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Glossary · Torah Ohr · Likkutei Torah

Osiyos

אותיות

Letters (osiyos)

The garments in which intellect is grasped and conveyed, in thought and speech. Not one with the idea, they draw it, and the Or Ein Sof, from concealment into revelation (osiyos, from asa, “come”).

The word The text also uses אותיות for the plain spelling of a word, especially in wordplay: “X is the letters of Y” (X אותיות Y) means the two words share their letters. There it is a reading device, not the concept of letters as garments and channels.

Where it’s explained

  1. Likkutei Torah, Behar 3, ¶1The middos unite with the intellect like body and soul; the letters are only garments, “inanimate,” bearing no comparison to the idea, yet the intellect can be grasped, and passed to the middos, only through them. Above, the Divine Names are letters that join the lights to the vessels; the tzimtzum was that the Or Ein Sof no longer shone through the letters, which remained as the reshimu.אבל אין כן האותיות שהם רק לבושים להשכל
  2. Likkutei Torah, Shir HaShirim 26, ¶1Osiyos is from asa, “comes”: the letters of Torah and prayer bring the Or Ein Sof from concealment into revelation in a person’s soul. They are called horses, which carry the rider where he could not reach by himself: the Or Ein Sof that encompasses all worlds, which no thought grasps, is held only through the letters of the Torah.אותיות הוא מלשון אתא בקר שהן המביאות והממשיכות אור א״ס ב״ה מההעלם אל הגילוי
  3. Torah Ohr, Mikeitz 15, ¶24The Torah is clothed in letters whose root is higher than the Torah itself: the Torah comes from Chochmah, its letters from Keser. The letters are drawings-down through which the Torah comes to be.ואותיות מלשון אתא שהוא לשון המשכה. שהאותיות הן המשכות שבהן ועל ידן נמשך להיות התורה
  4. Likkutei Torah, Shir HaShirim 5, ¶2Letters are born when one thinks the idea, hidden in thought and more revealed in speech to another; they clothe the intellect but are not its essence. The power of the letters is fixed in the soul itself, which is “full of letters,” and in their descent to thought they take the form of spoken sounds.והם בחי׳ לבושין להשכל שמתלבש באותיות המחשבה והדיבור אבל אינן עצמותו ומהותו
  5. Likkutei Torah, Emor 6, ¶16Above, Rachel is the letters of speech (the revealed world) and Leah the letters of thought (the hidden world); both are called Nukva, for letters are the last level. They are divided by the five Gevuros (מנצפ״ך), and from there the outside forces draw, unless the light of Chochmah sweetens them.רחל הוא אותיות הדבור ולאה היא אותיות המחשבה ולכן שניהם נק׳ נוקבא כי אותיות הוא הבחינה אחרונה

Stated differently

Where the letters are rooted above: in Keser, in Chochmah, or in Binah (with none yet in Chochmah)

Torah Ohr, Mikeitz 15, ¶24דאורייתא מחכמה נפקת והאותיות שרשן למעלה בבחי׳ כתר

The Torah comes from Chochmah, but its letters are rooted higher, in Keser.

Likkutei Torah, Rosh Hashanah 3, ¶10כי האותיות שרשם בחכמה שבממוח

The simple sound of the shofar, from the inner point of the heart, has not yet come into letters, because the letters are rooted in the Chochmah of the brain, and this cry is above it.

Likkutei Torah, Sukkos 2, ¶2והנה האותיות הן בבחינת בינה

The letters are Binah: when intellect comes to understanding, letters appear in thought, but Chochmah, above grasped intellect, has no letters yet. Hence the Written Torah, all letters, is Binah.

Whether there are letters within the intellect itself

Likkutei Torah, Shir HaShirim 5, ¶2אבל בשכל עדיין אין שם בחי׳ אותיות כלל

Letters are revealed in thought and speech; in the intellect there are no letters at all, and they are born only when one thinks it over.

Likkutei Torah, Bechukosai 2, ¶9שא״א להיות כלל גילוי השכל אפי׳ במוח האדם עצמו בלי אותיות

Even when one thinks the idea and not the letters, letters are included in that thought, for intellect cannot be revealed even in one’s own mind without letters; they are one with the intellect (inner Binah).

Torah Ohr, Megillas Esther 1, ¶32אותיות הדבור ואותיות השכל ואותיות המחשבה ואפי׳ בקדמות השכל יש בחי׳ אותיות

There are many kinds of letters: of speech, of intellect, of thought, and even in what precedes intellect there are letters.

Whether the letters (of thought) come into being from the intellect, from the middos, or from the soul itself, above the intellect

Likkutei Torah, Behar 3, ¶1אף שהתהוות האותיות הוא מן השכל עכ״ז אין מהות האותיות מערך מהות השכל כלל

Though the letters come into being from the intellect, their nature bears no comparison to it.

Likkutei Torah, Shir HaShirim 5, ¶2וכן אותיות המחשבה אין התהוותם מבחי׳ השכל המושג המאיר במחשבה

The letters of thought do not come into being from the grasped intellect shining in thought; their power is fixed in the soul itself, above intellect.

Torah Ohr, Yisro 9, ¶12היינו כי הנה המדות הן מקור האותיות של המחשבה כי אותיות מלשון המשכה

The middos are the source of the letters of thought, for osiyos means drawing-down and the drawing-down is in the middos; the letters are not born and revealed in intellect and understanding until they come to revelation in the middos.

Main sources

Likkutei Torah, Behar 3, ¶1Likkutei Torah, Shir HaShirim 5, ¶2Likkutei Torah, Shir HaShirim 26, ¶1Likkutei Torah, Bechukosai 2, ¶9Likkutei Torah, Sukkos 2, ¶2Likkutei Torah, Emor 6, ¶16Torah Ohr, Mikeitz 15, ¶24

Where it appears

In 675 paragraphs of 242 maamarim.

Written with AI from the paragraphs of Torah Ohr and Likkutei Torah, each entry checked by a second AI reader and every Hebrew quote checked by code; not yet reviewed by a person. Our English: CC BY-NC 4.0.

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