November 18, 2016

That the age of robots is coming, and soon, seems indisputable.  For some, though, achievements to date in mobility, dexterity and intelligence (“>William Tenn’s imagined interstellar Neo-Zionist convention. Whether coming from Jews or non-Jews, that line assumes that there is such a thing as a Jewish “look.” Whether there ever was a “look” is doubtful, but today any argument based on a presumed Jewish look involving a distinctive set of physical traits shared by all Jews is not only obnoxious, it is contrary to the “>Ginger Jews. Looks alone cannot compel a conclusion that our Jewdroid either can or cannot be Jewish. Our droid could come in any hue and be a Jew. 

Then there is the argument based on ritual: the droid cannot be circumcised. This objection is premised on the recognition, early in the Torah text, that “>A.I., Artificial Intelligence, Gigolo Joe, one of the humanoids, was designed and apparently functioned completely and very well as a male lover. There is no obvious reason why our droid could not be similarly formed, or even provided initially with a section of synthetic skin which could be removed.

Even if he were formed somewhat less than anatomically correct from a human viewpoint, as “>suggests, he could still be accepted under the halakhik principle of nolad mahul, because he could be considered to have been formed “pre-circumcised.” Indeed, there is “>depiction in the Sistine Chapel, notwithstanding), and including Moses and Jacob. They further view the pre-circumcised condition to reflect perfection. Consequently, the argument from ritual should not bar our humanoid from being considered Jewish.

A third objection is the argument based on descent: our droid would not have a Jewish mother. It is true, of course, that the Jewdroid would not be born of a Jewish mother in a conventional, biological sense, and it is also true that since the “>Shaye J. D. Cohen, a professor of Hebrew literature and philosophy at Harvard, it is also true that “>Reconstructionist and “>models for acceptance without biological Jewish ancestry. (See also, e.g., “>here, “>here.) These approaches involve issues both of personal identity and communal status. Once the conversion is complete, though, at least within the denomination in which it takes place, the convert is to be treated as no less a Jew than one born into the community. S/he is to be welcomed and embraced. If our Jewdroid commits to living a Jewish life, through study and action, s/he would seem to qualify for Jewish status by conversion, if not otherwise.

A fourth argument, again similar to one raised against the Bulbas, acknowledges that while Jews may have different physical appearances and come to their Judaism other than through biological descent, at least Jews must be human. This is the argument based on species. 

In relying on a biological classification, however, the objectors display a cramped understanding both of the reality of the evolution of modern humans, i.e., “>two to three million years ago. While this seems like a distant period, if we imagine the history of our planet as occurring over the course of twenty-four hours, mankind did not arrive until “>previously recognized, “>We and all else are made of stardust, the product of explosions of supernovae billions of years ago. Whether we are carbon based and naturally born or silicone based and manufactured, we are cosmological cousins, distant and removed by history, but bound nevertheless to the ultimate origin of all. Consequently, as author “>written, “(w)hether we are based on carbon or on silicon makes no fundamental difference; we should each be treated with appropriate respect.” 

The most fundamental objection to the Jewishness of our droid is theological: the droid is not made in the image of God. The biblical story of origins is quite emphatic that humans are the pinnacle of God’s creation. They are the last listed in the litany of creatures which were made to live in our world, and they are charged to have dominion over all other animals, on land, in the air and in the sea. (See Gen. 1:26.) And if that is not clear enough, they are told to fill the earth with offspring, to subdue it, to take all seed bearing plants, all fruit bearing trees, indeed, all green plants for food.  (See Gen. 1:28-30.)

Even greater than the commands to reproduce and to use other living creatures for their benefit, is the essential nature of the human. According to Genesis, by way of “>translation, God said “Let us make humankind, in our image, according to our likeness!” To emphasize this particular decision, the text shifts from prose to poetry, as it describes God’s ultimate work in the first week of creation:

                       God created humankind in his image,

                       In the image of God did he create it,

                       Male and female did he create them.

The poem is essentially repeated several chapters later at the beginning of the genealogy of the line of Adam and Eve’s third son, Seth. (See Gen. 5:1-2.)

The text could not be more clear in elevating the stature of humans to that of the creator God, yet the meaning of the phrase “image of God” is not so obvious.  Part of the resolution of the puzzle depends on the time period we are considering. According to the late Professor of Bible at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem “>Rabbi Gunther Plaut (1912-2012) was more specific in the original edition of his Torah commentary (The Torah: A Modern Commentary (UAHC  1981), at 22). There he states that the Hebrew word for image, tzelem, is related to the Akkadian salmu, which “applied specifically to divine statues in human guise.”  Similarly, “>Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon, known more familiarly as Maimonides  or Rambam (1135-1204) opened  his major work, The Guide for the Perplexed, with a refutation of the idea. He argued that in Hebrew there was a word for form other than tzelem, and that tzelem really meant the essential and distinctive quality of a human, his intellectual perception. (See The Guide for the Perplexed  (Friedlander trans. Cosimo 2007), Ch. 1, at 13-14.)

Maimonides further recognized that the capacity to learn and reason differs from one person to another (Ch. 17, at 288-89), and that there were four finds of wisdom, one involving cunning, another with the acquisition of moral principles, a third with workmanship and, most importantly, the “knowledge of those truths which lead to the knowledge of God.” (Ch. 54, at 393.) Man will attain true perfection, he said, when the knowledge of God’s ways and attributes leads man to commit “always to seek loving-kindness, judgment, and righteousness, and thus to imitate the ways of God.” (Ch. 54, at 397.)

Professor Kass, like Maimonides, argues that “image” involves more than mere physical resemblance. He wants to understand how man could be more godlike, aside from appearance, and looks at God’s activities and powers as described in Genesis. Among other attributes, he finds that God “exercises speech and reason, freedom in doing and making, and the powers of contemplation, judgment and care.” (Kass, above, at 38.)

We could argue, at length and depth, about whether the academic line from Maimonides to Kass concerning God’s essential attributes is either complete or valid. Everyone from biological anthropologists to philosophers has an opinion. “>argues that the uniqueness of humanity lies not in intelligence, but “in loving and being loved.”  We will defer diving into that pool. What is important for now is that if the identified attributes are descriptors of being made in the “image of God,” then our postulated droid, who would be created intelligent and learned and thoughtful and compassionate, would seem to qualify.

How then, could our Jewishly knowledgeable and committed droid not be considered Jewish? And how then, if he is, could he not receive a Jewish name, celebrate his bot mitzvah, be counted in a minyan and serve on the shul board?    

In his reported responses during an “>Rabbi Moshe Taub, an Orthodox rabbi, who literally summoned seven pages filled with chapters and verses to “>bat mitzvah. It is a defensible position, in the sense that it is based on thousands of years of tradition, but it is also a position that, in the United States, at least, has been rejected by the overwhelming majority of American Jews.

The failure of the argument is not that it lacks historic grounding, but that it is uniquely devoid both of imagination and pragmatism. The first failure is ironic given the fertile musings and considerable ingenuity of the sages upon whose stories and views Rabbi Taub relies. The second failure is neither sensitive to, nor sensible for, most Jews today. To the contrary, it is rather stifling. In Rabbi Taub’s insular world, his approach may work, even work well.  In the world most Jews occupy today, as the late “>Yuval Noah Harari has written, already in “a world in which culture is releasing itself from the shackles of biology.” (Harari, Sapiens (Harper 2015) at 409.) So that day is coming, maybe within a generation, and we need to be prepared. We have all listened as a soon-to-drop-out-of Hebrew-school teenager stumbles through a reading of the weekly “>d’var. We have all seen the leader of a minyan scramble to find the tenth person to fill the required quorum. We have all encountered synagogues with inattentive, unproductive and bored Board members futilely looking for ““>passage in the Talmud, attributed to Rabbi Eliezer the Great, asserts that there are literally dozens of decrees in Torah calling on us not just negatively to avoid oppressing the stranger, but also affirmatively to treat the stranger with respect. (See, e.g., Lev. 19:34; Deut. 10:18-19.) The Jewdroid of the future can be both capable and qualified to function constructively within the Jewish community. How shall we greet, how shall we treat him when he walks in the door? Whatever we do, the most important thing, according to “>not to be afraid.”