Book recommendation on why to believe

↑ flowerpower ↓

Mon, Oct 07 2024, 8:25 pm

amother OP wrote:

But why? What does it do for me? And the answer that I would find God if life got hard is not satisfying for me. I don’t want to find God out of desperation. That doesn’t feel real to me.

That is why you should find him now. When life is good. The more you thank him the more you’ll appreciate everything he does for you. I’m saying don’t wait until cv something happens and you need an intervention so you find him them. Find him now when life is good and connect to him now.

↑ honey36 ↓

Mon, Oct 07 2024, 8:29 pm

amother OP wrote:

But why? What does it do for me? And the answer that I would find God if life got hard is not satisfying for me. I don’t want to find God out of desperation. That doesn’t feel real to me.

Because our purpose in this world is to have a relationship with Hashem. Ideally it would be a result of positivity - you are thankful to Hashem for all the good He does for you and therefore want to have a relationship with him.

If that doesn't work, and You just ignore that all the good is from Him, what alternative does He have so he can get you to notice Him?

amother

↑ OP ↓

Mon, Oct 07 2024, 8:36 pm

honey36 wrote:

That’s the God you believe in? One who does bad things to people to make them notice him? Why does he need me to notice him? Why does it matter so much to him? I find it really hard to believe in a God who is so concerned about me noticing him. Sounds very needy and not someone I would respect.

amother

↑ OP ↓

Mon, Oct 07 2024, 8:38 pm

flowerpower wrote:

But connecting to him now so that bad things won’t happen and/or if they do I will be ok, sounds like anxious OCD thinking to me. Not inspiring. Not healthy.

PinkFridge ↓

Mon, Oct 07 2024, 8:39 pm

amother OP wrote:

I currently don’t feel any need to connect to or believe in G-d. I feel like my life is very full and busy and generally happy and I don’t see how believing in G-d will help it be better. I keep the basics and I’m fine with keeping those basics because I enjoy them and think they are good for me as a person. I don’t have a problem being “frum” but not believing. It feels fine to me. The only reason I see to believe and connect to G-d is if something bad happens, but I absolutely do not want to do it for that reason because that sounds like anxious thinking to me and I don’t want to connect to G-d just because I want something from him.
Anyways, I decided that I should really see if there are any very convincing arguments before I totally give up. Anyone have any really good books that explain why my life would be better if I believed in G-d?

I don't know what could convince you. I heard Ohr Somayach rabbis say that there is no "proof." But there is a lot of evidence out there to make a reasoned decision to believe. You might find Rabbi Kelemen's books Permission to Receive, etc. as suggested above interesting.

↑ PinkFridge ↓

Mon, Oct 07 2024, 8:39 pm

amother OP wrote:

That a being exists who monitors and cares about our day to day existence and the minutiae of our lives. That Torah is a divine book and not just the rules of an ancient people some of which are beneficial and some of which aren’t.
That I need to have a connection to this being in order to have meaning in my life.

Among other things. But those are a few.

What does give meaning? What do you want to pass down to your children? Do you feel any connection to Jews the world over?

↑ PinkFridge ↓

Mon, Oct 07 2024, 8:41 pm

amother OP wrote:

The classic answer is, it's for our benefit, not His. Hashem is not needy but we have the greatest happiness in believing in Him and living accordingly.

And you mentioned this elsewhere, that your husband has similar thoughts. I guess that's a good thing; you can be united in how you choose to raise your kids.

amother

↑ OP ↓

Mon, Oct 07 2024, 8:46 pm

PinkFridge wrote:

But that reminds me of an abusive husband: I’m hurting you for YOU not for ME, you should be grateful that I’m doing this to you etc
If god doesn’t need it then why would he give me troubles in order to make me need him? Why can’t he just leave me be?

↑ PinkFridge ↓

Mon, Oct 07 2024, 8:53 pm

amother OP wrote:

It always seems to boil down to this...
Why can't He just leave us be? And not have any relationship?
Rav Reuven Leuchter, shlita, has an interesting spin: We don't live our lives and sometimes let Hashem in say during our fifteen minutes of davening, but He's let us be part of His world. We're here on His terms. https://mishpacha.com/entering-hashems-world/

↑ honey36 ↓

Mon, Oct 07 2024, 9:04 pm

amother OP wrote:

It's not about noticing Him or needing Him. It's about the relationship. A relationship needs two sides. It can't go one way.

Basically, yes G-d "wants" to have a relationship with us, whatever that means. He doesn't "need" it obviously. If you don't want to live up to your side of the relationship, you might as well be dead, to put it bluntly. That is actually the purpose you were created.

amother

↑ OP ↓

Mon, Oct 07 2024, 9:09 pm

amother Midnight wrote:

Do you daven? If you daven you are believing in hashem that he listens to your tefillos.

No. I have trouble with the whole concept. It feels transactional and then if so I want to know I will get what I ask for. Otherwise what is the point? Mostly it leads to disappointment and disillusionment. I just don’t feel like it’s beneficial to me.

amother

↑ OP ↓

Mon, Oct 07 2024, 9:11 pm

honey36 wrote:

Ok but I feel perfectly happy. I think I am fulfilling my purpose in other ways. So that isn’t convincing.

I don’t feel like anyone really understands what I’m saying. I would love to hear from someone who has felt the same way and found some reason to believe in God that makes sense and is beneficial.

amother

↑ Midnight ↓

Mon, Oct 07 2024, 9:17 pm

Your the op of the previous threads questioning God. STOP OPENING THREADS! We all believe in hashem and have a loving relationship with him! We are living beautiful and meaningful torahdiga lives! We love doing mitzvos and davening to hashem!

yiddishmom

Mon, Oct 07 2024, 9:22 pm

So what do you believe?
That the world is one long chain of happenstance?

Maybe Rabbi Akiva Tatz's books can help you? I never read any of his books myself, but they are supposed to be very good. I've listened to some of his shiurim.

Honestly, I don't think any book can convince you that it's worth starting to believe in God.

You first need to realize that there really is a God and that he runs the world.

You need to start internalizing the basic 13 ikarim, and realize that it's the foundation of the world.

I give you a bracha to successfully come around and really see/ feel/ experience Hashem in this world.

You say that you are happy and content. I'm fairly sure, that what you are experiencing is only a fraction of the goodness,, meaning, and happiness that you can experience once you start living with Hashem.

↑ PinkFridge ↓

Mon, Oct 07 2024, 9:24 pm

amother Midnight wrote:

Are we sure it's the same person?
If she's doing this to be disruptive, okay, then yes, please stop. And we definitely don't need yet another thread after this. But if she's doing this because she has some serious disconnect, or wants or wants to want to believe, I don't know if I would stop her.

amother

↑ Moccasin

Mon, Oct 07 2024, 9:30 pm

I don't know if this will help you because it's not really a good reason to believe, but it is my thought process:

I believe that there is some kind of First Cause entity that we refer to in English as "God" and we will never be able to understand it, like microbes trying to understand Einstein. Period. All the explanations of relationships and whatnot are just our microbe-level human rationalizations trying to cope with that.

I believe that absent supernatural intervention, it is extraordinarily unlikely that the Jews would still exist, in the sense of a cohesive people who have maintained (more or less) a culture, traditions, texts, and group identity across multiple millennia and a worldwide diaspora. I don't know of any other group that has achieved this to the same degree, although I'm sure there could be.

Basically, I believe in the Jewish people and I believe in God. That's enough for me.

↑ PinkFridge ↓

Mon, Oct 07 2024, 9:32 pm

amother Moccasin wrote:

I like that "believing in the Jewish people." Indeed.