הֲל֨וֹא כֹ֧ה דְבָרִ֛י כָּאֵ֖שׁ נְאֻם־יְהוָ֑ה וּכְפַטִּ֖ישׁ יְפֹ֥צֵֽץ סָֽלַע׃
”Is not my word like fire,” declares the Eternal, “and like a hammer that shatters rock?”
Jeremiah 23:29
In Jeremiah 23:29, the fire of God’s word is destructive, in parallel with the hammer, but we know that just as a hammer can be a tool of building, fire can be a source for calling, as in the burning bush, light, as in the pillar of fire that accompanies the Israelites during the Exodus, or worship, as in the multitude of burnt offerings found throughout our sacred texts. The words of Tanakh and the centuries of tradition that follow it can also serve these purposes.
The words of our texts are, themselves, beautiful. What began as doodles in the margins of my notes from liturgy classes are now an instagram feed of quotations, redrawn by me, from Tanakh, rabbinic literature, Jewish liturgy, and more. You can follow the account on instagram, @wordlikefire.
Below, you may find a sampling of those works, including a Kabbalat Shabbat coloring book and two hand-drawn fonts, available for free download.
Free Downloads
-
KabShab Coloring Book
A Kabbalat Shabbat coloring book for all ages, with pages for each of the Psalms of Kabbalat Shabbat, as well as verses 1, 2, 5, & 9 of Lecha Dodi, and Shalom Aleichem.
-
"Snyder Stam" Font
A hand-drawn typeface, following the Hebrew scribal STa”M tradition, as I learned from soferet Leana Tapnack in a Sofrut class at HUC-JIR.
-
"K'tav Gabi" Font
A decorative hand-drawn typeface, loosely based on the STa”M tradition, including the taggin (crowns) found in traditional calligraphy.
