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How is a compulsive like a multiplication table?

No. That's not the first line of a joke. It's the first line of a discussion of several matters that came to mind this morning as my children were preparing theirs for school. [This particular essay will be the first in a multi-part series, but, for the moment, I'm not sure how long it will be. In all likelihood it will have two or three parts, but I can't be absolutely sure at this time. We'll both find out as I go along.]

I'm an observant Jew. But I admire ISIS and atheists. ISIS would strip me of my life and atheists of my beliefs. Yet I respect them both – at least in one particular way. I'm in awe of them. They have views which they hold very strongly. Members of ISIS would kill or die for them,ⁱ though I suspect that most atheists wouldn't go quite that far. But they don't hesitate to expound their views and when they talk – especially ISIS – the world listens. And in the United States, especially in legal settings, the atheists usually get their way. It's almost as if the Constitution prohibits religion.

Yet the Constitution and the Bible are very much alike. Both are filled with absolutes in the form of laws and standards. Both are subject to interpretation, and there is considerable disagreement about how to interpret those absolutes.ⁱⁱ But there are absolutes. There are rules. And in a world in which virtually anything goes, the discipline provided by rules, however you interpret them, and the structure they give to our lives helps us work our way through our quotidian struggles, is the factor that makes our lives more understandable.

On my refrigerator, held on by magnets, is an aging, typed list of assignments which were the responsibilities of my children as we prepared for the Sabbath. (They – the children – have families of their own now, but the document remains and serves as a checklist for me of chores that have to be done each week. I usually remember them all, but it's a good crutch.) There were other sets of rules distributed or posted that solved many problems before they occurred. I'm in agreement with those “experts” who favor structure for growing children; who believe that even though children seek independence, the existence of firm control is reassuring to them. I favor that view not because of the experts but because it makes sense, and my children responded to it. Order, structure, and predictability deflect chaos. They are the basis for living lives we can understand, and the same properties form the basis for meaningful change and progress.

But that approach isn't limited to parenting. In almost every profession there's a checklist that has to be followed by a practitioner so he can be sure he doesn't miss something. Take a pilot for example. There are certain things he must do every time, and every time he must do them in the same way. While that doesn't guarantee that every flight will be a safe one, it ensures that every precaution that can be taken has, in fact, been taken and the odds are better that there will be a successful outcome.

The same is true of the compulsive and the multiplication table. In both cases there is something that must be done the same way every time. There may or may not be a listing of precisely how – whether it's some particular act, as it might be for someone who's compulsive or, as with a multiplication table, the result of some specific act, but it should always be the same. People who straighten pictures, straighten pictures. Every one they see if that is possible. Multiply nine times eight and it will always be seventy-two. At least in base ten, which is the template usually used with children. Both compulsion and the multiplication table deal with some kind of absolute. It may be an absolute for a person or for everyone. But it is invariable. Gravity always brings things closer together. If it doesn't, it's not gravity.

Among the most important of absolutes – and I reject the concept of moral relativismⁱⁱⁱ – are right and wrong. Although it's not always obvious what is right, if we're not all on the same page, chaos will result.

Next episode: “Incompatibility” – Competing(?) absolutes.

I        They've made meaningless the entire concept of “mutually assured destruction” as a method for discouraging future conflict. They welcome destruction.

ii        There are many writers of commentaries on both. They deny that they are changing the contents – albeit there are many who would like to do so – and insist only that their interpretations of those contents clarify the meaning.

iii      At least within a given society for many of them. For others, however, there is only the belief that what is absolute is absolute.