I want to talk about this idea that is so integral to Jewishness of wrestling with God, how it relates to the idea of 'faith', and how that whole dynamic works differently than the Christian-centric view of faith. https://twitter.com/JustSayXtian/status/1274790526575759360

Some of my thoughts on this came into clarity while talking with @maimonides_nutz, and she has a fantastic piece on anger with God on her Patreon. https://www.patreon.com/posts/38446199 

The idea of wrestling with God is very important to a lot of Jewish peoples' understanding of our religion. It's the name of our people, and it's an integral part of a lot of our stories - the oven of Akhnai, Sodom and Gomorrah, Moses at Sinai, even the binding of Isaac.

We are frequently referred to by God as 'a stiff-necked people'. That isn't an insult. It's a point of pride. It is, to some people's thinking (including mine), why God chose us for the covenant. God *wanted* to be in a relationship with a people who would push back.

What does it mean to be in a relationship with God where arguing with God, being angry with God, even outright contradicting God is an expected part of things? What does faith mean in that context? The Hebrew word translated as faith is Emunah (אמונה).

It can also be translated as steadfastness, support, firmness, reliability. To be faithful is to be able to be trusted. There's a section in Exodus that I think captures the idea perfectly (lots of background here before I get to the point).

Israel is wandering in the wilderness. They're following Moses, who is following God, and at one of their camps there is no water. The people complain to Moses, and he answers them "Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you challenge God?"

And then we get "But the people thirsted there for water". Their needs are not being met. Telling them not to complain about it - to accept their situation without question - isn't sufficient. They ask why they left Egypt, if their children are just going to die of thirst?

So Moses goes to God and says "this sucks, these people won't stop complaining to me about how thirsty they are", and God tells him to go hit a rock with his staff, and then the rock will break open and water will pour out of it.

It's an open question on whether they would have survived or not if they *hadn't* tested God, but I tend to think they wouldn't. People need water to survive, and there wasn't any water. Because they complained and challenged God and refused to accept blindly, they got water.

So that's the background - immediately after this Amalek comes and attacks Israel. Moses tells Joshua to go fight, and he'll stand on a hill and hold up his staff that he used to get water. He does so and sure enough, whenever he's holding up the rod, Israel prevails.

Whenever he lowers the rod, Amalek prevails. But his arms get tired, so Aaron and Hur go and stand at his sides and hold up his arms for him. And that's where we get "emunah" - they keep his arms *faithful*.

So, in the context of the people arguing with God and complaining that their needs aren't being met, we get "faithful" to describe people coming to Moses' aid and literally, physically supporting him.

The whole section is a lesson in how we approach faith. It isn't that we have faith in God so we don't ask for water when we're thirsty, trusting against reason that things will be okay. We have faith in God, so we aren't afraid to complain, or to argue, or even to be angry.

Faith isn't believing that you can hold your arms up forever no matter how tired you are, even when your physical body isn't up to the task, against all evidence and reason. Faith is trusting that your brother will hold your arms up when you can't do it anymore.

What we have faith in is the covenant. We have faith in the *relationships*, including our relationship with God. And because we have faith in that relationship, we don't have to tiptoe around and be careful not to offend God.

We have faith that we can go to God and say "You idiot, what were you thinking putting us in a camp without water, do you want our children to die???" and our relationship is strong enough that God will say "I see your point, let me fix this."

Being angry with God is an act of faith. Questioning whether the way we've understood the commandments is correct is an act of faith. Telling God "no, I won't do this, it's wrong" is an act of faith. Telling God "fuck you, where were you when we needed you?" is an act of faith.

It's putting trust in the idea that the love and commitment between us and God is strong enough that we can challenge and argue and rage and God will still be our God, and we will still be God's people. It's trust that even if God doesn't exist, we are still pursuing justice.

Faith, in this understanding, very much does not mean assuming that God is always right, taking everything without question, being 100% sure that God has definitely never made a mistake or done something unjust, or been in the wrong. It's not certitude in God's infallibility.

Faith is being sure that we can call God on God's bullshit and come out on the other side with a stronger relationship, where both we and God are better for having wrestled with the issue and confronted it instead of ignoring it and leaving it unchallenged.

ADDENDUM:
Several people have brought up Moses being instructed to talk to the rock instead of hitting it with his staff. That's actually a later story in Numbers that parallels this one in Exodus, but I do think it's related. So - mini sub-thread: https://twitter.com/JustSayXtian/status/1276201328725733383?s=20