Q&A: The Meaning of Life, the Reason for Creation, the World to Come, and Attitudes Toward Death
The Meaning of Life, the Reason for Creation, the World to Come, and Attitudes Toward Death
Question
Hello, honorable Rabbi.
There are several issues that keep bothering me, and a few more questions on which I’d like to hear your opinion.
1. Why did the Holy One, blessed be He, create the world? What does He need with this thing called man? The whole matter sounds really absurd. What is the purpose of the world? What is the purpose of man? Why are we here? What was lacking for the Holy One, blessed be He, beforehand, that He needed to create the world and us?
2. “What profit has a man from all his labor at which he labors under the sun?” In the end, after all, we die anyway. (From some of what I’ve read in your writings, I understood that in your view one does not necessarily have to believe in the existence of the World to Come—is that really so?—which only strengthens the question.) This is somewhat connected to the previous question: what is man’s purpose? What good is any sort of progress to me when I know that everything is reset in the face of death?
3. There are several passages in the prayer liturgy that do not fit with various views I’ve read in your writings. First, I wanted to know whether you even try to explain the “contradictions” between these things, or whether it doesn’t bother you at all. If so, I’d be glad if you could explain the following statements:
– “We thank You… for Your miracles that are with us at every moment, evening, morning, and noon” (the Modim blessing)
– “And in His goodness He renews every day, continually, the work of creation” (Yotzer HaMe’orot)
There are several more examples, but for now I’ll make do with these two.
Answer
1. These are questions that probably cannot be answered. We live in a world created by Him, and it is hard to assess how He thinks and decides, and to explain the world on the basis of principles drawn from the world itself. I am generally not inclined to accept the answers usually given to this question (“it is the nature of the good to do good” — Ramchal; “He wanted to reveal His names in actuality” — Reish Etz Chaim; etc.). Beyond the fact that in principle I think we have no way of knowing, these are speculations with no clear basis. “What have you to do with the hidden things of the Merciful One?!”
Still, the question of why we are here can also be interpreted as directed toward us: what is our purpose, rather than what He wanted from the outset. In the common view, our purpose is apparently to serve Him. “What you were commanded, you must do; and what is pleasing before the Holy One, blessed be He — let Him do.” See Berakhot 10a.
2. First, “you have to believe” is an oxymoronic expression. There cannot be an obligation to believe. There is authority in halakhic / of Jewish law contexts, because one can require me to do an act that I do not think is right or proper. But one cannot require me to believe something that I do not think is true. Not because it is immoral, but because in any case I do not believe it if I do not think it is true. That is a self-contradictory demand. At most, one can persuade me of something.
As for the World to Come, I’m undecided about it, because I do not know the source of that belief. Does it have roots in what we received at Sinai or from the prophets, or is it an invention of the Sages based on reasoning (which itself is based on your question)? On the other hand, there is logic to thinking that the soul goes somewhere when it separates from the body.
I personally tend to think that there ought to be something after death, to which the soul goes. That does not mean it is the World to Come as described in various places—Gan Eden and Gehinnom, and so on. About that, obviously I do not know. It is possible that you do not remain as a distinct personality, but rather join the totality of the world (like bodies that decompose and become others in the natural cycle).
So the assumption that everything is reset is not necessary, and I tend to think it is incorrect. In any case, here too one should do what is right not because it benefits me, but because it benefits the world. Like the story of Honi the Circle-Maker, who planted a date tree that would bear fruit only after seventy years.
3. I do try to explain, but if there is something I find difficult, I do not accept it just because it is written (see all the points above).
The miracles of the Holy One, blessed be He, in my view are the laws of nature that He created, which accompany us and govern the world at every moment. In my understanding, there are no miracles in the simple sense at every moment. The same applies to “He renews every day, continually.” See Beit HaLevi in his explanation of the Sabbath day in creation; his source is in Nachmanides (and Rabbi Kook also wrote something along these lines).
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Oren:
Regarding question no. 1, I seem to recall that in a lesson on perfection and self-perfection in the thought of Rabbi Kook, you spoke about a possible answer: that the Holy One, blessed be He, created the world in order to realize His desire to perfect Himself. His perfection is apparently achieved through our serving Him. At the outset, the Holy One, blessed be He, could not perfect Himself on His own, because in order to perfect oneself, there first has to be some kind of impairment in one’s perfection, allowing room for perfection. It may be that this impairment is the granting of free choice to human beings (a domain that is not under the Holy One’s control).
This view also has parallels in our own lives, where we sometimes see value in the process of improvement itself, and not only in the results we reach.
What do you think of this idea?
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Rabbi:
That is possible, but it is still an empty definition. It does not tell us exactly what was lacking, or why what is happening here is the perfection of the Holy One, blessed be He (and of us as well). But as a conceptual framework, it is quite plausible that He created the world so that He could perfect Himself.