Kohen Gadol

Home/Tag: Kohen Gadol

The Standard Model

Introduction What could possibly be in common between the Standard Model of particle physics with some biblical accounts of Israelites’ travels in the Sinai desert, or with Kabbalistic doctrines related to the unfolding of spiritual worlds, or with the arrangement of the letter in the Name of G‑d? To suspect any connection or parallel between such different concepts may sound farfetched indeed. However, this is exactly what we are going to do in this essay. Remember that in structural analysis, we do not concern ourselves with the specifics or the nature of the objects at hand—we are only interested in the interrelationship between the objects, the high-level structure, or the storyline. So, let us not worry that particle physics speaks of… well, particles, whereas the Torah speaks of the arrangement of Jewish tribes [...]

By |2023-05-30T10:03:57-04:00May 25th, 2023|Bamidbar, Bamitbar, Kabbalah, Names of G‑d, Numbers, Parshah, Pentateuch (Chumash), Physics, Quantum Field Theory, Quantum Theory, Sefirot, Standard Model, Symmetry, Uncategorized|0 Comments
Read More

Brit Milah in Six Dimensions

Sefer Yetzira speaks of three dimensions: Olam, Shanah, and Nefesh.  Olam literally means "world" and signifies space. Shanah literally means "year" and signifies the dimension of time. Nefesh literally means "soul" and signifies the spiritual dimension. In another place, recognizing the space itself is three dimensional, Sefer Yetzira speaks of five-dimensional space which is a Minkowski spacetime with an addition of the fifth spiritual dimension. This construct is very similar to the Kaluza-Klein five-dimensional generalization of the General Theory of Relativity (a theory that is near and dear to my heart, because, unaware of its existence, I independently rediscovered it as a teenager.) Kaluza-Klein, first forgotten, is now experiencing a revival as a special case of the string theory. Sefer Yetzirah In every one of these dimensions, G‑d created the domain of holy [...]

By |2018-09-23T03:48:50-04:00September 18th, 2018|Uncategorized|1 Comment
Read More

Purim: Celebrating Randomness

The story of Purim, which we read in the Book of Esther, is a story about a righteous Jewish leader who held fast to his principles refusing to bow down to a rabid anti-Semite. It’s a story about a courageous Jewish queen, Esther, who saved her people risking her life. And yet, this holiday is not called by the name of Mordechai or Esther, it  is called Purim, because, as the Book of Esther informs us: For Haman the son of Hammedatha the Agagite, the adversary of all the Jews, had devised to destroy the Jews, and he cast the pur—that is the lot—to terrify them and destroy them… Therefore, they called these days Purim after the name pur. (Book of Esther, 9:24,26) This is odd because the casting of the lot (pur) [...]

By |2019-03-26T15:41:32-04:00March 12th, 2017|G‑d, Holidays (Yomim Tovim), Kabbalah, Names of G‑d, Purim, Quantum Theory, Randomness, Science, Uncategorized|0 Comments
Read More

Miracle of Chanukah—Seeing and not Collapsing

As I wrote in my post, Schrödinger  Menorah:  Burning  And  Not  Burning, the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, explains the miracle of Chanukah as a paradox of the menorah (chanukiah or hanukkiah) burning and not burning, thereby embodying the absolute nature of G‑d, who is not limited by His infinity and combines all possibilities including the infinitude (ko’ach bli gvul) and the finitude (ko’ach hagvul). The notion of the menorah burning and not burning easily lends itself to be cast in terms of the quantum superposition of states of burning and not burning. I couldn’t help myself to call it the Schrödinger Menorah. There a couple of problems, however, with this idea. Firstly, as the Rebbe wrote in 1971 in a letter to the editor of the Journal of the Association of [...]

By |2020-12-15T19:59:10-05:00December 26th, 2016|Chanukah, Collapse of the wavefunction, G‑d, Holidays (Yomim Tovim), Quantum Theory, Superposition, Uncategorized|5 Comments
Read More

Yom Kippur – Disentangling the Entangled

When G‑d created the first humans, Adam and Eve (Chavah), He created them as one. And G‑d created man in His own image, in the image of G‑d created He him; male and female created He them. (Gen. 1:27) Actually, as Midrash Rabbah (Gen. VIII:1) explains, Adam and Eve were created as one being as Siamese twins—attached by their side.  When the story of the creation of Adam is repeated in the next chapter, it seems as a very different story: And the Lord G‑d caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and he slept; and He took one of his ribs, and closed up the place with flesh instead thereof. And the rib, which the Lord G‑d had taken from the man, made He a woman, and brought her unto the [...]

By |2017-09-24T22:38:12-04:00September 24th, 2015|Creation, Entanglement, Holidays (Yomim Tovim), Mashiach (Messiah), Randomness, Superposition, Uncategorized, Yom Kippur|0 Comments
Read More

Forty Two Journeys to the Answer to the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything

These are the journeys of the children of Israel… (Numbers 33:1) When G-d brought the Jews out from Egypt, He brought them out with the mystery of the 42-letter name, just as He created heaven and earth… (Zohar Chadash) The forty-two “stations” from Egypt to the Promised Land are replayed in the life of every individual Jew, as his soul journeys from its descent to earth at birth to its return to its Source. (Rabbi Israel Baal Shem Tov)   Torah portion Massei (Num. 33-35) recalls forty-two journeys of the Children of Israel in the Sinai desert after the Exodus from Egypt. This is not the first time the concept of forty-two journeys appears in the Torah.  Commenting on the Biblical verse, "And G‑d said, 'Behold, I Will Cause to Rain Bread from Heaven for You,’” (Ex. 25:5) [...]

By |2019-07-30T21:26:13-04:00July 27th, 2014|Creation, G‑d, Massei, Mathematics, Names of G‑d, Numbers, Omer, Pentateuch (Chumash), Uncategorized, Yom Kippur|4 Comments
Read More

Saved by Randomness

In his book, “Fooled by Randomness: The Hidden Role of Chance in Life and in the Markets,” Nissim Taleb argues that the human brain abhors randomness. Our brain is hard-wired to see patterns everywhere. We need to make sense of our surroundings and events around us. Sometimes, an ability to discern a pattern is very useful but, other times, we simply fool ourselves into seeing a pattern where there is none. We just can't deal with randomness. Perhaps, this is one of the reasons why quantum physics—random at its core—is so hard to understand. It is difficult for us to accept that at the core of our reality, there is nothing but randomness. Even Einstein, himself one of the founding fathers of quantum physics, could not accept it. He famously said to Neils Bohr, “G‑d does [...]

By |2017-03-10T14:21:46-05:00September 16th, 2013|G‑d, Holidays (Yomim Tovim), Randomness, Uncategorized, Yom Kippur|0 Comments
Read More

Thou Shall Not Collapse G‑d’s Wavefunction

Acharei Mot  1. And the Lord spoke to Moses after the death of Aaron's two sons, when they drew near before the Lord, and they died. 2. And the Lord said to Moses: Speak to your brother Aaron, that he should not come at all times into the Holy within the dividing curtain, in front of the cover that is upon the ark, so that he should not die, for I appear over the ark cover in a cloud. (Leviticus 16:1-2) This parshah describes the service of the Kohen Gadol – the High Priest – performed on Yom Kippur. Why does it start by referencing the death of the two sons of Aaron (the first Kohen Gadol), Nadav and Avihu?  What relevance does this have to the topic at hand?  As we read earlier, [...]

By |2013-08-11T14:21:46-04:00April 22nd, 2013|Collapse of the wavefunction, Uncategorized, Uncertainty Principle, Wavefunction|1 Comment
Read More

Tale of Entangled Goats

And he shall take the two he goats, and place them before the Lord at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting. And Aaron shall place lots upon the two he goats: one lot "For the Lord," and the other lot, "For Azazel." (Leviticus 16:7-8) In the last Torah portion, Metzorah, we learned about two entangled birds. This week, we learn about two entangled goats. I don’t know if these goats studied quantum mechanics, but they can sure teach us a thing or two about quantum entanglement. Entanglement is one of the mysteries of quantum mechanics. On a macro level, entanglement is easy to understand. Imagine a coin sawn into two halves along the plane parallel to the face of the coin. One half has only heads and the other half has only [...]

By |2019-05-04T18:27:10-04:00May 4th, 2012|Acharei Mot, Collapse of the wavefunction, Entanglement, Leviticus, Pentateuch (Chumash), Quantum Theory, Yom Kippur|1 Comment
Read More
Copyright 2019 QuantumTorah.com
Toggle Sliding Bar Area

Archives

Categories

DON’T MISS A BEAT

Be the first to know when we publish a new post.

Go to Top