Sefer Yetzirah Class No 23

We are now going to start Chapter 4 which deals with the letters in a more specific manner.

Mishna 4.1

שבע כפולות בג"ד כפר"ת מתנהגות בשתי לשונות, יסודן חיי"ם שלו"ם חכמ"ה עוש"ר ח"ן זר"ע ממשל"ה:

Transliteration

Shevah Kiphulot Bagad Cafrat Meytanagut Beshiti Lashonot, Yesodin chaim Shalom: Chachmah Osir Chen Zerah MaMashal.

Translation

Seven Doubles:Beit, Ghimel, Dalet, Khaf, Peh, Resh, Tav.They direct themselves with two tongues Beit Bhet, Ghimel Gimel, Dalet Dhalet,Khaf Kaf, Peh Pheh, Resh Rhesh, Tav Thav,a structure of soft and hard, strong and weak.

Mishna 4.2

ומתנהגות בשתי לשונות ב"ב ג"ג ד"ד כ"כ פ"פ ר"ר ת"ת, רך וקשה, גבור וחלש, כפולות שהן תמורות, תמורת חיי"ם מו"ת, תמורת שלו"ם ר"ע [נוסח אחר - מלחמ"ה], תמורת חכמ"ה [נוסח אחר - חרוצ"ה] אול"ת, תמורת עוש"ר עונ"י, תמורת ח"ן כיעו"ר, תמורת זר"ע שממ"ה, תמורת ממשל"ה עבדו"ת:

Transliteration

Vemaytanagot Besheti Lashanot BeBet, Gimel, Dalet, Caf, Pey, Resh, Taf; Recha Vekesha, Gebur Vechalosh Kiphulot Shehen Temorot Temorot Chaim Mot Temarot Shalom Raya (Nusach Achar Milachamah) Temorot Chen Kiohr Temarot Zerah Shmaymah Temorot Maymashal Avadot.

Translation

Seven Doubles:Beit, Ghimel, Dalet, Khaf, Peh, Resh, Tav.Their foundation is Wisdom, Wealth, Seed,Life, Dominance, Peace and Grace.

These Mishnayot refer to the 7 double letters. Each of these letters have two sound forms. When the words are printed with a dot in the middle they sound one way and without the dot they sound another way. An example is the letter Bet which can be prounounced Bet with the dot and the Vet without the dot. The name of the dot is dagesh. The meaning of the word is "to emphasize". In normal usage it means the dot in the middle of the letter.

Some of the sounds of these letters are used in Modern hebrew. An example of this is the bet and vet above. Some are known from Oriental hebrew or Biblical Hebrew. One of the sounds is lost. The actual sound is a metaphor for our purposes. As we discussed a few classes ago in dealing with the Mother letters. The actual sound of the Hay is the blowing out of the breathe not the H sound. The actual sound of the Shin is ShShSh not Sh sound. The sound of the Aleph is not silent it is the sound of an indrawn breath.

The correlations are important to deal with.

There is a direct correlations to the lower sephirot from these letters. We have discussed that there are 3 connections Gashmiut, Ruchaniut, and Elohut. This is physical, Spirtual, and Divine levels. Gashmiut is the physical sound and shape as they are written. Ruchaniut or spiritual is the essence of the letters as taught in the Sunday morning classes on the Hebrew Letters which we are almost finsihed teaching for this series. the Divine level is there correlations to the sepirot.

when a person wants to utilize a letter in a Name, he may use it either with a dagesh or without a dagesh. Without the dagesh is considered the "graceful way". With the Dagesh is considered the forceful or severe way". For those of you who do not know. The Sephira of Chesed is sometimes referred to as Grace and not Mercy. Gevurah is sometimes refered to as strong or forceful. Keep that in mind when you use the sounds. pronouncing it with the dagesh makes the actions forceful. It makes the action stronger in more than a metaphorical way. Remember we are powering the "opening of the gates".

The bet with a dagesh is the sound of a letter B in English. In Modern Hebrew is pronounced as a V in Victor. In Biblical Hebrew and the manner in which it is suggested you use it from the Sefer Yetzirah it is the difference between Ba and Bh. Boy and a breathing Bee sound. Listen to the recording to truly "get" the sound.

the gimmel with the soft sound is a J or jimmel while the hard sound is a g or gimmel.

The Dalet as a soft sound is a TH sound like the word "the", while the hard sound with the Dagesh is a Dee. This applies very seriously to the Shema Israel. One can prolong a Th sound not a Dee sound. The Halacha says to prolong the Dalet sound of Echad. It is not Echadddd but echathththth. Please start to do this as you are violating Halacha when you prounouce it as a dee sound. What is the problem with that? it is the cause of many peoples chaos when one violates Halacha. Of course we are not on the level of being evaluated each night that severly but think about it. You are using a severe sound and God judges us measure for measure severity for severity. As a teacher of Kabbalah it is my responsibility to teach you Halacha. Many of the academic Kabbalists will not do so out of ignorance. The result is still potentially the same. If you want to change this as a sharing consciousness. do it so that i do not receive chaos from you not accepting my teachings.

Chaf with the dagesh it is gutteral like ch. Without the dagesh it has the sound of k.

the Pey has the P the F sound Pey and fey. which is the dagesh sound and which the soft sound?

The letter Resh is an R sound but the soft sound is rolling r. If your native language is Spanish you have an advantage over the English speakers which must practice this many times as you will see in the recording. We do not know how the hard Resh is supposed to sound. Perhaps it is a sound in the Oriental languages that is impossible for a westerner to pronounce properly. that is a big perhaps. Botht he rolling r and this oriental sound comes from the tongue being near the teeth. But we truly do not know.

The Taf is a tee sound. The Th sound is the soft sound not the S sound from the Ashkenazi.

why are there double sounds? why not have 7 more letters? There are alphabets with more than 22 letters. English has 26j Persian 32. and many others.

The lower Sephirot have an active and passive aspect. A male and female aspect. They are in unity yet the male female as we discussed last class need to be in unity to work. This is why there are two sounds to these letters. When you practice ... practice both sounds.

Here is very briefly the concept from the ARI about Male and Female which is called Mah and Ben. Mah represents Binah or female and Ben represents male or Zeir Anpin. this comes from teh idea of the breaking of the vessels. Now to repair the broken vessels the new light must lower itself (to bend over like the form of the Resh) to pick up the the broken sparks or parts of the vessels. This new light is the male while the previous lights represents the female in the new order of the Tree of Life. The old order had no communication between any of the sephirot while in this order of the Tree there is constant communication and the ability to move from Malchut of Malchut up to Malchut of Atzilut. This is part of the Ten Luminous Emanations teaching. If you understand it great. If not you need to be listening in on Wednesday's at 9 PM west coast time. How much desire do you truly have to open the gates? How much desire to you have to reduce your chaos.

In our dimensions exist with good and evil. Malchut is mostly evil - the desire for one self alone. In the Heavens the mix is 50/50 between sharing desire and receiving for the self alone. How do we switch between the two worlds? Consciousness of actions. Every action we do is a word of many letters. each of these words can be in the world of ben or the world of Mah. Change your consciousness you change your worlds. you change your movie. This is how Binding by Striking works.

Din or judgment is designed to wake us up so that we do not do more negative actions. So Din is actually a merciful consciousness. Understand this well but i don't expect you truly understrand it yet. You much experience it. Think about this meditate upojn this. Find out where the judgment exists in the Mercy notw that you know where the mercy exists in the judgment.

Bet Chesed;

Gimmel is Gevurah

Dalet is Tiferet

Caf is Netzach

Pey is Hod

Resh is Yesod

Taf is Malchut

A letter is a lighthouse. The form of letter is to shine out. there is not a limit to the energy of the letters. These are theoretical not practical. these letters relate to the emotions. The emotional aspects relate to these 7 double letters which allows us to truly find power within these letters more than with the mother letters. Use the same meditative techniques. Yet without the correlations it represents practice and sandbox play.

Wisdom is Tiferet,

Wealth is Netzach,

Seed is Yesod,

Life is Chesed,

Dominance or government is Malchut,

Peace is Gevurah

and Grace is Hod

Look at these correspondences. How can Peace be Gevurah? Peace means completion. Until every light is in the proper vessel ther must be restriction and severity and limits. Spend some time to understand these correspondences.

In this physical world, the seven becomes 14 as spoken about in Kohellet chapter 3. These are the 14 good times or the male times.

There is a famous story. Two brothers did well in their partnership. then the times change. One brother cashed out and retired and waited. The other found himself deeper and deeper in debt. The retired brother saw the times were changing back. He went back into buisness and ending up hiring his brother as an employee not a partner. What is the moral? do not fight the times go with the flow bend like a reed in the wind. Many other metaphors. Life lessons are being taught in the Torah and the sefer Yetzirah. Have you learned? People make money in bad times don't they? Remember the famous story from the Chinese. First generation is a peasant. Second generation is a merchant. Third generation is a power broker. the fouth generation is a peasant again. This has been going on in the US for 200 years. But our modern people do not percieve the world through these lenses. Things will go up forever so we should all have the dream of home ownership? or should we. There will be another drop in home values. No i am not a prophet. just seeing history as a cycle.

There are 28 times; 7 sepherot times 2 times 2. Light flows down in a Mah and Ben fashion. Direct light and returning light. in addition to the male and female. Male and female going down and male and female going up.

Here are the 28 Times.

Life

Death

Planting

Uproot

Kill

Heal

Wreak

Build

Weep

Laugh

Wail

Dance

Scatter Stones

Gather Stones

Embrace

Shun Embraces

Seek

Lose

Keep

Discard

Rend

Mend

Silent

Speak

Love

Hate

War

Peace

learn the relationship between a time and its relationship to the Sephirot. Each human has a cycle. Each day has a cycle. Each place has a cycle. Learn to know your own cycle. Ask a dream question. Do not fight the natural order of things. The proper sequence of letters have to work within the proper cycles.

The secret of the 14 is the hand. The Hebrew word for hand is Yad which has a gematria of 14. Coincidentally there are 14 bones in the 5 fingers of the hand. The secret of the hand is manifestation. Learn the secret of the times.

Adonai Elohenu Adonai יהוה אלהינו יהוה has 14 letters. Now move the letters toward the left of the order of the Aleph Bet. כוזו במוכסז כוזו Cuzu Bemoksaz Cuzu is the Name on the Left. 28 Letters representing the 28 times from Kohellet.

The Blessing of the Cohenim, a Mitzvah to be performed daily, is to Bless the Congregation of the Children of Israel. As part of that ritual the Cohenim put their two hands with fingers separated opposite each other near their heads. This is the balancing of the Good and Difficult times from Kohellet. This is the balancing of good and evil in the universe.

I did not have time to put the times into the chart from the end of Chapter One. Please do so combine these correspondenace.and then i will do it when i have time. It will be good exercise for you all.

the two sounds from each letter represents opposites as expressed in the second Mishna. Which one dominates depends on our choice and consciousness.

Fire and Water represents opposites. Sometimes fire overcomes water; sometimes water overcomes fire. Lets look at the opposites in the Mishna.

Opposites from the above Mishayot.

Opposite of Wisdom is folly or foolishness

Opposite of Wealth is Poverty

Opposite of Seed is Desolation

Opposite of Life is Death

Opposite of Dominance is subjugation or slavery

Opposite of Peace is War

Opposite of Grace is ugliness

When building a Golem which level will you use. Which sound will you make? When creating the body of the Golem versus the soul of the Golem which sound will you make.

Special effect. The US prides itself on the "Melting Pot" idea. Everyone is equal and everyone strives to be unified. Or maybe you will see it with some other sentences

the melting pot is not a Jewish idea. The idea of Scut - A hierarchy of responsibility and worthiness is the Jewish idea.

Live among yourself in your own culture?

Each of the Letters relate to 4 of the Times. Can you match them to the times? How do the Sephirot relate to the Times?

Bet Chesed Life Death Heal Build Kill Wreck

Gimmel Gevurah Shalom War Love Peace Hate War

How does Gevurah bring Love ? Chesed

Dalet Tiferet Wisdom Foolishness Silence Speaking TearingTearing

Caf Netzach Wealth Poverty Gathering Stones Seeking Cast away Stones Loose

Pey Hod Grace Ugliness Embrace Observe Cast Away Shun Embraces

Resh Yesod Seed Barreness Born Plant Die Uproot

Taf Malchut Government Slavery Dance Laugh Mouring Crying

When we do meditations, we need to correlate the letters with the "gas" the Tetragramaton, with the times that are appropriate for what we are doing. Give someone a Blessing for Peace. what day should it be? and many other questions. These need to be answered as well. Can you give a Blessing on a day that is other than what is connected to the Blessing? The answer is yes. We will discuss how to do that.

The meditations for these 7 Letters is similar to the Meditations we gave you for the Mother Letters.