{"id":725,"date":"2011-06-27T11:25:14","date_gmt":"2011-06-27T15:25:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ramchal.wordpress.com\/?p=725"},"modified":"2011-06-27T11:25:14","modified_gmt":"2011-06-27T15:25:14","slug":"gods-names","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/2011\/06\/27\/gods-names\/","title":{"rendered":"God\u2019s Names"},"content":{"rendered":"

Petach<\/em> 22 expands upon the whole idea of the Aleph<\/em>–Bet<\/em> and the Hebrew words that result from them by tying them in to God\u2019s various names (as we suggested above), most especially His ineffable four-letter name and its permutations, and by connecting them to the Sephirot<\/em>.<\/p>\n

As Ramchal words it there, the entire range of functions of the\u00a0Sephirot<\/em>\u00a0is governed by the order of the ten\u00a0Sephirot<\/em>, which is <\/strong>(itself contained within) the order of the four letters of God\u2019s Name<\/strong>\u00a0(Yud<\/em>,\u00a0Heh<\/em>,Vav<\/em>,\u00a0and Heh<\/em>). This is<\/strong>\u00a0(also)\u00a0the order that governs the trope, vowels, \u201ccrowns\u201d and letters<\/strong>\u00a0(spoken of above)\u00a0through the mystical import of those four letters as well as the four names contained in each individual name.<\/strong><\/p>\n

So, what we\u2019ll do here is first cite Ramchal\u2019s ideas about Divine Names exoterically; we\u2019ll then turn back to the above statement and see what Ramchal adds to it in his own comments to Petach<\/em> 22 where it originates; and we\u2019ll then see what he says about the whole of it exoterically in other works.<\/p>\n

He points out in Da\u2019at<\/em> Tevunot<\/em> 80 that \u201cthe One and only God in all His perfection cannot be named or termed anything, since we can\u2019t grasp His (i.e., Him in His state of) perfection, and it\u2019s impossible to name something you can\u2019t grasp given that a name is the named-object\u2019s definition and one can\u2019t name for something he can\u2019t grasp\u201d. Yet, as we all know, God is called by various names in Tanach<\/em> and throughout the tradition; how do we explain that? It\u2019s rooted in the fact that the prophets (including and epitomized by Moshe) recognized God as exhibiting certain specific traits in His interactions with the world \u201csuch as mercy, sovereignty, power, justice, compassion, anger, strength, and the like\u201d. Based on this we refer to God — despite His unfathomable makeup and our inability to name Him — as \u201c\u2019The Merciful One \u2019, \u2018The Ruler\u2019, \u2018The Mighty One\u2019, \u2018The Judge\u2019, etc.\u201d And Ramchal goes on by implication to apply those names to the terms for and functions of the Sephirot<\/em> [1]. There are other names for God, too (including more \u201cname-like\u201d names like the Tetragramaton and the like), that have nothing to do with this phenomenon, though, some of which are actually acronyms of certain phenomenon in the Divine Presence as we\u2019ll see soon. But we\u2019re getting ahead of ourselves.<\/p>\n

Note:<\/p>\n

[1] The whole of R\u2019 Gikatilia\u2019s Sha\u2019arei<\/em> Orah<\/em> is a treatment of this.<\/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":"

Petach 22 expands upon the whole idea of the Aleph–Bet and the Hebrew words that result from them by tying them in to God\u2019s various names (as we suggested above), most especially His ineffable four-letter name and its permutations, and … 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-725","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\/725","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=725"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/725\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=725"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=725"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=725"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}