God
the Creator and Human the Fashioner
By
Dr.
Ronald A. Brauner
An outstanding characteristic of Jewish tradition is its
relentless grappling with the realms of the "natural" and
the "unnatural." Certainly throughout much of our classical
literature, our struggle with this duality can be clearly
seen and it is this very struggle which provides us with
some remarkable insight into unique Jewish perspectives on
life and reality.
Even in such early documentary sources as the Creation
Stories of Genesis this portrayal is observable. The first
chapter of Genesis reports that "God blessed them (male and
female humankind) and God said to them: Be fertile and
increase, fill the earth and master it and rule the fish of
the sea, the birds of the sky and all the living things
that creep on earth" [v. 28] - making undeniably clear our
ancient understanding that control and domination of the
natural world are not only divine mandates, but that such
control and domination are, in themselves, characteristics
of divine behavior! The narrative of Genesis 2 (the "Adam
and Eve" story) reports that "The Lord God took the Man
(Adam) and placed him in the Garden of Eden, to till it and
tend it - pointedly employing the verbs "to till" and "to
tend" so as to reflect a further refinement of this dual
conception of the human commission - to care ("tend") for
the natural world and also to work ("till") it - to enjoy
the bounty of nature and yet also to exploit its
potentials. "Tending" is stewardship while "tilling" is
manipulation - and both functions have divine mandate!
Judaism is the record of our long experience in managing
this grand duality and it is in our recognition of the
supremacy of God and the concomitant empowerment of man
that we continue to define ourselves and our relationships.
Consider if you will how many examples there are of our
approach to the duality of stewardship and manipulation and
how, most importantly, manipulation is laden with the most
profound significance. Consider, if you will, that male
circumcision is, in its very essence, the violation of the
natural state of the human body and yet that circumcision,
an unnatural (we might say, transnatural) phenomenon
becomes, for the Jew, an ultimate declaration of our
allegiance to divine sovereignty -
God further said to Abraham, "As for you, you and your
offspring to come throughout the ages shall keep my
covenant. Such shall be the covenant between Me and you and
your offspring to follow which you shall keep: every male
among you shall be circumcised . . . and that shall be the
sign of the covenant between Me and you." (Genesis 17:9-11)
It is in the alteration of the natural that the sense of
human worth can be so clearly articulated. We are forbidden
to desecrate the body (Leviticus 19:27-28, for example)
and, at the very same time, are bidden to sanctify it
through modification.
We celebrate God's bounteous agricultural gifts at the
harvest festival of Sukkot and yet, the sukkah itself, a
primary symbol of the occasion, is valid for use only when
the natural materials of which it is constructed are no
longer attached to the trees and soil from which they come.
What a magnificent paradox - we celebrate God's gifts of
the natural world and, in that very celebration, use
materials which have been irretrievably altered by the
celebrants! The same, of course, is true of the palm branch
(lulav), the citron (etrog), the myrtle (hadass) and the
willow (aravah) - in every instance, if any of the symbolic
accouterments of the festival are left still attached to
their natural sources, they cannot be used to celebrate the
festival - for true celebration is in the partnership of
God the Creator and Human the Fashioner.
©1998,
Foundation for Jewish Studies, Inc.
Ronald A. Brauner has written numerous articles on Bible,
religion, education, and Semitic studies; he has edited
four books of essays dealing with all aspects of Jewish
civilization through the centuries. His newest volume,
BEING JEWISH IN A GENTILE WORLD: A SURVIVAL GUIDE has
recently appeared and has enjoyed enthusiastic reviews. Dr.
Brauner has directed the Brandeis-Bardin Institute in
southern California and the Hebrew Institute of Pittsburgh.
Currently, Dr. Brauner serves as President of the
Foundation for Jewish Studies, Inc. and Professor of Judaic
Studies at the Cleveland College of Jewish Studies. Dr.
Brauner is a member of the faculty of The Wexner Heritage
Foundation and a lecturer for the United Jewish Appeal and
Israel Bonds. Dr. Brauner is listed in WHO'S WHO IN
RELIGION. WEB SITE: WWW.TORAH.COM
