The Torah opens with maybe the single most famous and significant sentence ever written:
בְּרֵאשִׁית בָּרָא אֱלֹקִים אֵת הַשָּׁמַיִם וְאֵת הָאָרֶץ:
“In the beginning, G-d created the Heavens and the earth".
The undisputed single greatest Bible commentator in all Jewish history, Rashi (Rabbi Shlomo Yitzchaki, France, 1040-1105) addresses the question of why the Torah opens by telling us that in the beginning, G-d created the Heavens and the earth.
He cites Rabbi Yitzchak (presumably his father, though this isn’t certain) who expounded that the Torah “opens with the Creation to show G-d’s sovereignty and mastery over all existence", because “He has declared the power of His works to His nation, to give them the inheritance of peoples" (Psalms 111:6). “Thus if the nations of the world should ever tell the Jews: You are thieves for having conquered the lands of the seven Canaanite nations, their response is: The entire world belongs to G-d, He created it and gave it to whomsoever He saw fit".
It is remarkable indeed that Rashi was so prescient in the 11th century that he could anticipate a claim that would only arise some 850 years later - that Jewish possession of the Land of Israel constitutes a form of theft from other nations.
As much as the Torah opens with the Creation narrative to demonstrate our right to the Land of Israel, all our subsequent history was encoded in those first few moments of time.
בְּרֵאשִׁית בָּרָא אֱלֹקִים אֵת הַשָּׁמַיִם וְאֵת הָאָרֶץ: וְהָאָרֶץ הָיְתָה תֹהוּ וָבֹהוּ וְחֹשֶׁךְ עַל־פְּנֵי תְהוֹם וְרוּחַ אֱלֹקִים מְרַחֶפֶת עַל־פְּנֵי הַמָּיִם:
“In the beginning, G-d created the Heavens and the earth; and the earth was void and empty, with darkness on the face of the abyss. And the Spirit of G-d was hovering over the face of the waters".
The Midrash expounds:
“‘And the earth was תֹהוּ וָבֹהוּ, void and empty’ - this alludes to the Babylonian exile, of which it is said ‘I saw the Land [of Israel] and it was תֹהוּ וָבֹהוּ, void and empty’ (Jeremiah 4:23). וָבֹהוּ, ‘and empty’ alludes to the Persian/Median exile, in which it is written וַיַּבְהִלוּ, ‘and they hastened to bring Haman’ (Esther 6:14). ‘Darkness’ alludes to the Greek exile, which darkened Israel’s eyes with their decrees…. ‘On the face of the abyss’ refers to the exile of the evil kingdom [Rome] which is fathomless like the primæval abyss: just as the primæval abyss is bottomless, so too is their evil. ‘And the spirit of G-d was hovering’ alludes to the spirit of King Mashiach" (Bereishit Rabbah 2:4).
From those first moments of Creation, G-d had already programmed the future of His nation Israel - its very existence, its homeland, its various exiles, the persecutions it would face, and its ultimate redemption and return to its homeland.
This Creation narrative demonstrates perfectly the dichotomy of the Torah: it is simultaneously the story of one particular nation-the Jewish people-and the story of all humanity.
“G-d said: Let us make Man in Our image, as Our likeness...and G-d created the man in His image... Then G-d blessed them, saying to them: Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; rule over the fishes of the sea and the birds of the heavens, and over every animal which moves on the world. And G-d said: Behold! - I have given to you every herb that spreads seed that is on the face of all the earth; and every tree that has fruit that spreads its seed will be food for you…" (Genesis 1:26-30).
The Talmud (Sanhedrin 38a) asks: Why did Man come last in the order of Creation, created on Friday shortly before the first-ever Shabbat?
Among the answers it offers is that if man becomes arrogant, you can say to him: What are you so proud of? Even the mosquito came before you in Creation!
But the corollary is equally true. If man recognises his appropriate place in Creation, you can say to him: G-d only created you when the feast was ready for you. That is to say, everything, the entire majesty of Creation, was created for you! You only came into being when the entire Creation was ready!
This idea follows another discussion (Sanhedrin 37a-38a) about why G-d created only one man, Adam. To understand this, it is crucial to realize that the Hebrew name אָדָם, Adam, means “man", “mankind", “human". The standard appellation אָדָם הָרִאשׁוֹן can equally mean “the first man" or “Adam the First".
So why did G-d create Adam/Man, the ancestor of all humanity, single?
- For the sake of peace among humans, because no person can tell his fellow-man, “My father is greater than your father!"
Even if one man’s father is a great king and another’s father is a pauper, ultimately they descend from the same ancestor, Adam.
Another reason is so that the heretics cannot claim that there are different authorities in Heaven - different gods for different nations.
Another reason is to demonstrate G-d’s greatness: When a human builds a mould and stamps several coins from it, all the coins are identical. Yet the Supreme King created Adam as the mould for all future humans - and no two humans are identical, they are all different from one another.
And therefore every single human must say: “For me the entire world was created!" every human is unique in G-d’s Creation, no human is indispensable.
Writing in 1936, the then-Chief Rabbi of Britain, Rabbi Joseph Hertz, made this same connection between the unity of G-d and the unity of humanity in his commentary to Deuteronomy 6:4, the Shema:
“The belief in the unity of the human race is the natural corollary of the Unity of G-d, since the One G-d must be the G-d of the whole of humanity. It was impossible for polytheism to reach the conception of One Humanity. It could no more have written the tenth chapter of Genesis, which traces the descent of all the races of man to a common ancestry, than it could have written the first chapter of Genesis, which proclaims the One G-d as the Creator of the universe and all that is therein.
“Through Hebrew monotheism alone was it possible to teach the Brotherhood of Man…
“And this One G-d - Judaism teaches - is the righteous and omnipotent Ruler of the universe…
“The cardinal Jewish teaching of a living G-d Who rules history, has changed the heart and whole outlook of humanity. Not only the hallowing of human life, but the hallowing of history flows from this doctrine of a Holy G-d, Who is hallowed by righteousness. It is only the Jew, and those who have adopted Israel’s Scriptures as their own, who see all events in nature and history as parts of one all-embracing plan; who behold G-d’s world as a magnificent unity, and who look forward to that sure triumph of justice in humanity on earth which men call the Kingdom of G-d".
This is the great message of the Creation narrative, telling two stories simultaneously: universalistic human history and particularistic Jewish history. They were created by the same G-d, and emerge from the same Creation and the same conception of history.
Every human is created in the image of G-d, inherently holy, inherently knowing good from evil. Humans who do evil have deliberately chosen to desecrate that inherent sanctity.
And the same Creation narrative also establishes that G-d, Master and Sovereign of all, decided to give the Land of Israel to the Children of Israel. To deny that is not merely to dispute a historical claim - it is to deny the sovereignty of the One who created history in the first place.
G-d is not only the Author of Creation; He is also the Author of history.