Q&A: Free Will and God's Intervention in the World
Free Will and God's Intervention in the World
Question
Have a good week,
Recently I read the book The Science of Freedom, where the Rabbi explains that the sound intuition that free will exists is correct, and that there is apparently an influence from the mental state to the physical state, which drives a brain process. There is no proof that rules this out, and sound intuition supports it.
My question is whether God's intervention in the world is not a similar problem.
There is an intuition that if He created nature then He can also intervene in it, and apparently in fact does intervene… and this is precisely an intervention of a spiritual dimension causing the laws of nature to operate?
In other words, is God's intervention in the world not parallel to the intervention of the mental dimension/free will in physical processes in the brain?
Thank you very much, and have a good week,
Lior
Answer
I have already been asked this several times. In your words you casually included two claims: that He can intervene, and that He does intervene. With the first, I completely agree. With the second, I do not see any indication whatsoever. On the contrary, every time I check, I find that the explanation is natural-scientific. In contrast, for the involvement of my own choice there is an indication: my immediate feeling that this is happening.