvania. And he described how the clergy were part of the parade in order to show the importance of religion to good government. That's what he said. He said. And then he added, he said that one of the most exciting things for him was the ministers of the Gospel walking with a rabbi of the Jews arm in arm. You can't imagine that in Europe in 1788 in a civic parade. You can't imagine Europe in 1888 in a civic parade. That's America, 1788. Now there's no parallel to this in all of Jewish diaspora history.
- [13:58]
Larry Arnn
So America, Diaspora, you should say what that is.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Oh, Diaspora meaning post exile from Jerusalem, post destruction from Jerusalem. And So, and I have countless examples of this. And this is, people always speak about America as the land of opportunity. And it is. But it's not right to say that when Jews spoke America as a land of opportunity, it meant above all, economic opportunity. Truth is that in the early history of America, there were Jews, let's say in England, that had achieved much greater success than any Jew in America achieved. But they couldn't be members of Parliament. When a Jew was elected to Parliament, Parliament wouldn't seat them. Originally, in the 1850s, it was a controversy that lasted around a decade. So when they're writing to Washington saying it's a government that gives bigotry, no sanctions, persecution, no assistance, they're not talking about the First Amendment, they're talking about that America says, we're granting you full equality. And unlike secular France, full equality doesn't mean that when you enter the public square, you shed all aspects of your faith identity. You bring it with you into the public square. No other country has offered the Jews that.
- [15:22]
Larry Arnn
Yeah, and the French Revolution became anti God.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Yes.
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Larry Arnn
The American Revolution did not.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
That's exactly right. And that's as Rabbi Sachs himself used to say. One of Rabbi Sachs favorite sayings was that there were four revolutions in modern times, the British and the American Revolution. I was never sure which did he mean, the Glorious Revolution when he heard the British, or did he mean Cromwell? But be there as it may, British and the American Revolution and the French and the Russian. And he said, the difference between them is profound because the British and American, there was bloodshed, but then it led to an expansion of democracy. Whereas the French and Russian Revolution began with utopian dreams and ended in tyranny. And he says, what's the difference? He said, the difference, as he put it, is complex, but surely a lot rides on the question of who is the ultimate sovereign God or man. So French and Russian revolutions were fueled entirely by French philosophy, Russian philosophy, or other sorts of meaning. Not Russian philosophy, but secular philosophy, Marx and Rousseau, biblical story. Of course, philosophy played a role in the American Revolution. Locke played a role in the American Revolution. Other thinkers played a role in the American Revolution, but so did the Bible. Even Thomas Paine, who didn't believe in any of this. When he wanted to make an argument for the Revolution, he built it on the Book of Samuel, because that's how Americans thought. And so that means that there is a sovereign from whom rights stem, which means they're not merely the gift of the state, if the gift of the state, the state can take them away.
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Larry Arnn
There's a lot of trouble in America today. What is Senator Kaine saying?
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Yeah, he said it was like Iran, right? Is that what he said? Yeah, yeah, that's. That's saying what the founders. On the Jefferson Memorial are his notes on the state of Virginia. Something like this is when Jefferson was thinking most clearly in his life about slavery. Not all the time was he thinking this way, unfortunately, but in some of his most clear thinking, he wrote when he says, God, who gave us rights, gave us liberties. Can the liberties of a nation be secure when we have removed their sole foundation? That these liberties are the gift of God? Indeed, I tremble for my country when I ponder that God is just something like that.
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Larry Arnn
That's in the notes on the state of Virginia.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
That's on the Jefferson Memorial.
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Larry Arnn
Yeah, yeah.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
And you have this senator from Virginia.
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Larry Arnn
Well, Michigan, where we are today, is part of the Northwest Territory. And that's the first time a government like ours ever grew. Right. But the land was granted by Virginia. And Thomas Jefferson was the leader of the movement to give this Virginia claim of the western lands to the Union on condition that there never be slavery here. And that was a contract. He didn't free his own slaves. But there's no statement by Jefferson about slavery, except that it's an evil.
- [18:23]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
You see at certain points in his life that he is thinking very clearly about what the great creed of equality that he put into the Declaration should mean for slavery, but doesn't always write that way and of course, doesn't live up to the calling of that creed. And we recognize that, while also recognizing, as Lincoln said, that Jefferson could have just written a merely revolutionary document, but instead put in something that is, I think, as Lincoln said, true at all times, a stumbling block to tyrants everywhere. And that, of course, is the consequence,
- [19:03]
Larry Arnn
an abstract truth to all men and all time be a stumbling block to harbingers of reappearing tyranny.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Exactly right.
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Larry Arnn
He was pretty good.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Yeah. That's not bad.
- [19:14]
Larry Arnn
Not bad. Not bad.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
And that was just a letter. He just, like. That wasn't even a public. I think he just wrote that in a letter to somebody.
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Larry Arnn
So in the course of my life, I've studied with a lot of Jewish professors and learned a lot from them about a lot of things. Mostly not Jewish things, but along the way, plenty of those. And in the ancient city. And see, the Jews are an ancient people. That means 1500 to 2500 years before Socrates.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
We're old.
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Larry Arnn
Yeah. You guys have been around a long time.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Yeah. And I learned Abraham is long before Socrates.
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Larry Arnn
Yeah, long before. And so if you think of that context, if you read what Christians call the Old Testament, this covenant you're talking about is all over the place with Abraham, with Noah, with Jacob repeated,
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
and then at Sinai, of course.
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Larry Arnn
Yeah, that's right. And this will be a blessing to all the peoples on the face of the earth. And that's extremely different from ancient religion.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Oh, yes. In other words, Judaism always has a joining of, I think we could say, particularism and universalism. On the one hand, in Abraham, God is calling a specific family, but he's also saying that through you, all the nations of the world be blessed. At Sinai, G D is calling a particular people, but he describes their calling as to be royal priests, in Hebrew, mamlechet, qanim, and holy people. Which means that in some way, through their story, the biblical vision will be brought to the world. And then, of course, in the Hebrew Bible's descriptions of the redemptive times, in Hebrew eschatology, there's a Jerusalem, right? There's a city of God. But the aspiration is not just safety and security for the Jews. It's about an end of evil and an end to war. Everywhere. Swords beaten into plowshares and spears into pruning hooks, which is, as many note, ironically, the verse on what's called the Isaiah wall facing the United Nations. Right. And so directly across the street from where some of the great tyrants in the world are welcomed. But it is what it is.
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Larry Arnn
So the other thing about the Jews, there are so many things about it, but here's another. I think the last Greek city state that was sacked and destroyed was Thebes by Alexander, and that's pretty late. That's after Socrates. And then the understanding was the Thebans are gone.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
That's right, exactly.
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Larry Arnn
And their gods disappear.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Yes.
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Larry Arnn
The Acropolis means the high polis. And they put the temple at the top to protect the gods to the last minute in the case of a siege. And the women and the children would flee up there. And those two things represent the being and the future of the city.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Yes.
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Larry Arnn
And when they fall at the end of the city, the city is no more. And the gods are no more.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
And the people are no more.
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Larry Arnn
And the people are no more. Not Thebans anymore.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Exactly.
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Larry Arnn
And The Jews, what, 2000 years, 1500 to 2000 years earlier than that, lose their temple and their place and they don't go away.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
So the best recent book, not about the Jews, but about the opposite, is Victor Davis Hanson's the End of Everything.
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Larry Arnn
Yeah, that's right.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
And the ultimate example that he gives is Carthage. The Romans come to Carthage. They say, give us all your weapons. And Carthaginians agree in the Third Punic War. And they say, okay, now we have a great deal for you. Let us destroy your city. Or something like that. Like something. And the Romans think they're making an offer the Carthage can't refuse. But they do refuse. They fight. Carthage is destroyed. And you know, a century later, there are no Carthaginians. Now that happens before the Roman sack of Jerusalem in 70. And it's clear that what the Romans are doing to Jerusalem is what they originally did to Carthage. In fact, Josephus describes that after Titus conquers Jerusalem with the temple a smoldering heap, he stands there used to be you could still see a little bit of the arch, it's called Wilson's Arch. Near what's now the western wall. There is a bridge, was originally a bridge from the temple to the upper city. And he stands on one side of it and the not yet captured Jewish rebel standing on the other side. And Titus says, you fools, we defeated the Carthaginians. They're much greater warriors than you. How could you think you could defeat us? And Victor Davis Hanson's point is that this can come, he says to any society, culture, that if its central city is destroyed, that is the source of its identity, it will disappear. Now he doesn't talk about the Jews really. Only later at the end, he talks about the dangers that Iran poses to Israel. But he doesn't talk about exactly the question you asked. But that's all I was thinking about when I was reading this book. Yeah, all I was thinking of that I was thinking, Victor Davis Hansen, you should have titled this book the End of Almost Everything. Because it's exactly the same thing. And as you noted, that was the second time this had happened. Because Babylonian had already done it.
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Larry Arnn
Yeah, that's right. Let him off.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Had already done it. And so let him off. You can go. And they had already done it. And you can go to. I was at the Pergamon Museum in Berlin. You see the processional way that people would walk through, like the actual stones of it in the city of Babylon. And I thought, like, this is very possibly what my ancestors saw as they were walking. And so there's a quote I say all the time, which my dear friend Eric Cohn once showed it to me and I never forgot. It's from the southern writer Walker Percy. Where in his series of reflections called Message in a Bottle. Yeah, so he has a line where he says. He says, why are there Jews? But there are no Hittites. Even though the Hittites were a great and mighty civilization, when the Jews were a weak and meek people. He says, when you meet a Jew on the streets of London or Melbourne or New York, it is remarkable that no one finds the event remarkable. What are they doing here? But then he says it is even more interesting to ask, if there are Jews here, why are there no Hittites? Show me one Hittite in New York City. That's what he says.
- [26:32]
Larry Arnn
He's a brilliant man.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
He's brilliant. And so for him, the Jews are that. That's his point, that they're the message. They're a message in the bottle, as my friend Eric often says.
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Larry Arnn
So
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
that's the miracle, right? Because as you mentioned, God makes an eternal covenant. And God doesn't violate his promises. Human beings can violate their promises. God doesn't violate his promises.
- [26:58]
Larry Arnn
Christians say, a faithful God. That's what he says.
- [27:06]
Bill Gray
Hi there, it's Bill Gray from Hillsdale College. Before you skip ahead, can I ask you a question or two? If you could teach 50 million Americans one thing, what would it be? Would you teach our great American story that this nation is unique, founded on self government and individual liberty? Maybe you would teach the truth about free enterprise, how hard work and opportunity allow anyone to rise. Or would you teach the gospel and the Christian faith that helps us live good and meaningful lives? At Hillsdale College, we're doing exactly that. Teaching the best that's been thought and said. Through our free online courses, K12 programs, Imprimis, podcasts and more. We reach and teach millions every year with the principles of liberty that make America free. And with your help, we can reach even more. Your tax deductible gift today will help us teach millions more people to pursue truth and defend liberty. Just text the word give to 7 1844. You'll get a secure link to make your donation in seconds. That's give to seven, 1844. Thank you for standing with us. Now back to the show.
- [28:20]
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- [29:17]
Larry Arnn
I want to talk about civilization a little bit. What do we mean by the term?
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
So you remember the 1960s TV series Civilization? Was that Kenneth Clark?
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Larry Arnn
Yeah.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
So when he spoke about civilization, he did one, and then decades later they did one sequel called Civilizations.
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Larry Arnn
Yeah, yeah, right.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
So when Clark did Civilization, he was talking about the West. Right. Like I think Neil Ferguson has a book, Civilization, the West and the Rest. And he was talking about how do different strands come together to form Western civilization. The second series was using the term civilization in the more general sense, which is how I use it, which is you're talking about a civilization can be a series of long held transmitted cultural, political, legal and religious norms that persist over many generations amongst a large group of people. And understood that way, which is how I usually use it. Then you could speak of Western civilization. You could speak of Egyptian civilization, you could speak of Japanese civilization, which certainly was a civilization separate from. Other civilizations. I think we could safely say that about Japan if you study the history of Japan. So we could speak what is unique about Western civilization. And that is what Kenneth Clark was doing when he was doing the show, or what Neil Fern said.
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Larry Arnn
I think there's a problem.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Do you disagree with that?
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Larry Arnn
Well, yes and no. First of all, we refer to people as civilized. It means that we're looking for qualities in them that we think the word civil, the word civilization comes from a Latin word that means citizen or city. Right. So to be civilized is to be fit for the company of others. Right. To be in a community with others.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Right.
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Larry Arnn
And then Kenneth Clark, he goes through architecture, art, a story of human cooperation, you know, including war, by the way, because war is the greatest human conflict involving also on each side the greatest forms of human cooperation.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Right.
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Larry Arnn
You got to get together and die with each other. So in other words, there's some qualitative thing we're looking for to, you know, because like when we mean Japanese civilization, we're not talking about the garden club, we're talking about something big that abides and involves people cooperating with each other.
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Right.
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Larry Arnn
That's the first problem I see. The second one I see is Western civilization comes from two strains, both of them universal in their claim. That's what's so singular about the birth of ancient Israel, this idea that there's just one God. He made everything that was not the Greek understanding later, by the way, and he made all of Us, then whoever
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Rabbi Meir Solovechik
we are, in his image, by the way.
- [32:29]
Larry Arnn
That's right. And we're picking this people. It's going to be hard for these people, by the way. It's like, you know, in a certain way, bad luck to get chosen. You got to struggle. You got to suffer for all the peoples on the face of the earth. That is so different from, you know, the religion that if you. If you go to Pompeii, right, Which long about the time of Jesus is destroyed by volcano.
- [32:54]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Right.
- [32:54]
Larry Arnn
So that's late. That's sure. 350 years after Socrates or so you can see where they kept the sacred fire in the houses that are preserved. Right.
- [33:06]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
So would you call Rome a civilization or no?
- [33:08]
Larry Arnn
Yeah, I would, but. And it was, you know, it is a great one. And you're right about Japan. There's some greatness there, too.
- [33:16]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
I don't think you know this, but I'm very interested in Japan. And not just sushi, which I really love.
- [33:21]
Larry Arnn
Yeah, yeah.
- [33:23]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
I'm. I have a deep and abiding interest in Japan and its traditions. But here's where it gets complicated. Let's think it through this way. Let's say you read the Book of Maccabees or the books of Maccabees describing the conflict between the Greek Seleucids and Judea. So Greeks look at the Jews and they say, these people are barbarians, Right. They don't have gymnasiums. And by the way. And of course, some of the Jews started saying that we're barbarians, we should become Greek. They do this weird circumcision ritual instead of celebrating or even divinizing an art, the human form. We need to civilize these people, and we're going to civilize that by taking over their temple along with some Jews and bringing in civilized worship. And the Jews look in contrast to a society that in many ways achieved technological and architectural achievements, let's say Greece or Rome far beyond Judea. And they say, well, morally, these people have, you know, not advanced morally. And in some time, because they speak about Rome, they say these people kill each other for sport in front of 40,000 people. What kind of civilized people will do that? Now we come to the Coliseum, we say, the great achievement of civilization created this. And Jews, if you read what they're writing about it there, they say, this is disgusting. This is human sports. And so each one has different claims. Tacitus writes about the Jews, like other Romans.
- [35:14]
Larry Arnn
But it raises the question, who has the better claim? Sure.
- [35:16]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Well, you could say there are different civilizations with different Moral visions, and one is better than the other. But the term civilization would still apply,
- [35:26]
Larry Arnn
remember, from inside Judaism. And I'll add the second strain in Western civilization, universal philosophy. Born in Greek, born in Greece. Yes, Right. Both by their own lights, both of them claim to be pursuing the good for everybody, everywhere, universally. And that marks them out. Yeah, Right. And so, but to do that through
- [35:52]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
reason alone, not revelation. Right. That's achievement of philosophy.
- [35:55]
Larry Arnn
But that's why the rest, I mean,
- [35:56]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
achievement as philosophy sees it, meaning not as the Jews see it.
- [36:01]
Larry Arnn
That's why you have to combine those to get Western civilization right.
- [36:07]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Sure. There's no question that the west is a product of both.
- [36:13]
Larry Arnn
Yeah, there you go.
- [36:14]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
No question about that. But that doesn't always mean that they seamlessly fit with each other. And there's. From a biblical perspective, surely there still lurks, let's say, in art, the pagan temptation. Right. So if you, if you read Keats's Ode on Aggression, urn, beauty is truth, and truth beauty as a Jew, you're like, no, it isn't. In other words, or as Rabbi Sacks put it, what is beauty to a Jew? Well, great question. So it's funny you ask that because it's important to ask, where's beauty in the Bible? Right. That's important. Like, where do you see the term beauty in the Bible? So the way Roy Sachs put it is that the Greeks believed in the holiness of beauty and the Jews believed in the beauty of holiness. So psalms. Right. And bow down to the Lord in the beauty or glory of his holiness. So the Jews had notions of the aesthetic. No question. If you can't read the story of the tabernacle or the temple without seeing that. But all that was not an end in itself. Only holiness is the true. And God, who is the source of all holiness, is the ultimate end, holy.
- [37:33]
Larry Arnn
That just comes from a thing being a whole. What is the. I mean.
- [37:37]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
So first of all, I mean, in Hebrew, the Hebrew word for holy means more like separate. In other words, apart. Chadosh is. So it's less. The English may have its own origin, but in part it is separate and apart from. And of course, as you said, the Jews had this crazy idea, the acts of others, of a God who was apart from the world, who was not identical with nature.
- [38:05]
Larry Arnn
Right. The author of nature. And see. But I mean. So I teach a little Aristotle around here.
- [38:11]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Yeah, I like Aristotle. Do you like. Are you more of an Aristotelian than a Platonist, by the way? If you have to choose, because I think all people are either Aristotelians or Platonists.
- [38:22]
Larry Arnn
I was taught this way about that.
- [38:26]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
I'm asking the questions here now.
- [38:27]
Larry Arnn
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [38:28]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
No.
- [38:28]
Larry Arnn
So I'll answer this way. I'll quote my teacher. We were like young. We were like you. You and I have some similarities. We were like a young pack of dogs. We were always saying, who's greater, Churchill or Lincoln or Washington? Who's greater, the Jews or the Christians? Who's greater, Shakespeare or Milton?
- [38:48]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
People like lists and rankings. Rankings are fun.
- [38:51]
Larry Arnn
And Professor Jaffa would say, if you look up at two great peaks into the clouds, hard to tell which is higher, but you can tell they're not molehills. Who's greater, Aristotle or Plato? I'm not sure I'm qualified to say I know who I like better, and I even think I know why. I don't think there's any greater human achievement than Aristotle. Nicomachean ethics. But I have to say that of Plato's Republic, there's a reason why I know the ethics rather better than I know the Republic, although I know them both fairly well. And that is it sang to me at some point. I always say to the students here, if I get my way, you're going to be involved with us in one way and another. That fits with your many responsibilities. But you'll help them with this. I always say, and I learned this from one of my teachers, an important way to live your life is to decide when you're young, but decide as early as you can. If it's only today, today's the day that you're going to become the master of three books. They have to be great books. Great books contain a microcosm of the world. And if you ask the question, does a book fit that criteria, whatever answer, if you ask it seriously, you get, it's likely to be right, because there are more great books than any one person can master. But then how do you pick your three? And the answer is, it needs to talk to you. You personally love the Bible. You repeat its words in a soft and reverential voice and accurately. But it's not just you memorized it. You parse them out. They're living in you.
- [40:48]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Well, this is part of Jewish life.
- [40:49]
Larry Arnn
That's it.
- [40:50]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
That's part of Jewish life.
- [40:51]
Larry Arnn
I was taken by Professor Jaffa.
- [40:55]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
So Professor Jaffa would not say that Lincoln was the greatest. That's interesting to know, by the way.
- [40:59]
Larry Arnn
Couldn't say it.
- [41:00]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
He couldn't say it. Fascinating. That's interesting.
- [41:03]
Larry Arnn
Yeah. Yeah.
- [41:05]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
I always say Lincoln was the Greatest statesman of the 19th century. And Churchill xx.
- [41:10]
Larry Arnn
Yeah. And Washington the 18th, which is why
- [41:13]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
I get very upset and annoyed when I hear people say Napoleon was the greatest figure of the 19th century, which upsets me greatly.
- [41:18]
Larry Arnn
That guy was a despot. Also. He. Churchill would disapprove of. Well, Churchill admired. He did admire Pauline very much, but in a reserved way. Because to slaughter so many Frenchmen attempting to govern things that didn't have any ability to govern was the reason he was not entirely successful. He lacked restraint. Yeah. And I mean, you know, I married an English woman and studied Churchill. I love Britain. And one of my favorite things about Britain is that Nelson's great column in Trafalgar Square named after that naval battle that he won. The lions, cast metal lions, are made from melted down French cannon captured by the British. And Nelson is looking across the Channel at France, keeping watch. And it's pretty good, you know, but it is.
- [42:17]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
So you see how different, to go back to our original. How different that is from America. Right.
- [42:21]
Larry Arnn
Yeah.
- [42:21]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
You can never. We don't even have, you know, how many military. How many military memorials or even paintings. I mean, I'm speaking today about Washington crossing the Delaware, but that's not about a battle. It's about one great feat. Right.
- [42:39]
Larry Arnn
Yeah.
- [42:40]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
How many paintings like that do we have? Some of them are. We have Trumbull did things like Battle of Bunker Hill, Victory at Yorktown, but the Battle of Princeton. He did battles, but they don't loom in the Rotunda. What you have is declaration. Two documents. Declaration. And Washington giving in his resignation. So you see, again, how different the American character is.
- [43:07]
Larry Arnn
The great statesmen have amazingly assertive people. In the end, finally, they are obedient people.
- [43:14]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Well, I think some. I mean, obedient to whom or to what? I think some. And we've debated this and discussed this before, I think. But rare is the statesman that reflects the virtue that is not in the Nicomachean ethics, which is humility. Lincoln did, Lincoln did.
- [43:34]
Larry Arnn
Churchill did, too.
- [43:35]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
The great Lincoln. The Second Inaugural is simultaneously the greatest speech in American history and also the most humble speech ever given by a statesman on the verge of military triumph. There's nothing like that in the history of Western statesmanship.
- [43:52]
Larry Arnn
I've always thought. I think that's profound. I think you're right about that. There's none. You know, you talked about the inscriptions at the monuments. You know, on the left, when you look at Abe Lincoln, you got to get the. On the right, the second Inaugural and the whole text of each of Them can fit, you know, in big letters.
- [44:11]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Nowadays I try to emphasize that, you know, you take people to the memorial, don't just look at the statue. Let's read these words.
- [44:19]
Larry Arnn
Yeah. Tour. We have, in my opinion, crowded the National Mall and changed the architectural style of some of the new monuments in ways that are very unfortunate.
- [44:30]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
I am, however, with David McCullough, that it is long time that we have an Adams memorial.
- [44:36]
Larry Arnn
Yeah.
- [44:37]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
And I think it should be, as others, an Addams Family. The original Addams family memorial. It should be John and Abigail and John Quincy.
- [44:47]
Larry Arnn
Yeah.
- [44:48]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
And it's high time, in my view, not Henry Adams. No, definitely not. He's out. He's out, he's out, he's out. You know what that's like? That's like I was once journeying and I was once touring in England and we went to Runnymede. You've been to Runnymede, I'm sure. Oh, yeah, yeah. And I love British history and I love royal history. So I said to the guide something like, so who are your favorite kings? And he says something, oh, I like the less well known Edward Longshanks or something like that. I said, oh, the king who expelled the Jews in 1290. And there's a silence. And then the tour guide says, right, we'll take him off the list then. Henry Adams is out.
- [45:34]
Larry Arnn
Yeah. He's the one who executed William Wallace.
- [45:39]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
The Edward Longshanks.
- [45:40]
Larry Arnn
Yes, he did. Yeah. Yeah. That's two marks against a man. But you see, if you make this. So what my, my point is, behind our use of the term civilization, by the way, behind the use of any common noun, is some universal claim that something fits the description. And it turns out Western civilization is the intertwining of two claims, two ways of human knowing, I think. And they're not exclusive, although they're not identical. And that means that in the west there are these claims that this is the way. And it's interesting that one of them. This is the way by reason, which, by the way, issues in Socratic philosophy mainly with just asking questions. And the other, this is the claim by Revelation. And those two things come together to make the civilization of which we're part. And, you know, it's the great Roger Scruton, dead now, but a philosopher. And I heard him say one time, the east and the west are in conflict in some important ways, but when they meet, you tend to have the Western influence dominating. He said, and the example that I thought of was Communist China, because where does Marxism come from? You know, That's a blemish on the west, but it's very Western and. Yeah, and America. So the great Leo Strauss and the great Winston Churchill both said that the fonts of Western civilization are in Jerusalem and Athens.
- [47:36]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Yeah.
- [47:36]
Larry Arnn
And you've been quoting the founding fathers of America saying the same kind of thing.
- [47:40]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Absolutely, yes. The question is which is not if we were to rank which is the most essential? So John Adams, you know, I like rankings, as you said, so.
- [47:52]
Larry Arnn
Yeah, yeah.
- [47:53]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
So it all depends who you ask, I think. And I think even if you sort of gave one of those truth serums to Jefferson and Adams, they might answer differently. Jefferson, his writings all emphasize the importance of reason, reason specifically. Now Adams of course believed in reason, but Adams also wrote to Adrian van der Kemp, I would submit that the Hebrews have done more to civilize man than any other nation. Even if I were an atheist who believed that all was done by chance. I'm paraphrasing. I believe that chance had chosen the Jews to preserve and propagate for all mankind the concept of an all wise, all knowing creator, which I believe to be the foundation of all morality and all civilization. And of course they're falling out about how to see the French Revolution. Is the critical question of Sometimes you got to ask which is most central? Is it a God who creates all of us in his image and therefore each one of us is precious and inviolable? Because in the Jewish critique, if you don't have that, then some of the great achievements of Athens, math, architecture, art, philosophy, can be turned to ends the likes of which. Right. Like the tree of knowledge itself. Right.
- [49:11]
Larry Arnn
And see, you come to find out to separate them, to make them identical, seems to me impossible also to separate them because of course, if you say which is the greater? You've asked a philosophic question. In other words, now we got to talk about it.
- [49:34]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
One way of thinking of it is that the rabbis see in Noah's blessing to two of his sons, shaman Japheth. Japheth as the progenitors of the Jews and the Greeks. And so it's describing both the gift of devising aesthetics and the gift of devising morality. G D will give beauty to Yaphet. Yaphet actually means beauty, but he will dwell in the tent of shame. And the he is ambiguous. So it can either mean God will give beauty to yephet, meaning Greece will produce art aesthetics, but God will dwell in the tent of shame, meaning biblical monotheism will be born through a Semite.
- [50:16]
Larry Arnn
Right.
- [50:17]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Or you can read it as God will give beauty to Yefet. But he, if Greece is truly to have its achievements, it must dwell in the tent of shame. It must fuse as you described.
- [50:29]
Larry Arnn
Yeah. Aristotle's philosophy issues in God a perfect being thought himself unmoved. Right.
- [50:39]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
That's not the biblical God.
- [50:40]
Larry Arnn
And move. Oh, yeah, no, not at all.
- [50:42]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
And the biblical God cares about things.
- [50:44]
Larry Arnn
Yeah, that's right.
- [50:45]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Yeah.
- [50:46]
Larry Arnn
Well, I've always thought that, you know, I've been taught, I've been taught, you know, my especially Professor Jaffa was, let's call him, a very self confident man, but he always spoke with humility about his wife. Aristotle, George Washington, Winston Churchill, Abe Lincoln. And he's the author of that quote about trying to tell which peak is highest. And he, you know, you learn that. So. And he loved Thomas Aquinas, a contemporary of Moses, Maimonides, and on about some of the same stuff. Well, Aquinas actually undertakes in the Summa Contra gentiles, in about 15 pages of writing, four chapters in volume one, to reconcile Aristotle's account of God in the Metaphysics with the biblical God.
- [51:44]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Yeah.
- [51:45]
Larry Arnn
How would a God care about us? And he gives an argument. Everybody should go read it. Chapters 47 to 54.
- [51:54]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Oh, yes, MacIntyre. Alasdair MacIntyre just passed away. In his Gifford Lectures, three rival versions of Moral Inquiry talks about the achievement of Aquinas as being able to merge two separate traditions. Now, I got annoyed because he said he was the first to do it. I didn't think he was, because I think there's somebody whose name rhymes with schmozish Maimonides, who did it before him. So I actually wrote a whole PO paper about that. But you can absolutely merge traditions. The question is, what is the product and does it work? There was so much debate about Maimonides and his philosophy at the time, precisely because of that. So much of what he was doing was shocking, actually, and in my view, sometimes problematic. Actually.
- [52:37]
Larry Arnn
The other thing is once you know something about these great traditions, it is just a necessary next step to try to figure out how they relate.
- [52:48]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Oh, yes. But in theory that can happen to other traditions as well. Right. If you study Japanese aesthetics, for example, I think there's much to teach us about appreciating the fragility of life and therefore its beauty.
- [53:02]
Larry Arnn
My younger daughter is a classical architect and they go in architecture school, the classics. They go to China and Japan.
- [53:14]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Yeah.
- [53:15]
Larry Arnn
And they look at what they designed there in classic times, in both cases, and find forms of beauty that are really only different Superficially, that the thing. And see, that's. And I guess maybe that's a point that I'm struggling for. If this cup is well proportioned, then that has something to do with. With its function and purpose. And you would judge. It wouldn't matter where the cup was made. You would judge.
- [53:46]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
I'm trying to deduce from your discussion whether you're a Platonist or an Aristotelian, by the way, from the way you described it.
- [53:50]
Larry Arnn
Well, I know that both of them make this point.
- [53:53]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Yes, we both talk about this. I'm waiting to see where you go with this.
- [53:57]
Larry Arnn
Yeah, but, you know, like, how high are the columns in the Parthenon in Athens and how big around are they? And the way classical architects think of that is the way classical philosophy thinks of it. And that is they aren't as high as the architect willed them. They're as high as they need to be. And if they're not that high, then the architect has made a mistake because human beings are a certain size and you know so well.
- [54:33]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
But surely there's a. Let's say. Now, let's say we apply that to art and depiction of human beings. There's a very big difference between Michelangelo's David, which is essentially a divinization of David, and let's say a painting by Rembrandt of a human being with all of his or her flaws. These are two very different. One might say a Platonist versus an Aristotelian, maybe. But in other words, so at times art can have different aims. Are you trying to take your vision beyond to something much higher, or are you trying to reveal a truth in all its splendor, as it is before you? And of course, that debate is kind of what's.
- [55:18]
Larry Arnn
Surely it's the second.
- [55:20]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Well, isn't that what. That's kind of what I saw in your office suite. You had a poster of the School of Athens.
- [55:30]
Larry Arnn
Yeah, right.
- [55:30]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
So, of course, at its center is Plato pointing up.
- [55:34]
Larry Arnn
Right.
- [55:34]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
And Aristotle.
- [55:35]
Larry Arnn
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [55:36]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
So it does kind of get to that, I think. Where are we looking and what are we trying to do?
- [55:41]
Larry Arnn
You know, Aristotle in the first book of the Ethics, states a disagreement with his teacher Plato. But that disagreement, in my opinion, disappears even by the end of the Ethics and certainly by the end of Aristotle's corpus, you know, and the disagreement is about whether there is a form of the good that exists independently of particular good things, whether there's a universal good. And Plato goes on about that quite a lot. And Aristotle says, no, there. But then you know, he says, because that book, it's a very great book. It is written, I believe every page of it is written by somebody who knows that much. And the book changes very much as it goes. The status of pleasure changes very much after he's defined what it is. And now you can have all you want. You understand? It is the completion of the highest human activity, which is the contemplation of beautiful and eternal things. That's the highest life in Aristotle's ethics. But that's not the highest life. At the beginning, he even makes the argument that you require to become courageous to enjoy that life of contemplation. So you got to work on that first. Right. So in other words, up at the peak, there are arguments that can probably revolve through eternity, but the ethics is about how you get up there so you can approach the peak. And that takes time.
- [57:20]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Right, Sure. I mean, that's true. It is, as MacIntyre says, to see life as a techne. Right. A craft. Right. Which you have to learn from the great tradition in the past to actually achieve. The question is whether becoming the great souled man is truly the appropriate goal in life.
- [57:38]
Larry Arnn
Yeah. And you know, I have a controversial view about that. I taught that this very last week. Yeah.
- [57:45]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Are you teaching the Nicomachean ethics now?
- [57:47]
Larry Arnn
Yeah, right now. Yeah. So first of all, the description of the great souled man is introduced in book two and extended in book four. And the point is higher things tend to come later.
- [58:00]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Interesting.
- [58:01]
Larry Arnn
And he says this thing about the great old man. He is not given to wonder.
- [58:07]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
He wonders at nothing, for all is small to him.
- [58:11]
Larry Arnn
That's right. But philosophy is born in wonder. And in Aristotle, contemplation is the highest human.
- [58:19]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Well, that's part of the issue now you're touching on. This brings us all back to our debate about rankings.
- [58:23]
Larry Arnn
There you go.
- [58:24]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Because Leon Cass, who taught Aristotle for many years and then started teaching the Bible, when he was asked, what does your new subject have that your previous subject does not? And he said these three things. He says, let's talk about wonder. It's a different phrase. The correct word, which has been ruined today is awe. The word awesome has been ruined, but it's awe. And he said, aristotle doesn't have that as a virtue. Awe of something beyond you. And he basically meant to say that the Greeks. He doesn't see that in the Greeks. That's a b. He said the notion of. And he believes that actually liberal democracy can only be founded on this. The biblical concept of male and Female. Each created in God's image. Aristotle's politics. As my teacher Robbie George often says, it's not built. It's built on the rejection of human equality on the opposite.
- [59:19]
Larry Arnn
That's not true.
- [59:20]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Okay, I'll let you take that up with Robbie. But it's. It's so that.
- [59:26]
Larry Arnn
And three equals for equals, and unequal for unequals.
- [59:31]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
That's what Aristotle thinks. Okay, but there are.
- [59:34]
Larry Arnn
Which is what equality means.
- [59:37]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
And then the third is that the Greeks do not have what I think is essential as the third, Leon said, was truly essential for a meaningful life, which is the concept of vocation, the feeling that you have been called personally to do something. You're not getting that out of Greek philosophy. John Quincy Adams, if you notice the theme.
- [60:01]
Larry Arnn
Socrates had a demon.
- [60:05]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
So, you know, John Quincy Adams wrote a series of letters to his son, George Washington Adams, about the Bible. And in one of them, he starts talking about something like, you know, the Greeks achieve X, Y and Z. And then he says. He says, but when you look at their notions of the divine, he says, he talks about, like, what they believe. And he says, thus far and no further could their mind go. But in the Bible, it is revealed that in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. This great and moral truth was revealed to us in the book of Genesis. And so, as I said before, I think in the rankings, I think the Addams family.
- [60:45]
Larry Arnn
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [60:46]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
At least for John and John Quincy Gomez may be a different matter. I think they rank the biblical achievement first as the most essential and then the others. But I'm a competitive person, Larry.
- [61:01]
Larry Arnn
Yeah, there you go. You always want ranking.
- [61:03]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Yeah. And.
- [61:05]
Larry Arnn
And you. I'm gonna. I'm gonna put a final point.
- [61:10]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Yes.
- [61:10]
Larry Arnn
I think we have agreed that Jerusalem is an essential pillar of the West.
- [61:17]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Yes.
- [61:18]
Larry Arnn
As is Athens.
- [61:19]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Yes.
- [61:20]
Larry Arnn
And America is the modern structure built best according to those two things. And would that mean in your mind that if we forget either of them, we are diminished by that?
- [61:35]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Yes, but I think when we say that, it's a combination of the two. When we speak of American exceptionalism, we speak of that, but we speak of a variety of other things that become part of that or stem from it. Neil Ferguson has this great description where he says, if you were going to predict just based on natural resources, which would become the center of achievement, North America or South America? He says, of course you'd pick South America. It's where all precious metals are coming from. It's where all sorts of things are coming from. Their resources, agricultural Resources didn't happen. Why? So he describes that they bring into, from Locke to the British colonies, Lockean notions of private property and other things like that. So I think we can even go further and speak of the way the west, as Rabbi Sachs referenced in his description of the revolutions. You speak of the Glorious Revolution and then of Americans revolting in the name of their rights as Britons. So you're speaking of an Anglo American political tradition, which I think, again, I'm a ranker and obviously I'm biased, but is different than what you're going to get in France or Germany. And obviously part of the debate in England right now is whether they want to retain the exceptional liberties that their heritage has bequeathed them.
- [63:10]
Larry Arnn
I grieve over that and worry about us. I mean, first of all, this is our 250th anniversary this year. Yes, an amazing thing. And we forget the story, the story of America. You began this by comparing Exodus and the story of America.
- [63:28]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
It's Washington's comparison.
- [63:30]
Larry Arnn
The Exodus story is unique as people born to be a providential people according the first claim of a universal beneficial regard for everybody in a very ancient time. Well, America has a story like that because what happened was a civilization picked up and went to the New World and brought knowledge and faith and everything except the aristocracy. And they started over. Can't happen again absent an apocalypse. And so what did they do? Their first idea when they came here was we want to worship the way we want. We want. And so we're going to found towns and everybody in town is going to worship the same way. And they had 150 years of experience, and during the course of it, they figured out that we don't. We still don't know how big the continent is, but we know it's not big enough to enforce that it is now, no more that we speak of religious toleration as if it were by the indulgence of some that others enjoy there. In other words, that's one of the most important things they learned.
- [64:36]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Oh, yes. And I don't even think we teach about the figures that helped. Meaning even people are actually learning American history. Do they know about William Penn and his Charter of liberties in 1701? Have you met a student that if you asked what the Liberty Bell was created to commemorate that, how many can tell you it's commemorating the 50th anniversary of William Penn's Charter of Liberties? And they're choosing that verse in Leviticus because that's the jubilee about the 50th year proclaim liberty unto all the land. And so they don't know Roger Williams, William Penn. These are people that are part of the American idea and are part of the story that we tell. Along with John Adams, Jefferson, Washington, Madison.
- [65:17]
Larry Arnn
The answer to your specific question, have I ever met a student who knows those things?
- [65:21]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Yeah.
- [65:21]
Larry Arnn
The answer is every day.
- [65:24]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
I just walked right into that one, didn't I?
- [65:26]
Larry Arnn
That's right. Rabbi, I just want to thank you for coming here and say that I think you are a blessing to the nation as you are to the Jews and your congregation. And I hope that you will come back often and be much involved with Hillsdale College.
- [65:43]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Thank you. And I want to say in turn, that just having met your students and just talking to them on the college grounds has been an incredibly inspiring experience, and I'm so excited to encounter them soon in my talk, and I look forward to visiting again soon.
- [66:02]
Larry Arnn
Good. Thank you.
- [66:03]
Rabbi Meir Solovechik
Thank you.