One day, a green shoot appeared from amidst the smelly decay. You wanted to throw it out, but your teacher insisted that you wait. It looked like it was falling apart and rotting. At first, you were disappointed as you watched the seed. Every day you checked to see whether anything had grown. Recall that day in kindergarten where you might have planted a bean in a plastic cup so that it would grow into a plant for Mother's Day. The simple act of planting a seed is a powerful symbol of man's potential. The metaphor of the ground and its centrality in man's name is no coincidence. The proof is in the verse our Sages used to explain the revival of truth: "truth shall grow from the ground." God never rejected truth instead He planted in the ground. The Maharal of Prague explained that throwing truth to the ground was by no means a rejection of truth. Why did God need to consult with His angels before creating man? Why did He reject truth in order to create Adam? Were the angels negotiating with Him? How did they convince Him to revive the angel of truth? Did He really change His mind? A core tenet of Jewish consciousness is that when the rabbis tell stories like this one, they really mean to convey a deeper message hidden deep within the parable. The whole dialogue in the heavens appears bizarre at first glance. How could God abandon truth, which is known as His signature? God responded "may truth rise from the ground" and our Sages then cited the verse, "truth shall grow from the ground." God heard these arguments, and finally seized the angel representing truth and hurled it onto the ground, as it says in the verse, "and He threw truth to the ground" and created man anyway. Truth opposed man's creation, since humans are full of lies. For example, the angel representing kindness was for man's creation, for man bestows kindness. Some of the angels argued against creating man and others were in favor. With whom could God possibly partner when creating humankind? According to one approach, He consulted with His ministering angels and asked them what they thought about creating man. Man's kinship with the ground hints to his greatest potential.īefore creating Adam, God said, "Let us make man" in the plural. Man's kinship with the ground, therefore, hints to his greatest potential. The earth is a realm in which we can plant and yield fruits, giving rise to new life which was not there beforehand. In addition to the adama being a low place in the world, there is another aspect of the adama which is perhaps its defining feature. But are we really nothing more than the complicated mammals? The Earth's Potential The name Adam does indicate one's lower earthly nature. The mystics pointed to various deeper meanings within the name Adam, providing layers of insight that can make our own existence more meaningful. Once Adam sinned and ate the forbidden fruit, he introduced death to the world and was sentenced to once again return to the earth from which God created him. God formed man from the dust of the earth, and on the simplest level, that connection with adama, earth, is the basis for man's name. The first human ever to walk the earth was named Adam.
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