Aryeh Siegel

THE PURPOSE OF OUR LIVES is to undergo a gradual transformation. We are born with a self-centered nature, but we can acquire a nature in which the focus is on the other. Through spiritual work, we can slowly learn to overcome our innate desire to find some form of self-gratification in all we do. Union with God is the result of desiring to give to others with no interest in reward of any kind. This is the essential teaching of the Kabbalah as portrayed in these essays by Baal Hasulam. Rabbi Gottlieb’s commentary adds details on the winding road toward spiritual transformation.

The problem of evil might better be called "the problem of problems." That there is "evil" in the world can be expressed most generally by saying that there are problems with the way things are, that at least something is not the way it should be. I shall propose that the various possible resolutions of the problem of evil correspond to varying approaches that people generally take to the problems in their lives. In this way, a connection can be made between the problem of evil as discussed by professional philosophers - a problem concerning the consistency of beliefs - and the problem as often discussed by other writers - a problem concerning the proper response to the "evil" that we find around and within us. In the course of demonstrating the parallel between the philosophical and the practical problem, I shall elaborate on the contrasting points of view of exoteric and esoteric religion, and I shall conclude with an attempt to explain why the problem remains a problem.

Forgotten Truth is primarily a presentation of the traditional esoteric view that reality consists of a hierarchy of Being. Within the hierarchy there are an indefinite number of worlds, but they can be classified into four levels: the terrestrial, psychic, and celestial planes, and the Infinite. The corresponding levels within the human microcosm are body, mind, soul, and spirit. “From the multiple heavens of Judaism to the storied structure of the Hindu temple and the angelologies of innumerable traditions, the view was reached convergently and independently, as if by innate tropism, by virtually all known societies…” (18). The important exception is our current society, whose fundamental flaw is its inclination to reduce all reality to the terrestrial plane alone. Modernity is “captive of an outlook presumed to be scientific but in fact scientistic” (17); it goes beyond the actual findings of science to deny that other approaches to knowledge are valid and other truths true” (16).

In his paper "Why a Class Can't Change Its Members," Richard Sharvy appears to establish the impossibility of the existence of a variable class—that is, a class that at one time has a member that is not a member of it at another time. I first indicate the importance of Sharvy's argument for our understanding of the concept of identity in the contexts of time and modality, and I summarize his argument. Sharvy says that a class C that has one (non-variable) group of members at t2 and another (nonvariable) group of members at t2 would be identical with both the class C1 that always has the first group as members and the class C2 that always has the second group as members. This is an impossibility, since in general, one thing cannot be identical with two.I then criticize Sharvy's argument by pointing out a weakness in the defense of the claim that C = C1 and C = C2. This weakness is due to an ambiguity in Sharvy's Principle of Extensionality.

The problem of identity across possible worlds is raised with the following questions: What does it mean to say of something in one possible world that it is identical with something in another possible world? How are we to decide whether an individual in one possible world is identical with an individual in another?1 Because the questions concern meaning and verification, it appears to be the case that they presuppose that there are one or more sentences whose meaning and method of verification are in need of explanation. However, although it has been generally presumed to be easy, it turns out to be very difficult to produce a sentence that enables us to formulate the problem and that is not merely supposed to say, but really does say, of an individual in one world and of an individual in another world that the first individual is identical with the second.

It has often been thought that the existence of an infinite amount of time implies the realization of all possibilities. However, it can be proved that it is not true that for any T, if T is an infinite period of time, then every possibility is actualized in T. The proof works for any sense of 'possibility' in which there are possibilities that cannot be actualized simultaneously.It still might be argued that if there is an infinite amount of time, then each possibility is actualized sometime (during some infinite period of time, though not all). In particular it might be claimed that if there is an infinite amount of time, then there is an uninterrupted infinite period of time; and (P*) for any T, if T is an uninterrupted infinite period of time, then every possibility is actualized in T. However, it can also be shown that (P*) is not necessarily true.For it to be actually true, some very strong Principle of Universal Random Change must be true.