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From: samet@sfmag.UUCP (A.I.Samet)
Newsgroups: net.religion.jewish
Subject: Re Rights
Message-ID: <593@sfmag.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 2-Jun-85 14:52:14 EDT
Article-I.D.: sfmag.593
Posted: Sun Jun  2 14:52:14 1985
Date-Received: Tue, 4-Jun-85 05:37:49 EDT
Organization: AT&T Information Systems, Summit, NJ
Lines: 65

> ... your rights end where my rights begin ...

The issue of  rights  is  at  the  heart  of  many  disagreements
expressed here and it deserves comment.

One argument for respecting  men's  rights  is  that  the  common
interest  of  all  men  is  best  served if we all adhere to this
principle. This  argument  establishes  rights  infringements  as
wrong because they violate a social norm subscribed to by members
of society, for society's perceived benefit. Under this view, the
limit on personal rights is determined  solely  by  the principle
of personal rights, i.e., your rights cannot infringe on mine.

A second argument is that man is inherently endowed with  certain
inalienable   rights.    For   some,   this  position  relatively
axiomatic, in the sense that they don't  see  any  real  need  to
prove it, and can't understand how anyone could think otherwise.

A third argument is very close to  the  second.  Man's  endowment
with  rights  stems  from  the  religious  perspective that he is
somewhat sacred, being created in the image of G*d.  According to
this  position,  the  ultimate  reason for respecting others, and
respecting their rights,  would  be  because  of  man's  inherent
sanctity.  Historically,  this view pervaded Western society, and
in that sense, its incorporation into our legal  system  reflects
our heritage of so-called "judao-christian" values.

It's safe to say that the Torah sees   certain  validity  in  the
first  and  third arguments. (The second one is unnecsary in that
the third provides a basis for what was  taken  axiomatically  in
the second.)  In many cases the consequences are the same for all
three positions.

In others, the third view would lead  to  different  conclusions.
The   reason   for   this   is   that  this  view  sees  G*d,  in
contradistinction to Man, as the ultimate arbiter of  values.  In
this  sense,  it would place morality above ethics. (People often
use the term morality and ethics interchangibly. I am   selecting
a  usage  which  stresses the distinction between values stemming
from a Divine imperative   and  those  which  are  necessary  for
orderly human relations.)

In applying the third  view,  the  Torah  might  require  capital
punishment  for  certain  religious sins. This would override any
right to life which would be posited by purely man-centered value
systems. In such cases, it would appear that the Torah sees man's
sanctity as second to some other realm of  sanctity,  or  perhaps
that  certain  actions  undermine  his  sanctity  or  threaten to
corrupt the basic sanctity of mankind. Such considerations  would
seem to take precedence, in the Torah view, over argument #1.

As an aside, Christianity attempts, on the one hand to  subscribe
to the Torah, and on the other hand to advocate tolerance towards
some practices  which  the  Torah  views  harshly.   The  liberal
tendencies of modern humanism stem in part from such biases which
are tracable  to  Christianity.   Again,  the  issue  of  capital
punishment is a case in point.

Intelligent debate over rights issues  (and others)  requires  us
to  identify the relevant  sacred cows rather than to posit their
sanctity. An approach which ignores its own underlying dogmas and
simultaneously  attacks the Torah  view as dogmatic and arbitrary 
is  blindly biased and self-righteous.

					Yitzchok Samet