Christopher Hitchens Bo-Teaches Rabbi Shmuley How It's Done

On Wednesday night, the 92nd Street Y took a leap of faith and hosted a debate between avowed atheist and God-hater Christopher Hitchens and Kosher Sex author Rabbi Shmuley Boteach. I say "leap of faith" because it was the 92nd Street Y, bastion of liberal Judaism, inviting the implacably atheistic and devastatingly intelligent Hitchens in to debate the existence of God — and gave him the easy side. "The burden of proof is not with me," said Hitchens calmly at the outset, and though he went on to eviscerate organized religion (and specifically the tenets of Judaism) he really didn't need to, because his argument was won right there — because his opponent could come up with nothing to counter it.

While it's true that Hitchens had the easy side — whatever "proof" a rabbi could offer of God (the stars, sun, incredible mysteries of the human body, how someone who looks like Mystery is giving lessons in scoring chicks) could never be incontrovertible enough for such an exacting logician (Iraq war arguments notwithstanding), Boteach offered up exactly....nothing. Worse than nothing, actually, because his remarks amounted to time-wasting bloviations, attacks on Hitchens himself (always a telltale sign when someone's flailing: Attacking the writer rather than the writings), and shameless name-drops about when he was at Oxford (plus one non-sequitur mention of Kosher Sex). He also made some stunning scriptural errors for a Rabbi (saying that "Thou Shalt Not Kill" was a universal commandment that the Jews followed throughout the Bible, leaving aside all manner of indigenous peoples vanquished once they entered the Holy Land; offering up an odd formulation of the notion of the "Chosen People" that didn't acknowledge the bedrock covenant with God — though he used it elsewhere to justify circumcision, again poorly, especially as Hitchens wondered why God would care what we do to our genitals or those of our children). Hitchens countered all of Boteach's non-arguments effortlessly, at one point commenting almost pityingly that Boteach was doing his job for him. It was, in a word, excruciating.

You can see a video excerpt here, but if you want to know how appallingly short Rabbi Boteach fell in attempting to counter Hitchens, look no further than the scathing commentary from the assorted writers in attendance over at Jewcy. A sampling:

Phoebe Maltz: "I found myself wishing the rabbi could make one coherent point."


Jeff Bercovici: "Hitchens wiped the floor with Boteach to such an extent that it was actually Hitchens who lost, in a sense, just by showing up. Lost stature, that is. He should be debating his equals, not publicity-hungry TV rabbis."


Daniel Radosh: "After the way Hitchens treated Boteach, it was a little hypocritical of him to chastise God for condoning bloodbaths."


Rachel Sklar (me): "In the cab on the way home, we coined a new phrase: 'To Shmuley,' denoting the making of pathetic, unsupported non-sequitur arguments and the taking of flailingly weak intellectual positions, with a dash of name-dropping bluster thrown in for good measure. *

We didn't speak to anyone who thought otherwise. Afterward, the line to get Hitchens to sign books was long and slow moving (see video below); a plaintive 92nd St. Y employee would occasionally call out to see if anyone was there for the Rabbi (and moderator Neil Gillman of the Jewish Theological Seminary, who was clearly getting exasperated with Boteach himself). At one point the same employee tried to speed things up. "To speed this process up, we ask you to turn to the page of the book that says "God Is Not Great," she said. "I never thought I'd be saying that as a director of Jewish faith."

For my part, I was thoroughly impressed with Hitchens and lined up to have him sign my book, introducing myself politely. Actually, it was my second time meeting himi — third if you count being on Scarborough Country together as having "met" — but it wasn't the time for quibbling over details, so I just asked him to sign my copy and didn't mention this. Well, mostly.

I'm taking that as a concession — or certainly as much of one as I'll ever get. Which, frankly, is more than Rabbi Boteach got. Close-up of my inscription below; see Jewcy's account here.





*I left off the end of the comment, where I make the same pun I do in this headline. Is it plagiarism if you steal from yourself?

Comments

[pfc1369]

"Someone who looks like Mystery is giving lessons in scoring chicks." ???

Must say I've given Rachael a fair trial, but she remains incoherent, uninteresting, and pointless.

The real Mystery is why she has been given this space.

[SaintN]

So you've got a consensus that Hitchens won this debate because the logic of his arguments couldn't be countered with apocrypha.­The amazing thing thoug is the quick consensus siding with Hitchens.
An interesting point of extrapolation is that If President Bush and his Cabinet were debated with this exact Hitchens'logic,then surely their defense of the Iraq War would fall to pieces as quickly and as decisively!
Then again logical arguments don't work and actually,are steadfastly prohibited from working in today's Washington!

[totalliberal]

As an atheist I think he is one of our greatest spokesmen. His only problem with the war in the mid-east is that it is yet another religious war.
Let's face it, the Arabs and Israelis base their whole positions on unproven doctrine that can never be proved.
Neither of them gets the fact that you can run a country perfectly well and make laws without the intrusion of fantasy and beliefs. That is why neither of them "gets" western culture.

[TheHandyman]

Rachel, could you please explain how an avowed atheist and someone who clearly recognizes that a large amount of the social disaters in the world are caused by religion can be called a "God hater"? It would seem to be an oxymoron if there is no GOD, how could one hate it?

The thing I like about being an atheist myself is that there is nothing to believe in, study, preach, prove, give money to, waste time with other people trying to convince all the remaining people that what we don't believe in should be forced upon those people. I don't have to spend a lot of money on things I can't afford to give to people to celebrate an event or persons life and/or death who will then feel obligated to give me something equally unneeded or wanted. I just live Life as it comes and don't ask stupid questions when certain things happen as to why this imaginary being picked on me nor do I give that imaginary being credit for something I did myself! I deserve that credit. I also understand the law of probability and that some things in life just happen randomly. I may walk through a wall because the law of probability just happened but I'd be stupid to try to walk through a wall again. Doors ae more reliable!

As for the proof of GOD, why didn't the good Rabbi just keep mentioning Faith?

[andyg]

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