99 Names And The Beauty Of Dead Trees – OpEd

I have always been a lover of trees. I love their varied shapes and colors, their branches and foliage. Since the Torah is called a Tree of Life I have also seen trees as a bridge connecting earth and heaven, rooted in tradition while reaching up to draw nourishment from a higher source.

But then I discovered a new name for God in the Sefer HaHekhalot, a post Talmud period mystical text, that relates how Rabbi Ishmaelmeets Yofiel, (the Shekinah feminine presence of God's name means the beauty of God who is) the angel of (mystical or emotional) Torah (study), who instructs Rabbi Ishmael to fast for forty days in order to merit a visitation from Yofiel.

Rabbi Ishmael said: When I was 13 years old, my heart was moved by this matter, and I returned to the presence of Rabbi Nehuniah ben HaQanah, my master. I declared to him: "The Prince of Torah—what is his name?" And he declared to me: "Yofiel (the beautiful God) is his name." and I learned that Dead Trees can also be part of God's beauty.

One summer I began to notice dead trees. I spent several weeks on the Colorado plateau: Zion, Bryce, Canyon De Chelly and the north rim of the Grand Canyon. The area is arid and many of the dead trees remain standing for generations. The beauty of dead trees suddenly struck me. How could death be beautiful?

The Torah declares that we have a choice between good and evil, between being a blessing or a curse, between life and death. (Deuteronomy 30:15,19) We are then commanded to choose life. So how can there be any intrinsic value in death?

However, trees are not people and long dead trees do not reflect a severed relationship. Perhaps we can learn something from the beauty of dead trees. I share these two thoughts:

Some people long dead
I love more than
Many people now alive
Because they were so very lovable.
It is true "Love is as strong as death." (Song of Songs 8:6)
Love isn't stronger
Because no matter how much you love someone
You can't prevent a loved one's death.
But death isn't stronger than love
Because even within death
Love exists In the heart of the lover.

GOD GIVES, GOD TAKES
God gives opportunities but not forever.
God takes opportunities away after a while.
So don't hesitate or delay or curse the darkness
while remaining mired in hopelessness,
because God gives; and God takes away.
Blessed be the name of the LORD.

But why bless the LORD when God takes away?
Because if the opportunities were always there,
we would wait until the time was right
and never make the leap, and another year would waste away.
So God gives and God takes away.

Proverbs 3:18 proclaims: "She Torah) is a tree of life to those who embrace her; those who lay hold of her will be blessed" while Psalm 1:3 asserts, "He is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither. Whatever he does; prospers."

There are the people whose spiritual lives are symbolized by "the tree of Life". These people may have lived a large part of their lives remote from the Jewish path and the Jewish community. Indeed, they may not even have been Jewish. They may still not be as full of Torah and Mitzvot as they could be. But they have significantly changed their present life from their past life; and that alone makes them part of the tree of life people.

As the Sabbath prayer book says, "She (Teshuvah-life changing improvement) is a tree of life to those who embrace her; those who hold fast to her will be blessed. Her ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace."(Proverbs 3:18&17)

There's an apt maxim developed in the 1950s by tree-ring scientist Edmund Schulman: "longevity under adversity". This matches the 3,500+ years of historical experience of the Jewish People who have survived and overcome the most cultural, religious and military challenges of any other tribe or nation.

Everyone has heard of the Tree of (super long) Life that was in the Garden of Eden. Very few people are aware that this Tree of Life is also referred to four other times in the Biblical Book of Proverbs (and in no other book in the Hebrew Bible).

By examining three of the references we can learn very important things about the Tree of Life that stood next to the Morality Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil in the Garden of Eden.

Proverbs 15:4 teaches us that just by speaking words of kindness and comfort we are able to strengthen, revive and heal a human's spirit; while speaking nasty words of anger, hate and meanness are able to crush people's spirits, "A soothing tongue is a Tree of Life, but a perverse tongue crushes the spirit. (NIV trans)

Today we are so concerned with freedom of speech that we have lost awareness of our responsibility to always use our tongues kindly as a Torah (Divine teaching) of kindness (31:26). Politicians especially need to learn this.

Proverbs 13:12 teaches us the importance of our seeking to realize our longings for love and peace, because negativity, cynicism and despair destroy our spirits. "Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled is a Tree of Life" that makes us productive and generous.

Proverbs 11:30 teaches us that doing good deeds for others and for God is the way to save our lives from a perverse and negative tongue filled with criticism of others and ourselves. "The fruit of the righteous is a Tree of Life, and the one who is wise saves lives."

One name of God that few Christians and Jews know or use today, is a name that I believe will be added to the 99 names we already know in the future as Christians, Jews and Muslims learn more about each other's religions. This name, El Ro'ee, only appears twice in the Hebrew Bible and, as far as I know, is not used at all in the Talmud.

Abraham's wife Hagar's name for God is El-Ro'ee. El Ro'ee means A Self-reflecting God or A God Who Sees (literally mirrors) Me. "Then she (Hagar) called the name of YHVH, who spoke to her, 'El Ro'ee', 'You are a God who sees me'; for she said, 'Have I even remained alive here after seeing Him?' Therefore the well was called Beer-laHai-roee; the well of the Living One (Al-Hayy) who sees me." (Genesis 16:13-14)

Neither Sarah nor Hagar/Ha-jar are mentioned by name in the Qur'an, but the story of Ha-jar's exile from Abraham's home is traditionally understood to be referred to in a line from Ibrāhīm's prayer in the Qur'an (14:37): "I have settled some of my family in a barren valley near your Sacred House."

Muslim tradition relates that when Hā-jar ran out of water, and Ismā'īl, an infant at that time, began to die; Hā-jar panicked and ran between two nearby hills, Al-Safa and Al-Marwah repeatedly searching for water.

After her seventh run, Ismā'īl hit the ground with his heel and caused a miraculous well to spring out of the ground called Zamzum Well. It is located a few meters from the Kaaba in Mecca.

Perhaps this previously unique Torah name of God, El Ro'ee or Hai Ro'ee; which are Hagar's names for God, meaning A Self-reflecting God or A God Who Sees Me, and the name for the well 'Beer-laHai-ro'ee' the well of the Self-reflecting God; can help bring Christians, Jews and Muslims to see themselves in the eyes of each other better, and thus come closer together in the future.

That would be an excellent example of the power of just one of the many names of the One God to make us better lovers.