Welcome to Torah Today Ministries and our continuing series Divine Appointments. And this special episode I’ve entitled “The Secret of the Dreidel” and you might be thinking, what does this have to do with the holy days which are the divine appointments, the mo’adim (מוֹעֲדִים)?
Well, most of you are probably familiar with what a dreidel is. It’s a kind of a top that is associated with the holiday of Hanukkah. And though the dreidel is never mentioned in the Bible, you’re probably wondering, “Well, Grant, what have you gotten into? Are you this desperate for topics to talk about that you’re going to talk about a Jewish child’s toy?”
Well, I’m not desperate for things to talk about, but this is something that touches on something deeper than fact.
So, before I get into the dreidel, let me share something that kind of bothers me. You know, over the 30 years or so that I have been in the Messianic Awakening and been teaching Torah and speaking and traveling and leading a congregation for 26 years, I’ve encountered segments of the Messianic believers who love the scriptures of Israel. They love the Torah. They love the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. They love and follow the Jewish Messiah, but when it comes to the Jews themselves, they kind of shun them. They distance them. And that to me is just kind of weird.
Reminds me of a dog we had years ago. He’s named Winston, little Boston Terrier. And he was a great little dog, but he had this one psychiatric issue. He didn’t like dogs. I don’t think he realized he was one.
And I think there’s something wrong with Messianic believers who somehow shun and distance themselves from Jews and anything Jewish.
Now, I’m not saying we should embrace everything that is believed in Judaism or taught by a rabbi. I’ll never say that. But I think there’s more to embrace than there is to reject. And we should at least hear things with an open heart. We should have a Berean mindset. We should receive things with openness of mind, but check the scriptures to see if they’re so.
Because after all, God’s covenant people, the children of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, are the ones with whom he has entrusted his oracles. He has entrusted his scriptures through whom he’s given us the prophets, through whom he’s given us the Messiah. And I believe he’s given us many other things, many other treasures that if we tap into, we will be blessed beyond measure.
You know, on the one hand, we say God runs the world, and I do believe that with all my heart. But then on the other, we look with suspicion and fear at anything Jewish that isn’t spelled out in black and white in the Bible.
Well, if God runs the world, can’t God also orchestrate and ordain and develop many of the traditions we find in Judaism?
I know people who will keep Passover, but they’ll only do what’s in Exodus 12. They’ll only do what they see in the last supper in the Gospels. But anything outside of that, anything in the Haggadah, they reject. Even though there’s so much in the Haggadah itself, the ancient traditional Haggadah that’s been developed over centuries, so much there that would speak to us, that would reveal God to us.
You think, how can this be? Well, it’s really quite easy. In Proverbs 25:2, Solomon writes:
“It is the glory of God to conceal a matter. It is the glory of kings to search out a matter.” (Proverbs 25:2)
There’s this divine scavenger hunt that God’s kept up since creation where he has hidden and scattered in creation and in human history and events throughout time, things that reveal himself, clues to himself. He’s left footprints everywhere of himself.
It’s a divine game of hide-and-seek that he plays with us and he invites us to come and to find him in the details.
And just this year, I kind of focused on the dreidel. And this little toy that is kind of a silly little game you can play with it. And again, it’s associated with Hanukkah.
And it’s like really, could God even be in something so humble and insignificant? Well, let’s take a look and see what we can find.
According to legend, and it’s just a legend, when in the days of the Maccabees, this is before Messiah came when Israel was under the thumb of the wicked Greek dictator Antiochus IV Epiphanes. The laws have been passed that the Jewish people are not allowed to circumcise their children or study the Torah or own a Torah scroll. And the scrolls that they discovered were torn to pieces and the Jewish people were persecuted in horrible ways. And of course, this is the background to the entire story of Hanukkah and what is celebrated in this time of year.
But according to this legend, it was illegal to study the Torah and the Holy Books, but the Jewish men would get together anyway and study in secret. But they would have a lookout at the door, at the window, and they saw one of Antiochus’s spies coming along. They give the signal, and they would hide all the scrolls, hide the holy books, and they would get out their dreidels, these tops, and they get out some coins, and they would sit there and spin the tops and play this game. It was kind of a gambling game.
And when the spy looked in, he’d think, “Ah, these Jews, all they do is waste their time gambling.” And he would move on. And once he’d moved on, they’d put the dreidels away and they would get the holy books back out and resume their studies.
Again, it’s a legend. Probably isn’t true, but that’s the background.
But over the centuries, the dreidel has become this traditional game that is played at Hanukkah. And the dreidel has four sides to it. And each side has a different Hebrew letter. You probably can’t see them on the camera very well, but it’s a nun (נ), a gimel (ג), a hey (ה), and a shin (ש).
These are the four sides of the dreidel. Why these four letters?
Well, the nun (נ) stands for the word nes (נֵס), which means miracle. Gimel (ג) stands for the word gadol (גָּדוֹל) which means great. In Hebrew the adjective comes after the noun. So “miracle great” would be “a great miracle.” Hey (ה) stands for hayah (הָיָה) which means “happened” or “occurred” and shin (ש) stands for sham (שָׁם), “there.”
Nes Gadol Hayah Sham – A great miracle happened there.
And of course the miracle that happened at Hanukkah. There are two miracles really. One is the ragtag band of Jewish priests overthrew the mightiest army in the world at the time. Not just once but six times in six battles they defeated Antiochus and his army.
But the other miracle of course is the miracle of the oil. When they went to rededicate, and that’s what Hanukkah (חֲנֻכָּה) means, Hanukkah’s “dedication.” When they went to rededicate the temple, they found enough holy oil to burn only for one day and keep the menorah going for 24 hours. But a miracle happened. They put it in and it burned for eight days. That’s the story.
So a great miracle happened there.
But here’s something that’s kind of interesting. As you know, each Hebrew letter has a numerical value:
And this adds up to a grand total of 358.
And just coincidentally, 358 is the number, the numerical value of the word Mashiach (מָשִׁיחַ), Messiah, Christ.
What are the chances? … What are the chances?
But it doesn’t end there. You know, when Israel became a nation back in 1948, some of the Jewish manufacturers of dreidels changed the last letter from a shin (ש) to a pey (פ). So that would read:
Nes Gadol Hayah Po (נֵס גָּדוֹל הָיָה פֹּה) – A great miracle happened here.
And so if you go to Israel and maybe some Judaica shops, you may find dreidels with these four letters on them. But even there, and again, this is not something that comes out of the Bible. This is a tradition. And this tradition is less than 100 years old of dreidels in Israel sometimes having these four letters on them.
Nun (נ), gimel (ג), hey (ה) and pey (פ) which add up to 138.
What’s the significance of that? Well, 138 is the numerical value of the word Tzemach (צֶמַח) which means “branch.”
And you may wonder, well what does that have to do with anything? Well, branch is one of the names of Messiah.
We read in Jeremiah 23:5:
“Behold, the days are coming, declares Adonai, when I will raise up for David a righteous Tzemach (צֶמַח), Branch, and he shall reign as king and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land.” (Jeremiah 23:5)
And Jeremiah 33:15 also carries a similar message.
Zechariah 3:8:
“Hear now, O Joshua,” or Yeshua, same name as Yeshua, “the high priest, you and your friends who sit before you, for they are men who are a sign. Behold, I will bring my servant HaTzemach (הַצֶּמַח), the Branch, my servant, the Branch.” (Zechariah 3:8)
And if you go on to Zechariah 6:12:
“And say to him, ‘Thus says Adonai of hosts, behold the man whose name is the Tzemach (צֶמַח), the Branch, for he shall branch out from his place, and he shall build the temple of Adonai.’” (Zechariah 6:12)
These are messianic prophecies. They all have to do with Messiah. So the four original letters on the traditional dreidel add up to the numerical value of Mashiach (מָשִׁיחַ), Messiah. But even in the modern dreidel in Israel, the numbers add up to Tzemach (צֶמַח), Branch, one of Messiah’s names.
Again, is this just coincidence? Are we going to rob God of credit for this?
I have to stand back and look at this and say, “Lord, you’re just amazing.” And what a sense of humor you have. You could take something so insignificant as a child’s toy, little Hanukkah game, and you could hide your presence there. You could hide a powerful messianic message in this child’s toy.
Well, you know, this is enough to get you thinking. At least it did me. And I also came across a short little book. It’s less than 40 pages by Rabbi Yitzchak Ginsburgh. It’s called “The Dreidel’s Hidden Meanings.” And Rabbi Ginsburgh is one of the leading rabbis in Jerusalem. A brilliant man. And you can find many of his teachings on YouTube. And I’m not endorsing everything he teaches, but he did this little book and I found it fascinating.
And he talks about something that really got me thinking. You know, the word for dreidel in Hebrew is sevivon (סְבִיבוֹן), which comes from the word savav (סָבַב), which is found many, many times throughout the Hebrew scriptures. And savav means to rotate, revolve, or encircle.
And so it rotates just like this spins. Just something that rotates.
And what Ginsburgh brings out is that when a dreidel is at rest, basically what you have is a cube with a point that it can spin on. But when it’s spinning, it appears as a circle. And of course, this is not a very good photograph of that. But when this square top is spinning, the top looks like a circle.
So at rest, it’s a cube, but in motion it looks like a circle.
I want to think about something for a moment. In nature, in this physical world, we find circles everywhere. We find spheres everywhere. Our planet is a sphere. And I know some people believe it’s a flat earth. Sorry, don’t mean to disappoint you, but it is a sphere. And the moon is a sphere. And one circles around the other. And then together and the other planets circle around our sun, which in turn circles around in our galaxy. And galaxies circle around. Everything is in circles.
But in nature, there’s only one cube that is found.
And what’s interesting when you look in the Torah, and I’ve talked about this in other teachings, in the Torah, when you read about the Holy of Holies, you find out that the Holy of Holies is a cube. Its width and length and height were all identical.
So God’s holy presence in his house, in his tabernacle, dwelt in a cube. And then when you come to the end of Revelation, we read about the new Jerusalem descending out of heaven from God as a bride adorned for her husband. And when we read the dimensions of that holy city, we find its width and length and height also are identical. It is a cube.
So God’s presence likes to dwell in cubes. The holy of holies in the tabernacle, later in the temple, and then at the end of time in the new Jerusalem.
But in the meantime, what cube does he dwell in? Well, in Matthew 5, Yeshua says:
“You are the salt of the earth.” (Matthew 5:13)
Talking about his followers. And salt crystals are the only other cubes that occur in nature. So each of us is like a little holy of holies. Each of us is a cube in which God’s spirit can dwell. Therefore, we are his tabernacles. We are his temples.
But you know, a lot of us are always spinning. We’re always going just buzzing around. And then we wonder, why is it I don’t experience God in my life?
And when you think about the tabernacle as it traveled through the wilderness, when it came to rest, it was erected. The Holy of Holies came into existence and the ark was placed inside and God’s presence was there. But when it was time to move, the tabernacle was deconstructed. It’s a, that’s a kind of a trigger word these days, isn’t it? But it was taken down. The holy of holies didn’t exist anymore and all the pieces parts are carried through the wilderness until they come to their next destination, their next encampment.
So when it was in motion the tabernacle did not exist. In motion the Holy of Holies did not exist. But at rest it came back into being.
And as I was pondering this, I thought of the passage in Deuteronomy 2:1-3. And this is during the 40 years. And at the end of the 40 years of wandering, it says:
“Then we turned and journeyed into the wilderness in the direction of the Red Sea. As Adonai told me, and for many days we circled,” there it’s the word savav (סָבַב) again, the root of the word dreidel, savav. “We circled Mount Seir. Then Adonai said to me, ‘You have circled this country long enough. Turn northward.’” (Deuteronomy 2:1-3)
Enough spinning. Enough spinning. It’s time to go to your land. It’s time to go to the place where you find your home, where you find your rest.
You know, if you just consider the geometrical shapes of a circle and a square, a circle represents randomness. And when the dreidel is spinning, we don’t know which way it’s going to come to rest. It’s random. It’s uncertain.
And in quantum physics these days, we hear a lot about randomness and uncertainty. And there’s the uncertainty principle in quantum physics. When things are in motion, things are uncertain.
But when things come to rest, this once again returns to a four-sided or an eight-sided cube. And there’s stability. There’s order. There’s no more guessing.
So, which kind of life do you live? Is it always spinning? Always random, always uncertain, or have you learned to come to a place of rest?
You know, we are to stand on the rock, the rock of Torah, the rock of Messiah. It’s a place of rest and stability and certainty. We’re not to be balancing on a ball like a seal. We’re to be at a place of rest and stability.
You know, in that verse in Matthew 5, it says if salt loses its taste, its savor, its saltiness, it’s good for nothing.
Well, what’s interesting is that is not at all what it says in the Greek. Not at all. It says if salt becomes moraino (μωραίνω), moraino is the word, it comes from the word moros (μωρός). It means foolish. If the salt becomes foolish, it’s good for nothing.
Foolish salt. No wonder the translators thought we got to put something else in here. But every other place the word moraino is found in the New Testament, it’s translated foolish.
So we should keep it this way in Matthew 5. If salt becomes foolish, what does it mean to become foolish? It means it looks like salt, but it’s just not salt anymore.
And isn’t this what a fool is? Someone who looks like a human, but they’re not living like one. They’re not behaving like one. And you know, God’s word, the Torah, is our handbook for how to be a human being.
And if we’re not living according to the Torah, we are foolish.
Instead of our lives being stable, instead of our lives being orderly, it’s like salt crystals that have lost their corners. They become round. They become random. They become unstable and you can’t stand on them anymore.
Well, anyways, these are just some reflections that came out of a child’s toy.
And you might want to argue, well, God’s not in any of this. Okay, you’re welcome to your opinion.
And to you, this is all just random. It’s all just coincidence.
But the world I live in is a world where God infuses everything. It’s a world that he runs and oversees. And if somehow a little child’s toy called a dreidel was introduced into the Jewish culture and four letters were put on its sides and those four letters just happen to have the numerical value of the word Mashiach (מָשִׁיחַ), Messiah.
I just live in a world where God’s in control. I live in a world where it’s his glory to conceal things and it’s the glory of kings to search them out.
I want to live a royal life.
I love this divine scavenger hunt that God has invited us to participate in and it makes my life an adventure every single day. God never gets boring to me and neither does his word.
So I invite you just to be a little less fearful, have a little more faith that God is bigger than what you think and that he’s also smaller than you think and he can infuse all of reality with his presence and especially with his covenant people and with his word and with those to whom he has entrusted it, the Jewish People.
Don’t swallow everything, but don’t throw it out either. Filter it through, sift it through, and find God there first. And if he’s not there, then ignore it. But if you don’t look for him, you’re not going to find him.
So anyways, those are just some random thoughts about the dreidel. And so until next time, I wish you shalom. May God bless.
CLICK HERE to Print Notes (Print notes to view images)
נ (nun) = 50 Nes = “Miracle”
ג (gimel) = 3 Gadol = “Great”
ה (hei) = 5 Hayah = “Happened”
ש (shin) = 300 Sham = “There”
TOTAL = 358 = משיח = “Mashiach”
נ (nun) = 50 Nes = “Miracle”
ג (gimel) = 3 Gadol = “Great”
ה (hei) = 5 Hahah = “Happened”
פ (peh) = 80 Po = “Here”
TOTAL = 138 = צמח = Tzemech = “Branch”
Jeremiah 23:5 “Behold, the days are coming, declares Adonai, when I will raise up for David a righteous Branch, and He shall reign as King and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land.” [+ 33:15]
Zechariah 3:8 Hear now, O Joshua the high priest, you and your friends who sit before you, for they are men who are a sign: behold, I will bring My servant the Branch.
Zechariah 6:12 And say to him, ‘Thus says Adonai of hosts, “Behold, the man whose name is the Branch: for He shall branch out from His place, and He shall build the temple of Adonai.”’
סבב (sovav) = “rotate / revolve / encircle”
Deuteronomy 2:1-3 Then we turned and journeyed into the wilderness in the direction of the Red Sea, as Adonai told me. And for many days we circled Mount Seir. Then Adonai said to me, “You have circled this mountain country long enough. Turn northward.”
Randomness vs. Order
Uncertainty vs. Stability
REFERENCES:
Proverbs 25:2 It is the glory of God to conceal a matter, but the glory of kings is to search out a matter.
Jeremiah 33:15 In those days and at that time I will cause a righteous Branch (צמח, tzemech) to spring up for David, and He shall execute justice and righteousness in the land.
סבב (sovav) occurs seven times in the story of conquering Jericho. (Joshua 6:3-15)
Deuteronomy 32:10 “He found him in a desert land, and in the howling waste of the wilderness; He encircled(סבב, sovav) him, He cared for him, He kept him as the apple of His eye.”
Psalm 118:10-14 All nations surrounded (סבב, sovav) me; in the name of Adonai I cut them off! They surrounded (סבב, sovav) me, surrounded (סבב, sovav) me on every side; in the name of Adonai I cut them off! They surrounded (סבב, sovav) me like bees; they went out like a fire among thorns; in the name of Adonai I cut them off! I was pushed hard, so that I was falling, but Adonai helped me. Adonai is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation.
Matthew 5:13 “You are the salt of the earth, but if salt becomes foolish (μωραίνω, moraine), how shall its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people’s feet.”
Recommended Reading:
The Dreidel’s Hidden Meanings, by Rabbi Yitzchak Ginsburgh (Bro
