Where Did God Come From?
R' Menachem Mendel Bluming, Do you have a good answer for me? My 6 year old son keeps on asking me: If G-d created the world and everything in it, then who created G-d?
Hmmm... not an easy one. Indeed, G-d created everything in the world. Not just tangible things, like trees and rocks and caterpillars, but abstract things too, ideas and concepts. time and space, G-d created them too.
Until G-d created these things, they did not exist. Before creation, there were no caterpillars, but there also was no time. Space did not exist before G-d created it. We created beings can't really picture what this means.
We always say we don't have time, but we can't actually imagine existence before time. But that's what was before G-d created it.
Another idea G-d created was the very concept of creating, of a beginning. G-d made up the idea that things can be created, that they weren't there and then they are there. This too did not exist until G-d made it.
So you can't ask who created G-d; He created creating. He is above creation, not one of the creations.
This is hard enough for an adult to grasp. How can we explain this to a six year old? Here's an attempt:
Ole Christiansen was the person who invented Lego in the 1940s. So here's a question: Who put him together? Who built the Lego bits to make Ole Christiansen.
The answer is obvious. There was no Lego before Ole Christiansen. He invented it. He is not made of Lego, he made Lego.
G-d is a step further. Because Ole invented Lego, but G-d created everything. So just as Ole was there when there was no Lego, G-d was there when there was no creation, nothing, just Him.
See if your son accepts that answer. It may lead him to ask a bigger question: What was G-d doing before He created the world?
To answer that, there's no time :)
Menachem M. Bluming and Rabbi Moss and Chabad.org
Hmmm... not an easy one. Indeed, G-d created everything in the world. Not just tangible things, like trees and rocks and caterpillars, but abstract things too, ideas and concepts. time and space, G-d created them too.
Until G-d created these things, they did not exist. Before creation, there were no caterpillars, but there also was no time. Space did not exist before G-d created it. We created beings can't really picture what this means.
We always say we don't have time, but we can't actually imagine existence before time. But that's what was before G-d created it.
Another idea G-d created was the very concept of creating, of a beginning. G-d made up the idea that things can be created, that they weren't there and then they are there. This too did not exist until G-d made it.
So you can't ask who created G-d; He created creating. He is above creation, not one of the creations.
This is hard enough for an adult to grasp. How can we explain this to a six year old? Here's an attempt:
Ole Christiansen was the person who invented Lego in the 1940s. So here's a question: Who put him together? Who built the Lego bits to make Ole Christiansen.
The answer is obvious. There was no Lego before Ole Christiansen. He invented it. He is not made of Lego, he made Lego.
G-d is a step further. Because Ole invented Lego, but G-d created everything. So just as Ole was there when there was no Lego, G-d was there when there was no creation, nothing, just Him.
See if your son accepts that answer. It may lead him to ask a bigger question: What was G-d doing before He created the world?
To answer that, there's no time :)
Menachem M. Bluming and Rabbi Moss and Chabad.org