Food Fit For God - VaYikra - Mythic Torah

Feasting in Valhalla

Does God need to eat?

Now you make think that the answer is 'obviously no', of course God, who has no corporeal body in any literal sense of the word, does not need physical sustenance from food and drink. But the Ancient Greeks, and other ancient cultures, would certainly have disagreed with you - the Gods of Olympus dined regularly on nectar and ambrosia in order to maintain their youth and immortality. In Norse mythology too, the Gods of Valhalla feast regularly alongside the Einherjar, the honoured dead who were slain in battle.

As we begin the book of Leviticus (VaYikra) with its long descriptions of the sacrifices that had to be brought in temple times in various life situations, we have to ask ourselves this question about the God of the Bible, and consider what the answer might mean about the Torah and its meaning for us today.

Why might we think that God eats?

Well, the Mesopotamian epic of Gilgamesh, that predates the Bible includes a really interesting description of how the gods relate to sacrifices, in an image that is both resonant and dissonant with this week's parasha.

The Bricks of Heaven - Mishpatim - Mythic Torah

Lucifer published by DC Comics

If you want to read a comic about Lucifer, the fallen angel starred in his own series written by Mike Carey, published by DC comics, from 1999-2006. A spinoff from Neil Gaiman's Sandman, Lucifer followed the story of the devil after he quit his job and left the management of Hell to others.

But if you want to read a comic about God, you're out of luck. With the exception of DC Vertigo's comic Preacher, whose depiction of God is graphic and theologically challenging, the big comic book publishers have chosen to keep God out of there comics.

God clearly exists in the DC universe, for example as seen in Sandman's Season of Mists, but God is never depicted. Both Marvel and DC have chosen to avoid showing God in the flesh, as it were, choosing to have God off the page, if mentioned at all.

While their reasoning may be simply to avoid offending Christians, Muslims or Jews, they are remarkably in-keeping with most of the Bible, that teaches that "you cannot see My face, for no one may see Me and live" (Exodus 33:20).

We may be surprised then to learn that in this week's parasha of Mishpatim, 74 people did just that.

From the Deep - Feeling Monstrous - Leviathan in the Book of Job

William Blake

We've spent the last 5 weeks wrestling with the book of Job, the book of the Bible most packed with explicit references to Leviathan and primordial sea monsters. We saw three instances when Job mentions the sea monsters, Job 3, when he calls on those who seek to rouse the monster, Job 7, in which Job identifies with the creature, under a constant vigilant watch, and Job 26 in which he describes God's slaying of the Leviathan in ages past. We could also have discussed Job 9 - and will at some point soon - another one of Job's speeches.

Why does Job spend so much time talking about sea monsters? Why are all the instances put in Job's mouth, when his three 'friends' are silent on the subject? And why does God conclude His speech from the whirlwind with a description of Leviathan?

From the Deep - Fire-Breathing Sea Monsters - Leviathan in Job 40-41

William Blake, Leviathan and Behemoth

Job 40:25 - 41:25
   25] Can you draw out Leviathan with a hook? With rope press down his tongue?  26] Can you place a rope in his nose? And with a hook pierce his cheek? 27] Will he multiply supplications to you? Will he speak to you softly? 28] Will he make a covenant with you? Will you take him as an eternal slave? 29] Will you play with him like a bird? And bind him for your young girls? 30] Will partners bargain over him? Will they divide him among merchants? 31] Can you fill his skin with barbs? And with a fishing-spear his head? 32] Place your hand upon him - remember the battle, do no more.

    1] Thus his hope has been made false, will he not be cast down even at the sight of him? 2] None is so fierce as to rouse him - and who before Me can stand? 3] Who has come before Me, I shall repay him - under the whole heavens, he is Mine.

    4] I will not be silent over his parts, his strength and graceful form. 5] Who can strip off his outer garment? Who can penetrate his doubled jaw? 6] The doors of his mouth, who can open? ringed about by his fearsome teeth? 7] His shielding scales are his pride, tightly sealed together; 8] each is so close to the next that no air can pass between. 9] One cleaves to the other, they cling together and cannot be parted.

    10] His snorting flashes light; his eyes are like the glimmerings of dawn. 11] From his mouth streams firebrands, sparks of fire shoot out. 12] From his nostrils smoke pours, as from a steaming, boiling pot. 13] His breath ignites coals, and flames come from his mouth.

    14] Strength resides in his neck; power leaps before him. 15] The folds of his flesh are tightly joined; they are firm and immovable. 16] His chest is cast hard as rock, hard as a lower millstone. 17] When he rises up, divine beings are terrified; at his thrashing they retreat.

    18] The sword that reaches him has no effect, nor does spear, dart or lance. 19] He regards iron like straw, bronze like rotten wood. 20] Arrows do not make him flee; sling-stones are like chaff to him. 21] Like straw seem clubs to him, he laughs at the quivering javelin.

    22] His undersides are jagged shards, leaving the mud like a threshing-sledge. 23] He makes the depths boil like a cauldron, the sea he makes like an ointment-pot. 24] Behind him is a luminous wake, he makes the deep seem white-haired.
 

    25] Nothing on earth is his equal – made as he is, without fear. 26] He sees all that are haughty; he is king over all proud beasts.

Finally, at the end of the book of Job, God speaks, and reveals the horrifying mystery of creation, culminating in the mighty Leviathan that none but God can stand against.

We find here the longest, most vivid description of Leviathan in the Jewish canon, as detail after detail is poured out to create the image of the monstrous creature.

He has a "doubled jaw", "ringed about with fearsome teeth". He's covered in "shielding scales" and causes the deep to "seethe like a cauldron". Most interestingly for those of us that grew up with stories of European dragons like Smaug from the Hobbit, when the Leviathan opens its mouth "sparks of fire shoot out" and "ignite coals".


What can we learn from the idea that Leviathan breathes fire?

From the Deep - Playing with Leviathan - Psalm 104

Psalm 104:24-26 

    24] How manifold are your works, O Lord! In wisdom You have made them all; the earth is full of your creatures. 25] So is this great and wide sea, where there are innumerable creeping things, living things, small and great. 26] There go the ships; and Leviathan that You created to play with.

כד מָה־רַבּוּ מַעֲשֶׂיךָ ׀ ה' כֻּלָּם בְּחָכְמָה עָשִׂיתָ מָלְאָה הָאָרֶץ קִנְיָנֶךָ: כה זֶה ׀ הַיָּם גָּדוֹל וּרְחַב יָדָיִם שָׁם רֶמֶשׂ וְאֵין מִסְפָּר חַיּוֹת קְטַנּוֹת עִם־גְּדֹלוֹת: כו שָׁם אֳנִיּוֹת יְהַלֵּכוּן לִוְיָתָן זֶה יָצַרְתָּ לְשַׂחֶק־בּוֹ:

It's been a little while.

My baby daughter is 4 weeks old and doing all the things a 4-week old should do (they mostly involve bodily functions). Meanwhile, with minimum sleep I return to Mythic Writing and my ongoing series 'From the Deep', to delve once more into the mythic layer of the Bible.

Psalm 104 is a praise of the orderliness and greatness of God's creation. It holds a special place in my heart now, not just because of the Leviathan reference, but because we used the first two verses as part of our Simchat Bat ceremony to celebrate the birth of our daughter.

The psalmist praises how God "established the earth on its foundations" (v5), gives drink to every creature (v11) and so on. Psalm 104 is full of the joy of the natural world. In the context of all this splendour, verses 25-26 are another part of the greatness of creation - the marvelous sea with all its creatures, including the Leviathan, created for God to 'play with'.

What does it mean that the sea monster Leviathan, that we have seen as the manifestation of chaos, was created by God to play with?

From the Deep - Leviathan in Jewish Tradition - Genesis 1

Arthur Rackam, 'Leviathan'

21] And God created the great taninim, and every living creature that creepeth, wherewith the waters swarmed, after its kind, and every winged fowl after its kind; and God saw that it was good. 

כא  וַיִּבְרָא אֱלֹהִים, אֶת-הַתַּנִּינִם הַגְּדֹלִים; וְאֵת כָּל-נֶפֶשׁ הַחַיָּה הָרֹמֶשֶׂת אֲשֶׁר שָׁרְצוּ הַמַּיִם לְמִינֵהֶם, וְאֵת כָּל-עוֹף כָּנָף לְמִינֵהוּ, וַיַּרְא אֱלֹהִים, כִּי-טוֹב.  


Welcome to the first blogpost of "From the Deep" a series of short thoughts and reflections on Leviathan in Jewish tradition, starting from the Bible and then spreading forward (and even backward) in history.

We begin, as all things do, with Genesis 1, in which God creates the world through speech over the course of 7 days.

Iron Man 3 - In the Image of God - Jewish Eyes on the Arts

 My latest post for Jewish Eyes on the Arts is about Iron Man 3 and what it means to be in God's image. Check it out:

http://oholiav.com/2013/05/ironman3/