Binah and Jehovah

Open main menu Search EditWatch this pageRead in another language Binah (Kabbalah) The Sephirot in Jewish Kabbalah Category:Sephirot v t e Binah (meaning "Understanding"; Hebrew: בינה‬), is the second intellectual sephira on the kabbalistic Tree of Life. It sits on the level below Keter (in the formulations that include that sephirah), across from Chokmah and directly above Gevurah. It is usually given four paths: to Keter, Chockmah, Gevurah, and Tiphereth (some Kabbalists place a path from Binah to Chesed as well.) In an anthropomorphic visualization (in which the sephirot are reversed, as if one is standing inside the tree, looking out) it may be related to the "left eye", "left hemisphere of the brain" or the "heart." Binah is associated with the color black.[1] DescriptionEdit According to the Bahir: "The third (utterance): quarry of the Torah, treasury of wisdom, quarry of God's spirit, hewn out by the spirit of God. This teaches that God hewed out all the letters of the Torah, engraving them with the Spirit, casting His forms within it".[2] Binah is 'intuitive understanding', or 'contemplation'. It is likened to a 'palace of mirrors' that reflects the pure point of light of Chokhmah, wisdom, increasing and multiplying it in an infinite variety of ways. In this sense, it is the 'quarry', which is carved out by the light of wisdom. It is the womb, which gives shape to the Spirit of God. On a psychological level, Binah is "processed wisdom," also known as deductive reasoning. It is davar mitoch davar—understanding one idea from another idea. While Chockmah is intellect that does not emanate from the rational process (it is either inspired or taught), Binah is the rational process that is innate in the person which works to develop an idea fully. Binah is associated with the feminine. The Bahir states: “For you shall call Understanding a Mother.” Classical Jewish texts state Binah yeterah natun l'nashim ("an extra measure of Binah was given to women"). In its fully articulated form, Binah possesses two partzufim. The higher of these is referred to as Imma Ila'ah ("the higher mother"), whereas the lower is referred to as tevunah ("comprehension"). These two partzufim are referred to jointly as Imma ("the mother"). Qualities derived from BinahEdit Ethical qualitiesEdit In the medieval text the Tomer Devorah, Rabbi Moses Cordovero elucidated the ethical qualities associated with each Sefira, which one must attempt to imitate. The attribute associated with Binah is complete repentance, for 'just as Binah sweetens all severities and neutralizes their bitterness, one should repent and rectify all flaws'. Non-Jewish associationsEdit In Western occultism, Binah is seen to take the raw force of Chokhmah, and to channel it into the various forms of creation.[citation needed] For example, in a car, you have the fuel and an engine. While Chokmah is the fuel, pure energy, Binah is the engine, pure receptivity. Either one without the other is useless. In its role as the ultimate Object, as opposed to Chokmah as the Subject, its role is similar to the role of Shakti[citation needed] in Indian mysticism. It is feminine, because it literally gives birth to the whole of creation, providing the supernal womb, with Chokmah providing the raw energy. The name of God associated with Binah is Jehovah Elohim, the archangel that presides over it is Tzaphkiel, the order of angels that resides in it are the Aralim (the Thrones) and the planet associated with it is Saturn.[citation needed] Binah is related to the Yoni, the womb, the Priestess card in the occult tarot (according to Arthur Edward Waite's "Pictorial Key to the Tarot"). Aleister Crowley's "Liber 777" associates it with Isis, Cybele, Demeter, Rhea, Woman, The Virgin Mary, Juno, Hecate, The "threes" of the Tarot, etc. Occultists have compared the Sephira with the chakras of Indian mysticism, and one such comparison is in comparing both Binah and Chokmah with the Ajna chakra, which is where both Shiva and Shakti are united. For its negative opposite on the Tree of Death, it has the demonic order Sathariel, ruled by the Archdemon Lucifuge Rofocale. In the correlation of Binah with Shakti and Chokmah with Shiva, Shakti is the animating life force whereas Shiva is dead, a corpse, without her energy. References External links Last edited 8 months ago by an anonymous user RELATED ARTICLES Keter Chokhmah Tiferet Content is available under CC BY-SA 3.0 unless otherwise noted.
A charming allegory is found in the Zohar, one which unveils better than anything ever did the true character of Jehovah or YHVH in the primitive conception of the Hebrew Kabalists. It is now found in the philosophy of I’bn Gebirol’s Kabbalah, translated by Isaac Myer. “In the introduction written by R’Hez’quee-yah, which is very old,” says our author, “and forms part of our Brody edition of the Zohar (I, 5b. sq.) is an account of a journey taken by R. El’azar, son of R. Shim-on b. Io’hai, and Rabbi Abbah.” They met a man with a heavy burden and asked his name; but he refused to give it and proceeded to explain to them Thorah -------------------------------------------------------------------------------"Jehovah" in Zohar-------------------------

Vol. 1, Page  394   THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
(Law). “They asked: ‘Who caused thee thus to walk and carry such a heavy load?’ He answered: ‘The letter , (Yod, which = 10, and is the symbolical letter of Kether and the essence and germ of the Holy name  YHVH) . . . . They said to him: ‘If thou wilt tell us the name of thy father, we will kiss the dust of thy feet.’ He replied: ‘As to my father, he had his dwelling in the Great Sea, and was a fish therein’ (like Vishnu and Dagon or Oannes), ‘which (first) destroyed the great sea’ . . . . . and he was great and mighty and ‘Ancient of Days,’ until he swallowed all the other fishes in the (Great) Sea . . . R. El’azar listened and said to him: ‘Thou art the Son of the Holy Flame, thou art the Son of Rab Ham — ’nun-ah Sabah [the old: the fish in Aramaic or Chaldee is nun (noon)] thou art the Son of the Light of the Thorah,” (Dharma) etc. Then the author explains that the feminine Sephiroth, Binah, is termed by the Kabalist the great sea: therefore Binah, whose divine names are Jehovah, Yah, and Elohim, is simply the Chaldean Tiamat, the female power, the Thalatth of Berosus, who presides over the Chaos, and was made out later by Christian theology to be the serpent and the Devil. She-He (Yah-hovah) is the supernal (Heh, and Eve). This Yah-hovah then or Jehovah, is identical with our Chaos — Father, Mother, Son, — on the material plane and in the purely physical World. Demon and Deus at one and the same time; the sun and moon, good and evil, God and Demon.