In my opinion, a God who does not allow His existence to be proven absolutely and clearly is not perfect. That is a strong flaw that undermines His very existence.
Under no circumstances would I sacrifice my life in an army defending a state and a people against an enemy if I were not completely certain, without any doubt, that there is a state, that there is a people, that they are mine, and that it is fitting to give my life for them.

Even regarding the correctness of a particular military operation, it would be necessary for the soldiers to agree and understand that the mission is justified and vitally necessary. But for reasons of government and society, society's good is to rely on the decisions of the policymakers empowered by the majority to decide. Even that is not universally agreed upon, but many people understand it. In any case, even from that standpoint and in the combat context, when I devote myself to God I need absolute certainty, more than the kind derived from social convention due to necessity—especially when God is supposedly able to prove it to me, something no commander or ruler sending soldiers into battle can do.

As for simple intuition (I saw what you wrote about it in the notebooks, and still—) whoever takes the opium and feels good—good for him. I even envy him; I wish I had that.
But as long as he does not know it absolutely, but only through some inner or subconscious feeling, or he "just knows" without actually seeing it in his consciousness or thought, I treat his intuition as pure imagination.
Is it reasonable to sacrifice your life on the basis of intuition??? Is it reasonable to bind your son on the basis of intuition??? Is it reasonable to kill another Jew who desecrates the Sabbath because he did not succeed in drawing the very complex logical and philosophical conclusions, and also was not granted that intuitive revelation???
And in general, for some reason, this intuition is usually found among those born to a Jewish mother (especially if she believes…) and not among billions of others, many of whom have a simple and clear intuition that one of the thousands of other gods is the true God.
I am sorry for a god whose believers believe in him intuitively.

You wrote several times in your remarks about the assumptions I am making and about the "burden of proof."
My response is this:
The one who claims divinity and demands total devotion from me must prove His existence. The burden of proof rests on Him, no matter what.
It is audacious to assume that there is a God, or even to prove it to some degree but not absolutely, then to assume that I am obligated to believe this and therefore obligated to obey His commands to the point of self-sacrifice and killing those who do not believe and violate His will, and then to determine that if I cannot understand this, neither intuitively nor logically—the burden of proof rests on me to justify my demand for proofs.
I truly think this. And I know many, many others think this as well. And even more deny Him and have put their doubts behind them for that reason. And many of them would very much like to believe in Him if only the Master of the palace would reveal Himself to them—but He does not open a window and instead throws the burden of proof onto the worn-out seekers of faith who are exhausted from searching for Him.
If He existed, He would know that the people He created were created as beings who make assumptions and seek certain proofs, and He would provide what is needed to satisfy their minds and sustain their faith in Him.

These assumptions and the request for proof are not absurd. They are the offspring of common sense (the thinking of a normal, average, thinking person = common sense), and it seems to me that you too would miss the truth if you denied that you yourself once assumed this before all the many philosophical discussions.
If the answer to those who make logical, accepted, normal assumptions is that their difficulties are forced (and are really just excuses, as is known), alongside a demand that they bear the burden of proof—that is not a sufficient divine answer for me.

P.S.
I am writing this not in a provocative way at all, but out of pain in faith and a groaning heart.
I mourn the God I have lost and the faith that has died within me.
Who will give me back the months of old, and illuminate my eyes from my blindness—or at least my heart's inner chambers with the light of faith.
The cry bursts forth from those depths.

Hi Daniel, good evening!
Since I too wrestle with questions like these, I’d be happy to get in touch if you're interested.

There is a logical mistake here. A God who does not allow certainty regarding His existence is not perfect because you assume He would want to give us certainty and is unable to. That is a logical mistake for two reasons: 1. If He does not want to give us certainty for some reason, then there is no imperfection here at all—only a mode of thought that you do not understand. 2. Even if He cannot give us certainty, that does not necessarily indicate a deficiency. There are logical impossibilities that even He is subject to (He cannot make a round triangle). I have written about this here several times.
And in general it is not at all clear to me what exactly is bothering you. Are you fine with the fact that He created a world full of suffering and evil? It is only the lack of certainty that you find defective in the world? That really makes me laugh.
I think that first of all you need to examine yourself in one of two ways:
A. If you have good evidence for His existence, then these objections seem weak and insignificant to me. They certainly do not refute good arguments. The fact that you do not understand God's way of acting stems from the fact that He does not belong to your world, and there is no reason you should understand.
B. On the other hand, if you have no evidence for His existence, then do not believe in Him even apart from these objections.

I do not know whether you were in the army or what you do, but if you do not act anywhere you are not certain, you will not have much to do in the world.

You speak of an inner or subconscious feeling as the basis of faith. I am speaking of strong evidence. Now we return to the two options I described above (you have arguments or you do not). That is the meaning of my remarks about the burden of proof. If you do not believe, then you do not believe, and there is no need at all to resort to these dubious difficulties in order to justify that.

The fact that this intuition happens to be found among Jews is no refutation of anything. I have explained this several times. See, for example, column 294 and onward.

See my remarks at the beginning of the discussion on Anselm, where I explained the meaning of initial intuition and its role vis-à-vis logical arguments. There is nothing defective about arguments coming on the basis of an initial intuition. In fact, that is always the case.

Do not identify what I am saying here with the common preaching that tells a person that his questions are answers and not questions. I did not write that, and I do not speak that way. What I said is that your particular objections seem very weak to me, and they cannot justify abandoning faith unless, from the outset, you did not have it.

In my opinion, if you think carefully about what I wrote and do not insist, you will see that there is no real difficulty here. I encounter quite a few difficulties in faith, some better and some worse. These really belong among the worse ones.

Thank you for the reply.
Within the great sea of your rich website, I do not know whether this is the place for such a discussion. If you direct me elsewhere, I will write there. In the meantime, here I am.

To your question: at the moment I do not believe. At all. In anything.
But I want to believe. Why? Maybe because I have that inner groan Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin spoke about; maybe I miss the wonderful religious experiences that cannot be had without faith; and maybe for other reasons.

I started from the beginning, with proving the existence of the Creator, with the plan being to continue afterward to proving the revelation at Mount Sinai and Torah from Heaven, the Oral Torah, the Jewish people, the Thirteen Principles, rabbinic enactments, and so on and so on.
And I cannot settle in my heart or mind even the beginning—the very existence of the Creator.
I know the words of the medieval authorities (Rishonim) on the subject (I have answered many and continue to turn many away from sin by the power of their ordered teaching, fluent on my lips and conveyed to eager audiences), and also the proofs not drawn from sacred sources—but also the refutations of them all.
Still I do not despair of asking and searching, perhaps perhaps I may merit the fulfillment of the promise: "Then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God." I have labored and not found, and indeed I do not believe.

The best conclusion I have managed to reach is that apparently I will not be able, by human powers, to reach absolute proof. I was glad to see you write this honestly and fairly as an introduction to your notebooks. In other wells I found that admission only in the depths, after I had labored greatly to draw every drop from them.
I know many objections in faith at its various stages and layers (yes, also the question of good and evil in the world), and I know faith-based and philosophical answers to all of them. After all, I live among my people and stand in a place, position, and over a span of time that makes it necessary to know all these things. I know that everything can be discussed; it is fascinating and even full of wisdom, and there is more to come. But absolute proof—I do not find.

If this were about other matters that do not touch my very existence and therefore my total obligation and subjugation with all my body and soul, at all times, in this world and the next, my decision-making method would probably be different.
But we are not talking here merely about decisions concerning studies, work, residence, marriage, family, investment, and the like, which although they can sometimes have critical consequences, I understand and know that part of life is making decisions on important matters and acting on them, even if the level of certainty that led to the decision is not absolute. (At this stage of the discussion, I do not mind including in this list things that involve life and death such as the army and so on—the examples you raised above. Although personally I would need absolute certainty about the justice of the goal, since I reject the statement that "it is good to die for …," but let us leave that for another discussion. By the way, the insight that "if you do not act where you are not certain, you will not have much to do in the world" is not a philosophical-theoretical insight relevant to our discussion.)
In matters like these I would not see a flaw in logical arguments being based on an initial intuition that is not proven—but even that only on condition that any conclusion arising from this not obligate forcing that conclusion on someone else who lacks this basic intuition, certainly not depriving him of liberty and killing him on the basis of the intuitive philosopher's conclusion. As stated, I myself would not become totally committed and subjugate my body and soul to a conclusion arising from such arguments—but that would be a personal decision.

But knowledge of God and what follows from it is not at all comparable to any of these:
First, because it obligates far more than any other decision. When God wants me to commit to Him totally, forever, to the point of self-sacrifice and even killing another on His behalf, then let Him kindly present Himself without leaving room for doubt in the one being obligated. If afterward He disappears from me and leaves me full of questions about His ways of conduct—with that I could probably cope, because at least I had known Him until then. But first of all—let Him prove His existence to me. (And here I return to the question I already wrote in the previous exchange—how can one accept and agree to killing another person who does not believe solely on the basis of the faith of the first person who is commanded to kill him?? What kind of logic would agree to obey a god not proven with certainty when he commands one to slaughter his son or anyone else??? Even regarding less than that, corporal punishments such as lashes, our principle is that one does not punish on the basis of an inference, and in the opinion of many the reason is that perhaps a refutation will be found. The same applies, and all the more so, to our case.)
Second, the very claim that He does not want or cannot give us certainty of His existence fundamentally undermines His existence as One who demands total subjugation to Him as stated.

The statement that His thoughts are not my thoughts and there are things impossible to understand—I will accept only after I know and understand with my own mind that there is a God. After that—into His hand I will entrust my spirit, my thoughts, and my understandings. One cannot begin the process, the proof of God, by saying that I will not succeed in understanding. That is not an argument I can accept.
For exactly the same reason I will not accept the excuse of logical impossibility. After He proves that He exists, maybe I will not care if He runs into technical or logical difficulties in turning a triangle into a circle. But I will not accept logical impossibility at the first principle—the very fact of His existence.

And on the margins: look, I do not see myself as competing for the smartest question, and presenting the questions that trouble me as laughable, dubious, very weak, and inferior objections will not remove them from my heart or bring me to faith. (By the way, this is the way some Jewish communities deal with questions of faith at any level, as is known. With those who seek my advice and answers I make a point of treating their distress and struggles respectfully, unless they mean to provoke and mock—and I have already clarified that I truly do not come here from such a place.)
And another thing: according to the laws of the Torah, the duty and commandment to believe is imposed on me too, the owner of these weak and inferior questions, just as on every thirteen-year-old boy anywhere in the world, Jew or gentile. Is that possible? (To put it neatly: does God know how to deal only with the hard questions and not the less good ones?…)

And again I express my thanks for your taking the time.

Daniel, how old are you?

What do you say about free choice? There is an approach to faith that the Rabbi does not like so much, and I thought I had come up with it until I saw none other than Ben Shapiro, darling of the debate world, saying it, and one other person too.

K,
I would be glad for an explanation or a reference to anything that might bring me to faith.

So answer, Mr. Daniel.

Answer what—what my opinion is about free choice? Why is that relevant to the discussion? It is a huge topic in its own right. If it is relevant in some way, point me there.

Daniel,
What you write is moving, and to a somewhat lesser extent as well (in my humble opinion) intellectually compelling. Let me tell you something from my experience with the abyss of faith that I encountered (and still encounter) in my life. And maybe, just maybe, though very doubtful, it could also be some sort of solution for you. For me at least it is a partial solution.
I would suggest that you be stricter and at the same time more lenient regarding belief in the existence of God.
To be stricter means trying to accept that the question of His existence is first and foremost a rational question in which at most one can present a reasonable and well-argued case (in my opinion Michi does this not badly at all), and compare it to the alternative. The alternatives emerging from what you write do not seem plausible to me, and that is exactly the critical question.
To be lenient means to give up a bit on the historical biblical God (a living, personal God) and first of all seek some kind of "natural religion," less institutionalized and less tied to a concrete tradition. God as object preceding God as living subject. I am of course not talking about abandoning the religious life, if you really are deeply observant, but I certainly see value in intellectual and "spiritual" distancing from the Jewish mindset.
I do not know if I managed to say anything sensible this time.

It is related,
but I’d be happy to know your age.
And in my opinion—and I found two other common approaches in America—they connect the questions.

I will not force it. Too bad 😉

Doron,
Thank you for the reply.
I will not believe because of a lack of alternatives. There are many unresolved questions in the world.
Indeed I miss simple and sincere faith, and I would be happy to return there—but only if I truly believe it.

K,
You’ve intrigued me.
I am in my late fifties.
As for free choice, I am familiar with many conceptions (Jewish and others), from determinism to perfect free choice in everything.
As a believer I was attached to Rabbi Dessler's approach on the subject. In my opinion it contains a heart-settling combination of determinism with choice that allows for trial, reward, and punishment, and it fit in well with my Torah knowledge.
As of today I have no opinion on the matter. I do not really see any practical difference in it, and seemingly the main practical difference concerns personal responsibility (civil and criminal), and perhaps it also affects the way one educates children and the philosophy behind that. Since I am neither a legislator nor a criminal jurist, and I have already recited the blessing on my youngest son's becoming exempt from my responsibility, I listen and learn on the matter, but still do not see a need to express a definite opinion, if such a thing even exists.

Daniel,
Maybe I did not phrase it well.
In my opinion, belief in the God of natural religion is forced upon us. The moment we try to give more concrete cognitive content, the arguments begin over which content best fits that intuitive faith. What seems right to me here is to understand what, in your eyes, is the most successful expression of that faith. For me, this cognitive and intellectual move—based, as stated, on intuition—has tremendous existential and emotional significance. I found what seems right to me, meaning which alternative is least bad, and from there I moved forward.
Under no circumstances would I say that "I saw the light" or that faith is an effective support for me in daily life. It is not. But that is the maximum I have managed to achieve at the moment.
If for you that is not good enough, then no. Legitimate.

Okay then,
there is the approach of the cosmological proof, which assumes that something exists as a first cause.
Because it is primary, it has teleological capacity.
{P.S. We know only two kinds of causes that have such a capacity—free choice or randomness.}
Likewise, the first cause has the ability to bring about the present state. Otherwise it could not explain it. {That seems to follow as part of the definition.}

Now, if we assume that the current state is dualism (and it depends, of course, on which subtype, but for most dualists they speak about types for which the argument remains the same),
then there exists a first cause that has the ability to bring about consciousness.
{Add to that that the first cause is teleological by nature, and if there is free choice, that can be a very good explanation here—even better than randomness.}
Since we know that consciousness can affect matter, it will be easy for us to assume that the first cause is conscious.
For example.

Likewise, one could construct a cosmological proof about consciousnesses: there needs to be a primary consciousness that creates consciousnesses.

But nowadays the assumption of dualism is usually connected to another assumption concerning free choice (which according to what you wrote, you believe in; it is enough for me that once in your life you had a choice, and then by definition you do not hold that everything is materialistic).
{Likewise, even if there is no choice, there may still be dualism, just of another subtype. But here they will usually try to explain it in materialist terms, although it is far from clear that this works especially well.}
And therefore, in order to be a dualist, one can read more broadly in the book The Science of Freedom.

Here Shapiro added another twist, but I think I explained the beginning much better than he did 🙂

Please respond to the argument, and then we will see which direction to continue in.

It would help me if you spoke in more understandable language.
A great deal has been said against the cosmological argument and the teleological argument, and I have already reached the conclusion that they do not bring me to absolute proof that cannot be refuted at all.
Where did you get from me that I believe in free choice? In any case, I have no opinion on that as of today, and I do not mind saying anything about it so long as it does not obligate me. If it obligates me in some way, I will need proof of that understanding.
I did not understand what you wrote about consciousness.

In general, it would help me if you spoke in more understandable language. Talking in codes and headings is hard to understand, and in an essential matter like faith, perfect understanding is not a luxury or a privilege.

No, no, no—I meant a teleological cause (known in Hebrew as a purposive cause), not the teleological argument.
Suppose there is: cause 1 ("God") ← cause 2 ← cause 3 ← cause 4 ← our world.
We ask: what is the cause of our world? Cause 4. But what is the cause of 4? Then we say that 3 caused it. But what caused 3? 2! And what caused 2? 1. And what caused 1?
So you say: no, nothing caused 1. It is something different from the chain of causes that comes after it.
But how can that be? First, this leads to regress, and so you conclude that it is a different kind of cause. But in any case, there is no problem, because 1 is a generator of causes.
Usually the world is deterministic, meaning you can see it as billiard balls. If you see a billiard ball in motion, then either every ball moves because of a previous ball that struck it (this is Steinitz's analogy for Newton—that he saw matter as billiard balls),
or another possibility is something outside the table that creates a causal chain—for example, the person with the cue who performed a purposive action.
So then,
something that creates a causal chain can be one of three possibilities {maybe more, but that is a question for Rabbi Michi; in any case, we have no acquaintance with anything beyond these}.
1. Randomness—something that creates a process and is not caused by a previous cause. 2. Free choice—what is also called purpose, a volitional cause ← etc.

{3. Theoretically, people once held that matter is purposive by its very nature—for example, that water strives upward. But today that is pretty outdated. Still, you could add it as a third option, meaning that the nature of the first cause is to create what follows.}

The cosmological proof assumes that everything has a cause, and therefore at the beginning there is an entity that generates causes, "←".
This is not one of the familiar kinds of causes.

But if you believe in free choice, then it is easy to say that this entity did it by will.
For two reasons:
First, it is a kind of appeal to what is familiar. (Why not randomness? Here one can use the teleological argument, what Rabbi Michael Abraham calls the physico-theological argument. Then we are left with option 2 or 3.)

Second, the first cause "←" has to provide an explanation for the causes that come after it.
It has to be capable of causing them. For example, we would not assume that the reason a piano came into being is because an ant built it, but that there was an engineer—that is fine.
Therefore, if there are people in the world who possess free choice, it is reasonable to assume that the first cause can bring about their existence. Especially since it is an excellent purposive cause ←.

And from this it follows that it is reasonable that the ability to create free choice is "contained" in it. And therefore we posit option 2.

Moreover, if you assume that the world is not merely materialistic but dualistic—meaning composed of matter and spirit (or soul), and that spirit affects matter—then one can say that it is reasonable that the first cause can be spiritual, or that something spiritual is involved in it. After all, we know that spirit affects matter.

Or at least that there exists primordial matter and primordial spirit acting within it. (This is the philosophers' description mentioned in the old books.)

What is the reason to believe in dualism? Usually because of free choice or the existence of consciousness.
You can read the reasons for that in the book The Science of Freedom.

The lines along which you have framed this discussion prevent any progress in it from the outset.
After all, I wrote that there is no way to reach certainty, even if you were right that certainty is required. So what exactly are you asking me? Whether one can nevertheless reach certainty? One cannot.
Rather, I am arguing that there is no need to reach certainty, and as I understand it, only that is worth discussing.
If the lack of certainty prevents you from sacrificing your life—do not sacrifice it. If it prevents you from coercing—do not coerce. What does that have to do with the question of faith itself?
You write that you do not believe in anything. So what do you want to discuss? True, if what you meant was only to say that you do not have certain faith—but that in your view only certain faith counts as faith—then that means you do believe. And now we are back to the discussion of whether certainty is required.

Rabbi, if someone has 60% faith, then he keeps the easy and medium commandments but not the hard and severe ones.
In your opinion, is he coherent?

Definitely. At least he could be coherent (depending on what his reasoning is and what his doubt is).

Thank you for the answers.
I will study them carefully.

Here you can see another combination of the claim together with the proof from epistemology:

I probably got mixed up about the remarks I mentioned above. But as you can see, the argument there also starts out similarly.