Ketores
Ketores reminds me of
stoichiometry, which is a fancy word in chemistry for proportions. Let’s take H2O
(water)—it is a proportion of two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen. No matter how
much water I have, whether it’s the volume of a swimming pool, or a tiny drop,
it has constant molecular proportionality; every water molecule in that pool or
in that tiny drop is no more and no less than two hydrogens for every one
oxygen. We have proportionality in the ketores:
“1) Balsam, 2) onycha, 3) & galbanum 4) frankincense
– the weight of 70 maneh each. 5) myrrh, 6) cassia & 7) spikenard & 8)
saffron – [each] a weight of 16, 16 maneh. 9) costus – 12 maneh 10) aromatic
bark – three [maneh] 11) cinnamon – 9 (maneh) [Added also were] Lye of Carsina
– 9 Kavs (a measure), Wine of Cypres – 3 Seahs and 3 kavs- and if one did not
find wine of Cypres – he brings old wine. Salt of Sodom – a quarter [of a
kav.]… Rabbi
Yehuda said “This is the general rule – if it is in the same proportion – it is
Kosher for half… Bar
Kapara taught once every sixty or seventy years there were remains [of the
spices] of half."
So long as the
proportionality is consistent, the spices can accumulate for future use.
Moreover, the ketores
symbolize a direct, unfiltered experience (the four other senses we have are
regulated by the midbrain, but smell is connected directly to the frontal
cortex without an intermediary). The nose is the channel of the neshamah
(Genesis 2:7) and the neshama is connected to dreaming and therefore prophetic
experience. Our neshamas might not be as vast as the neshamas of the previous
generations, they might even be a tiny drop compared to a large pool that is
the sages and prophets of previous generations, but they have the same
“molecular proportionality” so to speak. A tiny light and a large light are
still light. Let us never forget that while we might not be prophets, we will
always remain bnei nevi’im, the sons of prophets. Our eternal potential
remains. Perhaps one day those tiny drops will themselves come together and form
a large pool.
By: Mordakhay Kholdarov
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