Introducing the G-d of Torah

A very interesting Jewish scholar is the historian Dennis Prager who has written a book in which he also analyzes the Torah in a rational way. (see below). Moshe Dann writes about this book in the Jerusalem Post of June 10, 2019 citing Prager: “The God introduced in the Torah is the first God in history to be completely beyond nature. And one of the first things that God tells man is that man has dominion over nature. This freed man from the idea that he was controlled by nature, a revolution that made moral and scientific development possible.

The Torah brought the concept of “universal morality” into the world. Only when a moral Gd is universal, then moral behavior is universal. Morality was no longer local or individual. It introduced holiness: raising man from the animal level to creatures created in the Image of G’d. The God introduced in the Torah gives every individual an unprecedented self-worth. Because all people are created according to Gd’s Image, every person is also of great value. It led movements such as brotherhood among humanity and human equality. It led to the abolition of slavery. It opened the brain for abstract thinking and learning and that physical reality is not the only reality. Also that there is an ultimate meaning in our existence here on earth for each of our lives.

Then Prager manages to bring the Torah into his book in such a way that it stimulates our critical thinking to ask questions and do research. He further states that the rabbis explain hatred of the Jews as a result of the fact that the world will not forgive the Jews for introducing a God into the world that requires moral responsibility from us that includes judgment. Prager then gives a solution to this problem: teach the world the Torah and an ethical monotheism and the Ten Commandments, then there will be no more Holocausts. (Exodus: G’d, Slavery, and Freedom The Rational Bible. By Dennis Prager) To which I want to add: Bring the world Torah and Messiah Yeshua, then peace can come.