Q&A: Balak as an acronym: “I feel like kugel”; Bilam as an acronym: “I want another serving”
Balak as an acronym: “I feel like kugel”; Bilam as an acronym: “I want another serving”
Question
There are all kinds of funny Torah sayings where it’s not clear whether they fall within the framework of the seventy-times-seventy faces of Torah: in the plain meaning times seventy, in homiletics times another seventy, in allusion times another seventy, and in the esoteric times another seventy—and that’s only in the revealed dimension, times seventy in the hidden dimension, and times another seventy in Hasidism, etc.
Like: Balak as an acronym for “I feel like kugel,” Bilam for “I want another serving,” Pinhas for “suddenly half the pot is finished,” and so on.
In the book From the Wellsprings of Torah and similar works you can find all kinds of things…
Preachers and rabbis also use this a lot: “in the end our groom comes…” and so on.
What’s the boundary? Where is this just a little garnish, some nice embellishment,
and where is it just plain mockery—one bit of clowning that pushes aside a hundred serious insights?
Answer
What do you mean, up to where? Nowhere at all. This is all nonsense. It seems like trolling to me.
Discussion on Answer
There’s no difference at all.
If, for example, the Sages expound the verse, “Therefore those who speak in parables say: Come to Heshbon” — “those who speak in parables” means those who rule over their inclination, etc., as is well known—that’s fine.
But a Hasidic quip — no.
What’s the difference?