As well as being a Jew, I am an Atheist, and being an Atheist is very important to me as well. My parents being non-religious, I was an Atheist from a very early age. For a few years during Junior High School and High School, I became a deist - I believed in God, but mainly to explain why I had consciousness. I slowly relieved myself of the belief in God, until I returned to my pristine Atheist and God-bashing state.
The first reason I don’t believe in God is because there isn’t a good reason to believe in him. One cannot pre-assume God exists just as much one cannot assume dragons exist, or that our neighbouring planets are inhabited by the Star Trek races, or that thought-reading is possible. It’s another assumption we are better not making because it won’t be scientific to do otherwise. (as scientists do not make assumptions without a good evidence to).
The second reason is that all the arguments for the existence of God can be refuted. If God created the Universe, who created God? If the Universe exists because of God, why does God exist? Finally, if we need God to explain our consciousness, we’ll have an equally hard time explaining God’s.
A better conclusion is to declare that existence simply exists and we as conscious individuals are aware of it. It always did, and always will, and wasn’t created (at least not conclusively). It simply exists.
And if I die or get killed, would believing in God, while he in fact does not, help me in any way? And would it be logical to assume that a god who created such wondrous existence, would be so petty to think that we must believe in him, or else follow the requirements that he put forth?
And further more, if I believe in God, which God should I believe in? The Jewish one? The Muslim one? The Catholic Christian? The Protestant Christian? My own self-invented God? The good thing about Gods is that you have so many to choose from.
One of my many Aphorisms say that “The prefix ‘God Said’ has the extraordinary logical property of converting any statement that follows it into a true one.”. And it is true. Just witness the way believers blindly follow their leaders because they are infected with the belief in “God”. Be it Orthodox Jews who dress in Black Robes in the hot days of Israel’s July. Or be it Muslims who send themselves to their death knowing they won’t survive, but wishing to take as many “Kafirs” as possible with them. Or be it Nazi soldiers who march across Europe trying to conquer states they do not need to conquer just because they believe in their God-leader.
No harmful doctrine is entirely free of the God concept, even if it blatantly claims to be so. That’s because such doctrines need a God to unite the people with. This God can be the State, the Aryan Race, “God”, the Common Good or anything else other than the well-being of the individual.
By rejecting the God concept, one becomes mostly immune to such manipulations.
The Godless man rejects any doctrine and any authority that attempts to go against him. He analyses any truism that he encounters trying to see if it is factual. Furthermore, he gradually makes his beliefs more and more accurate, and adapts them to the new technological and philosophical advancements of his time.
He is thus an independent thinker. Note that being Godless, means rejecting any god whatsoever. When you reject any God and any dogma, you will become “Godless”, independent and free.