Questions about faith

Asks:
Regarding 1. I understand from you that combining the Khazarian argument with the conclusion of the reality of God, and also combining it with the history of the Jewish people and its influence, a more complete picture is obtained from which it can be understood that the Torah is most likely from heaven. Are there additional central arguments in your opinion that are necessary to complete this picture? What did you mean by the uniqueness of our people's history that strengthens the argument for the Torah from heaven? If we suppose we go back to the days of Josiah, and have the same conversation, it seems that we are faced with a shaky tradition that has been forgotten, there is no influence of the people on the world, the historical uniqueness has not yet occurred. So that the same set of arguments in the days of Josiah seems looser, and yet do you think that even in the conditions that existed in the days of Josiah, was it possible to establish the belief rationally?

And another, less related question:
I noticed that there are external written sources from the biblical period such as Ugaritic poetry – “Dan almanat y'teft teft y'tem” (=Dan almanat y'teft y'tem), the Laws of Hammurabi (which you have brought close to the Bible), the Laws of Ash'nuna and other sources that contain elements similar to the laws of the Bible. I know of one explanation for the phenomenon that says that the origin of all these laws is in the 7 commandments given to the sons of Noah. Do you think this is the most plausible explanation, or are there perhaps different explanations for the phenomenon?
— 1. Indeed. I would include the tradition we received (in addition to all the phenomena we observe). The uniqueness of our people's history is the return to their land after many years, when there is a promise in advance that it will happen. The survival in exile and persecution. The contribution to culture and universal morality, and to science. In the days of Josiah, there was clear knowledge that there was such a Torah, since it was very close. It's like asking us about the Holocaust or World War I. Obviously, here you won't need evidence that is generalized into a complex picture. You simply know that there was something like this, and if someone comes and tells you (or based on a document you suddenly find) that it was in one way or another, you will accept it. By the way, in their time there was definitely already a contribution (morality in the face of the cruelty of idolaters, an organized legal system, and more).

As for the other question, as Mohr (=Gottfried) Leibniz wrote in his parable of the clocks (two clocks showing the same time - a correlation that for him represents the relationship between body and soul), on a principled level, such correlations can have three types of explanation: 1. A influenced B. 2. B influenced A. 3. There is something third that influences both (Zeit Geist, the spirit of the time). Of course, this could also be a coincidence (correlation without explanation), but usually it is less likely (when the correlation is statistically significant).
In our context, I have no problem with the three types of explanation: A. God wrote the Torah in terms that were acceptable to the people of that time. B. They were also influenced by the Torah or its previous incarnations, such as the Court of Shem and Eber, the Seven Commandments, the revelations to the first Adam and to Abraham and Noah, and so on. C. Everything comes from God and therefore appears in similar forms.
— Some believers have a kind of inner wish that the Torah will turn out to be true because it means that the believer has a way to act in accordance with Hashem's way in the world and that gives meaning to their lives, and without that a person can feel lost. Likewise, if the opposite turns out to be true, it means changing the believer's lifestyle from end to end. My question is whether this inner wish influences you to some extent in making decisions between opposing beliefs related to faith (such as those mentioned in the email above).
Best regards,
—
This is exactly the opium of the masses claim, which certainly has some truth to it. It is certainly possible. We are all infected with various biases. We must try to neutralize them, but no one seems to be completely successful. Incidentally, secularism and communism and all other ideologies are also affected by this (except for the holy vacuum). But in my opinion, the conclusion is that we should do our best, and not that all our decisions and insights are invalid. The alternative is to decide nothing and not trust yourself with anything. Another important conclusion is that we should be aware that our decisions are uncertain and that there is a possibility that they are infected and biased.
In other words, whoever concludes that faith is the opium of the masses turns the question mark into an exclamation mark, that is, concludes that our conclusions have no certainty (after all, secularism also has the same biases. It is also the opium of the masses, like any perception, except for the complete absence of it). This is the conclusion reached by postmodernists, who, because of their awareness of the effects and influences on our decisions, completely give up on our ability to reach any kind of truth. But as I explained, there is a logical leap here: I can accept that there is an influence, but because of that I will try to neutralize it and understand that my conclusions also do not have absolute validity. From here to complete relativism or complete skepticism, the distance is great. This is the leap between a claim that shows that there is a 10% chance of error, to the conclusion that everything is 50-50.
I expanded on this in my book Two Carts and a Balloon.

Regarding the continuity of tradition:
In both 2 Kings and Isaiah, it is not at all explained that the people knew about a mass revelation or the Exodus. All they knew was that there was a Torah scroll that commanded their ancestors, and probably some of the commandments. Ostensibly, this is exactly the place where the leaders could have inserted the entire story of a mass revelation in the giving of the Torah and the Exodus into the tradition, in order to establish it in a theological-historical way.

Sorry, I meant: both in Kings and *in Nehemiah*