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Everything you always wanted to know about Judaism,
but were too afraid to ask!
New questions and answers will be added to this page
on a regular basis, so please remember to return here.
Have your Halacha questions answered. (Use the link
below to ask your own questions. Please state if you
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Please note that previous questions answered
by Rabbi Livingstone are suffixed by
RL. New questions answered by Rabbi
Anthony are suffixed by RA.
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to your new questions to Rabbi Anthony
Questions about the subject
of God, in no particular order.
How
do you explain dinosaurs?
There are several reputable theories reconciling
of the traditional version of creation with
scientific and fossil evidence regarding the
Earth’s antiquity and the presence of dinosaurs.
Without going into all of these, I will list
a couple of ideas.
The first is that dinosaurs may well be the
‘great serpents’ mentioned in the
Torah at Genesis I:20-21. The classic commentators
Rashi and Ramban both suggest that these Taninim
could have been both sea and land monsters -
akin to what we would call dinosaurs. They will
have lived, on this version, during the initial
phases of creation, later dying out. According
to the Chief Rabbi Hertz in his Chumash, based
on Talmudic evidence each day of biblical creation
could well represent a vast epoch of millions
of years divided in the Torah into six or seven
eras. Certainly the dinosaurs, according to
this view, could have been around for a very
long time indeed before eventually becoming
extinct.
In any event, the Kabbalistic view of creation
does not take the narrative of the Torah absolutely
literally. Instead, it suggests a process not
unlike the ‘big bang’ involving extraordinary
dimensions of light, heat, space, and time.
Dinosaurs could well fit into this non-literal
understanding of Genesis without creating any
theological difficulty.
As a final point, it should always be noted
that even the best science and archeology is
hypothetical - as nobody knows with absolute
certainty and in exact detail how and whether
these things occurred. RL
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Why
did God give us the ability to do evil?
We believe that the possibility of doing evil
exists specifically in order for us to have
free choice as to whether we obey G-d’s
will or deviate from it. If we could only do
good then there would be no spiritual challenge
in life - which, according to Jewish philosophy,
is the very reason that G-d put us here. RL
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