BIRKAT HASHEM: BLASPHEMY - Preliminary Thoughts
Birkas Hashem constitutes one of the Seven Commandments given to "The Sonsof Noah" i.e., to all of humanity. I suggest that this prohibitionaddresses a natural human tendency to liberate oneself from all accountability.
DIFFERENTIATINGBETWEEN BLASPHEMY AND IDOLATRY
The blasphemer demandsthat Hashem, kiv'yachol, neutralize His own Being (chasv'shalom. See Sanhedrin 56a, and especially 60a). As opposedto idolatry, which substitutes an alternative commanding force for thePrimary one, Birkas Hashem reflects the human yearning for totalautonomy, with no existential responsibilities whatsoever. The blasphemeris cognizant of the fact that, ultimately, man must submit to the will ofthe Creator. He expresses his radical resentment of that fact by demanding thatthe Creator neutralize His own Being.
By the term “existential responsibilities” I meanobligations which devolve upon the individual (and upon community) as afunction of his or their very existence, rather than as a function ofcontractual obligations into which one enters as a result of one’s autonomousfree will.
DIFFERENTIATINGBETWEEN TORAH MI-SINAI AND THE SEVEN NOAHIDE MITZVOS
According to thisapproach, the Seven Noahide Commands, as opposed to Torah Mi-Sinai, are imposedupon man by virtue of his very being. They are not “accepted” –free-will or otherwise. Rather, they are as intrinsic to the human condition asis life itself. To violate these laws is to reject one’s inherent humannature. Therefore, violation of these laws is a capital offense.
In contrast, the contractual natureof Torah requires that every Jew - on some metaphysical level of his being- had been present at Sinai and had entered, of his own free will, into acommitted relationship with Hashem.
CONNECTINGBLASPHEMY WITH PROPERTY DAMAGE, ASSAULT AND BATTERY, AND MURDER [Leviticus24:15-21]
When God informs Mosheof the Blasphemer's punishment, God includes a list of punishments for killingsomeone’s domestic animal, for murder and for assault and battery. The implicitassumption behind grouping these interpersonal violations together withthe punishment for cursing God implies that whoever neutralizes the centralityof God from his existence will ultimately abuse living creatures and humanbeings.
Thus: totalautonomy → freedom from responsibility → freedom fromaccountability → moral anarchy.
This point has beentragically demonstrated in Maoist China, Stalinist Russia, and of course inNazi Germany.
Avraham Avinu articulatesthe concept of morality's dependence upon a theocentric world view when hedeclares to Avimelech [Genesis 20:11]: "I said [to myself], 'Surelythe fear of God is not in this place; they will [therefore] murder me [inorder to take] my wife.'"