Thoughts about the Thirteen Attributes of Mercy

 Two thoughts about the Thirteen Attributes of Mercy (Exodus/Shemot 34:6-7) - I want to write more about them, but I will share the basic thoughts here:

1. Whenever the Thirteen Attributes of Mercy are chanted as part of the High Holiday liturgy, in Selichot, on fast days, etc., they are chanted three times. Three times thirteen equals thirty-nine. There are thirty-nine melachot, or categories of work, prohibited to be done on Shabbat - and the reason they are prohibited is that they are the tasks done to build the Mishkan, the Tabernacle. The commandment to observe/remember Shabbat contains the commandment "Six days shall you labor" - so the commandment to rest from performing the tasks to build the Mishkan includes the implicit commandment to do so the rest of the week - which can be seen metaphorically as a commandment to work to build a place for G!d's presence on earth within and among us. Since the thirty-nine tasks equal three times thirteen, this can be seen as a commandment to build a metaphorical place for the presence of G!d emulating G!d's Thirteen Attributes of Mercy as the essential nature of those tasks (and we should emulate G!d because we are created in the image (Genesis/Bereshit 1:27) and likeness (Genesis/Bereshit 5:10 of G!d.

2. Rebbe Levi Yitzchok of Berditchev, in Kedushas Levi on Ki Tisa 14, quoting the Maggid of Mezritch, teaches that the Thirteen Attributes of Mercy correspond to the Thirteen Hermeneutical Principles contained in the Baraita of Rabbi Yishmael, each Attritute having a corresponding Hermeneutical Principle. (More info about these here: https://jewishencyclopedia.com/.../12937-rules-of-r....) These Hermeneutical Principles are recited at the end of the first section of Shacharit each morning. As regular readers know, I have wrestled with the Akedah, the Binding of Isaac (Genesis/Bereshit 22), for many years - and intriguingly, the Akedah is traditionally recited in the first section of Shacharit, not that long before the recitation of this Baraita. I think that perhaps reading this very disturbing text of Abraham almost murdering his son, which can be seen as resulting in trauma for Isaac, in the context of Hermeneutical Principles that correspond to the Attributes of Mercy, teaches us to have a "hermeneutic of G!d's mercy" when approaching traumatic texts such as this. (And "mercy" is such a weak translation of the incredibly rich "Rachmanim" - derived from "rechem," meaning "womb" - "rachmonus" - to use the Yiddish pronunciation means compassion - but a very deep compassion, the English word for which doesn't really exist.)

Shavua Tov - have a great week!

"Where" is the lamb for the ascent?

Longtime regular readers of my posts will know that I have been wrestling with the Akedah, the binding of Isaac (Bereshit/Genesis 22), for over three decades. One local rabbi gives me a trigger warning whenever it comes up in daf yomi or other contexts - and invited me to give a class on the various interpretations on the Shabbat when it was read as part of the Torah reading.

Tonight, I learned a new reading, in the teachings of Rebbe Nachman of Breslov, in a wonderful three-part class taught by Rabbanit Goldie Guy which concluded tonight. Here is the teaching, from Likutey Moharan:

ליקוטי מוהר"ן, תנינא י״ב:א׳:ט״ז

וְזֶהוּ בְּחִינוֹת עוֹלָה, בְּחִינַת (בראשית כב): ו"אַיֵּה" הַשֶּׂה לְעוֹלָה. שֶׁבְּחִינַת "אַיֵּה" הִיא בְּחִינוֹת שֶׂה לְעוֹלָה, לְתַקֵּן וּלְכַפֵּר הִרְהוּר הַלֵּב, שֶׁבָּא מִמְּקוֹמוֹת הַמְטֻנָּפִים כַּנַּ"ל. כִּי עַל־יְדֵי בְּחִינוֹת "אַיֵּה" נִתְתַּקֵּן וְעוֹלֶה מִשָּׁם כַּנַּ"ל.

Likutei Moharan, Part II 12:1:16

This is also the concept of the olah (burnt-offering), as in “but ayeh (where) is the lamb for the olah?” (Genesis 22:7). [Asking] “Ayeh?” is itself the concept of the lamb for the olah to rectify and atone for those thoughts in the heart that stem from the “filthy places.” For it is through the concept of Ayeh that a person is rectified and oleh (ascends) from there, as mentioned above.

Essentially, this is part of a teaching about how the glory of G!d fills the earth - yet at the same time is absent or concealed some of the time (I'm oversimplifying here), but when we feel the absence and ask "Where is G!d's glory?" - that is when it begins to revealed and we begin to make teshuvah - to return to G!d and relationship with G!d.

So rather than being "Where is the lamb for the burnt-offering?" (the pshat, or literal meaning of the text)- it becomes "'WHERE' [the question] is the lamb for the ascent" (an allegorical reading)- olah, burnt-offering, is the word for ascent (perhaps the burnt-offering is called this because the smoke ascends to G!d). The very question - the very search and desire for G!d - is what allows and begins the ascent.

I have long read Isaac going away separately from his father Abraham at the end of the Akedah through a trauma lens, that he was so traumatized by nearly being murdered by his father that he had to separate from him. And I still believe that reading is valid. But this introduces the idea that in the experience, even in the midst of the trauma, Isaac has the desire to seek G!d and sets out, separate from his father, to find G!d. The midrash suggests he goes to learn in a yeshiva. And at the very least, this perhaps explains the relationship he develops with G!d such that the text later describes him going out into the field for meditation and praying for his wife to be able to have children.

This is a new concept that I look forward to thinking about for some time to come.