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El Elid

Against Method 57

practice: they are community standards, the demands that those who write and read liberal halakhic literature the“producers” and “consumers” of liberal halakhah place upon the work we do. If we wish to raise the level of those standards, we may do so, but we can do so only through the very same process of intradisciplinary rhetoric by which we have created the standards that currently exist.

Like many other observers of the contemporary scene, I am “against method” as a way of establishing meaning in such discourses as law and halakhah.“Method” is a refuge, a simple and ultimately artificial formula for determining correctness that allows practitioners to marginalize their opponents while sparing themselves the hard work of argument and debate. In fact, there is no method, no refuge from that hard work. From this, we can derive two important lessons. The first is that the critics of liberal halakhah, whether to our right or to our left, have no“objective” basis upon which to declare that our halakhic teachings are incorrect. In the absence of formal halakhic method, they can declare us to be“wrong” only on the basis of argumentation that we, a distinct community of Jewish legal interpretation and practice, find persuasive and convincing. The second lesson is that we need to pay close and careful attention to the way in which we arrive at our decisions. That there is no formal halakhic method for determining objective correctness does not mean that anything goes, that any liberal halakhic idea is as good as any other. Our ideas are“right” to the extent that they pass the test of argument as imposed, understood, and practiced by our own community. Argument, when you get right down to it, is all that liberal halakhists and, for that matter, any halakhists— have. Yet that, if we do it right, is quite enough. Our task, like that of halakhists who form communities other than our own, is to facilitate the conduct of our argument, to make sure that it can be carried on honestly, vigorously, and respectfully, and that in pursuing it, we practitioners keep before our eyes the goal of making our practice the best that it can be. These conditions do not ensure that any one of us will win the