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faith

asked 2 years ago

Hello Rabbi, I would like to know what the Rabbi thinks about the prevailing belief system in the yeshiva world that says that faith is neither emotion nor intellect, but rather something that is engraved in our nature and the intellect polishes it?


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מיכי Staff answered 2 years ago
I have already written my opinion on these empty statements. If something is ingrained in us, it is not a guarantee that it is true. On the contrary, it is a basis for suspicion that it is simply the result of accidental evolution. The desire and inclination to speak slander is also ingrained in us. By the way, this is precisely the essence of an emotion, and therefore such a statement is inconsistent with the claim that it is not an emotion. Perhaps they mean to say that faith is a product of intuition, and I can of course agree with that and have even written and spoken about it quite a bit. Indeed, reason polishes intuitions, I agree with that too. But it also examines them critically and changes and replaces them if necessary. Furthermore, this description is true for all knowledge we have, not just faith. Science in its various fields is also based on intuitions. Therefore, I do not agree that faith is not reason (although it is of course not an emotion, and so on). Intuition is the basis of reason. In the margins of my remarks, I will add that this ‘method’ is prevalent mainly in places that do not know how and do not want to deal with arguments and difficulties, and then they issue statements that faith is above reason, etc., etc., and how important it is to stick to it despite the difficulties and not to pay attention to them because they are the advice of the instinct. Nonsense in the juice.

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אריאל replied 2 years ago

I very much agree with the rabbi, but I really find it difficult to see how all the Torah gurus of our community and the ultra-Orthodox community take this approach, how does the rabbi treat the Khozari, for example? That many of the rabbis learn this approach from Rachel?

מיכי Staff replied 2 years ago

As I wrote, people are not skilled in philosophical thinking and therefore babble.
I do not engage with books on Jewish thought. They do not interest me very much and do not contribute much to me. A friend of mine often says that instead of studying thought, it is better to think. In the second book in the trilogy, No Man Is Master of the Spirit, I explain that there is no such field at all, Jewish thought. A fragmented field that consists of the goyim of different people, who dress them up on sources that are not wrong in their hands. It is possible to glean ideas and insights from a multitude of sources, also from this literature as from any other literature. In the end, what matters is what you think. The thought of others is at most a source of inspiration or a source of insights that can help you build your own thought.

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