Radical Decisions: Religion/Morality/Ends & Means.

Y accepts Kant's dichotomy of factual & normative, but his interpretation of this dichotomy is more along positivistic lines: his discussion of the subject calls to mind Max Weber's. Ultimately, all normative obligations & value-imputations are dependent upon personal decision. A valuation may, of course, be justified in terms of already recognized values, but one's ultimate values cannot be validated by anything beyond them. They cannot be the subject of rational argument. Their validity for a person results from decision, not from recognition. Since Y regards religion as an exclusively normative domain & denies that Scripture was intended to be a body of information, this is as true of religious commitment as it is of all other basic life-values. Factualknowledge may be forced upon us by experience. There is nothing to compel one into acceptance of any ultimate value-commitments, including that of religious faith. This leads to a curious dialectic of autonomy & heteronomy. The religious value of an act consists in its being performed because it is a divine command. Yet the very idea of a divine commandment & acceptance of any specific system of norms as a body of divine prescription can only follow from an autonomous decision. The very ascription of normative force to a divine command is a matter of decision. Like many other weighty decisions, this one may be tacit rather than explicit. In the typical case, one is committed to halakhic practice as a result of socialization. Only in situations in which it cannot be taken for granted need the decision enter one's awareness. The tradition presents the decision to accept the Halakhah as a unique historical event which committed the future generations of Israel. However, if we follow out the logic of Y's position, it would appear that recognition of the validity of this commitment requires constant renewal of the basic decision. The heteronomous force of the Torah & it's Mitzvoth is dependent upon continued autonomous commitment (either explicit or tacit) on both communal & personal level. Decision is not merely a condition for entertaining value; it is constitutive of value. Only what is freely choosem - a goal to which one aspires or a property one seeks to embody in reality - is, properly speaking, a value. In Y's opinion, a need cannot possibly be a value since it is given, not chosen. Freedom of choice is not a value in its own right, but a condition of all valuation ...
It is something imposed, part of the human condition, not an end in itself. Autonomy does not commit one to any specific norms, not even to "the Moral Law." Hence there is nothing contradictory about the idea of autonomous commitment to a heteronomous system of rules. Enough for now: my eyes are getting a bit too old & tired. Sleep well, dream sweet & tell us all about it if you really want to do so. We are listening to you.
05 mrt 2011 - bewerkt op 05 mrt 2011 - meld ongepast verhaal
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