Saturday, February 6, 2010

God's costume? You fool!

In my last post, I had fun imaging what God's "costume" might be like, if God were a "superhero". I now realize that I have misspoken--it was a fool's quest. If I must represent God as a comic book character, it would be best if God were OUT of the panel. His presence might be implied, or we might even see a speech balloon pointing to the "voice" of God, but there's no need to have that word balloon actually point at a particular form; pointing to place outside of borders of the comic book box goes a long way to preserving the mystery of God. With this convention, we can include God in comics, and not worry about violating the prohibition of creating graven images. In fact, once you contemplate what God is supposed to respresent (as I read this morning in Parsh Yitro), it's a no-brainer; how do you represent pure and total awesomeness? Answer: don't even try. Just as God advised Moses when they communicated on Mount Sinai, don't look directly at God or you'll be destroyed. Look away, that is, outside the panel.So what's to make of my previous discussion, where I went though the steps of designing a costume for God? Well, whoever puts on that costume is obviously a charlatan and a fool! We need to direct our awareness to the very power of creation itself, not to some "puny human"(or humanoid form), as the Hulk might say.

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