‘This is my God’: One Jew’s Faith

Abstract

Judah Halevi is known as the most Jewish of Jewish philosophers. He is characterised that way because he rejected the attempts of the philosophers of his time to arrive at an understanding of God through reason. Writing in the twelfth century, he created an imaginary dialogue between a rabbi and the king of the Khazars, whose historical counterpart had converted himself and all of his realm to Judaism in the eighth century. In convincing the king of the truth of Judaism, Halevi’s rabbi argues that rational speculation is subject to mistakes and often leads to doctrinal errors. Even at its best reason may inform us of an abstract, philosophic God but not the living, commanding Lord with whom the religious Jew interacts. Only revelation and God’s actions in the history of Israel can provide an accurate (even if partial) description of Him, an explanation of the real grounds of the believer’s belief, and an understanding of why believers are prepared to sacrifice so much for their beliefs, in sharp contrast to the theology, justifications, and resultant behaviour of the philosophers. Anticipating Pascal by five hundred years, Halevi carefully and consistently distinguishes between the God of Abraham and the God of the philosophers (which, for him, meant primarily the Aristotelians) in their differing depictions of God, the reasons for believing in Him, and the conduct that grows out of that belief.