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Orchard of Delights
find rest. The Slonimer Rebbe adds that this Shabbat dispensation
figuratively applies to each and every person as well. During the six
days of the week, we wander about trying to navigate the obstacles
and challenges of the world, but every Shabbat we find rest and peace
of mind, as we bask in the holiness of Shabbat.
The aforementioned Midrash continues by declaring that when he
heard this, Adam rapped himself on the head and said: “This is the
power of repentance and I didn’t know it!” Immediately he stood
up and exclaimed: “A Psalm, a song for the day of Shabbat. It is
good to thank God and to sing praise to Your name” (Psalms 92:1).
This psalm of individual revelation has been incorporated into our
evening and morning Shabbat prayers. It is a potent reminder of the
power of teshuvah (repentance) and the healing quality of the holy
Shabbat. (This insight was discussed in The Mystical Power of Music,
pp. 33-34.)
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2 Bereishit
state of consciousness when they realize that the seeming plurality
in the world is really a manifestation of God’s oneness. Thus we must
recognize the spiritual equation guiding and infusing creation with
purpose: “One becomes two in order to become One.”
The creation of the first human being follows this very same
principle: “And God created Adam in His image, in the image of God
He created him [Adam]; male and female He created them” (Genesis
1:27). Adam, created in God’s image, was one unified being. Indeed,
the Sages deduced from this verse that Adam was created as one
unified androgynous being – “male and female He created them”
(Bereishit Rabbah 8:1). Later God informed Adam that “it is not good
for man to be alone” and promised to make him a helper (Genesis
2:18). Keeping his word, God formed a woman out of Adam’s side,
thus turning one androgynous being into two distinct people, a male
and a female. Since the guiding principle of the Divine creative process
stated above predicates the two becoming one again, in the very next
verse we are taught that “Therefore a man shall leave his father and
his mother and cling to his wife and they shall become one flesh”
(Genesis 2:24). Man and woman only become two in order to become
one again through marriage and the birth of a child, born of their
union. Marriage in Judaism is accorded tremendous importance as it
allows human beings to realize their full potential of being made in
God’s image: in marriage, man and woman replicate the very process
and creative dynamic through which God created the world.
£The Essence of NamesThe Essence of Names
££The Essence of Names
After placing Adam in the Garden of Eden, the Torah recounts that
God paraded all the animals before Adam to see what he would
call them: “and whatever Adam called each creature, that was its
name” (Genesis 2:19). Adam, according to Kabbalah and Chassidut,
assessed the fundamental nature of each animal and identified the
Hebrew letters that best embodied that quintessential essence. This,
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