Yet a story of the Beginning is just that: A statement that there is existence and we are swimming in it.  Most peoples have myths of how our world began, how the Earth and its creatures were formed in some mythological past from some greater, celestial world. From a big thing came a smaller one—that fits nicely into what we know and
how we think. We end up with a universe continuing endlessly in time and space. The finite extending infinitely, continually rebuilding itself on its own power. Absurd, perhaps, but entirely built of knowables. Being human, we are generally more comfortable with the absurd than with the unknowable.

Yet, there is a place within the human soul that resonates with the nothingness, that knows existence from Beyond. It is not mind, not heart, nothing tangible or describable

Yet, there is a place within the human soul that resonates with the nothingness, that knows existence from Beyond. It is not mind, not heart, nothing tangible or describable, just a certain sense of intimacy with the Infinite. The unknowable within us connects with the Unknowable of the cosmos, and from there we know all things.

Knowing Genesis means to know the world from Beyond.

As Moses told his people, “Know as clear as day and meditate upon this: In the heavens and beyond, in the earth and below, the Unknowable is G-d. There is nothing else.”¹

Perpetual Creation

Like every story of the Torah, the story of Creation is a perpetual event. So too with every article of G-d’s creation, spiritual and physical, large and small, from that glorious fusion reactor in the sky to the magazine in your hands.
From the tactile sense of paper beneath your fingers to the very thoughts going through your mind right now...each creation is pulled back out of the void over and over.

And if, for the smallest instant, that dynamic should cease, there would be not remain even a trace of what was. Nothing. Just as there was nothing before it all began. We are not objects—we are events. And not very firm ones, at that.

We need to know this, because without it we can’t begin to understand a thing of Genesis. At every turn, Genesis is fitting an Infinite G-d into the space of a finite world. It tells us that the Infinite is concerned about what occurs in finite space. That He communicates with finite, flesh and blood mortals. For the sake of public relations with this finite space, He abrogates the very laws He Himself set as its parameters. He makes Himself into a “He”—a character within His own story, a character to which even the youngest child can relate.

If the earth were a place that G-d had to fit into, the whole story would be truly outrageous. If G-d had formed all this from some primordial substance that was “just there,” independent of His will for it to be—with time already running, space there for the grabbing, and Newton’s Laws of Motion presumed—then we could seriously question every story of Genesis.

His masterpiece, however, is painted on a canvas of nothingness. He is the artist, the materials, and the inspiration all as one. If He removes his brush for a moment, the painting vanishes

His masterpiece, however, is painted on a canvas of nothingness. He is the artist, the materials, and the inspiration all as one. If He removes his brush for a moment, the painting vanishes. He is here within His handiwork, because it is made of His breath, His thought, and His speech. He is found within each event, each object, each emotion; in the heart of every animal and human, in every thought that passes through our mind. He can be found wherever He wishes to be found, because wherever He goes, there is only Him.

Abandon the notion that there is a world and there is a G-d. It is as foolish as thinking there is a story and there is a storyteller. When all is said and done, the world and G-d are one.  There is only the storyteller, expressing himself in the story he tells. There is only the Unknowable, expressing Himself as a world.

Tzvi Freeman is the author of “Bringing Heaven Down to Earth: 365 Meditations of the Rebbe.”