THE ONE WHO SPOKE AND THE WORLD CAME INTO BEING expresses a pretty profound metaphor, at least to those students of the Torah unbothered by anthropomorphism. Think about the many possible ways to spin a creation myth: divine entities dreaming everything into existence; a landscape composed of a giant dragon’s hero-dismembered parts; a war of cosmic proportions between co-creators; divine entities populating their fresh new world with grateful worshippers just for amusement. But the Torah’s version is sublimely, psychologically subtle: it posits that our reality is created by words. And really – isn’t it?
Once upon a time, in 2011 in fact, The Metaphorager aspired to daily feature a year’s worth of different names for that-which-some-people-call-God: some creative, others traditional, each unique. For reasons, instead we’re going to occasionally post one until we run out of what we’ve collected so far. If you want to see your favorite here, but haven’t, pass it this way with the subject line “365 Names” and let us know whether or not you want to be credited.