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God’s Problem: Part 2

 


In my previous email I stated that “God’s problem is getting people to love Him.” This wasn’t a surprise, because for people to “love,” they must be “free to not love.” If people did not have that choice, they could not love. God created humans to be “choice making creatures” (Genesis 1:24, 26-27):

 

“And God said, ‘Let the Earth bring forth a living soul

according to her kind . . . Let Us make ADAM in Our image,

according to Our likeness . . . God created ADAM with His image . . .

male and female He created them.”

 

The words “Us” and “Our” have created many theological debates. To whom do they refer? We use linguistic models in our work and in this context, they refer to “God and the Earth.” Prior to creating ADAM, God and the Earth were both involved in creating the animals.

 

1. God told the Earth to bring forth an Earth soul for the animals and the Earth did it.

 

2. After that God created ADAM.

 

3. Our models indicate the Earth also brought forth an Earth soul.

 

4. Then God created ADAM.

 

5. ADAM is “a couple” -- one male and one female human – not an individual.

 

6. God created the couple with His image. Note that I said “with,” not “in His image.”

 

7. The only thing revealed about that in this story is found in Genesis 1:2 – RUACH ELOHIYM -- “Spirit of God” (“the presence of God”).  

 

8. All humans are created with the Spirit of a Being that values TOV; a  Being that is unlike humans, and compared with all else is incomprehensible to humans.

 

9. Each human has an Earth soul with earthly appetites, desires and longings that drive animal and human behaviors.

 

10. God created humans with conflicting forces and the ability to choose between them. That is what makes it possible for humans to love.

 

This is reflected in teachings of the rabbis about yetzer hatov (good inclination/impulse) and yetzer hara (evil inclination/impulse). It supports the idea that humans are created with contradictory forces pulling away from each other. 

 

God created all humans to be alike, but He did not create them to function like preprogramed robots that love Him. However But God did something that makes it possible for humans to love Him and each other – He blesses them.

 

I will discuss this blessing in my next email. But I will close with an amazing fact from science that is related to what I have been discussing. Our bodies are created from a DNA code and the DNA code in humans is over 99% identical. Genetically we are alike!

 

May your Shalom increase,

Jim Myers

 

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