What is the 'Notarikon' hermeneutical method?

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Question

Using Hebrew letters to understand Bible passages is a fascinating topic. I have heard of it in Bible school, on this site, where it's been called "notarikon", and elsewhere.

Wikipedia explains that Notarikon arose in Jewish Kabbalistic schools, and says that its methods "were used in order to derive the esoteric substratum and deeper spiritual meaning of the words in the Bible."

So I am looking for:

• the meaning of the name Notarikon,
• an explanation of the method,
• who the major figures are in its history,
• whether the method has any variants, perhaps as it is distinctively applied by Jews or Christians in more recent times,
• as well as some examples, from those ancient mystics, through to modern uses.

Answer

The Jewish hermeneutic is call PARDES. It is both an acronym and a trope. As an acronym it represents four methods of understanding scripture. 'P' stands for 'pashat' meaning the plain or literal meaning of the words. This is parallel to the Reformed literal-historical methods. "THe pashat never loses it's meaning" emphasizes that without a literal meaning there can be no hidden meanings. The implication is far deeper. It says that Truth is not hidden in fables in scripture. Truth begets truth. The accounts of Adam and Eve have no truth if they are not based in historical truth.

The 'R' represents 'Remez' or 'hints'. This is similar to reformation cross referencing, but deeper. Remez brings the content of the cross reference into the present context. When Jesus cries out "Why have you foresaken me?" he is not quoting a single verse, but bringing all of Psalm 22 into context.

'D' is for derash 'seek' or 'compare'. This is not an exercise in English 101 compare and contrast. In derash, the various related pericopes are made into transparencies and lined up on similarities , each giving additional information. When Jesus gave the keys of the kingdom (teaching) to Peter, he started showing him in scripture where it said he must die. He gave his the tropes of the cross used in the mystery. These pictures of the cross are lined up on top of each other, and each adds information to the understanding of the cross. As an example. One of the tropes is things that are divided or split become the cross. The stone that was struck, split and produced water is a picture of the cross. The word stone is 'aben' אבן. Notarikon tells us that the stone is a picture of the Father 'ab' אב and Son 'ben' בן where separated at the cross, producing life thorough the word (water).

'S' represents 'Sod' [sowd] meaning hidden. The sod permeates all of God's revelation. Jesu said all the scriptures speak of him And Paul says the 'sod' or mystery has been hidden from the beginning.

Notarikon is only one of the many rules of Rabbi Eliezer ben Yose HaGelili for interpreting scripture. It is useful at all four layers. Rule 30: Noṭariḳon: Interpretation by dividing a word into two or more parts.

Rabbi Eliezer was a second century teacher from Galilee. Being close in time and proximity geographically makes him interesting. Some of his teachings are attributed to earlier rabbis which may make them contemporaneous to the NT authors.

Notarikon, as defined by Eliezer, is opposite the formula stated in the Sephir Yetzirah;building words from smaller components of letters and gates. It starts with a phonetic description of how consonants are formed from vowels by interrupting breath. The implication is that each consonant has a vowel attached to it. In practice it appears that often a single consonant is pronounced plosively and if it is desired for breath to be pronounce prior to the consonant, one of the five vowels is used. Double letters may behave differently. Since I have no one to speak Hebrew with, pronunciation is a novelty to me. More study is required in this.

The Sephir Yetzirah goes on to attribute meaning to the letters, and then explains how each letter is paired with all the other letters forming two-letter gates. If a gate is reversed there is some sort of reversal of meaning. The gates are decorated with letters before, after and within to enhance and expand the meaning of the word being formed.

Before going further, it must be explained that the Sephir Yetzirah was not the beginning of my study. It was only after several years of inductive study, when I began explaining my findings that I discovered the manuscript. I was being accused of being a Caballist and a Gnostic. I had no experience with either, and in defense of my work I had to do an analysis of these to know that I was not. A Gnostic understanding can be traced to scripture if Eliezer's rules are applied without other rules which are determined from scripture. The rules for sensus plenior eliminate free for all allegory and doctrinal error.

To state it plainly, the principle of Notarikon is evident on it's face in many words as they derive their meaning from subparts:

Adam

Adam came from the ground 'adamah' and has blood 'dam' and spirit [the aleph]. In Yetzira, the first number, aleph, is called the Holy Spirit. The letter aleph is called fire, a common metaphor for the Spirit in Christendom.

Having reverse engineered the words to the letters, we can say that the blood דם is the commandment ד finished by the Son ם.

In the beginning בראשית

Dividing 'bereshit' translated 'in the beginning' we get some surprising results:

ב-ראשית : in ב – the beginning ראשית

ברא-שית : created ברא - six שית

בר(אש)ית : a covenant ברית with man אש at the center

בר-אשי-ת : the son בר – offered total devotion (fire offerings) אשי – (makes it an object) ת

ב(ראשי)ת The daughter בת has her head ראשי in her heart (by position). A riddle that the daughter of God loves God (her head).

Using the reverse engineered letters:

ב-ר-א-ש-י-ת - a revelation to man ב it is revealed ר that God spoke and created the heavens and the earth א his word did not return void ש his plan for creation י was finished ת

ב-ראש-י-ת : in ב - the authority of (heads of) ראש - the creator י – (makes it an object) ת

A Contradiction?

It would appear that the aleph has different meanings. In one place it means 'spirit' and in another it means 'created'. Both words are expressions of it's foundational meaning; that which is derived from the meaning of the strokes. Extending notarikon to the strokes is practiced by rabbis. Rabbi Ginsburg splits the aleph into two yods and a vav. [1] Here they express that the vav is an extended yod These ideas are not unique and can be found in the writings of Cabbalah and Christian Hebrew roots churches.

The foundational discerned meaning of the aleph is 'creation by separation'. This is expressed in many expansions. The word create 'bara' ברא is understood to be the son בר who created א. It should be intuitively clear why the rabbis do not wish to go to this level, and why some intentionally confuse notarikon. How does this relate to the Spirit? He is also the creator: Ps 104:30 Thou sendest forth thy spirit, they are created: and thou renewest the face of the earth.

The aleph can be expressed as creation, the creator, the act of creation. It can be expanded as particular acts: the separation of light from dark, water above from water below, and the parting of the sea, tearing of the veil. It is expressed in the Spirit on the face of the waters, and the firmament on the same waters. It is the split stone, 'torn' baby, and as both the incarnation and the Father leaving the Son on the cross. It contains the unspeakable name of God as the creator of heaven and earth, יוי.

Even without notarikon, the letter is pregnant with meaning. Hebrew letters are also numbers. There are 28 forms of letters giving 28 numbers from 1-9, 10-90, 100-900, and 1000. The aleph is the first letter and the number one. It's name 'aleph' means 1000 which is the number of the last letter. The first is the last; the beginning is the end; and one is like 1000.

This may seem confusing for the one beginning to unpack prophetic riddle, but we do it readily in English; it is child's play. It is not recognized easily if Hebrew is not our first language. When this was shared with a pastor from Israel he exclaimed that though he had never seen it before, once I showed him, it was plain. It should be noted that critics wonder where additional meaning could come from. The letters and words are rich with additional meaning without resorting to free-for-all allegory.

Useful for literal interpretation

Notarikon is useful to understand the literal meaning of scripture. Scholars are hog tied to understand scripture when a word is used only once. This issue may be illustrated in 2Ki 4:42 where translations have the man carrying crops in a backpack or in their husks. 'In the husk בצקלנו breaks out as : swell, dough, flour בצק taught us לנו. The man likely carried the crops in dough form, as did the Hebrews when they left Egypt.

Method for discerning the meaning of the letters

By using Eliezers rule, that words can be divided into smaller parts, and using the Yetzirah, that words are built from the strokes and letters, we have something similar to a multidimensional crossword puzzle where we have clues for horizontal and vertical words. We can solve the meaning of the letters by tearing words apart, and putting them back together.

Which letters?

There are several Hebrew alphabets to choose from.

There is no agreement on the meaning of particular letters. As we examine other practices, it will be made clear why the methods used to determine meaning were rejected and an original reverse engineering of the language was required.