For seven months we have been inside our bubbles, hoping to stem the tide of COVID-19. The last blog post I wrote was on handwashing. (Thanks Trisha Arlin!). So much has happened since then. Rarely did a week go by that I didn’t think about what I would blog. And then someone asked at the High Holy Days what happened to the Engergizer Rabbi. So it’s back. This year or at least through the Book of Genesis, we will look at the chesed, the lovingkindness or kindness that is in the text and how it applies to our own lives. So here we go. Perhaps it is a shehechianu moment. Now if only I knew how to update the home page to include some new things.

The Chesed of Beresit

“In the beginning G-d created the heavens and the earth.” Or if you prefer, “When G-d began to create.” Such familiar language. In six days G-d created heaven and earth and on the 7th day G-d rested. G-d shavat v’yinafash. G-d ceased and rested. Or maybe even better, G-d re-souled, since one meaning of nefesh is soul. In between, in today’s parsha, portion, we learn of two different ways of telling the creation story. Looking at it through the lens of chesed, kindness Is perhaps not obvious. Who illustrates kindness, chesed in this story>?

G-d, in the very act of creating the world and placing human beings in it shows lovingkindness. G-d ,for creating us in G-d’s image. G-d, in created a helpmate for Adam saying that it was not good for an individual to be alone.

There are a couple of midrashim that illustrate my point.

What does it mean that we are created b’tzelm elohim, in the image of G-d. First, we need to see that every person has a spark of the divine in each of us.

“Why was only a single person created first? Therefore the first human being, Adam, was created alone, to teach us that whoever destroys a single life, the Torah considers it as if he destroyed an entire world. And whoever saves a single life, the Torah considers it as if he saved an entire world.” (Sanhedrin 4:5)

The midrash continues, “Furthermore, so no race or class may claim a nobler ancestry, saying, ‘ Furthermore, only one person, Adam, was created for the sake of peace among people, so that no one should say: ‘My father was born first. My father was greater than yours…. and finally, to give testimony to the greatness of the Holy One, who caused the wonderful diversity of humanity from one type. For if people strike many coins from one mold, they all resemble one another, but the King of Kings, the Holy Blessed One, made each person in the image of Adam, and yet not one of them resembles another. And why was Adam created last of all beings? To teach him humility; for if he be overbearing, let him remember that the little fly preceded him in the order of creation.” (Sanhedrin 4:5)

Leo Baeck picks up this idea when he said: “Above all demarcations of races and nations, castes and classes, oppressors and servants, givers and recipients, above all delineations even of gifts and talents stands one certainty: Man. Whoever bears this image is created and called to be a revelation of human dignity.” (Leo Baeck, The Essence of Judaism, rev. ed. [New York: Schocken Books, 1948], p. 152) Abraham Joshua Heschel said similar things when he marched with King and when he participated in a conference in 1963 on Religion and Race. We echo these sentiments every week when we pray for the welfare of our country.

Pirke Avot teaches us: Beloved are humans for we were created in the image of God. Still greater was God’s love in that God gave to us the knowledge of our having been so created. (Pirkei Avot 3:14)

In Psalms we learn: What is humankind, that You are mindful, / human beings, that you pay attention to them? / You have made them little lower than divine. (Psalm 8:5-6)

So how do we act when we know we are created in the image of G-d? How do we protect life itself? We act like G-d. We emulate G-d’s own acts of lovingkindness with our own. Sotah teaches us, using part of our very text this morning:

And Rabbi Chama the son of Rabbi Chanina said, “What is the meaning of the verse, ‘You should walk after the Lord your G-d. (Deuteronomy 13:5)’? Is it possible for a person to walk after the divine presence? And isn’t it already stated, ‘For the Lord your G-d is a consuming fire (Deuteronomy 4:24)’? Rather, To follow the character traits of G-d. “Just as G-d clothes the naked, as it is written, ‘And the Lord G-d made for Adam and his wife cloaks of leather, and G-d clothed them (Genesis 3:21);’ so too you shall clothe the naked. The Holy Blessed One, visited the sick, as it is written, ‘And G-d appeared in Ailonei Mamrei [while Abram was in pain] (Genesis 18:1);’ so too you shall visit the sick. The Holy Blessed One, comforted mourners, as it is written, ‘And it was, after the death of Abraham, and G-d blessed his son Isaac (Genesis 25:11);’ so too you shall comfort mourners. The Holy Blessed One, buried the dead, as it is written, ‘And G-d buried him in the valley (Deuteronomy 34:6);’ so too, you shall bury the dead.”

But it is more than being kind to each other because we are created b’tzelem elohim—although that is good and can be a starting point. We also need to be kind to ourselves. That’s what G-d illustrates by resting on Shabbat. G-d takes that breath, Shabbat, the pause that refreshes. The Sabbath is a gift, a sign of the covenant, that is in the category in modern language of “self-care”. Ahad Ha’am taught that just as Israel has kept the Sabbath, so has the Sabbath kept Israel. Taking time for self-care recognizes that we are each an individual created b’tzelem elohim. Therefore, each of us individually is worthy of being treated with respect and care…and with chesed, love.

That chesed is illustrated by another story from the ancient rabbis:

And all your actions should be for the sake of Heaven, like Hillel. When Hillel left for a place, they would ask him, “where are you going?”
– “I am going to do a mitzvah.”
– “What is the mitzvah?”
– “I am going to the bathroom.”
– “And is this a mitzvah?”
– “Yes, so that the body is not damaged.”

Or:

– “I am going to the bathhouse.”
“And is this a mitzvah?”
– “Yes, in order to clean the body. Know that if someone is appointed to polish and clean the statues of kings they are paid every year, and also respected among the great kings. So we, who are created in the image of God, how much more so?״ (Avot D’ Rabbi Natan 2:30)

So taking the time for self-care—for cleaning ourselves, for exercising, for eating healthy food, for resting and celebrating Shabbat are commanded because we are ourselves, each of us were created b’tzelem elohim and that very behavior is an act of kindness.

Ultimately, we derive three teachings from our verse Genesis. All life is sacred and must be protected, no human is inherently more important than another, and though we may look different from one another, the infinite nature of the Divine means that we are all equally created in the image of God.

There is a poem I want to leave you with from the Israeli poet Yehuda Amichi:

Tourists:
Once I sat on the steps by a gate at David’s Tower,
I placed my two heavy baskets at my side.
A group of tourists was standing around their guide and
I became their target marker.
“You see that man with the baskets?
Just right of his head there’s an arch from the Roman period.
Just right of his head.”
“But he’s moving, he’s moving!”
I said to myself: redemption will come only if their guide tells them,
“You see that arch from the Roman period?
It’s not important: but next to it,
left and down a bit, there sits a man who’s bought fruit and vegetables for his family.”

Yehuda Amichai from the poem Tourist

Remember that we are all created b’tzelem elohim. The person who cleans the stones of the palace or the school or the synagogue, the person who brings vegetables to his family, the person who teaches. And yes, even you, yourself. Remember to be kind. To everyone. Because everyone is created with that divine spark inside.