Congregation Shema Yisrael

For more than 70 years, innumerable physicists have tried to disentangle the meaning of quantum mechanics through debate. Now Zeilinger and his collaborators have performed a series of experiments that, while neatly agreeing with the theory’s predictions, are reinvigorating these historical dialogues. In Vienna experiments are testing whether quantum mechanics permits a fundamental physical reality. A new way of understanding an already powerful theory is beginning to take shape, one that could change the way we understand the world around us. Do we create what we observe through the act of our observations?

In 1935, from an idyllic corner of New Jersey, Einstein and two young collaborators began a different assault on quantum mechanics. Einstein, Podolsky, and Rosen (EPR) did not question the theory’s correctness, but rather its completeness. More than the notion that god might play dice, what most bothered Einstein were quantum mechanics’ implications for reality. As Einstein prosaically inquired once of a walking companion, “Do you really believe that the moon exists only when you look at it?”

-from Seed Magazine
The Reality Tests
by Joshua Roebke
June 4, 2008

One of the bizarre concepts attached to Quantum Physics is that (and this is an oversimplification) we change any object, at least subtly, just by observing it. That doesn’t mean your sofa turns into a giraffe just because you’re looking at it, but what it does suggest is that you cannot observe sub-atomic particles or perhaps the light from distant galaxies without, in some small way, altering the phenomena you’re studying. That said, certainly no one, not even the staunchest of Quantum Physics supporters, actually believes the moon would cease to exist if everyone where to stop looking at it. After all, the moon has measurable tidal effects on the Earth and a suddenly missing moon would be even indirectly noticed. Even if the world were completely depopulated, the Moon, as an objective thing would still be there.

On the other hand, there is one “observer” who neither slumbers nor sleeps, and so in that context, the Moon, and everything else, is always being “observed” by God. Perhaps the following can illuminate:

The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven. -Hebrews 1:3

“Sustaining” (present tense) “…all things by his powerful word…” Rather reminds me of this:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. -John 1:1-3

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. -Genesis 1:1

The Word was with God in the beginning, when God was in the midst of creating the heavens and the earth. Without the Word, nothing would have been made.

The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth. -John 1:14

And the Word, that was with God in the beginning, that participated in all Creation, and in its absence, nothing would have been created, became a man and temporarily dwelt among us. That part is a common understanding in Christian theology. Jesus Christ (Yeshua HaMashiach) is the author of life and all creation. But on the seventh day, God “rested” or rather, he stopped creating, didn’t he?

By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. -Genesis 2:2

If God, through the Word, created the universe in six days (six actual 24 hour periods or otherwise), and rested on the seventh “day” (is it still “the seventh day”?), then He’s still resting, rather than creating. This would certainly explain entropy as we see it in the world around us. The universe seems to be slowly “winding down”, much like the mainspring on an old clock (before electricity, let alone digital). Things wear out. The sun will eventually run out of hydrogen to burn (and helium after that, and carbon and iron…). We all age and die. Nothing lasts forever. OK, nothing lasts forever in the present age. I’m not talking about the world to come. But what about Quantum Physics? Was Einstein and Classical Physics correct and Quantum Physics completely bogus? Consider this.

The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven. -Hebrews 1:3

I presented that passage a little earlier, but now that we have more scripture to add context, what do we think it really means about Creation? Obviously, I can’t say for sure. I don’t think any human being has the inside track on exactly how Creation was and is sustained, but here we have some clues that what we observe may well be at least somewhat in synch with what God is telling us in the Bible. The writer of the Book of Hebrews states that the Word is also the “radiance of God’s glory”, which is a pretty good definition of the Divine Presence, otherwise known as the Shekhinah; what we see descending onto the Tabernacle in the desert at the end of the Book of Exodus.

Then the cloud covered the Tent of Meeting, and the glory of the LORD filled the tabernacle. Moses could not enter the Tent of Meeting because the cloud had settled upon it, and the glory of the LORD filled the tabernacle. -Exodus 40:34-35

I can’t say for sure that the Shekhinah is the Messiah in an alternate form, but it would fit if he was present at Creation, “hovering over the waters”. The passage in Hebrews also states that the Son is “sustaining all things by his powerful word.” Again, I point out that, at least in English, the word “sustaining” is in present tense and the plain meaning suggests that he is holding together the universe at the present moment, and in each and every present moment. Of course, I could be making far too big a deal out of a single word. We don’t see anything else in that part of the Book of Hebrews that speaks to this point, so I definitely could be wrong, but it’s interesting to ponder.

What if reality or Creation, as we understand and experience it, is really dependent on “observer effects”? Classical Physics states in part, that there is an objective reality beyond the observer. When you turn out the lights and go to bed at night, your blue sofa is still blue, your car is still in the garage, and the Moon is still orbiting Earth. For that matter, all of the atomic and sub-atomic particles that are part of you, your sofa, your car, and the Moon, are still doing what they should be doing, whether or not you are observing them or even aware of them.

Quantum Physics states in part, that the observer is an integral part of what is being observed, at least at the quantum level, so while you may not cause the Moon or your car to cease to exist by going to sleep at night, your observing or not observing particles at the quantum level does make a difference.

Classical Physics says that God wound up the universe like an old-fashioned toy soldier and is letting it march along until the spring finally unwinds and the toy slowly comes to a halt. Quantum Physics says that God may have wound up the universe, but assuming He constantly observes the universe, that observation makes a difference on the events that occur as the spring is unwinding…or perhaps even how fast or in what way the spring unwinds.

If the universe is indeed being currently sustained by His powerful Word, this at least suggests that the course of the universe, and the events occurring within it, are not random, as entropy would suppose, but rather are affected to at least a certain degree, by the observance of the “powerful Word”. While we know that Yeshua is our Savior, Messiah, Intercessor with the Father, and High Priest in the Heavenly Court, we might also be able to assign him of another role; that of “sustainer of the universe” or “sustainer of God’s plan”.

I admit my idea is as much imagination as it is of the Bible, and you can feel perfectly free to disagree, but if even the “heavens declare the glory of God”, then what we observe in the heavens; in the universe around us, should indeed provide “proof” of the existence of the Hand of God in Creation. In that sense, when I read material on physics, astronomy, medicine, or any of the “hard sciences”, I fully expect to see God there in the observations, unless we, as human beings, are so intent on denying God that we’re falsifying what we say we see.

When you look into a microscope or a telescope, what do you expect to see?

The heavens declare the glory of God;
the skies proclaim the work of his hands.

Day after day they pour forth speech;
night after night they display knowledge.

There is no speech or language
where their voice is not heard.

Their voice goes out into all the earth,
their words to the ends of the world.
In the heavens he has pitched a tent for the sun,

which is like a bridegroom coming forth from his pavilion,
like a champion rejoicing to run his course.

-Psalm 19:1-5