SHLIACH TO ACADEMIA

Dr. Aryeh (Arnie) Gotfryd’s award-winning course, Faith and Science, was for many years the most popular course offered at New College in the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Hundreds of Jews and non-Jews learned about Sheva Mitzvos, Yesh Me’ayin, even Shoftim Nun-Alef – and loved it. Part 2 of a series.

Beis M: How did a Chassid of the Rebbe come to teach at a secular university? What were you doing there?

AG: Good question. I was already in graduate school when I first encountered Chabad in 1981, and despite wanting to quit and go to yeshiva, the Rebbe wanted me to stay and finish. I left academia as soon as I completed my doctorate, worked and raised a family, and I’m proud to say I’ve followed the Rebbe’s directives and did not send any of my kids to college.

When Gimmel Tamuz 5754 came along, I, like all of us, suddenly realized that Chaf-Ches Nisan was for real – that bringing Moshiach was going to be up to us. I knew I had to re-focus on the area the Rebbe always guided me to pursue – the synergy of Faith and Science – and I felt that I could make the greatest impact on the University of Toronto Campus. I got a green light from my mashpia and off I went!

Beis M: This was obviously not your typical campus shlichus – What were you trying to accomplish?

AG: My goal was simply this – to bring down the Ivory Tower from inside. Like a Trojan Horse, I wanted to smuggle bona fide faith into the secular curriculum with complete academic integrity and thereby oppose and even defy the culture (more accurately ‘cult’) of atheism that had overtaken it.

I was terribly resentful that secular academia had robbed me personally, and an entire generation, indeed many generations, of permission to believe. From my studies of Torah and Science I knew this to be completely unfair – that in fact, it is entirely legitimate from a scientific perspective to believe in G-d, the soul, the significance of human life, and the authenticity of the Tradition from Sinai.

I set about to prove it.

Beis M: This is a tall order! How does one ‘frummie’ take on a whole secular establishment? Did you have a plan?

AG: I knew I had to edge my way in, starting small but with room to grow. I never guessed how far it would get.

My first step was to reach out to my old thesis advisor – a non-Jew – but a fairly open-minded fellow. He wasn’t in the slightest religious but he had no problem helping me out with networking. I asked him to contact all the Jewish professors and grad students he could and I’d deliver a sample seminar about the Interplay of Science and Faith.

It was an instant hit! Soon we had a half-dozen regulars and quite a few drop-ins for each seminar. It wasn’t long until half of the attendees were non-Jews. It seemed everyone was ready to open up that silent side of the scientist – the part that realizes that there is some Higher Unity.

The next step was to add two undergraduate students to the mix. They took the seminar as an “independent study,” a kind of extra credit which I managed and my professor friend supervised. I saw this as a stepping stone to getting the course eventually listed in the official calendar, but I still had absolutely no idea how to make it happen.

After a while, one of the non-Jewish professors, a chatzi-galach, chatzi-physicist suggested that I should apply for a Templeton Foundation Grant since they support curriculum initiatives that relate faith and science.

I told him, “Come on, I know about these guys. It’s a Christian old boys club. They’d never fund a Jewish course offering.”

“With all due respect Dr. Gotfryd, you don’t know everything. I’m familiar with how these people work and you’d be surprised. You have nothing to lose.”

So, apply I did. I drafted the curriculum in some detail and sent it off to the Templeton Foundation with a cover letter on my regular personal stationery – my letterhead included “Moshiach is on his way. Let’s get ready with acts of goodness and kindness.”

The Templeton Foundation’s response was something I never expected. They said, in effect, Dr. Gotfryd, you claim that science is evolving toward Torah principles but you only cite secular sources – without rabbinic sources your claims are weak. Please include rabbinic sources to complement the scientific ones and you will be eligible for funding.

Wow! I had thought I was stretching the secular establishment as far as possible with what I was doing already – Here the non-Jews themselves are pushing me for explicit Torah content or else they won’t back it.

It was one thing for the Templeton Foundation to support a faith-forward course offering – it was quite something else for the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences to accept it in their curriculum. But there was a solution here too: The grant included $5,000 for the University to list the course. Between the prestige of an international award and the cash boost, the University approved the course quickly and easily.

Beis M: How do you put rabbinic sources in a university course for the general public? What sources did you include and why?

AG: I added a lot of content from a variety of Lubavitcher and other frum scientists, and there were several primary sources too: The Rambam’s Hilchos Yesodei HaTorah on what is G-d and what is prophecy; The Alter Rebbe’s Shaar HaYichud V’HaEmuna on yesh me’ayin, and the Rebbe Melech HaMoshiach’s sicha of Shoftim Nun-Alef about the Rebbe’s prophecy.

These are things the Rebbe says that every non-Jew must know so I included it, in addition to the Sheva Mitzvos B’nai Noach which they had to memorize for the exam.

I put together a 400-page textbook with all this science and holy material combined and for the cover I had a collage of various monochrome science-type images plus one color picture – of the Rebbe. No one had a problem with it.

Beis M: What kind of person chooses a course on Faith and Science? Isn’t it a very ‘niche’ market? And if so, why was it so popular?

AG: Before I took the first step into this shlichus, I had a feeling that this topic would be a big draw for a wide public. First are the religious and spiritual people that want to see how science meshes with their views. They have questions but nobody is providing answers. Then there are the science people who look deeply into nature and keep running up against wonders and miracles. They too have no tools to deal with the more profound aspects of what they do. I used to be one of those.

The course was held in New College which had mainly small to medium sized classrooms for niche courses. The largest hall in New College had 100 seats and that’s how many students attended this Faith and Science course, year after year. It was the most popular course in the college.

On average there were about 15 Jews and about 85 non-Jews. The Jewish students included unaffiliated, atheist, agnostic, Reform, Conservative, Modern Orthodox, Yeshivish, and Chabad. The non-Jews, l’havdil, were just as eclectic. Every race, religion, spiritual trend, and philosophical outlook you could possibly imagine was present, and then some.

Beis M: Chabad demands emes and emes is only one – the views of Torah and Chassidus. If you tell them like it is, you will be branded a demagogue and kicked off of the faculty. If you accommodate diverse beliefs, you are sacrificing the emes. How do you deal with that?

AG: It’s all a matter of presentation. At the very first class of each semester, I addressed this issue head on. I told them:

“You don’t have to believe a thing I teach in this course. You can believe exactly like me and fail – or have completely opposite beliefs and get an “A” – it’s all about how well you understand the material on tests and how well you research and argue your case in your essays.

“All the examples from the faith perspective come from Judaism. Other traditions may be relevant to science but I can only teach you what I know about and that’s Judaism. If you don’t like that, you’re in the wrong place.”

Invariably 3 to 5 students would leave and not come back, but the next week there were another 3 to 5 to take their place. The strategy worked.

Beis M: I understand you expressed things in a diplomatic way, but people must have understood where you are coming from – that you are making a case for G-d and the Torah and the Rebbe. Were you ever accused of proselytizing?

AG: Only once, and the funniest part was, of course, that the accusation came from a Jew. And it was the non-Jews who helped resolve the issue.

The subject that week was Darwin: Myths and Facts. I really didn’t discuss Creation at all. What I did do was present the whole gamut of bona fide scientific challenges to Darwin’s Theory of Evolution. The experience was designed to lead the listener to the inexorable conclusion that only a bonehead could believe in Darwin after understanding the arguments and counterarguments.

At the end of the lecture I invited responses – “Any questions?”

I had barely gotten the words out of my mouth when a very Jewish looking young man pretty much leaps out of his seat and launches into a harangue:

“I don’t understand. Are you going to just sit there and let him get away with this? Listen to him – he’s not teaching Evolution, he’s preaching Creationism. Look at him! With his skullcap and his beard. This is a University not a synagogue. Why are you all taking this lying down? If what he says is true, why aren’t the other professors saying so?”

I waited for him to run out of steam, or at least to take a breath, but before I could get a word in edgewise, our friend was dealing with some backlash of his own, heaped on him by four of his peers.

“Why are you so emotional? Why so much polemic? If you have a rational argument, table it?”

“Are the science sources he quoted nonexistent? Have you looked any of them up?”

“Is the math wrong? Are the assumptions wrong? Is the logic fallacious? What exactly is your argument?”

“Hey man, where’s your respect? The guy’s a professor – he used to teach Evolution in the Zoology Department. What do you know?”

The poor fellow was in shock. He didn’t know which way to turn. His assailants looked like a committee of the United Nations – an Asian, a Black, an Indian, and a White. He sat back down, dumbfounded.

Now I could play ‘Good Cop.’

“I’d like to hear more about what you’ve got to say. Maybe we can talk about this in my office.”

He took me up on the invitation and sure enough, it turned out he was Jewish. I offered him to put on T’fillin and he reluctantly agreed. I placed them on him and started the bracha.

“That’s alright, Rabbi. I can do that myself,” and straight away he zips through the bracha, swiftly wraps the t’fillin just right, and starts reciting the Shma by heart. “V’ahavta… V’Haya im shamo’a… Va’yomer…” I rush to get him a siddur, but he says, “Naw, I’m not going to daven a whole Shacharis.”

I asked him where he’s from.

“Toronto.”

“Where’d you go to school?”

“Hebrew Academy.”

“You live at home?”

“No, downtown.”

“On your own?”

“No, I share with a friend.”

“A guy or a girl?”

“A girl.”

“Is she Jewish?”

“No.”

Finally, the mystery is solved. This young man wasn’t fighting for truth. He was fighting for his girlfriend! Because if Darwin was right, the Torah was wrong, and if the Torah is wrong, the gentile girlfriend is okay. But if Darwin is wrong, then the Torah is right and then his lifestyle is wrong. Too painful to bear… so let’s fight on the Darwin front.

I don’t know what became of this young man, but I’m sure there would have been no way for me to get him to put on t’fillin if not for the counter-reaction of his non-Jewish classmates.