{"id":668,"date":"2011-05-24T11:52:09","date_gmt":"2011-05-24T15:52:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ramchal.wordpress.com\/?p=668"},"modified":"2011-05-24T11:52:09","modified_gmt":"2011-05-24T15:52:09","slug":"ramak-on-the-letters","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/2011\/05\/24\/ramak-on-the-letters\/","title":{"rendered":"Ramak on the letters"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ramak explains a lot about the makeup, function, derivation, and the outcome of the combination of the letters in Shiur<\/em> Komah<\/em> (85). He says there that \u201cthe letters are (utterly) spiritual and subtle\u201d in their source, but that \u201cthey become \u2018light\u2019, which is to say, somewhat revealed\u201d or tangible \u201cwhen they descend\u201d into this world.<\/p>\n

He says that they \u201care compound of the four lofty spiritual elements\u201d, meaning to say of the \u201cfour animals of the Chariot\u201d (see Ezekiel 1:5).<\/p>\n

We learn there that each letter falls into a numerical grouping, as when Aleph<\/em> (1) is aligned with Yod<\/em> (10) and Kof<\/em> (100); when Bet<\/em> (2), Chaf<\/em> (20), and Resh<\/em> (200) are all aligned; when Gimmel<\/em> (3), Lamed<\/em> (30) and Shin<\/em> (300) are aligned; etc.<\/p>\n

He addresses their shapes and advises that one is to take their \u201clength, which is (rooted in) Chessed<\/em>\u201d into account, along with their \u201cwidth, which is (rooted in) Gevurah<\/em>\u201d, their \u201cdepth, which is (rooted in) Malchut<\/em>\u201d, and their \u201cheight, which is (rooted in) Tipheret<\/em>\u201d into account. That means to say that the shape and the amount of space each letter occupies determines it potency and makeup, and that the sages who know how to use that to our best advantage should take that all into consideration.<\/p>\n

And he points out that \u201call of the letters should rightfully be square-shaped\u201d since that would point to their fullness and potency, but they aren\u2019t. Hence the world, which is under the sway of the letters, is less than perfect because like the moon, the letters are \u201cround-shaped\u201d instead of square, so \u201conly a part of them shines forth\u201d to help govern the world.<\/p>\n

(c) 2011 Rabbi Yaakov Feldman<\/p>\n

Feel free to contact me at feldman@torah.org<\/a><\/p>\n

———————————————————-<\/p>\n

AT LONG LAST! Rabbi Feldman’s translation of Maimonides’ “Eight Chapters” is available here<\/a> at a discount.<\/p>\n

You can still purchase a copy of Rabbi Feldman’s translation of “The Gates of Repentance” here<\/a> at a discount as well.<\/p>\n

Rabbi Yaakov Feldman has also translated and commented upon “The Path of the Just” and “The Duties of the Heart” (Jason Aronson Publishers).<\/p>\n

Rabbi Feldman also offers two free e-mail classes on www.torah.org entitled “Spiritual Excellence<\/a>\u201d and \u201cRamchal<\/a>\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ramak explains a lot about the makeup, function, derivation, and the outcome of the combination of the letters in Shiur Komah (85). He says there that \u201cthe letters are (utterly) spiritual and subtle\u201d in their source, but that \u201cthey become … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-668","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/668","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=668"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/668\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=668"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=668"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=668"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}