|   WHY GOD MADE MAN |

 

 

What is the meaning of life?

Why did God create me?

 

RABBI MOSHE BEN-CHAIM

 

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Many people feel this question is unanswerable. But in fact, the answer is easily found, and it is very pleasing.

 

First, we must know this: only that which created life can answer our question above. God is the only creator. By definition, as nothing can create itself, all that exists requires something else to create it. All traces back to a first cause, before which there was nothing but God, since time itself is a creation (Maimonides) and prior to time, there was no “before.” Thus, God existed without being created. It is an amazing concept that even Moses did not know. But it must be so. For there cannot be an endless chain of causes going back in time infinitely with no beginning. For without a beginning, nothing ever starts, and nothing could exist. And also without a beginning, the present never arrives. Therefore, there must be a beginning, and that is what we call creation.

 

Now, God did not leave man—the only intellect on Earth—without a guide to live this life that God planned wisely and so precisely (biology, weather, zoology, Torah, justice, morality, thought, etc.). God did not leave us in the dark about how we can achieve the most fulfilling life. God created man alone with an intellect, as God desires man to use that intellect. And the intellectual guide for the best human life is the Bible. There was only one event in all of history where God communicated His one divine religion. 3333 years ago on Mount Sinai, God revealed his Bible to approximately 2.5 million Jews. No other religion makes any claim of mass revelation. But as other religions seek to validate their fabricated religions, they concoct false histories that never occurred. But to falsify credibility they include in their fables that God spoke to one person, or a small group of people, which cannot be disproved, or proved. And then they demand blind faith, as they offer no proof. Had they claimed masses witnessed God’s revelation when it did not happen, they would not succeed in gaining adherents, as all those they sought to convince would retort that they knew that they were not part of any mass revelation; they would respond, “We were not there on that date and time, as we were elsewhere.”

 

In contrast, not only Jewish history but world history and the major religions have but one record of 2.5 million Jews on the sixth day of the Hebrew month Sivan, 3333 years ago: Wed. May 2, 1312 B.C.E. On that date, all those Jews witnessed a voice emanating from a fiery Mount Sinai and Moses descending with the two miraculous tablets, the 10 Commandments, (image below) with writing miraculously inscribed internally, which is impossible for man to create. The two sapphire tablets were like blue glass which revealed the internal writing of those 10 Commandments. It was also impossible is that there should be any earthly intelligent voice emanating from fire which thereby proved that the source of the Bible is not of this world. Moses realized this significance and repeated to the Jews 9 times in Deuteronomy that they heard a voice from inside the fiery mountain.

 

Now that we know that God in fact communicated His religion to man, we can study his Bible and arrive at the answer to our question of what is our purpose and what will truly make us happy. God designed His Biblical ideals, values and commandments to be an enjoyable pursuit for man that outweighs any other assumed satisfaction, such as wealth, fame or instinctual pleasures.

 

The answer to “What is the meaning of life?” is that man find the greatest satisfaction in his endless discovery of God's wisdom through Torah study and practice, and the study of nature. God designed man where his intellectual pursuits provide him greater satisfaction than any other activity. The meaning and purpose of our lives is to achieve happiness through marveling at God’s immense wisdom found in Earth and in Torah, and drawing closer to God.