By Dr. Ruth Borchard-Berendsohn (Dr. Borchard-Berendsohn's works include a biography of John Stuart Mill, History and Symbolism of the Rose, The Unknown Secret of the Bible, The Jewish Pilgrim's Progress, The Introspective Listener, and Four Dialogues of Plato (editor). Kabbalah is called the Science of Truth. It is an exact science in the modern sense. Modern Kabalah stakes a great claim, namely that there exist objective limits to the natural and humanistic sciences of our modern age. According to the Hebrew Tradition man is responsible to G-d for creation. Due to western science, man's area of choice, of arbitrariness (Bergson's L'Arbitraire) is widening at ever-increasing momentum, and so is man's responsibility. The Hebrew Tradition of the harmony of the cosmos, its science of exact numbers and proportions, both in Torah and in music, offers modern man valid objective standards to guide his decisions in this expanding area of arbitrariness: namely, the knowledge of, and voluntary submission to the harmonious cosmic pattern. It offers insights in which head and heart of modern man can be united. The Science of Truth rests on two 'pillars': on Torah and on music. (Rabbi Elie Munk, Light of Harmony.) Torah here means the Five Books of Moses; their study includes the laws of Biblical Hebrew and of the Hebrew alphabet which consists of 22 numbered-letters: all consonants. Music here includes the natural mathematical acoustic laws of vibrations, their link with the 22 number-letter-notes, and the musical aspect of the Hebrew alphabet. The Hebrew number-letter-note (n-l-n) is one. Torah and music are parallel, in correspondence, called 'answering' in Hebrew. Torah is called 'the architect's plan', the 'nursling', 'the model of creation' – so is the Hebrew law of music the divine blueprint of creation, including the material cosmos. Number-letter and number-note have number in common. But the building brick of Biblical Hebrew is not the number-letter, but the two-letter root. Each Ur-root possesses its own Ur-meaning; from these radiate out the different meanings which at first sight, appear totally unrelated. The basic building brick of music is not the number-note, but the interval. Each interval possesses its own Ur-character, quality, and polarity, a tension with its own value especially within the decad 1…10. Torah and music both consist of low whole-number proportions of definite, unchangeable character. These same basic proportions prove the common denominator of modern sciences. The basic natural law of acoustics is the spontaneous generation of overtones of any note sounded: it generates further notes which are simple orderly whole number multiples of the fundamental's vibration. Professor R. Haase, Vienna, writes 'Harmonic is the science of identical laws of proportion in nature, in man, in music.' Hebrew tradition adds – and in Torah. There are 12 most important intervals which are most frequently used-both in mucis and in nature. R. Haase lists them as follows:
Both ancient wisdom teaching and modern Harmonics deal with the formation and the implicative order and preservation of the cosmos. The great regulation rests on the unity of number - and - harmony of vibrations. Within the range of audible sound waves in the air (16-200 Hz), especially within the range of the voice (80-1024 Hz) man has access to the laws of the universe, from fast 'fire' - to slow 'water' - waves and beyond these. In sound alone, man finds this flawless match between quantity and quality, numbering and meaning - based on natural acoustic laws and man's innate sensibility. The Jews are the people of the Book and of the ear. Shema Yisrael - Hear O Israel! Every morning and evening the Jew utters this triumphant cry of his prayers. It has stamped the Jew down the ages. It may account for his special gift for mathematics and music. The Hebrew System of Harmonics contains the order, both as a whole and in part, of the totality of music. And discord - evil finds here its necessary redeeming function: in harmony. The System is representation of the exact harmony of our cosmos. Modern sciences are, unwittingly, engaged in producing more and more proofs for this at ever-increasing speed. Hebrew Harmonics has the male-female voice as its touchtone. This is closely linked to the origin of music. Our late friend, Professor Edith Kiei-Gerson, Jerusalem, musicologist of unique insight, teaches: 'In most early cultures, music and dance were sacred: in them G-d or gods or force of nature danced; he or they were expressed in temples, hymns, calendars. In blessing and cursing and exorcism, the human voice was used as a non-human voice utterance - as is the priestly blessing in the synagogue today. But in the divine service of the Hebrews another method was used: the spoken word is stylized into a chant, as is the bible cantillation used in the synagogue to this day. The build of the text is recited on a single note, a kind of tonal axis, while the beginning and the end of the sentences, and the main points of punctuation are marked by brief melodic flourishes.' This form of singing, limited to a few notes, is not at all a natural form of either talking or singing. In talking, our speech produces a natural flow of voice, marked by frequent change of pitch. At the end of a normal sentence, the voice sinks by a fourth. An order or an exclamation is marked by a rise of the voice by a fourth. While the fifth upwards marks a question. And for tender expressions, the voice uses the third. All this is unconscious. By channeling speech into a one-note recitation, a magicohypnotic effect is produced, on hearers and speaker. Strangely enough, this even chant marks the birth of music! Paradoxically, music results when free movement of the voice ceases, and it is forced onto one repeated, perforated note. But to our hearing, this poor one note is the trues music and farther from speech than the most melodious aria. Why does music begin for us when our natural melodious speech is reduced to a single non-melodic interrupted note? Clearly, it is not melody alone - in the sense of pitch variation - which makes music for our understanding. It is our feeling that the chanter, the bard, carries a superhuman sound charged with a divine message. This is the meaning of music for the Human tradition, from Moses until this day: music awakens man's soul to its greatest spiritual heights - to all-seeing, all-hearing, to all-knowing at once. Thus in the Bible we see music awakening the prophetic spirit - and music lets man partake of the Holy Spirit. 'With a psaltery, a timbrel, a pope and a harp before them, they will be prophesying. And the spirit of the Lord will come upon you, and you will be turned into another man' (Samuel I x.5,6); "And when the minstrel played, the hand of the Lord came upon him" (Kings II,2, 15). In the Bible, music means singing, and singing means that estranged monophony of the human voice. Voice is the divine mark in man - Voice Is man. In the hierarchy of four kingdoms from the inorganic up, mankind is 'the kingdom of the speaking.' Thus Kind David is the everlasting symbol of king-musician-prophet. Man's voice, his language echo G-d's voice and utterance in Biblical Hebrew, tongue of creation and tongue of revelation. Musical instruments are merely feeble derivations of the human voice, man-made tools. Hence in the synagogue instrumental music is rejected. Jewish liturgy, performed by singing, laid the foundation of European music. The sacred song of Israel gave birth to the Georgian and Byzantine chant. The Word of G-d is eternal, unchanging and unchangeable. 'G-d does not have afterthought'. The laws of the Bible about sex are valid for the Jews of today in all their rigor as they were over millenia. Their taboos held. Sex is permitted only in marriage, and there safeguarded by strict rule of family purity. So the divine spark can join the union of father-and-mother for creation of the Jewish child. We bring here the laws about sex advisedly: they are absolute. So are the laws of music absolute. All arbitrariness regarding music and harmony is a Biblical 'abomination; the rules about incest, homosexuality and other forbidden unions apply also to numbers and to music! All arbitrary forms of octave division, all erosion of whole-number harmonies are corruptive forces for man and society and for nature. They are fruits of man's intellectual self-will. Music leads into the future. Only by regaining the narrow confines of the harmonic Laws of the Hebrew Tradition, of tonality, can man also regain health and joy for himself and for creation. In the ever-increasing area of man's choice and arbitrariness, Jewish Law-Halacha - and the simple whole-number proportions of Torah and Hebrew harmonics provide the objective standards for man's decision. |
