12 Flavors of Happiness: Part 1

Simcha, Sasson, Chattan, and Kallah

Next week, we’ll continue our exploration of grammar, gender and God. Please pardon this interruption for a few words about happiness.

We’ve called our series on Hebrew the “Language of Life” because Hebrew is the only language that claims to have been designed by the same Designer that engineered human life. Even temporarily entertaining the possibility of this being true can allow you to see the world through much more lucid lenses.¹

This isn’t to say that Hebrew is a better language. French may be more romantic, German the best for philosophy, and English the most practical. But if God actually created the Hebrew language, it would certainly make it the clearest and most insightful.

Seeing that this Friday is Purim, and we’re supposed to be well on our way to high levels of happiness, we’re going to use this post to learn what Hebrew can teach us about happiness.

Spotted on a school bus in Boro Park, New York by my cousin Jimmy. In Yiddish: “This bus is completely Purim-ified — no sour faces allowed” (a play on the typical sign during Passover forbidding chametz).

One of the lovely things about the English language is that it has lots of synonyms. When you’re writing a paper, you may use the thesaurus to not repeat the same word multiple times in close proximity. It isn’t uncommon for a thesaurus to provide ten to twenty alternatives for a word you’re trying to avoid. The problem is that very often, there’s no clear difference between synonyms.

Take, for example, the words:

• “joy”

• “happiness”

• “bliss”

• “ecstasy”

Is there a clear, crisp difference between them?

Not really. “Joy” and “happiness” pretty much mean the same thing, and “bliss” and “ecstasy” are interchangeable ways of saying “really, really happy.”

One reason for this phenomenon is that the English language is a hodgepodge of other languages — a linguistic cholent if you will. Words have been added over the centuries and melded by writers and speakers with other words from other languages, morphing their meanings in the process. Shakespeare alone is thought to have invented and imported around 1700 words to the English language.²

Origins of English Language

It’s this melting pot that makes the English language deliciously robust and flexible. And while English words certainly have different connotations depending on how they’ve come to be used,³ the distinctions between them are not nearly as clear as they are in Hebrew. This clarity is one of the hallmark of Hebrew, and what makes it so enjoyable to learn. It clarifies concepts, which in turn, clarify our otherwise blurry experiences of life.

“Hebrew clarifies concepts, which in turn clarify our otherwise blurry experiences of life.”

We’re going to look at 12 Hebrew words for happiness, and figure out their original meaning by referencing sources — not in modern Hebrew usage, but in the Torah and its surrounding literature.⁴ I’m calling them the 12 “flavors” of happiness because they’re not just shades on a sliding scale of intensities — they’re different experiences altogether.

What is the main, catch-all Hebrew word for happiness?

This is a pretty easy one:

“Simcha-שמחה,” as in “Yom Huledet Sameach — יום הולדת שמח” (“Happy Birthday”). This is the umbrella term for happiness that includes all the others. This is the first of the 12.

1. SIMCHA-שמחה - the joy of moving towards your goal

America’s Declaration of Independence codified happiness as an elusive goal to be pursued. Most Westerners have imbibed this kool-aid, but Simcha reveals the fallacy of this thinking.

The United States Declaration of Independence opens by codifying the right of all humans to pursue life, liberty and happiness.

Happiness is the natural emotional product as they pursue their goals. This happiness can then be reinvested as fuel to continue driving their pursuit.

But if we make happiness the goal, the system short circuits, and without a real goal we paradoxically cease being happy.

The feeling of Simcha is often paired with its sibling-emotion Sasson-ששון, where Simcha is the joy of the journey and Sasson the satisfaction of arrival. The Vilna Gaon refers us to a concise line that sums up the relationship between the two modes of joy. It’s from the Shabbat morning poem in the blessing of Yotzer Ohr, describing the stars in the sky:

שְׂמֵחִים בְּצֵאתָם וְשָׂשִׂים בְּבוֹאָם

They are happy (semechim-שְׂמֵחִים) as they head out to light up the night, and fulfilled (sassim-שָׂשִׂים) as they return after having done their job…

2. SASSON-ששון - the joy and fulfillment of having reached your goal

The child bouncing up and down on the way to the amusement park is happy in a different way from the child heading back to the car after a full day of rides. The first form of happiness is found on the way to his desired goal, which as we said, is called Simcha-שמחה. Whereas, the second, Sasson-ששון is an internalized joy of fulfillment, contentment and satisfaction at having accomplished what he had set out to do.

The question is: if Simcha is the joy of journey and Sasson the fulfillment of arrival, why, then, do we invert the order at a Jewish wedding when we sing “the sounds of Sasson and Simcha — קול ששון וקול שמחה“ for a bride and groom on their wedding day?

Simple. A bride and a groom feel Sasson at having found one another, and Simcha at starting their lives together.

“A bride and a groom feel Sasson at having found one another, and Simcha at starting their lives together.”

Which brings us to the next two flavors of happiness (and the final two for this post):

3. and 4. Chattan-חתן and Kallah-כלה - the joy of finding your life partner and the joy of being found

These are not just once in a lifetime experiences. If we can bottle up how we feel on our wedding day, we can carry it with us and re-experience forever. Think about how unique the feeling is of seeing so many plotlines of our lives intersect and bring us to that moment.

Think about what it takes to find your partner — all the coincidences and connections — you being in the right state of mind to appreciate him or her for who they are. This is Chattan-חתן, literally “Groom.”⁵

Think about the feeling of knowing your whole life that you are worthwhile, a gem, one-of-kind — and think about the doubts that cross your mind when you haven’t yet been discovered. When you’re finally found, and know it, you experience Kallah-כלה, literally “Bride.”⁶

Please like and leave comments with questions or insights of your own.

1. This can’t be overstated. If Hebrew were created by the Creator of the universe, its depth and precision would be unlimited. One would be able to study it eternally.

2. This is also the reason why English is so how to learn as a second language, and as a first language for children learning to read. There are so many exceptions that the rules can hardly be called “rules.” Think about how an actress takes a “bow” after her performance, an archer aims his “bow,” and a child swings from the “bough” of a tree. It may be intuitive to you, but it’s downright torture for someone learning English!

3. As we’ve mentioned in the past, human-made languages are liquid and evolve over time depending on how societies use them or stop using them. As a result, words undergo “meaning drift.” The word “smart” for most young Americans could only mean “intelligent,” but in England, where the word originated, it is mostly used to describe someone’s appearance as “fresh” and “fashionable.”

4. We introduced this methodology here. The 12 words we’ll be looking at come from the seventh and final blessing recited under a chuppah-marriage canopy in a Jewish wedding, which thanks God for creating the 12 flavors of happiness, and then blesses the bride and groom to experience them all through their marriage.

5. We should note here that it isn’t intuitive at all that in the seventh blessing under the chuppah, “Chattan” and “Kallah” don’t seem like they are part of the list of flavors of happiness — rather, they are simply referring to the actual bride and groom. The problem is that they’re stuck in the middle of the list:

“Blessed are You Hashem our God King of the Universe Who created Sasson an Simcha, Chattan and Kallah, Gila, Rina, Ditza and Chedva, Ahava and Achva, Shalom and Re’ut…”

It is for this reason that the Ramban (Nachmanides) counts them in the 12 expressions of joy. See his “Derasha Le’Chatuna” printed in Kitvei HaRamban I (Mosad HaRav Kook), towards the very end, and see the footnote.

6. The Torah is “Old School” in this way, and sees the man as bearing the primary responsibility of finding and courting his spouse. The woman’s job is to facilitate herself being found and cherished. See the Talmud here.