Q&A: A Question from the Notebooks of Faith
A Question from the Notebooks of Faith
Question
Hello Rabbi Michi.
I still don’t understand how, in your notebooks, you deal with God—that is, the transcendent being about whom one cannot speak and regarding whom one can only remain silent. All the more so when you deal with defining Him, since that already raises the problem of placing boundaries around God as such.
How is it possible to speak about something that is beyond the intellect of a human being?
Answer
If you’ve decided that He is beyond your intellect and that one must not speak about Him—then don’t speak.
I don’t think so, and therefore I do speak. There, I spoke, and it came out fairly understandable, didn’t it?!
Discussion on Answer
Itzik,
In your question you manage both to discuss God, to define Him, and also to say that both things are impossible. Just notice that.
In any case, the notebooks basically speak about an entity that created the world (the first four) and that one should obey His voice and that also intervened a bit in history (the fifth). If you don’t want to call this entity God (because it doesn’t fit your *definition* of God), call it the Flying Spaghetti Monster or the Invisible Pink Unicorn (or with more reasonable names like the Creator), and I’m sure Rabbi Michael won’t be angry with you (maybe about an invisible pink one he’d bother to comment).
Yishai, only sky-blue. Not pink, Heaven forbid.
Itzik wrote:
Following up on my question:
That’s the point I’m asking about—how can you speak about Him? Isn’t God absolutely outside your existence? If not, then what is the basic assumption on which you rely, by virtue of which you can speak about Him and even define Him?
I don’t understand any of this. I explained, and Yishai explained again. The proofs speak of the Creator of the world, not of God. Call Him Yankele if you want. I prove His existence and don’t speak about Him in any other sense whatsoever. That’s all. Is there something incorrect in the argument? Please point it out. If we stay with slogans, there’s nothing I can do with that.
The last one who called God “Yankele” was Jacob Frank, may the name of the wicked rot, a disciple of Shabbetai Tzvi and founder of Frankism. He was very original and cut out the divine names from a Torah scroll and in their place wrote “Jacob.” Thus he opened the book: “In the beginning Jacob created the heavens and the earth.” It is brought in Hamburger’s book False Messiahs and Their Opponents. What I don’t know is what he did in chapter 2: “On the day that Jacob God made earth and heaven”? Or “the Lord Jacob”? Maybe “Jacob the Lord”?.. And beyond that, what did he do in Exodus chapter 6: “And I appeared… as God Almighty, but by My name the Lord I was not known to them.”
It should read Hamburger (not Berger)
How is it possible to speak about something that is beyond the intellect of a human being?
You simply speak about Him according to His actions… everything else is philosophy..