[Avodah] Happenstance In this world

[Celejar]

On Wed, 30 Jul 2008 12:35:01 -0400 someone wrote on Areivim:

"there isn't really any such thing as a "happenstance" in this world.
If it happened then obviously Hashem planned it, but the difference is
whether the purpose of this plan is obvious or obscure."

It is certainly not obvious, and many Rishonim believed that there
most definitely *is* such a thing as happenstance in this world; see
Akeidah (Breishis Sha'ar 26) at length, and Abarbanel (endorsing the
interpretation of Akeidah) on the phrase "ki yipol ha'nofel
mimenu" (D'varim 22:8).  [See also Ikkarim 4:6.]

See Resp. Rashbash 195 for a a lucid explanation, similar to that of
Akeidah, of the classic moderate rationalist understanding of the
interplay of providence and natural law in the determination of the
destiny of men.  [This responsum is referenced by R. Akiva Eger (Gilyon
Ha'Shas Bava Kama 60b) in a different context.]

"And humans are also left [in the lower world] to chance events
['mikrim'], but He pays attention to His pious ones ['hasidim'] to know
them individually, so that His guardianship always cleaves to them, the
knowledge and memory [of them] does not separate from Him at all" 

-- Ramban Breishis 18:19, although he seems to contradict this in his
celebrated passage at the very end of Bo.

I believe that some contemporary Hareidi thinkers have denied that any
Rishonim actually reject the contemporarily popular maximalist belief
in divine providence, but I can't see how their position can be
taken seriously, in view of the perfectly clear language of the
Rishonim.

Yitzhak
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