Parashat Bereishit
Overture: Our Place in God’s Purposive World
Rabbi Len Levin
“In the beginning God created heavens and earth” (older translation)
or
“When God began to create the heavens and the earth
— the earth being chaos-shmaos (Yochanan Muffs’ paraphrase of tohu va-vohu
with darkness over the face of the deep
and the spirit of God hovering over the face of the waters —
God said, Let there be light,
And there was light.
Any way you translate it, it is a fitting opening to the most formative book in the world. Like a classic overture, the beginning chapters of Genesis articulate the themes that will reverberate through the rest of the Torah as well as the historical and prophetic writings, the psalms, and the other components of the Bible. In broad strokes, it lays out the important elements of the biblical world view:
- The world is ordered by God’s creative plan.
- Everything in the world — skies, seas, land, Read More >