haYom chamisha v’arba’im yom, sh’heim shisha shavuot u’sh’losha yomim, laOmer: tiferet she b’malchut

“when you pray, direct

your eyes toward the earth & your heart toward the heavens”

we learn this from Yevamot 105b, which goes on to explain that G’d’s Presence dwells everywhere, no less in the earthly realm than in the heavenly one. and this also reflects the position of tiferet in the sefirotic tree, for it is the central sefirah, the most interconnected one, receiving directly from every sefirah except malchut.

so it is eyes earthward for seeking out, perhaps, as the heart is not a hunter. though the Presence of G’d is everywhere, the hiddenness of G’d keeps the sense of exile alive. and the longing of the heart for reunification is a very important driver of tikkun olam. we repair the world for our own sake as well…..

tiferet in malchut is making harmony sovereign, giving compassion dominion over your life.

this year, in preparation for rosh chodesh sivan (which always corresponds with tiferet in malchut), the month of the giving of Torah, we had a broadly observable ring eclipse, in which the moon takes momentary primacy over the sun, creating a spectacular alignment light show in the heavens. but we also had interinclusion of the symbol of Shechinah/feminine/malchut in the moon in the symbol of haKodesh Baruch Hu/masculine/tiferet in the sun. even the temporary celelstial symbolism of this yichud (‘oneness’ or ‘unification’) gives us the beauty of tiferet all round.

“the earth is full of G’d’s glory”

time and space in harmony this year for our counting of the Omer. baruch haShem. and it is no accident that this statemen of glory comes in the line that is the essence of the kedushah prayer in our liturgy….all angels encircling the Divine Presence, each angel calling out to each other, with a bow casting eyes earthward, before lifting up eyes and all with “kadosh, kadosh, kadosh”. again and again and again.

tiferet in malchut….the realm of harmonious beauty all round.

mussar for tiferet she b’malchut

with another….bein adam l’chaveiro when we say the kedushah in prayer, all are equal, none of the differences of philosophy, approach, custom, even appearance that otherwise enter into everyday life matter a jot. all are as one, lifting on toes, uttering simply: “holy, holy, holy, G’d of hosts, full is the earth of Your Glory”. there are times when we accept each other without a thought. find more such.

with yourself….bein adam l’atzmo the moon is always lovely, the sun always brilliant….yet neither ever does a thing to beautify itself….it is simply there. do you comport yourself in a way that reflects harmony, balance and beauty? in a way that reflects the Divine Presence i nthe world as you walk in it? consider how you might be a better representative of the Way. start not with your clothing or your hair or your tie…start with doing justice and loving kindness…..the markers of blended tiferet…give them dominion in your realm.

kabbalah for tiferet she b’malchut

in assiyah….the world of doing/completion yesterday on the streets of chicago, while the NATO summit was going full on, protesters pushed and police shoved. balance was begun to be struck. by late in the day, reports of protesters accepting and police accepting compromise positions reached the world press. we even heard stories about the protesters and police joking together and sort of hanging out. if these strongly opposing sides can strike up even fleeting moments of harmony, what holds the rest of us back in our relationships with family, with friends, with neighbors…..with strangers? contemplate how you can remain open to harmony even in oppositional situations.

in yetzirah….the world of feeling/formation our emotions are key in being open to balance and harmony. most of us are not yet masters of equanimity, not yet calm regardless of the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune. meditate on how the love expressed in the Shechinah, the Divine Presence in malchut, can flow into the other emotions in your toolset. can you make compassion for all formative today?

in b’riyah….the world of thought/creation balance and harmony of spirit should extend not only to other humans, but to all of Creation. but working to retain/restore the environment, or to achieve world peace, or to stop needless war will take more than emotional change. it requires careful thought, examination and observation, planning and mobilization on a very large scale. this is an intellectual exercise as well. consider what specific steps you will next take to bring harmonious, compassionate, beautiful interactions to the larger world.

in atzilut….the world of nearness to G’d/intuition we recognise beauty in the celestial mechanics of the moon and sun. why? for the religious, such moments are of apprehension of the Divine Presence. meditate on how we can be of fully present of mind in such moments, not only to exist in them, but to remember the contextualizing blessings that are part of the response of our tradition. it is the blessing that brings the single moment into the following ordinary time.

kinyan 45 of 48 ways to acquire Torah

Lomed al M’nat Laasot….Learning in Order to Practice. the more we learn, the more we know. and to know, know, know G’d is to love, love, love G’d. among the most potent ways to know G’d is to study Torah tirelessly and to put into practice what we learn….that is, to live Torah is to love G’d….consider Psalm 50:

“You spoke….out of Zion, beauty’s perfection…You shone forth…arriving, breaking the silence. a fire before You with a cloud….calling

out of the heavens above and the earth below

for proving Your People….”

haYom tish’a u’sh’loshim yom, sh’heim chamisha shavuot v’arba’a yomim, laOmer: netzach she b’yesod

“soon as they came to baal-peor, they separated (devoted) themselves unto the shameful thing”

we find that the prophet Hoshea (9:10) recalls the incident at baal-peor, which is famous for the action of Pinchas, who–not content to allow a prince of Israel to consort with his idolatrous prostitute–took a spear and skewered the two of them in flagrante delicto…..joined as one flesh in the grave. for this zealousaction, Pinchas is granted a “covenant of shalom” directly from G’d, and is made high priest.

not the sweetness and light you expect from the Bible? well, it is only one instance of a theme that carries throughout Torah: devotion, service, dedication, and confirmation are double-edged. they can be great love of G’d as mesirut (devoted), nazar (set apart, consecrated), cherem (designated gift for G’d), and avodah (worship); or they can be evil in the same way: traitor, separated as in alien, designated for utter destruction, and slavery, respectively. just like the latin “devote”, ‘addiction’ is the dark side of religious ecstasy.

netzach in yesod is the sort of powerful dedication and spirit behind enduring effort that can build a Temple or be enslaving, obsessive and distancing from G’d. time and again in Torah and afterward in jewish history, what gets the People into a bad way is to become devoted to the wrong, to the conventional, to the surrounding culture…or these days to secular consumerism and shabbat-evacuating activities like, oh, school sports (yes, i said it). channeling netzach in yesod correctly is important.

we jews are supposed to be bound to G’d….just consider t’fillin…bound to arm, hand, and head….modeling even our relationship with G’d to the erotic cleaving love of Song of Songs…

“i am my beloved’s and he/she is mine”

holds between humankind and G’d as well as between bride and groom. and we mean it. we contract it. we acquire it. we bind and covenant it. it is all good, but one can easily see the other side, the dark side of this tight holding and utter devotion if a little confusion…and an idol or 2…get’s tossed into the mix.

jewish practice requires sustained effort, difficult endurance, diligence, determination. it is not enough to be strong (netzach), you must also make the strength abide, endure, be established on a sound footing of study, prayer, meditation and community engagement (yesod). because of our foundational strengths and bonds of the Promise, we have recently returned to the Land of the Promise to Avraham Avinu. this is the great example of netzach in yesod.

we are still like the early american pilgrims in that we are a People of Industry, of slow, steady growth, and devotion to what seem impractical ideals until we realize them. good marriages are like G’d and Israel….for better or for worse. and sometimes it takes a Pinchas action to rectify a situation…the effort of the work on the spirit trait of netzach in yesod is to be ready and able and willing to do tikkun olam…the rectification work of thousands of generations…..abiding as a matter of constitutional makeup. and too dang ornery to die off.

mussar for netzach she b’yesod

with another….bein adam l’chaveiro reuse, recycle, renew. the environmentally conscious credo. conservation work, sustainability work, tackling greenhouse gases…these are gigantic worldly opportunities to practice netzach in yesod. whether the first step is leaving the car in the garage and extra day each month, or taking the time to drop off used clothing/furniture/computer equipment for a charity or recycling business requires strength in practice for a long haul to achieve the good resulets we all hope for. engage!

with yourself….bein adam l’atzmo be more holy because G’d is holy. commit to a long-term religious discipline. commit to a sustained charitable volunteer gig. commit to stop longing for what you ought not have. foundational strength….

kabbalah for netzach she b’yesod

in assiyah….the world of doing/completion many of us spent many years in school to master professions that we now base our entire livelihood on. others have been long-term supporters of the State of Israel. but all of this requires that we have the firm base of healthy strength and energy with which to improve the world in our particular way. but maintaining health is itself a marathon. build up your health today, for the sake of your family, of yourself, of your community, of generation of the clan not yet born.

in yetzirah….the world of feeling/formation too many of us lead lives of quiet desperation. but finding the strength to call a spade a spade and speak out on oppression is difficult. choose an item needing stong, sustained, tight-bound effort and then walk the walk and talk the talk.

in b’riyah….the world of thought/creation it is said that the only reliably constant thing is change. might be so of much in the secular world, but in the religious world it needn’t be so. contemplate the comforting role of enduring practice on your everyday secular side.

in atzilut….the world of nearness to G’d/intuition mind your breathing. listen to your pulse. regular, enduring, life-sustaining. you have built a lifetime to this point taking this foundational strength for granted. but you are granted only so many heartbeats, only so many breaths in a lifetime. meditate on how you can be for your family, your spouse, your community…the whole world in your little corner…as foundational as a heartbeat, as invigorating and sustaining as a breath.

kinyan 39 of 48 ways to acquire Torah

Ma’amido al haEmet….Setting/Leading Others to Truth. ma’amido is the same root as in “amidah” (‘standing prayer’), so this way could be called standing others to truth. standing them up to truth. hmm. can’t preach your way there, but you can be a living model of your own faith, your own learning, your own loving practice before G’d. you can stand for truth and give all around you the chance to see…simply, and without any self-righteousness. just walk humbly within community and those who can and would will see. you acquire Torah by helping others to it.

“then i bowed down and prostrated myself to G’d and blessed G’d, the God of my master Avraham, who led me on a true path to get the daughter of m master’s brother for his son.” (Genesis 24:48)

haYom echad v’esrim yom,sh’heim sh’losha shavuot, laOmer: malchut she b’tiferet

“man should put his traits before him and direct them to the middle road…”

in order that “he will be complete in his person”. so advises the Rambam in his Hilchot De’ot (‘the Laws of Behaviour), perhaps mindful of the line between tiferet and malchut that is interrupted by yesod. it is the middle wqy, to be sure, but it is an interrupted flow…tiferet has a direct path to each of the sefirot except malchut.

hence, the kabbalists teach that malchut is in exile from tiferet, and that drawing tiferet and malchut together by way of yesod is a holy thing, not unlike the marriage of a woman and a man. just “come together, right now…. over me” says yesod.

in the interinclusion that makes 3 weeks this shabbat, we are considering malchut in tiferet, sovereignty in harmony. shechina in beauty is not hard to see, yes? but how do we make this bit of one in the other into a greater coming together of one to the other? how do we build upon an interinclusion to make for an intercoursing of shefa (‘divine flow’)? this is always the question when malchut/shechina are discussed….how to “return the princess to her king,” as Matisyahu puts it. we must do it by way of our middot, by improving our middot, we redeem sparks and are ready to do the mitzvot that will uncover the hidden fallen light that is trapped in the klippot (‘husks’).

we know that the shortest distance between 2 points, in this case between keter in the upper world (shamayim, ‘heavens’) and malchut in the lower world (olam, ‘the Creation’) is the middle road with tiferet being the center node and yesod being just below it, closer to malchut. look at the tree of life, ie, the sefirotic tree and you will immediately see this…no mystery therein.

we get a very, very straightforward directive from G’d about how to rectify our middot, don’t we? are we not told to be holy because G’d is holy?

“…you shall sanctify yourselves and be holy,

because i am holy…”

well not exactly. the verse (Leviticus 11:44) instructs us to get holy before we learn why…the cart seems to be before the horse. and it is important that we realize that we have to work down here in olam and not look to the heavens as our starting point. malchut is utterly grounded, the lowest of the sefirot. tiferet is middling, but unimpeded between middle and the heavens. we are forced to work around the yesod pivot point, as we learned yesterday.

Rashi explains that we are to make ourselves holy on earth, and G’d will make us holy above. the Baal haTurim goes further, telling us that: “one should sanctify oneself at the time of marital relations.” well, that is pretty earthy. so this holiness stuff…when we do IT, we, uh, DO it. woot.

but malchut in tiferet is but a hint of how. but it is a very important hint: no manipulation, no controlling, no domineering, harmony in beauty calls for equals in love, just as it calls for us to be balanced in our approach to everything else. be passionately harmonious, chevrei, not merely so. we are taught to “acquire” a friend for ourselves, which is taken to mean a study partner, but the great “kinyan” (‘acquisition’) is the ketubah, in which a spouse legally acquires a spouse by binding contract….so the verse might just as well be telling us to acquire a friend in marriage. malchut in tiferet is a marriage of friends sefirotically…a balancing of desires seferotically. we are to be ourselves harmoniously of 2 minds….not divisively, but harmoniously…and the flow of shefa by way of yesod reminds us of the bonding of 2. but you always knew that 2 heads are better than 1, right?

it is shabbat, all you marrieds…..remember, it is a greater mitzvah on shabbat. presence in beauty…malchut in tiferet.

mussar for malchut she b’tiferet

malchut-tiferet with another….bein adam l’chaveiro be aware of your affect with all those you meet…as aware as you are with a lover. THEN you want to put your best face forward, of course, but to do it always is bring sovereignty of a smile and an engaged mien to bear in the wider world. you prefer to see a bright face, yes? well, love your neighbor as yourself.

malchut-teferet with yourself….bein adam l’atzmo it is commonly said that it requires more muscular exertion to make a frown than to make a smile….but that isn’t true. smiles are harder work. so give yourself a better workout. smile. it is a most infectious form of exercise.

kabbalah for malchut she b’tiferet

in assiyah….the world of doing/completion to make balance in the world, is to give harmony greater sovereignty in the world. this is sanctifying yourself on earth. but it can be a team sport. as this completeness of 3 weeks falls on shabbat, bring balance to the world by visiting the elderly and sick, particularly by bringing children to seniors. when you see the smiles that will arise, note them well, and hold that image in mind thereafter.

in yetzirah….the world of feeling/formation another way to bring harmony and balance into the world is to receive it! we all need somebody to lean on, so seek guidance from a friend you have acquired this shabbat. listen well, for advice from those who’ve walked some of our paths is essential to any spiritual journey.

in b’riyah….the world of thought/creation we’ve been going out into the beauty (tiferet) of the world in spring this week, but there are ‘mindscapes’ that also must be walked. shabbat is such a mindscape year round. walk less in the world today and more in your mind. are the features of your shabbat mindscape as rich as those in the world outside? if not, do a little shabbat-worthy work and make your shabbat mindscape more rich…shabbat is for remembering Creation after all!

in atzilut….the world of nearness to G’d/intuition r’ Heschel teaches that “prayer is an invitation to G’d to intervene in our lives.” as you pray this shabbat, invite the Holy One in….a sure path to the holiness that is malchut in tiferet.

kinyan 21 of 48 ways to acquire Torah

Lev Tov….Good Heartedness. your attitude in the world and the face you bring to others will directly influence both the quantity and quality of Torah you gain. good cheer, open engagement, careful listening, and eagerness are all ways to not only change the climate of the world around you, but to come to superior understandings of the meaning of Torah. lishma should be in joy, so we end the week of tiferet with a very easy to understand quote from the sefer Tiferet Yisrael:

“a good heart includes a soft nature and the ability to act joyfullyfor the benefit of others”

haYom tish’a asar yom, sh’heim sh’nei shavuot vachamisha yomim, laOmer: hod she b’tiferet

“her ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace”

many of you will recognize this as the next to last line in the “etz chaim hi”, said as the Torah is returned to the ark. i read it as a proof text for permission to relax now and then in my errors of interpretation and understanding….or just the many errors of explication that i’ve made already (and will no doubt make more of) in this effort to share the sefirat haOmer. for even when the explanation doesn’t work, the study nonetheless happens…and that is Torah lishmah (‘study for its own sake’, understood to mean ‘for the sake of Heaven’) even without our intention when we err!

if yesterday was devoted to the force of netzach in breaking down barriers to compassion/balance/beauty, today, in hod, associated with humility/gratitude/splendor, we grow quiet in the face of compassion, balance, beauty and harmony that already surrounds us. it is always there; there is no place without it because all of Creation is a manifestation of G’d’s glory, and there is no where where that glory is not. G’d’s glory fills the earth.

but to understand hod in tiferet, splendor in beauty, we have to put away so much of our self. we are called “m’daber” in the rabbinic literature, ‘the talker’ for our proclivity to name and classify and analyze with exquisite subtlety in words all that catches our attention. we erect barriers in our efforts to understand more deeply. we are all-in-one machines that erect new barriers even in our process of stripping down to get closer to seeing another glimpse of G’d in nature….nature being the only aspect of G’d’s wonder that we can always grasp (if we are only awake). nature is the G’dstuff in which we live, the stuff of which we are….that we bluster through… over… around and beyond daily, every waking hour.

all the paths of Torah are pleasantness; all of them….even the broken, breaking, dissecting errant ways we sometimes derive are ultimately paths of peace. why? well, can you think of any self-understanding that comes without making mistakes? even pharaoh’s path was Torah, right? he quite literally descends to G’d, and with that descent comes freedom and peace, precisely as G’d intended all along.

but Chazal (rabbis of the talmuds) point out an even easier way. they teach that G’d created all with Torah….so everywhere you look is another path of Torah. and r’ nachman made the fields his place for Torah and prayer and meditation on G’d. everywhere. just look and see. and he also made clear that his every step was itself a step toward the Land of Israel, that is, the place of rectification and cleaving to G’d. every step is on a derech noam, on a ‘pleasant path’ toward the great good. just look and see.

it is hard to think of anything more beautiful than beauty…until you traverse the tree of life a little further and come to the splendor of beauty in quiet hod, beauty in thanks, in a smile without a word and without even the sound of a laugh. “hinei,” people….’behold’ all around you. it is all in hod. silent, eloquent, all a testament to the splendor and wonder of a G’d that gives us simple splendor in the grass…

why am i not a flower, a person-flower?

bless me, my spirit with tenderness instead of might.

to own smiles instead of words, and always bring light to the world.

to be able to give love, good fortune with my hair, like orchids.

and may my way through rooms be like finger-touches on piano keys.

tenderness, you ineffable name of G’d, be my image of G’d!

mussar for hod she b’tiferet

hod-tiferet with another….bein adam l’chaveiro i’ll bet that a lot of you welcome folks home from school and work with a pleasant “how was your day?” there is a little everyday compassion in that. but it might well be answered with the grumbles of daily disappointments and disaffections….or the disconnected minimalist “fine.” so get a little rad and reset the routine gently…..ask “what were the beauties, the wonders of your day?” if they can’t tell you, send them outside immediately to lay in the grass and look up, or down, or all aroun. at’ll fixem.

hod-tiferet with yourself….bein adam l’atzmo smile when you make a blessing today….no quick-get-it-out-of-the-way utterances, please.

kabbalah for hod she b’tiferet

in assiyah….the world of doing/completion baruch haShem, we are not only given to using words to make or find beauty. we decorate our living spaces. we spend lots of time getting just the right paint for a room’s walls, yes? and then what? we let our own creative work, our own engagement, recede into, well, wallpaper as we direct our attention to the television, the radio, the internet (well, yes, even this blog), hanging on the distracting and novel and noisy and sparkly. we consume without a lick of appreciation. go back to your own spark of creation in your place and remember why you so loved a particular paint for a wall, or a painting or a vase, or even the order that you impose in your cabinets in how you put your dishes away, or how you insist the dishwasher should be stacked…..it is all your sense of beauty and order at work. pleasant ways are found therein. don’t be unmindful of it!

in yetzirah….the world of feeling/formation every year the garden brings forth changes. changes in what you planted…changes in the volunteers that have taken root….changes in expression of abundance. remember the blooms of a previous year. compare them to this year’s early arrival of almost everything. be grateful for the variety that continues to enrich the order of your garden. and let your ruach flit with joy.

in b’riyah….the world of thought/creation pray from a siddur today (if you can read this, you can find one online if need be) and try to be mindful of the ‘order’ (“seder”) of the prayers. compose a brief transitional explanation or 2 for yourself. or read this week’s parshah for shabbat, mindful of the fact that the selection that is the week’s ‘portion’ is itself an ordering of words. be grateful for the words and for those who took great care in ordering their use for the betterment of your spirit.

in atzilut….the world of nearness to G’d/intuituition get out in the fields and forests like r’ nachman and the Besht. listen. pray. try to return the birds’ calls. see if you can see the Presence of G’d in the hiddenness of his nonCreation nature….G’d is not made of Creation stuff….but all of Creation is of made of G’dstuff. as you are looking, remember that every move you make, every breath you take, G’d will be watching you….

kinyan 19 of 48 ways to acquire Torah

Miyut S’chok….Moderation in Levity. Ben Sira 21:20–“a fool raises his voice in laughter; the wise smiles in silence”

haYom sh’monah asar yom, sh’heim sh’nei shavuot v’arba’ah yomim, laOmer: netzach she b’tiferet

“there is no light as brilliant as that light that emerges from out of the darkness”

the Holy Zohar (vol 3, folio 47b) brings this teaching to illustrate the importance of challenging the obstacles that face all of us in rectifying our spiritual traits and in learning to walk more humbly with G’d. essentially, the more difficult the obstacle overcome, the more powerful the rectification…..it is the effort that matters and not simply the achievement (see Avot 5:26). the example given is none other that the power of G’d, who brought light to the tohu v’bohu, bringing it out of utter darkness and absence of light.

r’ Tarfon offers a variation on the theme of struggle, also in Pirkei Avot (2:20): “yours is not to finish the task, yet neither are you free to desist from it.” it is the effort that matters most…..always walking humbly, never ceasing from the great task of doing the Way to repair the world.

netzach in tiferet is the courage to fight the good fight for compassion and the beauty it brings in truth. it is NOT easy to be compassionate to all always. anyone can find a situation or person or circumstance that is so personally revolting that we must struggle mightily to overcome loathing in order to do the compassionate good. i will never forget the scene in the film ‘Ben Hur’ in which Judah finally resolves to go deep into the dank, close cave in the valley of lepers to rescue his sister, going from disease-ridden, curtained shelter to shelter, viewing countless suffering in eaten away flesh and despair, and ultimately putting himself in direct contact with his nearly dead sister by lifting her and carrying her out of the cave. netzach came to me right then and there.

in netzach we channel our desire to risk-taking to rip off the husks that conceal the still burning embers of Divine Light. the compassion is all the greater for the force that must be brought to bear to make it happen in the world.

but few of us will face the valley of the lepers. most of us will have to battle a far more insidious enemy to strive to bring tiferet to all our waking moments: the world of distraction, convenience, conventional thinking, indolence, listlessness, ennui, inertia and habit. habit is the great enemy, for it is mindlessness reminding itself only of itself in an endless feedback loop of unthinking regularity and familiarity.

compassion withers in the face of this sort of wasting away to what is less than your soul-self. doing compassion takes effort and time. it is inconvenient almost always. it has to get in your way, get in your face. netzach is the courage of your compassion. the resolve to stay balanced, to persist, and to make harmony where none is yet found. it is steel in the magnolia.

mussar for netzach she b’tiferet

netzach-tiferet with another….bein adam l’chaveiro we love to argue, don’t we? try to find the truth (the tiferet) in opposing opinions within your familiy or with a friend or acquaintance. s0metimes the compromise reached is its own new truth.

netzach-tiferet with yourself….bein adam l’atzmo bring to mind 2 mitzvot: 1 that you already do, and 1 that you know you should do but dont. analyze the 1 you already do and understand why you do it. can you bring that understanding and make it bear upon the mitzvah you don’t yet do? (yes, i said ‘yet’.)

kabbalah for netzach she b’tiferet

in assiyah….the world of doing/completion humans are full of underused brainpower and undeveloped potentials…this is true in soul as well. netzach must be applied to get that indwelling couch potato nefesh up and moving in an unfamiliar direction. find something within you that you’ve expected/hoped you had, and plan a path to develop it.

in yetairah….the world of feeling/formation remember a time when you had great clarity of purpose, and persistence of spirit to see some particular thing done. did it feel good? did you feel more powerful then? ambition is ok within spirit-driven ambition. remember that clear strong time, and enjoy the feeling again.

in b’riyah….the world of thought/creation clarity and persistence sometimes happen by accident, but the spirit warrior will bring intention (‘kavanah’) to bear on potential and on power. apply cosmic intention to one of your best potentials or proven strengths and make it more. before you do the act next time, say that you are doing it to restore harmony of the Creation with the Creator…..and mean it.

in atzilut….the world of nearness to G’d/intuition gravity continues to hold you to the surface of the earth. your electrons don’t just linger in some improbable positions. you wake up breathing, your heart still sending oxygen to the farthest corners of you being. there is netzach within and without you always…quietly persisting, driving. recreating. meditate on this.

kinyan 18 (am yisrael chai!) of 48 ways to acquire Torah

Miyut Sichah….Moderation in Speech. sometimes it is just a matter of slowing it down. those of us who have overcome a stutter, or who still tend to stammer, have practiced for years to slow down our speech pattern to establish better breath control and to bring room for easing into sounds. how silly is it that we don’t ordinarily bring a similar discipline to the content of what we say and the frequency with which we say it? if you wish to speak with soul deliberation, you will weigh your words on the scale of truth (tiferet) before you speak them at all.

haYom shiv’a asar yom, sh’heim sh’nei shavuot ush’losha yomim, laOmer: tiferet she b’tiferet

” the Rushing-Spirit of G’d flitted over the face of the waters”

this is the description in Genesis 1:2 of the Presence within the tohu v’bohu (’emptiness’ or ‘chaos’) of the as yet unmade creation. i have always viewed this description as being the ‘physicalesque’ manifestation of G’d presence in the unprecedented state of tzimtzum (‘withdrawal within’)….it answers in a way the question of what was the Presence of G’d in the Absence of G’d that G’d created in order to Create.

the whole of Creation being the utter release of Chesed within the utter confines of Gevurah in the emptiness made within the withdrawal of the without end….making a border where none could have been….ein sof is literally ‘without end’, without border, without phase change, without delimit of time or anything else, without escape horizon….suddenly self-limited within.

ruach is the rushing-spirit, the wind spirit, the spirit of turbulence, of flitting. the waters are the primeval Torah in which all, absolutely all that is knowable is to be known ultimately. i imagine that when G’d is not everywhere in absolute ein sof, then G’d’s touch is without stop, flitting/hovering over and around every part of the emptiness, forming and unforming like clouds, else it would again immediately become ein sof, for there is utterly nothing sustainable–nothing itself is not sustainable–without the Touch of G’d constantly.

the gematria of this phrase from Genesis is 1369. 1369 is also the gematria of the first triad of the lower 7 sefirot: chesed (72), gevurah (216), and tiferet (1081). the first and greatest center of all the interinclusions, for tiferet is center of centers in the middle way of the tree. tiferet is itself Torah in that it is the only sefirah that is directly connected to all the others…save malchut. and it is Shechina that is the Divine Presence in malchut, the Presence of G’d in Creation that is not Torah, that is independent of Torah, that was not created out of or by way of Torah. but to end the exile, malchut will have to be gathered into tiferet, and Torah into Shechina, to end the exiles of Creation. we should all know that sovereignty will have to be all compassionate to achieve the great rectification. no more war, no more dictatorial rule, no more market forces…….just compassion in its expression in power–rule by way of nothing but empathy/integration/harmony….the great Beauty, tiferet in tiferet…..entering into malchut in the end times.

1369 is also the square of 37, and the earliest gematria of 37 is in the name of Hevel (Abel), the son of Adam and Chava whose offering of First Fruits was the perfect and accepted korban (‘bringing near sacrifice’). but Hevel was slain by Kayin (Cain), whose offering of the carcass of one of the flock was not accepted. and power outside of compassion was born, in severity of the left side.

the Omer is all about the first fruits of barley, leading to the first fruits of wheat at Shavuot…the new year for the sustaining grains that are the bread that feeds the world. the bread brought forth from the earth directly by G’d, in his compassionate will, as we say in the motzi blessing. Hevel brought the Omer, the barley to begin the count. and in a real sense, we still await the ripening of the wheat in the times of the Moshiach, when swords will be beaten into ploughshares to tend the fields….and none will know war no more.

the word “hevel” also means ‘vapor,’ which is what rises from our heated study of the sea-waters of Torah, engaging ourselves vigorously in plumbing its depths…..as Chazal teach:

“the Torah of this world is hevel compared to the Torah of the world to come”

but therein the beauty of the integration in integration that is tiferet in tiferet, for we all know the rain cycle, yes? evaporation from the great waters condenses in the clouds till water precipitates as rain and returns to earth and to the waters, over which the clouds hovered. do you see now how G’d’s great mark of compassion, his rachamim for us all, works?

“if you walk in my statutes, and keep my commandments, and do them; then i will bring your rains in their season, and the land shall yield her produce, and the trees shall yield their fruit”

when we choose the waters of Torah, we choose life. all in harmony, all in balance, all integrated; the life-giving rains raining the rachamim upon our heads and hearts and hands. tiferet in tiferet is the water in the vapor in the rain….the Rushing-Spirit of the Chai haOlamim (‘life of the worlds’) still flits above…wandering lonely as a cloud.

mussar for tiferet she b’tiferet

tiferet-tiferet with another….bein adam l’chaveiro my teacher, r’ mordechai eliyahu, zt”l, taught that raising both your right and left hands together while saying the line in the ashrei prayer “You open Your Hand and satisfy the needs of all creatures” was a great yichud in hiddur, signaling the harmonizing of chesed and gevurah in tiferet. when you shake someone’s hand today, use both your hands. it is an embrace in tiferet.

tiferet-tiferet with yourself….bein adam l’atzmo consider your most deeply held opinions about the nature of people. is your current view balanced? if expressed, would it tend to bring people together and create harmony? if not, work hard today to rid yourself of this error in your thinking. make your mind ready for compassion, not division.

kabbalah for tiferet she b’tiferet

in assiyah….the world of doing/completion this time of year, the wording of our prayers changes focus from rain to dew. consider how dew is another life-giving precipitation of hevel in compassion. contemplate what is the sign in dew that is parallel to the rainbow in rain?

in yetzirah….the world of feeling/formation most of us who are not afflicted with a psychological pathology, ch’v, are able to harmonize our good qualities with out faults. we do it without thinking most of the time. meditate on this harmony today. what else can you fold into it to make it more beautiful?

in b’riyah….the world of thought/creation Proverbs 10:6 teaches us that ‘blessings are upon the head of the righteous’. can you make the blessings that are upon your head rain upon that of another?

in atzilut….the world of nearness to G’d/intuition r’ kantrowitz brings this teaching: the 17th word of Psalm 67, the psalm we say each day as part of the counting of the Omer (see the spirit guide in this blog, is “yoducha” (‘they will thank you’). today is the 17th day of the Omer. meditate on the deep gratitude you owe to G’d for the blessing of spirit, the blessing of existence in Creation, the blessing of rain in its season.

kinyan 17 of 48 ways to acquire Torah

Miyut Sheinah….Moderation in Sleep. my personal favorite (see Proverbs 6:9, 10). there is a popular story told to yeshiva students about an encounter between the Netziv, legendary rosh yeshiva of volozhin, and his younger co-rosh yeshiva, r’ chaim soloveitchik (founder of the Brisk method of talmud study). r’ chaim told it as follows (with “me” swapped out for r’chaim, as i am not he):

one night at 3am the Netziv, who was very old at the time, called for his granddaughter’s husband, r’ chaim soloveitchik. r’ soloveitchik. r’chaim rushed to the Netziv, worried that the older rav was not well to be calling him at such an hour. when he got to the Netziv’s room, he found him studying from several volumes of talmud. the Netziv said that he wanted to show him (r’chaim) a proof of something they had argued out the previous day. r’ chaim asked the Netziv to give him a minute to make the blessing for Torah study, seeing as he, r’ chaim, had just woken up. the Netziv heard this and started weeping. “what will become of this younger generation? it is already 3am and you, reb chaim, haven’t yet said birkat haTorah!”

the proverb (6:9. 10) asks, “how long will you sleep? lazybones. when will you rise from your sleep?”, but i prefer in this case Milton’s Comus:

“what hath night to do with sleep? night hath better sweets to prove”

haYom shisha asar yom, sh’heim sh’nei shavuot ushnei yomim, laOmer: gevurah she b’tiferet

“uprightness and justice are the shape of Your love, the earth is full of Your kindness”

tonight we consider the interinclusion of discernment in compassion. but it is also Rosh Chodesh Iyyar, the first of the 2 new moons that fall withing the period of sefirat haOmer. and it is not incidental that this Rosh Chodesh actually presents us with a nice way to illustrate the notion of discerning compassion….that the strong 5th line (5 represents the power of division, of breaking things down to facilitate understanding, or a powerful discernment, if you will) of Psalm 33 points it up so well is, perhaps, not coincidental.

the central thrust of gevurah in tiferet is the question of whether the compassion you feel and act upon is commensurate with the need of the one receiving it, or the situation that elicits it. there is also the issue of discernment of interest in compassion–there are those who focus all their compassion close to home in family and friends (it is not compassionate to say that the poor of vietnam are the concern of vietnam, for instance), and others who do the opposite, focusing on those in distant lands, directing little compassion to those in need close to home (why would anyone overlook needs in their own community to only give to help the poor in vietnam, for instance?). and discernment is also brought to bear in the tzedakah that is dispensed–how much must we examine the likely use of any help we give?

the doing of compassion can be more or less efficient….the unbound chesed is not the middle way. we can pick and choose amongst charitable opportunities….within limits, being careful to start close and work out in ever widening circles of righteousness. but there is a simple baseline: if we are asked to help provide food by a needy person, we must give something if we have anything at all to give…even if we don’t know for certain that the funds will be used for food. we needn’t contribute to bus fare, or housing, or “just help” if we have reason to suspect fraud, though we are also taught not to be suspicious. but food help cannot be turned away so long as you have so much as a penny that you can afford to give.

the words used in Psalm 33 are “tzedakah” ‘uprightness’ and mishpat ‘justice with a strong notion of law’….and chesed ‘loving-kindness’. so we have obligatory responsibility giving, law compliant giving, and loving-kindness, which includes actual involvement in volunteering time and person as well as giving.

it is this complex that will bring 33, rosh chodesh, and minhag/halachah to bear as an illustration of gevurah in tiferet of a different sort. many of you probably know that we are in a limited state of aveilut (mourning) during a large part of the time of counting. this is due to the deaths of r’ Akiva’s 12,000 pairs of students (chevruta…the arguing friends of talmudic study) within 33 days during the sefirat haOmer period in the time of the rebellion against Rome. perhaps fewer of you know that the students were said to have died of the plague due to failure to “respect” each other….they failed to achieve the harmony of tiferet, hence, there Torah was not a suitable carrying on after the great r’ Akiva. (the standard is very high for yeshiva students, yes?!)

so to this day, we mourn the deaths (which nearly wiped out Torah in the Land) by refraining from enjoying music, dancing, frivolity, and grooming beyond what is necessary for hygiene and tsniut. (a mazel tov shout out to r’ mendy and alta goldstein, whose son will have “upsherin”, his first haircut at age 3, this coming Lag b’Omer!). but there are 2 customs regarding the period of mourning. the sefardim and most chassidim begin mourning with the onset of sefirah and break off at the 33rd day of the Omer count, ie, Lag (it means 33rd day) b’Omer.. the central/western mitnaged tradition is to begin mourning at Rosh Chodesh Iyar and continue until the day after Rosh Chodesh Sivan, which is 3 days before Shavuot. the third way is that of the Maharil, who held that 33 days during sefirat haOmer was crucial, but that no students died on the holiest of the days between Pesach and Shavuot, ie, 17 days comprising the 7 sabbaths, 6 days of Pesach, the day after Pesach, and the days of Rosh Chodesh Iyar and Sivan. so 33 days of mourning out of 50, but not in an unbroken succession.

this could lead to problems in many communities with mixed populations of sefardim, chassidim, mitnagdim, and those who follow the ruling of the Maharil. what if a mitnaged held a wedding and invited his sefardic friends to attend the blissful holiness during the mourning period for the sefardim? or vice versa? r’ Moshe Feinstein, the only just about universally recognized Torah decisor of the last century, ruled that any jew could, and should, attend a wedding for one of a different tradition regardless of their own mourning tradition. indeed, he also ruled that jews could switch their mourning period from year to year if need be….so long as they observed 33 days within the time of the sefirat haOmer (with some caveats for maintaining peace within a community).

r’ Moshe Feinstein’s compassion in this decision allowed for mutual respect between the different minhagim. by taking this approach, without missing the central halachah of 33 days, r’ Feinstein did a rectification of the error of the 12,000 pairs of r’ Akiva’s students by multiplying the harmony in the People. THAT is using discernment/gevurah in compassion/tiferet….oh, and if you need to spruce up with a trim for Rosh Chodesh or a wedding? well, that’s ok too!

mussar for gevurah she b’tiferet

gevurah-tiferet with another….bein adam l’chaveiro we should all be aware that our personal need for space will affect our relationships with others. sometimes we need a little more space than at other times. assess your needs and set appropriate boundaries for the good of your relationships with others.

gevurah-tiferet with yourself….bein adam l’atzmo you are responsible not only to your relationships, but also to yourself. if you don’t already, set up a calendar and get rigorous about recording appointments and other necessary times so you can navigate your world in better balance.

kabbalah for gevurah she b’tiferet

in assiyah….the world of doing/completion editing (which i need to do more carefully in these posts) is the process of rectifying error and bringing about better form through discernment. we can do the same with out spirit traits. consider your traits and practices. which are the necessary? prune out the deadwood of habits to bring clarity to your way.

in yetzirah….the world of feeling/formation it takes a village to raise a child, they say. and they mean that we all have something to offer to those in need as they grow in their character. examine your spirit skills. which are the ones that you could most usefully teach to another? just do it.

in b’riyah….the world of thought/creation harmony doesn’t just happen in music or color or amongst people. each of us has to think through the available notes, or pigments, or spirit traits to find which will balance or harmonize best in each situation. focus on your harmonies in family and community. contemplate what prompted you to bring those notes, colors, attitudes to bear. respect the balance you have achieved.

in atzilut….the world of nearness to G’d/intuition each of us has a prayer or a reading from Torah that seems most beautiful to us. or maybe you find beauty in other places and need to do hallel for those findings. contemplate the beauty you find and pray it…raise it up as an offering to G’d.

kinyan 16 of 48 ways to acquire Torah

Miyut Ta’anug….Moderation in Pleasure. jewish mourning is a stripping down of the joy we ordinarily seek to build as part of our avodah, our work for G’d in the world. like fasting, it is a practice that puts away things that tend to carry us away….the result being that we have the stillness internally to be more present to other things. usually to things that we don’t ordinarily take as much to heart. r’ Akiva’s students, in spite of having the greatest Torah master of their generation (of perhaps any generation) failed to get simple mutual respect, balance and harmony between them correct. due to this sever error a great plague (read disharmony and unbalance) was unleashed amongst them. disharmony is death to the highest aspects of spirit, and the fundamental underpinning of compassion is respect for the person and circumstance of your neighbors, family, friends, and community. empathy is a fellow feeling, and when it is lacking, rachamim (the embrace of the womb) is elsewhere.

“moderate your pleasures of olam hazeh (this world), but maximize the pleasures of olam haba (the world to come)–the pleasure that comes from serving the other. “

haYom chamisha asar yom, sh’heim shnei shavuot v’yom echad, laOmer: chesed she b’tiferet

“loving-kindness and truth are met together”

occasionally the sod (deep kabbalistic meaning) springs to the surface. it is so here in Psalm 85 wherein the hebrew actually says that chesed and emet (a second name for tiferet) encounter each other. and the result is the ‘kissing’ of peace and righteousness, which again reveals the balance that is wrought by the interinclusions in tiferet. so strong is this tendency toward G’d’s truth in harmony, the the tzedek of gevurah and wholeness of chesed are cheek to cheek. we end up with what we might call loving-righteousness, or compassion. this is the essence of G’d’s truth, for it too has both the quality of overflowing exuberance and obligatory goodness….remember that in the phrasing of the attributes of the Holy One (Exodus 34:7), G’d proclaims that this is a singular middah ‘quality or trait’:

“….v’rav chesed v’emet….”

G’d is ‘abounding in kindness and truth’; G’d is the very essence of bounty, harvest almost without measure in this arena. so it was revealed to Moshe as he was held in the cleft of rock, from which perch he saw only G’d’s back…perhaps the knot of G’d’s t’fillin….the eternal reminder of the exodus from mitzraim. since the time of Moshe, this view has been the “what to see” when one makes the stricture of totafot between your eyes real. it is always the knot of G’d’s tefillin that we bring into view, focusing through both eyes on the letter dalet of the knot. we can’t see the t’fillin on our head, but we can call that dalet knot sighting to mind, courtesy of Moshe Rabbeinu.

so what does dalet have to do with the interinclusion of chesed in tiferet? what does it have to do with chesed and truth? well, the very name “dalet” is cognate with the hebrew “delet” or ‘door’. the dalet letterform is said to be an open door. the word “dolim” means “needy ones” so whenever we see a dalet we are to be thinking about opening our door (p’raps the gates to our spirit) to the needy. the Maharal teaches that dalet, with a numerical value of 4 represents also the physical world (but also the 4 spirit worlds, see below) upon which we walk in the 4 directions, north, south, east and west…..which, of course, is why Avraham’s tent is open to all 4 directions, extending an open door to all who walk the earth: this is the omnidirectionality, the overflowing of chesed.

but the dal of doleh (needy) actually has a deeper meaning of uplifting. and also its opposite, ‘downletting’, if you will. when one goes to a well to draw water, one does “doleh doleh” (see Exodus 2:19) to draw water, ie, one lets down the bucket in order to bring water up from deep down in the earth. so dalet also reminds us of the up and down directions, so we have again our 6x6x6 of the cube…the shape of the t’fillin box, and the way of waving both the lulav and the omer. and the path of G’d extends up and down the tree of life via the sefirot.

but what about truth in all this? well, the downness of the bucket in the well is only to be raised up: the truth in the exodus is that G’d sent the People down so as to raise them up in aliyah to the Holy Land and the way of Torah. it was (and still is) the upness that is the reason for the downness. you want to see that explicitly? well, the verse after the one about the meeting of chesed and truth with which we began this d’var says:

“truth springs out of the earth; and righteousness looks down from on high”

truth is G’d’s watchword. placed upon the clay of the golem, the word truth brings the earth to life. G’d’s truth is ever near to you here on earth…adam is taken from the earth and G’d’s truth is in humankind from formation. but as the Slonimer Rebbe pointed out to his chassidim: “truth jumps out of the ground as you walk, but you are too stubborn to bend down to reach for it.” walk humbly, chevrei, see the dalet and answer the need “below” you, then gather ye the rosebuds of truth while ye may.

mussar for chesed she b’tiferet

chesed-tiferet with another….bein adam l’chaveiro Hillel teaches (Ketuvot 17a) that one should always compliment the beauty of a bride, even if she is not beautiful to you, for she is certainly beautiful to the groom in so many way you cannot even imagine. there is no lie here. it is a truth born of empathy, of the chesed in tiferet, extending a kind eye to find a greater than mere surface ‘truth’. seek the beauty in everyone you meet, for G’d’s truth springs out of each of us.

chesed-tiferet with yourself….bein adam l’atzmo remember that truth is another name for the sefirah tiferet. at the end of the last paragraph of the Shema, we add the word “emet”, ‘truth’ to the last line of the verse: “I, the Lord, am Your G’d” “truth”. remember that in this truth is the balance, harmony and beauty of tiferet. so when preparing to say Shema before retiring to bed, consider where in your day now past you erred in balance, creating disharmony when you could have made greater beauty. resolve to do better today.

kabbalah for chesed she b’tiferet

in assiyah….the world of doing/completion Moshe brought the teaching of dalet to us, but Miriam brought the well into which we must dip and raise up if we are to drink of the stream of Torah. tiferet is the sefirah of “rachamim” compassion, and “rechem” or ‘womb’ derives from the same root. it is by way of the watery womb of mothers that all of us come to walk on earth. how will you extend loving-kindness to all the women you meet today?

in yetzirah….the world of feeling/formation the Slonimer pointed out that even his chassidim stubbornly refused to look earthward and see the truth that constantly sprung up before them. is is so within the human psyche as well as outside it. we are so often busy measuring ourselves against external ideals that we fail to see the beauty within ourselves. reaching in is like looking down, contemplate your own beauty, it is your truth.

in b’riyah….the world of thought/creation the dalet reminds to look 4 ways round and 4 ways up and down. but tiferet is a middle way, neither right nor left (though listing to starboard). the middle matzah is broken, representing the broken word of now and looking toward the afikoman, taken from now, only to be restored in the future. the middle way has a4th dimension, time. meditate on walkin’ humbly with G’d in time.

in atzilut….the world of nearness to G’d/intuition many today seem to look earthward with a scientific eye only, seeing the truth only of the physical and material. seeing the dust, but not the watchword of G’d that can make of clay a human. contemplate the leap from inanimate matter to animate matter. what truth springs out at you?

kinyan 15 of 48 ways to acquire Torah

Miyut Derech Eretz….Moderation in Worldly Affairs. “this book of Torah shall not depart from your mouth; you shall meditate in the words day and night” (Joshua1:8)…..but also, “you shall gather your grains, your wine and your oil” (Deuteronomy 11:14). well, which is it? do we study Torah all day or do we work all day? can’t live without eating, so you gotta work. but what if you take the verse in Joshua literally? keep the Torah constantly in your mouth…in thought and expression and deed….and you will find that your work itself is Torah as well. it isn’t one or the other but each in the other. your work informs your reading of Torah, and Torah informs your approach to the Way in work. the Besht teaches: “when a man prays largely for material benefits, his prayer of supplication is wasted. it forms a material curtain between G’d and himself because he has brought too much matter into the domain of spirit. he receives no ‘answer’ whatsoever.”

haYom asara yomim, sh’heim shavua echad ushlosha yomim, laOmer: tiferet she b’gevurah

“you should judge your neighbor righteously”

the “b’tzedek” here, in this quote from Leviticus 19:15, is translated righteously and not as justly to reflect our interinclusion for this day of the Omer, tiferet in gevurah, or balance, harmony, compassion in judgement, restraint, limitation. tzedek can, of course, be both words, but the aspect of righteousness (NOT self-righteousness, mind you) is more balanced than ‘just’ may sometimes be seen as being. we all know too well that what may be legally correct is not always a deep justice, ie, righteousness, but merely a thinner layer of justice…and we mean righteousness herein.

the question is whether our interinclusion of tiferet in gevurah calls on us to go further….perhaps requiring us to go as far as Yehoshua ben Perachia in saying, “judge everyone favorably” (Pirkei Avot 1:6). Rav Aryeh Levin once quipped (but with Torah intent) that G’d made everything for a purpose, even “krum svara”, ‘twisted logic’, served the purpose of helping us to always be able to judge another favorably, even in the most difficult circumstances! and the Chafetz Chaim, perhaps the greatest master of the laws of avoiding evil speech, goes even further, pointing out that lashon hara should be stopped at the level of unspoken thought. to never pass a negative judgement in your mind is the ideal way to do the mitzvah of judging righteously. even if the issue is 50-50, you must come down on the side of the good in your judgement….and even if it is MORE likely to be judged negative by a normal person, it would be better to leave the doubt in the matter unresolved in your mind.

and the Besht comes down even more strongly by pointing out that we are best at recognizing our own faults in others, hence, before we decide to judge another negatively, we should examine our own fault in the trait…..only after we have rectified it in ourselves are we ‘permitted’ to judge another. BUT even then the same compassion that we applied to ourselves we must apply to our neighbor, hence instead of judging, we focus on how we can most compassionately help the person improve as we ourselves did.

the negative judgement is left undone.

this is the effect of tiferet in gevurah. the Sages teach us the way of savlanut (‘patience’):

“As G’d is called compassionate and gracious, so should you be compassionate and gracious; as G’d is called righteous, so should you be righteous; as G’d is called holy, so should you be holy. ”

(Sifre 85a)

when your greater goal is compassion, even your severity of judgement must be more situational than you might think to be ‘justice’.

mussar for tiferet she b’gevurah

tiferet-gevurah with another….bein adam l’chaveiro in spite of giving the benefit of the doubt, we are also mitzvah bound to gently reprove another when they have clearly done wrong. getting the right balance of restraint and release is the challenge. be compassionate in reproving another who has wronged you….remember that there must be love even in discipline.

tiferet-gevurah with yourself….bein adam l’atzmo we are subject to conflicting emotions within ourselves. how do we judge them? and judge between them? take the core compassionate step and try to more deeply understand why your internal conflicts persist. find the validity in what you might have thought to be wrong….judge the persistence of the conflict within yourself favorably!

kabbalah for tiferet she b’gevurah

in assiyah….the world of doing/completion we use harmony in discernment when we love through our self-restraint. …when we avoid the negative judgement if at all possible. in Ashrei we learn that G’d “opens up G’d’s hand and satisfies every living thing,” even the evildoer. consider how to approach your day with an open hand and not a clenched fist.

in yetzirah….the world of feeling/formation gevurah is also strength and power. there are times when we have to correct misjudgement of another. when we have to take responsibility for a wrong we did that others may not have known….these too are opportunities to get at tiferet by using gevurah. consider whether there are ‘things unsaid’ or ‘wrongful thoughts to right’ that require strength of will on your part. visualize how you will approach them with compassion, then set out to do them.

in b’riyah….the world of thought/creation teshuvah (‘repentance and return to G’d’) requires supreme strength. asking forgiveness when one has allowed i’m sorry to go unsaid for a long period demands great focus and diligent strength. yet we know that without it we cannot, simply cannot get ‘right’ with G’d. there is no crutch to fall back on. tikkun olam (‘repair of the world’) requires more than anything else that we discern (an act of judgement) the balance that was lost in the brokenness of the world. where is the discord and disharmony in your life? can you, through greater tolerance–to yourself, to your neighbor, to your children, to your spouse–effect a repair? can you through restraint of judgement grow compassion in your heart, thereby learning not to harden your heart in ways you may be accustomed to?

in atzilut….the world of nearness to G’d/intuition you may pray today the amidah. you will begin: “open my lips, G’d, that my mouth may declare Your Praise.” do we ever ask thereafter to have them shut? to cut off praise? consider this.

kinyan 10 of 48 ways to acquire Torah

Dibuk Chaverim….Closeness with Friends. we did not mention it yesterday, but the day of gevurah in gevurah is also the day on which King David surrendered 7 sons of Shaul to the Gibeonites, who killed them and hung their carcasses up in public to ‘make amends’ for Shaul’s killing of Gibeonite civilians during the battles against David. this is hard to understand…it is like Aharon’s making of the Golden Calf….and act we can scarcely imagine doing ourselves. of course, we were not in the situation and cannot walk in their shoes in their time, so can we judge? however, David did do a positive good in the offspring of Shaul that he reserved from slaughter–Mephiboshet, son of Jonathan, grandson of Shaul, was not given over. why? out of respect for the bond between him and Jonathan….the closeness of friends even after death.:

“and it came to pass that the soul of Jonathan was knit with the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as his own soul….” (1 Samuel 18:1)

in the love of friends, we may learn more about how to do the Torah of loving your neighbor as yourself.

hayom shiv’a yomim, sh’heim shavua echad, laOmer: malchut she b’chesed

CHEVREI: quick note to point out that we count now by days and weeks. we have tallied the first week with tonight’s counting! baruch haShem. for cbs’ers, we will not meet this sunday….there’s no room at the inn! chag sameach and shabbat shalom….r’av yo

“for from You is all, and from Your hand we have given to You”

David haMelech, who exemplifies rectified malchut (‘sovereignty’) points this out in 1 Chronicles 29:14. we see immediately that even the great king has nought which to give save that which is given him by G’d. in malchut the left-side sefirot flow most keenly to create a ‘negative’ space (not a downer space!), a receiving space, which the giving flow of the right-hand sefirot promptly fills. and what of the middle road down the tree through tiferet and yesod? well, self-consciousness, a balanced and rectified awareness is the marker of the middle path in the decidedly female directed malchut.

so we see in malchut she b’chesed the work of the left-side in creating the cleared path that is needed to walk with G’d, and the work of the right-side in naturally flowing in that cleared path with a rush of goodness, and the balanced, steady harmony of the middle flow elevating the clearing and filling into wholeness.

malchut in chesed is full ripeness of chesed, channeled now as it must be, but flowing freely in a position of power, operative in the wholeness of harmony in sovereignity. wow. that was a sentence, eh?

what it means for us in the count today is that we have achieved a week of the count. why is that significant? because the mitzvah is to count the weeks complete, that is, whole. shalem, shalom. entire. and because we are blessed this year with a special calendar alignment of the shabbat with the counting of the weeks, we will all be welcoming malchut as the sabbath bride herself. it is a perfect, complete week. baruch haShem. shabbat oneg (joy) and shabbat menuchah (contentment) rule in chesed this week. make this a giving, ripe shabbat for all around you. rule your shabbat with wave-rolling, righteous-aware loving-kindness, and bring it out of shabbat with you when you re-enter the coming week, for the count continues on the other side in the sefirah of gevurah.

mussar for malchut she b’chesed

malchut-chesed with another….bein adam l’chaveiro what would a regal but giving malchut be? perhaps one who would not begin shabbat rest without designating a certain act of loving kindness to run out from shabbat into the week. perhaps a special set aside of tzedakah to be delivered after shabbat? the JUF is at cbs this sunday, i believe…an opportunity, perhaps. or maybe an organizing of time in the coming week…to spruce up the cbs section of the cemetary? wrangling the efforts of others to do chesed shel emet?

malchut-chesed with yourself….bein adam l’atzmo during the week of the song of the sea, we frequently the story of nachman ben aminadav, who took the first leap (the very meaning of ‘pesach’ after all is leap, not “pass”, but leapover) into the void created by the pulled-back waters. there is chesed shel emet, for only with a perfect faith could nachman have known that he would even survive the step! be a nachman! take a leap and risk drowning in your shabbat rest this week. just do it!

kabbalah for malchut she b’chesed

in assiyah….the world of doing/completion on shabbat, of course, the completion rules and the doing eases into deliberately limited classes. Deuteronomy teaches us something important about the ruler that the People will elevate: “when the ruler is seated on the royal throne, the ruler shall have a copy of this Torah written for the ruler alone on a scroll …let it remain with the ruler and let the ruler read in it throughout life, so that the ruler may learn to revere G’d…” study Torah this shabbat as though your understanding of it would set the standard for the kingdom, and know that your own lifestyle would be the model for all around you. are you a worthy ruler?

in yetzirah….the world of feeling/formation G’d is Melech haOlam. this shabbat you are in malchut of your locus in the universe. you are struck in the image of royalty, right? well, enjoy being a daughter or son of the royal family today. you have unique access to the melech haolam, delight in it….nap the nap of a queen, eat with the hearty lust of a king….and feel the possibility of whole (and wholesome) power of the divine within you.

in b’riyah….the world of thought/creation a royal can decree things. your domain this day is shabbat, so issue an edict that a new blessing is to be said. write a blessing, or a psalm as did David haMelech…he wrote well more than a hundred! but he started with just 1.

in atzilut….the world of nearness to G’d/intuition malchut is a receptacle to be filled and overfilled so as to share the bounty with all the People. “You prepare a table for me in the midst of my adversity and moisten my head with oil. surely my cup is overflowing and goodness and kindness will follow me all the days of my life. and in the long days beyond, i will always live within You house.” G’d’s house here on earth is shabbat, so meditate on letting the wholeness of shabbat overflow into your weekday life….to always live in G’d’s house.

kinyan 7 of 48 ways to acquire Torah

Simcha….just plain Joy. acquire the Torah in Psalm 5:12…and be embraced by joy:

“but as for me–bathed in Your encircling kindness i enter your house, bow myself down before Your Presence in awe and wonder…then all who put their trust in You will rejoice….will shout out their joy in your protection…will exult in You all who love Your unsayableness. for You bless the faithful, circling around them round like a shield.”