GEN194 As a creation of the divine in the image of God, the human body is a source of wonder, a manifestation of divine wisdom, an opportunity for profound gratitude. The following blessing, recorded in the Talmud, was later included in the liturgy Jews recite each day: “Blessed is God who created human beings with wisdom, and created in each of them many orifices and many cavities.  It is fully known before the throne of Your glory that if one of them should be [improperly] opened or one of them closed, it would be impossible for one to stand before You … [Blessed are You] who heals all flesh and who performs wonders” Berachot 60b. This blessing is to be recited after going to the bathroom.  According to the commentaries to this text, the phrase “who heals all flesh” means that normal excretory function is a product of divine grace, that “evacuation is a healing for the entire body.” I know of no comparable blessing recited on a comparable occasion in any other religious tradition.  Here one encounters what the novelist George Eliot called Judaism’s “reverence for the human body, which lifts the needs of the animal life into religion.” To suggest that the human body or its natural functions are repulsive by nature is considered an affront to God’s image and to divine wisdom.  In themselves, bodily organs and functions are beautiful and good.  Only when abused or misused do then become ugly and repulsive. According to the medieval ethical treatise The Holy Letter: “’God saw everything He had made and behold it was very good’ [this verse]. … Nothing in the human organs are created flawed or ugly.  Everything is related with divine wisdom and is therefore complete, exalted, good and pleasant.  When one sins, ugliness becomes attached to these matters.” (1976, 45, 48). Through the performance of sacred deeds, the body, which is good by nature, becomes holy by actions.  According to Judah Loew, when an individual acts properly, one’s body becomes sacred, expressing the image of God, but when one does not act properly, one’s body is indistinguishable from that of any other animal Netivot Olom, sec. “Netiv Koah ha-Yetzer,” 2:130  SHER20C 14-5