Where does God live?

Rabbi Jonathan Sacks is one of the spiritual treasures of contemporary Britain. Ever since his Reith lectures on The Persistence of Faith I've read and listened and learned from this thoughtful interlocutor to the cultural arguments of our times. In one of his radio broadcasts he tells a story and draws clear lessons – as good teachers do, the narrative telling of truth.

"The Hasidic Rabbi asked his disciples "Where does God live?"

They were stunned by the strangeness of the question. "What does the rabbi mean?, 'Where does God live?' "Where does God not live? Surely we are taught that there is no place devoid of his presence. He fills the heavens and the earth."

"No", said the rabbi. "You have not understood. God lives where we let him in.

That story has always seemed to me more profound than many learned volumes of theology. God is there, but only when we search. He teaches, but only when we are ready to learn. He has always spoken, but we have not always listened. The question is never "Where is God?" It is always, "Where are we?" The problem of faith is not God, but human beings. The central task of religion is to create an opening in the soul."

Throughout the writings of Jonathan Sacks I hear echoes of that other great Jewish teacher, A J Heschel. It isn't that Sacks copies or quotes Heschel – it may not even be that he is all that familiar with Heschel's writing, though I suspect he is. But the spiritual honesty, the intellectual humility, the gentle confidence in the reality of God, the unswerving quest of the prophet for truth and integrity of life, and the instinct for prayer and devotion as essential human activities – these are held in common by Sacks, Heschel and those others who take the quest for God as the defining priority of the religious life and who recognise too that God is in quest of each of us.