Sefer ha-Bahir 162-163 -- the adversary and the evil inclination
Sefer ha-Bahir · The Book of Brilliance
ספר הבהיר · קסב-קסג
canonical late 12th c., Provence (ascribed to the 1st c. tanna) Hebrew Anonymous (attributed to Rabbi Nehunya ben ha-Kanah) tr. Hekhal Targum Project (machine-assisted draft; pending scholarly review)
The doctrine of evil. The king’s daughter guarded from her enemies by staying within and never sitting idle (§ 162); and the Adversary as “a measure whose name is evil” on the north — the form of a hand with messengers all named evil, rooted in the tohu of the north, the source of every evil inclination, kept to the left where alone it has authority (§ 163).
A provisional scholarly draft, released openly for correction and not yet reviewed by a credentialed editor. The Hebrew is reproduced verbatim from the Hebrew Wikisource transcription; the standard modern English translation (Kaplan, 1979) is under copyright.
משל למה”ד למלך שהיתה לו בת נאה ואחרים מתאוים לה, ידע המלך בדבר ולא היה יכול להתקוטט עם המוציאים בתו לתרבות רעה, בא לביתו והזהירה, אמר לה בתי אל תחושו לדברי אלה האויבים ולא יוכלו לך, ואל תצאי לפתח הבית ועשי מלאכתך בביתך ואל תשבי בטלה אפילו שעה אחת, ולא יוכלו לראותך ולא להזיק לך, כי יש בהם מדה אחת מתרחקים משל דרך טוב ובוחרים בכל דרך רע, וכשרואין איש מדריך עצמו בדרך טובה והולך בה שונאים אותו, ומאי ניהו השטן, מלמד שיש להקב”ה מדה ששמה רעה והיא לצפונו של הקב”ה דכתיב (ירמי’ א’ יד) מצפון תפתח הרעה על כל יושבי הארץ, כלומר כל רעה אשר היא באה לכל יושבי הארץ מצפון היא באה:
A parable: to what is it comparable? To a king who had a fine daughter, and others desired her; the king knew of the matter, and could not contend with those who would lead his daughter into evil ways. He came to his house and warned her; he said to her: my daughter, do not heed the words of these enemies, and they will not be able [to harm] you; and do not go out to the door of the house, and do your work within your house, and do not sit idle even one hour, and they will not be able to see you or to harm you. For there is in them one measure — they keep far from the good way and choose every evil way; and when they see a man directing himself in a good way and walking in it, they hate him. And what is it? The Adversary. This teaches that the Holy One has a measure whose name is ‘evil,’ and it is to the north of the Holy One, as it is written (Jeremiah 1:14), ‘from the north the evil shall break forth upon all the inhabitants of the earth’ — that is to say, all evil that comes upon all the inhabitants of the earth comes from the north.
Provisional draft (pending scholarly review)
ומאי ניהו מדה אחת, היא צורת יד ולה שליחים הרבה ושמם של כולם רע רע, אך יש בהם קטן וגדול, והם מחייבים את העולם, כי תהו לצד צפון, ואין תהו אלא רע המתהא את העולם עד שיחטיאם, וכל יצה”ר שיש באדם משם הוא בא, ולמה ניתן בשמאל, מפני שאין לו רשות בכל העולם אלא בצפון, ולא הורגל אלא בצפון, ולא רצה להיות אלא בצפון, לפי כשיהיה בדרום עד שילמד מהלך הדרום והאיך יכול להטעות יתעכב אותן ימים שילמוד ולא יחטיא. לפיכך הוא לעולם בצפון בשמאל והיינו דכתיב (בראשית ח’ כא) כי יצר לב האדם רע מנעוריו, רע הוא מנעוריו ולא יטה אלא לשמאל שכבר הורגל בה, לפום הכי אמר הקב”ה לישראל (שמות ט”ו כו) אם שמוע תשמע לקול ה’ אלהיך והישר בעיניו תעשה והאזנת למצותיו, ולא למצות יצה”ר, ושמרת כל חוקיו, ולא חקות יצה”ר, אני ה’ רופאיך:
And what is that one measure? It is the form of a hand, and it has many messengers, and the name of all of them is ‘evil, evil’; but among them there are small and great, and they condemn the world, for chaos (tohu) is to the north side; and chaos is nothing but the evil that confounds the world until it makes them sin. And every evil inclination (yetzer ha-ra) that is in man comes from there. And why was it placed on the left? Because it has no authority in all the world except in the north, and it is not accustomed except to the north, and it did not wish to be except in the north; for when it would be in the south, until it learns the way of the south and how it can lead astray, it would be delayed those days in which it learns, and it would not cause [anyone] to sin. Therefore it is always in the north, on the left. And this is what is written (Genesis 8:21), ‘for the inclination of man’s heart is evil from his youth’ — it is evil from his youth, and it inclines only to the left, for it is already accustomed to it. Therefore the Holy One said to Israel (Exodus 15:26), ‘if you will diligently hearken to the voice of the LORD your God, and do what is right in His eyes, and give ear to His commandments’ — and not to the commandments of the evil inclination — ‘and keep all His statutes’ — and not the statutes of the evil inclination — ‘I am the LORD your healer.’
Provisional draft (pending scholarly review)
❦
This edition sets the verbatim Hebrew beside a fresh English rendering and a critical apparatus: a running commentary on the passage, notes on the controlled vocabulary and the rendering chosen for each term, and cross-references to the lexicon and to related sections. It is a provisional scholarly draft, released openly for correction and not yet reviewed by a credentialed editor.
⁂
the daughter guarded from her enemies
A king warns his desirable daughter to stay within, do her work, and never sit idle, so her enemies ‘cannot see or harm’ her — for there is in those enemies ‘one measure’ that flees the good and ‘hates’ whoever walks in it. Sod: the daughter is the Shekhinah / the soul, guarded from the accusing powers by staying occupied in the good (never idle); the enemies are the forces of the ‘other side’ that cannot reach one who keeps to the way (cf. the king’s daughter, §§ 54, 132).
the measure called ‘evil’: the north and the evil inclination
The Adversary is ‘a measure whose name is evil,’ set ‘to the north of the Holy One’ — ‘from the north the evil shall break forth’ (Jeremiah 1:14). It is ‘the form of a hand’ with many messengers all named ‘evil,’ rooted in the tohu (chaos) of the north, ‘the evil that confounds the world until it makes them sin’; ‘every evil inclination (yetzer ha-ra) in man comes from there.’ It keeps to the left because it ‘has authority only in the north.’ ‘The inclination of man’s heart is evil from his youth’ (Genesis 8:21) — so the warning: hearken to God’s commandments ‘and not the commandments of the evil inclination’ (Exodus 15:26). Sod: evil is located on the northern / left side (unbalanced Din / Gevurah), the root of the yetzer ha-ra — real, but a bounded ‘measure’ within the divine order, not an independent power (see the Gevurah theodicy of the lexicon, and §§ 135, 161).
Editorial decisions
- ha-satan rendered ‘the Adversary’. As in section 161, ha-satan is rendered ‘the Adversary,’ and it is identified here explicitly with the measure ‘evil’ and the source of the yetzer ha-ra (the evil inclination) on the northern side — a bounded measure within the divine order, not a dualistic rival. (claude-opus-4-8[session-pipe], 2026-07-03)
No range cards emitted for this chunk.
No public-domain translations indexed for this chunk.