The Book and the Sword: A Life of Learning in the Shadow of Destruction

by David Weiss Halivni

David Weiss Halivni emerges his original approach to critical study of the Talmudic text not only in its modern printed form but as it was in its original form, the Oral Torah from the mouths of countless sages.

Genres: Judaism, Memoir, Jewish, History, Holocaust, Nonfiction

208 pages, Hardcover

First published October 2, 1996

Reviews

[Harry · Rating 3 out of 5]

Rabbi Halivni calls this book a spiritual biography, but as a complete biography I found it wanting. I had the honor of meeting Rav Halivni at the Union for Traditional Judaism. I had purchased his book because my mother-in-law came from Sighet. Yet her description of Sighet (a city, a county seat) seemed at odds with what Halivni seems to describe as a shtetl.
Halivni's most profound early relationship was with his grandfather. Yet we learn very little about his relationship with his biological father who was divorced from his mother when Halivni was quite young. Nor do we learn anything about Halivni's wife and sons.
The book is in part a biography and in part a Holocaust memoir. While I can in no way compare myself to someone who survived the horrors of the Shoah, Halivni does a poor job of describing these horrors and what it felt like to lose his entire family. Indeed, by his own admission, Halivni had it relatively easy during the majority of his time in the camps as a transporter of drill bits. Perhaps there s a bit of psychological blocking going on.
I wish Halivni had more to say about his theories of biblical maculation, but I understand this is covered more thoroughly in some of his other books ("Peshat and Derash"). Yet as a biblical and talmudic critic and innovator, I found it interesting that his break with the Jewish Theological Seminary and Conservative Judaism was over the ordination of women. With the hindsight of 35 years, we see that today the Orthodox movement is struggling with women's ordination. We also see that the Conservative movement is in a free fall, rapidly losing members and congregations. Unfortunately Halivini's own UTJ has not fared much better.
Finally Halivni states that we cannot ask theological questions on the Shoah. I disagree. We can always ask the questions (why did God cause the Flood, why were the two Temples destroyed, etc.), but we can never fully know God's motives.

[Maggie Anton · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was curious about Rabbi Weiss Halivni, the controversial Talmud professor whose critical text study of the Talmud outraged the traditional Orthodox world and led to his teaching Talmud at the Conservative movement's Jewish Theological Seminary. There was no doubt that he was Chaim Potok's model for Reuven Malter, protagonist of The Chosen and The Promise. What kind of man would stand up against the Orthodox movement that had guided him since childhood, at the potential cost of his own career? On the other hand, Halivni so vehemently objected to ordaining women rabbis that he left the Conservative seminary to teach at Columbia University and found his own movement, the Union for Traditional Judaism. Which, if you've never heard of it, explains a lot about his life.

While this was at times an interesting autobiography, I didn't think he did a good job of answering those questions. His early years, despite his time in Auschwitz, seem to lack emotion, especially in light of so many other powerful Holocaust memoirs. His rejection as a teacher also doesn't seem to bother him much; he just moves on to another institution. However much he tried to explain his Talmud text criticism method, he frustrated me by not giving any examples. In the end, I never learned the answers to my questions and found his "biography" disappointing.

[Elise Cohen]

The Book And The Sword: A Life Of Learning In The Shadow Of Destruction by David Weiss Halivni (1997)