Tag Archives: Ben Azzai

The Four Who Ascended to Heaven (Video)

What really happened with the four ancient Jewish Sages who ascended to ‘Pardes’, the Heavenly realms? Find out in this class where we also explore the difference between “physical” and “spiritual” worlds, the “upper waters” and “lowers waters” of Creation, and the proper approach to the study of mysticism and Kabbalah.

For the related class on ‘chashmal’ and electricity that was mentioned, see here.

Video of the Stuttgart water study here.

For a deeper analysis and exploration of the Heavenly waters and how they tie into Jewish rituals, see ‘Secrets of the Last Waters’.

That Purim When Rava “Killed” Rabbi Zeira

‘Two ancient Jewish sages studying and ascending to Heaven’ an image generated for me (in just seconds!) by Midjourney AI (Artificial Intelligence) software.

The Talmud famously quotes the sage Rava as teaching that one should imbibe wine on Purim ad d’lo yada, until one does not know the difference between “cursed is Haman and blessed is Mordechai” (Megillah 7b). This is a bizarre statement, because a Jew is never supposed to be so heavily under the influence. Indeed, the Talmud continues right after to tell a story of how one Purim, that same sage Rava got so drunk that he seemingly “killed” Rabbi Zeira! All was well though because, great sage that he was, Rava resurrected Rabbi Zeira back to life. The short passage ends by saying that the following year, Rava invited Rabbi Zeira to another Purim feast, and Rabbi Zeira politely declined, saying “miracles don’t happen all the time!” Nothing more is said, leaving the reader scratching his head. What really happened between Rava and Rabbi Zeira?

The simplest reading suggests that the Talmud is trying to disqualify Rava’s opinion. It was Rava who suggested that one should get really drunk, so the Talmud right after describes how Rava himself got so drunk that he ended up murdering someone. Lesson: don’t get drunk on Purim! More ironic still, it was Rava who taught, elsewhere, that one shouldn’t even look at wine, since consuming wine could lead to bloodshed! (Sanhedrin 70a) It is most likely that he only taught this after that infamous Purim incident, when he learned his lesson.

The simple solution above works, but doesn’t answer the big mysteries: why did Rava phrase his teaching that one should not know the difference between Haman and Mordechai? To not be able to differentiate at all between good and evil seems almost impossible, even when totally under the influence. Second, how could a tremendously righteous and wise rabbi like Rava kill another person? This, too, seems impossible, even if he was completely drunk. Finally, if Rava had the power to resurrect another person, why did Rabbi Zeira fear to celebrate Purim with him the following year? Surely Rava wouldn’t make the same mistake again, and even in the extremely unlikely event that he did, couldn’t Rava just revive him once more anyway? To solve these problems, we have to look deeper.

As discussed in the past (see ‘The Secret Behind Wearing Masks and Getting Drunk’ in Garments of Light, Volume Two), the real reason to drink wine on Purim is only to be able to understand Torah on a more profound level. One of the effects of alcohol is that it increases levels of (and/or acts like) the neurotransmitter GABA, an inhibitor which shuts things off in the brain. When one drinks a little bit, GABA starts to shut down processes in the outer cortex and prefrontal cortex of the brain. This includes things like motor function, decision-making, and analysis, which serves to remove various inhibitions and restraints one has, often making a person “softer”, more open and more loving, and able to see things as being more attractive. When applied to Torah, a little bit of wine can help a person notice things they never did before, or come to new realizations. Indeed, GABA is also associated with the formation of new neural connections. And, with their normal analytical mind suppressed, a person may be able to think differently than their usual modes of reasoning, opening up the possibility to chiddushim. (With too much alcohol though, GABA levels start to go up deeper and deeper into the brain, and if it gets all the way to the brain stem—which controls vital functions like breathing—it can become fatal.)

This explains why Rava would teach that drinking wine in moderation can make a person wise (Sanhedrin 70a). Our Sages similarly taught that nichnas yayin, yatza sod: when one drinks wine, “secrets come out” (Sanhedrin 38a). The traditional way to understand this statement is that a person who drinks alcohol is likely to run their mouth and reveal embarrassing secrets. On a deeper level, however, it means that a person who drinks a little bit of alcohol may be able to uncover some new Torah secrets. They may be able to see things on a more profound level. For instance, within the phrase nichnas yayin, yatza sod is a mathematical secret where the value of “wine” (יין) is 70, as is the value of “secret” (סוד). Seventy comes in and seventy comes out!

In the same way, when Rava taught that one should drink until they don’t know the difference between “cursed is Haman” (ארור המן) and “blessed is Mordechai” (ברוך מרדכי), he really meant to look beyond the surface and see that, in gematria, these two statements are exactly equal! (Both add up to 502.) Mordechai is the force of goodness that perfectly neutralized Haman’s evil. So, it’s not that Rava said a person should get smashed on Purim, he meant that a person should drink just enough to learn Torah better and uncover its secrets. With this in mind, we can understand what happened between Rava and Rabbi Zeira that fateful Purim.

Basic Gematria Chart

Ascending to Heaven

As we might expect, when two sages get together on Purim, they are not getting together simply to party. They surely used it as an opportunity to pursue a higher spiritual endeavour. Purim, like all holidays, is when spirituality is heightened and the Heavens are more accessible. What Rava sought to do, with Rabbi Zeira’s help, is nothing less than ascend to the upper worlds. There is a long tradition of a pair or group of sages getting together to accomplish such feats. Surely the most well-known is the story of the Four Who Entered Pardes:

The Sages taught: Four entered “the orchard” [pardes], and they are: Ben Azzai, and Ben Zoma, Acher, and Rabbi Akiva… Ben Azzai glimpsed and died, and with regard to him the verse states: “Precious in the eyes of the Lord is the death of His pious ones” [Psalms 116:15]. Ben Zoma glimpsed and was harmed, and with regard to him the verse states: “Have you found honey? Eat as much as is sufficient for you, lest you become full from it and vomit it” [Proverbs 25:16]. Acher “cut the saplings”. Rabbi Akiva came out safely. (Chagigah 14b)

Long before Rava and Rabbi Zeira, Rabbi Akiva led a group of four to ascend to the Heavenly “orchard”. Through various Kabbalistic means, the souls of the four wise men went up to the upper worlds, and the Talmud even describes some of the incredible things they saw. It was so shocking that Acher, previously known as Rabbi Elisha ben Avuya, “cut the saplings” and became a heretic. Ben Azzai’s soul never returned, while Ben Zoma went mad. Only Rabbi Akiva survived the experience and came out whole.

In his Ben Yehoyada, the Ben Ish Chai (Rabbi Yosef Chaim of Baghdad, 1835-1909) explains that this is precisely what happened to Rava and Rabbi Zeira! They were learning some really deep stuff and Rava was teaching Rabbi Zeira such great mystical secrets that his soul literally left his body and ascended heavenward. Rava was able to then draw Rabbi Zeira’s soul back down to this world and revive him. The Ben Ish Chai connects this to what happened at Mount Sinai, when the entire nation “died” and was “resurrected”, because God’s revelation was so intense. With this in mind, I believe we can properly understand why the Talmud uses a unique word in this passage:

Another version of ‘Two ancient Jewish sages learning Torah and ascending to Heaven’ generated by Midjourney AI

The standard Aramaic term for “killing” in the Talmud is katal (קטל). Yet here, the Talmud doesn’t use that word, but uses shecht (שחט) instead. This word is, of course, the one used in reference to the kosher slaughter of an animal, for meat consumption. So, what does it mean that Rava shechted Rabbi Zeira? We must remember that the purpose of shechitah is not to just kill the animal. Rather, shechitah is the mechanism through which the animal’s soul is able to return to Heaven. On a Kabbalistic level, it functions as a tikkun for the animal’s soul, allowing it to ascend upward. This is precisely what Rava did to Rabbi Zeira, by extracting the soul out of his body and elevating it to the upper worlds, giving him an “out-of-body” experience. I think this is the real reason the Talmud uses the term shecht!

To go back to our three starting questions: 1) Rava did not say one should be drunk out of their minds, rather he taught that one should drink a little wine in order to learn better and be able to unravel Torah secrets. 2) Rava never literally killed anyone, God forbid, but simply elevated the soul of Rabbi Zeira through the depth and breadth of his Torah teachings. 3) Rabbi Zeira did not wish to have another “out-of-body” experience with Rava the following year simply because he knew how perilous such a journey might be. After all, Ben Azzai’s soul was so happy up there that he never returned to Earth. So, it’s not so much that Rava wouldn’t be able to revive Rabbi Zeira again, but that Rabbi Zeira worried he might not wish to return!

It must be mentioned here that there is an alternate way to read the Talmud’s concluding words in this passage. Since the Talmud does not identify who the “he” is, some people read it to mean that it was Rabbi Zeira who asked for another Purim party with Rava—having had such an awesome experience the previous year—and it was Rava who declined, since he was not sure if he could revive Rabbi Zeira again! Whatever the case, we must remember that a Jew need not resort to chemical substances for spiritual elevation; Torah study itself can be far more potent.

Chag Sameach!

Mashiach and the Mysterious 13th Zodiac Sign

When Jacob blesses his children before his passing, he begins by telling his sons that he wishes to reveal to them what will happen b’acharit hayamim, “in the End of Days”. Yet, the text we read does not appear to say anything about the End of Days! The Talmud (Pesachim 56a) states that the Shekhinah withdrew from Jacob at that moment so he was unable to reveal those secrets. If that’s the case, how was he able to properly bless his children?

The Talmud states that when the Shekhinah left him, Jacob worried one of his children was unworthy to hear those secrets. His sons then recited the Shema in unison and said, “just as there is only One in your heart, so is there in our heart only One.” Jacob was comforted to know they are all indeed righteous, and it seems the Shekhinah returned to him at this point, allowing him to bless his children in holiness. Nonetheless, Jacob reasoned that to reveal the secret of the End in explicit fashion would be unwise, so he encoded these mysteries within the blessings he recited. In fact, Jacob not only encrypted what will happen in the End, but summarized the breadth of Jewish history (see ‘How Jacob Prophesied All of Jewish History’ in Volume One of Garments of Light).

One place where Jacob appears to make an explicit reference to the End is in blessing Dan, when he says, “I hope for Your salvation, Hashem” (Genesis 49:18). Jacob says Dan will be the one to judge his people—alluding to the great Judgement Day—and wage the final battles like a “snake upon the road… who bites the horse’s heel so that its rider falls backwards”. Jacob is speaking of Mashiach. Although Mashiach is a descendent of David and from the tribe of Judah, the Midrash states that this is only through his father, while through his mother’s lineage Mashiach hails from the tribe of Dan.

Why does Jacob compare Mashiach to a snake?

Snakes of Divination

In cultures around the world, there is a peculiar connection between snakes and prophecy. In ancient Greece, for example, the Oracle went into a prophetic trance when supposedly breathing in the fumes (or spirit) of the dead python upon which the Temple in Delphi was built. According to myth, this great python (a word which has a Hebrew equivalent in the Tanakh, פתן) was slain by Apollo. The Temple was built upon its carcass. For this reason, the Greek prophetess was known as Pythia.

Similarly, the Romans had their sacred hill on the Vatican (later adopted as the centre of Christianity). The second-century Latin author Aulus Gellius explained that the root of the word Vatican is vates, Latin for “prophet”. Others explain that vatican refers more specifically to a “divining serpent”. Meanwhile, on the other side of the world the Aztecs had Quetzalcoatl and the Mayans had Kukulkan, the “feathered serpent” god of wisdom and learning. And such mystical dragons appear just about everywhere else, from Scandinavia to China.

Incredibly, the Torah makes the same connection, where Joseph is described as a diviner who uses a special goblet to nachesh inachesh (Genesis 44:5). This term for divination is identical to nachash, “snake”. In Modern Hebrew, too, the term for guessing or predicting is lenachesh. Why is the snake associated with otherworldly wisdom and prophecy?

Primordial Serpent

Back in the Garden of Eden, it was the Nachash, “Serpent”, who encouraged Eve to consume of the Forbidden Fruit. This was the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge. The Serpent is the one who unlocked the minds of Adam and Eve to higher wisdom so that they could “be like God”. Jewish tradition maintains that Adam and Eve were eventually supposed to eat of the Tree of Knowledge (for otherwise why would God put it there to begin with?) but they simply rushed to do so when they were not yet ready. They transgressed God’s command, and knew not what to do with all of this tremendous information, resulting in the shameful descent of man into sin. The one who instigated it all was the Nachash.

It appears that ever since then, the snake has been a symbol of forbidden wisdom. Such divination and mysticism can be quite dangerous, and most are unable to either grasp or properly use this knowledge. The Talmud cautions as much in its famous story of the four sages who entered “Pardes” (Chagigah 14b). Pardes is an acronym for the depths of Jewish wisdom, from the simple (pshat) and sub-textual (remez) to the metaphorical (drash) and esoteric (sod). The result of entering the mystical dimensions was that Ben Azzai died, Ben Zoma detached from this world, and Elisha ben Avuya became a heretic. Only Rabbi Akiva was able to “enter in peace and depart in peace.” It is important to remember that Rabbi Akiva was the teacher of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, the originator of the Zohar. (Still, the Zohar, like most mystical texts, does not speak explicitly of esoteric matters, but cloaks them in layers of garments and complex language which only the most astute can unravel.)

Long before, Joseph was a master of this wisdom, surprising even the Pharaoh and his best mystics, who proclaimed: “Can there be such a man in whom the spirit of God rests?” (Genesis 41:38). Joseph, of course, is a prototype of Mashiach. The sages state that Mashiach is a great prophet and sage in his own right, but can he really surpass the unparalleled prophecy of Moses or the wisdom of Solomon? The Alter Rebbe (Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi, 1745-1812) solved the issue thus:

After the resurrection all will rise… the Patriarchs and Matriarchs, Moses and Aaron, all the righteous ones and the prophets, tens of thousands beyond number. Is it possible that Mashiach will teach them the same Torah that is revealed to us today? …Will all who knew the whole Torah be required to learn new laws from Mashiach? We must therefore say that Mashiach will instruct them in the “good of discernment and knowledge of the secrets of the esoteric teachings of Torah” that the “eyes will not have seen”—Moses and the Patriarchs not having been privileged to that knowledge, for only to Mashiach will it be revealed as it is written of him [Isaiah 52:13] “and he shall be very high.” (Likkutei Torah, Tzav)

Mashiach is the greatest of mystics, the holder of “forbidden” knowledge which will soon no longer be forbidden. The time will come when, as God originally intended, man will eat from the Tree of Knowledge and be “like God”. That first requires a return of mankind to the Garden of Eden, which is the very task of Mashiach. Beautifully, the gematria of Mashiach (משיח)—the one who brings us back into Eden—is 358, the same as Nachash (נחש)—the one who forced us out to begin with. And so, as Jacob foresaw, the snake symbolizes Mashiach himself.

While Mashiach is likened to a serpent, he must also defeat the Primordial Serpent which embodies all evil. Indeed, the Sages speak of two serpents (based on Isaiah 27:1): the “straight” serpent (nachash bariach) and the “twisted” serpent (nachash ‘akalaton). Mashiach is the straight serpent that devours the twisted one. This was all alluded to in Moses’ staff-turned-serpent consuming the Pharaoh’s staff-turned-serpent. In fact, another serpent staff, the nachash nechoshet, is later used by Moses to heal the nation. This healing staff found its way into Greek myth as well, where it was wielded by the healer god Asclepius, and eventually into the modern internationally-recognized medical symbol.

And that brings us back to the End of Days.

The 13th Zodiac

In recent years, there have been whispers of a necessity to change the current 12-sign horoscope to include a 13th zodiac sign. This was featured in the media on a number of occasions, with flashy headlines suggesting that some people’s astrological sign may now have changed. It is based on the fact that there is a “precession of the equinoxes”: Earth’s axis changes very slowly over time, meaning that the constellations which are visible in the night sky change, too.

The astrological signs are based on the 12 major constellations (out of 88 constellations total) that align with the sun and “rule” for about a month’s time every year (each making up 30º of the total 360º). The argument is that due to the precession of the equinoxes, a 13th sign has crept in which we can no longer ignore. The majority of astrologers have rejected this argument, mainly because astrology isn’t really based on the stars but fixed to the vernal equinox. While some in the East (namely Hindus) use “sidereal astrology”, which is based on shifting star positions, the system used in the West (“tropical astrology”) has 12 signs roughly corresponding to the 12 months.

The same is true in traditional Jewish thought, where each sign corresponds to a month on the Hebrew calendar, as well as to one of the twelve tribes of Israel. Having said that, including a 13th month for the Jewish system is not a problem at all. In fact, it is actually a solution, since the Jewish calendar has a 13th month in a leap year. The extra month has an astrological sign, too! Similarly, although we always speak of twelve tribes of Israel, there are really thirteen since, as we read in this week’s parasha, Jacob made Joseph count as two separate tribes: Ephraim and Menashe.

Whatever the case, whether the horoscope requires modification or not is irrelevant to Judaism, which denies any astrological effect on Israel (see ‘Should Jews Believe in Astrology’ in Volume One of Garments of Light). Besides, unlike astrologers, astronomers both ancient and modern have always been aware of this thirteenth constellation. To the ancient Babylonians it was the snake-like Nirah, while to the ancient Greeks it was known as Ophiuchus, the “serpent-bearer”. This constellation is in the shape of a man firmly grasping a twisted snake (the interlinked constellation Serpens). This is, of course, the very symbol of Mashiach, that serpentine saviour who defeats the primordial snake and all of its evil. After being an astrological footnote for a very long time, Ophiuchus has entered the spotlight, as if the cosmos itself is reminding us of Mashiach’s impending arrival.

The constellation Ophiuchus (or Serpentarius) grasping the constellation Serpens, from Alexander Jamieson’s Celestial Atlas of 1822. It is interesting to note that Mashiach must be a direct descendant of King David, whose own father Yishai (Jesse) was also called Nachash! (See Talmud, Shabbat 55b.)


The above is an excerpt from Garments of Light, Volume Two. Get the book here