Note 2 — II.

As has already been intimated, the design of this treatise is to exhibit a system whereby the universe may be viewed methodically in connection with the truths given in the Bible, thus shewing, from the gradual and systematic development of the creation, and from the harmony which prevails in all its multitudinous component parts, that One God produced it all, and that He is over all. The order in which God gave rise to this creation out of nothing (‏יצר ממש מתוהו‎), and the harmony which pervades all the constituent parts of the universe are shown by the analogy which subsists between the visible things and the signs of thought, or the means whereby wisdom is expressed and perpetuated among men. Since the letters have no absolute value, nor can they be used as mere forms, but serve as the medium between essence and form, and like words, assume the relation of form to the real essence, and of essence to the embryo and unexpressed thought, great value is attached to these letters, and to the combinations and analogies of which they are capable. The patriarch Abraham, therefore, employs the double value of the twenty-two letters of the Hebrew alphabet;2 he uses them, both in their phonetic nature and in their sacred character, as expressing the divine truths of the Scriptures. But, since the Hebrew alphabet is also used as numerals, which are represented by the fundamental number ten, and since the vowels of the language are also ten in number, this decade is added to the twenty-two letters, and these two kinds of signs—i.e., the twenty-two letters of the alphabet and the ten fundamental numbers—are designated the thirty-two ways of secret wisdom; and the treatise opens with the declaration3—“By thirty-two paths of secret wisdom, the Eternal, the Lord of Hosts, the God of Israel, the living God, the King of the Universe, the Merciful and Gracious, the High and Exalted God, He who inhabiteth eternity, Glorious and Holy is His name, hath created the world by means of (‏ספר‎) numbers, (‏ספור‎) phonetic language, and writing (‏ספר‎).” (Sepher Jetzira, chapter i; Mishna i.)