Where on earth is the "Kevod Hashem"?

On two occasions in the book of Bemidbar, the nation is involved in some form of frantic rebellion against God – or at least again his appointed leaders. As the mutinies of Korach and the Spies reach fever pitch, order is suddenly and dramatically restored by the “Glory [Kevod] of God” appearing to the entire nation.

The mysterious notion of a tangible “Kevod Hashem” features elsewhere in Tanakh and appears repeatedly in our prayers – but how is it to be understood? Is Kevod Hashem some form of tangible spiritual entity? Where is it to be found?

We are accustomed to the notion of God’s kavod “filling the entire world” – our daily kedushah prayer includes Yeshayah’s declaration that “melo chol ha’aretz kevodo”. But if such kevod Hashem indeed fills the entire universe then how can it said to appear suddenly mid-mutiny in order to restore order among the Israelites?

The extended Kedusha that we recite on Shabbat recounts that this question also troubles God’s ministering angels: “His kavod fills the world [yet] His ministering angels ask of each other “Where is the place of His kavod?!”” The resolution appears to be that his kavod is to be found among “am hameyachadim shemo” – the nation which perceives and declares his Oneness.

Radak explains in his commentary to Yeshayah’s declaration that “God has created everything, and those who are able to perceive God will glorify Him for this [yechabeduhu ba’alei sechel]”. Consistent with Rambam’s interpretations of this verse in Moreh Nevuchim, Radak is shifting the emphasis from kavod as a tangible spiritual entity to a description of humans recognizing and internalizing the nature of God’s existence. It would seem that while God’s kavod potentially fills the entire world – since all aspects of Creation can be said to point to a Creator – this kavod only exists in practice when and where humans perceive and declare God’s existence.

As Judaism Reclaimed analyses, Rambam categorically rejects as heretical the notion that God or divinity can enter into the limiting physical frameworks of space and time. Biblical verses which purport to describe God in this manner are therefore interpreted, in line with the ancient footsteps of Targum Onkelos, to be describing our perception and relationship with God. (Interestingly, Rambam does however consider it legitimate – if not entirely accurate – to understand kevod as a form of “created light” – an understanding which appears to have been favoured by other commentators such as Sa’adiah Gaon).

The extended kedushah prayer can be seen to reflect Rambam’s approach to kevod Hashem. Such kavod does not occupy any fixed place that the ministering angels can point to – rather it is to be found among the am hameyachadim shemo who use their tzelem Elokim – their God given intellect to recognise, internalise and develop a relationship with Him.

A further chapter of Judaism Reclaimed examines how such a recognition of God is not universally proclaimed and is central to the historical role of the Jewish nation. When pagans contemplated the world, they saw a multiplicity of concepts and forces which appeared to be in conflict with one another in the natural world. This they rationalised in terms of there being a multiplicity of deities, each with limited powers and spheres of influence, who engage in battle with one another where their interests come into conflict or their limited spheres of influence overlap. Aristotle, by contrast, contemplated the multiple ‘forms’ that make up the universe, understanding that there must be a single simple source from which they all emanate. This source, however, he viewed as being a natural and constant First Cause, eternally limited to its role of constantly producing the physical universe. In the modern era, atheists have concocted complex theories of multiverses and eternally self-perpetuating cycles of Big Bangs and contractions in order to explain what at first glance appears to be a precisely and finely-tuned universe.

From Avraham and the pagans, Rambam and Aristotle through to Rabbi Sacks’s disputes with New Atheists, Judaism has always stood at the forefront of the battle to declare and accept God’s governance of the world. These declarations have firmly rejected the various competing rival theories which have emerged at different historical junctures, gained popularity and then departed from serious theological and philosophical reckoning. It is this role of the Jewish nation which is concretised in the Kedusha prayer depicting us as the am hameyachadim shemo – the nation whose mission it is perpetually to recognise and declare God’s Oneness and governance of the world. The nation therefore among whom God’s kavod can be found.

The book of Bemidbar describes the formative years of our young nation in which it was being trained for its upcoming mission as God’s chosen people. This crash course required a more intense providential guidance – certain fundamental truths had to be supernaturally imposed on the nation. For this reason, when they rebelled in the episodes of the Spies and Korach, God’s kavodhad to make itself clear to them. Rather than emerging from the free choice of humans to meditate upon and perceive God, He made Himself clear and apparent in order to keep the emerging nation from rebelling against Moshe’s leadership and their destiny in the Land of Israel.

Subsequent generations of Jews, however, are guided by the phrase ברוך הוא אלקינו שבראנו לכבודו"” – “Blessed is He our God who created us for His kavod – our mission as God’s nation is to perceive, internalise and declare to the world His Oneness and governance.

First posted to Facebook 25 June 2023, here.

Rambam, Kaballah, and futile attempts to define God

Not long ago I was accosted by an enthusiastic panentheist, who accused me of seeking to minimise and limit God. Surely, he argued, any supposition that the physical world exists independently of God, inescapably diminishes God’s existence by imagining an area and dimension from which God is absent.

One chapter of Judaism Reclaimed, which relates to parashat Vayishlach, explores the contrasting ways in which Rambam and Kabbalah seek to relate to God. The most fundamental principle, from Rambam’s perspective, is to recognise and internalise the fact that God’s existence must not be related in any way to what we as humans consider to be existence – within fixed dimensions and frameworks of space, time and physicality:

“God is not a body, and that there is absolutely no comparison between Him and any of His creations in any way; that His existence, life and wisdom is of a different form to theirs – and that the difference between Him and them is not just a matter of more and less, but rather one of species of existence… so that no term can be used to describe them both.” [Moreh 1:35]

This latter point concerning terminology is crucial to Rambam. We can only meaningfully apply descriptions and definitions to concepts that our minds are capable of grasping, using descriptive words as way of integrating a new item, idea or concept within the framework of our previous knowledge and experience. Any term that we draw upon in an attempt to portray God is automatically limited by the restrictions of our vocabulary, which in turn is limited by the scope of our knowledge and imagination. The result of this is that any word that we use to describe God inescapably involves us drawing a parallel between God and the physical realm. Yeshayahu Leibowitz makes this point forcefully:

"This is the belief of God qua God, which cannot be conceived in the categories of human thought, as against the belief in God in terms of qualities and functions ascribed to Him, which are of necessity - a necessity following from the limitations of the human mind - corporeal. In our world of human consciousness, there are no qualities or functions which are not derived from the reality known to man. Thus, anyone who ascribes any such qualities to God sinks to the level of idolatry: he worships God in the image of man." [Faith of Maimonides p95

According to this approach, the panentheist’s error lay in his equating God’s mode of existence with that of humans. A human body cannot co-exist in a certain space with other physical matter. This person therefore presumed that the same must be true of God: either God must be present within the physical domain or His existence is necessarily diminished by the existence of a physical world.

Following Rambam’s path, there is a perpetual paradox. On the one hand our religious inclinations push us to want to relate to God – a project which is extremely difficult if we cannot first “make Him real” in our lives. On the other hand there must be a constant awareness that God’s essence is something which we can never, in truth, relate to by drawing on human imagination and experience. It belongs to a sacred higher realm.

This limitation in our ability to truly conceive of God remains the case regardless of whether one is dealing with biblical verses which describe God in physical terms (a subject which dominates the opening section of Moreh Nevuchim) or mystical systems of thought which seek to depict God’s interactions with the physical world. On the subject of the latter, Yeshayahu Leibovitz reports on a fascinating conversation he once had with Rav Kook:

“Rav Kook recognised that the veil separating Kabbalah from idolatry could collapse at any moment … he therefore regarded it as an act of grace on the part of God towards Israel that He gave us Maimonides, who could not be ignored by all these generations during which the Kabbalah spread among the Jews. During this period, Maimonides’ doctrine of the unity of God served as a brake against the deterioration of Kabbalah into idolatry.” [Faith of Maimonides p35]

First posted to Facebook 21 November 2021, here.