Aleph is for Analogy

IC XC
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NI KA

Let’s start with the place of analogy in theology. Analogy means that we can say something in human terms that, by way of parallel, may tell us something about divine things: usually by way of meditation and/or revelation. Thus, we cannot fully understand how God became man, but all of us have mothers and we can, thereby, understand something of the incarnation. Something is revealed when we call Mary the “mother of God” or the “God-birther” (theotokos). We may not understand God the Father at all. Still, St Paul says it is from God’s Fatherhood that every family on earth has a name (Ephesians 3:15). So analogy is important, especially if it helps us to see something that would otherwise be hidden or to hear something that would otherwise be silent.

Having looked, briefly, at Analogy, let’s look closely at the letter A.

The Letter A has a family history going back to an ancient, horned bovine called the aurochs. It’s been extinct since the 1600s, but it is considered the genetic ancestor of all modern domestic cattle. It’s important because the shape of the animal’s head (with horns) gives us the shape of the letter A. If you turn the letter A upside down you can see the horns and, in fact, this was the ancient form of the letter. It took a while to rotate all the way around. Long before the Latin alphabet, in Hebrew, it looked like this

The letter Aleph in formal Hebrew printing (as in the Torah and modern documents) now looks like this:

Yet, in modern Hebrew script (handwriting) it looks like this:

It’s still the same letter with the horns. There is a crucial difference, however, between our letter with the horns and the letter Aleph. In English, we read A like AAYE or AAAH. In both Ancient and Modern Hebrew Aleph – without any other modification – is entirely silent.

I am indebted to Rabbi Lawrence Kushner for what follows. I picked up his book on Hebrew Letters (Sefer Otiyot) in a Walden Books in a Mall in the Late 70s. I only read the pages on Aleph, but they have stayed with me 50 years. Make the sound of A with me. Shape your mouth. Breath in. And as you breathe out, say AAAH. Now, shape your mouth as if you were going to say the AAAH again. Breath in. Get ready to breathe out with the AAAH sound, but stop right there. That silence is the sound of Aleph.

The Aleph of Hebrew is entirely silent. It is, if you will, by way of analaogy, unrevealed. It took a few more years of linguistic evolution for the AAAH to be attached to the letter as it evolved. Aleph is silent, still, but the later letters now carry the revealed sound, the AAAH. This is the first stage of our analogy, what was silent in the early stages of the “Aurochs” letter is now revealed. But it’s still the Aurochs.

Aleph is the initial letter of God’s revealed name. In fact, there are three initial Alephs. אֶהְיֶה אֲשֶׁר אֶהְיֶה Ehyeh, Asher Ehyeh. “I am what I am” or “I will be what I will be” and other possible translations. God says, “Tell them ‘Ehyeh sent you.” Aleph. Silent until revealed, and threefold.

The incarnation changes that: the Aleph is no longer silent. But how can there be three persons in One Godhead but not three Gods?

Let’s return to the Aleph. Silent. But this time we will reveal it. Say it with me. Shape your mouth for the AAAH sound, breathe in, and as you breath out, say “AAAH”.

To say that, it takes your breath, and the shape of your mouth and the vocal chords – that is, an act of your will, controlling your breath, and your body. So where are you in all this? Certainly your will, but also your body? And the breath itself, is that you as well? At which point is your breath not you – or actually is you? It is your life in some way at that moment. And you expend it making a sound that is your breath and yet, somehow, also the vibrations of your body carried on your breath. We can say that the sound is you as well, in extension. If you send your words to another person, and they respond, that action of communication, an action of communion, is the bringing together of two persons, it is really you. When does your sound stop being you?

And so let’s look at the Trinity by way of Analogy only. This is NOT a revelation but an exploration. You are God the Father speaking – utilizing your will – your word (God the Son – the Divine Sound) and your breath is the Holy Spirit. Except in the Divine Realm each of those are real persons, doing their own thing – which is your thing, actually. God is. And the Divine sound of the Second Aleph spoken by the First Aleph by means of the Third Aleph – the Sound is the revelation of AAAH, the incarnation. That is, that the Son is – in his person – the very face of the Father.

The sound of A, the reality of A, the breath needed to make the sound to convey the reality, the will behind them. This is – by analogy only – the revelation of the threefold reality of the Godhead. And also how the mystery of the revelation was hidden in the silence of the prefigurement.

God speaks and the human heart can hear in silence.