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What Is a Soul? II. Anatomy of the Soul

In the biblical story of the creation of Adam, the Torah states: Then the Eternal God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.Genesis 2:7 The word translated into English as “soul” in the original Hebrew is nefesh. This is the first and the lowest level of the soul given to Adam. The taxonomy and anatomy of a soul in Judaism are quite complex. Original biblical sources speak of three levels of the soul: nefesh (“soul”), ru’ach (“spirit”),[1] and neshamah (“breath”).[2] The Kabbalah speaks of the five levels of the soul: nefesh, ru’ach, neshamah, chayah, and yechidah. This is based on classical rabbinic sources. As stated in the midrash, “By five names is the soul called: nefesh, ru’ach, [...]

By |2021-11-24T22:48:22-05:00November 5th, 2021|Ezekiel, Kabbalah, Names of God, Sefirot, Soul, Spirituality, Uncategorized|1 Comment
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What Is a Soul? I. The Spiritual vs. the Material

Introduction Most Americans believe in an immortal soul.[1] Most scientists think the soul does not exist. Why do so many people believe in an immortal soul? Why do scientists not believe in it? What is a soul, anyway? Do we need a soul? We will explore these and related questions in this essay. The French philosopher and mathematician René Descartes famously said “If philosophers were always in agreement about the meaning of words, almost all their disputes would evaporate.”[2] There is hardly a better example to demonstrate this truism than the concept of a soul—one of the most misunderstood and ill-defined concepts. A soul is perceived as spiritual, spooky, and otherworldly. While there is nothing spooky or otherworldly about a soul, it is indeed a spiritual concept. However, that knowledge does not help us, [...]

By |2021-11-18T22:42:50-05:00October 22nd, 2021|Soul, Space, Spirituality, Uncategorized|2 Comments
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Three Donkeys

And Abraham rose early in the morning, and saddled his ass.Geneses 22:3 And Moses took his wife and his sons, and set them upon the ass, and he returned to the land of Egypt.Exodus 4:20 Behold, thy king cometh unto thee, he is triumphant, and victorious, lowly, and riding upon an ass.Zechariah 9:9 The Torah tells us of a famous donkey riding through biblical history—Abraham used it; Moses used it; Mashiach will use it in the future.[1] In Hebrew, an “ass” or a “donkey” is chamor. In the verse in Exodus, Moses set his wife and children on the donkey—ha-chamor. The donkey means a known donkey. How is it known? Rashi states, based on the midrash Pirke d’Rabbi Eliezer, that this is the same donkey that Abraham saddled with wood on the way [...]

By |2021-10-20T10:16:27-04:00October 19th, 2021|Uncategorized|1 Comment
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Zettaflood

In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, on the seventeenth day of the month, on the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened.Genesis 7:11 As the Torah tells us, at the dawn of human history, the flood swept the world. Most people, except for Noah and his family, drowned in that flood. Today, we too are drowning in a flood of a different kind—the informational flood. To put the current flood in perspective, consider this: according to one estimate in 2003, between the beginning of human civilization and the spread of computers, humanity generated cumulatively about 12 exabytes (12x1018 bytes) of data. However, in 2002 alone, we generated 5 exabytes of data. According to another estimate, [...]

By |2021-10-05T16:43:54-04:00October 4th, 2021|Fractals, Genesis, Kabbalah, Mathematics, Noach, Parshah, Pentateuch (Chumash), Uncategorized|1 Comment
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Fill the Earth

And God created man in His own image, in the image of God created He him; male and female created He them. And God blessed them; and God said unto them: “Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it . . . .Genesis 1:28 God created man, male and female, and commanded them to be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth, and subdue or conquer it. While the literal meaning of this verse is apparent—fill the earth with your progeny by procreating[1]—it begs a question. Specifically, the phrase “fill the earth” seems superfluous—wasn’t it enough to say “Be fruitful and multiply”? Indeed, the Hebrew word milupim[2] (“to multiply”) is etymologically related to the word mil’u[3] (“to fill”).[4] If humans were to multiply, as commanded by God, they would naturally fill the earth. It seems [...]

By |2021-10-04T15:13:44-04:00October 4th, 2021|Bereishit, Bereshit, Creation, Fractals, Genesis, Kabbalah, Mathematics, Mathematics, Parshah, Pentateuch (Chumash), Space, Uncategorized|0 Comments
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Cosmological Problem of Initial Conditions and the Universe of Tohu

Now the earth was unformed and void…Genesis 1:2 We have a big problem in cosmology. It is a problem of initial conditions.[1] However, before we can explain this problem, we need to review some basic concepts of thermodynamics. Thermodynamics developed by Boltzmann and others[2] described the behavior of gases and liquids and the transfer of heat. A key concept in thermodynamics is entropy. Entropy is a measure of disorder, of chaos. The second law of thermodynamics states that in an isolated system, entropy always increases with time. The second law of thermodynamics is the reason behind universal decay. And entropy is the measure of the decay.[3] Shining stars produce entropy. Stars collapsing into black holes produce entropy. Evaporating black holes produce entropy.[4] The entropy of the universe is increasing.[5] Let us assume that now, [...]

By |2021-10-01T12:43:32-04:00September 30th, 2021|Bereishit, Bereshit, Cosmology, Creation, Genesis, Kabbalah, Parshah, Pentateuch (Chumash), Physics, Sefirot, Thermodynamics, Time, Uncategorized|2 Comments
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Let’s Make this Sukkot About Ananei HaKavod, not about Ananei ha-COVID

During the Holiday of Sukkot, we celebrate the divine providence that protected Jewish people from the sun and other dangers of the desert during their forty years of wandering in the desert. This providence came in the form of the ananei ha-koved (“the clouds of glory”). The clouds of divine glory hovered over Jewish people protecting them from the elements—hashgachah pratit (“divine providence”) was openly revealed. The concept of divine providence is often misunderstood. People expect open miracles. Nowadays, we no longer merit the open revelation of divine providence, which is concealed. However, it is still here guiding and protecting us, if we open ourselves to its protection. This reminds me of an old parable. After a shipwreck, a Jew was stranded on an uninhabited island. The Jew prayed to God for a [...]

By |2021-09-20T16:30:04-04:00September 20th, 2021|Uncategorized|1 Comment
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Yom Kippur—The Day of Pure Delight

Yom Kippur means “The Day of Atonement.” However, on a deeper level, Yom Kippur is the day of pure delight. To understand why, let us start with the day before—Erev Yom Kippur, the Eve of Yom Kippur. Erev Yom Kippur is considered a semi-holiday—a festive day, on which we do not say tachanun (penitent prayers) and on which we wear festive attire and eat two festive meals (as required on holidays). This is rather strange. The Eve of Yom Kippur is one of the Ten Days of Repentance (Asseret Yemei Teshuvah). Shouldn’t we be busy regretting past mistakes (and, indeed, we do!) and repenting our evil ways, instead of indulging in sumptuous meals? Moreover, it’s the day before Yom Kippur—the day on which every person is judged, and everyone’s fate is sealed for [...]

By |2021-09-16T22:09:47-04:00September 15th, 2021|Uncategorized|0 Comments
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The Offering of the First Fruits and Loop Quantum Gravity

. . . Thou shalt take of the first of all the fruit of the ground, which thou shalt bring in from thy land that the Lord thy God giveth thee; and thou shalt put it in a basket and shalt go unto the place which the Lord thy God shall choose to cause His name to dwell there. . . . And the priest shall take the basket out of thy hand, and set it down before the altar of the Lord thy God.Deuteronomy 26:2,4 And He garbed Himself with righteousness as a coat of mail, and a helmet of salvation upon His head . . .Isaiah 59:17 The Torah portion Tavo begins with the commandment of the offering of the First Fruits (bikkurim). The simple meaning of this mitzvah is self-evident. [...]

By |2021-09-06T16:28:20-04:00September 6th, 2021|Uncategorized|1 Comment
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The Paradox of Steven Weinberg

The world has lost one of the greatest theoretical physicists of our time—Steven Weinberg (1933–2021). I never met him in person. But I studied his textbooks at university. His Gravitation and Cosmology, translated into Russian, was one of the few books I brought with me when we left the Soviet Union in 1982. This book is still on my shelf. Weinberg’s contribution to physics was enormous. His electroweak theory earned him a 1979 Nobel Prize in physics (which he shared with Abdus Salam and Sheldon Glashow). His work played an essential role in laying the foundation for the Standard Model of particle physics. He made significant contributions to the theory of strong nuclear forces, formulating the quark theory of strong interactions called “technicolor.” His idea of effective field theory changed our understanding of [...]

By |2021-10-20T10:58:20-04:00August 31st, 2021|Uncategorized|1 Comment
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