Monthly Archives: January 2011

1.

But you needn’t raise the issue of our free choice being taken from us, seeing that we’ll inevitably be perfected and experience the third era that already existed in the first.

Human free choice is a fundamental of the Jewish Faith. And Ashlag is suggesting that we needn’t bother wondering or not what he’d said till now about the inevitability of our reaching the third era would seem to deny our freedom to choose to do the sorts of wrongful things that would seem to deny us a right to the third era (better known as a place in the World to Come: the era of cosmic perfection that will be achieved after the institution of the Messianic Era and the eventual resurrection of the dead). But let’s explain free choice before we get into the conundrum. The immortal Jewish philosopher, moralist, physician and legalist, Moses Maimonides (1135-1204), laid it out as follows in his definite work of Jewish practice and belief, Mishne Torah:

“Every person has been granted the capacity to either incline himself in the direction of goodness and to be righteous, or, if he so chooses, in the direction of evil and be wicked …. That means to say that … man, of his own volition, consciously and with his own mind, can distinguish between good and evil, and can do whatever he wants to do, either good or evil, without anyone stopping him. Don’t think that God decrees at birth whether a person is to be righteous or wicked; … that simply isn’t so. In truth, everyone is capable of being as righteous as Moses, or as wicked as Jeroboam (a reprehensible renegade and idolater who reigned from 922 to 901 bcE; see 1, 2 Kings; 2 Chronicles); wise or obtuse, compassionate or cruel, miserly or generous, and the like. No one forces, decrees or draws a person in either direction. He alone, of his own volition, consciously inclines himself in the direction he so chooses” (Hilchot Teshuvah 5:1-2).

What that means to say, among other things, is that while all other things in the world are fixed and static in their essence, and the greater part of our being is itself fixed and static, too (i.e. our own personal biology, chemistry, and physics), our ethical stature is malleable and always in flux. After all, as the Talmud puts it, “Everything is in the hands of Heaven but the fear of Heaven” (Megillah 25a), which means that God furnishes us with everything, but our ethical response to it is entirely up to us.

Now, we’re to be judged in the end as to whether we used our free choice for good ends, to be sure. And we’re to earn a place in the World to Come/the third era if we’re found to have done that (see Hilchot Teshuvah 3:1, 7:1).

Yet much of what Maimonides has said about the World to Come seems to fly in the face of what Ashlag had said above. For Maimonides implies that we don’t each necessarily earn a share in it. But we’ll now see, though, that everyone will in fact enter the World to Come/third era one way or another. So, are we free to make ethical choices (with all their concomitant consequences) or not? We are; but in unthought-of ways, as we’ll see. For …

2.

The point is this. God readied two ways for us here in the course of the second (i.e., the present) era to reach the third one. One is the path of Torah observance, and the other is the path of trials and tribulations, which (while daunting, nonetheless enables us to) cleanse the body (of its dross), and (thus) forces us to transform our ratzon l’kabel into a willingness to bestow and to attach ourselves onto God’s Being.

That is, what we’re free to choose is the path we want to take to secure a place in the World to Come; but we’ll all inevitably reach that destination. For, we can either choose the longer way that’s actually shorter, or the shorter way that’s actually longer. But let’s explain.

We’re taught in the Talmud (Eruvin 53b) that Rebbe Yehoshua ben Chananiah once reported that he’d “been on a journey when (he) noticed a little boy sitting at a cross-road”. He asked the boy which road he should take to get to town, and the boy offered that “this particular road is short — but long” while the other one is “long — but short”.

Rebbe Yehoshua decided to take the apparently short road. He discovered after a while, though, that the boy was right. Because the apparently short road was blocked and thus really was a long one; and that the apparently long road was actually a short one because there were no impediments. This story suggests a number of things, but the point most applicable to our subject is this.

Each one of us could either live a life of relative moral restraint based on higher values, or one of moral unrestraint and license (or a combination of the two, which is the most popular choice of all). According to the Ashlag and the Jewish Tradition that means to say that we could either follow the mitzvah-system, or the dictates of our ratzon l’kabel.

The wise would determine, though, that while a life of license seems to be a readier, more direct path to happiness and satisfaction, it will actually prove to be a very long, convoluted, and painful one. For it will result in tribulations. And that while the mitzvah-system seems to inhibit our happiness and thwart our interests, it will actually prove to be the greatest, most delicious and “heavenly” shortcut of all to the ultimate human goal, since it would enable us to avoid the tribulations involved in the other choice.

But know that the suffering one undergoes for having chosen the ostensibly shorter path to happiness isn’t the sort of vengeful, priggish slap across the face we might take it to be. Ashlag depicts it instead as a means of cleansing the body of the dross of the ratzon l’kabel which then allows us to attach onto God’s presence (thus making it akin to the pain we’d willingly — albeit hesitantly — be willing to suffer in order to scrub off some very deeply embedded dirt that exasperates someone we love).

There’s yet another point to be made about this, though. As many know, life becomes clearer at its end, when we start to sense where we’ve succeeded or failed. As such, some old people in ill health simply want to die and actually say as much. They feel they have nothing to live for and that they’re nothing but dry lumber. Now we have found that few elderly, spiritually-centered and observant Jews who are ill say that, and fewer-yet elderly, observant and learned Jews who are ill say it. For they know that they can serve God as long as they’re alive (if only on a pallid and wan level), which gives each moment meaning and pith.

We have found that they (and their families) thus come to know that without the richness and call of Torah-reflection and mitzvah-observance in one’s life, all there often is, is the bitter and gnawing, trying reality of meaninglessness. And they come to realize how true that had been all along, though they’ve only come to see it so clearly at the end. They know that life comes down to a choice between the search for God which is embodied in Torah, and tribulation. And their knowledge of that isn’t abstract, but learned; indeed, rather than being rooted in pat theology, it’s grounded in having finally caught sight of life at its end.

For as the (ancient Jewish) Sages put it, (it’s as if God said to the Jewish Nation) “If you repent (i.e., if you eventually adapt the mitzvah system so as to draw close to God), fine; but if you don’t, I’ll (eventually) place a king like (the evil) Haman (the influential chief minister of the Persian King Achasuerus in the 6^th century BCE, who set out to destroy the Jewish Nation as per The Book of Esther) over you who’ll force you to repent (i.e., to adapt the mitzvah system after all)”.

That is, we’re free to adopt the mitzvah system with all its inscrutabilities and mystical locutions on our own, either from the first or in retrospect as an act of awakening; otherwise its alternative (tribulation) will be thrust upon us instead. There’s simply no third option.

And as the Sages likewise said of the verse (that speaks of the redemption), “I God will hasten it — in its time” (Isaiah 9:22): (the curious discord between the idea of God “hasten(ing) it” on the one hand, and only allowing it to come about “in its time” on the other comes to this) “If they’re worthy (i.e., if they follow the mitzvah system), I’ll “hasten (the redemption — i.e., the World to Come and the third era)”; but if not, it will only come “in its time” (after a lot of tribulation)”.

What that means to say is that if we become worthy by following the first path of Torah-reflection and mitzvah-observance, we’ll speed up our reparation and thus won’t have (to suffer) harsh and bitter tribulations, or endure the time it would take us to be compelled to better ourselves.

On the other hand, though, if we don’t (take that path, the redemption will come despite us, but only) “in its time”. That is, only after tribulations — which includes the punishment that souls suffer in Gehinom (i.e., “Hell”). For, those tribulations will complete our reparations; and we’ll thus (and inevitably) experience the age of reparation (i.e., the third era/World to Come) despite ourselves.

3.

In any event, the rectification — the third era — will surely come about since it must, for the existence of the first era demands that. Thus the only choice we have is the one between the path of tribulations and the path of Torah-reflection and mitzvah-observance.

We’ve now thus demonstrated how all three eras of the soul are interconnected and necessitate one another.

Yet as we’ll soon discover, there’s a lot more to clear up vis a vis all the questions we raised at the very beginning of our efforts. Once we do all that, though, we’ll finally discuss the Zohar itself (which is the subject of this work after all, don’t forget).

AT LONG LAST! Rabbi Feldman’s translation of Maimonides’ “Eight Chapters” is available here at a discount.

You can still purchase a copy of Rabbi Feldman’s translation of “The Gates of Repentance” here at a discount as well.

Rabbi Yaakov Feldman has also translated and commented upon “The Path of the Just” and “The Duties of the Heart” (Jason Aronson Publishers).

Rabbi Feldman also offers two free e-mail classes on www.torah.org entitled “Spiritual Excellence” and “Ramchal”

1.

Now, when you reflect upon these three eras you discover that they’re fully and utterly interdependent; and so much so, that if one were to somehow not exist, the others couldn’t exist either.

To put it another way, it will be found, quite astonishingly, that if one of these eras in fact exists, then the two others must exist, too; for the three are the sole ingredients of the only dish there is. It thus follows then that if we who now experience the second era exist, then the first and third eras must exist, too.

2.

So if for example the third era — when the tsurah of receiving is overturned to one of bestowing — were not to come about, it would necessarily follow that the first era couldn’t have come about in the Infinite’s Being either.

We’d have expected Ashlag to begin with the first era, but he starts instead with the third one, because that’s the one we have to look forward to, and the one we’re to set our course by.

For all the perfection contained there (in the first era) only came about because it’s due to exist in the third one; so it was as if it already functioned (there, in the first era). In fact, all the perfection depicted in that (first) era is actually something of an image of the future one (projected) onto that (first) one. In any event, if the future (era) were to somehow be abolished, (the first one) couldn’t exist either. For, it’s only because the third era is to exist that the first one did.

3.

Now, that’s all the more so true if the second (i.e., the present) era were to be undone. For it’s the one in which we strive to achieve everything that will come to fruition in the third era; in which we do everything that (either) repairs or impairs (the spiritual order of things); and in which we continue (to hone) the (different) levels of (our) souls. After all, how would the third era ever come about (if this one were somehow undone)? So we see that the third era needs the second one (as well).

And the same is true of the first era, which is (already) in the Infinite and where the perfection found in the third era (already) functions. It must conform to that (same principle); it too must demonstrate the (existence of the) second era as well as the third one in all its perfection.

Let’s draw an analogy to families in order to understand all this as best we can. It goes without saying that were it not for my grandparents I wouldn’t exist; yet it’s also true that if I (or my siblings and cousins) weren’t born, my grandparents might as well not have existed for all intents and purposes; since they would have been nothing more than a breeze blowing past a minor character in an epic drama, for all intents and purposes, since they’d have only come and gone (unless they’d have done something momentous in their lives, and would thus at least have been a character in the drama).

In much the same way, it stands to reason that if the first era (in which everything is bundled and set for delivery) hadn’t existed, then neither the second (in which the package is to be toyed with, probed, and used), nor the third (in which everything that was bundled is to finally be delivered, no worse for wear) could have existed. But it also stands to reason that if the second or third eras themselves didn’t exist, that the first one might as well not have existed either since it didn’t produce anything of endurance.

And besides, while the first and third eras (which are mirror images of each other and sort of alter egos) are utterly indispensable in the grand scheme, they still and all depend on the second era. For it — the second era — is the flowering of the kernel that is the first, and the blossoming of the fruit that is the third. So without it, the first and third will have been fallow and bone-dry.

It’s vital to realize, though, that that’s not to say that God depends on us, as this might seem to imply — and that without our efforts in era two His “plans” in era one and their manifestation in era three would be doomed. It only means to say that His wishes for this world (and not He Himself) would have been stymied in a manner of speaking. But since the three eras are indeed utterly interdependent, and His plans and their manifestation are sure and inevitable, nothing we do or don’t do could affect that in the end.

4.

It also follows that the (existence of the) first era itself made it necessary for the two antithetical systems (i.e., the four worlds of holy-A.B.Y.A. and their counterpart, the four worlds of defiled-A.B.Y.A.) to exist in the second era, which then allows the body with its corrupt ratzon l’kabel to come about by means of the impure system (i.e., the four worlds of defiled-A.B.Y.A.).

For all that enables us to rectify it. In fact, if there hadn’t been a system of impure worlds, we wouldn’t have a ratzon l’kabel to rectify (in the first place) and to thus arrive at the third era, since one can’t repair something he doesn’t already have.

That is, were it not for the first and third eras, reality as we know it now, including ourselves, our overarching willingness to take-in without giving back, and the dilemmas of the spirit all that entails couldn’t come about either. And we couldn’t overcome all that and bask in triumph in the face of a hard-won battle as we inevitably will. For how dare crow in victory when you’d been handed the metal on the sneak?

5.

We needn’t ask, though, how the impure system could manage to exist (at all) in the first era (which is utterly Godly and antithetical to impurity). For it’s the very existence of the first era that allows for the (existence of the) impure system, and allows for it to be sustained in that form in the course of the second era.

Ashlag is now re-addressing the arcane question he’d touched on right before this of how evil could exist in God’s presence, which seems so contradictory (see Ch. 12). In short his answer is that evil only exists in the first era (albeit in an inchoate, latent state) because, again, it’s only thanks to the first era that the second one can exist; so if the first one didn’t contain that latent evil, we couldn’t experience it — and manage to overcome it — in the second.

AT LONG LAST! Rabbi Feldman’s translation of Maimonides’ “Eight Chapters” is available here at a discount.

You can still purchase a copy of Rabbi Feldman’s translation of “The Gates of Repentance” here at a discount as well.

Rabbi Yaakov Feldman has also translated and commented upon “The Path of the Just” and “The Duties of the Heart” (Jason Aronson Publishers).

Rabbi Feldman also offers two free e-mail classes on www.torah.org entitled “Spiritual Excellence” and “Ramchal”

1.

Thus, souls experience three distinct “eras” all told. The first encompasses the “time” they’re lodged within the Infinite’s intentions for creation and when they already have the tsurah they’ll assume when the final rectification comes about.

What we have here is an esoteric laying out of all of reality — from the very beginning, when all there was, was God; to the very end, when all there will be, will be God; through life as we know it now, when all there is, is God and the appearance of not-God. All of that is expressed variously in the Jewish tradition by statements that: “Their conclusion is embedded in their beginning, and their beginning in their conclusion (Sefer Yetzirah 1:7), “The final achievement was in the original thought” (Lecha Dodi), “Before the world was created, He and His Name were (already) one” (Pirke D’Rebbe Eliezer, Ch. 3), “What will be seen in the end is what was already there at the beginning” (Klach Pitchei Chochma, 49), and “(we’ll eventually) reach the point we had started from” (Ibid.).

The first era, we’re told here, encompasses the timeless-time the souls were lodged within the Infinite, and when they already have their final tsurah.

2.

The second era encompasses the six thousand years (“of creation”, i.e., of life as we know it), in the course of which the souls are separated by (passing through) the two previously cited systems (i.e., the four worlds of holy-A.B.Y.A. and their counterpart, the four worlds of defiled-A.B.Y.A [see 10:2]) into a body and a soul. It’s when the observance of Torah and mitzvot has been granted them so they might convert their ratzon l’kabel to a ratzon l’hashpia and grant satisfaction to their Maker rather than to themselves.

The second era, our own, is the one in which everything needs to be done and will be given the means to. It is life as we know it: bifurcated in every way but flush with the great and consummate communal row homeward toward the broad and sweeping, epochal and selfless admixture of the already-mixed.

But only souls can be rectified in the course of that era, not bodies. For (in order for the body to be rectified), it would need to undo its ratzon l’kabel, which is the (essence of the) “body”, and to set in its place a ratzon l’hashpia, which is the soul’s tsurah of willingness (to bestow).

We’re taught that soul and body will both be rewarded in the end, but not before, since body and soul are now cleft apart. For as things stand now, the soul is rewarded after death, but the body merely decomposes. The body will be rewarded however in the course of the third era, when the ratzon l’hashpia is restored, and everyone and everything’s original and true willingness-to-only-give-out will be restored.

In fact, even the souls of the righteous won’t be able to rejoice in the Garden of Eden after their death (in the course of the second era) until their body would have decomposed into dust.

That’s to say that even if one rectified his being in his lifetime and became truly righteous, he still and all won’t be able to bask in God’s light in the Afterlife in the course of this second era until his body will have decomposed in the ground. Nonetheless the point is that too will be reversed in the third era.

3.

The third (and final) era will encompass the rectification of all souls (and it will come about) after the resurrection of the dead, when even bodies will be fully rectified. For the ratzon l’kabel for our own sake, which is the body’s tsurah, will be overturned (by then), and a tsurah of pure bestowance will come upon it, when it will deserve (and experience) all the good, pleasure, and delight contained in the (original) intentions for the universe. And we’ll merit (experiencing) a surpassingly strong (degree of) attachment (onto God’s presence) as a consequence of our essential affinity with the Creator.

But that won’t come about from their ratzon l’kabel but rather because of their (having fostered the) willingness to grant satisfaction to their Creator. And God will derive pleasure from their having received that from Him.

This is a loaded statement. What it’s saying first is that the third era will only come about when the very thing that the souls had always sought — all the good, pleasure, and delight of attaching itself onto God’s presence — will have been achieved. And secondly, that that can only be achieved selflessly, with God’s wishes in mind alone.

Nonetheless the truth is that the third era will come about in any event, we’re taught; since it was always part of God’s intentions for the universe (see 13:2).

So the point is that the souls are to achieve all that goodness on their own by following through on God’s mitzvot, and that “God will derive pleasure from their having received it from Him” in recompense for that in the end.

For brevity’s sake I’ll simply refer to the “first era”, “second era”, and “third era” from now on (when I discuss this phenomenon). Remember this well.

AT LONG LAST! Rabbi Feldman’s translation of Maimonides’ “Eight Chapters” is available here at a discount.

You can still purchase a copy of Rabbi Feldman’s translation of “The Gates of Repentance” here at a discount as well.

Rabbi Yaakov Feldman has also translated and commented upon “The Path of the Just” and “The Duties of the Heart” (Jason Aronson Publishers).

Rabbi Feldman also offers two free e-mail classes on www.torah.org entitled “Spiritual Excellence” and “Ramchal”