שלא עשני אישה

Blessed are You, Adonoy our God, King of the Universe, Who did not make me a woman.

It is taught in a baraita that Rabbi Meir would say: A man is obligated to recite three blessings every day praising God for His kindnesses, and these blessings are: Who did not make me a gentile; Who did not make me a woman; and Who did not make me an ignoramus.

(A woman says: Blessed are You, Adonoy our God, King of the Universe, Who made me according to His will.)

Blessed are You, Adonoy our God, King of the Universe, Who spreads the earth above the waters.

The first thing G’d embarked on when creating the material universe was to create heaven and ‎earth.”
It is an axiom, general principle, that G’d created the entire universe, and having done so, ‎never withdraws from the universe for even a single moment, [unlike sculptors or painters who, ‎once they have completed a sculpture or painting, move on to something else, having “finished” ‎with their previous “creation.” Ed.] This axiom is true both of what He created in the heavens and ‎what He created in the material, three-dimensional part of the universe. We pay tribute to this in ‎our daily prayers when we say ‎יוצר אור ובורא חושך‎, “He creates and fashions (present tense) light, ‎and He creates darkness.” When speaking of any accomplishments of G’d’s creatures however, we ‎speak of them in the past tense, i.e.‎יצר כסא‎, “he shaped a chair,” or ‎עשה מזרון‎, “he made a ‎mattress.” G’d’s creative activity is never completed, as the Torah testified in Genesis 2,3 ‎אשר ברא ‏אלוקים לעשות‎, “which the Lord has created in order to complete it.” This means that G’d is part of ‎every creature He ever created, and once man realizes that he is nothing without G’d Who has ‎created him and Who provides him with all the strength and creative stimuli that he possesses, he ‎will be able to relate to Hashem as an ongoing creative Force in His universe. This is ‎reflected every morning when we get up [after having used the washroom] and we refer to G’d ‎with the words ‎אשר יצר את האדם בחכמה‎, “Who has fashioned man with ‎חכמה‎,” the word ‎חכמה‎ ‎meaning the opposite of ‎אין‎, “nothing.” It is appropriate therefore that in that prayer we refer to ‎the creation of man in the past tense, as opposed to the line we quoted earlier, seeing that we ‎refer to something or somebody who already exists, i.e. ‎יש‎. This explains why the Ari z’al , ‎Rabbi Yitzchak Luria, said that when we refer to G’d as ‎ה' מלך‎, usually translated as “Hashem ‎‎is King,” the reference is to the ‎אין‎, “nothing,” i.e. G’d at any given moment ‎gives us life, -by not withdrawing it from us.- The implied meaning of the expression is that man is ‎‎“nothing” unless he continues to exist as part of G’d’s creative activity. The so-called ‎אין‎, “nothing,” ‎in terms of metaphysical beings, rules supreme in the regions beyond those that are part of the ‎physical universe, the one that we conveniently refer to as “nature.” This so-called ‎אין‎, is not really ‎a “nothing,” in terms of the universe, its “nothingness” is such only vis a vis the ‎physical part of the universe; in the celestial regions this “‎אין‎” rules supreme. [as opposed to the ‎חכמה‎ in our part of the universe. Ed. Although ‎יש‎ and ‎אין‎ are popularly perceived as absolute ‎opposites, not having anything in common, this perception is built on a fallacy; the linkage between ‎יש‎ and ‎אין‎ are the mitzvot, Torah commandments, performed by the Jewish people. The ‎commandments are performed in the section of the universe known as ‎יש‎, as a result of which ‎close contact is maintained between the aforementioned two domains of the universe. Ezekiel 1:14 refers to the “mitzvot” in their capacity as providing the link between the terrestrial ‎and the celestial part of the universe with the words ‎והחיות רצוא ושוב‎, “and the chayot ran ‎to and fro”. According to the Zohar II 288, the mitzvot and the Torah respectively, ‎are viewed as related to one another like the “hidden” is related to the “revealed,” both being part ‎of the same whole. Torah and mitzvot provide the link between these two domains, so that ‎each domain is not completely divorced from the other. This concept is contained in the letters of ‎the word ‎מצוה‎ when we divide it up into ‎מצ‎ and ‎וה‎. The letters ‎מצ‎ when we read the alphabet ‎backwards, starting with the letter ‎ת‎ are equivalent to the letters ‎יה‎, symbolising the totally ‎abstract Divinity, whereas the letters ‎וה‎ symbolize the hidden parts of the universe, ‎יש‎. The first ‎half of the word ‎מצוה‎ being read with the two letters used in reverse order of the aleph ‎‎bet, alludes to the “hidden” part of the universe, the domain exclusive to Divine, abstract ‎forces. Let us explain something about what precisely is “hidden” and what is “revealed,” when it ‎comes to the ‎מצוה‎, “Torah commandment.” When we perform a ‎מצוה‎, we cause G’d to become ‎pleased with having created man, the choicest of His creatures. When we comply with requests ‎made to us by a fellow human being, we can immediately gauge whether he is pleased by our ‎actions or not, either by his face indicating this, or by words of approval, something that is not the ‎case when we comply with G’d’s requests from us. Since He is invisible, and does not speak to us ‎as He did to Moses, “mouth to mouth”, we have no way of knowing if our efforts to please Him ‎have been successful. When we try to perform deeds that are for our (immediate) personal ‎benefit, we are able to determine if our efforts have succeeded. This then is the “hidden” element ‎present whenever we perform any of G’d’s commandments, ‎מצות‎. This is what the Torah had in ‎mind when it wrote (Deuteronomy 29,28) ‎הנסתרות לה' אלוקינו‎, “the hidden aspects of ‎‎mitzvah performance are reserved for the Lord our G’d;” on the other hand, ‎והנגלות לנו ‏ולבנינו עד עולם‎, “the benefits which the performance of the Torah confers upon us will be ‎revealed forever.” This is also the meaning of the words ‎בראשית ברא אלוקים‎, (addressed to us) “at ‎the beginning of G’d’s creative activity G’d created the ‎יש‎, a physical domain of the universe.” ‎Through His creating ‎יש‎, i.e. ‎ראשית‎, a beginning, the creation of heaven and earth came into being, ‎for prior to that there was only the ‎אין‎, the abstract universe. This is the meaning of Targum ‎‎Yerushalmi who renders this verse as‎ 'בראשית בחוכמא ברא ה‎', “at the beginning G’d created ‎by means of using intelligence found in the domain of the abstract regions.” ‎חכמה‎, as we pointed ‎out earlier, is a quality inherent in the terrestrial domain.‎

Rava said, and some say it was Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi who said: Even an individual who prays on Shabbat evening must recite the passage: “And the heavens and the earth were finished [vaykhullu]” (Genesis 2:1–3), as Rav Hamnuna said: Anyone who prays on Shabbat evening and recites the passage of vaykhullu, the verse ascribed him credit as if he became a partner with the Holy One, Blessed be He, in the act of Creation. As it is stated: “And the heavens and the earth were finished [vaykhullu].” Do not read it as: Were finished [vaykhullu]; rather, as: They finished [vaykhallu]. It is considered as though the Holy One, Blessed be He, and the individual who says this become partners and completed the work together. Rabbi Elazar said: From where is it derived that speech is like action? As it is stated: “By the word of God the heavens were made, and all of their hosts by the breath of His mouth” (Psalms 33:6).

Elohim said, Let us make man in our image, as our likeness, and let him dominate the fish of the sea, the birds of the heaven, the animals, all the earth, and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.

There are two interpretations of this berakha. According to one interpretation, it is a sort of acceptance of a harsh judgment (hatzdakat ha-din), of the fact that even though women do not have as many mitzvot, they bless God “for having made me according to his will” out of faith that everything is for the good (Tur 46:4). In contrast, the second interpretation emphasizes women’s superiority in this world. In this blessing, the innate additional virtue of women is brought to fruition, for women are inherently more in tune with God’s will. Therefore, only they can say “…Who made me according to His will.” The fact that women must fulfill less mitzvot than men is because by nature they are more refined and therefore require less mitzvot to improve themselves. Man was created from dust of the earth, whereas woman was created from a more sublime substance, man’s rib. In other words, women are a manifestation of a more advanced stage of development than men (Siḥot Ha-Ritzya, Bereishit pp. 77-78; Shemot p. 380; Olat Re’iyah vol. 1, pp. 71-72).

Rebbi Yehudah says, “A person is obligated to say [the following] three Berachot (blessings) every day: Baruch [Ata Hashem Eloheinu Melech Haolam] Shelo Asani Goy (Blessed are You Hashem, our God, King of the world, for not making me a gentile), Baruch [Ata Hashem Eloheinu Melech Haolam] Shelo Asani Isha (Blessed are You Hashem, our God, King of the world, for not making me a woman), Baruch [Ata Hashem Eloheinu Melech Haolam] Shelo Asani Bur (Blessed are You Hashem, our God, King of the world, for not making me a boor). [The reason for saying a Beracha for not making him] a gentile is because it says ‘All nations are like nothing to Him. He considers them to be empty and void.’ (Isaiah 40:17) [The reason for saying a Beracha for not making him] a woman is because women are not obligated in Mitzvot (commandments).” [The reason for saying a Beracha for not making him] a boor is because a boor is not afraid of sin. They have said a parable to what this is similar to. [It is similar] to a king of flesh and blood who said to his servant to cook him [some] food, but he (i.e. the servant) has never cooked food in his life. In the end he ruins the food and angers his master. [Or the king told the servant] to hem for him a robe, but he (i.e. the servant) has never hemmed a robe in his life. In the end he [causes] the robe to get dirty and angers his master.