Sumac: Tang of Grief and Scarlet Will

Sumac carries the tang of grief and scarlet will — a red-fruited witness to harsh beauty. It stains the air with tartness and resilience, rising along dry borders where sorrow meets strength.

Astringency where ripened suffering becomes the strength to discern

When God created flavor

not to comfort, but to clarify,

He created sumac.

He gave it sharpness—

so you could not swallow life

without tasting it.

So that each breath

would spark truth on your tongue.

Sumac grows where softness is scarce.

On scorched hillsides,

on soil that has known blood and survival.

It does not fear fire—

it has made fire

into scent.

Its berries are not fruits of abundance—

they are fruits of endurance.

There is pain in their flavor,

but pain that has walked a path

and become a blade of awareness:

this is you—

and that is no longer you.

In Jewish tradition, it is not named directly,

but its spirit lives in the idea of ta'am—taste,

and in Kabbalistic stories

where din (judgment)

must not be erased,

but held in wisdom.

Sumac reminds:

not all suffering is a curse.

Pain, when lived with truth,

becomes a kind of justice

that liberates.

It is aligned with Gevurah—

the Sefirah of boundary and strength,

not to destroy,

but to define.

And if you can hold the taste of sumac

and remain—

you have already changed.

When distilled,

its berries yield a water

where astringency becomes illumination.

It does not embrace.

It enters.

And leaves behind the feeling of purification,

as if all that was excess

had burned away from within.

Sumac is not a spice.

It is a teaching.

About how suffering, met with honesty,

becomes the organ of discernment—

and gives you back

the taste of truth.

✨ This plant appears in Course 3 of the Talei Or journey.

A space where scent meets transformation, and the inner path expands. 

Discover the course →