From Idea, to Identifying the Good, to Gratitude to its Provider

Our last discussion of Birkhas Yotzeir Or was “Reflecting about the Flow from On High”, this is about “gratitude”. To recognize that good things are going on is “harkaras hatov”, a near literal translation. “Hoda’ah”, gratitude, shifts from identifying the good to letting it shift your relationship to its provider, or in this case — Provider.

This is also a theme in our berakhah. It is the whole link between talking about Hashem creating light and the providers of light to talking about angels saying Qedushah, declaring Hashem’s Will being consecrated (i.e. maqdish) to giving us benefit.

There is a hint of it also in the fours in the berakhah as well. Four, as I’ve suggested in a number of places, invokes the idea of humanity in the role of receivers. (Think of motherhood in the biological sense, and that we have four foremothers. (See the links and elsewhere for more.)

תִּתְבָּרַךְ (1) צוּרֵנוּ (2) מַלְכֵּנוּ (3) וְגוֹאֲלֵנוּ (4) בּוֹרֵא קְדוֹשִׁים

Blessed is (1) our Former, (2) our King, and (3) our Redeemer, (4) the Creator of holy ones.

The angels too are described in four ways:

(1) כֻּלָּם אֲהוּבִים. (2) כֻּלָּם בְּרוּרִים. (3) כֻּלָּם גִּבּוֹרִים. (4) וְכֻלָּם עוֹשִׂים בְּאֵימָה וּבְיִרְאָה רְצוֹן קוֹנָם

(1) All of them are beloved, (2) all of them are pure, (3) all of them are mighty and (4) all of them perform with awe and reverence the will of their Possessor.

And lest you think this is merely “to someone who only has a hammer, everything looks like a nail”, shortly thereafter we have a near reiteration of the four-fold way Moshe Rabbeinu describes Hashem that we use in Birkhas Avos:

אֶת שֵׁם – (1) הָקל הַמֶּלֶךְ (2) הַגָּדוֹל (3) הַגִּבּוֹר (4) וְהַנּוֹרָא – קָדוֹשׁ הוּא

The name of — the (1) G-d who is King, (2) the Great One, (3) the Mighty One, and (3) the Awe-inspiring Holy One — who is Holy.

Notice that the angels, are also (3) Mighty, and (4) involves their Yir’ah.

Before you ask about adding “King” to Moshe Rabbeinu’s list, recall that in Birkhas Qedushah, “haKeil haQadosh” is replaced with “haMalekh haQadosh”, and we consider Shema’s “Hashem Elokeinu Hashem Echadh” to be the essence of accepting Hashem as King. Keil and Melekh are aspects of a single concept.

Also, I think because of “HaKeil / haMelekh haQadosh” in that berakhah of Shemoneh Esrei, the “Qadosh Hu” here applies to the full list of appelations, rather than #4 being “the Awe-Inpiring Holy One”. Qedushah is closely linked to this Keil / Melekh concept; more so (in my opinion) than to Yir’ah.

So, as I see it, this first part of the berakhah has three layers:

1. The conceptual: Everything flows from Hashem except he leaves gaps which He leaves for us to fill in.
2. Developing an awareness of just how much “everything” means. From everything we encounter every day to all of space and everything in it, to the world of angels. And think about each item in “everything we encounter everyday”. All of that is Divine Light, being filtered through layers of perception, i.e. “Metaphysical Worlds”.
3. Turning that awareness into gratitude toward the One Who Provides that Good. Which then joins us to those angels as ones who sing Hashem’s praise.