Brody sets out to help us understand. Armed with serious credentials in philosophy as well as medicine, he offers a bold, new definition that is simple, and elegant, and stands up to the criticism to which he subjects it. The Modern Orthodox Jew, says Dr. Brody, is one who also accepts pro tanto the values and teachings of modernity. (He immediately addresses the concerns of those of us who are Latin-challenged, by telling us in a footnote that a pro tanto belief is one that may be overridden by other stronger considerations. This is a crucial point for Brody, as he is certainly not willing to allow the values of modernity to trump clear halacha, and similarly uneasy when those values collide with other forms of traditional thinking. He spends considerable space in the essay offering different strategies of dealing with such conflicts.)
Dr. Brody then takes us on a tour of Western thought since the Renaissance, and culls twelve values that he takes as achievements of modernity that MO should embrace. Briefly, they are: 1) the value of human worth and dignity, and of human individuality; 2) the value of beauty for its own sake; 3) the value of individual conscience in interpreting G-d’s law; 4) the value of toleration (? respect) of diversity; 5) the value of inquiry even into long-established truths; 6) the tentative acceptance of the results of scientific inquiry as true; 7) the value of reason; 8) the belief in cumulative human progress; 9) the rule of law, derived from the consent of the governed that binds all citizens equally; 10) the principle of fundamental human rights held equally by all; 11) the values of liberty, equality and fraternity; 12) the importance of nationality.
Brody fleshes out each of these values, and why MO should look kindly upon each one. I could imagine that this list might some day become the Brody Test of progressive thinking, scoring people on a scale of zero to twelve. (I find some truth in most of the values, while emphatically rejecting only one. Dr. Brody amplifies item #3 with these words: “Modern Orthodox Jews should consult sacred texts to find answers to their questions. To the extent that they feel the need, they should consult the experts on the texts….The common strategy of adopting a single expert authority as one’s authority and following their views in all cases seems to me to be an abdication of individual responsibility.” To me it seems that failure to recognize the need to submit to those who are greater talmidei chachamim runs afoul of many passages in Shas and poskim.)Adlerstein has in fact identified exactly what is, or ought to be, the difference between Modern Orthodoxy and Haredism. It is similar to one of the differences between Roman Catholicism and Protestantism. In Roman Catholicism the priests are intermediaries between ordinary Christians and God. Protestantism believes in the "priesthood of all believers". This is how the Wikipedia article on "Universal Priesthood" defines it:
Protestants believe that through Christ they have been given direct access to God, just like a priest; thus the doctrine is called the priesthood of all believers. God is equally accessible to all the faithful, and every Christian has equal potential to minister for God. This doctrine stands in opposition to the concept of a spiritual aristocracy or hierarchy within Christianity.Similarly, Modern Orthodoxy is based, or should be based, on "the Rabbinate of the observers".
I didn't read Brody's original article. For all I know, Adlerstein may have been deliberately misconstruing Brody's argument in order to set up a straw man to knock down. It doesn't matter, because I want to address Adlerstein's straw man.
