O ne of my ongoing peeves with secular Jewish publications is the sheer tediousness of so much of what passes for writing on Judaism in their pages. That there are Yiddishe neshamos that feel a compulsion to subvert Jewish beliefs and practices is painful enough — must their regurgitation of laughably baseless assertions be so drearily predictable too?

Among the all-time leading yawn-producers of course is the notion that Judaism is fairly besotted with questioning and challenging. Yes indeed: Questions here questions there questions truly everywhere… As for answers — or for that matter G-d — well not so much.

“Judaism Religion of Questioning” is a close cousin of another perennial doozy that of “Judaism Religion of a Plethora of Voices.” You know the drill: There’s Bet Shammai and Bet Hillel and you can take your pick because it’s anyone’s Bet as to which one is right since the Talmud endorses a “multiplicity of opinions.” If you thought you just heard a low anguished murmur that would be your faithful columnist who as he types is pleading with no one in particular “No no please not again.”

But in fact yes again. Each year just as spring has sprung and Passover approaches Four Questions make a prominent appearance during the Seder (the one ritual unaffiliated Jews observe more than any other). And out rolls the “questions” meme faintly redolent of schmaltz and ready for one more hackneyed schlep around the Jewish media block.

This year’s specimen appearing in the Forward was authored by a young man ordained by a certain contemporary movement that fancies itself both “Orthodox” and “open” but is sadly neither. His piece is a quite a classic of the genre.

Our junior theologian the ink on his semikha sheepskin barely dry begins with some questions of his own about the Passover Seder:

With all their wisdom what did the rabbis instruct us at such an auspicious time? Belief in G-d? Keeping kosher? Giving charity? Nope. They preached about the importance of asking questions! With all ears listening they decided that Passover night should be filled with questions instead of answers — a truly radical pedagogic decision on their part. Beyond asking why tonight is different from all other nights the Seder is structured to provoke all sorts of questions.

Yoohoo! Question from the floor over here actually two of them: His essay is after all titled “Passover and the Jewish Art of Questioning Everything ” and if he claims that there is a Jewish art of questioning everything intellectual consistency would seem to demand the right to question the centrality indeed the very existence of this “Jewish art” itself.

And so first question: May I provide an alternative answer to the rhetorical question about “what the rabbis instructed us” to do at the Seder? True enough there’s no particular place in the Haggadah to speak of kosher and charity. But to speak of belief and trust in G-d; of obedience and thanksgiving to Him; of Israel as His Chosen People over all others; of bountiful reward for those who obey Him and severe punishment for those who don’t?

Yes all of that and more is very much what we’re bidden to speak of on that night so much so that to coin a phrase “the more one speaks of these matters the more praiseworthy one is.” So many politically incorrect Judaic principles to affirm and convey and so little time to do so (at least if you want to make chatzos).

Second dear rabbi please reassure me: You didn’t actually pen the words “Passover night should be filled with questions instead of answers ” did you? Incredibly the author continues by doubling down writing that “for the rabbis… a question is more valuable than an answer teaching us to value exploration and not discovery.”

He is speaking of a night on which the central theme is the mitzvah d’Oraisa of v’higadeta l’vincha which calls upon every Jew to teach and transmit — ideally to be sure in response to another’s questions — clear answers eternal verities absolute truths to himself to his family to the world. If ever there was a night on which answers reign supreme this is it.

It is a night on which we distinguish genuine humble curious questioning from its opposite. It is a time at which we excoriate in the harshest terms the so-called questioning of the wicked son which is naught but a mocking challenge with a question mark tacked on at the end.

For those who doubt by the way whether Elie Wiesel’s writings however well meaning he may have been do violence to authentic Judaism consider these Wiesel words that our author invokes in support of his own: “Elie Wiesel echoed the words of the sages by asking ‘When will you understand that a beautiful answer is nothing? Nothing more than illusion! Man defines himself by what disturbs him and not by what reassures him. When will you understand that you are living and searching in error because G-d means movement and not explanation.’ ”

He then quotes A.J. Heschel’s assertion that we “are closer to G-d when we are asking questions than when we think we have the answers.” Two misguided Jews offering their distorted ignorant portrayal of Torah to credulous illiterate fellow Jews.

To present Judaism as a religion that’s all about questions and ever more questions is silly uninformed and trite. But to portray it as one that “values exploration not discovery ” and whose sages believed that “a beautiful answer is nothing [an] illusion”? That’s both logical madness and religious anarchy.

Imagine the reception of derision this ordained rabbi would get were he to offer his “exploration not discovery” gem in regard to the sciences. But in his ordaining institution absolute truth is off-limits so it’s fair game.

The essay concludes with the assertion that “the highest expression of freedom is asking questions.” Quite so. The exaltation of endless questions and the denigration of answers provides all the freedom one needs — to do precisely as he pleases. (Originally featured in Mishpacha Issue 655)