ספר שמות

This idea has been hinted at when the Talmud in Taanit ‎‎29 stated that ‎משנכנס אדר מרבים בשמחה‎, normally translated as: ‎‎“once the month of Adar has begun we experience an additional ‎measure of joy in our lives.” The word ‎אדר‎, is a short form of the ‎word: ‎אדרת‎, “cloak,” or mantle, a garment that envelops the ‎wearer, a garment that the prophet Elijah is reported as having ‎worn regularly. (Compare Kings I 19,19, Kings II 2,8, Kings I ‎‎19,13) The Talmud means that prior to the beginning of this ‎month when the Jews tried to look at G’d, they were consumed by ‎awe, as G’d had not draped sufficient protective “clothing” ‎around His essence to enable those who worship Him to entertain ‎feelings other than awe and fear.One of the supports for such an interpretation is presumably ‎the fact that all the miracles G’d performed for the Jewish people ‎during that time, in the lifetime of Mordechai and Esther, were ‎covert rather than overt miracles, i.e. G’d practiced ‎הסתר פנים‎, a ‎benevolent type of “hiding” His face, so that His creatures would ‎not have to experience too much fear when turning to Him. The ‎miracles performed at that time were in contrast to those ‎performed when G’d split the sea at the time of the Exodus, using ‎supernatural phenomena in doing so. In the Purim episode, not a ‎single supernatural element was part of the chain of events that ‎resulted in the salvation of the Jewish people. [It seems ‎clear to this editor that the author chose this approach to his ‎exegesis as this portion is read annually around the time of ‎Purim. Ed.]‎An additional reason may be that around this time, nature ‎that had denuded itself and presented itself to us as awesome ‎during the winter months, once again bedecks itself with foliage, ‎arousing new hope and joy in the hearts of the people who have ‎just experienced a harsh winter.‎ ‎Quoting Genesis 49,11 where Yaakov blesses his son Yehudah, ‎and zeroing in on the words: ‎עירה ולשרקה‎, the author sees in the ‎apparently extraneous letters ‎‏ ה‎ at the end of the word ‎עירה‎ and ‎שרקה‎, a mystical meaning based on the concept of ‎צירוף אותיות‎, ‎the ability to divine the deeper meaning of why certain letters ‎have been combined, [an art that according to our sages enabled ‎Betzalel, the master-builder of the Tabernacle to carry out his ‎task, Ed]. The use of the two letters ‎ה‎ where they do not appear ‎to be needed, is an allusion to the abundance of G’d’s largesse for ‎His creatures in the universe, whereas the letters ‎י‎ and ‎ו‎ allude to ‎looking at the overwhelming brilliance of light experienced when ‎looking at the Creator. These four letters, of course, are the ‎letters forming the tetragram of the holy name of G’d, ‎י-ה-ו-ה‎. The ‎system has been explained further by Shaar Hayichud ‎vehaemunah in the writings of Tanya, (Rabbi Shneer ‎Zalman of Ladii).‎[Many of my readers are familiar with a mystical poem ‎appearing before the recital of ‎לכה דודי‎ commencing with the line ‎אנא בכח‎, where we find the respective first letters of each line ‎printed separately at the end of that line. This is one of the best ‎known examples of the system of ‎צירוף אותיות‎ having found its ‎way into prayer books even of the Ashkenazi (Charedi) ‎community which normally refrains from including passages that ‎the average worshipper cannot understand. The reader may also ‎be interested to know that this is the reason why in most ‎Ashkenazi communities the entire portion of the Friday night ‎service known as kabbalat Shabbat, and commencing either ‎with the saying of ‎לכו נרננה‎ or the preparatory saying individually ‎of the entire scroll of Song of Songs, was for hundreds of years ‎resisted; even when and where accepted, the chazan recites it on ‎the platform from which the Torah is read, to remind the ‎congregation that this was not part of the original Friday night ‎service, Ed.]‎ ‎