#berishit

“Why the Creation Story Matters,” class

September 20th @ 1PM EST

Register as a part of Wrestling with Torah’s High Holy Days 5781!

See full schedule here.

They feed them.  They wash their feet.  They treat them with respect.

Elohai Avraham, Yitzhak, v’Yaakov!

As Jews, we are partners with God in creation-- the creation of goodness, wholeness, love, justice, and peace in our world.

In addition to reading Parshat Berisheet, the Creation Account, Jews around the world will be reading Isaiah 42:5-43:10 this beautiful Shabbat morning.

In the text, we find praises to God because of the Divine’s handiwork in creating the world.  Throughout the entire Hebrew of the Tanakh, God is usually given masculine pronouns but on this first Shabbat of our Torah cycle, we encounter maternal imagery for God.

“יְהוָה֙ כַּגִּבּ֣וֹר יֵצֵ֔א“ [”Adonai kagibor yetzeh”] “Adonai goes forth like a warrior...” (Is. 42:13), and God said that “כַּיּוֹלֵדָ֣ה אֶפְעֶ֔ה אֶשֹּׁ֥ם וְאֶשְׁאַ֖ף יָֽחַד׃" [”kayvoleydah efeh eshom v’eshaf yachad”] “Now I will shriek like a woman in labor, I will pant and I will gasp” (42:14)

God’s essence is attributed to a warrior that becomes as powerful as a woman in labor.  Imagine how revolutionary that statement was when our ancestors developed this and other texts, and how revolutionary it was when it was canonized in the Tanakh within the book of Isaiah, and how revolutionary that we as Jews have been reading it right alongside our Creation narrative for ... God knows how long!

May the start of the Torah bring you all strength, love, and joy!