2020年经济学人 著名的拉比萨克斯勋爵(2)

A rabbi was, after all, a teacher. He was a clear, kind one, still with a touch of East End about him, his father had sold shmatters, clothes, in Petticoat Lane, and when he was made a peer in 2009 he took the title "Baron¹ Aldgate". But he was also firm, even stern. He wanted to leave his mostly secular² listeners in no doubt that things were good or evil, true or false, absolutely, and that moral relativism was the scourge³ of the age.

毕竟，拉比是个老师。他是个清白善良的人，身上还带着一点东区的气息，他父亲在衬裙街市集卖过衣服，当他在2009年被评为贵族时，他获得了“阿尔盖特男爵”的头衔。但他也很坚定，甚至很严厉。他想让大多数世俗听众确信事情是好是坏，不管是真是假，绝对如此，道德相对主义是这个时代的祸害。

Judaism, as he pointed⁴ out, often provided antidotes⁵ to the chaos⁶. The Torah, God's will revealed in words, was an algorithm that gave discipline to life. Keeping Shabbat was an ideal way to achieve work-life balance. The festivals and High Holy Days reminded Jews of their shared traditions and history: the "we", not the "I". Above all, out of the suffering endured by Jews for centuries, Judaism had distilled⁷ hope.

正如他指出的，犹太教经常为混乱提供解药。律法，上帝的旨意，在文字中揭示，是一个算法，给予生活纪律。庆祝安息日是实现工作与生活平衡的理想方式。节日和圣日提醒犹太人他们共同的传统和历史：“我们”，而不是“我”。最重要的是，在犹太人几个世纪的苦难中，犹太教提炼出了希望。

Every crisis gave birth to opportunity. The world could be changed not by force, but by ideas. Unhappily, though, much of the raucousness⁸ that dogged him came from Jews themselves. Though non-Jews saw him as the spokesman for all the Jews of Britain, officially he was the leader of only an Orthodox minority, the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth⁹. A much larger number, Reform and Liberal and ultra-Orthodox, or Haredi, were outside his purview¹⁰, but still looked to him. Pleasing everyone was impossible. His intellectual instincts, honed at Church of England schools and Cambridge rather than religious shuls, were on the liberal side, and in that spirit he made services more lively and revised the daily prayer book, translating the Hebrew from scratch.

每一次危机都会带来机会。改变世界不是靠武力，而是靠思想。然而，不幸的是，困扰他的喧嚣大多来自犹太人自己。虽然非犹太人视他为英国所有犹太人的代言人，在官方上，他只是一个东正教少数民族的领袖，即英联邦希伯来联合会众。但大多数，比如“改革和自由”运动以及极端正统派教徒哈雷迪，这些都不在他的管辖范围，但都尊敬他。取悦所有人是不可能的。他的智力本能是在英国教会学校和剑桥大学而不是宗教学校磨练出来的，是自由派的一方，本着这种精神，他使礼拜更加生动，并修改了每日祈祷书，从头开始翻译希伯来语。

1 baron   

n.男爵；(商业界等)巨头，大王

参考例句：

• Henry Ford was an automobile baron.亨利·福特是一位汽车业巨头。
• The baron lived in a strong castle.男爵住在一座坚固的城堡中。

2 secular   

n.牧师，凡人；adj.世俗的，现世的，不朽的

参考例句：

• We live in an increasingly secular society.我们生活在一个日益非宗教的社会。
• Britain is a plural society in which the secular predominates.英国是个世俗主导的多元社会。

3 scourge   

n.灾难，祸害；v.蹂躏

参考例句：

• Smallpox was once the scourge of the world.天花曾是世界的大患。
• The new boss was the scourge of the inefficient.新老板来了以后，不称职的人就遭殃了。

4 pointed   

adj.尖的，直截了当的

参考例句：

• He gave me a very sharp pointed pencil.他给我一支削得非常尖的铅笔。
• She wished to show Mrs.John Dashwood by this pointed invitation to her brother.她想通过对达茨伍德夫人提出直截了当的邀请向她的哥哥表示出来。

5 antidotes   

解药( antidote的名词复数 )； 解毒剂； 对抗手段； 除害物

参考例句：

• Treatment involves giving antidotes that Bind the lead in the tissues. 治疗办法有用解毒剂，它会与组织中的铅结合而把它驱逐出去。
• With Spleen Qi, heat antidotes, such as cough Runfei effectiveness. 具有补脾益气、清热解毒、润肺止咳等功效。

6 chaos   

n.混乱，无秩序

参考例句：

• After the failure of electricity supply the city was in chaos.停电后，城市一片混乱。
• The typhoon left chaos behind it.台风后一片混乱。

7 distilled   

adj.由蒸馏得来的v.蒸馏( distil的过去式和过去分词 )；从…提取精华

参考例句：

• The televised interview was distilled from 16 hours of film. 那次电视采访是从16个小时的影片中选出的精华。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Gasoline is distilled from crude oil. 汽油是从原油中提炼出来的。 来自《简明英汉词典》

8 raucousness   

n.粗声；沙哑；沙哑声

参考例句：

9 commonwealth   

n.共和国，联邦，共同体

参考例句：

• He is the chairman of the commonwealth of artists.他是艺术家协会的主席。
• Most of the members of the Commonwealth are nonwhite.英联邦的许多成员国不是白人国家。

10 purview   

n.范围；眼界

参考例句：

• These are questions that lie outside the purview of our inquiry.这些都不是属于我们调查范围的问题。
• That,however,was beyond the purview of the court;it was a diplomatic matter.但是，那已不在法庭权限之内；那是个外交问题。