Daniela

Abravanel

The Secrets of the

Hebrew Alphabet

Translation: Kay Wallace

Cover: Amritagraphic
First digital edition September 2015, ISBN 978-88-97951-42-1
published by
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 CONTENTS

Introduction

Ch. 1 - Alef
Intuition of Divine Oneness within multiplicity
Rediscovering the Creator with every breath
Adam’s mission
The ability to make associations and the Kabbalah
Ch. 2 - Bet
The perception of the deceptive plurality of creation
Bet, bayit: “house”
Blessing: the flow of Divine emanation
Ben and bat: children
Ch. 3 - Gimel
Animals: archetypes for divine messages
Gerim: “converts”
Ch. 4 - Dalet
Poverty and spiritual development
Dofek: “pulse”
Ch. 5 - Hei
Unambiguous communication
Hei, the gift of clear and pure communication
Using speech to repair emotions and transform enemies into friends
Speech of gratitude
Ch. 6 - Vav
The perception of the Divine in the natural world
Contemplation of nature
The body and health in the month of Iyar
Health as a process of renewed creation
Ch. 7 - Zayin
Discovering the correct rhythm of Yin and Yang
Memory and time: central aspects of Jewish life
Zayin, the Seven Noahide Laws
Ch. 8 - Chet
 The feminine principle and the role of women in redemption
The “teachings of life” are transmitted through breastfeeding
The mikveh, love, and sexuality
Sun and moon, action and contemplation
Disease and “missing the target”
Ch. 9 - Tet
And God saw that it was good
God hidden in nature
Ch. 10 - Yud
The smallest people
The paradox of Israel
Who really are the people of Israel?
Yofi: “beauty”
Ch. 11 - Kaf
Physical force, the expression of Divine energy
Kelayot and kaved, kidneys and liver
Kaved: “liver”
Energy of love
Ch. 12 - Lamed
The art of loving
Ch. 13 - Mem
Water
The mikveh, conversion of the soul
The mikveh and women
Ch. 14 - Nun
The art of “falling” in the spiritual quest
The sign of Scorpio: returning to the essence in order to heal oneself of
obsession
Loving tests
Ch. 15 - Samech
The month of Kislev and the miracle of Chanukah
“Dreaming” with the month of Kislev and the letter samech
Ch. 16 - Ayin
Wisdom: the cure for anger
The “fountain of wisdom,” cure for anger and pride
Etzem: “bone”, “essence”
 The Seventy Nations
Ch. 17 - Peh
Talmud and The Oral Tradition
The contrast between Greek culture and the oral Torah
Study and melody
Ch. 18 - Tzadik
Food as nourishment for the soul
Fasting in ancient and modern times
Eating and prophecy
Tzadik, the sign of Aquarius and the messianic era
Ch. 19 - Kuf
Kabbalah: the crown of the king
Kuf and descent into the depths
The sense of laughter
The Temple in Jerusalem, and the ketoret ha’besamim (“spice incense”)
The evil throne for good
Holiness and separation of the Jewish people: the “double bind”
Ch. 20 - Resh
The head as protection from evil
Evil and noise
Images of the mind
Ch. 21 - Shin
The element of fire
Joy
Ch. 22 - Tav
Tefillah: service of the heart
Approaching God
Teshuvah: return to the real essence
Prayer and desires
Teshuva: “return”
Tikun: “reparation”, “transformation”

Appendix 1 - Author and contributors

Daniela Abravanel, Author
Tobia Ravà
Frank Lalou
 Josh Baum

Appendix 2 - Biographies of contemporary Torah teachers

Appendix 3 - A suggested meditation
Appendix 4 - Glossary
Appendix 5 - Bibliography
1. Classical Jewish texts
2. Modern works
 INTRODUCTION

The Oral Tradition1 teaches that the twenty-two letters of the Hebrew alphabet
are vessels that channel God’s powerful spiritual energy for creating the world.
In other words, when the commandments “Let there be light, and there was
light…; Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters…; Let there be lights
in the firmament…,”2 were uttered, God permutated the individual letters of the
Hebrew alphabet. These letters are the “bricks” of creation that translate Divine
will into reality. However, the creation process did not only occur in the past.
God is continually creating and thereby intimately involved with the world every
moment.
We can clarify this concept by noting that the Hebrew word davar means both
“word” and “thing”. The same term for “thing” is used for the “word that created
the thing,” implying that the thing is, in essence, the word that was used by God
to create.
The study of the inner meanings of words and the creative power of the letters
is the heart of the Jewish esoteric tradition, Kabbalah. This book is not intended
to be a linguistic and etymological analysis of the alphabet, but an attempt to
convey the strong connection between the letters and the concepts and values
inherent in the Jewish tradition. Based on the a priori position that a language
reflects the culture and concerns of the people who speak it, the letters of the
Hebrew alphabet are a key to the ethics, values, spiritual obligations, and
metaphysical aspirations of the Jewish people.
The power of the letters resonates deeply with the human soul. Biblical
Hebrew is precisely structured, reflecting its Divine origin, which determines
each letter’s meaning, shape, numerical value, and position in the alphabet. A
corollary to this principle is the halachic3 rule that each letter in a Torah scroll,
mezuzah4, and tefillin5 must be perfectly written. No letter may be omitted or
improperly written, and its individual integrity may not be compromised by
being allowed to touch another letter. The same holds true for words. Any
missing, extra, or damaged word invalidates the entire scroll, until it is corrected.
If a Torah scroll cannot be corrected, it is buried in a Jewish cemetery, next to
the tomb of a tzadik, a righteous man.
The strong relationship between letters and human beings is the heart of the
Kabbalistic practice of “reading” the mezuzah (the Torah parchment affixed at
the doors of every Jewish home) in order to determine the reasons for problems
that the family is experiencing. According to the events occurring in the home,
some letters of the mezuzah may be erased or damaged by ink deterioration. In
addition, a missing letter, due to a scribe’s error, can have a dramatic impact on
the life of the family. For this reason, scribes must approach their task with
utmost honesty and integrity. Often the scribe will immerse himself in a mikveh
(ritual purification pool) in order to purify his thoughts before writing the
ineffable name of God (yudhei-vav-hei).
The dialogue between the text and the reader is also the basis of the Oral
Tradition. In the Oral Tradition, a personal interpretation of the written text is
developed according to many factors. The choice of the vowel that accompanies
the consonants gives different meanings to the word. In addition, the study of the
symbolism, form, numerical value,6 and teachings linked to each letter has been
fundamental for all the masters of the Torah’s Oral Tradition.
The Talmud,7 for instance, states that Betzalel8 knew how to combine the
letters that were used to create heaven and the earth, as it is written: “I have
filled him with the spirit of God, with wisdom, with understanding, and with
knowledge.”9 From this verse it is clear that even the masters of the Talmud
were fully aware that the energy of Hebrew letters is an aspect of the living,
dynamic, Divine light that penetrates every moment of our lives. Although the
laws regarding the scribes were written thousands of years before the advent of
quantum physics (which postulates that matter absorbs energy), they reflect the
energetic interplay between the letters, the reader, and the writer. Understanding
the mysterious link between Divine wisdom and the knowledge of the letters is
not exclusive to the Kabbalists. By studying the meaning of the Hebrew letters,
each one of us can learn more about the various aspects of Divine light.
The system of analysis and reflection used in this book is mostly based on
teachings from the Oral Tradition (i.e., the Talmud10 and the Midrash11) and on
Kabbalah, particularly the seminal Kabbalistic work Sefer Yetzirah (“The Book
of Formation”). I have also included my personal reflections, which have been
inspired via the process of actually drawing the letters. In fact, according to the
great Kabbalist, Rabbi Abraham Abulafia, one way of understanding the spirit of
the letters is to feel their energy by drawing them on a surface.12
Sefer Yetzirah13 describes how Abraham, too, gained enlightenment from the
letters: “And when Abraham came, he contemplated [the letters], sculpted them,
unified them, [and] counted them until he succeeded…Then God appeared to
him, drew him to Him, kissed him on his head, and called him ‘Abraham, My
beloved.’”14
The most ancient Kabbalistic text, the Book of Formation, attributed to the
patriarch Abraham, describes the deep interconnection between the Hebrew
letters, the planets, body organs and emotions. In a generation that has awakened
to the need of finding the link between matter and spirit, body and soul, the
message of the Book of Formation offers the possibility of a deeper reflexion on
the subject.
In fact, according to this text, the interconnection goes so deeply as for it to
dare to suggest that our organs “contain” parts of our spirit: not only they
animate the body, but they are the channels of our spiritual evolution. Our soul,
according to the Book of Formation, is in fact considered not as a single unit, but
as composed of several different “spirits,” which live within our limbs and
organs, and which are activated separately in different circumstances and times
of the year. In order to give the reader a taste of the terse yet inspiring flavor of
this text, here are some typical passages: The foundations are the twenty-two
letters: three “mothers,” seven “doubles,” and twelve “elementals.”
The three mothers are alef, mem, and shin: mem hums, shin hisses, and alef
is the breath of air, which is the mediator between them…
The three mothers are alef, mem, and shin; the heavens were created from
fire, the earth from water; and the air was formed from the spirit, which is the
mediator between them…
The three mothers are alef, mem, and shin; in the male and female soul are
the head, the belly, and the chest; the head was created from the fire, the belly
from water, and the chest from the spirit, which is the mediator between
them…
The seven doubles are bet, gimel, dalet, kaf, pei, resh, and tav; these are the
foundations of wisdom, wealth, seed, life, dominance, peace, and grace…
The seven doubles are bet, gimel, dalet, kaf, pei, resh, and tav; they are
height, depth, east, west, north, and south, with the holy palace in the middle
supporting them all…
The twelve elementals are hei, vav, zayin, chet, tet, yud, lamed, nun,
samech, ayin, tzadik, and kuf; their foundations are speech, thought,
 movement, sight, hearing, action, the sexual appetite, smell, sleep, anger,
taste, and laughter…
The twelve elementals are hei, vav, zayin, chet, tet, yud, lamed, nun,
samech, ayin, tzadik, and kuf; with them He designed, formed, combined,
weighed, and changed, and created the twelve constellations of the heavens,
the twelve months of the year, and the twelve important organs of man…

These excerpts from Sefer Yetzirah give an idea of the depth of knowledge
contained in the Hebrew alphabet, and its connection to the healing of body and
soul.
Healing, as we shall see in the course of this text, is a key word found
throughout the entire Bible, and in Judaism at large. Maimonides explained that
the main role of the precepts of the Torah is to create a healthy body, a stable
chariot (Merkavah) for the soul. Elia Benamozegh, the greatest Italian Kabbalist
and scholar, in his History of the Essenes, the most esoteric Jewish sect (of
which, according to most scholars, the father of Christianity was a member)
stated that Judaism is mainly a “teaching of cure and prevention of disease.”15
Sefer Yetzirah describes the exact connections between the letters, the body
organs, the emotions, the senses, and astrological constellations. Those
associations were a guide for the cure of body and soul for ancient Jewish
doctors who knew how to apply the knowledge of the Kabbalah, and the energy
of the letters, to their medical profession.
Also, Rabbi Nachman of Breslav (inspired by Sefer Yetzirah), taught his
disciples the importance, both for spiritual evolution and for physical well-being,
of establishing a dialogue with “the organs of the body” (sichat ha’eivarim).
Unfortunately, the “know-how” for establishing this dialogue, the esoteric-
medical inheritance of the Jewish masters of healing, was for the most part lost
over the last 2,000 years. During various persecutions, Jews and their holy books
were burned together in “holy” fires that destroyed valuable healing remedies for
every human being.
In search of a holistic approach to healing that is still in use today, I have been
drawn to the study of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM). TCM, in practice
and in theory, synchronizes the cure of the body with the soul. Like Kabbalah,
TCM associates every organ with a planet, an emotion, a color, a season, a
direction, etc. Like Kabbalah, it stresses healing the emotions as a condition for
healing the organs.
 I found myself at home studying TCM and mystical healing practices of
Taoism. Many Bible commentators state that these eastern traditions find their
origins in the teachings of the patriarch Abraham. According to the Bible,
Abraham sent his children to the East: “He gave gifts and sent them eastward, to
the east country” (Genesis 25-6). The “gifts” refer to these healing practices.
The powerful similarities between the medical teachings of Maimonides and
those of TCM inspired me to combine practical holistic healing strategies based
on spiritual truths common to both Judaism and the Orient. Both systems warned
that there cannot really be healing if there has not been a transformation of the
emotions (tikun ha’midot), and a rebalancing of the “elements” and the
hormones that rely on conflict resolution.
Kabbalistic teachings attribute disease to our transgressions. Humbly
admitting our shortcomings and subsequently improving our character has a
direct effect on our physical health. This process of teshuvah, complemented by
realigning the pulses, sefirotic energies, and Qi most exemplify the
complementary relationship between TCM and Kabbalah.
Besides the health-related benefits offered by the association of Kabbalah and
TCM, there are great philosophical insights that can be born from such a
“marriage.” Paradoxically, the study of TCM has helped me to better understand
the teachings of the Jewish tradition! Just to offer some examples, the Talmud
tells us that Abraham, who lived many generations before Moses, knew all the
Torah even before it was revealed on Mount Sinai. How was this possible? The
oral tradition explains, “God gave him two kidneys that served as advisors, from
which he learned his wisdom (Bereishit Rabbah, Talmud). This curious verse did
not make much sense to me until I read the TCM book, The Web that Has No
Weaver (Kaptchuk, 2000). I then began to understand the spiritual functions of
the kidneys, which are called the “Gate of Faith and Destiny.” This is where
primordial faith and wisdom are stored. I will further explore the kidneys in the
chapter on the letter kaf.
By meditating on some key concepts of TCM, we may deepen our
understanding of some of the most significant chapters of the Bible. For
instance, the conflicting relationship between heart and liver appears in the
verses of Exodus, disguised in the dialogues between Moses, God, and Pharaoh.
I will discuss the relationship between heart and liver, both in Chinese medicine
and in Kabbalah, in the chapters on the letters lamed and kaf.
The reciprocal exchange of esoteric knowledge and healing strategies is
invaluable. Some Israeli acupuncturists have enriched their medical practice with
the knowledge of the connection between the Hebrew letters and the organs.
When practicing Qi Gong (“energy work”) or acupuncture, together with
intentionally directing the Qi (“life-force”), they visualize the letter associated by
Kabbalah to the organ they are trying to heal. Sometimes the results are quite
impressive. TCM doctors could benefit greatly from incorporating the secret
knowledge of Kabbalah in order to rediscover the authentic “spirit” of Chinese
medicine. The penetrating Divine illumination, an essential aspect of TCM, has
been silenced by communist China. This truth needs to be exposed with the
revival of this invaluable medical tradition.
In fact, the goal of the book is to build a solid bridge for spiritual searchers
and healers of different disciplines to cross over, without fear of losing their
identity. On the contrary, it will become clear how each ancient tradition
powerfully reinforces the other.16 Mystical teachings of all traditions can offer
potent tools for speeding up the process of healing and evolution, as it is written:
“And the spirit of the Lord shall come upon you, and you…shall be transformed
into another man.”17
For centuries, rabbis have feared sharing the esoteric teachings of the Torah.
Therefore, Jews, Christians (naturally interested in the mystical tradition of
Yeshua ben Yosef), and Orientals were unable to access the healing power of
mystical Kabbalah teachings.
To paraphrase the words of the prophet Isaiah, the great “sin” of the people of
Israel was that they favored the ritualistic rather than the inward religious
experience: Yisrael lo yada; ami lo hitbonen—“Israel does not know; My people
do not meditate.” This “sin” has prevented both Jews and non-Jews from
drinking from the wellsprings of Kabbalah. I hope and pray that this book will
help truth-seekers of all faiths to be inspired to “meditate and know” once again,
in order to heal the entire planet.

A Note to the Reader: Each chapter is devoted to a Hebrew letter and its
Kabbalistic teachings. In addition, relevant and parallel concepts in Chinese
medicine will be discussed. Aside from ancient and historical sources, I have
also included my own experiences and those of my contemporaries from
various disciplines.
The illustrations throughout the book depict children who are trustfully
 riding on soap bubbles. God calls the Jews the “children of Israel” in order to
teach us that we must learn to trust and experience simple faith, the highest
spiritual power. The cherubs that shielded the cover of the Ark with their wings
were angelic figures with the faces of children. Perhaps these images will
awaken the unadulterated wisdom of the angelic children within, openly
receiving these concepts with wonder, curiosity, and intuitive understanding.

 CHAPTER 1
Alef

Intuition of Divine Oneness within multiplicity

Alef represents absolute unity within the plurality of Creation and is therefore
the major symbol of Divinity. Many of the names of God begin with this letter:
‫ל‬-‫ – א‬El,18 ‫ – אלוקים‬Elokim, and ‫י‬-‫ – אדנ‬Ad-nai.19 In addition, there are many
epithets used to describe God, such as ‫ – אדיר‬Adir (“glorious”) and ‫ – אדון‬Adon
(“master”). The Zohar20 relates that before Creation, each letter of the alphabet
came before God, requesting to be chosen to begin the process of creation. The
letters presented themselves in reverse order: first was ‫ – ת‬tav, the last letter of
the alphabet; next was ‫ – ש‬shin, the second-to-last letter of the alphabet; then ‫– ר‬
resh, and so on, up to ‫ – ב‬bet, second letter of the alphabet, which begins the
word ‫ – ברכה‬berachah, “blessing”. Bet pleaded, “Let the world be created with
me, so that all beings shall use me to bless God”. And God assented.
The letter alef, besides being the first letter of the alphabet, also
represents the number one, echad (‫ )אחד‬in Hebrew. The numerical value
of echad is thirteen, which is the numerical value of ahavah (‫)אהבה‬,
“love.” The letter alef represents both the oneness of God and His love
for His creatures (the attribute of chesed, “goodness”).

Then God asked the ‫ – א‬alef, the first letter of the alphabet, who had not yet
uttered a word, why it was silent. The alef replied that in a world of plurality
there was no place for her, since the numerical value of alef is one. God
reassured alef, saying that even if the world would be created with Bet, alef
would still be the queen of the alphabet. He said, “Have no fear, alef, you are
one, and I am One. I want to create the world to have My spirit of oneness dwell
there through the study of the Torah and the performance of mitzvot (the
commandments). The first of the Ten Commandments will begin with alef, the
first letter in the word ‫ – אנכי‬Anochi (“I”)—“I am the Lord your God.”21
The perception of God’s oneness that alef represents is further suggested by
the Hebrew word ‫“( פלא‬wonder”), a permutation of the word alef: Discovering
God as He is disguised in each detail of creation generates feelings of wonder
and awe.

Rediscovering the Creator with every breath

God’s light and mercy are chiefly poured into creation through air, the main
vehicle that God uses to keep creation alive. It is common knowledge that a
human being can survive for days without drinking or eating, but only for a few
minutes without breathing. For this reason, Sefer Yetzirah associates alef (which
is categorized as one of the three “mother letters”)22 with air. The word ‫– אויר‬
avir (“air”) is comprised of all the letters found in the word ‫ – אור‬or (“light”)
plus the letter yud, whose numerical value is 10, alluding to the 10 sefirot
(“Divine emanations”) of Creation, sourced in One.23
Emotional imbalances cause us to lose our objective vision of reality.
Breathing deeply brings us back to our center as we reclaim our natural, healthy
state of enlightenment. Sefer Yetzirah states:
Three Mothers (letters): Alef Mem Shin in the year are the hot, the cold, and
the temperate.
The hot (shin) is created from fire
The cold (mem) is created from water
And the temperate (alef) from breath, which decides between them.

Three Mothers in the soul, male and female, are the head, belly, and chest.
The head is created from fire
The belly is created from water,
And the chest from breath, which decides between them.

This passage reveals some of the many parallels between the Kabbalistic view
of the world, and that of the Ancient Chinese. The alef is associated with
oneness, balance, the temperate (as opposed to the extremes of hot and cold),
rooted in the breath and the chest.
The alef also relates to the element of metal, which is associated with the
breath and higher perceptions of Divine Oneness. In fact, TCM designates metal
to the heavenly realms, the spirit beyond the body, and pure consciousness.24
Metal is also related to autumn, the pivotal “temperate” season between the hot
summer and the cold winter. Another parallel between TCM and Sefer Yetzirah
is that the metal element, like the alef, is related to the physical organ of the
lungs, and therefore to the breath. In Chinese thought, the breath is also seen as
our connection to the original, undivided, pure Divine. Correct breathing
maintains our balance and supports our righteous and ethical choices between
fire and water. As we inhale, we draw inspiration and nourishment from the air
and the heavens. When we exhale, we release that which is no longer needed.
According to numerous Jewish sources, deep breathing is seen as a key
instrument for coming into contact with the Divine within us.25 It is also no
accident that the Book of Psalms—the Biblical poems that express King David’s
constant striving to live in God’s presence—ends with the verse Kol
ha’neshamah tehallel Kah:26 (“Every soul shall praise God”).27 The Midrash28
invites us to read this verse not as “Every soul shall praise God—kol
ha’neshamah ‫—הנשמה‬but as ‫ הנשימה‬: “Every breath shall praise God”—kol
ha’neshimah.
Indeed one of God’s Names is Arich Apayim,29 literally meaning “Long
Breath” (even though it is usually translated as “patient,” “slow to anger”). By
emulating God with deep breathing, we allow the element of air to temper
between the excess of water and fire (our out-of-control emotions) and restore
balance.

Adam’s mission
By analyzing the word Adam we find out that the first human being was
created directly from ‫ – אדמה‬adamah, the earth.30 As his descendants we should
be aware of our essential need to be in contact with the earth from which our
vitality derives. The Oral Tradition clearly states that “a man who does not
possess a field is not a man.”31
The survival of humanity especially depends on our ability to follow God’s
commandment, originally given to Adam, regarding the preservation and
protection of the land that he was meant to cultivate.32 The Midrash comments:
“When God created Adam, He showed him all the trees of the Garden of Eden,
and then said to him, ‘Look at the perfection of My work! I created it for you, so
remember it and do not corrupt it, making My world desolate. Because if you
corrupt it, there will be none other to repair it.’”33 If we continue to work the
earth without taking measures to preserve it, ecological catastrophe will be
unavoidable. The Torah and the Talmud’s profound integrative spiritual and
physical wisdom provides precious instructions concerning protecting the
environment.34 Some of the Torah’s commandments are based on ecological
principles, such as the obligation to give the land a year of rest every seven years
(the sabbatical year).35
When we recycle wastes and maintain the purity of the water and the air,36
etc., we are fulfilling the commandment to protect and preserve the environment.
It is clearly stated in the Book of Genesis that we are the caretakers of the
garden. God tells Adam and Eve: “Be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth and
subdue it, and exercise your dominion over the birds in the sky and the fish in
the sea, and over every living creature that moves upon the earth.” A few verses
later, God addresses Adam’s possible illusion that he is on this planet to
dominate and exploit the earth. Scripture makes it very clear that man was
placed in the Garden of Eden to “preserve it and guard it.” The Midrash explains
that God is telling Adam: “Everything was created for your sake. Take heed that
you should not ruin or destroy My world, for there is nobody to rectify it after
you”.
Within these passages are God’s warning and calling to mankind to practice
the role of caretaker. The Oral Tradition clearly directs us to preserve the natural
environment and not to use it wastefully or wantonly. The Torah, for example,
discusses the concept of Bal Tashchit. When an army lays siege to a city, it may
not carelessly cut down trees as an act of terrorism. Rabbi Hirsch explains, “The
prohibition against the wanton destruction of trees in a siege is to be interpreted
as a prohibition against the purposeless, wasteful destruction of any object. Thus
the concept of Bal Tashchit becomes an all-encompassing warning to man not to
misuse his assigned station in the world by destroying the things of earth
capriciously.” Today this concept can be applied to all forms of energy
conservation.
A beautiful and ancient practice that should inspire modern city planning is
that of maintaining greenbelts around developed urban areas. Torah law
explicitly states that if the whole city votes for changes in city planning, the
preservation of greenbelts cannot be altered. They are considered the
“inheritance of future generations,” and thus no particular generation has the
right to disturb or alter them.
Greenbelts are a beautiful method of nature preservation, assuring that natural
plant and animal life can continue to flourish even in the presence of human
development. What is very interesting to note is that greenbelts were given to the
Levites—the musicians, teachers, and cantors of Israel—who, unlike the other
twelve tribes, did not have a territory of their own in the Land of Israel. Through
their music, the Levites inspire others to respect and contemplate the Shechinah,
the immanent aspect of God: Mother Nature.

The ability to make associations and the Kabbalah

Another concept related to the word ‫ – אדם‬adam is ‫ – דמיון‬dimayon
(“imagination”). Dimayon embraces the capacity to make associations,
deductions, analogies, and hypotheses, i.e., to engage in abstract thinking. The
word Kabbalah itself has a similar meaning: from its root, which is ‫ – קבל‬kabel,
the word ‫ – מקביל‬makbil (“parallel”) is derived. Most of the Kabbalistic
discipline is based on our ability to make associations. When we “translate” the
material world into symbols and metaphors, we are able to carry on a steady
dialogue with the Divine. The search for affinities between physical and spiritual
reality, and between the lower and higher worlds, is the best protection we can
give our consciousness against being deceived by the world’s façade of plurality,
and the attraction of materialism or any other form of idol worship.
Within God’s creation we are, so to speak “the apple of God’s eye.” As such,
we have the distinctly human power to translate and elevate the physical world
to its spiritual roots, through the various artistic expressions inspired by our
imagination. When God said, “Let us create man in our image,”37 He possibly
meant that human beings would have the ability to re-create the world, through
their own unique way of expressing appreciation for the wonders of creation.
Even every blade of grass is aware of and grateful to God for its life, but only a
human being can respond to the call to “sing a new song,”38 to creatively express
his feelings of awe to the Master of the Universe.
The spiritual mission of Adam and, therefore, of all humanity, is to rediscover
the alef, the profound teaching found in every phenomenon of creation, and to
give it expression. In Genesis, we learn that God tested Adam’s maturity by
asking him to contact the spiritual essence of the animals in order to intuitively
name each one of them.39 The Hebrew word ‫ – שם‬shem, meaning “name,” is the
center of the word ‫ – נשמה‬neshamah (“soul”). In other words, a name, rather than
being an external label, reveals essence.
By calling every animal by its name, Adam showed how he could use his
imagination to extract the soul from its external shell. For example, the word for
“dog,” ‫ – כלב‬kelev is a contraction of the words kol lev – “all heart,” expressing
how a dog is “all heart,” or “all sentiment.” In the same way, King Solomon was
called “the wisest of all men” because he could invent three thousand parables to
explain any concept.40 Because of his ability to ascend from material to
existential phenomena, proceeding backwards along the path of Creation from
matter to spirit, King Solomon could make any concept understandable for all
possible levels of comprehension.41

The picture shows an alef in a chromatic pattern that makes it almost

impossible to distinguish it from the rest of the image. This expresses the
concept of God’s Presence, which although hidden, is immanent in every
element of creation.
 CHAPTER 2
Bet

The numerical value of bet is two, representing duality. Since it is the

beginning of the word berachah (“blessing”) through which every food and
drink is reconnected to its heavenly root, bet is also a link between the material
world and the spiritual world of unity, reinforcing the truth that God is One.
Blessings open up our awareness of the bounty we receive and thereby open
us up for receiving even more. As we stated earlier, the word ‫ – ברכה‬berachah
(“blessing”) also means ‫ – ברכה‬bereichah (“large receptacle”). The more we
bless God for the good we have received, the larger is the space we make that
only He can fill.
Although we experience duality in this world—light and darkness, Yin and
Yang, feminine and masculine, etc.—our spiritual work is to reach beyond the
duality and reveal the source of Oneness hiding behind all duality. For example,
our ultimate capacity for balancing Yin and Yang requires us to tap into pure
essence, the deepest place in our souls that is beyond all time, space, and
categories. As we shift our identity to pure essence, we may heal from all
imbalances and fragmentation.

The perception of the deceptive plurality of creation

While Abraham is associated with the energy of alef, which unifies plurality,
Isaac, in contrast, evokes the theme of bet, the perception of the deceptive
plurality of creation and the need to overcome this deception. Although God’s
creation is made of infinite variety and diversity, everything is endowed with His
Spirit. Every event and situation is a manifestation of His will, even those which
are most enigmatic.
During the moment that Abraham was about to sacrifice his son Isaac on
Mount Moriah, Isaac’s perception expanded. He clearly saw through the
deceptive aspect of the material world, in contrast to the eternality of the spirit.
For this reason, even though he ultimately was not sacrificed, Isaac chose to
separate himself from the illusion of the material world. While Abraham served
God through socializing—receiving guests and sharing his vision—Isaac spent
most of his life in deep meditation and isolation. In fact, the first hint about
meditation in the Bible actually refers to him: “And Isaac went to meditate in the
field.”

Bet, bayit: “house”

The letter bet, from the word ‫ – בית‬bayit (“house”), is often equated with “a
woman”. Bat – ‫“( בת‬daughter”), without the letter yud is the young girl still in
the process of maturing with wisdom from her mother’s home. The letter bet
introduces us to the sanctuary we are called upon to build in order to reveal His
presence on earth.42
The focal point of holiness on earth is God’s “house,” the Bet HaMikdash
(“the Holy House,” otherwise known as “the Holy Temple”). When it was
destroyed, the spiritual leaders encouraged the people of Israel to make their
homes become miniature temples. As we read in Psalms: “Lord, You have been
an abode for us for all generations.”43 Just as the body is a sacred house for the
soul and must be treated with love and respect, so too should every home
become a sanctuary and a place of refuge. This can only be accomplished by
those who are capable of identifying with motherly, nourishing, protecting, and
guiding feminine energy.
It is a feminine mission to turn our home into a small sanctuary (mikdash
me’at)44 and transform our table into an altar, on which we offer “sacrifices,”
especially in the form of (w)holy meals.45 Preparing food with the awareness of
the alchemical value of food, means adding knowledge, creativity, intention, and
love, to the food with which the bat, and the bayit, nourish their loved ones.
Some Torah commentaries46 affirm that the Temple47 itself was inspired by
the home of our foremothers and forefathers, where the Divine Spirit reigned.
Just as the spirit hovered over the Bet HaMikdash in the form of a cloud,48 a
cloud hovered over Sarah’s tent.49 Just as the breads offered on the Sanctuary’s
altar did not become stale,50 Sarah’s bread was filled with so much love that her
guests, after eating it, would be physically and emotionally satiated for days.51
During my first year of study in Jerusalem, I experienced the intense feeling
of being in such a Sanctuary during my frequent visits to Esther Kitov, who
many consider to be one of our generation’s great spiritual teachers. Her home
evoked such a strong sense of sanctity that I sometimes felt afraid to enter.
However, the Divine love that my hostess embodied helped me overcome my
fear. After offering her guests delicious food, this young “priestess” gave
incredibly deep classes on Kabbalah as well as practical lessons in human
kindness and spiritual awareness. She would do all this while nursing an infant,
teaching a two-year-old a blessing, or dusting the books in her library. At the
touch of her hands, the golden letters on the bindings seemed to shine, and their
holy contents were perceived even by those, like me, who were unable to read
them.
This welcome was extended to women of all ages and backgrounds who had
traveled to Israel in search of their roots: former Hollywood directors and
actresses, psychologists and PhDs from prestigious American colleges,
businesswomen, and young girls dealing with Jewish identity issues all found a
safe and holy sanctuary to connect with their roots.
Esther’s home was neither an impregnable fortress where the wary and
dubious seek refuge or easy answers, nor an elitist tower where only select
individuals are received on the basis of their cultural affinity or ties of affection
for the host. Rather, it was an ideal place for meeting spiritual brothers and
sisters and sharing in the beautiful rituals observed in a traditional Jewish home.
Without the filter of answering machines, invitations, or appointments, anyone
in need of a sympathetic ear, a hug, some food, or lessons in the Torah and life,
can knock at the doors of modern sanctuaries. Women like Esther open their
doors to visitors from all over the world, especially on Shabbat. Since giving is
so much a part of who they are, women like Esther often suffer in the absence of
guests. This trait is inherited from Abraham (and Sarah) who was unable to eat
without having guests at his table.52
As the similarity of the words ‫ – רוח‬ruach (“spirit”), and ‫ – אורח‬oreyach
(“guest”) suggest, the Shechinah (“Divine Presence”) is especially felt in the
presence of guests basking in warm hospitality, welcomed and nourished in the
spirit of gracious giving.53

Blessing: the flow of Divine emanation

God, as He is hidden in each detail of creation, generates feelings of wonder
and awe. Since our main life purpose is to experience Godliness, and to reveal
and testify to God’s presence (specifically in the physical and sensual world), we
make blessings. Therefore, each life experience, such as eating, smelling a
pleasant fragrance, seeing beautiful animals, creatures, and natural phenomena,
should be reinforced and elevated through its corresponding blessing. Thus we
recognize that everything is from God. However, the sages teach that a blessing
can only become a true vehicle of communication with God if one is deeply
immersed in the experience.
Once, in the middle of a powerful thunderstorm, I uttered with strong kavanah
(“awareness”) the blessing “Blessed are You, God, whose force and strength fill
the universe.” After articulating the blessing, I was impressed by the result. I felt
that the energy of the thunder was being “transferred” to me, allowing me to feel
alive like I never felt before in my life!
As mentioned above, the letter bet was chosen to begin the Torah because it is
the first letter of the word ‫ – ברכה‬berachah (“blessing”). The appropriate human
response to God’s love and blessing is an expression of gratitude. The more we
are able to feel and express gratitude, the more we create a channel for Divine
blessing.
 Since God creates the world through combinations of letters forming words, it
is with words that we reunite creation with the Creator. For instance, when we
recite a blessing in Hebrew over food, we produce sounds that evoke the Divine,
primordial words that gave form to that food. The blessing is our way of re-
establishing the link between physical matter and its Divine root, of transforming
matter into Divine energy and of enriching our nourishment with the spiritual
aspects that would be lacking were we to only relate to food materially.
Moreover, the person reciting a blessing creates a metaphysical quantum field
that affects the psychological state of those present, elevating them spiritually, as
well. I have seen personally that when I recite blessings over food in the
company of non-religious people, most of them, regardless of their level of
spiritual awareness, after a moment of surprise, welcome with curiosity the re-
inclusion of the Divine in their reality.
 As the prophet Amos said, at the end of days all humanity (not only mystics
and prophets) will be hungry and thirsty for the word of God: “…not hunger for
bread nor thirst for water, but for hearing the words of the Lord.”54
Blessing and expressing gratitude for nourishment is the most powerful means
we have to be in a state of awareness all day long, and not only when sitting on
the yoga mat. Abraham knew this well. He invited travelers to eat in his tent and
taught them to bless God, the Master of the Universe, for the exquisite food they
had been fed.55 A berachah invites perception of the Absolute. It forces the
person reciting it both to ponder the origin of what she or he is eating and to
create a moment of intimacy and communion with the Master of the Universe.
For example, a special prayer is designated for eating seasonal fruits for the first
time in any given year. We thank God for “giving us this new experience (of
eating the fruit for the first time this year), having kept us alive and having
sustained us for another year,” in order that we could experience again the joy of
tasting such fruit.
A blessing after meals reveals the truth that that food is Godliness: ‫כל‬-‫אוכל = א‬.
The Hebrew language makes it clear: God is in the food. We see this especially
in the spiritual manna that we ate in the desert for forty years, which descended
directly from heaven. Eating manna allowed us to integrate emunah (“faith”)
into our consciousness.
Since most of us interact with the world first and foremost with our bodies,
our experiences are dominated by and filtered through the senses. For this
reason, Sefer Yetzirah talks about chushim, senses that must be elevated and
transformed. In order to nourish the spiritual dimension of the senses, the sages
devised some blessings that are authentic tools of transcendence. The blessings
created by the great prophets of the Bible make sensual experiences channels for
spiritual elevation.
Blessings do not deny the reality of our senses, but make them much more
potent, while opening us to our spiritual relationship with food. Ideally, this
protects us from the dangers of indulging in eating unhealthy quantities. Food
disorders are rooted in our attempt to make up for the feeling of emptiness we
experience when we do not eat at the “holy altar.”
All religions require their adherents to bless God after eating. However, only
if we have eaten with full consciousness (having enjoyed the color, texture and
smell of the food) and we have been aware that all of these pleasant qualities are
God-given, then the moment of blessing becomes a heartfelt experience of God’s
beneficence. For this reason the sages say, “You will eat, You will feel satiated
and You will bless God.” Unconscious, mindless eating which is neither
satisfying (rather it gives us a feeling of bloating, not of real satiation) is
inconsistent with an authentic expression of gratitude.
Nechama Sarah Burgeman, in The twelve Dimensions of Israel, discusses how
specifically in the month of Shevat there is extra Divine help available to rectify
eating. This is partly because the time-dimension of Shevat is formed through
the energy of the letter tzaddik. Nechama cites the passage, “A tzaddik
(‘righteous person’) eats in order to satiate his soul.” In other words, we need to
only eat what will give us the energy to serve God. By meditating on this
passage we can avoid destructive eating patterns.
The Torah provides us with an example of ravenous eating and the
consequences thereof. Esau comes in from the field, declaring, “Give me a
swallow of that red stuff [lentil stew]. I’m famished.”…“First sell me your
birthright,” replies Jacob.
“Here I am about to die,” exclaims Esau, “What good is a birthright to
me?”…“Esau ate, drank, got up, and left…. He thus rejected the birthright.”
(Genesis: Toldot: 29-33) This verse makes a clear connection between the
tendency toward indulgence and the risk of giving up our birthright of a life of
spiritual awareness and aliveness.
Psalm 115 expresses constricted consciousness as a state in which we have
“eyes, but we don’t see; noses, but we can’t smell; hands, but we can’t feel,” etc.
In other words, our senses are not being used to help us experience the richness
of life. True spirituality, as this verse teaches us, cannot be realized unless the
subconscious is integrated through the physical senses. Only when the
subconscious mind surfaces, allowing us to deeply feel and sense while being
totally aware of the present moment, may we make proper blessings.

Ben and bat: children

The Hebrew words for “son” (‫ )בן‬and “daughter” (‫ )בת‬both begin with bet and
together form a constellation with the words “blessing” and “home,” which is
intrinsic to the most important values of Judaism. One’s home is the place to
withdraw from the illusory, exterior world. Sons and daughters are the legacy of
their parents. Teaching one’s children and guiding them in the proper ethical and
spiritual path is of primary importance in the Jewish home. For this reason the
main verse of the Shema Israel has to do with teaching children to love God and
trust God. When parents fulfill this obligation, their children are a blessing and
their home is a sacred place, a microcosmic temple for the sanctification of
God’s name. The Torah’s emphasis on the elevation and purification of sexuality
guards and sanctifies the relationship between a man and a woman. A couple has
the potential to create a partnership that expresses the Divine, including
procreating with awareness.
The problem of western civilization is not only of having become physically
sterile (with wrong diet and unbalanced life styles), but of having lost the sense
of parenthood, as a tool of transmission of values, of being a link between the
ancient wisdom of previous generations.
In the western world in fact the selfish refusal to have children (to have more
space, time, money and fun as couples) and the inability for effective parenthood
(seeing children as a way to maximize our egos) represents a huge obstacle in
the transmission of spiritual values. For this reasons many of us had to “shop”
and seek spiritual teachers—some real, and some less honest and authentic.
Parents who are aware of the genetical and spiritual task to provide
knowledge, stable and deep roots to the new generations so that their tree will be
able to stand firm (also in front of the storms that are appearing at the horizon)
are unfortunately a minority. Our children are both our teachers and our
disciples. Every child, according to the Kabbalah, is a Book of Torah for his
parents. Both mother and father must strive to evolve spiritually and emotionally
in order to meet the challenges of being a guide to younger generations. Also,
thanks to our children, we might be inspired to rediscover and contact our inner
child, the healthiest part of our personality, capable of finding the freshness and
joy expressed in the verse of Psalms:56 “You are My son; I have begotten you
this day…”
 CHAPTER 3
Gimel

Animals: archetypes for divine messages

The ‫ – גימל‬gimel introduces us to the idea of the journey (in the existential
sense of life-altering awareness, most often involving a struggle), specifically of
riding the camel (‫ – גמל‬gamal). The letter’s name forms the words ‫ – גמל‬gamel
and gomel (“one who performs kind deeds”),57 representing the soul’s ability to
give to and nourish others. Thanks to his courage, strength, and desire to help his
master, the camel helps human beings to overcome the trial of crossing the
parched and dangerous desert.
The spiritual lesson we learn from the camel (so deeply influenced by the
shape and the spiritual energy of the gimel) is the ability to reduce our needs to a
minimum. When necessary, this marvelous animal can abstain from drinking for
thirty days. The camel thus performs a genuine act of self-limitation, forgoing its
own needs for the sake of others. This is reminiscent of the primordial tzimtzum
(“contraction”) that preceded the Creation of the world: God withdrew His
infinite presence into Himself in order to give creation the “space” it needed to
exist. A person who strives mightily and makes great sacrifices in order to reach
an altruistic goal exhibits this same selflessness.
In the relationship between the letter gimel and the gamal (“camel”), we can
see the symbolic teachings that the ancient Hebrews associated with animals. We
consistently find throughout ancient cultures, including ancient and modern
shamanic practices all over the world, the presence of animals as messengers,
helpers, and guides. All shamanic cultures have a system of symbology
associated with the animals most closely related to them (for example, the bear
and the wolf in some Native American traditions, and the Siberian tiger and the
snow leopard in Mongolia). When these animals appear either in nature or in
meditative visions, they carry messages related to the symbolism between that
animal and the culture that recognizes it as a helper.
The relationship between gimel and the gamal is evidence of how the dialogue
with the cosmic soul of animals58 is basic to Judaism.59
In the Scriptures, God reveals Himself to man through animals as well. Noah
follows Adam in communicating with the Divine spirit through living creatures:
the raven and the dove tell him when the Flood has ended.60 Cosmic animals
appear to the prophet Ezekiel in the vision of the Chariot,61 the basic structure of
Jewish mysticism. The Chariot symbolizes God’s desire to communicate with us
through the vitality of His creatures, and the specific soul powers that we are
called upon to integrate in our lives. Native American shamans and masters of
Qi Gong have also made a point in the healing process to help their patients to
identify and integrate the energies of sacred animals.
In Kabbalah, the transcendent level of the soul is called ‫ – חיה‬chayah
(“animal”). States of higher understanding are often reached through the
revelation of “cosmic animals,” spiritual archetypes that help us come in contact
with the immanent divine, vital force of creation. In the Oral Tradition it is even
written that if we had not received the Torah,62 we could have learned it from
observing the animals. The Talmud states: “Be as bold as a leopard, light as an
eagle, swift as a deer, and strong as a lion to carry out the will of your Father in
Heaven.”63
I would like to mention a personal experience. One day, while in Israel near
Ein Gedi, I was hiking in the Negev Desert and at some point realized I was lost.
I had no idea which way to go. After three hours without water, I was quite
desperate. Stopping in my tracks, I began to pray. I was immersed in profound
meditation when I suddenly felt inspired to look up to my right. There I saw a
gazelle—and behind her was a waterfall! She went up to the waterfall and stared
at me for a long while, seeking contact with the eyes of my soul. I could not stop
staring at her eyes, almost hypnotized. Then the gazelle started making sounds
that became clearer and clearer until I could distinctly hear the words: “God is
only love. If the four-letter Ineffable Name of God, yud-hei-vav-hei, would be
pronounced, it would sound like ahavah (‘love’).”

Thanks to the courage and strength of the letter gimel, which is

associated with the archetype of the camel (gamal), humanity can
overcome major obstacles such as the test of crossing the desert, where
it is necessary to cope with a hostile environment including the absence
of water. For this reason, Sefer Yetzirah associates the letter gimel with
the planet Mars, which represents the Divine power to overcome
difficulties.

When the overwhelming emotions of that meeting faded away, I started

praying from the Book of Psalms, noticing for the first time that if the four-letter
Ineffable Name of God would be pronounced, it would in fact sound very similar
to the Hebrew word ahavah—“love”.
Together with the turtle dove, the gazelle is considered the most holy among
Biblical animals. She is one of the animals that represent the feminine revealed
aspect of God, the Shechinah. Symbolizing speed, lightness and awareness, the
gazelle also represents the soul’s capacity to hasten the Redemption.64
Excited from my meeting with the gazelle, I explored Hebrew texts where I
found various hints about the holiness of this animal. In the Zohar the Rashbi
explains: Every desire and yearning that Israel has is for God, and Israel requests
that God should never leave them. Rather, when He runs he should be like a
gazelle. Why? Because there are no animals in the world like gazelles. When
they run, after a short time they turn their heads back to the place where they ran
from. So Israel says, “Master of the World, if we have caused You to go away
from us, may it be Your will that You run like a gazelle who runs and turns his
head back to the place he left…” Also, when a gazelle sleeps, he sleeps with one
eye open. “Behold, He neither sleeps nor slumbers; He guards Israel.” (Psalms
121) The encounter with the gazelle deeply changed my life. It affected me so
much that I ended up naming my daughter “Yael”—“desert gazelle”. After this
encounter, all the heaviness, laziness, and lack of motivation that often stopped
me from accomplishing my mission to reveal Godliness in the world
disappeared. In a few years I had written five books that seemed to flow from the
same well of wisdom revealed to me by the gazelle at the waterfall.

Gerim: “converts”
In recent years, ever-increasing large numbers of gentiles have expressed their
desire to convert to as they journey towards Judaism’s unified spiritual vision.
Since there are various motivations for conversion, today’s rabbis are cautious
when judging the sincerity of aspiring gerim (“converts”). We are nearing the
end of times. According to the Ba’al Shem Tov, the souls of gerim are actually
Jewish souls. For reasons that Divine Providence has not yet revealed, these
souls were required to incarnate in the society of non-Jews and undertake the
long, weary path back to their spiritual roots.65
After my books were published in Italy, I started receiving letters and e-mails
from aspiring converts. They often described dreams as the main reason that
they felt strongly about belonging to the Jewish people.
• Below are three of the most significant stories: Anna of Ravenna dreamt of
standing before a sort of cupboard covered by richly embroidered fabrics. The
door of the cupboard opened, and in front of her appeared two containers of
sacred writings. They were topped with silver pommels that turned into two
candles. She was feeling totally at peace until the candles were extinguished,
whereupon she cried out, aghast, “My faith, my faith has gone!”
Anna in her real life had never seen a Torah scroll or an aron kodesh (the ark
in which Torah scrolls are housed in synagogues), but her soul remembered
them well. I explained to her that what she had seen in the dream was a prayer
service in a Jewish synagogue, probably on Shabbat since the candles were lit.
Today, after studying Hebrew and the Torah for some years, Anna managed to
convert to Judaism, and to light again the candles of her faith.
• Angela of Catania had three similar dreams in which she was in Rome,
running down the street, fleeing from men in black suits. In the last dream, she
entered a house where other people were hidden. The house was small, dark,
and gloomy. Then she entered a room on the upper floor. The light was bright
and the room full of peace. There were benches and she went to sit where her
name was written. The peace was interrupted by screams from the lower floor,
“They’re here. Hurry, send the children away through the terrace.” She went
down to help the children climb over the parapet and then she heard people
breaking down the door.
After those three agonizing dreams, Angela listened to the voice of her soul
guiding her to recover her Jewishness. She now understands from her dreams
and from her meditations, her last gilgul (incarnation) was interrupted by Nazi
fascism. She started reading books about Judaism and the Torah. Since then
her painful dreams have ceased.
• Silvia, a yoga teacher in Milan, also had some terribly distressing dreams until
she started the conversion process. All of her dreams started with a date, 1943,
immediately after the concentration camps in Germany appeared. She dreamt
she was standing in front of the ovens, but she was not forced to go in.
Instead, she helped the Germans force her Jewish brothers inside. Silvia’s
dreams also continued until she started studying Jewish history and Nazism,
and then read memoirs of the kapos (those Jews who assisted the Nazis in the
crematoriums). At that point she realized that she had been one of them in her
previous incarnation. Today, Silvia organizes courses on Judaism in her yoga
centers and helps other Jewish souls find their way home.

According to Rabbi Gershom, author of Beyond the Ashes: Cases of

Reincarnation from the Holocaust, Jews are a soul group bonded together by
love of the One God. At Mount Sinai all Jewish souls were present; those that
were born Jews and who were physically present at Mount Sinai, as well as
those souls who would be born from generation to generation, from incarnation
to incarnation. This remarkable book makes it clear that being Jewish is both
genealogical and spiritual. To quote: During the Holocaust, so many Jews were
killed that there were simply not enough Jewish women to give birth again to
those souls, so they had to reincarnate as non-Jews…as a result, there was a
disconnection in the family tree. Some actually came back as non-Jews out of
choice, because of the terror of being persecuted again as Jews.

Today, thanks to the discovery of their past life as Jews, many people were
able to heal psychologically. Their haunting memories of Nazi Germany, aroused
through dreams, déjà vu, and hypnosis (with the psychiatric diagnoses that their
therapists attributed to such experiences) were now placed in the context of a
wider paradigm of the soul. Therefore, they were able to discontinue taking
pharmaceutical drugs prescribed by rationalist psychologists who refused to
consider the reality or possibility of reincarnation.
We may say that many converts, gerim, have drawn from the energy of the
letter gimel, which channels the Divine power to move forward on a new soul
journey.
 CHAPTER 4
Dalet

Ancient philosophy and medical theories are based on the Four Elements. The
Kabbalah has described in length the existence of four realms or worlds
permeating all of existence: Asiyah (the physical world of action); Yetzirah (the
emotional world); Beriah (the intellectual realm); and Atzilut (the spiritual
realm). Although they are categorized for our understanding, these worlds are
not disconnected. Rather, they flow into one another. In order to heal, we need to
take care of our body, our emotions, and our psychological and spiritual well-
being. At times we need to fast, meditate or pray in order to realign with our
soul.
The Shabbat (Sabbath) is the ideal opportunity to get in touch with all realms
of our being. We receive and let go with the flame of the Shabbat candles. Our
perceptions of asiyah, yetzirah, and beriah are enlightened as the highest level of
our soul is aroused. Although we eat, drink, and share with friends and family,
these activities are elevated by the sanctity of Shabbat.
Without the awareness of the four elements and their parallel relationship to
the four worlds, our lives lack depth. That is why the letter dalet is also the
beginning of the word dalut (“poverty”). Lack of da’at (“knowledge”) is the
source of poverty.
The numerical value of the letter dalet, “four”, is associated with the four
primordial elements: fire, water, air, and earth. These elements are the
basis for plurality in creation. We see that the blessings on Shabbat night
are related to the four primordial elements: lighting the candles (fire),
blessing over Kiddush wine (air), washing the hands (water), and the
blessing over bread (earth). Through these blessings of the holy
Shabbat, plurality is elevated to its source in unity.

Poverty and spiritual development

Written out in full, the letter ‫ – דלת‬dalet forms a word obviously associated
with its message: ‫ – דלת‬delet (“door”). It refers to the door on which those in
need, ‫ – דל‬dal (“poor”) can knock. The Talmud teaches us that the letters gimel
and dalet stand for gomel dalim, “care for the needy.”66 The Talmud uses the
graphic form of gimel and dalet to explain the dynamics between them. The
gimel is shaped like a man running with his leg extended forward toward dalet.
The poor person, dalet, looks behind shyly in the hope that his needs will be
understood and fulfilled by the rich man, the gimel.
The psychic dynamics between gimel and dalet were concretely represented in
a physical component of the Temple of Jerusalem, known as the “Room of
Silence.”67 Only one person at a time could enter, either to take the amount of
money needed or to make a donation. In this way, tzedakah (“charity”) was
completely anonymous and caused neither shame to the recipient nor
haughtiness in the donor.

Judaism prescribes that tzedakah be given in a way that does not humiliate the
person receiving it.68 A rich person really is considered the administrator of
goods belonging by right to the poor, and these goods are returned to the poor
through the act of tzedakah.69
Concerning the proper way of giving, God tells Moses, “Speak to the
Israelites and have them bring me an offering. Take my offering from everyone
whose heart impels him to give.” (Exodus: Terumah: 25) The words “whose
heart impels him to give” teach us that the motivation for charity must come
from the heart and in this way the giver truly fulfills the mitzvah.
Many people protest: “Why did God create poverty and imperfection?” One
possible answer to this question is found at the end of the story of Creation,
where it is written that on the seventh day, “God rested from the work He had
created to make.”70 The words “to make” imply that creation is neither complete
nor perfect. In fact, it was created not yet perfect, in order to be completed. God
has chosen humanity as His partner to complete and perfect creation.
 This is why poverty and wealth exist. Humanity, created in the image of God,
must act in His stead wherever there is need. Hunger in the world is not proof of
Divine indifference, but rather proof of the immaturity of that segment of
humanity that has more than it needs and refuses to accept its role as God’s
partner in helping the creation to reach balance and justice. This part of
humanity is unwilling to become gimel (the giver) for the dalet (the needy) of
the world.
On the other hand, experiencing poverty is important in the process of
spiritual maturity. If we would not know poverty and therefore the meaning of
need, we would not be able to grasp two of the most important spiritual values:
total dependence on God and His emissaries, and gratitude. Depriving ourselves
of food and water during fast days, such as Yom Kippur, besides being a means
of atonement, is a reminder to not take food that God has given us for granted.
Moreover, by rejecting the race towards material gain, we may discover spiritual
wealth.
The mindset of modern society is to grow as large as possible, and as quickly
as possible, in material wealth. We are constantly encouraged to use our energy
towards acquiring more material possessions. Even on the national level,
expanded economic activity and growth are the absolute priority, at the expense
of the environment. Overheating, pollution, and extinction of many species of
animals and plants are only some of the consequences of having chosen to
expand beyond real human needs.
Today most people recognize the truth that the goal of unlimited economical
growth is no longer tenable. Even the best ecological strategies cannot save the
world from self-destruction. As Rabbi Carmel states: The only way out of the
human predicament of our time lies in a complete and radical change, not of
methods but of goals. The essence of the human being is that he is capable of
setting his own goals and changing them when necessary. There is only one way
to avert the disaster that threatens to overwhelm mankind. Material goals must
be replaced by spiritual goals.

Only by finding happiness with fewer physical possessions and, in parallel,

striving for more emotional and spiritual intelligence can man change the
outcome of the present ecological crisis.
The Torah values human life and our potential to reveal the Divine in this
world, on Planet Earth. The Torah also makes it clear that the pursuit of material
gain for its own sake can only end in ruin and frustration. A striking example of
this is the statistical fact that the most-materially opulent countries have the
highest rates of heart attack, high cholesterol, clinical depression, and anxiety.
The only true and sustainable wealth worth pursuing is our spirituality. On an
individual level, each of us must come to trust that spiritual cultivation is the
path to true health and happiness, which material gain can never actually
provide. On a collective level, it will take an entire paradigm shift: a world
movement that might capture the imagination of mankind. Such a movement’s
aim would be to release the enormous spiritual potential that is at present locked
up in the heart and mind of man.
The Bible teaches that ten percent of our earnings do not really belong to us,
and therefore should be given to tzedakah. It is easy to neglect our obligation to
give this amount of our earnings because we are so engrossed in our own
material gains. Such neglect blocks our awareness that all we have is directly
from God’s blessings. We then lose sight of the fact that we are given also the
share of our less fortunate brothers in order to redistribute it to them. If we do
not fulfill this obligation, the payment is taken from us in painful ways we may
not always be conscious of. I personally had to first lose a great deal of money
before understanding this lesson: I received driving tickets, health problems and
medical bills, and encounters with very dishonest people who cheated and
robbed me. It was clear that all of this happened because I did not remember to
share a tenth of my earnings with people in need around me.
This practice of donating the “tenth” could provide a model for a just and fair
society with a more balanced distribution of income. At the same time,
individuals with creative or entrepreneurial talent and ambition may be
acknowledged and encouraged. Through instituting tzedakah, the
psychophysical condition of the Western world may be healed from its
intoxicated “surplus.” So, too, may the awareness of the interdependence
between health problems and opulence be aroused.
Shared wealth should not be looked upon as a “communist” imposition, but
rather as a spontaneous process of self-management in a society mature enough
to understand the importance of preventing the dangerous imbalance of “haves”
and “have-nots”. According to statistics, one third of the world’s population are
starving, while the sickness and mortality rate in the other two thirds is, in great
part, the result of overeating.
In the illustration we see the forward movement of the rich man (gimel)
running after the poor man (dalet) in order to give him charity. Charity
benefits the giver even more than it does the recipient, for, as King
Solomon says, charity saves from death. The healing effect of charity not
only helps both the giver and the receiver, but sometimes it can even
literally save the lives of those who give.

Regretfully, the lack of adherence to and involvement in Jewish tradition and

studies caused the positive social movements of the 1960’s to lose their
momentum. Rebellious youth, who saw themselves as socially alienated and
exploited, lost the opportunity to strengthen their ideological foundation. It could
have been most productive to reveal the deep connections between today’s
struggle for social justice and that of the people of the Bible against Pharaoh,
which serves as a universal archetype for rebellion against tyranny and the
longing to create a fair society. Other Biblical parallels include verses that the
“Oral Tradition” (Mishnah) comments on the social reality concerning the
generation of the Tower of Babel. This was a prototype for the Egyptian slavery
system and for the industrial economical systems thousands of years later. “If a
person were to fall and die, no one would notice him; but if even a single brick
were to fall, they would sit and cry, ‘Woe unto us, for when will another brick be
brought up in its stead?’”

Dofek: “pulse”
Kabbalistic masters could discern both physical and spiritual pathologies from
pulse patterns. In the words of Rabbi Chaim Vital, “Know that just as physical
illnesses can be diagnosed from a person’s pulse by physical doctors, so could
my Master [the Ari] of blessed memory, discern the maladies of the soul by
feeling a person’s pulse.” (Sha’ar Ruach HaKodesh 3) According to the
Kabbalah, the pulse is the interface between the spiritual and physical
dimensions of our being. Rabbi Chaim Vital brings a Kabbalistic teaching of the
Ari: God brought about the Creation through the ten sefirot, ten modes of
creative power through which God’s infinite light was successively contracted
and muted in order to bring about a finite realm in which man can come to know
God. The vitality flowing from keter (“crown”) is “clothed” in the sefirah of
chochmah, “wisdom,” also called abba (“father”). The vitalizing power of abba
extends into the arteries and veins of the human body in the form of pulse
patterns that govern blood circulation. These pulse patterns are a garb for the
supreme vitality of the Infinite, which is concealed and clothed within these
pulse patterns. The pulse itself is abba, while the vitality contained within it is
the light and vitality of the Infinite, which gives man life.

Each of our souls is ultimately rooted in abba through the level of the soul
called the chayah, the “living essence.” From here vitality is channeled down
level by level, from the divine soul to the animal soul and into the body. The
vitality flowing into the body from Abba is expressed in the flow of ten sefirot.
This is why there are ten main pulse patterns: each one is a manifestation of a
particular kind of vitality flowing from the ten sefirot of Abba. In the words of
the Ari, each pulse pattern indicates from which aspect of Abba the vital energy
in the pulse is coming from.”
A pulse pattern is made up of a series of rhythmic beats or, in the language of
the Ari, “dots,” which vary in their spacing and intensity. The Ari teaches that
the various patterns exhibited by the pulse at different times correspond to the
forms of the Hebrew vowel signs, which are themselves made up of dots and
short lines in various combinations. The Hebrew vowels, like the letters, are
creative forces. If the letters are the building blocks of creation, the vowels
enable them to function together to form meaningful structures—words. Thus
the Kabbalah speaks of the Hebrew letters as bodies and the vowels as souls.
Just as the vowels “animate” the letters in different ways, so do our various pulse
patterns—expressions of various spiritual influences—give rise to different
rhythms of bodily functions and different kinds of vitality.
Thus, by identifying the vowel sign formed by a particular pulse pattern and
knowing the sefirah that corresponds to that vowel, it is possible to understand
what energy is coming into the individual’s soul and body at the moment the
pulse is taken.
In Rabbi Nachman’s beautiful tale, The Seven Beggars, the “Master of Prayer”
is capable of saving the Queen’s daughter from death because he knew the “Cure
of the Ten Pulses.” I will quote a few lines from this tale just to present an idea
about the deep meaning and value that Rabbi Nachman and the Kabbalah
attributed to knowing the “Cure of the Ten Pulses.”
The Queen’s daughter decided she would run into the castle, for she
preferred to drown in water rather than have the King of Evil catch her. He
ordered to shoot her; if she dies, she dies. They shot her, and all the ten types
of arrows that are smeared with the ten types of poisons struck her. And she,
the Queen’s daughter, ran into the water castle and entered its interior, passing
through all the doors of the watery walls, until she entered the castle’s interior,
fell down, and remained in a faint.
…And only I could heal her. For whoever does not have in his hands all the
ten varieties of charities cannot enter past all the ten walls of the water castle,
for he would drown in water. So the King and his soldiers pursued the
Queen’s daughter and were all drowned in water. But I can enter past all the
ten walls of the water castle. Now, the walls of water are sea waves standing
like a wall. The winds are what erect the waves of the sea and hold the waves
erect…waves that penetrate them with different force…And I can enter past
all the ten walls of the watery castle and I can pull out all ten arrows from the
Queen’s daughter, because I know all the ten varieties of pulse beats through
the ten fingers; for through each of the ten fingers, one can know a particular
pulse beat from the ten varieties of pulse-beats, and I can heal the Queen’s
daughter through all the ten varieties of melodies.

It is well known that diagnostic methods in TCM are based on pulses. How
these pulse patterns correspond to the sefirotic pulses of Kabbalistic healing is
beyond the scope of this book. However, it would be a very useful study to
pursue.
 CHAPTER 5
Hei

According to Sefer Yetzirah, the letter hei is associated with the month of
Nisan, the month of redemption. It is also related to the tribe of Judah—from
whom Mashiach will descend—and to the “sense” of speech, as we will
explain.71
According to modern Kabbalists, the advancement of computer technology,
which makes it possible to instantaneously communicate incredible amounts of
information, will hasten the redemption. Thus, the prophecy of Isaiah that states
that in the messianic future, the “earth will be filled with the knowledge of God
as the waters fill the sea” (Isaiah 11:9) will be realized.

Unambiguous communication
In Judaism, Mashiach is not God or a Divine being, but rather a flesh-and-
blood leader with “the gift of words,” the art of communicating with the hearts
and souls of his audience. Since, by Divine Providence, his advent has been
delayed until our generation, the messianic movement is making use of modern
technology to spread the “good news” of redemption to every corner of the
globe.
 Computers not only have made it possible to spread “the Word of God,” but
also to explain “the Word.” As a result, secret codes of the Bible have been
revealed. Throughout the centuries, the great Torah sages indicated that there
was a level of Torah which was unattainable, except for a very few. The Vilna
Gaon, known by his acronym the Gra (1727-1797), said that all the details of the
past, present and future are in the Torah. Now these encryptions, known as the
“Bible Codes,” are being revealed due to the research of the Hebrew University
mathematician and Biblical scholar, Dr. Eliyahu Rips, and similar investigations.
Because of the computer’s ability to display vast stretches of information, it is
possible to see word patterns spelling out events with incredible accuracy.

Hei, the gift of clear and pure communication

Another factor in the process of redemption is the rectification of speech.
When words are used for trivial, superficial communication or dangerous gossip,
they are in “exile,” removed from their role of spreading light. It is no accident
that the Hebrew word ‫ – חלול‬chilul (“blasphemy”) is derived from the root ‫– חלל‬
chalal (“void”). Chilul HaShem (“profanation of God’s name”) is thus
essentially a process that subtracts or “empties” reality of its true content: the
presence of God. The central prayer in Jewish liturgy ends with the words “My
God, guard my tongue from evil and my lips from speaking deceitfully,” in order
to remind us of the critical importance of the quality of our words.
Shema Yisrael is the most important prayer and “mission statement” of the
Jewish people: Listen Israel…You will love your God with all your heart and
with all your might…and you will teach these words to your children, and you
will speak about them when you are in your house and when you go on the way,
when you rise and when you lay down to sleep…

The Shema Yisrael prayer reminds us that spiritual life is not only about
silently meditating on God, but on revealing His presence through words which
are capable of filling the world with God’s presence.

Nisan, besides being the month of the original, seminal redemption of the
Jews from Egypt, is also the most propitious month for future, universal
redemption,72 through the rectification of the word. The Arizal73 teaches that
Pesach (“Passover”), which falls on the full moon of Nisan, literally means “the
mouth [peh] speaks [sach]”.74 In the Seder of Pesach, for hours Jews
acknowledge, relate, and sing praises of God’s miracles and Divine Providence.
This is the best possible use of the mouth: prayer and the transmission of faith
and truth.
The aforementioned association between Nisan, Passover, redemption, and the
“sense of speech” suggests that the future liberation of humanity from the bonds
of ignorance will depend on the improvement of both the content and technology
of information. Communication is meaningless unless it makes a positive
difference in the hearts and minds of the people. Otherwise, in Shakespeare’s
words, it is “full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”75
Unfortunately, today many people who meditate cannot even speak about the
depth of their spiritual experience. They often feel that they have to protect their
insights because other people will not understand and perhaps make fun of them.
They are even told by their teachers to try not to share their inner revelations.
Sometimes this dichotomy causes suffering because the soul ends up living in a
state of separation. One’s private life is cut off from one’s social life. While
navigating this dichotomy we sometimes manage to cut off a small a piece of our
day for spiritual life and continue living as down to earth human robots.76

Using speech to repair emotions and transform enemies into friends

Sarah Yehudit Schneider explains in her book You Are What You Hate, that
Rabbi Yisrael Ba’al Shem Tov, founder of the Chasidic movement, developed a
therapeutic system for dealing with enemies and serious conflicts. According to
his disciple, Rabbi Yitzchak of Komarna, some fragments of our soul exist
outside of us. We may find them in nature—in a fruit, a tree, a flower, or in a
particular scene, whose vision resonates and touches our inner being. Most
importantly, we can find sparks of ourselves within other people. At the level of
nefesh (life soul), part of our soul may incarnate in the material things that
belong to us and to which we are particularly attached (houses, objects, plants,
animals, etc.); on the ruach level (the emotional soul), fragments of our soul can
be incarnated into friends, colleagues, boyfriends, or spouses. On the level of
neshamah (the spiritual soul), parts of our soul merge with the people who are
deeply connected with the roots of our soul, like our children, spiritual teachers,
or soul-mates.
 Just as we can benefit and evolve spiritually from certain herbs or medicines,
we also do so from our relationships with friends and family. Sometimes the
lessons necessary to transform us can be learned by some deeply negative and
conflicting interactions. If we are not able to recognize the subtle, conflicting
dynamics when someone offends, insults, or robs us (energetically or
materially), our instinctive response is to sever the relationship as a result of
projecting the “evil” outside of us. However, if we can manage to transcend our
pain and anger, it is possible that these people hold a fragment of our soul, and
the possibility of our spiritual elevation. For example, according to the Talmud,
every time we are unjustly accused of something, it is possible that there is a
fraction of truth to the accusation that can inspire us to progress, instead of being
angry.
Therefore, it is best to reflect upon what our perceived enemies have to teach
us and to use that knowledge to improve ourselves, i.e. redeem that part of our
soul which needs to be rectified. By doing so, we learn the necessary lessons and
remove any future conflicts of this kind. Otherwise, these people will forever be
in our lives, or we will continuously encounter these same situations until we
evolve to a higher level. In fact, it will not be easy for us to rid ourselves of these
people who are, in effect, holding a part of our souls “hostage” because they are
part of us. For this reason we must pray for our “enemy.” Instead of approaching
him with anger, we must be grateful for this precious opportunity for spiritual
growth. Thus we eliminate the need for any future confrontation of this kind.
A clear and enlightened mind has the ability to resolve personal conflicts as
well as strife among others. This ability to understand why and how a conflict
developed and to explain this process to others was referred to by the prophets as
safah berurah (“crystal-clear language”). According to the Sefer Yetzirah, Nisan,
the month of redemption, is especially the time to rectify communication by
speaking the truth clearly and perfectly. The precise language of safah berurah
enlightens both the speaker and the listener. A word that “enlightens” can
appease, pacify and even convert the enemy, as we can see in the transformation
of the word oiyev (“enemy”) into the word ohev (“friend”): the only difference
being a hei, the letter of communication! Clearly, speech is the most effective
and indeed the only tool of conflict resolution.
In the event that communication fails to explain to the “enemy” the
destructiveness of his behavioral choices, then transformation may occur via the
element of fire in the form of prayer which is today’s replacement for the burnt
offerings in the Temple. Passionate and sincere prayer has the power to effect the
metamorphosis of “enemy” into “friend”. The verse: “You made us pass through
fire and water, but in the end you brought us to a [land of] abundance (revaiya),”
alludes to the transformation of emotions through prayer and meditation. The
fire of prayer, affecting alchemic transformation, is the only element able to
drain the stagnant water of non-rectified emotions. The strategy proposed by the
Ba’al Shem Tov, requires the achievement of a balance between the inclination
towards understanding and the tendency towards intolerance. Intolerance
represents an attitude (e.g., a “black and white” perspective), in which the fixed
goal is to eliminate the enemy by any means, without asking too many questions,
and without doubt or compromise.
However, if we perceive the world from a unified perspective in which light
and dark touch and blend together, and within each part is found aspects of the
other, then what emerges is the need to devise a different strategy. It is essential
to be aware that within each of our enemies, those who provoke us, there is a
part of us that needs to be rectified.
The Rebbe of Komarna explains that the theory of the Ba’al Shem Tov is
extremely profound and important. Our shadow zone sometimes is composed of
a number of sparks that are found outside of us. Thereby our conflicting
relationships provide us with the opportunity to work on them. Just as it is our
duty to elevate the positive sparks that concern us (contained in fruit, scents,
tastes, and sights that resonate with our soul), it is also our duty to elevate the
fragments of our souls which are inside of people and situations which have
negative effects upon us.
Another reason that should prompt us to overcome the immature attitude of
wanting to eliminate these negative fragments from our lives is that the more we
reject them, the more they will try to force us to deal with them!!! Consequently,
a tikun (an elevation of our soul’s fragments) that could be accomplished
relatively quickly sometimes lasts for years and even through repeated
reincarnations.
Personally, I have tried dozens of times to distance myself from a negative
person or confront them in a heated verbal controversy, only to realize that this
was creating a new spiral of antagonism. By internalizing the teachings of the
Baal Shem Tov, I was able to realize that certain people did not come into my
life purely by chance. I realized that I was being challenged by these very
“enemies” to repair what needed to be fixed in myself.
 Our enemies, in fact, challenge us to strengthen ourselves by summoning up
all of our spiritual powers, including that of prayer and forgiveness. Forgiving
injustices not only elevates those who manage to do it, but profoundly
transforms both poles of the relationship. The level of forgiveness that some
survivors of the Holocaust have managed to attain (in order to not be destroyed
by their own hatred) has opened the doors to accelerated evolution for a huge
number of German people. An impressive number of children and grandchildren
of Nazis are currently living and studying in Israel, repaying their karmic debt to
the Jewish people. The little Israeli village of Migdal, where I lived for fifteen
years, hosts a large community of German converts who initially came to Israel
to help the survivors of concentration camps. These individuals (who were often
relatives or children of Nazis) were so impressed by the survivors’ humanity and
empathy towards them that they decided to join Israel, the people whom their
nation had tried to annihilate.

Speech of gratitude
Another rectified use of speech that humanity must learn is how to express
gratitude to those who help them. Acknowledgement and gratitude are so central
to Judaism that it is even forbidden to step on bread if we find a piece of it on the
street. Instead, we are commanded to pick it up and move it, as a sign of respect
for our main source of nourishment.77 The Oral Tradition78 refers to man as
medaber (“the being who speaks”). In other words, he can fully express gratitude
after receiving a favor, and is able to make use of words in order to enlighten the
world around him.
We are obligated to acknowledge the good that others do for us, and not to
take kindness for granted. Just as we thank God for His goodness to us in our
prayers of thanksgiving, we must strive to convey our love and gratitude in our
personal relationships.
We learn about another type of “rectified” use of speech from Judah, the
progenitor of the tribe that adopted his name. Sefer Yetzirah associates Judah
with the letter hei, the final letter in God’s four lettered name that represents
malchut (“revealed reality”). On a human level, this corresponds to speech, the
revealed expression of one’s essence.
The Biblical story of Judah and Tamar represents the rectified use of speech
through the admission of one’s mistakes. The Torah gives us a description of
Judah’s remarkable ability for self-criticism. When his daughterin-law Tamar,
obviously pregnant, is accused of having illicit relations, Judah favors the truth
over his own public image. When he becomes aware of his responsibility for her
pregnancy, he admits it, publicly acknowledging that “she has been more
righteous than me.”79
Unfortunately, the spiritual path of many modern leaders—and of most of us
—is often limited by our need to justify ourselves and rationalize our actions.
This distances us from God as well as from our loved ones. Searching for the
words that will heal and repair is tantamount to liberating speech from its exile.
The power of rectified speech allows the hei to transform our thoughts into
words that lead to individual and collective redemption. As King Solomon
taught, “Death and life are in the power of the tongue.”80
 CHAPTER 6
Vav

The perception of the Divine in the natural world

Vav is a vertical line, acting as a conduit between above and below, heaven
and earth. Sefer Yetzirah links this letter to the sign of Taurus and Issachar, the
tribe of scholars who were both farmers and astronomers. Connected to the
natural rhythms of the earth and the celestial bodies, those of Issachar were able
to experience the words of King David: “Day by day utters speech; night by
night expresses knowledge.”81
The shape of the letter vav consists of a yud and a straight line. According to
Chassidut, Divine knowledge is represented by the yud. This knowledge
descends into the material word through the long, vertical channel of the vav.
According to the theory of tzimtzum,82 “contracted” Divine light passes through
this channel, enlivening the lower, material world.
In the same way, the tribe of Issachar linked heavenly Divine knowledge with
practical, down-to-earth know-how. Far from being a tribe of simple farmers, it
produced many Torah scholars, who performed the complex calculations
required to regulate the Jewish calendar: “the tribe of Issachar, they who have
knowledge of times.”83 Because of their connection to the land, they were in fact
most familiar with the cycles of time, the rhythm of the seasons, including the
astrological signs regarding the planting and harvesting of crops. They were also
responsible for establishing the correct timing of Jewish holidays as well as
when to go out to war.
 Issachar is described as being attuned to a life of rest and contemplation: “He
saw that rest was good, and the land, that it was pleasant.”84 The tribe of
Issachar knew how to deeply experience and appreciate the physical and
spiritual benefits of ‫ – מנוחה‬menuchah (“relaxation and rest”). Maybe for this
reason they are associated by the Sefer Yetzirah with the kidneys, the organ most
linked, according to TCM, with the function of resting, storing energy and
connecting to the deepest sources of wisdom in relaxation.
Our sages teach that Abraham learned the Torah from his kidneys. Through
deep contemplation Abraham was able to acquire wisdom from his body before
the Torah was given on Mount Sinai.
In traditional Chinese medicine, the kidneys are the organs related both to
inner wisdom and to willpower. They are also considered the organs that
preserve and dispense our deepest energy reserves. This is referred to as the
kidney yin. Someone with strong and healthy kidney yin will have a strong and
healthy will, whereas a person who has overtaxed their kidney yin with
excessive activity or improper lifestyle will have a weakened will. The kidneys
are depleted by all types of overexertion. This demands that they dispense
energy reserves more quickly than the reserves can be replenished. Rest, sleep,
and stillness nourish the kidneys’ deep and powerful reserves of energy and
wisdom. A verse in the Torah about Issachar, the wisest tribe of Israel,
appropriately affirms this: “Issachar knew that ‘rest is good.”
A short quote from The Web that Has No Weaver gives us an idea of the subtle
but powerful role of rest in creating the environment for motivation and will:
“The Yin will is elusive, almost intangible. It is noticed in stillness. It is the
recognition that the deepest force requires no effort.”
The Chinese sages knew the importance of rest and stillness in order to
preserve our life force, our will and also our wisdom. This same value is
preserved in the Jewish tradition through the commandment of observing the
Shabbat, a day of menuchah (“total rest”). By resting fully once a week, we are
given the opportunity to enter the depth and the stillness of the kidney energy, to
replenish our reserves of Yin, that subtle inner force that will give support to our
activity. By entering into stillness we also receive mental replenishment and are
reminded that a great part of moving through life requires the peacefulness of
allowing, rather than putting all our efforts into exerting our will on the world
around us. As the tradition of Shabbat (the absolute symbol of rest in Jewish
tradition) suggests, our active life must first be nourished inside. Only then can
we exert a positive influence on the world during the coming six working days.
On Shabbat, the day of rest, we are called upon to experience the state of
menuchah so dear to the tribe of Issachar. In the words of the liturgy of the
Shabbat afternoon, “a rest of peace, serenity, a perfect and complete rest, which
You want us to experience. May Your children recognize and know that from
You is their rest, and by their rest they sanctify Your Name.”

Contemplation of nature
The anniversary of the death of Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai, author of the
Zohar, is commemorated on the 18th day of the month of Iyar,85 which
corresponds to the sign of Taurus, as we have noted. His work was inspired in
the context of nature: the olive trees of the Galilee, the lake of Tiberias, the cave
where he lived and where he and his disciples withdrew for periods of
meditation and study. This great sage received and transmitted the highest
teachings of Kabbalah while immersed in the Land of Israel.
In the Kabbalistic text Tomer Devorah—The Palm Tree of Deborah, by Rabbi
Moshe Cordevero, such periods of study, carried out in close contact with the
natural environment, are defined as gerushin (“self-imposed isolation from the
social world”). In former times, groups of students who were very close to their
teacher and totally dedicated to the study of the secrets of Jewish mysticism
preferred to conduct their studies in a natural environment away from centers of
human habitation in order to support their kavanah (“directed awareness”) and
contemplation. The Ba’al Shem Tov is known to have frequently entered the
forest to pray. In the quiet, undisturbed solitude of nature, we can best hear that
“still, small voice”86 of the soul that is our spiritual connection (our personal
vav, which also means “hook”) to God.
The most common method of meditation practiced by the patriarchs and
taught by the great masters, including Rabbi Avraham ben HaRambam (the son
of Maimonides), is contemplation of nature, especially the vast, starry celestial
spaces and the sea. The power of such reflection to enhance Divine awareness is
alluded to by the fact that the Hebrew word ‫ – הטבע‬hateva (“nature”) has the
same numerical value, 86, as ‫ – אלקים‬Elokim, the name of God specifically
associated with nature.87
The letter vav is associated with the Hebrew month of Iyar. The modern
State of Israel, whose purpose, like the letter vav, is to unify heaven and
earth, was founded in the month of Iyar. The tribe associated with the
letter vav in Sefer Yetzirah is Issachar.

The body and health in the month of Iyar

The body, whose spinal column resembles the straight line of the vav, is also
associated with the month of ‫ – אייר‬Iyar. The word ‫ – אייר‬Iyar is composed of the
initials of the verse ‫ – אני יי רפאך‬Ani Hashem rofeicha (“I am God who heals
you”).88 This, according to the Oral Tradition, designates Iyar as the best month
for healing.89 The body is the vessel of the soul, and we are therefore obligated
to maintain our physical health as much as possible. When we are not healthy,
our physical discomfort becomes our sole focus and our spiritual awareness
diminishes.
 Through a healthy body Divine light can flow freely, giving energy and
nourishment to every organ. The following passage, taken from Maimonides’
Prayer of the Jewish Physician, sheds light on the holistic approach, the non-
duality of body and soul, in Jewish tradition:
Almighty God, You created the human body with infinite wisdom. You
have combined in it ten-thousand times ten-thousand organs that act
unceasingly and harmoniously to preserve the whole in all its beauty: the
body, which is the envelope of the immortal soul. They are ever acting in
perfect order, agreement, and accord; yet when the frailty of matter or the
unbridling of passions deranges this order or interrupts this accord, then forces
clash and the body crumbles into the primal dust from which it came. You
send to man diseases as beneficent messengers to foretell of approaching
danger and to urge him to avert it.

Sharing the same view, Traditional Chinese Medicine theorizes that disease is
caused by imbalance or conflict among the Five Elements. Healing is therefore
the result of rebalancing relations among the various organs and their associated
elements and emotions. Kidney-Water imbalance will affect the Liver-Wood
energy (trees need Water in order to grow). Such an imbalance will, in turn,
cause damage to the heart-fire (which needs wood to be able to burn), which will
then create an imbalance in spleen-earth. The Earth without Sun cannot give
fruits; the stomach without heat cannot digest food. This imbalance will
eventually damage the Lungs-Metal. Indeed, earth that is poor does not contain
minerals (Metal). The weakness of metal (Lungs) will create an imbalance in
Water. As a matter of fact, in nature water is collected by metal spoons or pots.
As medical science teaches, lungs and the kidneys must effectively cooperate for
the water passages to flow.
Awareness of the emotions that cause organ dysfunctions and disrupt the
perfect order and cooperation of the systems is the primary condition for healing.
The Oral Tradition clearly refers to physical healing being synonymous with
psychological and spiritual healing: “Great is teshuvah (“repentance”) because it
brings healing to the world.”90

Health as a process of renewed creation

The word ‫ – בריאה‬beriah (“creation”) contains all the letters of the word ‫– בריא‬
bari (“healthy”). According to the Kabbalah, one’s health is dependent upon his
or her ability to continually “re-create” oneself—professionally, spiritually,
psychologically, and emotionally. This renewal involves the faith and constant
trust that every seeming setback and reversal is intended to strengthen us. If we
were spared every challenge, we would not experience growth or achieve new
levels of awareness. Self-expression and creativity are the basic tools we can use
to recover our health. The word ‫ – רפואה‬refuah (“healing”) can be seen as a
combination of the words ‫ – אור‬or and ‫ – פה‬peh (“light of the mouth”), in other
words: verbal expression.91
These concepts are also expressed in Jewish liturgy, as we read in the first
blessing recited after awakening and ridding the body of waste:92
Blessed are You, King of the Universe, who fashioned man with wisdom
and created within him many openings and many cavities…. If but one of
them were to be ruptured or but one of them were to be blocked, it would be
impossible...to stand before You93 for even one hour.

In Psalms, the mystical experience of union between body and soul is clearly
expressed by the following verse: “Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is
within me bless His holy Name.”94
In the Shabbat morning liturgy, we find the same thought:
From severe, numerous, and enduring diseases You spared us…. Therefore,
the organs that You set within us and the spirit and soul that You breathed into
our nostrils…all of them shall thank and bless You…. Every knee shall bend
 to You…and all innards and kidneys will sing to Your Name, as it is written,95
“Lord! Who is like unto You?”

In the central passage of the daily liturgy, during the Amidah (“standing”
prayer), we bow four times, first bending at our knees and then bending forward
with our backs, curving the spinal cord, which is symbolized by the vav. The
Oral tradition explains that the eighteen blessings of the Amidah prayer
correspond to the eighteen vertebrae that bend in the act of bowing.96 According
to both osteopathy and acupuncture, the act of bowing and keeping the spinal
column elastic enhances one’s physical health. The Talmud says that we are
obligated to bow during the Amidah to the extent that “all one’s vertebrae
stretch.”97 On a spiritual level, by bowing we acknowledge our humility as we
come before the Divine King with our prayers. The vav, the straight line that
symbolizes the direct connection between heaven and earth, must also be humble
and flexible in God’s presence.
 CHAPTER 7
Zayin

Zayin is the seventh letter of the alphabet, and its numerical value is seven.
Therefore, the zayin has a strong association with the seventh day, Shabbat, the
day of rest.

Remember the Shabbat Day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor and do
all your work; but the seventh day is a Shabbat unto the Lord your God. On it
you shall not do any manner of work—you, your son, your daughter, your
manservant, your maidservant, your cattle, and your stranger that is within
your gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea and all
that in them is, and rested on the seventh day; wherefore the Lord blessed the
Shabbat Day and hallowed it.

According to Jewish tradition, success in the six days of work depends on the
blessing bestowed upon us by resting on the Shabbat. Just as the true musician is
recognized by his ability to accentuate the intensity of musical pauses, so does
the quality of human existence totally depend on our capacity to “pause” and
cease all our work on the Shabbat. The Shabbat is a gift that we are commanded
to extend to our animals, to those who work for us, to strangers, and to all who
are within our gates. For one day a week all creation is called to experience the
bliss of stillness.
 We live in a time-based reality, and our bodies are wired to function
rhythmically, in intervals such as waking, praying, eating, working, and sleeping.
Shabbat offers us an island in time that is disconnected from the demands and
requirements of our everyday existence. Just as God rested from His work, so
too do we take a rest from ours. We spare both the universe and ourselves from
our manipulations. We do not make changes in the world around us. Instead, we
step back and enjoy the world as it is.
The Shabbat is the ultimate expression and exercise of our freedom. Only
human beings have been endowed with the blessing of choosing rest. On
Shabbat the telephone is ignored, television and radio are silent, and food has
already been cooked and only needs to be enjoyed. There is no traveling, and
any thoughts, activities, or speech having to do with money-related subjects, are
avoided for almost twenty-six hours.
 On the other hand, the Hebrew word ‫ – זן‬zan refers to sources of nourishment
for humans, and the word ‫ – זין‬zayin itself means “weapon,” which hints at the
“struggle” of earning a living. This is only an apparent contradiction. Work can
be so all-consuming that, in our effort to earn a living, we can forget to “make a
life.” The Shabbat is the cure for the Yang totally taking over the Yin (the
introspective aspect of life). The Maharal of Prague explains that the number 6
symbolizes the six directions of space (above, below, and the four lateral
directions), in which physical labor takes place, while 7 is the center, the
untouchable heart of the cube—the Shabbat, the source of all the blessings for
the entire week.98 In order to gather the strength to meet the demands made of us
during the six workdays, we must reconnect to our higher self by recreating our
own center. The effort involved in making this day intensely different from the
rest of the week is parallel to the effort of working with an honest, pure, and
enlightened state of consciousness on the other six days.
Sefer Yetzirah connects zayin to the month of Sivan, in which the Torah was
given on Mount Sinai, and to the tribe of Zebulun. We can wonder whether it
might not be more appropriate to associate the Torah revelation with the tribe of
Issachar, the tribe of scholars, rather than with the entrepreneurs of Zebulun.
In Jewish thought, however, the way we earn our living is of major
importance in our spiritual lives. Doing work that is not ours is like “sleeping
with a prostitute.” According to Kabbalah, finding the work that best suits us is
as crucial as finding our “soul mate.”99 God joins work partners as well as soul
mates. Honest and correct partnerships are so important that the sages tell us that
the first question a soul is asked when it reaches the Afterlife is: “Were you
honest in your business dealings?”
The correct energy dynamics between the Yang and the Yin aspect of zayin is
central to Judaism. The Torah does not advise spiritual seekers to go to a convent
or a monastery to meditate. Rather, the Torah clearly encourages one to “work
for six days, and rest (a deep complete rest) on the seventh day.” On Shabbat,
our commitment is in the realm of “not doing.” During the week, the effort is
about “doing” in a state of higher awareness. In TCM terminology, we could call
the Shabbat the Yin that nourishes the Yang.
Keeping Shabbat is central to Judaism. Thus, we understand that the
sanctification of God’s Name occurs in the dimension of stillness and
meditation. Says the prophet Ezekiel: “Not in the wind, not in the storm…but in
the still small voice…” We read in the liturgy of the Shabbat afternoon, “a rest of
peace, serenity, a perfect and complete rest, which You want us to experience.
May Your children recognize and know that from You is their rest, and by their
rest they sanctify Your Name.”
The need to stop creative activity and go inside during Shabbat can also be
explained from an astrological perspective. The Hebrew name of the planet
Saturn (Shabtai) shares the same root as the word Shabbat. The energies of this
planet, which rules the seventh day, are not conducive to action. Saturn is known
as the planet that blocks and thwarts creative human effort. It is therefore much
more natural to withdraw and abstain from action and work on this day.
For centuries the first Christians also observed the seventh day on Shabbat,
Saturday, the day of Saturn, and not on Sun-day. From the astrological
perspective, the energy of the sun is much less conducive to introspection and
withdrawal and more inspiring to ‘action’. Maybe one of the reasons why
Western society is so extroverted and unable to go ‘inside’ is that its day of rest
is under the influence of the Sun, a heavenly body that is inspiring the fire of
activity. In fact, many Westerners spend their day of “rest” engaging in active
sports, traveling on crowded highways, or participating in social activities that
deprive them of the rest available on the seventh day.

Discovering the correct rhythm of Yin and Yang100

 As mentioned above, the letter zayin is associated with the tribe of Zebulun.101
In reference to the continuous journeys of this tribe of navigators and traders,
it is written: “Rejoice, Zebulun, in your going out.”102 External movement, the
capacity to go far, is possible especially thanks to the ability to return “home.”
The root of the name Zebulun (from ‫ – זבול‬zevul, “abode”, “dwelling”) means to
“have a home,” a deep root to return to.
According to Maimonides, staying healthy, happy, and balanced when
working, traveling, extending oneself beyond our limits, depends on being able
to live in a correct rhythm of strain and rest. Therefore, if we do not keep
Shabbat, we may end up consuming our Yin. Yin is the inherited essence of our
life force needed to keep our immune system healthy. Instead of depleting our
Yin through overworking, it is better that we should keep it for staying alive!
Our society does not accord to the night, the Queen of the Yin, the respect we
owe her. Thanks to electricity, we can deny the fact that it is night, the time for
sleep and energy recuperation. We can pretend that it is still day!
As Nechama Sarah Burgeman points out in The Twelve Dimensions of Israel,
Zebulun’s stone, as it appears on the High priest’s breastplate, is a white pearl.
Our sages explain that its white color alludes to the whiteness of silver, which
symbolizes wealth. Because Zebulun understood the pure source of money—that
everything belongs to and comes from God—he was able to rectify the greed
(symbolized by the color green) usually associated with money. Perhaps this is
another reason that Zebulun merits being associated with the month in which the
Revelation at Mount Sinai occurred. This cosmic event impressed on all of our
souls that Ain od milvado (“There is nothing besides God”). All of the detailed
Divine laws guiding our conduct in the material world of plurality return our
consciousness to this truth.
Zayin means a “metal sword.” The metal sword cuts away the old in order to
make space for the new (also “new air,” as we mentioned in the chapter on the
letter alef: new ideas, new relationships, etc.). Metal is also associated with the
management of money (metal coins), which is an important issue for traders and
for old age, represented by metal. Also, metal and the lungs have to do with the
going in and out of breath (as we saw in the chapter about alef) as well as the
soul going into and out of our body; birth and death. The quoted verse, “Rejoice
in your going out…” can be associated with the idea of the metal element and
old age as a time of spiritual preparation for leaving this world, letting go in joy,
celebrating the last stages of detachment from human evolution, of separating
from our possessions, money, and people.
Realizing the bliss of the World-to-Come can help some people to breathe
their last breath in peace and awareness of the infinite Divine love. This is why
not only Buddhism and Kabbalah, but also psychologists and doctors today are
trying to teach terminally ill people to be ready to face the world to come with a
smile. “Rejoice, Zebulun, in your going out…” This attitude is not easy in a
society that mostly lives as if there is only “one world”. Deep spiritual
preparation is needed in order to not be afraid of the unknown and to establish a
connection of love and trust to our spiritual guides, beloved parents, and
grandparents who are already living in the World of Heavens.

Memory and time: central aspects of Jewish life

Zayin is also the first letter of the words ‫ – זמן‬zeman (“time”) and ‫ – זכר‬zecher
(“memory”). Much of our successful spiritual and psychological growth depends
on our relationship with time and memory. The Name of God, the
Tetragrammaton, suggests the union of past, present, and future:103 by
combining the letters of the Tetragrammaton in various ways, we obtain the
Hebrew words for was, is, and will be. This hints to how God is beyond all time,
yet involved in every aspect of all time dimensions that we pass through.
Observing the Jewish holidays helps create a well-balanced relationship with
these three dimensions of time. On the one hand, as we reconnect to the events
of the past through rituals and prayer, we experience the trials and salvations that
our forefathers experienced. In doing so, we also reactivate the same energy and
states of consciousness they experienced, which helps reinforce our faith in the
positive promise of our future.
 The holiday of Passover illustrates the importance of remembering: we recall
the story of the Exodus to remind ourselves of our past slavery, in order to
remain constantly aware of the danger of spiritual, emotional, and psychological
decline into all kinds of slavery (food, drugs, work, emotional traumas,
relationships…)104 On Passover, eating maror (bitter herbs), dipping in salt
water (to feel the taste of tears), and the numerous rituals of the Pesach seder105
have one single aim: to recall and arouse our awareness of the bitterness and
suffering of slavery—of any kind of slavery—and the possibility of freedom.
By remembering God’s continuing presence in our personal history, we also
can access the different qualities of time, related to the different “faces” of
Divinity. As is written in Ecclesiastes:106
To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the
heaven:
A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to reap that
which is planted;
A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build
up;
A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to
embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
A time to reap, and a time to sow; a time to keep silent, and a time to speak;
A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of war, and a time of peace.

Flowing with time is a religious precept in Judaism. Our sages teach that
Pesach (“Passover”) is a time when all of nature is escaping from the chains of
cold and winter. Similarly, Yom Kippur, the Day of Forgiveness, could only be in
the month of empathy and compassion, and the day of Purim (in which we must
reach the state of equanimity necessary for not seeing the difference between
good and bad in our lives) could only happen in the full moon of Adar, the
month of Pisces.
In our daily life, if we speak when we should listen, if we remain silent when
we should speak up, if we embrace when we should refrain from embracing, if
we want to win when we have already lost, we are not tuned in to “God’s time.”
For thousands of years in the East, the Book of Changes has been a guide for
men of wisdom to inquire and tune in with the right times for action and
contemplation, following the Divine energy flow.
A tool for tuning into the present moment is the practice of reciting the
blessings that are appropriate for any particular given situation. For example,
when someone dies we recite a particular blessing of accepting the Heavenly
decree. There are special blessings we recite when we see the ocean, smell the
scent of a fruit, or eat a certain type of food. Blessings are a type of meditation
through which we totally immerse ourselves in the present moment. Thus, we
avoid the psychological malady of either constantly projecting into the future or
digressing into the past.107 The condition of absolute awareness can be learned
from children, who know how to totally concentrate on what they are doing at
any given moment. As Zen masters also teach: “When you sit, sit; when you
walk, walk; when you eat, eat!”

Zayin, the Seven Noahide Laws

The Seven Noahide Laws are the universal aspect of the Torah, which belong
to all of humanity. I will explain their origin.
Humanity did not prove itself to be worthy of God’s trust and thus forfeited its
right to exist. Therefore, God sent the Flood. Only Noah and his family were
saved, because Noah was “righteous” despite the influence of his depraved
generation. After the Flood, God revealed Himself for the first time since the
creation of Adam, in order to stipulate the terms of His pact with Noah and his
descendants.
We were promised that there would never again be a flood to destroy
humanity. Human beings, however, would have to accept and obey God’s
precepts, the “seven precepts of the children of Noah.” These became the laws
that define moral life.
No dogma is imposed in the Noahide laws. Indeed, any philosophy, theology,
or legal system could be based on the Noahide principles. In his explanation of
these seven precepts, Maimonides comments,
Moses our teacher transmitted the Torah and the laws only to Israel…and to
those of the people who decide to convert…. No one can be forced to adopt
them. What all human beings should instead accept as Divine legislation are
the precepts given to the children of Noah…. Anyone who adopts, professes,
and puts them into practice is called righteous, and will have a portion in the
 world to come.108

This is a further acknowledgement of the equality of man, since all humanity

descends from Noah. With the exception of Noah and his family, all humanity
prior to the flood had violated moral principles that guide human behavior. In the
path to redemption, the process of spreading the Seven Precepts of Noah is
considered a fundamental step.
Here are the Seven Precepts, with brief commentary:109
• To acknowledge the existence of a single God, infinite and superior to
everything, and to not replace Him with idols (including other human
beings, or ourselves). This precept includes prayer to God, meditation, and
the study of spirituality.
• To respect the Creator. As frustrating as it might be, given the
circumstances, there must be no expression, not even jokingly, of disrespect
toward the Creator.
• Not to murder. Every person is an entire world. Saving a life means saving
an entire world, and destroying a life means destroying an entire world.
Helping others to live, with every form of assistance, is a corollary of this
precept.
• To respect the institution of marriage, since the union between man and
woman is a reflection of the union between God and His Creation. Marriage
is a Divine institution, and therefore every form of dishonesty within it is
considered a desecration of that Union.
• Not to steal. One must do one’s work honestly. By trusting in God, rather
than in one’s own powers, one expresses one’s faith in He who sustains life.
• To respect God’s creatures. Adam was created to care for and to protect all
creatures of the Garden of Eden. At the beginning, eating the flesh of
animals was forbidden.110 After the Flood, it was allowed, but on the
condition that no avoidable suffering would be caused to living creatures.111
• To maintain justice. True justice is a Divine task, but humanity is required
to do all it can to reinforce justice by applying the law. When societies are
just, humanity becomes God’s partner in the work of Creation.

Unfortunately, the Jews did not succeed in spreading those laws. This is partly
due to their difficult relations with the nations (thousands of years of
persecutions), and forgetting the importance of such a universal inheritance.
Today there is a large number of people who are interested in Kabbalah, or who
want to convert. According to the sages, in reality there is no extra spiritual merit
in being a Jew over being a non-Jew practicing the Seven Noahide Laws. The
real mission of the Jewish people is not to convert people to their religion (on the
contrary, they try to persuade people not to become Jews) but to help create a
world not only more “enlightened,” but also more ethical, towards humans and
animals alike.
 CHAPTER 8
Chet

According to Sefer Yetzirah the letter chet is associated with Cancer—the sign
of feminine energy, the moon, water, and maternity. According to Jewish
tradition, as well as psychoanalysis and astrology the moon represents the inner
world, the unconscious, the emotions, and the deepest needs to nourish and to be
nourished. The energy of chet corresponds to the Yin principle.

The feminine principle and the role of women in redemption

In today’s Western society, many women are forced to work outside of their
homes and, consequently, to delegate the care of their children to daycare centers
or unrelated caregivers. These substitutes cannot fully meet children’s deep need
for their mothers’ presence and affection. Children thus deprived run the risk of
developing various neuroses. It is not unreasonable to hypothesize that many
psychosomatic disorders, such as obesity, bulimia, and anorexia, are a reaction to
homogenized baby food and other convenience foods that the patterns of modern
society force us to consume from a very young age. We eat in a hurry removed
from the family setting and rituals, without a tale or a song.
Individuals who are particularly fragile and who do not receive sufficient love
and protection from their mothers are liable to be wounded in the deepest layers
of their soul. Just as the moon, representing the psyche, rotates around the earth,
the symbol of the body, the relationship between the emotional and physical
worlds is extremely intertwined. If the soul’s wounds are not healed, they can
manifest themselves as serious physical disorders. This is illustrated by the
similarity between the Hebrew words sartan (“cancer”) and sarat (“scratch”).
The scratches left on our body as well as on our subconscious when unattended
can, God forbid, lead to cancer.
According to the Oral Tradition, the Exodus from Egypt took place by the
merit of enlightened Jewish women, who were able to guide their husbands and
children on the path to liberation. Precisely because of the wisdom displayed by
the women of the generation of the Exodus, God instructed Moses to
communicate the commandments to the women first, and only afterward to the
men: “Say to the house of Jacob [which represents the community of women of
Israel] and [afterward] speak to the children of Israel [which are the men of
Israel].”112 According to the commentaries, this instruction was based on the
idea that women (the house of Jacob) would best be able to ensure proper
interpretation and communication of the Divine word. In the Garden of Eden,
when God communicated His first commandment only to Adam, without
articulating it directly to Eve, dramatic misunderstandings brought tragedy for
the whole of humanity.
In the Book of Proverbs,113 King Solomon says, “Listen, my son, to the
mussar (“rules of conduct”) of your father, and do not abandon the Torah of your
mother.” These words imply that the psychological and spiritual training of
children is in the maternal domain. It is the mother who communicates lessons
about life through the “Teaching of Life,” Torat Haim. It is her energy, her
watchful concern, her nourishing, her love, and her example that helps the child
to develop, not only physically but also emotionally. The father’s domain is the
child’s education relating to morality and norms of behavior that we refer to as
the mussar of the father. This starts later in life. According to Mosaic law, “a Jew
is one who is born to a Jewish mother.” This emphasizes the profoundly deep
connection between mother and child, whose education regarding life lessons
begins at gestation, as we read in Masechet Niddah:
…the fetus is sitting in the womb of his mother for nine months, wrapped in
the bliss of the Garden of Eden, while an angel holding a candle above his
head instructs him in the Torah. Thanks to the candle that the angel holds on
top of the child’s head, the fetus, like Adam in the Garden of Eden, has the
gift of prophetic vision and can see from one end of the universe to the other
and lives in a state of deep ecstasy. In fact, during the pregnancy the mother
 allows the fetus to experience, to “know” the love of God, through the
satisfaction of each need and desire. For this reason, during pregnancy the
woman is treated with extra care and is never refused the satisfaction of any of
her cravings for a particular food no matter how strange it may seem, so that
also the fetus should not be denied this fulfillment.

Subsequently, the Midrash continues to explain:

…at the time of birth, the baby receives a “slap” on the lip from the same
angel who lovingly trained him for nine months. The tap (including the nose
and the upper lip, in the area corresponding to point g26 of Chinese
acupuncture: the point of unconsciousness) makes him forget in an instant
everything he had learned in the preceding nine months of gestation.
Nevertheless, the angel whispers to him a final teaching: “Be fair and do not
sin!”

Each person spends an entire life recalling the memories of those teachings,
buried in the unconscious, in order to become, one day, capable of being just, of
putting into practice all the teachings of the angel stored in his subconscious.
Connecting with water, especially through the ritual of immersion in the mikveh,
has among its functions the goal of helping us remember who we really are…

The “teachings of life” are transmitted through breastfeeding

Following the nine months of pregnancy and the birth of the child, the life
lessons are transmitted through breastfeeding. Jewish tradition recommends that
for two years the only source of nourishment for children should be breast milk.
According to Jewish mysticism, this is necessary because the mother must help
the child to develop a total trust in the loving providence of God, of which she is
the conscious channel. Breastfeeding is the most powerful channel through
which the child comes into contact with faith in “good” and divine protection.
Not surprisingly, the Hebrew word shad, which means breast, has an identical
root to one of God’s holy Names, Shaddai (God’s name that appears on mezuzot
attached to the doorposts of Jewish homes). During the nursing period, the child
should not experience hunger or thirst, nor be left alone to cry for his mother’s
attention or for any of his needs. Exclusive breastfeeding should help the child to
develop trust in humans and in the goodness of the universe.
 The central role of the mother in the evolution and development of positive
character traits is hinted at by the Hebrew word imahut—motherhood—which
perfectly expresses the primal mother/child relationship. Imahut means, in fact,
“island of essence.” The mother’s presence in the child’s world is an island of
security and safety in a sea of uncertainty. Her absence causes feelings of
abandonment and is the basis of primal fears. If she does not provide that “island
of security,” the child will create and wear various “masks” in order to deal with
the world. This is because he will not have a sense of self, of “essence,” strong
enough to deal with the world honestly and with authenticity. The child will be
forever trying to compensate for that original loss.
Of course, for someone who has not been blessed with an attentive mother
during the first years of life, it is always possible to heal those childhood
wounds. The Biblical injunction “Do not make any cuttings in your flesh for the
dead” (which was common practice among ancient peoples losing their parents)
represents an invitation to people of faith to free themselves from excessive
attachment to parents and the conditioning of childhood.
As stated in Genesis (“the man then leaves his father and his mother and
cleaves to his wife and they become one flesh”). The undeniable right to build a
family represents a new beginning, the implicit opportunity to rectify the past
and the traumas of a difficult childhood.

The mikveh, love, and sexuality

According to the Kabbalah, it is the woman’s responsibility to help her partner
“circumcise his heart,” to transform sexuality into eroticism, affection, and
spiritual union. The woman achieves this goal by adhering to certain Jewish laws
that protect women’s control of their bodies and emotions, defending them from
demands of their partners, who often are insensitive to the needs of female
intimacy, trust, love, and understanding. Without recognizing these needs, sexual
intercourse becomes an intolerable paradox (contradiction) for the woman, even
from a physical standpoint. Uncontrolled—“not elevated”—sexuality is
ultimately destructive for both the man and the woman.
The elevation of sexuality to a sacred act is made possible especially by the
practice of mikveh, a ritual immersion in water. Each month the woman is
“reborn” after almost two weeks from the first drops her menstruation cycle (the
“tears of the uterus”), before resuming sexual relations with her partner. The
mikveh, the building containing the ritual bath, is so central to Judaism that it is
this structure, and not the synagogue, that defines the existence of a Jewish
community. The rite of immersion in the mikveh begins with a careful process of
cleansing the body, skin, and nails, with the intention of remove any residual
impurities and to eliminate all frills (nail polish, lipstick, makeup, rings,
necklaces, jewelry). After this preparation, which re-establishes the woman’s
identity with her body, special prayers are said before immersion.
I am including one prayer that appears on a wall in almost all of the mikvehs. I
want to remind the readers that any translation of a verse or Jewish prayer
expresses only a minimal part of its true and profound meaning.
God, You created the world from a womb of water. You made me in Your
image, pure and holy, according to Your will. I thank You for my miraculous
body, which keeps its own rhythms as do the sun and the moon, the seasons,
the Shabbat, and the Holy Days. I bless Your sacred name as I ask for Your
blessing upon me and upon those I love.
As I immerse in the mikveh waters, I am ever more aware of my
 dependence upon You. I know that my life is sustained by Your mercy.
Be kind and beneficent to me. Help me purify my life from pain and
sorrow, from bad influences, and from my own faults and inadequacies.
As these waters embrace me, dear God, may I embrace Your presence in
and around me at all times and in all space, Amen.

The mikveh is the most important spiritual ritual of transformation in Judaism.

Its most well known use is for conversion to Judaism. After immersion, the
convert is “reborn” as a totally renewed person. The same is true for a male-
female relationship. In the mikveh, the inevitable frustrations and habits (the
greatest enemy of passion) that poison our relationships are washed away.
Immersion in the mikveh is a rite of passage: from the role of a sister or life-
partner, to that of “lover.”

Sun and moon, action and contemplation

The Sages knew about dangers caused by the imbalance between masculine
and feminine principles. An interesting midrash explains the relationship
between the two and the root cause of imbalance. Commenting on the verse of
Genesis, “And God created the two great luminaries: the big light to rule the day
and the small light to rule the night,” the Sages ask why at first the two great
lights are described as equal, but in the second part of the sentence one is
described as the big light and the other as the small light.
The Sages explain this as follows:
The moon asked God: “How is it possible to share power between two
equal rulers?” God’s answer was: “Right! Go and make yourself smaller. Let
the sun rule!” The moon protested the injustice of this decree, and God
comforted her by saying that she would appear in the sky both by day and by
night, and that the Jewish calendar would be based on lunar cycles. The moon
answered: “What is the benefit of a lamp lit in full day?” So God declared:
“Since I decreed the moon would lose her greatness, bring a sin offering for
Me.” With this statement, God acknowledged His own mistake and His need
to repent for the deterioration of the world that would be caused by the
reduction of the light and feminine power of the moon.

In reading these lines, we may ask ourselves how the all-knowing God could
not know from the beginning that reducing the moon would be a great mistake.
This gave the masculine sun the power to influence humanity with its tendency
towards fighting wars, domination, and irresponsible use and abuse of natural
resources. The answer to this question could be: God’s will was to test the sun
and show how impossible it is to rule without the moon’s cooperation, without
the feminine principle. Since the sun failed this test, the opposition between sun
and moon will be ultimately solved in the messianic era, by a new, final stage of
equal cooperation between their polarities. As it is written, “And the light of the
moon will be like the light of the sun.”
The moon, the “mother,” is that part of the psyche that reminds us, for
instance, to rest when we are tired. The damage resulting from an un-internalized
healthy mother can be corrected. We simply need to learn to take care of
ourselves and not to expect that others will do this for us. As the Sages say, “If I
am not for myself, who will be for me? And if not now, when?”. (Pirkei Avot)
The process that psychologists call “re-parenting” finds its roots in the
mitzvah to “Love your neighbor as yourself.” We must first learn to love
ourselves in order to love others in a positive and balanced way.
We can more deeply understand the importance of the moon by noting that
while the sun disappears and seems to be defeated by darkness and obscurity, the
moon not only illuminates the night but is often visible during the day as well.
The hard work of self-reflection together with prayer, meditation, and artistic
expression can illuminate the shadows in our lives that threaten our ability to
grow emotionally and to develop healthy relationships. A purely rational,
sensible analysis of our problems alone is often not enough and is sometimes
detrimental to the healing process. Like the sun, rational solutions act like
merciless reflectors, creating areas of shadows and thus resistance. In contrast,
the light of the moon gently penetrates our inner world, healing it without
creating new shadows.
Mashiach, King David, and the people of Israel are all associated with the
moon. They are identified with their ability to become smaller and once again
become bright and majestic. They, like the moon, go into exile and are
drastically reduced, only to be ultimately restored to their original greatness.

Disease and “missing the target”

Chet is the first letter of the words ‫ – חיים‬chayim (“life”) and ‫ – חיות‬chayut
(“vitality”). Paradoxically, it is also the first letter of the word ‫ – חולי‬choli
(“sickness”). It is interesting to note that choli has the same root as the word chol
(“profane, empty”) and that it begins with the same letter as chet, which means
both “sin” and “missing the target.” A comparison of these words teaches us that
illness arises when we lose contact with our body’s vital force. This is linked to
our inability to fill life with meaning, to keep it from being “empty” by aiming at
the “wrong target” (or seeking the wrong goal) in terms of affection, profession
and spiritual evolution.
In this regard, non-conventional systems of treatment, such as homeopathy
and Chinese medicine, have reached conclusions that are very similar to those of
Jewish tradition. We become ill when we are removed from our real essence,
when the soul does not fully penetrate and give life to the body. In the Torah,
sickness often appears as a process in which we are warned that something is
“out of order” in our relationship either with God, a companion, or ourselves.
The Scripture’s most famous “patient,” who understood the psychosomatic
origin of illness, was King Hezekiah.
When King Hezekiah discovered that he was mortally ill, he immediately
began to pray. His new praying posture, of standing in front of a wall, was added
to the Jewish liturgical tradition. This position indicated his will to concentrate
on his innermost self, so that he could understand how his behavior caused the
illness. It was again King Hezekiah who, after being healed, destroyed the Book
of Remedies, a monumental treatise on medicinal herbs inherited from King
Solomon.
He dared to treat Jewish medical knowledge in such a drastic manner because
he desired to keep men of faith from trusting medicine rather than God and their
own capacity to renew and to heal themselves. His actions were in stark contrast
with those of King Asa, his predecessor, who was defined by the sages as an
“evil man,” because when he became sick, he called for a doctor rather than
turning to God in prayer.
Maimonides, the great Rabbi and healer had also stressed that the doctor
should not be under the illusion of curing his patients with herbs and medicines.
The cure must come from a deeper place in the soul.
Healing as a form of spiritual enlightenment was the most potent form of
therapy practiced by Chinese masters of acupuncture. As the great master Bian
Que admitted, “using techniques (of questioning and pulse taking) is like
peeping through a tube to see the sky….” He and other great masters preferred to
apprehend the general movement of the spirit of the patient, to become a selfless
channel that can know, unite and finally transform the energy of the client. This
kind of enlightenment is the core of healing. As it is written in The Web that Has
No Weaver, the point in which receptivity becomes transformation:
…The Divine penetrating illumination is the resonance of Qi between
patient and physician. Intimate knowing and profound witnessing effortlessly
become the elixir of profound transmutation. Assessment and treatment,
patient and doctor, yin and yang merge. Healing manifests…the Qi shifted, the
spirit was touched, integrity was experienced…

While serious and sometimes years-long therapies can, through transference,

effect a similar phenomena, the transformative encounter between a master of Qi
and his patient is immediate. I have personally experienced, at various levels of
depth, this truth expressed in simple words by Xu Shu Wei: “…to make the
patient feel better before taking the medication is the most direct method,
especially when encountering complex and internal illness.”
This also holds true for great homeopaths. The moment they can understand
and give a “name” to the secret movement of the patient’s soul, have actually
started the healing process. As we read in The Web that has no Weaver, “Those
kind of encounters help patients to find within themselves a depth of humanity
deeper that the difficulty or tragedy of any illness…”
The debate between the effectiveness of spiritual treatments achieved through
introspection, as in the case of King Hezekiah, and passive therapy that comes
from outside ourselves, is the topic of many Talmudic discussions. Indeed, the
Sages of the Talmud voice opposing opinions regarding physicians. On the one
hand, the Talmud states that anyone whose life is in danger must violate the
Shabbat, if necessary, to go to a doctor. On the other, when speaking of the pride
and arrogance of some “great” doctors, who dismiss the role of insight and
spiritual transformation in the process of healing, the Talmud categorically states
that “the best of doctors goes to Hell.”
An anecdote from Chassidic tradition concerning Rabbi DovBer, the Maggid
(“preacher”) of Mezeritch, provides a greater understanding of this controversy:
An elderly man became very ill. His wife went to a famous physician
saying, “You are the only one who can save my husband. Please, hurry home
with me!” The doctor slowly started getting ready. When she saw him
delaying, intently brushing his coat and hat, the woman rushed toward the
door crying, “Enough! I can’t trust doctors. Only You, Father of the Universe,
can save my husband!” Hearing her words, the doctor rushed out of his home
and was at the man’s sickbed a few minutes later. When the woman entered
the house after the doctor, he had already given her husband some medicine.
Seeing her bafflement, the doctor explained, “It is not man who heals. It is the
angel accompanying him. When I heard you say that only I could save your
husband, I knew that no angel would accompany me to a house where the
Creator was forgotten. When you became angry and finally cried that you only
had real faith in God, I was certain that an angel would go with me to treat
your husband.”
 CHAPTER 9
Tet

The first tet that appears in the Book of Genesis is in the word tov, “good,”
and hints to the highest form of Divine love. Meditation on the letter tet helps us
to focus our attention on the good that surrounds us. This tov is synonymous
with the life force that animates all of creation. If we are meant to emanate God’s
attributes, we are then obligated to look for the good in ourselves and in others.
It is through this letter that we understand that God knows what benefits us and
if we look through the surface of “good” and “evil” we may perceive His
consistent, unbending love for us.

And God saw that it was good

When we read that God “saw it was tov (‘good’)” following each day of
creation, we might ask what was this goodness that God saw. Everything that
was created was perfectly designed to fulfill its purpose. For example, each
animal has the physical characteristics and abilities to sustain itself in a
particular environment, to reproduce and defend itself. Everything that God
created appeared so perfect so that on the seventh day God ceased from all the
work that he had been creating and stood afar, like an artist, and declared: “it is
good.”
Did God need reassurance that His creation was good? Or, as in the case of his
“resting” on Shabbat, was He trying to teach us to always see the “good”?
The letter tet refers to the idea of noticing hidden blessings even in unpleasant
events. As hard as it is to always maintain an optimistic perspective, we must
accept any given situation, especially those that are difficult, with the belief that
their hidden good is beyond our understanding. We have just a limited frame of
reference, but there is a whole picture beyond our personal perception. It is
within the whole picture (that sometimes includes previous reincarnations) that
the particular situation makes sense and indicates God’s goodness and love for
us.
Joseph is one of the Biblical protagonists whose life exemplifies the way
God’s plan plays out in ways beyond our understanding. The horrific act of
Joseph’s brothers, initially intending to kill him, and ending up selling him to
Arab traders en route to Egypt, ultimately led to his becoming the vice-king of
Egypt. In this exalted position he was able to feed his family during the famine.
When Joseph reveals his identity to his brothers he says, “…it is not you who
sent me here, but God.”2 (Genesis 45:8)
King David’s beautiful Psalms have been universally recited by countless
generations because of the solace it provides at a time of need. Psalm 23
especially expresses the ultimate statement of trust. It begins with “The Lord Is
my shepherd, I shall not lack…” an expression of the optimism and faith with
which we should greet life’s experiences. His words continue to guide us until
our last moments: “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of
death, I will fear no evil…for goodness and mercy shall follow me…”
 Victor Frankl, incarcerated in Auschwitz and three other concentration camps,
made the ultimate effort to find the good, which he articulated in The Search for
Meaning. He teaches us that even in the worst of all possible situations we can
find something that is good to focus upon and thereby transcend our physical
reality. He wrote that “…We cannot avoid suffering but we can choose how to
cope with it, find meaning in it, and move forward with renewed purpose…
When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change
ourselves.” In what might be his most enduring quote, he said: “The salvation of
man is through love and in love. I understand how a man who has nothing left in
the world still knows bliss, be it only for a brief moment in the contemplation of
his beloved.”
Jewish history reveals the importance of always getting in touch with the
hidden goodness. We see this especially on Tet of Av (Tish b’Av, the Ninth Day
of the Month of Av) one of the most sacred days in the Jewish calendar. This was
the day on which both Temples in Jerusalem were destroyed, the first in 420
B.C.E. and the second in 70 C.E. The expulsion of the Jews from Spain in 1492
C.E. and other tragedies of the Jewish people also took place on the same day,
Tet of Av.
The first Tisha b’Av occurred as a result of the testimony of the spies who
were sent by Moses to report about the land of Canaan, which God was giving
them as an inheritance. The bad report in their famous expression “it is a land
that swallows its inhabitants” expressed such a lack of trust in God that the 9th
of Av became a day of mourning. Because the Jews could not see the good, but
only the hardships that they would face in Israel, in the future we have good
reasons to weep, especially on that day.
How can we then explain the apparent contradiction between these two
messages of the letter tet? One possibility might be that during the events that
took place on the Ninth of Av, Jews were called on to show God their ability to
accept and grow through suffering. The expulsion of Spain caused the Jews to
push and finance the discovery of America, the land that would become the new
homeland for many persecuted people.114
The Oral Tradition invites us to accept with joy, or at least with a feeling of
mature acceptance, the trials and challenges we experience. We can only
sincerely react in this way when we understand that this world is a “school of
life,” covering every sphere of experience. Its classrooms are relationships,
work, illness and suffering. The diploma we receive is our psychological and
spiritual maturity. When a Jew hears about the death of someone, he should
pronounce the following blessing: Baruch dayan ha’emet—“Blessed is the
truthful Judge.” With this he plants in his subconscious that even if he will
mourn for weeks and months and years, he is ready one day to fully grasp the
meaning of the ultimate truth of Divine Judgment.
The Zohar states that at the entrance to the celestial academy of Rabbi Shimon
bar Yochai, a voice proclaims: “Entrance is forbidden to those who in their
lifetimes were not able to transform darkness into light and bitter into sweet.”
Being aware that all experiences, positive or negative, are meant for our
evolution, effects this transformation. The wise of all religions and all ages have
also taught this truth to be the secret for enlightenment.

God hidden in nature

As we have seen, one of the names of God is Elokim, which has the same
numerical value as the word ha’teva (“nature”). Mystics of all ages have
searched for the Shechinah, the feminine aspect of God, in nature. In the Holy
City of Safed, the famous Kabbalists of the 16th and 17th centuries started the
Shabbat prayers by leaving the synagogues and going to the fields to welcome
the Shechinah, the divine feminine immanence, personified as the “Shabbat
Queen.”
One of the main works of the Talmud is Perek Shirah, totally dedicated to the
study and glorification of nature. Perek Shirah, “A Chapter Of Song,” is an
ancient text that some commentaries attribute to King David himself. It takes the
form of a list of eighty-four elements of the natural world (sky, earth, plants,
birds, animals, and insects, etc). Each one is associated with a verse from the
Bible.
This text was so highly revered that Rebbe (Yehuda HaNassi) said, “Anyone
who engrosses himself in Perek Shirah in this world merits to learn and to teach,
and his learning succeeds, and he is delivered from the evil Inclination and from
all harm, and from castigation of the grave and from the verdict of Geihenom,
and from the birth pangs of Mashiach.” It is taught that Rabbi Eliezer the Great
said: “Anyone who engrosses himself in Perek Shirah every day, I bear witness
that he is destined for the World-to-Come, and is delivered from calamity, the
Satan, and from all types of evil and destruction. And he enjoys longevity of
days, and merits life in the World-to-Come.”
The concept behind Perek Shirah is that everything in the natural world
teaches us a lesson in ethics or spirituality. The “songs” of the natural world
weave a tapestry of lessons for life. Perek Shirah, a work of tremendous historic
value, is itself extremely mysterious and cryptic. However, various
commentaries have been written over the last five hundred years, giving insight
into what creation is teaching us.
I will quote some of its verses:
The heavens say: “The Heavens tell of God’s glory, and the firmament tells
of His handiwork.” (Psalms 19:2)
The desert says: “The desert and the wasteland shall rejoice, and the arid
region shall rejoice and blossom like a rose.” (Isaiah 35:1)
The fields say: “HaShem founded the land with wisdom; He established the
heavens with understanding.” (Proverbs 3:19)
The seas say: “More than the voices of many waters, mightier than the
breakers of the sea, HaShem is mighty on high.” (Psalms) 93:4).
 Regarding contemplation of nature, Rambam writes:
When a person meditates on these things and recognizes the creations—
forces, constellations…—he will be in awe of the wisdom of the hidden
Source in all of its handiworks and all its creations. Pleasurable identification
with the Infinite will increase, and one’s soul will expand and will strive to
love the Infinite, the Source.”

Rebbe, after having being immersed for a long time in the contemplation of a
wild duck, prayed to God that this would help him “acquire Olam HaBa, the
World to Come”: Obviously for the great masters of Kabbalah, meditation and
contemplation of nature was a means of achieving a clear and direct line of
communication with the Infinite. This ultimate state of transcendental awareness
is also called “prophecy.”
The average (non-prophetic) person receives indirect but potentially clear
communications from the Infinite in the form of daily events that occur. There
are some, particularly insane people, who can apparently receive direct but
unclear communications. In contrast, the prophetic experience is described as a
communication that is both clear and direct.
Deveikut (“cleaving to God”) is a specific method of reaching transcendence.
Ultimately, the Infinite’s essence is unknowable by a finite mind with finite
senses. Nonetheless, the Infinite created this universe for the purpose of giving
to another. We are that other, and the greatest gift is the ability to have a
relationship with the Infinite itself.
Everything is the Infinite. The infinite is the “location” of the universe.
Indeed, one of the Hebrew terms for the Infinite is ha’makom—the place. On
human terms, however, it suffices to understand that the Infinite by definition is
always very near to us. This understanding is not intellectually difficult but does
require practice in order to be integrated into a constant awareness.
Fasting is a practice of constant focus and awareness that is central to Zen
Buddhism. Westerners developed a limited version of this awareness called
“epiphany”: the momentary experience of an object’s infinite source. Judaism
combines the two by cultivating both an expanded mind and a constant
awareness of this world.
Perek Shirah found some hints in the verses of the Bible, to the connection of
Nature to its transcendent source. Here are a few more quotes.
The rivers say: “Let the rivers clap their hands, together the mountains shall
 sing for joy!” (Psalms 98:8)
The wellsprings say: “And as singers that are flutists, are all my wellsprings
within you.” (Psalms 87:7)
The day says: “The day to day utters speech and night to night expresses
knowledge.” (Psalms 19:3)
The rain-clouds say: “He made darkness His secret place; His surroundings
are His shelter, the darkness of water the clouds of the heavens.” (Psalms
18:12)
The hen says: “He gives bread to all flesh, for His loving-kindness endures
forever.” (Psalms 136:25)
The dove says before The Holy One, Blessed Be He, “Master of the World,
may my sustenance be as bitter as an olive in Your hands, rather than being
sweet as honey in the hands of flesh and blood.” (Talmud, Masechet Eruvin
18b)
The crane says: “Give thanks to Hashem with the lyre; play for Him with
the ten-stringed harp.” (Psalms 33:2)
The swallow says: “So that my soul shall sing Your honor and shall not be
silent, Hashem my God—I shall forever thank you.” (Psalms 30:13)
The swift says: “My help is from Hashem, Maker of Heaven and Earth.”
(Psalms 121:2)
The duck says: “Trust in Hashem forever, for God Hashem is the
everlasting rock.” (Isaiah 26:4)
The giant sea-creatures say: “Praise Hashem from the earth, the giant sea
creatures and the depths.” (Psalms 148:7)
The whale says: “Give thanks to Hashem for He is good, His kindness
endures forever.” (Psalms 136:1).

These last verses might sound familiar to anyone who has been involved with
the mysterious world of whales. Two thousand years after Perek Shirah, the
whales are thanking God for saving their species from sure extinction. This is a
great act of love, clearly recognized by all modern nature “contemplators.”
Unfortunately, two thousand years of persecutions and exile have caused most
Jews to lose their connection to the feminine aspect of Godliness and to relate
more comfortably (and safely, during times of persecutions) to the transcendent
aspect of God. Thus, we have for the most part exclusively become the “people
of the book,” connecting on a more intellectual with God. This has caused us to
lose touch with our Kabbalistic inheritance, our bond with the Shechinah, whose
presence is most easily felt in the natural world.
Adam, the first man on earth, in the Garden of Eden was given a special task
to love, enjoy and take care of the whole planet. All environmental abuse can be
attributed to the disconnection between Adam’s descendents and the Shechinah
(“mother earth”), which, according to the words of bio-molecular scientist Bruce
Lipton, is “trying to expel, with its fever, the micro-organisms that are disturbing
its balance: mankind.” The increasing phenomena of floods, earthquakes, and
other natural disasters may be interpreted as the earth’s valiant effort to restore
the balance that was disrupted by man’s destructive and unrestrained, greedy
pursuits, in the name of progress.
 CHAPTER 10
Yud

The letter yud, the smallest of all the letters, is the beginning of the Hebrew
word for Jerusalem, Yerushalayim, and is also the beginning of the word for
Israel, Yisrael, which the Torah calls the smallest people on earth. In the next
image, we see how the gates of Jerusalem are opening for the ingathering of
those returning to their faith (ba’alei teshuvah). They are bringing their
enthusiastic offerings to the Temple, the sparks of light gathered in their long
journey in search of truth.
Yud is the smallest letter in the Hebrew alphabet, but it is far from being the
least significant. The powerful energy of the yud is concentrated in its tiny form
and is associated with wisdom. The value of humility, required for the
acquisition of true wisdom, testifies to the yud’s greatness, in spite of its small
size. One can imagine the great significance of the yud when we realize that the
beginning of any Hebrew letter or any Hebrew word starts with the form of the
letter yud.
Yud in Hebrew is spelled out with the same letters of yad (“hand”). As in
English, the Hebrew word for hand, yad, connotes “power” as in the phrase “the
hand of God.” In the Sefer Yetzirah the hand (the left hand particularly) is
associated with the world of asiya, inspired action and the sign of Virgo. Virgo
connotes the talent involved in transforming the material word into works of art,
or of “service” to humankind.
 For this and other reasons, the use of hands is central to Jewish ritual and
liturgy. The first ritual and prayer a Jew performs upon awakening concerns his
hands. Netilat yadayim (washing the hands, literally “the raising of the hands”) is
recited while hands are lifted towards the sky, and palms and fingers are opened
as much as possible to receive God’s blessing. This movement is extremely
similar to that of Qi Gong: raising the hands to Heaven in order to collect and
make Heavenly Qi descend.
Birkat haKohanim, the Priestly Blessing (recited by the priests in Biblical
times and those descended from the house of Aaron today) is considered as the
most dramatic part of the synagogue service. And the role hands play in this
cerimony is central. The Kohanim bless the congregation while they stand with
their hands uplifted, the fingers outstretched in a particular “mudra”, resembling
the form of the Hebrew letter shin, the first letter of Shaddai, one of God’s
names. This gesture is symbolic of the Divine Presence, which “shines through”
the fingers of the Kohen while he blesses the people.
 On Shabbat many observant Jewish parents bless their children by covering
each child’s head with their hands as they recite the following words, inspired by
the Priestly blessing:
May God bless you and guard you.
May God show you favor and be gracious to you.
May God show you kindness and grant you peace.

A similar gesture of raising of the hands is made during Birkat HaMazon (the
blessing after meals) when pronouncing the words poteach et yadecha u’masbia
le’chol chai ratzon (“You open Your hands and satisfy the needs of each
creature”). Once again, hand gestures are used in prayer for intensifying and
elevating one’s level of intention (kavanah).
At the conclusion of the Shabbat, one of the rituals signifying the separation
of the holiness of the Shabbat from the mundaneness of the rest of the week
involves holding the hands in front of a lit candle. The hands are reversed in a
gesture of channeling the light of the candle to the fingernails of the hand. One
intention of this ritual is to draw the holiness of Shabbat into the six working
days by enlightening the creative work of the hands, represented by the nails, the
most aggressive and powerful part of the hand.
The meaning of the hamsah (“the healing hand”), which appears in classic
Jewish jewelry, is a reminder of the important role hands and their positions had
in ancient Jewish healing.

In recent studies much attention has been given to the importance of hand
gestures in speech development… The brain’s “communication messages” are
first sent to the hands, and then our hand gestures are subsequently followed by
verbal speech. Basic hand gestures comprise a universal language, invaluable
when we find ourselves in a foreign country and unable to communicate.

Many discoveries regarding this issue can be found in the book Giving Speech
a Hand by Amy Hubbard. Her findings suggest a common neural substrate for
processing speech and hand gesture, likely reflecting their joint communicative
role in social interaction. Successful social communication involves the
integration of simultaneous input from multiple sensory modalities. Hand
gestures for example, can alter the interpretation of speech, disambiguate speech,
increase comprehension and memory and convey information not delivered by
speech.
Throughout history, many societies have used hand signs. These hand signs
transmit powerful messages and have religious, political, cultural and social
meanings. Our hands are powerful tools. They are tools of self-expression and
can communicate many sentiments that we are not able to express verbally. The
hearing impaired rely on the use of their hands to communicate with others.
Hand gestures greatly aid autistic children in developing their communication
skills. Where speech is absent we rely on the hands. Each time we touch one
another we communicate something specific. Aristotle considered the hands to
be “the organs of organs, the instrument of instruments.”
The role that hands have in communicating messages to our brain and our
subconscious mind is also extremely meaningful. As novelist Robertson Davies
puts it; “The hand speaks to the brain as surely as the brain speaks to the hand”.

The smallest people

The Lord did not…choose you because you were more in number than any
people; for you were the fewest of all peoples.

The letter ‫ – י‬yud, the smallest in the Hebrew alphabet, is the first letter of the
Tetragrammaton, the ineffable, unpronounceable Name of God. As mentioned
above, yud is also first letter of the holy land and the people of Yisrael. Yud, a
black dot, represents this little-big people, as they are defined in the Torah.
This seeming paradox was perfectly expressed in an article by Mark Twain on
the “miracle” of the Jewish people. According to Twain, although Jews represent
only one percent of the world’s population, they include a disproportionate
number of scientists, artists, musicians, doctors, and businessmen. In his article,
Twain states:
The Egyptian, the Babylonian, and the Persian rose, filled the planet with
sound and…then…passed away; the Greek and the Roman followed, and…
they are gone; other peoples have sprung up and held their torch high for a
time, but it burned out, and they sit in twilight now, or have vanished. The Jew
saw them all, beat them all, and is now what he always was…. All things are
mortal but the Jew; all other forces pass, but he remains. What is the secret of
his immortality?

Mark Twain’s question could be answered in a number of ways. One of which

is that the people of Yisrael, with their defeats and miraculous rebirths, bear
witness to a complete dependence on God. While the Land of Israel was
promised to Abraham, it was given on a condition: “because the land is Mine
and you are strangers and sojourners with Me.”
Yisrael is not just any land. It obeys the will of the Creator as written in the
Torah and sacred writings. “It is a land that vomits and devours its inhabitants, a
land [which] the eyes of the Lord your God are always upon… from the
beginning of the year to the end of the year.”
Today, the eyes of the world are also turned to this land. The world
mercilessly examines, comments on, and broadcasts the modern State of Israel’s
every error or imperfection. Today, the Jews are once again in their land, but
they live like “a people desolate and half insane from the Holocaust and the
murder of 1,500,000 of its children.”
Why must these “chosen” people be so mistreated? There are many answers to
this question. With typical Jewish humor, it has even been turned into a joke:
“Dear God, I know we are the chosen people. But, once in a while, can’t You
choose someone else?”
Being held to higher standards pays the price in severity of judgment. As it is
with individuals, the closer one gets to God, the higher is the price to be paid for
every transgression. We see this exemplified by Moses, the greatest of the
prophets. Moses’ desire and prayers to enter the Promised Land were rejected
only because of his “mistake” in hitting the rock with his staff to provide water
for the Children of Israel instead of simply speaking to the rock as God had
commanded.
Those who live in Israel as well as those who are aware of the teachings of
Torah are accountable to a higher standard. When their behavior is beyond
reproach, they are punished accordingly. In this regard, one of my teachers,
Rabbi Aryeh Lev, said, “It is like the difference between traveling at 120 miles
an hour and traveling at 35. When you are traveling at very high speeds, turning
the steering wheel the wrong way, even slightly, can have a catastrophic effect.”
Israel enjoyed total peace only in the time of Solomon who was both a King
and a prophet. During his enlightened, universalistic reign, not only did Israel’s
neighbors cease to wage war but also the Beit Hamikdash (“the Temple”)
became the site of worship and pilgrimage for many nations.

The paradox of Israel

 The Written and Oral Torah both clearly show that the hand of God was
behind every persecution of the Jewish people; from the Egyptians to the
Babylonians, from the Greeks to the Romans, and even, most inexplicably, the
Holocaust. It was He who set fire to the Sanctuary in Jerusalem (using the
enemies of Israel as His instrument).
This was done because the Temple had become a merely physical edifice,
where sacrifice had become a replacement rather than an inspiration for true
repentance. Today, the modern State of Israel continues to live under the threat
of exile, war, and terrorism. The Torah requires that the Jewish people act
generously, that they show love toward the foreigner who lives in their midst, for
“you were strangers in the Land of Egypt.”
According to the interpretation of the Sages, the persecution of the Jews was
also aimed to “vaccinate” them against a lack of sensitivity toward ethnic
minorities. So we see, for example, that Jews were strongly involved in the black
people’s fight for equal rights.
Unfortunately, Israel today is missing its true leaders and has not found a way
to protect itself and still be merciful. If the Jewish people and the State of Israel
could reach the perfection required for being “chosen,” they could help all
humanity, spiritually and scientifically. There is a great potential for developing
new resources that could replace the use of gasoline, natural gas, and nuclear
energy, which severely pollute the environment. If Israel could invest in spiritual
and scientific research (which go hand in hand), her visionaries and scientists
could direct their energies towards ecological and efficient use of the earth’s
resources. As the Kabbalists state, the way to use “zero point” energy will be
revealed only to those scientists who will be aware of the absolute spiritual
nature of matter.
The survival and rebirth of the “real” Israel is important for humanity. As
Rabbi Adin Even-Israel [Steinsaltz] writes: “If this nation of priests were to
decline, not only would it destroy itself, but it would delay the evolution of
humanity.”

Who really are the people of Israel?

According to many scholars and Kabbalists, one reason that Israel has not yet
come into her full strength is that the current Jewish population is made up of
only a fraction of its original population; the twelve tribes of Israel descendants
of the twelve sons of Jacob. In fact, from a holistic perspective as described by
Sefer Yetzirah (whereby each of the twelve tribes of Israel corresponded to one
of the twelve permutations of the Tetragrammaton, twelve gates of prayer,
twelve spiritual senses, twelve organs and limbs of the body), the people of
Israel today are comprised only of the descendants of a few of the twelve tribes.
In addition to the six million Jews (and all those who would have been their
descendants) who died in the Holocaust, the absence of the majority of the tribes
is an enormous blow to the real identity of Israel.
In the archetypal language of Sefer Yetzirah, the present composition of Israel
from probably only three tribes is analogous to a body that has only one “leg”
(the right leg associated by Sefer Yetzirah to the tribe of Judah), a “stomach”
(associated with the tribe of Benjamin), and a part of the “liver” (associated with
the tribe of Dan, which, according to one theory, was partially restored after the
aliyah of the Falashas).115
An exclusive mentality, which characterized the Israeli government since the
inception of the state in 1948, has prevented Israel from recognizing the
incredible and beneficial effect of thousands and thousands of descendants of the
lost tribes, converging on the land of Israel. Even today, the aliyah of
descendants of the ten lost tribes (scattered in India, Pakistan, Afghanistan,
Nepal, China, Burma and Japan) is viewed with suspicion and thereby delayed.
Only a few thousand Jews from India and Burma, representing the chain of
uninterrupted Jewish life for thousands of years and consequently scattered after
the destruction of the First and Second Temples, have managed to become Israeli
citizens. Like the Falashas from Ethiopia, their arrival in Israel has contributed
greatly to the richness of Israel’s diversity and spirituality.
The return of hundreds of thousands believers in the Torah will greatly enrich
Israeli society. This ingathering will restore those original religious values that
honor and welcome diversity, making it possible to realize the ideal messianic
image of Israel embracing people from all nations. Replacing the current image
of a nationalistic military country and spiritual exclusivity, the tribes of Israel
will “raise the sparks” by bringing back a specific treasure of ancient values and
wisdom that has been buried in the diaspora. Reunited, they will radiate an
embracing and healing energy, bridging the gap between Israel and the world.
In Israel and the Seventy Dimensions of the World, Nechama Nadborny-
Burgeman points out: “A midrash describes the future Third Temple, whose
present and eternal essence exists in the supernal worlds, as scintillating with
seventy-two jewels, representing God, the seventy nations, and Israel. Within the
very framework of the Jewish justice system, we also find an intricate
relationship between the seventy members of the Sanhedrin (the highest court of
justice and the supreme council in ancient Jerusalem at the time of the Second
Temple) and the seventy nations of the world. God’s heavenly tribunal, which
included the seventy guardian angels of the seventy nations, was reflected in the
earthly court of the Sanhedrin below. Each member of the Sanhedrin was
required to know the seventy archetypal languages of the world as well as the
cosmological visions of the seventy nations.” Without the knowledge and
integration of world spirituality, the 70 sages of the Court of Justice would be
missing some of the wisdom needed to fulfill their enlightened mission.
Don Yitzhak Abravanel, my ancestor, was one of the great rabbis who
maintained that the return of the ten lost tribes would play a central role in the
process of the messianic redemption. Also the Vilna Gaon and other great sages
stressed that the return of the lost tribes is one the most important conditions for
messianic redemption.
The process of reintegration of the missing brothers, (the disconnected parts of
our collective soul-body), also requires that the Jewish people learn to relate to
Christianity not only through the painful memories of thousands of years of
persecutions and inquisitions, but with the awareness of the original, altruistic
intent of spiritual brotherhood. It is imperative to reopen a profound dialogue
with Christianity. The role and conditions of the reconciliation between Judaism
and Christianity (fundamental for the achievement of world peace) are admirably
expressed by the scholar Marco Morselli in his preface to Elijah Benamozeg’s
book on the Essenes: “
To talk about a Christianity before Christ or without Christ is utterly absurd,
but it is not at all absurd to talk about a messianism that precedes the birth of
Yeshua. It is necessary to reinstate Rabbi Yeshua ben Yosef disciple’s role in
Jewish messianism. Which is not to say that the specificity should disappear
from that context. This is not to Christianize the Essenes, but to return the
origins of Christianity to its Jewish context…. Not the conversion of Jews to
Christianity, but the return of the hearts of the children to their fathers, and the
hearts of the fathers to their children, as Malachi, the last of the prophets,
predicted. So, the reconciliation dreamed by early Christians as a condition of
the Parousia, the return of the Jews to the womb of the Church, will take
place not in the way we expected, but in the only serious, logical and long-
 lasting way, especially in the only way beneficial for all of humanity.

My ancestor Don Yitzhak Abravanel, who like many great rabbis of the past,
was very knowledgeable of the New Testament and was therefore able to
communicate and establish meaningful relationships with kings and statesmen of
the Christian faith of his time. He should be considered a role model for all
Jewish leaders who are seriously motivated to establish a more constructive
cooperation among believers of various religions.

Yofi: “beauty”
The word ‫ – יפי‬yofi (“beauty”) begins and ends with the letter yud. The
connection between beauty and yud is also explained by the numerical value of
yofi, 100, which is the square of 10, the numerical value of yud. In Kabbalah, the
square of a number reveals the precise explanation of its essence. Therefore,
beauty is deeply tied to the history of Israel. Japheth (Yefet, in Hebrew, derived
from the word yofi), as the father of the Indo-European race and of Greek
civilization, is blessed by his father Noah with the following words: “God shall
enlarge Japheth in beauty and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem.”
This blessing is reflected in the fact that the numerical value of the Hebrew
word for “Israel” (‫ )ישראל‬is the sum of the numerical values of the words ‫– יפי‬
yofi (“beauty”) and ‫ – אמת‬emet (“truth”). The messianic redemption will bring
the unification between the beauty of Western civilization and its artistic
expressions with the truth of the Bible and the Jewish spiritual tradition, yofi and
emet. Though he may not have intended this association, the famous last lines of
John Keats’ (1795-1821) The Grecian Urn, are relevant in this context:
Beauty is truth, truth beauty. That is all Ye know on earth and all ye need to
know.

The role beauty has in spiritual evolution can be easily intuited by reflecting
on one of the first verses of the Bible describing the creation of the Garden of
Eden, “and God caused every kind of tree to grow from the soil, delightful to the
sight and good for food.”(Genesis). The commentators of the Bible have pointed
out that in those verses, God is telling us that man’s nourishment does not come
from physical food only, but from aesthetic gratification (the sequence being:
delightful to the sight, and afterwards, good for food). Here the aesthetic sense,
man’s sense of beauty, receives its justification and sanctity. The forms of beauty
that appear on our earth are abundant, and, as far as we know, man is the only
creature endowed with a capacity to enjoy beauty. The development of the
aesthetic sense is part of the path to enlightenment. The enjoyment of beauty
creates a state of spiritual elevation. The various blessings that Jews should
articulate upon seeing natural beauty accentuate the awareness of the joy one is
experiencing. When we thank and bless for the “bliss” of beholding beauty we
are expressing awe and gratitude to the Creator.
From the Kabbalistic perspective, everything we experience is part of the
infinite. The infinite is the “location” of the universe. As previously mentioned,
one of the Hebrew terms for the Infinite is HaMakom, the place. The emphasis
Jews put in blessing God for the beauty they experience heightens our awareness
that the Infinite is always very near to us. Olam HaBa, the World to Come, is
better translated with the words “the world that comes to us.” This understanding
may not be intellectual, and requires practice to develop into a constant
awareness of the Shechinah, the Infinite Divine presence contained in creation,
felt and seen by physical senses.
 CHAPTER 11
Kaf

A verse from the prophecy of Zachariah states that Mashiach will appear
riding upon a donkey. According to Chassidut, this verse must be read
symbolically: the word for “donkey,” ‫ – חמור‬chamor, has the same letters as the
word ‫ – חומר‬chomer (“matter”). In other words, the main goal of Mashiach is to
“ride upon matter,” helping humanity to transform matter into spirit. Presently,
matter “rides” and dictates humans’ psychological and spiritual reality. At the
time of redemption the emphasis placed on the struggle to acquire more and
more material possessions will be transferred into the desire to utilize matter for
the goal of stimulating and enlivening spiritual awareness. This shift in
awareness is needed both for healing the planet and for supporting human
evolution.
Spirituality is not a synonym for withdrawal from the world of action. It is
true that many spiritually oriented people today lack physical vigor and are often
unable to act with determination in the real world which they mistakenly view
pejoratively. This perspective, however, might be due to their lack of
understanding of the essential congruence of spirit and matter.
 In the same vein, one of the afflictions of modern consumer societies is a
general malaise and spiritual emptiness that drives so many to acquire more and
more material wealth. In contrast, a clear example of the proper congruence of
spirit and matter is the biblical figure Samson, whose physical strength was an
expression of his union with the Divine. The balance between the spiritual and
the physical, between matter and energy was the key to his superhuman feats.

Physical force, the expression of Divine energy

Einstein’s formula E=mc2, symbolizing matter becoming energy, has its
analogue in the human sphere. This formula, as well as other modern scientific
discoveries, prepare us for the equivalent reality on a spiritual level. The letter
kaf is the initial of the word ‫ – כח‬koach (“strength”, “energy”). When we study
the Scriptures, we notice that strength, associated with the sefirah of gevurah
(“power”), is one of the most commonly mentioned Divine attributes. This is the
energy that God injects into the world, mirrored in human beings made in His
image, in order to complete the arduous task of transforming reality.

Kelayot and kaved, kidneys and liver

Words beginning with the letter kaf are deeply connected to the concept of
energy, force, and strength. Kelayot and kaved, the kidneys and the liver, are
especially a seat of human strength.
We already talked about Abraham learning and being inspired by his kidneys,
his wise “teachers” according to the Talmud. According to TCM image, this
awesome organ contains the prenatal energy of Yin. Yin is the pure and subtle
energy we received from former generations. Our physical strength is deeply
connected to how we use this energy. Yin energy must be used sparingly, aware
of its limitations. It is certainly not capable of being replenished like a bank
account.
The energy of the kidneys is different from that of the other organs. For
instance, the stomach and the spleen, which transform and store food, have a
more material energy. The lungs, which function with air (Qi), have a lighter
energy. Kidney energy, besides providing physical energy, is our deepest super-
conscious connection to God. For this reason it is also the source of the human
will, power, creativity, and generativity.
As Ted Kaptchuk writes in his The Web that Has No Weaver:
The kidneys store the Will…both aspects of the Will. The Yang will, the
forceful assertions that shape the course of decades, belongs here. The big
shifts, decisive efforts, and fundamental commitments that allow a person to
take responsibility for his or her life are the creation of the Yang will’s
volition. The Yang will is the most dynamic assertive aspect of a person, the
ultimate Fire. The Yin will is the other side of Will. It is the deep encounter
with the inexorable and ultimate destiny that already exists hidden in the
undifferentiated seed. It is the recognition that the deepest force requires no
effort. The Yin Will is elusive, almost intangible. It is noticed in stillness. It
has a quality of irreducible mystery. The Yin Will is about the inevitable,
about a direction we each move toward that can be seen only when we turn
around and look at how we have developed through time. It is about fate and
destiny. It is about the unknown and death. …Recognition of the Yin Will
allows for the creation of the virtue of Wisdom. This Wisdom is not about
knowing things. In fact, it is more about being deeply connected to the
unknown…
 Abraham, being a man of incomparable virtue, received the wise counsel of
the kidneys in their highest form. God revealed to Abraham the wisdom of the
universe and all the necessary human qualities needed for founding the nation of
Israel. Thus began the relationship between God and His people.
From a Taoist perspective, our life work is to make a bridge between the
energies of the Kidney and the energies of the Heart, which represents our
connection with the Divine on a more conscious level. As we shall see in the
next chapter, the Heart is considered to be the home of the spirit. It is the main
channel of active communication with the Divine. According to TCM, the heart
“opens in the tongue.”
It is fascinating to read in the Bible that HaShem “checked the heart and
kidney” of his faithful people. What a beautiful act of caring. By checking the
Heart and Kidney, God is able to discern to what degree each individual is being
true to their convenant with God and to their mission on earth. This process of
checking the kidney and heart is implicit in the story of Abraham. Surely,
HaShem would only have chosen as the progenitor of His people a prophet
whose Heart and Kidney energies were properly synchronized.
Why is this? The kidneys store the raw material with which HaShem created
the universe. The heart houses our understanding of and ability to use that raw
material wisely. By so doing one becomes close to the Divine. Even before the
revelation of the Ten Commandments, Abraham’s Heart energies were already in
order. His morals and virtues were integrated with his being and his commitment
to and love of God were his driving forces in life. In other words, he was able to
listen to the wisdom of his Kidney energies and direct these energies according
to the understanding of his Heart.

Kaved: “liver”
According to both TCM and Kabbalah, the liver is the seat of another very
potent life force. It contains large amounts of blood (actually 13% of the body’s
blood at any given moment), and, as the Scriptures teach, the blood is the nefesh
(the part of the soul that enlivens the body).
This accounts for the very strict prohibition in the Bible of eating the blood of
an animal. According to the Oral Tradition, the blood-filled liver is the seat of
two opposite drives. On one hand, it drives us toward impulsiveness, anger and
obsession with power. On the other hand, it is the symbol of our creative power,
of our will, courage and determination to be God’s partners in Redemption. This
can be seen in the numerical equivalence of the word ‫ – כבד‬kaved and the
Tetragrammaton, the unpronounceable, ineffable Name of God; both equal 26.
TCM also confirms the liver’s double drive: when the liver is healthy, it
provides the human being with the capacity to act with determination, to be
creatively inspired by the vision of “the” Project—to be like a General of the
army who has a strategy; knowing when to proceed and when to withdraw. An
unbalanced liver, on the other hand, can result in a paralysis of will or the
incapacity to retreat when faced with self-destructive tendencies.
The unrelenting Biblical figure of Pharaoh corresponds to the behavioral type
described by Chinese medicine of a lack of yin in the liver. This is the inability
to pull back in the midst of a disastrous situation. Modern Kabbalists and
acupuncturists diagnose the attitude of Pharaoh as a condition in which the “liver
has taken over the heart.” In reading the Exodus a curious attentive reader would
be puzzled by the number of times the words “Pharaoh’s heart is hard, heavy
(kaved.)”
The Hebrew word ‫ – כבד‬kaved means both “liver” and “heavy.” Therefore the
verse may also be read “Pharaoh’s heart has become a liver.” The image of the
“heart becoming the liver” is one that occurs repeatedly throughout the entire
narrative of Pharaoh and the Israelites. Instead of being the site of love and
wisdom, the heart becomes impulsive and irresponsible like the unbalanced liver
of a k’vad pei. The ruler of Egypt refuses to set the Israelites free despite the fact
that this stubbornness provoked disaster in the form of the ten plagues inflicted
upon the Egyptians.
However, Pharaoh is not the only one to be affected by the condition of “heart
becoming liver.” Also Moses, when he was invited by God to speak to Pharaoh
as well as the Israelites, initially refused to go. This is because he “stuttered,” or
was k’ved pei. This expression means two things: “heavy tongue” (speech
defect), or “a tongue that became a liver.”
Now we must remember that the “heart opens in the tongue.” That means that
the deepest intuitions of the heart can be communicated, if the heart is at its best.
When the main tool of expression of the heart (the tongue) is impaired, like
when it becomes hardened by the liver and its anger, the tongue and the heart
close up, blocking the flow of communication. Moses’ capacity to communicate
had been damaged by his reaction of anger and frustration when he witnessed
the persecutions of his brothers in Egypt. His tongue became heavy, became a
liver, blocked, unable to perfectly communicate the vision and the messages of
God, neither to the Jews nor to Pharaoh.
The connection between the heart and the capacity to communicate the inner
truths of the soul is reinforced by the Jewish religious practice of donning
tefillin. This mitzvah is a tool for inspiring the heart and enhancing the power of
prayer and communication.
There are times when we experience a “Pharaoh-liver,” which impels us
toward self-destructive behavior. The path to healing lies in allowing the heart
and mind once again to rule over the liver and its impulses. This is alluded to by
the first letters of the Hebrew words moach-lev-kaved (“mindheart-liver”), which
in this order spell melech (“king”).
Healing occurs when the liver becomes a faithful servant of the mind and
heart, i.e., when a person is king over his impulses. When the order of these
three letters is reversed (kaved-lev-moach), we have the word klum (“nothing”),
the condition that the Sages define as the “burning of the inner sanctuary” by the
flames of the fire of anger.

Energy of love
Another great generator of strength in the Torah is love for another and for
God. Jacob, our patriarch, met Rachel, his future wife, at the well where she was
waiting to water her flock. The surge of love he felt upon seeing her for the first
time enabled him to remove the stone covering the well. Normally the joint
efforts of a number of shepherds were required to move the stone.
Moses’ love for God inspired him to refrain from food or drink for forty days.
To a lesser degree in our own lives we may become oblivious to our bodily
needs and limitations when we are in a heightened emotional state.
The other great generator of energy is blissful awareness of God, in Hebrew
deveikut (“cleaving”). Many episodes in the Bible communicate the idea of how
the spirit animates and rules over the body. Mirra Alfassa, known to spiritual
seekers as Mère or The Mother, is an example of the power of deveikut. Born in
Paris of Turkish-Moroccan parents, Mirra learned the Jewish esoteric tradition
and studied a central subject in Kabbalah: that of redemption through matter,
specifically the body, which has too often been considered the greatest obstacle
for spiritual awareness.
Alfassa postulated that spiritual evolution must be revealed in matter. An
illuminated person cannot be limited to perceiving light only in his or her inner
self. Such a person must learn to perceive light by descending into matter in
order to transform every cell of the body. Her experiments in meditation allowed
her to heal from many diseases, becoming the living proof of the Kabbalistic
idea of the spirit riding the “donkey.”
This concept is expressed in the experiments that Mirra Alfassa carried out as
she began her journey of healing. Through yoga, breathing exercises, long
periods of fasting, and other practices, she discovered that cells could be fed
directly by Divine energy, recalling the experience of Moses. She also
substantiated this phenomenon through meditation and communication with the
intelligence of the cells, allowing her to recover at will from the most serious
diseases. She thus discovered and demonstrated that a deficiency of
consciousness can cause illness, and conversely, heal us. Her story serves as an
example and proof that we have the continuing task to maintain our health so
that the body becomes the perfect instrument for the soul.
Sefer Yetzirah states that during our spiritual journey, we must rediscover and
dialogue with the “parts of the soul” residing in the different organs. This teaches
us that we must learn to sustain Divine light in every part of the body. This is the
only way to reach energy levels that will allow us to become a merkavah
(“chariot”) for Divinity in this world. When our entire being, including the cells
in our bodies, is full of awareness, we will leave the exile and declare with King
David, “Your Torah is within my heart,” or, like Job, “I see God in my flesh.”
These verses have become more meaningful than ever with the recent
proliferation of illnesses afflicting millions of people in modern society. The
pathway toward physical health will be made easier by healing the weakness of
the soul through a process of rediscovery and identification with the Qi, the
Divine vital energy.
In the image, we see the word koach (“strength”), and in its center we can see
Samson, the great prophet-warrior. His strength was not brutal and physical,
rather it derived from his direct connection with Divine energy.
 CHAPTER 12
Lamed

The lamed, which towers above all of the other letters in the Hebrew alphabet
and is the initial letter of the word lev (“heart”), reflects the wisdom of TCM.
TCM declares that the heart is the strongest organ, emitting the most energy. The
heart is the source of inspiration, love and connection.
The essential energy of the month of Tishrei is channeled through the letter
lamed. It is in this month that we renew and purify our relationship with God and
make amends with each other. Our souls are then invited to bond under the
protective roof of the sukkah, the holy space where Jews eat for a week in purity,
in the presence of angels and visiting patriarchs and matriarchs. The sukkah is
like a communal mikveh where all of our social interactions become imbued with
love and clarity as we together purify our hearts.
During the week-long Festival of Succot, we shake four types of plants in
prayer and meditation. Each plant represents a different part of the body. The
etrog represents the heart and is the only specie that is held in the right hand.
Jews belabor the selection and purchase of the perfect etrog, which must meet
stringent halachic requirements. A good etrog reflects a rectified heart, free to
love one’s fellow man and serve God in joy.
 We begin the New Year having strengthened and healed our strongest organ,
the heart. Throughout the rest of the year all of our thoughts, speech and actions
will surely be inspired by a vibrant, pulsating love.
According to TCM, when the heart becomes heavy (in Hebrew “heavy” is
written with the same letters of the word “liver,” kaved) one becomes numb to
life and blind to vision. When scripture informs us that Pharaoh continually
resisted Moses and thereby rejected the process of redemption, the verse
continues to relate that the heart of Pharaoh had become a “liver” or the “heart”
of Pharaoh had become “heavy.”
Because of his “liver-heavy” heart, Pharaoh witnessed the ten plagues and all
the miracles of the Exodus, oblivious to the mystery of the supernatural. Pharaoh
asked Moses several times: “Who is the God who sends you?” but he could not
receive an enlightening answer from Moses. Why is it that the greatest prophet
of the Bible could not answer his question? Could we attribute Moses’ failure to
communicate to and inspire the dictator to his own “constricted heart”? In the
Biblical text we learn that also Moses’ heart had lost part of its capacity for
inspiration and communication. Moses defined his communication problem
when he resisted God’s order to speak to Pharaoh as “I am k’vad pei (“my mouth
is heavy,” or “my mouth is a liver”).” TCM teaches that the mouth is the main
tool for the heart’s expression. In terms of TCM, Moses’ statement can be related
to his heart (the source of spiritual vision) having become tight and unable to
communicate like an angry liver. Unfortunately all these concepts are totally
buried by the prevalent English translation of the Biblical text: “I am stuttering.”
When God tells Moses to speak to the rock so that it will bring forth water, the
verse reads that the prophet “hit the rock instead of speaking to it.” Because of
his inability to speak and communicate, due to his pei kaved (“heavy mouth”),
God punished Moses by denying him entrance to the Promised Land. This
illustrates the dramatic importance of the heart’s capacity to inspire and
communicate.

The art of loving

Improving relations furthers our spiritual growth. The holiest day in the
Jewish calendar, Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement, on the tenth day of
Tishrei), follows nine days from Rosh HaShanah (the New Year). Between Rosh
HaShanah and Yom Kippur, the days of teshuvah, we make amends especially
for the sins that we have committed against each other. Through prayer we can
appeal to God for forgiveness, but we must directly approach those whom we
may have offended and ask them to forgive us. We aslo need to forgive.
True spiritual elevation is reached through wisdom of the heart. This is
alluded to by the numerical value of the Hebrew word lev, 32, the number of the
“Paths of Wisdom” in Sefer Yetzirah.
 The Torah is closely bound to the heart: the final letter of its text is lamed (of
the word Israel) and the first letter of its text is bet (of the word Bereishit).
Together these two letters spell the word ‫ – לב‬lev. Also, the 32 Paths of Wisdom
are identified collectively with the Torah: for it is your wisdom.
Lamed is also one of the roots of the word ‫ – לימוד‬limud (“study”, “teaching”).
The wisdom of the heart is the spiritual teaching that we receive when
interacting with others. As artist and author Nechama Nadborny-Burgeman
writes in her The Twelve Dimensions of Israel: Please guide me in reaching out
to another
To be in the present and relate to the real you
Without illusions colored by
Relationships of the past
Of pain,
Or of lifetimes we once traveled through.

In spirituality, rectifying the heart is a most complex task because it is linked

to the emotions, to unconscious impulses, and to deep-seated patterns. But it also
has the greatest potential for guiding us towards God, whose essence is love.
We are reminded of the importance of being wise-hearted in regard to the
building of the Mishkan (“tabernacle”). God stipulates: “I have placed wisdom in
the heart of every naturally talented person.” (Exodus 31:6) This fusion of heart
and mind, in those truly “gifted,” results in Divinely inspired artistic expressions.
 An extremely important precept of the Torah tells us: “Love your neighbor as
yourself.” This mitzvah ends with the following words: “I am God.” If we want
to love our neighbor even when our lower instincts (such as territorial expansion,
competitiveness, and aggression) impel us to act in ways that deny the laws of
harmony and truth, we must remain focused on the Divine. By overcoming the
obstacles of the ego and learning to give, we strengthen the Divine spirit within
ourselves. Hillel (110 BCE-10 CE), one of the most influential Jewish religious
leaders expressed this ethic of reciprocity (referred to as “the Golden Rule”):
“That which is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow man. This is the Torah.
The rest is explanation. Go and learn.” Given the fact that our sphere of action
and influence is in the real world, our relationship with God is contingent on the
improvement of our relations with those around us. As Rabbi Simon Jacobson
writes in Toward a Meaningful Life, based on the teachings of the Lubavitcher
Rebbe: Love is a way of talking to God. When you look into someone’s eyes and
love that person, you are transcending the physical world and connecting to
God…. The deepest love is not merely human. It is a love infused with
Godliness, whereby a mortal kiss is transformed into an immortal one. True love
is one soul greeting another.

Recognizing the difficulty of transforming physical acts into spiritual ones,

Judaism teaches every couple approaching marriage the laws that will guide
their sexual life to become a means for coming closer to God. The rules dealing
with sexuality require avoiding all physical contact during the woman’s
menstrual period and for a week following. The woman then immerses herself in
a mikveh (“ritual bath”) before her renewed encounter with her husband and with
God, who is seen as the third partner in marital relations. The act of immersion is
the woman’s way of sanctifying her marital life.
Something that surprised me the most when I was still attracted by my
“single” mystical, almost monastic path of spiritual realization was that married
couples among my teachers in Israel lived half their time in a “cloistered” state,
as it were. For almost two weeks every month, they related to each other as “soul
brother and sister.” When they united as lovers, their sexual relations were much
more intense than those of the secular couples I knew. I discovered that for these
couples, love was a spiritual discipline in which opposites—male and female,
human and Divine, body and spirit—were joined together. The fact that their
sexual relations were governed by Biblical wisdom endowed their sexual lives
with a beautiful and spiritual sanctity. In addition, I began to see the childbearing
process as a spiritual challenge. I saw my friends striving to become real
spiritual teachers for their kids, who were so different from the spoiled children
of my secular friends. They were like angels, and sitting with them at the
Shabbat table was an enlightening experience. My New Age friends would call
all of them “Indigo Children”!
The spiritual connotation of marriage in Jewish religious communities is very
enticing for a spiritual seeker. When you stop seeing marriage as just a social
institution, but also as part the process of retrieving the lost parts of your soul,
then the search for the twin-soul takes on a dramatic importance in your life.
Even after a painful divorce, I still am grateful for having had the experience of
feeling whole, for a few years of marriage. Needless to say, the deep spiritual
experience of motherhood, a bridge to feel one with the Shechinah, the “mother
of every living being”, is invaluable for any true spiritual path.
Also discovering the importance of tashmish (the foundational connection
between two people, especially between and husband and wife), the hush
(“sense”) associated by Sefer Yetzirah to the month of Tishrei helped me to
appreciate the experience of soul and body, male and female merging together in
an act that the Bible calls da’at (“knowledge”), and not “sex.” “And Adam knew
his wife” (Genesis) hints to the possibility of mind-expansion latent within every
embrace.
While drawing the letter lamed, I realized how it really looks like a snake
elevating the forepart of its body. Its form might be associated with the oriental
metaphor of the “reawakening of the Kundalini,” symbolized by a snake that
stands upright by uncoiling itself. This is a way of describing the rise of energy
from the lower parts of the body to the heart. Lamed could therefore refer to our
overcoming the sin of Adam, who was governed by his lower impulses, which is
symbolized by the snake that lost its erect position after tempting man and was
condemned to crawl along the ground.
The elevation of women’s sexual desire and ancestral impulses is part of the
tikun (“rectification”) of the drama that took place in Gan Eden. We are called
upon to annul the Divine curses, specifically the Divine decree of enmity
between the woman and the serpent, as it is written in Genesis: “…thou art
cursed among all the animals…I will put hatred between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and hers.” As the great commentator Abraham Ibn
Ezra explained eight hundred years ago, the drama of Gan Eden is also a
metaphor for the disintegration that has occurred within the human psyche: the
snake was the “liver” (the base of ancestral instincts and sexuality); the woman
was the “heart” (the center of feelings), while the man represented the “brain.”
The initial harmony existing in Gan Eden was therefore the symbol of a
perfect union between mind, heart, and instincts. Not surprisingly, as mentioned
previously, the combination of the initial letters of the Hebrew words for mind
(moach), heart (lev) and liver (kaved) form the word Melech (“king”): the
maximum perfection of human psyche in which emotions, feelings, and instincts
are reunited. The expulsion from Gan Eden was the end of that integration and
the origin of the split between the archetype of woman-heart (the feelings of
affection of the woman for her partner) and sexual desire (the archetype of the
snake).
The sexual difficulties that many couples presently experience could be traced
back to the “curse” that uprooted Eve, the first woman, from her eroticism
(associated with sensual memories of the relationship she had with the snake).
The tikun of the expulsion from Eden is, according to Kabbalah, linked to the
reintegration of feelings of love and affection within erotic passion. The ritual of
immersion in the mikveh, for Jewish women, recreates that lost connection.
There is, however, another, potentially negative aspect of relationships. The
deeper a relationship becomes, the more it can cause us to subsume our spiritual
priorities. The following parable clearly illustrates this principle: A man had to
take a long journey to a far-away country. In order to maintain his relationship
with his wife, he sent her beautiful love letters. The postman who delivered them
became so important in the woman’s life that she ended up falling in love with
him and forgetting her husband.

Similarly, God, the true husband and father of us all, often uses messengers to
make us feel His love, to show that He is near, to train us to have a heart that is
“alive.” Having to “love God with all our hearts” (as we are commanded in the
Shema Yisrael prayer), we are given the task of opening up the heart—getting
ready for “openheart surgery,” as sometime happens in relationships. However,
sometimes the “messengers” make us literally forget about God, instead of
helping us live our lives more intensely in the Divine presence.
For this reason, our wedding day is the only time we are excused from reciting
Keriyat Shema al ha’mitah, the prayer said before retiring for the night. On this
day of our deepest encounter with human otherness, we are permitted for once to
forget Divine otherness. But if this “omission” were to become habitual, we
would have to restructure the relationship or bring it into question. When a
relationship is compromised by mutual dependence, manipulation, and power
games, the souls of the couple become increasingly distanced from each other
and therefore from God. If they can succeed in overcoming their baser instincts,
and forge a connection nourished by the wisdom of their hearts, they will
strengthen the spark of divinity in their souls and their match will be truly
blessed.
For this reason, the sefirah associated with the month of Tishrei is yesod
(“foundation”), whose inner attribute is truth. The only way to avoid letting our
relationship with human otherness take us away from God is by being fully
conscious of the healthy boundaries we must maintain in our relationships.
 CHAPTER 13
Mem

The letter mem is the initial letter of the Hebrew word mayim (“water”), and
of mikveh (“ritual bath”), the symbol of rebirth and transformation. By
immersing ourselves in the mikveh, we express our willingness to give up the
material, static, dense part of ourselves and to be reborn as different beings.
He made Mem king over water
And He bound a crown to it
And He combined one with another
And with them He formed
Earth in the Universe
Cold in the Year
And the belly in the Soul.

Water
The word most clearly linked to the letter mem is ‫ – מים‬mayim (“water”).
When we write the name of the letter out in full ‫ – מם‬mem, we have the same
consonants as this word. The additional ‫( י‬yud) in mayim, the letter associated
with “wisdom”, hints to the inherent healing qualities of water. The Torah is
likened to water, which is as essential to our spiritual survival as water is to our
physical survival. As it is written in the Talmud, “There is no water other than
the Torah.”
The mikveh, conversion of the soul
To fully understand the meaning of water in the Torah we have to continue our
discussion of the mikveh, the ritual bath. A Jewish community is in fact defined
by the presence of a mikveh. Archaeological excavations in Israel reveal the
presence of a mikveh, and the importance of the practice of immersion in “living
waters” to be central to Jewish observance. Even the small community of Jews
on Masada, who so valiantly fought off the Romans until their mass suicide, had
a mikveh. Perhaps this is the mitzvah that gave them the strength to refuse to
become subject to pagan rulers.
The first reference to the mikveh in the Torah is its role in the transformation
of Aaron and his sons from lay people into priests (kohanim). The immersion
performed for the first time by the kohanim was the initial ritual act
distinguishing them from the rest of the nation. In the same way, the Kohen
Gadol (“High Priest”)’s own purification in the mikveh before entering the Holy
of Holies on Yom Kippur was a process of spiritual elevation. This was necessary
in order for the High Priest to stand before God and obtain forgiveness for the
entire community.
Immersion in the mikveh, part of the ritual of conversion for a non-Jew who
wants to embrace the faith of Israel, transforms the soul. Signifying the water of
the womb, the mikveh for a convert is a rebirth into the nation of Israel and the
commitment to assume the obligations incumbent upon a Jew. The convert
emerges from the mikveh with a new identity and a new relationship to God. It is
written that, after immersion, a convert is like a newborn baby who has taken on
a new identity, There are numerous references in Kabbalistic literature to the
mikveh as a mother’s womb, the place where spiritual rebirth takes place. The
very root of the word mayim (“water”) helps us understand this process. Rabbi
Waknine points out that mah, the first syllable of the word mayim, means
“what.” With immersion in the mikveh, a person shows that she or he is ready to
nullify his or her ego—the fixed, unchangeable part of the personality—and to
ask the question, “What am I in my authentic, Divine essence?” Rabbi
Ginsburgh teaches that the word ‫ – טבילה‬tevilah (“ritual immersion”) is an
anagram of the word ‫ הביטול‬ha’bitul (“annulment” [of the ego]). The cleansing
effect of the water on the metaphysical level in effect washes away the barriers
that prevent access to spiritual awareness; in the case of the convert, a new
spiritual awareness.
The words ve’nachnu mah? (“what are we?”), the ontological question that
Moses expresses to the Jewish people, describes a psychological and spiritual
state of humility. One must be ready to confront and subdue his or her ego with
this rhetorical question in order to be renewed.

The mikveh and women

Now we can begin to examine the meaning of the ritual of the mikveh, the
immersion that a married woman must perform seven days after the end of her
menstrual period. This ritual regulates the rhythm, the “pulse” of the Jewish
nation’s family life. Many modern feminists have asked, “Why should a woman
be considered ‘impure,’ even for a limited period of time?” They consider the
label “impure” to be an example of a patriarchal system.
First, we must clarify what kind of impurity we mean when talking about a
menstruating woman. This impurity has no moral implications. On the contrary,
it is totally connected to the idea of life and death. For Judaism, the greatest
source of impurity is death, because it signifies the total impossibility for growth
and transformation. Menstrual blood is part of this category of impurity. It has
been described as “the tears of the uterus” that has lost an occasion to create, to
conceive new life.
Through these tears of mourning, a woman experiences a minor death. In her
profound understanding of the female psyche, Simone de Beauvoir wrote
regarding this experience that the woman “feels her body most painfully as…the
prey of a stubborn and foreign life that each month constructs and then tears
down a cradle within it; each month, all things are made ready for a child and
then aborted in the crimson flow.”
The mikveh, with its promise of renewal and hope (‫ – מקוה‬mikveh, “ritual
bath,” and ‫ – תקוה‬tikvah, “hope,” have the same root), allows a woman to release
herself from the subtle psychological impression left in her from the experience
of bleeding. In the same vein, a man or a woman goes to a mikveh when he or
she feels constrained, unable to proceed or grow, or when seeking new
inspiration for spiritual growth. Observant Jewish men also use the mikveh,
especially before Shabbat and holidays to inspire feelings of renewal and rebirth.
The waters of the mikveh represent the washing away of our limitations, the
impurities that block the channels of Divine energy. According to Rabbi
Waknine, who writes that what gives the mikveh this characteristic is in the
nature of its water (sea, river, or rainwater), which cannot be stagnant. Only
water that is “alive” can support one’s awareness of the inner dynamics that
motivate him or her to overcome stagnation and all impediments to spiritual
growth.
The Talmud relates that when Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi asked the prophet
Elijah when Mashiach would be revealed, the prophet answered: Go and ask
him. You will find him seated among the poor and sick at the gates of Rome. He
can be recognized by the fact that, while these sick people untie their bandages
all at the same time, Mashiach unties and adjusts each bandage separately.

Of the various teachings found in this passage, it is clear that one of

Mashiach’s most distinct actions is that he teaches the lepers a different way of
“changing their bandages,” a new and different way of facing and overcoming
their illness.
As we have already discussed, the Zohar states that the highest level of
spirituality consists in knowing how to “transform darkness into light and the
bitter into the sweet.” Who has more opportunities than the terminally ill to
achieve this transformation and make the miracle of redemption visible to all?
One of Mashiach’s main tasks is therefore to help the ill and suffering to
understand that their illness and their suffering (whether psychological or
physical) is the way that God has chosen to transform them. In light of this
understanding, it is possible to overcome the “birth pangs of Mashiach,” (the
difficult times now and in the immediate future), to recover and be reborn, both
individually and collectively. As it is written in Psalms, God makes us go
through all possible tribulations, through “fire and water,” so that we can reach
serenity, completeness, and abundance. “We underwent fire and water, but You
bring us out into abundance.
Water is also associated with Divinity in the Bible: “And a wind from God
hovered over the surface of the waters, moving the waters.” In cursive Hebrew,
mem suggests the image of a wave, water moved by the spirit.
The letter mem is related to the element of water, to the cold climate and to the
winter season. Ancient Chinese mystics also combined these natural phenomena
(water, cold, and the season of winter). In the Chinese tradition, water is the
element associated with our deepest fears and our most hidden, buried, and
shadowed emotions. If we dwell in the depths of these fears and shadows, we
easily become stagnant and darkened. In order to evolve, move forward, and to
be renewed, we must dive into the depths of our own dark waters. This means
resolving our fears and keeping the waters of our life in motion. In nature, it is
the waters of the winter that nourish the seeds of the spring to grow into new
life. It is up to us to perform the necessary tasks and rituals to keep the waters of
our inner life in motion, nourishing our seeds of growth.
 CHAPTER 14
Nun

The nun is associated with the concept of nefilah, “fall,” the existential tests
that are sent to us by God to force us to look in the deepest places of our
subconscious in order to find the power to transcend our limitations and to
overcome the unconscious destructive drives. This descent becomes an
opportunity to lift ourselves and attain a level that is higher than the one we had
achieved previously.

The art of “falling” in the spiritual quest

Some souls are destined to know God in their fall and subsequent rise from
the depths—where they encountered their personal demons, the “monsters” that
feed upon weakness. Nun in Aramaic means “sea serpent” (“water dragon”). The
letter nun therefore indicates the confrontation and descent into the depths of
water, which purifies through suffering. In the same way, the world was purified
by the waters of the Flood.
Sefer Yetzirah associates the nun with the sign of Scorpio, whose astrological
identity is characterized by the process of physical, psychological, and spiritual
death and rebirth. We can contemplate this letter imagining terrible, successive
existential crises following one after the other, as described in the verse, “All
Your waves and billows have gone over me.” These crises befall us to bring us to
radical transformation. Without them, we would not achieve higher levels of
spiritual awareness.
 The secret of rebirth after death that the nun teaches us depends on our belief
that our falls raise us higher, that God is near us, even in the abyss, and will not
allow us to go beyond the point of no return. Indeed, He may even be closer to
us, i.e., present with greater intensity, than He is when we are experiencing
positive events. As it is written: “He makes darkness His secret place, and He
remains among them in the midst of their uncleanness.”
A verse from Scripture enlightens us about this process: Naflah lo tosif kum
betulat Israel.
This verse is commonly translated as: naflah, “she has fallen”; lo tosif kum,
“she shall no longer rise”; betulat Israel, “the maiden of Israel.” But, as the Oral
Tradition teaches, the verse can also be interpreted in the opposite sense by
moving the commas: naflah lo tosif—“she fell but she will not continue to fall”;
kum, “arise!” betulat Israel, “maiden of Israel.”
In the midst of a difficult period or painful disruption in our lives, we, like a
bouncing ball, can use the force of the impact with the ground to ascend even
higher, experiencing a true rebirth. This higher level of awareness occurs from
the shock experienced by the soul as it touches bottom. It is specifically at this
very point that the soul summons the strength to deal constructively with its
emotions and renew the enthusiasm needed to rely on those parts of its
personality that are still intact. With this effort, it can rise again, like the “maiden
of Israel.”
The psychologist Roberto Assagioli, the founder of psycho-synthesis, states:
When danger threatens to paralyze us, an unsuspected force suddenly rises from
the depths of our being that energetically stops us at the edge of the cliff.

The seriousness of a psychological crisis depends on the level of identification

and energy invested in the object of an “unhealthy passion.” The sign of Scorpio,
linked to the letter nun, is associated with the tension created by desiring
something with unrestrained intensity, to the point that it endangers ourselves
and others.

The sign of Scorpio: returning to the essence in order to heal oneself of

obsession
In this context, the Hebrew word ‫ עקרב‬akrav (“scorpion”), contains an
important teaching. Akrav is composed of the same letters as the word ‫– בעקר‬
be’ikar (“in the essence”). Thus, the only way for us to be saved when we are
“possessed” by the objects of our passion is to separate from the object and
transform this passion into the passion for true essence, the source of our
spiritual renewal.
In order to do this, one must restore the value and importance of what was
lost, over time, to the objects of our desires, such as people or situations that
became genuine “obsessions.” It is necessary to recover the pleasure, the
interests, the activities, and the relationships that were minimized and discarded
by our obsessions. We can only halt destructive instincts (directed against
ourselves and others) by disengaging from the object of our unhealthy passion.
Maybe for this reason the Italian word cattivo (“bad”) comes from the Latin
captivus (“prisoner”). During this procedure of disengagement, it is particularly
helpful to recite this verse from Psalms: “Even though I walk through the valley
of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil, for You are with me.”
Our belief in God’s absolute presence in our lives is our “safety net,” which
catches us from reaching the point of no return that we experience when we feel
that giving up our obsessions is like “dying.” Suicide, so common to Scorpios
who have not attained that trust in God’s protection, can be viewed as the total
lack of belief in that “safety net.”

Loving tests
The Hebrew month associated with the sign of Scorpio is called Marcheshvan.
The name literally means “bitter reckoning,” referring to the difficult trials
related to the sign of Scorpio. In a seeming contradiction, Sefer Yetzirah
corresponds this month to the sefirah of chesed (“love and goodness”). This
teaches us that once we have fallen under the weight of the mistakes caused by
emotional excess, only love for ourselves and our persistent faith in Divine love
for us can keep us from descending into a vicious cycle of guilt and depression.
Chesed, the kindness and forgiveness that we must feel for ourselves is what
allows us to return to the surface.
The second association between the sefirah of chesed and the month of
Marcheshvan comes from the metaphysical principle expressed in the verse,
“For the Lord reproves him whom He loves.” This verse makes us understand
that suffering is a nisayon (“trial”—beginning with the letter nun) that God
reserves for whom He loves, for the more elevated. As is written, “Your rod and
Your staff, they comfort me, for they are the expressions of His love.”
Some religions depict Divinity as if completely removed from evil, ascribing a
negative role to the figure of Satan. This is a total anathema to Judaism, in which
Satan is an angel who obeys the Divine will by tempting us with evil. This
concept is expressed in an enigmatic verse from Isaiah: “I form the light, and
create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I, the Lord, do all these things.”
The Oral Tradition deals with this theme metaphorically, telling the story of a
king who tested his son’s purity by engaging a prostitute to lead him into
temptation. The story has various endings, but according to the one most
generally told, the prince resisted the temptation of “evil” and sent the prostitute
away from the palace. Another version, representing a more Kabbalistic
interpretation, relates that the prince understood that the prostitute was part of
the “family” (since she was sent by the king). For that reason, he married her and
helped her become a faithful wife.
According to a third version, the prostitute was so close to the king’s will that
she was not able to corrupt the prince. She thus had to hire a second prostitute
who, having never met the king, performed her duties, and the prince was unable
to escape her.
This story contains a metaphysical principle expressed in the Sefer HaBahir, a
controversial Kabbalistic text. According to this work, the levels of evil that are
farthest from the Creator act with such fervor that they almost deny the will and
existence of Divinity, who desires the triumph of man over evil. These levels of
destruction fall under the category of the nun’s tests and trials of initiation, which
may either end in death (and rebirth in a future incarnation in which the soul will
be tested again) or in miraculous resurrection.
These idea are expressed by Rabbi Adin Even-Israel [Steinsaltz], who
attributes man’s greatness to his capacity to oppose evil. He states that this
unending struggle against evil can be interpreted as a test, with man on one side
and God Himself on the other, pushing against him. As soon as man shows the
will to resist this particular evil, Rabbi Steinsaltz says, God removes it, but not
without replacing it with a new obstacle to test him. Thus, concludes the rabbi,
the struggle starts all over again, but at a higher state of consciousness.
Sometimes we cannot overcome a test without God’s intervention, as is clear in
the first rule of the Twelve Steps program of NA and AA, in which the addict
must realize and declare that without a helping hand from Above he cannot resist
the temptation of substance abuse.
This concept can also be found in the Torah. On the one hand, Israel is
commanded to blot out the remembrance of Amalek, the symbol of evil. On the
other hand, Israel is told that God Himself will destroy the evil inclination, as it
is stated in the Talmud. Only God will undertake the total defeat of evil (a task
absolutely impossible for us) after we have shown our desire to utterly forsake it.
The successful overcoming of initiation tests can even lead to prophecy. In
Hebrew ‫ – נבואה‬nevu’ah, “prophecy” represents the ultimate level of spiritual
awareness. This word can be in fact divided into two words: ‫ – נון בא‬nun ba
(“nun comes”), bringing the gifts of the “fifty gates of understanding” associated
with the numerical value of the letter nun (50).
 CHAPTER 15
Samech

The name of the letter ‫ס‬, samech, means “support” or “trust,” referring
specifically to our trust in Divine protection. In Sefer Yetzirah, samech is
associated with the month of Kislev, the hush (“sense”) of dreaming, the sefirah
of netzach (“victory”), and the experience of trust. Dreaming in a state of higher
awareness is an enlightening experience that can help integrate the sense of trust
in the deepest layers of the soul.
The holiday of Chanukah occurs in the month of Kislev, celebrating the
victory of light over darkness. This is the time of the winter solstice in which we
find the longest night of the year. In the darkest of days in winter, we light the
Chanukah candles in order to integrate the message of the letter samech, whose
round shape represents a surrounding light of protection and support. When we
meditate on being surrounded by the light of the samech we can abandon
ourselves to absolute trust.
Together with the ‫ – נ‬nun that precedes it, ‫ – ס‬samech forms the Hebrew word
‫ – נס‬nes (“miracle”). Miracles are a genuine form of resurrection that God grants
us, for having acted with the maturity necessary to emerge victoriously from our
challenges. By staying connected to our inner light, and by remaining optimistic
even after repeated failures, we merit to understand, that even in darkness God is
always near. Thus, we can pass from ‫ – שחור‬shachor (“black”), a metaphor for
darkness, to ‫ – שחר‬shachar (“dawn”), a metaphor for light and redemption. The
difference is small, as small as the leap between our feelings of desperation and
of resurrection that can happen in a fraction of few seconds.

The month of Kislev and the miracle of Chanukah

The story of the miracle of Chanukah is proof of this teaching. The Bet
HaMikdash (“Temple”)— the “world center” of spirituality—and the oil of the
menorah were defiled by the Greeks. These conquerors wanted to stop the
spread of the Torah and the Seven Noahide Precepts, which contained the
universal spiritual teachings that God commanded Israel to pass on to all the
nations of the earth.
In the wake of the conquests of Alexander the Great, there had been many
Greek aristocrats (and later, Romans) who adopted these Seven Laws. They had
learned these laws from the Sages of Israel. However, a majority of the Greeks
rejected the teachings. In order to fight against the truth of the Torah, which was
antithetical to the basic, rational, and philosophical precepts upon which their
culture was based, they defiled the Sanctuary. In so doing, they aimed to
interrupt the flow of spiritual light that Jerusalem was shining forth to the
nations. They defiled the oil while the Temple lights were still lit, thereby
diminishing the spiritual power needed for the kohanim to transmit their
message. However, one flask of pure oil was found in the cellars of the Bet
HaMikdash, and it was actually enough for only one day. Despite this minute
quantity of pure oil, the kohanim lit the menorah according to ritual. They
trusted that the Divine light, represented by the flames of the menorah, would
not be extinguished, as (Greek) logic would dictate. Miraculously, the menorah
continued to illuminate Jerusalem for eight days, the amount of time needed to
receive new oil from Galilee.
Parallel to the faith of the priest lighting the menorah, another group of
kohanim, armed with faith and strength, had started a revolt against the massive
and perfectly armed Greek forces. Thanks to the people of Israel’s faith in
Divine miracles, the invaders were defeated.
There are periods in all our lives when our emotional resources (our individual
sanctuaries) are devastated by illness, loss, or conflicts in our relationships. As
we learn in Chassidut, it is especially important during these times to keep close
contact with that part of our soul that cannot be weakened or defiled, because it
is “part” of God. At times, it is difficult to be aware of our pure essence because
it is almost imperceptible. However, by looking for it and trusting that it is there,
we can find it again. Our Divine soul has the power to illuminate our existence
and by trusting in its existence, we magnify its power. This is the human
analogue to the tiny amount of pure oil of the Temple. Because of the faith of the
kohanim and of the entire people, the menorah stayed lit for eight days.
Watching the joy with which children light the Chanukah lights, with the
implicit feeling of responsibility for enlightening the world, inspires the idea of
trust. Each one of us can start anew, with a small effort (a prayer, a small victory
against our conditioned behaviors and limiting habits) and make a meaningful
change in our life.
This brings us to the central point of Rabbi Nachman on Breslav’s teachings:
“It is forbidden to fall into despair!” Despair is the instrument of the sitra achra
(the “other side”) of Satan. When we feel distant from the light, we must
remember the lesson of Chanukah and the verse in Psalms: “I will sing to the
Lord as long as I live.”
In other words, I will sing with that small pure essence of Divinity that is left
in my life, trusting that it has the power to illuminate my existence. If I believe
and trust its power, I will sing a song that will make me worthy of receiving a
miracle that will transform my existence.

“Dreaming” with the month of Kislev and the letter samech

In order to integrate faith into to all levels of our consciousness, including our
subconscious, the Torah preceding Freud, teaches us to draw faith and wisdom
from the realm of dreams. Not only should our conscious and waking lives be
imbued with belief and trust in God but also, our faith should be reflected in our
dreams. Indeed, in modern psychology as well as throughout esoteric systems of
spiritual searching, we find that the study, analysis and willful search for
enlightenment in the dream state is a central theme.
Kabbalah explains that while sleeping, the soul detaches itself from the body
to travel through various spiritual worlds where it makes contact with various
entities. Messages from these entities are translated into images we see in
dreams. The truth of these messages depends on the quality of the “encounters”
made during this journey. According to the Talmud, there are different types of
dreams. The more common are hirhurei ha’lev, dreams based on what we
experienced during the day.
Other dreams are prophetic dreams and transmit, to a greater or lesser degree,
information that can guide the dreamer. For this reason, in cases of crisis, illness,
or difficulty, the sages of Judaism sometimes recite the prayer known as the
she’eilat chalom, the request for an illuminating dream, before going to sleep.
Psycho-synthesis and various other therapies attempting to unlock the
subconscious would interpret she’eilat chalom as a request of the “higher self” to
express itself through a dream.
Whether or not the dream comes from the subconscious, as psychoanalysis
believes, or from God, the illuminating dream can provide healing. It is
important, however to decide if the dream is a prophetic dream or a “day
residual,” without ruling out the third possibility, that the dream comes from the
“Other Side,” the world of impurities. How can we determine if the dream
receives its information from the World of Truth or from the “Other Side”? The
wise claim that prophetic dreams usually happen at dawn and their colors and
the emotions they transmit are much more tangible and vivid than day residual
dreams. In addition, prophetic dreams usually repeat themselves, often several
times. Another type of dream that is considered prophetic is one that is dreamt
by dear friends and people who are deeply connected to us.
 If we read the story of Joseph, we can clearly see that dreams become true
according to the interpretation that is given them. According to the Zohar, the
dreams of Pharaoh and his servants came true according to Joseph’s
interpretation.
Each of the two men—the cupbearer and the baker of the king of Egypt,
who were being held in prison—had a dream the same night. Each dream had
a meaning of its own. When Joseph came to them the next morning, he saw
that they were dejected. So he asked Pharaoh’s officials who were in custody
with him in his master’s house, “Why are your faces so sad today?” “We both
had dreams,” they answered, “but there is no one to interpret them.” Then
Joseph said to them, “Do not interpretations belong to God? Tell me your
dreams.” So the chief cupbearer told Joseph his dream: “In my dream, I saw a
vine in front of me, and on the vine were three branches. As soon as it budded,
it blossomed, and its clusters ripened into grapes. Pharaoh’s cup was in my
hand, and I took the grapes, squeezed them into Pharaoh’s cup, and put the
cup in his hand.”
“This is what it means,” Joseph said to him. “The three branches are three
days. Within three days, Pharaoh will take account of you and restore you to
your position, and you will put Pharaoh’s cup in his hand, just as you used to
do when you were his cupbearer. But when all goes well with you, remember
me and show me kindness; mention me to Pharaoh and get me out of this
prison. For I was forcibly carried off from the land of the Hebrews, and even
here I have done nothing to deserve being placed in a dungeon.” When the
chief baker saw that Joseph had given a favorable interpretation, he said to
Joseph: “I too had a dream. On my head were three baskets of bread. In the
top basket were all kinds of baked goods for Pharaoh, but the birds were
eating them out of the basket on my head.” “This is what it means,” Joseph
said. “The three baskets are three days. Within three days Pharaoh will cut off
your head and hang you on a tree, and the birds will eat away your flesh.”
Now the third day was Pharaoh’s birthday, and he gave a feast for all his
officials. He took account of the chief cupbearer and the chief baker in the
presence of his officials: He restored the chief cupbearer to his position, so
that he once again put the cup into Pharaoh’s hand, but he hung the chief
baker, just as Joseph had said to them in his interpretation. The chief
cupbearer, however, did not remember Joseph; he forgot him.
 This is the reason why, according to the Kabbalistic tradition, after having a
disturbing dream it is important to talk about it with some very wise person (or,
preferably, three Torah scholars), asking them for an “improvement of the
dream” (hatavat chalom). This is a ritual in which the proper prayer is recited in
order to not only “repair” the dream, but also to give it a new and positive
interpretation.
My father and other wise old men of my family told me of an event that
confirmed the effectiveness of hatavat chalom. My father’s grandfather, Rabbi
Yuda Labi, was a great rabbi to whom many came for blessings and advice. One
day, a very distraught woman told him about a dream she had that foretold the
death of her son. The rabbi reassured her that it was a “good dream.” He gave
another interpretation of the dream, reversing the meaning, and the woman
returned home relieved. After a month, the same dream occurred again, and
again Rabbi Yuda Labi once again interpreted it as a “good dream” and the
woman returned home peacefully. The woman experienced the bad dream
intermittently for two years, and Rabbi Yuda Labi, by giving it a positive
interpretation, was able each time to prevent it from coming true. One day, the
woman arrived to tell the rabbi the same dream again, but Rabbi Yuda was away.
His substitute told the woman to fast immediately in order to prevent the horrible
dream from coming true. After a few days her son died, since he was not kept
alive anymore by the positive interpretations of Rabbi Yuda Labi.
The Sages of the Talmud recommend that we do not tell our dreams to others
unless they are knowledgeable and benevolent people, in order to avoid negative
influences. For instance, if we had a positive dream of success and happiness, it
would not be wise to tell it to people who are envious or who have other
negative feelings toward us, because they could “drain” it and prevent it from
happening.
There is a prayer in Jewish liturgy that relates to dreams and their reparation,
and which, unlike hatavat chalom, can also be pronounced without the presence
of three sages: Lord of the Universe! I am Yours and my dreams are Yours; I
have dreamed a dream and I know not what it is. Whether I dreamed concerning
myself, or whether my fellows dreamed concerning me, or whether I dreamed
concerning others; if they be good dreams, strengthen and fortify them (and may
they be fulfilled) like the dreams of Joseph; but if they require to be mended,
heal them as the waters of Marah were healed by the hands of Moses our teacher,
as Miriam was healed from her leprosy, as Hezekiah from his illness, and as the
waters of Jericho were sweetened by the hands of Elisha. And as You turned the
curse of the wicked Balaam into a blessing, so too may You turn all my dreams
for me into good.

The great importance of dreams for spiritual growth is evident in the Keriat
Shema al Ha’mitah, the prayer said at night before retiring. According to many
Kabbalists, this prayer is most essential because during our sleeping hours we
may connect with our deep, inner self and our prophetic potential. Since we
sleep for one third of the day, we should take advantage of this time to grow
spiritually and to gain the prophetic visions and knowledge that are usually
inaccessible during our waking hours. According to Maimonides, prophecy is
not a privilege of the great masters and initiates but rather a spiritual right for all
of us. We can all access the prophetic experience if we truly desire this with a
whole-hearted and pure intention. Dreaming is a privileged path to prophecy.
A verse in the “Song of Songs” clearly refers to the role of dreams on our
spiritual pathway: “I sleep, but my heart is awake: Hark! My beloved is
knocking, saying, ‘Open to me, my sister, my bride.’” Through our dreams, the
voice of God speaks to the spark of Divinity in our souls. Upon awakening, our
task is to transform the dream into an experience of spiritual awakening.
The dream is at the core of a human being’s spiritual experience. It is written
in Tanya, regarding a man who has not expelled the spirit of impurity from his
life, “His dreams are vanity and degradation of the spirit, because [during sleep]
his soul does not ascend toward the heavens.” As it is written, “Who shall ascend
into the mountain of the Lord? He who is of clean hands and a pure heart.”
An analysis of the content of one’s dreams is therefore suggested by Chassidic
masters as a method of verifying one’s progress or regression along the spiritual
path. It is written in the Talmud that anyone who does not dream for a week can
be defined as an evil person. This is because anyone who does not remember his
or her dreams, or represses the memory of certain dreams, refuses to receive the
teachings necessary for spiritual growth. It is true that certain dreams are
particularly agonizing. Nevertheless, we must listen to their message. This is
what King David teaches us when he thanks God for having advised him during
the nights when he was tormented with nightmares.
According to the Talmud, a dream that is not interpreted is like a letter left
unopened. In ancient times, there were many wise men in Jerusalem who
dedicated themselves to interpreting dreams. Even today, some rabbis can
explain the messages of dreams in such a profound, precise, and almost
prophetic manner that undergoing dream analysis with them might be the fastest
way of solving one’s problems. This may replace endless sessions of
psychoanalysis.
We can only interpret dreams correctly if we comprehend symbols.
Interpreting the messages that dreams contain requires familiarity with and
mastery of Biblical symbols. The letter samech is also at the beginning of the
word ‫ – סימן‬siman (“sign”, “symbol”). This hints to the Talmudic teaching:
“Decipher dreams and symbols and you will acquire Torah.”
 CHAPTER 16
Ayin

Sefer Yetzirah associates the letter ‫ – ע‬ayin with the emotion of anger, the
sefirah of chochmah (“wisdom”), and the sign of Capricorn. Ayin means both
“eye” and “wellspring.” It is the symbol of the superior perception of reality that
supports us when we need to extinguish the flames of anger.

Wisdom: the cure for anger

One of the most well-known verses from Psalms (111:10), whose message
appears throughout the Torah in various versions, states that “The beginning of
wisdom is awe of the Lord….” Being in a state of awe means feeling His
Presence. In this way, the dramas of our lives lose their impact on our soul. Such
detachment allows us to control the destructive emotion of anger. Another vital
ingredient for receiving wisdom is bitul (“self-effacement”). Only when we
empty ourselves of our egos can we make room to receive wisdom.
In the Torah and its mussar (“moral”) literature, overcoming one’s anger is
both the precondition, and the means, of acquiring wisdom. The Prophet Elijah
stated that the Torah can only be understood by one who does not let himself or
herself be overwhelmed by fury. Elijah would only appear to those who did not
get angry.
 The bond between faith and the ability to refrain from anger is very clearly
described, “He who becomes angry disregards the Divine Presence, and He who
becomes angry, it is as if he worshipped other gods.” In other words, when we
get angry, we put ourselves in the place of God. In a sense, we delude ourselves
by controlling our own existence. With faith in Divine Providence and certainty
that it is God who controls and oversees the world in every moment, we
understand that He is the prime mover of all that happens to us in life. When we
become angry, we exercise judgment, which is God’s domain, and not ours.
Thus, anger is synonymous with arrogance; by becoming angry we overstep our
boundaries.
The Tanya gives this description of King David’s attitude towards those who
insulted and cursed him:
David understood that God decided to test him through the words of
Shim’i, and that the thoughts that entered Shim’i’s mind and heart came from
God. [Therefore, he wisely chose not to react.]
 The Tanya discusses this in greater depth. While someone who damages us
economically or morally is guilty from the perspective of human and Divine law
because he chose to do evil, the person who was damaged must, in any case,
understand that this was decreed in Heaven. If we use our “eye of wisdom” to
see the face of God when we are tested, it will be easier to avoid becoming
angry. An anecdote that a sage told Maimonides is an excellent example of how
restraint results in growth that leads to the acquisition of wisdom:
One day I was sailing on a ship. At a certain point, even though he saw me
in the lower part of the vessel, a rich merchant raised his gowns and relieved
himself right next to me. He did not think that I, a humble traveler in the lower
bridge, was worthy of his consideration. I swear that I did not get angry. I was
only surprised that he had forgotten that he was a human being and had
behaved like an animal. On the other hand, I was full of joy because I
understood that, with the help of God, patience, and humility, I had finally
reached the goal that I, by nature not at all pacific and easily angered, had
aspired to all my life.

There are many discussions in the Oral Tradition about ways to avoid anger:
There are times when we make the situation worse by trying to step in and
control a misunderstanding. Instead, we should learn to remain silent or say a
prayer that will do much more than any words. As it is written in Psalms, “To
You, silence is praise, O God.”
The Talmud advises to not try to calm a person when he is at the peak of his
anger. Citing the words of God to Moses, “Wait until My anger passes and then I
shall forgive you.” A Midrash encourages us to remember the positive traits of
the person who offended us. In this way we emulate God Himself, who is also
referred to as “He who is slow to anger”:
My children, remember the virtues of your brothers when you are angry
with them. Learn from Me.

He that covers a transgression seeks love, but he that repeats a matter

separates close friends. When a friend offends us, we should remember the good
she or he has done for us instead of concentrating on the bad. Gratitude, one of
the basic tenets of Judaism, helps us to forgive and to save our friendships.
Rabbi Meir ben Yitzhak Aldabi taught: “Anger produces an excess of heat in
the body and may cause illness, or even madness. It is particularly harmful to get
angry after eating.” According to TCM, anger heats the liver, and an excess-liver
“attacks” the spleen and the stomach, which in turn effects the functioning of a
logical mind. The heated liver can also attack the heart, which is the source of
the superior functions of the intellect and the spirit. A person who does
everything possible to avoid anger performs a basic mitzvah of the Torah: “Take
therefore good heed to guard yourselves, i.e., your health.” Taking care of our
health allows us to serve God fully. Many of our longlived sages attributed their
good health to the fact that they did not allow themselves to get angry. The
Talmud relates that when Rabbi Zeira was asked how he managed to reach such
an old age, he answered, “I never insisted on being right.” In TCM, both metal
and water can put out the fire of anger. The practitioner needs to restore a
healthy balance among the elements in order to help control anger.

In the image, we see the opposition between fire and water—anger and
tolerance—controlling and letting go. The resolution of conflict can be
achieved by Divine wisdom, the inner eye related to the letter ayin.
The “fountain of wisdom,” cure for anger and pride
Sefer Yetzirah teaches us that the liver is the organ connected to the letter ayin,
and as mentioned above, corresponds to the sefirah of Chochmah (“wisdom”),
whose inner dimension is self-effacement. Through these associations, the Sefer
Yetzirah offers us a valid cure for the liver, ‫ – כבד‬kaved in Hebrew. Kaved is
written with the same letters as the word kavod, which means “honor” or
“pride.” These are the psychological characteristics responsible for the rise of
anger. When we learn to worry less about our own pride, and instead give kavod
(“honor”) to others and to the Creator of the Universe, we will attain health and
wisdom. The person who is truly humble does not allow his ego to dominate his
relationships. Instead of responding impulsively, he reacts with restraint. Rather
than being controlled by his anger, his anger is totally under his control.
In identifying the liver and anger with the letter ayin and the sign of
Capricorn, Sefer Yetzirah suggests that a person born under this sign must
approach the reviving power of water springs in order to discover “the third eye
of wisdom.” In Hebrew the word for water-spring is ‫ – מעין‬may’an, written
exactly like ayin (“the eye of higher awareness”) with the addition of a mem, the
letter associated with purifying waters. Those who suffer from pride and career
obsession must find the spiritual powers the fountain of wisdom, and connect to
energy of the sign of Cancer (opposite of Capricorn in the Zodiac, and root of
feminine receptivity of water). The contact with the may’an, the inner fountain,
can help them bring playful creativity, friendship, and imagination back into
their lives. Connecting to the inner and outer source of waters can create a
healthy balance between external power, productivity, and contemplation, with
inner essence.
In TCM, the water element is the “mother” of the wood element. Therefore,
reinforcing the Yin, the feminine receptive energy, is the most successful therapy
for curing the excess competitive aspects of the liver-wood energies. As water
puts out fire, silence cancels the force of ire.

Etzem: “bone”, “essence”

It is interesting to note that the word “bone” in Hebrew—etzem—is the root of
the word etzem (“essence”) and otzmah, which means power. In TCM, the
deepest essence of a person is contained in his bones. The bones are nourished
by the kidneys and associated with the water element. Again we can draw from
the wisdom of TCM to better understand what the Torah is trying to tell us: Only
by going back to the deepest part of ourselves, which is contained in the deep
essence of our bones, the marrow, and not in the appearance of the “flesh,” can
we summon up all our resources. In the marrow most of our genetic inheritance
is stored. The spinal column and the marrow connect the kidneys to the brain,
the unconscious to the conscious. For this reason in Judaism the prayer of the
amidah requires various bends of the column that stimulate the free flow of
energy between of the “subconscious mind” of kidneys to the conscious activity
of the brain. It is interesting to note that for every debilitating disease Jewish
grandmothers cook marrow broth for their dear ones. So too, TCM practitioners
advise marrow broth for their patients. On the physical level, this precious
substance is much more nourishing than the flesh of the meat. On the energetic
level, the bone marrow enlightens us with wisdom, the anecdote for the negative
aspects of an unbalanced liver. By finding our deepest essence, we tap into our
real power. We can let go of the need to control, a major ingredient of anger, and
allow destiny to lead us to the fulfillment of our deepest Self.
The reason why the most dangerous spiritual enemy of the people of Israel is
Amalek (whose gematria is safek, “doubt”) is that it directly attacks our faith, by
attacking those “who were tired and did not see God.” From a TCM perspective,
excessive exertion burns out our water and kidney essence and make us
vulnerable to the attacks of doubt and fear.

The Seventy Nations

The numerical value of ayin is 70, the number of archetypal nations
enumerated in Genesis. According to the Torah, it is fundamental that there be a
dialogue and mutual understanding between Israel and the nations. By stating
that all human beings descend from Adam (and then Noah), the Torah is
declaring that we all have the potential for unity and brotherhood.
Humanity once spoke a common language. But when God punished the
generation of the Tower of Babel for its arrogance and immorality, humanity was
confused, and fragmented into seventy different languages. Instantly, there was
no understanding as each language became an incoherent babbling sound to
those who spoke another language.
The revelation of God at Sinai was a new chance to return to the original
union, offering a common code of laws to all the people of the world. The
Talmud explains that the Torah was given simultaneously in all seventy
languages. This was done to allow each nation to receive the Divine message in
the language and imagery closest to its essence, but markedly inspired by a
single moral and spiritual system. Israel is meant to be the point of reference for
all the nations. Jacob’s twelve sons and their children were seventy souls when
they descended into Egypt, representing the seventy psychological archetypes of
the nations of the world. “He set the bounds of the nations according to the
number of the Children of Israel.”
The beneficial exchange between Israel and the nations is suggested in a verse
in Genesis that we have already quoted. In Noah’s blessing for his son Japheth,
the father of the nations of Europe, he says, “God shall enlarge Japheth, and he
shall dwell in the tents of Shem,” the father of the Semitic nations.
In other words, the Torah invites the Western civilizations to align their art,
their philosophy, and their science with the values of truth and monotheism
—“the tents of Shem”—to which the Jewish people have always been faithful.
The importance of understanding, integrating, and uplifting the particular
spiritual vision of each one of the seventy nations can be understood through a
law regarding the Sanhedrin (the highest spiritual authority of Temple times).
The rabbis of the superior religious court were supposed to be knowledgeable
about all religions and spiritual practices of the world.
The “seventy faces of the Torah” are also reflected in the diversity within the
Jewish people. The sages teach us that although the Torah is one unified entity, it
nonetheless has seventy “faces,” or facets, of interpretation. The body of
teachings that constitute the Oral Tradition is a perfect example of the underlying
unity forming a plurality of opinions. This concept is also expressed in the
division of the Jewish people into twelve tribes, representing twelve different
expressions and perceptions of Divinity,
The twelve tribes are unified by the worship of the One God. Today we are far
from this pluralistic view. Few are the Jewish congregations that would consider
the point of view of a group “more” or “less” orthodox as valid. So too, few are
the religions that have a body of members who, like the Jewish Sanhedrin,
actively look for the “sparks” of Godliness in other spiritual traditions.
 CHAPTER 17
Peh

Talmud and The Oral Tradition

Peh means “mouth.” The most classic expression associated with the word pei
is ‫ – תורה שבעל פה‬Torah sheba’al peh (“Oral Tradition”). The Oral Tradition is
the authoritative methodology of the interpretation of Scripture given orally by
God to Moses and subsequently written down. It has just as much authority in
Judaism as the written text. The notes, rhythms, and melodies of the Oral Torah
transmit information that deepens one’s understanding of the simple written text.
Upholding the Torah as a living document, The Talmud is a written collection
of ancient rabbinic debates, constituting the basis of Jewish law. The Talmud
guides our dynamic personal relation with the Written Text of the Torah and its
relevancy for every generation. Judaism is continuously adding interpretations
and rulings, based on the constantly changing conditions of the modern world.
For example, the Torah prohibits creating fire on Shabbat because it constitutes
work; the use of creative energy to cause changes in the composition of matter.
In today’s world, the use of electricity and fire produce similar changes therefore
turning electricity on and off during Shabbat is also prohibited by the oral
tradition.
 Halachic experts must issue rulings regarding the conditions under which one
is allowed to desecrate the Shabbat. Every invention and scientific discovery
poses a new set of circumstances, which the rabbis and experts must examine in
the light of the Torah. They then must issue halachic (“legal”) rulings governing
their use. For example, in vitro fertilization and surrogate motherhood,
impossible even a few years ago, posed the question of who should be
considered the parents of the child.
Like other religions, Judaism has also made use of religious institutions (such
as yeshivot—academies of Torah study), but it has never delegated the teaching
of the Torah exclusively to instructors or books. The living tradition of the Torah
has always been transmitted in the Jewish home, from parent to child, in an
uninterrupted chain extending all the way back to Moses.
As the Mishnah records,
Moses received the Torah from [God at Mount] Sinai and transmitted it to
Joshua; Joshua transmitted it to the Elders; the Elders transmitted it to the
 Prophets; and the Prophets transmitted it to the Men of the Great Assembly.

In order to understand another essential aspect of the Oral Tradition, we have

to introduce the important role of vowels as well as consonants. Torah scrolls are
written only with consonants, while vowels are assumed by the reader. For this
reason, every word has a number of meanings, in accordance with the possible
ways that vowels can be added.
It can also be explained that the Hebrew letters are masculine and the vowel
points are feminine. The letters express the simple meaning of a passage while
the vowels hint to the subtler nuances. In order to tap into the rich messages of
Scripture, we must first sharpen our analytical skills in deciphering the words of
the text, a left-brain function. As we access our intuitive grasp of the vowels, we
exercise the right side of the brain. Each of the ten vowels is comprised of
different combinations of points and lines corresponding to one of the sefirot.
This, in combination with the numerical values of the letters, provides a hint to
the vast mysteries that are hidden in the words of the texts. These secrets,
recorded in Kabalistic and Chassidic books, form a large basis of the Oral Torah.
Therefore, the Torah, although a fixed text, is not limited to one single
interpretation. As the Sages have said, “The Torah has seventy faces; these as
well as those are the words of the living God.” Indeed, a translation of the Torah
can easily evoke the false notion that there is only one, unequivocal meaning that
precludes others.
This is the reason that, when Ptolemy of Egypt (the Greek ruler in the late 2nd
century BCE) ordered the Seventy Elders of the Sanhedrin to translate the Torah,
“…for the first time, obscurity descended into the world for three days.” The
translation, in effect, limited the wealth of teaching contained in the Hebrew
letters to a single, restrictive message.
Most of the literal translation of the Scriptures appears to be a narration of
historical events, apparently containing few spiritual teachings. Indeed, the word
‫ – פשט‬peshat, the “literal meaning,” is derived from the word – ‫ פשוט‬pashut
(“simple”), and is composed of the same letters of the word tipesh, meaning
superficial, childish.
The church’s intolerance of the Oral Tradition (persecutions of Jews were
always accompanied by the efforts to destroy the Talmud, the world’s most
frequently banned and burned book) caused humanity to only relate to a
superficial and improper translation of the Biblical text. This prevented
Christians from correctly studying the Holy Scriptures, as clarified by the Oral
Tradition.

The contrast between Greek culture and the oral Torah

The Torah sheba’al Peh, the Oral Tradition, besides ensconcing the traditional
understanding of the written Torah, challenges us to also question, and to create
a personal, constantly changing relationship with the written text. It transforms
study into a form of dynamic meditation and personal communication with the
Divine. In Hebrew, the Scriptures are called ‫ – מקרא‬mikra, meaning “that which
is read” rather than “that which is written.” This term clearly emphasizes the two
poles of an alliance. As the philosopher Abraham Joshua Heschel teaches, God
is in search of man as much as man seeks God.
This reciprocal relationship emphasizes the immediacy of the experience of
engaging in the Torah. Such an alliance between the Divine Word (logos) and the
human response (this aspect of the Oral Tradition) encourages us to avoid seeing
Divinity as static, and essentially, separated from the human being. Judaism is
the opposite approach of Greek philosophy and Christian and Western cultures,
wherein “essence” (the Divine) and “history” (the human) are tragically divided
(as articulated by Schopenhauer and Nietzsche). For Judaism, man and God, as
indicated above, have a reciprocal, not an antithetical relationship. From the
perspective of normative Judaism, history constantly reveals the presence of
God; God is eternally present and active in the life of each individual and
community.
This alliance has very important social implications. For instance, the dialogue
between the written and oral Torah amplifies the laws protecting the rights of
women. The laws of niddah (restricting sexuality) as well as the laws of divorce,
detailed in the Talmud, preserve the utmost sensitive and respectful treatment of
women.
In contrast, many negative aspects of Greek culture, which still define Western
civilization, are a result of a spiritual alienation caused mainly by the separation
of the written text (the masculine principle) from the Oral Tradition (the
feminine principle) of the Torah. The Greek world, both in its mythological roots
as well as in its historical domination of the people and the Land of Israel, was
known for its oppression of women. For example, women could not participate
in Olympic games unless they consented to cut off their breasts. They were also
banned from poetry and philosophy contests. During the Greek conquest of
Israel, the attack on the feminine principle was expressed in many oppressive
ways, such as the law that forced every Jewish bride to submit to the sexual
abuse of the Greek army general the night before her wedding. Such customs
also belonged to the Roman culture, known as jus primae noctis (“the right to
the first night”).
It was this custom that caused the explosion of the revolt of the Maccabees,
who defeated the Greeks in a miraculous battle of “the few against the many”
that is still commemorated today in the holiday of Chanukah. The many laws
that defend women’s rights in the Torah reflect the need felt by the rabbis to
protect women in every aspect of life. To understand the deep value of women
and the feminine principle in Judaism, it suffices to read Aishet Chayal (“A
Woman of Valor”), the poem that every husband is supposed to sing to his wife
at the Shabbat table:
Who can find a woman of worth? For her price is far above rubies. The
heart of her husband safely trusts in her, and he shall have no lack of gain. She
will do him good and not evil all the days of her life. She seeks wool and flax,
and works willingly with her hands. She is like the merchant ships; she brings
her food from afar. She rises while it is yet night, and gives food to her
household and a portion to her maidens. She considers a field and buys it;
with the fruit of her hands she plants a vineyard. She girds her loins with
strength, and she makes her arms strong. She perceives that her merchandise
is good; her candle does not go out by night. She lays her hands to the distaff,
and her palms hold the spindle. She stretches her hand out to the poor; yea she
reaches forth her hands to the needy. She is not afraid of the snow; for the
members of her household are clothed with scarlet. She makes herself
coverlets; her clothing is fine linen and purple. Her husband is known in the
gates, when he sits among the elders of the land. She makes garments and
sells them; and delivers girdles to the merchant. Strength and dignity are her
clothing; and she laughs at the time to come. She opens her mouth with
wisdom; and the principals of loving-kindness are on her tongue. She looks
well to the ways of her household, and does not eat the bread of idleness. Her
children rise up and call her blessed; as does her husband, who praises her;
many daughters have done virtuously, but you excel over them all. Grace is
deceitful, and beauty is vain; but a woman who fears God, she shall be
praised. Give her of the fruit of her hands, and let her deeds praise her in the
 gates.116

The Greeks, however were not interested in controlling man’s nature, allowing
their dark side to dominate with their unharnessed intellect. This unenlightened
mindset rationalized male chauvinism, breeding uncompassionate behavior
towards women. The wisdom of the Greeks was highly valuable in terms of the
arts, music, physical, social, and psychological sciences. However, the tendency
to objectify reality and disconnect man from his family roots and from his
personal relationship to the spiritual realm formed the basis of the Greek exile.
In Greek mythology, Zeus tried to eliminate his father, Chronus. In
Christianity, the son dies for the father. But in Judaism, the word of God is a
dialogue, not a monologue. The mikra (“the sacred writings”) have no value
without the response from those who believe in them. This response is
considered to be the feminine receptive part of the Bible: the Torah she’ba’al
pei, the Oral Tradition.
The Torah needs our contribution because the human soul is part of God
Himself, assisting the Torah’s ongoing revelation by questioning and interpreting
the text. Indeed, every soul, with its experience of life and Divinity, has its own
contribution to make in the revelation of Scripture’s meaning. According to
one’s personal and spiritual preparation and state of mind, each soul must,
metaphorically, choose the vowels and punctuation. Thereby, the reading and
interpretation of the text results in a personal and participatory experience. Of
course, with the guidance of our sages, past and present, we gauge the truth and
validity of our interpretations.

Study and melody

The quality of this experience becomes evident when we enter a yeshiva and
sense the “vibrations,” i.e., the electric atmosphere engendered by the intensity
of hundreds of students, each of and every one of whom is totally concentrated
and engaged in the text. Here, study is not what a Westerner imagines. This is a
place where Torah is learned through singing and melody. Students argue and
debate over various possible interpretations of the text by singing, not just by
talking to each other. Rather than listening to a professor lecturing, and students
taking notes and occasionally asking questions, in the yeshiva each student
studies with a learning-partner with whom there is an active exchange of ideas
and interpretations.
 The texts are not studied only with the rational, left hemisphere of the brain
but also, with the intuitive, right hemisphere. The role of melody in enhancing
the understanding of the deepest interpretations of the text is of dramatic
importance. Indeed, the written text “hides” its secret teachings within little
accents and symbols that indicate the tones and the melody that guide the
reading of the Torah. Through song, hidden messages are transmitted. This is
accentuated by the fact that the Talmud is not considered studied unless the text
is sung!

I once personally attended a Torah reading by one of the greatest scholars of

Israel: Rabbi Eliyahu Kitov. He was reading—or more precisely, chanting—the
Scroll of Esther, on the night of Purim. When he pronounced the word kelim (the
holy vessels containing the wine at the royal feast), most people started to cry.
We all felt the dramatic past inscribed in that word. Those kelim were in fact the
holy vessels of the Temple of Jerusalem, which had been taken away, along with
the Jews, imprisoned by the Persian invaders. With his broken voice, the Rav
had been able to transmit the tragedy and suffering of the Jews who were exiled
and taken captive by the Persians.
For this reason, the study of the Oral Tradition is considered the most popular
technique of Jewish meditation. It sets one free from the confinement of
preconceived thoughts, by entering a higher dimension of reality through
reciting the text as a “mantra” (i.e., with the proper intonation and relative
musical rhythm). In other words, the Torah cannot be studied with intellect
alone. This is why it is called Torat chayim, “the teaching of life”: it is a living,
powerful, life-giving teaching that leads us to a direct, personal relationship with
the Divine. For those who engage in Torah study, and who are open to this life-
giving energy, even the seemingly simple stories and often incomprehensible,
irrational laws in the Torah portion read every week acquire profoundly relevant
meanings from one year to the next. Rather than being a mere narrative of past
events, the Torah becomes a mirror reflecting one’s own personal history. Every
reader can become aware, for example, that Abraham and Sarah’s story is his
own story, that the exodus from Egypt is his personal exodus. The various twists
and turns of one’s personal history are just different aspects of the same,
archetypal story replayed anew: the evolution of humanity from slavery to
freedom, from ignorance to understanding, from suffering to beatitude.
The final words of the Amidah prayer are: “May it be Your will that the Holy
Temple be rebuilt speedily, in our days. Grant us our share in Your Torah.” These
two concepts are closely connected. The construction of the Temple and “our
portion in the Torah” are the unique contributions that every soul makes to the
messianic redemption. Each soul corresponds to a unique “letter” in the Torah.
One’s personal experience together with God’s intervention and providence in
his or her life is an individual offering in the collective redemptive process. For
this reason, it is written in the Talmud, “When will Mashiach come? With the
birth of all the souls that should be born.” This not only refers to the physical
birth of the souls that must still take place in material form, but it also refers to
each soul’s spiritual birth, which will allow it to contribute to the revelation of
the “seventy faces” of the Torah.
 CHAPTER 18
Tzadik

Food as nourishment for the soul

Sefer Yetzirah associates the letter ‫ – צ‬tzadik – with the month of Shevat and
the rectification of eating. As a word, tzadik means “the righteous person,” of
whom it is said: “The righteous eats to satisfy his soul,” i.e., the goal is to “eat in
order to live” and not to “live in order to eat.”
The holiday of Tu B’Shevat, the New Year of the Trees, takes place during the
full moon of Aquarius in the month of Shevat. The evolved person is like the
tree, having found his or her physical roots. The tzadik receives food and
nourishment from the ground as well as from Above. “Man does not live by
bread only, but rather he lives by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of
the Lord.”
 Like the tree, which needs light and air along with mineral nourishment
extracted from the ground, the tzadik also learns to direct his “antennae” toward
his celestial roots for spiritual nourishment especially during the act of eating.
There are many stories of Chassidic teachers who completed their mystical
ascents when eating. The Biblical texts also mention this possibility: the elders,
who were endowed by Moses with the prophetic spirit, ate, drank and prophesied
at the same time.

In the image, we observe the messianic couple, who is able to reach the
eternal knowledge of the Tree of Life. The tree progresses with
increasing complexity as it develops in a space and time continuum. The
DNA, whose double helix is the template of the evolution of life, like the
tree of life, is found in each being. Our goal is to reveal the hidden
mystery of life: Kabbalah, which is today supported by the sciences. In
fact, the Kabbalah can and is being be revealed in all disciplines of
knowledge. It is precisely in this way that the Divine is uncovered in every
aspect of creation, nourishing the Tree of Life.

The Kabbalah bases much of its teachings on the image of a tree. The
outgrowth of the sefirot from God’s undifferentiated infinity is referred to as the
Tree of Life. Our real roots are in Heaven. A person, who is like a tree of the
field, can grow and rise towards the Heavens, and then offer his or her fruits,
shade, or support to others by connecting with the Divine nature of his or her
soul. This soul connection is sourced in either a particular facet of the Torah, a
specific emanation of Divinity, or an association with a righteous person who
illuminates from Above. However, in order to be effective for others, he or she
must develop strong and deep physical roots by learning to eat balanced and
nourishing foods.
Achieving self-control in eating, knowing when and how to eat, is a
fundamental goal in the Jewish tradition. Advice in this regard is found in
Maimonides’ discussion of Jewish law, and throughout the literature of Kabbalah
and Chassidut.

Fasting in ancient and modern times

According to Rabbi Tzadok HaKohen, the primordial sin for which Adam and
Eve lost paradise was not the consumption of a particular fruit, but rather the
performance of the act of eating in an imperfect psychological and spiritual state.
Eating has its own holiness that must be respected, just like any other ritual.
According to Kabbalists, the fact that paradise was lost because of a sin linked
to the act of eating implies that a proper attitude while eating (what, how much
and when…) is the main spiritual attribute required in order to hasten the
redemption. As the Kabbalah teaches, a person may perform a fundamental tikun
(rectification of his own soul and of both physical and metaphysical reality) by
fasting, changing and elevating his eating habits, thereby rectifying the
primordial sin.
The many fast days in the Jewish calendar are opportunities for heightening
spiritual awareness, certainly with regard to our relationship to food. According
to Dr. Moshe Refael, director of a healing in Safed, Israel:
Fasting quiets the ego. On the other side, the more we eat, the more we
inevitably feed the animal aspects of our soul. After a few days of fasting, a
person loses much of his aggressiveness, his impulsive reactions, and is ready
to begin to seriously work on himself.
 The suggestion of the sages to eat little and fast often guides us in breaking
the tendency to eat obsessively (to avoid dealing honestly with our emotional
void, professional frustrations and other uncomfortable situations). Maimonides
also argued that most diseases derive from excess food consumption and,
secondly, by an incorrect combination of foods. He used fasting as one of the
most important therapeutic strategies, following the lead of the great physicians
of the ancient times including, Plutarch, who claimed that “Rather than resorting
to medicine, [it is] better to fast one day.”

Maimonides’ advice to patients to reduce their intake of food during meals by

getting up from the table a little “hungry” is even confirmed by the physician
Paracelsus, who said: “It’s the dose that makes the poison.”
According to Maimonides, overeating causes imbalances and increases stress
and vulnerability to diseases. “The sensation of fullness is to be avoided at all
costs because it causes stomach extension and thus diminishes its strength and
ability to digest food properly. Do not eat until you feel full. You should leave a
fourth of your fullness dissatisfied.” TCM shares all of these ideas. Consulting a
serious acupuncturist will lead to a total change in eating habits.
According to Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi, the battle between holiness and
profanity in the act of eating is represented by the common root of two words:
“bread” – ‫( לחם‬L-H-M), and “war” – ‫( מלחמה‬M-L-H-M). Every time we eat, we
have the opportunity to “make war” against our materialistic instincts, which
tend to make us eat obsessively. In fact, unlike breathing, which is an automatic
response, eating is an act within our control, whereby we can win the war against
the compulsion to repeat subconscious, self-destructive eating habits.
The damages created by overeating are contained in a few words in verses by
King David, King Solomon, and Isaiah. “The table of evil people will become a
death trap for them”; “The belly of the wicked always feels empty” (Proverbs
13:25); “For all tables are full of vomit and filth, so that there is no clean place”
(Isaiah 28:8). The practice of fasting was used both to break the yoke of
individual destructive habits and as the main tool for national repentance. The
three-day fast of Queen Esther (and of the whole community) succeeded in
reversing the decree of the total destruction of the Jewish nation.
Contemporary medical research has also confirmed that overeating and being
overweight are the causes of serious diseases, and that fasting has therapeutic
effects. Fasting removes toxins from the tissues, detoxifies the liver and kidneys,
purifies the blood and enhances our immune system. As Dr. Andrew Weil
explains in his book, Question: To Fast or Not to Fast, prolonged fasting could
lead to achieving complete remission from diseases that had been resistant to
other treatments. Obviously, fasting should only be performed under the
supervision of a competent physician, and it is absolutely necessary, to drink at
least two liters of water per day.
Fasting is the most powerful remedy available for breaking the vicious cycle
of self-intoxication. In fact, the more bad habits we have, the more we tend to
compensate our physical or emotional disturbances through the consumption of
increasingly toxic, fatty, sugary foods manipulated by the food industry. To cope
with the heaviness, heartburn, excess cholesterol, depression, or infections, we
begin to use all sorts of drugs that increase the outburst of toxins in the food and
drugs. Thus, we pollute our body even more. As stated by Dr. Lucas Heidn in his
text on liver health, “Even many doctors with the best intentions unknowingly
become ‘smugglers’ for the pharmaceutical companies.”

Eating and prophecy

The Arizal teaches that one of the most important techniques for reaching
ruach ha’kodesh (“inspiration and prophecy”) is total ‫ – כוונה‬kavanah (“directed
awareness”) when reciting the blessings over food before eating. In this way, it is
possible to nullify the power of the ‫ – קליפות‬kelipot (“shells of impurity”) that
metaphysically inhere in food and attach themselves to the person who does not
eat with the proper attitude. It is even possible to purify our bodies when we eat
with awareness, turning them into suitable vessels for receiving the spirit of
holiness.
By consuming food with the intention of using its energy to do good, thereby
transforming ourselves and the world around us, food becomes our partner in the
work of rectification. Thus, matter ceases to be the means by which Divinity is
hidden. Instead, it becomes the channel for Divine revelation. As teacher and
biologist Susan Schneider has noted, once the molecules contained in food have
been ingested, their spiritual essence ascends from the lower levels of
consciousness (those generally accessible to the animal, vegetable, or mineral
worlds) to higher levels of understanding. This is because they are now an
integral part of the human being who has assimilated them. In effect, we have a
reciprocal relationship with the food we are eating; we elevate the food and the
food elevates us. This is so, provided that we eat with the proper awareness and
intention.
In addition, eating with kavanah (“the proper intention”) can elevate a human
being even further by putting him or her in contact with the sparks of Divine
energy that descended before man was created. The process of Genesis began
with the creation of minerals and ended with that of man. Even though the
simplest, most original forms of life are organisms with little understanding, the
sparks of Divine energy that they contain are closer to the absolute Divine
essence. When minerals were created, nothing else existed in the world, except
the Divine Presence. When man was created, all the other forms of life (animal,
vegetable, and mineral) already existed.
The rock, finding itself alone and face to face with the Creator, was literally
“petrified” by that vision. In contrast, Divine energy descended through many
levels of tzimtzum (“contraction”, “limitation”) when God created man. Adam
found himself face to face not only with God, but also with many other beings.
This fact is still reflected today in man’s tendency to “lose sight” of the Divine.
However, man with his many powers of expression, not only verbally, but also
through all art forms, is capable of reflecting the universe (creating images) and
thus, glorifying God’s creation.

Tzadik, the sign of Aquarius and the messianic era

Tzadik is associated with the sign of Aquarius, the messianic sign that, with its
pail of water, fills the entire world with higher understanding. According to the
Oral Tradition, if one sign of the Zodiac were to correspond to the people of
Israel, it would be Aquarius. Balaam’s prophecy of Israel’s messianic role speaks
of a pail from which the waters of the Torah of Israel pour over the world.
According to some astrologers, we have only recently entered the Age of
Aquarius, during which both the peak of technological development, as well as
the apex of spiritual awareness, will be reached. This notion reflects a prophecy
in the Zohar which stated two thousand years ago that there would be a
prodigious development of “lower understanding” (science and technology)
beginning in the Jewish year 5600, corresponding to 1840 CE. At the same time,
the Zohar predicted that there would be a surprising leap forward of “higher
understanding.” The subsequent unification of these two bodies of knowledge
would hasten the arrival of Mashiach. Indeed, the emergence of Chassidut,
which can be considered the greatest revolution within Judaism, came at the
same time as the Industrial Revolution. Perhaps we can speculate that the
development of the computer and its numerous possibilities represent the “lower
understanding” which will illuminate (serve) the “higher understanding.” This
unification will be the harbinger of the messianic age.
One of the goals of the messianic revolution will be the establishment of a just
society, which, thanks to the support of scientific discoveries, will put an end to
social and economical exploitation by allowing an equal distribution of divine
bounty. The letter tzadik is at the beginning of the words “justice” (tzedek) and
“charity” (tzedakah), reflecting this association with Aquarius (the sign most
involved in the creation of a just and enlightened society).
The shape of the tzadik actually resembles an antenna (with two lines directed
upwards), hinting at the powerful tools of communications developed in the Age
of Aquarius. Today, thanks to the Internet, the Kabbalah has reached not only
uninitiated Jews, but millions of non-Jews who share the holistic vision of
esoteric Judaism. The Zohar foretold this event: “In the “end of times” there will
be a unification between the ‘lower waters’ [representing the scientific vision of
life] and the ‘higher waters [the Torah].” Today this is reality: The deepest
teachings of the Torah have been confirmed by science, which, with increasing
emphasis, shares the unified vision of Kabbalah.
The phenomenal progress in communication has created the possibility of new
contacts and mutual understanding between the scientific and spiritual worlds.
The Torah’s unified vision, quantum physics, Chinese medicine, and holistic
therapies (which view the organism as a whole and not as the sum of its parts) all
play a common role in saving mankind. These concepts are widely discussed by
Rabbi Ginsburgh and Rabbi Steinsaltz, as well as in Daniel Matt’s work,
explaining how physics and metaphysics go hand in hand. We are privileged to
live during this exciting and promising juncture as we witness the unification of
ancient wisdom and modern knowledge. Not only is there no conflict between
them; on the contrary, their confluence produces a powerful synergistic effect.
 CHAPTER 19
Kuf

The letter kuf is associated with the sign of Pisces and the ability to laugh. On
Purim, every Jew is encouraged to become inebriated to the point of not
knowing how to distinguish between Mordechai and Haman; good and evil. In
this way we come to understand that behind every destructive event, there is a
hidden good. This realization helps us attain the highest spiritual level and
experience the pleasure of laughter, the reward for transforming “bitter into
sweet,” as it is written in the holy Zohar.

Kabbalah: the crown of the king

With the letter kuf, the powerful word “Kabbalah” (considered the most
precious treasure of the Torah) begins. The revolution of Rabbi Yisrael Ba’al
Shem Tov, founder of Chassidut, opened the door to spreading the Kabbalah
among the uninitiated. Accused of throwing “precious pearls” at people
incapable of appreciating them, he answered with this parable:
Once upon a time there was a king. His son fell ill and no doctor could cure
him. One day, a wise man came to the door, stating that he knew how to cure
the prince. He told the king that the only cure for his son was to take the most
precious stone from the crown, crush it into a powder, and then make the
powder into a potion for the prince to drink. The ministers, alarmed at the
prospect of destroying the royal crown, tried to discourage the king from
doing what the old sage proposed. But the king replied, “Of what use to me is
 the crown if my son dies?”

The king of the tale is God, the son represents the Jewish people, and the
“mortal danger” is that of giving up the spiritual quest for Torat Chayim (the
“teaching of life”). The king’s crown is in fact the Torah, and its precious
diamond represents the Torah’s inner dimension, too bright and powerful to be
looked at. The brightness of such a jewel had to be transmuted into a less direct
form of light that would make it possible for the masses to look at, without being
blinded by its power. The “ministers” of the king are those rabbis who, for
various centuries, tried to halt this revolutionary movement, opposing the
“sacrifice” of the aura of secrecy surrounding Kabbalah. If the esoteric teachings
had been restricted, as they wished, to an exclusive group, the spiritual survival
of the people of Israel and of humanity would have been endangered.

Kuf and descent into the depths

Kuf – ‫ – ק‬is the only letter in the Hebrew alphabet that dips below the line,
even when it is not found at the end of a word. Because of this, the Oral
Tradition associates it with the descent into the abyss. However, as we have
pointed out, a descent is often necessary to reach an even higher level and
therefore—when we look beyond the difficulty—we can welcome the situation
that transforms our tears into laughter.
Sefer Yetzirah paradoxically associates kuf, the letter that “descends into the
depths,” with the month of Adar (which contains Purim, the holiday of
happiness) and with the sense of laughter. Furthermore, kuf is the first letter of
the word ‫ – קרבן‬korban (“sacrifice”, “offering”).
We will examine these incongruities by starting with a study of the Book of
Esther and the holiday of Purim. We will also discuss the mass murder of the
Jews (a human korban) by the Nazis, conventionally known as the Holocaust,
also termed the Sho’ah (“catastrophe”), in which the 6 million Jewish people
became a sacrifice.

The sense of laughter

On Purim, it is a mitzvah to become so drunk that we are unable to distinguish
between the expressions “blessed be Mordechai” and “cursed be Haman”;
between the blessing of good, represented by Mordechai, the spiritual guide who
saved the people, and cursing evil, represented by Haman, the enemy who
wanted to destroy Israel. In Hebrew, these two expressions, baruch Mordechai
and arur Haman, have the same numerical value, indicating the close
relationship between blessing and curse. Deep faith requires accepting evil and
pain just as we accept Divine blessings.
In keeping with the teachings of Sefer Yetzirah, during the month of Pisces
(corresponding to the month of Adar in the Hebrew calendar and the letter kuf),
we are obligated to make an effort to laugh, to maintain a joyful and optimistic
spirit, even in the darkest situations. The Oral Tradition accords joy a real power
of redemption and spiritual elevation. It is no accident that ‫ – עמלק‬Amalek,
Israel’s ultimate enemy, comes to attack optimism and enthusiasm, as Israel
finally managed to escape from Egypt. Indeed, it is written in the Bible,
“Remember…what he did to you by the way, when you were coming out of
Egypt.” To revert to the vernacular, dampening enthusiasm is synonymous with
raining on one’s parade.
 Amalek has the same numerical value as ‫ – ספק‬safek (“doubt”), 240. This is
the enemy that the Jews want to destroy during the holiday of Purim. Through
higher states of consciousness attained by inebriating oneself (a central mitzvah
of Purim) Israel attains absolute faith beyond doubt.
This mitzvah, according to the Kabbalists, is designed to help the Jewish
people learn how to transform tragedy into comedy. The experience of laughter
enhanced by substances that increase the awareness at the level of mochin de
gadlut (“expanded consciousness”) is meant to help us keep in tune with one of
God’s attributes—nosei hafachim—the ability to embrace paradoxes. The
festivity of Purim is therefore intended to open human consciousness in
preparation for the messianic age. At this time it will be revealed that bitterness
and darkness are instruments that God uses to stimulate our striving for deep
happiness and real fulfillment.
As we have seen, the Zohar claims that at the entrance to the celestial
academy of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, a voice proclaims, “Entrance is forbidden
to those who in their lifetimes were not able to transform darkness into light and
bitter into sweet.” Achieving this perception is the goal towards which we must
strive. Once a year, the mitzvah of Purim enables us to move closer in that
direction.
The legalization of the occasional use of intoxicating substances prevents
them from being used routinely and habitually. Shabbat as well as all the Jewish
festivals are sanctified with a glass of wine. On the first night of Pesach, we are
required to drink at least four glasses of wine.
Jews are forbidden to drink non-kosher wine and liquors, thereby
discouraging the kind of “social drinking” (not associated with Shabbat and the
holidays). Social drinking can easily lead to addiction. This is particularly a
danger for Jews living in the Diaspora who are especially susceptible.
Kabbalists consider Purim, in this sense, to be the holiest of all Jewish
holidays. It is not by chance that the Day of Atonement, which is usually
considered the holiest day in the Jewish year, is called Yom KePurim (literally “a
day similar to Purim”).
These semantics convey a clear message: the spiritual elevation achieved on
Yom Kippur with its 26 hours of fasting and prayers is secondary to that
achieved on Purim through intoxicating drinking. The objective of this
inebriation is to overcome and transcend the restricted consciousness that
resulted from eating the fruits of the Tree of Knowledge of good and evil.
 Jewish law prescribes that before becoming intoxicated on Purim, it is
necessary to listen to the reading of the Scroll of Esther, the most mysterious
books of the Bible. The Scroll of Esther describes the hidden functions of Divine
Providence within a story of far-fetched and paradoxical synchronicities. In the
book, the name of God never appears, but special melodies provide subtle
allusions to Divine Providence and the verses also bear witness to hidden Divine
intervention. The name “Esther” itself means “hidden,” alluding to the subtle
role and presence of the true heroine (and hero, the tzadik Mordechai) of the
story.
Listening to the reading of the Book of Esther expands our awareness. The
drinking that follows, helps us to internalize the possibility of reversing,
overturning, and transforming negative feelings: fear into courage, evil into
good, illness into recovery. It also helps us to understand how the various
Hamans of history—Hitler, Saddam Hussein, Ahmadinejad, and so on—exist for
the purpose of reawakening our consciousness, our faith, and our free will. As
Ariel Lev said one Purim, “Like in a dramatic play, when the final curtain
descends and the exile is over, (the time of final redemption), all the main
characters will step onto stage to remove their masks and the audience will
applaud Divine Providence’s disguised purpose.”
Purim falls on the night of the full moon during the month of Pisces (this
being the origin of Carnival) echoes astrological assertion that this moment is
considered the best time for a dramatic turnover for individuals as well as for
nations. On Purim, the Jews of Persia were saved from Haman’s planned
genocide and came under the special protection of the king. The king himself
sentenced Haman to death by hanging him on the same gallows that Haman
himself had prepared for Mordechai. Purim is thus considered the most
propitious time to pray for blessings and for the reversal of a difficult situation
because on this holiday, the gates of heaven are open and all is possible.
The same power to turn over and transform darkness into light, and potential
catastrophe into an impetus for a quantum leap towards fulfillment and salvation,
was manifested in a number of recent events that also occurred on Purim. On
Purim of 1953, the sudden death of Stalin prevented him from putting into action
his evil plan to kill all the Soviet Jews. On Purim of 1991, the torrent of Iraqi
missiles that terrorized the Israeli people for over a month was finally put to an
end. Another fact that should not be ignored is the identical fate of Saddam
Hussein and Haman; both were executed by hanging. During the Nuremberg
trials, another fascinating connection took place. Julius Sreicher, Nazi
propagandist and publisher of the anti-Semitic Der Sturmer, shouted “Purim
Festival 1946” just before he was hanged. Ten Nazis corresponding to the ten
sons of Haman were hung. The Talmud relates that Haman’s daughter committed
suicide. These and other “coincidences” were revealed through the work of
Rabbi Neugerschel, Israeli holocaust educator, and can be further studied in The
Code of Esther by French authors Bernard Benyamin and Yohen Perez. A most
interesting Torah code reveals that certain letters of the names of Haman’s sons
add up to the year 1946.
A story about Rabbi Akiva (which concludes the Talmudic tractate of Makkot)
describes the salutary effect of seeing the positive in the midst of evil, and the
power of laughter that inspires and re-ignites the belief in Divine goodness.
Rabbi Akiva was standing with other renowned rabbis on top of Mount Scopus,
looking out at the ruins of the temple. Just then, they saw a fox running through
the Holy of Holies. Everyone tore their garments in mourning, except Rabbi
Akiva, who burst out into laughter. Confounded by his response to this sign of
utter destruction, he responded with the following verse from Zachariah:
Thus says the Lord of Hosts: Old men and old women shall yet again dwell
in the streets of Jerusalem, every man with a staff in his hand, for long days.
And the streets of the city shall be full of boys and girls playing. (Zachariah
8:4)

The Ba’al Shem Tov’s strategy of “turning the enemy into a friend,” i.e., of
seeing a personal spark that needs to be rectified, within our enemies, and many
other Kabbalistic strategies regarding the transformation of darkness into light
could have deeply enriched the anti-psychiatry movement. In addition, the
teachings of Laing and Shatzman—“Divided Self” and the “Family that Kills”—
contribute to positive transformation.

The Temple in Jerusalem, and the ketoret ha’besamim (“spice incense”)

In the Temple of Jerusalem, cathartic activities such as dance, chant, and
prayers were empowered by the intoxicating substances of the incense. Its
powerful aroma helped the worshippers bypass the opposition to transcendental
experience posed by the rational and unconscious mind.
Ancient Jewish traditions describe the great healing power of the incense.
Faithful adherence to the recipe found in the Book of Exodus, with its specific
Divinely prescribed mixture of herbs and fragrance, produced an incense that
cleansed the soul and the body from any disease. It could eliminate a scourge or
a pestilence and shift human attention from fear and doubt to faith and memory
of the perfect origin of the soul. Tradition reports that the aroma of the incense,
reached as far as the city of Jericho. Its fragrance provided an opening to ecstasy
and to the contemplation of supernal levels of consciousness, as stated in the
Zohar:
When the holy incense ascended to heaven in smoke, with the help of the
herbs that were being burnt, the hearts of those who were present were
purified by the enlightenment and the joy of being at the service of the Divine.
The impurity of the yetzer ha’ra (“tendency to evil”) moved away from the
heart, and those present became totally connected to God. Why? Because
nothing else in the world like the holy incense has the ability to break the
power of the “Other Side.”

The books of Kabbalah are not the only sources that discuss the incense. The
Oral Tradition refers to it frequently. In the Midrash, the essence of the incense is
explained as follows: “Ketoret (‘incense’) can be read as an acronym for
kedushah (‘holiness’), taharah (‘purity’), rachamim (‘compassion’) and tikvah
(‘hope’).”
What made the incense so powerful, according to Oral Tradition, was its
ability to reverse what was most harmful into something extremely therapeutic.
The incense contained eleven elements, one of which, galbanum, had a very
strong and nasty smell. But the Divinely ordained mixture, exact in dosage,
ensured that this ingredient would not ruin the aroma of incense, but rather
enhance its effectiveness and make it even more pleasant.
In psychological terminology, the smell of the incense awakened the
worshippers’ right cerebral hemisphere and its ability to absorb difficulties
within a broader perspective. This negativity was neutralized with the perception
of what is positive in life. In the incense this message correlates with the foul-
smelling galbanum, which loses its foul aroma when mixed with the other ten
spices.
The transforming power of incense is linked to the power of the sense of
smell, the sense that the Kabbalah attributes to the Mashiach. Indeed, in the
Garden of Eden, the sense of smell did not unite with the other senses during the
first couple’s transgression. They looked at, touched, tasted, and discussed, but
did not smell the forbidden fruit.
The role of the holy incense in Jewish tradition was so important that when
the 1st-century Essenes took refuge in the caves near the Dead Sea, they took
incense along with their holy books. An amphora containing about 600 kilos of
the precious substance was found with the manuscripts of Qumran.
Since the destruction of the Temple of Jerusalem, the Temple incense is no
longer produced. However, Orthodox Jews continue to relate to its power by
reading the Torah passages and instructions that detail its composition as part of
the daily prayers. The law that forbids the exact reproduction of the Temple
incense, according to the recipe given to Moses in the Book of Exodus, was
meant to clarify to all generations the absolute holiness of this incense. It was to
be used exclusively in the context of the holy Temple service, in order to
facilitate the ecstatic experience.
The Oral Tradition required of those preparing the incense to sing while
grinding the elements, for “the voice has a positive effect on incense.” Our
prayers perhaps reflect this requirement as we await the return of the Temple and
its holy incense. In the meantime, the rest of humanity has been deprived of the
therapeutic power of the incense that will, be offered soon, God willing, at the
Temple in Jerusalem, the house of prayer for all people.
The widespread use of incense, marijuana, and other mind-expanding
inhalants seems to be clearly linked to the unconscious desire to reconnect to the
magical experience of transformation, purification, and hope that the aroma of
the Temple incense evoked. It has been reported that the lingering scent of the
incense can be inhaled from the stones of the Kotel (“Western Wall”). For those
who pray at and kiss the Wall, that fragrance, even though it is such a faint
facsimile of the incense, has the power to quiet the mind.

The evil throne for good

The Kabbalah calls “expanded” states of consciousness “minds of maturity.”
According to the Jewish esoteric tradition, the purpose of these states is to
perceive how “evil is the throne of good.” What appears disastrous to our “small
minds” might actually be the highest good. However, we will only be able to
fully perceive this in the future. For example, the Holocaust, still unfathomable
even for the greatest sages of Judaism, had at least two obvious positive
consequences. First, it provided humanity with some imperative lessons,
although certain historians and political movements are attempting to erase its
memory. Second, it led the European nations, troubled by the enormity of the
damage caused by their own more-or-less open anti-Semitism, to consent to the
creation of the Jewish state.
If we avoid “small-minded” logic, which is unable to embrace contradictions,
we can move beyond the platitudes that interpret unpleasant events as being
Divine indifference or injustice. In the case of the Holocaust, it was the ashes of
the death camps that caused the astonishing flowering in the desert—the
migration to Israel of thousands of Jews. Many had considered the return to their
land a dream that would never come true. Overcoming every possible obstacle,
including the effort of pro-Arab Britain to limit their numbers, the Jews persisted
with courage and determination to realize that dream.
Even the most devout are speechless today in the face of the ashes of the
concentration camps. When confronted with such a reality, all we have is silence.
This is what the Torah teaches us when we read the story of Aaron, who reacted
to the death of his two sons with silence: “And Aaron held his peace.”
Aaron’s reaction is the archetype for all those who suffer the tragedies
“permitted” by God. Aaron’s silence is an expression of fundamental humility
before God: “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My
ways.”
Yet it is silence that must be followed by action, rather than the immobility of
depression. At the end of the Second World War, in spite of the crushing reality
of the Holocaust, the Jewish people rallied and built the State of Israel. Soon,
they returned to laughter and song and trusting in a better future.
In today’s Israel, Remembrance Day, in honor of soldiers who died in the line
of duty as well as civilian terror victims is a day of intense mourning.
Remembrance Day is followed immediately by the celebrations of Independence
Day. In just a few hours, the country goes from tears to dancing, thus affirming
the possibility of constant rebirth from ashes, thanks to the belief in a better
future even when surrounded by cool blood terrorism. This act of faith should be
a lesson for all humankind and for every individual who personally faces death
and separation in his own life.
When we hear of a death, we say to those who mourn "Baruch Dayan
HaEmet” (“Blessed is the true Judge”) acknowledging that although we do not
understand His reasons, we must accept His verdict.

Holiness and separation of the Jewish people: the “double bind”

 The second lesson we learn from the letter kuf is the concept of ‫– קדושה‬
kedushah (“holiness”). In Hebrew, the word ‫ – קדוש‬kadosh means “different” and
“separate” as well as “holy.” It is a paradox that the very verse that enjoins the
Jews to be different, and separate, also designates them to be a kingdom of
priests, and mentors of faith in one God, for all other peoples. Psychologist
Gregory Bateson would perhaps define this commandment as a double bind: On
the one hand, the Jews are obligated to consider themselves different and
separate from other peoples; on the other hand, they are exhorted to have a
profound effect upon them, in order to transmit their belief in one God, to be “a
light unto the nations.”
The need to reinforce our sense of uniqueness is found throughout the Jewish
tradition. Kashrut—the dietary laws—for example, make socializing with non-
Jews difficult, since Jews cannot sit at the same table with gentiles without
openly acknowledging their differences. The laws of Shabbat, stipulating
restrictions as well as special observance, further separate Jews from non-Jews.
On the other hand, the Jews are a universal people, possessing a deep-rooted
capability to empathize and identify with other peoples. In order to understand
this concept, we must remember the seventy souls that descended into Egypt
with Jacob, which correspond to the souls of the “seventy nations” of the world.
In modern culture (art, cinema, literature, etc.), it is often an outstanding Jew
—be it Freud, Marx, or Woody Allen—who understands the world of the non-
Jew and describes it with great sensitivity. Indeed, this extraordinary ability to
understand and identify with other peoples has made it difficult for Jews to
remain “different” and fulfill their role as teachers.
In recent years we have witnessed an incredible phenomenon. Large numbers
of non-Jews are becoming interested in the Jewish tradition. They have
discovered that the observance of Judaism speaks most authentically to their
desire for a more fulfilling life. With growing surprise, the rabbinical schools in
Jerusalem find that they are unprepared to meet the pressing demands of non-
Jews who attend their courses. This is a clear sign of the imminent messianic
redemption, about which the Talmud states, “Mashiach will come from Rome,”
meaning that the same process that pushed the Jewish people to give up their
uniqueness, forcing them into geographic and cultural exile (particularly the
Roman empire, from which the Western world spiritually descends), will provide
the inspiration for the Jews to recover their love for their tradition and assume
their role as a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.
 The whole world is realizing that the prophecy of the Bible, according to
which the earth continues to be cursed on account of humanity, is true. Exile
from spiritual teachings brings destruction. The overheating of the planet and the
persistent natural disasters inspiring the “end of times” mentality are making it
clear that the new Pharaohs—the petroleum empires—are indeed a danger to all
humanity, not only to Israel. The nations of the world are loathe to condemn the
nuclear threat to Israel in the international public forum, for fear of jeopardizing
their good relations with the Arab producers of petroleum on which they are
heavily dependent.

The image, representing a kuf during the holiday of Purim, refers to the
Jews who, during the Second World War, were obliged to wear a star of
David. They were able to be reborn like the phoenix, from their ashes and
use the symbol of the star of David in the flag of the newborn state of
Israel.

The solution is the Torah, the book of instruction, that tells us how to escape
slavery from Pharaohs in all ages. The People of Israel, with their scientific
genius, entrepreneurial know-how, and holy, enlightened teachers, must develop
an alternative, non-polluting source of energy that can save humanity from these
present-day Pharaohs. As we have seen, the Zohar states that in our times, the
Higher Waters (the Torah) will unite with the Lower Waters (the discoveries of
scientists) and together bring redemption.
 CHAPTER 20
Resh

The letter resh initiates the words ra’ash (“noise”) and rosh (“head”).
Meditation can help us to block out external noise and distractions and subdue
our internal noise, allowing us to reach the silence and serenity that, according to
the sages, is the beginning stage of prophecy.

The head as protection from evil

There are a number of problematic, pejorative words that begin with the letter
resh: ra (“evil”); rasha (“evil person”); and, as just mentioned, ra’ash (“noise”).
But there is also a positive word that is very important in Judaism: ‫ – ראש‬rosh
(“head”).
The word ‫ – רע‬ra can be read backwards as er – (‫)ער‬, which means “aware.”
This association indicates that awareness is our strongest weapon against
negativity. This notion is also alluded to by the two letters that are written larger
than usual in the first verse of the Shema, the central declaration of Jewish
monotheism ‫“( שמע ישראל ד׳ אלקנו ד׳ אחד‬Hear O Israel, God is our God, God is
One”).
Here, the enlarged Hebrew letters ayin (‫ )ע‬and dalet (‫ )ד‬form the word ‫ – עד‬ed,
meaning “witness.” This prayer, which can be called the Jewish “mantra,”
inducing a person to become his or her own witness, aware of the influence of
subconscious conditioning.
The role of mental awareness in the process of transformation is encoded in
the Hebrew names of two important festivities in the Jewish calendar: Rosh
HaShanah and Rosh Chodesh. The first one is the beginning, or literally, head,
of the year, the second one is the beginning—head—of the month. Both heads
are followed by words meaning change and transformation: Shanah (“year”)
shares the same root with the word shinui (“transformation”) and chodesh
(“month”) shares the same root with the word chidush (“innovation”). We are
encouraged by these meanings to make significant and positive changes in our
lives instead of reconciling ourselves to negative, self-destructive situations and
relationships.
On Rosh HaShanah, Jews have the duty to work on the contents of their rosh,
transforming as much as possible unconscious conditioning into awareness,
thereby avoiding the risk of spending the whole year in a state of spiritual
sheinah (“sleep”). The pivotal choice between shinui and sheinah that faces us
on Rosh HaShanah is alluded to by the fact that all three words share the same
root.
The ancient ritual of donning tefillin, a set of prayer boxes wrapped on the
head, arm, and hand is a Jewish “energy” practice designed to establish a
connection between the mind and the heart. The “wise head” acquired through
donning tefillin before prayer helps one to speak from one’s deep, authentic self.
As illustrated in the story of Moses’ tongue being heavy—kaved—when our
hearts are not connected to our inner wisdom, we are unable to communicate our
deepest truth.
The heart’s domain, in TCM, is about relationships and communication.
Prayer is considered in all mystical tradition to be the highest expression of
communication. In the process of prayer we can see how the virtues of the
kidneys, liver, and heart build on each other. The kidneys are our deep,
unconscious will, the liver is our ability to act in the world, and the heart is the
place where understanding illuminates our deep will and our capacity to act.
When all of the organs cooperate in harmony, the possibility of communicating
our truth to others and to God becomes real.
 It is only through understanding the deep forces within us and bringing them
to conscious awareness, that we are able to become clear expressions of our soul.
Our speech may then become the outer manifestation of the highest truth within.
Steven Schram analyzes the effects of tefillin on the heart and mind from the
perspective of Chinese medicine in “Tefillin: An Ancient Acupuncture Point
Prescription for Mental Clarity” (Journal of Chinese Medicine number 70,
October 2002”): “The acknowledged purpose of the tefillin is to raise the
spiritual consciousness of the people who wear it. If we examine where the knots
and wrappings are placed from a TCM point of view, it appears that the tefillin
and wraps form a potent acupuncture point formula focused on the governing
vessel (Du Mai) and aimed at elevating the spirit and clearing the mind.”
The first prayer-box of tefillin is placed on the front of the head with a strap
attached that is tightly knotted at the base of the skull (occiput). While the
prayer-box puts pressure on points at the front of the head (stimulating the
frontal lobe, the more conscious part of the mind), the knot at the occiput puts
pressure on the area of the more primitive parts of the brain (related to the
kidneys), thus allowing unconscious parts of the wearer to come into conscious
awareness. The acupuncture points stimulated are understood in TCM to have
direct effects on the mind and spirit. In fact, TCM defines the position of the
tefillin at the front of the head as a “gate to heaven.” Researchers at Bar Ilan
University have shown through Kirlian photography that the color of a person’s
aura changes dramatically when he is wearing tefillin.

The second prayer box is attached on the upper part of the left arm and
wrapped in place with a strap. The wrapping comes down from the arm and then
wraps on the hand, stimulating acupuncture points on several acupuncture
channels relating to the heart, mind, and spirit, culminating by wrapping around
the middle finger, thus stimulating the Pericardium channel. The Pericardium in
Chinese medicine is also known as the “Heart Protector,” and has the function to
protect the heart (both physically and emotionally) and to help the heart to safely
engage in relationship, without being overly vulnerable and thus possibly
wounded. A healthy Heart Protector is essential for the free flow of
communication with others and with God.

Evil and noise

The close affinity between the words ra’ash (“noise”) and ra (“evil”) draws
our attention immediately to modern society’s role in the deterioration of human
health through sound pollution and air pollution (which can be conceived of as
chemical “noise”). Walking through the cacophony and chemical pollution of
city traffic deeply disturbs and upsets our delicate psychological and spiritual
balance. Kabbalah, like alchemy, teaches that every exterior phenomenon has its
interior effect: we have a tendency to echo and amplify in our own minds the
disruption and confusion that we experience on city streets. The relationship
works in reverse, too: evil encourages noise. These two elements activate and
stimulate each other’s growth. As people struggle with simple activities of
walking and talking and maintaining a safe space, their instincts for survival lead
to aggressive behavior.
The Native Americans have something to teach us in this regard. In an 1855
letter to the President of the United States, Chief Seattle of the Duwamish tribe
wrote: There is no quiet place in the white man’s cities. No place to listen to the
leaves of spring or the rustle of insect wings. But perhaps because I am a savage
and do not understand—the clatter only seems to insult the ears. And what is
there to life if a man cannot hear the lovely cry of the whippoorwill, or the
arguments of the frogs around a pond at night?

Today, the “white man” has polluted the entire world, and not just the land of
the indigenous people, with his “noise” using the rationale of “progress.” In the
face of this disaster, we can at least silence another thundering noise—that of our
thoughts. In order to promote our peace and well-being, we can start to control
our inner noise. With our heads, our rosh, we can put a stop to our most
obsessive thoughts. The three-letter Hebrew word rosh shares its first and last
letters with those of the three-letter word ra’ash. However, its middle letter
changes from an ayin to an alef. According to the discussions of these letters, the
alef represents Divinity, and is the symbol of monotheism, whereas the ayin is
associated with anger. Since the numerical value of the alef is one, it follows that
in order to change from the negative noise, ra’ash, to the positive rosh, we must
exchange the anger of the ayin for the alef: the presence of God.
Overcoming the incessant activity of the mind is aided by the recitation of the
Shema. When we recite its first verse, we cover our eyes with our hand. With
this gesture we declare our intention to detach ourselves from the outside world.
One of the Shema’s most important directives is to seek not after your own heart
and your own eyes.
A metaphor used in Buddhist philosophy compares the untrained mind to a
monkey who, “restless by nature, jumps from one branch to another, then
becomes drunk on the wine of desire and is bitten by a scorpion who fills it with
envy for the success of others.” Finally, “it is possessed by the demon of pride
and its torment becomes impossible to describe.”

Images of the mind

In contrast, the rosh is the “good” head, which corresponds in Kabbalah to the
faculty of ‫ – רצון‬ratzon (“will”). Our ratzon allows us to make life changes,
provided these changes benefit our soul. Thus, it is that intention by which we
become wise. As it is written in Psalms: “A good intelligence [is acquired by] all
those who fulfill [God’s commandments].”
According to Afterman, the battle for the mind is the battle for the contents of
its images. Indeed, he says that this is the battle for the person’s very essence.
The only way to bring awareness into our lives is by ceasing to live according to
the mental programs dictated by our astrological charts, psychological
configurations, and personal history. All these influences impel us to follow the
line of minimum resistance and keep us from making the daily breakthroughs
that spiritual growth requires of us.
The good mind, however, can help to set us free, and even make us “kings.”
According to the Oral Tradition, the word ‫ – מלך‬melech (“king”) is an acronym
for ‫כבד‬-‫לב‬-‫ מוח‬moach-lev-kaved (“mind-heart-liver”): the mind governs the heart,
which in turn governs the liver and the flames of desire. That is the only way for
the good mind to become king of the “small world” that is the human being. The
letter thus alludes to the process through which we attain ever-higher levels of
awareness through contemplation and meditation.
The first phase of this process of elevation is according to the sages,
tranquility, inner calm, relaxation, rest. The medieval commentators Rashi
(Rabbi Shlomo Yitzchaki) and Radak (Rabbi David Kimchi) identify the rest
(referred to in the verse “And I have not found rest”) with “prophecy.” When we
learn to find quietude and relaxation, allowing ourselves to be enveloped in the
present moment, we can access the powerful mental energy of the right brain and
the subconscious mind, the gate to prophecy.
The conscious mind, which processes information in linear, logical patterns
and can handle just a few tasks at a time, has limited short-term memory and
processing capacity—up to 40 bits of information per second. In contrast, the
subconscious mind can process 11 million bits of information per second and
handle thousands of tasks simultaneously. The human mind could hardly attain
any of its complex and superior goals without the cooperation of the
subconscious.
By living in the present moment, connecting to our senses, relaxing, closing
the eyes, and letting the imagination assume control for a few minutes every day,
we can start to make the subconscious our ally instead of our enemy. The
subconscious is not only the reptilian part of ourselves, that which is driven (and
drives us) by fear, greed, impulsive behavior, anger, etc. It is the storehouse of
the wisdom of our ancestors and of our previous reincarnations and past
experiences.
The second way to make the subconscious our ally is to reach for a state of
“completeness,” the ability to reveal and express all parts of our soul. In fact, as
Jung pointed out, unless we express all parts of our soul (and stop exiling aspects
of our personality from consciousness when they do not fit the need of the ego)
we cannot fulfill our highest “self.” The rejected parts of our selves, banished to
the subconscious, will sabotage the success of all projects that “ignore” their
existence. Peace, completion, fulfillment is possible only when each part and
function of the soul is permitted to express itself.
The professional woman coming home must make space for the loving mother
within herself; the scientist must let his yearning for artistic expression, mystical
experience, or emotional contact take over when his job is finished; the
housewife must allow her sensual self to take center stage at the proper time.
Our neshamah (“soul”) has the role of conducting the harmonic expression of all
aspects of the personality so that none of them, will sabotage our efforts.
To give a personal example, I am a creative, mystically oriented person. If I
deny this part of myself the right of expression in favor of excessive need to
control and organize I suffer the consequences. For instance, when I have an
appointment with the editor of my book, my subconscious will often see to it
that I forget the address or the exact time of the meeting to repay me for having
ignored all the needs of my soul.
The letter resh is also the beginning of the word ‫ – רפואה‬refuah (“healing”).
Healing takes place when the mind, subjected to a higher will, succeeds in
harmonizing the various conflicting forces inside the personality. In the same
way, a conductor subjugates an orchestra’s musicians to the composer’s overall
vision of the piece being played.
 CHAPTER 21
Shin

He made shin king over fire

And He bound a crown to it
And He combined one with another
And with them He formed
Heaven in the universe
And the head in the soul

Both in shape and sound, the letter shin represents the effort of the soul to
elevate and cleave to God. For this reason, it is the beginning of the word shirah
(“song”), the instrument of the soul that the Jew uses to unite with God.

The element of fire

Sefer Yetzirah associates the ‫ – ש‬shin with the element of fire. Both its shape
and sound (sh) recall the upward direction of the flames and represent the soul’s
effort to rise upward towards the Divine. Just as a flame burns by virtue of the
transformation of matter—the wood that is consumed, turning into fire and
smoke—shin signifies the consumption of the materialistic aspects of the ego.
In Chinese tradition, the element of fire is related to the heart, the summer
season, and the emotion of joy. Fire is the most yang of the five elements; its
planet is Mars, the intense red planet. Fire’s summer season is the time of heat,
growth, warmth, and increased light. It is a time of singing and dancing.
In Sefer Yetzirah, the shin is represented as the letter of fire, the most
potent tool of transformation we possess. In the Temple, animals were
burned in order to elevate man’s lower, more primitive instincts. In this
way the person who brought the offering was transformed.

Joy
The highest level of elevation is joy. As written in Psalms, “When the Lord
brought [us] back, we were like dreamers. Then was our mouth filled with
laughter and our tongue with singing and joy.”
The emotion of joy in Chinese medicine, as it relates to the element of fire and
to the heart, is associated with the experience of love and bliss. These states are
reached when all blocks to our pure loving nature and our connection to the
Divine are removed. We must strive to attain these states all of the time, for the
sake of our health. The Torah warns us: the Divine fire that burns on the altar
must not be extinguished. It is easy to be inspired, but it is not easy to keep our
inner fire lit, as the Bible commands. Fire (the powerful destructive passions of
the liver) can be extinguished by wind or by water, the fears and depression
created by a malfunctioning of our kidneys.
In the spiritual anatomy of the Chinese tradition, the heart is seen as the
“Emperor,” or the organ that unites and directs the rest of the kingdom of one’s
spirit, body, and personality. As we mentioned each organ in Chinese medicine
relates to certain emotions; the Liver to anger and to our creative drive, and the
Lungs to grief as well as to inspiration and our ability to release and let go. The
Kidneys, Stomach, Spleen, Gallbladder, and the other organs also possess their
own energy, according to the elements they are connected to. The organs are in
reality not only physiological, but they are “spirits”, as alchemical Chinese
medicine teaches. Different spiritual traits are held within each of our organs and
used by us at different circumstances and times, to help us evolve and fulfill our
task on earth.
It is the “Emperor”—the heart—that takes the stance of connection with the
Divine, which guide us towards joy, truth and connection to our higher self. It is
from this place that the heart is able to direct the rest of the body and personality
to be loving and balanced. An Emperor who is out of balance cannot maintain a
happy kingdom with healthy subjects. So is it, too, with our body, mind, and
spirit. Through the directive from our Hearts, our between the pairs of words ‫שיר‬
– shir (“song”) and ‫ – חזן‬chazan (“cantor”), ‫ – שור‬shur (“vision”) and ‫– חזון‬
chazon (“prophecy”) demonstrates how shirah is the ideal way of reaching
levels of higher understanding. Indeed, one of the properties of music is its
ability “to cut off” the negative spirit, as shown by the double meaning of the
word zamer: “to sing” and “to prune.” The Scriptures confirm this analogy: King
Saul was in a deep depression that, according to the Sages, was due to a spirit
that wanted to completely possess him. The only remedy was listening to the
holy music of David (the future king of Israel). Only this gave him relief and
restored his potential to access ruach ha’kodesh, the prophetic spirit. David was
in fact brought to King Saul’s court to play the lyre in order to exorcise this
antagonizing spirit.
 The ecstasy experienced by the worshippers in the Temple of Jerusalem was
facilitated by the Levites, who played the Temple music with hundreds of
instruments. Their heavenly orchestra accompanied prayer and the cathartic rites
of korbanot (sacrifices for the purpose of drawing closer to God).
The writings of Rabbi Nachman of Breslav powerfully illustrate that music in
the Jewish tradition not only stimulates transcendence, but it is also essential in
the healing process. We find particularly, in the story of “The Seven Beggars,”
that only the sage who was able to diagnose the ten types of affliction by feeling
the pulse in each of the ten fingers, was able to heal the princess. The princess is
the symbol of humanity. Through ten types of melodies, the sage rebalanced the
ten pulses that correspond to the ten powers of the soul, paralleling the ten
sefirot.
In a very similar way, Chinese medicine uses music to heal the imbalances of
the five elements and the twelve meridians. According to Chinese lore, Emperor
Huang Ti appointed one of his ministers to capture the harmony of nature in a
musical instrument. In this way the Emperor thought that it would be possible to
heal the citizens of his kingdom. The minister took a bamboo cane and filled it
with seeds. Then he prepared others of different sizes, following exact numerical
proportions, and filled them with the appropriate quantity of seeds. In this way
he was able to build therapeutic musical instruments that were described in the
Nei Ching, the most important text of traditional Chinese medicine, as an
effective method to re-establish the balance of the meridians and the flow of vital
energy.
Six references in the psalms mention “singing a new song” to God. This
means that each of us, through reflection and meditation leading to the
communion with the Divine, can be inspired to sing a song that comes from the
soul. Each song will be a unique expression, created through the spontaneous
outpouring of the soul in harmony with the Divine. Every man or woman of faith
will be inspired to sing a song that specifically resonates with his deep spiritual
essence
Nowadays, thousands of young artists are claiming the right to convey Divine
light through music and song, just like the ancient prophets or the Levites in the
Temple of Jerusalem. In Israel many inspired musicians are unlocking a pathway
to the secrets of healing that are contained in the Bible. This healing cannot be
accessed through a solely intellectual approach to Torah. Rabbi Kook used to say
that messianic redemption will be possible with the condition that each poem,
each song, each work of art divinely inspired, will be finally written, sung and
created!
Unfortunately, some musicians, once they rise to fame, start creating and
playing music to satisfy the needs of an audience. This is betraying the prophetic
mission of the real musician. This sentiment is articulated poignantly by King
David, who dramatically describes the exile of music and of the musician:
By the rivers of Babylon,
There we sat down, and we wept,
When we remembered Zion.
On the willows of that land
We hung up our lyres,
For there our captors asked us for words of song.
Our oppressor [asked us for] joy, [saying]: “Sing us some of the songs of
Zion.”
 The beautiful 1970 reggae song, Rivers of Babylon, quotes this psalm,
perfectly conveying the mission of music to speak to the soul, and not sell
herself to the needs of the record business.
Connecting to our spiritual center via music and song can lead us to the
highest level of spiritual experience; the joy of total connection with the Divine.
“When God will lead back the returnees to Zion…our mouth will be filled with
laughter and our tongue with chants of joy.” Ecstatic music wells up from within
us when we overcome a separation from our inner core and yearn to return to the
essence of who we are.
On another musical note, when the Israelites walked on dry land after crossing
the Sea of Reeds, and saw the waters engulf their Egyptian pursuers, Miriam led
the women in joyous song, praising God. In parashat BeShalach 15:42, “Miriam
the prophetess, Aaron’s sister, took the drum in her hand and all the women
followed with drums and dancing. Miriam led them in the response, ‘Sing to
God for His great victory; horse and rider He cast into the sea.’” Singing is the
soul’s spontaneous reaction to a totally exhilarating experience when spoken
words will not suffice to express an overwhelming emotion of joy.
In the Temple of Jerusalem, the Levite vocalists (whose role it was to
spiritually inspire and elevate the worshippers) were chosen according to their
musical capabilities, rather than according to their knowledge of ritual. Music
was recognized as the ultimate instrument for creating the alteration of
consciousness necessary to stimulate the process of teshuvah.
When the people of Israel went into exile after the destruction of the Second
Temple in 70 C.E., the masses were disconnected from the intense musical
experience that the Temple had provided. Then, as predicted by King David, the
vision of the prophets surfaced in our generation! The vision was first expressed
in the form of the music of the hippies, which became the “soundtrack” of a
revolution of consciousness in the Western world. For decades, the music of the
‘60s, reverberates through time, continuing to spread the Biblical message of
hope, peace, and transcendence.
Intoxicated with the dream of creating a world of justice, freedom,
brotherhood, a return to the earth, equality, peace between people and the sexes,
and in search of a genuine spirituality liberated from religious dogma, an entire
generation identified with the lyrics and the music of the ‘60’s. The music
blended politics, philosophy, ecology, and spirituality into a very powerful
counter-culture mission statement, challenging the materialistic values of a
consumer society.
Both the beatnik and hippie generations correctly intuited the holy, very
powerful role of music, summarized in the words of Leonard Cohen’s 1984 song
Hallelujah:
Now I’ve heard there was a secret chord
That David played, and it pleased the Lord
But you don’t really care for music, do you?

With these words, one of the “high priests” of this generation articulated the
quest of enlightment and spiritual roots, provocatively .questioning Western
society and its materialism, the leaders of this counter-culture accused
contemporary society of being deaf to the call of the spirit, and to the message of
music.
In Paul Simon’s famous lyrics,
Hello, darkness, my old friend,
I’ve come to talk with you again,
Because a vision softly creeping
Left its seeds while I was sleeping
And the Vision that was planted in my brain
Still remains
Within the sound of silence.
…
And in the naked light I saw
Ten thousand people, maybe more.
People talking without speaking;
People hearing without listening;
People writing songs
That voices never share…
“Fools,” said I “You do not know
Silence like a cancer grows.”
“Hear my words that I might teach you….”
And the people bowed and prayed
To the neon god they made…

As we read these words, it hardly seems that two thousand years have passed
since Moses, Jeremiah, and the prophets of Israel warned the people against
worshipping idols. King David described exile as “darkness of the soul,” a
condition in which people “hear without listening, look without seeing,” a time
of illness born of silence and the inability to communicate.
According to contemporary Kabbalists, the powerful flow of Divine love that
descended in the world in the summer of 1967 inspired both the hippies and the
people of Israel. Thousands of concerts, of which Woodstock was only the most
famous, deeply transformed American society during what was called the
“summer of love.” On the other side, this powerful celestial configuration
assisted the people of Israel prevail through what could have been a catastrophic
war (against five Arab armies attacking the Jewish state). The Sixties and in
particular 1967 has been called by Kabbalists a “moment of grace” (et razon), an
opportunity that God gave humanity to transform itself.
However, that evolutionary leap was not realized. The opportunity for a
messianic society was lost. One of the reasons was that the potentially fruitful
encounter between the wisdom of Judaism (the “secret chord” of the harp of
David) and the hippie movement’s aspiration toward expanded consciousness
did not occur. The establishment succeeded in consigning this movement to the
fringes of society and denigrating it rather than incorporating its message of
essential spiritual growth into the mainstream mentality.
Afterward, the power of the hippies slowly faded. The music and lyrics of
Leonard Cohen, the Beatles, Donovan, Bob Dylan, Simon and Garfunkel, Pink
Floyd, and the rest, inspired by the visions and the words of the prophets, were
gradually replaced by hard rock. Hard rock degenerated to the point of assuming
dark tones and lyrics inspired by satanic rites (Heavy Metal, Black Sabbath).
Many Jewish mystics today are gathering the music of the 60’s with the certainty
that they belong to what the Ba’al Shem Tov calls “the remains of the melodies
of the Temple of Jerusalem.” These melodies were scattered to the four corners
of the world after the destruction of the Temple, trusting that in the messianic
age, these melodies will be reconnected to the holiness of spiritual experience.
The reasons for the failure of the hippie movement are many and complex.
Since this is not the appropriate context to discuss them all, I will describe only
two factors that prevented the fusion of the revolutionary ideals of the hippie
generation and the spiritual bases that could have supported them.
The first factor was Israel’s inability to welcome and absorb the thousands of
hippies who traveled there. They were inspired by the miraculous success of the
1967 war, in which Israel defeated five Arab countries despite of their numeric
and military superiority. These young people were not welcomed into the
religious world; they instead ended up in secular kibbutzim, utopian societies
based on equality but quite removed from the teachings of the prophets with
whom these inspired youths were instinctively trying to identify.
The second factor was the passage from soft drugs to hard ones, covertly
orchestrated by commercial American interest groups who could not accept the
liberation of an entire generation from capitalist consumerism. Most
unfortunately, these commercial interest groups succeeded in sabotaging a
movement that would have disempowered them. Hopefully this movement will
be revived, imbued with the proper spiritual basis, and will help to usher in the
messianic age.
 CHAPTER 22
Tav

Tav is the initial letter of the words tefillah – “prayer”; teshuvah –

“repentance”; and tikun – “rectification.” The soul ascends to heaven to be
enlightened, only to return to earth and another incarnation on order to undergo
further rectification, necessary for its purification.

Tefillah: service of the heart

For many people, even those who are spiritually elevated, ‫ – תפילה‬tefillah
(“prayer”) is hard to comprehend. They ask: “Why is it necessary to say our
prayers if God knows all our thoughts and desires?” The Talmud states that the
first verse in the second paragraph of the Shema, “You should love the Lord,
your God, and to serve Him with all your heart,” refers to prayer, the “spiritual
service” (avodah) of the heart. In Rashi’s words, “This verse speaks of a service
that is in the heart, which is prayer.”
On a metaphysical level, the heart is the channel through which human beings
express themselves. According to the theory of the five elements of Chinese
medicine, the heart represents our ability to express and communicate not only
our love but also our essence. In order to speak to God, the heart must make a
spiritual effort that is more intense than simple meditation. This is because when
we speak to God we must express and give shape to our most intimate desires.
As opposed to meditation, we move our lips in prayer, further emphasizing that
we are speaking, albeit silently, and actively communicating with God.
 Prayer is a way of externalizing our desire for spiritual elevation and our
yearning to approach the Absolute. If prayer is “service of the heart,” it is no
accident that God says to a person: “My son, give Me your heart. If you give Me
your heart, I will know that you are Mine.”

Approaching God
One meaning of the word tefillah is “union.” The highest form of union we
can have with God is to feel Him so close to us that we can speak to Him.
Moreover, the more we speak to God, the closer we feel to Him. This
phenomenon of mutual reciprocity is a proven fact in the field of
communications. The closer two people feel to each other, the more they can
communicate, and the more they communicate, the closer they will feel to each
other.

Teshuvah: return to the real essence

 Tav – ‫ – ת‬the first letter of the word tefillah, is also the first letter of the word
‫ – תשובה‬teshuvah (“return”), specifically the return to the real, original, one
essence, to the alef, the first letter of the alphabet. One of the most effective
ways of achieving this return is through tefillah. Tefillah is the tool that
demolishes the obstacles that separate us from God when we stray from the
truth.
There are many people today, including believers, who find it intimidating to
address God’s Presence, which is both so absolute and so hidden. As an aid in
overcoming this block, let us examine some of the teachings of the Oral
Tradition regarding one’s proper attitude during prayer.

Prayer and desires

The Sages teach us that if we want to pray with the proper intention and
solemnity, we must first rediscover the real needs of our Divine soul, separating
them from the needs of the ego. According to Maimonides, in prayer, a person
“purifies the heart and mind from any extraneous thought, and visualizes himself
or herself in the presence of the Shechinah.”

Prayer is not only the expression of the soul but is also the instrument
with which the soul joins with God. In fact, the word nefesh, “soul,”
according to the Talmud, also means “prayer.” The goal for every human
being is to live in a constant state of prayer in order to achieve true
fulfillment. In the image, we see the letter tav wearing a prayer garment
(tallit).

In the Book of Proverbs, King Solomon tells us that the heart, which
expresses itself most intensely in prayer, must be refined just like gold and
silver: The refining pot is for silver and the furnace for gold, but the Lord tries
hearts. The Hebrew word kesef (“silver”) also means “desire.” In other words,
before prayer, we must refine the quality of our desires and our requests.
In the terminology of Roberto Assagioli’s theory of psychodynamics, we
could say that in the process of praying, a person goes from ego to higher Self
and puts himself or herself in contact with the Transpersonal Will. This is the
Divine will expressed in our soul, freed of the weight of the ego.
In order to understand how the structure of the liturgy serves to refine the
heart, we need to recall the ladder that Jacob saw in his dream. According to the
interpretation of the Zohar, the verse “And behold, a ladder was set up on the
earth and its top reached to heaven” refers to prayer, which we recite on earth but
reaches to heaven. We also see this in the verse, “Then hear, You in heaven…”
The imagery of the ladder indicates how we ascend toward heaven through
prayer, step by step, with the aim of reaching God. According to the Midrash, as
explained by Maimonides, the ladder had four rungs, representing the four stages
through which thought must pass to reach God. According to Kabbalah, the
ladder’s four rungs are the four spiritual worlds. The earth is the base of the
ladder. The first rung is the world of Asiyah (“action”), the world of cause and
effect. The top rung of the ladder, from which we reach toward “heaven,” is the
supersensitive world of Atzilut (“emanation”), the world of the Higher Spheres.
In between are two other rungs/worlds, Beriah (“creation”) and Yetzirah
(“formation”).
While the worlds that the Kabbalah delineates represent the downward
development of Divine Emanation, the ladder of prayer signifies the different
phases of consciousness that we must reach and then overcome, starting from
earthly phenomena and culminating in the vision of the Absolute. The apex and
most dramatic part of the Jewish liturgy is the silent prayer, the Amidah
(“standing”). It is so called because it is to be recited while standing at attention
in one place. Although it is at this point in the liturgy that we reach the highest
level of consciousness, it is also, paradoxically, the first time in the liturgy that
we voice our material requests for blessings such as livelihood and health.
Indeed, it is crucial that we not make these requests until we reach the state of
self-abnegation that characterizes the Amidah and the world of Atzilut. For it is
our higher essence that must express our material needs, and not our unrectified
ego, with its limited vision of existence. Our desire for health and livelihood
must be predicated by our desire to better serve God. Therefore, the Amidah is
prefaced by the verse: “God, open my lips, and my mouth will relate Your
praises.” It is as if we are saying, “May it be You, not me, who prays the
following prayer through me.”
It is only after the soul has used the liturgy to ascend through the four spiritual
worlds that its Divine spirit can express its needs, in order to assure both
personal well being as well as that of the collective; the Jewish people and the
world at large. This type of prayer is by no means a “shopping list,” the self-
serving act that is denigrated by the sages and that the Ba’al Shem Tov described
as the “barking of a dog asking its master for food.”
There is a verse in Psalms that shows how the Divine spirit, the Shechinah,
prays within us: “He shall call upon me, and I will answer him; I will be with
him in times of trouble.” The following parable from the Midrash clearly
illustrates the meaning of these words.
As a woman was giving birth to a child, her mother was on the upper floor
of the house. When she heard her daughter’s screams, she also began to cry.
When the neighbors asked her why she was screaming, she replied, “Isn’t it
my daughter who is feeling the pain? I am screaming because her pain is
mine.”

If a mother can identify in such a way with her daughter, then she must be
even more capable of identifying with the Shechinah, since it is the Divine spirit
that not only created us but lives inside us and suffers every time we suffer. If we
do not feel fulfilled, if we are ill, if our personal and professional relationships
are not satisfactory, the Shechinah suffers with us. She suffers because our
alienation is its alienation.
The irony is that though the Shechinah, the Divine aspect of our soul, is very
sensitive to our thoughts and actions and we can either move her forward into
the Light of Divine awareness or backwards into the darkness of negative
emotions and unworthy aspirations. It is the soul, which is that part of us that
will continue in other lifetimes where a tikun will eventually be completed.
Teshuva: “return”
There are a number of pathways of teshuvah, the soul’s return to God. Some
may achieve peace through spiritual awareness without having to face any harsh
trials. This person is obligated to be a living example, instructing others to find a
suitable language to communicate one’s feelings and remain in light, even in a
world of darkness. In Kabbalistic tradition, this is the role of the tzadik, the
righteous person. The tzadik’s return is the opposite of spiritual elevation since
his duty is to descend, to anchor himself to the material world to illuminate
others. The tzadik is obliged to choose to communicate with people and not with
the angels.
Ba’alei teshuvah (penitents) have a very different path. Their trial consists of
redeeming the sparks of light contained in the obscure situations in which they
have been placed by God and to perform an alchemical ritual, transforming evil
into good and darkness into light. It is written: “Great is teshuvah because it
heals the world.”
Quite often, these “black holes” are distinguished by a physical or
psychological illness that cannot be healed without help. But God, either directly
or through the tzadik, can penetrate the soul of someone in exile and cure it.
The overwhelming majority of ba’alei teshuvah must walk through the valley
of the shadow of death, often experiencing a shattering of the ego in order to
transcend and evolve spiritually. It is not easy to find a tzadik gifted with the
ability to look into the depths of our soul. According to the Talmud, however, in
every generation there are at least thirty-six hidden tzadikim in the Jewish world.
They are not only capable of making infallible diagnoses of the origin of
mental and physical imbalances but also of giving precise instructions on how to
cure them. Often, all that is really needed is just a little readjustment, while for
others a genuine tikun is needed. Tikun is a Kabbalistic term referring to the
difficult operation of repair and transformation that our souls must undergo.

Tikun: “reparation”, “transformation”

The process of tikun is alluded to in the form of a lit candle. The body of the
candle symbolizes the nefesh, or “animal soul”. It represents the genetical,
karmic baggage that hinders pure consciousness, our subconscious
programming, acquired in our childhood or in past reincarnations. The wick
symbolizes the insight, the enlightment which allows us to start transforming our
programmed automatic behaviors. The flame symbolizes the neshamah, the
manifest spiritual power of the soul; the highest self, which alchemically draws
energy from the most material aspect of our being, our personal “wax”.
The consumption of the candle as it is transformed into the burning flame
alludes to the “alchemical” transformation of matter and darkness into spirit and
light. The more wax to be consumed by the wick, the bigger the flame, the
potential for enlightment.
The wick is the catalyst in this transformation. Allegorically, the wick is the
spiritual teacher or teaching which we must find in order to start “burning” our
wax. It could also be an angel, a dream, or some moment of spiritual awakening
that comes to us seemingly of its own accord.
The transformation of candle into light requires oxygen. This underscores the
importance of proper physical and spiritual breathing, which we have referred to
previously. Conscious breathing enhances and expands our arenas of free choice.
We have noted already that Egypt (Mitzrayim) is the paradigm for exile, for
restriction and constricted consciousness (meitzarim). Psychologically, Egypt
represents our inability to see any possibility of change. When the Torah
describes Israelites suffering in Egypt, it refers to them as suffering from kotzer
ruach, “an inability to breathe,” constricted by fear and stress. In contrast, when
God told Moses that He was about to redeem the Jewish people from Egypt, He
referred to Himself as Ekyeh asher Ekyeh, usually translated “I am who I am,”
but literally meaning “I will be that which I will be.” This indicates that there is
always the possibility of changing our mazal. Proper breathing is a key to
spiritual growth, as the most important divine attribute confirms through the
hebrew language: “Erech Apaim” litterally means “Long Breath” (but is
translated as “compassionate” and “forgiving”).

Jungian psychoanalysis and Tikun C.G. Jung, the creator of a psychology that
“transcended” itself, and become a tool for spiritual and religious experience,
was extremely attracted to Kabbalah and Hassidism, and in particular to the
ideas of tikun.
One of the strongest influences of Hassidism on Jung was the idea that the
goal of religious life is the tikun (reparation)—the restoration and rectification of
the world. As Jung stated in a letter to James Kirsch (Drob, 2009, p. 33): “The
Jew has the advantage of having long since anticipated the development of
consciousness in his own spiritual history. By this I mean the Lurianic stage of
the Kabbalah, the breaking of the vessels and man’s help in restoring them. Here
the thought emerges for the first time that man must help God to repair the
damage wrought by creation. For the first time man’s cosmic responsibility is
acknowledged”.117

Jung was fascinated by the kabbalistic concept of man’s descent into the abyss
of material existence “for the sake of an ascent,” for the purpose of elevating the
Divine sparks dispersed in the world. The archetype of tikun, the reparation of
the world, as expressed by Lurianic Kabbalah and later by Hassidism (which
believes there is a spark of divinity in all things, waiting to be rescued by man)
was very near to Jung’s belief in the connection between individual and
collective unconscious.
Each individual, according to Kabbalah, is given by God a certain number of
sparks to elevate that are uniquely suited for his soul to raise, both in the world
and within himself. Jung integrated these ideas into his work, seeing
psychological redemption as a prompt to man to free the sparks that are trapped
in the husks, overcoming neurotic complexes that prevent the individual from
actualizing his redemptive role and divine potential. Jung understood the fact
that psychological complexes were also spiritual entities. He used to say that
“more than having a complex, it is more accurate to say that a complex is having
us…A person who is a complex, is in a sort of a state of possession by an alien
personality…”.
The psychoanalytic treatment has the goal of freeing the sparks and releasing
man from his complexes, obtaining something more than an individual cure.
Like Hassidism he believed that the process of tikun and of psychotherapy is
incomplete if it remains only on the personal level and does not affect the
external world.
Following the visions he had in 1944 visions about his relation with Rabbi
Shimon Bar Yohai (as describer in his biography “Dreams, Visions and
Memories”), Jung uttered a public acknowledgement of his debt to Kabbalah and
Hassidut: “The Hassidic Rabbi Beer from Mesiritz, whom they called the Great
Magid…anticipated my entire psychology in the 18th century” (McGuire, 1977,
p. 271).
1 The Oral Torah is the detailed explanation of the Written Torah, given
concurrently with it and revealing the profound, hidden meanings of the written
text. The Talmud (Gitin 60b) states that God established a pact with the Jewish
people only on the basis of the Oral Torah, as it is written: “And the Lord said to
Moses, ‘Write these words: for after the tenor [literally, “for by the mouth”—the
oral explanation] of these words I have made a covenant with you and with
Israel’” (Exodus 34:27).
2 Genesis 1:3.
3 Halachah (literally, “walking”) is Jewish law.
4 A mezuzah, or “doorpost,” is a parchment inscribed with Torah verses placed
on the doorframes of Jewish homes.
5 Tefillin—also called phylacteries (from Ancient Greek phylacterion, form of
phylássein, meaning “to guard, protect”)—are a set of small black leather boxes
containing scrolls of parchment inscribed with verses from the Torah, which are
worn by observant Jews during weekday morning prayers.
6 Every letter of the Hebrew alphabet is also a number, based on its order in the
alphabet: the first 9 letters are the integers; the next 9 letters are the tens; the next
9 letters (i.e., the remaining 4 letters and the 5 final forms) are the hundreds.
7 Berachot 55a. The Talmud is a central text of Rabbinic Judaism. It consists of
63 tractates, and in standard print is over 6,200 pages long.
8 The master artisan chosen to oversee construction of the Tabernacle.
9 Exodus 31:2.
10 Particularly Shabbat 104ab.
11 Particularly the work Otiot d’Rabbi Akiva.
12 Otzar Eden HaGanuz
13 6:7.
14 Isaiah 41:8.
15 In the Bible, God gives a description of Himself using a very clear image: “I
am God your healer” (Ani Hashem Rofeicha). The second definition God gives
of Himself is “I am God who frees from slavery.” These two Divine roles are
deeply related, as will become clear throughout the pages of this book.
16 As quoted in the book The Art of Amazement, Abbot Norman Fisher (Jewish-
born) leader of the San Francisco Zen Center, declared: “Being Jewish is deep
karma” (qtd. in Seinfeld, 2002, p. 13).
17 1 Samuel 10:5.
18 The Eskimos have 38 words for “snow,” reflecting its importance in Eskimo
culture. In the language of the Bible, concepts such as “good deed,” “prayer,”
and “God” are expressed in multiple ways. In Jewish practice, it is customary,
out of respect for God, not to pronounce His Names outside of liturgical use. We
will therefore follow the practice of inserting hyphens in these Names to indicate
that they are not to be pronounced as written. The customary “mispronunciation”
of the Name El is “Kel.”
19 The customary “mispronunciation” of the Name Adonai is “Ad-ni.”
20 1:2b-3b; Zohar Chadash, Rut 107b.
21 Exodus 20:2.
22 The three “mother letters” are alef, mem, and shin, and represent three
essential phonetic and natural elements, air, water, and fire, respectively.
23 See Glossary.
24 Ancient Chinese philosophers, in order to observe and perceive the natural
world and its connection to humans, divided it into five elements. Each element
encompasses a multitude of interrelated characteristics in the natural world, in
the physical and in the spiritual nature of human beings, and in the mystical
realms.
25 See Tanya, chapter 2.
26 The customary “mispronunciation” of the Name Yah is “Kah.”
27 Psalms 150:6.
28 Bereishit Rabbah 14:9.
29 Exodus 34:6; Numbers 14:18; Joel 2:13; Jonah 4:2; Nahum 1:3; Psalms
86:15.
30 Genesis 3:19.
31 Yevamot 63a.
32 Genesis 2:15.
33 Kohelet Rabbah 7:13.
34 See Aubrey Rose, ed., Judaism and Ecology.
35 Leviticus 25:1-7.
36 Bava Batra, chapter 2, etc.
37 Genesis 1:26.
38 Isaiah 42:10; Psalms 33:3, 40:4, 96:1, 98:1, 144:9; 149:1.
39 Genesis 2:19-20; Bereishit Rabbah 17:4.
40 1 Kings 5:11-12.
41 Every physical entity is a manifestation of a corresponding spiritual principle:
water, for example, is the physical materialization of the principle of love and
knowledge, while fire is the physical manifestation of the principle of power and
strength. Practically speaking, if we manage to contact the “parallel” essence of
this reality when, for example, we take a shower or light a match, we will be
able to formulate all the possible metaphors, just like King Solomon. Thus, in
the Kabbalistic sense, we will hasten the fulfillment of the prophecy that on that
day, the Lord shall be One and his name One (Zechariah 14:9).
42 Exodus 25:8.
43 Psalms 90:1.
44 The term is from Ezekiel 11:16. In the Talmud (Megilah 29a) it is understood
to mean synagogues and houses of study. In Chassidism it is applied the Jewish
home, as well (see Likutei Sichot, vol. 22, p. 181, vol. 23, p. 265, vol. 25, pp.
418, 423, vol. 31, p. 237; Sefer HaSichot 5748, vol. 1, p. 162, etc.).
45 Berachot 55a, Chagigah 27a.
46 E.g., Midrash HaGadol, Midrash Rabbah, and Nachmanides, Preface to
Commentary on Exodus.
47 Jewish temple or The Jewish Temple, may refer to the original two ancient
Jewish Temples in Jerusalem. The First Temple was destroyed by the Neo-
Babylonian Empire in 586 BCE. The Second Temple was destroyed by the
Roman Empire in 70 CE.
48 Exodus 40:34-38; Numbers 9:15-23; 1 Kings 8:10-11.
49 Bereishit Rabbah 60:16; Rashi on Genesis 24:67.
50 Leviticus 24:4-9; Chagigah 26b.
51 Bereishit Rabbah 60:16; Rashi on Genesis 24:67.
52 Genesis 18:1-8; Rashi on Genesis 18:1.
53 Shabbat 127a; See Rabbi Yitzchak Ginsburgh, The Mystery of Marriage, pp.
230-232.
54 Amos 8:11.
55 Bereishit Rabbah 49:4.
56 Psalms 2:7.
57 The fact that vowels are generally not written in Hebrew allows us to read
groups of consonants—words—in different ways. In this example, the
consonants ‫ג‬, ‫מ‬, ‫“ = ל‬g”, “m”, “l”, with the vowels “i” and “e” are read gimel,
with the vowel “a” they are read gamal, and with the vowels “o” and “e” they
are read gomel.
58 For example, Judah is referred to in the Bible (Genesis 49:9) as lion, the king
of animals, since the ultimate king, the Messiah, will descend from him. In the
same way, every person who wants to reach his or her own potential ability to be
a leader can meditate on the archetype of the lion.
59 This concept is also reflected both in Shamanism and Jungian psychoanalysis.
60 Genesis 8:6-12.
61 Ezekiel 1.
62 Torah is the central reference of the religious Judaic tradition. The term Torah
means “instruction” or “teaching”, and offers a way of life for those who follow
it. It can most specifically mean the first five books of the twenty-four books of
the Tanakh, and it usually includes the rabbinic commentaries; it can mean the
continued narrative from Genesis to the end of the Tanakh, and it can even mean
the totality of Jewish teaching, culture and practice.
63 Avot 5:23.
64 At the conclusion of the Song of Songs, Song of Solomon 2:17: “Until the
cool of the day when the shadows flee away, turn, my beloved, and be like a
gazelle… Flee, my beloved, and be like a gazelle.”
65 Igrot Kodesh Admor Mehorayatz, vol. 8, p. 208 (quoted in Keter Shem Tov,
addendum 108). See Teshuvot MiBa’alei HaTosefot MiKitvei Yad, p. 286, §19;
Midbar Kedeimot, Gimel 3; Sefer HaMa’amarim 5721, p. 256 ff; Likutei Sichot,
vol. 18, p. 130.
66 Shabbat 104a.
67 Shekalim 5:6.
68 Mishneh Torah, Matnot Aniyim 10:4.
69 Avot 3:7; Midrash Shmuel ad loc.
70 Genesis 2:3.
71 Sefer Yetzirah associates the twelve months, the twelve signs of the zodiac,
and the twelve tribes with twelve “senses,” or human faculties.
72 Rosh HaShanah 11ab.
73 Rabbi Yitzchak Luria (1534-1572), central figure of Kabbalah, known by the
acronym of the phrase HaEloki Rabbeinu Yitzchak Zichrono Livrachah – The
Godly Rabbi Yitzchak of blessed memory.
74 Pri Etz Chaim, Sha’ar Mikra Kodesh 4.
75 Macbeth, Act 5, Scene 5.
76 Marina Borruso: Il presente adesso. Tecniche Nouve, 2012. (Disciple of
Eckhart Tolle)
77 Eiruvin 64b; Magen Avraham on Shulchan Aruch 1:171:1.
78 See Targum Onkelos on Genesis 2:7.
79 Genesis 38:26; Rashi ad loc.
80 Proverbs 18:21.
81 Psalms 19:3.
82 See above, in the chapter on gimel
83 1 Chronicles 12:33.
84 Genesis 49:14-15.
85 The holiday of Lag Ba’omer (the 33rd day of the counting of the Omer) is
celebrated on this date. In Israel, Jews of all origins and spiritual levels visit the
tomb of Rabbi Shimon in Meron, in the northern Galilee, on this day.
86 1 Kings 19:12.
87 Pardes Rimonim 17:4.
88 Exodus 15:26.
89 Chidushei Chatam Sofer, Shabbat, 147b; Sha’ar Yissachar, Chodesh Iyar 3
(88ab); Likutei Sichot, vol. 32, pp. 72-76.
90 Yoma 86a.
91 Ben Yehoyada on Shabbat 119b and Ketubot 111b.
92 Jewish law forbids praying before the body is freed of waste and impurity.
93 The words stand before, which are not present in all the versions of the
prayer, indicate that should these channels not work, we could not stand before
God, that is, we could not pray and serve him.
94 Psalms 103:1.
95 Psalms 35:10.
96 Berachot 28b; Zohar 3:255b; Likutei Torah 3:70d.
97 Berachot 28b.
98 Derech Chaim 5:15.
99 Both are compared to the Splitting of the Red Sea (Pesachim 118a; Sotah 2a).
100 Very succinctly, we can say that in the language of Chinese philosophy, Yin
and Yang represent contemplation and action. Yin is the passive, contemplative,
female element; Yang is its opposite: the active, male element.
101 The sixth son of Jacob and Leah.
102 Deuteronomy 33:18.
103 Zohar 3:257b (in Raya Mehemna); Sefer HaYirah; Pardes Rimonim, Sha’ar
Eser v’lo Teisha 9; Sha’ar HaYichud VehaEmunah 7 (82a). Deuteronomy, 25:17
104 George Gurdjieff, a spiritual teacher of Russian origin best known in the
West for his charisma, attributed a fundamental role to memory (“self-
remembering”) as an instrument to increase awareness of the present by helping
us avoid falling into the sleep of automatic, unconscious behaviour and
emotional reactions.
105 Exodus 12:8.
106 3:1-8.
107 Another mechanism Judaism uses to encourage deliberation and awareness
is the mezuzah attached to every doorpost. These signposts enjoin the Jew to
“preserve awareness” every time he or she crosses a threshold.
108 Mishneh Torah, Melachim 8:10-11.
109 Sanhedrin 56a; Mishneh Torah, Melachim 9:1.
110 See Genesis 2:29.
111 Genesis 9:2-4.
112 Exodus 19:3.
113 1:8.
114 Unfortunately the Spanish conquest was followed by the destruction of
Indian spiritual life, whose reparation on the side of white Americans is yet to be
completed.
115 The descendents of the Jews exiled in Ethiopia, who were brought back into
Israel in the majestic airplane operation in 1972.
116 Proverbs 31:1-31.
117 These words of Jung’s, together with his commitment in saving many Jews
from Nazism, can be understood as a powerful compensat ion for years of
“suppression” of that truth, as well as for his anti-Jewish writings during the rule
of nazi Germany and his conflict with Freud.
 APPENDIX 1

Author and contributors

Daniela Abravanel, Author

Daniela Abravanel grew up in Libya where, riding with her father in the North
African desert and countryside, she developed a profound love for God, Nature
and animals. And lived in Italy, Israel and the US where she is presently
studying to complete a Phd on Depth Psychology, preparing for an
interdisciplinary dissertation on Kabbalah, Five Elements acupuncture and
Alchemy,.
She had previously graduated in Philosophy in Milan and in Counseling and
Family Therapy in California. After that she extensively travelled East and West,
to remote communities where she longed to get in touch with the natives’
knowledge of God and nature. In the Yucatan, she met a Mayan shaman who
became her teacher till the day he invited her to leave Mexico and to continue
her quest in order to learn “how to serve God,” an expression that only years
later began to make sense to her.
Leaving Mexico, she traveled to Rishikesh and then to Dharamsala, in order to
study Buddhism. A Lama in Dharamsala offered her a gift: her first book of
Kabbalah, the Thrirteeen Petals Rose. He invited her to leave India in order to
find her own spiritual roots. The next step was therefore Israel, where
encouraged by Chabad rabbis, Daniela began studying the Torah, Chassidut and
Kabbalah. Sensing a need to fully integrate these teachings with the mystical
knowledge of the ancestors she lived for extended periods in the desert of the
Negev, especially in Ein Gedi, and Kumran, the home of the Essenes and of the
alchemical healing tradition of Judaism.
Wishing to integrate her passion for Judaism and for the healing tradition she
has been deeply involved in the study of Traditional Chinese Medicine.
Today, Daniela teaches interdisciplinary courses about traditional Jewish
healing practices and Alchemical Five Elements Chinese Medicine. She has also
elaborated a therapeutic method based on the Kabbalistic system of the Four
Worlds, the medical theories of Maimonides and traditional Essenic-Judaic
inheritance which she shares in workshops in Cozumel and in the vicinities of
Tulum (Mexico), where a group of healers has gathered to create a holistic
healing center. This facility is being built in an area surrounded by the sacred
waters of the Cenotes (mayan sweet-water springs). The center will offer various
detox programs, Qi Gong, authentic movement, prayer and Five Elements
Alchemical medicine. Jungian and and kabbalistic tecniques for reconnecting
with Ancestors. The location (in the jungle between Tulum and Cancun) is ideal
for a deep experience of Nature, as a powerful transformational healing practice.
Besides meeting with local curanderos, the workshops allow the experience of
various eco-therapy-modalities, meeting with the spirits of plants, wild-animal-
facilitated therapies; ecospirituality, and more. We will also explore mayan
ecotherapies designed to answer the environmental and economic challenge,
both to stop “use” nature for human benefit and to practice the ethical
imperatives needed to create a true circle of reciprocal healing between man and
nature.
In addition, she holds open-House-Shabats in her residence in Los Angeles,
and shares her knowledge on the Bible and Kabbalah. to those who are sincerely
motivated to learn Kabbalah and Hebrew prayers, in the original sacred
language.
For several years, Daniela Abravanel has also been promoting trips to Israel.
Thanks to her personal relationships with many great Kabbalists, and highly
skilled therapists, she can be a connection for all those who want to start a path
of healing and self-awareness in the holy land. Just as for millennia, true mystics
of every tradition traveled to Jerusalem, not as a place to conquer and possess,
but as a true Axis Mundi, these journey can open gates of self-descovery and
deep healing.
She is the author of major books about the subject of Kabbalah and Healing,
published in Italy (Guarire per curarsi, I quattro mondi della guarigione,
Trasformazione con le lettere ebraiche, Il segreto dell’alfabeto ebraico).
She can be reacheb by email at: daniela.abravanel@gmail.com

Tobia Ravà
Ravà lives and works in Venice, Italy. He attended the International School of
Graphics of Venice and Urbino and graduated with a degree in semiology of the
arts from the University of Bologna. He began painting in 1971, displaying his
works in individual and collective exhibitions in Italy and abroad since 1977. He
is one of the founders of the Bologna group AlcArte, founded in 1983. In 1988,
he began concentrating on Jewish iconography, carrying out research involving
the cataloging of Jewish epigraphs in the Veneto, Friuli, and Trentino Alto Adige
regions in Northern Italy.
In 1993, along with Cimitan, Fontanello, Pain, and Vignato, he promoted the
Triplani (“Three Planes”) group, deriving its name from the idea that there is a
third symbolic level of reading in addition to those of the signifier and the
signified, stemming from the double-paned semiology of Greimas and
Galabrese. Since 1999, he has lectured at universities and higher schools of art,
speaking on his involvement with Hebraic culture, mathematics, logic, and
contemporary art.
Ravà was a founding member of Concerto d’Arte Contemporanea, created to
bring together artists’ ideas on harmonizing man with his environment and
giving contemporary art its place in both history and art history. The group
exhibits in historic villas, parks, and city squares in order to extend the reach of
art in its communities.
See his website: www.tobiarava.com

Frank Lalou
Lalou was born in Marmande in southern France in 1958, and resides in
France and Belgium.
Lalou is an internationally known calligrapher. He has had over a hundred
exhibitions in France, Japan, the USA, Morocco, England, and Canada. At the
same time, he has a passion for publishing, both as an illustrator and as an
essayist in the various fields of Biblical studies, archeology, poetry, and
education. Currently, he has published 40 books among which are La
Calligraphie de l’Invisible for Albin Michel (his main publisher) and Les Lettres
hébraïques for Alternatives.
Some of his one-off books have been purchased by famous institutions, such
as the Bibliotheque Nationale de France, Le Musée d’Art et d’histoire du
Judaïsme in Paris, Le Musée des Arts décoratifs de Bordeaux, the Israel Museum
in Jerusalem, and the Sackner Foundation and the Library of Congress in the
USA.
As a polymorphous artist, he applies his calligraphy on numerous materials
including stained-glass windows, glass façade (the largest calligraphy in Europe,
for the Church of Notre Dame d’Espérance in Paris), sculpture, carpets, jewelry,
clothes, video, furniture, and gardens.
 In 2000, thanks to his invention of the calamophone, he managed at last to
combine art with music, his other great passion, thus fulfilling his artistic
mission.
See www.lalou.net

Josh Baum
Born in London in 1971, Josh studied painting in Barcelona and traveled
throughout Spain. He then moved to Safed, the center of Kabbalah in northern
Israel, where he became enchanted by the Hebrew letters. During these years in
Safed, Josh studied in yeshiva and restored the paintings on the domed ceiling of
the ancient Sephardic Abuhav synagogue. From Safed he moved to Jerusalem,
where he trained as a sofer stam (“ritual scribe”) and wrote a Sefer Torah. His
illuminated manuscripts, etchings, prints, drawings, and other Judaica draw on
influences as diverse as medieval manuscripts, art deco, hip-hop, Islamic art,
science, and nature. He is currently living in East London, working and studying
for his Masters degree in Fine Art at Central Saint Martins.
See www.alefsinwonderland.com
 APPENDIX 2

Biographies of contemporary Torah teachers

Dr. Miriam Adahan: psychologist, therapist, prolific author, and founder of

EMETT (“Emotional Maturity Established Through Torah”), a network of self-
help groups dedicated to personal growth. She lives in Jerusalem, and has
recently written on the struggles of life in the terror-beset land of Israel.

Allen Afterman was born in Los Angeles in 1941. He studied at UCLA and
Harvard Law School, and taught law in New Zealand, Australia, and Singapore.
In 1972 he retired from teaching and devoted himself to poetry, publishing The
Maze Rose (1974) and Purple Adam (1980). In 1980, he immigrated to Israel,
where he resided until his death in 1992.

Rabbi Eliyahu Avihail: Rabbi Eliyahu Avihail is the founder and director of
the Amishav (“My People Returns”) organization, which is dedicated to the
research and discovery of lost Jews. Rabbi Avihail is a sought-after lecturer
worldwide, and the author of Those Lost in the Land of Assyria and The Tribes of
Israel.
Rabbi Avihail is a member of the special rabbinical court that converted the
community of Belmonte, Portugal. He was also active in the immigration of the
“Toward Jerusalem” community of Mexico and the “Benei Moshe” community
of Peru, and continues to assist the “Benei Menasseh” tribe of Northeast India.
Rabbi Avihail travels worldwide to seek out, investigate, encourage, and direct
lost Jews wherever they are.

Rabbi Yitzchak Ginsburgh: Born in St. Louis, Missouri in 1944. Prior to his
rediscovering his Jewish heritage, Rabbi Ginsburgh pursued an academic career
in mathematics and philosophy. Upon finding his way to Torah faith and
observance, he began an intensive program of religious study and development
under the close guidance of several great sages, most notably the Lubavitcher
Rebbe. After moving to Israel in 1965, Rabbi Ginsburgh began drawing from his
intimate knowledge of these profound teachings so as to make them spiritually
relevant to the contemporary Jew for whom the original texts are virtually
impenetrable. Using his academic background to present these classic ideas into
a conceptual language and system that speaks to the 21st-century mentality,
Rabbi Ginsburgh has been able to unlock a vast treasure of insights that many
have long been thirsting for. He is a talented musician and composer, having
produced recordings of original music. He teaches throughout Israel and around
the world. Rabbi Ginsburgh has also devoted much of his time and energy to
writing original works of Chassidic thought based upon his unique system and
methodology. Rabbi Ginsburgh lives with his wife and children in the rural
Chassidic settlement of Kefar Chabad.

Rabbi Tzvi Inbal: Born in 1945, received his MS in Chemistry from the
Technion. He was active in the League Against Religious Coercion in Haifa.
Beginning in 1972, while serving in the IDF, he began to return to his Jewish
roots. He is one of the founders of Arachim and serves as one of its senior
lecturers, both in Israel and the Diaspora, while continuing to work in the field of
chemical research.

Rabbi Simon Jacobson: Born in 1956, Simon Jacobson was educated in

Lubavitcher yeshivas in the United States. He worked in close association with
the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson. In 1979, he
headed a team of scholars who memorized and transcribed entire talks that the
Lubavitcher Rebbe delivered during Shabbat and holidays (as writing and tape
recording are not permitted on holy days). He also headed the research team for
Sefer HaLikkutim, a 26-volume collection of Chassidic thought anthologized
from the works of the third Lubavitcher Rebbe. Jacobson heads The Meaningful
Life Center, dubbed a “Spiritual Starbucks” by The New York Times. He is a
sought-after speaker in the Jewish world today, having lectured on six continents
and in forty states on psycho-spiritual issues and applying Jewish thought to
contemporary life. He has been interviewed on over 300 radio and TV shows,
including CNN with Larry King, Charlie Rose, and the CBS News Show, “The
Best of Us.” In 2010, Rabbi Jacobson appeared in the award-winning film, The
Human Experience.

Esther Kitov: Teacher on Women’s subjects and Kabbalah, Jerusalem.

Rabbi Shaul Leiter: Founder and Director of the Ascent Institute, Safed.
Born in New York, Shaul became observant and entered yeshiva in Brooklyn
after graduating from Cornell University with a BSc in nutrition in 1976. He
came to Israel in 1978 to focus on his rabbinic studies, and soon after married
and settled in Safed. In 1984, he co-founded Ascent, using his newly gained
knowledge and teaching ability to share the wealth of Judaism with jewish
backpackers in the Holy Land. A separate branch of Ascent has been created by
Rabbi Ayal Reiss (The Kabbalah Center of Safed) to allow non-jews to also be
able to access the study of Kabbalah.

Nechama Nadborny-Burgeman holds a Phi Beta Kappa and Phi Kappa Phi
degree in Cultural Anthropology with a minor in Art History. After her world
travels, she came to Israel where she attended yeshivas in Safed and Jerusalem.
Nechama has authored The Twelve Dimensions of Israel, The Princess of Dan,
and The Seventy Dimensions of the World. Nechama lives in Moshav Ta’oz, 40
minutes from Jerusalem, where she continues to study, write, teach, paint, and
play the harp. She lectures both in Israel and abroad.

Rabbi Adin (Steinsaltz) Even-Yisrael: Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz is a teacher,

philosopher, social critic, and prolific author who has been hailed by Time
magazine as a “once-in-a-millennium scholar.” His lifelong work in Jewish
education earned him the Israel Prize, his country’s highest honor. Born in
Jerusalem in 1937 to secular parents, Rabbi Steinsaltz studied physics and
chemistry at the Hebrew University. He established several experimental schools
and, at the age of 24, became Israel’s youngest school principal. In 1965, he
began his monumental Hebrew translation and commentary on the Talmud. To
date, he has published the 46 volumes, the final one in the series on November
2010. The Rabbi’s classic work of Kabbalah, The Thirteen-Petalled Rose, was
first published in 1980 and now appears in eight languages. In all, Rabbi
Steinsaltz has authored some 60 books and hundreds of articles on subjects
ranging from zoology to theology to social commentary. Continuing his work as
a teacher and spiritual mentor, Rabbi Steinsaltz established a network of schools
and educational institutions in Israel and the former Soviet Union. He has served
as scholar in residence at the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Studies
in Washington DC, and the Institute for Advanced Studies at Princeton
University. His honorary degrees include doctorates from Yeshiva University,
Ben Gurion University of the Negev, Bar Ilan University, Brandeis University,
and Florida International University. Rabbi Steinsaltz lives in Jerusalem.

David Friedman: one of the greatest teachers of Kabbalah, lives in the city of
zfat (Safed), and uses his beautiful artwork and mandalas to express the deepest
teachings of Jewish mysticism. Look at his website www.kosmic-kabbalah.com.
 APPENDIX 3

A suggested meditation

Now that we have explored some aspects of the Hebrew alphabet, we wish to
invite the reader to have a personal experience of meditation in front of the work
of the famous italian artist and kabbalist Tobia Ravà. Even if the reader is not an
expert of numerology, by looking at his paintings, he may have a sense of the
depth of the hebrew language and of its metaphysics which Tobia Ravà has
grasped as few scholars have been able to do.
My meeting with Tobia Ravà and my decision to use his paintings to illustrate
the depth of the hebrew language can unreservedly be described as a “Divine
coincidence”: I met him in Padua, at the grave of our common ancestor, Don
Yitzchak Abravanel, the greatest sephardic leader and scholar, serving as an
advisor of Queen Isabel before the Inquisition. Tobia graciously handed me a
catalogue with his extraordinary paintings, offering me the possibility to use his
artwork in my books to give an idea of the depth of the science of numerology
(numerical equivalences, and associated concepts), Hopefully, you will thus get
an idea of the infinite possibilities, meanings, parallels, and juxtapositions
associated with the Hebrew language.
Nautilus ghematrico (Fibonacci), 2006. Resin and acrilyc tempera on canvas,
cm 80×80. Private collection.

Seconda natura delle cose, 2007. Acrylic resin and tempera on canvas and
panel, cm 92×67,5.
Private collection.

 Foresta degli Elementi, 2006. Acrylic resin and tempera on canvas, cm
100×120. Private collection.

II germoglio del libro, 2007. Acrylic resin and tempera on canvas, cm 30×40.
Private collection.
 APPENDIX 4

Glossary

Amidah (“Standing”): The central prayer of Jewish liturgy, originally

comprising eighteen but now nineteen blessings on weekdays and seven
blessings on the Shabbat and holidays. Recited standing, hence its name; also
known as Shemoneh Esreh (“eighteen,” after the original number of blessings it
contained).
Arizal: Acronym for ‫האלקי רבינו יצחק זכרונו לברכה‬, “the Godly Rabbi Yitzchak,
of blessed memory,” referring to Rabbi Yitzchak Luria (1534-1572), central
figure of Kabbalah, whose teachings form the core of Kabbalistic doctrine and
the basis for understanding the Zohar. His teachings were recorded primarily by
Rabbi Chaim Vital (1543-1620).
Bet Hamikdash: The Holy Temple. The central sanctuary in Jerusalem,
which serves as the physical abode of the indwelling of God’s Presence on earth
and as the venue for the sacrificial service. The Temple is the focal point of
spiritual consciousness. The first Temple was built by King Solomon (833 BCE)
and destroyed by the Babylonians (423 BCE); the second Temple was built by
Zerubabel (353 BCE), remodeled by Herod and destroyed by the Romans (68
CE); the third, eternal Temple will be built by Mashiach.
Berachah (“Blessing”): In general, beneficence. Specifically: a benediction
recited before performing a mitzvah or before or after eating, etc.
Chassidut (“Piety,” “Loving-kindness”; also called “Chassidism”): The
movement within Judaism founded by Rabbi Yisrael Ba’al Shem Tov (1648-
1760), the purpose of which is to awaken the Jewish people to its own inner self
through the inner dimension of the Torah and thus to prepare the way for the
advent of Mashiach. Also, the oral and written teachings of this movement.
Halachah (“Walking”): Jewish law.
Hatavat Chalom (“Repair of a Dream”): A ritual by which a bad dream is
transformed into a positive one.
Holy of Holies: The Inner Sanctum; the innermost chamber of the Holy
Temple, housing the Ark of the Covenant containing the Tablets of Moses.
Kabbalah (“Receiving” or “Tradition”): the esoteric dimension of the Torah.
 Kavanah: “Directed awareness.”
Kelipot (“Shells”): the dimension of reality either neutral or antithetical to
Godliness and holiness; evil.
Kohen (pl. Kohanim) (“Priest”): A descendant of Aaron who performs the
sacrificial and other rites in the Holy Temple.
Lev: “Heart.”
Maharal: Acronym for Moreinu HaRav Livai, “Our teacher, Rabbi [Yehudah]
Livai” of Prague.
Mashiach (“Anointed one,” “Messiah”): the prophesied descendant of King
David who will reinstate the Torah-ordained monarchy (which he will head),
rebuild the Holy Temple, and gather the exiled Jewish people to their homeland.
This series of events (collectively called “the Redemption”) will usher in an era
of eternal, universal peace and true knowledge of God, called “the messianic
era.”
Mayim: “Water.”
Menorah (“Candelabrum”): the seven-branched candelabrum that was lit
daily in the Holy Temple.
Mezuzah (“Doorpost”): a ritually-written parchment, affixed to the doorposts
of the Jewish home, on which are written the first two paragraphs of the Shema.
Midrash: see Bibliography, q.v.
Mikra: (“Scripture”): See Bibliography, s.v. Bible.
Mishnah: see Bibliography, q.v.
Mitzvah (pl. Mitzvot) (“Commandment”): One of the six hundred thirteen
commandments given by God to the Jewish people, or seven commandments
given by God to the nations of the world, at Mt. Sinai.
Oral Tradition: see Bibliography, s.v. Torah.
Pesach: “Passover.”
Pirkei Avot: see Bibliography, s.v. Avot.
Rashi: see Bibliography, q.v.
Sanhedrin: the Jewish High Court of 70 elders.
Seder (“Order”): The ritual surrounding the meal of the first night(s) of
Passover.
Sefer Yetzirah: see Bibliography, q.v.
Sefirah (pl. Sefirot): A channel of Divine energy or life force. It is via the
sefirot that God interacts with creation; they may thus be considered His
“attributes.”
 Shalom: “Peace.”
Shechinah (“Indwelling”): the immanent Divine Presence that inheres within
the universe, corresponding to the sefirah of malchut, the “feminine” aspect of
Divinity.
Shema (“Hear”): a compilation of three Biblical passages (Deuteronomy 6:4-
9, 11:13-21, Numbers 15:37-41) beginning with this word, or sometimes, the
first verse alone. The first verse is the fundamental profession of monotheism,
“Hear O Israel, God is our God, God is One.”
Siddur (pl. Siddurim): “Prayer book.”
Talmud: see Bibliography, q.v.
Tefilah: “Prayer.”
Tefillin “Prayer [accessory]”: Leather cubes containing parchments on which
the three paragraphs of the Shema are written, worn on the head and arm by
Jewish men during morning weekday prayers.
Tetragrammaton: The ineffable four-letter proper Name of God.
Torah: see Bibliography.
Tzadik (“Righteous person”): Someone who has fully overcome the evil
inclination of his animal soul (and has converted its potential into good).
Tzedakah (“Righteousness”): Charity given to the poor.
Vilna Gaon (“The Genius of Vilna”): Rabbi Eliahu ben Shlomo Zalman of
Vilna (1720-1797).
Yeshiva (“[Place for] Sitting”): An academy for advanced Torah study.
Yom Kippur (“Day of Atonement”): The holiest day of the Jewish year,
marked by fasting and repentance, particularly through confession of sin.
Zohar: see Bibliography, q.v.
 APPENDIX 5

Bibliography

1. Classical Jewish texts

Note: Words preceded by an asterisk have their own entries.
Biblical texts are cited by chapter and verse. If a post-Biblical text is divided
into chapters, sections, or the like, it is cited accordingly. Otherwise, it is cited
according to its pagination. There are two systems of pagination used in post-
Biblical texts. The classic system is that of the Talmud, in which the page
number refers to the physical page (“leaf” or “folio”), which is followed by a
letter referring to the column of the page. This usually means that column “a” is
on the front side (“recto”) of the page, and column “b” on the back (“verso”), but
if there are two columns on a page, columns “a” and “b” will be on the front, and
columns “c” and “d” on the back. This system was abandoned in later works,
which are paginated in the modern fashion, each side of the page having its own
number. In citations, then, “43c” means page 43, column 3 of a work paginated
in the Talmudic fashion, and “p. 43” means simply page 43 of a work paginated
in the modern fashion. References to Talmudic pagination are not preceded by
“p.,” since the letter following the number makes it clear that the reference is to
a page and not a section. References to modern pagination, however, are
preceded by “p.” in order to distinguish them from references to sections.

Amos: a book of the *Bible.

Avodah Zarah (“Idolatry”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Avodat HaKodesh (“The Holy Service”): Rabbi Meir ibn Gabbai (1480-1547).
Kabbalah.
Avot (“Fathers”): a tractate of the *Talmud. Also popularly known as Pirkei
Avot (“Chapters of the Fathers” or “Sayings of the Fathers”).
Bava Batra (“The Last Gate”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Bava Kama (“The First Gate”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Bechorot (“Firstborn”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Bemidbar Rabbah: the Midrash on the book of Numbers.
Ben Porat Yosef (“Joseph is a Graceful Son” [Genesis 49:22]): Rabbi Yaakov
Yosef of Polnoye (1704-1794). Sermons on the *Torah, containing the earliest
recordings of the teachings of Rabbi Yisrael Ba’al Shem Tov (1698-1760).
Ben Yehoyada: Rabbi Yosef Chaim of Bagdad (1832-1909). Commentary on
the homiletical sections of the Talmud.
Berachot (“Blessings”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Bereishit Rabbah: the Midrash to the book of Genesis.
Bible: the written *Torah. The Bible comprises twenty-four books, divided
into three sections: (1) the Torah (“teaching”), comprising the five books of
Moses; (2) the eight books of the Prophets (the first and second books of Samuel
and Kings are considered one book, as are the twelve “minor” prophets); (3) the
eleven books of the Writings (the books of Ezra and Nehemiah are considered
one book, as are the two books of Chronicles). The Bible is therefore known in
Hebrew as the Tanach, the abbreviation formed by the first letters of the names
of these three sections: Torah, Nevi’im, Ketuvim.
Birkat Avraham (“The Blessing of Abraham”): Rabbi Avraham David
Wohrman of Butchatch (1770-1840). Chassidic commentary on the Book of
Genesis. Zolkiev, 1888.
Chagigah (“The Festival Offering”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Chidushei Chatam Sofer (“Novellae of the Seal of the Scribe”): Rabbi Moshe
Sofer (1762-1839). Commentary on the Talmud.
Chulin (“Profane [Food]”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Chronicles: a book of the *Bible.
Commentary on the *Bible: Rabbi Bachya ben Asher (1255-1340). Cited
according to Biblical passage discussed.
Commentary on the *Bible: Rabbi David Kimchi (Radak, 1160-1235). Cited
according to Biblical passage discussed. Lemburg, 1868.
Commentary on the *Bible: Rabbi Moshe ben Nachman (Nachmanides, 1194-
1270). Cited according to Biblical passage discussed. Rome, before 1480.
Commentary on the *Bible: Rabbi Ovadiah Seforno (1475-1550). Cited
according to Biblical passage discussed. Venice, 1567.
Commentary on the *Bible: Rabbi Shlomo ben Yitzchak (Rashi, 1040-1105).
Cited according to Biblical passage discussed. First printed in Italy, 1475.
Commentary on the *Mishnah: Rabbi Moses ben Maimon (Maimonides,
1135-1205).
Derech Chaim (“The Path of Life” [Proverbs 6:23]): Rabbi Yehudah Liva of
Prague (1520-1609). Commentary on *Avot.
 Deuteronomy: a book of the *Bible.
Devarim Rabbah: the Midrash to the book of Deuteronomy
Ecclesiastes: a book of the *Bible.
Eiruvin (“Mixing [Domains]”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Esther: a book of the *Bible.
Exodus: a book of the *Bible.
Ezekiel: a book of the *Bible.
Genesis: a book of the *Bible.
Gitin: a tractate of the *Talmud.
Guide for the Perplexed: see Moreh Nevuchim
HaTamim (“The Sincere [Student]”): Periodical published by the Chabad
Chassidic Yeshiva Tomchei Temimim, Warsaw, 1935-1938. Republished in two
volumes, Kefar Chabad: Kehot, 1975.
Igeret HaKodesh (“The Holy Letter”): Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi (1745-
1812). Fourth section of the *Tanya.
Igrot Kodesh Admor MehoRayatz: Correspondence of Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak
of Lubavitch (1880-1950). 14 vols. New York: Kehot, 1982-98.
Isaiah: a book of the *Bible.
Jeremiah: a book of the *Bible.
Job: a book of the *Bible.
Joel: a book of the *Bible.
Jonah: a book of the *Bible.
Judges: a book of the *Bible.
Kalah Rabati (“The Bride”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Keritot: (“[Sins punishable by] Excision”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Keter Shem Tov (“The Crown of a Good Name” [Avot 4:13]): Rabbi Aharon
of Opt. Collection of Chassidic teachings of Rabbi Yisrael Ba’al Shem Tov
(1698-1760). Zolkova, 1794. Cited according to the Kehot (NY, 1972) edition.
Ketubot (“Marriage Contracts”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Kidushin (“Betrothals”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Kimchi, Rabbi David: see Commentary on the Bible.
Kings: a book of the *Bible.
Kohelet Rabbah: the Midrash to the book of Ecclesiastes.
Kuzari (“The Khazar”): Rabbi Yehudah HaLevi (c. 1075-1141). Philosophy.
Lamentations: a book of the *Bible.
Leviticus: a book of the *Bible.
 Likutei Diburim (“Collected Sayings”): Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak of Lubavitch
(1880-1950). Chassidic teachings and lore. Poland, 1933 on.
Likutei Sichot (“Collected Addresses”): Rabbi Menachem Mendel
Schneersohn of Lubavitch (the Lubavitcher Rebbe). Thirty-nine volumes
published to date. New York: Kehot, 1962 on.
Likutei Torah (“Collected [Teachings on the] Torah”): Rabbi Shneur Zalman
of Liadi (1745-1812). Chassidic discourses. Continuation of *Torah Or,
published with glosses of Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Lubavitch (1789-1866).
Zhitomer, 1848.
Liturgy: The standard liturgy used today was originally compiled by the Men
of the Great Assembly, the Sanhedrin that functioned roughly from the period
after the rebuilding of the first Temple (353 BCE) to the beginning of the period
of Alexander the Great (313 BCE). Although additions and variations have been
added to this basic core throughout the historical dispersion of the Jewish
people, resulting in several versions (or nuscha’ot) of the liturgy, the basic core
remains common to all versions. The text of the liturgy they instituted was fixed
according to Divine inspiration (the Great Assembly included a number of
prophets) and is thus inviolate and almost as infinite in depth as the Torah itself.
Ma’aseh Torah (“Act of the Torah”): Talmudic work listing sayings of the
Talmudic sages according to the number of phenomena described.
Magen Avraham (“The Shield of Abraham” [liturgy]): Rabbi Avraham
Gumbiner (c. 1637-1683). Commentary on the *Shulchan Aruch. Dyhernfurth,
1692.
Magen Avot (“Shield of the Fathers”): Rabbi Shimon ben Tzemach Duran
(1361-1444). Commentary on *Avot.
Meor Einaim (“The Light of the Eyes” [Proverbs 15:30]): Rabbi Menachem
Nachum of Chernobyl (1730-1798). Chassidic teachings. Slavota, 1798.
Megaleh Amukot (“Revealing the Depths” [Job 12:22]): Rabbi Nathan Nata
Shapira (c. 1584-1633). Kabbalah.
Megilah (“The Scroll [of Esther]”): a tractate of the Talmud.
Micah: a book of the *Bible.
Midbar Kedeimot (“Desert of the East” [Deuteronomy 2:26]): Rabbi Chaim
Yosef David Azulai (1724-1806). Lemberg, 1864.
Midrash (“seeking”; pl. Midrashim): the second major body of the oral Torah
(after the *Talmud), consisting of halachic or homiletic material couched as
linguistic analyses of the Biblical text. An individual work of midrashic material
is also called a Midrash; a specific analysis is called a midrash.
The Midrash is a corpus of many works written over the span of several
centuries (roughly the second to the eighth CE), mostly in the Holy Land. The
chief collection of homiletic midrashic material is the Rabbah (“great”) series,
covering the five books of Moses and the five scrolls. Other important
collections are Midrash Tanchuma, Midrash Tehilim, Pesikta d’Rav Kahana,
Pirkei d’Rabbi Eliezer and Tana d’vei Eliahu. Several later collections contain
material that has reached us in its original form. These include Midrash HaGadol
and Yalkut Shimoni. There are many smaller, minor Midrashim, as well; some of
these are to be found in the collection *Otzar HaMidrashim. Halachic Midrashim
include the *Mechilta, the Sifra and the Sifrei.
Midrash HaGadol (“The Great Midrash”): 13th century compendium of
midrashic material, including material missing from older midrashic collections.
Midrash Mei HaShiloach. A *Midrash.
Midrash Shmuel: Rabbi Shmuel Uzida (1545-1604). Commentary on *Avot.
Midrash Tanchuma: a *Midrash on the Torah from the school of Rabbi
Tanchuma.
Midrash Tehilim: the Midrash on the book of Psalms.
Mishnah: see Talmud.
Mishneh Torah (“Repetition of the Torah” [Deuteronomy 17:18]): Rabbi
Moshe ben Maimon (Maimonides, 1135-1205). Codification of Jewish law.
Rome, before 1480.
Moreh Nevuchim (“A Guide for the Perplexed”): Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon
(Maimonides, 1135-1205). Philosophy. Rome, before 1480.
Nachmanides: see Commentary on the Bible.
Nahum: a book of the *Bible.
Nedarim (“Vows”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Netzach Yisrael (“The Eternity of Israel” [1 Samuel 15:29]): Rabbi Yehudah
Liva of Prague (1520-1609). Philosophy.
Nidah (“The Menstruant”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Nishmat Chaim (“The Soul of Life” [Genesis 2:7]): Rabbi Menasseh Ben
Israel (1604-1657). Philosophy.
Numbers: a book of the *Bible.
Otiot d’Rabbi Akiva (“The Letters [of the Hebrew Alphabet expounded] by
Rabbi Akiva”): a minor *midrash. Published, inter alia, in *Otzar HaMidrashim,
p. 408.
 Otzar Eden HaGanuz (“The Treasury of the Hidden Eden”): Rabbi Avraham
Abulafia (1240-1291). Kabbalah.
Pardes Rimonim (“The Pomegranate Orchard” [Song of Songs 4:13]): Rabbi
Moshe Cordevero (1522-1570). Summary of pre-Lurianic Kabbalah. Cracow,
1592.
Pele Yoetz (“Wondrous Advisor” [Isaiah 9:5]): Rabbi Eliezer Papo (1786-
1824). Ethics. Constantinople, 1825.
Pesachim (“Passover Offerings”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Pirkei Avot: see Avot.
Pri Etz Chaim (“The Fruit of the Tree of Life”): Rabbi Meir Popperos (1624-
1662). Exposition of the liturgy according to Lurianic Kabbalah. Koretz, 1785
Pri Tzadik (“The Fruit of the Righteous” [Proverbs 11:30]): Rabbi Tzadok
HaKohen Rabinowitz of Lublin (1823-1900). Chassidic thought.
Proverbs: a book of the *Bible.
Psalms: a book of the *Bible.
Rabbeinu Bachya: see Commentary on the Torah.
Rashi (Rabbi Shlomo Yitzchaki): see Commentary on the Bible.
Reishit Chochmah (“The Beginning of Wisdom” [Psalms 111:10]): Rabbi
Eliahu di Vidas (16th century). Ethics, based on Kabbalah. Venice, 1579.
Rosh HaShanah (“The New Year”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Samuel: a book of the *Bible.
Sanhedrin (“The Sanhedrin”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Sefer HaKaneh (“The Book of the Rod”): attr. Rabbi Nechuniah ben HaKaneh
(1st century). Kabbalistic exposition of the 613 commandments.
Sefer HaLikutim (“The Book of Collected Teachings”). Lurianic Kabbalah.
Jerusalem, 1913.
Sefer HaMa’amarim (“The Book of Discourses”): general name for books of
Chassidic discourses by Chabad rebbes. If followed by a year from 5643-5680,
refers to discourses by Rabbi Shalom Dovber of Lubavitch (1860-1920); if by a
year from 5680-5711 [or the word Kuntresim], to discourses by Rabbi Yosef
Yitzchak of Lubavitch (1880-1950); if by a year from 5711-5752 [or the word
Melukat], to discourses by Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Lubavitch (the
Lubavitcher Rebbe).
Sefer HaSichot (“The Book of Addresses”): general name for books of
addresses by Chabad rebbes. If followed by a year from 5680-5711, refers to
addresses by Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak of Lubavitch (1880-1950); if by a year from
5711-5752, to discourses by Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Lubavitch (the
Lubavitcher Rebbe).
Sefer HaYirah (“The Book of Fear [of God]”): Rabbi Yonah Gerondi (1210-
1263). Law and ethics.
Sefer Yetzirah (“The Book of Formation”): a fundamental text of Kabbalah,
containing teachings that date back to Abraham, redacted by Rabbi Akiva (2nd
century). Mantua, 1562. English translation by Aryeh Kaplan, York Beach,
Maine: Weiser, 1990.
Sha’ar HaYichud VehaEmunah (“The Gate of Unity and Faith”): Rabbi
Shneur Zalman of Liadi (1745-1812). Second part of the *Tanya.
Sha’ar Ruach HaKodesh (“The Gate of the Holy Spirit”): Rabbi Shmuel Vital
(?-1677). Lurianic Kabbalah Jerusalem, 1868.
Sha’ar Yissachar (“The Gate of Issachar” [Ezekiel 48:33]): Rabbi Chaim
Eleazar Shapiro of Munkatch (1871-1937). Chassidic teachings on the holidays.
Sha’arei Teshuvah (“Gates of Repentence”): Rabbi Yonah Girondi (1210-
1263). Ethics.
Shabbat (“The Shabbat”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Shekalim (“Shekels”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Shevilei Emunah (“Paths of Faith”): Rabbi Meir ben Yitzhak Aldabi (c. 1310-
after 1360) Amsterdam, 1627.
Shnei Luchot HaBrit (“The Two Tablets of the Covenant” [after Deuteronomy
9:11]): Rabbi Yeshayahu Horowitz (1560-1630). Kabbalah, halachah, ethics.
Amsterdam, 1648-9.
Shulchan Aruch (“The Set Table” [Ezekiel 23:41]): Rabbi Yosef Karo (1488-
1575). The Code of Jewish law. Cited by volume name (Orach Chaim, Even
HaEzer, Yoreh Deah, and Choshen Mishpat), chapter, and paragraph. Venice,
1564.
Siddur im Dach (“A Prayerbook with Chassidic Commentary”): Rabbi Dovber
of Lubavitch (1773-1827). Chassidic discourses on the prayerbook. Kapust,
1816.
Song of Songs: a book of the *Bible.
Sotah (“The Suspected Adulteress”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Sukah (“The Booth”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Ta’anit (“The Fast”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Talmud (“learning”): the written version of the greater part of the oral *Torah,
comprising mostly legal but also much homiletic and even some explicitly
mystical material.
The Talmud comprises the Mishnah (“repetition”) and the Gemara
(“completion”). The Mishnah is the basic compendium of the laws (each known
as a mishnah) comprising the oral Torah, redacted by Rabbi Yehudah the Prince
in the second century CE. The Mishnah was elaborated upon over the next few
centuries in the academies of the Holy Land and Babylonia; this material is the
Gemara.
There are thus two Talmuds: the one composed in the Holy Land, known as
the Talmud Yerushalmi (“The Jerusalem Talmud”), completed in the third
century, and the one composed in Babylonia, known as the Talmud Bavli (“The
Babylonian Talmud), completed in the sixth century.
The Mishnah—and ipso facto the Talmud—is divided into tractates.
References to the Mishnah are simply the name of the tractate followed by the
number of the chapter and individual mishnah. The Jerusalem Talmud was first
printed in Venice, 1523-24. Although subsequent editions have generally
followed the same pagination as this edition, it is nonetheless cited by chapter
and halachah (i.e., individual mishnah) number, as is the Mishnah. References to
it are therefore prefaced by “Y,” to distinguish them from references to the
Mishnah itself. The Babylonian Talmud was first printed in its entirety in Venice,
1520-23, and subsequent editions have followed the same pagination as this
edition, as well. References to the tractates of the Talmud Bavli are simply by
tractate name followed by page and column (“a” or “b”).
Tamid (“The Daily Offering”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Tanya (“It has been taught”): Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi (1745-1812).
Seminal work of Chabad Chassidut. Also known as Likutei Amarim (“Collected
Teachings”) and Sefer shel Beinonim (“The Book of the Intermediates”). Slavita,
1796. English translation (Rabbis Nissan Mindel, Nisen Mangel, Zalman Posner,
Jacob Immanuel Schochet): New York: Kehot, 1962-69.
Targum (“Translation”): the Aramaic translation of the Bible. The translation
of the Five Books of Moses is that of Onkelos (2nd century); that of the Prophets
is that of Yonatan ben Uziel (1st century). See Megilah 3a.
Teshuvot MiBa’alei HaTosefot MiKitvei Yad (“Responsa of the Tosafists from
Various Manuscripts) ed. Dr. Avraham Yitzchak Eigus. NY: Yeshiva University,
1954.
 Tikunei Zohar (“Rectifications of the Zohar”): Additions to the *Zohar.
Mantua, 1558; Constantinople, 1719, 1740. Cited according to section and page
number (according to the second Constantinople edition, which is followed by
most subsequent editions).
Torah (“teaching”): God’s will and wisdom as communicated to man. It pre-
existed creation, and God used the Torah as His blueprint in creating the world.
God certainly communicated the teachings of the Torah in some form to
Adam, who then transmitted them orally from generation to generation.
However, God “officially” gave the Torah to mankind c. 1313 BCE (and during
the ensuing 40 years) at Mt. Sinai through Moses. The Ten Commandments were
pronounced in the presence of the entire Jewish people.
God gave the Torah in two parts: the Written Torah and the Oral Torah. The
Written Torah originally consisted of the Five Books of Moses (the
“Pentateuch”), the other books being added later (see Bible). The Oral Torah was
communicated together with the Five Books of Moses as an explanation of the
laws and lore included in it. This material was later written down by the sages of
the oral Torah in the form of the *Talmud, the Midrash, and the Zohar. (All
references to “the Sages” in this book refer to the sages who transmitted the oral
Torah as recorded in these works.)
Torah Or (“Torah Light” [Proverbs 6:23]): Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi
(1745-1812). Chassidic discourses. Kapust, 1837. Cf. Likutei Torah.
Yalkut Shimoni (“The Shimon Collection”): Rabbi Shimon Ashkenazi (14th
century). Compendium of midrashic material, including material missing from
older midrashic collections. Salonika, 1521-1526.
Yevamot (“Levirite Marriage”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Yoma (“The Day [of Atonement]”): a tractate of the *Talmud.
Zechariah: a book of the *Bible.
Zephaniah: a book of the *Bible.
Zohar (“Brilliance”): Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai (2nd century). One of the basic
texts of the oral Torah and Kabbalah. The Zoharic literature includes the Zohar
proper, the Tikunei Zohar, and the *Zohar Chadash. The Zohar was printed in
1558 in both Mantua and Cremona, but standard pagination follows the Mantua
edition.
Zohar Chadash (“The New Zohar”): Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai (2nd century).
Additions to the *Zohar. Salonika, 1597.
2. Modern works
Adahan, Miraim. EMETT: A Step-by-Step Guide to Emotional Maturity
Established Through Torah. Jerusalem/ NY: Feldheim, 1987.
Afterman, Allen. Kabbalah and Consciousness. NY: The Sheep Meadow
Press, 1992.
Ap Dijksterhuis, Henk Aarts, and Pamela K. Smith, “The Power of the
Subliminal: On Subliminal Persuasion and Other Potential Applications,” in The
New Unconscious, ed. Ran R. Hassin, James S. Uleman, John A. Bargh. Oxford
University Press, 2005.
de Beauvoir, Simone. The Second Sex. Translated by H. M. Parshley. Penguin,
1949.
Drob, S. Kabbalistic visions: C. G. Jung & Jewish mysticism. New Orleans,
LA: Spring Journal, 2009.
Ginsburgh, Rabbi Yitzchak. The Hebrew Letters: Channels of Creative
Consciousness (published also as The Alef-Bet). Jerusalem: Gal Einai, 1991.
— The Mystery of Marriage: How to Find True Love and Happiness in
Married Life. Jerusalem: Gal Einai, 1999.
Haralick, Robert. The Inner Meaning of the Wisdom of the Hebrew Letters.
Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson, 1995.
Heschel, Abraham Joshua. God in Search of Man: A Philosophy of Judaism.
Harper & Row, 1955.
Hirsch, Rabbi Samson Raphael. Commentary on the Book of Psalms.
Translated by Gertrude Hirschler. Jerusalem/ NY: Feldheim, 1978.
Jacobson, Simon. Toward a Meaningful Life: The Wisdom of the Rebbe.
William Morrow, 1995.
Jeffcoate, Sir Thomas Norman Arthur. Principles of Gynaecology. London:
Butterworths, 4th edition, 1975.
Jones, Vendly M. Qumran Excavations, Cave of the Column Complex &
Environs. Arlington: Vendyl Jones Research Institutes, 1995.
Jung, C. G. Memories, dreams, reflections. In A. Jaffe (Ed.), New York, NY:
Vintage Books, 1989. (Original work published 1963).
Kaplan, Aryeh. Meditation and Kabbalah. York Beach, Maine: Samuel
Weiser, 1982.
— Meditation and the Bible. York Beach, Maine: Samuel Weiser, 1978.
— Rabbi Nachman’s Stories. Jerusalem: Breslov Research Institute, 1983.
Klaphotz, Rabbi Yaakov. HaMagid MiMezeritch. Bnei Brak, 1972.
 Laws, Sophie. Issues of Blood: The Politics of Menstruation. Macmillan,
1990.
Matt, Daniel C. God & the Big Bang: Discovering Harmony between Science
& Spirituality. Woodstock, Vermont: Jewish Lights Publishing, 1998.
McGuire, W. C. G. Jung speaking: Interviews and encounters. Princeton, NJ:
Princeton University Press, 1977.
Nadborny, Nechama Sara Gila. Israel and the Seventy Dimensions of the
World. Jerusalem: Ya’alat Chen, 2003.
— The Twelve Dimensions of Israel. Jerusalem: Ya’alat Chen, 1995.
Nørretranders, Tor. The User Illusion: Cutting Consciousness Down to Size.
Penguin Press Science, 1999.
Rose, Aubrey, ed. Judaism and Ecology. London: Cassel & Co., 1992.
Schatzman, Morton. Soul Murder: Persecution in the Family. London: Allen
Lane, 1973.
Simon, Paul. The Sound of Silence (lyrics). 1964.
Stein, Joseph. Fiddler on the Roof (musical comedy). 1964.
Steinsaltz, Rabbi Adin. The Long Shorter Way. Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson,
1977.
— The Thirteen-Petalled Rose. Basic Books, 1980.
Sutton, Rabbi Avraham. The Spiritual Significance of the Qetoret [Incense] in
Ancient Jewish Tradition. posted at
http://www.jewishmag.com/11mag/mystic/mystic.htm.
Vivekananda, Swami. The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda. Vendata
Press, 1947.
Yang, L., An, D., & Turner, J. Handbook of Chinese Mythology. ABC-CLIO,
2005.