So it's Yom Kippur. The day of atonement. The most religious day in the Jewish calendar. I haven't eaten for 6½ hours, and I wont eat for another 18½ or so. As I have done for the last 19 years.
But here's the thing that makes this year a bit different.
I no longer believe in God
Which makes this whole fasting thing, this whole atonement thing, this whole asking God for forgiveness a little bit of a dichotomy.
So I'm not exactly sure when I stopped believing in God. There wasn't one single moment where it happened. It happened somewhere in the course of the last 12 months or so. It happened mainly as the result of two concepts I was reading about at the time.
Now I'm not going to go into why Intelligent Design is a super idiotic argument, especially touted as science. There are enough resources that do that. But this idiocy, thanks to the Kansas school board, was quite public with lots of stuff being written on it (by both sides) at the time I was reading a very complicated science book on string theory.
Actually I read a few books on science that dealt with the origins of the universe around this time, but string theory (and it's more complex offspring, m-theory) really got me thinking what a incredibly complex place the universe is. I mean really really complex. Like complex on a level that makes arguments about 'evolution' being complex seem a bit ludicrous. Yeah our biology is pretty impressive, and we don't understand it all. But we understand a hell of a lot more than me do about what happened to the other 6 (or possible 7) dimensions in the universe that are sitting around folded in on themselves.
So I'm looking at all these arguments about creationism, intelligent design, and thinking "Dudes, never mind evolution, why would a god meddle with our biology, but not the rest of the far more complicated universe" . To witch the obvious counter argument is "Well God did that too".
But it just makes no sense. So God created this super complicated universe, with all this really complicated science governing it, and then took some time out, to pop to this backwater planet on the edge of some shitty galaxy in the middle of fucking no where (cosmically speaking), to fiddle with out biology and give us eyes and some other things we can't yet explain by evolution (or create dinosaur fossils, if you really want to put forward a stretch argument). A little full of our own self importance me thinks. It just makes sense.
Look if a God/entity/deity/thing exists above and beyond the normal order of things, it created the conditions for the big bag and then let things run. We're not the ants in the ant farm, but the sand. The god of our religious & spiritual texts (all of them, from Jewish to Islam to people who dance around Stonehenge in white sheets) simply cannot exist. It make no sense.
See what used to happen is we created gods to explain phenomena that we didn't understand. So we had a god of lightning and a god for the sun rising and a god for this and a god for that. These days we consider ourselves enlightened and have eliminated this pantheon of gods from the olds days for the "One true God". Except all we have really done is create a god for the one thing we no longer can explain, why we are, and what our purpose is. We have essentially created a god of philosophy. I'm sure future generations will laugh as they look back on us the same we we do on the ancient Greeks, romans and Egyptians.
Which brings me back to Yom Kippur and fasting. And why I am doing it. The short answer being, "I don't really know" and the slightly longer answer being "Because I've done it for near on 20 years and stopping now feels like more of a waste than doing it, and I'm still Jewish by tradition".
But it's not quite that simple. And it's a lot harder not eating pork and keeping Pesach and fasting, when you don't believe in God as opposed to "just kinda not being all that religious/observant". So I'm still doing it, but it was much easier to do when it had a little more than tradition going for it.
In other words, I haven't resolved internally how to deal with my lack of believe in a God but still being Jewish. I don't know if I ever will. I assume I might one day. We'll see.
1. Matt
If I may indulge these are very, very similar reasons to mine for “why I don’t eat meat”. Short answer: Dunno. Long answer: Haven’t done it for 29-ish years (except for the odd slip, once or twice), don’t really need to do it, no point starting now, my parents would be very disappointed, I would feel disappointed with myself, etc.
Knowledge says humans would never have reached the levels of intelligence we currently have without hunting animals and eating their meat. I think we’ve evolved beyond that, because the way meat is brought to our tables now does not involve us performing anything that uses our intelligence. And I think we’ve evolved beyond the need for religion too, for the same reasons you outline. I feel anyone who feels the need to staunchly believe (as in properly believe, not just a “go to mass/church at Christmas”-kinda ‘belief’) in any particular god may be searching for meaning or purpose in their lives, where actually, we’re just piles of random-ish chemical reactions and stardust.
I don’t think we’ll ever evolve beyond the need for tradition though, and religious traditions will outlive the religions, imho.
2. annie
Interesting. Even more interesting is what you’ll do if you have kids… (There was an almighty row in the family when my nephew was born & it came to the question of circumcision.)
Matt, ‘religious traditions will outlive the religions’ - it would be nice to think that, I don’t know what it’s like in Ireland but here Christmas has mutated into a hideous Festival of Consumerism.
3. Dad
Interestingly in the Jewish religion a belief in God is secondary to observing ritual. If one were devout the actual act of religious tradition be it fasting, not eating non kosher food or reciting ritual prayer would be considered adequate to do Gods will even if you had doubts as to God’s existence.
Great emphasis is placed on doing those things that define a moral way of life. The 10 commandments has one (maybe two) commandments regarding not having any other Gods (says nothing about believing) and then has a host of restrictions about playing with your neighbours wife etc. All the fun things are prohibited.
The instruction to fast comes from a throw away line in Leviticus16 which is a passage more about Atonement for your sins and getting a goat (scape-goat) to help absolve you from your sins. So fasting is about self discipline, tradition, introspection. Most of us fast because its just too easy not too. People climb mountains just to prove they can it’s not much different. It creates a day of introspection and self discipline.
As to a belief in a greater being who created the world well join the very long queue of people who like you have struggled with the concept of “what’s it all about” Are we just a bunch of smart chemicals that by their makeup have given us a degree of consciousness or is there something more too it. What remains after death? A heap of useless DNA or does your consciousness continue.
The problem is that whilst there is a lot of circumstantial evidence that predicates the survival of some essence there is no proof in the classical scientific sense. And let’s not go there again I recall an endless discussion on this point some time ago.
Having spent much time reading and studying eastern philosophies, and to a lesser extent some Jewish mysticism I find the language of modern science such as string theory beginning to sound more like the religious philosophy of these mystics. I recall reading about the multiple dimensions of the universe and how they were hidden inside each other 40 years ago accept it came from a book on yoga philosophy and the only proof offered was it was the word of a person considered self realised and he could not care less whether you believed him or not.
So fast because it’s good for you (your mother says so and that’s non negotiable) and believe or don’t it really does not matter and you can always change your mind later or not.
Dad
4. Destructor
There was an almighty row in the family when my nephew was born & it came to the question of circumcision
Who won? The rationals or the child abusers? I’m all for the joys of tradition, but I think it has its limits- and chopping part of someone’s dick off is like way, way over the limit.
5. Adrian
Discussions about circumcision are off topic and will be delete if using the words “child abusers”. I will not have this post subverted with weighted language that insults my entire culture and history regardless of ones opinion on God.
6. Destructor
Fair enough- to be continued elsewhere.
My fast continues well, although I always wake up with a dry mouth and was dying for a drink this morning.
7. Jack
Oooh Sevitz, I do love it when you get all uppity.
I don’t have a need for the comfort in believing there’s more to life than random chance or the reassurance and security that comes with following tradition, so I don’t believe in any kind of god. Despite parents who do I never have done; perhaps in the end you either need to be indoctrinated or have blind faith in things you can’t prove to sustained belief, and I was definately born without that capacity.
8. nrgza
Interesting post Ade - got me thinking about the traditions I observe, if any, despite the fact that I’m a bit iffy on the religion front.
Christmas is a very weird one, because I was never in the kind of family that all went to Mass in the morning or anything devout like that. We were all (including parents) in it for the family time and, yes, the prezzies.
You spent a Christmas with me last year, and we observed the day, had the tree, but not a carol nor a cross in sight. I was just happy to take the time to hang out and eat loads and drink with mates.
I’m not sure I’m comfortable with that, when I frame it that way. Or with the fact that since then, I haven’t been inside a church for un-tourist reasons. Hmmmm.
9. Calista
Fascinating conversation!
Okay…I have a few questions for you.
Where are you going to go when you die, Adrian? Do you believe you have a soul?
10. Adrian
I don’t know where I’m going when I die or if I go anywhere. I guess I’ll find out when I die. I don’t think it has any influence on my current plane of existance if it proves to be something more than nothing. I’d likely suspect I’ll return to the universe as some sort of energy, which is what we all are anyway.
Do I belive I have a soul? I belive I have life? Do I think their is something more to life than life itself? Not really. Life is what life is, and like not understanding why the Nile flooded and calling it the God Ra, not understanding life and calling it a soul is about the same.
Or course I might find out I’m wrong when I die. But until then no one can prove anything one way or the other, so the argument is fairly intellectual and nothing more.
Even if we have a soul, I don’t think their is much to it in the manner of our religous texts. Rather it’s a bit of science which we don’t understand yet.
11. Gordon
Hmmmm, the only part I don’t get is the “I’m still Jewish by tradition” line.
How can you be religious by tradition? Religion is based on belief, not tradition surely? If you don’t believe you aren’t religious.
Now if you had said that you were observing the fast through habit, that I’d have gone with, but to say you are doing this through tradition (which in most cultures has roots in religion) suggests that you still haven’t fully made peace with yourself.
From long discussions with a friend who is a priest, he does admit that whilst “lack of faith” is tolerated by all, ultimately “lack of belief” means you are non-religious. It’s a thin, and arguable line, but there you have it… so said a priest, he must know, right?
12. Adrian
Gordon, what I meant by that is pretty much the same as all the people I know who don’t believe in God but still give and receive Christmas presents, and do the whole Christmas shebang. They are Christian by tradition not by faith.
Judaism is as much a identity as a religion. You’re Scottish, I’m Jewish. You’re Christian (I think), I’m Jewish.
And much of the followings of a religion, the trappings and the things you do are far more based in tradition than faith or belief. Dig into almost any religious tradition and you find it’s more based on a previous tradition and often has no basis in any sort of faith or belief at all.
13. Gordon
Damn. Caught bang to rights.
Well I say PHOOEY to all that, and you ain’t getting an Xmas pressie from me! HAHA!
Ummmm
Actually, what the hell does being a Christian have to do with Xmas these days? I say the tradition is consumerist, not Christianist. But yes, that’s a thin excuse of an argument.
There is no “God” anyway so this is all kinda bunkum at best.
14. Stuart
Whenever I’m asked about my religion, I say, rather stupidly now I come to think of it, ‘Lapsed Catholic’ which suggests that my religion is like a library book still knocking about the house but I haven’t gotten around to renewing it in ages.
I am an atheist, but I have a lot of friends who identify themselves with their religion, either culturally or through active personal belief, and while all my thoughts actions and conversation points are atheistic, labelling myself as a not-too-bothered, ex-religious person is less aggressive towards them and their choices than saying that I refute the existence of any deity whatsoever.
The BEST analogy of religion (well…the anthropic principle really, which when faced with Intelligent Design and its ilk boils down to the same thing) that I’ve come across is that of the sentient puddle. The puddle thinks to itself ‘Wow, I really fit into this hole! There is no part of me that doesn’t fit this hole perfectly. I must have been made to fit this hole. I wonder who made me this way?’
15. Ella
oddly enough four years ago at a bbq we were discussing string theory (and drinking cocktails)
16. Vaughan
Hey dude, have you ever read up about Unitarian Christianity. Very interesting.
17. Adrian
Interesting from a religious perspective. Although I would probably side with Dawkins on how religion and science can’t really support each other.
The Chamberlain tactic of snuggling up to ‘sensible’ religion, in order to present a united front against (‘intelligent design’) creationists, is fine if your central concern is the battle for evolution. That is a valid central concern, and I salute those who press it, such as Eugenie Scott in Evolution versus Creationism. But if you are concerned with the stupendous scientific question of whether the universe was created by a supernatural intelligence or not, the lines are drawn completely differently. On this larger issue, fundamentalists are united with ‘moderate’ religion on one side, and I find myself on the other.
18. Oormi
Nice post! You have argued your case well. I also believe that future generations will laugh at our cultural beliefs of a Supreme Creator. The elements were Gods to our ancestors who didn’t know better. Am sure that as science unravels the mysteries of our Existence,there will come a time when our present beliefs will be punctured… Till then, I remain an agnostic…