Rabbi Joseph Gikatilla’s Sha’are Orah

Memories and Promises (Continued)

Succeeding as they do to extend the meaning of life (or life-experience) beyond the length of life, memory and promise pose as the passport beyond the static drift of disconnected temporality.

For Gikatilla, there are several stars hung in this constellation that can substitute for the term promise. Our collection steps in and around the issue with terms such as covenant [BRIT], oath [SheVuAH] and pact [NeDeR]. Shifting focus from memory to promise Gikatilla writes:

Know that it is through this Sphere that the Torah established the language of SHeVuAh (oath). Allow me to explain: know that any oath that one may swear depends on the attribute known as EL CHaY, the reason being that and usage of the word SHeVuAh (oath) is derived from the word SHiVAh (seven). The essence of this is contained in what Abraham, our father, said to Avimelech:

“Take the SHeVa (seven) ewes from me as a proof that I dug the well.” Therefore the place was called BE’eR SHeVa, for it was there that both niSHVAu (gave oaths). (Genesis 21:30)

Behold the three different usages of the language that have been mentioned in this verse; each usage [of the root SHeVa] has an impact on the other. The first part [of the verse] states: “Take the SHeVa ewes from me as proof that I dug the well”. The the verse continues, “Therefore the place was called BE’eR SHeVa”, and what is written after that? “For it was there that both niSHVAu (gave oaths).” The meaning of these three uses of SHeVa—the SheVa (seven) ewes, BE’eR SHeVa and niSHVAu (gave oaths)—these three meanings united during that week, therefore the verse stated: “Therefore they called the place BE’eR SheVa”. Why does the verse say “Therefore”? It must pertain to the SHeVa (seven) ewes and the SHaVuA (oath), because both were given as reasons for calling the place BE’eR SHeVa. (47)

Being that a foundation provides stability (a YeSoD function) we see from Hannah Arendt that “…the power of stabilization inherent in the faculty of making promises has been known throughout our tradition.” (48) Associate images with the number seven, SHeVa, include a geometric representation whereby seven is divided into six and one—the six denoting the extremities of space (up, down, left, right, backwards and forwards) or possibilities of motion. The 7^th coordinate point would be the intersection of the six in the middle. As a nodal point, the 7^th marks the secret of SHaBaT where the motion finds rest in being able to coordinate its directions and unify them.

Kabbalistic literature is filled with references of this nature. In Gikatilla’s case, he pursues the connection with SHaBaT to the extent that it also manifests itself as a sign and a covenantal bond that turns this spatial analogy into a temporal one—that of gathering and reorienting the time of the week. Thus he writes:

Now we must mention that SHaBaT which is connected to the attribute of EL CHaY is called OHT (sign). As it is said,

“It is an OHT between me and the Israelites forever.” (Exodus 31:17)

…Therefore, know that wherever the word OHT is found in the Torah, it is the essence of EL CHaY, which is the essence of memory by which God reminds all the children of the world; and the OHT BRIT [sign of the covenant] of SHaBaT and the BRIT of circumcision is special between Him and all flesh on the land. (49)

Functionally SHaBaT represents an interruption on the mundane, an interruption which can also be perceived as the conclusion of time speeding along towards its telos. As the “teleological” circuit-breaker lodged in the schema of time, SHaBaT marks the creative process itself, binding time together and signaling its renewal. SHaBaT is foundational. It is the recurrent reminder of creation and the rest and comfort, support and stability that preserves us.

So anyone who transgresses an oath goes against EL CHaY and the seven Spheres which are the essence of seven days of creation. If, through his negligence and contrariness, he transgressed his oath, from where would he get life and good? For the world was created from these seven Spheres alone and it is from them that all creatures are sustained—seven days within the essence of seven Spheres contained in the essence of SHeVuAh (oath). If, God forbid, one were to lie about his oath, he would be uprooted from the seven Spheres which are the essence of his existence, and he would thus be uprooted from the world. From all this one learns that SHeVuAh (oaths) are contained in EL ChaY, which is the essence of SHeVI’I (the seventh), which is the essence of CHaYaH haNeFeSH (living souls),which is the essence of the [Biblical words] SHaBaT vayiNaFaSH (he rested and made souls). (50)

Transgressing an oath is to deny the entire framework of creation, to shatter the spine of time thereby rendering all progress meaningless. Paralyzed, we come under the spell of our own inertia. All this is to live in opposition to life. Speech destroyed the world it once built. Yet, we are not without reprieve. We can keep our commitments. SHaBaT is not a requiem. Tied to the EL CHaY, the Living God, SHaBaT deploys new possibilities and helps us to carry on.

Why are the stakes to high? Do the Rabbis seek to brandish the prongs of wrath and guilt to pierce us, especially when considering Gikatilla’s explanation for the transgression of oath that follows?

The punishment for betraying an oath has already been revealed in the tractate Shevuot, as the rabbis said: “An oath betrayed consumes that which fire cannot” (Shevuot 39a). This reason is very clear in nature. In nature, fire burns and consumes wood, clothing and other things like them, but it cannot consume dust and stones, for even if stones are burned they return to dust, Yet, a betrayed oath consumes stones and dust, the reason being that a creation has no existence outside the seven Spheres which are known as the seven days, for heaven, earth and their hosts depend on the seven Spheres….Whoever betrays these seven Spheres, which is the essence of the oath, these seven Spheres consume his body, his life, his income both the land and that which can be carried off. Because all is dependent on them since all of creation was created from them, they were like the artisan who did the work and has the power to destroy and ruin his work. Similarly, one who betrays an oath betrays the artisan who made the world. The artisan can destroy the man’s house, him and whatever else the man has, even the dust and the stones, for the craftsman who made the stones can eradicate their memory from the world. The essence of the word AoMaN (craftsman) is contained in the world AMeN [which was mentioned in the previous verse]. Therefore, he who answers AMeN [to an oath] is seen as if he has sworn to the same oath….That is to say that the one who swears, swears to the AoMaN (artisan) who made the world. (51)

Does the oath/promise command such power that we are compelled to announce the destruction of the world in its absence or perversion? A world operating without the concept of oaths could not exist. Everything would become unglued. To whom or to what could we attach ourselves? Deprived of promise, deprived of memory, are we not lost to the indeterminable? How can any form of self-reliance exist?

The seven Spheres (52) constitute the being of the natural world—we might even suggest, working with a Heideggerian translation, that they enframe all the objects that we encounter and render them intelligible within the greater phenomenon of being-in-the-world. (53) Turning to Nietzsche, for whom the question of promises is never questioned enough, we can harvest significant insights from the juxtaposition of the following passage from his Genealogy at this juncture.

In order to have that degree of control over the future, man must first have learned to distinguish between what happens by accident and what by design, to think causally, to view the future as the present and anticipate it, to grasp with certainty what is end and what is means, in all, to be able to calculate, compute – and before he can do this, man himself will really have to become reliable, regular, automatic [notwendig], even in his own self-image, so that he, as someone making a promise is, is answerable for his own future! (54)

From this do we ascertain that causality requires the concepts of memory and promise to be meaningful?  To think a future as identical with the present is to maintain a memory-bond between the two. Sharing a common memory, present and future unite in the promise suspended between them—from this marriage will spring the ability for self-determination starting with the rudiments of an ordering of events into a series.

This series [SeDeR (55)] may come to manifest itself in an untimely manner and prove to be both more and less than a linear order. In practice, it may show up in the distant heavens or in daily episodes on earth, as the constellation whose reflections echo one of the barest facts of the universe in a more original manner of truth that it presents to us. So primordial is the creative capacity of promises (and oaths) that their first register is heard on the ontological level. As Gikatilla cautions:

For the SHeVuAh is the artisan that created fire, stones, dust and all creatures. Fire, therefore, cannot destroy stones and dust, for dust also is one of the basic elements, like fire—both of which were created. The SHeVuAh, however, which is the essence of the artisan and the creator, can destroy fire, stones and anything else among the created, for everything is in the hands of the Artisan who made all the exists, Blessed be He, Blessed be He. (56)

The allusion that Gikatilla gives as to why the oath plays with existence itself can be found in his apparently off-handed remark that: “All oaths which are SHeVuAh’s [a oath invoking God’s name] are uttered in Y-H-V-H’s Name while all oaths which are NeDeRs [an oath where one promises to give tribute or a sacrifice to the Temple] are uttered for Y-H-V-H.” (57) Arguably an oath that is “uttered in Y-H-V-H’s Name” carries an appropriate emphasis (here superadded by Weinstein in his translation) highlighted by the word “in.” What does “in” this specific name entail?

Tradition—most assertively kabbalistic tradition—reads this name, the Tetragrammaton as HaVaYaH meaning Being. Thus, an oath uttered in this Name suggests that Being, or perhaps more aptly put, the ground of Being, is evoked here, which, seen through the Heideggerian prism, refers to time.

While this puzzle would require extensive treatment to justify to the philosophic contents packed within it, let it suffice to speculate that this phenomenon has been addressed in various kabbalistic tracts as the ordering of time—the prerequisite challenge that precedes the full-blown releasing to time proper. (58)

⁴⁷ Gates of Light. Pp.83-84.

⁴⁸ The Human Condition. P. 243.

⁴⁹ See in particular Gates of Light p.82-3.

⁵⁰ Ibid. pp.84-85.

⁵¹ Ibid. p.86.

⁵² From CHeSeD to MaLCHuT which are the lower seven of the seferiotic spectrum.

⁵³ See for instance Heidegger’s essay “The Question Concerning Technology” pp.3-35. Of particular interest is a phrase employed by Heidegger at the end of this essay regarding reflection on art [the purely creative, the YeSoD as the organ of that creativity, and the AoMaN or artisan in our discussion] where it “does not shut its eyes to the constellation [emphasis mine] of truth after which we are questioning.” P.35.

⁵⁴ Quoted p. 89-90 in The Gift of Language. There Düttmann cites Nietzsche from his On the Genealogy of Morals p.39 trans. Carol Diethe, Cambridge University Press.

⁵⁵ See note 12 above.

⁵⁶ Gates of Light. pp. 86-87.

⁵⁷ Ibid. p.85.

⁵⁸ See Elliot R. Wolfson’s Alef, Mem, Tau: Kabbalistic Musings on Time, Truth and Death pp.62,73,77-79,84-88,94,109,111,217n108, 220n151,222nn178,180,230n283 for an detailed treatment of the question of seder zemannim, or “order of time/temporal ordering.”

 http://www.interinclusion.org/inspirations/memory-and-promise-part-7/ 

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