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he source for one s standards of morality guiding humanity through ethical principles 3 6 creative maimonides describes god in this fashion the foundation of all foundations and the pillar of wisdom is to know that there is a primary being who brought into being all existence all the beings of the heavens the earth and what is between them came into existence only from the truth of his being 12 omniscient jews often describe god as omniscient 13 although some prominent medieval jewish philosophers held that god does not have complete foreknowledge of human acts gersonides for example argued that god knows the choices open to each individual but that god does not know the choices that an individual will make 14 abraham ibn daud believed that god was not omniscient or omnipotent with respect to human action 15 omnipotent jews often describe god as omnipotent and see that idea as rooted in the hebrew bible 13 some modern jewish theologians have argued that god is not omnipotent however and have found many biblical and classical sources to support this view 16 the traditional view is that god has the power to intervene in the world omnipresent that the lord he is god in heaven above and upon the earth beneath deut 4 39 maimonides infers from this verse that the holy one is omnipresent and therefore incorporeal for a corporeal being is incapable of being in two places simultaneously 17 incorporeal and non gendered to whom will ye liken me that i should be equal isa 40 25 maimonides infers from this verse that had he been corporeal he would be like other bodies 17 although god is referred to in the tanakh with masculine imagery and grammatical forms traditional jewish philosophy does not attribute gender to god 18 although jewish aggadic literature and jewish mysticism do on occasion refer to god using gendered language for poetic or other reasons this language was never understood by jews to imply that god is gender specific some modern jewish thinkers take care to articulate god outside of the gender binary 19 a concept seen as not applicable to god kabbalistic tradition holds that emanations from the divine consist of ten aspects called sefirot unimaginable the torah ascribes some human features to god however other jewish religious works describe god as formless and otherworldly judaism is aniconic meaning it lacks material physical representations of both the natural and supernatural worlds furthermore the worship of idols is strictly forbidden the traditional view elaborated by figures such as maimonides reckons that god is wholly incomprehensible and therefore impossible to envision resulting in an historical tradition of divine incorporeality as such attempting to describe god s appearance in practical terms is considered disrespectful and possibly heretical conceptions of god edit personal edit the mass revelation at mount horeb in an illustration from a bible card published by the providence lithograph company 1907 most of classical judaism views god as a personal god and as a national god meaning that individual humans and the nation of israel both have a relationship with god and vice versa 20 rabbi samuel s cohon wrote that god as conceived by judaism is not only the first cause the creative power and the world reason but also the living and loving father of men he is not only cosmic but also personal jewish monotheism thinks of god in terms of definite character or personality while pantheism is content with a view of god as impersonal this is shown in the jewish liturgy such as in the adon olam hymn which includes a confident affirmation that he is my god my living god who hears and answers 21 edward kessler writes that hebrew bible portrays an encounter with a god who cares passionately and who addresses humanity in the quiet moments of its existence 22 british chief rabbi jonathan sacks suggests that god is not distant in time or detached but passionately engaged and present 22 the word personal as applied to god in judaism does not connote that god is corporeal or anthropomorphic views that jewish sages rejected rather personality refers not to a physical body but to inner essence psychical rational and moral 21 however some non traditional jewish texts for example the shi ur qomah of the heichalot literature describe the measurements of limbs and body parts of god jews believe that god can be experienced but also that god cannot be understood because god is utterly unlike humankind as shown in god s response to moses when moses asked for god s name i am that i am anthropomorphic statements about god are understood as linguistic metaphors otherwise it would be impossible to talk about god at all 22 a notion that god is in need of human beings has been propounded by abraham joshua heschel because god is in search of people god is accessible and available through time and place to whoever seeks god leading to a spiritual intensity for the individual as well this accessibility leads to a god who is present involved near intimate and concerned for and vulnerable to what happens in this world 23 non personal edit seal of hezekiah 727 to 698 winged disk representing god winged disk reproduced in the jewish encyclopedia 1906 modern jewish thinkers claim that there is an alternate stream of tradition exemplified by maimonides who along with several other jewish philosophers rejected the idea of a personal god 22 according to the pew forum on religion and public life s 2008 u s religious landscape survey americans who identify as jewish by religion are twice as likely to favor ideas of god as an impersonal force over the idea that god is a person with whom people can have a relationship 24 modern jewish thinkers who have rejected the idea of a personal god have sometimes affirmed that god is nature the ethical ideal or a force or process in the world baruch spinoza offers a pantheist view of god in his thought god is everything and everything is god thus there can be conceived no substance but god 25 in this model one can speak of god and nature interchangeably although spinoza was excommunicated from the jewish community of amsterdam spinoza s concept of god was revived by later jews especially israeli secular zionists 26 hermann cohen rejected spinoza s idea that god can be found in nature but agreed that god was not a personal being rather he saw god as an ideal an archetype of morality 27 not only can god not be identified with nature but god is also incomparable to anything in the world 27 this is because god is one unique and unlike anything else 27 one loves and worships god through living ethically and obeying his moral law love of god is love of morality 27 similarly for emmanuel levinas god is ethics so one is brought closer to god when justice is rendered to the other this means that one experiences the presence of god through one s relation to other people to know god is to know what must be done so it does not make sense to speak of god as what god is but rather what god commands 28 for mordecai kaplan the founder of reconstructionist judaism god is not a person but rather a force within the universe that is experienced in fact anytime something worthwhile is experienced that is god 29 god is the sum of all natural processes that allow people to be self fulfilling the power that makes for salvation 30 thus kaplan s god is abstract not carnate and intangible in this model god exists within this universe for kaplan there is nothing supernatural or otherworldly one loves this god by seeking out truth and goodness kaplan does not view god as a person but acknowledges that using personal god language can help people feel connected to their heritage and can act as an affirmation that life has value 31 likewise rabbi zalman schachter shalomi the founder of the jewish renewal movement views god as a process to aid in this transition in language he uses the term godding which encapsulates god as a process as the process that the universe is doing has been doing and will continue to do 32 this term means that god is emerging growing adapting and evolving with creation despite this conventional god language is still useful in nurturing spiritual experiences and can be a tool to relate to the infinite although it should not be confused with the real thing 33 rationalistic conception edit main article jewish philosophy in the philosophy of maimonides and other jewish rationalistic philosophers there is little which can be known about god other than god s existence and even this can only be asserted equivocally how then can a relation be represented between god and what is other than god when there is no notion comprising in any respect both of the two inasmuch as existence is in our opinion affirmed of god may god be exalted and of what is other than god merely by way of absolute equivocation there is in truth no relation in any respect between god and any of god s creatures maimonides moreh nevuchim pines 1963 maimonides borrowed from avicenna s conception of god as the being that exists necessarily and therefore grounds the existence of all contingent beings while rejecting aristotle s conception of god as the unmoved mover he also rejected avicenna and aristotle s belief in the eternity of the world 6 kabbalistic conception edit main article kabbalah in kabbalistic thought the term godhead usually refers to the concept of ein sof אין סוף which is the aspect of god that lies beyond the ten emanations or attributes sephirot the ten attributes are considered to be a dynamic and organic unity whose nature depends on humanity 34 the knowability of the godhead in kabbalistic thought is no better than what is conceived by rationalist thinkers as jacobs 1973 puts it of god as god is in godself ein sof nothing can be said at all and no thought can reach there ein sof is a place to which forgetting and oblivion pertain why because concerning all the sefirot one can search out their reality from the depth of supernal wisdom from there it is possible to understand one thing from another however concerning ein sof there is no aspect anywhere to search or probe nothing can be known of it for it is hidden and concealed in the mystery of absolute nothingness david ben judah hehasid matt 1990 see also edit conceptions of god ethical monotheism existence of god god in abrahamic religions god fearer holocaust theology holy spirit in judaism names of god in judaism origins of judaism seven laws of noah shituf thirteen attributes of mercy references edit 1 2 tuling kari h 2020 part 2 does god have a personality or is god an impersonal force in tuling kari h ed thinking about god jewish views jps essential judaism series lincoln and philadelphia university of nebraska press jewish publication society pp 67 168 doi 10 2307 j ctv13796z1 7 isbn 978 0 8276 1848 0 lccn 2019042781 s2cid 241520845 stahl michael j 2021 the god of israel and the politics of divinity in ancient israel the god of israel in history and tradition vetus testamentum supplements vol 187 leiden and boston brill publishers pp 52 144 doi 10 1163 9789004447721_003 isbn 978 90 04 44772 1 s2cid 236752143 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 grossman maxine sommer benjamin d 2011 god in berlin adele ed the oxford dictionary of the jewish religion 2nd ed oxford and new york oxford university press pp 294 297 doi 10 1093 acref 9780199730049 001 0001 isbn 978 0 19 975927 9 lccn 2010035774 hayes christine 2012 understanding biblical monotheism introduction to the bible the open yale courses series new haven and london yale university press pp 15 28 isbn 978 0 300 18179 1 jstor j ctt32bxpm 6 1 2 3 moberly r w l 1990 yahweh is one the translation of the shema in emerton j a ed studies in the pentateuch vetus testamentum supplements vol 41 leiden brill publishers pp 209 215 doi 10 1163 9789004275645_012 isbn 978 90 04 27564 5 1 2 3 4 lebens samuel 2022 is god a person maimonidean and neo maimonidean perspectives in kittle simon gasser georg eds the divine nature personal and a personal perspectives 1st ed london and new york routledge pp 90 95 doi 10 4324 9781003111436 isbn 978 0 367 61926 8 lccn 2021038406 s2cid 245169096 leone massimo spring 2016 asif agha ed smashing idols a paradoxical semiotics pdf signs and society 4 1 chicago university of chicago press on behalf of the semiosis research center at hankuk university of foreign studies 30 56 doi 10 1086 684586 eissn 2326 4497 hdl 2318 1561609 issn 2326 4489 s2cid 53408911 archived pdf from the original on 23 september 2017 retrieved 20 october 2021 1 2 3 4 5 ben sasson hillel 2019 conditional presence the meaning of the name yhwh in the bible understanding yhwh the name of god in biblical rabbinic and medieval jewish thought jewish thought and philosophy 1st ed basingstoke and new york palgrave macmillan pp 25 63 doi 10 1007 978 3 030 32312 7_2 isbn 978 3 030 32312 7 s2cid 213883058 lemaire andré may june 1994 house of david restored in moabite inscription pdf biblical archaeology review 20 3 washington d c biblical archaeology society issn 0098 9444 archived from the original pdf on 31 march 2012 botterweck g johannes ringgren helmer eds 1986 theological dictionary of the old testament vol 5 translated by green david e grand rapids michigan wm b eerdmans p 500 isbn 0 8028 2329 7 archived from the original on 23 january 2021 retrieved 19 may 2020 christiano kevin j kivisto peter swatos william h jr eds 2015 2002 excursus on the history of religions sociology of religion contemporary developments 3rd ed walnut creek california altamira press pp 254 255 doi 10 2307 3512222 isbn 978 1 4422 1691 4 jstor 3512222 lccn 2001035412 s2cid 154932078 mishneh torah book hamadda section yesodei ha torah chapter 1 1 original hebrew english translation 1 2 jewish beliefs about god in c jeep curriculum guide american jewish committee pdf archived from the original pdf on 15 september 2012 retrieved 5 february 2018 jacobs louis 1990 god torah israel traditionalism without fundamentalism cincinnati hebrew union college press isbn 0 87820 052 5 oclc 21039224 page needed guttmann julius 1964 philosophies of judaism the history of jewish philosophy from biblical times to franz rosenzweig new york city holt rinehart and winston pp 150 151 oclc 1497829 geoffrey claussen god and suffering in heschel s torah min ha shamayim conservative judaism 61 no 4 2010 p 17 1 2 maimonides moses 1180 mishneh torah sefer ma adah yesodei hatorah the book of knowledge foundations of the torah law p 1 8 the fact that we always refer to god as he is also not meant to imply that the concept of sex or gender applies to god rabbi aryeh kaplan the aryeh kaplan reader mesorah publications 1983 p 144 julia watts belser transing god dess notes from the borderlands in balancing on the mechitza transgender in jewish community ed noach dzmura berkeley ca north atlantic books 2010 samuel s cohon what we jews believe 1931 union of american hebrew congregations pp 125 127 1 2 samuel s cohon what ...