Parashat Bereshit 5766/2005
EJD
The weekly reading for the week of 26 Tisrei, 5766 - October 29, 2005 Parashah: Bereshit Genesis 1:1 to 6:8; Haftarah: Isaiah 42:1 to 43:5; Mei Kituvim: Nehemiah 9:1-38; Brit Chadashah: Matthew 12:1-50
The Bagel: PBO.
Parashah Lite Edition (Focuses on one verse or idea anywhere in the readings)
"In the beginning God...." (Genesis 1:1).
PBO. This is the English acrostic for Pre-Bereshit Olam. Bereshit is the Hebrew for "In the beginning." Olam can mean "a long time" or "age" or "eternity." Thus PBO is simply the age or period before the creation (Bereshit). Some attempts to explain the features of that time have been made. For example, Rabbi Yehoshua Ben Levi remarked in the Talmud to the effect that the Torah was hidden in God for "924 generations before the creation of the world."1 There is something that we humans are aware of. We can ask the question of such an explanation: "What was before the period of the 924 generations?" We can conceive of infinity in the past as well as in the future. PBO is a long time indeed.
Now, it is true that the angels were around when Elohim (G-d) spoke: "Let us make man in our image...." Some view this as a "plural of majesty" that is G-d was speaking in the plural, but was really meaning in the singular. This is like an English king saying "We decree that taxes shall be administered equitably." The king was actually making the decree by himself, but saying it as though it included the people. But this statement of His image is one of a relationship. Even a plural of majesty speaks of a relationship. Yet, there were no angels in the PBO (or before for the 924 gen.). What relationship was this based on in the PBO since G-d alone existed in the PBO? Could a Monad G-d even talk? There was no one else around to hear and respond back. Creating things by thought, if it is a real creation or has real existence (and not necessarily a material existence), is that not a Bereshit? That would be a Bereshit before Bereshit. Whatever was there in the PBO, it had to be in G-d Who doesn't change: "For I the LORD do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed" (Malachi 3:6).
In the Bereshit act there was Adonay as the agent of creation. The six questions posed by the Proverbs gives us a hint of that eternal relationship:
Who has ascended heaven and come down?
Who has gathered up the wind in the hollow of his hand?
Who has wrapped the waters in his garment?
Who has established all the extremities of the earth?
What is his name?
Or his son's name, if you know it?
--- Proverbs 30:4 (Tanakh JPS)
The son can't be Israel because Israel was not there in the Bereshit act. Angels were created during that act. This is evidence of an eternal relationship. Thus the "Let us make...." goes back into the PBO. It is not surprising that the Brit Chadashah discloses with great clarity this relationship: Yeshua said: "I and the Father are one" (John 10:30). Yeshua was already there in the Bereshit act: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God....And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth" (John 1:1, 14). This can only mean that He existed in the PBO as well.
Cream Cheese: So G-d did speak after all.
1 from Talmud Bavli: Shabbat 88b
Unless noted, all Scripture quotations are taken from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version (ESV). Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good News Publishers.
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