The nature of providence
Hello Rabbi, I heard the Rabbi’s lesson on the subject of fundamental explanations and dogmas. In the lesson, the Rabbi discussed the words of the Maimonides that there is no providence for living and non-living things except in general, and you brought up the Maimonides regarding a sinking ship, where the Maimonides writes that the providence would be that no one would board it, and the Rabbi had difficulty (as part of the questions) why the providence would not be that there would be no storm. And I thought (based on what I heard from the Rabbi) that in fact nature is largely deterministic, since cause and effect are necessary, since man’s choice is a certain form of renewal that does not force the choice, and therefore it is more possible for the Creator to intervene in man’s desire to board the ship, a situation that does not require intervention in the laws of nature, than preventing a storm, which is intervention in nature, something that our eyes see that in general there is no intervention.
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0 Answers
Hello Rafi. I no longer remember the lesson in question, and I will refer to what you wrote here. There are two mechanisms that occur in our universe: natural causality (cause and physical cause) and the free choice of people. Neither of these depends on momentary decisions of God (but only on the fact that He created these mechanisms themselves). Interfering with any of them is a violation of the laws of creation, or the laws of nature, or the law of free will. I do not see a fundamental difference between the two. On the contrary, it is easier to interfere with the laws of nature, which do not have much value in themselves, than to interfere with the free will of man, which gives meaning to all his actions.
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Asks:
What is implied from the Rabbi’s words is that the problem of understanding God’s intervention is a theological problem, that it does not appear that there will be intervention. To my understanding, the problem with intervention in nature is that our eyes see that everything proceeds causally, and we do not find a place where there is no causality, (which leaves the possibility of intervention only where we do not examine). What is not true about choice is that we cannot know whether there is intervention or not, and the Rabbi’s assumption that there is no intervention stems, to my understanding, from the fact that it does not appear that there will be intervention in choice.
Even assuming that there is no interference with the choice, one can argue that there is interference with the will that causes the choice, and not with the choice itself, so that the choice does not go away, but rather the person’s tendencies change, and in this we also get out of the problematic of interfering with the actual power of choice. Although I was content with whether the tendency of the will depends on natural causality, or is it outside the laws of physical nature.
Thank you for the quick response.
All the best
Rafi Diamant
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Rabbi:
I disagree. When we see natural behavior according to natural laws, you cannot know whether there is no intervention. This is a physical assumption that if there are natural laws, then nature operates regularly according to them. In the same way, when I see that I have free choice, this means that no one interferes with my choice, nor with the desires that determine it. With Pharaoh, there was a special case in which God, blessed be He, intervened in his desires and thus influenced his choice. It is not for nothing that the Torah mentions this, because usually this does not happen.
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Asker (another):
How does the Rabbi define God’s providence in the world?
(The Rabbi, for example, claims that casting lots is essentially relying on the decision of God, who decides what will fall by lot.)
Does any such observation necessarily contradict the laws of physics?
And to what extent is there divine involvement in our daily lives?
Avishai
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Rabbi:
This is not the Gerida, but rather a common view among many commentators before him (Havi and others).
Clearly, this is a deviation from the laws of nature. After all, if he assumes that the die falls on the side that God decides based on His own considerations, then it will not necessarily fall on what the laws of nature determine.
I tend to think that God is not involved in our lives, and fate does not express God’s will but rather a random event. Fate is a way of deciding when there are no considerations on the merits of a matter to decide. Just as any ordinary person understands the matter of fates that are made from time to time (going out on Shabbat or serving in the army).
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Asks:
It’s not clear to me whether it’s even philosophically possible to understand that there is causality and yet there is intervention. Or does any intervention require that there is no causality and that what we think of as causality is a mistaken idea and is not just a coincidence in proximity in time?
Rafi —————————————————————————————— Rabbi: I didn’t understand the question. When God intervenes, it means something happens other than what the laws of nature would dictate without the intervention. That’s the definition of intervention, isn’t it?
And if everything that happens is in the hands of God, then you didn’t say anything, because He Himself acts according to the laws of nature. So what difference does it make if He does it Himself but according to fixed laws or if He created natural laws that operate exactly this way? It’s the same thing. —————————————————————————————— Asks: If all the laws of nature are a process of intervention, it is indeed understandable. After all, nature is intervention, but if we understand that there are laws of nature, and the laws of nature are a chain of cause and effect, except that sometimes there is intervention that neutralizes the laws of nature, then in order for there to be intervention, the chain of cause and effect must be severed, and then we will have to say that what I think of as a cause is not a cause, because if it is a cause, then there is no intervention here, because even without intervention it would have happened because of the cause, and in any case there is no intervention here. —————————————————————————————— Rabbi: If you talk about intervention sometimes, then at those points where God intervenes there is no natural reason for what happens. You assume for some reason that at those points too it seems to us that there is a natural reason. Where does this assumption come from? —————————————————————————————— Asks: Since I do not see things in the world that do not have causality, where can I place the intervention, since causality is evident to me?
This is the reason I raised the possibility that the intervention is in the will of the person, where there is no causality anyway, and therefore intervention is possible without us noticing it.
Honorable Mention —————————————————————————————— Rabbi: In most things you don’t see causality. You assume it exists. —————————————————————————————— Rabbi: So what is the reason to assume that “God left the earth” and there was a change in leadership? After all, it turns out that even in ancient times the main thing in the world was that the experience was that the world behaved as it was, and yet the Torah and the prophets reveal a change of intervention. So what indication indicates a change? thanks —————————————————————————————— Rabbi: All the scientific indications that teach us that things that happen have natural causes. But it is still not true that every incident that happens before us we notice has a natural cause.
Rafi —————————————————————————————— Rabbi: I didn’t understand the question. When God intervenes, it means something happens other than what the laws of nature would dictate without the intervention. That’s the definition of intervention, isn’t it?
And if everything that happens is in the hands of God, then you didn’t say anything, because He Himself acts according to the laws of nature. So what difference does it make if He does it Himself but according to fixed laws or if He created natural laws that operate exactly this way? It’s the same thing. —————————————————————————————— Asks: If all the laws of nature are a process of intervention, it is indeed understandable. After all, nature is intervention, but if we understand that there are laws of nature, and the laws of nature are a chain of cause and effect, except that sometimes there is intervention that neutralizes the laws of nature, then in order for there to be intervention, the chain of cause and effect must be severed, and then we will have to say that what I think of as a cause is not a cause, because if it is a cause, then there is no intervention here, because even without intervention it would have happened because of the cause, and in any case there is no intervention here. —————————————————————————————— Rabbi: If you talk about intervention sometimes, then at those points where God intervenes there is no natural reason for what happens. You assume for some reason that at those points too it seems to us that there is a natural reason. Where does this assumption come from? —————————————————————————————— Asks: Since I do not see things in the world that do not have causality, where can I place the intervention, since causality is evident to me?
This is the reason I raised the possibility that the intervention is in the will of the person, where there is no causality anyway, and therefore intervention is possible without us noticing it.
Honorable Mention —————————————————————————————— Rabbi: In most things you don’t see causality. You assume it exists. —————————————————————————————— Rabbi: So what is the reason to assume that “God left the earth” and there was a change in leadership? After all, it turns out that even in ancient times the main thing in the world was that the experience was that the world behaved as it was, and yet the Torah and the prophets reveal a change of intervention. So what indication indicates a change? thanks —————————————————————————————— Rabbi: All the scientific indications that teach us that things that happen have natural causes. But it is still not true that every incident that happens before us we notice has a natural cause.
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