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Man and science's place in creation and faith FEEDBACK APPRECIATED
The world was ready for man.
To see the light through the mist would not be easy, but it could be done if man were honest in seeking the truth rather than satisfying his animal desires. Because it could be done, man was required to do it.
Because it was not an easy task, he would be amply deserving of reward if he achieved it.
Thus, the Divine satisfied the motive of creation: He would be able to confer good upon man, but it would not be cheap, undeserved good.
Man could attain it only by elevating the spiritual in himself and by uniting it with the spiritual in creation. He would see the universe for what it was, a camouflage disguising what was truly meaningful and eternal. He would realize that in total immersion in the Bible even amid poverty, hunger, and thirst, lay a degree of happiness and contentment in this world that was infinitely greater than any to be found in wealth, luxury, and self-indulgence (see Ethics of the Fathers 6:1).
To whatever extent he is able to accomplish that, man attains a degree of perfection that is somewhat akin to that of his Maker. By uniting his intellect with that of G0D through the study of Bible (Torah) and by perfecting his deeds through his performance of the commandments, man earns the degree of perfection that it is possible for him to attain, and the degree of reward that G0D seeks to give.
IN ALL OF CREATION, ONLY MAN HAS UNLIMITED FREEdom of choice. The forces of nature have no such freedom. The natural forces are under the control of angels who serve as the intermediaries in carrying out G0D's will. Thus we find references in the words of the Sages to the angels of the sea, the angels of individual nations, even the angels of blades of grass. These angelic ministers carry out G0D's dictate throughout the universe. The Jewish people began to attain this degree of holiness through the deeds of Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yaakov.
Until the time of the Patriarchs, all men were equal both in their calling and in their opportunity to achieve the Heavenly goal set for them. But the ten generations up to Noach failed to achieve their mission, and the ten generations from Noah to Abraham failed again until Abraham founded the nation that would become G0D's chosen one.
DESPITE THE LAWS OF NATURE AND THE ANGELS WHO carry them out, there is a power higher than them --- man. For it was given to him, through his free choice, to make nature yield to him.
Throughout the Torah are sprinkled blessings that will come to man if he makes the Bible his love and the commandments his pursuit. Indeed, as Ramban (d. 1270) explains, this is one of the great miracles of creation. It is not at all surprising that man can sanctify himself and earn the blessings of holiness through immersion in spiritual pursuits. That souls can cleave to G0D after they leave their bodies, or that righteous human beings can be rewarded with the superhuman height of prophecy is not at all surprising: spiritual attainment is deserving of spiritual reward.
But rain, prosperity, security, triumph over enemies? Why should the study of Torah or the performance of commandments affect crops, bank accounts, and battles? That is one of the great miracles of creation.
For that reason the Torah declines to promise spiritual reward instead of material ones; the first are understood, the second could never be fathomed had not the Torah made them plain. It is clear, therefore, that man's deeds are not statistics in a personal ledger. They can split the sea and stop the sun, water the desert and silence a cannon, because the world's existence is founded in the spirit of G0D. It is covered and camouflaged, but without it there is no universe, for without G0D's Presence -- open or concealed -- nothing can exist. Man can unite himself in thought and deed with that Presence. When he does so he has fulfilled the purpose of creation, and creation bends to his needs.
MORE WORLDS THAN ONE
Even in this world of obscurity and hiddenness, there are still many levels of existence --- many worlds.
Can one say that the great and holy sage and the avaricious criminal inhabit the same world in any save the physical sense? Do the intellectual and the aborigine live in the same world? A person's world consists of far more than sand and sea --- in essence the physical peculiarities of his existence are no more important than the brown paper bag in which a treasure may be wrapped.
In these terms, we can catch the merest glimpse of the vast difference between essence and appurtenance. Some people do indeed believe that clothes makes the man, while others know that worth makes him.
Some judge a person by his cover, others by his content. Is it merely figurative to say that the truly holy did not inhabit the same world as Hitler and Stalin? Just as there are parallel lines of existence between righteous and wicked, so, too, there are higher worlds than any we can conceive of.
The Sages tell us that there is a parallel to Jerusalem's Holy Temple in heaven that awaits the final redemption, when it will descend to earth. It is not a building of brick and mortar. There is a spiritual Beis HaMikdash which will one day become clothed in physical form and take shape on earth just as the Torah of black fire on white fire took the form of parchment and ink and earthly commandments. There was a physical Garden of Eden and there is a Heavenly paradise --- the first is the physical manifestation of the second. When Jacob returned to the land of Canaan he saw a company of angels and named the place Machanaim, twin camps. Ramban explains that there were two camps -- one, a company of angels on high; the other, Yaakov's company below. The one below was the human complement of the one above -- except that it was greater, because creation came into being to serve it and to be influenced by it.
EVEN FAMILIAR SIGHTS ExIST ON LEVELS BEYOND OUR perception. With this concept, Rabbi Moshe Chaim Luzzatto (d. 1746), in Adir BaMarom, explains many seemingly difficult Talmudic passages concerning the sun.
"The sun should have set in the middle of the sky" (Sanhedrin 91b) --- how is this possible? "He splits the windows of the firmament and removes the sun from its place" (Traditional Jewish prayer book) --- but the earth is round and it circles the sun continuously; from what "place" is the sun removed?
The fact is, however, that although the sun, the moon, and the stars are physical things, they are also the garb of metaphysical properties and emanations by which G0D infuses spiritual life into creation. Whenever the Sages refer to astronomical phenomena that contradict observable facts, they are referring to this spiritual aspect -- the higher world -- of those heavenly bodies.
It is certainly true that, because the earth is round, there is no factual basis for saying that any point on the globe is "the east" --- wherever one stands on earth, there is always a point farther east as one continues to go round and round, nor does the world have a top or center. But in a higher sense, it has.
The Even Shessiah stone (situated atop Jerusalem's Temple Mount) is the top, the center, because it was the beginning of creation and remained forever the point of utmost holiness on earth.
There are other holy places on earth: houses of worship, study halls, the Holy Land, homes that are founded upon and guided by biblical dictates. It is upon such places that G0D smiles in the benevolent glow of His Presence with emanations that are dispatched to earth by means of the sun.
When the sun moves above a place that is deserving of these spiritual rays, G0D removes the higher sun from its place in heaven. It proceeds through the "windows" of the firmament and imperceptibly melds with the ball of gas that astronomers call the sun. When the sun goes by the repositories of spirituality on earth, it is indeed fitting that "it should set in the midst of the sky": the spiritual manifestation should cease to radiate, not the gaseous mass that provides light, heat, and energy --- that physical body rotates endlessly, serving its planetary satellites everywhere on earth. That, too, is part of the sun's task, just as it is part of a teacher's job to apply Band-aids and care for bloody noses. But his main task is to inspire a child with a love of Torah and an unquenchable desire to make it his.
The sun does all the things that scientists say it does, but their vision fails them before they can bask in its spiritual rays. All of this is part of the creation in which we live: limitation upon limitation, level after level.
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Each person lives in his own world with the responsibility to climb to a higher one and the danger that he will stumble and fall to a lower one. Each person can be buffeted by the angelic enforcers of the laws of nature, or he can rise above them and bend them to his greatness. He can be one more earthly creature, hardly rising above animal life, or he can become the fulfillment of G0D's wish when He created heaven and earth and said: (Genesis 1) Let us make man.
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