Isaiah 45:7 -- "I form the light and create darkness: I make peace and create evil: I the LORD do all these things".
This post is about the 7 that leads us to 8.
With Hanukkah, the Festival of Lights, around the corner, I was thinking about the supernatural meaning of Eight nights. Biblically or spiritually speaking, 8 has a supernatural meaning. Seven (7) is natural, eight (8) is after the natural.
This concept of "8 following 7" is the very nature of the Jewish holidays of Sukkot (Feast of Tabernacles), a 7 day holiday, which is followed immediately by a holiday on the 8th day, Simchat Torah when Jews celebrate with immense joy the Torah. The very next holiday after Feast of Tabernacles and Simchat Torah is Hanukkah, the Festival of Lights; a holiday lasting 8 nights. (We are coming into holiday season of Hanukkah and Christmas, which I refer to as the Season of 25.)
On Simchat Torah, Jews finish reading the Torah. We go from the end of Deuteronomy, when Joshua is inheriting Moses staff and Moses is giving his final words, at the end of his physical life at age 120 years, back to the beginning, Genesis 1. The Torah scroll is literally rolled back. Back to when the earth was chaos and waste.
Biblically speaking, throughout history there is a long arc of reversals. God creates, evil destroys, God restores, evil destroys again. Light and darkness. Once together, in the beginning, then seperated, Day and Night, making the 1st day of creation.
Darkness can not enter the Light, and when Light enters, the darkness is expelled. As the Light fades, the area becomes a state of darkness. It is like that with love and a relationship. When the love fades, darkness enters a relationship. Rekindle the light.
Darkness is the absence of light. Light is a form of energy: made of photons. Darkness is the state that exists when light is not present. Darkness is not the opposite of light; it is the lack of it. Our eyes perceive darkness because, without light, they have nothing to see. A light source, however small, can instantly remove darkness from an area. Light reveals.
Absolute total darkness is arguably impossible to achieve. The complete absence of light, or any electromagnetic radiation, is prevented by several natural phenomena, from the quantum level to the cosmic scale.
Spiritually speaking, I believe it is our obligation to see the light, even in apparent darkness. Our role is to magnify the light. Every one of us has a Light inside us that we can bring out into the darkness. We can transform the state from darkness to light.
The Festival of Lights, Hanukkah, is around the corner. Think of a Hanukkah menorah being lit in a dark room. Each candle we light adds to the light. We are those candles. We have a servant candle, its called the Shamash. The Shamash candle is the 9th candle and it stands above the other 8 candles. The Shamash is used to light all the other 8 candles. We add one candle each night. The word Shamash means "servant" or "helper." We can be like the image of God by helping to light a candle in the world.
God is pure, holy Light. The Light of the entire universe. God is so bright that if any of us saw God's full glory we would not live.
Exodus 33:20-22 -- But,” he said, “you cannot see my face, for man shall not see me and live.” And the Lord said, “Behold, there is a place by me where you shall stand on the rock, and while my glory passes by I will put you in a cleft of the rock, and I will cover you with my hand until I have passed by.
Creation is completed on the 7th day. The Creator, the Light of the world was finished. If we take away 7 from 7 we have 0. Zero is the state of the absence of God's Light; a state of chaos and waste before God spoke Light into the world. In the beginning they were together: the full potentiality of 7 and the absence of 7 which is zero. 7 and 0 together; that is 70. That is the Hebrew letter Ayin. Ayin is an eye. In a mystical sense, Ayin is "spiritual sight." Spiritual sight is the ability to see the Light, even the least bit of light, and to magnify it; to add our light to the light of others.
Epilogue:
Christians should be interested to know, speaking of the last day of Sukkot, known as the "Great Day" (Hosannah Raba), have a listen to Messianic Rabbi Jonathan Cahn's brief message about the 21st day (3 sevens) of the 7th month, Hosannah Rabbah.
THIS IS THE BEAUTIFUL SPIRIT OF AN ISRAELI HOSTAGES IN THE TUNNELS.
LISTEN TO WHAT SUSTAINED THEM IN THE DARKENESS!!
