[Avodah] Thinking about, knowing about, and knowing G-d

[Micha Berger via Avodah]

On Thu, Sep 10, 2015 at 12:27:43AM -0400, Moshe Yehuda Gluck via Areivim wrote:
: R' ZS:
:> The Nachum in your story is too busy to think about HKBH, and that's not
:> good, but OTOH HKBH Himself said "I wish they would forget me and keep my
:> Torah", so this Nachum is better than someone who is constantly
:> thinking about HKBH but doesn't keep mitzvos.   But this is why Tanya
:> (ch 41) says to interrupt ones learning once an hour to think about why one
:> is learning.

: This discussion reminds me that there's another step - not only to think
: about Hashem, but to _know_ about Hashem, as in the old story (excerpted
: from a piece I wrote for "A Daily Dose of Torah"):

: R' Levi Yitzchok of Berditchev studied for an extended period of time with
: the Maggid, R' Dov Ber of Mezeritch. When he returned, his father-in-law -
: who did not approve of R' Levi Yitzchok's leanings towards chassidus - asked
: him, "What did you learn there?" R' Levi Yitzchok answered, "I learned that
: Hashem exists." His father-in-law, annoyed, protested that everyone knows
: that, and to prove it, asked the maid, "Does Hashem exist?" She answered,
: "Certainly!" 
: "She says it," R' Levi Yitzchok responded, "but I know it!"

: Certainly pertinent to Malchiyos. 

I often quote something R/Prof Shalom Carmy wrote in
<http://www.aishdas.org/avodah/vol07/v07n087.shtml#07> (Aug '01):
> [RGStudent: <http://www.aishdas.org/avodah/vol07/v07n086.shtml>]
>> However, in his Al HaTeshuvah (pp. 195-201), R. Yosef Dov Soloveitchik 
>> investigates what it means to "know" God.  As he points out, it is 
>> impossible to know God.  Rather, the Rambam means that we are obligated to 
>> constantly recognize God's existence.  As it says in Mishlei (3:6), "In all 
>> your ways know Him."  Cf. Rabbeinu Yonah's commentary to Mishlei, ad loc.

> People who throw around big words on these subjects always seem to take
> for granted things that I don't.

> The people who keep insisting that it's necessary to prove things about
> G-d, including His existence, seem to take it for granted that devising
> these proofs is identical with knowing G-d.

> Now if I know a human being personally the last thing I'd do, except as
> a purely intellectual exercise, is prove his or her existence.

RMYG's point is similar to that in the quote from RGS.

There is a difference between knowing about Gcd and knowing Gcd. 

The latter is experiential, and doesn't demand proof. And IMHO more
related to Malkhios.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             None of us will leave this place alive.
micha at aishdas.org        All that is left to us is
http://www.aishdas.org   to be as human as possible while we are here.
Fax: (270) 514-1507            - Anonymous MD, while a Nazi prisoner