CHAPTER FOUR

DALET

(dah’let)

SOUND: d

NUMERICAL VALUE: 4

Meanings

The fourth letter of the Aleph Beit, Dalet shares the same Hebrew root as , delet, meaning “door,” “doorway,” “entrance,” “threshold.” The form of Dalet suggests an open doorway with its horizontal top or lintel and vertical doorpost.

Dalet is also said to suggest a person doubled over while carrying a heavy load. This is related to the other main association with Dalet, that of a poor person who knocks on doors, begging for alms. As discussed in the chapter on Gimmel, the Talmud describes Dalet as a poor person toward whom Gimmel is rushing in order to give charity.

Application

When Dalet wanders into our life, we are asked to examine the nature of true wealth. Dalet calls on us to open up our doors to receive the gifts that the universe is rushing to bestow upon us. Our ability to recognize and receive these gifts depends on our humility. It’s not easy to acknowledge that we are needy and to allow ourselves to accept offerings from others. When we are not full of self-importance, when we are poor in ego and opinions, then the doorway is open for inspiration and divine gifts to flow into our lives.

Selecting Dalet is a reminder to cultivate humility. Have we become arrogant, puffed up with our own importance, forgetting to acknowledge the central place of the Divine? The word “humility” comes from humus, meaning “earth.” The English word “human” has a similar etymology, as does the Hebrew word , adam, which indicates both “man” and “earth” (and is the name of the first man on earth). As we become more humble, we become more human.

Humility arises from being connected with our roots, down close to the soil. Dalet, bent over toward the ground, calls us to remember this connection, that our bodies and nurturance, our very lives, depend on the earth. In fact, our bodies are the earth. We are the earth manifesting as living, moving, self-aware and reflective creatures. We are not separate, and we are not self-sufficient. Rather, we are connected to and dependent upon everything.

If we are going through a difficult time and feeling low and poor, Dalet can be an encouragement that this very difficulty can be the door through which greater blessings will enter. As Jesus said, “Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

Receiving gifts and blessings gracefully can itself be a gift offered to others. The Talmud says that more than a baby seeks to be nursed does a mother seek to nurse her baby. Sometimes we give, sometimes we receive. Sometimes the door swings one way, sometimes the other. As we remain open to each situation, not burdened by either inflated ideas of ourselves on one hand or excessively self-condemnatory ones on the other, we find the appropriate response.

Our senses are the doors of our bodies. As we open them more fully, blessings naturally flow. These blessings grace us with the riches of the material world, in such forms as a bird’s call, sunlight glinting on green leaves, the smell of onions, the taste of an apple. When our time is full of busyness and the arrogant pursuit of “more important” matters, and our minds are full of ideas, we shut the door on these simple blessings, this humble daily life which after all is our only life.

Doorways mark borders. They define “in” and “out.” Modern-day seer Paul Richards teaches that energy gathers at borders. These can be physical borders such as where the ocean meets the land, or temporal borders, such as New Year’s or a wedding or the end of a job. Humble yet powerful Dalet is right at the center of these energy-rich boundaries. It’s the guardian of transitions, the open doorway between one environment and another, between what has been and what might be.

In traditional villages in the Mayan highlands of Guatemala, the houses have doorways but no doors. In fact, there is no word in the Mayan language for “door.” Doorways allow for the free flow of sounds and sights and people in and out of the house, each household connected to the rest of the village in a natural and familiar age-old pattern. In recent decades, after doors were introduced to many of these traditional villages, people started guarding their belongings more and sharing less; informal socializing decreased, thievery increased. Soon everyone started putting locks on the doors and keeping them shut. The social fabric of the villages became frayed.¹

One of Dalet’s messages for us is to find ways to stay open to our villages. While our doorways define inside and outside and provide important protection, closed and locked doors can block the healthy circulation of people and ideas.

Dalet asks us to open the doors to our hearts. The suffering of the world and the pain in our own lives can lead us to shut down, to close the door on these difficult emotions. Dalet encourages us to have the courage to confront these feelings, to open up to them. “Courage” comes from coeur, the French word for heart. It is courageous to feel with our hearts the distress of the world. Much of our lives and modern culture is actually built on distracting us from confronting this pain.

Simple, heartfelt prayers carry tremendous power. One teacher of old wrote, “Do not think that the words of prayer as you say them go up to God. It is not the words themselves that ascend; it is rather the burning desire of your heart that rises like smoke toward heaven. If your prayer consists only of words and letters, and does not contain your heart’s desire — how can it rise up to God?”² Dalet gives us the reassurance that as we offer our prayers humbly and sincerely, wisdom and creativity will flow toward us.

One Rosh Hashanah, the Baal Shem Tov instructed his disciple Reb Wolf Kitzes in the proper way to blow the shofar, the ram’s horn. The Baal Shem taught him the specific kavanot or prayerful intentions the student would need to concentrate on with each blow. But when the time in the service for the blowing arrived, poor, nervous Reb Wolf forgot all the kavanot and all the prayers. It was all he could do to manage to blow the shofar in the proper sequence. Afterwards, he was miserable, heartbroken, and with tears in his eyes he confessed to the Baal Shem Tov his failure to maintain the proper kavanah when blowing the shofar.

The Baal Shem Tov comforted him with this allegory: there are many keys to the various doors of God’s house. But there is a master key that opens all the doors. This master key is an axe. Each of the kavanot for the shofar is like one of the keys to the individual doors. The master key, the axe, the Baal Shem Tov taught, is a broken heart. With this master key, one breaks down all the doors and stands directly in the presence of the Divine.³

Paradoxically, as we open our hearts to the fullness of grief and sadness, we open ourselves to receive joy as well. The Hasidic masters teach that one of the best ways to do this is through singing and dancing. Rebbe Nachman of Breslav, the great-grandson of the Baal Shem, said, “The most direct means for attaching ourselves to God from this material world is through music and song.” He also wrote, “Get into the habit of singing a tune. It will give you new life and fill you with joy.” And elsewhere he said, “Get into the habit of dancing. It will displace depression and dispel hardship.”⁴

Niggunim, the wordless melodies of the Hasidim, have the quality of opening the doors of our hearts to simultaneous feelings of joy and grief. We can incorporate the message of Dalet by learning and singing regularly some of these simple and beautiful songs.

One way Dalet’s poverty or humbleness manifests is in freedom from feeling attached to a separated sense of self. As we let go of the barriers between us and “others,” us and God, a profound openness results. The doors are thrown wide open. Walt Whitman exhorted us to “Unscrew the locks from the doors!/Unscrew the doors themselves from their jambs!”

Dalet represents the number four. Four is a number of wholeness, fullness, and completion. There are four elements, four cardinal directions, four seasons, four Worlds in Kabbalistic cosmology, and four letters in God’s Holy Name, Yud/Hei/Vav/Hei. Paradoxically, the impoverished and needy Dalet embodies this number of wholeness. Letting go of everything, owning nothing, poor Dalet receives the blessings of the whole universe. In its very emptiness, Dalet becomes full.

Dalet encourages us to not be afraid to be “poor in Spirit.” It promises profound fullness and completion, with the four elements, four directions, four seasons, and the Holy Name all conspiring to pour forth new blessings through the doorways of our lives.

Dalet’s Shadow

One of Dalet’s shadows is that of false humility. Do we nurse a desire to be praised for how noble we are for our sacrifices or modest outward behavior? Are we proud of how humble we are? Selecting this letter can be a reminder to be alert to this subtle tendency.

Another shadow of Dalet is excessive humility. Lack of self-esteem is epidemic in our culture, leading to depression and self-destructive behaviors. In many cases, a little less humility and a little more pride may be exactly what is called for.

Personal Comments

Hello Dalet. One reason Jews have mezzuzot on their doors is to remind them that thresholds are sacred. Coming in and going out, that’s what our lives are made of. Breath comes in and goes out our lungs, blood comes in and goes out our hearts, ideas come in and go out our minds — in and out, in and out.

My grandfather had a plan for getting into heaven. He would stand at the gates of heaven and open the gate and close the gate, open the gate and close the gate, open the gate and close the gate. Finally, the guardian of the gates would yell in exasperation, “Look, either in or out!” and my grandfather would go in.

Dalet, on the other hand, is both in and out, neither in nor out. It represents the freedom of the threshold. At the threshold all things are new. At the threshold anything is possible. Our treasure is right here, at the threshold!

 

Summary for Dalet

Numerical value:	4
Meanings:	Door. Doorway. Threshold. Humility.
Application:	Open the doors of our senses.
	Stay open to our village.
	Open our hearts to grief and joy.
	Walk humbly.
Shadow:	False humility.
	Excessive humility.
Reflection:	What is the “burning desire of my heart that rises like smoke toward heaven”? How can I act more fully in accord with this desire?
Suggested action:	Find a way today to open yourself more to a situation or person to which the door of your heart is closed.