Robert Levine (5)

This book is a bit of a mixed bag, and may defeat its own purpose. What one expects from the title is the encouraging, even inspiring material in the last half of the book. There, Rabbi Robert Levine’s goodness and compassion shine through, and make you wish you could spend a few hours talking with him. He demonstrates that people can behave morally and kindly whether or not they believe in God.

But the fact that this inspiring material is preceded by something less inspiring may turn away people that Levine clearly hopes to reach, and who could have benefited from what he teaches.

Through the initial chapters, Levine’s defense of belief in God seems rather…defensive. And full of straw men.

He maintains, for example, that if you suggest God is non-existent and irrelevant, this is an “attack” rather than simply a claim. And furthermore, if you (as he says) “attack” the idea of God, you first must posit that God yourself, because you can’t “attack” him if he’s not there. So those who get angry at fundamentalists have to posit the fundamentalist God first, in order to “attack” him. Making defenders against fundamentalism exactly the same as the fundamentalists. Which is preposterous.

To say “There is no Santa Claus” is not to “attack” Santa Claus; nor must you posit a Santa Claus before you can claim he doesn’t exist. So Levine’s claims make no logical sense, and set up a straw man he himself can easily attack.

Nor does Levine consider that after eight years of American fundamentalists ramming their religion down the world’s throat and trying unconstitutionally make it the law of their land – one might have a justifiable cause, perhaps even a moral obligation, to attack this behaviour, and not be “positing” their God at all. Straw man, easily attacked.

Levine continually assumes things without proof, to bolster his argument. Nobody can be good or moral without God – despite evidence that atheists are equally as moral and good as believers. No atheist can express “wonder” about the universe without positing a God behind it – despite the fact that so many, in fact, do.

Levine can say “I don’t know” about matters of faith, without discrediting that faith at all. Yet a scientist who admits “I don’t know” somehow secretly discredits atheism and proves there’s a God.

The fact that Levine appears to have a temperamental need to posit a God to fill the gap of “I don’t know” or of “wonder” does not mean that everyone else has the same temperament. Yet he claims that they do.

So Levine’s book, no doubt unintentionally, begins with a virtual attack on atheists which is likely to sour them on considering anything he says later. He may find himself, as they say, “preaching to the choir,” or to people who are already searching for a God to fill their gaps. Perhaps that’s the audience he wants anyway.

Yet the God he offers, even in the later chapters, is dissatisfying. In addressing the Holocaust and 9/11, the only way he seems able to deal with them is to weaken God, so the deity couldn’t have done anything about them. Levine’s idea of the “partnership” of God and humanity is very helpful, yet one can’t imagine that if God exists, he is quite so helpless as Levine wants him to be so that people can believe. Why bother with a “God” at all, then?

The concept of God that the Rabbi offers appears to be a “make it up as you go along” sort of deity, picking and choosing interpretations that suit you. What is the difference between this sort of God and simply relying on your own mind and principles, without having to posit a divine (yet weak) justification for them?

Despite Rabbi Levine’s obvious compassion and generosity, and his undeniable good work, his book does not live up to its title. It does not offer any way of living or viewing the world, in practical terms, that a hopeful, moral, compassionate person can’t live on their own without needing to create a God to back them up.… (mais)

The purpose of Rabbi Robert M. Levine's book is made obvious in its title and subtitle together: "What God can do for you now: For seekers who want to believe." It is clearly a self-help book, giving an answer for those who in this modern or even post-modern age are lost. More specifically it gives many answers and picks one path as the most treadable for most people.

The most precise formulation of the proposed solution can be found on page 120: "…prescription for how to find G-d and this find your true self: be vulnerable […,] awe-ful[…,] grateful […,] purposeful." Theologically or sociologically speaking

I wanted to provide an objective overview of the book's 12 chapters, before sharing my personal opinion. I found, however, a difficult job to summarize them, because each chapter contains myriads of quotes, stories, references. They are rarely sewn around a single line of reasoning; structured more like along the lines of showing lots of colors of the rainbow in the hope that together they form a single shining white light. The chapter titles might give a sense of their content. Instead of summaries, I am sharing my short impression on them

1. Is there any way we can believe in God today? – Stories about the evolution of the author's faith and introduction to most major themes of the book
2. Faith for the faith challenged – Anecdotes about people who felt God's presence or help.
3. The God of the atheists and the fundamentalists – Tirades against true believers at both end of the spectrum
4. God's big bang: why science needs religion – Explanation of how science and religion are essentially the same, because they describe the origin of the world in similar terms.
5. Red ribbon religion – Outburst against the shallowness of the current Kabbalah fad and analysis of how and why saying Kaddish works
6. Where was God during he Holocaust and 9/11 – Review of theological answers of how can evil and bad things exist in the word. The answer given: our role is to ease suffering
7. Affirming the God I do not know - Affirmation works, helps you, particularly if you do it the traditional way, through words heavily invested with historical and personal meaning, i.e. the Shema
8. The arrogance of self-sufficiency – debunking the "secret" and "the law of attraction" as self-centered, materialistic and alienating principles, causing loneliness and unhappiness
9. The power of prayer – Point by point description and list of reasons how prayer can work for the individual, with examples
10. Why God should not choose the next president – Mini-essay on how the concept of separation of state and church was supposed to work in the USA ad how this might thwarted by the fundamentalist religious right.
11. Making miracles matter – deals partly with the Jewish perspective on miracles, but mostly a historical analysis of Jesus' miraculous acts and the accompanying words
12. How we can believe in God today – Summary and conclusion of the themes covered earlier.

An ambivalent feeling accompanied my reading experience. In positive terms the book is very rich. It is full of ideas, quotes, and stories drawn from a dizzyingly wide array of sources. If one is looking for ideas to ponder upon this is a good book to start with. However I can approach the same point from a negative perspective, and I admit that came up more often for me, while I was reading: the lack of single focus and voice was dissatisfying. While there are some excellent insights, but the fact that virtually every page contained extended quotes (even two page long quotes were not rare), made me feel that the author does not have anything original to say.

Upon closer inspection I found it may not be entirely true. Rabbi Levine shared a lot of wisdom gained through his readings and congregational work. Unfortunately these nuggets of meaningful point are too well-hidden in the avalanche of external sources used to make them.

The style of the book is rather entertaining. For me, with my background, it was a light reading, but I think some people might find it a book to read slowly. Had I not labeled this work earlier as fitting for the self-help shelves I would call it "popular theology." One of the purpose "pop science" is to make non-experts aware and understand scientific principles and discoveries. This book works in a similar way, by introducing theological concepts and authors to members of the general audience who may not have encountered them. Unlucky for me, because I learned almost all of them on my way to get a BA in religious studies. Thus the fact that I found the book lacking new ideas was at least partially my "fault" because I was not part of the target audience, not versed in these matters.

I can recommend the book to those of you who are not used to think or read much about theological matters and reasons for faith. You will surely find something in it that will inspire you. I, even though in terms of my worldview I am very close to the author, enjoyed it as a light reading, but was disappointed by not getting clear line of reasoning proposing a single proposal. But who could provide a simple answer for complex question in a postmodern world?… (mais)

I read this book as a spiritual, but not religious person. The book is written from a somewhat liberal religious viewpoint, which I can admire. However, there are quite a few claims in this book that I had difficulty with.
I don't entirely agree that there are miracles all around us. Levine uses the argument that the conception and development of a child is a miracle by describing the perfection of the process. The fact is that things do go wrong. People are born with deformities all the time, so the process isn't perfect. Is it only a miracle when the child turns out OK? Levine states that natural processes are part of the miracle and that it is not incongruent to accept both a creator and evolution by natural selection. I believe this also. However, I would expect more from a bona fide "miracle." Childbirth, the movement of the solar system, and the creation/evolution of beings who perfectly fit into their ecological niches are wondrous, but not exactly miraculous.
Also, claiming that atheists and fundamentalists "believe" in the same god seems spurious, since atheists by definition do not believe in a god at all. I can go along with the claim that anti-religionists (not all atheists are anti-religion) use the most unbelievable and unpleasant aspects of religion to make their claims. This can make other believers feel that they are all being painted with the same brush.
I admire Levine's claims that real religion is based on actions instead of thoughts and beliefs. He also states that those who behave in a spiritual way, helping others and trying to make the world a better place, are working in concert with God whether or not they realize it. Later, though, he suggests that to be truly religious, one needs to be following one of the Abrahamic religions. He says that this is the only way to have a personal relationship with God. The idea is that if we behave in godly ways, we will be brought to God. That is, we will become believers. To be fair, this makes sense when you consider the audience that Levine is trying to reach. In the title he names this audience, "For Seekers Who Want to Believe."
I give the book three stars because I am not convinced by all of Levine's assertions. but there is much to be gained by his approach. To use a common phrase, Levine's book reminds us that "God helps those who help themselves." By "themselves" we can take this to mean mankind must help itself. We are responsible for each other.… (mais)