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By Root 433 0

Every human being is the image of God. Every creature and every life form is a garbing of divine presence. The way in which we treat them and relate to them is the ultimate testing ground of our own religious consciousness. The One seeks to be known and loved in each of its endless unique manifestations. The purpose of our growing awareness is to reach out and appreciate all things for what they really are. This is especially true with regard to our fellow humans. That every human being is the image of God is Judaism's most basic moral truth. We need to help all humans to discover this dimension of their own existence in whatever terms they may choose to articulate it. We recognize that this truth may be depicted differently in the varied religious and secular languages of human culture. We do not require others to accept the language of Judaism, but we do see justice, decency, and civility to one another as universal human imperatives that stem directly from the reality that we call tselem elohim, the image of God. A person cannot be expected to discover the image of God within himself or herself as long as he or she is hungry, or as long as he or she is homeless or degraded by poverty, addictions, or the seemingly overwhelming burdens of everyday life. Our task has to be to lessen and lighten those burdens as ways of helping all to see the radiant presence that surrounds us and fills us in each moment. In the realm of “heart” it was illusory walls we had to remove in order to see that light. But in the realm of “deed” the forces that block out the light are quite concrete — social, political, or economic barriers — and they too have to become the object of our attention as people and communities of faith. “Where are you?” Are you engaged in the work given to you by the call of God?

All of these aspects of the call are the stuff of Jewish moral theology. In a sense I am commenting here on the opening teaching of the Talmud, the great treasury of rabbinic law and wisdom. Although the Talmud seems to begin with discussion of prayer and its proper hour, buried within it lies a little treatise called Avot (Principles), an eternal favorite of Jewish moral teachers. This tractate was meant to serve as an introduction to the Talmud (or perhaps as a concluding summation). Hence it begins with a superscription, telling us whence authority for the Law is derived: “Moses received Torah from Sinai and gave it to Joshua, who gave it to the judges, who gave it to the prophets, who gave it to the elders,” and so forth. But then the first teaching is stated: “The world stands upon three things: on Torah (teaching, wisdom, the cultivation of awareness), on Worship (the struggle to open the heart), and on Deeds of Kindness (the active transformation of the world; the bringing about of ‘God's kingdom’).”

Because I take this call seriously, when I read the old rabbinic dicta16 that say “God looked at the righteous” or “Israel arose in God's mind” and ““For their sake God created the world,” I surprisingly find myself to be among the affirmers. Of course I don't read these words literally, thinking of a Roman emperor or a Near Eastern potentate who calls in his advisers and asks, “Should I create humans?” But I do agree that there is a purpose to human existence, and that is what these statements really mean. Reading these ancient words for our day we also understand that “Israel” as generally understood is far too narrow and chauvinistic a term in this context and that even “the righteous” sounds rather smug and elitist. I by no means think that God created the world for the sake of the Jews or the pious Jews or anything like that. I need to universalize the “Israel” of this sentence (and so many others!) to include all those who struggle with God, referring back to the original etymology of that name.17 “The righteous” here has to include all those who do the work of stretching toward the One, by whatever means and methods they employ. I affirm this universalizing of the rabbis’ teaching to be in accord with the often ignored truth