WHERE IS GOD?

Rabbi Rifat Sonsino, Ph.D.

Recently, I logged in to a Friday night service in NYC where the Rabbi was discussing the issue of where is God? Where is God to be found? The ancient Rabbis imagined that God is dwelling in the heavens above (“avinu she-bashamayim, our God who is in heaven) , watching over us. Her answer  was that we experience God in the acts of goodness we perform. For her, doing good deeds means acting in accordance with God’s character, which is suffused with love.  

That answer made me feel good, but, after reflection, I started to question the veracity of the statement. The proposition sounded nourishing and cozy, but I felt it was without any substance regarding the essence of God. For, right after that sermon, I happened to watch a program about the Holocaust where the question became more acute. Where was God during this unspeakable tragedy?   To say that we do not know or that God was suffering along with the victims made God irrelevant to me, for I do not need a God who is incapable of action when it was desperately needed. Besides, how does she know that God is experienced in the actions we perform? Simply to state that this is so, does not convince me of its correctness. 

For me, God is the energy that sustains the universe. It is not good or bad. It simply is. And it stands for the way in which nature operates irrespective of the people who are involved in the process. When a person carries out deeds of lovingkindness, the reward is found in the act itself, not because God approves it.  On the other hand, when evil prevails in society, it is because people act without concern for the wellbeing of humanity and not because of God’s punishment. God does not interfere in human acts. As the ancient Rabbis say it, olam keminhago noheg, “the universe goes according to its own mandate.” (Avodah Zara 54b).