חדש באתר: NotebookLM עם כל תכני הרב מיכאל אברהם. דומה למיכי בוט.

Q&A: Regarding the video "The Myth of Jewish Tradition"

Back to list  |  🌐 עברית  |  ℹ About
Originally published:
This is an English translation (via GPT-5.4). Read the original Hebrew version.

Regarding the video "The Myth of Jewish Tradition"

Question

Hello Rabbi Michael, I came across a YouTube video that touches on problems in the Jewish tradition, and honestly, some of the things said there sound logical and reasonable. I’d be glad to hear your opinion on the subject, or perhaps if you could refer me to some reading material on it:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QMaGNEa1Uqc

Answer

Unfortunately, I don’t have time to watch all of it. I know Moshe Shainfeld (he is one of those who passed through my hands back when they were still religious; unfortunately, I don’t succeed with everyone 🙂 ).
 
Just one sentence. I listened to the beginning (until I saw how long it was), and already his starting point seems mistaken to me. He thinks that our trust in the tradition is built on its inherent reliability—that is, that it could not have become corrupted. It is commonly thought that this is what the Kuzari says (he has a short passage about this). But that is not correct. Of course it could have become corrupted. The starting point is that there is a philosophical God, and once we reach that conclusion, the giving of the Torah becomes reasonable. If you examine the giving of the Torah and the tradition about it on their own, it is certainly less reliable. This is Russell’s celestial teapot question. If you do not know that such a teapot exists, why would you accept testimony about its existence or about some color it has? But if you know that such a teapot exists, why would you not accept the testimony of someone who claims to have seen it and says that it is pink? So too regarding God: if you know that He exists, then there is no reason to reject reasonable testimony about an encounter with Him (at Mount Sinai). In sum, the reliability of the tradition is not inherent (arising from itself), but is based on the philosophical belief in the existence of God.

השאר תגובה

Back to top button