Today is Brought to You by the Letter ALEPH

Let’s look at the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet: aleph. Verse 1 of Genesis says: “In the beginning God (Elohim) created the heaven and the earth.” Elohim starts with aleph, in fact many of God’s names start with this letter : El (God, Mighty One), El Shaddai (God Almighty), El Olam (God Everlasting), El Elyon (God Most High). Also many facets of God’s nature begin with this letter as well: love, light, truth, faith, Sovereign Lord. These are all Hebrew words that start with aleph.

When you write the three letters in Hebrew that spell "aleph" you get 3 different words - eleph which mean “ox” or “thousand”, alaph which means “teach”, “learn” or “tame”, and aluph which means “prince”, “chief”, “leader”, “master”, “ruler”, “guide” and “teacher”. The first one, eleph, may seem weird at first if you’re trying to relate the letters to Biblical symbolism. What has an ox to do with anything Biblical? An ox signified strength. It was the chief domesticated animal of the time and had to be “tamed”. That brings us to the second word, alaph, which means “tame” as well as “teach” and “learn” with the idea of learning by association. The last word, aluph (prince, leader, etc.), appears in Genesis 52 times, that’s 64% of all the times it appears in the entire Bible. I think Genesis is showing us very clearly who our leader, master and guide is: God.

There are many words that begin with aleph besides God’s names, such as “one”, “love”, “light”, “truth” and “faith”. These are such important words to our beliefs that I suggest you pause a moment and think about why they would all begin with this first Hebrew letter.

Now think of the Ten Commandments (found in Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5). What’s the first one? No other gods before me! God is Number 1, the One and Only, the Eternal Omnipotent God. He keeps reaching out to man, provides new covenants, never gives up on us and blesses us. He is the Sovereign Ruler over all of His creation.

(Above taken in part from Crossing the Scriptures, copyright 2011.)
(Other posts on Hebrew letters: TET, ZAYIN, KAPH, PEY )