Birth Pangs (3)
Then God said, “Let there be an expanse in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters.” Genesis 1:6 NASB
Expanse – Remember this? “. . . the Ishmaelian reading of experience is, like all logical readings, subject to refutation and falsification,” while “Akiva’s esoteric reading of experience is, like all such exegesis, not subject to such refutation or challenge.”[1]
Why is the Ishmaelian view subject to refutation but the Akivan view isn’t? Rabbi Ishmael’s view of God is the transcendent one. God’s ways are not our ways. He is the “holy Other,” existing outside time and space. How can this view be subject to refutation but the view that God is immanently involved in human history isn’t? You would have thought just the opposite. Akiva’s view of God in history seems to be the one most likely to be refuted. Why does Tucker claim just the opposite? Ishmael seems much closer to the Western idea of systematic theology than Akiva. Akiva is like our devotional approach. You know, the one where “God spoke to me” is the guiding light. What is it that makes one subject to falsification and the other immune?
The Ishmaelian approach attempts to present God as the ground of being. God’s transcendence is the logical foundation of creation and rationality. We turn to His revelation to truly understand the how and why of this world. But that means that other philosophical arguments must be entertained, arguments that posit alternatives to this transcendent divinity. So, random accident as the real source of the universe or evolution as the mechanism of creation challenge Ishmaelian theology. The truth comes down to who has the best evidence and the most convincing connections. And, after 3000 years of debate, the verdict is still out. Remember David Hume’s challenge: “Is he willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is impotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Whence then is evil?”[2] If I believe in the transcendent God, I have to show that Hume’s logical dare is wrong, that God can be both just and merciful. And I have to show that this is a rational conclusion. The same predicament holds for the very existence of God. This is the realm of systematic theology.
But Akiva avoids all this. How? By focusing entirely on our experience. Akiva’s view does not depend on evidence or argument. It depends on “faith.” In other words, no matter what occurs or how the world interprets what occurs, the man of faith knows that God is behind it all. He feels this to be true. Don’t ask him to justify it? That would be the equivalent of asking a man to justify his claim to be in love. The evidence, no matter how ubiquitous, is always ambiguous. But “How do you know you’re in love?” isn’t a question about evidence. It’s a question about feelings, and feelings are private to each individual. If I believe that God sent the coronavirus pandemic as a punishment for Man’s sins, then all the facts will be interpreted according to this belief. Here is an example of this unfalsifiable view:[3]
In three short months, just like He did with the plagues of Egypt, God has taken away everything we worship. God said, “you want to worship athletes, I will shut down the stadiums. You want to worship musicians, I will shut down Civic Centers. You want to worship actors, I will shut down theaters. You want to worship money, I will shut down the economy and collapse the stock market. You don’t want to go to church and worship Me, I will make it where you can’t go to church.”
“If my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.”( 2 Chronicles 7:14)
Maybe we don’t need a vaccine, Maybe we need to take this time of isolation from the distractions of the world and have a personal revival where we focus on the ONLY thing in the world that really matters. Jesus.
Do you see the difference now? Ishmael or Akiva. Calvin’s Institutes or Jay Michaelson’s Everything Is God? Is there evidence that would convince you the whole thing is just a myth, or is there nothing on earth that would ever invalidate your experience of God?
Which one do you think you embrace?
Topical Index: Akiva, Ishmael, evidence, experience, Genesis 1:6
[1] Gordon Tucker, in Abraham Heschel, Heavenly Torah as Refracted through the Generations (ed. and trans. by Gordon Tucker, Continuum International Publishing Group, New York, 2007), p. 129.
[2] David Hume, Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, ed. Nelson Pike (Bobbs-Merrill, 1970), part 10, p. 88.
[3] I received this in a recent email. The source was not identified.
