[Avodah] purpose of creation?? varous opinions??

[Micha Berger]

On Thu, Oct 27, 2011 at 01:20:53PM -0700, Harvey Benton quoted someone
from another forum:
: Very well said, thank you _______. The big difference between 
: Torah and Esther Hicks is that she believes we are literally the hands 
: of god, amplifying the universe, while Torah tells us that God does not 
: need any part of His creation to do His work. 

I would say the contributor is 180 deg wrong.

HBashem created us in order to share with us His Good. The greatest Good
is to be betzelem E-lokim. And thus, Hashem left the world incomplete, so
that we wouldn't be passive recipients living in received joy. Rather, He
left room in creation for us to join with Him in partnership in perfecting
our own ability to receive good and share that good to others. As R' Shimon
Shkop put it
    Yisbarakh haBorei veyis'alah yaYotzeir,
    Who created us in His "Image" and in the likeness of His "Structure",
    and planted eternal life within us, so that our greatest desire
    should be to do good to others, to individuals and to the masses,
    now and in the future, in imitation of the Creator (as it were). For
    everything He created and formed was according to His Will (may it
    be blessed), [that is] only to be good to the creations. So too
    His Will is that we walk in His ways. As it says "and you shall walk
    in His Ways" (Devarim 28:9) that we, the select of what He made --
    should constantly hold as our purpose to sanctify our physical and
    spiritual powers for the good of the many, according to our abilities.

Hashem doesn't need us to do His work. However, Hashem wanted to bestow
upon us the greatest Good, which is to do His work. We, in the image
of the Creator, are happier when enjoying Good we made ourselves than
simply receiving it as do the animals and angels.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             "The worst thing that can happen to a
micha at aishdas.org        person is to remain asleep and untamed."
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