Q&A: The Podcast on Divine Providence
The Podcast on Divine Providence
Question
It seemed that Rabbi Yochai had trouble formulating and defining his own claims, and I wanted to try to raise some points that he himself was apparently somewhat aiming at.
A. One could argue that God intervenes by influencing a person’s mentality or consciousness, since those are not deterministic even according to your view. For example: a sick person prays, and God improves his mental state, which then affects his physical condition (the connection between mind and body has already been confirmed by many studies). In such a case, one could also explain what intervention through the laws of nature means. Based on his physical condition alone, the person should have died, but the metaphysical influence, which is by definition outside the laws of nature, is what healed him.
B. What is your claim based on that people think like you on this issue even if they do not say so? After all, people live by this belief, especially regarding settling the Land of Israel and God’s intervention in the establishment of the State and so on. It seems this goes even beyond “thinking this way.” It is part of their lives.
C. You asked him why he is more impressed by the cases of rescue of the Jewish people than by the disasters. And the answer is simple: when a whole strong army comes with the goal of destroying a weak and persecuted people, the natural expectation is that they will succeed. And if they do succeed, there is no particular impression of intervention there. But when a people surrounded by four large and powerful countries that want to destroy it manages to defeat them within six days, the impression is that there was intervention here.
C. You mentioned that everyone agrees that in the past there was more intervention and that it diminished, and therefore how do we know it did not disappear completely. But the question also goes in the other direction: how do we know that it did disappear? If you also agree that there was a stage of more hidden miracles, there is no way to identify a stage at which they disappeared. That is part of their essence: they are hidden. Especially since, as stated, there is some indication of intervention in the miracles of the Jewish people, and especially since research around quantum theory still has not uncovered all of its effects, and especially since you too agree that sporadic involvement may occur. So what is left of this view beyond a gut feeling of: I just don’t feel that there is intervention?
Answer
If you’re asking, it would first be worthwhile to link to the podcast itself: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cX-TQb0JtZM
A. I think he did raise that possibility, and I have also explained here more than once why nothing is gained from it. There is still intervention in nature here. My claim is not that the Holy One, blessed be He, cannot intervene, but that His policy is not to intervene. That is true with respect to nature and with respect to free choice.
B. I have explained this more than once. Of course many declare this. But all those who proclaim trust in God and “human effort” are careful to make every effort just like any ordinary atheist. All the believers would not forgo an investigative committee that failed to find the source of the malfunction in the plane that crashed. And so on.
C. Indeed, Hamas is a very strong and powerful army. And indeed, the IDF is a weak and small army compared to our enemies. There is no limit to tendentiousness and to bending reality to the wishes of the heart.
D. See my columns on divine involvement in the world. This has been discussed here many times and in great detail.
D.
Discussion on Answer
A. What you are describing is a complete change in the laws of nature. The topographical environment within which we operate is a product of the laws of nature.
B. I also agree that sporadic involvement is possible. But there is no way to detect it. Not in major events and not in minor ones. By the same token you could argue that He intervenes only on even-numbered days for people whose names begin with letters in a certain range.
C. Yes, October 7 was a routine event. Totally predictable. You can always insist. Enjoy.
Yes, the difference between major events and minor ones is really just like the difference in the letters of a name.
October 7 was unexpected because of our lack of knowledge. In hindsight it is very understandable.
I’m going back to your first response: “I think he did raise that possibility, and I have also explained here more than once why nothing is gained from it. There is still intervention in nature here.”
I’ve read and heard this from you many times, and I don’t understand it. You present only two possibilities: either God changes the laws of nature, or He does not.
Why don’t you address a third possibility: He changes them, but not in a way that people will see it (so as not to undermine free choice). Therefore He can create clouds in the middle of the ocean ex nihilo if there will be no documentation, and He can cause different choices by human beings.
Because there are no more than two possibilities. Changing the laws of nature without our seeing it is also changing the laws of nature. If you have read and heard this many times, then I have explained it more than once.
You can of course assume that He hides from us and intervenes again and again without our noticing. Enjoy. You also have an explanation for it (so that it will not contradict free choice. For some reason in the past that did not bother Him). Enjoy. You are also ignoring the words of the Sages about prayers for a deviation from nature, as I have explained more than once. And in any case, you cannot point to any case in which there was divine involvement, so various statements about the hand of God have no place even according to your own view.
But really, I have completely exhausted these discussions. They have been held here dozens of times already.
A. Not exactly. God does not intervene in free choice. As you yourself compared emotional influences to a topographical structure located on an incline, so that the choice becomes harder. God lowers or raises the structure but leaves the choice in the person’s hands. As with “He hardened Pharaoh’s heart.”
Even if we call this intervention in nature (the definition is not the essence here), there is still a significant opening here for divine providence, in a place where even you think there is no fixed lawfulness.
B. Nobody said that in most cases there is no intervention, or at the very least that in most cases there is no way to observe intervention; the discussion is about the large processes the people undergo. As Rabbi Zvi Yehuda argued, God was revealed through history.
C. Indeed, if there are cases where the loss exceeds what appears natural, that would be evidence of intervention to exactly the same degree that victory constitutes evidence. In any case, as far as I know Hamas did not defeat us. A mass slaughter by thousands of bloodthirsty terrorists is not surprising in any way.