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EXODUS | 20:4 image — EXOD364 The God who, to the accompaniment of thun...

EXOD364 The God who, to the accompaniment of thunders, once proclaimed at Mount Sinai: "You shall not make for yourself a sculptured image!" (this verse), is supposed to be beautiful? The God who said of Himself: "You cannot see My face, for man may not see Me and live," (Exodus 33:20), is supposed to be apprehended in aesthetic categories? Jewish monotheistic sensitivity must surely shrink back from such a thought. Or must it? There is love in the world, and we regard God as the Source of Love. There is the search after righteousness in the world, and we see God as the Fountain of Righteousness. We human beings, even (or is it particularly?) in this technocratic world, wants to be regarded as persons, and not as statistical numbers. However, if we claim personhood for ourselves, then it would follow that the Creator, to whom we owe our existence and our personhood, must have at least as much personhood as His creatures. And, then, there is beauty in our world. Does it, therefore, not make sense to assert that beauty, too, has its origin in God, so that whatever we perceive as beautiful, and call "beautiful," goes back to something which is also an attribute of God?

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Verse20:4
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