This shawl is inscribed with the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet. Each letter has its own unique energy and creative property. The letters are a revealed form of something more subtle, that exists as a configuration of light or fire.

Combined in different ways the letters are said to give rise to the soul of every being and the manifest world. The Kabbalists would move the letters of a word around

(“permuting”), as a way to derail the intellect and allow for non-conceptual consciousness to arise. The creating of a mental emptiness allows for a direct experience of the divine. The letters on this shawl are therefore not in their usual alphabetic order!

Abraham Abulafia, a 12th century Kabbalist taught that “one should permute the letters by writing them down to make use of the body as well as of the intellect...from the permutations your heart will become extremely warm... you will gain knowledge that you never learned from human traditions nor derived from intellectual analysis. When you experience this you are prepared to receive the (divine) influx.”¹