{"id":503,"date":"2017-03-06T21:56:41","date_gmt":"2017-03-06T21:56:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/?p=503"},"modified":"2017-03-06T21:56:41","modified_gmt":"2017-03-06T21:56:41","slug":"derech-hashem-242","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/2017\/03\/06\/derech-hashem-242\/","title":{"rendered":"Derech Hashem 2:4:2"},"content":{"rendered":"

Derech<\/em> Hashem<\/em> – The Way of G-d 2:4:2<\/p>\n

Adam and Eve — who were everyone\u2019s<\/em> ancestors, of course 1<\/sup> — were on a far greater spiritual level than any one of us, as we\u2019d already explained 2<\/sup>. They deserved great homage and eternal life, and had they not sinned they\u2019d have achieved greater and greater heights 3<\/sup>.<\/p>\n

They\u2019d then have had as many descendants as G-d saw fit for there to be, and they\u2019d have all delighted in His benevolence along with Adam and Eve. It\u2019s just that those descendants were to be comprised of different levels in that some would have been primary and others secondary, \u201croots\u201d and \u201cbranches\u201d 4<\/sup>.<\/p>\n

But Adam and Eve descended far downward when they sinned and became sullied with all sorts of murkiness and impurity, as we\u2019d also pointed out 5<\/sup>. As a consequence their descendants \u2013 we<\/em> ourselves<\/em> — slid to a level that almost precluded them from reaching the exalted and immortal level originally due them.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s not to say that we\u2019re incapable of ascending higher than the level we\u2019d sunk to, or that Adam and Eve were denied the chance to return to their original level even though they\u2019d descended so. Humanity has been granted the freedom to choose to ascend to a very great level. It\u2019s just that there\u2019s a time limit within which we can do that, not unlike the time limit each one of us has in this world to rectify ourselves and attain a place in the World to Come 6<\/sup>; after all, everything that requires effort has a time limit.<\/p>\n

Footnotes:<\/p>\n

1\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/sup>This point will matter later on when it\u2019s explained why the Jewish Nation alone was chosen.<\/p>\n

2\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/sup>See 1:3:6-8.<\/p>\n

Ramchal depicts them in Adir<\/em> Bamarom<\/em> (p. 29) as being so pure at first that they could have single-handedly finished off the order of perfection that G-d set in motion. All wrong would have been turned to right there and then, as will eventually happen, and all<\/em> of<\/em> creation<\/em> would have been utterly purified.<\/p>\n

3\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/sup>See 1:3:13 for our connection to that, and Da\u2019at<\/em> Tevunot<\/em> 40, 126 for more about their sin.<\/p>\n

4\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/sup>I.e., major family lines and minor ones.<\/p>\n

5\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/sup>See 1:3:8 and 1:4:2.<\/p>\n

6\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/sup>See 1:3:3.<\/p>\n

(c) 2017 Rabbi Yaakov Feldman<\/p>\n

Feel free to contact me at feldman@torah.org<\/a><\/p>\n

———————————————————-<\/p>\n

Rabbi Feldman’s new annotated translation of Rabbi Yehuda Ashlag\u2019s \u201cIntroduction to the Zohar\u201d is available as \u201cThe Kabbalah of Self\u201d on Kindle here<\/a>. His annotated translation of Maimonides’ “Eight Chapters” is available here<\/a> and his annotated translation of Rabbeinu Yonah\u2019s “The Gates of Repentance” is available here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

He has also translated and commented upon “The Path of the Just” and “The Duties of the Heart” (Jason Aronson Publishers).<\/p>\n

Rabbi Feldman also offers two free e-mail classes torah.org entitled \u201cSpiritual Excellence<\/a>\u201d and \u201cRamchal<\/a>\u201d that can be subscribed to.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Derech Hashem – The Way of G-d 2:4:2 Adam and Eve — who were everyone\u2019s ancestors, of course 1 — were on a far greater spiritual level than any one of us, as we\u2019d already explained 2. They deserved great … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[14,2,3,4,5,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-503","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-hashkapha","category-jewish-thought","category-kabbalah","category-ramchal","category-torah","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7iqof-87","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/503","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=503"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/503\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":505,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/503\/revisions\/505"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=503"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=503"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=503"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}