Experience: The Basis Of Our Faith

In this essay, it is our intent to apply the principles developed in the analogy of the ship and the islanders to the 'truth' of Torah, the verification of that 'truth', and the reliability of the transmission of that 'truth' to us today, we, who live some 3300 years after the moment at Sinai! Because this essay is the application and conclusion of the principles established in the previous essays, it would be most meaningful for those who have not read them, to do so before embarking on the final concluding essay.

We, who live in the latest moment in the saga of our people's history, are faced with an unending avalanche of cultural heritages from the past. Protagonists of different, varying, complimentary, and conflicting ideas pound on our hearts and minds telling us... "This is the TRUTH of the past! This truth will ensure your survival!"

Whose message is the 'truth'?

Mohammedans say to us... "anything other than belief in Islam is the work of the devil, and must be destroyed!"

Within our own national body of Jews we have proponents of Orthodox, Conservative, Reform, Reconstruction, and a host of other off beat variant ideas about the 'truth' of Judaism.

When we are asked to accept what each of these groups proposes, we must ask ourselves... "what is the basis for each one's 'truth'?"

Is it the product of an individual inspiration? Is it the germination of an active imagination? Is it a subjective ideal objectified? Or is it the 'knowing' of something that actually occurred, which we 'sensed', 'experienced' with our five senses...the only sane way we know something?

Remember that the knowledge we have is true only if it is in harmony with an event that occurred outside our skins, and it must be verifiable.

The common basis for our nationhood is the event at Sinai some 3300 years ago. The truths we espouse are embodied in the Torah recording the momentous event at Sinai, before and after.

These truths are:

1. G-d revealed Himself to Moses and all Israel in the first two, of the Ten commandments.
2. G-d redeemed our forefathers from the slavery of Egypt, split the Red Sea for them, and brought them into the Land of Canaan after 40 years' trek in the desert.
3. G-d provided for their safety and sustenance in the desert.
4. G-d commanded the Written and the Oral Law to the people of Israel for all generations, and provided for the internally consistent expansion of the principles embodied therein. The Law of G-d is eternal, as the product of an Eternal Giver.
5. The people of Israel are an eternal people, whose fate is foreshadowed in the Torah, and who will be redeemed from their plight at the appointed time.