God of Becoming and Relationship: The Dynamic Nature of Process Theology

Maimonides argues here that the motivation for observing mitzvot should be joy at the opportunity to embody God’s lure,

Modern Westerners often approach religion as I did the paneling: they assume that the only way to be religious is to accept the sickly green overlay of Greek philosophy.

In the words of theologian Rabbi Jakob Petuchowski, “Literary history cannot solve the questions asked by Theology; and the question as to the fact of Revelation is a theological question.”

“All that people see—sky, earth, and its fullness—are God’s outer garments, manifesting an inner spirit, the Divine which permeates them.”

Mitzvot are commandments because we are loved with an everlasting love and because we are inspired to yearn for God’s intimacy and illumination. Love creates imperatives that ripple out from the core of our loving hearts, which is precisely where God abides. Love obligates from the inside, as caring and nurturing warm from within.

This category of evil requires no additional supernatural intervention, but is the immediate result of our freedom and our relatedness.

Halakhah invites the possibility to transcend our own self-centered focus and orient our lives to embrace service and integration, while offering a palette of practice that allows each individual to paint a life of color and clarity.

‘In all your ways, acknowledge God’

Jewish thought requires the implementation of mitzvot to actualize Judaism’s potential to inspire lives of goodness and holiness.