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Religion & Law

: Thoughts in a Haystack

Huh?

By John Pieret

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This may be the start of another run of posts where I wind up criticizing / making fun of David Klinghoffer. For some reason, probably having to do with his getting on a train of thought that causes him to address matters that interest me, my noticing him seems to run in spurts ... with several posts about him in the space of a week or two and nothing for a month or more.

This one is a doozy. It seems that God has an upright posture:

... God had in mind a particular creature -- us -- and this is indicated by the enigmatic Scriptural phrase "image of God," a quality that we somehow carry with us. I did not suggest how the human face, or hands and feet, reflect this image, because I'm not sure how exactly that works. It is much easier to say how our posture, unique in the world of creatures, bears witness to our human mission on earth.

Klinghoffer quotes The Maharal of Prague (Rabbi Judah ben Bezalel Lowe) thusly:

Man stands upright, straight, like a pillar that is upright, which is not the case with any other being, as none of them stand up straight but rather all walk hunched over. And this is an indication of the [exalted] level of man, for man is king over the lower plane of existence, and all serve him....This is called the "image of God."

Maybe it's just me but it seems a little hard for an incorporeal being who is everywhere to have posture ... where exactly are his feet and how are they above his head, if he is everywhere? Oh, wait a minute! That "image of God" business is one of those thingies that theists use that sometimes we're supposed to take as metaphors, except when we're supposed to take them literally.

Now the good Rabbi sort of had an excuse ... he had no way to know about dinosaurs with upright stances (though no excuse for ignoring birds and, probably, other examples I'm forgetting).

But Klinghoffer will have to make some bafflegab about how the T. Rex was always being told by his mother to stand up straight but wouldn't listen.
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Full post as published by Thoughts in a Haystack on December 04, 2009 (boomark / email).