Ethan (איתן) Yakhin
A few months ago I was sitting at a family member’s kiddush table and he said something that didn’t sit right with me.
According to him, “Charedim” don’t learn Tanakh at all. “Charedim” is the name for the Ultra-Orthodox in Israel, and the Tanakh is what is referred to as the “Old Testament”.
His point was to belittle the religious, pointing out that it is hypocritical for them to keep a Torah that they don’t even know. Unfortunately, the conversation didn’t end there. I unsuccessfully tried to defend Charedim, and in the process, became quite upset.
Quae cunctas haereses sola interemisti in universo mundo
A.
The 20 Councils prior to the Second Vatican Council had all been convened in order to extinguish the chief heresy or evil of the time: through an ever deeper and clearer enunciation of Church doctrine. This Council was different on two counts: first, in that it was not occasioned by any contemporary heresy or evil, and second (as we have already noted above), in that it was not dogmatic. It nowhere used the formula by which dogma is infallibly defined, and moreover did not present itself as a dogmatic, but rather as a ‘pastoral’ council, understanding pastorality as a matter of action and reform. Pope Paul VI stated in a General Audience that: ‘differing from other Councils, this one was not directly dogmatic, but doctrinal and pastoral’[1]. One might say that it was dogmatic