JUDAISM
Christianity
| Islam
How is the relationship between God and humanity understood
in the religion?
by Howard Greenstein
At
every major turning point in Israel’s history, the Jewish
people encountered God in a different context. In the event of the
Exodus from Egypt, they discovered God as the sole protector and
guarantor of human freedom. God was the spark of inspiration that
compelled them to break the chains of slavery and to risk their
lives and their children’s lives for the precious, inalienable
right to liberty. Only God can confer such a blessing. No human
agent can bestow it or deny it.
At
Sinai the Israelites envisioned God as the lawgiver, the source
of every standard for justice, truth and goodness. They discovered
in their wilderness experience that the foundation of a stable society
required rules that were rooted in some objective reality, not in
the momentary impulse of popular fashion.
In
their moments of trial and temptation, they found in God their healer.
In times of need, God became their helper. In the unfolding of an
endless series of significant events they understood God as the
author of history. Life was not a meaningless succession of unrelated
accidents. The people of Israel assigned to their individual and
collective lives a divine purpose that would ultimately lead to
their own fulfillment and redemption.
Even
in the face of total defeat, God was their savior. For some people
the defeat might mean death, and the salvation some form of life
beyond the grave. In a larger context, however, the “defeat”
might pertain to ignorance, insensitivity, fear or any other human
limitation. The victories a person achieves over these disabilities
are clearly for Judaism a form of salvation or healing. This healing
is also a display of God’s power as a personal savior.
One
of the outstanding contributors to the concept of God in Jewish
tradition was the spiritual giant of Hellenistic Judaism, the philosopher
Philo of Alexandria (30 BCE - 45 CE). The influence
of the traditional Jewish idea of God is clearly evident in the
Philonic emphasis on God’s transcendence and spirituality.
The concept of God for Philo is elevated above all values and perfections
conceivable to the human mind. God is above knowledge and virtue,
even above the good and the beautiful. Since God is exalted above
all that is knowable, only God’s bare existence is accessible
to our intellects. In an attempt to blend Jewish and Hellenistic
thought, Philo’s aim essentially was to bring together and
unify the two major categories of truth: human knowledge and divine
revelation.
Any
discussion of God’s relationship to humankind in Judaism requires
at least a brief reference to the concept of “the Covenant.”
The Covenant is simply an agreement between God
and the Jewish people, the content of which is fully contained in
the Torah, the first five books of the Hebrew Scriptures. The Covenant
stipulates that God will protect and prosper the Jewish people,
if they in return will observe the statutes and injunctions that
God commands. If they violate those commandments, God will punish
them.
That
the community of Israel is party to this difficult and divine partnership
confers upon it the distinction of being a “chosen people.”
That “chosen-ness” implies primarily a heritage not
of special privilege but of special responsibility; and this serves
as a unique model, a high standard of truth and goodness.
The
belief that God actually chose the Jewish people for this task is
a matter of faith. History, however, confirms that Israel chose
God in these terms. That truth is what matters most of all. The
Jewish people have forever perceived themselves as living to serve
the Supreme Creator and have ascribed meaning and
significance to their own experience only as a consequence of this
imperishable relationship.
The
limits of God’s reality in the world and God’s relationship
to humankind in Judaism are defined only by the limits of human
experience. Judaism teaches that God relates to people in as many
ways as people choose to relate to God.
Copyright
©2006 Howard Greenstein
Howard
R. Greenstein serves as Rabbi of the Jewish congregation
of Marco Island, Florida. He has previously served congregations
in Florida, Ohio, and Massachusetts. Greenstein has been a Lecturer
at the University of Florida, University of North Florida, and Jacksonville
University. He is the author of Judaism:
An Eternal Covenant (1983) and Turning Point: Zionism
and Reform Judaism (1981).
Excerpts
from What Do Our Neighbors Believe?: Questions and Answers on
Judaism, Christianity and Islam by Howard Greenstein, Kendra
Hotz, and John Kaltner are used by permission from Westminster John
Knox Press, Louisville, Kentucky. The book will be available for
purchase in December 2006.
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