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The concept of divine providence over human actions

שו”תCategory: philosophyThe concept of divine providence over human actions
asked 3 years ago

And all your deeds are written in the book.
Is this your understanding of it as such or are there spiritual forces that are created by human action?
Because there are secularists who claim that this supposedly diminishes God.


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0 Answers
מיכי Staff answered 3 years ago
I don’t understand the claim you put in the mouths of secularists. But I don’t see how anyone can know what’s going on up there. It’s clear to me that the intention is that God is watching our actions and judging us. Does he write it in Rashi script or in English? Is it in a notebook or a book or just keeps it in his memory? I don’t suppose anyone can know.

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אורי replied 3 years ago

The claim that may not be profound, that God is so great that you religious people are supposedly diminishing Him by being interested in the actions of small people. I have something to answer. I would love your perspective.

מיכי Staff replied 3 years ago

I have nothing to say about statements.

אורי replied 3 years ago

Why statements? A certain claim of theirs..

מיכי Staff replied 3 years ago

Statements and claims are the same thing, unlike arguments.

י.ד. replied 3 years ago

Uri, the Torah bothered to tell us that He is interested in the small actions of humans. That is the crux of its argument. So if you agree with that, then apparently something in your argument doesn't hold up. Maybe the actions of humans aren't that small or God isn't that great? If you don't agree with that, then there is no basis for discussion.

אורי replied 3 years ago

From what I've read, this is an argument... from the philosophers who believed in God who is not interested in humans because of their inferiority. I can accept that precisely because He is great, He encompasses and is interested in everything, except for the argument from Torah tradition. I want to read your understanding.

מיכי Staff replied 3 years ago

I don't know what is small for him and what is not. And I certainly can't determine a priori based on that what interests him and what doesn't. If he said he's interested in what we do, then it probably interests him. Is he small because of that? Well. So he's small. These are uninteresting questions that just play with words and baseless ideas.

טירגיץ replied 3 years ago

It's hard for me to understand how in your opinion this isn't a serious and significant question (is it a priori probable that God gave such Torah, and to such a small group?). If it is a given that He exists and gave Torah, then indeed the question is not that significant. But here we are talking about an a priori consideration and it will affect the evidence.

מיכי Staff replied 3 years ago

Why not? He gave Torah to all of humanity, but it was given at different levels. I don't see any problem with that. And I certainly can't raise questions based on strange beliefs like this.

טירגיץ replied 3 years ago

The size of the group is a side issue relative to the meticulous content of the Torah and whether he cares, etc., is slaughtered from the back. What can I do? The explanation does not seem strange to me at all, and on the contrary, it is not an argument to make. From my impressions of the world, it also seems to me that this explanation is firmly established in the minds of secular people and is a major stumbling block to repentance.

[If I understand correctly, the main points of your teaching on the subject are as follows. Observing the commandments and studying the Torah out of choice is an important purpose in creation. This mysteriously provides training for a person and also mysteriously brings into play the training power of the perfect, high God, who apparently cannot himself choose good day and night (by the way, what about a person's choice of evil). And the specific commandments are wired in such a way that they create wonders in the invisible worlds that you created for this purpose. Therefore, there is really no reason to think that a human mind should be able to grasp the passage in general and the details of the commandment (not the boundary but the purpose). Because there is indeed a reason for the specific commandments, but it is arbitrary from our perspective, like the constants of physics. So far, this is a summary of what I understood from all of your words on the subject. In fact, it seems that all of the above is a structure that was hoisted and raised as an answer to the question asked by the questioner. And this apparent answer can be summarized by saying that the Holy One’s mind is broader than ours and we do not know how to understand what the purpose (which, according to the interpretation, exists) is in the whole matter. And not only in the details of the commandments, but also what the purpose is “for its own sake” in that people knew that there was a Creator who knew all things and was all-knowing and all-powerful, and they would rule over Him and worship Him. And if even after all the structure, this is the summary of the answer – which we do not know and that is it – then it raises a good eyebrow and arouses suspicion that everything is a human creation, a pattern of the landscape of its birthplace and time that became more complicated over the years until the giving of the Torah and even more so after it.].

מיכי Staff replied 3 years ago

This is not an answer to that question. It is an answer to the question of why he would do things without a reason.

טירגיץ replied 3 years ago

What is meant? Uri brought up a question about why one is interested in the small actions of people, and to that I may have added only that the particular manner of interest in Jewish law also seems small. And the answer is that in choosing goodness and obedience there is a high and strong need for G-d and this also creates something or there is a hidden reason. What did I mix up?

מיכי Staff replied 3 years ago

I explained. I answered the question of how He does things without a reason, and I answered that it is likely that there is a reason even if we do not understand it. Furthermore, I explained that the reason is supposed to be outside the world, otherwise there would be no need to create it. That it would not be created and there would be no need for commandments. All this is simple logic.
He asked why God would be interested in the actions of humans, after all, it is small to Him. This is a completely different question and in my opinion really stupid. How do you know what is small and what is big in His eyes? This is just a baseless hypothesis about what is important in His eyes.
The first question is logically difficult and was answered logically. The second question is not difficult and does not need to be answered. We do not build questions on just a hypothesis drawn from the finger.

טירגיץ replied 3 years ago

The difference is that to the first question (why does he do things for no reason) you answer that there is an invisible reason, and to the second question (isn't it small for him) you answer that it is probably big in his eyes and there is no need for an invisible reason why it is big in his eyes, but rather that it is that big in his eyes?

מיכי Staff replied 3 years ago

If you don't understand the difference between the two questions and answers, I have no way of explaining it any better. To me, it seems really obvious.

טירגיץ replied 3 years ago

I also don't see a difference between the questions (not that they are parallel, but that it is exactly the same question. God does something, it seems to simple humans like an unnecessary thing, asking why He did it [meaning it is both a question and an argument that He probably didn't do A, B, C]. The question of why He did it can be wrapped in all sorts of words like "It's small, but it's just a side addition to the question"), and I also don't understand that after you have the card of a disappearing cause, what other questions can there be about anything in the world (Why did He create? What does the Torah want? The problem of evil? Why did revealed providence and prophecy cease? Why weren't humans born seven times wiser than deciphering all the laws of physics at the age of one? A disappearing cause! This is what is written: "For He will bring all the works of God into judgment: for every "disappearing" thing! Whether good or bad) until there is even a point in even starting to think. What is a question and what is not a question. Besides, I don't really understand the question of why to create either, because the question of why not to create is asked in exactly the same way (I hope we don't come to strange ideas about the difference between a decision to do and a decision not to do), so in order to pose the question, one must add "why to create, since so and so" and this so and so is always a hypothesis (it is a pinch from God's finger). Maybe Cordiacus will hold me, but I can't figure out how you dismiss this big question that the questioner asked so casually.

אורי replied 3 years ago

What I brought is an argument of the great philosophers and Aristotle among them so that I did not connect with the disdain for the claim and the question?
But what you answered from where do we know what is small etc. is a good answer in my opinion. What you wrote maybe it is small does not connect, it is clear that God is great.. Even Muslims shout Allah Ikbar..
In my understanding and I mentioned this, he does care because the greatness of a creator is also to manage what he created and to manage one must be interested.
So for the honorable respondent, I have no claim to say that they are right, but to hear more arguments in favor

טירגיץ replied 3 years ago

If I am the honorable commenter then I did not write that you claimed they were right.
There are also all sorts of other Jews (prophets and elders) who were astonished by this matter

אורי replied 3 years ago

I know, like “the heavens are higher than the earth, so my ways are higher than your ways”
But these verses come to say that we do not understand the ways of the Creator, nor in your interpretation
Therefore, I reserve this only according to the claims of the Gentile philosophers

טירגיץ replied 3 years ago

Google It
https://www.hatanakh.com/en/node/39119

The nature of reason does not give, but from our point of view we err and judge the opposite, and that is that we think and say, if not that the Torah has enlightened us, that He’ blessed be He, is exalted above all our deeds and affairs, and that God forbid that He would pay attention to our commandments and warn us, as the philosophers thought and built upon them all their evil constructions, it would soon be cut off and uprooted. And even the prophets, even though they knew the truth of such a thing, wondered about it and said (Psalms 8) What is man, that You remember him, etc., and He also said (Job 13) What is man, that You magnify him, and that You set Your heart on him, and that You visit him morning by morning, etc. And since this is so, if not that the Torah has enlightened us, we would think and strive from our point of view, that He’ May God be exalted, when his commandments and warnings reach us, and that it is not fitting for us to worship him at all, since if so, we would believe that he would be impressed by our actions, and that he would have some dependence and connection with us, but it is fitting for us to worship him as well from the side that we have a connection with them, and that we think all this to know the absolute truth, and that anyone who thinks this, may God be exalted, and anyone who thinks the opposite, is from a position of weakness. And therefore our sages said, "I am a fool, and you will not hear from the mouth of the mighty one what we hear from him." And this is by way of a parable, that if one of the king's closest ministers were to command us in something that would seem to us to be a deficiency and a disrespect for his kingdom, it would be fitting for us not to believe him in any way, but we would answer him that in no way would we do so unless we heard that command from the king face to face and mouth to mouth, while we would believe him in other commands that he would command us from the king.

טירגיץ replied 3 years ago

And in my (probably incorrect) understanding, Rabbi Michi does give a direct answer to this question (is it likely that God is interested in the actions of a depraved person? There is a baseless hypothesis and strange reasoning, etc., that it is not likely) and his answer is that work is a high necessity because there is free choice (perhaps this is the tzimtzum) and this poor choice, oh my, how much hidden desire there is in it to plant heaven and lay the foundation of the earth and give strength to God. And close to this is the statement that there is no king without a people, and therefore it is requested that God create subjects for him.
And there are other ideas that the Holy One is good (meaning, in my understanding, interested in matters such as suffering and pleasures) and the way of goodness to be good, and therefore stuck us in this ridiculous world and revealed to the sages the secrets of secrets that there is a reward in the world to come, and so Elihu said in Job (whose words are generally true according to the Ramban): "Look up to heaven and see, and the heavens are higher than you. If you have sinned, what will you do to him? If your transgressions are many, what will you do to him? If you have done righteously, what will you give him or what will he take from your hand? To a man like you, your wickedness and to a human being, your righteousness." But for the benefit of creatures, He commanded and warned, as the Ramban explained there and as the sages say, to unite the creatures.

אורי replied 3 years ago

Interesting. I still think it makes a lot of sense, even without the Torah and the revelation at Mount Sinai, to say that God is interested in our actions, as I explained.

טירגיץ replied 3 years ago

Rabbi Michi, a question with your permission, your line of argument in moving from a philosophical to a religious G-d is that if there is a G-d, then it is likely that He wants something and what He can want already, He probably wants something from man (because free choice, otherwise He would easily roll the whole world by Himself), and therefore it is likely that there will be revelation and demands, now which revelation is the most convincing (and also convincing in itself)? He who says the Torah at Sinai. Although the element that it is likely that there will be revelation is not critical to the argument, but to my recollection you do use it, if only for the sake of convenience. In other words, you use the declared (in the secret of anon as a fingertip to the proof) in the opposite hypothesis, namely that it is likely that G-d wants something from man. Is that right?

מיכי Staff replied 3 years ago

Indeed. Opposite of what? My argument is that it is unlikely that the world was created without a purpose, as I wrote above.

טירגיץ replied 3 years ago

Not just any purpose, but a purpose that is related to man and his actions, right? Otherwise, what is the connection to revelation (within that line of argument), perhaps there is a purpose that is not related to man but to toothpicks. Ostensibly, this is a positive hypothesis that it is likely that God is interested in man, which is the opposite of the negative hypothesis that God is not interested in man.

מיכי Staff replied 3 years ago

Indeed, exactly as you wrote. Choice and revelation are the indication that the purpose is man.

טירגיץ replied 3 years ago

I understood, on the contrary, that the hypothesis that the purpose is man supports the claim of revelation.

מיכי Staff replied 3 years ago

I explained there that it works both ways. Our having a choice implies that the purpose of the world is within us. It means that a revelation is expected to tell us what it means for us. But to the same extent, the tradition about this revelation reiterates and reinforces the initial thesis.

טירגיץ replied 3 years ago

So regarding the first direction (that apparently the purpose of God in the universe is related to man on earth), isn't this a hypothesis that assumes what is important in the eyes of God and what is not? After all, the implication is not due to the question of why He created choice, because we don't know why He created many other things, but rather that apparently choice is in your eyes a miraculous power and a huge and terrible thing, and therefore it is reasonable that such a great thing that has a little of G-d in it has a great purpose and that He would want us to use it according to His instructions. In other words, from the same hypothesis that others have made great astonishment of, you turn it on its face with improvements (choice is the improvement) and make inferences from it in the opposite direction.

מיכי Staff replied 3 years ago

Not because of the terrible and terrible power of choice but because it is the only thing that is not mechanical and therefore there is room to say that it can create something that is not the creation of God Himself.
This is not a hypothesis that assumes anything about God and what is important in His eyes. I repeat again and again, and my throat is already sore.

טירגיץ replied 3 years ago

(I understood (and wrote) that this is the power of choice). Your throat is sore and my head is dizzy, sorry. (Because to me this is a huge, obscure puzzle and I was stunned to see your initial response). But I still don't understand. I'll come back to look at the thread in a few days.

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