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Introduction to JUDAISM in the Image of God

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Introduction to JUDAISM in the Image of God Temple Sinai, S. Burlington, VT. Rabbi David Edleson z Introduction to JUDAISM In the image of God THE JEWISH VIEWS OF HUMAN NATURE z B’tzelem Elohim z z B’tzelem elohim ▪ ַו ִּי ְב ָָֽ֨רא ֱאֹל ִּ ִ֤הים ׀ ֶאת־ ָֽה ָֽא ָֽד ֙ם ְב ַצ ְל ֔מֹו ְב ֶ ֶ֥צ ֶלם ֱאֹל ִּ ִ֖הים בָֽרָָֽ֣אאֹת֑ ֹו זָֽכָֽ ֶ֥ר ּונְקֵבָֽ ִ֖ה בָֽרָֽ ֶ֥א אֹתָֽ ם׃ ▪ And God created humanity in the divine image… z HOW JEWS READ BIBLE: Mikra’ot G’dolot z digital version: SEFARIA ְּבֵר אשִׁ֖ית ב רָ֣א ֱא ִֹ֑להים ▪ GENESIS 1: In the Beginning...... z CHEVRUTA STUDY Study in pairs and small groups, unlocking and debating the meaning of texts is one of the central religious acts of the Jewish imagination. Study is not an “added value” to Judaism; study is essential, integral, and holy. God is seen to dwell in the act of study and particularly, studying with others to wrestle answers to the great religious questions. z TAKEAWAY ▪ Humans are innately curious and wanting to learn. ▪ We became humans when we ate the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. We became moral agents. ▪ Thinking and study is one way to connect to God and the divine image within us. ▪ Wisdom lies in probing the complexity of a matter, not in oversimplifying. ▪ Humans are able to understand a variety of opinions that they may not agree with. Humans are able to be friends and family even with profound disagreements. z HILLEL AND SHAMAI: ELU V’ELU ▪ ואמרה אלו ואלו דברי אלהים חיים הן והלכה כבית הלל ▪ TALMUD ERUVIN: For three years Beit Shammai and Beit Hillel disagreed. These said: The halakha is in accordance with our opinion, and these said: The halakha is in accordance with our opinion. Ultimately, a Divine Voice emerged and proclaimed: Both these and those are the words of the living God. However, the halakha is in accordance with the opinion of Beit Hillel. ▪ The Gemara asks: Since both these and those are the words of the living God, why were Beit Hillel privileged to have the halakha established in accordance with their opinion? The reason is that they were agreeable and forbearing, showing restraint when affronted, and when they taught the halakha they would teach both their own statements and the statements of Beit Shammai. Moreover, when they formulated their teachings and cited a dispute, they prioritized the statements of Beit Shammai to their own statements, in deference to Beit Shammai. z B’REISHIT - IN THE BEGINNING? ▪ RASHI: 11th C French Scholar: Rabbeinu ShlomoYitzchak IN THE BEGINNING GOD CREATED — This verse calls aloud for explanation in the manner that our Rabbis explained it: Godבראשית ברא ▪ of His (God’s) way”, and for the sake ofראשית( ) created the world for the sake of the Torah which is called (Proverbs 8:22) “The beginning ,of His (God’s) increase’’. If, however, you wish to explain it in its plain senseראשית( ) Israel who are called (Jeremiah 2:3) “The beginning explain it thus: At the beginning of the Creation of heaven and earth when the earth was without form and void and there was darkness, God said, “Let there be light”. The text does not intend to point out the order of the acts of Creation — to state that these (heaven and earth) were ”.At first God created etcבראשונה ברא את השמים וגו “' created first; for if it intended to point this out, it should have written occurs in Scripture, it is in the construct state. E. g., (Jeremiah 26:1) “In theראשית And for this reason: Because, wherever the word ▪ his kingdom”; (Deuteronomy 18:4) “The first fruit ofראשית( ) the reign of Jehoiakim”; (Genesis 10:10) “The beginning ofבראשית( ) beginning of at the beginning of God’s creating. Aבראשית ברוא, as though it readבראשית ברא אלהים thy corn.” Similarly here you must translateראשית( ) ,which is as much as to sayתחלת דבר ה' בהושע, (similar grammatical construction (of a noun in construct followed by a verb) is: (Hosea 1:2 “At the beginning of God’s speaking through Hosea, the Lord said to Hosea.” Should you, however, insist that it does actually intend to point out that these (heaven and earth) were created first, and that the meaning is, “At the beginning of everything He created these, admitting is in the construct state and explaining the omission of a word signifying “everything” by saying that you haveבראשית therefore that the word texts which are elliptical, omitting a word, as for example (Job 3:10) “Because it shut not up the doors of my mother’s womb” where it does not explicitly explain who it was that closed the womb; and (Isaiah 8:4) “He shall take away the spoil of Samaria” without explaining who shall take it away; and (Amos 6:12) “Doth he plough with oxen," and it does not explicitly state, “Doth a man plough with oxen”; (Isaiah 46:10) “Declaring from the beginning the end,” and it does not explicitly state, “Declaring from the beginning of a thing the end of a thing’ — if it is so (that you assert that this verse intends to point out that heaven and earth were created first), you should be astonished at yourself, because as a matter of fact the waters were created before heaven and earth, for, lo, it is written, (v. 2) “The Spirit of God was hovering on the face of the waters,” and Scripture had not yet disclosed when the creation of the waters took place — consequently you must learn from this that the creation of the waters preceded that of the earth. And a further proof that the heavens and earth were not the first thing created is that the .from which it follows that fire and water were in existence before the heavensמים(, ) and waterאש( ) heavens were created from fire Therefore you must needs admit that the text teaches nothing about the earlier or later sequence of the acts of Creation. z OUR OWN CHEVRUTA z CREATION STORY I: Genesis 1 ▪ ַו ִּי ְב ָָֽ֨רא ֱאֹל ִּ ִ֤הים ׀ ֶאת־ ָֽה ָֽא ָֽד ֙ם ְב ַצ ְל ֔מֹו ְב ֶ ֶ֥צ ֶלם ֱאֹל ִּ ִ֖הים בָֽרָָֽ֣אאֹת֑ ֹו זָֽכָֽ ֶ֥ר ּונְקֵבָֽ ִ֖ה בָֽרָֽ ֶ֥א אֹתָֽ ם׃ ▪ And God created humanity in the divine image, in the image of the divine God created him; male and female He created them. z AND IT WAS VERY GOOD ▪ וַיִַַּ֤֤רְא אֱֹלהִּים֙ אֶ ת־כָֽל־אֲשֶ ָ֣ רעָֽשָֽ֔ הוְהִּ נֵה־טִֹ֖וב מְ אֹ֑ד ו ַיְהִּי־עֶ ֶ֥רֶ ב וַיְהִּ י־בִֹ֖ קֶריֶֹ֥ום הַשִּשִּ י׃ )פ( ▪ And God saw all that God had made, and found it very good. And there was evening and there was morning, the sixth day. z IN OUR IMAGE RASHI: כדמותנו. לְהָֽבִּ ין ּולְהַשְ כִּ יל: IN OUR IMAGE— with the power to comprehend and to discern. z What is MIDRASH Midtrash is an interpretive act, seeking the answers to(מדרשׁ) religious questions (both practical and theological) by plumbing the meaning of the words of the Torah. Midrash responds to contemporary problems and crafts new stories, making connections between new Jewish realities and the unchanging biblical text. z BREISHIT RABBAH 8 ▪ ... Said R’ Yirmiyah ben Elazar: In the hour when the Holy One created the first human, He created him [as] an androgyne/androginos, as it is said, “male and female He created them”. Said R’ Shmuel bar Nachmani: In the hour when the Holy One created the first human, He created [for] him a double-face/di-prosopon/ du-par’tsufin, and sawed him and made him backs, a back here and a back [t]here, as it is said, “Back/achor and before/qedem You formed me” [Ps 139:5]. z 3 FUNDAMENTAL TRUTHS Rabbi Yitz Greenberg 1. We are each of infinite worth – no one is expendable, and we cannot quantify the value of any human life 2. We are all fundamentally equal – no human being is an y more important than any other human being. 3. We are each totally unique – there is no one else like us, and no one is interchangeable with anybody else. z HESCHEL ON HUMAN NATURE The Bible is an answer to the supreme question: what does God demand of us? Yet the question has gone out of the world (God in Search of Man, 168). Wonder or radical amazement is the chief characteristic of the religious man’s attitude toward history and nature. One attitude is alien to his spirit: taking things for granted, regarding events as a natural course to things. To find an approximate cause of a phenomenon is no answer to his ultimate wonder. He knows that there are laws that regulate the course of natural processes; he is aware of the regularity and pattern of things. However, such knowledge fails to mitigate his sense of perpetual surprise at the fact that there are facts at all. Looking at the world he would say, “This is the Lord’s doing, it is marvelous in our eyes” (Psalms 118:23) (God in Search of Man, 45). The soul is endowed with a sense of indebtedness, and wonder, awe, and fear unlock that sense of indebtedness. Wonder is the state of our being asked. In spite of our pride, in spite of our acquisitiveness, we are driven by an awareness that something is asked of us; that we are asked to wonder, to revere, to think and to live in a way that is compatible with the grandeur and mystery of living. What gives birth to religion is not intellectual curiosity but the fact and experience of our being asked (God in Search of Man, 112).
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