From “Faith and Doubt,” by Rabbi Norman Lamm, Ktav Publishers, 1986
For many contemporary men and women, God is irrelevant, and secularism triumphant; there are no longer any questions. However, for many others, the will to believe is alive but not the ability to believe. Such people are intelligent and concerned, but they question the validity, the meaningfulness, and the relevance of organized religion...
The path to knowledge of God is strewn with the rocks and boulders of doubt... The honest doubter must, therefore, not be looked upon as an enemy who is hostile to his religion... A genuine doubt must be a question that arises from a quest, not a specious excuse that spares the doubter the need to commit himself. It must be critical not only of the object of its concerns, but of itself as well lest it be no more than an irresponsible evasion of the need to take a stand. The Greek skeptomai meant to watch and search closely; the skeptikos, therefore, is a particularly careful investigator, not one who rejects ideas and proofs on principle. The object of his search is truth, not doubt. The spurious doubter, however, seeks not to discover truth but to avoid both it and the passion to which it obligates him.
Since Kant, we do not accept the validity of the classical proofs of Gods existence ---. Faith is therefore accepted in its narrower, theological sense as religious faith. Lamm discusses various kinds of faith. He says that cognitive faith is not an abstract, static acknowledgment of truth; it is a violent struggle in the attainment of [truth]. I begin by believing despite doubt; I end by believing all the more firmly because of doubt....
"Faith is thus a dialectic process, not an established fact, an inner encounter between yes and maybe, between the exclamation point and the question mark. --- The truth which faith affirms is not given to us for the price of mere assent; it is the prize for which we must engage in a fierce intellectual struggle. Doubt becomes, not an impediment, but a goad to reinvestigate and deepen cognitive faith assertions. --- The path to the knowledge of God is strewn with the rocks and boulders of doubt; he who would despair of the journey because of the fear of doubt, must resign himself forever from attaining the greatest prize known to man.
Lamm then asks the question, Can God doubt? Does he sometimes oscillate between affirmation and denial? Now, of course, I do not mean to ask if God believes in God. --- The question is legitimate and valid in the affective and truest sense when the object of the Divine concern is man. The drama of human existence is predicated upon the divine grant of freedom to man. --- The built-in risks of an ethically autonomous being are implied in the symbolic parable about the debates between the Heavenly hosts as to whether such a creation ought to take place. The deadlock among the angels was broken by Gods vote in favor of the creation of man. He knew man might fail; yet was willing to take His chances on man. God had, or has, faith in man. --- But faith always implies the possibility of doubt. If, then, God has faith in man, He can also doubt man. [Biblical evidence: Adam and Eve, the generation of the flood, the Golden Calf, etc.] Is Gods trust vindicated?
This then is how our own doubts may be transcended, if even for a fleeting moment, which may be worth all eternity: by the realization that we may well be the objects of Gods doubt. The fullness of faith may be attained when, instead of doubting God, we come to the sudden and terrible awareness that God may be doubting us; that our human existence has yet to be affirmed by God who may not be convinced of its worth; that God may have lost faith in us because we have betrayed Him. That must be the focus of our concern.
What a tragic fate! - to be tossed between the torment of doubting God and the terror of being doubted by Him. The way of the faithfulin this last [part] of the 20th century is not an easy one. Not for him is the facile peace of mind of those for whom religion is but a psychological crutch; nor for him is the perverse security of the nihilist who has resigned himself to utter, hopeless meaninglessness. His way is not easy - but it is sublime, and it is sacred. He risks the bitter waters of faith --- but he knows he must persist in love until there will shine on him the light of the King of all life. in the words which the profound Spanish philosopher, Miguel de Unamuno, concluded his masterpiece, The Tragic Sense of Life: --- and may God deny you peace but give you glory!
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Great issues raised. Must read post and book.
Thanks for giving me and others a lot about which to think.
Rabbi Dr. Lamm is a superlative author.
Your contributions to TheNewsTalkers are most valued.
I am gratefulto you both.
Peace and Abundant Blessings. Enoch.
Thanks, Enoch.
I edited it to convert it from a Judaism-centered piece to a universal one because it applies to all.