Posted on 12/26/2010 5:51:21 PM PST by jdlevy95
Even the honest atheist will agree that a first cause, an original being, must have preceded the universe. This original cause or source is what so humbled Einstein, although he incorrectly described it as a religious experience. The questions of faith begin with how we understand this First Cause, its nature, and its relationship to us and to the universe.
The Christian perspective on the relationship between reason and faith is, I believe, quite different than that espoused by the author of your article. There is no law that is not based on reason, because all that God does is reasonable, and all good law is rooted in Him and therefore in reason. It is only because we lack full access to all the facts and infinite capacity of intellect that sometimes G-d’s acts and laws appear to us unreasonable. But we are not the measure of reason. He is.
Furthermore, in Christianity, we are invited to contemplate the question of his existence as a distinct being who exists independently of the physical universe and as a Person with whom we can have a relationship. The fact that he belongs to the class of things we designate as a First Cause does not mean he may be reduced to any arbitrary chain of infinite physical causation. It is little more than a parlor trick to say that everyone accepts God’s existence because everyone believes in the notion of First Cause. Christians are constrained by Scripture to see more there, to accept that He does dispense justice, does confer with angels, and definitely has a demonstrated capacity for localized self-expression, ubiquitous though he may be.
Christians, however, are likely to object to any teaching which tends to pantheism, such as the following passage from another article on the website you reference (chabad.org):
“The essence of a Jew, that which makes him Jewish, is his soul, and his soul is not a creation. The soul of the Jew is an eternal, infinite part of the eternal, infinite G-d; the Jew is a piece of G-d. Whoever has this soul is Jewish. Whoever doesn’t have this soul is not Jewish, but rather is a human being created by G-d, created in the six days of creation through G-d’s speech.” See http://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/2902/jewish/What-Is-the-Cause-of-Antisemitism.htm
The foregoing statement almost seems to be a parody of the Apostle Paul’s position that Jewish chosenness was a two-tier arrangement, where there were revelational benefits to being ethnically Jewish but true spiritual Jews were those chosen for faith in Jesus, regardless of ethnicity. But Paul never ventures the pantheistic premise that any soul, Jewish or otherwise, is an uncreated manifestation of the Deity. Therefore, while some may find value in the assorted doctrines emanating from the site you reference, I believe you will find most knowledgeable Christians regard such teachings as damaged goods.
Respectfully,
SR
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