In His Image
One of the awesome, inspirational, and comforting ideas at the beginning of Bereishit is that human beings are created בְּצֶלֶם אֱלֹקים, in the image of God.
After Adam and Chava leave Gan Eden, they have two sons, Cain and Abel. Cain kills his brother. The first family does not exactly become the picture of harmonious family life.
Then Adam has another son, Shet. And the Torah describes him with strikingly similar language: Adam fathers a son בִּדְמוּתוֹ כְּצַלְמוֹ, in his likeness, according to his image.
The Torah has moved from being created in God's image to being born in a parent's image.
That feels like more than a coincidence.
We often think about b'tzelem Elokim as a statement about the inherent holy value of every human being. And it is. But here, the Torah seems to invite us to think about another kind of image: the ways we carry something of the people who came before us.
A phrase our grandmother always used. A melody we learned from our father. A way of welcoming guests. A particular sense of humor. A relationship with God. A story we heard so many times that we can tell it without thinking.
Some of what we inherit is intentional. Much of it is not. Some of it we are grateful for. Much of it is surprising.
And then we become the older generation.
That can be both beautiful and humbling for grandparents. We may want our grandchildren to carry forward the things that matter most to us. We may hope they will love the traditions we love, value the things we value, and recognize the significance of the stories we have carried for so long.
But Cain and Abel remind us that even the most extraordinary inheritance does not guarantee a particular outcome. Being created in God's image does not make us incapable of hurting one another. Being someone's child or grandchild does not mean becoming a replica of them.
Shet is Adam's son in his image, but Shet is not Adam.
Perhaps that is part of the wisdom of intergenerational life. We are meant to transmit, not reproduce ourselves.
As grandparents, we can offer an image of what matters to us, but we cannot dictate how it will look in the next generation. Our grandchildren will take what we give them and encounter it in a world we cannot fully imagine. They may express our values differently. They may ask questions we never asked. They may keep some traditions, change others, and create something entirely new.
That can be difficult when we are deeply invested in what we hope our family will become.
And this brings us back to the beginning of the story, when God asks Adam a deceptively simple question:
אַיֶּכָּה? Ayekah? Where are you?
Adam has sinned. He and Chava have left the Garden. There are plenty of places to look for an explanation. There is the snake. There is Chava. There is Adam.
But perhaps the first question is not Who is to blame?
It is Where are you?
That may be a powerful question for grandparenting, too.
When a family relationship is not what we imagined, it is easy to look for the snake. Who caused this? What went wrong? Who influenced whom? Why isn't my child closer? Why don't my grandchildren seem interested? Why doesn't my family look like theirs?
Ayekah asks us to stop for a moment and locate ourselves.
Where am I in this relationship? What is mine to own? What am I bringing to it? And from where I am standing, what kind of connection is still possible?
We cannot control what the next generation will do with the image they receive from us.
But we can pay attention to the image we are creating.
JOYFUL
Notice what has already traveled through your family. What part of yourself do you recognize in your child or grandchild? Enjoy the discovery rather than judging whether it is important enough to count as an inheritance.
INTENTIONAL
Choose one thing you would like to make more visible to the next generation. A story. A blessing. A Jewish practice. A family value. A way of seeing the world. Don't assume they know it matters to you. Find a way to share it.
CONNECTION
Ask yourself Ayekah? Where am I? Think about one family relationship that feels different from what you imagined. Instead of looking for the snake, honestly consider your own place in the relationship. What can you acknowledge, what can you influence, and what connection is possible from where you are?
Adam was created in God's image.
Shet was created in Adam's image.
And somewhere in between those two statements is the mystery of every family: what we receive, what we become, and what we leave for those who come after us.
Becoming the Grandparent You Want to Be
What kind of grandparent do you want to be?
Not the perfect grandparent. Not the grandparent someone else tells you to be. The grandparent you want to be.
Join me this fall for a six-week journey through Torah wisdom, reflection, conversation, and practical ideas for building meaningful relationships with your grandchildren.
Together, we'll explore the lives of the first Jewish parents and ask what their experiences can teach us about the real-life questions of modern grandparenting: connection, boundaries, values, joy, legacy, and the relationships we hope to build.
https://grandplan.pro/profile/workshop
Shabbat Shalom,
Rabbanit Sharona Hassan
Founder of Grand Plan
Did you listen to the Connecting Jewish Grandparents: The Grand Plan Podcast this week? It was completely different from this Weekly.
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Use this learning in honor or memory of someone you love.
A parent.
A grandparent.
A child.
Whether celebrating a joyous life-cycle event or honoring the memory of those no longer with us, it is a meaningful way to connect the generations and mark a legacy.
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