Against Method The Practice of Liberal Halakhah

All of the above applies to us, as well. Liberal halakhah, like the Orthodox variety, is the intellectual practice of a particular selfdefined community of interpretation. It is our practice, and we, its practitioners, need not seek legitimacy or validation in the eyes of another community of interpretation. Our decisions are“correct” when they satisfy us. Our responsibility, therefore, is to ourselves and our own practice, the same responsibility shouldered by the participants in any other intellectual discourse: we should seek to conduct our practice according to our own best understanding of it. [ use the word“best” to imply a sense of aspiration, which is part and parcel of the activity of any intellectual practice.'” Professionals are not as a rule content to accept any and all examples of their practice as equally valuable. On the contrary: lawyers, philosophers, literary theorists, and others tend to operate on the assumption that there are better and worse ways to practice their craft. Their discussions center upon the critical examination of the work of their colleagues, in order to determine by means of accepted intradisciplinary argument just what counts as a“good”(or“better,” or“best,” or“not-so-good”) example of their community discourse. If liberal halakhah is such a discourse, a similar aspiration ought to be at work in our discussions and teaching. I begin with the assumption that we do have standards, that those who participate in the liberal halakhic endeavor do not do so with the idea that anything goes or that every interpretation presented in the name of“liberal halakhah’ is as good(or as bad) as every other one. Each of us who works in the field does so according to a vision of what liberal halakhah is and ought to be. Though we need not seek Orthodox approval of our work, we do seek our own; we measure it according to the criteria of value that motivate us. We should at the very least strive to see that it meets our own standards of what constitutes liberal halakhah at its very best.