GEN58 The Talmudic rabbis taught that God not only reveals the Torah, but that God also observes the commandments: “A human king issues a decree. The king may then choose to obey it; or the king may choose to have only others obey it.  Not so the Holy One. When God issues a decree, God is the first to obey it. As it is stated, ‘And they shall observe my observances… I am the Lord’ Leviticus 22:9. I [God] am the first to obey the commandments of the Torah” Palestinian Talmud, Yebamot, chap 4. Sec 12. Yet, when creating human beings, God did not obey the commandments of the Torah.  Though Scripture forbids making an image of God, when God created human being, God made an image of God.  Of all of God’s creatures, only the human creature is described by Scripture as having been created “in the image and likeness of God” [this verse; see also Genesis 5:1, 9:6]  As Rabbi Joshua ben Levi said, “A procession of angels pass before a human being wherever he or she goes, proclaiming – Make way for the image of God” Deuteronomy Rabbah, chap 4, sec 4; see also Midrash Tehillim, chap 17, sec. 8, 66a.  Rabbi Akiva taught that not only have human beings been created in the divine image but that divine grace allows them to become aware of it: “Beloved are human beings for they were created in the [divine] image. Even more beloved are they, because they can be aware of having been created in the [divine] image. As it is written, ‘For in the image of God, God made human beings’ Genesis 9:6” Palestinian Talmud, chap 3, sec 14.  Jewish ethics focuses upon how human beings can live out their lives in the awareness of their having been created in the image and likeness of God. SHER20C 1