Morality: A Jewish Perspective on Ethics

Introduction

Morality refers to the knowledge of right and wrong. This very idea opens up a huge pool of ideas. It opens up to the different ideas of what’s right and wrong.

An objective morality is a moral system that is strong, rock-solid, and encourages logic. It is not a thought process that you can easily manipulate. In a nation built on an objective morality, ethics have concrete definitions and can not be bent by an individual. The 613 Mitzvos are an objective morality.

A subjective morality is flaccid and relativistic. It relies on the emotions of the people, and because of these emotions, it is extremely manipulatable (and sometimes unstable). A society dominated by a subjective morality can be emotionally exploited for the gain of the manipulator. Trends are more inclinable, our ethical codes become more malleable, and the line between right from wrong grows blurry. In a society dominated by a subjective morality, people become a slave to their emotions.  A subjective morality leads to a trend-mentality, and it will be one that will always be subject to change. It is unstable because it can not stand the test of time.

In a society dominated by a subjective morality, we have those that wish to take advantage of the inspirited. These people can then be pulled into the void of nihilism where morals aren’t perceived as relevant. An example of this are the Cultural Liberals. These social progressives are extremely trend-oriented and do not have any appreciation of an objective moral compass. The socio-political ideas that these groups pander to heavily rely on trends and will typically discard the trend ideas once they are deemed unpopular. These trends influence the direction of the moral consciousness of humanity.

These are the people who are capable of ignoring the holiness of human life because of an interest in attaining various privileges that promote selfish behavior. These dangerous ideas are in direct contradiction to an objective morality, and have opened up the door to the power of evil, and when an entire nation is governed by such a negative force of influence then we can expect corrupt leadership to succeed.

So it shouldn’t surprise anyone that a degenerating society would have such horrible leaders like those that ruled over the world’s most infamous governments. These leaders didn’t just come out of nowhere, they climbed their way up a society that tolerated vile, immoral behavior that slowly began to accept the ideas of these horrible dictators. It would make sense that an entire nation populated with of immoral supporters would be able to accept some of these corrupt people as leaders.

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[Modern Society]

It should be completely apparent that the world we live in has severely deteriorated, and to an extent, we may no longer even notice them because we are so used to it that we don’t seem to think or do anything about it. When did it start, and where does it end? Are we willingly impeding our own doom? The empires of this world have already collapsed and with them have collapsed the fundamental structures that held us together.

The “moral relativism” in the 20th century led to the withering decline in objective morality. The social decline of the human race didn’t begin in the 1960’s – though many “revolutionary” ideas were propagated then. The originating concepts rather pre-date the counter-cultural revolutions in the 1960’s going back even further. The early effects of false “enlightenment” have led to a slippery slope that has caused the world to become even more corroded from it’s very livelihood in the most disgraceful manners possible. 

The degeneration of ethics can be traced even prior to the establishment of the world’s infamous governments such as the The Third German Reich (Nazi Germany) and the United Soviet Socialist Republic (USSR) which plunged the world into turmoil. And moral changes caused such atrocious dictatorships to be conceived into existence wouldn’t have happened had it not been for the moral deterioration of society at large from the smallest to highest level of humanity. Mankind has become greatly influenced by the ideas of corrupt people with no distinct understanding of right from wrong. Nazis benefited from the lack of moral awareness. Even Hitler, himself, said that “conscience is a Jewish invention”.

Of course, anyone from previous generations would be capable of noticing the global decline, but many people in the latest generation do not seem to even be aware of it. Could it be that they are so desensitized to the degeneration of our culture that they wouldn’t even be aware of this digression? Are people in this day and age so desensitized to this literal, on-going corrosion of ethics that we are no longer aware of it?

[Shifts in Consciousness] 

There isn’t any specific, secular reason for humanity to only lean in one social direction. A nation of people can have stable relations with the world around them, and  overnight, they can be suddenly betrayed. If this can happen in human politics, then this can also happen on a social level. What is socially acceptable in mainstream culture has changed over the years.

A country can start off beautiful but quickly become spiritually polluted. A nation can be birthed by a strong understanding of what is right and then fall into darkness, and much like a nation that quickly succumbs to evil, a nation can start off having peaceful relationships with the Jewish people, and in the course of one generation, the entire relationship can disintegrate. 

Proper ethics are necessary in all levels of society. From the lowest level to the top of the pyramid, ethics are important for creating a stable society. If neither the top or bottom are decent, then you can’t expect society to be good. If we don’t fight corruption on a local level, then we can’t find it on a grand level.

The biggest problem today isn’t the mere existence of evil itself but the desensitization of evil. As man is gradually exposed to immoral things, man becomes less repulsed by this. It begins to settle and normalize in the mind. The idea that human life has no value is an example of how an immoral concept can be easily normalized [into] society. The most noble men have the capability of becoming [savages]. Germany is an example of a country where well-behaved people. 

The Modern world no longer perceives things with a real notion of value. And if it does value something, it has no genuine way of authenticating the idea that one thing is more valuable than another because they have removed sacredness from it. Even if a person in purely secular-liberal life was to claim that something is valuable, they’d have no way of showing how one object is more or less valuable than something else. In a society, without an objective idea of what is valuable, everything is perceived equally in value, and thus, everything can be seen as equally invaluable.

When someone commits an immoral act, it hurts that person in the long run. That person is damaging their Neshamah for what can seem like momentary pleasure. He is destroying something precious when he sins. This is especially true in the sin of wasting seed. Immoral behavior, generally connected to this sin, is a serious problem for the Neshamos on this world.

Some of the problems involving sexuality are] interesting to note because of the irony that is taking place in the current world. People aren’t actually having kids. In fact, many young people aren’t even getting married. It’s reverse psychology! The part of the world, once affiliated with hyper-sexualization, has ironically became a place where a large number of people who aren’t even pursuing relationships. [Modern people] are desensitized to the nature of romance and sexuality and feel no need to pursue a committed relationship or any type of relationship.

Not only is there a lack of marriage initiatives, but we also have a growing level of divorce because of the  culture of “convenience”.  We have conditioned a mentality where people will choose to enter-in and opt-out of virtually anything without having even visualized the potential outcomes of their actions. They won’t even take into consideration the harm they may have in the act of opting out of something important like a committed relationship. This lack of birth directly affects the Jewish community, for our seemingly small population in the world will get even smaller if we aren’t fruitfully multiplying.

It’s the hedonistic “culture of convenience” which pushes people to do what is necessary to satisfy short-term pleasures, to indulge in instant gratification, to fulfill the “wants” that do not truly gratify people in the long-run.

In the developed world, we have the means to satisfy all of our basic needs. We can even satisfy most of our “wants”, but are we thankful for this? Many people don’t seem to be grateful for the abundance of goods and services that people, elsewhere, don’t have the privilege of having.