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GENERAL INTEREST SOCIAL COMMENTARY

Rabbi Chaim Navon

The Pendulum

of Human Nature

ussian journalist and writer, for Canaan, Yitzchak must not marry Avraham already knew then how
Vasily Grossman, entered Berlin a Canaanite woman. On the other much local culture can influence a
Rin 1945 with the forces that sub- hand, Rashi explains that if the ser- person’s behavior and life.
dued Nazi Germany. At the Berlin Zoo, vant does not find a woman worthy
he found hundreds of mutilated animal of Yitzchak in Charan, he will marry Human nature is a mixture of good
corpses. At the gorilla’s cage, Grossman a woman from the noble daughters of and evil, desires and dreams, light and
talked to the old caretaker. Grossman Canaan, Avraham’s allies. Hence, the darkness. The culture that surrounds
asked him if the gorilla was wild. “No,” prohibition on marrying a Canaanite us and the education we receive will
replied the old man. “She just roars woman is relative and not absolute. largely determine how we develop.
loudly. Humans are wild.” At that time, Of course we have free choice, and
it was difficult to doubt it. 1 If so, the question remains: what is one can overcome one’s environment.
Avraham himself, the son of pagans,
Rousseau claimed that human beings so bad about Canaanite girls? It is is a case in point.
are essentially good. It is culture possible that the emphasis is not on
that spoils them. Nevertheless, the their nature and character but on the Sometimes we hear of the romantic
opposite seems true as well – human Canaanite culture. As Bnei Yisrael myth of the ‘noble savage’: pristine
nature is fundamentally evil and it is were about to enter the Land, G-d man, uncorrupted by civilization,
only culture that subdues that evil and repeatedly warned them not to imi- is surely good and fundamentally
restrains it. tate the evil deeds of the people of honest. We know the truth. It is
Canaan. The Canaanite culture was impossible, said Karl Popper, to return
When Avraham feels his days are corrupt and degenerate, cultivating to the harmonious state of nature: “If
numbered, he calls to his faithful ser- the lowest aspects of human nature, we turn back, then we must go the
vant and has him swear in the name such that it would be imperative to whole way – we must return to the
of G-d: “that you will not take a wife beasts.” 2
for my son from the daughters of the find a wife for Yitzchak from another
Canaanites among whom I dwell” place. David HaMelech captured this ten-
(Bereishit 24:3). What’s so bad about sion perfectly: “What is man that You
Canaanite girls? (The Radak men- “” Avraham already should remember him, and the son
tions that Noach cursed his grandson knew then how much of mortal man that You should care
Canaan.) Do they have some sort of about him? Yet You have made him
eternal, metaphysical, evil gene in local culture can slightly less than angels, and crowned
their DNA? influence a person’s him with soul and splendor” (Tehillim
8:5–6).
This explanation is a little problem- behavior and life.
atic, as Avraham seems to recognize We have seen the depths and the
the possibility that Yitzchak may Rabbi Shimshon Raphael Hirsch also heights human beings can reach.
indeed have no other option but to The choice is ours.
marry a Canaanite woman. Avraham explains that precisely because of
declares that if Eliezer does not find his location in the land of Canaan,
a woman in Charan willing to come Avraham was afraid of the influence 1 The Fall of Berlin.
with him to the land of Canaan: “you of a Canaanite woman in his home. 2 The Open Society and Its Enemies.
shall then be clear of this oath to me; A wife from far away would become
but do not take my son back there” assimilated into the culture of Avra-
(Ibid, 8). The Ramban explains that ham’s household, but if she came from
even in such a situation, when no nearby, close to home, she would Rabbi Chaim Navon is a renowned author
woman would agree to leave Charan serve as an agent of local culture. and educator.

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