Paperback and E-book publication

The Image of Man in the Torah - Peter van 't Riet - 2014
Contribution to the Debate on Norms and Principles in Modern Society

A book about the image of man in the written and oral Torah.
Translation: Dick Broeren Sr.
Paperback edition: ISBN/EAN: 978-90-76783-49-9.
E-book edition: ISBN/EAN: 978-90-76783-26-0.
Both are for sale at Amazon.com.

The Torah - the first five books of the Bible - speaks about God. Fat tomes have been filled with answers on numerous questions about the image of God. But reading the Bible, the author of this book feels more often than not that God is taken for granted and that man is the real problem. That's the reason why he got fascinated by the question after the image of man in the Torah. And apparently this question could only be answered by reading the Torah in the light of the traditional rabbinical exegesis, because their language and their line of thought are most cognate to the Torah.

In this book Peter van 't Riet discusses the image of man in the Torah for a wider audience. In the course of his study amazingly modern views and insights emerge: responsibility for a better world, learning all one's life, continuing self-reflection, creating a just society, reconciliation after conflicts, all these notions that today play an important part in modern society, can already be learned from the Torah. Man, who is - according to the Torah - the partner of God in the Creation, needs next to his own experience, the sounding board of the Torah to make his way through the world.

The author makes interesting comparisons with other religious and secular images of man. He shows the image of man in the Torah as a third way between the doctrines of Christianity and Islam at one hand and the arbitrariness of Rationalism and Romanticism at the other. This book is a must for everybody who wants to participate in the present-day debate on norms and principles in society.

You can purchase this book at www.amazon.com.


This is the website of Peter van 't Riet