2020年经济学人 著名的拉比萨克斯勋爵(4)

The task of uniting his co-religionists paled, of course, beside the collapse¹ of society, but this too he had to address. Every man and woman had a duty to care for others, and thus to recreate the bonds that held society together. "I" had to give way to "we". Out of great crises—climate change, coronavirus—that chance might come. Ideally religion could drive this change, with the world's faiths uniting, as they had done, imams and gurus, priests and rabbis, at Ground Zero that day. But his argument in "The Dignity of Difference" that all the major religions were equally valid² ways to truth had caused even more trouble with the Haredi. Instead, in his last book, he called for a shared morality: agreed norms of behaviour, mutual³ trust, altruism⁴, and a sense of "all-of-us-together".

当然，与社会的崩溃相比，联合他的宗教信徒的任务显得微不足道，但这也是他必须解决的问题。每一个男人和女人都有责任关心他人，从而重新建立起维系社会的纽带。“我”不得不让位于“我们”。像气候变化，新冠病毒等重大危机有可能出现。理想的情况下，宗教可以推动这一变化，就如世界的信徒一样，那天在世贸中心遗址联合起来，伊玛目古鲁，牧师和拉比。但他在《差异的尊严》一书中提出，所有主要宗教都是通往真理的有效途径给哈西德教派带来了更大的麻烦。相反，在他的上一本书中，他呼吁建立一种共同的道德观：公认的行为准则，相互信任，利他主义，以及“我们所有人都在一起”的感觉。

The liberty craved⁵ by "me" could be sustained only by "us". It was a very long shot, but he was not a pessimist⁶. Part of his job was to cheer people up, and he liked to wear a yellow tie, like sunshine, for his public lectures. If he felt depressed⁷, music soon lifted him out of it. So, too, did his studies. If he was stranded⁸ on a desert island, he told a BBC interviewer, he hoped it could be with all 20 volumes of the Talmud and plenty of pencils, in order to write commentaries in the margins⁹. Meanwhile, thinking and writing in his garden study in Golders Green, with or without his invaluable¹⁰ earphones, he could escape the shouting world a little.

“我”渴望的自由只有“我们”才能维持。希望非常渺茫，但他不是一个悲观主义者。他工作的一部分是让人们高兴起来，他喜欢打黄色领带，就像阳光一样，他的公开演讲。如果他感到沮丧，音乐很快就把他从沮丧中解脱出来。他的研究也是如此。如果他被困在一个荒岛上，他告诉BBC记者，他希望能有20卷《塔木德》和大量铅笔，以便在页边空白处写评论。与此同时，他在戈尔德格林的花园书房里思考和写作，不管有没有他那无价的耳机，他都可以逃离喧嚣的世界。

On a visit he made once to Auschwitz, as he wept and asked, like so many others, where God had been in the Holocaust¹¹, he seemed to hear an answer: "I was in the words." The words were "You shall not murder." If human beings refused to listen to God, even he was helpless. But if much of the noise that humans made could be cancelled out, they might more often hear what He was saying.

在一次访问奥斯威辛集中营时，他哭了，像许多其他人一样，问上帝在大屠杀中去过哪里，他似乎听到了一个回答：“我在文字里。”那句话是“你不应杀人。”如果人类拒绝听从上帝，即使他也是无助的。但是，如果人类制造的噪音能够被抵消，他们可能会更经常地听到他在说什么。

1 collapse   

vi.累倒；昏倒；倒塌；塌陷

参考例句：

• The country's economy is on the verge of collapse.国家的经济已到了崩溃的边缘。
• The engineer made a complete diagnosis of the bridge's collapse.工程师对桥的倒塌做了一次彻底的调查分析。

2 valid   

adj.有确实根据的；有效的；正当的，合法的

参考例句：

• His claim to own the house is valid.他主张对此屋的所有权有效。
• Do you have valid reasons for your absence?你的缺席有正当理由吗？

3 mutual   

adj.相互的，彼此的；共同的，共有的

参考例句：

• We must pull together for mutual interest.我们必须为相互的利益而通力合作。
• Mutual interests tied us together.相互的利害关系把我们联系在一起。

4 altruism   

n.利他主义，不自私

参考例句：

• An important feature of moral behaviour is altruism.道德行为一个重要特点就是利他主义。
• Altruism is crucial for social cohesion.利他主义对社会的凝聚是至关重要的。

5 craved   

渴望，热望( crave的过去式 )； 恳求，请求

参考例句：

• She has always craved excitement. 她总渴望刺激。
• A spicy, sharp-tasting radish was exactly what her stomach craved. 她正馋着想吃一个香甜可口的红萝卜呢。

6 pessimist   

n.悲观者；悲观主义者；厌世

参考例句：

• An optimist laughs to forget.A pessimist forgets to laugh.乐观者笑着忘却，悲观者忘记怎样笑。
• The pessimist sees difficulty in every opportunity.The optimist sees opportunity in every difficulty.悲观者在每个机会中都看到困难，乐观者在每个困难中都看到机会。

7 depressed   

adj.沮丧的，抑郁的，不景气的，萧条的

参考例句：

• When he was depressed,he felt utterly divorced from reality.他心情沮丧时就感到完全脱离了现实。
• His mother was depressed by the sad news.这个坏消息使他的母亲意志消沉。

8 stranded   

a.搁浅的，进退两难的

参考例句：

• He was stranded in a strange city without money. 他流落在一个陌生的城市里， 身无分文，一筹莫展。
• I was stranded in the strange town without money or friends. 我困在那陌生的城市，既没有钱，又没有朋友。

9 margins   

边( margin的名词复数 )； 利润； 页边空白； 差数

参考例句：

• They have always had to make do with relatively small profit margins. 他们不得不经常设法应付较少的利润额。
• To create more space between the navigation items, add left and right margins to the links. 在每个项目间留更多的空隙，加左或者右的margins来定义链接。

10 invaluable   

adj.无价的，非常宝贵的，极为贵重的

参考例句：

• A computer would have been invaluable for this job.一台计算机对这个工作的作用会是无法估计的。
• This information was invaluable to him.这个消息对他来说是非常宝贵的。

11 holocaust   

n.大破坏；大屠杀

参考例句：

• The Auschwitz concentration camp always remind the world of the holocaust.奥辛威茨集中营总是让世人想起大屠杀。
• Ahmadinejad is denying the holocaust because he's as brutal as Hitler was.内贾德否认大屠杀，因为他像希特勒一样残忍。