Does God control nature?

Divine Providince Vs. Natural Law

(This post explores whether divine providence is compatible with natural laws, but it also touches on topics such as the teleological arguments and whether nature exists independent of God. However, I did not clearly delineate where it jumps from one topic to the next, and the focus may be a bit messy, so I apologize if it’s a bit confusing.)

For much of human history, the various forces of nature have been used to demonstrate the existence of a higher power. In ancient Egypt the Sun’s movement was attributed to Ra, in Norse mythology thunder was explained as the rumbling of Thor, Poseidon was considered by the Greeks to be the force behind earthquakes, Ahura Mazda was the Zoroastrian deity of light, and Ishtar was the goddess of fertility in ancient Mesopotamia.

With the innovation of monotheism, God was no longer seen as a force of nature, rather as a higher power outside of the natural framework. This meant that all forces of nature were not independent beings, but rather were created by the One and only God. However, this did not remove God from natural events (as the Greeks did), rather he was understood to direct the forces of nature as well. In Tanach we find God described as controlling wars, rain, fertility, sickness, and more. This is a central aspect of Abrahamic monotheism, where God is not simply an abstract First Cause, but rather intimately involved in worldly affairs and directly in control of natural occurrences. In fact, the Midrash famously tells the story about Abraham who observed the forces of nature and inquired ‘מי בעל הבירה’ (who is the owner of the castle), and deduced from there that God must be running the world, which was the origin of Monotheism.

We also find God being used as an explanation for many phenomena which don’t seem to be explained by natural causes. This was traditionally used for all matters of origin, and was used for various gaps in natural explanations throughout history. Even the great Jewish rationalist Maimonides, who believed that God allows nature to run events, nevertheless fell back on God when trying to explain the motion of the celestial spheres. When Newton presented his model of the Solar System based on the theory of gravity, he ultimately conceded that it is inherently unstable, and posited that God intervenes from time to time to maintain the stability of the orbits.

As scientific progress continued marching forward, more and more natural phenomena were discovered to be the product of more basic natural laws. This felt threatening to several 19^th century theologians, as they felt that the more science can explain, the less role there is for God. This wasn’t simply a minor issue that arose, rather was a pivotal moment in history of Western thought: The clash between the tradition of of Jerusalem and the tradition of Athens, between a world ran by God and a world governed by nature. This issue illustrates the inherent tension between many theological traditions and the concept of natural inquiry. The ancient peoples understood the gods to be the natural forces themselves, while natural philosophy attempted to discover laws inherent in nature itself. Even in the Biblical conception of God being beyond nature, He is still considered to be the cause of worldly events as mentioned earlier. Which is it? Is nature the cause, or is God the cause?

This problem is two-fold; firstly, if nature can account for all the events in the universe, what need is there to posit the existence of a God at all, and secondly this presents a theological problem as to the doctrine of divine providence. If physical laws actually cause events to occur, at what step in the process can we attribute anything to God? Is God constantly overriding the natural order for the purpose of manipulating outcomes in accordance to his desire? (The second issue has been discussed at length in the classical sources, who already accepted the concept of natural law from Greek philosophy, however the first issue was only raised in the modern era.)

This was Plato’s objection to the concept of divine providence. While he conceded that God created for the order of nature, he rejected the notion that he intervenes in the world, as he understood natural laws to be the fundemental cause of events. (Aristotle believed this as well, but he took it a step further and claimed that nature is eternal, and while God may be the explanation of it, he did not set the laws himself.)

In 1893, Henry Drummond introduced the concept that is known as ‘The God of the Gaps’. He argues that all the areas which science hadn’t yet succeeded in deciphering should be regarded as indications of God’s handiwork. This allowed him to maintain that nature indeed can account for much of what we observe, however there are many things which cannot be explained and demonstrate that God controls the world directly. This concept enjoyed temporary popularity in some 20^th century religious circles.

However, there has been significant pushback on this idea, both from religious thinkers and from the scientific community. The religious objection was that God should not be pigeon-holed into whatever small gaps remain, as that minimizes the power of God to only several aspects of the world. Instead of God being a placeholder for mysterious phenomena, the argument was presented that the entire edifice of nature should be seen as a manifestation of God’s actions.

This brings us to the crux of the major discussion. If nature can be attributed to be the cause of events, does that preclude divine influence? Are nature and God two competing hypotheses, or can they somehow be compatible with each other? The question isn’t simply whether God uses nature, rather the question is a deeper issue in ontology. Are physical causes real? Does gravity actually make things fall? If the answer is yes, then in what sense is God making it fall? Yes, we can argue that God ordained the laws of nature, but if he is does not override the laws, is that compatible with the belief that he controls all events? Through what means does he control them?

In the Jewish tradition this concept has already been introduced by the famous Ramban in Exodus 13 where he argues that nature itself is a miracle, and thus divine providence encompasses every aspect of common patterns in how God runs the world, in order to maintain a façade of natural law to facilitate divine hiddenness. (What is less known is that Nachmanides was writing this against the contrary position Maimonides in Guide to the Perplexed 2:28. Maimonides maintains that God created natural law as a fixed system which controls events, and although the system was created by God, it contains the ability to function independently. This theology is what caused Maimonides to minimize the occurrences of miracles, and to differentiate between general providence, which applies uniformly across nature, and special providence which only applies to humans of high perfection.)

This theology has been countered by philosophers who defended determinism. They argue that if every natural event is determined by the events preceding it, there is no room left for the divine to influence events. To address this concern, there have been three different approaches suggested.

1. A modern approach is to deny determinism. One of the methods of doing so is by pointing to the seemingly indeterminate nature of the quantum world, where events take place without any physical cause. Therefore, God can be understood to influence events at the quantum level, which is not governed by natural law. (This approach has a striking similarity to the God of the Gaps, although it can be used to explain God’s influence on every event on the macro level.)

2. A more traditional form of this objection is to argue for substance dualism, where aspects of the natural world are comprised of both physical and spiritual components. God can influence events through the spiritual components, although he (usually) allows nature to control the physical components. (This is the approach that Maimonides takes.)

3. The third approach is called Occasionalism. This was originally introduced by the 11^th Century Sufi Muslim philosopher Al-Ghazali. He argued that nature is merely a façade, and is not the true cause of any event. Rather, it is God directly controlling events, and the observations of natural law are simply patterns which arise from the manner God chooses to control the universe. (This is the approach that Nachmanides takes.)

Each of these approaches has their own issues. Let us analyze them one at a time.

1)     The position that God operates and the quantum level seems to clash with both the scientific perspective and the traditional theological perspective.

From a scientific perspective, it has yet to be established that the quantum world is truly random. There are various interpretations of quantum mechanics which do not claim true randomness. According to the Copenhagen Interpretation, which is widely accepted, prior to observation the particle exists in a superposition of various states, and it is only upon observation that it collapses into one specific state. Although one may still object that which position it collapses into is still random, Niels Bohr argues that the fact that it exists in a superposition beforehand might suggest that it is not simply acausal, and even if it is not caused in the traditional sense, there are other forms of causality which affect this. This is further supported by the fact that there is a probabilistic outcome, which suggests that there is something governing the final result. David Bohm rejects the Copenhagen interpretation and argues that there are hidden variables which affect the final result. Hugh Everett introduced the Many Worlds Interpretation, where he argues that each outcome actually occurs on its own ‘branch’, and we are simply observing one of those branches.¹

From a theological perspective, the notion that nature operates independently aside from at the root of it is troubling to some. However, I would like to present a novel idea which might help align this approach with traditional sensibilities.

In Kabbalistic literature we find a comprehensive system of many עולמות. These עולמות are the divine conduit through which Godly emanations flow from the upper worlds to our lower world. In this system, I would argue, the natural world is not simply an order, rather it is complete ontological realm. Events that take place within this world are the direct result of prior events in this world as well. Where is the connection between this world and the upper worlds? That happens at the root of the physical realm itself. The השפעה is משתלשל through the עולמות and ultimately enters our world at its most basic components, where it is directly dependent on the causal factors in the Upper World which precedes our world.²

2)     Maimonides’ approach where hashgacha usually only influences through the spiritual forces of the world is presented in Guide to the Perplexed 3:17. While I don’t claim to have a full grasp of his position, he seems to argue that all natural objects are subject to natural causes, and only humanity, through his power of free will, is not subject to natural causes. Being that the human mind is intellect, which he argues is not of physical nature, there are no natural laws that govern this. He argues that through free will we either align ourselves with divine virtue or distance ourselves from it. He further argues that the natural order is aligned with God’s virtue and justice, and it will naturally follow that when one acts in accordance with God’s virtue the natural order will respond to him in kind. (I would like to qualify once again that I may be grossly misrepresenting his position, and if anyone would like to correct me, please point out where I went wrong in the comments.)

There are two issues with Maimonides’ approach from a philosophical perspective. The first is that he assumes substance dualism, seemingly to the extreme, in accordance with the Aristotelean dichotomy between matter and form. In this tradition, the mind is completely immaterial, and is a conceptual object which is governed by logical laws, not natural laws. This is hard to defend to this extreme in light of modern discoveries in psychology, neuroscience, and cognitive science, where there is clearly some influence from natural factors. Furthermore, the claim that the mind is immaterial raises the problem of interaction, for how does something in an immaterial realm have causal power on something that exists on a separate ontological realm? Maimonides himself does not have an issue with this, as in Aristotelean natural philosophy the physical world is also comprised of immaterial form and material matter, and the mind can directly interact with the form present in the physical world. However, modern physics does not support the notion that form is a separate substance, as form is simply seen as an interaction of energy within SpaceTime, which is simply a different form of mass in of itself as demonstrated by Oppenheimer and Einstein in the mass-energy equivalence of E=mc².³

The second issue with this approach is that he asserts that the natural order is imbued with qualities such as justice. However, this idea is itself rooted in the Greek concept of Natural Harmony, where nature itself is a logical system rooted in concepts in the World of Forms. Modern scientific discoveries do not support this, as the laws of nature are abstract mathematical, physical or otherwise natural processes that do not seem to contain any inherent value judgements.

There are various attempts to address these objections and either defend some of these positions or modify them to align with the current scientific understanding, but the issues definitely demand a response.

3)     Nachmanides’ approach of Occasionalism has received significant pushback from many philosophers. Essentially, this doctrine is denying natural realism, which is not supported by any observations we make. Maimonides’ himself illustrates the absurdity of this belief, by pointing to a wind which blows a leaf off a tree. Which reasonable person can maintain that the wind did not cause the leaf to fall?

What this objection seems to boil down to is the reliability of empiricism. When we observe processes which repeat themselves billions of times without exception, are we justified in positing a principle which governs this pattern? Some would say that we can assume it will continue to operate this way, but we have no way of making any claims about the underlying principle. If this is true, why should we assume that it will continue in this way? Is it because patterns tend to continue? However, that is circular reasoning, as we still haven’t yet established that what has tended to occur is a valid indication of the future, so although things have tended to follow patterns, that doesn’t give us the justification to assume this as a principle. (This is known as the problem of induction, introduced by David Hume in 1748.)

Clearly, we do assume that patterns indicate underlying principles. If this is true, can we reject natural realism and subscribe to Occasionalism? This will obviously depend on how we address the problem of induction, and how exactly we would like to define the ontology of natural laws, but this is the reason that most modern philosophers (and the scientific community) reject this approach.

One justification given for this approach is that God is constantly reaffirming the existence of the world and the natural order, while allowing nature to govern according to its laws. However, this is insufficient to believe in divine providence. It may make nature compatible with God, but if he chooses to allow nature to run its course, that means he is not guiding each particular event based on his desires, and there is no divine providence.

Whichever position one takes in this discussion, it has no bearing on the possibility of miracles, as they all affirm that God, as the one who set the laws of Nature, may violate them at will. (Maimonides does minimize miracles due to his understanding of nature as a realm and not simply a pattern, but ultimately he agrees that they are possible.) However, the discussion is relevant where natural law does prevail; can we still ascribe the events to God. What is still unclear, is that although Maimonides and Nachmanides differ on the ontology of nature and how it can be ascribed to God, ultimately if determinism is true this presents a practical challenge on divine providence. If nature dictates every outcome, than as much as God does not override the natural order events will occur without regard to the divine will. What mechanism can guide events if God is unwilling to change the natural course?

In Maimonidean thought the providence of God is inherent in the natural order itself. However, if one accepts determinism this is impossible, as ultimately nature is comprised of the most basic physical laws, which themselves have no regard for Aristotelean concepts of Natural Harmony. They can only coexist with the laws of physics if determinism is false, which allows for another system to direct events. Nachmanides as well has not succeeded in achieving divine providence even given Occassionalism, as this binds God to work according to the patterns of natural law and there’s no room left for divine will, justice, prayer, or otherwise spiritual influence. Seemingly, both Maimonides and Nachmanides must deny determinism in nature, although this position has weak support from modern science.

(In the next post I will discuss the other question raised by God of the Gaps, namely the usage of natural phenomena to demonstrate the existence of God. I also hope to continue exploring this discussion if science can replace God, or if it simply elaborates on God’s handiwork.)

1. Even if indeterminism is true at the quantum level, it is unclear if that can be used to explain divine providence. This is because the events on the quantum level are governed by probabilities, which cause what is known as quantum decoherence, where at the macro level every event is ‘adequately determined’, which effectively places very strong limits on where God can intervene within the natural framework.

2. However, I would like to point out that in many Kabbalistic sources we find that the world immediately preceding ours are the constellations, which according to modern cosmology exist within the same physical realm as our planet.

3. I probably will get a lot of pushback on these ideas, and they are really deserving of their own discussion, but I couldn’t refrain from mentioning them briefly with regards to the Maimonidean approach.