18/07/2025
I was asked: "If our upbringing, personality, and even our thoughts are shaped by forces beyond our control, how can we truly have free will—and if we follow the Torah for reward, are we really any different from pleasure-seekers?"
My Response:
What you’ve articulated touches the heart of not just some of the most difficult theological and philosophical tensions in Jewish thought but also psychological. Really, these questions are not unique to Judaism but are issues that all of humanity has. You’re not alone in feeling that the shiur you listened to didn't fully address your concerns. These aren’t questions that yield easily to standard answers because they ask us to confront paradoxes at the core of being human. Freedom and fate, pleasure and purpose, responsibility and the roots of our desires.
With that said, here are some general observations that might be of use to you. Let’s zero in on the phrase that’s troubling you: “Everything is in the hands of Heaven, except for the fear of Heaven” (Berachos 33b). On the surface, this sounds like a simple dichotomy. God controls everything, but we control our moral choices. But as you rightly point out, that division quickly collapses under scrutiny. If our intelligence, tendencies, upbringing, cultural environment, and even moment-by-moment mood states are shaped by forces beyond our choosing, then how can we genuinely claim ownership over our reactions? How can "fear of Heaven"—our awe, reverence, or ethical alignment with God—be untouched by all that came before?
This isn’t just your question; it’s a question that Rambam, Ramban, Rav Dessler, and Rav Tzadok all wrestled with. At first blush, the Rambam seems to imply in Hilchot Teshuvah that we have radical moral freedom where we are responsible precisely because we could have chosen otherwise. But you and I live after Freud, Darwin, neuroscience. We know how deeply determined we are by unconscious patterns, evolutionary wiring, and neurochemistry. It makes the Rambam’s radical freedom sound naive. However, even for the Rambam in his time he had a deep sensitivity to environmental influences. In the beginning of Shemone Perakim he full acknowledges that family and culture are huge factors in what we believe. These false beliefs dig deep into our soul cand are amplified at almost every level of its functioning. For the Rambam, he entirely accepts that one can have false beliefs that block us from doing what is correct. However, he demands that one dedicate his entire to correcting those beliefs and condition ourself to act out those beliefs in order to transform who we are. In this sense, “fear of heaven” in our hands means that we are in control of the overall process and not exactly every specific act. This is a common position amongst all the Rishonim.
Playing off this theme, those like Rav Dessler, offer a more case specific view as opposed to the Rambam’s long term perspective view. While it is not entirely clear that they are disagreeing, there may be a distinction to be had in how each looks at one’s culpability in heaven. On this point, I’m not entirely certain, however he acknowledges that most of what we do is indeed not free. Rav Salant would also concur on this point and is the basis of his approach to character development through behavioral training. Much of our life is governed by habit, by temperament, by the circumstances into which we were born. But he says there exists within each person what he calls a nekudat habechirah—a moving point of freedom. It’s not everywhere. It’s not everything. But at that precise edge where your inner conflict lives between doing what’s easier and what’s right, between self-indulgence and self-transcendence that’s where free will exists. That point is different for each person. For one person, it might be getting out of bed to pray. For another, it might be forgiving someone who wronged them. And for you, it might be the very question you’re asking now. Whether to live a life driven by reaction and inclination or to seek something higher even when it doesn’t feel entirely “yours.”
So, to your question, if all my thoughts and reactions are shaped by factors outside my control, how can I be responsible for fearing God? The answer is you’re not responsible for everything. You’re responsible to fully dedicate yourself to the process of change, in the broad sense, and only for the part of you that stands at the frontier of your current awareness at any given moment. And that part, while small, is real. Judaism doesn't claim you have total freedom over your psyche. It claims you have enough freedom, at enough moments, to be held accountable; not in a punitive sense but in a dignifying sense. You are a soul, not just a system of chemicals. The Torah’s view of man insists that there's something transcendent in you that can choose. Not everything, not always, but meaningfully.
Looking at this same question from a psychological scientific perspective, a similar picture emerges. Take neuroplasticity: the brain’s architecture is not static, but is reshaped by intentional behavior, reflection, learning, and repeated choice. Cognitive-behavioral therapy, mindfulness practices, teshuvah itself all rely on the brain’s capacity to rewire itself through conscious engagement. Studies show that sustained moral or spiritual practice changes activity and even physical structure in regions like the prefrontal cortex, associated with judgment, self-regulation, and long-term planning. Moreover, the simplistic interpretation of the Libet experiments that the brain "decides before we do" has been refuted by subsequent research (and Libet himself) showing that subjects can still veto an action even after a readiness potential has begun. That veto power, that deliberate pause, may well be the physiological correlate of bechirah chofsh*t. In other words, while we may not control the impulses that arise, we can increasingly choose how to respond to them and over time, we shape the very impulses that arise. This is not only compatible with the Jewish vision of moral responsibility. It powerfully affirms it. The Torah never claimed that freedom is easy, nor that it is absolute. But it insists that it is real.
Now, let me shift to your second question, which is just as searching, maybe even more so. I understood you asking if Judaism teaches us to reject a life of pleasure-driven impulsivity then why is our ultimate reward also pleasure? Isn’t the entire spiritual journey, in the end, just a strategy to maximize enjoyment, only in the next world rather than this one? This question reveals a deep moral unease with the idea that we’re just playing a more refined game of self-interest. After all, what distinguishes the Torah Jew from the secular hedonist, if both are chasing pleasure, only on different timelines?
Let me tell you something radical, and then qualify it. The answer to your question is both yes and no. Yes, the Torah promises ultimate pleasure and that this is not a bug in the system, but a feature. The Ramchal in not just Mesillat Yesharim but all of his kabbalistic works always opens with this idea. Yes, the purpose of man is to attain true and eternal pleasure. God, being perfectly good, wants to bestow the greatest good possible. And that good is not a physical or emotional thrill. It’s closeness to God. That is the deepest pleasure a soul can experience, one that transcends time, body, and even the ego.
But, and here’s the crucial difference, this pleasure is not something external to righteousness. It is righteousness. It's not that we behave well so that we can later receive the good. It’s that the very experience of being aligned with truth, love, holiness, and God is the good itself. That’s the difference. The hedonist says, “Pleasure is the goal; the good is what gives me pleasure.” The Torah says, “The good is the goal; and pleasure arises from being in alignment with it.” Depending on the Rishon, the telos of manifesting this pleasure is different. What human trait or virtue must be maximized? For the Rambam it’s intellectual enlightenment of Hashem. For the Ohr Hashem it’s in love with Hashem. For the Kuzari, it’s being in an organic relationship with Hashem. For Chavos HaLevavos it’s unity of self towards purity to rise up towards Hashem. At the end of the day, each establishes a hierarchy where something is above us, externally, that we live up to. Not something that we hedonistically consume and we ourselves are masters over.
And yes, the Torah speaks of reward and punishment, of Gan Eden and Gehinnom. These are frameworks for moral education. They create a language that the human being, in his limited state, can grasp. But the mature soul grows beyond reward. The Rishonim all assert, explicitly, that serving God for reward is an immature form of piety. The highest service is done out of selflessness and love, from recognition of God’s greatness and goodness, not for what we get out of it. In that sense our reward is not a bribe. It is a mirror. What you become in this world is what you experience in the next. If you shape your soul into one that desires only truth, then in the world of truth, you will be home.
So, are we “just like everyone else,” only with better PR? I don’t think so. The Torah doesn’t ask us to annihilate desire; it asks us to refine it. To transform it from self-centered craving into soul-deep longing for the Divine. When a person gives tzedakah, when they break a bad habit, when they learn Torah out of love—yes, they may feel pleasure. But it's not the pleasure of indulgence; it's the pleasure of transcendence and becoming the person you were created to be.
You asked is our selflessness rooted in selfish reward? Only if we never grow out of that stage. Just as a child initially behaves for treats and praise, but matures into someone who acts out of integrity and care, so too with us. Judaism offers a ladder. The bottom rungs may be self-serving. But the higher you climb, the more you forget yourself entirely not because you’re repressing the self, but because you’re expanding it into something divine.
From the standpoint of contemporary psychology and neuroscience, the Jewish perspective on pleasure and moral development finds surprising confirmation. Research in affective neuroscience and behavioral psychology reveals that not all pleasures are created equal. There’s a qualitative distinction between hedonic pleasure (immediate sensory gratification) and eudaimonic well-being (the deeper satisfaction associated with meaning, virtue, and self-transcendence). Studies by positive psychologists like Martin Seligman and neuroscientists such as Richard Davidson show that long-term happiness correlates more strongly with acts of generosity, spiritual practice, purpose-driven living, and moral integrity than with wealth, status, or indulgence. Functional MRI studies even demonstrate that altruistic behavior activates reward pathways not unlike those triggered by food or s*x but with more enduring effects and without the eventual habituation that characterizes addictive pleasures. In this way, the Torah’s claim that the greatest pleasure lies in cleaving to God and living in moral alignment is not a mystical assertion alone but a claim supported by empirical evidence. The tradition’s developmental arc from external motivation through reward and punishment, toward internalized love of the good parallels what psychology calls the shift from extrinsic to intrinsic motivation. What begins as pursuit of reward can evolve into joy in itself.
Ultimately, these questions aren’t distractions from religious life. They are religious life. Keep asking. Keep struggling. That, too, is fear of Heaven. Not the fear of punishment, but the trembling awe before the weight of moral reality and the grandeur of the soul. You’re not crazy for questioning. You’re awake.
To Reach Out:
Email: info@jerusalemtherapy.org
Phone: 053-808-0435
International: +972538080435
- Bio -
Yonasan’s a graduate of Hebrew University’s School of Social Work and Social Welfare. He completed post graduate training in a wide array of therapeutic approaches from CBT at The Beck Institute, behavior and emotion focused therapies, to various Psychodynamic theories. Before Hebrew University, he studied at Washington University in St. Louis and Drake University majoring in philosophy and ethics. He received his rabbinic ordination from Rav Yitzchak Berkovits.
Yonasan is a member of the Association for Contextual Behavioral Science and a Dialectical Behavioral Therapist skills trainer. He has collaborated with Machon Dvir and has been a group leader for the National Educational Alliance for Borderline Personality Disorder Family Connections program.
He specializes in treating anxiety, depression, anger, poor self-esteem, insomnia, autism, eating disorders, psychosis, problems in parenting, s*xual dysfunction, and marital conflict. He has an extensive background working with individuals, couples, families, and children in his therapy practice.
