JUDAICA - Wisdom In Torah

duty
ciety. His novels De figuranten (“The Extra’s,” 1997), Fantoompijn
(2000; Phantom Pain, 2002), De asielzoeker (2002; “The
Asylumseeker”), and De Joodse Messias (2004, “The Jewish
Messiah”) gained him prominence. He has published poetry
and essays, made a new version of Desiderius Erasmus’ Lof
der Zotheid (1509, The Praise of Folly), called De mensheid zij
geprezen. (“Humanity Be Praised,” 2001). Grunberg also makes
use of the not overtly Jewish pseudonym Marek van der Jagt.
Both Grunberg and Van der Jagt have won many Dutch and
international literary prizes.
In fiction for children and young people, the novel
Chaweriem (“Hawerim” (Hebrew for “Friends”), 1995) stands
out as a modest Dutch classic. In this tale of a group of young
Jews wanting to immigrate from Holland to Israel, Leonard de
Vries (1919–2002) caught the hopes of young child survivors
for a better future. Child survivor Ida Vos (1931– ) has gained
prominence with her many novels for children: Wie niet weg
is wordt gezien (1981; Hide and Seek, 1995), Dansen op de brug
van Avignon (1989; Dancing on the Bridge of Avignon 1995),
Anna is er nog (1991; Anna Is Still Here, 1995), Witte Zwanen,
Zwarte Zwanen (“White Swans, Black Swans,” 1992), De sleutel
is gebroken (1996; The Key Is Lost, 2000), and De lachende
engel (“The Laughing Angel,” 2000).
Dutch literary critics include Joseph Melkman (1914– ),
who settled in Jerusalem and wrote Geliefde Vijand (“Beloved
Enemy,” 1964), a book about the Jew in postwar Dutch literature.
Historian Jaap Meijer (1912–1993) published a study on
poet Jacob Israël de Haan, De zoon van een Gazzan (“The Son
of a Cantor,” 1967). Meijer, the father of Ischa Meijer, also became
known by his pen name Saul van Messel, a poet who
distinguished himself from his peers in the literary world by
writing in the Saxon dialect of Groningen province.
A few Jews have also written in Afrikaans, a dialect of
Dutch containing other elements and spoken mainly by the
South African Afrikaners; see *South African Literature.
Bibliography: S.E. van Praag, De West-Joden en hun letterkunde
sinds 1860 (1926); J. Meijer, Zij lieten hun sporen achter
(1964); P. Kat, Bijbelsche uitdrukkingen en spreek wijzen in onze taal
(1926); H. Beem, Jerôsche, Jiddische spreekwoorden en zegswijzen uit
het Nederlandse taalgebied (1959); idem, Resten van een taal, woordenboek
van het Nederlandse Jiddisch (1967); C.G.N. de Vooys and G.
Stuiveling, Schets van de Nederlandse letterkunde (1966); J. Melkman,
Geliefde Vijand (1964). add. bibliography: S. Dresden, Vervolging,
vernietiging, literatuur, (1991); J. Snapper, De wegen van Marga
Minco(1997); D. Meijer, Levi in de Lage Landen (1999), J. Vos, Het geschrevene
blijft te lezen (2004).
[Gerda Alster-Thau / Daphne Meijer (2nd ed.)]
DUTY, an action that one is obligated to perform; a feeling,
or sense, of obligation. In Judaism man’s duties are determined
by God’s commandments. The entire biblical and rabbinic
conception of man’s role in the world is subsumed under the
notion of mitzvah (meaning simultaneously “law,” “commandment,”
“duty,” and “merit”). The term ḥovah, meaning “obligation”
or “duty,” which came into use later, is used interchange-
ably with mitzvah. To perform a divine commandment is to
fulfill one’s duty, laẓet yedei ḥovah (Ber. 8b). The translator
from the Arabic original into Hebrew of *Baḥya ibn Paquda’s
major work Ḥovot ha-Levavot (“Duties of the Hearts”)
used the term ḥovah as a synonym for commandment, and
the term was taken up by other writers of *musar literature
(for a discussion of the relationship between “mitzvah” and
“ḥovah” see ET, vol. 12, S.V. ḥovah). Duty is the incentive to
moral action, and a morality-based duty is evidently different
from one that is based on pleasure. According to a talmudic
dictum “Greater is he who performs an action because he is
commanded than he who performs the same action without
being commanded” (BK 38a). The pleasure derived from the
performance of a commandment is irrelevant to its nature (cf.
RH 28a “the commandments were not given to be enjoyed”),
and conversely dislike of an action is no sufficient reason for
abstention from it, cf. the saying of R. Eleazar b. Azariah: “Say
not, ‘I do not like to eat pork’… but say, ‘I would like, but I will
not for it is God’s prohibition’” (Sifra 20:26; cf. Mak. 3:15). One
should not perform an action in order to gain a reward, but
because it is a divine commandment, and hence one’s duty:
“Be not like servants who work for the master on condition
of receiving a reward…” (Avot 1:3).
The morality of an action is determined more by the motivation
of the one who performs it than by its consequences:
“You must do what is incumbent upon you; its success is up
to God” (Ber. 10a). The notion of intention (kavvanah) is central
in Jewish ethics: “Whether it be much or little, so long as
the intention is pure” (Ber. 17a; Sif. Deut. 41); “God demands
the heart” (Sanh. 106b). That is not to say that an action performed
without the proper motivation is worthless. The fact
that its results are beneficial does give it some worth. Moreover,
through performing an action without the proper motivation,
one may come to perform it with the proper motivation:
“From doing [good] with an ulterior motive one may
learn to do [good] for its own sake” (Pes. 50b; cf. Maim., Yad,
Teshuvah, 10:5).
The major problem in modern Jewish thought in connection
with the concept of duty is posed by the Kantian notion
of autonomy, according to which an action to be moral must
be motivated by a sense of duty, and must be autonomous (I.
*Kant, Fundamental Principles of Ethics, trans. by T.K. Abbott
(194610), 31ff.). This appears to conflict with the traditional
Jewish notion that the law is given by God, that is, that
it is the product of a heteronomous legislator. Moritz *Lazarus
in his Ethik des Judentums (1898, 1911; The Ethics of Judaism,
trans. by H. Szold, 1900) attempts to show that rabbinic
ethics are based on the same principles as Kantian ethics, the
basic underlying principle of both being the principle of autonomy
(ibid., 1 (1898), no. 90–105). In so doing he somewhat
distorts the Kantian notion of autonomy. Hermann *Cohen,
in Die Religion der Vernunft aus den Quellen des Judentums,
in his attempt to deal with the problem of heteronomy and
autonomy, interprets mitzvah to mean both “law” and “duty,”
72 ENCYCLOPAEDIA JUDAICA, Second Edition, Volume 6