Elliot Resnick is a staff reporter for The Jewish Press. He studies Modern Jewish History at the Bernard Revel Graduate School of Yeshiva University. This article appears in issue 4 of Conversations, the journal of the Institute for Jewish Ideas and Ideals.
Despite the rhetoric emanating from certain camps of Orthodox Judaism, studying secular knowledge lishmah-knowledge for knowledge's sake-is a widely accepted notion among Jewish thinkers. In fact, virtually none of the great Jewish personalities who discuss the value of secular knowledge-from Rav Saadiah Gaon and Rambam to Rav Kook and Rav Soloveitchik-speak of its utilitarian value. Rambam does not praise Aristotle's philosophy for its salary-increasing powers, nor does Rav Kook laud university studies because of their utility in getting into a good law school.
