{"id":684,"date":"2011-06-13T10:44:13","date_gmt":"2011-06-13T14:44:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ramchal.wordpress.com\/?p=684"},"modified":"2011-06-13T10:44:13","modified_gmt":"2011-06-13T14:44:13","slug":"ramchal-on-the-aleph-bet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/2011\/06\/13\/ramchal-on-the-aleph-bet\/","title":{"rendered":"Ramchal on the Aleph-Bet"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ramchal\u2019s initial idea is that the supernal Lights must enter into the mystical realm of letters before they can <\/strong>actually bring about <\/strong>physical actions, as letters are a particular order<\/strong> of phenomena that exist to bring things about <\/strong>in the physical realm (Petach<\/em> 18).<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong>As he explains it in his comments there, \u201cThe Lights \u2026 (perform) on the mystical level of \u2018thought\u2019\u201d which he equates there with Adam<\/em> Kadmon<\/em> [1]. \u201cBut it\u2019s another matter actually bringing things into existence,\u201d he goes on to say there, \u201cas just \u2018thinking\u2019 about something doesn\u2019t necessarily make it come about\u201d. That\u2019s to say that while physicality is rooted<\/em> in the highest realms, it only comes to fruition by means of lower phenomena — the letters, which are a particular order<\/strong> of phenomena (i.e., a specific system [2]) that exist <\/strong>(i.e., that\u2019s suited and designed) to bring <\/strong>physical things about<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Then he offers in Petach<\/em> 19 that the letters are<\/strong>\u00a0(i.e., function as)\u00a0twenty-two different orders\u00a0<\/strong>(of phenomena) — no less and no more<\/strong>. And he adds in his comments there that \u201cthe reason why there are twenty-two letters (explicitly) is rooted in the first principles which we\u2019re not to inquire into, as we\u2019d determined earlier\u201d in Petach<\/em> 15.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s to say that just as there are specific reasons why there are ten Sephirot<\/em> specifically which we\u2019re not privy to (and why we have two arms, one head, and the like), there are likewise specific reasons why there are exactly 22 letters to the Aleph<\/em>–Bet<\/em> (27 counting the end-letters as we pointed out). For as we indicated in 4:4 above, God works from a \u201crecipe\u201d if you will in His interactions with this world which needs to be \u201cexact, with neither too much nor too little of anything\u201d. Twenty-two is apparently just the right number of letters and we haven\u2019t the right to question why that\u2019s so.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ll see what Ramchal adds about the Aleph<\/em>–Bet<\/em> in his other writings.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Notes:<\/p>\n

[1] See note 12 to Section 2 above as well as 3:1-2.<\/p>\n

[2] We derived our idea that the letters are a \u201csystem\u201d from the statement Ramchal made in his comments to Petach<\/em> 19 that \u201ceach letter is one of various orders of interconnected groups of lights necessary to bring about action\u201d.<\/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":"

Ramchal\u2019s initial idea is that the supernal Lights must enter into the mystical realm of letters before they can actually bring about physical actions, as letters are a particular order of phenomena that exist to bring things about in the … 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-684","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\/684","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=684"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/684\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=684"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=684"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=684"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}