Does God act logically? Courtesy of Freedom website
Dan Amir
The President of the State of Israel, Moshe Katsav, said that "God does not behave irrationally". And since the president is supposed to serve as an example and role model for all of us, I, the little one, will also try to contribute my meager part in the issue of God and logic.
To the best of our knowledge and understanding, man said "Let us make God in our own image and likeness" because he encountered phenomena and forces that he did not understand and had no control over, and that they have a decisive influence on his life and destiny. He attributed the disappearing forces to a higher power that intervenes in what is happening in our world, and since then man has devoted many efforts, including heavy personal sacrifices, to please that higher power and to win his grace and protection.
Even today, after many of the phenomena and forces that were mysterious to our ancestors have received a satisfactory scientific explanation, man still tries to deal with the unknown, and the "logical" path leading to religion often begins with the question of creation.
We can summarize this path in the following line of questions:
A. Does there exist, or did there exist (or: exist), a "creator", or a "generative force", which we call him (or: them) "God" (singular and plural), who is the "cause of the reasons" for the existence and duration of the universe?
B. Does that "God" have any influence on our world today and in the future?
third. Does "God" have a "will" that exerts this influence?
d. Is his will likely to be influenced by our general behavior, or by certain (ritual) acts that we must do, or refrain from doing, in order to please him so that he acts in our favor?
God. Do we know such rules of conduct in full or in part? Do they align with a particular religious commandment?
As the questions are worded, it is clear that there is no meaning to any of the questions XNUMX-XNUMX, unless the answer
To the previous question it is positive. Therefore, like all religious preachers, our converts direct their main arguments to question A, in order to convince those who doubt the existence of the Creator.
Less obvious to the eye, at first glance, is the fact that the opposite direction is also true: that is, it is not possible to have a logical answer to any of the questions a-d, unless the answer to the question that follows it is positive (unless we are willing to accept, contrary to President Katsav's advice, an answer that is not based on logic).
I will try to explain it. How can it be proven, logically, that God's will is affected by our behavior? The only way to do this is through observations that will show us that the fate of those who kept a tract of certain rules of conduct that are supposed to desire this, that is, a certain religious commandment, is better for them than the fate of those who did not do so, and contrary to the laws of nature known to us (that is, we do not mean here "Religion" of the type of observing safety, sanitation or traffic rules).
Therefore, without a positive answer to question e, we certainly cannot logically establish a positive answer
For question d.
Similarly, how can it be logically proven that God has a will, unless this will is demonstrated, that is, by the fact that it appears that God's "reaction" changes according to the various circumstances we create, meaning that our answer to question d is positive? We can explain some incomprehensible natural phenomenon to the "will of God", as the primitive humans did and do, that is, to see in the rain or thunder, the flood or the earthquake, the solar eclipse, the plague or the drought, the manifestation of God's will. But if it happens without any causal connection to our behavior, then this is not a relevant God, that is, it is not important for us that our behavior takes into account "His will". Therefore, without a positive answer to question d, we certainly cannot logically establish a positive answer to question c.
The existence of an unwilling "God" influencing our world is, in other words, the claim that the world behaves randomly, unpredictably, without any legality (unless we identify this "God" with the laws of physics themselves). This is not, perhaps, an optimistic view of the world, but it has nothing to do with religion or anything. Our experience so far supports, precisely, the opposite view - we succeed in understanding more and more natural phenomena as derived from the laws of physics. Therefore, there is no point in asking question b if we are not convinced of the correctness of the positive answer to question c.
Finally, if that "Creator" whose existence we question has no influence on our world, surely there is no
It has no relevance from now on, and its "existence" or "non-existence" has no meaning for us. Thus, without a positive answer to question B, there is no point in discussing question A. Admittedly, we have no possibility to prove - logically - that there was no "generative force" that stopped its operation, or
"God" who is "dead" - but such a possibility neither raises nor lowers for us.
Therefore, the question of the existence of God, for those who want to use the rules of logic - and not accept it as "Torah from Sinai" - is reduced to the following question, it is our question: do our observations (individual and collective) confirm that the observance of certain rules (religious commandments) cause, contrary to the way of nature, For the results we want?
The problem with the problems of all religions, and the Jewish religion in particular, is that human experience does not support this hypothesis. This fact reaches its full poignancy in the defiance-distinction "righteous and evil to him, wicked and good to him". We were all witnesses, not only to "a righteous person is left and his seed begs for bread", but also to millions of righteous people being murdered, whatever their religion may be.
This should also be the main point in the argument against the missionaries in general, and the converts
in particular. While they can try to confuse the uneducated person with their pseudo-scientific arguments against evolution or against the big bang theory, there is no logical answer to this main problem, except by "solutions" that take it out of the realm of rational consideration and cannot be accepted by a reasonable person, such as a president The State of Israel, for example.
The theologians in different religions and periods, from the Sumerians and the ancient Egyptians to Ovadia Yosef, came up with several such solutions, and the believer will believe, such as:
A. "Reward and punishment" are given "in the world to come", or will be given in the "last days" - and therefore are not given
To watch.
B. "Reward and punishment" are given in this world through "reincarnation", but since we are not aware of our previous incarnations, the theory of retribution is not observable here either.
third. "Reward and punishment" are not individual, but collective. Because the collective is not defined
Clearly (for example, even in the Holy People of Israel Arab-Rabb intervened) and the time frame is not bounded by a certain time, again there is no possibility to put this "solution" to the test of reality.
d. We are not able to make observations on God's behavior because we do not know the data to confirm them, "because man will see with the eyes and God will see with the heart", and because "the ways of God are hidden".
All this belongs to what our president called "theological interpretation". These forced solutions (similar to the "multiple worlds" theory in quantum physics) are speculative solutions that prevent contradiction through observation, but accepting them is an act of faith only, a faith that completely removes us from the realm of logical consideration.
Although it is true that in the past almost all human beings held such beliefs, and even today some, probably most of the inhabitants of the earth believe - Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus, and Jews among others. There is nothing between this and logic and nothing, and if the majority opinion is decisive, or sectarian success - then it is better for us to convert to Christianity or Islam.
In failing to gather evidence on the path of logic, the missionaries try to gather evidence on the path of "divine revelation" and the miracle, as experienced, or claimed to have been experienced, by the founders of religions, their prophets and saints. These phenomena, if they exist, should be, at best, within the scope of the psychologist's occupation, and usually - within the scope of the fraud division's occupation. Their validity in terms of logic is that of the act of the Hasid telling his rabbi that he has, every Shabbat eve, a revelation of Elijah, and the solid evidence for this is that the Rebbe told this himself, and he is such a holy man, to the extent that he has a revelation of Elijah once a week, and therefore Surely he is not lying... Thus the status of Mount Sinai is a proven fact, because it had 2 million witnesses - because that is what is written in the Torah. And since the status of Mount Sinai is a fact, it follows from this that the Torah, and also the Bible, and in fact the Torah in the Bible, were given from heaven and are absolute truth. And if they are full of errors or contradictions, or do not fit the knowledge we have, it is because we are not able to understand them properly (but then, how can we accept the things written in them as they are?).
In conclusion: anyone who wants to act logically, cannot accept the "proofs" for the existence of a God who intervenes in our world as a response to the holding or non-holding of certain rituals, or expect a deferred reward for the operation of the end of a baby's organ, or a child, in the form of an endless feast of wild bull meat And the Leviathan - with wine (for Jews) or an eternal pastime in the company of black-eyed maidens - without wine (for Muslims).
On the other hand, a non-intervening God is meaningless, and it makes no difference if he is legally responsible
Physics or it is the same as the laws of physics themselves. Our justified admiration of the wonders of the universe is not a reason for worship.
First published on the Freedom website on November 1
