[Avodah] Does God Change His Mind?

[Micha Berger]

On Mon, February 11, 2008 12:52 pm, Michael Makovi wrote:
: First, if He is not really merciful, but only acts as-if merciful,
: then what kind of example is this? ...

If someone shows me how to type, but does does in a way that no
letters are produced, do I still not learn how to type?

:                                    I have a similar objection to the
: Ramban who says that we aren't supposed to be merciful to the mother
: bird because she merits such mercy, but only to train us to be
: merciful.

Or cover challah not because we're weird and think the challah is
actually embarassed, but to practice hakaras hatov and bestowing
kavod. (Unless it's to imitate the frost atop the mon.) Or Moshe not
being able to initiate the first three makos because He owed his
survival to the Ye'or and the sand.

:            I forget where, but somewhere, I read the objection (with
: which I concur) that if this were so, could not have Hashem commanded
: us to be merciful to chairs and lightbulbs? If a bird does not merit
: mercy, how can we learn from practicing mercy towards it?...

Hashem, I suppose, could have -- although our ancestors would need to
understand the concept of lightbulb in order to receive such a
mitzvah. However, one could ask in the reverse: if it were about
actual mercy, why is it limited to birds and *not* include higher
mammals?

The act is a practice of mercy. The reason why the cheftzah is beitzim
or efrochim needs separate explanation.

However it's the gemara that says it's not an act of mercy itself, in
explaining the problem with the tefillah "al kan tzippur yagiu
Rachmekha".

: Regarding a trait merely describing His action, I fail to see how this
: does not make Hashem into an irrational capricious deity. If He is not
: angry, but acts as if He is angry, then is He not behaving
: unjustifiably capricious and cruel? ...

No, it's justified. Hashem has a plan which gives Him a sevara for
doing everything. At time that plan appears generous, other times
just, other times in correcting response to some way we wronged Him --
and looks just as human anger would to the outsider.

:                                  For He apparently is behaving
: without any reason for this behavior. And if one defends Him, saying
: that the man (at whom Hashem is behaving as-if angry) sinned and
: deserved this reaction from Hashem (even though Hashem is not actually
: angry), and thus Hashem most certainly had justification and reason, I
: would ask, if the man did something deserving of anger, and Hashem
: acted as-if angry, then is it not reasonable to say that Hashem
: actually was angry?...

Because the concept makes no sense AND implies a divisible deity. Both
points I already made twice now. That's why RSB and the Rambam speak
in terms of negative attributes. Not because of Asristotilian,
neoPlatonic, Metekalamunic or Scholastic thinking, even if they spoke
in the language of the zeitgeist. But because the conclusions seem
inescapable simply within looking at the Torah and using reason. A G-d
who is at times angry is experiencing time. A G-d whose relationship
with the universe appears to be the same as a person who is angry
isn't necessarily experiencing time. Time is a creation. Thus, which
is more possible.

AND, a G-d who is at times angry is two things when He is angry - a
G-d, and His Anger. Divisibility. Now, if you can explain how a
divisible G-d is within the realm of mutar beliefs... Also, please
explain how a divinity at times assembled from essence and anger could
escape the question: But then who created G-d? One needn't use
Aristo's terminology to repeat the Rambam's proof for extreme
indivisibility. Something that is two elements that come together
needs a creator no less than the universe does.

...
: Just because (of the disputed assertion that) He actually does have
: mercy, doesn't mean He is subject to it. You seem to regard this mercy
: as something outside Him to which He is subservient or influenced by.

: Would we say that I am subject to my own personality? No! My
: personality IS me! If I am subject to myself, yofi. I should hope that
: Hashem is subject to Hashem.

You are subject to the concept of anger (to return to the same
middah). How and when you express that anger is you, but the very
concept of anger precedes you. The concept of anger cannot precede the
Creator of anger.

: Now, Hashem says He feels for the poor, the widow, the orphan, etc. He
: says His wrath will burn at their oppressor. Scriptural quotations
: could be multiplied. I don't see why I shouldn't take these at face
: value.


Jumping back to skipped text to address the meta-issue:
:> You do realize that you're citing RIE or REB isn't going to
:> make much impression if you do not address how their
:> positions address the concerns of primary sources like Rav > Saadia,
:> the Rambam, the Kuzari, the Ikarim, etc...

: REB explained himself, so I feel no need to do anything more (it
: should be obvious that most of my arguments are simply reworded
: versions of his)....

REB, was far less immersed in the Torah weltenschaung than the people
he was disputing. This is the whole nisqatnu hadoros. REB might have
nice theories, but his threshold of proof is quite high. And his
invocation of a Torah theology over that of Chazal or the rishonim
smacks of R's call of a return to prophetic Judaism -- with the huge
distinction of the claim being mutar WRT aggadita.

Mutar, but equally flawed in principle. There is a mesorah and a
continuity between Tanakh, Chazal, the savoraim, geonim and rishonim.
Chazal lived and breathed Torah in a way we can't. Even if we who
stand on their shoulders see further, we are still "like chamorim, and
not Pinchas ben Yair's". Don't be lead astray by their addressing the
questions that were popular in their day, or using the terminology of
their day. When the RSG accepted an Aristotilian argument it was with
the basis of a deep feel for how the Torah works. And thus, RSG might
use a kankan chadash, but his wine is the same as Yehoshua's.

Second-guessing one of the geonim requires very solid reasoning and
proof. One must demonstrate that while they had more wine, they poured
it into flawed bottles. I haven't seen that burden carried.

We must start with the assumption otherwise, or the entire process --
including the development of halakhah -- is suspect. It's a reducio at
absurdum: if you can believe that baalei mesorah regularly erred in
aggadic matters, wouldn't the same argument apply to the transmission
of halakhah? And for an O Jew, a lack of emunas chakhamim in the realm
of pesaq is absurd. I reject that epistemology because it defies my
first-hand experience of the rightness of a halachic lifestyle, as
halakhah reached us today. And by denying the means by which one would
believe aggadita is trivially changeable, I have no reason to embrace
the conclusion.

Remember, REB is no less trying to package the Torah in post-Kantian
terms as they did against the philosophies of their day. The
difference is that Rihal's gestalt was more Torahdik than anyone of
our day. The chance they fit a square peg to a round hole far less.

...
: Let's deconflate what Jewish thought is. Jewish thought can either be
: something originating with Jews (and presumably true) or something
: held by Jews (and not necessarily true)....

Or: An idea that is supportive of living according to the Torah.

Given that my instinctive definition is off your dichotomy, I have
little to say in reply to your next comments. See above, my
distinction between the wine, the cultural bottling, and the bottle
that leaks vs one that successfully holds its contents.

...
: B'kitzur, if it is not Sinaitic, I can question it. If Chazal didn't
: see a problem with attributes (AFAIK, IMHO), then I am going to decide
: against what seems to me in Ramban and RSG to be philosophical and not
: natively Jewish....

But you're assuming that any idea not explicated at Sinai, and "only"
implied to be found through later exploration is arguable. (I presume
only aggadita.) And if ideas implied in the Torah and helpful for AYH
and shemiras hamitzvos are Jewish thoughts, then I must question
whether their notion of what qualifies might reflect something I
simply didn't catch.

: REB, as far as I know, did not rely on any non-Jewish philosophy in
: this area....

Of course he did. Everyone does. Since Kant, the questions we ask
shifted. Even in the index page, you can see the hand of non-Jewish
philosophy, never mind its answers. REB, like RJBS, RSRH, REED, etc...
draw heavily from Kant in their answers as well. The exploration of
the Torah from the perspective of what it's like to live it rather
than trying to identify what's "out there" is very modern.

To ask a final question: If REB's argument is valid WRT Hashem's
emotions, why isn't it valid WRT His features? How can one say "charon
apo" is an idiom for anger, not a reference to the flairing of the
Divine Nostril, and yet insist one must stop there because the anger
couldn't possibly be anthropomorphic idiom?

SheTir'u baTov!
-micha

-- 
Micha Berger             "Man wants to achieve greatness overnight,
micha at aishdas.org        and he wants to sleep well that night too."
http://www.aishdas.org     - Rav Yosef Yozel Horwitz, Alter of Novarodok
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