Sacrificial Categories and Personality Types
2010; Volume: 38; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês
ISSN
0792-3910
Autores Tópico(s)Psychology of Moral and Emotional Judgment
ResumoOVERVIEW AND GOALS This paper explores symbolic interpretation of the sacrificial procedures. In the first section, I clarify the importance of such a symbolic interpretation. In the sections that follow, I review a psychological theory of personality types, sacrificial law, and the proposed personality-sacrificial correspondence. In the final sections, I present applications. Statistically, sacrifices are a significant part of the Jewish religion. One-fifth of the pentateuchal books (Leviticus) and one-third of the talmudic orders (Kodashim) are devoted to sacrifices. Thus the meaning and interpretation of sacrifices must be addressed. Two schools of thought have emerged on the subject. (1) One of them interprets sacrificial laws as lacking intrinsic value, concessionary and transitional stages in weaning the Israelites away from idolatrous practices which frequently included sacrifices. Advocates of this approach can cite strong biblical evidence to support their thesis, since the sacrifices were frequently associated with decadence and corruption. An opposing school of thought interprets the sacrifices as providing symbolic guidance on core Jewish moral values and attitudes. This school includes prestigious advocates from both the early medieval scholars such as Nahmanides and 19th century scholars such as Samson Raphael Hirsch. The advocates of this approach can also point to strong biblical and talmudic support, for the Bible, as interpreted by the Talmud, describes the sacrifices as representing an intimate love relationship between God and Israel which will be renewed in the messianic era. We see that Jewish sources host diametrically opposite viewpoints on the interpretation, value and attitude toward sacrifices. This paper is properly classified as belonging to the school of thought that interprets sacrifices symbolically. There are several approaches to symbolic interpretation of sacrifices. For example, Rashi connects several sacrifices as symbolically recalling the story of the Golden Calf. (2) In contrast, Hirsch, following earlier authorities, symbolically interprets sacrifices as reflecting social hierarchy. He associates sacrifices of birds with the lower poverty-stricken classes, of sheep/goats with classes of people who are followers, of rams with leaders, and of oxen with co-workers of God--the High Priest and High Court--who assist God by plowing a course for the community in the field of life. (3) In this paper I present a third symbolic approach exclusively based on personality. The basic goal of this paper is to show a one-to-one correspondence between the six basic personality types and the six distinct categories of items that can be offered as sacrifices. It is rather remarkable that the six basic personality types used in a wide variety of modern settings, and which were developed independent of any biblical source, correspond naturally and exactly to the six categories of items that can be offered as sacrifices. THE HOLLAND THEORY OF PERSONALITY AND ENVIRONMENTS The interpretation of sacrifices does not deal with personalities only, but rather with the interaction between personalities, and conditions. For example, the sacrifices related to sin, thanksgiving, and childbirth are all different, indicating that the Bible symbolically wanted different personality responses to different situations. Therefore, for the purposes of this paper I use the Holland personality theory. Its strength is precisely that it studies the optimum interaction between personalities and environments. Although initially conceived as a theory of vocational types, it applies more broadly to personality types and environments. The Holland theory contributed profoundly to psychology's conceptualization of people and work environments, has generated international interest, is considered one of the foremost theories on people and and correlates well with other personality theories. …
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