Sefer ha-Temunah
Encyclopedia
Sefer ha-Temunah (lit. "Book of the Figure", i.e. shape of the Hebrew letters
) is a 13–14th century kabbalistic
text. It is quoted in many Halakhic
sources.
and Rabbi Ishmael, tannaim
of the 1st and 2nd centuries. According to Hebrew Manuscripts in the Vatican Library Catalog, the work was composed in the 1270s. The first extant edition was published in the city of Korets
in Poland in 1784. Aegidius of Viterbo
, a 15th-century cardinal, was influenced by Sefer ha-Temunah, as can be seen in his writings Shekhinah and On the Hebrew Letters.
, "God created universes and destroys them." The Talmud
(Sanhedrin 97a) states that "Six thousand years shall the world exist, and one [thousand, the seventh], it shall be desolate". Sefer ha-Temunah asserts that this 7000-year cycle is equivalent to one Sabbatical cyle. Because there are seven such cycles per Jubilee
, the author concludes that the world will exist for 49,000 years.
According to some sources, the author of Sefer ha-Temunah believed that the world was currently in the second Sabbatical cycle, corresponding to Gevurah (Severity), which occurs between the cycles Chesed
(Kindness) and Tiferet (Adornment). Sefer ha-Temunah offers a description of the final Shmita, Malkuth (Kingdom), as "distinctly utopia
n" in character. This may explain why the book was widely embraced by Kabbalists.
Some say that the Sabbatical cycles in Sefer ha-Temunah can be used as a basis for calculating the age of the universe. While Sefer ha-Temunah sees the world as existing in the second cycle, others say it is in the seventh cycle. If so, Adam
was created when the universe was 42,000 years old, and six worlds were created and destroyed before the creation of Adam. This thesis was laid out by Rabbi Isaac ben Samuel of Acre
, a 13th-century Kabbalist, who said that when calculating the age of the universe, one must use divine years rather than physical years.
By interpreting the texts of Sefer ha-Temunah and the Midrash, Isaac ben Samuel of Acre calculated the age of the universe to be 15,340,500,000 years old. His reasoning was as follows: as the Midrash states, "A thousand years in your sight are but as yesterday" (Psalm 90:4); a physical year contains 365 ¼ days, which, if multiplied by 1000 would give the length of a divine year as 365,250 physical years; if we are living in the last, 7th Sabbatical cycle, that would mean that the creation as it described in the Bible
happened 42,000 divine years ago; to convert this figure to physical years it should be multiplied by 365,250; this gives the result 15,340,500,000 years.
In 1993, Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan
wrote that the Big Bang occurred "approximately 15 billion years ago", calling this "the same conclusion" as the 13th century kabbalists. According to a 2010 estimate by NASA
's Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe
project, the age of the universe
is 13.75 ± 0.13 billion years.
Kaplan also relates to Sefer ha-Temunah the idea that Torah teachings are compatible with other areas of modern science. According to Kaplan, Orthodox Jews often challenge the findings of paleontology
and geology
as conflicting with Torah concepts. But in an "extremely controversial" essay, Israel Lipschitz
drew on the writings of Abraham ibn Ezra
, Nahmanides
, and Bahya ibn Paquda
to argue the opposite conclusion: "See how the teachings of our Torah have been vindicated by modern discoveries." Lipschitz wrote that fossils of mammoth
s and dinosaur
s represent previous Sabbatical cycles in which humans and other beings lived in universes before Adam, and that the Himalayas were formed
in a great upheaval, one of the upheavals mentioned in Sefer ha-Temunah.
in general, and in Kabbalah even more so. The creative power of letters is particularly evident in Sefer Yetzirah
(Hebrew: book of creation), a mystical text that tells a story of the creation which is based on the letters of the Hebrew alphabet
, a story which diverges greatly from that in the Book of Genesis. The creative power of letters is also explored in the Talmud and Zohar
.
In Kabbalah, every Shmita corresponds to individual emotional sephirot (the lower seven sephitot (i.e. from Chessed to Malchut) named middot). 13th-century scholar Nahmanides
asserted that the Torah could be read differently through different pronunciation and word divisions. Building on this idea, the author of Sefer ha-Temunah asserted that the Torah is read in a different way during each Shmita. The author further stated that one Hebrew letter is missing altogether from the Torah, and will be revealed only when the world moves to the next sephira.
According to Lawrence Kushner
, author of The Book of Letters: A Mystical Alef-Bait, Sefer ha-Temunah teaches that "every defect in our present universe is mysteriously connected with this unimaginable consonant
", and that as soon as the missing letter is given to us, our Universe will be filled with undreamed of new words, the words that will turn repression into loving.
Kushner states that the letter Shin
(ש) is of special interest. The letter shin that appears on the small leather cube that holds the tefillin
has four prongs rather than the standard three. Some scholars say that this is the missing letter. According to these scholars, the coming revelation of the name and pronunciation of this letter will be what repairs the universe
.
Hebrew alphabet
The Hebrew alphabet , known variously by scholars as the Jewish script, square script, block script, or more historically, the Assyrian script, is used in the writing of the Hebrew language, as well as other Jewish languages, most notably Yiddish, Ladino, and Judeo-Arabic. There have been two...
) is a 13–14th century kabbalistic
Kabbalah
Kabbalah/Kabala is a discipline and school of thought concerned with the esoteric aspect of Rabbinic Judaism. It was systematized in 11th-13th century Hachmei Provence and Spain, and again after the Expulsion from Spain, in 16th century Ottoman Palestine...
text. It is quoted in many Halakhic
Halakha
Halakha — also transliterated Halocho , or Halacha — is the collective body of Jewish law, including biblical law and later talmudic and rabbinic law, as well as customs and traditions.Judaism classically draws no distinction in its laws between religious and ostensibly non-religious life; Jewish...
sources.
Origins
Sefer ha-Temunah was probably written anonymously in the 13th or 14th century, but it is pseudepigraphly attributed to Nehunya ben ha-KanahNehunya ben ha-Kanah
Nehunya ben ha-Kanah was a Tanna of the 1st and 2nd centuries. It appears from B. B. 10b that Neḥunya was a contemporary, but not a pupil, of Johanan b. Zakkai. He was the teacher of Ishmael b. Elisha...
and Rabbi Ishmael, tannaim
Tannaim
The Tannaim were the Rabbinic sages whose views are recorded in the Mishnah, from approximately 70-200 CE. The period of the Tannaim, also referred to as the Mishnaic period, lasted about 130 years...
of the 1st and 2nd centuries. According to Hebrew Manuscripts in the Vatican Library Catalog, the work was composed in the 1270s. The first extant edition was published in the city of Korets
Korets
Korets is a city in the Rivne Oblast in Ukraine. The city is located on the Korchyk river, 66 kilometers to the east of Rivne. It is administrative center of the Korets Raion. As of 2001, the population of Korets was 8,649....
in Poland in 1784. Aegidius of Viterbo
Aegidius of Viterbo
Aegidius Antonini of Viterbo was an Italian Augustinian cardinal, a reforming theologian, orator, humanist and poet. He was born at Viterbo, Italy and died at Rome.-Life:...
, a 15th-century cardinal, was influenced by Sefer ha-Temunah, as can be seen in his writings Shekhinah and On the Hebrew Letters.
Sabbatical cycles and the age of the universe
One of the main concepts in Sefer ha-Temunah is that of the connection of the Sabbatical year (Hebrew: Shmita) with sephirot and the creation of more than one world. The author of Sefer ha-Temunah believed that worlds are created and destroyed, supporting this theory with a quote from the MidrashMidrash
The Hebrew term Midrash is a homiletic method of biblical exegesis. The term also refers to the whole compilation of homiletic teachings on the Bible....
, "God created universes and destroys them." The Talmud
Talmud
The Talmud is a central text of mainstream Judaism. It takes the form of a record of rabbinic discussions pertaining to Jewish law, ethics, philosophy, customs and history....
(Sanhedrin 97a) states that "Six thousand years shall the world exist, and one [thousand, the seventh], it shall be desolate". Sefer ha-Temunah asserts that this 7000-year cycle is equivalent to one Sabbatical cyle. Because there are seven such cycles per Jubilee
Jubilee (Biblical)
The Jubilee year is the year at the end of seven cycles of Sabbatical years , and according to Biblical regulations had a special impact on the ownership and management of land in the territory of the kingdoms of Israel and of Judah; there is some debate whether it was the 49th year The Jubilee...
, the author concludes that the world will exist for 49,000 years.
According to some sources, the author of Sefer ha-Temunah believed that the world was currently in the second Sabbatical cycle, corresponding to Gevurah (Severity), which occurs between the cycles Chesed
Chesed
The Hebrew noun khesed or chesed is the Hebrew word for "kindness." It is also commonly translated as "loving-kindness," or "love." Love is a central Jewish value, and leads to many particular commandments. Chesed is central to Jewish ethics and Jewish theology...
(Kindness) and Tiferet (Adornment). Sefer ha-Temunah offers a description of the final Shmita, Malkuth (Kingdom), as "distinctly utopia
Utopia
Utopia is an ideal community or society possessing a perfect socio-politico-legal system. The word was imported from Greek by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book Utopia, describing a fictional island in the Atlantic Ocean. The term has been used to describe both intentional communities that attempt...
n" in character. This may explain why the book was widely embraced by Kabbalists.
Some say that the Sabbatical cycles in Sefer ha-Temunah can be used as a basis for calculating the age of the universe. While Sefer ha-Temunah sees the world as existing in the second cycle, others say it is in the seventh cycle. If so, Adam
Adam
Adam is a figure in the Book of Genesis. According to the creation myth of Abrahamic religions, he is the first human. In the Genesis creation narratives, he was created by Yahweh-Elohim , and the first woman, Eve was formed from his rib...
was created when the universe was 42,000 years old, and six worlds were created and destroyed before the creation of Adam. This thesis was laid out by Rabbi Isaac ben Samuel of Acre
Isaac ben Samuel of Acre
Isaac ben Samuel of Acre was a Jewish kabbalist who fled to Spain.According to Abraham Azulai, Isaac ben Samuel was a pupil of Nahmanides.-View of the Zohar:...
, a 13th-century Kabbalist, who said that when calculating the age of the universe, one must use divine years rather than physical years.
By interpreting the texts of Sefer ha-Temunah and the Midrash, Isaac ben Samuel of Acre calculated the age of the universe to be 15,340,500,000 years old. His reasoning was as follows: as the Midrash states, "A thousand years in your sight are but as yesterday" (Psalm 90:4); a physical year contains 365 ¼ days, which, if multiplied by 1000 would give the length of a divine year as 365,250 physical years; if we are living in the last, 7th Sabbatical cycle, that would mean that the creation as it described in the Bible
Bible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
happened 42,000 divine years ago; to convert this figure to physical years it should be multiplied by 365,250; this gives the result 15,340,500,000 years.
In 1993, Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan
Aryeh Kaplan
Aryeh Moshe Eliyahu Kaplan was a noted American Orthodox rabbi and author known for his "intimate knowledge of both physics and kabbalah." He was lauded as an original thinker and prolific writer, from studies of the Torah, Talmud and mysticism to introductory pamphlets on Jewish beliefs and...
wrote that the Big Bang occurred "approximately 15 billion years ago", calling this "the same conclusion" as the 13th century kabbalists. According to a 2010 estimate by NASA
NASA
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration is the agency of the United States government that is responsible for the nation's civilian space program and for aeronautics and aerospace research...
's Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe
Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe
The Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe — also known as the Microwave Anisotropy Probe , and Explorer 80 — is a spacecraft which measures differences in the temperature of the Big Bang's remnant radiant heat — the Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation — across the full sky. Headed by Professor...
project, the age of the universe
Age of the universe
The age of the universe is the time elapsed since the Big Bang posited by the most widely accepted scientific model of cosmology. The best current estimate of the age of the universe is 13.75 ± 0.13 billion years within the Lambda-CDM concordance model...
is 13.75 ± 0.13 billion years.
Kaplan also relates to Sefer ha-Temunah the idea that Torah teachings are compatible with other areas of modern science. According to Kaplan, Orthodox Jews often challenge the findings of paleontology
Paleontology
Paleontology "old, ancient", ὄν, ὀντ- "being, creature", and λόγος "speech, thought") is the study of prehistoric life. It includes the study of fossils to determine organisms' evolution and interactions with each other and their environments...
and geology
Geology
Geology is the science comprising the study of solid Earth, the rocks of which it is composed, and the processes by which it evolves. Geology gives insight into the history of the Earth, as it provides the primary evidence for plate tectonics, the evolutionary history of life, and past climates...
as conflicting with Torah concepts. But in an "extremely controversial" essay, Israel Lipschitz
Israel Lipschitz
Israel Lipschitz was rabbi and one of the Acharonim first at Dessau and then at the Jewish Community of Danzig. He was the author of Tiferet Yisrael a well-known commentary on the Mishna...
drew on the writings of Abraham ibn Ezra
Abraham ibn Ezra
Rabbi Abraham ben Meir Ibn Ezra was born at Tudela, Navarre in 1089, and died c. 1167, apparently in Calahorra....
, Nahmanides
Nahmanides
Nahmanides, also known as Rabbi Moses ben Naḥman Girondi, Bonastruc ça Porta and by his acronym Ramban, , was a leading medieval Jewish scholar, Catalan rabbi, philosopher, physician, kabbalist, and biblical commentator.-Name:"Nahmanides" is a Greek-influenced formation meaning "son of Naḥman"...
, and Bahya ibn Paquda
Bahya ibn Paquda
Bahya ben Joseph ibn Paquda was a Jewish philosopher and rabbi who lived at Zaragoza, Spain, in the first half of the eleventh century...
to argue the opposite conclusion: "See how the teachings of our Torah have been vindicated by modern discoveries." Lipschitz wrote that fossils of mammoth
Mammoth
A mammoth is any species of the extinct genus Mammuthus. These proboscideans are members of Elephantidae, the family of elephants and mammoths, and close relatives of modern elephants. They were often equipped with long curved tusks and, in northern species, a covering of long hair...
s and dinosaur
Dinosaur
Dinosaurs are a diverse group of animals of the clade and superorder Dinosauria. They were the dominant terrestrial vertebrates for over 160 million years, from the late Triassic period until the end of the Cretaceous , when the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event led to the extinction of...
s represent previous Sabbatical cycles in which humans and other beings lived in universes before Adam, and that the Himalayas were formed
Geology of the Himalaya
The geology of the Himalaya is a record of the most dramatic and visible creations of modern plate tectonic forces. The Himalayas, which stretch over 2400 km between the Namche Barwa syntaxis in Tibet and the Nanga Parbat syntaxis in Pakistan, are the result of an ongoing orogeny — the result...
in a great upheaval, one of the upheavals mentioned in Sefer ha-Temunah.
Missing letter
Hebrew letters are invested with special meaning in JudaismJudaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...
in general, and in Kabbalah even more so. The creative power of letters is particularly evident in Sefer Yetzirah
Sefer Yetzirah
Sefer Yetzirah is the title of the earliest extant book on Jewish esotericism, although some early commentators treated it as a treatise on mathematical and linguistic theory as opposed to Kabbalah...
(Hebrew: book of creation), a mystical text that tells a story of the creation which is based on the letters of the Hebrew alphabet
Alphabet
An alphabet is a standard set of letters—basic written symbols or graphemes—each of which represents a phoneme in a spoken language, either as it exists now or as it was in the past. There are other systems, such as logographies, in which each character represents a word, morpheme, or semantic...
, a story which diverges greatly from that in the Book of Genesis. The creative power of letters is also explored in the Talmud and Zohar
Zohar
The Zohar is the foundational work in the literature of Jewish mystical thought known as Kabbalah. It is a group of books including commentary on the mystical aspects of the Torah and scriptural interpretations as well as material on Mysticism, mythical cosmogony, and mystical psychology...
.
In Kabbalah, every Shmita corresponds to individual emotional sephirot (the lower seven sephitot (i.e. from Chessed to Malchut) named middot). 13th-century scholar Nahmanides
Nahmanides
Nahmanides, also known as Rabbi Moses ben Naḥman Girondi, Bonastruc ça Porta and by his acronym Ramban, , was a leading medieval Jewish scholar, Catalan rabbi, philosopher, physician, kabbalist, and biblical commentator.-Name:"Nahmanides" is a Greek-influenced formation meaning "son of Naḥman"...
asserted that the Torah could be read differently through different pronunciation and word divisions. Building on this idea, the author of Sefer ha-Temunah asserted that the Torah is read in a different way during each Shmita. The author further stated that one Hebrew letter is missing altogether from the Torah, and will be revealed only when the world moves to the next sephira.
According to Lawrence Kushner
Lawrence Kushner
Lawrence Kushner is a Reform rabbi and currently the scholar-in-residence at Congregation Emanu-El in San Francisco, California.-Biography:Born in Detroit, Kushner graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the University of Cincinnati, after which he went on to receive his rabbinical ordination from Hebrew...
, author of The Book of Letters: A Mystical Alef-Bait, Sefer ha-Temunah teaches that "every defect in our present universe is mysteriously connected with this unimaginable consonant
Consonant
In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the vocal tract. Examples are , pronounced with the lips; , pronounced with the front of the tongue; , pronounced with the back of the tongue; , pronounced in the throat; and ,...
", and that as soon as the missing letter is given to us, our Universe will be filled with undreamed of new words, the words that will turn repression into loving.
Kushner states that the letter Shin
Shin (letter)
Shin literally means "Sharp" ; It is the twenty-first letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician , Aramaic/Hebrew , and Arabic ....
(ש) is of special interest. The letter shin that appears on the small leather cube that holds the tefillin
Tefillin
Tefillin also called phylacteries are a set of small black leather boxes containing scrolls of parchment inscribed with verses from the Torah, which are worn by observant Jews during weekday morning prayers. Although "tefillin" is technically the plural form , it is loosely used as a singular as...
has four prongs rather than the standard three. Some scholars say that this is the missing letter. According to these scholars, the coming revelation of the name and pronunciation of this letter will be what repairs the universe
Tikkun olam
Tikkun olam is a Hebrew phrase that means "repairing the world." In Judaism, the concept of tikkun olam originated in the early rabbinic period...
.
See also
- MysticismMysticismMysticism is the knowledge of, and especially the personal experience of, states of consciousness, i.e. levels of being, beyond normal human perception, including experience and even communion with a supreme being.-Classical origins:...
- Jewish views of astrologyJewish views of astrologyIn Hebrew, astrology was called hokmat ha-nissayon, "the wisdom of prognostication", in distinction to hokmat ha-hizzayon...
- Kabbalistic astrologyKabbalistic astrologyKabbalistic astrology Kabbalistic astrology Kabbalistic astrology (called Mazal or Mazalot ["zodiac," "destiny"] is a system of astrology based upon the Hebrew Kabbalah. It is used to interpret and delineate a person's birth chart, seeking to understand it through a Kabbalistic lens...
- Sefer Raziel HaMalakhSefer Raziel HaMalakhSefer Raziel HaMalakh, , is a medieval Kabbalistic grimoire, primarily written in Hebrew and Aramaic, but surviving also in Latin translation, as Liber Razielis Archangeli, in a 13th century manuscript produced under Alfonso X.-Textual history:The book cannot be shown to predate the 13th century,...
External links
- Ascensions on High in Jewish Mysticism
- http://www.simpletoremember.com/faqs/Kaplan-SimpleToRemember.com.pdfThe Age of the Universe:A Torah True Perspective by Aryeh KaplanAryeh KaplanAryeh Moshe Eliyahu Kaplan was a noted American Orthodox rabbi and author known for his "intimate knowledge of both physics and kabbalah." He was lauded as an original thinker and prolific writer, from studies of the Torah, Talmud and mysticism to introductory pamphlets on Jewish beliefs and...
] - Representation in religion: studies in honor of Moshe Barasch By Moshe Barasch, Jan Assmann, Albert I. Baumgarten page 214