Chasidut sobre Gênesis 14:18
וּמַלְכִּי־צֶ֙דֶק֙ מֶ֣לֶךְ שָׁלֵ֔ם הוֹצִ֖יא לֶ֣חֶם וָיָ֑יִן וְה֥וּא כֹהֵ֖ן לְאֵ֥ל עֶלְיֽוֹן׃
Ora, <span class="x" onmousemove="Show('perush','Já explicado anteriormente que os reis das cidades e cercanias na antiga Canaan tinham o título como nome, pelo que Abimelekh, que era o rei de Gerar, continuaria seu filho, neto, bisneto a serem chamados pelo mesmo nome, assim como foram antes de si seu pai, avô bisavô. Na cidade de Salém, este título era Malki-Tsêdeq (rei de justiça).');" onmouseout="Hide('perush');">Melquisedeque</span>, rei de <span class="x" onmousemove="Show('perush','Futuramente chamara-se Jerusalém.');" onmouseout="Hide('perush');">Salém</span>, trouxe pão e vinho; pois era <span class="x" onmousemove="Show('perush',' Em diversos casos na antiga Canaan o rei exercia também a função de sacerdote. Os ocidentais, porém, em certa carta supostamente escrita aos judeus por um judeu do século I da era comum ocidental, criaram, firmando-se no significado dos termos que compõem o nome, fantasias e vesânias, por simples incultura.');" onmouseout="Hide('perush');">sacerdote do Deus Altíssimo</span>;
Sha'ar HaEmunah VeYesod HaChasidut
From the days of Avraham began the, “two thousand years of Torah.” This is as it says in the Gemara (Sanhedrin, 97a), “Two thousand years of chaos, and two thousand years of Torah.” The Ramban comments on the verse in Bereshit, “and God blessed the seventh day,” that the two thousand years of Torah began with Avraham. Likewise, we find in the Midrash (Bereshit Rabbah, 2), “‘And the earth was chaos and formless, and darkness on the face of the void’ – these are the first generations. ‘And God said, let there be light’ – this is Avraham.” Avraham began to illuminate the world with the understanding that God does not exist only in heaven, but also on earth. Noah’s son Shem is identified as Malki Tzedek, the king of Shalem. (See Bereshit 14:18) Malki Tzedek addressed God as El Elyon, “the supernal God.” The verses identify him as, “a priest to El Elyon,” and he himself said, “blessed is Avraham to the El Elyon, and blessed is El Elyon, who has delivered your enemies into your hands.” Elyon – Supernal – represents that which is above man’s comprehension. Before the giving of the Torah, the acts of studying Torah and serving God were accompolished through tremendous self-nullification, trials, and suffering. This led them to an understanding of G-d’s existence, and the knowledge of the One who rules His world in the aspect of, “the Supernal God.”
Ask RabbiBookmarkShareCopy
Kedushat Levi
This point is made even more clearly in Genesis 13,14 where we read: וה' אמר אל אברם אחרי הפרד לוט מעמו שא נא עיניך וראה מן המקום אשר אתה שם צפונה ונגבה וקדמה וימה, "and the Lord had said to Avram after Lot had separated from him ‘raise your eyes and look northward, southward, eastward and westward;’” this was a promise first and foremost that he would see in his lifetime three of the patriarchs of the Jewish people, i.e. himself, Yitzchok, and Yaakov. The first three directions mentioned here symbolize the attributes חסד , גבורה, and תפארת, referring to Avraham, Yitzchok and Yaakov in that order.
When telling Avraham that he would see את כל הארץ, “the whole of the land” (future Eretz Yisrael), this refers to David, whose attribute is מלכות, Royalty, David representing this symbol on earth, the Jewish people. David is directly linked to the patriarch Avraham, was shown “the whole land,” so that he would be aware that the glory of the Kingdom of David would be directly traceable to him. This is the reason why north and south, east and west are listed here in this order. According to Ari za’l, ימה, “west,” refers to the emanation יסוד, the emanation directly above the emanation מלכות, the one symbolized by the kingdom of David.
[Malchut, as the “lowest” of the emanations, is the one closest to the physical universe. Rabbi Elie Munk (Ascent to Harmony) has described the emanation Malchut as “History” (of man), thus seeing it as the bridge between the actual physical universe and the celestial domains, since when something becomes “history,” it has either receded or ascended (depending on whether the persons making history made constructive or destructive contributions) to a domain beyond the physical but robbing it of the “substance” common to phenomena in the earthly domain of the universe. Ed.]
According to the Zohar, tzaddik and tzedek, the righteous person and the performance of righteous deeds, are indivisible, i.e. the emanations מלכות and יסוד always go hand in hand. We find this concept first alluded to in the Torah when Malki Tzedek, King of Shalem, (Jerusalem) in Genesis 14,18 congratulates Avram on his victory, blesses him in the name of the Lord, and presents him with bread and wine. The word לחם, commonly understood as “bread,” is used to describe חכמה, “wisdom,” whereas the word יין, commonly understood as “wine” means בינה, “insight,” in this context. Malki Tzedek presented these items as symbols of the two highest emanations man can usually attain, both of which Avraham employed in his service of the Lord.
[As on previous occasions, the author sees in such apparently irrelevant details as a King bringing bread and wine from hundreds of kilometers from Jerusalem. According to Genesis 14,15, Avraham had pursued the armies of Kedorleomer all the way to Damascus) an allusion to something far more profound. Ed.]
The Zohar I,199 traces the fact that a tzaddik serves the Lord with חכמה and בינה to Job 28,28 יראת ה' היא חכמה וסור מרע בינה, “Reverence for the Lord is wisdom, to shun evil is understanding, insight.” The two blessings that Malki Tzedek, who was viewed as G’d’s High Priest in those days, most likely Shem, Noach’s oldest son, bestowed on Avram, represent the two emanations that Avram had been able to use in his service of the Lord, and are reflected in Targum Yonathan’s translation of the Torah, in the first verses of the Torah in which they appear. [In our verses, instead of commending Avraham to G’d, as we would translate the words ברוך אברם ל.., Yonathan ben Uzziel translates: ברוך אברם מ..., “Avram has been blessed by the supreme G’d, etc.” Ed.] Targum Yerushalmi translates already the first words of the Torah, i.e. בראשית ברא אלוקים את השמים ואת הארץ, as “in the beginning G’d used the emanation of חכמה to create heaven and earth.”
When telling Avraham that he would see את כל הארץ, “the whole of the land” (future Eretz Yisrael), this refers to David, whose attribute is מלכות, Royalty, David representing this symbol on earth, the Jewish people. David is directly linked to the patriarch Avraham, was shown “the whole land,” so that he would be aware that the glory of the Kingdom of David would be directly traceable to him. This is the reason why north and south, east and west are listed here in this order. According to Ari za’l, ימה, “west,” refers to the emanation יסוד, the emanation directly above the emanation מלכות, the one symbolized by the kingdom of David.
[Malchut, as the “lowest” of the emanations, is the one closest to the physical universe. Rabbi Elie Munk (Ascent to Harmony) has described the emanation Malchut as “History” (of man), thus seeing it as the bridge between the actual physical universe and the celestial domains, since when something becomes “history,” it has either receded or ascended (depending on whether the persons making history made constructive or destructive contributions) to a domain beyond the physical but robbing it of the “substance” common to phenomena in the earthly domain of the universe. Ed.]
According to the Zohar, tzaddik and tzedek, the righteous person and the performance of righteous deeds, are indivisible, i.e. the emanations מלכות and יסוד always go hand in hand. We find this concept first alluded to in the Torah when Malki Tzedek, King of Shalem, (Jerusalem) in Genesis 14,18 congratulates Avram on his victory, blesses him in the name of the Lord, and presents him with bread and wine. The word לחם, commonly understood as “bread,” is used to describe חכמה, “wisdom,” whereas the word יין, commonly understood as “wine” means בינה, “insight,” in this context. Malki Tzedek presented these items as symbols of the two highest emanations man can usually attain, both of which Avraham employed in his service of the Lord.
[As on previous occasions, the author sees in such apparently irrelevant details as a King bringing bread and wine from hundreds of kilometers from Jerusalem. According to Genesis 14,15, Avraham had pursued the armies of Kedorleomer all the way to Damascus) an allusion to something far more profound. Ed.]
The Zohar I,199 traces the fact that a tzaddik serves the Lord with חכמה and בינה to Job 28,28 יראת ה' היא חכמה וסור מרע בינה, “Reverence for the Lord is wisdom, to shun evil is understanding, insight.” The two blessings that Malki Tzedek, who was viewed as G’d’s High Priest in those days, most likely Shem, Noach’s oldest son, bestowed on Avram, represent the two emanations that Avram had been able to use in his service of the Lord, and are reflected in Targum Yonathan’s translation of the Torah, in the first verses of the Torah in which they appear. [In our verses, instead of commending Avraham to G’d, as we would translate the words ברוך אברם ל.., Yonathan ben Uzziel translates: ברוך אברם מ..., “Avram has been blessed by the supreme G’d, etc.” Ed.] Targum Yerushalmi translates already the first words of the Torah, i.e. בראשית ברא אלוקים את השמים ואת הארץ, as “in the beginning G’d used the emanation of חכמה to create heaven and earth.”
Ask RabbiBookmarkShareCopy
Kedushat Levi
Genesis 14,18. “and Malki Tzedek King of Shalem produced bread and wine, seeing that he was a priest loyal to the Supreme G’d.”
We have previously referred to two different types of people worshipping G’d, one worshipping Him out of a sense of negating himself as a person, making no demands on life, whereas the other expresses his worship of G’d through performance of positive and negative commandments, as well as by being of assistance to his fellow-man. The former is dedicated truly to the metaphysical world, the totally spiritual Being Who created the universe, the one we described as אין, presiding over אין prior to commencing creation, whereas the other serves the Lord under the heading יש, thereby raising the phenomena in the physical world from a mundane to a more spiritual level when he performs the positive and negative commandments of his Creator. G’d gave the Jewish people these commandments to perform as part of living in a domain called “יש.” Since the person serving G’d under the heading of אין does not perform specific commandments applicable in the יש part of the universe, he cannot draw down from the metaphysical world any of G’d’s largesse, held in reserve by G’d for the human race.
It is an error to think that by performing מצות מעשיות commandments involving our bodies in what appear to be mundane activities, we have closed the door to being part of the meta-physical world, the אין. This element of the אין part of the universes is the נחת רוח, a pleasurable sensation, satisfaction that man’s good deeds cause the Creator to experience.
Indeed, he who draws down upon himself physical gratifications in this world by means of his מצוה performance, attaches himself both to the אין and to theיש aspects of the universes; he does the former through having desired to provide his Creator with this sense of satisfaction, with the feeling that He has demonstrated to the creatures in the celestial regions that He had been correct in His fondest hopes when He undertook to create a free-willed human being; such a person also attached himself to the יש part of the universe as the commandments of the Torah were given in order to make him an inseparable part of this יש part of the universe. This is the reason why, on occasion, we find that some people by dint of performing G’d’s commandments find their livelihood on this earth.
We have previously referred to two different types of people worshipping G’d, one worshipping Him out of a sense of negating himself as a person, making no demands on life, whereas the other expresses his worship of G’d through performance of positive and negative commandments, as well as by being of assistance to his fellow-man. The former is dedicated truly to the metaphysical world, the totally spiritual Being Who created the universe, the one we described as אין, presiding over אין prior to commencing creation, whereas the other serves the Lord under the heading יש, thereby raising the phenomena in the physical world from a mundane to a more spiritual level when he performs the positive and negative commandments of his Creator. G’d gave the Jewish people these commandments to perform as part of living in a domain called “יש.” Since the person serving G’d under the heading of אין does not perform specific commandments applicable in the יש part of the universe, he cannot draw down from the metaphysical world any of G’d’s largesse, held in reserve by G’d for the human race.
It is an error to think that by performing מצות מעשיות commandments involving our bodies in what appear to be mundane activities, we have closed the door to being part of the meta-physical world, the אין. This element of the אין part of the universes is the נחת רוח, a pleasurable sensation, satisfaction that man’s good deeds cause the Creator to experience.
Indeed, he who draws down upon himself physical gratifications in this world by means of his מצוה performance, attaches himself both to the אין and to theיש aspects of the universes; he does the former through having desired to provide his Creator with this sense of satisfaction, with the feeling that He has demonstrated to the creatures in the celestial regions that He had been correct in His fondest hopes when He undertook to create a free-willed human being; such a person also attached himself to the יש part of the universe as the commandments of the Torah were given in order to make him an inseparable part of this יש part of the universe. This is the reason why, on occasion, we find that some people by dint of performing G’d’s commandments find their livelihood on this earth.
Ask RabbiBookmarkShareCopy