Part VII: Traditional Themes
Various topics relating to free-willed moral consciousness and its relevance to issues involving the Biblical perspective on the purpose for the creation of he universe, the method of its creation, the role of human development of Biblical law, and the meaning of life.
Chapter 31: Will, Wisdom, and the Self-Justifying Universe
Divine Creation: A Perplexing Contradiction in Maimonides: In Maimonides's: "Guide for the Perplexed" there is a discussion regarding which of the fundamental aspects of the divine was involved in creation - Will or Rational Thought. Paradoxically, it is specifically the contradictions in this discussion which point to Rambam's intent. The relation to free will, and to the accounts in Genesis. 10 pages
Chapter 32: Time Travel, Free Will and the Development of Jewish Law: The immutable Jewish law given at Sinai has in fact changed over the ages - a paradox resolved via the concept of free-willed consciousness. 2 pages
Chapter 33: Kohelet, Cosmic Pessimism and Free Will: The book of Kohelet, seen by some critics as a pessimistic or even atheistic lament, is interpreted as a treatise on cosmology and free will, with hints to the creation and Eden accounts. 1 page
Ch 31: Will, Wisdom,
and the
Self-Justifying Universe
Introduction
Most of the phenomena of the physical realm are categorizable as being the result of the operation of one or more of a very few basic laws of nature. Many scientists believe that eventually all will be seen to result from one fundamental 'law of everything'. To some, the universe as a result has been seen as reflecting the underlying unity of the creator.
From the perspective of science, all occurs as a result of the laws of nature, the constants of nature (the speed of light, etc), the initial conditions of the universe, and its fundamental features such as its four-dimensionality. The question has been raised as to whether or not there is a connection between all these - so that perhaps a universe with the dimensionality of our own must necessarily have a constant speed of light, and with the value it has in our own universe, or even if perhaps the only universe which can exist is one with all the characteristics of our universe. Einstein phrased the question thus:
" What I wonder is whether God had any choice in creating the universe as it is". [INSERT EXACT QUOTE]
In ancient times, a form of this question was raised as well, and was given extensive expression by Aristotle (350BCE-xxxBCE INSERT), whose theories reigned supreme for hundreds of years, and were later rediscovered in the middle ages. Aristotle felt that God had no choice in creation at all - that the universe is actually a necessary byproduct of the existence of God's very existence. Rambam on the other hand stated that it was a basic tenet of Jewish belief that the universe was created by God as a deliberate act, in order to accomplish some divine purpose.
We shall investigate an important philosophical difference between Rambam (11xx -12xx) and Aristotle on the fundamental issue of whether or not human logic can be applied to God, and a few important metaphysical areas where their differing conceptions on this issue led to disagreement: whether the universe was created as the result of a choice on God's part or if it exists necessarily; whether the universe has a purpose or not; and whether the universe has been in existence for an infinite amount of time or was created a finite amount of time ago.
All these metaphysical issues were related to a central question - in the language of Aristotle and Rambam, the question of whether God created the universe via the divine Wisdom or the divine Will.
We will find that Rambam's resolution of the questions involves intentional paradox and contradiction, and these will point us back to our central themes: the nature of free will, the purpose of existence, the connection between free-will and emergence of the universe into existence, and the connection of all these to the creation and Eden accounts.
I: The Existence of the Universe: Necessity or Choice
In ancient times the manifestations of God in the universe were considered to follow from specific divine attributes. Two of these attributes - the main ones?? - were those of the divine Wisdom, or rational thought, and that of the divine Will.
According to Aristotle, if the existence of the universe is the result of divine Will, one can say that since the existence of the universe is dependent on God's Will that it exist, and this Will is a matter of choice, God could have decided that the universe should not come into existence.
However, if the existence of the universe is the result of divine Wisdom, then this means that it is wiser to create than not create. Since God is necessarily as wise as can be, God always takes the wiser course of action, and therefore it is necessarily true that the universe would be created. Effectively, the universe would be a necessary byproduct of the very existence of God.
However, if the universe exists necessarily, as a byproduct of the Wisdom of God, one cannot say that the universe is a product of God's creation. Rather than God creating the universe, Aristotle claimed that if the universe was a product of God's Wisdom, it would be more correct to say that the universe exists due to the fact that God exists.
The Age of the Universe: eternal?
Imagine God and time co-exist; there is no existence of God when there is no time. If God is infinite and eternal and time always co-existed with God then time past is infinite.
Also, assume that the universe is not eternally co-existent with God as is time; i.e. the universe was created by God at a certain time. One could then ask why God chose to create the universe at that time rather than at another. Did God suddenly decide to create a universe? Did something happen to make God take this decision?
If God is eternal then from any given point of time God's existence stretches back an infinite time past, and ahead an infinite time into the future. Therefore from the point in time that the universe was created an infinite amount of time stretches to the past. This means that an infinite amount of time passed before God created the universe. Why would God wait an infinite time to create the universe? Was the creation of a universe so difficult a task to God that it necessitated a very long time to plan and execute? If God is infinitely-powerful the creation of the universe should be accomplishable instantly.
If the universe is a necessary byproduct of the very existence of God, there would never be a time when God would exist but the universe would not. Since God is eternal, and has existed already for an infinite amount of time and will exist in the future to infinity, the universe would necessarily have existed already for an infinite time and will exist to eternity.
From this perspective then, if the universe is a product of God's Wisdom, the universe is not created, and does not have a certain age, but rather it exists as a necessary byproduct of God's existence, has existed an infinite amount of time, and is eternal into the future. Indeed, this was the perspective adopted by Aristotle.
It is interesting that these philosophical questions also arise in the discussions of kabbalists, and indeed Rambam considers all the matters connected to creation to be part of the secrets of Torah.
Rambam's View
According to Rambam human logic cannot be applied to God's actions, thoughts or reasons, and conclusions based on such considerations are invalid. He therefore rejected the validity of those of Aristotle's arguments which led to the conclusion that God had not created the universe by choice, and that the universe is eternal.
Furthermore, according to Rambam not only is logic opposed to such an argument, but also it is a basic tenet of Biblical belief that the universe was created according to the will of God. Indeed this is implied quite clearly in the creation account, where the various created entities result from commands of God such as 'let there be...', and are generally followed with a statement that 'and God saw that it was good' which implies that had it not been so, it would have been remade.
According to Rambam one cannot apply rules of human logic etc. to God - God is beyond our comprehension. Thus, we cannot decide the issue of whether God created using Will or Wisdom, or whether the universe is eternal or created, by using human logic applied to God's actions or method of operating, as Aristotle attempted to do. Furthermore God is above time, and our conceptions of God's actions as they relate to time are faulty.
As opposed to Aristotle then, Rambam held that the universe was a creation of God, created by choice rather than being a necessary byproduct of God's existence, and that it was not eternal.
Modern Conceptions
If God is beyond time, and created time along with the universe, then there is no meaning to 'before the universe was created', and therefore no meaning to the question 'why did God not create the universe "immediately" so that it would be co-eternal with God', or 'why did God wait before creating the universe'.
It is also not obvious that the concept of an infinite being or of eternity is meaningful.
The universe exists only because God willed that it exist, and it exists according to the design of God, and so God is logically prior to the existence of the universe, not temporally prior. God is also the source of the existence of time, and so God is 'beyond' time, or 'logically prior' to time, though not 'temporally prior' to time.
How does a being beyond time create time? How does such a being experience the time of historical events, or intervene within time? These are old philosophical conundrums, and it is not entirely clear that any of it is actually meaningful - it is inevitable that we enter into paradox and contradiction when dealing with this subject since the terms are not well-defined, and are perhaps even meaningless.
Is the Universe Eternal?
Rambam states that:
"There is no other difference of opinion as regards any portion of the universe, except that the philosophers believe in the eternity of the universe and we believe in the Creation. Note this."
Rambam also points out that the creation account clearly implies that the universe began at some time rather than having always existed. (He also notes that it does not directly imply anything about whether it can continue to exist to eternity in the future) . Nevertheless, Rambam continues, if there was proof of the fact that the universe had existed for an infinite amount of time already rather than having been created some finite amount of time ago, this proof could be accepted, since the creation account may be allegorical. However, as Rambam felt that the prevailing proofs of the eternity of the universe were not convincing, he felt that one should accept the traditional understanding of the creation account as implying a created rather than eternal universe.
II: The Universe: Purpose vs. Purposeless
As a result of his position that the universe exists as an eternal byproduct of the divine Wisdom, a necessary side effect of the existence of God rather than being a creation of God's Will, Aristotle believed that the universe was not created by choice, and therefore that there can be no ultimate purpose to the creation and to the universe as a whole.
Aristotle admitted that even though the universe considered as a whole does not have a purpose, events within the universe can have a purpose. He postulated that only a finite amount of steps or historical events would be necessary to achieve any purpose of any event within the universe, and that these would therefore take only a finite amount of time to occur from the onset of the existence of the universe. Since the universe has already existed for an eternity the purpose of those events would have been already reached, and thus events occurring now could not be considered purposive .
Aristotelians did however consider all events as expressions of an immanent purposiveness, and saw the world from a teleological point of view . Events were considered to be teleological in the sense that events were 'caused' by their eventual effects, and therefore the 'purpose' of events was to bring about that which occurred. (However they denied overall purpose to events in the universe and certainly to the universe itself.)
Aristotle also posed a challenge to those who believed that the universe was indeed created, and created as a result of a choice: the challenge to determine what was the purpose of this creation.
Rambam: Creation as an Act of Will
Rambam claimed that creationists did not have to produce a reason for God to have created the universe. Indeed according to Rambam it is logically impossible for us to do so, as the Divine reason to create is necessarily beyond human comprehension.
Rambam also concluded that creation was via the divine Will - the creation was willed - rather than the automatically existent universe which is implied by the operation of divine Wisdom as per Aristotle.
The question of why God created the universe is a meaningless one because it cannot have an answer - it is logically impossible for us to understand whether or not God had a reason to create. Of course Rambam could have postulated that there was a reason, just that it was beyond human comprehension, but he preferred to rule out reason based on the following argument. All reasons we can devise to explain the Divine decision to create, will give rise to an infinite regress of reasons, and reasons for the reasons and so on: if the purpose of creation is X, what is the purpose of X? If it is Y, what is purpose of Y ?... etc. etc. ad infinitum.
Rambam then states that the only answer to the question of why God created the universe is "it is the Will of God". It is problematic to apply human concepts such as reason and will to God, but nevertheless for two reasona Rambam concluded that creation results from God's Will rather than from some reason or purpose. The positive reason: the universe's existence was not automatic. The negative reason: creation via Wisdom implies a reason for creation, which is not possible.
In the language of ancient and Medieval philosophy, the universe is a result of "the divine Will" rather than "the divine Wisdom" - and Rambam quotes the Rabbis as being in support of this view.
III: The Eternity of the Universe vs. Creation: Metaphysical Reasoning
In addition to the issues of whether or not the universe was a product of a creation, a choice, and whether there was a purpose to creation, there was yet another central issue on which Rambam disagreed with Aristotle. As we mentioned previously, according to Aristotle the universe is eternal, whereas according to Rambam, it began a finite amount of time ago.
Aristotle felt that he had proved this, while Rambam felt that these proofs were unconvincing, as outlined below.
The Unchanging Nature of God Implies the Eternity of the Universe
According to Aristotle, if creation is the result of God's Will, the universe must be eternal, and he reasoned as follows.
God is not affected by anything outside God, and so the cause of the Will to create the universe is inside God. Since God is eternal and unchanging, therefore God's Will is unchanging. According to Aristotle, the fact that the universe exists now implies that God wishes that it exist, and if God now wishes that it exist, then since God knows all and therefore doesn't change his mind, the will that the universe exist must always have existed in God's mind (and would always exist). Since there is no obstacle to God, God always can act on his wishes, and therefore God would have created the universe as soon as this was his wish, but since this must always have been his wish, the universe must always have existed; it would be coexistent with God eternally rather than created.
Alternately, if creation is the result of God's Reason, or equivalently, of the divine Wisdom, then this implies that there was a good reason to create the universe. However God knows all and nothing is new knowledge to God. Therefore, if it was ever true that there was a compelling reason to create, the reason to create could not be the product of previously unknown information. Therefore, if a reason to create ever existed, that same reason would always have been valid, and would always be so. Therefore the universe would always exist. That is, the universe would be co-eternal with God, rather than created.
Thus Aristotle arrived at the conclusion that irrespective of whether the universe was created via divine Will or divine Wisdom, the universe would necessarily be eternal, rather than created. According to Aristotle therefore, God is not the 'creator' of the universe: since however the universe exists only due to God's existence, God is the 'ground of existence' of the universe.
The Eternity of the Universe: Another Proof
According to Aristotle, reasoning - which is the basis of wisdom - is a chain of logic, so that for each link in the chain, there is a prior link which is its cause. Each link leads necessarily to the next link in a logically necessary way.
Aristotle argued that if God created the universe as a result of Divine reasoning - the 'Divine Wisdom' - then each link in the chain of logical reasoning leading to the decision to create implies a prior link. Therefore the chain of logic could not have a beginning, since the beginning - by definition - means there is no prior cause, and if there is no prior cause to some link, then by definition that link arose without cause, and something which arises without cause is obviously not the result of reasoning.
Therefore, since the chain of reasoning cannot have a beginning, the chain is infinite in length, so that the initial links in the decision to create existed an infinite time ago. Since God can do as he wishes, as soon as he decides to create, this would occur. That is, the actual creation would have occurred a finite amount of time after the decision to create.
Since the beginning of the chain of reasoning to create was an infinite time ago while the creation was a finite time after this, the creation was therefore also an infinite time ago. [If something is infinitely far away, and then moves a finite amount closer, it is still an infinite distance away - and similarly for time.] Since creation was an infinite time ago, the universe has existed for an infinite time, that is, it is eternal.[Eternal back and forth in time from now, assuming that it will always exist - which is the case according to Aristotle if God doesn't change his mind, which is indeed the case in Aristotle's philosophy according to which God's Mind is unchanging ªas explained previously).]
As we saw, Aristotle reached the same conclusion regarding a universe created via the attribute of the 'divine Will'. Aristotle reasoned further that if God created the universe not as a result of reasoning, but rather as the result of a caprice, then there could be no reason for this caprice to arise at one time more than at any other time. Therefore, since God is eternal, and there is equal chance of the choice having been made at any time, there is an infinitesimal chance of the caprice having occurred during any finite interval of time. Therefore it did not occur a finite time ago. Therefore since the caprice-decision must have occurred an infinite time ago, the universe must be eternal.
Aristotle therefore reached the conclusion that irrespective of whether creation was via divine Wisdom or divine Will, the universe is necessarily eternal, with God its ground of being rather than its creator.
Rambam's Response to Aristotle
Regarding creation via the 'divine Will': Although Aristotle had argued that God's Will is eternal and unchanging, so that if God Willed creation at one time, then it would always have been willed, Rambam stated that even though God is indeed beyond time, nevertheless it is wrong to say that this implies a limitation on God - that is, God can create 'in time'. God's Will to create need not always have existed in the sense which implies that the universe would then always have existed. Rather, the Will to create the universe could have been acted on a finite time ago - the Will to create can take effect at some specific 'time' and need not be eternal.
Similarly if creation is the result of the Divine Wisdom, Rambam stated that God's Wisdom can take effect at some specific time and therefore something created in accordance with the divine Wisdom need not be eternal.
Furthermore Rambam stated, even if creation is the result of Wisdom, then even if this means that it is wiser to create than not create, it is not true that the universe exists as a necessary byproduct of the Wisdom of God rather than as a product of God's creation. That is, it is possible for the universe to be a creation rather than a necessary byproduct of God's existence.
Therefore since he believed that one cannot apply human logic to God, Rambam rejected the Aristotelian view of the logical necessity of concluding that the universe must be eternal, and this opened the possibility that the universe is created rather than eternal. Since now Rambam had shown that logic was not conclusive one way or the other, he declared that tradition is the proper guide, and according to tradition, the universe is not eternal and there was indeed a creation.
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The arguments of Aristotle and Rambam seem to imply the existence of time during God's existence
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The creation account relates that it was six days to indicate that it was not a long time, and that it was IN time...
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IV: The Contradiction in Rambam
Introduction
Although Rambam stated that God employed the divine Will in creating the universe and that the Rabbis supported this view, at a different juncture Rambam states that God used Wisdom in creating, along with Will, and states that the Rabbis supported this view that creation involved both Will and Wisdom.
"...the creation was not the exclusive result of God's Will, but rather the divine Wisdom made the actual existence of the universe necessary. Our sages frequently express this idea." [Guide:III:25.]
"...The Jewish Sages....clearly stated that it was not logical necessity that determined the existence of all things, but rather it was the action of the divine Will." [Guide:III:13.]
Thus Rambam contradicts himself, and by bringing the Rabbis as being in support of both views, he seems to involve the Rabbis in the same contradiction.
In addition, whereas previously Rambam stated that it is meaningless to discuss the reason for creation, as any possible reason would be beyond us, Rambam himself later provides a reason for God's creation of the universe.
Rambam: Contradictions as pointers to 'Hidden Matters'
In his introduction to the "Guide for the Perplexed", Rambam writes that it contains contradictions within it which are a result of the need to hide certain esoteric religious secrets. Since these contradictions are deliberately contrived to obscure the true meaning, it is easier to get to Rambam's true meaning by comparing what he says in all the places where the matter is dealt with. One example is the contradiction between the two chapters discussing the issue above - whether God created the universe by employing the Divine Will alone or with both the Divine Will and the Divine Wisdom.
Rambam: Creation as Both Wisdom and Will
According to the Rambam, it is important to attribute the creation to both God's Wisdom and God's Will. Creation via Will alone without Wisdom would imply creation as an act of caprice - senseless , purposeless and vain - and it is impossible to assume that God acts in such a manner.
On the other hand, creation via Wisdom without Will implies that since Will was not involved, the creation was not an expression of God's Will to create - instead, the universe exists because it had to exist, and God could not have chosen not to create. This conclusion however seems to imply that God is limited in his freedom to act, which is not possible.
Thus, Wisdom alone or Will alone could not have been the source of creation - the only possible resolution must involve a combination of both Will and Wisdom.
However, some religious philosophers had indeed proposed creation via Will alone. Rambam states that the reason these religious philosophers attribute God's act of creation to a pure act of Will without the purposefulness of Wisdom behind it is because they fear that if they claimed that the creation involved Wisdom, then they would be forced by Aristotle's reasoning to conclude that the universe is eternal rather than created. In their view, this would not only contradict the Biblical teaching of the creation, but even more importantly, as we have shown above, it would lead to the idea of the purposelessness of the universe as a whole.
However, as we saw above, Rambam rejected the conclusion that the involvement of the divine Wisdom implied the eternity of the universe as opposed to creation, and therefore Rambam showed that the universe could be created via the divine Wisdom. Furthermore as we have seen above, Rambam showed that creation via Wisdom did not imply the necessity for determining a reason for creation - which would be impossible for humans to do - precisely because such a determination is impossible .
Thus Rambam did not feel constrained to state that creation was via Will exclusively - as had other religious thinkers - since he rejected the logical consequences of the divine Wisdom stated by Aristotle, and therefore Rambam felt free to conclude that there was an element of divine Wisdom involved in creation in addition to the divine Will.
The Purpose of Creation According to Rambam
As we saw above, postulating that the universe exists of necessity - via the divine Wisdom - obviated the troubling question of the "Purpose" of the universe, and this was a polemic advantage which the Aristoteleans claimed, since they demanded of the creationists - who proposed creation via the divine Will - to come up with some reason for why God created the universe .
Rambam of course had claimed that creationists did not have to since the divine reason to create is beyond human comprehension, and speculation into the Purpose of creation leads to an infinite regress, and so the only answer to the question of why God created the universe is "it is the Will of God".
Despite this, later (Guide:III:25) Rambam says that it is nonsense to believe that God created the universe without any Purpose, through caprice of the divine Will. Instead, Rambam says, there is a very good reason why God created the universe: because existence is a good in of itself! Thus, since God wanted to do good and existence is a good, God gave existence to the universe.
By providing a reason for creation, Rambam has allowed for the divine Wisdom to have played a part, which removes any problem of caprice or purposelessness. By involving the divine Will, a willed creation of the universe is possible. Therefore by postulating a combination of the divine Will and Wisdom, it is possible to propose that the universe is the product of a purposeful willed creation.
Rambam then states that the Rabbinical sage support his view that the universe is a product of both divine Will and Wisdom. However this view of Rambam's seems to contradict what he says earlier (Guide:III:13), that creation is a result solely of the divine Will - where Rambam also claims that the sages back him up !
The Resolution of the Contradiction
There is however one instance in which the problem of infinite regress or its flip side, caprice, is resolved - if existence is a good in of itself relative to that which exists. In such a case, when the universe does not exist, there is no necessity or reason that it should exist. However, once the universe does exist, the good of existence is the reason for God to provide it with continued existence, and its existence provides a good reason for the universe to have been created. Thus the decision to create is free, but is not caprice, since creation leads to existence, which according to Reason is a good.
In such a case, there is no chain of reasoning to explain the reason for creation - the reasoning is of an acausal type.
According to Rambam, indeed the universe exists because existence is good in of itself, and God wished that this good should be. Thus existence is self-causative in the theological sense; the intrinsic good of existence is the cause of the universe's existence.
Although stating that creation is a good in of itself does not solve the problem since one can then inquire as to the reason for God to do good, a different formulation leads to a cleaner resolution: "The purpose of existence is existence itself". Then in human terms, as humans see things from the perspective of how their existence is good for them, one can state that they and the rest of the universe exist because 'existence is a good in of itself'. As Rambam stated:
"We must be content and not trouble our mind with seeking a certain final cause (purpose) for things that have none, or have no other final cause but their own existence, which depends on the Will of God, or if you prefer, on the Divine Wisdom."
Existence, Acausality and Free Will
This problem therefore involves an acausality difficulty - the infinite chain of logic implied by creation via reason, as well as a free-will type difficulty - will without reasoning is mere caprice, yet reasoning is deterministic.
Where 'Will' is taken as meaning caprice - randomness - Rambam cannot accept that God created the universe via the divine aspect of 'Will' alone. Instead it would necessarily be via a combination of 'Will' and 'Wisdom' tha thte universe was created. However, where 'Will' means 'free will', then since free will involves reasoned choice, Rambam can accept creation via 'Will' alone.
In essence though, Rambam's approach is unambiguous - it is merely the terms that were in use in philosophical discourse which were ambiguous, and it is the concept of free will itself which introduces the difficulty. Free will is not discussed clearly by Aristotle, and it is not entirely clear what he meant by 'will', and 'will' could be synonymous with 'randomness'. For Rambam on the other hand the freedom of the will is a major and basic tenet of Jewish belief, and 'will' generally means 'free will', which by definition is not random but rather is reasoned - free will is a combination therefore of will and wisdom. Therefore when Rambam states that the universe was created via the divine 'Will', and that this was the opinion of the Jewish Sages, this is not contradictory to his saying that creation is the result of a conjunction of the divine 'Will' and 'Wisdom', and that this too was the opinion of the sages.
For Rambam, all matters pertaining to the creation of the universe involved secret knowledge which was to be passed on from master to disciple in private tutelage, rather than information which was accessible to the masses, and therefore he chose to deal with these matters in a manner which involved apparent contradiction.
The Creation and Eden Accounts
It is interesting to note the connection of self-reference and acausality in Rambam's resolution of the contradiction. Existence itself is an acausal phenomenon, and its use here is in a self-referential context in that according to Rambam although there is no reason to create existence, existence exists because after it already is a fact, existence is good.
In these discussions the emergence of the universe into existence is via Will or Wisdom and involves the issue of free will and causality. Of course in our approach free will is a process closely connected with the bringing of the universe into retroactive acausal existence at the moral being stage when man with will and wisdom emerges.
One could also see the Biblical description of creation as referring to these matters - the two accounts representing different aspects of the divine. The creation account involves the divine Will, however it is centered on clear logical construction of a universe, and represents the action of the divine Wisdom, while the garden of Een account, although also involving Wisdom, centers around the acquisition of free Will.
Furthermore, by dealing with matters related to creation in a veiled manner - deliberately employing apparent contradictions - Rambam is also making a veiled comment about the Biblical accounts which deal with the same matters. One could infer from Rambam's method of discussion that the Bible itself used the method of apparent contradiction in dealing with creation as a deliberate means of keeping secret that which was not meant for the masses.
This then puts the creation and Eden accounts in a new light - the clearly apparent contradictions between the creation and Eden accounts are meant to point the careful reader to deliberate paradoxes whose resolution could then lead to a deeper understanding, so that the juxtaposition and contrast of the two accounts is then part of the accounts themselves.
NEED TO EDIT THIS: MERGE? DELETE?
Thus one can be the solution of the problem of the other (as in Joseph's dream-solving in Egypt): Will is OK because it is only after Wisdom decided that it would be good that Will chose to do this good, i.e. it is not caprice; and Wisdom is OK because it is not forced on God - rather Will still has to choose whether or not to do it. How choose? By using Wisdom! This is a full circle - involving acausality , or self-causation . {THIS STILL INVOLVES REGRESS : i.e. WHY SHOULD GD WANT TO DO THIS etc]
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* Perhaps we can resolve the contradiction etc. and problem by recalling that free will involved an inherent impossibility/paradox, i.e. the necessity that it be rational vs. necessty that it be free. This is same problem: Maybe with God it is two separate faculties: the rational and the free = the Wisdom and the Will , and the conflict is the same as the internal contradiction of human free will.[our limited comprehension causes the appearance of duality/opposition/conflict/paradox.
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As we discussed earlier [section X], the essence of paganism is the absence of a moral imperative, of moral absolutes , and of a purpose to existence. The Aristotelian system was a strange mixture of religion and science, yet it remained thoroughly pagan. Indeed, as the Rambam showed, although Aristotle believed in a God, he believed that the universe existed simply as an automatic byproduct, or side-effect of the very existence of this God. As a result, the universe could not be considered to be existing for any "purpose".* In contrast, it is one of the most fundamental beliefs of Judaism that not only does there exist a God who brought the universe into existence, but that He did so as part of a Plan. Thus, in the Jewish view, the existence of the universe is the result of an act of Divine Will, rather than an automatic byproduct of God's existence, and the universe itself exists in order to fulfil some Divine Purpose, rather than merely existing because of logical necessity.
However, in order that it not seem that God created the universe out of a caprice of his Will, (the) Rambam stated that the world was also partially the result of God's Wisdom: God's Wisdom declared that the universe should exist (must exist in order to achieve the Purpose), and then God's Will that the universe exist brought it into existence.
This is of course a parallel to our scenario: man was created in "the image of God" which is understood as meaning that man has a free will (as does God). Man also attained wisdom, i.e. an understanding of good/evil and of his free will. God's Wisdom and Will brought the universe to potential existence, and man - created in the image of God brought the universe into actual existence through his will and wisdom (the exercise of free will and the understanding of its significance).
Man is the purpose of creation - "Bishvili ... " - yet Rambam says "the major error....":
" ...
[Gd's Will was to create man, who possesses both will and wisdom.]
[Gd's Wisdom dictated that it was necessary to create a big-bang-emergent universe - so that when man uses his wisdom to seek his origins , the results should not stifle his free will.]
Also, Will and Wisdom are in essence the same thing since wisdom is the understanding of the significance of free will, and one without the other is meaningless or useless. [Consciousness is not sufficient; self-consciousness, i.e. the awareness that one is conscious, is also necessary.]
?* "Wisdom" in Rambam is (translated as) "Chochma" but free will is related to "(the tree of) knowledge"="da'at"; in Kabalah, Chochma, Bina, Da'ath are related. What is the relevance here, etc.? Did Rambam write of it in Mishne Torah (i.e. using terms in Lashon hakodesh)?
The connection drawn here between the instant universe concept and the ideas expressed by the Rambam on this issue are related by another interesting "coincidence": the discussion as to whether things were created for man or for their own sake includes the following discussion.
Note: All evil is nonexistence: all existence is good: [Dover p. 266 III:X]
"Ubacharta betov, vechai bahem" = choosing good = choosing existence.
Man's awareness of the distinction between good and evil brought existence from non-existence.
"All the great evil which men cause to each other ... are ... due to non-existence; because they originate in ignorance, which is absence of wisdom", p.267 Dover III:XI.
Ch 32: Time Travel, Non-Causality and
The Evolution of Halacha
Introduction: Time Travel and Paradox
The possibility of time travel has intrigued people for generations, however the paradoxes involved seem to rule out many types of time travel.
Of course we are all time travellers, as we all move into the future. However, physics actually teaches that one type of time travel is possible - travelling into the distant future in a short amount of time. As special relativity shows, the faster one moves relative to any other body, the greater the elapsed time as measured by the other body. Thus for example a person moving in a rocket at a speed very very close to the speed of light for a few thousand years as measured by the earth, will measure one hour time passage on their own watch, and will age only one hour. Thus, if one wishes to travel to the distant future, one need only travel quickly.
However, there is no possibility in special relativity theory of going backwards in time, and therefore the trip is one-way only according to this theory.
Recently researchers in general relativity theory have attempted to investigate the possibility of time travel if a sufficiently advanced technological civilization were capable of forming a theoretically possible entity known as a 'wormhole'.
Travel to the past seems to be possible using certain types of wormholes. However, if one were to travel to the past, one could conceivably end up killing one's ancestor or otherwise changing events, thereby erasing or changing the chain of events leading up to the trip to the past. These paradoxes have led many to conclude that travel to the past is impossible, and therefore that wormholes of the type that permit such travel are actually physically impossible.
There are similar paradoxes which arise when one considers the possibility of information transmission. If someone were to be able to obtain information about the future, they could in theory prevent that very event from ever occuring. In addition, any information which is sent faster than the speed of light will give rise to paradoxical situations where the information can be used to prevent the information from being sent to begin with.
Of course any event which is predictable can be prevented, in which case of course the prediction itself is changed, so that there is no additional paradox involved in obtaining information regarding a future event if one postulates that the future is not fixed. The past would seem to have to be fixed in order for the present to remain as it is, but if the future is changed then there is no repercussion on the present, and therefore changing the future involves no inherent paradox. Knowing the future however implies that there is an already existent future which cannot change, and this is what involves paradox since the knowledge obtained about an event occuring in the future can be employed to prevent that very event from occuring. Therefore knowing the future of non-predictable events implies that the future is (un?) changeable.
Of interest therefore are those events which cannot be predicted for one reason or another, with the associated question of whether such events can be known before they occur without this involving paradox.
Divine Omniscience and Free Will
Since by definition a creator of the physical universe is beyond the limitations of physical law, and has infinite computation ability, all determined events can be predictable to the creator. Random events may be unpredictable if they are truly random, but it is also possible that what is random in the physical universe is not random to a being beyond the realm of physical law.
As to free willed events however, prior to their occurence there is no means to know what the choice will be - if it were otherwise it would not qualify as free will. Nevertheless, in Jewish philosophy it is generally assumed that God does indeed know beforehand the results of future free willed decisions. Often this pre-knowledge has been felt to imply that these free willed decisions are actually determined, and therefore not free.
An interesting approach to this question was suggested about a thousand years ago by Rav Hai Gaon. According to Rav Hai Gaon, events have to actually occur in the universe in order for God to have known them in advance. Therefore, God does not know the outcomes of future free-willed choices because they are predictable, but rather these future choices are known only because God is beyond time. Free willed events are truly free and are unpredictable to God, but those free willed choices which occur at any time during the existence of the universe are known to God at any other time, including a prior time. However it is only known because it has been injected into the stream of reality via the free willed choice of the individual at some point in the existence of time.
The Evolution of Halacha, and Non-Causality
The end of the creation account states that God rested from the work of creation"which God created to do". According to the Midrash and Zohar, this is a reference to the need for humanity to complete the creation, which was deliberately left incomplete in order to allow humanity to form it according to free willed choice, and creative activity.
There is an additional realm of incompleteness in the initial creation which is filled-in via human activity involving free-willed choice and creativity - the development of halacha. In Jewish philosophy, the guidelines for correct action are determined by halacha, and it is up to individual free willed choice to decide whether or not the halachic path will be followed. As situations change, halacha must evolve to meet the new cases which arise. Halacha is determined by Torah scholars, and they are guided by intelligence, knowledge, and inasmuch as their opinions may be affected by natural inclinations and biases or remain free of such taint, by their free-willed choice.
Metaphysically, the Torah is the blueprint of creation, and halacha is the fine-print of the blueprint, and therefore the development of halacha is the detailed filling-in of the blueprint of creation.
Together with the approach of Rav Hai Gaon, this idea can help us understand a few interesting statements reflecting the worldview of the Jewish sages in regard to Halacha.
Although of course the creation of the world preceded the development of halacha, it was perhaps only because halacha would be developed as it was that the blueprint of the universe - the Torah - emerged as it did, and therefore that the universe could be created as it was.
This gives meaning to the Midrashic and Kabbalistic statement that God consulted a blueprint in order to create the universe and that this blueprint was the Torah, implying in some manner that the blueprint was derived not from God. Indeed in this context one can attribute the existence of the blueprint to the fact that after the creation of the universe the development of halacha would procede as it has. This again is a self-referential non-causal loop, as is the case with all matters involving free will.
Similarly, according to the Talmud, Moses received the entire body of Jewish law, all of halacha, at Mt. Sinai, and that all halachic insights and novel ideas that anyone later ever come up with are actually part of what was given to Moses at Sinai. One can then interpret this in the same manner - that Moses received at Sinai all that would ever be introduced by later Talmudic scholars. On the ther hand the Talmud states that halacha is a continually developing system. One can then say that Moses was able to receive all of halacha at Sinai only due to the fact that this halachik matter would later be developed, and only because the transmission to Moses was via God who is beyond time and therefore has access at the time of the giving of the Torah to all that would eventually be developed.
Similarly, the Talmud relates relates that God translated Moses in time so that Moses himself attended a lecture given by Rabbi Akiva. At this lecture, Rabbi Akiva stated that all that he was teaching originated with Moses - yet Moses himself heard these matters for the first time! On can then understand this in the same manner: Rabbi Akiva indeed originated the material, and then this fact allowed the material to become known to Moses via God prior to Rabbi Akiva's birth, at Mt. Sinai, creating again a non-causal loop.
The means by which at Sinai Moses was made aware of all the halachot which would eventually be developed is generally taken to be via direct transmission from God, as was the case with the rest of the Torah. However the means by which Moses is made aware of those matters discovered by Rabbi Akiva may have been by the bringing of Moses forward in time to participate in Rabbi Akiva's lectures.
Ch 33: Kohelet and Free Will
Introduction
Hundreds of years prior to the earliest known Greek philosophers, King Solomon wrote and philosophized in Jerusalem.
The contemporary civilization to the far east of Israel believed in a cyclical preordained pattern of history and in multiple deities, while other civilizations felt that there was no pattern at all to events, and no creator. The Jewish view on the other hand was - and is - that of a God creating the universe for a purpose, of a progression of history from a beginning to a specific end, of the moral responsibility of humanity and the connection between human moral choice and the unfolding of universal history.
King Solomon grappled with the competing philosophies, with the wisdoms of the other contemporary civilizations, but firmly espoused the Jewish philosophy - as can be seen in the book of Kohelet (Ecclesiastes).
Kohelet: Determinism and Randomness
There are two major themes which are repeated over and over in this book: the lack of novelty in events, expressed in the repeating refrain "there is nothing new under the sun", together with the cyclical nature of history "that which was is that which shall be"; and furthermore, the meaninglessness of all, expressed in Solomon's terms (usually translated as "vanity of vanities, all is vanity") "emptiness and chaos, all is emptiness and chaos."
However, at the end of the long tirade of despair, and of deterministic and nihilistic philosophising, Solomon's conclusion is a bolt from the blue, a reaffirmation of the Jewsih belief in meaning and purpose, in the centrality of free-willed moral choice.
Solomon's Terminology
The word employed in Ecclesiastes for "vanity" or "emptiness" is, in the original Hebrew", Hevel". One can relate this word to the word 'tohu' in the Bible, the word translated as 'emptiness/chaos/void' in the creation account: "In the beginning, God created...and the earth was empty and void...", since the words 'tohu' and 'hevel' are employed jointly in the same context, as we shall show.
Furthermore, one can relate the word 'hevel' as well as to one from ancient Greek cosmology, the 'hyuli' or primal chaotic matter from which Ramban says God fashioned the world.
INSERT HERE SECTION on WORD RELATIONS ETC (on Mac disk: Kohelet article)
= hyuli......tohu va'vohu - hevel vetohu ; hevel = tohu = randomness. etc.
One can therefore interpret Solomon's statements to the effect that "there is nothing new under the sun", and "that which was is that which shall be" as referring to the tenets of determinism, and his statements "emptiness and chaos, all is emptiness and chaos" ("vanity of vanities, all is vanity") as referring to the idea of the inherent randomness of the universe. That is, Solomon's treatise deals with the basic philosophies of meaning in life, as based on underlying metaphysical and cosmological understandings, philosophies which were later explored by the Greek philosophers as well as by the civilizations in the far East.
Biblical Philosophy and Free Will
According to Jewish tradition, although all is determined according to the Will of God, humanity possesses the ability to freely choose between good and evil. If we assume that this is the meaning of the Talmudic saying "all is in the hands of Heaven except for the fear of heaven", then the expresion "the fear of heaven" must be the Talmudic equivalent of 'free will'. That is, the expression"all is in the hands of Heaven except for the fear of heaven" means "all is determined by God, except for the operation of human free-willed choice".
According to Jewish philosophy, the Torah is the unique guideline for human action, and provides the model for the correct application of free-willed choice.
The spiritual essence of humanity is the soul, the breath of God which is in them, and the physical essence of humanity is its unique ability to transcend the causal structure of the physical universe in using free will.
A succinct expression of Torah philosophy in exhortatory form is expressed by Solomon as the conclusion of his long excursus into the competing philosophies of the day - that of determinism and of randomness. After exhausting the arguments for determinism and for random chaos and meaninglessness, Solomom sums all up, and concludes with the words:
"And in conclusion, after all has been said and done, fear God and keep His commandments, for this is the essence of Humanity" - or, in our paraphrase, "After considering the philosophies propounding a meaningless existence, those of preordained and cyclical determinism and those of randomness, chaos, nihilism, after all the evidence and arguments have been heard, the conclusion is: use your free will to choose the good, that which is outlined in the Torah - for free willed choice is the essence of what humanity is about, and it is this (using free will to choose the good) which is humanity's purpose."