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Big Questions for Little People
Because Nothing Looks Like God
By Lawrence Kushner and Karen Kushner.
Illustrated by Dawn W. Majewski.
Jewish Lights Publishing, 2000.
Reviewed by Michael Wilt
Rabbi Lawrence Kushner's literary work and spiritual sensibilities benefit people far beyond the congregations to which he has ministered and the theology students he has taught. His influence extends, too, beyond his faith tradition, touching individuals of other traditions or none at all. His new book, Because Nothing Looks Like God, written with his wife Karen and illustrated by Dawn W. Majewski, brings the communicative powers of this modern spiritual master to bear on big questions for an audience of little people, as the Kushners attempt to make some sense, for children, of the notion of God. The arrival of this book is welcome, and in my case, timely.
The Kushners structure the book in the form of answers to three key questions: Where is God? What does God look like? How does God make things happen? Their answers are stated simply and employ a variety of images that are meaningful for children. Where is God? "God is in the beginning," the Kushners write, "In the first fun day of vacation, / And in the tiny hands of a baby." And God is in the end, "in the closing moments of someone's life," as well in human relationships and in nature. Each facet of the answer gives children, and the adults with whom they experience the book, a chance to develop an understanding that is varied and comprehensive rather than dogmatic and constricted.
Because Nothing Looks Like God is both poetic and practical. In answering the question "What does God look like?" the Kushners evoke feelings that demonstrate for children that something can be known but not seen: "long hours until suppertime;" "jumpy excitement;" "your hope when it's your turn at bat." Reading this book with my seven-year-old son, Sam, I felt that he grasped the sense of this mystery especially well with the help of these descriptions.
When they answer the final question, How does God make things happen?, the Kushners point to the various ways in which people come together and cooperatively produce good results, and how individuals can take initiatives to make the world a better place. God makes things happen with hands -- "with young hands and old hands, / With your hands."
My son and a young neighbor took care, for a little while, of a friendly dog that had wandered into our backyard. Having helped bring dog and owner back together, Sam told us, "It feels good to help somebody like that." Later that day we read this book together, and he recognized that feeling as having something to do with God's connection to their helping action. The simplicity of Because Nothing Looks Like God, and the ease with which Sam can read and grasp its ideas, contributed to his ability to recognize God in his own actions.
Along with its use of images, actions, and ideas that are thoroughly connected to children's lives, Because Nothing Looks Like God succeeds in large part because the Kushners have refused to anthropomorphize God or talk down to their primary audience. In a note to parents and teachers, they state plainly,
Too much of children's religious literature is meant to be outgrown. But just because children's cognitive development makes some theological ideas difficult (or impossible) for them to comprehend does not excuse us from telling as much of the truth as possible. For this reason these stories talk about matters of the spirit without anthropomorphizing God or asking a child to believe things that he or she will later discard and replace.
Amen to that.
I must admit that at first I found Dawn W. Majewski's illustrations too literal and perhaps a bit awkward. But when I showed the book to Sam, his first words as he looked at the opening spread were, "Dad, this is by a really really good artist." From Sam's word choice and tone of voice I knew this to be a definitive statement, and I defer to his judgment. Majewski's work has grown on me considerably in the light of Sam's assessment.
Sam has already requested that, when I am done writing this review, Because Nothing Looks Like God be put on the bookshelf in his room. I look forward to many evocative bedtime readings -- and to the follow-up discussions that will no doubt ensue.
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