Question On Building a Jewish Knife

J

John Andrews

Joined
Jan 24, 2003
Messages
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I am contracted to build a 12" knife as a gift to a Jewish gentleman. The blade is to be a 7" upswept with what I call a "double dip" ground on the top (spine), making the blade similar to a scimitar. The handle is to be 3 colors and match each other. Customer says 7" blade and 5" handle both have religious signigicance.(?)The Jewish flag is blue and white. OK. Two colors. What the heck would match up with that for a 3rd. color and not look like one of those import $2 knives? I have been flogging myself trying to figure a handle that would be approriate for such a knife. It is going to be a wall hanger, by the way. Natural materials would be preferred, such as a 3 colored horn, ect. Got any ideas, anybody?
 
Just so it doesn't look cheesy I would go with black as the third color. Maybe an ebony/ivory kind of thing with blue spacers material.
Kyle Fuglesten
 
wow... thats weired... how about blue and white with a little trim in between of some metallic stuff

like

the metal thats between the stag and the wood in this handle... so it could be blue, silver white, etc...

jrtrailingpt.jpg


if that picture didnt work

http://www.ycsi.net/users/jolley/knives/IMAGES_HUNT_FISH/jrtrailingpt.jpg

thats the llink
 
John
If you can use a synthetic material I would be glad to work with you on a twist pattern something like this:
twist.jpg



This Piece is 1 5/16" diameter (round), white, deep navy with a little red. Could make it in about any color.

Let me know if I can help.

Thanks&
Be Blessed
Gary



 
John,
Maybe something similar to the knife here, just change the spacers to blue.
Would not the pin/bolster/guard material be the third color?
You could also make some mosaic pins with the colors you want.
Regards,
Greg
 
This is easy Olivewood . Olivewood is very symbolic to jewish customs. Bethlehem Holy Land olive wood is a local raw material from which mainly religious, historical, and artistic articles are made, using the prunes of young olive trees , and the sprouts from the trunks of the old, unproductive trees.
 
Thanks for the help and suggestions! I am leaning toward the blue wood, spacers and stag suggested by Aaron, or the olive wood. The idea of olive wood never occured to me, being pretty ignorant of Jewish beleifs. Thanks to you guys, I am now smarter than I was this morning!
 
Just a quick thought: How about finding a small enameled pin or medallion of the Israeli flag and embedding it in a handle? (black in pic) That would make a three-color handle of blue & white on the embedded flag plus whatever color is the handle material. You could embed the flag in the butt of the handle as well. Maybe use olive wood for the handle as suggested, because it can be a real pretty material.

attachment.php


(edited to add) An alternative thought to keep it from looking like a cheap knife would be to embed a gold medallion of the flag or Star Of David into a two-color handle.
 
Be careful about which Olive wood you get. There are different kinds, California Olive (not olive), Russian Olive (redder, darker, different texture) and Mediterranean Olive (this is what you want).

You probably already know this, but I thought I'd repeat it anyway - since I got caught on the short end of the stick a while back on this issue.

Dan
 
How about a knife with a handle made of "Gopher" wood (Cypress -- Genesis 6:14) the wood Noah's Ark was made of, or of "Shittim" wood (Acacia -- Exodus 25:10) the wood the Ark of the Covenant or Ark of Testimony was made of. I don't know whether cypress or acacia would need to be stabilized or not.

Of course these woods would be representative of more than Jews (those of the tribe of Judah) since they represent only 1/12th of the tribes of Israel. I am also an Israelite from the tribe of Joseph through his son Ephriam. Many with European ancestry may be from one of the twelve tribes and may feel a little connection to those two woods, after all, we all survived the flood in the ark built by Noah and his three sons.

Bruce Woodbury
 
Bruce, that's really cool! I appreciate the insight on the wood and the real meaning of it. The fellow giving the knife as a gift is a gentile that was pretty much raised by the Jewish gentleman, and he wants a lot of meaning to go with the gift. I checked with one website about Med. olive wood and found some great folks with promise to send very colorfull 1" X 1" X 5" blocks cheaper than you can imagine! Their site is http://w.w.w.bethlehemolivewood.net, and talk to Diane. I ordered 5 blocks and may go with the olive wood. Thanks for the suggestions and insights, too! Edited to add, the folks mentioned send certification papers along with the wood.
 
Everybody's got some cool ideas.

I especially like Rokjok's idea of a Gold Star of David(Magen David) medallion on the handle.
Also white and blue spacers would look good.
And, John, going with the Olive wood is excellent. Trees, in general(albeit the planting of them), is HUGELY important in Judaism.

Then there's the word "Chai", which means Life. It's pretty much the most important and significant word in Hebrew and in our religion, except for the notion of G-d ofcourse.

Chai is made of the Hebrew letters Chet and Yod.

I can't say enough how often used and important this Hebrew word is in Judaism.
We even donate money in increments of 18(dollars or shekels,etc.) because the word Chai has a numerical value of 18.(Has to do with Kabbala).

I even have it around my neck along with a Star of David.
But remember, it only has meaning to us in Hebrew letters!!

Good luck!!

Oh, BTW, what's the difference between an Israeli and an Israelite???

Give up?

Answer: 10 percent less calories.

Bwahahahaha

I freakin kill myself.:D :p
 
I have one more question. The fellow that is having me build the knife says the 7" blade means something, and the 5" handle means something, too. I havn't been able to find out what this means, but it should have importance when building future ethnic or religious knives.
 
Originally posted by John Andrews
I have one more question. The fellow that is having me build the knife says the 7" blade means something, and the 5" handle means something, too. I havn't been able to find out what this means, but it should have importance when building future ethnic or religious knives.
Click to expand...

Symbols: What is the significance of the number 5?


Well, the number 10 denotes a complete set, because we have (assuming we're healthy, thank G-d) 10 fingers. Five is therefore representative of half of a set. The 5th letter, with a gematria of 5, is the letter hei. Hei denotes an outcry; that is, the letter is literally named "Hey!"

In kabbalistic understanding of the Tetragrammaton, the letter "hei" represents the spreading of G-d's beneficience from a point outward. It it therefore composed of a point-like yud and a dalet showing orthogonal axis, 4 (the gematria of dalet) compass points. We find in Genesis 1 that creation can be described through the metaphor of speech. "And G-d said 'Let there be light!'" So, this permeation of G-d's Goodness through the universe is very much an outcry. The Talmud sees in the shape of the letter the theme of repentence -- the choice of descending or finding that small window near the top. They too touch on a theme related to outcry -- but not G-d's call to man, but man's cry to G-d.

The song toward the end of the seder asks "Who knows one?" and makes its way up to 13. For 5, the answer is "5 are the books of the Torah". Which is why there are 5 books of the Torah -- because only with including the Oral Torah with the written text are we dealing with a complete set. This idea, of two halves crying out for each other, is what the symbology of five revolves around in Judaism.
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Still trying to figure out the number 7.

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See?

Nice and simple :D
 
BTW, Torah simply means "Old Testament".

So when it said the five books of the Torah that's the five books of the Old Testament starting with Genesis ofcourse.
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Here's about colors for now:

Symbols: What is the significance of blue in Judaism? Are there other special colors?


In his analysis of the meaning of the mitzvah of tzitzis (tassles placed on the corners of a four cornered garment), and in particular the thread of blue that one is supposed to place around it, R' Samson Refa'el Hirsch (Frankfurt-am-Main, Germany, 19th cent) writes (in Collected Writings vol III pg. 126):

We find only three terms to encompass the colors of the spectrum: adom for red, yaroq for yellow and green, and techeiles for blue and violet…

Red is the least refracted ray; it is the closest to the unbroken ray of light that is directly absorbed by matter. Red is light in its first fusion with the terrestrial element: adom, related to adamah [footstool, earth as man's footstool]. Is this not again man, the image of G-d as reflected in physical, earthly matter: "vatichsareihu me'at mi'Elokim" (Tehillim. 8,6)?

The next part of the spectrum is yellow-green: yaroq.

Blue-violet is at the end of the spectrum: techeiles.

The spectrum visible to our eye ends with the violet ray, techeiles, but additional magnitudes of light radiate unseen beyond the visible spectrum. Likewise, the blue expanse of the sky forms the end of the earth that is visible to us. And so techeiles is simply the bridge that leads thinking man from the visible, physical sphere of the terrestrial world, into the unseen sphere of heaven beyond…

Techeiles is the basic color of the sanctuary and of the High Priest's vestments; the color blue-violet representing heaven and the things of heaven that were revealed to Israel… no other color was as appropriate as techeiles to signify G-d's special relationship with Israel. A thread of techeiles color on our garments conferred upon all of us the insignia of our high-priestly calling, proclaiming all of us: "Anshei qodesh tihyun li—And you shall be holy men to Me" (Ex. 19, 6).

If we now turn our attention to the pisil techeiles [blue thread] on our tzitzith, we will not that it was precisely this thread of techeiles color that formed the krichos [windings], the gidil [cord], the thread wound around the other threads to make a cord. In other words, the vocation of the Jew, the Jewish awareness awakened by the Sanctuary, that power which is to prevail within us, must act to unite all our kindred forces within the bond of the Sanctuary of G-d's law.

The Talmud's desciption of the blue woolen thread reads: "The blue wool resembles the ocean, the ocean resembles the color of the sky, the sky resembles the purity of the sapphire, and the sapphire resembles the throne of G-d." (Chullin 89).

Along similar lines, Israel's leaders get a vision of G-d on His Throne during the revelation at Sinai. The throne room is seen as being paved with "sapphire brick, like the essence of a clear sky." (Exodus 24:10) And the Midrash writes that the two tablets themselves were sapphire.

Issacar, a tribe that was known for studying Torah full time, had a standard with a picture of a donkey on it on a field of sapphire blue.


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John,
Here's what I found out about the number 7.

On one hand the number 7 numerically corresponds to the color violet/blue. See my previous post about colors to see the significance of this color in Judaism.

Also, in Deut. the Torah speaks of the 7 Heathen peoples:

Deuteronomy 7:


7:1 When the Lord your God brings you to the land that you are going to occupy and forces out many nations before you-Hittites,1 Girgashites,2 Amorites,3 Canaanites,4 Perizzites,5 Hivites,6 and Jebusites,7 seven nations more numerous and powerful than you 7:2 and he9 delivers them over to you and you attack them, you must utterly annihilate them. Make no covenant with them nor show them compassion! 7:3
Click to expand...
 
Just to recap, I think the real meaningful symbolism of the number 7 is because simply put it signifies Heaven.

So in a very basic way the 5 represents the five books of Torah, or Torah itself. (1.Genesis, 2.Exodus, 3.Leveticus, 4.Numbers, and 5.Deut.)

And seven represents Heaven and the things of heaven that were revealed to Israel.

Call me Rabbi!


edited to add:

If the blade is supposed to be 7 inches long, and we now know that 7 signifies the color Blue/violet, and blue/violet signifies Heaven,.....then perhaps you can try Bluing the blade.

I use kleen bore Black Magic(very aggressive chemical bluing, but very fast and real good stuff) Also, Birchwood Casey Perma Blue is excellent.

just a thought.
 
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