Incarnation, Jews, Covenantal People

Pray to be known, to be understood and to be welcome -- Anthony Gittens

Throughout the many religious traditions the world has known, the idea of both incarnation and covenant have been frequently embraced. Looking at these as a sort of continuum one is able to see the relationship between them. Writing on both these subjects, the author, Peter Kreeft, discusses them in his book, The God Who Loves You. Proclaiming "G-d is love, the incarnation," Kreeft acknowledges that this topic is perhaps one of the most difficult in Western thought to grasp.

The subject, in its knowable, yet untouchable mystery, is the trinity of creation, where all is love. There is the Lover, the beloved and their creation, together forming a tri-partite relationship, one to the other. Kreeft writes:

• G-d is love.
• Love is G-d's essence.
• Love is one with G-d's personhood and being.
• Love requires a lover, a beloved, and the act of love.
• G-d is three parts of one.
• The three know and love each other.
• The processes of love are without beginning or end.
• The Creator loves by knowing, and by his will.
• The Creator loves both in time and in eternity.
• The Spirit is love between the Creator and his beloved creation.
• There is holiness, sacredness in human sex. Two make three.

G-d is love. Nowhere in the Tanakh does it say that G-d is justice or mercy itself, or that he is anything, but love itself. Love is G-d's essence. This is absolute; as the Tanakh tells it, everything else is relative to this love. "Love necessarily means three things: there is a lover, a beloved, and the act or creation of loving.

Thus for G-d to be love, he must somehow be all three. The Creator knows and loves his creation; his creation knows and loves his Creator. The Spirit which proceeds from this act of loving is sometimes called the Holy Spirit, or the Incarnate. This Spirit is the love between the Creator and his creation. Their knowledge of each other is through, and by this Spirit of love.

As the Creator knows his creation, he generates himself, his love by knowing him. So it is through knowing and the will that love comes into being. Thus the trinity may be also thought of as being, knowing and loving [by the will].

Creation loves both in eternity and in time. The relationship of the three is one of equality; creation is equal in love to creator and love, the spirit is equal to both. That is the force and power of love. In two come three; the Spirit of love is the ultimate origin of holiness or sacredness of human sexual love, says this tradition.

"The love of G-d has invaded our world, and we see with new eyes."
The love of the Spirit is a mystery, modern man has, tragically lost easy access into, or indeed, conception of. There is another ultimate dimension that ancient man found far easier to access. In this realm there is not science, empiricism, nor quantification, but rather it is a place of myth, imagination, analogy, and sacramentalism.
Since "G-d is the Creator, and since creation reflects and reveals the Creator, and since G-d is love, all creation somehow reflects and reveals this love," this Spirit.

Unlike ancient minds, "modern" man is enveloped by an overweening atmosphere of science and tangible proofs; in earlier times, the connections between individual and Creator were more obvious, for the simple reason that the ancient mind believed. The ancients viewed a beautiful landscape, sunset or night-time sky and were filled with the awe of the creation. Or for example, human sexuality was easily seen to be a part of the universal dimension, the wholeness or oneness of the world.

In today's English language, the pronouns he and she have been nearly stripped away. They are avoided, dis-used. Left in their place is a socio-political idea that rejects this very principle of universal oneness. There are labels and divisions, parsing the world into diverse units.
To the ancient mind, this is akin to tragedy. What could take the place of the Chinese idea of the yin and yang? Or the Hindu wedding ceremony in which bride and groom pronounce one to the other, "I am heaven, you are earth;" to which the bride responds, "I am earth, you are heaven."

Many modern minds, especially in the West will find these ideas unintelligible, in part thanks to science. Our rational mind does not allow us to go there. It is all myth, we say. Science, in its aims to reduce things to quantifiable matter fails, it cannot see cosmic love.

Rather, science ignores the "final cause" of creation. It cannot rationalize what something or someone was made for, its purpose, its goal, its end. This reason is the most important to creation. The Tenakh tells us that both the historical and in the ultimate dimension, G-d is the final cause, creation the ultimate end; it is the alpha and the omega, both the beginning and end.

In this ultimate dimension, we are freed "of the dirty little dungeon of a universe that the Enlightenment thinkers" of past centuries have placed us into wholesale. Enlightenment thought, thought in which rationality and science are the reigning sovereigns gives to modern minds, "a universe in which love and beauty, praise and value are mere subjective fictions," invented by the self spinning aloneness of a human mind.

And yet science through all its triumphs has not been able to extinguish an ancient, almost primordial instinct from the deepest places in our soul, to realize love as the highest wisdom and meaning in a life. So then the Judeo-Christian Bible, or Tanakh, in its entirety is then to be read with imagination, with myth and analogy as a divine love story, says Peter Kreeft.

In both the Jewish and Christian telling of the story, the Word contained in the book is a covenant, an agreement between G-d, the Lover and his beloved; the persons he created, the Jews and all who come to him in the Spirit of the Oneness (adonai echad).

The word of G-d is the Christ, the unity of G-d, the Creator. And to the Christian mind, among other names we may call this oneness, the Christ, love incarnate. Christ has proved G-d's love for his creation by the example of the Cross. He has come because of, and for love, alone. He comes out of love.

Other manifestations of love are found in the connection between the "fall" from the garden of Eden. The connection here is found between the fall and freedom. Love does not enslave; love makes free. Because you are the Beloved, you are free. We are not the Creator's pets; we are meant to be G-d's lover.

In the redemption, love manifests. G-d's love is powerful and in full display as soon as Adam falls. He makes a mistake, he falls away from the covenant that he made in free will with G-d to obey.
as covenantal people, Jews traditionally see the "law" of the Torah as an expression of G-d's will. It is their joy to learn, to know this will. Thus they see their holy book as a love making manual, if you will.
In the ten commandments, the main covenants presented to creation by G-d, the Creator, are laid out. In essence, they form the whole of the "covenant-contract." G-d is to have this agreement with his people, who in free will grow to abide by this contract, or rule. In following the way of G-d in divine law, more love is made. Human-kind is "fruitful and multiplies."

Caring for the garden, the world of Creation, is so that human persons may learn to be more like Creators. G-d wishes to teach love through loving the world and the soil it comprises, to raise a crop to the benefit of all of creation.
The Creator starts small and then moves through the world until his love reaches the ears of his perhaps, most complex creation, mankind. As a lover, G-d is not jealous. Sharing in oneness is the essence of all.

"And the forbidden fruit of Adam and Eve is to teach the Beloved the reality of pure, "blind," love." If they had been told that the reason (a rational idea) was that the fruit was poison, would not Adam and Eve have obeyed; not from a trusting, free love, but from a selfish fear?
Yet G-d did command them, and asked for their love in return for no other reason than love itself. This is covenant. When we "fall," we lick our wounds, we gain a sense of the real, we dust ourselves off and remain in the moment, rather than a self-serving, spinning mind.
Thus we again realize the fall as a direction back to the source, back to the Creator and we, are his Beloved. This love is not sentimental, it is not cheap, easy or compromising. This love is in totality.

You are the deepest secret of G-d's heart. --Peter Kreeft

Judaism, I Asked For Wonder*

"The gods attend to great matters; they neglect small ones..." --Marcus Tullius Cicero (106 B.C.E.-43 B.C.E.), ancient Roman Statesman

Responding to one of the great figures in the Hellenistic world Jewish theologian, Abraham Joshua Heschel writes "in the theology of the common good, according to Aristotle, the gods are not at all concerned with the dispensation of good and bad fortune, or external things. To the Hebrew prophet, however, no subject is as worthy of consideration as the plight of man. Indeed G-d Himself is described as reflecting over the plight of man rather than as contemplating eternal ideas. His mind is preoccupied with man, with the concrete actualities of history, rather than with the timeless issues of thought."

In the Nevi'im, or Prophet's message, nothing that has bearing upon "good and evil is small or trite in the eyes of G-d. The teaching of Judaism is the theology of the common deed. The Torah, or Bible, insists that G-d is concerned with the everydayness, the trivialities of life.
Thus the great challenge does not lie in organizing solemn demonstrations, but in how we manage the commonplace. The prophet's field of concern is not the mysteries of heaven, the glories of eternity, but the blights of society, the affairs of the marketplace.
He addresses himself to those who trample upon the needy, who increase the price of grain, use dishonest scales and sell the refuse of corn or wheat (see Nevi'im, Amos 8:4-6). The predominant feature of the biblical pattern of life is unassuming, unheroic, inconspicuous piety, the sanctification of trifles, attentiveness to details."

The wages of a laborer shall not remain with you until morning (Torah, Leviticus 19:13,18).
Love your fellow as yourself; I am the Lord. When you encounter your enemy's ox or ass wandering, you must take it back to him.
When you see the ass of your enemy lying under its burden and would refrain from raising it, you must nevertheless raise it with him (Torah, Exodus 23:4-5).

-- taken from I Asked for Wonder, A Spiritual Anthology by Abraham Joshua Heshel

* A SimpleMind Zen reader favorite which first appeared here in 2009.

Friends with God

  " Unchained from Judaism, the parent of Christianity, one easily comes to the idea that God doesn't care what you do, or what your will be..."  -- a Simple Mind

Writing with a very different understanding of the cosmos, author, Neale Donald Walsch in his book, Friendship With God, writes: "God does not care what we do because of why we are here." Some will easily argue that his conception of the universe and the cosmos is incomplete, therefore flawed by the standards of current scholarship. For example, while in Walsch's view, God acknowledges himself as the creator of life, but then he (Walsch) adds that he created us in his image so that we could be creators as well. At first this sounds possible. We are conceived and people do conceive further... However, he continues, writing: "God has no special will for us: ". . . your will for you is God's will for you . . . I have no preference in the matter . . . I do not care what you do . . ."

Whoa. Here we hit the skids. The Decalogue is shot. In many references, the Torah tells of an attentive and caring Lord.  It writes of covenants, agreements made between God and the people, Israel. Not so in Walsch: God continues on, saying that we are not here to learn lessons, but only "to remember, and re-create, who you are." This came about because God, who originally was all that existed, longed "to know what it felt like to be so magnificent" and was not satisfied unless there was a reference point through which God could know his magnificence..."

Has anyone picked up a book on philosopher and mathematician Gotfried Leibnitz's idea of the Monad lately? It's all in there. Here it is in ungarbled form: Monism most simply argues for the idea that there is unity, only unity and not dualism. Many, if not most all of the world religions address this issue. Now review the writing of Walsch once more after reading Leibnitz's ideas. It is less clear to this Simple Mind what Walsch's point really is.

 For more views on this topic, one writer's thoughts Marcia Montnegro's, and the thoughts of University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point philosophy professor, Joseph Waligore:
christiananswersforthenewage.org/Articles_BookreviewWalsch.html
spiritualcritiques.com/author-criticisms/neale-donald-walsch/

Melchizedek, a Jew and other Torah Figures

Melchizedek-- Heb. meaning, "the god Zedek is king."


The Hebrew name Melchizedek appears in many current documents as if something new to humankind is being uncovered. In fact the name means in English, the god Zedek is King. It is also the name of the ‘mysterious’  (Greek word meaning ‘the initiate(d)’) personage mentioned in Genesis 14:18-20.

He is also mysterious because little is actually known of this person whom the Bible records as being a priest and king. In the book of Hebrews 7, he is presented as one who presages the appearance of the Christ come into the world. Here the name Melchizedek, owing back to its original Hebrew, takes the additional connotation of ‘the king of justice.’

There are three main points of resemblance between Melchizedek and the Christ who it may be said later fulfills his oracle. Both men were both priest and king; both offer bread and wine as sacrifice to G-d; both derive their priestly state directly from the ancient Hebrew tribe of Aaron, because neither man is from the tribe of Levi, another branch which served a different priestly function.

Who and why are the tribes of Israel important to the story of Melchizedek? First of all, the bible records for history that the ancient tribes of Israel performed several distinct functions in their society and that this ordering reflected well upon their religion which in time comes to us as Judaism. While the Torah records many tribes from far and wide, the tribes most important to the story of Melchizedek are the Levites, those men who were the hereditary priests, or sacred ministers with duty to offer sacrifices at the altar of the holocausts (Leviticus 1:3-4); they also entered the place of worship morning and evening to offer incense at the golden altar. See Psalms 99 and 110:4, also Hebrews 7:1-17.  The significance of the “order of Melchizedek” is that his authority arose by means different than the traditional hereditary one of other priests. They were made priests on the mandate of G-d, the Creator. Nothing more is made of their priestly state.

Aaron was a member of the tribe of Levi (Exodus 4:14-16 and 7:28-30) and the brother of Moses; he was the designated tribal spokesman before the Egyptian Pharaoh. The Levite priests were also charged with several other duties, including the care and cure of Lepers in their communities. Luke 1 and 5. They officiated at the temple, and all the Tribe of Levi along with those of Aaron ministered together during the great festivals. Their dress was a long, light linen tunic worn with a decorated sash and turban. Compare this with the modern, Orthodox Christian practice owing its tradition back to the Hebrews, in all ways of the priests. So it is the priest of modern day who presides as Melechizedek's descendant, anointed with Holy Chrism.

The World of Jesus' People

"Thus...Rome established or supported friendly kings... thereby governing through subsevient agents in lands where Rome itself did not choose to rule... Friends of Caesar." Judaism in the Beginning of Christianity by Jacob Neusner


The ruler of the Bible,Herrod and his sons, were local Jews selected by the Romans to rule. Developing the region as they wished for political and economic gain, Roman rule brought changes to the land of the biblical Jesus. They built new cities, ports, aqua ducts, roads; they divided the territory into taxing districts, collected the rents and public due from the populace by means of an established and efficient bureaucracy.

Not regarding Roman rule as wholly legitimate, Jews of the period regarded the taxation imposed upon them as robbery, writes religious historian, Jacob Neusner in his book, Judaism in the Beginning of Christianity. Furthermore he writes, "No Gentile (non Jew) could ever take valid, legal possession of land [since it was ultimately deeded from God in the Jewish mind]; even if a Gentile bought land from a Jew, Gentiles held it as sharecroppers."

Many people, Neusner writes, received a religious education, rich and poor alike. "This education centered on religious learning, was sufficiently broad to impart civilizing and humanizing lessons." Typically Jews of the period learned about their forefathers, such as Moses, Abraham and Jacob. Their tradition was sufficiently old so as to take a look backward into history and observe those peoples of history who no longer existed.

They were instructed about their obligations to the temple, the poor, children and widows, to care for the sick and to bury the dead. God was there for the Jew to be the One Lord, that they should not regard any other, nor idolize as had been done in days long ago. The Jews of the time of the Christ learned to do justice, love mercy and its practice, and mostly to walk humbly with their God.

Thus to these ancients, a comet, a flood, an earthquake or a scientific calculation all conveyed truths equally. They did not readily discriminate among them. Yet socially they were widely stratified. Among the residents of the city Jerusalem, there were those of great wealth, merchants, scholars and men of the Temple. Apart from these were the skilled trades, the money changers, the bankers and the tax collectors. In the countryside, land owners took p residence, with shepherds near or at the lowest rank.

Also present in the countryside were centers established by groups who purposefully separated themselves from the wider society.
The Roman, Philo, describes these groups principally as the Essenes who went outside of the Polis seeking purity and hoping for eternity; the Sadducees, another group who lived outside the Polis, stood for strict adherence to the written word, and practiced conservatism in both ritual and belief as spelled out in the Torah.


Finally the much maligned group of the New Testament, the Pharisees were a group who lived as deliberate Separatists, avoiding contact with those outside their group. Together these groups formed what is now thought of as early monastic practice in which they lived, worked and worshiped together in community. The Pharisees in particular, writes Neusner, adhered to the writings of Jewish philosopher, Hillel, who wrote, "Do not separate yourself from the community."

Thus supposes Neusner, it was the Pharisees who actively fostered their philosophies within the larger society, both Jews and Gentiles alike, greatly able to influence large masses of persons. Some joined with the urban Pharisees and formed urban communes, living, working and carrying out the religious traditions under Pharisaical direction. These groups frequently lived and worked among those who did not know or hold their views. Teaching by example, was an early model followed by those disciples who would later come to follow the Christ; in just the same way, they remained in community at one another's side.

Judaism, a Theology of the Common Deed

"The gods attend to great matters; they neglect small ones..." Marcus Tullius Cicero (106 B.C.E.-43 B.C.E.), ancient Roman Statesman

Responding to one of the great figures in the Hellenistic world Jewish theologian, Abraham Joshua Heschel writes "In the theology of the common good, according to Aristotle, the gods are not at all concerned with the dispensation of good and bad fortune, or external things. To the Hebrew prophet, however, no subject is as worthy of consideration as the plight of man. Indeed G-d Himself is described as reflecting over the plight of man rather than as contemplating eternal ideas. His mind is preoccupied with man, with the concrete actualities of history, rather than with the timeless issues of thought."

In the Nevi'im, or Prophet's message, nothing that has bearing upon good and evil is small or trite in the eyes of  G-d. The teaching of Judaism is the theology of the common deed. The Torah, or Bible, insists that G-d is concerned with the everydayness, the trivialities of life. Thus the great challenge does not lie in organizing solemn demonstrations, but in how we manage the commonplace. The prophet's field of concern is not the mysteries of heaven, the glories of eternity, but the blights of society, the affairs of the marketplace. He addresses himself to those who trample upon the needy, who increase the price of grain, use dishonest scales and sell the refuse of corn or wheat (see Nevi'im, Amos 8:4-6). The predominant feature of the biblical pattern of life is unassuming, unheroic, inconspicuous piety, the sanctification of trifles, attentiveness to details."

The wages of a laborer shall not remain with you until morning (Torah, Leviticus 19:13,18). Love your fellow as yourself; I am the Lord. When you encounter your enemy's ox or ass wandering, you must take it back to him. When you see the ass of your enemy lying under its burden and would refrain from raising it, you must nevertheless raise it with him (Torah, Exodus 23:4-5).

-- taken from I Asked for Wonder, A Spiritual Anthology by Abraham Joshua Heshel

Rahamim, Compassionate Forgiveness

"For He knows how we are formed, remembers that we are dust. Our days are like the grass; like flowers of the field, we blossom. The wind sweeps over us and we are gone; our place knows us no more. But the Lord's kindness is forever, toward the faithful from age to age." --Torah, Psalm 103:14-18

In recognition of this the Jewish day of the New Lunar year, 5770, Rosh Ha-Shon'ah is again upon us with all its great blessings and preparations for the coming New Year. Ever important to the full understanding of Jewish wisdom are the extensive teachings about kindness, compassion and forgiveness. At the New Year these thoughts are again forefront in the Jewish mind. Canadian Rabbi, Stuart Rosenberg writes in his book, More Loves Than One about the force and authority of love. Love, he writes, is communal, it is familial, it is Eros, and above all, it is patient and forgiving.

Rahamim, is described by the author, as "a humane nearness of G-d to the offender, a willingness to accept and affirm that person as a person, while standing firmly opposed to his wrongdoing... is profoundly related to much of the ethos" of Torah. He says that the word, rahamim, is accurately translated as 'compassionate forgiveness.' Rosenberg asserts that nothing greater can happen to a human being than to be deeply and wholly forgiven. "And there can be no greater love of things, ideas, or persons without the central, ethical role which forgiveness plays in human affairs."

In this view, a 'first step' consists of perhaps excusing the transgression once, while awaiting the next fault, or mistake so as to pounce again, since it can't be a mistake twice, the Rabbi writes. In this hard, rational mind, these persons of the 'first step' draw conclusions quickly before learning of all the factors; yet mature love asks, and needs, patience. It "bids us to wait and tolerate."

And sometimes we think we have learned the meaning of forgiveness when we have really only achieved a sort of truce or cease fire. "Too many of us," writes Rabbi Rosenberg, "pardon our neighbors, but seek to exact tribute. "Gleefully, we set down a catalog of pre-conditions for our compassion. But forgiveness is incomplete if we can only offer punishments fitting the crime, and not true love," or Maitreya. Forgiveness that is complete and whole exacts no tribute, it requires no moral barter.

The forgiveness, Rabbi (Rabbi, a Hebrew word meaning teacher) Rosenberg writes of is biblical, not pragmatic; it is extravagant, not quid pro quo; it is mindful, not forgetful, and it is life changing and healing to all involved, not only to 'transgressors.' "Forgiveness is the Divine answer" to the utter imperfection implied in human existence. It is a free-will act, liberating all who engage. "This is why no man truly loves who cannot accept forgiveness as a way of life. The deeper our experiences of forgiveness, the deeper and fuller our love experience."

In this radical viewpoint, forgiveness is a wild, bold risk, and a healing, freeing opening to a new day. Its wisdom lies in recognition of our mutual clumsiness and imperfection. Forgiving means reconciliation "in spite of estrangement, reunion in the face of hostility, acceptance of the unacceptable, receiving the rejected. If we are not to kill the things we love, we must learn to accept help rather than reject, receive rather than to defy, embrace rather than to revile those whose lives connect to our own."

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The One, Adonai

"In his unfathomable love, God became what we are, that he might make us what he is." --Saint Irenaeus, (125-202 C.E.)

As more and more the Way of the Christ is considered, it becomes clear that a central figure, the Christian notion of a monism, is relatively new in history. What, however, some may wish to argue is that Christianity is set apart, and unto itself, through the extensive belief in a creative, and personally loving life force, a god, who makes, yet is in itself already fully fashioned. A creator who exists, one, whole and complete.

This One makes himself known as a lover, as one speaking to his beloved. The intimate, personal nature of the Spirit, this god of love has moved around the world, encircling humanity from all the ends of the earth. As Judaism prepares to enter into the year 5,770 C.E. (Sept.2009-Sept.2010), the faithful remain as a testament to this one God, this one book, Torah:

Deep Within

Deep within I will plant my Way,
not on stone, but in your heart.

Follow me, I will bring you back.
you will be my own,
and I will be your God.

I will give you a new heart,
a new spirit within you
For I will be your strength.

Seek my face
and see your God,
for I will be your hope.

Return to me
with all your heart,
and I will bring you back.

Words inspired from:
Nev'im: Jeremiah 31:33; Ezekiel 36-26; Joel 2:12
written in this version as lyrics by David Haas

simplemindzen.blogspot.com