Torah Tidbit

Bereshis (in the start/beginning), Genesis 1:1 – 6:8

God creates all out of nothing, God creates man, tests man in the Garden of Eden, man fails, nine generations pass by and Noah appears.

In the beginning of God’s creating the heavens and the earth – when the earth was astonishingly empty, with darkness upon the surface of the deep, and the Divine Presence hovered upon the surface of the waters – God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light.  – Genesis 1:1-3

Walking the Walk

Ever see something appear from nothing?  You certainly have if you’ve seen a magic trick involving slight of hand.  Pulling rabbits out of hats, making a coin appear behind someone’s ear, a handkerchief disappears from one hand and shows up in the other.  When watching such things, it’s interesting how our minds naturally assume it’s a trick, because deep down within us we know that something can’t actually be formed from nothing.  Yet the existence of all that we see is the result of an incomprehensible amount of something appearing from nothing. That’s what the Big Bang theory is all about.  For years many scientists fought against this theory because the implication is immediate – something beyond the cosmos must have brought all into existence.  That Something did so by overriding all of the laws of thermodynamics, bringing massive amounts of energy, matter and order out of lower energy chaotic non-existence.   

Look around, wherever you are at the moment.  Seriously, look up and around you. Now imagine – it all came from a point smaller than pinhead.  Look around again and think about that – all from the size of a pinhead.  Think about it as you’re driving to work tomorrow, enjoying some water cooler talk, banging on a PC, chatting with the grocery check-out clerk.  All from a pinhead.

Why would God want it written that each act of His creating started with speech?   Why doesn’t the Bible just say, “He made XYZ. QED.  ‘Nuff said.”  How might the purpose and behavior of speech best describe the physical manifestations of God’s will?

God Spoke

Rabbi Zusya rarely heard his teacher’s sermon to the end.  For when the Great Storyteller (Dov Baer of Metzerich) began his lesson with a scripture that contained “God spoke”, Rabbi Zusya was overcome with ecstasy and screamed and gesticulated so wildly that he had to be taken out of the room.  He then stood in the hall, beating his hands against the wall, crying “And God said!”  But the truth is, if one speaks in the spirit of truth and listens in the spirit of truth, one word is enough.  And with that word the world can be uplifted and redeemed. – Rabbi Israel of Rizhyn