[HANASHIR:4225] Re: Everybody's Got a Little Music in 'Em

[BEBWH <BEBWH...>]

Ah such a tangled web .... all Jews...even Orthodox Jews believe there is 
alittle G-d in 'em. There are many ways to attack this but the answer is that 
G-d created us in His image, b'Tzelem Elokim (Bareishes 1:27). Rashi says 
this means we have some of the same traits as G-d, morality, reason and free 
will. Great philosophical works, including but not limited to the Tanya, 
(Schner Zalman of Liadi, the founder of Chabad Chassidus) explain that we 
each have what we call a G-dly soul. This neshama, or as he calls it the 
Nefesh Elokis, can certainly be considered a part of G-d in us. Our Neshama 
comes from G-d. In Jewish tradition when one dies, ones soul is recalled back 
upstairs, leaving only the physical shell of a body which had been the home 
to a neshama. For a Jewish opinion on reincarnation ask another question some 
other time because thats an easy but long answer. One could say our job now 
is to be as much like Him as possible. We are able to do that by doing 
Mitzvos. The whole concept of "chosen people" is not that we are better than 
anybody else. G-d created everybody, all shapes, sizes, colors, races etc. 
The choseness is that G-d choose us to have His Torah. (Ata B'chartanu M'kol 
H'a'mim, You have chosen us from amoung all peoples, V'kedashtanu, And you 
made us Holy, B'mitzvo-secha, with your mitzvos). The Torah is the users 
manual on special ways to be close to the Creator of the world. When one does 
a mitzva, she/he has the ability to be close to G-d in the way G-d said we 
get close to Him. So when we do a mitzva we connect with G-d in a special 
way. Totally unrelated but interesting perhaps is that we learn that when 
Moshe went up to the burning bush, and was told he's going to take the people 
out of Egypt, the Torah says he saw the back of G-ds head. That's cool 
enough, but it says that when Moshe saw the back of G-ds head, he saw the 
knot of the T'fillan shel Rosh, the part of the T'fillan thats worn on the 
head... G-ods head.  So....I work in an Orthodox school and I personally own 
a bunch of what most people would call "Orthodox" kids, although they are 
quite unorthodox in their Orthodoxy, and I would have no problem hearing them 
sing a song that says they have a bit of G-d in them.  What was the question 
again? PS, I grew up with Joe Black and he told me to say this.

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