Mysterious Confusion
“Who knows, God may turn and relent and withdraw His burning anger so that we will not perish.” Jonah 3:9 NASB
May turn – Rabbi David Aaron addresses the difference between Jews and Christians on the subject of prayer in his online article, “Why Do We Pray?” In that article he states the Jews do not pray. On the contrary, Jews become hit’palel, that is, they engage in the reflexive act of changing themselves to conform to the sovereign will of YHVH. Rabbi Aaron considers prayer as “trying to get Yehovah ot want what I want, to change His mind and to want what is on my mind.”[1] This, he suggests, is strictly impossible. He argues, “But, what would it mean for an Omniscient being to get new information? And what will it mean for Yehovah who transcends time to change? Change only occurs in time, but Yehovah transcends time. How could an Omniscient being change?” Therefore, the purpose of the actions we typically associate with prayer has nothing to do with God. It is about our “personal transformation.” To put it bluntly, when we communicate with an immutable, omniscient deity, we do so (perhaps without knowing it) in order that we undergo some form of therapeutic personal adjustment. The action affects us, not God. This is why, according to Rabbi Aaron, Jews do not pray. They do not seek to change the immutable will of YHVH. Instead, they enter into an adjustment ritual.
What do you think about Rabbi Aaron’s argument? How does it make you feel? Are you making a mistake to believe that your prayers actually affect God? Would you continue to pray (or practice hit’palel) knowing that all that is really happening is personal therapy without the hourly rate? Once again we find that this rabbi, along with dozens of Christian theologians, follows the logic of suppositions about time, omniscience and divinity to their conclusions—and ends up in a place that is contrary to virtually all the interaction between God and men that we find in Scripture. The logic is correct, but the premises are wrong. This is a case of believing my theology rather than the biblical text. Anyone can make this mistake, Jew or Christian, but the conclusion should raise big red flags. Frankly, if prayer is nothing more than disguised therapy, I would rather go to the shrink. At least I could have a dialogue.
Where does Rabbi Aaron err? According to the king of Nineveh, repentance and prayer change God’s mind. In fact, the whole story of Jonah is based on the premise that Jonah knows God may change His mind and Jonah doesn’t want that to happen. Rabbi Aaron errs when he supposes that an omniscient being is “outside” of time and therefore cannot learn anything new. But such a being is also, logically, completely disconnected from any actions taken by men. He is ultimately transcendent, not involved, not subject to alterations in circumstances here on earth (or anywhere else). Once again we see the Greek concept of time enter the picture. Defining time as a measure of physical change while contending that God cannot change leads to prayer as psychotherapy—and pretty useless at that. When the king of Nineveh uses the Hebrew verb shuv he does not mean that God has transcendentally determined before the creation of time the outcome of all earthly events. He means exactly what he says. God may change His mind. The argument for this theological position is complicated*. But this much seems clear. God can and does change His mind, and quite frankly, I for one am very glad He does.
The rabbi suffers from mysterious confusion. Having committed himself to a Greek conception of God and time, he ends on the therapist’s couch. How God ever does anything in the world remains a great mystery. The fact that we think God interacts with the world remains a great confusion. But for $100 an hour I can explain to you why you are so deluded—and you can stop praying.
Topical Index: prayer, Rabbi David Aaron, time, omniscience, Jonah 3:9, shuv
The full argument for a God in time is given in my book God, Time and the Limits of Omniscience.
[1] Rabbi David Aaron, “Why Do We Pray?”, p. 2
In Skip’s book “God, Time And The Limits Of Omniscience” he summarizes the Greek postulates of perfection as “simple, infinite, necessary, eternal, immutable and perfect” as being the attributes we then turned around and assigned to G-d. In doing so, we can come up with the statements:
“God is the most high
God is the most complete
God is immeasurable
God is most excellent
God lacks nothing”
Sounds great! But, is love possible between such a God and ourselves?
If you really want to get what you thought G-d must be disturbed, try taking on the subject of G-d knowing everything (omniscience) and the problems of prayer, like Skip suggests, or evil, for that matter: and, further, the subject of prayer would need to include the prayer Yeshua prayed about “if it be possible, let this cup pass from me”. If G-d is really love, then He would have had to create (or LEAVE!) the possibility, that all of the above statements (if they are, in fact, true) must come with qualifiers, or, limitations – even if they were self-imposed. Why?
Because, if love is possible, then love has to have the capacity to stoop lower than the object of that love to be able to meet the beloved NO MATTER WHAT. That is what love, in fact, is. The only way that perfection would make any sense to love, then, is if perfection means “able to meet the beloved no matter what”. (We still haven’t come to the requirement of love that the beloved meet the Lover back, however.) No matter how evil, compromised, unlovable, debased, unable or undeserving the object of love could possibly be, if love is true, then a perfect Lover could still meet the beloved in those places. The most horrible implication of evil, to me, is its capacity to require limitations on love. The most glorious fact about love, to me, is its capacity to remain itself no matter what evil can require of it. The quintessential picture of the martyr singing in the flames is the purist example of sanity in the face of the insanity that put him there, but it is a mystery to evil, for the only time evil could sing in the flames is if it were completely insane. (However, to the extent that evil exists, I do actually believe it to be insane.) Nevertheless, evil would never voluntarily sing in the flames out of love.
When it comes to the subject of love, I am speechless. If it took the existence of evil, which puts limits, or, roadblocks, if you will, on love (even though I believe that evil did not have to exist for love to be love) to show what love actually is, then I am equally speechless when it comes to the subject of evil (which must be a possibility for love to be a freely chosen condition). For me to have the ability to choose freely, which love must have, G-d apparently granted not only to me, but to Himself, the possibility of an open-ended future – which is the essence of the dance – where both His choices, as well as my choices, matter. The future, then, to love, is a mutual construct. When I share a yoke with Christ, it is to come into mutual agreement as to what that future must be. I am speechless again.
Laurita, After reading your comments this morning I was confused (not new). It was as if, and I take great liberty to paraphrase John 16:17: “Then said (one) of his disciples among (him)selves, What is this that (s)he saith unto us, “Because, if love is possible, then love has to have the capacity to stoop lower than the object of that love to be able to meet the beloved NO MATTER WHAT”. (I) said therefore, What is this that (s)he saith, “NO MATTER WHAT?” (I) cannot tell what (s)he saith.”
However, after several readings (slow today) and plodding on to the end of your comments my thoughts are thankfully now closer to verses 29 and 30: “His disciple said unto (her), Lo, now speakest thou plainly, and speakest no proverb. Now (I am) sure that thou knowest (SOME) things, and needest not that any man should ask thee: by this (I) believe that thou camest to this (blog).” So thanks once again for being here and sharing from your ‘experienced’ heart. I now understand that love IS the “stooping lower no matter what”, and the “no matter what” was the cross. Shalom. Michael
Laurita, After reading your comments this morning I was confused (not new). It was as if, and I take great liberty to paraphrase John 16:17: “Then said (one) of his disciples among (him)selves, What is this that (s)he saith unto us, “Because, if love is possible, then love has to have the capacity to stoop lower than the object of that love to be able to meet the beloved NO MATTER WHAT”. (I) said therefore, What is this that (s)he saith, “NO MATTER WHAT?” (I) cannot tell what (s)he saith.”
However, after several readings (slow today) and plodding on to the end of your comments my thoughts are thankfully now closer to verses 29 and 30: “His disciple said unto (her), Lo, now speakest thou plainly, and speakest no proverb. Now (I am) sure that thou knowest (SOME) things, and needest not that any man should ask thee: by this (I) believe that thou camest to this (blog).” So thanks once again for being here and sharing from your ‘experienced’ heart. I now understand that love IS the “stooping lower no matter what”, and the “no matter what” was the cross. Shalom. Michael
Sorry for the double entry, but better than a double entendre!
Dear Michael,
You know I shoot from the hip and never know where I am going, and most of the time what I am saying, either. You mostly know me by the spray pattern of the bullet holes I leave in the wall! LOL Thank you for hearing me, as I really don’t know until you know, and so I appreciate your ears very much. You are right! Thank you for hearing the cross! Now I hear it, too!
I have a new goal in life, thanks to you. My desire is to write something that Michael Stanley can read as he runs. I know, I know, a lofty goal and way beyond where I currently am, but when I do, please be sure to let me know. Until then, thank you for your patient muddling through my clear-as-mud efforts! Have a blessed day for you and yours!
The point of prayer and proper way/when to pray and all things related to prayer has been such a struggle since I took a big step away from American Christianity. In one of Skip’s audio lessons (living biblical worldview), I learned how I had made prayer a form of “risk management” requesting God change anything that might be hard, painful or difficult. I have since swung the pendulum to the other side and focused my prayers on being thankful and God helping me or others to accept His will regardless of what it means for me/them even if it seems awful or painful or scary and providing me wisdom so that I know how to do His will. Several passages come to my mind regarding God seemingly having the perogative to change His mind and changing His mind after conversation (aka prayer and repentance?) with one of His Kingdom subjects. Moses seemed to change God’s mind on multiple occasions (ie Numbers 12 for Miriam and Aaron; Exodus 32 for all of Israel). And yet other passages read in English translations seem to say that God can’t/won’t change His mind (ie Numbers 23:19, 1 Sam 15:29). (Maybe if I understood Hebrew and wasn’t reading translations these passages wouldn’t seem to conflict???) But often I would pray out of both sides of my mouth so to speak which led to wishywashyness and anxious fear. I have previously reconciled these passages to mean there are times when God’s will can’t/won’t be changed b/c it MUST BE SO b/c of the end result and other times there is some flexibility that won’t effect the things that MUST BE SO. (Too simple?) Whether He changes His mind, the goal (and prayer) is for me to trust Him through obedience. Sometimes it’s hard to distinguish whether God changed His mind or not and consequences of our actions. I think too often in todays version of American Christianity we have made prayer all about “give me” “bless me” “heal me” “change me” and so I can see why Rabbi Aaron would want to make a distinction between Jewish prayer. But this type of prayer he describes does not really sound like the relationship with the King I would like to have or a relationship at all.
We’re on the same page, Mandy. I especially relate to your comment that my prayers used to be “risk management”. That was me… I realize that now, my attitude in prayer is simply “I am willing, Father. Please, conform me to Your will”. And an interesting “side effect” is that I seem to more quickly “enter in” when I bypass reciting my own solutions to the problem at hand. 🙂
Sometimes I’m asking “what do I need to understand in this” or “what am I missing here?” and sometimes it’s “why did I respond that way to this event?” But always, my questions seem to be some variation of “what (or how) do I need to change?”
Does G-d change His mind? I surely hope so, but I think the attitude of our prayer needs to be that we are obedient in every circumstance, and trusting in both the light and the dark.
I am so glad that my hours in prayer over my years have not been wasted on an unhearing God!
“When trouble disrupts our mythological belief in personal control we cry out to God to set things straight by which we mean returned to us the control we have lost.” Skip wrote that on 07/08/13. It’s written on a Post-it notes stuck above my desk.
I’m with you Mandy and Suzanne, and many others I am sure. My prayer life has been redirected significantly from the goal of mitigating pain towords drawing near to Abba relationally. Very recently it’s become more about moans and groans, sighing and crying in the awesomely strong arms of my merciful, gracious slow to anger and abounding in and loving kindness Abba.
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