Attik (7)

The next point is that not only are aspects of Attik conjoined and co-equal side-by-side, as we saw just above in relation to MaH and Ban as “male” and “female” — they’re conjoined “fore” and “aft” as well.

The “fore” aspect is termed Attik’s “face” while its “aft” is termed the face’s “back”.  At bottom, Attik’s “aft” is utterly subsumed to its “fore” and Attik is a thorough unity in all dimensions. There is some seeming aspect of an “aft”, technically speaking, but that turns out not to be a true “aft” so much as a relative and inconsequential one. Here’s how that’s worded in Petach 76.

The phenomenon of the “back (of the ‘head’, as opposed to its ‘face’ or ‘front’)”, which is defined as being symbolic of the instance where the lights are darkened and don’t irradiate [1](as opposed to the “face”, which is symbolic of the instance in which lights irradiate fully — as if being projected outward “full-face”), isn’t found in Attik. For, instead, Attik manifests a full “face” or “front” on each side.

Its aspect of a “back”,suchasitis, is subsumed under the aspect of the “face” side there that governs. It’s just that there’s a “face” when it comes to the MaH there and a “face” when it comes to the BaN there, but the BaN’s “face” is considered MaH’s “back” relatively speaking, while it’s really not a “back” at all [2].

Note:

[1]       See Pitchei Chochma v’Da’at 42.

[2]       See Klallei Chochmat HaEmet 46, “v’al yikshe”.

 

(c) 2014 Rabbi Yaakov Feldman
Feel free to contact me at feldman@torah.org

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