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Nathan Lopes Cardozo

Judaism Begins with Awe

It was the man some call the “father of philosophy, Thales (624-547, BCE), who taught me to ask the big questions. I had found his ideas in my father’s small library on philosophy when I was about 14 years old. The books, wherein I discovered Thales, were written by Will Durant who, in a brilliant way, simplified philosophical concepts understandably.

But Thales annoyed me. He confronted me with questions I had never thought about and, to be honest, did not want to think about: What is existence? Why is there “existence” at all? What is the essence of all that manifests itself in different forms—mountains, wind, water, stars, human beings…? Why do things happen as they do?

And the greatest question of all: Why do human beings think? How is it possible that the physical brain is able to produce a non-physical thought? Is it true that thoughts are just manifestations produced by electrochemical processes? And if that is the case, how much does it really explain what thought entails?

Other big questions asked by philosophy include: Is the world merely physical? What is the origin of the Cosmos? If it is true that the universe is everlasting, as many Greek philosophers believed, how then does it produce the transient and fleeting? Does this not indicate that the universe is not eternal but had a beginning? But what was there before the beginning? Or as Stephen Hawking asks: Why does the universe go to all the bother of existing?[1]

These are very irritating questions.

Why do I need to deal with them when I can lead a contented life without them? Why should I create difficulties if I can avoid them? Life was good without them. I had my movies, sports, good food, music lessons etc. Why spoil it?

But what was even more annoying was that I realized that these questions were unanswerable. Throughout my youth, and even today, more than 60 years later, having read extensively in general philosophy, I have come to the conclusion that not one philosopher has ever given a satisfactory answer to these questions; neither has science or any other form of human knowledge. Logic and science tell us about the “what” and the “how” but not about the “why”. They fall flat when it comes to the “ultimate” questions.

But if this is the case, why ask questions which are unanswerable?

Thales and others taught me, however, that without asking these questions human beings are not truly alive. We are mere robots.

Why? What did Thales and others know what I did not know?

Is there a purpose in asking a question which nobody can answer?

But something strange happened. Whenever I asked these questions, they revealed a sense of wonder within me which was a complete surprise and which I had not anticipated to be possible. They delivered a knockout punch from which I almost could not get up.

These questions seize my limbs, and strike a nerve. I quiver like strings on a musical instrument, and my whole being bursts into shudders. I am totally astonished. It is the same experience as when I listen to Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony. The greatest answer to a question is sometimes deafening silence; an uproar in the soul which is ineffable.

It is “radical amazement” as our teacher Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel calls it.

There is no greater encounter than awe. It is ultimate joy. What we cannot comprehend we become aware of in awe.

Wonder comes when we have exhausted all other possibilities.

In awe I acknowledge that logic, rationality, and science can provide no answers. And there is nothing greater than that revelation.

Awe arrives after sensing the transcendent. It is an awareness that there is mystery beyond all things; to sense the ultimate in the common and the simple. We experience awe when we realize that what we know is only the tip of something which we sense, but cannot identify. Awe creates a murmur beyond the shores of our wisdom.

Wonder is a form of thinking and living .

Confronted with all of this, how could I remain indifferent? Why did I fall back on normality when nothing is “normal” about normality?

It seems that apathy was holding me back—an indifference that told me not to bother. By why? My education had indoctrinated me into believing that the world is a tool-box to gratify our needs. I had accepted that a thing has only value when it serves a purpose.

But I now realize that this indoctrination was leading me to commit spiritual suicide in the midst of grandeur.

We get used to reducing mysteries to dogmas and we hide behind reason, even when reason is of no assistance. Every time we arrive at the shore of mystery we face hazards composed of existential denial.

And so we talk ourselves into a deep existential sleep. We cease to be sensitive to wonder.

It is easier not to ask the question because there is nothing more irrelevant than an answer to a question nobody wants to ask.

But above all we are afraid of awe. We deny its existence because awe makes a demand on us. It is teaching us something of ultimate importance which requires us to respond. After all, awe is a gift which we do not deserve, unless we live up to its demands.

No one ever earned the right to exist, the right to enjoy, and the right to wonder. These are undeserved gifts. And not to interact with them, there is no dignity in that. How can I make myself worthy of awe?

To deny this essential question is the root of all secularism. To embrace the question is the source of genuine religiosity.

It is tragic that modern society has given up on human dignity and has reduced human beings to apelike creatures. But this is the only way to keep the Big Questions at bay. And by avoiding these questions we have undermined and devaluated our uniqueness as images of God.

So how do I deserve Awe? And how shall I respond? What should we do with the mystery of awe?

These are perhaps the most important questions we need to ask.

I am not afraid to die, but I am afraid not to have truly lived.

In future essays, I will try to offer a response to these questions.

About the Author
Rabbi Dr. Nathan Lopes Cardozo is the Founder and Dean of the David Cardozo Academy and the Bet Midrash of Avraham Avinu in Jerusalem. A sought-after lecturer on the international stage for both Jewish and non-Jewish audiences, Rabbi Cardozo is the author of 13 books and numerous articles in both English and Hebrew. Rabbi Cardozo heads a Think Tank focused on finding new Halachic and philosophical approaches to dealing with the crisis of religion and identity amongst Jews and the Jewish State of Israel. Hailing from the Netherlands, Rabbi Cardozo is known for his original and often fearlessly controversial insights into Judaism. His ideas are widely debated on an international level on social media, blogs, books and other forums.
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