God's Card

A couple of week's ago I made a couple of comments on Lawrence Kushner's book God Was in This Place and I, i Did Not Know with the suggestion that over the following days I would follow up with some other things I liked about it. I did follow up with one brief bit a couple of days later, and then nothing. So by now, you're probably saying to yourself, "Lordy b-gordy, when is the boy going to talk about Rabbi Kushner's book again?!?" (Or maybe you haven't given it any thought at all.) Well, here's a small gem I found there.

In talking about the Ten Commandments, Kushner talks about the preamble, "I am the Lord you God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery," as God's self-introduction. He playfully imagines it being like God handing the Israelites his divine calling card. In the center, it has the ineffable name of God. Just below that, in italics, it says "frees slaves" and in the lower right hand corner, in small print "Call any time."

I loved this image. I loved it so much I made an image of my own, which I hope will not offend.