Some questions about the first and second books in the trilogy
Hello dear Rabbi, a few questions and thoughts (I'm in the middle of the second book of the trilogy)
- In your book, you repeat the mantra "Any divine intervention in nature is a miracle," and that nature is deterministic and therefore God cannot enter the picture. But there is another type of intervention, and it is in human decisions. God can manage our interactions with nature according to His considerations (reward and punishment and other considerations). If, for example, a plane is about to crash, and God (who we have already agreed is involved in our consciousness, otherwise the concept of repentance would not exist, because how can a person decide to change his values) decides from His considerations that the person should continue to live, He can make the person take the next plane.
- You write that you have no reason to assume that there is a private providence over humans in the first place, so you see no need to try to apply the words of the Sages regarding private providence. But if God left the fate of humans to nature and the decisions of creatures, then this is cruelty on His part. And we would expect God to meet the moral standard reflected in the ideal of morality that He created in His world. If a person lost his son in a car accident not because of a justified decision by God, but simply because of natural causes, then that person now has moral claims against God (even if there is an intention to compensate him in the next world) and this is not coherent with the morality He created in the world. Why is such a consideration not sufficient in your opinion (at least like the consideration that says that if God created the world, we would expect there to be a revelation to His creatures)?
- I categorically oppose the term "worship of God." I think that the only justified reason for giving the burden of Torah and mitzvot should be the good of the creatures, otherwise God is not moral. Even if I discover in the hereafter that one must keep the mitzvot, I will not be able to call these mitzvot the work of God, because their purpose is not the good of God (at least, this is not the sole purpose). Just as a person who brings a child into the world in order to enslave it is not moral at all, so too will the situation be with God and the creatures, and this is not possible in our world because God created morality. I want to believe that the framing of the Torah and the mitzvot as the work of God in the Torah and the prophets came as a reaction to the idolatry that dominated the world at that time, in the sense of "some in chariots and some on horses, and we in the name of the Lord our God will remember," similar to the purpose of sacrifices according to Maimonides. What do you think?
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Greetings to Mr. the owner of the mantras, Shlita.
- This question has been asked here more than once. God can also intervene in nature itself if He wants. But we see that He does not intervene, and hence He probably does not want to. We see by the same token that He does not intervene in human decisions. Humans act freely (at least those who are not determinists assume that humans act freely, and neither nature nor heaven interfere with them). Therefore, I see no benefit in the intervention mechanism you proposed (through human choices instead of through nature).
- This is not cruelty. The determination of the laws of nature has its own reasons, and as part of this, unpleasant consequences also occur. These reasons justify the unpleasant consequences, just as in analysis the consequence justifies the pain. It is true that one can wonder why not make nature that will bring about the same results without the unpleasant accompanying consequences, and to that I replied that in my opinion there is no such logical possibility. The laws of nature that govern our world also require the accompanying consequences. This is a logical constraint. It is true that God can intervene whenever there is a bad outcome, but then de facto there are no laws of nature here, and this is not a situation He wants. But beyond all of that, it has nothing to do with my argument. How do you, as someone who believes that He does intervene, explain the evil in the world? Doesn't that indicate His cruelty? I didn't add anything to what is known from the facts. I just called for them not to be ignored. That's all. It has nothing to do with the consideration of revelation. First, because there I have no indications that there was no revelation. And second, because even a priori there is no reason not to have revelation, but there is a reason not to intervene in nature.
- The author's speech. I was happy to read about your position, but of course I don't agree with it.
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