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Creating Bridges: Spirituality & Philosophy:
Kabbalah: "Letters from Heaven:"
Spiritual Guidance from the Hebrew Alphabet
Shin: Balance
Numerical value: 300
Sound: Sh as in “short”
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by Avigayil Landsman |
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Dedication
My friend, Mary Sarsheen is a dancer. Dance is her gateway to God. She uses her body to express her life’s story. As she goes through her day, her movements appear choreographed in a gentle, natural way. Her generosity is also divinely choreographed.
The sound of shin reminds one of the hissing sounds of fire: shhhh! The three prongs can be seen as three supernal flames, burning like a writhing dance, yet not consuming. Life lived with passion is the dance of shin, Mary’s dance.
Letter Derivation
The letter shin derives from a pictogram of a tooth. Over time, this “molar” evolved into the three-pronged letter shin. The three prongs suggest various images of balance: a seesaw and a scale of justice. The seesaw and the scales are symbols of balance. Two people sit on either end of a seesaw with a fulcrum in the center. The scales contain two pans with a central fulcrum. The letter shin is similarly constructed and also represents the quality of balance. The middle prong acts as a fulcrum to keep the two opposite sides in balance.
The numerical value of shin is 300, 100 times the numerical value of gimmel, which is three. The letter shin derives from an ancient symbol that looks like a bow from which an arrow is sent over a great distance. There is an interesting connection here since gimmel is derived from gamal-- camel, an animal that is capable of traveling great distances. Gamal is the root for the Hebrew expression, gimilut chasadim, meaning acts of loving-kindness. The lamed, whose numerical value is thirty, represents a transcendent journey and the shin, a bow is that which makes it possible to launch the arrow into the beyond: movement and distance. Both potential and actual movements are implied in the shin. (Mysteries of the Alphabet, Marc Alain Ouknin, Abbeville Press) We see in the letter shin how gimmel’s nourishment and acts of loving-kindness are propelled into a state of balance and peace, shalom.
Balance relates to wholeness or completeness, shalem in Hebrew. A related word to shalem is shalom, which means hello, good-bye and peace. A Hebrew greeting, translated, as “How are you,” literally means, “How is your peace?” Peace is a place of balance and wholeness. Peace results through integrating the positive and negative aspects of life. When the world communities feel whole, gratified with what they have and willing to cooperatively share their resources with those who have less, we will have shalom, peace.
Shabbat (Sabbath) also begins with the letter shin. In the Bible we read that on the seventh day of creation, God rested. Later in the Bible, God instructs the Israelites to “remember the Sabbath and keep it holy.” Because God rested on the Sabbath and we are made in God’s likeness, we too, rest from our work and worries, which are our creation. Part of this remembrance is to reflect on the original Creation. Shabbat is a space in time where one lives in the moment, with no concern about the past or future. The focus on the present results from ceasing obtaining. The everyday work effort ceases. This is the day where we say our work is complete (shalem) and we rest from our work to enter a state of wonder. Shabbat is a time of experiencing ourselves as human beings, rather than human doings. We connect with the beauty intrinsic in everything as it is. We focus on our wholeness. Thus Shabbat brings us into a state of balance. A common greeting on Shabbat is Shabbat Shalom: Hello, Shabbat, or Peaceful Shabbat.
If you look at the three prongs of shin, you may also think of a Yiddish word that begins with shin-- shpilkes, which means pins and needles. The shin looks like a pincushion. Shpilkes is how you feel when you are waiting to hear if you won the grant you applied for, if that cute guy you met at last weekend’s retreat has left a message on your answering machine while you were out taking the dog for a walk. Shpilkes is the opposite of balance, but it certainly is a force that propels us into action!
Shin is the first letter in a name for God, Shaddai. We’re all sitting on shpilkes waiting to know God. We’ll know God when we stop thinking life will be complete when we get the grant, when that cute guy calls. Knowing God is not about getting, but in letting go of wanting. Even letting go of wanting to know God.
Another place of balance is between the yetzer hara and the yetzer hatov. The yetzer hara is our desire for self-gratification. The yetzer hatov is our desire to serve our higher purpose in life. If we focus too much on the yetzer hatov we run the risk of becoming overly prideful. An example of this is the rebbe who is so deep in study that he ignores the beggar who is knocking at his door (it is a mitzvah, a good deed, to help the needy just as it is a mitzvah to study Torah). If we were to cling to God completely (the condition known as devaykut), we would eventually drop our bodies, where the ego resides. We need a healthy focus on the body’s needs. As living beings, we require food, clothes and shelter for our survival. There is nothing wrong with wanting to be protected and cared for. Overly focused on the yetzer hara takes the form of self-indulgence, forgetting the needs of others.
There is a wonderful story by the Hassidic rebbe, Israel of Rizhyn that illustrates the importance of balancing the two yetzers. There were two thieves who were caught and tried for their crime. The King had to sentence them to death, but since he knew one of them and didn’t want to kill him, he gave him a mediating sentence. “You must walk along a tightrope over that chasm between two mountains. If you don’t fall to your death, you are free.” The first thief successfully walked across the chasm. The second thief asked the first how he did it. “I don’t know how I was successful,” he humbly admitted. “All I can say is that when I felt myself being pulled to the left, I pulled to the right and when I felt myself being pulled to the left, I pulled to the right.” The message of this story is to stay balanced by not clinging to either side.
Whole-some Food
I learned a lot about balance through braiding challah. It is customary for Jews to eat a braided challah, delicious, fluffy egg bread for Shabbat, the day of rest. I approached this self-assignment with the intention that through the making of my own challah, I was making Shabbat. I know that it is customary to braid challah, that in fact, part of challah’s identity is its unique shape. Although I have asked many people the reason for braiding challah, no one had ever given me a satisfactory answer. I know that there is much braiding throughout world traditions. The braiding requires three pieces: first, we bring the left into the middle, then the right into the middle. The middle is displaced as we bring one side into the middle. As I was braiding the challah, I had the insight that the left and right sides represented the yetzer hara and the yetzer hatov, respectively and the middle piece represented the place of balance, which constantly changes.
Like the story of the tightrope walker mentioned above, the process of braiding demands constant movement. I noticed that my hands moved in a figure eight while braiding the challah. The digit 8 on its side is the symbol of infinity, meaning that the process of seeking balance goes on infinitely. One time while I was braiding, I asked my children to come up with something good that happened in the week and something unpleasant. As they said something, I would bring one side over the middle piece. Each braid was composed of a good and bad experience. I told them that just as the good and bad experiences make up the totality of our lives, so too, do the right and left sides of the challah weave together to form a whole bread that we consume. Good and bad woven into a whole that nourishes us. Just before I came to the end of braiding the challah I saw that the small pieces that were left over looked like the letter shin. Since I had put my prayers and awareness carefully into the process of making this challah, I held it up and saw that I had created an edible mezuzah (a decorative ritual object that one hangs on a doorpost of Jewish homes, containing prayers and is often decorated with the letter shin on top).
When I told my friend, Shira about this experience, she added that the challah also reflects the special relationship that we have with God. God gives us the raw materials and we need to knead the resulting dough-- the stuff of our lives, to make something that nourishes us. If we use whole grains, it is very wholesome: shalem, complete.
PICTURE
In the middle of the picture is the challah, symbol of balancing the good and bad experiences of life. The shape of the challah reminded me of an ancient goddess, so I painted breasts, shadayim on the braids. To the left is a shofar, a hollowed ram’s horn used to blow during the Jewish New Year to awaken us spiritually. The year is shanna. To the right of the challah are the sapphire tablets with the Ten Commandments written on them, indicating the giving of the Torah at Mr. Sinai. The holiday that commemorates this is Shavuot. Top left is the Shekinah, the indwelling presence of the Divine, or the Divine feminine. Top right we see the two lit candles of shabbat.
APPLICATION:
Is your life out of whack? Do you fail to see that the good balances out the bad? Shin is here to remind you that the unwanted, seemingly negative experience you are in serves a higher purpose. The unwanted and that which we desire are two sides of the same coin. When you focus your attention on the truth that your actions are part of the cosmic whole, you will find a place of balance that will bring you peace. Remember that the challah integrates the eternal braiding together of the happy with the sad. We eat both and are nourished.
I would like to include here a few lines from the poem by Thich Nhat Hanh, a Buddhist monk from Viet Nam. “Please Call Me By My True Names” speaks of integrating the opposing natures within us through the mediating quality of compassion.
“My joy is like spring, so warm it makes flowers bloom in all walks of life.
My pain is like a river of tears, so full it fills up the four oceans.
Please call me by my true names,
So I can hear all my cries and my laughs at once,
So I can see that my joy and pain are one.
Please call me by my true names, so I can wake up,
And so the door of my heart can be left open.
the door of compassion.
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Avigayil Landsman,
Torah Scholar, Calligrapher, Lecturer, Teacher & Creator of the "Letters From Heaven" Deck
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Avigayil has been a serious student of Torah for the last ten years and has written many d'vrai Torah(Torah lectures). She is the creator of Letters from Heaven, a Jewish divination system that incorporates the mystical meanings of the Hebrew letters, her chiddushim (new insights into Torah) and their application to the challenges of daily life. Her LFH readings offer seekers of all persuasions spiritual direction in finding one's authentic voice.
Avigayil is a multi-media artist who is best-known for the beaded breastplate that adorns the Woodstock Jewish Congregation's Torah. She creates personalized ketubot, beeswax Shabbat candles, shiviti plaques and other judaica as well as secular art in Sculpey, paint, and shadow boxes that combine disparate objects such as feathers, beads and wood.
Her Judaica (beeswax Shabbat and havdallah candles, havdallah spice boxes, shiviti plaques) and calligraphy cards are available for purchase at the Woodstock Jewish Congregation's judaica shop, Miriam's Well and her home. She also does private commissions.
Avigayil has taught enrichment classes in calligraphy for the Woodstock Jewish Congregation's Hebrew school. She prepares children and adults for becoming Bat/bar-mitzvah with humor and deep wisdom that come from her own unique way of living through the lessons of Torah. She has also given workshops and lectures on the spiritual meaning of the Hebrew letters and Letters from Heaven at Omega and Mount St. Alphonsus.
"Avigayil Landsman's interpretations of the Hebrew letters are original, witty, steeped in scholarship, and above all a genuine opening to our own spiritual wisdom." Rachel Pollack, creator of Shining Tribe Tarot Deck
www.rachelpollack.
com
Avigayil is available for art commissions and LFH readings in person or on the phone. She may be contacted by e-mail at:
Avigayil1@earthlink.net
Website:
www.jewish-wisdom
-and-art.4t.com
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