Honorable Rabbi,
In your article you wrote:
“According to my humble opinion, this is the assumption that underlies Rashba’s conception of myth, and apparently that of all of us as well. A myth is not just some story by means of which we educate ourselves and our children and students. If it were such, then indeed there would be no importance at all to its historical truth. The myth is a focal point of causal influence. The deeds of Abraham our forefather influence his descendants, and so too the deeds of all the patriarchs. Without this influence they would be like other legendary myths, or semi-legendary ones, which have no real influence whatsoever beyond the narrative-psychological power within them (those are indeed ‘educational myths’).

The revelation at Mount Sinai is also not a myth. If the revelation at Mount Sinai was not in historical reality, or if the patriarchs and their deeds were not in historical reality, then one could not educate on their basis in any meaningful way either. There is also a different conception here of the very notion of ‘education.’ Education, too, is not merely psychological influence, but causal influence (not deterministic, of course). It is not possible to educate a people, or any social group, to act and to sacrifice itself throughout history, solely on the basis of shared myths, in the modern sense of the term ‘myth.’ This impossibility is not a psychological-educational problem, for if it were, then the myth and its historical truth would be no more than an educational means. This is a real problem, and its indication is that one cannot educate on the basis of a falsehood, or a historical illusion.[13]”

If I understood correctly, then we are obligated to say that, for example, the stories of the patriarchs happened historically as well, because otherwise we could not educate toward the values they represent.

1) If so, why do you say that it is indeed possible that not all these stories happened (except for the revelation at Mount Sinai)?

2) Then what weight do mythical stories without a historical basis have, if you claim that one cannot really educate on their basis?

My opinion has changed since then. There is a likelihood that some core existed, but I am far from convinced that all this really happened. Beyond that, what I wrote here is that the only thing necessary for faith is the revelation at Mount Sinai. Everything else can be myth, but I do not know whether, or what part of it, is myth. My claim was only that the mythical conception can also fit with faith. Indeed, it does not seem likely to me that everything is myth, but in principle it is possible. Of course there may be educational difficulties, but the fact that there are difficulties does not say anything necessary about reality as it was. At most, one has to think about how to deal with the difficulties.
“We are obligated to say that everything happened” is not a phrase I use at all. There is no obligation to say or think anything. What you think is what you think. There is no obligation to think something.

In what way has your opinion changed, and why?

In that article I thought that myths existed and were created if they had influence over generations, and today I am less sure of that. Although even there I presented it only as an explanation of Rashba’s view.

Do these remarks also apply to the second book in the quartet (about science, religion, and myth)?

Indeed.
Both are from the period of early Michi.

Why doesn’t Michi B accept Michi A?

Because he came to his senses and saw counterexamples (Michi C).

So it’s not worth reading it?

I think it is worth reading, because even incorrect positions can teach. And in particular, the arguments are substantive and call for a response. Beyond that, this is a negligible part of the book.

It is ruled in the Shulchan Arukh (Orach Chayim 25:5): “When putting them on, one should intend that the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded us to place these four sections, which contain the unity of His Name and the Exodus from Egypt, on the arm opposite the heart and on the head opposite the brain, so that we remember the miracles and wonders that He did for us, which indicate His unity and that He has the power and dominion in the upper and lower worlds to do with them according to His will.”
Is that a myth? And the Passover Haggadah?

Instead of referring me to the Shulchan Arukh, refer me to the Torah itself. Beyond the descriptions themselves, there are also verses that command us, such as: “so that you remember the day of your departure…” and many more.
Clearly, even someone who says that this is myth does not deny that Jewish law relates to it as real events. Either because our Sages were mistaken, or because the myth is supposed to be constitutive, and therefore it does not matter whether it happened or not; we are to show gratitude to the Holy One, blessed be He, “who brought us out of Egypt” in the virtual-mythical history. It is true that if it is completely clear that it did not happen—it is harder to do that. It seems artificial. Agreed. But if you are in doubt, there is no problem.

Still, the term myth is not comfortable for me. It hints at a decision on a question that in my opinion cannot be decided. The Holy One, blessed be He, is beyond the world, and therefore any attempt to limit Him from within the world is not real. I live a scientific life, and despite gritted teeth, what is tangible cannot be denied, and the contradictions between the scientific findings and the Torah exist. Still, it is preferable to leave these questions as an empty space and not decide them at too high a cost to my scientific integrity or my religious faith (and artificiality is also a cost).

The Rabbi preserves the revelation at Mount Sinai, but the same doubts raised against the rest of the Torah can be raised against the revelation at Mount Sinai (and they have been). So I do not understand what the Rabbi gains from this distinction besides the technical, legalistic, and tasteless aspect. If we accept religious faith, we accept them as one whole. After all, the Ten Commandments themselves rely on the creation of the world and on the Exodus from Egypt, so why divide them up?

Who is Michi C? Right now there should only be Michi B—the adolescent stage of Michi. Michi C is the mature stage (unless Ailon is still in the state of Ailon A).

Y.D.,
The difference in terms of necessity is clear: without a historical and not mythical revelation at Mount Sinai, there is no obligation to keep Torah and commandments. Everything else is unnecessary. That is with regard to need.
But there is also a difference regarding the facts. Revelation is more historically grounded (there is a tradition about it, and there it is unlikely that this is a myth, unlike the other events), and also philosophically (a priori it is reasonable that there would need to be revelation if the Holy One, blessed be He, expects us to keep commandments. The rest is unnecessary).
The fact that people challenge all these events does not mean that the challenges have the same logical and historical standing.

Ailon,
Michi C is the researcher of early Michi (Michi A) and later Michi (Michi B). He is asked and offers his opinion about them and is considered an expert on their history and views.
Signed: Michi D.

The point about necessity is clearer in your words, but by the same logic, belief in the Exodus from Egypt is also required in order to define the group being commanded, as is clarified in the first sentence of that very revelation: “I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage.” Without that narrowing, we would think that all creatures in the world are commanded in the commandments. And the creation story is also required in order to move from the God of the philosophers to the God of the Bible, as you explain in the fifth booklet.

As for your other grounds, historically it is no better than the Exodus from Egypt, and philosophically it shoots the arrow and then marks the target.

I have no better answers than you. The last representatives of what is told in the Torah are us, and we do not deny our own existence. The reason for our existence is the Exodus from Egypt and an ancient revelation that created us. We have no answers to the questions that science raises about our existence, but we are still here, existing, despite the fact that for thousands of years they have been proclaiming our end. Perhaps that is the clearest and strongest revelation.

The verse does address those who left Egypt, but there is no hint in it that the obligation depends on your being among those who left Egypt.
Do you think that the sons of Ephraim who left earlier: https://www.yeshiva.org.il/wiki/index.php?title=%D7%91%D7%A0%D7%99_%D7%90%D7%A4%D7%A8%D7%99%D7%9D
would not be obligated?

The fact that only Jews are commanded does not emerge from those verses, but from the tradition (and perhaps from the reasoning that whoever was present at the covenant was obligated by it. Though see again the sons of Ephraim).

I have never heard of a scientific challenge to the fact that we exist. Apart from a few bizarre skeptics who question whether the chair I am sitting on, or I myself, exist.

Indeed there were those who predicted our end (like the Christians), and they were proved wrong. That is an argument with some weight (though one should not exaggerate its importance).

As for the grounding of the revelation at Mount Sinai, I disagree, and I have already said my piece. There is no point repeating it again.

A proof has to begin from here and now, as the wise man notes in “The Tale of the Wise Man and the Simpleton.” Tradition does not begin from here, but from some testimony about something over there. And just as no historian would take traditions seriously, and even medieval chronicles, merely because they are tradition, so too the tradition of the revelation at Mount Sinai is only a tradition and not a fact. Writers of medieval chronicles transmitted numbers of participants in battles that were repeated and quoted in complete trust, until historians began examining the ledgers of royal supply officers and started reducing the numbers by a factor of ten. Today no historian would treat numbers given without criticism seriously, and especially not testimonies about supernatural events (the question of plausibility is a matter of taste).

The philosophical proof is ridiculous as well. Just assume there is no expectation of command, and then you will not need command. As I wrote, you shoot the arrow (an expectation of command) and then mark the target (oops, indeed there is command). Better to say the truth: you believe there was command, that’s all. And to the same degree, I believe there was an Exodus from Egypt.

This whole search for a fit between the Creator’s revelations and reality is a kind of anthropomorphism, in the sense of “You hear the sound of words, but see no form.” God is not seen but heard (His word). And the attempt to see His manifestations in this world is in the category of “for no human shall see Me and live.” It is frustrating, but that is what there is. Seemingly this is an escape, but from the outset things are presented this way, as can be seen in quite a few chapters of Psalms: “O God, we have heard with our ears, our fathers have told us, the work You did in their days, in days of old.” We have heard many reports, but in practice nothing—as he goes on to detail.

It is not only the Christians, but also the Muslims, and especially the Nazis, who tried to solve this historical “anomaly.”

I completely disagree, but we are repeating ourselves.