Historian and futurist Yuval Noah Harari has become one of the most profound thinkers of the 21st century, examining the ancient past to predict and foreshadow what is yet to come. His 2011 masterpiece, Sapiens, has become one of the most popular books in recent years, primarily because it articulates complicated ideas about anthropology and sociology in a digestible and accessible way. Yet, among his writings, Harari’s most relevant work might be his 2018 book 21 Lessons for the 21st Century. In it, he examines 21 aspects of modern life and explores how those areas will change and evolve over the hundred years that are most relevant to most human beings today.
In one chapter, Harari confronts the nature of God in our contemporary reality. He begins by musing: “Does God exist? That depends on which God you have in mind: the cosmic mystery or the worldly lawgiver? Sometimes when people talk about God, they talk about a grand and awesome enigma, about which we know absolutely nothing. We invoke this mysterious God to explain the deepest riddles of the cosmos…on other occasions, people see God as a stern and worldly lawgiver about whom we know only too much.”
What Harari, an Israeli of Jewish origin, is exploring is the great challenge of coming to terms with the great diversity of perspectives when we talk about God. So often, it feels like there is one version of the 21st-century God that we accept or reject. Likely as a result of the deeply ingrained Christian comfort with talking about God in their own terms, it is common for people to see God as a white-bearded old man in the sky pulling the puppet strings. This works for some people, but it also has driven a wide range of individuals to reject religion wholesale, due to their inability to accept that singular conception of God.
But that simple singularity undermines the inherent complexity of theology. After all, there is a reason that human beings have been grappling with conceptions of the divine for almost all of our existence. Within the Jewish imagination alone, there are dozens of different perspectives, from Maimonides’ Negative Theology (imagining that the only way to understand God is by way of what we know God ISN’T) to Process Theology (a modern theological perspective that sees God as an evolving, adapting being that has influence over the changing circumstances in our lives).
In many ways, the history of humanity is a tapestry of different depictions of God, all with one central goal: to understand the meaning of life. There have been countless interpretations and opinions, each with the unique voice and perspective of the thinker who offered it. In a world where we confine our understanding of God only to the most classically biblical imagination, we are depriving ourselves of not only the comfort that an individualized and intimate perspective on God could offer us, but also the joy and excitement that comes with crafting a conception of God that feels in conversation with all of those who came before us.
In Judaism, we declare as the central idea of our faith the idea of the Sh’ma: “Hear, oh Israel, Adonai is our God, Adonai is One.” It is a powerful thing that God is a binding agent, bringing us together in pursuit of meaning, understanding, and purpose. But that doesn’t mean God can’t also be unique and intimate for each of us. There are so many aspects of the Divine that are unknowable; after all, we can say almost nothing with certainty about faith, which is the defining characteristic of faith in the first place. Yet, rather than finding an answer to settle with throughout our lifetimes, perhaps, as Am Yisrael, the people who wrestle with God, the ultimate goal is to engage in the sacred work of finding what is worthy of our belief, constantly navigating an ideology that is dynamic, personal, and life-affirming all our own.
Austin Zoot is the Rabbi Educator at Valley Temple in Wyoming, Ohio.
