ABSTRACT
The previous chapter concluded with the realization that the Good is at the core of the meaning of creation, as creation issues from the Holy Name. Here we have a crucial distinction between Jewish thought and the speculative thought that governs much of the Western worldview. “To the philosopher,” Abraham Joshua Heschel states the distinction, “the idea of the good is the most exalted idea. But to the Bible the idea of the good is penultimate; it cannot exist without the holy” (Heschel 1955: 17). According to the sage Moshe Chayim Luzzatto (1707-1746), the meaning of the word b/f (tov) or “good” is that G-d’s purpose in undertaking the creation was to bestow His ultimate and absolute goodness upon all He created-that is the essence of the Holy Name (Derekh HaShem 1:2:1). Each time the Holy One declares His creation to be good with the assertion of b/fÎyKi (ki-tov), He pours the light of His holiness into all things. Thus the eternal enters time, and the finite becomes a vessel of the infinite.
