WHO IS HOLDING THE STRING? Three Years After October 7 — Providence, Free Will, and the 50/50 World

 In our Tuesday morning Safra Class, three years after October 7, we step
back from the individual headlines and ask a larger question: What happens
when we stop looking at each event separately and begin looking at the pattern?
From the extraordinary turns in Israel’s war to Rav Yosef Zvi Rimon’s idea of
the “Divine puzzle,” we explore a world in which every individual event may
have a perfectly reasonable natural explanation—and yet, when the pieces are
placed beside one another, we are left asking: Who is holding the string? 

But Bereishit reminds us that Hashem created man be-tzelem Elokim,
with genuine beḥirah,
and therefore history can never be a simple story of puppets and miracles.
Drawing on the Rambam, the story of Kayin, Rabbi Asher Abittan’s unforgettable
teaching of the “50/50 world,” and the contrasting responses of Yitro
and Amalek, we ask how Divine Providence and human freedom can exist
together—and why two people can witness the same events and see completely
different realities. Ultimately, the question is not only whether we can
recognize Hashem in the story, but whether, after everything we have lived
through, we can recognize one another again.