Countering Supremacy with Tzelem Elokim

By Rabbi David Jaffe

Image description: Blog image with a photo of a sunrise over a hazy golden mountain range, trees, and hilltops fading in the fog off in the distance Text reads, “Iyar 5786 by Rabbi David Jaffe”.

When I was studying in Yeshiva 25 years ago, I got a ride home one day from a man who spent most of the ride explaining to me that the concept of Tzelem Elokim, that humans are made in the Divine image, only applied to Jews. At the time, people who believed similarly either didn’t publicize their beliefs or functioned on the margins of Jewish society, both in the Diaspora and in Israel.  

The situation has changed drastically with the current Israeli regime, where a Kahanist (followers of the Jewish supremacist, Rabbi Meir Kahane) is now in charge of policing and settlers are given wide latitude to carry out pogroms against Palestinians in the West Bank. What was a discriminatory belief system of those on the margins is now influencing policy with lethal consequences, the recent death penalty law that only applies to Palestinians, and the lack of consequences for peace activist, Awdah Hathaleen’s murder are just two recent examples. Indeed, the committee for Israel Independence Day celebrations announced that one of next week’s torch lighting honorees will be rabbinic court judge and military bulldozer operator Rabbi Avraham Zarbiv, best known for his social media posts videoing his destruction of Palestinian homes and exhortations to “flatten” and resettle Gaza during the recent Israeli war against Hamas. 

With our new month of Iyar being the time Jewish sovereignty in Israel is celebrated with Yom Ha’atzma’ut (Independence day) and Yom Yerushalayim (Jerusalem day), this is a crucial moment to revisit the concept of Tzelem Elohim and its universal application. 

The Torah is unequivocal that ALL humans are created in the Divine image (Genesis 1:26)

וַיֹּ֣אמֶר אֱלֹהִ֔ים נַֽעֲשֶׂ֥ה אָדָ֛ם בְּצַלְמֵ֖נוּ כִּדְמוּתֵ֑נוּ

And God said, “Let us make humankind in our image, after our likeness.” 

A strain of thought developed in the early Middle Ages positing that Jews had a special Divine soul, different than all other humans, implicitly limiting the application of Tzelem Elohim. This position was rejected by the greatest Torah sage of the time, Maimonides, who held the traditional view that all humans, without exception, are created in the Divine image. As long as Jews didn’t have communal power over other people, this belief in Jewish superiority didn’t cause harm and, in fact, may have provided solace to Jews who were badly oppressed in Christian and Muslim societies.  

However, in our current situation, where Jews wield life and death power over millions of Palestinians and Israeli Arabs, it is absolutely imperative that the particularist and tribal interpretation of Tzelem Elohim is rejected. As Rabbi Jonathan Sacks points out in his 2015 book, Not In God’s Name: Confronting Religious Violence, humanity is by nature tribal, and groups always favor their own group. The last thing we need is a textual interpretation to reinforce and give religious power to this tendency towards chauvinism.  

What we need is the opposite, and that is the power and potential of the concept of Tzelem Elokim. Indeed, this is one of the greatest gifts Judaism gave to the world—the idea that all humans are made in the Divine Image, providing a pro-social outlet to balance humanity’s tribal instincts. It is unlikely that any Kahanists are reading this blog post or will be convinced by my arguments. Rather, the Mussar move is to use the world as a mirror to reflect on where we may need to grow in our belief in and application of Tzelem Elohim. As Jewish supremacy grows and needs to be confronted, where might you harbor feelings and beliefs in your superiority? If you are Jewish, do you think that others, such as Palestinians, are in any way inferior or less than fully human? Do you harbor feelings that people with different political views are inferior? The teaching that ALL humans are made in the Divine image is a perfect spiritual technology for helping us grow and heal where we hold onto feelings of superiority, whether from fear, trauma, or other reasons. In fact, holding at the same time that you and all others are reflections of the Divine is a path towards healing of trauma that traps us in binary thinking. Rabbi Nosson Tzi Finkel, the leader of the Slobodka school of Mussar, made Tzelem Elohim the cornerstone of his educational program, challenging his students to live up to the fact that they were made in the Divine Image. We need to ask ourselves regularly, “Am I treating myself like a Tzelem Elokim? I am treating others as Tzelem Elokim?”  

In this moment, I am inspired by Christian colleague, Rev. Jer Swigart, who has been writing and organizing for decades to counter Christian supremacy and “return the Church to its peacemaking roots.” With Jewish supremacists now in charge of the levers of power that determine the living conditions of millions of Palestinians, it is imperative that all who care about the well-being of anyone living in Eretz HaKodesh, the Holy Land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean sea, do the honest, inner-work of living as Tzelem Elokim and treating all people as a full Tzelem Elokim.

Chodesh tov,

David