Customer Reviews

The Disappearance of God: A Divine Mystery

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I just finished this book and intend to read it again right away. I found it to be a very powerful work and am disappointed that it does not seem to have a stronger following; this is a real gem that has apparently been lost in the shuffle. Written for both believers and non-believers, Friedman proposes a very interesting framework for understanding man's relationship with God and our place in the universe. It's not a comprehensive theology by any means nor is it an attempt to convert atheists. By the end of the book, however, I found my faith strengthened ("renewed" is actually a better word) in a God that bridges the apparent gaps between modern science, the Bible, and the oft-misunderstood philosophies of Friedrich Nietzsche (who gets soem very enlightening attention in this book, along with Dostoyevsky). Fundamentalists, on the other hand, may be disappointed (even though I think they shouldn't be). Highly recommended.

This is an ambitious and insightful book. I had never thought that the Bible had a plot, and I learned from this book that it has one: the coupled and progressive weakening of god and strengthening of man. I don't know much about Nitzsche and Dovstoyevsky but I learned a lot about these incredible philosophers from the third part of the book. The last part of the book was weak. The tie of god and scientific cosmology never panned out, and the real question of the book " How do you inculcate a moral code in the absence of faith in a divinity?" is framed, discussed, but never really answered. Still, a remarkable and thought-provoking book.

I was intrigued by author's idea to explore the disappearance of God in the Old Testament. He notes that at the beginning of creation God walked with man in the Garden of Eden, but as man developed, God spoke and interacted less and less directly with man. The author notes that God's face became 'hidden' - e.g., He appeared as a burning bush or in a column of 'glory' and could no longer be looked upon directly. Eventually he began to speak to man or demonstrate His power only in very private appearances or miracles, whereas He had previously done things that a whole people could witness. And the first part of the book takes this idea even farther.

I liked the first part of the book the best. The author tries to link the disappearance of God to the writings of Nietschze and to the Qabalah (parts two and three of the book), but IMHO fails to do anything other than suggest a connection. The book was informative, as far as it went. I would've liked to see the author search ancient religions/beliefs systems/mystical writings for a reason WHY God disappeared, rather than merely speculating on it himself.

Overall, I think it's an interesting read, especially if you like books like The Da Vinci Code.

Excellent book! It's the second time I read it. I checked it out at the library and liked it enough to buy it.

In this absorbing work, Freedman investigates 3 mysteries concerning the presence/absence of God. The first part deals with the gradual disappearance of the visible presence of God throughout the Old Testament, part two considers Nietzsche and Dostoevsky's experience of this phenomenon and their premonitions of the future, whilst the last part examines correspondences between religion and science in view of the return or rediscovery of God.

The author traces the diminishing presence of the deity through the course of the Hebrew Bible, showing how the nature of communication changes from visible to indirect whilst signs of the divine, like miracles, become rarer, finally ceasing altogether. A related development is a shift in the balance of control in human destiny - a transition from divine to human responsibility. This is observed in the actions of Adam & Eve, through Noah who builds the ark himself, Abraham who even challenges a decision of God, through Moses and down to the Book of Esther where the name of God is not even mentioned overtly. As the author notes, it is the apparent control that is shifting.

The same phenomenon is evident in the non-historical books. The prophets encounter the divine through dreams and visions - not face to face like in earlier times - and their impressions are filtered through their own personalities. Some prophets like Isaiah are explicit about the absence of God, and the promise of reunion. This is also reflected in the Psalms. The word of God now takes the place of the acts of God. Scholars have not paid enough attention to the growing human role during the receding visibility of the deity. This is especially remarkable as the phenomenon appears with chronological consistency in a narrative composed by many authors over many centuries. Friedman considers the way religion, history, psychology and literary composition reflect it.

He attempts to find the reason, pointing out that it is not only the result of human transgression but seems also to be the granting of a measure of independence to humanity. The closest description of the character of God is that in Exodus 34, where He is called "merciful and gracious, long-suffering, abundant in kindness and truth, bearing transgression ...", in other words a compassionate and forgiving Father. The last chapter of the first part deals with the legacy of the age. Both Rabbinic Judaism and Christianity developed with the awareness of divine absence. In Judaism, the response was the doctrine of the two Torahs with the development of the Oral Torah.

In the context of the shift in the divine-human balance, the appearance of Christ is striking as it is claimed that God now appears in human form. Jesus most often refers to himself as "son of man" whatever the finer nuances of the meaning are. And again there are showers of miracles, but of the type associated with Elijah and Elisha, not of the Exodus type. Friedman speculates about three possible meanings for these words on the Cross: "My God, why have you left me?" which become highly significant in view of the phenomenon of hiddenness in the Tanakh. In addition, out of reverence the Divine Name was not pronounced and was in a sense "lost" for 2000 years until its rediscovery in modern times. This also relates to the disappearance. Over the last 2 millennia, God has been publicly known only through churches and synagogues and books. Of course individuals have always had their own experiences but the issue here is the public absence of the deity.

Part two covers Nietzsche and Dostoevsky, their work in which they predicted a world without moral compass and the theme of madness. Chapter 9 deals with the "death" of God in the 20th century, a time of blood and darkness in which the feeling of the absence of the divine was very profound. At the same time it was and still is an era of magnificent scientific progress, which is tied in with the third part of the book which explores the science of cosmology as it enters the realm of religion. Many popular books by prominent scientists, like Hawking's A Brief History of Time, are attempts at making the latest knowledge available to the general public. Friedman provides an overview of the history of Big Bang theory and presents a careful and intriguing comparison with the creation model of the Kabbalah, with particular reference to the Zohar.

He discusses the concept of God inhering in the universe according to some cosmological theories, which mirrors the ideas of the Zohar. In other words, creation is a part of God. This is not simple pantheism, and I was surprised that Friedman never uses the word panentheism as that is what he describes. He mentions the central role of consciousness with reference to Roger Penrose and talks about the Kabbalistic idea of restoration called Tikkun.

The final chapter addresses divine-human reunion by looking at the connections between the 3 mysteries and how they illuminate one another. Here the writing becomes a bit repetitive as the author revisits previous chapters. All of the 3 are outer reflections of the search for relationship, all 3 are about communities and all 3 trace the path of Western civilization, revealing where we began and where we stand now. Friedman believes humanity is at a crossroads, on the verge of "coming of age." There are 25pp of notes arranged by chapter, a bibliography of works cited, acknowledgements and an index.

Unfortunately there is a huge crater in Friedman's reasoning - the mammoth in the midst of the earth. Since he's a formidable Bible scholar, it cannot be ignorance so it must have been a deliberate omission. Almost exactly in the middle of the cruelest century in human existence, a great miracle occurred. That was the 1948 rebirth of Israel as a sovereign nation as predicted in the Bible. And the great aliyah continues. Moreover, these are PUBLIC miracles, witnessed by the whole earth. Friedman missed the obvious - so only 4 stars for this book.

Why is it, Friedman asks, that God seems to withdraw and become gradually less and less involved with people as we progress through redemptive history?

Friedman says this is a relatively new idea that nobody has explored -- and he may be right -- but it doesn't seem new to me. I've wondered about the changes in God's interaction with people for all the years I've read the Bible. Why does God seem to be talking up a storm for a few years, and then go into hiding for a while, and then talk up a storm again? IOW, the idea of the changing nature of God's interaction with man - specifically through miracles, prophecies, etc. - is certainly not a new idea.

But Friedman's argument is that there is a general decline in God's involvement with man, and that this is a kind of passing of the torch. God is portrayed in the Bible, Friedman says, as backing away so that men can be responsible for themselves.

His argument seems overplayed and quite unconvincing. For one thing, it seems to me that he doesn't take into account the narrative strategy of the different stories. He makes a big deal out of the fact that God spoke directly to Abraham, but not to later kings (to whom he spoke through prophets). But maybe that's because the Abraham stories are about Abraham - to whom God spoke - while the stories about kings are about kings - to whom God spoke through prophets. If the Pentateuch was about ... oh, I don't know, maybe Caleb - then it would be about how Caleb's relationship with God was mediated by Moses and the alleged trend would disappear.

IOW, God is still speaking to people throughout redemptive history, it's just that the person being spoken to isn't always the subject of the story, and the stories are written in different styles, and with a different theology in mind. An apples to apples comparison would be to contrast a story about Abraham with a story about Jeremiah -- written in the same style. But we don't have that. In short, I think a lot of his argument is based on faulty sampling.

A couple trends do seem to apply, but Friedman's analysis is weird. The early stories have God walking around with people, wrestling with them, etc., and we don't see that in later stories. But that's because (from Friedman's perspective) only J presents God that way, and J stops shortly after the divided kingdom. There is no J perspective on the later kings. So it seems incredible to me that Friedman speaks of this "trend" in the canonical text.

As an analogy, imagine that The New York Times was the only newspaper that wrote in Times Roman font. And then The New York Times went out of business (We can dream!), and then someone saw that as a trend away from the Times Roman font.

Having said all this, I will agree with Friedman that divine activity does seems to taper off - in a rather general sort of way - as we get to the end of OT history. But is this because divine activity is "generally tapering off," or is it because God's activity tends to coincide with significant acts of redemptive history, which tended to happen early in the story? E.g., Creation (sacred family), flood (try that again), Abraham (sacred tribe), Moses (sacred nation), David (sacred monarchy), ... then, ... what? The big pause.

Until Christ, and then we have John the Baptist and Zacharias and Elizabeth and shepherds and angel choirs and ... gee ... God is chatty again. And how.

So against Friedman's hypothesis of a disappearing God, the stronger hypothesis seems to be the "God who only talks when something important is going on." Or, IOW, miracles happen during important changes (e.g., new law, new priesthood, new monarchy) -- during important events in redemptive history. Lots of those events happen up until the establishment of the Davidic monarchy - with accompanying miracles. Then there's a pause. No surprise. Then it starts up again with the coming of Christ.

In short, I am underwhelmed by Friedman's argument.