One Last Post

For those who cannot tell from this blog, I am Jewish. This pretty much guarantees that I have relatives who are doctors. Well, it turns out that I have lots of relatives who are doctors, some who are actually famous. When I went in to interview for my daughter's Beis Ya'akov, so many years ago, the three main topics of discussion were:
1) Why didn't you get your name put higher on the list by coming earlier in the night to stand on line (that pretty much gives away the school, doesn't it)?
2) Why do you go by your English name (I don't)?
3) Wow, your uncle is a really famous doctor.
(And how wonderful my mother-in-law is.)

Not only that, I went to YU. So my friends are either:
1) Accountants
2) Trained as engineers but working in computers
3) Doctors
4) Rabbis (or trained as rabbis but working in computers)

The engineers and the doctors took lots of science. Without exception, everyone with whom I have had a serious discussion about their scientific training has told me how amazing the world and the human body is, and how the more they learn about it, the more they grow in awe of God.

That is why I was so surprised when R. Mordechai Plaut wrote in the Yated Ne'eman (thanks to Steve Brizel for bringing this to my attention) that people should really only learn medieval science to grow in their appreciation of God. Modern science just won't do it.

Nowadays, one who seeks to arouse and enhance his love of Hashem is best advised not to study modern science. He may study the material that the Rambam suggests at the beginning of Hilchos Yesodei Hatorah, or Chovos Halevovos. Many find that deep study of the lomdishe acharonim enhances their ahavas Hashem.

Maybe he should have consulted with some people who actually studied modern science and ask what their reactions were.

UPDATE: Compare. Rabbi Plaut:

This is not to say that the awe that the deep discoveries of modern physics can inspire cannot be useful, but it is to argue that it is much less special and unique than was the knowledge that the Rambam lays out in his early chapters of Sefer Mada...

In fact, all of the content of modern science is only of the kind that the Rambam shows elsewhere as applying to basic belief in G-d and not to love of Him. By showing complexity and the skill of the Designer, it can lead to emunoh.

Yet Rambam does not recommend the study of natural science for acquiring basic belief but for arousing love of G-d — ahavas Hashem.

Rambam (Hilkhos Yesodei Ha-Torah 2:2):

What is the way to love and fear God? Whenever one contemplates the great wonders of God's works and creations, and one sees that they are a product of a wisdom that has no bounds or limits, one will immediately love, laud and glorify [God] with an immense passion to know the Great Name, like David has said, "My soul thirsts for God, for the living God". When one thinks about these matters one will feel a great fear and trepidation, and one will know that one is a low and insignificant creation, with hardly an iota of intelligence compared to that of God, like David has said, "When I observe Your heavens, the work of Your fingers...what is man, that You are heedful of him?".