GEN12 … Midrash Rabbah Genesis 4:6 … tells us that Ben Zoma threw everyone into a state of extreme excitement because of the text in Genesis which reads “And God made the sky,” “Made” – exclaimed Ben Zoma. How could that be? For there is another verse which contradicts this idea: “By word of God were the heavens made and by the breath of His mouth all of their host.” Psalms 33:6  It is inconceivable, Ben Zoma seems to day, that the creation of the heavens – these most exalted spiritual, immaterial regions – should have occurred through a process of making. It is only appropriate for the heaven to have been brought into existence through the agency of speech, the truly sublime motive force of the universe. And may we not interpret Ben Zoma’s words to mean that man transcends this physical world primarily through speech rather than through action? If speech has a function it also has a purpose. Where shall we look for that purpose if not in the Torah itself? The initial exercise of speech in the Torah occurs on the first day when God says, “Let there be light.” [this verse]. One can genuinely infer, it would seem that the very first words spoken in the history of the universe give us not only the message which they contain but also a clue to the purpose of all speech: that is, to bring light to the world. Speech can be said to possess value only to the extent that it is instrumental in illuminating the world with the reality of God’s existence.  If we regard speech from this standpoint, then the prohibition against certain types of speech which are enumerated in the Torah emerge naturally from this original definition. Slander, malicious talk, obscene language, idle chatter –all these activities introduce darkness into God’s universe. The most subtle and complex products of the human mind do not partake of the particular quality of speech if their object is not the establishment of another beacon of truth.  Hence we gain additional insight into the meaning of the Midrosh Rabboh, Genesis 2:4 which tells us that the word choshech – darkness – which appears in the second verse of Genesis is an allusion to the Greek dominion over Israel. The reason given in the Midrash is that the kingdom of Greece “Made dark the eyes of Israel by their decrees, saying to them, ‘Write on the horn of an ox that you have no share in the God of Israel.’” Greek culture, for all of its genius in art, science, philosophy and literature, is seen as “darkness” because of its tyrants, who insisted that Jews repudiate their belief in God. Among the Greeks language became a highly developed skill, to the extent that it was permissible to write sacred texts in that tongue. At the same time, the linguistic producers of this superb civilization possessed no intrinsic value because they were devoid of the purpose inherent in the first words of the Creator: ‘Let there be light.” BUILD 217-8 ft. 10