Prof. Sam Lehman-Wilzig: Personal Story-Genesis Starts with God: On Belief and Unbelief
A short personal story. A few decades ago as I was putting my 7-year-old son to bed, he looked at me with a serious face and said: “Abba, I want to tell you something.” I thought to myself: “Here comes his occasional confession of some minor infraction.”
“What is it?” I asked, with an inner smile.
“God doesn’t exist,” he replied.
I was dumbfounded (an understatement) – by the very thought, and even more that a 7-year-old was even considering such a heavy topic!
But then again, why not? We all constantly mention the Almighty – whether in saying “With God’s help…,” “My God!” or “God help you…”. Moreover, who doesn’t think about the big question: “who’s really in charge here?” For children of religiously observant parents, it’s particularly hard to avoid God altogether – especially during this time of the year when we start the annual Torah reading cycle with the very first verse from Genesis: “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.”
I’ve long been thinking about my son’s ”admission,” and have come to the conclusion that our tendency to Believe-in-God (or not) is something that we are born with i.e., it’s part of a person’s nature. Of course, deep in their hearts many people are somewhere in the middle: agnostic – not sure that S/He exists, but also not certain that some sort of an Almighty Being doesn’t exist.
True, this isn’t only a matter of a person’s nature. Socialization is a large part of it as well (family and peer environment) – although that is a greater influence on the way we express our religion than the actual belief itself. In short, it’s Nature and Nurture.
There’s a third aspect that is less talked about, but might well be central to a person’s level of belief: existential angst. I know that’s a mouthful. Simply put, this involves two quite different things: 1- The human fear of “nothingness” regarding what happens after they die; 2- The nagging question: is there any rhyme or reason to life (or even to the universe)?
The first fear can be felt at an early age, especially when a young person sees someone in the family (or close friend’s family member) pass away. This doesn’t mean that everyone – child and adult – will find succor in God’s hands. Many people will not accept a Being that they can’t see, hear, or touch – indeed, one who’s completely invisible. True, for a 3-year-old the “virtual” is real (make-believe characters they converse with); by the age of 7 or thereabouts, the only real is the really real – for them, “make-believe is for babies.” But for much of humanity, it’s not “make-believe” but rather that they really do believe. Or should I say, I really need to believe.
Which brings me to the “war” between atheists and believers. My first reaction to my son’s statement was to try and convince him otherwise. But I stopped myself, for if a young boy can come to such a conclusion by himself (he certainly didn’t get this from our home!), why try at this stage to argue with what is (for him) a very natural position? Yet, there’s a converse lesson here too: why should atheists try to convince religious believers of their “error”?
Here’s why they shouldn’t. Let’s try a “thought experiment.” You are told by a doctor friend with many years of experience as a family GP, that for so-called ailments that don’t have any medication the best thing she does is to prescribe for the “patient” a placebo pill to be taken three times a day. “It’s amazing how many of my patients return after a while thanking me for the great medicine I had them take!”
Do you then run off to inform her patients that it is all a scam; the “medicine” is a sugar pill? Of course not! Why not? Because in fact, it works! Now instead of the above doctor’s vignette, substitute “existential angst” for “ailment,” and “God and prayer” for the “placebo pill.” You as an atheist might feel that they are being duped; they feel (and actually receive) relief from their spiritual “ailment.”
Thus, there is nothing so exasperating as religious people who try to convince atheists that God exists – and equally maddening, atheists who try to undercut religious belief of the observant and the worshipper. If both sides are happy with their unbelief or belief, they should leave the other side alone.
However, there’s still one last, gigantic question. All this might be fine and dandy on the micro-individual level but don’t religious belief, and conversely atheism, have consequences on the macro-societal level? I’ll relate to that question another time.
