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A key question in faith

שו”תCategory: faithA key question in faith
asked 2 years ago

Hello Rabbi, I study at a high yeshiva.
And I have one question in faith, can I say
The question is who said that God truly gave the Torah and that the Torah is truly a divine commandment?
I asked several rabbis from my yeshiva and also from the seminary and they gave me answers that were not good enough. I would be grateful if you could help me and answer my question or add to one of the answers below that I have provided.
Their proofs are given by God.
The Torah in a nutshell:
1. Our religion is the only religion that has a revelation to a group of people compared to other religions.
And since the other religions have not produced such proof that they had a mass revelation
This means that such proof cannot be provided unless it actually happened.
This means that in Judaism there was truly a divine revelation.
2.
In natural science, this is something that happens more than once.
The same thing in history is natural, it happens more than once, as they say, history repeats itself.
And since the claim that God will reveal himself to a group of people is only found in Judaism
This means that this is an unnatural claim and is only found in Judaism because only in Judaism does God truly reveal himself to a group of people.
3.
Everything in history happens at least twice.
In repeating patterns
Why is revelation to a group not found twice in history?
It must be because it is something God did and is not natural, and therefore it has not happened twice.
Therefore, Judaism must be true.
4.
Our people have a culture of discovering God.
And we see it in the light that this people has always had a culture of discovering God.
Therefore, you know that God has revealed Himself to this people.
In this nation, we see that there is a culture of discovering God.
because of:
A.
The people of Israel are the only people who were exiled and returned to their land.
on.
There was no longer a people who, when they were found in the land, the land was fertile, and when they were not found, the land was desolate.
third.
There is no other people who, even though they live in different places in the world and look different from each other, still consider themselves to be one people.
D.
There is no longer a single nation that all nations hate without reason, and all nations hear about and care about.
the.
There has never been another nation that has had such an impact on the world despite its small size.
and.
There has never been another nation that was an empire and fell and became an empire again.
G.
There was no other case where they told of an entire nation that had a great and defining event.
H.
There has never been another case where they told of an entire nation that had a major, defining event in which they claim the details changed.
9. In addition, all these things we said were in prophecy, even though these were non-standard things that happened that never happened to any other people.
Nevertheless, this was prophesied about the Jews, and this is what happened to them.
You see, this is a people of prophets.
A people with a culture of discovering God, which is expressed in the existence of prophecy.
For a thousand years there was a prophecy and it stopped but still sparks remain
And since the people of Israel are a people of the revelation of God, it means that God revealed Himself to the people.
The problem with these answers is that they are incorrect. Some are factually incorrect, some are logically illogical, and some are illogical in terms of cause and effect. I explained how I think the story of the Torah developed, and then I will explain why their answers are incorrect in my opinion.
I say:
It may be that the religion of Judaism is truly the most well-founded, logical, and wise religion.
But that still doesn’t mean it’s true, because it’s not proven that there is a God at all, and even if there is a God, it’s not proven that religion is necessary. It could be that one should follow one’s natural morality.
And the story of the Torah developed like this (of course, it’s all theoretical and it’s impossible to really know what happened, but this is one of the possibilities):
A group of slaves left Egypt with great success after hundreds of years in Egypt. The slaves managed to escape the Egyptians through their leader Moses, who told them about their ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and the stories that happened to them. In the desert, he went up to Mount Sinai and brought this group the Ten Commandments, which they must keep.

Later in the time after Moses, when there was Joshua and the prophets who followed him, stories about the patriarchs, about the exodus from Egypt, and about the commandments that Moses gave began to be added. In the same vein, on the other hand, they began to write down sections of commandments and stories that the prophets had told orally.
After a few years of feeding people stories, commandments, and prophecies, they began to compile larger sections from the above sections until the complete Torah was compiled, which cannot be changed. After that, the Tanakh was also compiled, and after that, they also began to scrutinize the Torah, every letter of it, including midrashim, traditions, etc.

Now we will respond to the answers that the rabbis gave me:
1.
The fact that other religions have not provided proof of their religion from mass revelation does not mean that such proof cannot be provided unless it really happened.
It may be that the other religions did not make this claim not because it is not possible but because
On the one hand, it is difficult to create the illusion that an entire people is experiencing a revelation.
It takes hundreds of years to build a story like this.
On the other hand, it’s not that effective because you can still claim it didn’t happen.
And you also need some kind of story or background to build this story on.
Besides, there are religions that base themselves on inner feeling and not on evidence.
2-3
There are patterns in history that repeat themselves, but not everything has to repeat itself exactly the same.
There are still similar patterns in other religions of revelation even if they were not revelations to a group.
There is a claim of revelation, not revelation to the group, because only the patterns generally repeat themselves, but not the details.
4
A. Not true. There is, for example, the return of the Greeks to Greece after the fall of the Ottomans.
on. Even when most Jews were not in the land, the land was not desolate and there were periods when it was fertile.
C. There are such peoples as Armenians, Indians, Chinese, and others.
D. Not all nations hate us, for example Indians and Chinese.
There are a number of reasons that can be given for anti-Semitism over the years, from the influence of Christianity to the treatment of the weak and different.
In addition, there are many other peoples who experienced hatred from other peoples, regardless of where they were or what peoples ruled them, such as the Armenians.
Despite Israel’s special name and the fact that it is heard about all over the world, many reasons can be given for this, such as anti-Semitism. Of course, the conflict with the Palestinians affects all Muslims in the world. In addition, there are conflicts that the whole world is interested in, and the interest depends on people and places.
E. It is true that there has been no other people who have influenced the world so much despite their smallness, but again, the fact that the people of Israel are a special people does not mean to the extent of saying that it is supernatural. There have been other peoples who have influenced the world despite their smallness, not like Israel, but there are some in certain areas.
F. There are nations that have experienced similar things, such as Egypt, China, Persia, Poland, Bangladesh, and the Baltic states.
7,8 Trojan War
I. A self-fulfilling prophecy.

All of this comes to show that even though the people of Israel are special, it does not mean that they are a people of the revelation of God.

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0 Answers
מיכי Staff answered 2 years ago

It’s too long and I can’t address all of it. If you’re interested, read my first book, where I explain the matter according to my method.

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