Tag Archives: Light

Red Cow: Quantum Physics in the Torah

This week’s parasha, Chukat, begins with the laws of the Red Cow (or “Red Heifer”). The Torah describes in detail the Red Cow ritual, starting with the production of a special mixture which alone had the power to remove the greatest of impurities, the impurity of death. (Because we lack this mixture today, everyone is considered ritually impure at all times, and this is one reason why most Orthodox authorities discourage Jews from ascending the Temple Mount in Jerusalem.) First, the Torah requires finding a perfectly red calf. The Sages elaborate that even two non-red hairs invalidate a cow. The calf must also be entirely unblemished, and in perfect health. It must not have ever been used for any kind of labour. The simple act of putting a yoke on the cow—even if just for a moment—immediately disqualifies it.

Rabbis inspect a red cow in Israel (Courtesy: Temple Institute). Jewish tradition maintains there have only been nine red cows used in history. The tenth will come in the time of Mashiach.

Once such a cow is found, it is taken to the Temple and appropriately slaughtered. The High Priest takes some of its blood and sprinkles it towards the Holy of Holies (or the “Tent of Meeting”). The cow is then entirely consumed in flames, with the added ingredients of cedar wood, hyssop, and crimson wool. At this point, the High Priest has become impure himself, and must go to the mikveh. Another priest (who is pure) must gather the ashes to be used to make the purifying solution. This person, too, becomes impure. Finally, the third pure person who actually prepares the mixture and sprinkles it on the impure people also becomes impure in the process. Perplexingly, the act of purifying others instantly makes the purifier himself impure.

This strange Red Cow ritual puzzled the ancient Sages. They went so far as to say that even King Solomon—the wisest of all men—could not understand the Red Cow (Yoma 14a). The Sages base themselves on Solomon’s own words (Ecclesiastes 7:23): “All this have I tried by wisdom… but it was far from me.” Solomon had all the wisdom, yet there was one thing that was too “far” for him to grasp, and that was the Red Cow. (The Midrash, meanwhile, comments on Solomon’s words in Proverbs 30:18—“Three things are wondrous to me, and four I do not know”—to mean that Solomon didn’t know seven more things. The three things wondrous to him were the secrets of the Pesach offering, matzah, and maror; and the four he didn’t know were the mysteries of the four species of Sukkot. See Vayikra Rabbah 30:14)

The Sages conclude that the Red Cow has no human logic and is, as the Torah states, a chok, an incomprehensible divine law. In other words, no one understands the Red Cow.

The Nazis tried to ban Einstein’s theories and discoveries. They didn’t like quantum physics very much, and once branded it as a “Jewish science”.

Interestingly, there is a parallel phenomenon in the world of science. The past century and a half has seen the rise of a bewildering new field called quantum physics. Like the Red Cow ritual, many experiments in quantum physics yield results that are incomprehensible. They often contradict the foundational principles of classical physics, and are sometimes just plain bizarre. This may be why Albert Einstein once humorously described quantum physics as a “talmudical theory”. (And may be why Jews are so disproportionately represented in the field.) Niels Bohr, meanwhile, said something along the lines of “Those who are not profoundly shocked when they first come across quantum theory have not understood it.” And Richard Feynman concluded: “I think I can safely say that no one understands quantum mechanics.”

Quantum physics is to science what the Red Cow is to the Torah. In fact, a closer examination may reveal a very intimate connection between the two.

Entanglement

One of the central principles of quantum physics is entanglement. This refers to two particles that are intertwined, and appear to affect one another instantaneously even though they may be very far apart. For example, take the case of two entanglement particles, one with a clockwise spin, and the other with a counter-clockwise spin. If the clockwise particle is forced to spin the other way, the counter-clockwise particle immediately changes its spin as well. This is true even over vast distances, and the effect is immediate, suggesting faster-than-light communication. Einstein famously called this strange phenomenon “spooky action at a distance”.

Entanglement has the potential for many practical applications, and scientists are even working on an un-hackable “quantum internet”. Meanwhile, Stuart Hameroff and Roger Penrose have built an entire biological theory around entanglement, which provides a scientific explanation for the soul, the afterlife, and reincarnation.

Of course, from a Jewish mystical perspective, all souls are intertwined and “entangled”. Entanglement may even explain the strange nature of the Red Cow. Recall that when the pure person sprinkles the mixture upon the impure person, he instantly becomes impure himself while the impure person becomes pure. This is precisely like a counter-clockwise particle instantly switching its spin to clockwise when its fellow entangled particle is made to go from clockwise to counter-clockwise.

Uncertainty Principle

Another foundation of quantum physics is Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle. In short, this means that when measuring any given particle, we can either determine its position, or its speed, but not both. If we measure its position, then technically at that split instant the particle isn’t really in motion, so we cannot determine its speed. If we measure its speed, than it can’t be standing still in any one position, so we cannot determine exactly where it is. (The principle can be explained with a classic physics joke: a police officer pulls over a speeding particle and asks: “Do you have any idea how fast you were going?” The particle replies: “No sir, but I know where I am.”)

Rav Yitzchak Ginsburgh beautifully points out that the Torah actually speaks of the Uncertainty Principle. We read in Job 28 of the difference between man’s limited wisdom and God’s omniscience. We are then told that “God understands her path, and He knows her place.” (Job 28:23) Unlike man, who is incapable of grasping such things, God alone knows both the “path” (momentum) and “place” (location) of a particle! Rav Ginsburgh summarizes:

Now, what is the verse saying? Actually, it is saying exactly what Einstein said when he heard that the uncertainty principle was somehow inherent in nature: “God does not play dice with the universe.” It did not sit well with him that God cannot see beyond the uncertainty principle. Little did Einstein know that he had a verse in the Bible to support his intuition that God does know… (Lectures on Torah and Modern Physics, pg. 90)

Wave-Particle Duality

Perhaps the most well-known principle in quantum physics is that of wave-particle duality. This is the notion that every particle is also a wave. The discovery was a result of a much earlier debate (going back at least to the time of Newton) of whether light is a particle or wave. Over the decades, experiments would alternately show that light behaves as a particle, while others would show that light behaves as a wave. Eventually, it was found that photons (particles of light) behave in both ways, and the same is true for other particles, too.

Closely related to this is what is known as the “observer effect”, that the presence of a conscious “observer” actually affects whether a particle will behave as a particle or wave. In the famous double-slit experiment, whenever scientists “watch” a particle it always passes through one slit and leaves a single mark on the screen behind as expected. Yet, whenever they remove the measuring devices and shoot particles without any observation, the particle seemingly goes through both slits simultaneously, and produces a wave-like pattern on the screen!

Notions like this led Max Planck, often called the “father of quantum physics”, to conclude:

As a man who has devoted his whole life to the most clear-headed science, to the study of matter, I can tell you as a result of my research about atoms this much: There is no matter as such. All matter originates and exists only by virtue of a force which brings the particle of an atom to vibration and holds this most minute solar system of the atom together. We must assume behind this force the existence of a conscious and intelligent mind. This mind is the matrix of all matter.

Rav Ginsburgh once more shows how wave-particle duality is secretly embedded in the language of the Torah. The Torah’s word for a “wave” is gal (גל), while the Torah’s word for a tiny drop, or “particle”, is egel (אגל). The two share one root, meaning there is a profound connection between them. Rav Ginsburgh cites ancient commentaries (ibid, pg. 128-129) which explain how a multitude of tiny drops of dew blanketing a field combine to form the appearance of a wave. The Sages are speaking of an observer who seems to be looking at a wave but, upon closer examination, is seeing individual particles of dew. This is little more than a poetic way of describing the scientific “observer effect”, where close observation and measurement shows particles while lack of measurement shows waves.

String Theory in Kabbalah

For decades, physicists have been looking for a “theory of everything” that can elegantly explain all of the various phenomena in the universe. Currently, one very popular such theory is string theory, which holds that the universe boils down to a set of tiny vibrating strings. Differing vibrations would result in particles of different masses and charges, giving rise to the variety of forces and particles in the universe, including a particle that carries gravity (called a graviton). String theory is therefore a good “theory of everything” that can neatly unify all of physics.

Edward Witten is also Jewish, and the son of Louis Witten, another well-known physicist.

In reality, string theory is not one theory, and has multiple versions. In the past, there were five major, accepted models. Then, in 1995 Edward Witten was able to unify these models into one wholesome theory, called M-theory, sparking a “superstring revolution”. Since then, a great deal of work has been done to strengthen and support M-theory, which continues to be one of the leading models in modern physics.

Interestingly, M-theory suggests that the universe has a total of 11 dimensions. Three of these are the familiar dimensions of space (length, width, height). The fourth is the dimension of time, which is really inseparable from the three of space, and part of one continuum. In addition to these, there are seven more dimensions unperceivable to human senses:

Etz Chaim, “Tree of Life”, showing the upper sefirot (Keter/Da’at, Chokhmah, and Binah, known as the Mochin), and the seven lower sefirot.

Anyone who has dabbled in Kabbalah will immediately recognize that this conception of 11 dimensions perfectly parallels the “dimensions” of Kabbalah, ie. the Sefirot. In the arrangement of the sefirot, too, we have the three sefirot of the mochin, which are tied to a fourth (usually hidden) sefirah of Da’at, just like the three spatial dimensions are intertwined with time. Below the three mochin are the seven middot. Like the 11 dimensions of M-theory, the Kabbalistic “Tree of Life”—as made popular by the Arizal—is typically shown depicting 11 sefirot. (Yet, the Sages insist that there are ten sefirot, never eleven! It should be noted that in non-M-theory versions of string theory, there are indeed only 10 dimensions.) One who studies both M-theory and the Arizal’s teachings of the sefirot will quickly find tremendous overlap between them.

And one who has delved into the Kabbalah of the Arizal will know just how easy it is to get lost in descriptions of dimensions within dimensions, and universes superimposed upon universes; in souls entangled across vast distances, and across eons of time; and in lengthy formulas of yichudim, kavvanot, and tikkunim (“unifications”, “meditations”, and “rectifications”). In fact, studying the Arizal sometimes feels like studying quantum physics. Truly, the two go hand-in-hand, and are poised to bridge the gap between the realm of science and the realm of the spirit.

The Mystical Purpose of the Omer

“Bringing the Omer to the Kohen” by Ahuva Klein

In this week’s parasha, Emor, we read of the commandment to count the Omer. Each of the forty-nine days between the holidays of Pesach and Shavuot must be enumerated. In Temple times, this went along with a special “wave-offering” consisting of sheaves (omer in Hebrew) of barley. The Torah doesn’t clearly spell out why this must be done. However, a big clue is given from the conspicuous interplay between the words Emor (the name of the parasha) and Omer (the mitzvah commanded in this parasha).

The difference between Emor (אמר) and Omer (עמר) is just a single letter: an aleph replaced with an ayin. Our Sages point out that when two words differ in such a way, there is a special connection between them. The letter aleph is the first in the alphabet, with a value of one, representing the One God. (In fact, an aleph is composed of two yuds joined by a vav, the sum of which is 26, equal to God’s Ineffable Name, Yud-Hei-Vav-Hei). Each Hebrew letter is also a word with its own meaning. “Aleph” means “master” or “chief”, once more hinting to God being the Master of the Universe. Ayin, meanwhile, means “eye”. The eyes are the tools with which we see this physical world. Because of this, the eyes mislead us, distracting us from the truth that everything is truly One. Indeed, the Shema that we recite twice daily cautions not to follow “after your eyes”. The aleph therefore represents spirituality, while the ayin represents physicality.

The Ramak (Rabbi Moshe Cordovero, 1522-1570) suggests that Israel represents the unique, spiritual nation among the seventy root nations of the world that are trapped in physicality, the value of ayin being 70. Here (Pardes Rimonim 13:3), he gives the most famous example of the interplay between aleph and ayin: The Sages state that Adam and Eve were initially created as beings of light (אור). Only after consuming the Forbidden Fruit did their light disappear, replaced with fragile skin (עור). Other examples of such parallel terms described in mystical texts include “me” (אני) and “poor” (עני), “nothingness” (אין) and “eye” (עין), and the words in question: “emor” (אמר) and “omer” (עמר).

“Emor” means to speak. It is one of three major roots for “speaking” in Hebrew. The Zohar (I, 234b) explains that ledaber (לדבר) refers to simple, day-to-day speech; le’emor (לאמר) is to speak from the heart; and lehagid (להגיד) is to speak from the soul. For more practical examples, a simple, everyday Torah insight is called a dvar (דבר), while a long and in-depth discourse is a ma’amar (מאמר), and on Pesach we have a particularly special text that comes straight from the soul called the haggadah (הגדה). The form of speech we are interested in here is emor—speech of the heart.

What is the connection between this type of speech and the Omer?

32 Paths of Wisdom

Sefer Yetzirah, perhaps the oldest Jewish mystical text, explains how God brought about the universe. It begins by stating that God created through 32 Paths of Wisdom. These 32 paths are the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet and the 10 Sefirot (as explained here). Sefer Yetzirah tells us that the first letters God forged were aleph, mem, and shin, which brought about the three primordial elements: air (avir or ruach), water (mayim), and fire (esh). These central letters therefore stand at the three horizontal axes of the Kabbalistic “Tree of Life”. The Arizal elaborates (Sha’ar Ruach HaKodesh, drush 2) that God then brought about the substances of the first day of Creation: light, water, and space, ie. or (אור), mayim (מים), and rakia (רקיע). As we read in the Torah, these were the only things in existence at the end of Day One.

The three horizontal lines of the Tree of Life correspond to the paths of the letters Aleph, Mem, and Shin.

You may have already noticed that the initials of these three things make aleph-mem-reish (אמר), “emor”. Amazingly, it is exclusively this verb of speech that the Torah uses in describing God’s creation: v’yomer, God spoke (ויאמר), and everything came to be. It is this form of speech that contains within it the very power of Creation.

Even more amazingly, the Zohar we saw above states that this is speech from the heart. The heart is a special organ for, unlike any other organ, it literally intertwines with every single living cell in the human body, ensuring that the tiniest bodily component receives oxygen and nutrients. So, too, does God permeate the entire universe, and is intertwined with even the tiniest bit of matter, ensuring its continual existence. In Hebrew, “heart” is lev (לב), which has a value of 32, once more alluding to those 32 paths of Creation.

Better yet, the 32 paths correspond to the 32 times that God (Elohim) is mentioned in the account of Creation. It is only after the account of Creation ends, at the 33^rd instance, that the Torah introduces us to God’s Ineffable Name. So, too, during the Sefirat haOmer period, we have 32 days before we reach the climax of the whole Omer period, the 33^rd day, the holiday of Lag b’Omer. Of course, man is a microcosm of the universe, so it is only fitting that the human body has a spinal cord with 31 pairs of nerves emerging out of it, sitting beneath the all-important 33^rd component, the brain.

With this in mind, we can understand the connection between Emor and Omer.

Rectifying Speech

The Sefirat haOmer period is meant to be one of rectification and purification. Upon the Exodus, the Israelites spent these 49 days preparing to receive the Torah at Sinai. We relive this experience each year, and likewise work on ourselves in these seven weeks. When we count the Omer each night, we quote from the verse in this week’s parasha: “And you shall count for yourselves from the morrow after the day of rest, from the day that you brought the sheaf of the waving [omer hatenufah]; seven weeks shall there be complete; until the morrow after the seventh week shall you count fifty days…” (Leviticus 23:15-16) and then we add, in many versions of the prayer, “in order to purify the souls of Your people Israel from their impurity.” The very purpose of the Omer is personal development and purification. How do we purify ourselves?

The greatest sin that needs to be atoned for is improper speech. The Talmud (Yoma 44a) states that it was for this sin in particular that the Kohen Gadol entered the Holy of Holies just once a year, on Yom Kippur. Conversely, as we saw above, proper speech has the power to create worlds. Impure speech can be immensely destructive while pure speech can rectify anything. King Solomon similarly wrote that “death and life are in the hand of the tongue” (Proverbs 18:21). It is through the mouth that we speak, and the tongue is its primary organ. Beautifully, the mouth, too, contains 32 teeth to parallel the 32 paths of Creation, with the central 33^rd component being the tongue.

More than anything else, the purpose of the Omer (עמר) is to allow us to rectify our speech (אמר). The Torah itself hints to this in the verse above, calling the special offering of these 49 days the omer hatenufah, where the latter word can be split (תנו פה) to mean “give mouth”, or “teach the mouth”. Each of the seven weeks that the Torah prescribes correspond to one of the seven mystical middot of the Tree of Life. In the Omer period, we are meant to rectify these seven “lower” Sefirot (hinted in the term Sefirat HaOmer). We do not mention the three “higher” sefirot above. We can understand why this is so, for the Sages say the upper sefirot are the mochin of the mind, while the lower seven are the middot of the heart—and as we saw above, it is the speech of the heart that we are particularly focusing on. The final Sefirah is called Malkhut, “Kingdom”, which Patach Eliyahu (Tikkunei Zohar 17a) says is פה, the mouth. The very culmination of the Sefirat HaOmer period is the purification of speech.

The mochin above (in blue) and the middot below (in red).

Rabbi Akiva’s Students

The Sefirat HaOmer period overlaps with the tragic deaths of Rabbi Akiva’s 24,000 students. As is well-known, the students died because they lacked respect for one another. How exactly did they disrespect each other? Although we have discussed in the past that they were probably killed by the Romans during the Bar Kochva Revolt, the Talmud (Yevamot 62b) cryptically states that they died of a disease called croup. Elsewhere, the Talmud (Sotah 35a) suggests that croup is the standard Heavenly punishment for a person who commits slander. We may learn from this that Rabbi Akiva’s students spoke negatively about each other, and thus deserved their cruel death penalty.

Rabbi Akiva’s students ceased to die on the 33^rd of the Omer, as if God was hinting at their misuse of the tremendous powers of speech. One of Rabbi Akiva’s surviving students, Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, himself had to hide from the Romans for 13 years because he spoke negatively about the authorities. It was he who ultimately fixed the 33^rd of the Omer as a holiday. Although this was the day of his death, it was also the day he revealed the depths of Kabbalah, and the teachings that would eventually be compiled into the Zohar. Lag b’Omer is a celebration of this mystical wisdom, much of which is focused on the powers of divine speech.

To bring it all together, we find that the term “lag” (לג) actually appears in the Torah. It is found only in one passage, Leviticus 14, where it refers to a measure of oil, log hashamen. This was a special oil used in the purification procedure for a metzora, loosely translated as a “leper”. The Sages teach that a person would be afflicted with this illness if they spoke negatively about another, motzi shem ra, hence the term “metzora”. Like the Omer, the log hashamen was also a “wave-offering”, a tenufah. Afterwards, the oil was sprinkled and poured upon the leper in order to purify them. If “log” (לג) hints to the oil used to purify improper speech, and Omer (עומר) is the inverse of emor, itself alluding to impure speech, then Lag b’Omer (לג בעומר) takes on an entirely new meaning.

Chag sameach!

How to Receive God’s Blessing

This week’s parasha is Re’eh, which begins by stating:

Behold, I set before you today a blessing and a curse. The blessing, if you will heed the commandments of Hashem your God, which I command you today; and the curse, if you will not heed the commandments of Hashem your God…

God promises that a person who fulfils His mitzvot will be blessed, and one who does not will be cursed. The phrasing is interesting: we might assume it would be clearer to say a person who fulfills God’s mitzvot would be blessed, and one who sins or transgresses the mitzvot will be cursed. Instead, the Torah connects the observance of mitzvot with receiving blessing. What, exactly, is a blessing? And what does it have to do with a mitzvah?

Heaven Down to Earth

The Hebrew word for blessing, brakhah (ברכה), shares a root with two similar words. The first is brekhah (spelled the same way), which means a “pool” or source of water. The second is berekh (ברך), which means a “knee”. What do these seemingly unrelated things have to do with blessing?

Our Sages teach that a blessing is a source of abundance, like a well from which water can be drawn continuously, hence its relation to brekhah. Each blessing in Judaism begins with the words Barukh Atah Adonai, meaning not that we are blessing God (which is impossible), but that we recognize God is the infinite source of all blessing and abundance. The name of God used here is the Tetragrammaton, denoting God’s eternity and infinity, alluded to by the fact that the Name is essentially a conjunction of the verb “to be” in past (היה), present (הווה), and future (יהיה) tenses.

The blessing continues with the words Eloheinu Melekh haOlam. Now, the name of God switches to Elohim, referring to His powers as manifest in this world. Thus, he is described as Melekh haOlam, the “king of the universe”. That same ungraspable, ineffable God permeates every inch of the universe He created, controlling and sustaining the tiniest of details. And so, when we recite a blessing, we are stating that God is the ultimate source of all things, transforming the infinite into the finite, and showering us with constant abundance.

This is where the second related root of berakhah comes in—the knee. Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan explains that the purpose of the knee is to allow a person to bend down or descend. Thus, when one recites a blessing, they are causing God to “descend” into this world, so to speak, and bless us. When we are blessing, what we are really doing is receiving a blessing. This is alluded to by the very root letters of the word for blessing, beit (ב), reish (ר), and khaf (כ), whose corresponding numerical values are 2, 200, and 20, respectively. These doublets represents the two-way nature of a blessing.

Plugging in to the Source

Our holy texts affirm that God is constantly showering us with blessings. Yet, oftentimes it may seem like our lives are devoid of blessing. What’s going on? Imagine walking out into a torrential rain and trying to catch the water with your bare hands. No matter how much water is pouring over you, it is unlikely that you will succeed. Now imagine doing the same thing with a bucket in each hand.

The same is true for blessings. One needs the appropriate vessel to receive the abundance. In this case, the vessel is the person. To receive holy blessings, the vessel must be made holy. This is accomplished through the performance of mitzvot, which are designed to rectify and sanctify the person.

On a deeper level, the purpose of the mitzvot is to bind a Jew directly to God. In fact, it is taught that the root of mitzvah actually means “to bind”. God is the Infinite Source of all things, and if one wants to receive from the Infinite, they must only tap into It and form the right connection. Once such a connection is made, there is no end to how much blessing can be obtained.

This is why the parasha begins by telling us that a person who fulfils the mitzvot will be blessed, while a person who does not fulfil them will be “cursed”, devoid of all blessing. It is also why Jews going to receive a berakhah from a great tzaddik are often given a blessing only on the condition that they take upon themselves some kind of mitzvah. The same is true in prayer, during which it is customary to give tzedakah, tying our requests with the fulfilment of an important mitzvah.

Every mitzvah that is done opens up another channel of Heavenly Light, and each time it is repeated that channel is widened and reinforced. In fact, our Sages speak of precisely 620 channels of light shining down into this world, corresponding to the 613 mitzvot of the Torah, and the additional 7 mitzvot instituted by the rabbis (or the additional 7 Noahide laws).

As we enter the month of Elul and begin a forty day period of heightened repentance and prayer, we should be thinking about which mitzvahs we can take on, which we might improve upon, and how we can further sanctify ourselves in order to become the purest possible vessel of divinity. We mustn’t forget that the blessing is always shining down upon us; we must only be prepared to receive it.

Sukkot: Uniting Heaven and Earth

This week we celebrate the festival of Sukkot. This holiday is possibly the least-observed among Jews in modern times. After the “high holidays” of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, many go back to their regular routines and completely forget about Sukkot. In reality, Sukkot is considered a “high holiday”, too, and is inseparable from Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. Most people are aware that one is judged and written into the Heavenly Books on Rosh Hashanah, and that the books are sealed on Yom Kippur, but few know that the books are reopened on Hoshana Rabbah, the last day of Sukkot (before the semi-independent holiday of Shemini Atzeret which immediately follows Sukkot).

The Arizal describes the great importance of Hoshana Rabbah, and the need to stay up all night learning Torah, and saying selichot after midnight. Some also blow the shofar on this day. Hoshana Rabbah literally means “the great salvation”, and many prayers associated with this day beseech God to finally send us Mashiach and bring about the last redemption. It is well known that if all of Israel repented properly and wholeheartedly, Mashiach would come immediately. This was what Mashiach himself told Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi:

Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi met Elijah [the Prophet] by the entrance of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai’s tomb… and asked him:
“When will the Messiah come?”
[Elijah responded:] “Go and ask him yourself.”
“Where is he?”
“At the entrance [of Rome].”
“And how will I recognize him?”
“He is sitting among the poor lepers…”
… So he went to him and greeted him, saying, “Peace be upon you, Master and Teacher.” [Mashiach] replied: “Peace be upon you, O son of Levi,”
“When will you come Master?” he asked.
“Today!” was his answer.
On his returning to Elijah, the latter enquired, “What did he say to you?”
“Peace be upon you, O son of Levi,” he answered.
Thereupon [Elijah] observed, “He thereby assured you and your father of [a portion in] the World to Come!’
“He spoke falsely to me,” he replied, “stating that he would come today, but has not.”
[Elijah] answered him, “This is what he said to you: Today, if you will but hearken to his voice…” (Psalms 95:7)

Rabbi Yehoshua was excited when Mashiach assured him he would come on that very day. When the day passed, the rabbi was heartbroken, and thought Mashiach had lied to him. However, when later meeting Elijah again, the prophet told him that Mashiach was only quoting Psalms, that the redemption would come today if the Jewish people merited it. The fact that Mashiach has yet to come means the people are not yet worthy.

As such, each Yom Kippur that passes without Mashiach’s immediate arrival means that Israel has not repented completely. In fact, the final long blow of the shofar at the conclusion of Yom Kippur is likened to the shofar blow that will be heard when Mashiach arrives. We hope that God has fully accepted our prayers, and that this final shofar blow is the one to bring the redemption. If Yom Kippur passes without the redemption, we have one more chance on Hoshana Rabbah, when the Heavenly Books are reopened one last time. We show our devotion by staying up all night learning Torah, and we say selichot just once more in the hopes that it might tip the scales in our favour. We blow the shofar for the very last time, too, in one final attempt at bringing Heaven down to Earth. This union of Heaven and Earth is precisely what Mashiach’s coming – and the holiday of Sukkot – is all about.

David’s Fallen Sukkah

When God created this world, He intended for the spiritual and material realms to coexist, and for human beings to inhabit both dimensions simultaneously. This perfect state of reality was embodied by the Garden of Eden, where Adam and Eve were “bodies of light” and God’s presence was openly experienced. But Adam and Eve’s actions caused their bodies of light, ‘or (אור), to turn to skin, ‘or (עור) – two words that sounds exactly the same in Hebrew, and written the same save for one letter. Man was banished from the Garden and descended into a world where spirituality is concealed, and God’s presence is not so easy to recognize.

Mashiach’s coming is meant to re-bridge the gap between Heaven and Earth, restoring the world to a state of Eden. This is what we are meant to experience on Sukkot, when we leave the material confines of our homes and spend our time in simple outdoor huts, surrounded by God’s “clouds of glory”. The sukkah is a place to experience Heaven on Earth.

The Kabbalists tell us that this is the inner meaning of sukkah (סוכה), the numerical value of which is 91. This special number is the sum of God’s name (יהוה), the value of which is 26, and the way we pronounce the name, Adonai (אדני), the value of which is 65. In Heaven, where Godliness is openly revealed, God is known by His Ineffable Name (יהוה). On Earth, where Godliness is concealed, the Tetragrammaton cannot be pronounced, and we say “Adonai” (אדני) instead. The fusion of God’s heavenly title (26), and His earthly title (65) makes 91, the value of sukkah, for it is in the sukkah that we can experience the fusion of Heaven and Earth.

[Incidentally, 91 is also the numerical value of malakh (מלאך), “angel”, for what is an angel but an intermediary between Heaven and Earth, a being that can freely migrate between these two dimensions?]

Sukkot is therefore a brief taste of a forthcoming world ushered in by Mashiach; a hint of the Garden of Eden that will be re-established by the Son of David. This is the deeper meaning of the final prophetic verses of Amos:

On that day, I will raise up the sukkah of David that is fallen, and close up its breaches, and I will raise up his ruins, and I will build it as in the days of old… And I will turn the captivity of My people Israel, and they shall build the waste cities, and inhabit them; and they shall plant vineyards, and drink their wine; they shall also make gardens, and eat their fruit. And I will plant them upon their land, and they shall no more be plucked out of their land which I have given them, says Hashem, your God.

Chag sameach!

Sukkot decoration featuring the “Sukkah of Leviathan”. Midrashic literature suggests that Mashiach will slay the great mythical dragon Leviathan and build a sukkah from its skin. The righteous will then be invited to partake in the “Feast of Leviathan” together with Mashiach. (Malkhut Vaxberger, www.mwaxb.co.il)

Chanukah: Did the Jews Really Defeat the Greeks?

“No two cities have counted more with mankind than Athens and Jerusalem. Their messages in religion, philosophy and art have been the main guiding light in modern faith and culture. Personally, I have always been on the side of both…”

– Winston Churchill

Chanukah is perhaps the most famous of Jewish holidays. The nine-branched candelabrum, the chanukiah, is instantly recognized by people around the world. One reason for this is because of the halakhah of pirsumei nissah, literally “publicising the miracle”. Although just about every Jewish holiday revolves around some kind of miracle, it is particularly with regards to Chanukah that there is a special mitzvah to publicize its wonder. And so, one can find a glowing, public chanukiah on display in pretty much every major city on the planet.

The purpose of the chanukiah is well-known: after defeating the Greeks and recapturing Jerusalem, and its Holy Temple, the Jewish warriors led by the Maccabees discovered only one cruse of oil for the Temple menorah (this one with seven branches, as the Torah commands). Although the oil was meant to last only for one day, it miraculously burned for eight, the amount of time necessary to produce a fresh batch of olive oil.

Temple Menorah Replica by Jerusalem’s Temple Institute

This is the story as recounted in the Talmud. However, the more ancient Book of Maccabees (which is part of the apocrypha, scriptural texts that did not make it into the official Biblical canon) provides a different reason for the eight-day festival. Here, we are told that since the Temple was still in the hands of the Greeks two months earlier, the Jewish nation was unable to celebrate the Torah festival of Sukkot. Of all the Torah-mandated holidays, Sukkot is most associated with the Temple, and was celebrated with many offerings on the altar, along with water libations, and eight days of revelry. Since the people were unable to commemorate Sukkot properly in the month of Tishrei, they decided to commemorate it in the month of Kislev instead, now that the Temple was back in Jewish hands. So, they kept an eight-day festival, with offerings, libations, and revelry, both in honour of the belated Sukkot, and to celebrate their victory over the Greeks.

A David and Goliath Story

Chanukah is a beautiful underdog narrative. The mighty Syrian-Greeks (better known as the Seleucids, to differentiate them from the mainland Greeks in Europe) are imposing their Hellenism upon the conquered and impoverished Jewish people, still struggling to rebuild after the decimation of the First Temple period. The Greek king, Antiochus, demands the sacrifice of a pig upon a Jewish altar, and the Jews refuse. Well, at least some of them do.

Bust of Antiochus IV Epiphanes, of Chanukah fame, at the Altes Museum in Berlin (Credit: Jniemenmaa)

At the time, there were many Hellenized, assimilated Jews among the masses that were very much okay with a pig on the altar. (It seems that history repeats itself: the first graduation ceremony in 1883 of Hebrew Union College, a Reform seminary, consisted of frog legs, crabs, and shrimp, among other non-kosher foods, earning it the nickname, “the treif banquet”.) Matityahu the High Priest wouldn’t have any of it, and together with his five sons—soon to be known as the “Maccabees”—started a revolution.

More than anything else, this was a civil war between traditional Jews and the Hellenized ones. Of course, the Hellenized Jews had support from the Greek government, which soon brought in some 60,000 troops, together with war elephants, according to the Book of I Maccabees (4:28-29). The Maccabee forces managed to scramble 10,000 mostly-untrained, guerrilla warriors. Ultimately, the 10,000 overpower the professional Greek army. The Seleucid Empire would never be the same again, and less than a century later, would totally come to an end.

Spiritual vs. Physical

Today, the Chanukah story often carries the same message: the Greeks were materialistic, promiscuous, Godless people, while the Jews were moral, spiritual, and God-fearing. Chanukah, then, celebrates the triumph of righteousness over licentiousness, religion over secularism, spirituality over physicality.

While the above description of the Seleucid-Syrian-Greeks may be true, it presents a false image of the Greeks as a whole, and one that isn’t at all consistent with traditional Jewish holy texts, especially the Talmud. In truth, the great Jewish sages of the Talmud valued and respected the Greeks. They stated (Megillah 8b) that it is forbidden to translate the Torah into any language, except Greek, which the rabbis considered a rich and beautiful tongue. The rabbis also adopted the Greek style of democratic government, with elected officials sitting on the Sanhedrin, from the Greek root synedrion, meaning “sitting together”.

One of the earliest known synedrions was established by Alexander the Great, made up of representatives from across his vast empire to assist him in government. The Talmudic sages spoke highly of Alexander the Great. According to legend, Alexander saw a vision of the Jewish High Priest before coming to conquer Jerusalem. There are several versions of this story, but all agree that Alexander was grateful to the High Priest, and spared Israel from his destructive conquests (as well as from paying tribute, according to some sources). In turn, the rabbis adopted “Alexander” as an honorary Jewish name. Indeed, one of the sages of the Talmud is Rabbi Alexandri, and many other rabbis have Greek names, such as Hyrcanus, Teradion, Antigonus, Dosa, Papa, Symmachus, and Tarfon.

These rabbis gathered in various learning academies across Israel and Persia (producing the Jerusalem and Babylonian Talmuds, respectively). Their academies were very similar to the Greek academy. In fact, the successors of a Greek academy spoke very much like the rabbis of the Talmud, quoting teachings from previous generations and debating them, while citing an uninterrupted chain of tradition all the way back to Plato, much the same way that rabbis cite an uninterrupted tradition back to Moses. Many of their modes of reasoning and dialectics were the same, too, even lesser-used forms such as gematria, another Greek word adopted by Judaism. The Greeks had also used their alphabet for numerology (an art that they called isopsephy).

Greek traditions appear to have even found their way into Jewish holidays. In ancient Greece, families would get together for symposia, parties in which they would recount the history of Greece and its great victories. According to the Greek philosophers, it was best to drink three cups of wine at a symposium, while drinking five cups was considered excessive and inappropriate. Thus, most people drank four cups. They would lie on couches, specifically on their left side. Recounting history while drinking four cups of wine and lying on one’s left—sound familiar? Let’s not forget that afikoman is itself a Greek word (epikomon, literally “that which comes after” or “that which comes last”, referring to either dessert or the concluding festive songs).

While the ancient Greeks certainly held onto a number of abhorrent beliefs and practices, to suggest that all the Greeks were atheistic, unjust, or not spiritual is certainly untrue. Socrates was killed for criticizing Athenian injustice, Plato preached how illusory this physical world is, and Aristotle described metaphysics and theology as the “first philosophy” and most important of subjects. One of the earliest known preachers of reincarnation was Pythagoras, who also wrote of three souls, much like the Jewish conception of nefesh, ruach, and neshamah. Nor is it a secret that some of the angels mentioned in the Talmud bear Greek titles, among them Sandalfon and Metatron.

So, did the Jews really defeat the Greeks? We certainly defeated the immoral and oppressive Seleucid Greeks in battle, but definitely not the Greek spirit as a whole. In fact, some might argue that Judaism is the best preservation of ancient Greek culture in the modern world! Whereas the rest of society has moved on to other methods of education, we still have a yeshiva system like the ancient Academy. While others celebrate their holidays with gifts and formal dinners, we gather in symposia, reliving the words of our sages, who openly bore their Greek names. And of course, while most of society is primarily concerned with what’s happening on television, we’re still trying to be philosophers, debating the finest points of reality.

The Greeks had a profound impact on all of civilization, and Judaism was not immune from it. Perhaps this is why, over time, the holiday became less about defeating Greeks and more about the miracle of light. Chanukah is a holiday celebrating Jewish resilience, and symbolizing the power of light over darkness, and hope over despair. It is a lesson in resisting assimilation and being true to ourselves; in standing up for what’s right and upholding our customs; and most importantly, in the longest, blackest nights of winter, Chanukah teaches us that although the world may be full of evil, one tiny flame can break through all the darkness.