Must we believe in a god???
Rambam included the following in his list of "Principles of Jewish Faith"
- God exists
- God is one
- God is incorporeal
- God knows individuals
Hesdai Crescas responds:
R. Hesdai Crescas, the great leader of fourteenth-century Iberian Jewry, rejected the idea that the Torah contains commandments concerning these matters of belief and knowledge. For a commandment to have any significance, Crescas argues, we must be able to accept it or reject it. It makes no sense whatsoever to command someone to do something over which he has no control.
It is, he says, a matter of both common sense and common experience that we cannot control our convictions.
We cannot will to believe or not to believe, or to be convinced of the truth of something or to be convinced of its falsity.
How can we then be commanded, Crescas asks, to know (or even believe) that God exists, is one, and is incorporeal?
--From Must a Jew Believe in Anything? (Menachem Kellner, page 77-78