Do We Really Have Free Will? - Live Jewish Video

About this Class

If G-d knows what we will choose, do we really have free choice? In this challenging 1-hour lecture, Rabbi New tackles this profound paradox.

By Moishe New

Rabbi Moishe New heads the Montreal Torah Center. He is a sought out lecturer on Kabbalah and its relevance in our lives today

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January 16, 2013

Free will

Again, HaShem being all and everything, knowing all and everything, presupposes the idea of free will, in my opinion. Most people have a hard time with determinism because they feel manipulated. Nevertheless, everything happens between our two ears and therefore tends to be somewhat illusionary. Consequently, what appears real is an act of
the Creator's ongoing creation and as it is an ongoing time related function, we can never know more that what is in the now as determined for us.

Allan Koven
Anaheim

December 26, 2012

Free Will

God has to define the parameters and then within those limitations we must have a Free Will. I cannot think myself to be on Mars and abracadabra , I am on Mars. So we can assert a notion of input into the world we exist by exerting a Free Will, but it has material limitations . But if a basic determinate of Will, is to answer any question , or refrain from responding to any question and thus stand mute, then the election to express an answer to an invitation to speak, and to refrain and stand silent, shows a binary world exists in which options exist and personal feelings can weigh in, A man can be forced to answer, subverting the extent of the pleasure of free will, but some men can stand mute, even to the affliction of death ,showing man certainly has a place where he has a simple option and nothing can force the selection , and the man is then free to choose. A man cannot choose anything, but he can choose or decline to make a choice, and that is a signal of free will

Carmine R. Fragione
New Smyrna Beach

October 30, 2012

Free Will

There is no free will that is not destined.

Angela Hoffberg
Richland, Mississippi

October 26, 2012

Free will

Didn't God create the soul along with everything else? If so wouldn't the soul be all knowing?Or did he leave that part out?

Except for the discussion of God as creator of all, I find the Rabbi's arguments regarding free will illogical and unconvincing In addition,with all due respect, yelling out a perspective does not make it true.

Allan Koven
Anaheim, Ca.

October 25, 2012

Who Are You?

Freud spoke of the Id, Ego and Superego, that is, the body, the mind and the soul. If you "are" your body then you will do what your body tells you to do. You are not free. You eat when you must. Breathe when you must and so on. If you "are" your mind, that is, an ego, then you are bound to satisfy the ego and you have no choice and are not free. You will work eighty hour weeks to buy that mansion and impress people you don't even know. You will go to war over trifles. It is only when you are yourself at the deepest level, the spiritual level, the Godly level, that you are truly yourself and free.

Anonymous
Dallas, Tx/USA

October 22, 2012

No "feeling" of free will, and no God's free will

Harris and others make the mistake of asserting the illusion of free will is a "feeling." It is not. A feeling is most technically an emotion or sense perception. Our illusion of free will is most precisely defined as a conclusion (for those of us who have arrived at the notion by thoughtful consideration - or lack thereof) or a belief (for those of us who have never truly thought the issue through, and have simply been taught that our will is free).

The assertion that if God has caused us to feel or conclude that our thoughts are up to us, then certainly they must be up to us is refuted by the acknowledgment that if it is God who is causing us to have a certain feeling or conclusion, it cannot be up to us.

Also, if we acknowledge that God is compelled to be God, to be infinite, to be the Creator, to be every attribute by which we describe Him, surely He is not free to be any way other than that, and therefore He is not free to choose contrary to Nature.

Excellent exploration.

George Ortega
White Plains, New York

October 21, 2012

Do we really have free will?

Could surrender to God be death blows to the ego-self-I until it is no longer I?... but God?

Linda Best
Raleigh, NC

October 21, 2012

Free Will?

My goodness Rabbi New, I am speechless concerning this teaching. It is so deep, I need to listen to it again.

My spirit stirred as I listened to your lesson, and I felt a deep presence of G-d.

All I can say is thank you for this marvelous lesson.

You are blessed to have this great insight and I am blessed to have had the opporutnity to hear you teach on it.

Irene
Glen Curnie, MD USA

October 21, 2012

Moshe New - Fre Will

Excellent - the way of how the Rabbi addresses the dynamics of creation, as the stem from the free will., central to the very concept of creation which is opposite to any sorts of determinism. By means of our free will we are enabled to create in a permanent and constant manner Hashem's dwelling here on earth.

Gilly, Albert Gilead

October 21, 2012

Free Will

Simply awesome analysis of 'free will'! May the truth reign.

Mark
Coventry, UK