Studies in Judaism, First SeriesSchechter, S. (Solomon)
Religion
Studies in Judaism, First Series
Schechter, S. (Solomon)
Jews
All created things and every product of human intelligence owe their being
to God. All generation and all existence spring from the thought and will
of God. It is incumbent upon man to believe that all things are pervaded
by the divine life, and when he speaks he should remember that it is this
divine life which is speaking through him. There is nothing which is void
of God. If we imagine for a moment such a thing to be, it would instantly
fall into nothingness. In every human thought God is present. If the
thought be gross or evil, we should seek to raise and ennoble it by
carrying it back to its origin. So, if a man be suddenly overwhelmed by
the aspect of a beautiful woman, he should remember that this splendour of
beauty is owing to the all‐pervading emanation from the divine. When he
remembers that the source of corporeal beauty is God, he will not be
content to let his thought abide with the body when he can rise to the
inward contemplation of the infinite soul of beauty, which is God. A
disciple of Baalshem has said: Even as in the jewels of his beloved the
lover sees only the beauty of her he loves, so does the true lover of God
see in all the appearances of this world, the vitalising and generative
power of his divine master. If you do not see the world in the light of
God you separate the creation from its Creator. He who does not fully
believe in this universality of God’s presence has never properly
acknowledged God’s Sovereignty, for he excludes God from an existing
portion of the actual world. The word of God (to Baalshem, a synonym for
God himself), which “is settled in heaven” and “established on earth,” is
still and always speaking, acting, and generating throughout heaven and
earth in endless gradations and varieties. If the vitalising word were to
cease, chaos would come again. The belief in a single creation after which
the Master withdrew from his completed work, is erroneous and heretical.
The vivifying power is never withdrawn from the world which it animates.
Creation is continuous; an unending manifestation of the goodness of God.
All things are an affluence from the two divine attributes of Power and
Love, which express themselves in various images and reflections.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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