בראשית פרק יז פסוק א

וַיְהִ֣י אַבְרָ֔ם בֶּן־תִּשְׁעִ֥ים שָׁנָ֖ה וְתֵ֣שַׁע שָׁנִ֑ים וַיֵּרָ֨א יְקֹוָ֜ק אֶל־אַבְרָ֗ם וַיֹּ֤אמֶר אֵלָיו֙ אֲנִי־אֵ֣ל שַׁדַּ֔י הִתְהַלֵּ֥ךְ לְפָנַ֖י וֶהְיֵ֥ה תָמִֽים:

 

Avram was ninety-nine years old and HaShem appeared to Avram and said to him “I am God the Almighty, walk before Me and be whole.

In Midrash Bereshit Rabbah Avraham is compared to Noach:

בראשית רבה (וילנא) פרשת נח פרשה ל

את האלהים התהלך נח, ר’ יהודה ור’ נחמיה, ר”י אמר משל לשר שהיו לו שני בנים א’ גדול וא’ קטן אמר לקטן הלך עמי ואמר לגדול בא והלך לפני, כך אברהם שהיה כחו יפה (בראשית יז) התהלך לפני והיה תמים, אבל נח שהיה כחו רע את האלהים התהלך נח

“With God Noach walked…” Rabbi Yehudah: a parable of a ruler who had two children, one older and one young. He said to the young one “walk with me.” He said to the older one: come and walk before me.” Similarly, Avraham, whose power was fine, “walk before Me and be whole.” But Noach, whose power was weak, “with God Noach walked.”

Rabbi Tzadok HaKohen of Lublin explains:

ר’ צדוק הכהן מלובלין – קומץ המנחה חלק ב אות כט

(וגם רצה לומר ההתגלות מן ההצנע לכת לא יהיה זה המטרה מעבודתו להתגלות ולהנהיג העולם כמו שנתבאר במקום אחר כי נח לא היה מנהיג העולם ומוכיחם רק יושב אוהלים בבית המדרש שלכן משפטו גם כן התיבה וכמו שכתב ר’ משה אלשיך וכמו שאמרו ז”ל (בראשית רבה ל’, י’) בנח את האלהים וגו’ (בראשית ו’, ט’) רצה לומר במקום שהוא השראת אלהותו ארבע אמות של הלכה וכל מיני הגדרה אבל אברהם התהלך לפני וגו’ (שם י”ז, א’) מאיר לפניו שכל מקום שהיה הולך בעניני זה העולם היה מגלה ומפרסם האלהות בכל חמדות העולם):

 

Rabbi Tzadok haKohen of Lublin, Kometz haMinchah, 2:29.

Noach did not guide the world or give them constructive criticism, he only sat in the tent, in the Beit Midrash, so the rule for him was similarly to be relegated to the Ark, as Rabbi Moshe Alsheikh writes, and as it says (in Midrash Bereshit Rabbah 30:10) regarding Noach “with God,” meaning in a place where the dwelling of His divinity is obvious, in the four cubits of the Halakhah and subject to all kinds of limitations. But for Avraham it is “walk before Me,” shine before Him, that every place that he would walk in the issues of this world he would reveal and proclaim the Divine in all the desires and delights of the world.

According to Rabbi Tzadok, Avraham Avinu attained a level of wholeness that enabled full awareness of God’s Presence, described as walking before God in the sense of not having to be constantly reassured of God’s Presence by limited, external conditions. This enabled him to realize and reveal the Presence of God everywhere.

Rabbi Shmuel of Sokachov explains further:

שם משמואל בראשית פרשת לך לך

והנה השי”ת אמר לו התהלך לפני והי’ תמים, והיינו שתמים הוא שלימות מכל צד ובכל המדות וזה אי אפשר אלא ע”י בחי’ ביטול לרצון השי”ת ואל כל אשר יהי’ שמה רצון ה’ ללכת ילך בלי שום הבחנה ע”י מדותיו, ועי”ז זוכה להיות למעלה מכל מדה ומדה

 

Shem mi-Shmuel, Lekh Lekha

Behold, God said to him “walk before Me and be whole,” that is, wholeness is perfection from every side and in all qualities, and this is only possible through nullification to the Will of HaShem, bless Him, and to wherever it is God’s Will to go he went, without discriminating on the basis of his own qualities, and by this he merited to be beyond each and every quality.

Rabbi Shmuel understands walking before God as attaining a freedom of movement in all dimensions, always facing forward, through a complete self-effacement to be open to God’s Will without hindrance from our own assumptions and proclivities.

What is the experiential meaning of walking before God, in contrast to walking with God, and what kind of self-effacement is this? To be hyper-literal for a moment, if you are walking before God, it’s as if God is behind you — like the parent behind the older, more mature child in the midrash. We are created physically with a polarity of front and back: what is in front of us is in sight and attention; what is behind us is hidden from sight and hidden from attention. To have a sense of God “behind us” means not to objectify God in thought – such objectification would be mental idolatry (R. Yehudah ben Barzilai, Perush le-Sefer Yezirah). When Ezekiel’s vivid vision of the Merkavah opens, he says:

יחזקאל פרק א פסוק א

וַיְהִ֣י׀ בִּשְׁלֹשִׁ֣ים שָׁנָ֗ה בָּֽרְבִיעִי֙ בַּחֲמִשָּׁ֣ה לַחֹ֔דֶשׁ וַאֲנִ֥י בְתֽוֹךְ־הַגּוֹלָ֖ה עַל־נְהַר־כְּבָ֑ר נִפְתְּחוּ֙ הַשָּׁמַ֔יִם וָאֶרְאֶ֖ה מַרְא֥וֹת אֱלֹהִֽים:

 

And it was in the thirtieth year, in the fourth month, on the fifth of the month and I was in the midst of the exile, by the river Kevar, that the Heavens opened and I saw visions of God.

At the end of the vision he concludes:

יחזקאל פרק א פסוק כח

כְּמַרְאֵ֣ה הַקֶּ֡שֶׁת אֲשֶׁר֩ יִֽהְיֶ֨ה בֶעָנָ֜ן בְּי֣וֹם הַגֶּ֗שֶׁם כֵּ֣ן מַרְאֵ֤ה הַנֹּ֙גַהּ֙ סָבִ֔יב ה֕וּא מַרְאֵ֖ה דְּמ֣וּת כְּבוֹד־יְקֹוָ֑ק וָֽאֶרְאֶה֙ וָאֶפֹּ֣ל עַל־פָּנַ֔י וָאֶשְׁמַ֖ע ק֥וֹל מְדַבֵּֽר:

 

Like the appearance of the bow that is in a cloud on the day of rain was the appearance of the surrounding glow, it is the appearance of the likeness of the Glory of HaShem, and I saw and fell on my face and I heard a voice speaking.

Ezekiel’s response to the overwhelming vision is to fall on his face – an act both spiritually pious and existentially urgent. He covers his direct seeing and shifts to hearing. Later, when he is sent on his prophetic mission, he describes the experience in terms that are memorialized in tefillah:

יחזקאל פרק ג פסוק יב

וַתִּשָּׂאֵ֣נִי ר֔וּחַ וָאֶשְׁמַ֣ע אַחֲרַ֔י ק֖וֹל רַ֣עַשׁ גָּד֑וֹל בָּר֥וּךְ כְּבוֹד־יְקֹוָ֖ק מִמְּקוֹמֽוֹ:

 

And a spirit lifted me, and I heard behind me a voice of great noise: “blessed is the Glory of HaShem from His Place.”

Here, the angels are not proclaiming God’s obvious, world-filling Glory, but the hiddenness of God Himself, wherever His place is. In the Kedushah in tefillah this is introduced with the question “where is the place of His Glory?” in the sense of where is it coming from? It’s noteworthy that Ezekiel experiences the angelic expression of God’s hiddenness as being called from behind him. In tefillah this verse becomes an antiphonal response to Yeshayahu’s vision of the Serafim calling to each other “Holy, Holy, Holy is HaShem of Hosts, the whole earth is filled with His Glory (Is. 6:3).” The point is that though we perceive and experience overwhelming evidence of God’s Glory, His Presence, suffusing all of reality, God God’s self remains hidden and unknown.

When Avraham is commanded to “walk before Me and be whole,” in contrast to walking with God, the implication is to fully internalize a sense of God’s Presence and Will without objectifying God in thought in any way. We internalize God’s Will through internalizing Torah in detail, which gives us relatively detailed guidelines for assessing how to act in the world. But this is just the beginning. It’s then our task to be attentive, guided by Torah to clear our minds from self-regard and open our hearts to discern how to enact God’s actual Will in every specific situation. Rabbi Yaakov Leiner in Beit Yaakov notes that the Will of God is not something apart from us. We are always, already in the Will of God by virtue of just being absolutely here. But it’s our job to recognize this, to attune to God’s Will consciously through thorough internalization of Torah, and to work and serve and enact God’s will in truth, to be His true agents in this world (Lekh Lekha sec. 48). Torah, deeply and authentically internalized, shifts from being heteronomous, commanded from outside us, to as if it’s autonomous, already inside us. This is true internalized submission to God, to be a real agent of God’s Will. This is expressed in Kohelet:

קהלת פרק ט

(ז) לֵ֣ךְ אֱכֹ֤ל בְּשִׂמְחָה֙ לַחְמֶ֔ךָ וּֽשֲׁתֵ֥ה בְלֶב־ט֖וֹב יֵינֶ֑ךָ כִּ֣י כְבָ֔ר רָצָ֥ה הָאֱלֹהִ֖ים אֶֽת־מַעֲשֶֽׂיךָ:

 

Go and eat your bread in joy and drink your wine with a good heart, for God has already wanted your deeds.

Already. And this may be why Ezekiel received his extraordinary vision by the River Kevar – literally, the River of Already. We are already walking before God, Who is hidden behind us, so to speak, but intimately present, far, far more than an attentive parent. As His mature children, it’s up to us to realize this, trust this, internalize the Wisdom He teaches us, and make it real – to walk before Him, always facing forward and be whole.