Psalm 117 reads:
Praise ADONAI, all you nations! Glorify Him, all you people. For great is His lovingkindness (Chesed) toward us, and ADONAI’s truth endures forever. Halleluyah!
Torah Sages say the "The light that was created on the first day shone from one end of Creation to the other". Or, in the language of Kabbala, "In the beginning, an infinite, uncompounded light filled all of Creation." This is the light of Chesed חֶסֶד which permeates all of Creation and through which all of Creation is built."
Chesed, like many Hebrew words, does not translate precisely into English. The word means more than simply “kindness.” Often translated as “loving-kindness,” chesed means giving oneself fully, with love and compassion.
The concept of chesed appears in the Torah more than 190 times. For this reason, many Jewish thinkers hold the value of loving-kindness up as Judaism’s primary ethical virtue.
Psalms 89:3 tells us "The world was built with chesed." Chesed חֶסֶד denotes the unbounded loving-kindness with which G‑d created the worlds and with which all of creation is permeated.
Chesed is one of the ten Sephirot on the Kabbalistic Tree of Life. Sephirot are the 10 emanations, or powers, by which God the Creator was said to become manifest. Sages say Chesed preceds (comes before) all the other Sephirot. Characteristics of Chesed are: lovingkindness, devotion, mercy, strength, grace, purity, loyalty, tenderness, and steadfastness.
Rabbi Simlai in the Talmud claims that "The Torah begins with chesed and ends with chesed." It is a Jewish belief that "the entire Torah is characterized by chesed. It's said that the vision of the ideal life is characterized by behaviors which are merciful and compassionate. Chesed is properly described as an act that has no "cause."
Rabbi Yehonasan Gefen says "chesed is more appropriately understood as a trait that is characterized by overflowing and lack of boundaries. One significant outgrowth of this is kindness in that chesed causes a person to want to unabashedly share with others, breaking his boundaries of selfishness."
According to Jewish mystical belief, Kabbalah "The World is Built on Kindness."
How the World is Destroyed
If the world is built on Chesed, it is destroyed on Evil (רוע in Hebrew, pronounced Ra) and Hate (שִׂנאָה in Hebrew, pronounced Saw-nay). Hamas and Iran have made it obvious. Like Haman from the Book of Esther and Hitler, Hamas is an animation of Evil and Hate. They illustrate, they show us, how (Eicha) Evil and Hate look, act and what they are capable of.
Right now in Israel we are witnessing how evil and hate destroy the world. It is painfully obvious to see -- in what Hamas did to little children living on Kibbutzim in Israel.
Make no mistake, the evil and hate we are witnessing began with words spoken and taught to the children. We see the same evil and hate displayed at the rallies in support of Hamas around the world at which are chanted the same words heard at Nazi rallies -- "Kill the Jews." They have the same objective as Haman. But God ... and we know how Purim ends for Haman!
The Source of Hate
I see the number of the shortest Psalm about Chesed, 117, as a clue of the darkness hidden in the light. According to the Tzava'at Harivash, the anthology on the deep mystical meanings of the Tenach, 117, relates to the Yetzer Hara. Yetza Hara described as mankind's "inclination or impulse to evil," otherwise known as the "evil inclination" in mankind and the world. It is said that the Yetzer Hara seeks mankind to "cease."
Psalms 36:4 tells us "The words of his mouth are evil and deceit; he has ceased to be wise, to do good.” The Yetzer Hara seeks to do evil through “The words of his mouth.”
In the Christian bible it says in James 3-6 that "The tongue is so set among our members that it defiles the whole body, and sets on fire the course of nature; and it is set on fire by hell."
In the Beginning
Before the 4th day of Creation when God creates the Sun, Moon and Stars, Genesis 1:1-4 TLV reads:
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was chaos and waste, darkness was on the surface of the deep, and the Ruach Elohim was hovering upon the surface of the water. Then God said, “Let there be light!” and there was light. God saw that the light was good. So God distinguished the light from the darkness.
The Sage says"The light that was created on the first day shone from one end of Creation to the other."
Light and Darkness have been in the world since Day One, but "Chaos and waste, darkness" existed before God said "Let their be Light." This was the Light of creation. God saw that the Light is Tov, good, but not the darkness, so God separated them. I believe the Light creates. Without the Light we go back to chaos and waste again.
The Light of Creation is in us, but Darkness is as well. We are "in the image of God." We can distinguish good from evil. God gave us free will to choose. The Ruach Elohim, God’s Holy Spirit, is hovering over us to offer us discernment and understanding.
We can speak good or evil into the world. If we choose good it manifests through Chesed, lovingkindness. If we give in to the Yetza Hara, the evil inclination, our tongue is destructive.
Proverbs 18:21 TLV says:
"Death and life are in the control of the tongue. Those who indulge in it will eat its fruit."
It is said we will be known by our fruits.
CHOOSE THE LIGHT! BE THE LIGHT!
P.S. Click here for some additional explanation of the "Chesed Personality" by an Orthodox Jewish Yeshiva source.
