God, Agnosticism, and the Jew Explored

"Can an agnostic still be a good Jew?"

I asked the question, "Can an agnostic still be a good Jew?" to a visiting American Rabbi during his lecture in the holy city on the 'Meaning of God.' As an agnostic Jew, I already had the answer for myself. Nonetheless, I was particularly interested in hearing the perspective of a prominent Rabbi who derived his answer on the meaning of God from a predetermined acceptance that God exists. As the saying goes, curiosity killed the agnostic……the cat.

"You are just agnostic about God, not about Judaism," the Rabbi said as he swiftly moved on to the next question.

For some, this answer may make little sense, especially to devout Christians or Muslims, but from the perspective of being Jewish, it is perfectly sensible. Aside from the self-explanatory fact that being Jewish is an identity that extends beyond the bounds of a belief system and into the realm of ethnicity, the parameters of Judaism allow for the questioning of such a paradox. Allow me to explain.

At bottom, religious people believe they know there is a God and atheists believe they know there is no God, I'm still not convinced about the reality of God. Meaning, there is no compelling proof for the existence of God, the divine, or the supernatural. I don't discount the possibility. Instead, I believe this is something that remains unknown and unknowable for humans.

If I were to contemplate the possibility of a God, I often find myself looking at intangible entities, such as thoughts through the perspective of metaphysics and epistemology. Through this lens, we understand that something does not necessarily need to be material to exist. Thoughts, as mental phenomena, exist within our minds and are evidenced by our awareness and introspection. When we think, reflect, imagine, or perceive, we are engaging with the reality of our thoughts. However, this differs from the traditional claims made by most believers or organized religions about the existence of the divine, which is the topic at hand. 

For the sake of argument, let's say God exists. What if God sits there perpetually wondering whether He exists or does not exist? Out of His questioning, a whole world is generated—with beings like us who go around asking, "Is this for real, or what?" Now, you might say, "That's nuts. Why would God (if He exists) be unsure of His own existence?"

Well, consider this perspective: Who originated the very concept of existence?

Atheists fundamentally view existence as a given, something that just is. They don't contemplate non-existence. For atheists, existence is attributed to natural processes, evolution, and chance interactions in the cosmos, devoid of inherent divine purpose or meaning. That's atheism in a word: Things just are. (Okay, three words.)

A believer will claim that God came up with the idea of existence. Through the lens of Judaism, oftentimes people cite that this can be found in God's name itself. God in Hebrew means 'The Isifier' (bringing something into existence) - as in we is and He ises us.

If a believer, believes that God conceived the idea of existence and non-existence (categorized as A and B), then God must have faced a pivotal decision: whether He Himself should belong in category A or B.

Maimonides, the great 12th-century codifier of our beliefs (and non-beliefs)—just so everybody can argue about it for the next thousand years—writes that God cannot be called an existence. Existence has some sort of definition, as in "exist as what?" If God were to exist, then something would have had to 'existify' Him—which means He wouldn't be God. Therefore, by this definition, God does not exist.

Beyond that, free choice also implies the non-existence of God. If He existed, then—being the all-encompassing, all-powerful being that God is—He wouldn't leave any possibility for my free choice. There just isn't room for the two of us. Free choice, in other words, means that I exist, I make my own decisions, and run my own life. Therefore, God does not exist.

However, one could ask, what is it that I have free choice to decide? After all, there has to be something meaningful to decide in order to make a choice. Meaning, purpose, inherent value—those are just other code words for God, a believer would say. So the choice is whether I do what God wants me to do or not, which means that God exists.

Belief in an omnipotent, benevolent, and omniscient God presents another fundamental challenge known as the problem of evil: The reasoning is straightforward. If God exists, there cannot be evil. Because evil is the absence of good—and if God is here and God is good, some even say within us, how could there be anything here but good? So the existence of evil implies that God does not exist. Believers, lacking a rational explanation, often attribute evil to human nature. In more troubling scenarios, they resort to enigmatic responses such as "the ways of the Lord are unfathomable" or "things happen for a reason." Therefore, the existence of evil seemingly negates the existence of God.

But here's the twist: If God does not exist, how can evil exist? Evil, devoid of divine attribution, becomes a mere facet of existence. Therefore, the very existence of evil presupposes the existence of God. Once again, the conundrum of evil presents a scenario where God simultaneously exists and does not exist.

Let's delve into the core of the quandary: Existence. How does anything exist? Only because it is sustained by God, the great Isifier (as described above). So, for anything to exist, God must exist. Or so religion would have one believe.

But not so fast: What is it that the Isifier (blessed be He) is isifying? Whatever it is, it is not Him—because if it were Him, then He hasn't isified a thing, has He? Existence must be that which is not God. Reduce that to: God does not exist.

So existence itself is an agnostic state, akin to Schrödinger's cat sitting in the box neither alive nor dead and not even a little bit in between. This is what the quantum physicist calls "qubit entanglement" or "an indeterminate state."

Now that you're just as confused as I am: Who will untangle the qubits, open the box, determine the state of the world and of God, and relieve Him (shall He exit) of His grand conundrum? Who will let Him come into His universe and exist here along with us?

There's only one hero of the story I can think of, and that is us. In effect, we are God's conscience. There is no proof for God’s existence or non-existence; nearly everything on either end of the scale is utterly contradictory, and ultimately, we decide whether He should live in this place or not.

Simply put, if enough people believe God exists, then He exists, by the fact that he wields the power over the world that humans attribute to him. If enough people believe God does not exist, then He wields none of the power attributed to him today by organized religion or believers.