HEBREW WORD STUDY – THE MINATURE  ALEPH  ‘AVATH  ‘A  MINI’ATAVARI    אות. א. מיניאטרי   

Leviticus 1:1: “And the LORD called unto Moses, and spake unto him out of the tabernacle of the congregation, saying,”

You basically have two approaches to Bible Study.  The first is to translate.  For those who have not studied Biblical Languages, they can still do their own translations by examining as many of the 115+ modern English translations or they can and/or go to their Strongs, BDB, or Davidson lexicons and look up the word and examine its many usages and decide for themselves which is the best English word to use in the context of the verse.  There are very few variances in translations and most have no real impact on the fundamentals of our faith.  

From there you go to interpretation and you will find many possible interpretations. This is really where the battle lines are drawn.  For instance in I Corinthians 14:34 we find the Apostle Paul saying that women are to keep silent in the church and not even be allowed to speak.  There is very little wiggle room in your translations, even in the Aramaic, but you get many and varied opinions as to how to interpret this.   Of course, everyone feels their interpretation is the right interpretation even if it is the total opposite of another Christian.  Doctrines, dogmas, and creeds are established by these interpretations. Some follow the Church Fathers, some rely upon the power structure of a particular church or denomination, some just by tradition and others just by a literal reading of a passage. 

However, there is a third approach to Bible study which is, unfortunately, not encouraged by our churches and denominations.  There is the concern that if you use this approach you may be stepping off the reservation.  However, I have seen and read Jewish rabbis who regularly practice this approach and that is to sermonize or spiritualize a passage.  Most denominational leaders outright condemn this practice, yet I  have seen and read where it seems God is quite ok with that approach.   For instance, there is a book called the Heavenly Man where the author, a Chinese pastor, was in prison.  The Lord miraculous allowed him to escape but he only got as far as a great wall that even a pole vaulter would have difficulty scaling.  Yet, this Chinese pastor instantly recalled Psalms 18:9: “For by thee I have run through a troop, and by my God have I leaped over a wall.”  So by faith, he just jumped over this 12-foot wall, an impossible feat especially in his weakened condition. Of course, translators will argue that the passage meant scaling over defenses, interpreters would say he was speaking metaphorically or poetically, few actually believe he scaled walls.  This Chinese pastor didn’t care what the translators or denominational leaders and interpreters said, he just jumped over the wall. He spiritualized the passage.

Spiritualizing is either outright condemned by many teachers or given a stern warning to be careful. Yet, I believe if one is truly committed to God and seeks the guidance of the Holy Spirit, I just don’t put it past God to take a passage of Scripture out of context and allow someone to jump over a wall. 

That brings me to Leviticus 1:1 where Jewish rabbis have traditionally spiritualized.  “And the Lord called unto Moses.”  The word “And He called” in Hebrew is vayikra.  The last letter, the Aleph, in the Torah scrolls is miniaturized.  There are probably about 100 abnormal letters in the Old Testament.  If you are a member of our Full Access you may write to me in the Ask Chaim section and I will send you a copy of a chart with all the abnormal letters.  Their abnormalities are open to much spiritualization.  There are different schools of thought that these abnormalities were the result of scribes writing them in as they were references to the Midrash and Talmud.  There is another school of thought, which I follow and that is those abnormalities found in the first five books of the Bible, the Torah was part of the original inspired text written in by Moses Himself. Since there is no definitive reason given in Scripture for these abnormalities, we are free to make our own application through the guidance of the Holy Spirit. 

This being the case the sages teach that the shrunken Aleph was to show the trait of humility in Moses. He shrunk the letter Aleph to minimize the fact that the God of the universe called him out. He tried to minimize his own importance. By shrinking the letter Aleph in vayikra it could be read as vayikr which means not to call out but to happen upon.  By doing this Moses is saying; “Hey, I am just old Joe the Shepherd here that God just happened to pick out to deliver a  nation. I mean I am nobody.” 

To me as I watch so many pastors and church leaders with all their education and adoration from their congregations who are so full of themselves and their fancied importance taking themselves just too serious, I think paying attention to these little esoteric Jewish teachings would be highly recommended.  Check out the shrunken Aleph and ask yourself before you write your biography, would you begin your autobiography by shrinking the Aleph when you start with God calling you and say: “God just happened upon me and gave me this mission.”