This is the way a gardener would work. Something randomly shows up or does well and the gardener responds by nurturing a welcome innovation. This is opportunism rather than design. If something good comes out, the gardener goes with the flow and builds around it, making room for it and giving it a special chance.

But this is not a determinate process. Something starts developing and so it may be helped. On the other hand, the forces of random chance may just have their day instead. There are many ways to move forward cognitively. It might be one feature that turns up and it might be another. The goal is set that an intelligent creature that is aware of itself, the Universe and ultimately its Creator should emerge. Exactly how this should happen and what cognitive constellation this creature will have depends on what opportunities the random process throw up.

I don't know if I would have chosen this way of creating the Universe as we know it but, then again, nobody asked me. All we can say is that this seems to be the only way of explaining the evolution patterns that we observe. The outcomes are absolutely beyond random and yet it seems to build up bit by bit following opportunism generated by random processes. The conclusion that this is the way the Universe is guided is an observational, empirical one.

We learn from the observations of the early history of life as well as observations of the dynamics of genetics as it appears today that this is the nature of the behavior of the Creator.

The fascinating thing is that He seems to apply the same manner of guidance to human history too. This simple idea provides insight that is helpful to understanding why questions such as human suffering and why, in general human history seems to be the way it is. This is not the place to provide the detail but here too we propose that the right way to look at the problem is by starting out with the model of a Divine Gardener rather than a Divine Engineer. Slowly, ever so slowly, humanity emerges that learns to control more and more illnesses. Slowly we create a society where we can focus resource away from raw, brute survival. Who knows, perhaps we may even learn to translate this economic prowess into an existence focused on learning, advancement and self-understanding.

But this does not only provide a unified insight into pre-human and human history. This idea of G-d as a gardener provides insight into understanding what the Torah is telling us about His Guidance. This is also the image of G-d presented in the text of the Torah.

Throughout the Torah we see that G-d wants a specific goal: the good for all of His Creation. However, there are many paths that lead to that goal and presumably many forms that that good may take. We see Him respond again and again to the initiative and behavior of human beings. If they fail Him, then history takes one course and if they strive to create good in the world then history takes another. Human beings plead and pray and G-d responds. He even creates covenants with His creations agreeing to restrict Himself in a specific manner in return for them promising to keep the covenant.

We see that throughout the Torah, the actions of G-d revealed in the world follow the model of the responsive gardener far better than the model of the pre-ordaining engineer. G-d has run the world in the billions of years of its development in the model as He runs the affairs of humanity today.

Of course, the nature of the initiative is different. The initiative of human beings derives from their Free Will. We cannot apply the same concept in the same way to inanimate random processes. Nevertheless, there is a striking parallel between the two that can only be a starting point for a deeper understanding of the nature of both random initiative and Free Will.

The concepts that I have developed here provide insights for me personally as I consider my sister Etta Z"L. They provide insights both into her life and into the fact that she was taken from us so young.

On the one hand, her passing away is to be understood as part of the respect and love that HKB"H has for the laws that govern the Universe. The laws of physics, biology, genetics and molecular dynamics must in most cases be allowed to run their course. Until cures are developed, diseases will kill their victims. The best people together with the less good people will die. G-d may sometimes intervene here and change things there, but only well within random variations on the scale that we can see. Etta's passing was not some part of a plan. Her particular death did not serve some higher good.

On the other hand, Etta's life embodied exactly what G-d expects from humanity. Her life overflowed with initiative and drive towards the goals of a better Universe as she understood them. May her memory be blessed.