Havayah

When reciting a complete Scriptural or liturgical verse, this Name, the four-letter Tetragrammaton, is pronounced Adonai; otherwise, it is referred to as Hashem ("the Name") or "Havayah" (a permutation of the letters of the Tetragrammaton).

The Name Havayah is the most sacred of all of God's Names. It is referred to as the "essential Name (shem ha'etzem)," representing the absolute transcendence of Divine Essence (Atzmut); the "unique Name (shem hameyuchad)," representing the existential paradox of God's omnipresence and omnipotence remaining constant before and after Creation; and the "explicit Name (shem hameforash)," representing God's ultimate will in creation, to reveal to the world His very Essence.

In Kabbalah, the Name Havayah represents the innermost soul and light of all the Divinely emanated sefirot. Its 4 letters, together with the kotzo shel yud ("spike of the yud"), are seen as corresponding to the entire configuration of the sefirot : Kotzo shel yud--keter; yud--chochmah; first hei--binah; vav--midot (from chesed to yesod); final hei--malchut.

In particular, the Name Havayah manifests itself at two levels, first at the level of chochmah, whose inner spiritual state is bitul (selflessness), the "father" principle in Kabbalah, and second at the level of tiferet, whose inner spiritual state is rachamim (mercy), the level of "son" in Kabbalah. The union of these two principles, by the power of the Name Havayah, is alluded to in the verse "what is his name and what is the name of his son" (Proverbs 30:4)--(the word "what," ma = 45 = the primary "full spelling" of Havayah).

When seen as corresponding to the sefirah of chochmah, the Name Havayah reflects the Divine power of the continual recreation of all reality (a process which includes 4 stages, corresponding to the 4 letters of Havayah: yud--contraction [of God's infinite light into a point]; hei--expansion [in the concealed realm]; vav--extension [from the concealed to the revealed realm]; hei--expansion [in the revealed realm]). This Divine power derives from the sefirah of chochmah (whose initial manifestation is the creation of time itself), and is alluded to in the verse: "Havayah with chochmah established the earth (Proverbs 3:19)."

As the primary manifestation of the Name Havayah in creation is at the level of tiferet (which is called the "middle pillar," which rises to keter and descends to malchut), it is seen, in general, as reflecting God's "attribute of mercy." While in the Torah's first account of Creation only the Name Elokim appears, in the second account of Creation, the Name Havayah precedes the Name Elokim. Our sages interpret this phenomenon as "in the beginning, God intended to create the world in accordance with the attribute of strict judgment, but saw that the world would not survive; so He joined it with the attribute of mercy, which He made precede the attribute of strict judgment."

Havayah = 26 = 2 times 13. 13 = echad ("one"). Thus, when we proclaim "Hear O Israel, Havayah our God, Havayah is One," we express God's absolute unity as the ratio of 26 to 13, of the "whole" to the "half," implying that God (the whole) and His creation (the half) are essentially One.

In at-bash , the Name Havayah transforms to mem, tzadik, pei, tzadik, which equals 300, the letter shin . 300 also equals the highest "full spelling" of God's Name Elokim. This equality implies that "Havayah [supernatural revelation] is [absolutely one with] Elokim [natural order]." On the head--Tefilin are inscribed two shins, one with three heads and one with four heads. The three headed shin, the shin of this world, represents the "full spelling" of Elokim, while the four headed shin, the shin of the world to come, represents the at-bash transformation of Havayah.

In total, there are 27 ways to spell Havayah in full (each one of the three letters hei, vav, hei, possesses three spellings; (3 x 3 x 3 = 27). Together they = 1521 = 39 squared (39 = Havayah echad). The four primary "full spellings" referred to in Kabbalah = 72, 63, 45, 52, which together equal 232. Their average value (232 divided by 4) = 58, chen (Divinely inspired "grace").

Previous

Next