Torah-Moses

The Torah

Since the dawn of time, man has tried to understand the world around him. The questions of: who, what where, why, and how, are all things that man has been confused about involving the world. The first five books of the Old Testament, or for followers of Judaism, the Torah, try to explain this. In the first five books, we see the beginning of time, the first peoples, the rise and destruction of man, and the aftermath. The Torah is used as a way to explain the past to people, and the genuineness of it can be individualistic, but overall it lays the groundwork of how God started the earth, and his communication with the people he created. In the following paragraphs I will discuss the relationship between God and man; while focusing on the closeness of the relationship, the affect that Abraham/Moses had on the relationship, and what the relationship told us about God and people.

To begin, the intimateness of the relationship between God and man can be argued. In Genesis 3.8, "They heard the sound of the Lord God moving about in the gardenÐ'..." This shows that in the beginning, God and man had an immediate relationship. God and the people he created would communicate with each other, and did not have to speak to each other through signs, or through other people. But as time went on, and people became angrier and more evil, God started to distance himself from them. God gave the people he created several chances, but they did not listen. The treachery of people was continued in the Cain and Able story in Genesis 4.8. This story showed jealousy and was the main catalyst in God starting to not talk directly to people. On the other hand, it was after this story that God started to have special relationships with people, and would only talk with them. Therefore, the main people God communicated with were Noah in Genesis 6, Abram in Genesis 12 and Moses in Exodus 3. Except for speaking to the Israelite people as a whole, this is a small number of people for God to speak directly to. Also, God did not appear to the mentioned people in his actual form. God spoke through other things. Therefore, God had a distant relationship with the majority of men, but had a somewhat intimate relationship with certain people.

Furthermore, the relationship God had with Abram and Moses adds to my opinion of God's somewhat distant relationship with man. Abram and Moses, also Noah and others, are the main mediators in the relationship between God and man. Why did God pick these two people? The text does not give us sufficient evidence for Abraham, but one can infer that he was a good man that did not commit many sins, and acted as God would want him to. Moses was picked because of his relationship with the Jews and the Egyptians. But, even though Moses and Abraham were special in God's eyes, he still did not communicate with them that often. Abraham did not do anything that dramatic in his life. Nothing of great importance was called upon him. The only thing God asked was for him to settle in Canaan, keep the covenant, and to increase his family and descendants, as told in Genesis 17. On the other hand, Moses did have to mediate between God and the Israelite people much more than Abraham had to. It seemed as though the Israelite people were