Is belief in God rational? – An investigation

I don't think it's fair to put as a condition for the discussion “Go read my book and then after you read it maybe we'll have something to talk about”.
Rather, I was hoping that we would simply have a discussion.
“Some of them, in my opinion, are not questions at all” – What does that mean about a question that is not a question? What is it?
I understand that you won't be able to enter into a detailed discussion of all the questions, so let's discuss the last topic that talks about freedom of choice and the creation of the evil inclination.
First, I will prove that there is no such thing as freedom of choice. Freedom of choice is in the context where a person is in a situation where there are several alternatives, and the person is “free” to choose which of the alternatives he wants. In this situation, there are 2 options.

Either there is a reason why the person chose the alternative he chose, or it is random. If there is a reason, then there is no freedom of choice because the reason forced him to choose as he chose, there is something (the reason) that forces him to choose. And even if he does the opposite of the reason that forces him, even then he does not have freedom of choice, there is something that forces him to choose in a certain way, something that he does not really control, something that is outside of him, which is the state of reality at the moment of choice (when the person and his mental state and desires are part of reality at that moment), which forces him to choose in a certain way. We can say that the person is a slave to reality, and he cannot transcend what reality forces on him.

And the second possibility is that no reason forced him to choose as he chose, but that it was random. But if it is random, then the person does not have freedom of choice either, he did not really choose, it simply happened by itself, no active action was taken on the part of the person to choose.

Now, if there is no freedom of choice, we can say that all humans are not so different from robots, who simply carry out orders of what reality makes them want. By the way, there is no person in the world who truly knows what he wants, and the evidence is that every desire can be asked about “why do you want it” ad infinitum or until the person does not know how to answer “why does he want”, so this also fits with the theory that all humans are sophisticated robots of reality without a true will of their own, without a single drop of freedom of choice, it is all a chain of causality in which it is not clear what the initial cause of the chain is, if there is even an initial cause.

And if all humans are robots, and God created them without freedom of choice, how can he come at them with claims that they do not do what he “wants”? After all, He Himself created them as they are, and they could not have behaved differently than they did, unless an element of randomness is incorporated into the robotic model, and even then it is not clear what God wants from humans who do not do as He commands. It was a combination of choices that were forced upon them with choices they made at random, or a combination of coercion and randomness.

Uri Shalom.
If there is anything unfair, it is citing a quote that I did not write in my name. You quoted it in quotation marks: “Go read my book and then after you read it, maybe we will have something to talk about”, but I did not write that, nor did I formulate it differently. I wrote that I dedicated a book to it and in it I answered some of your questions in detail. This is not a demand or rejection of the discussion, but a suggestion if you would like to delve deeper.
Beyond that, if you raise so many fundamental questions at once, it is certainly fair to refer you to a book dedicated to them instead of starting a discussion here that will not end with all of them at the same time. Furthermore, it was certainly fair to ask you to focus on one question so that the discussion does not become muddled and can reach the bottom line. I am glad that is what you did in the end. Although, I must say that the question you raised is also discussed in my entire book (I also referred you to it), ‘Sciences of Freedom’, I am afraid that it too cannot be summarized here. Discussing it requires defining concepts, presenting models, examining implications, etc. It is not for nothing that I am dedicating a book to this subject, since in my opinion a thread on the Internet is not enough for it. But since you raised it, let's try to start discussing it anyway.
But before I begin, I will refer you (and not require reading) to the aforementioned book. If you want a summary, see the article here on the site: https://mikyab.net/%d7%9e%d7%90%d7%9e%d7%a8%d7%99%d7%9d/%d7%9e%d7%91%d7%98-%d7%a9%d7%99%d7%98%d7%aa%d7%99-%d7%a2%d7%9c-%d7%97%d7%95%d7%a4%d7%a9-%d7%94%d7%a8%d7%a6%d7%95%d7%9f/
And now for the discussion itself.

The argument you raised was first presented by Peter van Inwagen, and is presented at the beginning of every discussion on determinism. It has a fundamental logical fallacy and I will try to explain what it is here.
Before entering into such a discussion, it is necessary to define the two positions in question. Here is my analysis.
The determinist claims that everything in the world has a reason. Although this is not a necessary presentation of his position, since as you yourself present here there is also the possibility of randomness (an event without a cause). Therefore, what he is actually claiming is not that everything necessarily has a reason, but that if something happens without a cause, it is random. In other words, his claim is that there is no such thing as free choice.
The libertarian, on the other hand, claims that there is also a third mechanism: free choice. Note, his claim is that it is neither a causal nor a random mechanism.
This is the debate. Before I enter into Van Inwagen's argument, I would like to mention that if you want to make an argument against the libertarian, you must start from his starting point and show that he is wrong. To do so from your perspective is a fallacy (the assumption of the desired). It is clear that if you assume that there is no third mechanism, then there is no third mechanism. But from the libertarian's perspective, there is a third mechanism. Now you must prove to him that according to his method, he is also wrong.
Van Inwagen's argument tries to do this, and of course fails. As a determinist, he assumes that there are only two possibilities: randomness or causality. But this is where the debate itself comes into play. Therefore, his argument suffers from the desired assumption.
What confuses people (and especially Van Inwagen himself) is that these are supposedly the only two possibilities and there can be no third. After all, either there is a reason or there is not. The law of the impossible third states that there is no third possibility.
I say that this is absolutely true. I also agree that either there is a reason or there is not. But Van Inwagen assumes something else, that if there is no reason then it is necessarily randomness. But the libertarian does not agree with this, as we have seen. The libertarian claims that under the heading "no reason" two different possibilities are covered: 1. Randomness. 2. There is no reason but there is a purpose, or goal for which this action is performed. It is based on discretion (and this is not a causal mechanism). This is the mechanism he calls free will or choice. Note that this is a third mechanism, not randomness or causality.
You can of course accept or reject the claim that there is a third mechanism, but that is where the debate ends. There is no point in assuming it, since your argument wants to prove it or attack the other position (that there is a third mechanism). But he does not do so. If you want to attack the libertarian position, you are welcome to do so from the picture I have described here, and not on the basis of your own assumptions.

Sorry for the unfairness. In any case, we will continue the discussion if it interests you.
In order to accept the claim that there is a third mechanism, I need to understand what it means.
The claim says “There is no reason but there is a purpose”. I will try to interpret it simply – If reason is “because” then purpose is “for”. When the main distinguishing characteristic is past versus future, that is, a reason is a factor from the past, and a purpose is a factor from the future. But it is not clear to me why it matters whether it is a reason or a purpose. Although there are differences between the two, as I said, they also have things in common, when for the purpose of the discussion they have the same essence, which is “why”. And in this context the word “reason” or “causality” Includes both the meaning of “because” and the meaning of “for”.
“Why did you choose like that? Because of X”.
“Why did you choose like that? For X”.
When as far as I am concerned there is no difference between “because” and “for”. As long as there is “why”, as far as I am concerned there is a reason for the choice, and this means that the reason forced the person to choose as he chose, and he has no freedom. And as mentioned if there is no reason but it is a random mechanism, then even then he has no freedom, and there is no meaning to the choice.
Note: For me, the “for” also relies on “because”. I will explain intuitively “where did the human desire to achieve a certain purpose come from?” “Because” is his perception of reality, which he acquired even before the desire to achieve a certain purpose. So from a certain perspective, there is really no difference between “because” and “for”.

I don’t know if my analysis is what you meant by “there is no reason but there is a purpose”, I tried to explain how I understand what you wrote, if not, I would be happy if you explained what that third mechanism means.

In any case, I'm not one of those who argue about basic assumptions, I have no interest in "accepting or not accepting the claim that there is a third mechanism", I only have an interest in clarifying the basic assumptions, and checking whether they make sense. After it turns out that they make sense, I'm for everyone to believe whatever they want, even though I personally don't understand where the belief comes from, if it's not necessary, and it's also possible to believe the opposite. But that's for another discussion, for now we'll focus on the third mechanism.

I have also discussed this in my book The Science of Freedom, and I will explain briefly.
A distinction must be made between two types of purposive explanation: 1. Aristotle's teleology (the stone falls because it wants to return to its quarry, the earth). 2. A purpose that a person sets for himself out of discretion. The first type is not truly purposive, since it is mathematically equivalent to a causal explanation. It is just another formulation of it. There is mathematical proof that most causal explanations in physics have a purposive formulation (such as Fermat's principle in optics, or Lagrange's mechanics). The stone cannot help but "aspire" to return to its quarry. Therefore, it is only a question of formulation. And this is where many who disparage Aristotelian explanations make a mistake, since they identify them with granting (free?) will to the stone. In contrast, a person's choice involves a judgment that chooses a future goal, and from that derives a current action. For example, I want to meet a friend tomorrow morning, so now I call him to make an appointment. My desire that moves my hand to ring the bell is created from a future goal that I set for myself. My claim is that this happens without a reason that causes it, but rather desire is setting a goal out of thin air. This is the libertarian position. The determinist does not accept this, but that is the debate. There is no reasonable causal explanation for such an explanation. Unlike the stone, a person could also not want a meeting and then none of this would have happened.
Therefore, the focus of my observation is not whether it lies in the past or the future, but whether there is a reason that forced the result or not. I argue that it does not.
As for your request to explain this mechanism, I explained in the book that it is based on a mistake. When you look for an explanation for any mechanism, you are actually looking for its cause (what caused it, what causes it). But here we are talking about behavior without a reason, and therefore looking for a reason for it is a mistake. The fact that you can't find an “explanation” is because you're trying to superimpose a third mechanism on the first. But it's a different mechanism that can't be superimposed on the first.
Incidentally, this is also the reason (!) that as you ascend the ranks of the sciences from inanimate objects to humans, the explanations become more purposeful. Physics is ostensibly completely causal (this is also not true, and I've already argued that too), and so is chemistry, although it's harder to argue for it there (because the systems are more complex). But in biology you've long found a completely teleological discourse (for which evolution has offered a causal explanation). In psychology, the entire discourse is teleological (man does this because he wants to do this and his goals are this and that. Even when a causal explanation is offered for this, it's with the aim of changing the result. The subtext is very non-causal). When you move on to society (sociology and anthropology), it goes back more to causality because of the law of large numbers (like in quantum mechanics where there is dephasing on large scales). But there is no point in going into all of that here.
In the book I also explained that the desire to place choice above causality is itself absurd, since of the three mechanisms, only the third (choice) is directly familiar to us. Every person feels that he is choosing, but determinists choose (!) to ignore this feeling and define it as an illusion because it is impossible to place it above causality (like van Inwagen). But causality is an a priori hypothesis (as Hume and Kant showed) and randomness is generally something that is not understood and is not familiar to us from life (that is why we are twisting around quantum theory). So why take a familiar mechanism and try to find a reduction for it to two other mechanisms that are less familiar than it?! And then draw a conclusion that if we did not find it, it probably does not exist. We did not find it precisely because it does exist. On the contrary, perhaps it makes sense to look for reductions of causality and randomness to choice, which is the more familiar one, and then deny the existence of the latter. In philosophy, by the way, many really deny the existence of causality - like day and randomness (hidden variables in quantum mechanics),

"My argument is that it happens without a reason that causes it, but the will is the setting of a goal out of nowhere."
"Was there a reason that forced the result or not? I argue that there is no reason."
Let's focus on these arguments.
Let's take a simple case. A 5-year-old child is sitting on the floor and playing. Suddenly he notices a candy on the table. This makes him want to get on a chair and take the candy from the table. You can put it this way, the child chose to stop playing and take actions to achieve a goal - to get the candy, that's his purpose right now. Is this child's purpose disconnected from causality? After all, if he hadn't seen and wanted the candy, he wouldn't have chosen to change his desire and achieve the goal. In this simple case, I have no idea what is meant by "happens without a reason," because the reason seems clear to me. Proof - if he hadn't seen the candy, he wouldn't have had the desire to get the candy. Just as if a child didn't see a balloon, he wouldn't want to get a balloon. I would be happy if you could explain in this case what is meant by no reason, and how a desire is created out of thin air in this case.
And let's take another case, a little more complex. Let's say there is an ultra-Orthodox person who grew up in Bnei Brak, who calls a friend every day to make an appointment to go to Torah class. And let's say there is a secular person who grew up in Tel Aviv, who calls a friend every day to make an appointment to go to a bar to start talking to girls.
In my understanding, their choice depends on what they know and their perception of reality. The secular person wouldn't think of setting a "goal" (the term you used) of setting a date every day with a friend to go to Torah class, and the ultra-Orthodox person wouldn't think of setting a "goal" of going to a bar every day and start talking to girls. Because everyone acts according to their own world of values, which is derived from their own perception of reality. Do you think that the ultra-Orthodox person's choice is unrelated to how they were raised? And to the society in which they grew up?
Could it be that the choice is completely random? Only in the case of the Haredi does he set a Torah lesson every day, but to the same extent he could also choose to go to a bar and start dating girls. Yes, it could be that it is just a coincidence. But there is a much more logical explanation, that it is not just a coincidence, that there is a reason for it. And your claim that there is no reason does not seem connected to reality, it seems to deny reality, to deny the logical explanation and to embrace the improbable possibility that this is a non-causal scenario. A person will come and claim that there is no such thing as gravity, and that the fact that until today all the apples have fallen to the floor is just a coincidence, to the same extent they could also have been floating in the air or flying up, it was only by chance that until today they fell down. With all this, there is still the possibility that there is no reason and that there is another mechanism, and if this is a basic premise, there is nothing to argue about it, although I would find it very difficult to accept this basic premise. Ultimately, if you say that everything is random, then it is clear that in relation to this premise any belief will be rational, if everything is random it is consistent with the existence of God and it is also consistent with the existence of a flying spaghetti monster. But it is difficult to accept a premise like "everything is random". I am not saying that it is not a possibility, but it is difficult to accept. In any case, you still need to understand what this premise means. You did not explain how it is possible for something to be created out of nothing. Even when you explain that God created the world out of nothing, even then it is not clear what that means. But in a human context, when they say that a person creates something out of nothing, it is even more unclear. To me it sounds like a paradox. A person creates something. From what? From nothing. So from what does he create the something? What does the something consist of? From nothing? How can it be that something consists of nothing?

Sorry for my outburst.
I believe in free will (by the way, thanks to Rabbi Mikhi alone! And thank you for that…), but what does that have to do with belief in God? Determinism does not contradict faith/Judaism.
It is possible that the Creator created people without the ability to choose, and punishes the disobedient in order to correct the world.

Even a staunch determinist desires a reformed (independent?…) judicial system.
That is, it is possible that the punishment for sins is so that they will hear and see and not to correct the person.
And R’ Hasdai Karshakash already wrote so (for those interested in the sources…)

In the 27th of Av, 3rd of March

To Ezra, greetings,

I am not currently on the subject, but it seems to me that according to Rabbi Karshakash, even if actions are subject to determinism, man's thoughts are free, and he is responsible for his identification with his actions.

Best regards, Fishel

See Rabbi Zeev Sultanowitz's lesson "Bina Chit" on Rabbi Hasdai Karshakash (on the "Har-Baraka" website).

With greetings, Fishel

Ezra,
You are absolutely right. That is what I wrote to him at the beginning of the conversation. But here we are discussing determinism per se.

Sh”l,
There is a contradiction in this between the two parts of the book. I think Avi Ravitzky insisted on this in the article.
I have already written here in the past that I think this is a groundless position. If my thoughts are in my hands, then why assume that my actions are not? My thoughts are an event in the world like any other event, and if God knows them in advance and this does not contradict my freedom to think, then there is no contradiction regarding actions either. And if He does not know, then we can say that He does not know and there is no theological problem with this, so why is it not said so regarding actions?!

Uri,
Excuse me, I will stop here. All of this is discussed in detail in my book The Sciences of Freedom (and in summary in the article I referred to), and if you wish, you can read it there. It is difficult for me to continue, especially at such intervals.

Uri:
I expected the rabbi to write the following, but since he didn't, I'll write what I assume he would have said (of course, this is my sole responsibility).
In comparing the ultra-Orthodox with the secular, you're attacking a straw man. Even someone who believes in free choice doesn't necessarily claim that it is not limited, it can even be minimal and it will still be free at that minimal point. In practice, it's quite clear that a person operates within a variety of influences of different kinds that limit his choice. This does not contradict the very existence of choice, which many people have an intuition about, but only limits it.