Parasha: Genesis 1:1 – 6:8 Haftarah:Isaiah 42:5 – 43:10 – Sefardim reads: Isaiah 42:5 – 42:21
Focal Points: 1:1-5 – Creation that continues
1 When God began to create heaven and earth —
Bereshit bara Elohim et hashamayim ve’et ha’arets.
2 the earth being unformed and void, with darkness over the surface of the deep and a wind from God sweeping over the water —
Veha’arets hayetah tohu vavohu vechoshech al-peney tehom veruach Elohim merachefet al-peney hamayim.
3 God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light.
Vayomer Elohim yehi-or vayehi-or.
4 God saw that the light was good, and God separated the light from the darkness.
Vayar Elohim et-ha’or ki-tov vayavdel Elohim beyn ha’or uveyn hachoshech.
5 God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, a first day.
Vayikra Elohim la-or yom velachoshech kara laylah vayehi-erev vayehi-voker yom echad.
—-
“In the beginning of G-d’s creating…” that’s what the very first line of Torah says. Literally. This to us indicate two things:
Creation is an ongoing process and G-d didn’t create out of nothing.
G-d creates out of that which is already in existence. This is good news to us – this means that G-d can use whatever chaos and deformity we are at the moment to make something great out of, and that we don’t have to despair at being slow to learn or taking our time to “get it” – G-d’s creative work is an on-going process, so we don’t have to worry about a timetable.
“…with darkness over the surface…”
G-d starts out His creating in darkness and then He decides to make a counterpart to Darkness – Light.
This is important for us – because for most of us life up till now has been much on the Dark Side, we too started out in darkness. We need Light to counterpoint the Darkness of our unmanageable lives. So G-d creates Light, makes distinct lines between Light and Darkness to separate them from each other.
Notice that He doesn’t remove Darkness, He makes a special room for it – “Night”. Now, if He is G-d, then why on earth didn’t He just get rid of Darkness and go completely with Light? Perhaps because without each other Light and Darkness would be meaningless. Creation needs both to function, and so do we.
Darkness in our lives works much like Night in nature – it provides dew, moisture that feeds/waters nature, inspires it to grow. If nature never experienced Night/Darkness, it would very quickly be scourged to dry dust by the Light/Day. That same way we need to soak up “moisture” from Darkness in our lives in order to grow during the times of light. We too would be scourged to dry dust if all we ever experienced was light.
And G-d saw that it was good…
On the other hand – the Light that explodes onto the scenery in v.3 is a Light that leaves no shadows. To that Light we are totally transparent. That is good, because it means that G-d knows exactly what He has to work with, so that in the end we become exactly what we are supposed to be – not what we might have been if the Light had been just any other light.
So the to-and-fro between Light and Darkness has another function – every now and then we need to be completely transparent in order to find the areas in ourselves that needs working on. At those times, Darkness is the Sweet Shadow in which we can rest between turns at digging in ourselves.
Whether we are in Light or Darkness – we are exactly where we are supposed to be, in the middle of G-d’s Continued Creating
Shabbat Shalom!
This article, including artworks and photos in this Blog is Copyright © Henric C. Jensen aka Shadow Bear/Silly Old Bear and are NOT public domain – unless otherwise specified.
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