APPENDIX Z45: New Interpretations***
Published on 24 Jun 2016 at 2:05 pm.
No Comments.
Filed under Uncategorized.
APPENDIX Z45:
New Interpretations
***
“I end with a fascinating comment by the
nineteenth-
nineteenth-
century Jewish mystic Rabbi Zadok haCohen of
Lublin
Lublin
(1823-1900).
‘Every day there are new
interpretations of Torah,
interpretations of Torah,
because every day,
continually, God renews the work
continually, God renews the work
of creation.’ Since the world was created according to
the Torah…presumably, the renewal of the world comes
about through new aspects of Torah. That is why after the
blessing [in the morning prayers] ‘creator of the
heavenly
heavenly
lights’ which speaks about the daily renewal of
creation,
creation,
the sages instituted a second blessing which is a
form
form
of blessing over the Torah…in
which we ask to know the
which we ask to know the
new interpretations of Torah
which come about through
which come about through
the new aspects of creation….’
Rabbi Zadock haCohen, Tzidkat ha-Tzaddik, 92
(c. 1870)
According to Rabbi Zadok, since the God of creation
is the God of revelation, and since the Torah is itself a
commentary on the natural world, every new
scientic
scientic
discovery generates new religious insight. By daily
renewing
renewing
creation, God is daily renewing,
our insight into his creative
our insight into his creative
will.”
*** Jonathan Sacks, The Great Partnership, New York: Random House, Inc. 2011, pp.111-112