Prayer Before Torah Study
B’rucha aht Shekhinah eloteinu ruach ha’olam asher kidshatnu bemitzvoteha vetzivatnu l’asok bedivrei torah.
Blessed are You, Holy One, whose Presence fills creation making us holy through the sacred connective action of cultivating words of Torah.
For the assertion that G-d created human beings in the divine image comprises only half of the verse. The verse continues with an equally challenging second half: "male and female [G-d] created them" (Gen. 1:27b). This assertion is a challenge of a different kind, for its simple statement appears, at least on its surface, to fly in the face of what many know to be true: that gender and gender identity cannot be neatly divided into immutable categories of "male" and "female."
-Margaret Moers Wenig, "Male and Female God Created Them," Torah Queeries: Weekly Commentaries on the Hebrew Bible
Adam Kadmon: ( ). "Primorial Man." Also called Adam Elyon or Adam Ila'ah. Not to be confused with the frail figure of Adam in the Genesis account, who is formed from clay (Gen. 2:7), Adam Kadmon is the supernal, first creation of G-d that is made in the divine image (Gen. 1:26-27). Drawing on Platonic notions of "forms," the teachings about Adam Kadmon explain that he is the true "image of G-d," a majestic vessel of divine Glory, the ideal human (PdRK 4:4, 12:1; Lev. R. 20:2). All earthly humans are in His image. We are an image of an images, as it were (B.B. 58a).
[...] According to the Midrash, Adam Kadmon is androgynous, incorporating all the aspects of both genders. He is also a macrocosm, extending from one end of the universe to the other and containing all Creation. The Rabbis believed Adam Kadmon embodied and exemplified the Creation.
[...] In many mystical sources, Adam Kadmon signifies the totality of the sefirot. Often, the ten sefirot are shown superimposed on the figure of the Adam Kadmon to represent his mediating role between G-d and Creation--he is literally the embodiment of divine attributes as well as the place of the universe.
In Lurianic Kabbalah, he is the light that fills primordial space after the light of G-d is withdrawn. Luria sees the Jewish project as bringing a restoration of humanity to the state of Adam Kadmon. Chayyim Vital, elaborating on the Bahir, sees Adam Kadmon as a kind of "world soul" that precedes the rest of creation and finds repetitions of him at each stage of the chain of Creation (Gen. R. 8:1, 10; Sanh. 38a; Zohar II:48a, 70b; Etz ha-Chayyim 1). He also teaches that various facets of all the subsequent human souls reflect the location from which they were derived (Sefer ha-Hezyonot).
-Geoffrey W. Dennis in The Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic & Mysticism (second edition), pp. 18-19.
“This one at last
Is bone of my bones
And flesh of my flesh.
This one shall be called Woman,
For from man was she taken.”
The nature of Adam's sin is a tightly guarded secret. Here the Zohar suggests that his sin was driving out Et (Shekhinah). He does this by partaking solely of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil (also a symbol of Shekhinah), this separating Her from the other sefirot and divorcing Her from Her husband, Tif'eret (the Tree of Life). Further, he disrupts the divine-human connection by casting out Shekhinah and losing awareness of G-d's presence. On a psychological level, he separates consciousness from the unconscious.
-Daniel C. Matt in Zohar: Annotated & Explained, pg 18.
Rabbi Shim'on said, "Supernal mysteries are revealed in these two verses. Male and female He created them, making known the Glory on high, mystery of faith. Out of this mystery, Adam was created.
"Male and female He created them. From here we learn: Any image not embracing male and female is not a supernal, true image. Come and see: The blessed Holy One does not place His abode anywhere male and female are not found together. Blessings are found only where male and female are found, as is written: He blessed them and called their name Adam on the day they were created. It is not written: He blessed him and called his name Adam. A human being is only called Adam when male and female are as one."
Zohar: Annotated & Explained, translation by Daniel C. Matt, pp. 21-23