Q&A: A Segulah for Finding Lost Objects
A Segulah for Finding Lost Objects
Question
Hello Rabbi,
I wanted to know what you think about the blessing of Rabbi Meir Baal HaNes, "Rabbi Benjamin said: everyone is presumed blind…," for finding lost objects.
I'm asking because of a few fairly astonishing coincidences that happened to me and my friends after saying this blessing.
Do you think there is reason to say that it helps?
Thanks in advance.
Answer
Hello.
I am very doubtful. In principle, anything is possible, but usually simple explanations can also be found for "miracles" of this kind that people experience.
For example, after you say this mantra, you become sharper and more focused, and then you remember where you lost the items (sometimes you remember it unconsciously, meaning you go there מתוך a hidden memory and then discover the lost object).
Another possibility is that there is some probability of finding a lost item even without remembering, or of remembering even without saying the mantra. Sometimes it works entirely by chance, and if it happened when you said the mantra, you attribute it to that. And maybe it also happens without the mantra, except that when you said it you of course remember the events much better.
For example, if I tell you that some medicine works for a certain illness, and every time you are sick you take it. One time it worked, and then you are impressed that it really works. But here too there are all these possibilities: maybe it is a placebo, and maybe it is spontaneous healing, and so on.
Systematic research on the effectiveness of a medicine is supposed to neutralize all these phenomena, and therefore there is a requirement there for a systematic study (with a sample group and a control group, to neutralize spontaneous healing) and double-blind (to neutralize placebo). After conducting the study with a proper method, the "miracles" disappear. See about all this in the appendix to my book God Plays Dice. To form a position about saying the mantra, I suggest that you conduct a systematic study on a sample group and a control group of people who lose objects (where you also give the control group a different mantra to say, in order to neutralize the "placebo"), and see whether you find significant results. Tested and proven (which of course you won't see 🙂 ).
Discussion on Answer
I don't know it. But my opinion about segulot is written above.
I agree that you can't really test this (and you shouldn't try; it's enough to say that in Heaven they'll do the opposite on purpose if you try to test it), but it seems to me that examining it with statistical or scientific tools misses the point. Here it דווקא seems to me that each case stands on its own. So in my opinion, you don't need statistical proof that it works in order to decide whether it's worth using, and it's enough to hear stories about individual cases. What do you think?
The Sages said, "If you labored and found, believe it."
It's worth searching thoroughly, and if you didn't find it—this too is for the best.
If you're going to believe in segulot, then look for segulot that will make you wise!
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A.,
I wrote my opinion above. What more do you want me to write? Go by individual cases and conclude whatever you want. That's exactly what I addressed in my Column 38 on the law of small numbers. Read carefully there: https://mikyab.net/%D7%97%D7%95%D7%A7-%D7%94%D7%9E%D7%A1%D7%A4%D7%A8%D7%99%D7%9D-%D7%94%D7%A7%D7%98%D7%A0%D7%99%D7%9D-%D7%9E%D7%94-%D7%9C%D7%A9%D7%95%D7%91%D7%A8%D7%99%D7%9D-%D7%A9%D7%AA%D7%99%D7%A7%D7%94-%D7%95/
What does the Rabbi say about Rabbi Chaim's segulah of "There is none besides Him"?