A question about the contradiction between the antiquity of the world and today’s science
Shalom Rabbi
I would appreciate a quick answer. And please note that my questions stem from whether there is clear proof and not just any probability.
Y
Here, in the Book of Mormon, Chapter 1, Chapter 1, he rejected the sect of the Debaters who proved the reality of the Creator based on the proof that the world was created and not pre-existent, and since it is renewed, it necessarily has a new beginning, and the Lord says that this is the preferred way, because since the renewal of the world has not been proven by a miracle, we will not base the knowledge of God’s reality on this assumption, and the Almighty, because everything that they think is a miracle about the renewal of the world will be met with doubts, and it is not a decisive miracle except for those who do not know the difference between a miracle and a victory and victory, etc. Indeed, for those who know the matter clearly, we will find that all of those proofs contain doubts, etc.And this is the question that the Lord, the beginning of the world or its renewal, will not reach in a cut-and-dried example..
He did not find conclusive evidence to reject the method of predestination, and now we will quote one passage in which the Rabbi explicitly states that this method, for which there is no definitive example, believes that the world came forth from God without intention or will.
This is the language of the Rambam in the book of the Hebrews, Chapter 20: “Now it has already been explained to you that Aristotle would believe that those things that exist are not found by chance and are found as they are due to a change, although it is necessary for them to be not of themselves, that they are intended by the intention of the one who intends and the will of the one who desires. It is not clear to me that Aristotle would believe this, and this is because the grouping between reality by virtue of the obligation and between the novelty by virtue of the one who intends and the will, until the two matters become one, is close to me to the grouping between two opposites,” etc. and see there later the parable that the Rambam brought to this.
And above, Rish Pi’t wrote about Aristotle’s opinion thus: ” According to this, the opinion would not be such that these things would be by deliberate intention, but chose and willed that they would be so that if they were by deliberate intention, they would already be nonexistent before they were intended. ” More there, and more is explained than this in the reality of the unity of the wheel, for which no one can find a special reason other than deliberate intention.
And see above in the Pt. 5 how much effort he took to show, with difficulty and without a model cut from the path of the wheels, that here in creation there is a deliberate intention, but from the human body and the Bible and all the 25th century he never brought evidence that there is a deliberate intention in creation. And not only that, but in the Pt. 1 in the Kt. 2 he brought four ways to prove the reality of God (which is also proven to those who believe in the pre-existence of the world because they believe that the world was obligated by God as an obligation of the intelligent from the intellect) and in no evidence did he prove the exemplary order that exists in the world and does not contradict the thought that creation came from God by virtue of the obligation of the intelligent from the intellect as stated in the above-mentioned Pt.
Indeed, he saw in the Book of Revelation chapter 13 that he wrote thus: “And know that one of the great things in the evidence for the renewal of the world is that for those who acknowledge the truth, the example will stand on it in the natural phenomena , because each thing has a different purpose and that this is because of that and it is evidence of the intention of the One who intends, and the intention of the One who intends will not be drawn only with a new renewal. ” All that is, in finding things in creation that were intended to serve something else, this brought him evidence of the intention of the One who intends.
And apparently what he did not decide was that this was complete evidence, nor did he bring it into the body in question in the book, because he did not decide that there is indeed something in existence that can definitely be said to be directed towards no other purpose – all of it to serve human life, and it is possible that everything here has a reason and purpose, a certain purpose.
And here the things are reminiscent of what Darwin said, that the contradiction to his entire theory is if something is found that was not intended for him at all, but for another purpose.
- Therefore, I would like to ask and know whether science has advanced in this matter since the time of Maimonides and has discovered a great deal of material that clearly proves with much evidence that there are many things here that have no purpose at all, only for human use, etc. So we can say that if Maimonides had known about this, he would have said that this contains complete evidence for the renewal of the world and creation according to intention and planning. And I do not mean evidence that is according to the theory, such as the evidence of the Big Bang, which is not scientific evidence, only a scientific explanation of some things. I just want to know about evidence that can be seen with the eye of science clearly and without doubt.
And I would appreciate it if you could elaborate a bit on this matter or refer to material written on this subject in a detailed manner, even for beginners who are not scientists.
- And by the way, it is necessary to comment on what is usually shown about order and planning from the position of the sun in relation to the world, which requires great precision. And one must ask, therefore, that there are an infinite number of stars here, all of which do not have the conditions for life and are not in the correct balance with respect to the sun. And yet, it is not far from the case that one star out of an infinite number will land in a completely precise place.
- And now, in our time, evidence is brought to bear on the innovation from the distance of the stars, and the ancients have a number of wise assurances in rejecting the evidence. We see only a small segment of movement in a short period of time, and it can be assumed that the universe breathes as it expands and contracts alternately, and we cannot conclude from the distance that the universe began from a point in the center, or that it is fixed in its current state with a slight movement outward and inward, like a person breathing. So.
- He also refuted the evidence they presented that if there were eternal radiation, the world would be filled with the energy of solar radiation throughout its space and would envelop all the spheres. He refuted this by suggesting that perhaps excess radiation is swallowed up in black holes, and that it is also possible that the radiation escapes in an infinite amount of time to the infinite ends, and therefore is not concentrated around the world.
- There is evidence that infinitely ancient remains are found in the living world, but it must be argued that everything very ancient has already completely disintegrated and that there is no trace of it. And according to the Torah, there is also no evidence of the age of the world, since everything that existed before this time has already disintegrated, like the pavement of the entire world that we know, which is disintegrating all the time, and from the approaching seed a new tree grows in a natural way.
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I would like to ask His Eminence a question that really bothers me about Maimonides' opinion. Of course, it doesn't seem to me that the excuse for this is in the style that Maimonides supposedly had to not completely reject Aristotle in order to save his contemporaries. Etc. It seems to me that it is more necessary to understand their way of thinking, which is apparently different from ours. And in this I ask for help from His Eminence.
Maimonides wrote that if it were not for the revelation of God, it would be possible to understand that Aristotle was indeed right that God has no will and that the world necessarily derives from Him as the shadow does from man. In other words, that the world necessarily derives from God. And was not created by will.
I find this very difficult to comprehend and I cannot find the opening to introduce such a thought. After all, there is no equal side between God, who is obligated to reality. The reality of the world, which is lacking and limited and which is not the truth, and what must be.
When there is an inconceivable gap between things, how is it possible to speak of something that comes without will. There is no continuity that connects the true God with the uncommitted creation except that such is His will.
In other words: Even if we were faced with an insoluble question (according to the philosophers), why does God have a will? To say that He has no will would be much more difficult because there is a world here that is not God Himself and how it came to be. And even more so if you have denied will because you do not understand how will belongs to the whole. Even more amazing is it to you how there is a world that is not true, a thing that comes out of the whole. We would have to find only the whole and nothing else.
If the philosophers had said that the world is ancient and is, in all things, the source of itself. There would still be room to accommodate this in the mind. But since they too correctly understood that something that is only possible is necessarily reality and that its cause of existence comes from a place, then how is it possible without the will of God?
In short, even if there are difficulties in saying by force that something has no introduction in the mind.
Of course, with regard to the matter of the shadow emerging from a person and a physical body, we understand well the sequence of the process, but here they have associated the two things that have the greatest gap that our mind tolerates. And as a far-fetched example, as it is said that reason has a shadow and it takes up space. There is a thousandfold difference between the true God and the possible and limited world. If the philosophers did not have a perception of the perfection of God, then it would not be difficult for me. For in this thought, God is also nothing but something similar to rain. But I ask them precisely from where they came and understood the perfection of God. And how could they continue to say that the world can emerge from Him without conscious intention and will.
And I will explain in a slightly different way: How is it possible to perceive that there is a world that is not bound by reality and is not the source of itself and yet did not come out of God's will another that was here nothing and nothing. And this is in my opinion no place to understand because..
After all, God is of a completely different nature and is bound by reality and truth. And the world is not like that and so how could such a thing come out of it without a calculated will to do something that is completely different from it. It is not and does not belong to there being any continuity between nothing and truth. For something that is limited and does not have to be. And how could it even be conceivable; in the most remote possibility that one came out of it. Without will and intention.
In short, they also knew that God and the world are different things, the purpose of change and so how did they believe that there is a continuity here.
Even if the possibility of something coming out of nothing was not perceived in their minds. They had to say that the world is necessarily primordial on its own. (Which of course the mind does not accept because then we would have to think of the world as having to be and not something that is only possible) but that the world comes out of God in a way anyway. This seems completely absurd and we will not say so even if the line of greatness beyond comprehension makes it difficult for us. Although it seems that the root of their thought lies in the fact that their thought did not contain a concept of being from nowhere. And as the Maimonides claimed about them, they did not notice the division between another created and the pre-created. And that this should not be touched upon. But I still firmly argue that I attribute to creation the division in all kinds of division. To God and as required by Him, this is impossible anywhere and is open to our reason. (And yet I am most puzzled by Maimonides, since he taught us to understand the process of creation, and he did not continue his blessing and cry out that Aristotle's words are completely exaggerated. And what is the point of requiring a world that is not true from a true God. And there is no conceivable continuity)
And especially in light of Nathaniel Rubin's book, "What God Cannot Do," in which he extensively reviewed all the nonsense that has been said about God throughout the ages. And there he brought up in detail that the philosophers were the ones who insisted that nature cannot exist and that it is impossible to ascribe to God whatever they want. And by whole we mean what is truly perceived as whole and does not include the opposites as well. And so I stand and ask whether what they said is not more far-fetched than what the Christians said that God was made manifest. I think that the philosophers' opinion is much more far-fetched. Because the Christians say that God is omnipotent and can, by His will, be whatever He wills. But at least they explained some kind of continuity of logic. But in the words of the philosophers there is no trace of perception and any continuity between God, who is obligated to reality, and the world, which is nothing but a possible reality, and between the non-existent and the finite. These are the things that are most fundamentally different, and we have no greater division than this. And we have nothing but the possibility of a being from nowhere and a purposeful afterlife and a complete will. And without any side or word of being obligated to Him.
I think that they had a different type of thought than ours and therefore could have contained such an idea. I would like to stand on the order of this thought. I will bring a fish to this. Probably in years to come we will stand and ask how it was that many scientists could investigate creation and not ask what its initial origin was, and that their short-sighted minds could contain a type of answer that the beginning is not a matter for science, and that is enough. And we will cry out to the heavens, is it possible? How can you not think about what the source is and what the Big Bang could have come from on its own? But today, since we are familiar with these short-sighted people, we understand very well where their thoughts came from. And once there is a type of low perception that deals only with what exists, it is possible to reach such thoughts. I want to understand something like this process in relation to the thought of the philosophers. And I am not successful. And perhaps His Honor can help me with this.
P.S. What is the philosophical reason that caused the wise men of the nations to abandon Aristotle's opinion? (Apart from the scientific one. And in general, has science proven that the world was created from nothing?)
Thank you in advance. And I would be very, very happy for an answer soon.
Hello.
The questions that deal with metaphysical speculations don't mean much to me. They are a collection of hypotheses floating in the air that are linked together in all sorts of different and strange ways. They are not interesting and do not mean much to me. Can or cannot that which is different come from its source with or without will. Is will a disadvantage or not, and does it have any disadvantages at all? I have no idea about any of this and I don't think anyone does. Many of these questions don't even make sense. That's why I don't deal with these old, Aristotelian questions.
As for the origin of science and its laws, this is not a scientific question but a philosophical one, and therefore there is no reason for science itself to stand on it and for scientists to need or know how to answer it.
The Big Bang is a theory that has scientific confirmations and it caused Aristotle's precepts to be abandoned.
Shalom ’ Rab
And many thanks
What I brought from Darwin is what he said that if we see something that is unnecessary for the body in which it is found and is found only for the existence of another species, then this is evidence that there is an external designer who made this detail, because the body does not need the thing for itself, and if we see that the thing is needed for another item, then you have evidence of a designer.
And to this I note that it is also the evidence that the Lord brought to contradict the precepts, since in all the wonderful order that prevails in the universe he did not see a contradiction, because since everything is built of minds, then it is by law that things will come in the right order, but in that we see that something is intended for the purpose of another - for example, what grows for the sake of man - if this is proven, then this is evidence of an external designer and not of reason in itself, because then the mind would not do anything for its own sake.
And that's why I asked if since the time of the Prophet, science has advanced in the evidence that there are things that were created for others.
Because it is proven that the Prophet was satisfied with this and did not bring this as conclusive evidence, since it is possible that plants do not exist only for the sake of man.
With great gratitude
In my opinion, there is no evidence from this. Even if something is intended for another purpose, it can benefit it in its evolutionary survival. And there are known such phenomena of symbiotic existence. So the answer, as far as I know, is positive. Today, we talk about things that are intended for others. The question of whether it is only for others is difficult to answer, because even if creature A is useful to creature B, this does not mean scientifically that it is intended for B. It can also be an end in itself (science does not deal with ends).
In any case, according to the Maimonides, as far as I know, everything in creation is an end in itself, and in this he disagrees with Maharam Gabbay, who sees everything in creation for the sake of man. And the author of HaLeshham went further in this (as far as I remember in the Hiddush).
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