נח , חן , והויה

Saw the following in a sefer called פי המדבר.

The word חן (and consequently נח as well) being related to הויה as follows:

ה, וה , הוה , י"הוה = 58

At first glance I thought it a little strange because it's the opposite of  the usual concept of אחוריים, where usually the first letter of the שם is the point of origin and then gradually expands out -- י , יה , יהו, יהו"ה.  and here it's the opposite -- the last letter of ה being the origin.

But then i thought it's beautiful. The idea of the conventional אחוריים I vaguely remember seeing in עץ חיים as being the idea that every upper ספירה is too "needy" to receive it's own sustenance from the sefira above it, and so every sefira is "looking up" to the sefira above it to receive it's sustenance, and so you have י standing alone, and then you have the ה tagging along and trying to cling to it, hence יה, and so on.

The beauty here then by חן and נח  is that the lowest sefira is standing on its own, not lifting it's eyes for any heavenly salvation or inspiration or special treatment. Just being with what is without expecting anything more. נח איש האדמה. ונח מצא חן.

The upper sefirot then choosing to turn their eyes downward,  so that now you have a new kind of אחוריים wherein every sefira is focusing downward to give, to deal with what is needed. the heavenly assistance that then comes is not as a result of any request or expectation -- וחנותי את אשר אחון.

Just a thought for now. Maybe has substance, maybe doesn't.

זמה היא

תוספתא קידושין פ"א: ומלאה הארץ זמה זמה היא. ר"א אומר זה פנוי [הבא] על הפנויה שלא לשם אישות. ר"א אומר מנין שענוש לפני [מקום כבא] על אשה ואמה? נאמר כאן זמה ונאמר להלן זמה שנאמר (ויקרא כ) ואיש אשר יקח את אשה ואת אמה זמה היא וגו'

I was thinking the logic is actually very straightforward. Why should someone marry a woman? because he wants to bring out more of her in the world. if so, why would you sleep with her mother or daughter who in essence embodies them? it can only be because you just want the physical pleasure, as is the case by a פנוי הבא על הפנויה; not interested in building up and building forth the woman you're with, just interested in the pleasure. 'nuff said.

A general thought on Masechet Gittin

It's been a long time since i learnt Masechet Gittin, and even now I just got up to the first few pages, but I was always bothered by the organization of the masechta. Why in the world should it begin with the seemingly trivial halachot of שליח ממדינת הים צריך שיאמר בפני נכתב ובפני נחתם and not start with the more fundamental concepts of גט such as for example whether עדי מסירה או עדי חתימה כרתי (which equally baffling is placed only at the last perek if memory serves me correctly). It's completely backwards!

So these are the lines along which i'm thinking: Given that everything can be placed along a spectrum between intrinsic existential being (הויה)  versus the manifestation of that being and how it is perceived and related to by the external world, even by the most distant and far removed from it, otherwise known as שם, a name by which the person is called by the external world. And being that the former is a male dimension whereas the latter concept of שם is a female one. And being that מסכת גיטין is dealing in a feminine world of divorcing a woman  --- it then can make sense possibly that the masechta will go in opposite direction i.e. starting at the furthest outpost of שם and working its way to the intrinsic essence of being.

So we begin with the most removed scenario of גט possible -- ממדינת הים, with no husband in sight but only a שליח, and not even עדי הגט  in front of us, and we discuss to what degree and it what circumstances does this removed גט impact us. Only at the end of the masechta will we discuss the fundamental question of what a גט  is intrinsically in and of itself.

Just a proposal at this point. i haven't learnt enough of the masechta to know if it holds water.

Anansi the Spider and His Six Sons

So we received a children's book for my daughter, Anansi and his six sons. It's based on the African Ashanti folklore, and the glaring question i have after reading it is how in the world did kabbalistic concepts make their way into Ashanti Folklore?!

A brief summary: Six sons that jointly and together save their father and then quibble about who is deserving of a prize, a seventh element (a glowing ball) that then becomes none other than -- the Moon. That sounds peculiarly kabbalistic to me...

Full story can be found here.

Peculiar.

Economic Base Analysis

Interesting to me that there is this economic theory called "economic base analysis" which essentially sees an economy divided into two two sectors -- Basic (Export) and Non-Basic (local) sectors.

The basic sector being defined as :

• Consists of activities that bring money into the local economy from the outside
• Consists of activities that meet external demand
• Consists of activities dependent on factors external to the local economy

Note how nicely that matches the concept of יסוד (base) being a function of relationship with the external world.

Taking it a step further, according to EBA the local sector only thrives as a result of the Base sector. Put in our terms a person's internal self only thrives insofar as his connection and relationship to the outside world.

T

Passover Thoughts - מכות, ד' בנים

The lengthy multiplication of the מכות in Egypt and at ים סוף in the Haggada. Consider that given the fact that the word of מכה itself in kabbalistic writing is often used in terms of multiplication.


ד' בנים -- Was thinking to say that the order of the 4 sons is actually by order of greatest to lowest, the רשע then being second best to that of the חכם. The reason being that in terms of development a man with passion to question -- even if misdirected -- is still significantly greater than a man who has very little drive to question (תם) or even worse a man who has no drive to question at all (שאינו יודע לשאול). Mediocrity and "living life on auto-pilot" being then the greatest evils of all when seen from the perspective of Pesach self-growth and development.

Opportunity Costs of Today

(Have to be terse. No time)

Learning some fundamentals of Finance of late. One of the concepts I found to be really insightful. It goes like this:

If you purchased a home 20 years ago for $100,000 and today it's worth say $1,000,0000 - How much should you rent it out for? One school of thought is to compare it against whatever rate of interest you have readily accessible to yourself. The thought goes that if I can get a 5% interest rate today on my money, then in theory I could sell my 1 million dollar home and deposit the cash while getting $50,000 interest. That being the case I have no reason to rent the house out unless I atleast get that amount. You then are receiving a 5% return on your investment.

Maybe it's obvious to others, but the thing that really struck me was this -- there's no relevance to what your purchase price was of the home in regards to the present calculation of managing your house. You could have looked at the house as a running investment -- from the date of purchase to the current day. in which case you've had a great run -- 10X your initial investment plus the future cash flow of rent, whatever amount you decide to rent out for.

But you don't. Why? Because today you're making a separate choice of investing $1,000,000, not $100K. The question is not anymore what to do with a house that i bought for $100K, it's what to do with $1 Million, and it's on that number alone that you benchmark your success or failure.

And so, the insight for me -- no matter what a man has made of himself; no matter what great talmid chacham he has become, what institutions he's founded, what families he's grown -- vis-a-vis the future outlook of the rest of his life -- it's entirely irrelevant. That would be all fine and dandy if he dies today. Then  you could take a look back and benchmark where he started and where he ended. But so long as he's alive -- today, tomorrow and the next -- the only relevant issue is how are you optimizing the resources and achievements you have in your life - today!  Because you're not gauging what has Daniel Mokhtar become since the day he was born. You're gauging what has the Daniel Mokhtar of the past done with himself for that extra day he was given existence today - March  2, 2015.

Is there any positive ROI for today alone?

Here's to hoping.