A Remembrance of His Wonders. David I. Shyovitz
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same intricate configuration as the fire, electrum, and angels that Ezekiel observes in his famous vision.83 In one passage attributed to Eleazar, this secret is explicitly linked to Psalms 111:4, again indicating that, for the Pietists, theological truths can be derived from routine objects and phenomena found in the natural world.84
But structural analogies of this sort are complemented elsewhere by passages in which elements of the merkavah can be comprehended on the basis of experimental data. In Ezekiel’s prophecy, for example, the angelic “wheels” (ofanim) of God’s chariot are described as “crystalline” (ke-ein tarshish). Eleazar explains that this means that they are transparent, a conclusion he draws in light of empirical verification: “If you place crystals (even tarshish) in clear water in the sunlight during the summertime, the stone, which is [itself] clear and transparent, will not be visible.”85 The nature of prophecy itself can be understood by analogy with yet another sensory observation: “The voice [heard by the prophets] is audible but not visible … and is similar to when a man walks through a valley in a mountainous area, where the mountains around him are jagged. When the man speaks, his words mix with the air in the crevices, and when he ceases speaking the mountains echo his words back to him. If he spoke in a loud voice, the echo is loud, and if [he spoke] quietly [the echo is] quiet. [This happens] even though there is nothing there but air—and this is similar to how a bat kol is heard.”86 The workings of echoes thus shed light on the workings of divine aural revelation. Other natural phenomena are marshaled to identify the locations of sacred spaces. The fact that the Garden of Eden is in the east is demonstrable in light of the fact that “the sky is red in the [morning] due to the splendor of the flowers and fiery stones that are in Eden,” while Gehenna’s location in the west explains why “from the fiery flames, the sun is blood red when it is in the [west].”87
Eleazar discusses other elements of the throne world by reference to artisanal knowledge, reminiscent of his discussion of distillation above. For example, in describing the intensity of the Dinur River, which is referred to in the book of Daniel and which, according to the Talmud, consists entirely of flowing fire,88 Eleazar avers that “when gold is boiling in the melting pot, its fire is larger than a fire of [burning] wood. Know, that if one places lead into a fire, it will not melt quickly, but if you place it into boiling silver or boiling gold, it will melt instantaneously.”89 Knowledge of metallurgy is also brought to bear in a cryptic discussion of what happens when different angelic legions go to war with one another. He explains: “If one were to ask: ‘Who can harm an angel in war, since they live eternally?’ … An example is iron which is being heated in a fire—when one hits it with a hammer, sparks fly [but the iron is not shattered]…. So too one angel cannot kill another.”90 Here and elsewhere,91 metallurgical knowledge is invoked for theological ends, as are an array of empirical observations drawn from other artisanal crafts. These technological discussions indicate that the Pietists’ general interest in the natural order was complemented by at least some technical knowledge in those fields in which empirical observations regarding the workings of the natural were harnessed and applied.92
A final example of the invocation of natural phenomena to lend credence to esoteric theological teachings can be found in Eleazar’s discussion of the angel Yorkmi, whom the Talmud had identified as the angel appointed over hail (sar ha-barad).93 As Eleazar explains: “All angels are named after the mission to which they are appointed. For example, Yorkmi is the angel appointed over hail, for when sunlight strikes hail it appears to be green (yarok), as though green fire is being kindled within the hail. [Similarly,] moist tree-branches produce green fire [when they are burned], because of the mixture of water and smoke. Thus Yorkmi [is named on account of the] greenness of water (yorkei de-maya).”94 The “greenness of water” is expanded upon in another context, where Eleazar invokes experimental knowledge in discussing the colors of plants: “You will never find buds [of plants] that are any color other than green, like the color of leeks, because water is the ‘master’ of the earth, and the earth desires it.95 Thus it produces plants that are green, like [water]. For if you put rainwater in a stone vessel, and wait for many days, it will turn green. But during the summer the planets rule alongside the sun, and the rainbow, which has many different colors, is present during the summer, thus the buds turn into a variety of different colors.”96 For Eleazar, the green algae that forms in standing water is taken to be the culmination of a process in which water’s true color reveals itself. This empirical confirmation of water’s “greenness” not only undergirds his efforts to understand plant botany, but even to shed light upon the nature of God’s angelic messengers. It also allows Eleazar to explore the nature of tohu (nothingness), the term used in Genesis 1:2 to describe the formlessness of the world prior to Creation. Rabbinic sources had cryptically defined tohu as “the green line (kav hayarok) which surrounds the entire world.”97 In Sodei Razya, Eleazar explains that this green line is “like the green that is on the surface of the water.”98 And in another, somewhat obscure passage, he seems to explain that tohu’s description as a green line links it to the horizon—if one wants to visually apprehend tohu, he says, one should go out to sea in a boat, wait to be lifted up by a wave, and then look around in all directions at the line where the land meets the sky.99 The angel Yorkmi, the nature of tohu, and the biological workings of plants are all newly comprehensible once the fundamentally green nature of water is understood. The empirical observation of physical “remembrances” thus sheds light upon—and inextricably connects—the “natural” and ostensibly “supernatural” realms, in both the exoteric and esoteric writings of the German Pietists. Far from deriding natural causality or seeking to suspend its dictates, the Pietists prized the workings of the material world as a valid source of knowledge about God and His actions.
“THE POWER OF INCANTATIONS, AND THE POWER OF HERBS, AND THE POWER OF STONES”
And yet, the Pietists at times invoked Psalms 111:4 regarding “remembrances” that are anything but prosaic. Indeed, in his liturgical commentary Arugat ha-Bosem, Abraham b. Azriel—a student of Eleazar of Worms, and compiler of Ashkenazic and especially Pietistic traditions—offers a categorical description of the “remembrances” found in the world: “Everything the Holy one created in his world is a remembrance of His wonders; he created the power of all kinds of incantations, and the power of herbs, and the power of stones.”100 Each of these subcategories is well represented in Pietistic writings, and is utilized in contexts that seem prima facie to undermine the notion of a stable, theologically resonant natural order.
The “power of incantations” refers to apparently inexplicable phenomena like the one with which this chapter began: “If one places hot ash on hot excrement, it will cause harm to the one who produced [the excrement].” This remembrance, which sheds light upon God’s wondrous invisibility, is accompanied in Pietistic texts by an array of remembrances that are themselves wondrous. For example: “If one were to ask: How can [God] be present everywhere, yet remain invisible to the eye? It is possible to respond that He created an example in His world…. If one’s nose is cut off [of his face], and he attaches another person’s nose [to his own face] using a potion, the nose will fall off when the man [who owned it originally] dies, for it smells the death of its [original] body. Some substance must have come in contact with [the nose], though it is too subtle to see.”101 Not only potions serve as wondrous remembrances, but also spells and adjurations: “If one were to ask: How are we to believe that [God] is omnipotent, since He cannot be seen? I will offer you an example: one can adjure a sword so that it will not cut him, or a piece of white-hot iron so that it will not burn him. And even though we see no boundary between the sword or the iron and the body, we know that there is something in the way, preventing the cutting or the burning, even though it is too subtle to see.”102 Or again, “if one places upon oneself a dead snake, and ties it as a belt around himself, no sword will [be able to] harm him.”103 In a similar vein, Eleazar refers to certain varieties of charcoal which can serve as charms that will protect one from magical attacks.104 The “power of herbs” is represented in these contexts as well. Judah discusses a type of grass which can cut iron, again suggesting that