The Shape of Tzaddi: Blessing on the Shoulder

10aOr we may read “Noach … in his generations” through the shape of the letter tzaddi. The complete tzaddik, who always walks in true unity, brings down a flow of goodness and blessing to all Israel, and the letter tzaddi hints at this. It is written thus, צ: a nun (נ) with a yud (י) on its back. The upper head of the nun is short, hinting at the unity in which the tzaddik walks; its lower foot is wide, hinting that the tzaddik must bring blessing down, widening and spreading the flow over all Israel. And the yud, written behind the nun as if on its shoulder, hints that he receives the flow on his shechem, his shoulder, from the yud, from which the main flow comes.

10bThis is “All Your works shall praise You, Hashem”:¹ yoducha (יודוך), “shall praise You,” is read as speaking of the yud (יוד), for all Your works come about through the yuds (יודי״ן). The same is hinted in “Avraham vayashkem, rose early, in the morning”:² he drew down flows of kindness, chassadim, for “morning” hints at kindness, and he drew them through the shoulder, for vayashkem is from shechem, shoulder. “And he saddled his donkey”: vayachavosh, “saddled,” also means “bound,” and his chamor, “donkey,” is the chomriyus, the materiality, which is the harsh judgments: he bound and subdued them and sweetened them. The verse says of Shaul HaMelech, “From his shoulders, mishichmo, and upward he was taller than all the people,”³ hinting at the same thing. Shaul was like a one-year-old, clean of all sin,⁴ and he stood at this level of the tzaddik who draws down blessing through the shoulder, and at this level he was higher and greater “than all the people.”

11That is what the verse means by “Noach was a righteous man, whole in his generations”: he was whole in his righteousness, in true unity, and drew down flows of blessing to his generations. Understand this well.