Community Magazine June 2016

LEON SAKKAL Seeing the Sounds S uch is the Torah’s awe-inspiring description of the theophany at Mount Sinai. The Depth of our ‘Aleph-Bet’ According to the Talmud, the words “All the people saw the sounds,” mean that the Jewish People actually saw the sounds of the Ten Commandments; that is, each word spoken by Gd took the form of letters that pierced the sky like lightning. The ancient Kabbalistic text, Sefer HaYessirah , discusses the spiritual significance of the Hebrew alphabet: In contrast to man-made letters, the Hebrew alphabet was given by the Creator, and represents profound spiritual forces – or, in modern terms, different energies that flow through each letter. For example, the letters of Gd’s commandment: “Va’yehi ohr” , or “Let there be light,” actually convey the infinite varieties of light found in creation. From the visible to the invisible, from the spiritual to the manifest, the statement is all encompassing. Seeing is Believing Today, two Israeli scientists, Hayim Yaakov Guggenheim and Hayim Ben-Harav Chai Elbeze, have each made an amazing discovery that illuminates the shape and sound of the Hebrew letters. Guggenheim is an electro-optics engineer at Aircraft Industries of Israel, and part of the team that developed the Lavi Fighter Jet. After grappling with the notion that the Jewish Nation “saw the sounds,” the scientist had an idea. With the booming advancement of science and technology, highly sophisticated machinery has been created, capable of transforming soundwaves into images that canbe displayedon a computermonitor. Guggenheim wondered if it was possible to use these instruments to display, in tangible form, the ancient Jewish understanding that the sound of the letters actually corresponds to their shape. Guggenheim was initially skeptical, particularly over the fact that our present-day pronunciation of the letters differs from the original spoken Hebrew. Yet despite his suspicion, and much to his amazement, he discovered that the sound waves for seventeen out of the twenty-two letters of the Hebrew alphabet created an on-screen image very similar to the shape of the written letter itself! “And it came to pass on the third day, in themorning, that there was thunder and lightning and a thick cloud upon the mountain, and the voice of a horn exceedingly loud; and all the people that were in the camp trembled… And Gd spoke all these words, saying... I am the Lord your Gd... And all the people saw the sounds, and the lightning, and the voice of the horn, and the mountain smoking.” (Exodus 19-20) 48 COMMUNITY MAGAZINE