TERUMAH

Faith Verses Reality

One of the great struggles in life is that what we see and feel feels more real than what we believe.

A religious person lives with tension. On one hand, we believe in a G-d who is beyond anything physical. On the other hand, we are physical beings. We experience the world through what we see, hear, smell, taste, and touch. And whatever we can see and feel feels powerful and convincing. It feels real. Faith is abstract. The physical world is right in front of us.

Rabbi Levi Yitzchak of Berditchev once cried out: “Master of the Universe, where is the fairness? This world

You put right in front of our eyes, but Gan Eden You left in the books.” In other words, the physical world feels immediate and obvious. The spiritual world feels distant and theoretical.

So the question is: how do we stay connected to faith when the physical world is so intense and overwhelming?