The Potentially Problematic Line in Sheva Berachos (and What to Do About It)

The fourth of the Sheva Berachos is prone to misunderstanding. Abudarham warns it could lead to "severe heresy." Thankfully, there are at least three solutions.

Jun 19, 2025

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This week’s Torah content is sponsored by Chaim and Rifka Peck, the awesome parents of two of my NEJA students, in honor of the marriage of my dear talmidim, Chayim Zifkin and Shira Stein. Though they don’t know the couple personally, the Pecks chose to dedicate their sponsorship to their simchah—a beautiful gesture in a time when Israel and Jews around the world are under attack. “Let there soon be heard in the cities of Judah and the streets of Jerusalem the sound of joy and gladness, the voice of the groom and the voice of the bride.”

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The Potentially Problematic Line in Sheva Berachos (and What to Do About It)

Preface: Why I Wrote This Article

Earlier this week, I was given the kibud (honor) of reciting the fourth of the sheva berachos at the wedding of my talmid, Chayim Zifkin, and my talmidah, Shira Stein. This wasn’t the first time I’ve been asked to recite that particular berachah at a wedding. Why that one? Because, as the Abudarham points out, the wording of this berachah can give rise to misunderstanding. Thankfully, there are several ways to avoid the problem.

I’ve been meaning to write about this for years, so that the next time someone asks, “What’s the deal with the fourth berachah?” I can simply send them this article.

One final note: this topic is a bit more technical than what I usually write about, and it won’t be for everyone.

Establishing the Terms

Before we examine the berachah itself, let’s review the relevant terms, drawn from the pesukim in the Torah:

בראשית א:כו-כז: וַיֹּאמֶר אֱלֹהִים נַעֲשֶׂה אָדָם בְּצַלְמֵנוּ כִּדְמוּתֵנוּ ... וַיִּבְרָא אֱלֹהִים אֶת הָאָדָם בְּצַלְמוֹ בְּצֶלֶם אֱלֹהִים בָּרָא אֹתוֹ זָכָר וּנְקֵבָה בָּרָא אֹתָם.

Bereishis 1:26-27: God said, “Let us make man in our form (b’tzalmeinu), like our likeness (ki’dmuseinu)” … God created the man in His form (b’tzalmo); in the divine form (b’tzelem Elokim) He created him; male and female He created them.

A few chapters later, the Torah recounts man’s creation in slightly different terms:

בראשית ה:א-ב: זֶה סֵפֶר תּוֹלְדֹת אָדָם בְּיוֹם בְּרֹא אֱלֹהִים אָדָם בִּדְמוּת אֱלֹהִים עָשָׂה אֹתוֹ.

Bereishis 5:1-2: This is the record of the descendants of Adam. On the day that God created man, He made him in the likeness of God (bi’dmus Elokim).

The phrase b’tzelem Elokim reappears in the Torah’s first reference to the prohibition against murder:

בראשית ט:ו: שֹׁפֵךְ דַּם הָאָדָם בָּאָדָם דָּמוֹ יִשָּׁפֵךְ כִּי בְּצֶלֶם אֱלֹהִים עָשָׂה אֶת הָאָדָם.

Bereishis 9:6: One who spills the blood of man, by man his blood shall be spilled; for in the divine form (b’tzelem Elokim) He made man.

All the Rishonim who comment on these terms agree that tzelem Elokim refers to man’s non-physical, rational, eternal soul, even if they differ on how. [1] But the phrase demus Elokim is subject to machlokess (disagreement).

According to R’ Avraham ben ha’Rambam (ibid. 1:26), tzelem and demus are interchangeable. He explains that this is why the Torah first uses both terms together (b’tzalmeinu ki’dmuseinu), then uses tzelem without demus (b’tzelem Elokim bara oso), and later uses demus without tzelem (bi’dmus Elokim asah oso). If the two terms had distinct meanings, the Torah’s omission of one or the other would be problematic. Therefore, he concludes, they must be synonyms.

Others maintain that tzelem and dmus refer to distinct aspects of the human being. Sforno (ibid.), for instance, explains that tzelem refers to man’s intellect, which resembles God and the angels in that it is “a non-physical, rational, eternal essence,” whereas demus refers to the realm of actions: man “acts with knowledge and cognizance” like the angels, and “acts with freedom” like God, albeit with the ability to choose evil.

We don’t need to take a stance on this machlokess to appreciate the issue in the Sheva Berachos and its possible solutions. My goal here is simply to clarify the relevant terms and sources up front.

The Problematic Implication of the Fourth Berachah

Here’s the standard nusach (text) of the berachah, followed by a literal translation:

Baruch atoh Hashem Elokeinu Melech ha’olam, asher yatzar es ha’adam b’tzalmo, b’tzelem demus tavniso, ve’hiskin lo mimeinu binyan adei ad. Baruch atoh Hashem, Yotzeir ha’adam.
Blessed are You, Hashem, our God, King of the universe, Who fashioned the man in His form (b’tzalmo), in the form-likeness of his structure (b’tzelem demus tavniso), and established for him [and] from him a building for eternity. Blessed are You, Hashem, Who fashions the man.

Why is this berachah potentially problematic? Because it could lead someone to believe that our tzelem demus—our form and resemblance to God—is physical, due to the word tavniso.

While tzelem (“form” or “image”) and demus (“likeness” or “resemblance”) can refer to either physical or non-physical characteristics, the word tavnis (“structure” or “physical shape”) refers exclusively to something material, as the Rambam explains in the Moreh ha’Nevuchim 1:3:

Tavnis is a noun based on the verb banah, to build. It signifies the figure of a thing—its shape, or structure: square, round, triangular or such. So the Torah speaks of “the tavnis of the Tabernacle and the tavnis of all its vessels” (Shemos 25:9). It says “make them according to their tavnis, which you were shown on the mountain” (ibid. 25:40). It forbids idols “in the tavnis of any winged bird” (Devarim 4:17). It mentions “the tavnis of a hand” (Yechezkel 8:3) and “the tavnis for the porch [of Shlomo’s Temple]” (I Divrei ha’Yamim 28:11). In all these cases, tavnis means "shape." So the Hebrew never applies these terms to Hashem.

The Radvaz (cited in the Shitah Mekubetzes to Kesubos 8a) also notes this distinction:

One must be precise: it makes sense that tzelem is a subtle term, whereas tavnis is a coarse term, and cannot be used except in reference to something material—not to the Holy One, Blessed is He.

There are two possible misreadings that could lead to a mistaken interpretation of this berachah: one simple and one more nuanced.

The simple error is to assume that the pronoun in tavniso refers to Hashem rather than man—interpreting the phrase as “in His (i.e., God’s) physical structure” rather than “in his (i.e., man’s) physical structure.” This leads to the mistaken belief that Hashem has a tavnis, and that man’s tavnis resembles it.

The nuanced error occurs when the second clause (b’tzelem demus tavniso) is read as elaborating on the first (asher yatzar es ha’adam b’tzalmo). One might then mistakenly infer that man’s tzelem demus is identical with his tavnis—and since man was created b’tzelem Elokim, it would follow that his anatomy resembles God in some way.

Here’s how both misreadings might look in translation:

asher yatzar es ha’adam b’tzalmo, b’tzelem demus tavniso, ve’hiskin lo mimeinu binyan adei ad
PROBLEMATIC READING (SIMPLE): “Who fashioned the man in His form—in the form-likeness of His (i.e., God’s) physical shape—and He established for him [and] from him a building for eternity.”
PROBLEMATIC READING (NUANCED): “Who fashioned the man in His form—[that is,] in the form-likeness of his (i.e., man’s) physical shape—and He established for him [and] from him a building for eternity.”

We will now examine three ways to avoid this serious error.

Solution #1: The Pause (YBT’s Minhag)

Our yeshiva has a minhag that supposedly avoids the problematic implication: we insert a pause between the phrases tzelem demus and tavniso, like this:

asher yatzar es ha’adam b’tzalmo, b’tzelem demus ::: PAUSE ::: tavniso, ve’hiskin lo mimeinu binyan adei ad
SOLUTION #1a: “Who fashioned the man in His form, in the form-likeness ::: PAUSE ::: his (i.e. man’s) physical shape, and He established for him [and] from him a building for eternity”

Alternatively, it’s been suggested that our minhag is to pause between tzelem and demus, like this:

asher yatzar es ha’adam b’tzalmo, b’tzelem ::: PAUSE ::: demus tavniso, ve’hiskin lo mimeinu binyan adei ad
SOLUTION #1b: “Who fashioned the man in His form, in the form ::: PAUSE ::: [the] likeness of his (i.e. man’s) physical shape, and He established for him [and] from him a building for eternity”

Presumably, the audible separation between tavniso and the earlier clauses makes it clear that tavnis doesn’t refer back to God.

My issue, however, is that neither reading seems to make syntactic sense. The phrase “Who fashioned the man b’tzalmo (in His form), b’tzelem demus (in the form-likeness [of God])” works grammatically—but if you insert a pause before tavniso and then resume with that word on its own, the sentence becomes a fragment. The same problem arises if we pause after b’tzelem, leaving demus tavniso as a fragment.

This puzzled me for years. We’ll return to it and see if it can be justified after we go through the other solutions.

Solution #2: Understand What is Actually Being Said (Abudarham)

The Abudarham (Chapter 41, Berachos Erusin v’Nisuin) acknowledges our problem, calling it not just kefirah (heresy) but kefirah ra’ah—a particularly egregious form of heresy. Still, he maintains that a careful reading of the berachah resolves the issue. Here is how he presents the problem and its solution:

asher yatzar es ha’adam b’tzalmo – as it is stated, “Let us make man in our tzelem,” and it is written, “for b’tzelem Elokim He made man.” This refers to the form of the nefesh (soul), which is emanated from the glory of the Creator. [The berachah] further adds, as an explanation, b’tzelem demus tavniso, which refers back to man—namely, the demus tavniso which is the form of his body, He formed b’tzalmo, which is the form of the nefesh. All of this was stated in order to reject the evil heresy into which many have strayed—namely, the belief that b’tzalmo refers to the to’ar tavnis ha’adam (the shape of the human form), as Rambam explains at the beginning of the Moreh (1:1).

According to the Abudarham, the berachah should be translated like this:

asher yatzar es ha’adam b’tzalmo, b’tzelem demus tavniso, ve’hiskin lo mimeinu binyan adei ad
SOLUTION #2: “Who fashioned the man in His form—[that is] b’tzelem (i.e., with a soul), [and He also fashioned] the likeness of his physical shape—and He established for him [and] from him a building for eternity”

My issue with this is that it still feels cumbersome. I’m not a fan of the need for parenthetical clarifications. We’ll revisit the Abudarham’s explanation later on.

Solution #3: Different Nusach (Saadia Gaon)

A few years ago, I came across Saadia Gaon’s nusach, which elegantly sidesteps the problem by shifting the vav (the word “and”) from ve’hiskin (“and He established”) to b’tzelem (“in the form”), like this:

asher yatzar es ha’adam b’tzalmo, u’v’tzelem demus tavniso hiskin lo mimeinu binyan adei ad
SOLUTION #3: “Who fashioned the man in His form, and in the tzelem-demus of his physical structure He established for him [and] from him a building for eternity”

At first glance, this might not make much sense. The key lies in recognizing that this berachah is about the creation of Chava from Adam. Before Chava was created, Adam had a problem: “he did not find a corresponding helpmate” (Bereishis 2:18). Sforno (ibid.) explains this to mean “a helper who is equal to him in tzelem and demus.” Once Adam became aware of this, “Hashem-Elokim built the rib/side that He had taken from the man into a woman and brought her to the man” (ibid. 2:22). This explains the use of the unusual terms hiskin (literally, “to fix” or “to set right”) and binyan (“building”) in the berachah.

Saadia Gaon’s nusach not only solves our problem—by making it clear that the entire phrase b’tzelem demus tavniso refers to man’s tzelem, demus, and tavnis, not God’s—but it also fits beautifully with the theme of the berachah, in which we praise Hashem for the creation of woman as a perfectly suited partner for man. The only catch is that if one recites the berachah with this nusach, it should be divided into two clauses rather than three, in contrast to the standard Ashkenazic melody.

At the wedding of another talmid and talmidah of mine in December 2022, I discussed this problem with my Rosh ha’Yeshiva, Rabbi Yisroel Chait. As soon as I mentioned Saadia Gaon’s nusach, he said, “That’s gotta be correct!” Unfortunately, when I asked if I could use it under the chuppah, he said “no,” since we shouldn’t change the customary nusach.

Solutions #1 and 2 Reexamined: The Pause (YBT’s Minhag + Abudarham)

Once I received that pesak from my Rosh ha’Yeshiva, I knew I needed to go back to the drawing board to better understand our yeshiva’s minhag. When I asked him for an explanation, it sounded like he was saying what the Abudarham wrote, but I still felt like I was missing something. (And I wasn’t able to ask him in depth or discuss the issue at length, since it was during the wedding and very hard to hear his already quiet voice.)

The cleanest explanation I’ve seen appears in the Iyun Tefilah commentary printed in Siddur Otzar ha’Tefillos:

According to this, the main intent of the statement [in the berachah] is what our Sages said: “All the works of creation were created in their full stature and in their characteristic form” (Rosh ha’Shanah 11a). Rashi explains “with a rationale for each and every one, and in the template (defoos) of each one.” This is the meaning: “Who fashioned the man in His tzelem”—in the tzelem of the Holy One, blessed be He—and not only that, but also “in the tzelem demus tavniso” of man, in the physical structure suited to man, in a manner that if Ha’Kadosh Baruch Hu had asked him, “Which bodily structure would you choose to be created with?” he would undoubtedly have chosen the very form in which he was created.

From what I recall, Rabbi Chait’s explanation was similar. God fashioned two things: (1) man’s tzelem—his non-physical, rational, eternal soul; and (2) man’s physical tavnis, which was shaped into a demus (i.e. a defoos, or template) suited to that non-physical tzelem. It is true that man’s uniqueness lies his nefesh, but that nefesh requires a specific kind of tavnis, or physical anatomy—sufficient cranial capacity, a complex brain, upright posture, and all the other features that enable our tzelem to function.

Here's how that explanation would be read into the berachah:

asher yatzar es ha’adam b’tzalmo, b’tzelem demus ::: PAUSE ::: tavniso, ve’hiskin lo mimeinu binyan adei ad
SOLUTION #1 (Revisited): “Who fashioned the man in His tzelem, in a tzelem-template [He fashioned] his bodily form, and He established for him [and] from him a building for eternity”

That’s my current understanding of our yeshiva’s minhag—though, admittedly, I’m not certain whether I have it right. If you think I’m missing something, please correct me!

Conclusion

I’m not gonna lie: Saadia Gaon’s is the only solution that really sits well with me. If the Abudarham is right—and the phrase tzelem demus tavniso was added as an explanation to avoid the mistaken belief that tavniso implies Divine corporeality—then I’d argue that the explanation ends up muddling things further. And no matter how many times I ask someone to explain YBT’s minhag to me, it always sounds forced or overly complicated. I agree with what my Rosh ha’Yeshiva said: Saadia Gaon’s nusach has to be right.

But regardless of which version of the berachah you say—or how you say it—the key point to remember is this: tzelem is non-physical, tavnis is physical, and God has no physicality whatsoever.

[1] In an earlier draft of this article, I went out of my way to write about the machlokess on whether the phrase בְּצֶלֶם אֱלֹהִים should be rendered b’tzelem Elokim (in the form of God) or b’tzelem elohim (in the form of angels). My attempt to acknowledge this machlokess in my translations and transliterations cluttered the article. Let this footnote suffice. I’ll use b’tzelem Elokim for the sake of simplicity.

Which of these three solutions do you prefer, and why? Can you explain to me YBT’s minhag in a manner that makes me say, “Oh, I get it now!”? Do you know of any other solutions?

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