God in Judaism has been conceived in a variety of ways. Traditionally,

Judaism Judaism ( he, ''Yahăḏūṯ'') is an Abrahamic, monotheistic, and ethnic religion comprising the collective religious, cultural, and legal tradition and civilization of the Jewish people. It has its roots as an organized religion in t ...

holds that

Yahweh Yahweh *''Yahwe'', was the national god of ancient Israel and Judah. The origins of his worship reach at least to the early Iron Age, and likely to the Late Bronze Age if not somewhat earlier, and in the oldest biblical literature he poss ...

, the

God In monotheistic thought, God is usually viewed as the supreme being, creator, and principal object of faith. Swinburne, R.G. "God" in Honderich, Ted. (ed)''The Oxford Companion to Philosophy'', Oxford University Press, 1995. God is typically ...

Abraham Abraham, ; ar, , , name=, group= (originally Abram) is the common Hebrew patriarch of the Abrahamic religions, including Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. In Judaism, he is the founding father of the special relationship between the Je ...

Isaac Isaac; grc, Ἰσαάκ, Isaák; ar, إسحٰق/إسحاق, Isḥāq; am, ይስሐቅ is one of the three patriarchs of the Israelites and an important figure in the Abrahamic religions, including Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. He was th ...

, and

Jacob Jacob (; ; ar, يَعْقُوب, Yaʿqūb; gr, Ἰακώβ, Iakṓb), later given the name Israel, is regarded as a patriarch of the Israelites and is an important figure in Abrahamic religions, such as Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. J ...

and the

national god A national god is a guardian divinity whose special concern is the safety and well-being of an ethnic group (''nation''), and of that group's leaders. This is contrasted with other guardian figures such as family gods responsible for the well-be ...

of the

Israelites The Israelites (; , , ) were a group of Semitic-speaking tribes in the ancient Near East who, during the Iron Age, inhabited a part of Canaan. The earliest recorded evidence of a people by the name of Israel appears in the Merneptah Stele o ...

, delivered the Israelites from

slavery in Egypt Slavery in Egypt existed up until the early 20th century. It differed from the previous slavery in ancient Egypt, being managed in accordance with Islamic law from the conquest of the Caliphate in the 7th century until the practice stopped ...

, and gave them the Law of Moses at

Mount Sinai Mount Sinai ( he , הר סיני ''Har Sinai''; Aramaic: ܛܘܪܐ ܕܣܝܢܝ ''Ṭūrāʾ Dsyny''), traditionally known as Jabal Musa ( ar, جَبَل مُوسَىٰ, translation: Mount Moses), is a mountain on the Sinai Peninsula of Egypt. It is ...

as described in the

Torah The Torah (; hbo, ''Tōrā'', "Instruction", "Teaching" or "Law") is the compilation of the first five books of the Hebrew Bible, namely the books of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. In that sense, Torah means the ...

Jews Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

traditionally believe in a monotheistic conception of God (God is only one), which is both transcendent (wholly independent of, and removed from, the material universe) and immanent (involved in the material universe). God is conceived as unique and perfect, free from all faults, deficiencies, and defects, and further held to be

omnipotent Omnipotence is the quality of having unlimited power. Monotheistic religions generally attribute omnipotence only to the deity of their faith. In the monotheistic religious philosophy of Abrahamic religions, omnipotence is often listed as one ...

omnipresent Omnipresence or ubiquity is the property of being present anywhere and everywhere. The term omnipresence is most often used in a religious context as an attribute of a deity or supreme being, while the term ubiquity is generally used to descri ...

omniscient Omniscience () is the capacity to know everything. In Hinduism, Sikhism and the Abrahamic religions, this is an attribute of God. In Jainism, omniscience is an attribute that any individual can eventually attain. In Buddhism, there are diffe ...

, and completely

infinite Infinite may refer to: Mathematics * Infinite set, a set that is not a finite set *Infinity, an abstract concept describing something without any limit Music *Infinite (group), a South Korean boy band *''Infinite'' (EP), debut EP of American m ...

in all of his attributes, who has no partner or equal, being the sole creator of everything in existence. In Judaism, God is never portrayed in any image. The Torah specifically forbade ascribing partners to share his singular sovereignty, as he is considered to be the absolute one without a second, indivisible, and incomparable being, who is similar to nothing and nothing is comparable to him. Thus, God is unlike anything in or of the world as to be beyond all forms of human thought and expression. The

names of God There are various names of God, many of which enumerate the various qualities of a Supreme Being. The English word '' god'' (and its equivalent in other languages) is used by multiple religions as a noun to refer to different deities, or spec ...

used most often in the

Hebrew Bible The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
'' Tetragrammaton The Tetragrammaton (; ), or Tetragram, is the four-letter Hebrew theonym (transliterated as YHWH), the name of God in the Hebrew Bible. The four letters, written and read from right to left (in Hebrew), are ''yodh'', '' he'', '' waw'', and ...

() and Elohim. Other names of God in traditional Judaism include

El-Elyon Elyon ( he, ''ʿElyōn'') is an epithet of the God of the Israelites in the Hebrew Bible. ' is usually rendered in English as "God Most High", and similarly in the Septuagint as ("God the highest"). The term also has mundane uses, such as " ...

, El Shaddai, and

Shekhinah Shekhinah, also spelled Shechinah ( Hebrew: שְׁכִינָה ''Šəḵīnā'', Tiberian: ''Šăḵīnā'') is the English transliteration of a Hebrew word meaning "dwelling" or "settling" and denotes the presence of God, as it were, in a pla ...

. According to the rationalistic Jewish theology articulated by the Medieval Jewish philosopher and jurist

Moses Maimonides Musa ibn Maimon (1138–1204), commonly known as Maimonides (); la, Moses Maimonides and also referred to by the acronym Rambam ( he, רמב״ם), was a Sephardic Jewish philosopher who became one of the most prolific and influential Torah s ...

, which later came to dominate much of official and traditional Jewish thought, God is understood as the absolute one, indivisible, and incomparable being who is the

creator deity A creator deity or creator god (often called the Creator) is a deity responsible for the creation of the Earth, world, and universe in human religion and mythology. In monotheism, the single God is often also the creator. A number of monolatr ...

—the cause and preserver of all existence. Maimonides affirmed Avicenna's conception of God as the Supreme Being, both

and

incorporeal Incorporeality is "the state or quality of being incorporeal or bodiless; immateriality; incorporealism." Incorporeal (Greek: ἀσώματος) means "Not composed of matter; having no material existence." Incorporeality is a quality of souls, s ...

, necessarily existing for the creation of the universe while rejecting Aristotle's conception of God as the

unmoved mover The unmoved mover ( grc, ὃ οὐ κινούμενον κινεῖ, ho ou kinoúmenon kineî, that which moves without being moved) or prime mover ( la, primum movens) is a concept advanced by Aristotle as a primary cause (or first uncaused cau ...

, along with several of the latter's views such as denial of God as creator and affirmation of the

eternity of the world The eternity of the world is the question of whether the world has a beginning in time or has existed from eternity. It was a concern for both ancient philosophers and the medieval theologians and medieval philosophers of the 13th century. The ...

. Traditional interpretations of Judaism generally emphasize that God is

personal Personal may refer to: Aspects of persons' respective individualities * Privacy * Personality * Personal, personal advertisement, variety of classified advertisement used to find romance or friendship Companies * Personal, Inc., a Washington, ...

yet also transcendent and able to intervene in the world, while some modern interpretations of Judaism emphasize that God is an impersonal force or ideal rather than a supernatural being concerned with the universe.

Names

The name of God used most often in the

(). Jews traditionally do not pronounce it, and instead refer to God as ''

HaShem HaShem ( Hebrew: ''hšm'', literally "''the name''"; often abbreviated to 'h′'' is a title used in Judaism to refer to God. It is also a given name and surname. Religious usage * In Judaism, '' HaShem'' (lit. 'the Name') is used to refer ...

'', literally "the Name". In prayer, the Tetragrammaton is substituted with the pronunciation Adonai, meaning "My Lord". This is referred to primarily in the Torah: " Hear O Israel: the LORD is our God, the LORD is One" (). The Tetragrammaton is not attested other than among the

and seems not to have any plausible etymology. Current scholarly consensus generally reconstructs the name's original pronunciation as "

". In the traditional interpretations of Judaism, God is always referred to with masculine grammatical articles only.

Godhead

In Judaism, Godhead refers to the aspect or substratum of

that lies behind God's actions or properties (i.e., it is the

essence Essence ( la, essentia) is a polysemic term, used in philosophy and theology as a designation for the property or set of properties that make an entity or substance what it fundamentally is, and which it has by necessity, and without which it ...

of God).

Rationalistic conception

In the philosophy of Maimonides and other Jewish-rationalistic philosophers, there is little which can be known about the Godhead, other than its existence, and even this can only be asserted equivocally.

Kabbalistic conception

In Kabbalistic thought, the term "Godhead" usually refers to the concept of ''

Ein Sof Ein Sof, or Eyn Sof (, he, '; meaning "infinite", ), in Kabbalah, is understood as God prior to any self-manifestation in the production of any spiritual realm, probably derived from Solomon ibn Gabirol's ( 1021 – 1070) term, "the Endless ...

'' (אין סוף), which is the aspect of God that lies beyond the emanations (''

sephirot Sefirot (; he, סְפִירוֹת, translit=Səfīrōt, Tiberian: '), meaning '' emanations'', are the 10 attributes/emanations in Kabbalah, through which Ein Sof (The Infinite) reveals itself and continuously creates both the physical realm an ...

''). The "knowability" of the Godhead in Kabbalistic thought is no better than what is conceived by rationalist thinkers. As Jacobs (1973) puts it, "Of God as God is in Godself—Ein Sof—nothing can be said at all, and no thought can reach there".

Properties which are attributed to God

In modern articulations of traditional Judaism, God has been speculated to be the

eternal Eternal(s) or The Eternal may refer to: * Eternity, an infinite amount of time, or a timeless state * Immortality or eternal life * God, the supreme being, creator deity, and principal object of faith in monotheism Comics, film and television * ...

, and

creator of the universe, as well as the source for one's standards of morality, guiding humanity through

ethical principles Ethics or moral philosophy is a branch of philosophy that "involves systematizing, defending, and recommending concepts of right and wrong behavior".''Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy'' The field of ethics, along with aesthetics, concerns ma ...

Creative

Maimonides describes God in this fashion: "The foundation of all foundations and the pillar of wisdom is to know that there is a Primary Being who brought into being all existence. All the beings of the heavens, the earth, and what is between them came into existence only from the truth of His being."

Omniscient

Jews often describe God as omniscient, although some prominent medieval Jewish philosophers held that God does not have complete foreknowledge of human acts.

Gersonides Levi ben Gershon (1288 – 20 April 1344), better known by his Graecized name as Gersonides, or by his Latinized name Magister Leo Hebraeus, or in Hebrew by the abbreviation of first letters as ''RaLBaG'', was a medieval French Jewish philosoph ...

, for example, argued that God knows the choices open to each individual, but that God does not know the choices that an individual will make.

Abraham ibn Daud Abraham ibn Daud ( he, אַבְרָהָם בֵּן דָּוִד הַלֵּוִי אִבְּן דָּאוּד; ar, ابراهيم بن داود) was a Spanish-Jewish astronomer, historian, and philosopher; born at Córdoba, Spain about 1110; die ...

believed that God was not omniscient or omnipotent with respect to human action.

Omnipotent

Jews often describe God as omnipotent, and see that idea as rooted in the Hebrew Bible. Some modern Jewish theologians have argued that God is not omnipotent, however, and have found many biblical and classical sources to support this view. The traditional view is that God has the power to intervene in the world.

Omnipresent

''"That the Lord, He is God in heaven above and upon the earth beneath"'' (Deut. 4.39) Maimonides infers from this verse that the Holy One is omnipresent and therefore incorporeal, for ''a corporeal being is incapable of being in two places simultaneously.''

Incorporeal and non-gendered

"To whom will ye liken me, that I should be equal?" (Isa. 40,25) Maimonides infers from this verse that, "had He been corporeal, He would be like other bodies". Although God is referred to in the

Tanakh The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
'' gender to God. Although Jewish aggadic literature and Jewish mysticism do on occasion refer to God using gendered language, for poetic or other reasons, this language was never understood by Jews to imply that God is gender-specific. Some modern Jewish thinkers take care to articulate God outside of the

gender binary The gender binary (also known as gender binarism) is the classification of gender into two distinct, opposite forms of masculine and feminine, whether by social system, cultural belief, or both simultaneously. Most cultures use a gender binary ...

, a concept seen as not applicable to God. Kabbalistic tradition holds that emanations from the divine consist of ten aspects, called ''

sefirot Sefirot (; he, סְפִירוֹת, translit=Səfīrōt, Tiberian: '), meaning '' emanations'', are the 10 attributes/emanations in Kabbalah, through which Ein Sof ( The Infinite) reveals itself and continuously creates both the physical realm ...

''.

Unimaginable

The

ascribes some human features to God, however, other Jewish religious works describe God as formless and otherworldly. Judaism is

aniconic Aniconism is the absence of artistic representations (''icons'') of the natural and supernatural worlds, or it is the absence of representations of certain figures in religions. It is a feature of various cultures, particularly of cultures which a ...

, meaning it lacks material, physical representations of both the natural and supernatural worlds. Furthermore, the worship of idols is strictly forbidden. The traditional view, elaborated by figures such as

Maimonides Musa ibn Maimon (1138–1204), commonly known as Maimonides (); la, Moses Maimonides and also referred to by the acronym Rambam ( he, רמב״ם), was a Sephardic Jewish philosopher who became one of the most prolific and influential Tora ...

, reckons that God is wholly incomprehensible and therefore impossible to envision, resulting in an historical tradition of "divine incorporeality". As such, attempting to describe God's "appearance" in practical terms is considered disrespectful, and possibly heretical.

Morally good

Conceptions of God

Personal

Most of classical Judaism views God as a

personal god A personal god, or personal goddess, is a deity who can be related to as a person, instead of as an impersonal force, such as the Absolute, "the All", or the "Ground of Being". In the scriptures of the Abrahamic religions, God is described as b ...

, meaning that humans can have a relationship with God and vice versa. Rabbi Samuel S. Cohon wrote that "God as conceived by Judaism is not only the First Cause, the Creative Power, and the World Reason, but also the living and loving Father of Men. He is not only cosmic but also personal....Jewish monotheism thinks of God in terms of definite character or personality, while pantheism is content with a view of God as impersonal." This is shown in the

Jewish liturgy Jewish liturgy is the customary public worship of Judaism. The liturgy may include responsive reading, songs, or music, as found in the Torah and Haftorah, the Amidah, piyyutim, and Psalms. Singing or reading the Psalms has a special role in th ...

, such as in the Adon Olam

hymn A hymn is a type of song, and partially synonymous with devotional song, specifically written for the purpose of adoration or prayer, and typically addressed to a deity or deities, or to a prominent figure or personification. The word ''hy ...

, which includes a "confident affirmation" that "He is my God, my living God...Who hears and answers."Samuel S. Cohon. ''What We Jews Believe'' (1931).

Union of American Hebrew Congregations The Union for Reform Judaism (URJ), known as the Union of American Hebrew Congregations (UAHC) until 2003, founded in 1873 by Rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise, is the congregational arm of Reform Judaism in North America. The other two arms established b ...

Edward Kessler Edward Kessler (born 3 May 1963) is the Founder President of The Woolf Institute and a leading thinker in interfaith relations, primarily Jewish-Christian-Muslim Relations, and is a Fellow of St Edmund's College, Cambridge as well as a Principal ...

writes that Hebrew Bible "portrays an encounter with a God who cares passionately and who addresses humanity in the quiet moments of its existence."Edward Kessler, ''What Do Jews Believe?: The Customs and Culture of Modern Judaism'' (2007). Bloomsbury Publishing: pp. 42-44. British chief rabbi

Jonathan Sacks Jonathan Henry Sacks, Baron Sacks ( he, יונתן הנרי זקס, translit=Yona'tan Henry Zaks; 8 March 19487 November 2020) was an English Orthodox rabbi, philosopher, theologian, and author. Sacks served as the Chief Rabbi of the United ...

suggests that God "is not distant in time or detached, but passionately engaged and present". The "predicate "personal" as applied to God" does not necessarily mean that God is

corporeal Corporeal may refer to: *Matter (corporeal, or actual, physical substance or matter), generally considered to be a substance (often a particle) that has rest mass and (usually) also volume * Body, of or relating to the body * Corporeal (Altar Line ...

or anthropomorphic, views that Jewish sages sometimes rejected; rather, "personality" refers not to physicality, but to "inner essence, psychical, rational, and moral". However, other traditional Jewish texts, for example, the

Shi'ur Qomah Shi’ur Qomah ( he, שיעור קומה, lit. Dimensions of the Body) is a midrashic text that is part of the Hekhalot literature. It purports to record, in anthropomorphic terms, the secret names and precise measurements of God's corporeal limbs ...

of the Heichalot literature, describe the measurements of limbs and body parts of God. Jews believe that "God can be experienced" but also that "God cannot be understood", because "God is utterly unlike humankind" (as shown in God's response to Moses when Moses asked for God's name: " I Am that I Am"). Anthropomorphic statements about God "are understood as linguistic metaphors, otherwise it would be impossible to talk about God at all". According to some speculations in traditional Judaism, people's actions do not have the ability to affect God positively or negatively. The Book of Job in the

Hebrew Bible The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
'' ffectsa person like yourself, and your righteousness a child of humanity." However, a corpus of traditional Kabbalistic texts describe theurgic practices that manipulate the supernal realms, and

Practical Kabbalah Practical Kabbalah ( he, קַבָּלָה מַעֲשִׂית ''Kabbalah Ma'asit'') in historical Judaism, is a branch of the Jewish mystical tradition that concerns the use of magic. It was considered permitted white magic by its practitioners, ...

(Hebrew: קבלה מעשית) texts instruct adepts in the use of

white magic White magic has traditionally referred to the use of supernatural powers or magic for selfless purposes. Practitioners of white magic have been given titles such as wise men or women, healers Alternative medicine is any practice that aims t ...

. A notion that God is in need of human beings has been propounded by

Abraham Joshua Heschel Abraham Joshua Heschel (January 11, 1907 – December 23, 1972) was a Polish-born American rabbi and one of the leading Jewish theologians and Jewish philosophers of the 20th century. Heschel, a professor of Jewish mysticism at the Jewish T ...

. Because God is in search of people, God is accessible and available through time and place to whoever seeks God, leading to a spiritual intensity for the individual as well. This accessibility leads to a God who is present, involved, near, intimate, and concerned for and vulnerable to what happens in this world.

Non-personal

Although the dominant strain in Judaism is that God is personal, modern Jewish thinkers claim that there is an "alternate stream of tradition exemplified by ... Maimonides", who, along with several other Jewish philosophers, rejected the idea of a personal God. Modern Jewish thinkers who have rejected the idea of a personal God have sometimes affirmed that God is nature, the ethical ideal, or a force or process in the world. Baruch Spinoza offers a pantheist view of God. In his thought, God is everything and everything is God. Thus, there can be conceived no substance but God. In this model, one can speak of God and nature interchangeably. Although Spinoza was excommunicated from the Jewish community of Amsterdam, Spinoza's concept of God was revived by later Jews, especially Israeli secular Zionists.

Hermann Cohen Hermann Cohen (4 July 1842 – 4 April 1918) was a German Jewish philosopher, one of the founders of the Marburg school of neo-Kantianism, and he is often held to be "probably the most important Jewish philosopher of the nineteenth century ...

rejected Spinoza's idea that God can be found in nature, but agreed that God was not a personal being. Rather, he saw God as an ideal, an archetype of morality.Hermann Cohen, ''Reason and Hope: Selections from the Jewish Writings of Hermann Cohen'', trans. Eva Jospe (New York,: Norton, 1971), 223. Not only can God not be identified with nature, but God is also incomparable to anything in the world. This is because God is "One", unique and unlike anything else. One loves and worships God through living ethically and obeying His moral law: "love of God is love of morality." Similarly, for

Emmanuel Levinas Emmanuel Levinas (; ; 12 January 1906 – 25 December 1995) was a French philosopher of Lithuanian Jewish ancestry who is known for his work within Jewish philosophy, existentialism, and phenomenology, focusing on the relationship of ethics t ...

, God is ethics, so one is brought closer to God when justice is rendered to the Other. This means that one experiences the presence of God through one's relation to other people. To know God is to know what must be done, so it does not make sense to speak of God as what God is, but rather what God commands.Emmanuel Levinas, ''Difficult Freedom: Essays on Judaism'', trans. Sean Hand (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1990), 223. For

Mordecai Kaplan Mordecai Menahem Kaplan (born Mottel Kaplan; June 11, 1881 – November 8, 1983), was a Lithuanian-born American rabbi, writer, Jewish educator, professor, theologian, philosopher, activist, and religious leader who founded the Reconstructionist ...

, the founder of Reconstructionist Judaism, God is not a person, but rather a force within the universe that is experienced; in fact, anytime something worthwhile is experienced, that is God. God is the sum of all natural processes that allow people to be self-fulfilling, the power that makes for salvation. Thus, Kaplan's God is abstract, not carnate, and intangible. It is important to note that, in this model, God exists within this universe; for Kaplan, there is nothing supernatural or otherworldly. One loves this God by seeking out truth and goodness. Kaplan does not view God as a person but acknowledges that using personal God-language can help people feel connected to their heritage and can act as "an affirmation that life has value". Likewise, Rabbi

Zalman Schachter-Shalomi Meshullam Zalman Schachter-Shalomi (28 August 1924 – 3 July 2014), commonly called "Reb Zalman" (full Hebrew name: ), was one of the founders of the Jewish Renewal movement and an innovator in ecumenical dialogue. Early life Born Meshullam Zal ...

, the founder of the

Jewish Renewal Jewish Renewal () is a recent movement in Judaism which endeavors to reinvigorate modern Judaism with Kabbalistic, Hasidic, and musical practices. Specifically, it seeks to reintroduce the "ancient Judaic traditions of mysticism and meditation, ...

movement, views God as a process. To aid in this transition in language, he uses the term "godding", which encapsulates God as a process, as ''the'' process that the universe is doing, has been doing, and will continue to do. This term means that God is emerging, growing, adapting, and evolving with creation. Despite this, conventional God-language is still useful in nurturing spiritual experiences and can be a tool to relate to the infinite, although it should not be confused with the real thing. According to the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life's 2008 U.S. Religious Landscape Survey, Americans who identify as Jewish by religion are twice as likely to favor ideas of God as "an impersonal force" over the idea that "God is a person with whom people can have a relationship".http://www.pewforum.org/files/2013/05/report-religious-landscape-study-full.pdf , p. 164

References

Bibliography

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