Spiritual Photosynthesis: Torah Color Theory

Photosynthesis harvests the sun's energy. It is the biological process that transforms light into life. Much can be learnt from it.

Both blue and red light activate photosynthesis, but red light works better than blue light. Why is this so and what can we learn from it?

Because of its higher frequency a blue photon has more energy than a red one. A chlorophyll molecule excited by a blue photon is unstable.

It dissipates heat and drops to the energy level of the chlorophyll molecule hit by a red photon, the ideal state for photosynthesis.

Thus we may say that photosynthesis either begins red or that blue goes to red. What does this mean for us?

Red is the color of life, the color of blood, the body's life-force. In Hebrew Adam is cognate to red. As plants, man converts light to life.

Blue to red is as light to life, as chaos to order, as mind to heart, as time to space. To be alive is to move, and you need space to move.

Light in vacuum has no experience of time, it is time. As pure time it is not "in" the space that it transverses. Life-forms are in space.

Red shift is the sign of an expanding universe, more and more space to move in, allowing for more and more life-forms on earth!

How do I know that light is time? Because "God called light day" – "And it was evening and it was morning one day."

How do I know that life needs space? Israel is called "the land of the living." "A man without a home (his private domain) is not a man."

When I say that I need my own space, time is implied as well. But I don't call it my time, for time for me is time for you. Not so for space.

On the first day of creation, "one day," relates time to light. On the third day, "one place," relates space to water, the source of life.

Blue to red is as seeing to hearing. On the red long wave length side of the electromagnetic radiation spectrum come radio waves.

In photosynthesis the chlorophyll has to hear the light it's absorbing. In Kabbalah, to absorb is to hear. You can't absorb by seeing alone.

Blue light hovers above and around, red light enters in. Blue to red is as transcendence to immanence.

Blue to red is as standing to sitting. The Rebbe had a red chair.

Blue to red is as cool to warm. A red colored room is physically warmer than a blue colored room, even though blue has more energy.

Chlorophyll does not capture green, it reflects it. That's why plants are green. The Mashiach is called a plant. He is human photosynthesis.

Hearing (understanding) what you see (wisdom) depends on your sense of smell (super-conscious crown)! Mashiach excels in his sense of smell.

Of all land animals bears have the best sense of smell (7 times better than bloodhounds). Of all sea animals sharks are the best smellers.

The biggest animal ever known to have existed is the blue whale. For red consider the red heifer, a symbol of life.

The blue whale, a mammal, lives in the sea, the concealed world. The red heifer lives on land, the revealed world. So is blue to red.

There are blue sharks and red panda bears, again blue in water and red on land. The whale shark is the largest fish (not mammal) on earth.

Shark (530), bear (6), whale (496), heifer (285) = 1317 = lion (216), ox (506), eagle (550), man (45), the Divine Chariot!

The sages say that a naturally beautiful bride needs no makeup, no blue for her eyes and no red for her cheeks.

As with regard to a bride, blue to red is as eyes, light receptors, to cheeks, which in the idiom of the Torah glow with the light of life..

In Hebrew, "cheeks" reads "for life" (lechaim)! Cheeks radiate life-giving light, as in Proverbs: "Life is the light of a majestic face."

Human photosynthesis takes place in the reddish cheeks, the light-life of one's countenance, not in the bluish eyes, the seers of light.

Human photosynthesis (Mashiach as a plant) has to do with the complexion of one's skin, beginning in the face, one's cheeks.

Thus, blue to red is as light to skin. In Hebrew, light and skin sound (hear) alike, just that the alef of light becomes the ayin of skin.

The average value of the 3 letters of light (207) = 69. Another 69 (the difference between alef and ayin) gives skin (276) = eternal life!

Before the primordial sin (and the decree of death), man's skin was radiant. He was photosynthetic. Skin as we know it is the product of sin.

Why is complexion complex? Because it means the combination of temperaments (hot, cold, wet, dry) and of humors (red, white, green, black).

In Kabbalah, physiological complexity relates to the Act of the Chariot, combinations of four qualities. Photosynthesis is a chariot process.

Life (chaim) is primarily hot (cham), red (blood) and fire. Blue to red is as light to fire, as Abraham to Isaac.

Abraham began to shine light to the world. Isaac lived the maximal Jewish lifespan in the Torah. He lived 180 (= 10 times 18, life) years.

In science (not so in art which substitutes yellow for green) the 3 primary colors and blue, green, and red.

Abraham is blue, Isaac is red, and Jacob is green (or yellow, the same word in Rabbinic Hebrew). Plants convert blue to red but look green.

Isaac (208) plus life (68) = 276 = eternal life = the triangular value of 23 (the sum of all integers from 1 to 23). 23 = the living one.

Life (68, one less than 69), long life (345 = Moses = 5 times 69), eternal life (276 = 4 times 69) = 689 = Eternity of Israel (Name of God).

Long life (345 = Moses, the midpoint of 689) = "from light to life," the secret of photosynthesis.

Blue has short wavelengths, red has long wavelengths. Long wavelengths – long life.

Normally the right, long line of the Tree of Life is associated with blue and the left, short line with red. Inter-inclusion at work.

Blue is spiritual longevity (some of the greatest sages didn't live to 40), red is physical longevity. Resurrection is a physical phenomenon.

69 (the common divisor of light, skin, long life, eternal life) = vivid red (adom chai). Life (and light) on earth begins with vivid red.

Blue to red is as spiritual to physical, as heavens to earth. The sky is blue and the earth is red. Red, ground, and man share a common root.

Of the three Patriarchs only Isaac was commanded never to leave the Land of Israel, never to part from holy red.

In Kabbalah, father is blue and mother is red. New life results from father impregnating mother. Life is conceived and born in red.

Baby boys dress in blue, baby girls in red (or pink, the color of the skin). 69, vivid red = Dinah, Jacob's (and Leah's) only daughter.

Leah had "soft (blue) eyes." Rachel had "(a beautiful figure and) a beautiful complexion." Blue eyed Leah gave birth to vivid red Dinah.

Dinah (vivid red), whose name permutes to spell nidah (as it appears once in the Bible), impure menstrual blood, was raped by Shechem.

Dinah was the mother of Osnat, Joseph's wife, and grandmother of Efraim and Menashe, who were blessed to be as fish, immune to the evil eye.

Efraim inherited his grandmother's red and Menashe inherited his great-grandmother's blue, both in the general context of blue (bluefish).

Blue Leah had many more children than red Rachel, her energy level was higher, as blue to red. The "living tzadik," Joseph, came from Rachel.

Efraim and Menashe thus came from Leah on their mother's side and from Rachel on their father's side. Efraim was the red in the blue.

Efraim and Menashe were blessed to be "as many as fish in the midst of the earth" = 861, the triangle of 41 (mother) = The Holy Temple.

Pleasure in Hebrew has 2 forms, oneg, 123, and ta'anug, 529. 861 = 7 times 123, oneg. Plus Efraim Menashe = 1587 = 3 times ta'anug.

Efraim is the "child of delights" of the Jewish people. His first and final letters spell mother as do the first and final letters of red.

Another phrase in the Torah that equals 861 (= The Holy Temple) is "it is holy ground," said to Moses at the burning bush.

"Holy" means "on fire," red. "Ground" is from the same root as red. The Temple sacrifices are called "fires." All transform light to life.

In the Holy Temple, God's infinite light shines in the Holy of Holies, His light to the world shines from the menorah. Fire is on the altar

The light of the Holy of Holies is pure light. The menorah shines light from fire (candles). The altar is pure fire. From light to life.

There are 4 precious gemstones (all others are semi-precious): diamond, sapphire, emerald, ruby. They correspond to the 4 letters of Havayah.

The sapphire and the ruby are the same stone just that the primary color of sapphires is blue (as in sapphire eyes) and rubies are red.

Sapphires and rubies, the same stone, correspond to the two letters hei of Havayah, mother and daughter, understanding and kingdom.

Rubies are red due to a bit of chromium present in the stone. The atomic number of Cr, 24, alludes to the 24 "courts of justice" in kingdom.

Diamonds, sapphires, emeralds, rubies are white, blue, green, red respectively. In photosynthesis blue goes to red, sapphires become rubies.

Diamond white is the all-inclusive color. It divides into the 3 primary colors of the spectrum: sapphire blue, emerald green, ruby red.

Humans inhale oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide. Plants inhale carbon dioxide and exhale water. Every morning blue photons activate breathing.

Green photons tell the plant to slow down, to be patient, for too energetic breath will result in loosing too much water and drying out.

Sapphires (blue) turn on plant respiration, emeralds (green) slow it down. Breath is a cycle of 4 stages: inhale, hold, exhale, rest.

In plants, blue (sapphire) controls the primary stages of inhale-exhale while green (emerald) controls the intermediate stages of hold-rest.

In Hebrew, diamond sapphire emerald ruby = 630, the triangle of 35, Yehudi (Jew) = 14 (David) times 45 (Adam, the same word as ruby).

Ruby, Adam, and red are all the same word (= 45). White blue green red = 495 = 11 times 45, red and 10 times red. Kingdom (ruby red) is all.

Blue (3 letters, 28 and 30) = 58 = "grace," or "favor." 58 = Noah, who found favor in the eyes (blue) of God, on the 58th day of the year.