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As a guy, I shouldn't be expected to know that challahs have nothing to do with cauldrons but I believe the connection here is more on the side of witchcraft and superstition."Looking for a group of 43 challah bakers to bake Erev Shabbos... in the zechus of a refuah shelama for..."
This is a common email I receive on the 5-Towns shul postings. I never quite understood the concept of baking challah or making a blessing that would somehow propitiate God to provide a speedy recovery. What is the connection? Why challah and not another act that has a bracha attached to it? How did they come up with 43? Wasn't it 40 last week? Are there controlled experiments to see which number of challah brachas are successful? Perhaps there should be a severity chart that correlates number of challahs to intensity of condition. What if the challahs fail to rise to the occasion? Is that essential? Should we bake a red string inside just in case?
Boyer, in Religion Explained, noted that most religious ritual is NOT logical. You swing the chicken 7x over your head and your grass will grow. No logical connection. The reason is that things that are unusual or unexpected tend to be better remembered and better transmitted. Hence the success of religions in embedding these memes in our mind and passing on many odd traditions.
So why do smart people continue believing these seemingly illogical things?
One reason that people associate a given segula with a particular act or time period is because someone once noticed a particular outcome actually occurred (coincidentally). Unfortunately, they have fallen in the trap of what is known as Confirmation Bias: Once you consider a hypothesis, you detect and recall confirming instances better than non-confirming. All the other times that these segulas failed are not registered with nearly the same intensity. Someone once got better after a bake-a-thon and a segula was born/baked.
I see this phenomenon at work. I noticed, as have all my coworkers, that anytime I am free but go to the fridge, try to prepare or eat food, a client comes in. I can be free for 6 hours until I touch food. This has happened so consistently that a legend has emerged from this. Yet, when I consciously try hard to imagine all the times I touch food, there are indeed times when no client magically appears. But the confirmation bias is so strong that it feels like fact.
I think people err as to the purpose of segulas (incl learning, praying, shmirat halashon, charity). These actions do not cause a direct result. God is not under our power nor is he obligated to respond in a defined, mechanical manner to our actions. Instead the purpose is to remind us that everything comes from God (incl. blessings, failures, successes, protection, marriage, children, health etc etc). These actions invoke in us a potential; a potential to recognize God in everything as well as act as a stimulus towards tikon of the individual and eventually tikun olam.
It is, of course, our hope that God deems us worthy of blessing but that is up to Him.
NJG coined a few great terms. He, at first, called this "vending machine" Judaism where you press a button (do action A) and get your candy (receive what you want from God). Then he called it "slot-machine" Judaism because you can put the lever but often you don't get what you would like. Instead, he pointed out that "the 'segulah' is for the person to stop and contemplate. Like all prayer, which God doesn't "need", the purpose is to narrow your focus, and work on YOURSELF." There is great power in prayer. In The Brother’s Karamazov, Dostoyevsky writes ‘Every time you pray…there will be new feeling and new meaning in it… and you will understand that prayer is an education.’
I do believe that the human mind needs the reassurance that it is not insignificant and powerless in an uncertain world. "[E]mbracing rationality while denying the existence of any mystery to life and its meaning-that is no less a form of madness than eager devotion to unreason." -Odd Thomas in Forever Odd by Dean Koontz. The power of the segulas can also lie within its ability to mollify the frightened spirit, lest it sink into depression and despair. People need to believe. Sometimes having faith (even misguided) allows the person to accept the challenges of life with greater resolve and handle the pain in an equally efficacious manner.
The danger is that, on the flip side, believing in a power that fails you, may lead you to abandon everything. Damned if you do, damned if you don't but at least you get to eat fresh challah.
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