There are so many people afraid to listen to anyone who has a problem believing in God. I’ve been accused of allowing Kfira on this blog. But I don’t. The fear expressed by some of these people does however show a flaw in their own Emunah. They fear that someone may say something that will put a doubt in their minds. But those of us whose beliefs are subjected to questions come out stronger for it. We have been subjected to “trial by fire” so to speak. It is those who close their eyes and ears who are the most vulnerable to losing their Emunah when they suddenly encounter the kind of questions put forth by a skeptic. They claim strong belief but it is not strong at all. It is weak if it can so easily be upset by the questions posed. Da Ma L’Heishiv is a necessary requirement for evey Jew. Without it, one’s belief is vulnerable to the simplest questions of faith. Al Taamin B'Atzmecha... Do not believe that Emunah Peshuta is enough to sustin your beliefs. None of us should ever be so sure of ourselves. For those of us who think about matters like this… we have all had perplexing questions. A forum like this allows us to give vent to them. The Rambam wrote an entire book on that basis. Should he have just told his "Talmid" to shut up, and stop having K'fira questions? That was not his answer and it is not mine. Fun A Kashe Sharbt Min Nisht.
What many people may not realize is that those atheists who have intellectual honesty aren't Kofrim to the extent that they absolutely deny God's existence. They are what is known as “weak atheists”. That means that since God cannot be proven their default belief is that He does not exist. Only a “strong atheist” believes with absolute certainty that God does not exist. In my view strong atheists are not intellectually honest.
Weak atheists have hope of returning to belief in God and Torah at some level. They would vehemently deny this. I would retort that the line which separates them from true believers is very slim. God can neither be proven nor disproved. There is room to argue, “Why not err on the side of caution?”
That said I do not wish to turn this post into a debate between atheists and believers. That would truly be against Halacha and if that happens, I will delete this entire post. My entire purpose here is to be Dan L’Kaf Zechus to those who call themselves atheists and hope that someday they will see things the way I do.
Intellectual honesty does not mean we have to discard our beliefs. Just because there are questions we cannot answer doesn't mean there aren't answers. And just because there is evidence lacking about biblical events doesn’t mean they absolutely did not occur. That means that they at least could have happened even if apparently highly unlikely. How likely is it for random evolution to have produced the species? Yet they can accept that with more “faith” than they can the biblical narrative. The odds that the biblical narrative happened is a gazillion times greater than the odds of random selection ultimately resulting in the universe as we know and experience it. That alone should be enough to err on the side of caution and believe in the likelihood if not the certainty of a Creator and the acceptance of the possibility of the biblical narrative taking place just as the bible said it did And the biblical narrative I am talking about is common to all three major faith including the largest one, Christianity.
Belief in God is about far more than scientific proofs. By definition, the spiritual cannot be proven by the physical. If one wants to deny God’s existence based on lack of physical evidence, he has many questions himself to answer, like what was the “first cause”? How does he explain “rational thought”? How does he ignore the immeasurable odds of randomness producing nature with all of its intracacies... and in all its grandeur and glory? There many more such questions. All indicate that there is a God in the world.
Yes, I know there are answers that atheists give to all these questions that will satisfy them enough to keep them skeptics. But the questions far outweigh their answers, just like their questions seem to outweigh some of our answers. Which is why I ask, why not err on the side of caution. What if God DOES exist?!
The other big question atheists have is, how do we know Judaism is the true path and not some other religion …or perhaps no organized religion at all? Just admit God exists but that Judaism is all made up. God may have created the universe but doesn’t really care what we do in it. Maybe our Jewish beliefs truly are a result of indoctrination from a very early age just like people of other faiths who believe in their religion with the same fervor that we do in ours?
Well, yes, it all about belief. I am not the one to make the comparative arguments between Judasim and other religions. There are a lot of very smart people in all religions making the argument that theirs is the true one. But monotheism makes sense to me as I am a firm believer Occam’s razor. And from what I do know about the three major faiths that proclaim monotheism, Judaism makes the most sense to me. True I have been indoctrinated like every other religious Jew, but indoctrination alone can’t work.
Our written Mesorah goes back further is far more voluminous than the other three major faiths, and has had contributions by some very brilliant people over those millennia, in a continuous chain. Add to that the various arguments put forth by the Rishonim like the Kuzari, and just plain intuition and it becomes a “no brainer”. At least to me. But proof? That is for the science lab, and should not determine our beliefs.
I too have questions that do not have satisfactory answers, some of them the same as the so-called Kofrim. Does that make me a Kofer? No. It makes me a human being with a mind who cannot deny his thoughts. It is what we do with those thoughts that matter not whether we have them. To be asked deny a question doesn’t mean you’ve irradicated it from existence. It only means that you’ve pushed it out of your mind. The question is still there. And, yes, it does test our Emunah. Those of us who pass, are the lucky ones. Those of us who don’t… well, let’s just say there is always hope and the for weak atheists. I certainly believe there is, even if they deny it.
I just want to repeat that this blog post will be removed if anyone starts actually trying to persuade or argue against belief in God or His Torah. This is not the forum for that. But I am relatively certain that the atheists that have posted here won’t do so, at least not intentionally. They have thus far proven to be honorable individuals. If I find an individual comment along those lines, I will delete it. If it starts happening too much this entire post will be deleted.
