According to the biblical narrative, man was created by God as part of the world. However, he is set apart from the rest of nature and constitutes the climax and purpose of the entire Creation. Abraham Joshua Heschel commented that the Bible is not a book about God but a book about man. Indeed, once the world is created its entire focus becomes man and his history. When after a series of disappointments God decides to cultivate a special people called Israel, the human focus is not abandoned. The Covenant with the patriarchs and with Israel is simply the means to bring "blessing to all the families of the earth" (Gen. 12:3). Man is created last, after the rest of creation is brought into existence in an orderly, graduated process, and is blessed to have dominion over all that preceded him (Gen. 1:28, 29). Previously, God announced His intention: "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness ..." (Gen. 1:26). Man's creation is described not in terms of God's word, as had previously been the case (e.g., "God said: Let the earth put forth grass ..." [Gen. 1:11], "God said: ... Let the waters swarm ..." [Gen. 1:20]) but in terms of a direct act of God: "God created man ..." (Gen. 1:27). The second chapter of Genesis, which goes into greater detail about the creation of man, states: "And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and man became a living soul" (Gen. 2:7). This figure of speech has been interpreted as implying that in man alone is there direct intake from God Himself, the life-giving principle.
After the creation of man, it is not said---as in regard to other orders of creation--- "And the Lord saw that it was good" (Gen. 1:10, 12, 18, 21, 25). This, say the rabbis, indicates that unlike other creatures, man is not complete until he develops his own personality and becomes a moral "self." The "image of God" in man has been variously associated with his possession of freedom of choice; his ability to invent and to learn and use conceptual language; his ability to employ intelligence in creative ways; his ability to experience his "self" as a unique, individual person; his ability to be self-reflective and become aware that he bears the "image of God" (Avot 3:4). Most significant of all is "freedom of choice," which makes of man a moral agent, responsive to moral obligation yet with the power to disobey, and confers upon him responsibility for his actions (see Free Will).
According to Judaism, the effect of the first sin of Adam and Eve in eating of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and Evil, whatever else it might have done, did not affect man's freedom to obey or disobey. While certain expressions in the Bible point to a deeply rooted propensity in man toward evil (Gen. 8:21), the regular appearance of good people in the world suggests that even before man receives additional help from God in the form of special revelations, he is able to "choose life and the good." The rabbis taught that each man possesses a yetser ha-tov (good inclination) and a yetser ha-ra (evil inclination) but that he "himself" can decide to serve God with both inclinations (Sifré on Deut. 6:5). According to Martin Buber, the rabbinic notion of the natural evil in man can best be understood as a "directionless passion," an unchallenged brute energy rather than any demonic or satanic power. The Bible speaks of man as a psychosomatic unity. The words nefesh (soul) and ru'aḥ (spirit) in the Bible generally denote the total living reality that is man rather than any separate or disembodied part of man. The rabbis, however, developed the biblical suggestion of man's composite origin into an explicit dualism without perceiving in the body the source of all evil: "All creatures from heaven have their bodies and souls from heaven. All creatures created from earth have their bodies and souls from the earth. Man alone has the body from the earth and the soul from heaven. Thus, if he does the will of his Father in heaven, he becomes like a heavenly creature. If he does not he becomes totally an earthly creature" (Sif. 30b). This explicit dualism raised questions as to how proper retribution and reward were to be accorded man for his actions in the afterworld (see Reward and Punishment). The rabbis also saw man as a microcosm of the entire universe ("All that God created in the world He created in man") and as ultimately experiencing a palpable yearning for God (Midrash on Eccl. 6:7). Created by a benevolent God and placed in a world that He pronounced "very good," man can be expected to see his life in optimistic terms. However, when man contemplates his history, both as a Jew and as a human being, he has cause for anxiety and even pessimism. Because of this ambiguity and because of Judaism's respect for individual differences, there is an acceptance of various temperaments and combinations of character traits as possible versions of the ideal pious personality. In terms of social morality, a rigorous standard of justice, righteousness, and compassion is insisted on. However, in the area of personal morality the rabbis were satisfied to urge the acquisition of certain key traits, such as Kedushah (holiness) or yirat ha-Shem (fear of God) or lev tov (a good heart). However, once one of these traits is mastered, the individual is free to structure his personality in any variety of combinations: inner- or outer-directed, cheerful or worried, puritanical or pleasure-oriented. Since the Bible deals primarily with Israel as a nation, it does not discuss the ultimate destiny of man as an individual. The rabbis, however, made it clear that the career of man does not end with physical death. They spoke of a "world to come," of a spiritual existence, and of a "Resurrection of the dead" as realms in which man attains fulfillment in accordance with his deserts (see Afterlife).
