Sources:
B. Berakhot 6a-7a; Ma’aseh Merkavah, Schäfer, Synopse #582.
Studies:
Keter: The Crown of God in Early Jewish Mysticism by Arthur Green.
48. GOD’S TABERNACLE
From the very beginning God made a tabernacle for Himself in Jerusalem, as it is said, Shalem became His abode (Ps. 76:3). That is the place where God would confer with Himself in prayer.
Ever since the tabernacle was destroyed, God prays for His children to do penitence, so that He may hasten the rebuilding of His house and His Temple, and spread the Tabernacle of peace over all His people Israel, and over Jerusalem.
This myth not only reaffirms that God prays, but establishes Jerusalem (using the ancient name, Shalem) as the place where God made a tabernacle for Himself. The notion that God would create His own tabernacle and pray to Himself is strange. But who else would God pray to?
Sources:
Midrash Tehillim 76:3; Yalkut Shim’oni, Psalms 813; Yalkut ha-Makhiri on Isaiah 57:6, on Psalms 76:3; Genesis Rabbah 56:1; Y. Berakhot 4.5, 8c; B. Berakhot 30a; Song of Songs Rabbah 4:4; Midrash Shir ha-Shirim 4:4.
Studies:
Midrash Yerushalem: A Metaphysical History of Jerusalem by Daniel Sperber, pp. 89-91.
49. GOD’S PRAYER
How do we know that God prays? From the verse I will bring them to My sacred mount, and let them rejoice in My house of prayer (Isa. 56:7). It does not state “their house of prayer,” but “My house of prayer.” Therefore it can be seen that God says prayers.
What is God’s prayer? It is, “May it be My will that My mercy overcome My anger, and that My mercy dominate My attributes. May I act toward My children with the attribute of mercy, and go beyond the strict measure of the law.”
This is one in a series of myths about God participating in the same prayer rituals as His people, Israel. See also “God Studies the Torah,” p. 34; “God Puts on Tallit and Tefillin,” p. 34; and “God’s Tabernacle,” p. 35. Here God is portrayed as praying. Other myths describe God as singing praises of Israel, just as Israel sings praises of God.
Note that the prayer that is described as God’s prayer—to Himself presumably—is similar to the blessing that Rabbi Ishmael makes to God when he has a vision of Akatriel Yah—one of God’s names—while in the Holy of Holies on Yom Kippur, also found in the same talmudic source. See “The Lord of Hosts,” p. 27.
Sources:
B. Berakhot 7a; Otzar ha-Kavod.
50. GOD EXPOUNDS THE TORAH
In the future God is destined to sit in the Garden of Eden and interpret the Torah. All the righteous in the world will sit before Him, with all the household of heaven sitting at their feet. At the right hand of God will be the sun, the moon, and the planets, and at His left hand will be all the stars. Then God will expound the new Torah, which God is destined to give them at the hands of the Messiah.
In the messianic era, the Messiah will transmit a new Torah to Israel that he received from God. Then God Himself will expound the Torah in heaven, before all the righteous and the other inhabitants of heaven, including the angels. Thus God is here demonstrated to be the final authority on the Torah, since, after all, God created it. This myth is also a part of a larger myth cluster in which God’s actions mirror those of observant Jews—God not only prays, puts on tallit and tefillin, and studies the Torah, but He even teaches the Torah, demonstrating that He is the Master of masters. The new Torah that God teaches is appropriate to the postmessianic world, which will be considerably transformed. See “A New Torah,” p. 522.
Sources:
Battei Midrashot 2:367-369.
51. THE SUFFERING GOD
When a Jew is afflicted, God suffers much more than the person does, as it is said, In all their troubles He was troubled (Isa. 63:9). For God is not subject to any limitation, and therefore His suffering is also boundless. It is impossible even to conceive such suffering. If the world ever heard God’s weeping, and realized the extent of His grief, it would explode. Even a spark of His suffering would be more than the world could bear.
From the day the Temple was destroyed and Jerusalem made desolate, there has been no joy before God. Nor will there be any joy until God rebuilds Jerusalem and returns Israel into its midst.
God weeps in the inner chambers of heaven. Three times a day a divine voice, like the cooing of a dove, goes forth, saying, “Woe to My children. Because of their sins I destroyed My house and burnt My temple and exiled them among the nations.” And three times a night, during the three watches, God sits and roars like a lion, repeating the same words of grief, as it is said, Yahweh roars from on high, and thunders from His holy dwelling (Jer. 25:30).
And whenever Jews go into the synagogues and pray, “May His Name be blessed,” God shakes his head and says, “Happy is the king who is praised in this house. Woe to the father who had to banish his children, and to the children who had to be banished from their father’s table.”
In tractate Berakhot of the Talmud, Rabbi Yose enters a ruin in Jerusalem to pray and hears God giving voice to His grief over the destruction of the Temple and the exile of Israel. Upon leaving the ruin, he meets Elijah, who tells him that God grieves thus three times a day—a clear reference to the daily prayers in the morning (Shaharit), the late afternoon (Minhah), and the evening (Ma’ariv). In effect, this is God’s prayer. And Elijah reveals to Rabbi Yose that when Israel responds with the words, “May His Name be blessed”—a traditional response—God shakes his head in both joy and grieving: joy that His children haven’t forgotten Him, and grief over His decision to destroy the Temple and send His children into exile.
In a derashah (a discussion of a portion of the Torah, usually delivered on the Sabbath), Rabbi Kalonymus Kalman Shapira emphasizes the impossibility of any person being able to conceive God’s infinite suffering, much less to endure it. For God feels guilty not only about the disaster He brought upon Israel, but He also wants to atone for their sins. Rabbi Shapira attributes Rabbi Yose’s ability to hear God’s words to the fact that he was standing in a ruin in Jerusalem, which annihilated his sense of self, making it possible to hear God’s voice. This echoes the still, small voice of God that Elijah hears in the entrance to a cave (1 Kings 19:12). See “A Still, Small Voice,” p. 30. For other examples of God’s expressions of grief, see “God’s Tears,” p. 37 and “God Weeps Over the Destruction of the Temple,” p. 38.
Sources:
B. Berakhot 3a; B. Hagigah 5b; Eikhah Zuta 7; Yalkut Shim’oni, Eicha 1009; Esh Kadosh, from a derashah delivered by Rabbi Kalonymus Kalman Shapira on February 14, 1942.
Studies:
The Holy Fire: The Teachings of Rabbi Kalonymus Kalman Shapira, the Rebbe of the Warsaw Ghetto by Nehemia Polen, pp. 106-121.
Theology and Poetry: Studies in the Medieval Piyyut by Jacob J. Petuchowski, chapter 8.
“The Philosophy Implicit in the Midrash” in Essays by Henry Slonimsky, pp. 41-50.
“The Holy One Sits and Roars” by Michael Fishbane. Journal of Jewish Thought and Philosophy 1 (1991): 1-21.
Midrash Yerushalem: A Metaphysical History of Jerusalem by Daniel Sperber, pp. 104-106.
52. GOD’S TEARS
When God remembers His children, who dwell in misery among the nations, He lets fall two tears into the ocean, and the sound is heard from one end of the world to the other. So too when God remembers how the Shekhinah lies in the dust of the earth, does He shed tears hot as fire, that fall down into the Great Sea.
Others say that in the hour that God cries, five rivers of tears issue from the five fingers of His right hand, and fall into the Great Sea and shake the world.
Many human characteristics are attributed to God, even weeping. Here God weeps remembering the suffering of his children, Israel. Just as God’s size is enormous (see “The Body of God,” p. 24), so too are God’s tears. Even more surreal is the image of God weeping rivers of tears from the fingers of His right hand. Implicit in this weeping is both God’
s helplessness and His need for comfort, which clearly seems to contradict God’s omnipotent role as creator and ruler of the world.
Zohar 1:26b explains that God’s tears roll down to the great sea because Moses brought the Torah down in two tablets, but Israel was not worthy of them and they broke and fell, causing the destruction of the first and second Temples. In the Prologue to the Zohar 56, Rahab, the Angel of the Sea, is said to be sustained by God’s tears.
The falling of God’s tears into the ocean is also given as an explanation for earthquakes. See “What Causes Earthquakes?”, p. 102.
Sources:
B. Berakhot 59a; 3 Enoch 48:4; Prologue to the Zohar 56; Likutei Moharan 1:250.
Studies:
“Arm of the Lord: Biblical Myth, Rabbinic Midrash, and the Mystery of History” by Michael Fishbane.
“The Philosophy Implicit in the Midrash” by Henry Slonimsky, pp. 41-50.
53. GOD WEEPS OVER THE DESTRUCTION OF THE TEMPLE
When the Temple was destroyed and Israel banished, God wept bitterly day and night, saying, “Woe is Me! What have I done? I caused My Shekhinah to dwell on earth for the sake of Israel, but now that they have sinned, I have returned to My former habitation. As below, so above—in both there is weeping over what has come to pass. You weep in the night, but I weep day and night, for My presence knows no sleep.”
Then God hung sackcloth over the entrance of His house, rent his purple garment and went barefoot. So too did God extinguish the lamps, withdrawing the light of the sun and the moon and the stars. And God sat silently and lamented over the Temple. He alone knew of the precious spiritual treasures hidden there.
At that time Metatron, the Prince of the Presence, came before the Lord, fell upon his face, and spoke before Him: “Master of the Universe! Do not weep. Let me weep instead of You.”
God replied, “If you do not let Me weep now, I will go to a place where you do not have permission to enter, and I will weep there.”
This is a myth of great divine distress, agony, and regret. At the same time, the myth demonstrates God’s grief over the chain of events that led to the destruction of the Temple and the exile of the Jews.
Although God permitted the destruction of the Temple to take place (and in some myths was the cause of this catastrophe), here he faces the consequences of His actions and weeps. Metatron, who normally substitutes for God in many respects, is so disturbed at the sight of God weeping that he begs to weep for God instead. Metatron’s response indicates the rabbinic discomfort at the notion of God weeping. Despite Metatron’s offer, God is so distraught that He is ready to go off alone to weep. The place Metatron is not permitted to enter is the Pargod, the heavenly curtain, behind which only God and the Shekhinah can go. This is God’s inner sanctum. God’s insistence that he will continue to weep is explained by the verse For if you will not give heed, My inmost self must weep, because of your arrogance (Jer. 13:17).
In Esh Kadosh Rabbi Kalonymus Kalman Shapira proposes that the reason the world was not destroyed by God’s suffering over the afflictions of Israel and the destruction of the Temple is because God wept in secret, in his innermost chamber. For had his grief penetrated to this world, it would no longer exist.
God’s garment is described as purple, referring to the imperial purple garments worn by kings. Indeed, throughout God behaves in mourning as would a human king.
Sources:
Lamentations Rabbah, Proem 24; Pesikta Rabbati 15:3, 28:1, 28:3; Simhat Yisrael p. 87; Esh Kadosh pp. 159-164.
Studies:
The Holy Fire: The Teachings of Rabbi Kalonymus Kalman Shapira, the Rebbe of the Warsaw Ghetto by Nehemia Polen, pp. 106-121.
54. GOD’S LAMENT AT THE WESTERN WALL
God’s grief over the destruction of the Temple was boundless. Once Rabbi Tzadok entered the Temple area and saw the destroyed Temple. He said, “Heavenly Father, You destroyed Your city and burned Your Temple, but now You are tranquil and untroubled.” Before long Rabbi Tzadok dozed off, and that is when he saw God standing there in the Temple, lamenting, with the ministering angels lamenting with him.
On another occasion, Rabbi Nathan entered the Temple area and found the Temple destroyed, with only the Kotel, the Western Wall, still standing. He wondered what the survival of that wall signified, and he heard a voice say, “Take your ring and press it against the wall.” Rabbi Nathan did this, and he felt through the ring that the wall was trembling, trembling because of the presence of God. At that instant Rabbi Nathan saw God bow down at the wall and straighten up and weep, and He did this over and over, lamenting.
This myth not only confirms God’s great grief over the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem, but it also conveys just how holy is the Kotel, the western retaining wall of the Temple Mount, which the myth seems to treat as a wall of the Temple itself. Most important is Rabbi Nathan’s vision of God praying at the wall. This confirms the immense sanctity associated with the Kotel. Accounts of God praying at the Western Wall are very unusual, while there are many reports of sightings of the Shekhinah, the Divine Presence, who made her home in the Temple before it was destroyed. The Shekhinah is often envisioned as a mourning dove or as an old woman dressed in black, or sometimes as a spirit hovering above the wall. See “The Creation of the Temple,” p. 420, and “A Vision at the Wailing Wall,” p. 63.
Sources:
Eliyahu Rabbah 30, p. 149; Pesikta Rabbati 15:10.
55. GOD’S OATH
Once, when Rabbah bar Bar Hannah was traveling in a caravan, he met an Arab merchant who offered to show him Mount Sinai. When they arrived there, Rabbah heard a heavenly voice crying, “Woe is Me. I have sworn to exile My children, and now that I have made the oath, who can absolve Me of it?”
When Rabbah returned from his journey and told the other rabbis of his experience, they screamed at him, “You fool! You should have cried out, ‘I absolve You of Your oath!’”
The legendary travels of Rabbah bar Bar Hannah include this journey to Mount Sinai, where Rabbah hears God bemoaning the oath He took to send Israel into exile. According to Jewish law, an oath must be fulfilled and cannot be broken unless someone absolves the one who made it. Here Rabbah had an opportunity to absolve God His oath, but foolishly failed to do so. Had he absolved Him, the exile of Israel would have come to an end.
Sources:
B. Bava Batra 73a.
56. GOD CONSIDERS ENDING ALL EXISTENCE
When the Temple was destroyed and Israel exiled from the land, God departed to the higher realms and He did not look upon the destruction of the Temple, or upon His people, who had gone into exile.
In that dark time, when the children of Israel wept by the rivers of Babylon, their cries reached the highest heavens, where God and all the angels heard them. Then God yearned to return all of existence to chaos and desolation. God said, “The world I created, I created with My two hands alone. Now I shall return it to chaos. I will bring heaven and earth together, smiting one against the other, and thus destroy the entire world, all of it; and not merely the earth, but the heavens as well, as it is said, “I, too, will strike hand against hand and will satisfy My fury upon you” (Ezek. 21:22).
The angels understood that all of existence was on the verge of coming to an end, and that God was about to turn even the Throne of Glory upside down. Then all of the ministering angels came before God and said, “Master of the Universe, is it not enough for You that You have already destroyed the Temple, Your dwelling place on earth? Will You also destroy Your dwelling place in heaven?”
God replied, “Do I need comforting? If I kindle but one spark, I can make the world, which I created, perish. I existed before the world was created, and I existed when the world was created, and I will continue to exist, whatever the fate of the world. Verily, I know the beginning and I know the end. Leave My presence.”
This dark myth shows God contemplating ending all existence, not only on earth, but even in heaven. Since God had created the world only for
the sake of Israel, Israel’s cries of suffering during the Babylonian exile, not long after the destruction of the Temple and the defeat of Jerusalem, bring the purpose of the world’s continuing existence into question. This myth portrays a God who seems human in his deep emotional reaction, who comes very close to ending all existence in that bleak moment. That is when the angels, whose existence is also being threatened, intercede, but God’s initial reaction to them is one of contempt and anger—“Do I need comforting?” God is not flesh and blood, and therefore needs no comforting. “Verily, I know the beginning and the end” suggests that God is not going to act on impulse, but that He alone knows His intended plan for existence, from the time of Creation to the End of Days. Even though this response to the angels is abrupt and contemptuous, it also seems to suggest that God has remembered His original plan for the world and has decided not to act on impulse and end all existence.
God’s reply to the angels, “I know the beginning and I know the end,” is elaborated in Eliyahu Rabbah 1:3: “God knows both the beginning and the end and can tell from the beginning what the end of anything will be like, long, long before it comes to be.”
Rabbi Hayim of Volozhin is clear that all of existence depends on God: “The entire universe owes its continued existence to the will of God. If God were to rescind His will to maintain the world, it would instantly revert to nothingness” (Nefesh ha-Hayim 3:1).
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