Christianity in Jewish Terms (2000 Frymer-Kensky), edited volume

Christianity in Jewish Terms (2000) is a volume edited by Tikva Simone Frymer-Kensky.

Abstract

In this edited volume the essay by Elliot Wolfson, "Judaism and Incarnation: the Imaginal Body of God" and the two responses to it by Randi Rashkover and Susan Ross are particularly instructive. In a similar vein to Neusner before him, Wolfson strives to recapture the significance of incarnation in the history of Judaism, yet he diverges from Neusner's arguments in significant ways. Wolfson employs classical Jewish sources to demonstrate "a philosophical conception of incarnation that refers to the imaginal body of God, a symbolic construct that allows human consciousness to access the transcendent reality as a concrete form" (254). After identifying a number of passages from the Hebrew Bible which stand as precursors to this notion, whether they present an anthropomorphic picture of God or depict God as an angel, Wolfson surveys rabbinic and medieval text to illumine the two primary ways, namely prayer and Torah study, whereby the imaginal body of God assumed incarnate form. One key text that he cites come from b. Sanh. 22a, in which Hana ben Binza reports the teaching of Simeon the Pious: "The one who prays must see himself as if the Shechinah were opposite him, as it says, 'I have set the Lord always before me' (Ps 16:8). As this text and several others illustrate, for Wolfson it is through the processes of prayer and Torah study that Jews imagine or see God as real, present, and incarnate among them. ~Deborah Forger

Editions and translations

Published in Boulder, CO: Westview Press,

External links

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