I will admit that I have not read all your posts here, so you’ll have to forgive my ignorance.

I personally believe that it is God’s charge that we evolve – that we ask the questions – and that we have the wisdom to find the answers that make sense to us. In the end it’s only our own quiet voice inside ourselves that we can truly trust. In my way of thinking, that IS the voice of God.

I believe we are all here on our own spiritual journey and for each of us, it is a different one. There are many ways to know God. How we know him is rarely wrong.

So, I applaud you in that regard.

My one response to your reference to Abraham and his belief that God was asking him to sacrifice his son: Was it God’s charge to do that where this story goes so wrong or is it man’s perception of God that was so misguided? I think if nothing else it shows that we have indeed evolved into more sophisticated beings both physically and spiritually.

We both know that in today’s society that parents who hear the voice of God tell them to kill their children are either very ill or criminally responsible. Never is it in our minds that God ACTUALLY asked that of them. Is it God who has changed or is it us as human beings who have evolved precisely as I believe is God’s plan all along.

I heard once that God is a building with many doors in. If I could encourage you it would be to see God as he is today, not as he was perceived to be thousands of years ago.

Many of the mantras you recite in your post I believe can and do reflect our evolved awareness of God. Don’t rule out his excistence quite yet. It is possible to understand that the “I” – this god – can include the person (the body), the spirit, and a higher power. We are not separate from God. He is not “out there” and we are “over here.”

We are truly one just as the drop of the water in the ocean IS the ocean. Where does one drop end and the other begin? The drop could not exist on it’s own. It would dry up and disappear. Together we are the sea.

Again, I applaud you for asking the questions. What is real and what is our human misguided perceptions of the truth about God. If you are too quick to think you have all the answers nailed down, you might be making the same mistake all humans and religions (including “Objectivism”) have made since the beginning of time.

Love you and can’t wait to see you on the 16th!

Aunt Karen

Very nice to read. I actually have a similar story where I think my children for my current understanding. I read The Fountainhead and then Atlas Shrugged and then a bunch of Ayn Rand’s non-fiction about 6 or 7 years ago. It was awesome. But I noted the obvious conflicts and contradictions as well with Objectivism and the Christian world view I had accepted. I attempted to reconcile what I was learning and what I could see as true with was taught to me my whole life by family, friends and teachers. Over that time when faced with the contradiction of “I think vs. they say” I blinked quite a few times to avoid the conclusion that may upset my family members. Actually to be a little more fair to a person who was overcoming a lifetime of indoctrination I’ll say I deferred judgement pending more information.

I spent a long time not thinking much about it until posed with the question of how to educate my two daughters. I realized I was ill equipped to judge what was “good” education versus “poor” education. Beyond obvious necessities like reading and mathematics, but even then, how to judge what was going to be effective at teaching.

This was early last year, and I went to the root of the problem which is, I now know, fundamental questions on epistemology: how do I know what I know? And how do I know what is true versus what is false?

I knew from my prior study that Ayn Rand had some definite thoughts on that so along with some other lines of investigation I got a copy of Dr. Leonard Peikoff’s lecture “The Philosophy of Education” from the Ayn Rand Bookstore. And over the next 15 months or so every free hour was spent in detailed study of Objectivism various arguments for or against. And in detailed thought about truth, the importance of ideas and the identification and uprooting a lot of false ideas that I had accepted without even realizing it.

Earlier this year I began calling myself an Objectivist as I accepted that her philosophy was correct. And although the atheism thing caused a minor stir with family members by the time I became sure of it the idea of god was a minor issue. The thing that really broke the bank for me was overcoming skepticism I had picked up in college. It was a lecture series Dr. Peikoff had given called the Art of Thinking and when I hit the part on certainty, statistics and skepticism. It really made a lot of my thinking clear. It was when I learned that omniscience is not the standard of knowledge but reason and the evidence of the senses.

In any case, I am wrestling with Objectivism and Judaism, which seems to be harder, because there is no creed, no requirement that one accept a particular concept of G-d, rather Jews tend to posit that G-d exists, but do not do much theologizing in the Christian sense. And Judaism is as much an identity as it is a religion. The emphasis is on behavior rather than on belief. In my dialogues with some Christians, particularly the Evangelicals, I come across a lot of misunderstanding of Judaism. I see it in your post as well. (I have no opinion on Islam in this regard because I do not know its stories).

Christians borrowed the Hebrew Bible, but have a completely different and much more literal understanding of it. For example, Judaism does not have a concept of original sin. Judaism teaches that the human being is ‘very good’ and that physical existence is very good. (I realize that the word physical here is redundant, but I find that with Christians, I must use it because they have inherited the Greek Mind-Body problem). Judaism never has just one interpretation of a story from the Bible, and the same is true of Genesis 2, the garden story, the second creation myth in the Bible. But original sin is not featured in any of them. (The Talmud and the Midrash–Jewish commentaries–are one long argument carried out over the centuries). Judaism does not need to put a negative gloss on this story because Judaism does not need the doctrine of Original Sin to explain the crucifixion of a god.

The same is true of the Akeda–the story of Abraham and the near sacrifice of Isaac. Quite a few commentators thought that this story was a warning of how easy it is to assume that what your neighbors are doing is what G-d wants you to do. (In this case, Abraham’s neighbors were throwing their firstborns into the fires of the god Moloch) There is a story in which the messenger (that is what the Hebrew says) who stops the near murder of Isaac is Sarah, the mother of the child. In any case, very few of the Midrashim praise Abraham for the incident. Again, Judaism does not have to praise a father for sacrificing his son, because Judaism does not posit that the crucifixion of the son of that father is salvific.

Maybe you can see my problem? I love my people, and I understand the stories through Jewish eyes, and since there are no creeds, Jews are not enjoined to believe specific things –even regarding the existence of G-d.. (When Maimonides introduced a creed, manyEuropean Jewish communities burned it in the streets). The ideas of Judaism in regard to original sin, suffering (we have suffered alot but we have never thought that was good thing or how it should be), money and prosperity, the goodness of life and it’s value, are the same in Objectivism. However, in a discussion with C. August at Titanic Deck Chairs that was dropped by him before completion, I got the sense that I cannot be Jewish–even though I do not believe in a omniscient, omnipotent god–and also study Objectivism.

And I understand from your blog, that you cannot be Christian–and that I understand more clearly–because Christianity demands a total allegience and submission of the mind (as does Islam). Judaism does not. It allows many arguments and there is no authority that can demand a set of specific beliefs.

Many Jews, who would protest their identity as Jews to their dying breath, do not believe in any god. But they act like Jews and love and appreciate the myths, stories, customs and traditions that Judaism has developed, understanding them in a completely non-dogmatic way. (By definition Judaism has no dogma since we have no central authority to enforce it).

So, perhaps you can understand my problem. I see Objectivism as a philosophy that states the truth about the world and about human beings. And I also see myself as a Jew, as a member of a unique people, a people who have sensibilities that I enjoy and that are utterly familiar to me.

I thought that you might have some understanding of my problem, and that you could help me identify the main problems with my situation, should you wish to do so.

Finally, congratulations on the birth of your son, and upon your momentous personal discoveries.

Glad you’re reading the blog. I’ll try to respond to more of this later, but I did want to address to one of your comments now.

You say, “Takes a lot of faith to be an atheist.”

I do not agree. It takes very little faith to be an atheist. In fact – it takes none. All it takes is a refusal to believe anything without any objective evidence for it. It is not on the atheist to disprove the existence of God, but on the believer to provide evidence for his existence. That’s why Christianity, and indeed all modern religion, has been set up on the foundation of non-provability. Believers and Non-believers alike all acknowledge that God must be accepted on faith alone – you can’t wait on proof to believe in him – because there isn’t any. I remember that lesson well from Sunday School.

In general we’ll probably have to agree to disagree on this issue. I know you and Tara are strong believers – and I strongly believe that my point of view is correct.

Sounds like we’ll be seeing each other in a couple of weeks. Looking forward to catching up!

John

(For non-family members in the audience – Wayne is my cousin and David is his brother-in-law.)