Some people use the idea of a dance as a metaphor for the ‘relationships within God’ that they believe exist. They see it as a dance where all are one, stepping aside for each other, participating constantly in movement, creating the dance and being one through it. While the metaphor is understood to be partial, many Christians appreciate this particular expression of ‘complex unity’.
What has been done here is a terrible misappropriation of something that is at the very heart of God’s creation, as if it were a part of Him.
Various aspects of goodness interact with each other within creation. The attributes of kindness, justice, strength, glory, humility (the list goes on) are truly one in their source, purpose, and expression. While questions of ethics can be very difficult, through wisdom, these attributes together hold a rich blessing of peace as they honour God’s holiness.
We also see this same kind of dance taking place on lower levels. The elements of nature, and their attributes, come together in many amazing systems, processes, objects, substances; many worlds are formed by diverse parts coming together. Our planet holds fragile ecosystems that support unique environments, in which we and other creatures live. Our societies are made up of many people, values, ideas, and experiences that dance together in a fusion of culture. And most intimately, our friendships, marriages, and families involve the drawing together of more than one to become truly one.
The same is not to be said about our God. No one sees the inside of Him, as if He were a world visible to the eye. It is not only disrespectful but completely away from truth to compare Him to the complexity in any natural unity. While nature is a gift from Him, it doesn’t directly reflect Him in its ‘form’. Let us be humble enough to accept the gift, and call Him our Giver of life and of everything, exploring His greatness and praise within the natural world, but never applying its categories to Him by making an image of the one we pray to.
If you found this article helpful please consider making a donation to Judaism Resources by clicking on the link below.
https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=FEAQ55Y7MR3E6
Judaism Resources is a recognized 501(c) 3 public charity and your donation is tax exempt.
Thank You
Yisroel C. Blumenthal
1000 Verses - a project of Judaism Resources 
Quite right Annelise, we should only worship the One who has revealed Himself, not another, that would be idolatry. Whether complex or simple, we are to be bound by His word not our preconceptions.
‘The law of the LORD is perfect, converting the soul: the testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple.’
Shalom Charles,
This was less an argument for, and just more a description of, what I see to be important, true, good, and right.
What God revealed to the ancestors of the Israelites is that the forms and ideas, attributes, relationships, number…everything in the heavens and the earth…is made BY Him, and we do not knowwhat He is but we can know Him personally, in the relationship of thanks, praise, and existence that we have in a truly unified aspect of our hearts. Anything we can see or know is finite, yes? So to say God revealed Himself in ‘visible’ relationships
(cont… Sorry, I pressed post by accident)
is not faith, it’s nonsense and truly turns our thankfulness to God for creation into a sense that something visible, and a relationship humans could see, ‘is God’.
What is finite and visible isn’t Him. Whoever claims that He revealed it is speaks falsely. He is beyond our sight; He reveals Himself by relating with us, in and through creation, but the manifestations are created.
Charles,
When you say “we should only worship the One who has revealed Himself” you omit “at Sinai.” All the speculations about various other manifestations are a distraction. Deuteronomy emphasizes that God is known through his revelation at Sinai and emphasizes also that “you saw no form.” All these other “manifestations” are not part of that command, and in fact would be a violation of it.
Jim
Yasher Koach, Jim. Well said. “Remember the first things of old, that I am G-d and there is no other; I am G-d and there is none like Me.” Isaiah 46:9. The Torah tells us what idolatry is in Devarim 13:7-9 (Deuteronomy). It is any spiritual experience unknown to us at Sinai — and no one at Sinai ever heard of Jesus:
“[This is what you must do] if your blood brother, your son, your daughter, your bosom wife, or your closest friend secretly tries to act as a missionary among you, and says, ‘Let us go worship a new god. LET US HAVE A SPIRITUAL EXPERIENCE PREVIOUSLY UNKNOWN BY YOU OR YOUR FATHER.’ 13:8 [He may be enticing you with] the gods of the nations around you, far or near, or those that are found at one end of the world or another. 13:9 Do not agree with him, and do not listen to him.”
The key phrase here is LET US HAVE A SPIRITUAL EXPERIENCE PREVIOUSLY UNKNOWN BY YOU OR YOUR FATHER
or gods “YOU DID NOT KNOW” (Devarim 11).
When did “our fathers”, present at Sinai, have a spiritual experience with Jesus? Was Jesus “known” to them? Did they pray to Jesus or through Jesus? Of course not! Jesus was unknown to them.
Ergo G-d warned us against both Christianity and Islam — any spiritual experience not known to us at Mount Sinai is false. It is not the Rabbis who have “changed” or turned to avodah zarah — it is those apostate Jews who pray to or through a man and put that man above the G-d of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
Well said, Annelise!