The Letter kaf

Behold, I am with you  Genesis 28:15a NASB

I – hinneh ʾānōkî  (“Behold, I”) says YHVH to Jacob in the famous dream of Genesis 28.  Here the text uses ʾānōkî rather than the shorter form, ʾānî. But since ʾānōkî and ʾānî are both translated “I,” we would have a hard time distinguishing the two. Sometimes they are used interchangeably.  But sometimes they aren’t, and when they are not, something important is usually happening. Mei Ha-Shilo’ach explains the difference.  ʾānōkî contains the added letter kaf  “which, as a prefix, denotes approximation—‘like,’ ‘as if.’ God here reveals himself as only incompletely, provisionally knowable.  If Jacob is to develop a larger capacity for comprehending God, he will need to unfold the latent dimensions of his own ʾānōkî.”[1]

There are verses where Jacob refers to himself with the longer version, ʾānōkî .   It is significant that these occurrences are also about partial concealment (note particularly Genesis 27:19 in the deception of Isaac).  ʾānōkî becomes an important word in Jacob’s quest for himself.  And God responds to Jacob with the same self-concealment.  Jacob sees what he wants to see, until circumstances (divinely ordered?) interrupt his control and force him to look into the dark places where he has hidden himself from himself.

You and I are also on the quest of ʾānōkî .  We know ourselves only in part because we have disguised ourselves from whom we completely are. Notice I did not say, “From whom we really are,” because we really are all of this concealment and revelation. It is not as if our true selves reside somewhere else, in that perfect world where we stand fully in the light. No, we are ʾānōkî , the hidden and the revealed, and it is along that continuum that we trace the steps toward complete human being.  There is a very good reason why the tears of sorrow are wiped away in heaven but the memories of our travels are not.   Now we manage the flow along this course of action.  One day we will look back and see how it brought us to completion.

We often decry the loss of vulnerability in this world.  We excoriate hypocrisy.  But the lesson of ʾānōkî is this: we are all on the path of concealment and disclosure. Yes, we might recognize the log in the eye of another.  We might hate, as Jacob hated, the one who forces us to admit our deceptions. But there are splinters everywhere, especially in those so well-practiced at ʾānōkî.  We can be encouraged.  God Himself uses ʾānōkî when He addresses Jacob.  He matches where we are on the continuum of becoming human.  He is the God who is near, both physically and psychologically. But, of course, He also prods. It is divine engineering that brings Leah into Jacob’s bed, and in the process forces Jacob to deal with his trajectory of deception.  The God who reveals is also the God who conceals, and we are required to open our own hand to His presence (the Paleo-Hebrew meaning of kaf) if we are to move along this continuum.  ʾānōkî is the designation of already-not-yet.

Topical Index:  ʾānōkî, Jacob, kaf, Genesis 28:15

[1]Avivah Gottlieb Zornberg, The Murmuring Deep, p. 289.