Clarification on Jewish-to-Gentile Organ Donation

A couple of times over the last couple of days, I've alluded to the notion that there is a halakhic question about whether an Orthodox Jew can donate (post-mortem*) an organ to a non-Jew. I've now become convinced that there is no question, at least in practice. The Halachic Organ Donor Society boasts a number of prominent rabbis as members and maintains that the religion (or lack thereof) of the organ recipient is irrelevant.

They offer 5 reasons why donating organs to the general population is okay according to halakha. The only one which is explicitly anti-racist is presented as a "could be:"

(1) [That the Torah considers the life of a non-Jew to be less valuable than that of a Jew] could be challenged on the Torah basis that "all of mankind was created in the image of God."

The other 4 are (I paraphrase): (2) that today's non-Jews, especially monotheistic ones, are not in the same category as the non-Jews referred to in the Talmud; (3) that we fear donating only to Jews would cause enmity between non-Jews and Jews; (4) that your organ could end up in a Jew; and (5) that by donating to a non-Jew, the Jews on the waiting list get bumped up.

(2) could be read as not being racist and, if you stretch, as not being anti-non-child-sacrificing-pagans, but 3-5 are really justifications for why one can donate even if the fact that the recipient(s) potential non-Jewishness is a problem. It seems clear to me from the Talmud cited that Orthodox Judaism does fundamentally find a non-Jewish life somehow less valuable, but that in practice, it does not rule that way. This speaks well of Orthodox Judaism as practiced, but should raise serious questions about the underlying dogma of OJ.

Kudos to HODS and the rabbis affiliated with it for taking such proactive action to save lives.


* What constitutes death for the purposes of organ donation is a matter of debate, with many rabbis holding a stricter view than does the medical establishment.

What's the Deal with Halakha?

For the purposes of this discussion, halakha is the system of Jewish law followed by Orthodox Jews.

Andrew Sullivan has a provocative quote from a Dutch sociologist:

Are women more attracted to the life of a desperado than men?" asks sociologist Jolande Withuis in her essay "Suffer, fight, become holy" on radical women Muslims. She sees their motivation in the promise of complete devotion. "Faith offers radical women Muslims a 'total' identity that isn't limited to certain occasions and which is considerably more serious than anything else. It demands effort and renunciation, yet offers fulfillment and peace of mind. Boring or tiresome rules, such as covering oneself or not being allowed to eat certain foods, become a source of self-awareness. They are like anorexics, who derive satisfaction in overcoming hunger, even if it is harmful to their health. Correspondingly, these women occupy themselves to the point of absurdity in trying to determine whether things are 'haram' or 'halal' – and this occupies their time and gives them the pleasant feeling of pursuing a meaningful life.

I'm not that interested right now in the question this essay asks, but the part I've bolded jumped out at me. We current and former Orthodox Jews know many who seem obsessed with the following the letter of the law to an absurd degree. And even that's not enough for them -- they accept more and more stringencies upon themselves, going far above and beyond what is required by halakha. Why do they do this? What do they get out of it?

Ask them and they'll tell you that they are merely fulfilling God's commands or, if they are the more spiritual type, that paying close attention to the intricate details of halakha infuses every aspect of their life with meaning. I think that's probably a fair assessment, leaving aside the people with actual OCD.

In discussing why people become or remain religious, meaning generally comes in at the top of the list or in second, after community. I didn't fully realize until I read the above quote that meaning comes in two forms -- one, the overarching sense that the universe makes sense and that we are here for a reason, and two, that the feeling that every action we do can be meaningful.

When I tie my shoes, it has no real meaning, but when an Orthodox Jew of a certain mindset does it, following carefully the halakha which states you must put on the right shoe before the left, then tie the left before the right, it becomes a way to connect to a deeper purpose. Some people apparently find this very satisfying.

Is this a healthy way of living? Who am I to say? I'm pretty sure I don't have the personality type to find such absurd rules meaningful even if I did believe in God. ("Does God really care how I tie my shoes?" I asked as a kid when I first learned that rule.) The analogy to anorexia made by the author of the above quotes strikes me as unfair in the sense that anorexia is objectively dangerous and unhealthy, while I haven't seen any evidence that adherence to halakha is particularly bad for you. However, the idea that the obsessively halakhic Jew (or strict Muslim, etc.) is deriving psychological satisfaction from his actions and omissions is an interesting one albeit a bit obvious in hindsight.

Do Orthodox Jews Avoid Investigating Biblical Authorship?

Chana, in her review of the movie Trembling Before God, responds to the tension between compassion for gay people and loyalty to the laws of the Torah:

The Rabbis who were interviewed came across as compassionate but in a halakhic bind, as they truly are; the Torah says what it says and one cannot, as Rabbi Steven Greenberg suggests, simply reinterpret the verses in question. The Rabbis on a whole explained that they felt compassion toward those who were suffering and realized that these people were in pain, but they were not at liberty to change Torah law. I believe this to be a fair approach.

In the comments section, erachat summed up the problem as follows:

The problem lies in the fact that Orthodox Jews don't believe the Torah was written by man.

Here was my response:

I agree. They also, by overwhelming majority, refuse to investigate whether this belief is reasonable in the light of the text itself, even when they admit it's a struggle to reconcile themselves to some of its moral instruction.

If nobody were harmed by the notion that the Torah was written by God, this would be merely a personal choice. However, because there are hundreds or thousands of actual, existing human beings who are being marginalized because of some of the words contained in that book, I'd argue that people have the moral responsibility to investigate whether the book is indeed divine, or whether said divinity falls apart under scrutiny.

If, upon honest investigation, they continue to believe the Torah is the word of God, so be it. But few have the courage to try, and even fewer of those remain convinced that it's God's word.

Chana wrote that the rabbis are in a bind and that is true, but what she is leaving out is that they have the ability to unbind themselves but choose not to exercise it.

How can I be so sure that the rabbis have chosen not to investigate the Torah's origins?

First of all, I grew up Orthodox. I know that certain topics are off-limits, and authorship of the Torah is one of them. Yeshiva students don't go through the process of studying Biblical criticism before coming to a conclusion about the Torah's origins -- they don't even spend an hour with a friend debating both sides of the issue.

Second, I don't believe that a fair-minded perusal of the facts can possibly support the notion that God dictated the Torah word-for-word to Moses. Even without the multiple authors idea behind the Documentary Hypothesis, a plain reading of the text shows that it was written well after Moses's lifetime. (For example, in Gen 14:14, it refers to the city Dan. Dan was named Dan much after Moses's time, though, as recounted in Judges 18. There are many other examples.)

Can anyone tell me I'm wrong? What percentage of rabbis who think they are "in a bind" have honestly investigated whether the binding is of their own making? How many of you, Orthodox readers, can tell me you've honestly considered the question and decided that the Torah was written by God as dictated to Moses?