Dear Jewish Response,
It is one of the fundamentals of Jewish belief that G-d is not a physical body, is everywhere and is not bound by any physical laws.
So how can the Torah say that Moshe saw G-d's back (Shemos 33:23)? How can the prophet Yechezkel claim to have seen a vision of a man sitting on a throne (Yechezkel 1:26)? How can the Torah talk in many places about the voice of G-d (Bamidbar 7:89)?
And why do the Talmud Sages speak of an angel who ties crowns on his Master? The Gemara in Chagigah 13b reads: "There was an angel standing on the earth and his head reached the level of the Chayos. A teaching from the Mishnaic period says that his name is Sandalfon, and he is higher than his colleagues by 500 years' journey. He stands in back of the chariot and ties crowns onto his Master. How could this be? Does it not say, 'Blessed is the glory of Hashem from His place' - implying that no one knows where His place is? - He pronounced a name over the crown and it went on its own and sat on His head."
I would appreciate it you could clarify these things for me.
Chaim F.
Dear Chaim,
The Jewish sources address your questions. In particular, the verse in Yechezkel is addressed by the Midrash, Bamidbar Rabbah 19:4.
The Midrash opens with a verse from Koheles 8:1, "Who is like the wise, and who knows the explanation of a matter? The wisdom of a man lights up his face, and the strength of his face is changed." The Midrash explains: Who is like the wise - this means G-d, who created the world with wisdom. Who knows the explanation of a matter - this means G-d, who explained the Torah to Moses. The wisdom of a man lights up his face - great is the power of the prophets, who compared G-d to the form of a man. Daniel (8:16) said, "I heard the voice of a man." Ezekiel (1:26) said, "And on the form of the throne was a form like the appearance of a man on it above." And the strength of His face is changed - from the attribute of strict justice to the attribute of mercy on Israel.
The Midrash is saying that since we cannot understand G-d, we don't know how to address Him, how to pray to Him, how to ask Him for forgiveness. The prophets therefore compared G-d to a human king sitting on a throne, so that we should be able to address Him and influence Him to deal with us mercifully. But we must remember that these are only metaphors and we can never truly understand G-d.
This is the key to understanding all the human language used in reference to G-d in the Torah and Prophets. The Prophets did this to make us feel closer to G-d and gain a stronger belief in Him.
But it is clear that in truth, G-d is boundless and non-physical. The Rambam opens his Mishneh Torah with the words, "The foundation of all foundations and the pillar of all branches of wisdom is to know that there is a Prime Being who causes everything else to exist." Rabbi Yosef Karo in his commentary Kesef Mishneh questions the Rambam's use of the Hebrew words "yesh sham" (there is there a Prime Being...). Is the Creator "there," only in a specific place? He resolves this problem by saying that the word "there" means that the Creator is everywhere at once. Wherever one turns, He is there.
The Rambam in Hilchos Yesodei Hatorah 1:9 proves that the Biblical language is figurative: What does the Torah mean when it says things like, "under His feet" (Exodus 31:18), "written with the finger of G-d" (ibid), "the hand of the L-rd" (Exodus 9:3), "the eyes of the L-rd" (Genesis 38:7), "the ears of the L-rd" (Numbers 11:1), et cetera? These phrases are in line with the level of understanding of people, who can only comprehend physical existence, and the Torah speaks in terms that we can understand. All examples of this nature are merely attributory. For example, when it says, "If I whet My glittering sword" - does G-d really have a sword and does He really kill with one?! Such phrases are figurative. Evidence for this is that one Prophet saw G-d as wearing garments as white as snow, whereas another Prophet saw G-d as wearing crimsoned garments from Bozrah. Moses our Teacher himself saw, at the time of the splitting of the Red Sea, G-d as a war-waging warrior, but at Sinai as a cantor to show him the order of prayer. This shows that G-d has no form or shape [because He appears different to different people]. G-d's appearance varies according to each prophetic vision and what it contains. It is beyond Man's intellect to investigate or comprehend [the nature of] G-d's existence, as it is written, "Can you find out the deep things of G-d? Can you find out the purpose of the Almighty?"
In the following section (1:10) the Rambam addresses your question about Moshe seeing G-d's back: What did Moses wish to comprehend when he asked, "I beg of You, show me Your glory"? Just as one can recognize a particular person's appearance and know him to be different from other people, so Moses wanted to understand G-d's existence and to be able to differentiate from everything else. G-d replied to Moses that is beyond the strengths of a living man, whose body and soul are as one, to understand the nature of His existence. Still, G-d made known to Moses things which no man before or since had known, so that Moses understood G-d enough to tell Him apart from other things in existence, just as it is possible, based on differences in dress and build, to tell one person apart from another by seeing only their backs. This is the meaning of the verse, "And you shall see My back, but My face shall not be seen".
The Raavad (quoted by the Kesef Mishneh) disagrees with the Rambam's explanation of the verse "show me Your glory". If the Rambam were correct, why did G-d say in reply, "I will be kind to whomever I will be kind, and I will be merciful to whomever I will be merciful to"? He explains it in the context of the preceding verses, in which Moshe requests that G-d lead the Israelites on their journeys in the desert. G-d promises He will do so, and then Moshe says, "Show me. Allow me to see that You are with us." G-d replies, "I will pass all My goodness before you" - you personally will be able to see that I with the Israelites, but among the people, who angered Me with the golden calf, some will see and some will not -"I will be kind to whomever I will be kind, and I will be merciful to whomever I will be merciful to."
The Rambam, however, might have answered the Raavad's question by saying that Moshe's request to understand G-d really meant to understand His attributes. Therefore, G-d's reply that "I will be kind to whomever I will be kind" is an explanation of those attributes (as are the Thirteen Attributes in the following chapter).
G-d is infinite and unfathomable to humans and even to angels. The prophet Ezekiel (1:14) described the angels as follows: "And the angels ran to and fro, like the appearance of a flash." The Sefer Chareidim explains that humans are finite and physical in nature, and their imaginations work spatially. Whenever we learn of the existence of something, we automatically imagine its size. But G-d is infinite and cannot be quantified. The angels are able to comprehend a little of G-d, more than humans. But as soon as they reach that comprehension, they leap backward, fearing that their intellect, like that of humans, will want to impose a limit on G-d.
Humans have an innate desire to know G-d, although He is unknowable. The Midrash (Bereishis Rabbah 41:1) explains this with an analogy to a palm tree, which is used in the Bible as a simile for the righteous (Psalms 92:13). There was once a date palm growing in Chamsan, near Tiberias, and it bore no fruit. A palm expert passed by, saw it and said, "This tree wishes to grow in Jericho." They transplanted it in Jericho and it bore fruit. The tree longed for the soil of Jericho, although it had never seen Jericho. Similarly, the righteous long for knowledge of G-d.
We can never really satisfy this longing, but we can come closer to G-d by understanding His attributes and ways. The human terms used by the Prophets are for the purpose of helping us understand these attributes.
Jewish Response Staff