Reply To: Aesthetics and Kedusha

Wow, OneOfMany. Very interesting blog. I think I may have seen it before but didn’t read it closely.

Please let me know if I misunderstand you. It’s been a long time since I had a serious conversation with a non-math person. 🙂

1. Re the definition of art:

It seems to me you are using Art to describe the creative force of knowledge. To quote –

– I would sum this up as “the creative force in humankind can be called art”. And I agree.

2. The place of art: As believing Orthodox Jews, our lives revolve around serving Hashem and Torah. Everything we do is dedicated to that. If art/science/literature is its own goal, where does Hashem come in?

It’s the rare person who can separate as Reb Meir did, the fruit from the peel. People shouldn’t be drawing their moral code from biology as it is currently taught, or statistics, or political science. And every professor I have met claims to be fair and unbiased. Yet we see that people are influenced by what they learn.

What I’m trying to say is that I currently think that art for the sake of art cannot really exist with an Orthodox hashkafah. Hence the pasuk Hashem gave beauty, art, aesthetics, the ability to create structures of theory in the world to Yefes – and he should dwell in the tents of Shem, using it l’shem Shamayim.

If I am mistaken, you are the one person I think may be able to explain it to me. 🙂