Q. How can you prove there is a God?
Ask the rabbi.
PROVING GOD
Rabbi Raymond Apple
Q. How can you prove there is a God?
A. I have two quarrels with your question.
The first quarrel is with the delineation of what the real issue is.
What is the real issue? Whether there is God, not “a” (i.e. any) God. If there is “a” God there can equally be other gods, and if there are other gods there is no God.
The second question is with the word “prove”. There were medieval theologians who proposed rational proofs (cosmological, teleological, ontological) and indeed Maimonides insisted that it is logically impossible for God not to exist, to be one and unique, and to be eternal.
However, believers know God is there for reasons that are above and beyond conventional standards of proof. God is there not because of rational proofs but because we encounter and experience Him.
An attempt at an analogy: how do we know that love exists? Can we prove it in some scientific manner? We experience it (or its absence). We see what love does for people and what people do for love. How do we know God exists? We see what God does for people and what people do for God.
What does God do for people? The long and distinguished history of belief provides an answer. The sheer existence of the world provides an answer (don’t tell me about all that is wrong with the world: there is a God-given charge to man “l’takken olam”, to repair, to restore the world). The fact that we are alive is evidence that God does things for man and has faith that man will be worthy of the privilege.
What does man do for God? Man can and should make himself into the response to the Divine command, “Be a blessing”.
SECOND DAY YOM-TOV
Q. Do visitors from the Diaspora keep a 2nd day yom-tov when in Israel?
A. It’s a difficult question with strongly opposed points of view. The general rule is to follow the most stringent view.
The lenient view (associated with Rabbi Shne’or Zalman of Liadi and recorded in the Shulchan Aruch Orach Chayyim 496:5)) is that if a man and wife are in Israel together they are regarded as at home and need keep only one day. A student who is in an Israeli yeshivah is also regarded as at home.
The strict view (Mishnah Berurah Orach Chayyim 496:13) says that if you intend to return to the Diaspora you should keep two days whilst you are in Israel.
Rabbi Raymond Apple served for 32 years as the chief minister of the Great Synagogue, Sydney, Australia’s oldest and most prestigious congregation. He is now retired and lives in Jerusalem where he answers interesting questions.
The presumption that no literal, capital P proof of G-d is possible from within the scriptural record only reminds us that tradition does not have one to offer. Which for anyone of independent mind studying scripture may seem strange as there are so many passages of an evidential character to suggest that such a proof should indeed be plausible. The other problem is the considerable number of passages within both canonical and non canonical texts that warn for false and deceptive teaching. Yet among all the historical divisions and alternatives available in the world today, no means exist to know for certain what is of G-d and what is of men. No doubt history will one day sort that out!