Where the Existential Meets the Non-Existential

— Samach-Vav Part 10 —

When we read the story of Exodus in these weekly Torah portions many questions come to mind. The most obvious one being: why in the first place did G-d want the Jewish people to be enslaved and oppressed by the Egyptians (as foretold to Abraham)? After all, it was G-d that created a situation that forced Jacob and his family to Egypt, which ultimately lead to the Egyptian bondage. Why would G-d want to cause such countless suffering to a nation that He loved?

Which of course is the eternal question of all time: Why is life so difficult? Why do each of us have to endure “Egyptian enslavement” (Mitzrayim constraints) in our personal lives? Why do we have to be “foreigners in a land that is not” ours?

Even if the actual bondage and subsequent exodus can be explained, the ensuing events that followed the exodus seem equally unfair. Okay, after 210 years under Egyptian oppression the Jewish people finally leave Egypt. But before they can even catch their breath, Pharaoh and the Egyptians regret letting the Jews go, and they pursue them to the point where the Jewish nation is stuck between the pursuing Egyptians behind then and the unrelenting sea before them. Why did G-d lead them to the sea – completely out of the way of travel toward the Promised Land?! Haven’t they suffered enough? They barely leave Egypt, broken, worn out by over two centuries of persecution, let them be – take them to the Promised Land. Why do You – G-d – have to lead them out of the way, knowing that they would now be trapped between the sea and the Egyptians?!

Even if this too can be explained, it doesn’t end there. The Egyptians drown in the sea, but the difficult journey of the Jews just begins. 43 days after the parting of the sea, they receive the Torah at Sinai. Over the next nine months they build the portable Temple (Mishkan), which is erected on Rosh Chodesh Nissan (almost a year after they left Egypt). Then they begin a long, arduous wandering through the Sinai Wilderness.

And after all the forty years of wandering – which comprises the rest of the entire Torah (all the four books from Exodus through Deuteronomy) – one would think that the story has a happy ending. But no – that would be asking for too much… The entire generation that left Egypt (save two people), including the great Moses, never enter the Promised Land. They all perish in the wilderness.

The only “comfort” we perhaps can glean from these events is that reading the story of the Bible makes our own lives look not that bad. Challenge after challenge, from one darkness to the next, disappointment after disappointment – even when you feel you have found redemption you are thrown right back into the lions’ den – and then some.

The Bible is an incredible reflection of real life.

But is this our destiny? Are we doomed to a life of constant struggle? After all our great achievements will we ever enter the “Promised Land”?

***

What is Torah? The word Torah means instruction, and also light. As discussed many times, the Torah is not a story or history book. It is a blueprint for life – bestowed to us by the Cosmic Architect of life.

The Torah’s account of the exodus from Egypt (which begins in these weekly chapters and continues till the end of the five books) is actually a fascinating study that can teach us volumes about our own personal passage from darkness to light in every which way – the journey from fear to courage, from pain to joy, from confusion to clarity, from tension to resolution, from insignificance to purpose.

Above all – beginning from the root of all existence – the Torah narrative describes the process of creation and the very dynamics of existence. The characters, places and events in the Torah lay out the basic building blocks of reality. In essence, the Torah is as spiritual map, which evolves and manifests into a historical narrative that transpires in a particular time and space. The rule is that things always begin in the spiritual and then take shape in the material.

The Egyptian exile is the physical manifestation of the great tzimtzum – the original “black hole” created by the concealment of the Divine light, as explained in Lurianic Kabbalah. Every form of darkness – every misaligned state and displacement, every form of injustice and oppression – is a result of the tzimtzum. When the Divine light/energy emanates, everything knows its place in the big picture; everything feels part of one integral whole. Man would be unable to raise arms against man if we sensed that we are all one.

Essentially conscious life as we know it is initially a state of darkness, and we must search for light and for meaning. We begin with our eyes closed, and work toward opening them.

The purpose of this concealment is not to torture us, but to bring the best out of us to fulfill the purpose of existence: To reveal the light and transform the very darkness of matter into a luminous source of spiritual en

ergy – creating a Divine home in the lowest of worlds.

Following the tzimtzum, Luria continues, comes a kav, a thin ray of light that transmits energy into the “black hole” and begins to bring existence into being, as discussed last week.

Our hard work of refining this unlit world draws light from the kav and refines the “containers” of materialism. As the “containers” become more honed and the light grows in intensity we come closer to filling the “dark space” until the point when matter gets reunited with spirit, in one seamless flow, and in turn introduces new unprecedented dimensions of the Divine.

This process, which in microcosm is reflected in every life’s up and down journeys, is the entire story of the exodus from Egypt and the subsequent events, the parting of the sea, Sinai, the Temple, and the forty year trudge through the Wilderness. Each step expresses another stage in the process of illuminating and transforming the void and the tzimtzum, and turning the universe into a Divine home.

After the Jewish people leave the dark Egyptian exile – and after the kav begins to illuminate the great dark void left by the tzimtzum– the light of redemption begins to expand.

Once could argue that perhaps we should be satisfied, relieved that we escaped from the clutches of darkness; why ask for more? But no. Simply to get out of the constraints is not enough reason and cannot justify the pain caused by the enslavement.

As G-d told Abraham, after your children will be “enslaved and oppressed” as “foreigners in a land that is not theirs,” they will “leave with great wealth” – they will come out stronger and greater than when they entered.

Thus, we move from Egypt to the Re(e)d Sea. The sages explain that the parting of the sea was an unprecedented Divine revelation. In Kabbalsitic terms: Sea reflects the “hidden worlds” originating from the Divine infinite light (ohr Ein Sof). Land manifests the “revealed worlds” stemming from the Divine finite light. These two dimensions, on a lower level, express the two levels of “lights” and “containers,” the inner and the outer – soul and body, spirit and matter.

The parting of the sea – when the “sea was transformed to land” – opened a door between the finite and the infinite, and bridged the two, giving us a taste of the seamless pre-tzimtzum reality.

This too, however, is not enough to justify all the pain. “Great wealth” includes much more than a taste, and even more than a full meal even of the pre-tzimtzum unity. Because after all, this seamlessness existed before the tzimtzum, so what is ultimately achieved by returning to square one?

And so – we go from the kav into the light before the tzimtzum. In perhaps the single deepest Chassidic discourse ever delivered, the Rebbe Rashab, 100 years ago this week, takes us on a fascinating journey into the pre-tzimtzum reality. The Rebbe takes us on a trip – as only a Rebbe can – into the vortex of reality, as it was at the moment of the first “bang” and even earlier (conceptually, not in time).

And how far can we go? How deep does the “rabbit hole” really go?

Come let’s find out.

So, working our way from existence upward – deconstructing, as it were, the process of creation – first we have a tzimtzum, a profound concealment that is the very nature of existence as we know it. We feel alone; a sad state of existential loneliness. Separate form each other, separate from ourselves – a lonely dark world, which has potential for inflicting great pain and misery. All rooted in disconnection.

But this tzimtzum is not airtight. It has a purpose, and is driven by a concealing force – to allow space for our independent consciousness, so that we can build the Divine home in the lowest of levels.

Following the tzimtzum comes the kav – the ray of light transmitting light and transcendence. The kav is a paradox: It is only a ray, but a ray that touches and is rooted in the pre-tzimtzum light. As opposed to the tzimtzum which is a state of detachment, that conceals the light, the kav is a state of attachment that reveals the light; albeit, a very thin ray, but a ray of light nonetheless.

Now we move upward, into the light itself and its source.

Here the Rebbe Rashab cites the differing opinions among Kabbalists as to the nature of the Divine Source of all existence and its relationship with our experience of existence.

“Ein Sof” – literally, “no end” – is the term used to describe the Infinite Source. The question is: what exactly is Ein Sof?

Ibn Gabbai and other Kabbalists maintain that Ein Sof is not the Divine Essence but a level “below” the Essence – the level of Keter (the crown), or the level of Divine Will (Rameh of Pano). The Ramak (Rabbi Moshe Kordovero) however disagrees, and holds that Ein Sof can be attributed only to the Divine Essence and nothing else, not even the most sublimes levels of spirit. Keter, according to the Ramak, is the loftiest level, but still one of the defined Sefirot – the building blocks of existence.

The Rebbe Rashab explains that each opinion has its strengths and weaknesses. The first opinion explains how the creation process does not affect and change the Divine Essence, because the process begins and is related not to the Essence but to the state of Ein Sof (Keter or will), “below” the Essence. It also explains why we call it “Ein Sof” and not “Ein Techilo” (no beginning), because this level is infinite in its extension, but it has a Source (a beginning) – the Essence from where the Ein Sof” stems.

The obvious flaw in this opinion, as the Ramak emphasizes, is that we are attributing a state of absoluteness, permanence and eternity to something other than G-d alone. Only the Divine Essence, as the Ramak correctly explains, can be called true Ein Sof – an absolute reality that has no source and no beginning, one that is undefined by any definition, including the term “undefined;” a non-existential existence.” As opposed to everything else that exists, including Keter and the most sublime states of spirit, G-d has no cause other than Himself; nothing preceded Him; His being derives from His own self. G-d’s existence must exist, for it is true reality. And therefore the Ein Sof power to create comes only from the Essence, and not from any other level.

But according to the Ramak, we are still left with the question how creation (which comes only from the Ein Sof power of the Essence) has no effect and causes no change in the Essence.

Comes the Arizal and reconciles between the two opinions. The Arizal says (Eitz Chaim gate 42) that Keter has two dimensions: The higher one (Atik) manifests “the lowest level of” Ein Sof. The lower level (Arich) is the “highest level of the” defined states of the sefirot.

Explains the Rebbe Rashab that the Arizal clearly recognizes that there is some “entity” outside of the Essence which is called Ein Sof (unlike the Ramak). Yet, this level is higher than and beyond Keter and will (unlike Ibn Gabbai and the Rameh).

What “state” can be called Ein Sof and yet not be the Essence?

The answer is given by Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi. In perhaps (if one can be bold enough to say) his greatest contribution, Rabbi Schneur Zalman, states that this is the level of “light” – ohr. Light combines both substance and no substance: it has no substance of its own; it always reflects its (luminary) source. Yet, precisely because of its transparent bittul (selflessness), light purely reflects and channels the deepest ‘substance’ of the source, with no ‘personality’ of its own to get in the way.

Thus, the Divine Light is Ein Sof, not by its own virtue, but because it is merely a reflection and emanation of the Ein Sof of the Essence, with no substance and existence of its own. (see The Physics of Chanukah and Chanukah Lite).

This state of ohr (light) allows us to reconcile between both opinions: Ein Sof is attributable only to the Essence (as the Ramak explains), but since light has no reality without the Essence and is a mere reflection of its source, the Divine Ein Sof extends into its reflected light. This also explains how creation causes no change in the Essence, because the process is implemented not through the Essence itself (as Ibn Gabbai and the Rameh explain), but also not by a force outside of the Essence: Creation is possible only through the Ein Sof power of the Essence, carried through the power of light, which is a mere emanation of the Essence.

In effect, light “carries” the non-existential Essence into existence. Light is a bridge between the non-existential and the existential, and serves as a backdrop – like an invisible blanket – where the entire process and all of existence plays itself out.

So this completes the circle: Light is the manner by which the Essence imparts its Ein Sof quality to existence. This light will go through many stages of evolution – it will divide into the infinite light and the finite one, and then undergo further levels concealment and revelation, and finally become the source of the narrow kav following the tzimtzum, which in turn will go through further stages of concealment and revelation.

And this light is also the manner by which we climb the ladder, reversing the steps and returning from matter to spirit, from the containers to the light. We climb via the kav into the pre-tzimtzum light, and that in turn leads us into the Ein Sof of the Essence reflected in the light. Since light is completely selfless and only reflects its source, it also bridges the final gap between the existential and the non-existential Essence.

In the language of the Torah narrative: We have the power not only to leave our constraints (Egypt), and to taste the interface between the finite and the infinite (parting of the sea), and then to marry heaven and Earth (Sinai), and then to build a home below for the Divine (Temple) – but above and beyond all that: we actually have the power, through light, to fuse the existential and the non-existential, the most conscious states of our defined lowly existence with the undefined Divine Essence.

However, this fusion is achieved through a process — the journey through the “wilderness” of life and all its challenges, trials and tribulations. At times we may feel stuck, confused or wandering. But these difficulties are a manifestation of the tension between matter and spirit, the finite and the infinite and the existential and the non-existential. And all the work we do to bridge the two helps pave the way toward the “Promised Land” — when we mortals become united with the Divine.

To do so we must become like light, and transform our containers into light; we must become embodiments of absolute bittul: An existence that clearly exists, but is nothing more than an extension of a reality greater than ourselves.

And once we suspend ourselves and become channels to the Higher Reality – we can become extensions of the Ein Sof of that Reality. Bittul cannot become botul. The invisible cannot disappear.

Where the Infinite Meets the Finite

— Samach-Vav Part 9 —

Can we mortals ever achieve immortality? How high can a limited existence ever reach? Can the finite ever touch the infinite? Can heaven meet earth? Can imperfection meet perfection? And if it can, does the finite have to lose its personality in the process?

Is love of two equals truly possible – the union of two distinct entities, without one compromising (or annihilating) the other? Can we imperfect creatures ever unite with the perfect G-d without losing our individuality?

One hundred years ago this week these “big” questions were addressed by one of the foremost mystics and thinkers of modern times. A centennial ago, the Rebbe Rashab (1860-1920) delivered his powerful magnum opus, Hemshech Samach Vav, in which he laid out, in a series of 61 discourses, the dynamics of existence and the principles of discovering and living up to our higher calling.

In the previous installments Samach-Vav discussed the power of self-generated human initiative, which comes through the hard work of holding strong to our highest ideals and living a virtuous life despite the challenges of our harsh world. Immersion in material existence demands a vigilant and exerted effort, a battle, to refine the world in which we live – a world that on its own is quite dark and menacing.

The dark Egyptian exile, which we read about in these week’s Torah portions (in the beginning of the book of Exodus) is the quintessential model of both the bondage of material life and the way to find freedom from our constraints. “Mitzrayim” (Egypt in Hebrew) actually means “constraints” – referring to every type of inhibition or limitation, psychological, emotional or physical, imposed upon us (from within or without) in life. Hence the directive – “in every generation (and every day) a person should regard himself has if he just came out of Mitzrayim:” Our lifelong effort is to free ourselves from the confines of our existence.

In this week’s Torah portion the redemption from Egypt begins. Apropos, this week’s Samach-Vav discourse begins a discussion on the nature of the “Kav” – the ray of light which pierces the Tzimtzum darkness (the root source of every form of “Mitzrayim”), and opens the “window” to every ray of hope and illuminating force in existence.

What are the Tzimtzum and the Kav? They are part of the grand Lurianic doctrine that describes the process of creation. Initially the “Divine infinite light – the manifest expression of the Divine omnipresence and omnipotence – filled the entirety of existence,” and left no “space” for any independent entity to take hold. A world such as ours—finite, self-defined and independent—could not exist, for it would have been utterly nullified within the divine light. G-d employed the “Tzimtzum” – literally: concealment or contraction – which concealed the Divine light on a conscious level, creating a “void” and “empty space,” which leaves “room” for the emergence of our existence. Into this void G-d then (not in time, but conceptually) allowed a “Kav” – literally: a line, a ray, a thread – of light/energy to penetrate that begins to bring existence into being. Through this Kav flows divine energy that is meted out to every level of reality in accordance with its capacity to receive it. Unlike the initial pre-Tzimtzum infinite light that filled all of existence, the Kav is a single, narrow thread of light, which does not overwhelm the independent entity emerging. (Click here for the actual translation of the Lurianic text as cited in Samach-Vav).

The classic example for the Tzimtzum and Kav is the process used in any form of transmission from a higher level to a lower one. When a brilliant teacher wants to convey a powerful idea to a beginner student, he first conceals his brilliance and then begins to transmit piecemeal a narrow thread of information, measured and tailored to the student’s containers, slowly spoon feeding him. As the student’s mind expands he is able to receive greater measures of light. After years of hard work the student refines his mind and understanding to a point where is finally able to contain the entire brilliance of the teacher, including the pre-Tzimtzum light and beyond (see Part 1).

The purpose of existence is to build a “home for the Divine” in the lowest of worlds in the post-tzitmzum reality – our material universe which is consciously void of Divine revelation, with the capacity to turn away from and even deny its Creator. Essentially our mission in life is to transform the Tzimtzum and the void it created—to refill the “void” with divine light.

There are two ways in which this is achieved. One way is to draw into the world the divine light that was withdrawn through the Tzimtzum. This means increasing the intensity of the light that flows through the “line” by gradually increasing our world’s capacity to receive it. Every time we do a mitzvah, we make the world more receptive to the divine truth, stimulating a greater infusion of infinite light via the “line.” Ultimately, the world is elevated to the point that it can receive the full intensity of the light coming from beyond the parameters of the “void,” and the area of the “void” is as saturated with the manifest Divine presence as it was pre-Tzimtzum.

Another, deeper, way of transforming the Tzimtzum is from the “bottom up” – to refine the containers that receive the light by subjugating the “ego” and self-contained nature of the post-Tzimtzum world. The “sparks” within the material world are more powerful than the light within the “Kav” per se, originating from the depths of the “unconscious,” far higher than the “revealed” levels of the Divine. The hard work of redeeming these “sparks” energy and refining the material world generates the “ohr chozer” (reflective light) power that reaches deeper than the “ohr yosher,” the light that flows from the “top down.” Every time we battle with the very qualities that make our world “unspiritual”—its finiteness, physicality and materiality—and direct it toward a Divine end, we manifest the divine essence that brought the material world (and the Tzimtzum) into existence. By taming the coarse elements of the material ego and narcissism, we refine the “containers” thereby allowing them to absorb the highest levels of light, to the point that we actually produce a new unprecedented energy that expresses “the innermost aspect and essence of the Infinite Light” – the essence of the Divine “supra-conscious” Part 5.

These two ways – “direct light” from above to below, and “ohr chozer,” from below to above – manifest in general into two types of Divine service, and even more generally into two types of souls:

1. Souls of the world of Atzilut. The primary nature of these select souls, even as they live in bodies in this material world, is spiritual. These unique individuals – like Moses – are completely selfless, and their service consists of revealing the absolute nullification of their souls in face of the Divine. These souls are compared to “sons” who have access to the “most intimate chambers and secrets of their father’s home.”
2. Souls of the worlds of B”iya (Beriah, Yetzirah, Asiya), whose primary nature is material, and their service consists of the hard work to sublimate the “egocentric” personality of matter. These souls are compared to “servants,” who are strangers in the palace, and their access is not by virtue of their “genes” but by their hard work and dedication.

Samach-Vav then begins an elaborate discussion on the nature of the world of Atzilut and its root – the Kav – which leads into an comprehensive analysis of the nature of light, the mystical metaphor for Divine transmission and the ultimate bridge between the infinite and the finite, the Divine and the mundane.

Atzilut, the Rebbe Rashab explains, is a world of revelation: It reveals the hidden Divine light of higher levels. This “world” is essentially the interface between the Divine and the human, and like any interface it has a dual quality, one that represents the Divine and the other that speaks to the human. These two qualities are actually a fusion of opposites (see also Meat and Atzilut):

On one hand Atzilut is clearly a world of structure, with ten sefirot (Chochma, Binah etc.), each one consisting of light/energy and a container (ohr and keili) – the basic building blocks of all existence including our material universe. Atzilut in effect is the “perfect” parallel version of our universe.

At the same time the word “Atzilut” means “impart” or “emanate” [from the verse: “I will impart [emanate] from the spirit upon you”] and also “close” – it is not a new creation, but one that “emanates” and “imparts” the light of the Kav into a conscious experience. Atzilut is the state of being that reveals the Divine light and allows us to have a comprehension of the Divine.

So is Atzilut a created, i.e. “new” entity (like our universe) or is it a “revelation of the hidden?” The answer is both. Relative to the Kav, the ray of light flowing after the Tzimtzum, Atzilut is only revealing the hidden features of the Kav. But relative to the Divine light higher than the Kav, Atzilut (and even the Kav) is a “new” entity, infinitely distant from that Divine dimension. [Samach-Vav explains this idea in several different ways – to be discussed in a later article].

Why is the long discussion of Atzilut, Kav and light so necessary to understand the difficult work of transforming the dark void into a Divine home?

The obvious reason is to give us by contrast a sense of the unprecedented achievement resulting from the self-generated hard work and exertion of transforming the existential ego (of the “yesh) in a world of no inspiration (and often one that actually stifles inspiration). Because after all is said and done, Atzilut and the souls of Atzilut are in a state of revelation, revealing the hidden light of the Kav. They are inspired souls that do not require quite as much self-generated effort. So even though they too have an aspect that separates them from the higher light, yet their work is relatively easy compared to the difficult effort required to sublimate the coarse material universe. This also explains why this exertion generates a new and unprecedented light, because it is not (like Atzilut which is) about revealing a level that was previously hidden but existent; it’s about generating something entirely new, that never before existed.

On a deeper level, the personality of Atzilut and the Kav, help us understand how we can integrate the Divine into our personal experiences. It’s one thing to say that our exertion to “break” the “narcissistic” nature of matter generates a new, infinite energy that from the Divine Essence (higher than anything Atzilut or the Kav can access on their own). But the question remains: Whether this revelation actually permeates the finite nature of material existence or perhaps it compromises or annihilates our personalities?

The purpose of existence – to transform the lowest world into a Divine “home’ – includes two aspects: 1) A home for the Divine Essence, 2) That the Essence be revealed and integrated, like a “home”, in the personality, structure and parameters of our existence.

The first aspect is achieved through our self-generated hard work in transforming matter into spirit (made possible by the concealment of the tzimtzum). The second aspect is achieved through Atzilut, the Kav and all the revelations from above, which have the power to access and reveal the innermost dimensions of light. Atzilut and the Kav allow us to feel comfortable, close and intimate with the Divine (revealing the hidden). The work of sublimating matter by definition evokes a sense of awe and distance from the Divine.

Therefore, Samach-Vav elaborates how even light is comprised – subtly – of both levels: It reflects and is an extension of its essence/source, and it is a “new” and separate entity, which is not the Essence (and is infinitely and qualitatively distant from the Essence), but only a revelation of It.

Similarly, the work of refining the coarse world also is not exclusively “new” and separate from the Divine. It also includes the element of generating inspiration and revelation, as discussed in a previous article Part 7.

This dynamic has many far reaching implications that require much more elaboration. Many lessons can be gleaned from these principles, in virtually all areas of life.

Take growth for example. Every form of growth requires two elements, and comes in two stages: First, aspiration. Then, internalization.

Initially there must be a feeling of want and desire, which is only possible if the object is distant, and not easily accessible. You have to feel and respect your distance from your intended goal. If you feel close to it, or that it’s just a matter of revealing the hidden, then you may grow somewhat, but it will be a limited form of growth. True growth is only possible when then destination is beyond you. Then comes stage two: The acquisition and the internalization of the object. When you come to “own it.”

The same is true in relationships: Every healthy relationship – whether between spouses, friends, man and G-d, you and your own self – requires both closeness and space, Obviously, a relationship by definition means that there is some relation – some measure of commonality and closeness – between the two parties. Love is not just closeness, but even a state of intimate oneness. Yet, love that obliterates any one of the parties is not love. A relationship also means that two distinct entities are relating to each other, or are in love. Their distinction dictates that each of them needs their individual space, which must be respected and honored by their partner.

And when a relationship has a balance of both ingredients, it will yield the best results: It will reveal the hidden potential in each party and also generate something new.

So too, in our relationship with the Divine: Tzimtzum defines the distance between the finite and the infinite. But that then allows the two to unite – in true unity, which is harmony within diversity: Not compromising or obliterating one or the other, but both retain their distinct identities, yet join as one.

How that is actually possible will be discussed in next week’s article.

After 210 years of painful oppression, the light begins to shine. After a Tzimtzum of epic proportions, the Kav begins to manifest in the darkness (when Moses was born his “home was filled with light”).

“Just as it was in the days of Egypt I will show you wonders.” The exodus from Egypt was the beginning – the first ray of light that pierced the confines of existence. Today, 3318 years later, the ray of light has expanded into a wide swathe of light.

We have but to finish the last touches and then the “Kav” will touch the bottom of the black hole, filling all of existence in the basking warmth of the Divine.

The Story Behind the Story

WYSINWYG??!! Is that a typo? No it’s not. Read on.

Take this quick questionnaire:

Do you think you know where your life is headed?

Do you feel that your losses and disappointments in life give you good reason to be resigned?

Do you feel that the hurt in your life has dampened (or killed) your trust and hope in a brighter future?

Do you feel your childhood scars have left you for damaged goods?

Does fear and insecurity drive many of your decisions?

Do you feel that you will never find true love in your life?

If you answered yes to any of these questions, then this week’s Torah portion has an indispensable lesson for you that can change your entire perspective on your life. In truth, the lesson is equally relevant even if you answered no to these questions.

Item: A 17 year old boy is sold into slavery by his brothers.

Item: 13 years later he rises from slavery and prison to become viceroy of Egypt.

Item: Some 7 years later he turns Egypt into a superpower.

Item: 22 years from the time he was sold, he controls the destiny of his brothers and father, and for that matter, of the entire populated world!

From the brink of disaster Joseph emerges a king:

“From out of prison he comes to reign, for even in his kingdom he was born poor.” (Ecclesiastes 4:14)

From a tragedy of epic proportions salvation is born. Joseph being sold into slavery ends up saving lives – as Joseph tells his brothers: You sold me to Egypt. But don’t worry or feel guilty…for G-d has sent me ahead of you to save lives. There has been a famine in the area… G-d sent me ahead of you to insure that you survive in the land and to sustain you through great deliverance. It is not you who sent me here, but G-d. He has made me Pharaoh’s vizier, master of his entire government and ruler of all Egypt.

Not only this, but Joseph’s descent into the abyss lead Jacob and his entire family to Egypt (see Midrash Tanchuma Vayeishev 4. Midrash Rabbah, Bereishit 86:1. Cited and discussed in a previous article) where their children would be enslaved, then freed in the Exodus, only to receive the Torah at Sinai, followed by their journey into the Promised Land, building of the Holy Temples and all the rest of history.

Essentially, Joseph’s initial tragedy was the catalyst that brought the birth of the Jewish people, the giving of the Torah – and all that follows Sinai: the birth of civilization as we know it today, which is based on the principles of the Ten Commandments and the Bible in general (as scholars have noted, see here and here), and ultimately the transformation of the entire universe in the days of Moshiach.

Who would have thought? Who would have known? When Joseph was brutally attacked by his brothers and almost killed, then sold to the Ishmaelite nomads — who would have thought that it would lead to such great events? Who would have known that it would change the world forever for the better?

The lesson for us is both simple and profound: You and I do not know the script of our lives. Sometimes what appears as bad news for the moment (or more than a moment) can turn into the greatest blessing. And sometimes it’s the other way around.

How many opportunities have we missed in our lives because we are still salving basking in (licking) the wounds of our past loss or disappointment?

I recall an e-mail that was circulating a while ago. It went like this:

TWO TOUGH QUESTIONS.

Question 1: If you knew a woman who was pregnant, who had 8 kids already, three who were deaf, two who were blind, one mentally retarded, and she had syphilis, would you recommend that she have an abortion?

Read the next question before looking at the answer for this one.

Question 2: It is time to elect a new world leader, and only your vote counts.

Here are the facts about the three leading candidates.

Candidate A – Associates with crooked politicians, and consults with astrologists. He’s had two Mistresses. He also chain smokes and drinks 8 to 10 martinis a day.

Candidate B – He was kicked out of office twice, sleeps until noon, used opium in college and drinks a quart of whiskey every evening.

Candidate C – He is a decorated war hero. He’s a vegetarian, doesn’t smoke, drinks an occasional beer and never cheated on his wife.

Which of these candidates would be your choice? Decide first, no peeking, then scroll down for the answer.

Candidate A is Franklin D. Roosevelt. Candidate B is Winston Churchill. Candidate C is Adolph Hitler.

And, by the way, the answer to the abortion question: If you said yes, you just killed Beethoven.

Pretty interesting isn’t it? Makes a person think before jumping to conclusions.

Never be convinced that we know the destiny of events. Remember: Amateurs built the Ark. Professionals built the Titanic.

In the same spirit, here’s an excerpt from an off-line blog I wrote in the pre-blog era.

THE OJ FACTOR

Sometimes When You Win You Lose

They call it the OJ factor. That is: OJ as in OJ Simpson. Remember him? He clearly murdered his wife, yet he won his case and was acquitted on technicalities. Remember the jury jingle: “If the glove don’t fit, you gotta acquit.” Wonder why they didn’t turn it into a rap song…

He won, but… he lost. He isn’t sitting in a physical prison, yet he is locked in a psychological jail. A social pariah, OJ will never be trusted. He can play as many tennis games as he likes, but everyone knows that he is a cold-blooded murderer.

I haven’t followed his daily schedule. I don’t have a desire to. But I do not envy his haunted life. Wherever he goes, whomever he meets, every interaction must be affected by his ‘innocent’ guilt (or is it ‘guilty’ innocence). Perhaps that is what the Talmud means when it says that the wicked “even when they are alive they are dead.” The living dead.

Yes, he won. Legally, technically – and for some that may be all that matters. But… he lost. Big time. What will always be remembered for posterity? What will go down in the annals of history? Not his acquittal; his evasion of justice. How a guilty man got away with murder (literally).

A similar thing happens to many of us. We dedicate our lives to a just cause. We go through many battles fighting for our cause. And then a tyrant obsessed with conquest and control takes it all away. With his eye on the prize, he forgets about the lives he is trampling on, and is consumed with winning at all costs.

How many innocent people have suffered on way or another from this type of brutality? How many of us have had to encounter a person who knows how to manipulate the system, does not take no for an answer, fights to the bitter end, with a ‘no prisoners taken’ attitude, with sheer, unrelenting force and intimidation?

But… Even when it appears that the tyrant has won, in truth he lost. He may not know it yet consciously, thinking that all things will pass, and people will soon come to accept his travesty (as they usually accept everything and anything). But he will always be remembered – and feared – as someone who mugged an innocent family.

Yes, he may have won. But… he lost.

I always wondered what lesson we derive from the mockery of justice that we all witnessed just a few years ago in Brentwood, California. I was incensed as were so many others how someone so guilty could get away so clean. And I was ready to chalk it up to yet another ‘no justice in the world’ scenario.

But today, in retrospect, much can be learned from OJ about winning and losing. Perhaps there is justice after all, yet not always in the way we expect it.

Maybe that should give us some hope.

So many of us are consumed with winning. And if we are relentless enough we may even get what we want. We win. Yes, we win, we get what we want, but we may not get what we need.

What may be even worse is that some people first have to win to even discover that they really lost. They simply could not be humbled with a loss; their egos and self-righteous bravado attitude could not take losing. Their humility will come from victory. They first have to win (win in their eyes that is) to be able to become open and realize the truth, that they really lost.

Always remember, sometimes when you win you really lose.

And sometimes when you lose you really win.

So, next time you feel resigned that all seems is lost, if you are haunted by your scars, wounds and previous disappointments in life, and feel that you don’t have much hope – remember the story of Joseph. A boy at the brink of death, sold into slavery, imprisoned in a depraved land – rises suddenly from the ashes, becomes king, sustains his family and the world, and changes the universe forever…

Indeed Joseph’s life captures the history of the Jewish people as a whole and of countless individual lives – the story of the moon: Just as it is about to disappear, it is reborn anew. Throughout the millennia the Jewish people faced the abyss time after time, Obituaries were written, and their extinction seemed inevitable. Yet, out of the darkness, unexpected, they experienced renewal.

History is our witness. But today we don’t need to rely only on past history. We have living witnesses, burning embers, of Holocaust survivors who rebuilt their lives from the ashes of the unprecedented genocide 60-70 years ago. These wretched souls, from destroyed families, are presiding over the great renaissance of Jewish life today – with unprecedented freedom and prosperity.

Who could have known? Who could have written such a bizarre script?

Now ask yourself: After hearing the story of Joseph – can any one of us claim that we know the true story of our lives? Can you argue that your life, no matter how much you suffered, offers no hope? Are you going to insists that you have it all figured out, ready to write off new possibilities that you may have not expected?

How much energy are we expending in fear, insecurity and all our haunted nightmares based on our limited perceptions of our life experiences?

Even if bad things may have happened to you, you don’t want to perpetuate its effects by living up to your own self-fulfilling doomed prophesy. None of us can afford to.

To get Jacob and his family to Egypt why did G-d create such a convoluted series of events, pitting brother against brother, causing so much anguish to Joseph, Jacob and all the family?

Perhaps to teach us the lesson of the mystery of life: Even when things seem all lost, greatness emerges.

Our responsibility is to take the lesson to heart and see it through.

Now decode the title of this article:

WYSINWYG = What you see is never what you get.

The Anatomy of the Soul

— Samech Vov 100 Years – Part Six —

JERUSALEM, 24 Kislev, The day before Chanukah

After discussing the unprecedented (undefined “supra-conscious”) energy generated through the human struggle with darkness, this week of Chanukah one hundred years ago, Samech Vov begins to dissect the dynamic nature of the soul, which is compared to a flickering flame, apropos to Chanukah the festival of lights.

Understanding the very nature of the soul’s light, energy and source of inspiration will help us appreciate the difficult work of extracting and redeeming the “sparks” embedded in the darkest places, specifically once the initial spiritual inspiration wears off.

And with this the Rebbe Rashab begins an extensive and intricate discussion on the significance of “avodah be’koach atzmo,” the enormous power of self-generated human initiative spawned from below (not one that originates from above) which lies at the heart of the very purpose of creation and its ability to introduce into our lowly world unprecedented Divine energy from the Essence Itself.

As we prepare to enter Chanukah, there is a beautiful way to enhance the menorah lighting, as suggested by the Rebbe Yosef Yitzchak: “We should listen to the flames,” to the story that the Chanukah lights are telling us.

The Chanukah flames tell us many stories. They reveal to us much about our own souls, which are compared to flames – “the flame of G-d is the human soul.”

Following are some profound lessons about the flaming nature of the soul derived from this week’s Samech Vov discourse.

The obvious parallel of the soul to a flame is its constant motion. Just like a flame flickers as it rises and falls, so, too, a soul by its very nature is transcendent, reaching upward only to be drawn back below, in the dual dance called “rotzo v’shuv,” yearning and returning, or tension and resolution. Like a flame, the soul aspires to reach upward, only to be tugged downward by the grounding wick. And so the soul is always on the move – in an ongoing state of dynamic motion, continuously fluctuating between the two poles.

However on further reflection the question arises: Is the soul inherently mobile or is the natural state of the soul actually calm and peace, with an unwavering sense of fulfillment, which does not fluctuate? If so, what causes the soul to flicker?

This brings us back to the soul/flame metaphor. We cannot say that the soul is defined only by it being the “flame of G-d” because the first description of the soul in the Torah (at the beginning of Genesis) actually defines the soul as G-d’s breath: G-d formed the human from “the dust of the earth. He breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and the human became a living soul.” Indeed, the word for soul in Hebrew is “neshomo,” which also means breath (as in the breath of life).

Breath and fire are totally different entities. Among the four central elements – earth, water, wind, fire – wind (breath) is a different dimension than fire. [Ruach in Hebrew can be translated as breath, air, wind or oxygen. Therefore the term is used here interchangeably].

So which one is it: Is a soul flamelike or windlike? The answer is both: The soul has both dimensions, ruach-breath and neshomo-fire. [The soul actually has five dimensions, starting from the lowest: nefesh – biological life; ruach – emotional life; neshomo – intellectual life; chaya – transcendent life; yechida – the unified essence of the soul].

Here, too, we can understand the soul’s dynamic by “listening to the flames.”

A flame needs oxygen (air) to ignite and remain lit. Proper ventilation (ruach) is necessary both for the flame to burn and that it burn smoothly, flickering as it consumes the wick.

The (inner) reason for this is because the inherent nature of fire is to expire into its source above, and not descend at all. Unlike wind whose nature is to rise and fall and spread about. Wind currents rise, but do not rise to the point of expiration, and they also descend.

The same applies to the fire and breath dimensions of the soul. Spiritual fire on its own completely expires and disappears into oblivion as it is engulfed by its source. This is the yearning in the world of Tohu, as experienced by the sons of Aaron: Consumed by their love for the Divine, their souls expired in ecstasy.

By contrast, the yearning and fire of the soul from the balanced world of Tikkun, is fire imbued with the “breath of G-d.” The level of ruach keeps the flame from expiring, as well as ensuring that the flame descends to the wick. Above all it maintains the poise of a smoothly burning soul and balances upward transcendence and downward integration, the tension of yearning and the resolution of returning.

Without the windlike inspiration of the “Divine breath” the soul’s fire will not have the power to come ablaze with passion. The flame may exist but only in a concealed state, which can be easily extinguished by the “wind” of the animal soul. The light needs to be ignited by the inspiration that comes through the “breath” – the level of Aaron the High Priest who kindles the Menorah.

These two dimensions of the soul are similar to the two components of the supra-conscious state of the soul: Taanug (pleasure/fulfillment) and Rotzon (will) – as discussed in a previous part of the Samech Vov series titled, The True You. The undiluted dimension of fire, whose essential nature is to be absorbed upward into itself, is akin to taanug, the inner pleasure which is an internal state. The breath dimension of the soul, which consists of movement, is comparable to rotzon, which extends and reaches outside of itself.

On a lower level, this is also the difference between intellect and emotions. Pure intellect is isolated and separate from any outside force. It turns inward into the essence. A true intellectual is not affected by outside disturbances. Emotions, on the other hand, are fundamentally driven by movement – extending or being drawn outward to express a feeling or fulfill an emotional need. In contrast to intellect, emotions are affected by forces outside of itself.

This will explain the Talmudic statement about Chanukah, that the mitzvah is to “place the Chanukah lights at the door of the house facing outward, on the left side of the door, so that the Mezuzah is on the right and the Chanukah menorah on the left”:

The light of Chanukah is the light of Torah that has the ability to illuminate the darkness and the severities of the “left side.” However, to ignite the flame of Torah and the flame of the soul we need the power of mitzvot, the mezuzah on the right, which are like the wind of emotions and that will cause the flame to burn – “the candle of a mitzvah” generates “the light of Torah.”

All this however, is the power of the soul that is generated by the “wind” of inspiration from above, which imbues the soul with energy to move to and fro. But the ultimate goal, is to generate energy through our own efforts.

After all is said and done, inspiration can only go so far. Every inspiration dissipates after a short while. So as powerful as the inspiration may be at the time, once it fades away we have to exert ourselves with our own energy to generate the flame.

And it is this hard work which defines the ultimate purpose of creation.

[In context of the weekly Torah portions: After Jacob gathers strength in Laban’s home and builds his family, he is ready to encounter the battle with raw Esau-materialism. In Laban’s home the soul was inspired and imbued with the ruach. Now comes the hard work].

As we enter into Chanukah and prepare to kindle the flames, remember to listen closely to the story that they tell.

The flickering flame is your flickering soul, which needs spiritual oxygen to inspire it to yearn to great heights and return to tell about it.

When you kindle the flames you are affirming your mission in life:

We each have the responsibility to kindle flames – to inspire the flame of our own soul and the soul of others. To breathe life into our own experiences and into the lives of the people you come in contact with.

Furthermore: Even after the light burns out and the inspiration dissipates, we are charged with the task to generate our own light and illuminate the darkest crevices of the world.

Chanukah gives us light, but also the challenge to face the darkness of the night and the street – and transform them.

As you light the Chanukah Menorah open your eyes, cup your ears, and listen. Listen to the flickering flames and the story of our lives.

Listen to the flames, and your life will never be the same.

How One Lonely Battle Changed the Course of History

And Jacob remained alone, and a man wrestled with him until the break of dawn.

Genesis 32:25

During the night of Exile, the nations of the world and the kingdom of Edom (Esau) wrestle with Jacob, until the dawn of redemption.

Midrash Lekach Tov on the verse

So now we go from the frying pan into the fire. After 20 years of hard labor in Laban’s home, Jacob has built a family and gathered the necessary resources preparing him to enter the fray and confront Esau.

In personal terms: Once we have built up our strength and resources and established a family and secure home – a solid ground base – we are then ready to enter combat with the difficult “Esau” based warrior-like world, as discussed in last week’s Before the Battle.

What happens next is the theme of this week’s Torah chapter and this corresponding column.

After 20 years of hard labor in Laban’s home, Jacob has built a family and gathered the necessary resources to confront Esau. He now feels ready to reunite with Esau and join forces. Jacob therefore dispatches messengers to Esau as an overture for reconciliation. When the messengers return with the news that Esau is marching with “400 men,” he realizes that Esau is not yet ready to live in peace. Jacob would therefore have to draw out the Esau energy through his own efforts.

These efforts constitute the essential theme of this week’s Torah portion. A previous article, The Big Confrontation, reviews the overall story of what actually happens when Esau and Jacob finally meet and its personal applications. In this complementary column we will focus on one key episode that occurs the night before Jacob meets Esau.

After recognizing the precarious situation, Jacob prepares himself and his family to encounter Esau. He splits his family and belongings into camps, and prepares gifts to appease Esau. He also prepares for war.

That night was a fateful one. “In the middle of the night he got up” and took his family and possessions “across the Yavok river.”

“Jacob remained alone. A man wrestled with him until the break of dawn. When he saw that he could not defeat him, he touched the upper joint of [Jacob’s] thigh. Jacob’s hip joint became dislocated as he wrestled with him.”

Upon dawn break the man asks to leave, and Jacob complies only after exacting a blessing from the man. The blessing is that Jacob, and his descendants, would have a new name – “Israel.”

This mysterious wrestling episode is fraught with cryptic implications and intonations.

The sages and commentaries analyze the meaning of the Hebrew word used here for wrestling, “Va’yai’oveik.” One primary opinion is that it is derived from the word “avok,” which means dust, referring to the dust that rose from the ground they were struggling on. As the classic Bible commentator Rashi writes:

“Menachem explains: And a man became covered with dust, derived from dust, for they were raising dust with their feet through their movements.”

According to this interpretation an obvious question is: why does this dust play such a primary role here? It would appear that the dust created by their struggle is a side-effect, a peripheral detail, an insignificant consequence of two people wrestling on the ground (were they wrestling, say, on stones there would be no dust). Why then does the Torah give it such prominence, and actually uses a word that focuses more on the dust than on the struggle itself?

Indeed, upon further research the dust takes on a whole life of its own: The Talmud explains that:

“The dust of their feet went up to the Divine Throne.” (Chulin 91a)

The Midrash (Shir HaShirim Rabba 3:5/2) goes even farther and tells us that all Jacob’s gifts came as a result of this “dust.” Furthermore, all the “gifts that Israel would gain in this world,” “all the success they would have in business,” “all the success they would have in battles” – all of it is “in the merit of Jacob’s dust”!

What possible power did this dust have that it would be the source of all these blessings throughout history?

First we need to understand who was the mysterious “man” that wrestled with Jacob? He was the guardian angel of Esau (Genesis Rabba 77:3. 78:3. Tanchuma Vayishlach 8. Zohar Bereishis 170a. Rashi. See Hosea 12:4-5). Jacob’s wrestling with him all night symbolizes the struggle with materialism and evil that he and his descendants would have from this time forth during the night of “exile” (see Rashba Chulin ibid. Ramban and Bachya on our chapter).

[The Zohar (VaYikra 100b) implies that this wrestle took place on Yom Kippur eve, which only underscores the centrality of this event].

Jacob’s wrestling with Esau’s angel cuts straight to the spiritual core of the perpetual battle between the twins. As we discussed in the previous articles how Jacob’s lifelong battle with Esau reflects the struggle in each of our own lives and in all of history – the battle between matter and spirit. Esau the warrior represents the body, the material world, whose untamed elements need to be conquered. Jacob the wholesome scholar symbolizes the soul, the spiritual world. Initially these two worlds clash and fight for control.

In mystical terms this struggle represents the process called Avodat ha’Birurim. Everything in our material existence contains Divine “sparks,” i.e. spiritual energy, and we are charged with the mission to redeem and elevate these sparks, to uncover the spiritual opportunity embedded in every experience, and thereby refine the material universe and transform it into its true purpose: a vehicle for spiritual expression.

Esau and Jacob are the embodiment of the cosmic twin worlds of Tohu and Tikkun. Esau is the “warrior” – the raw, untamed energy of Tohu, which is embedded in coarse matter. This energy is a very powerful force – far more powerful than the defined energies that animate Jacob’s correct and orderly world. However, without the focus and control of the structured Tikkun spirituality, that material universe can become a destructive force. Matter needs spirit to channel its enormous energy toward constructive goals. The challenge of all life is that we humans delve beneath the surface of the physical world to unearth the “sparks of holiness” that are the residue of the primordial Tohu world, tap their potent potential, and, ultimately, integrate the two realities, fusing the cosmic twins by capturing the “immense energy” of Tohu in the “broad containers” of Tikkun.

The struggle to achieve this synergy is the life-history of the biblical twins, and the essence of human history as a whole. Esau and Jacob emerge from the same womb where they were already fighting, and the rest of their lives is defined by the search for reconciliation. But the dichotomy is too deep to be resolved in one lifetime. The forces of Tohu are too expansive, too hungry and too raw to submit to the rigors of Tikkun; and the vessels of Tikkun are too defined, too structured, to embrace the passions of Tohu.

So the quest to unite Tohu and Tikkun extends beyond their lifetimes, to the nations of Israel and Edom, which originate from Jacob and Esau. The eight kings which “reigned in Edom, before there reigned any king over the children of Israel” are the volatile forces of Tohu, while the people of Israel proceed to Sinai where they are entrusted with the mandate of the 613 commandments to bring tikkun olam, the correction and civilization of the world. All of subsequent history is the story of the tension between matter and spirit and our efforts to relieve the tension and find resolution by integrating Jacob and Esau. The conflict rages on in the battles between Judah and Rome, between spirit and matter, between the sacred and the mundane, to be resolved at the end of days when the struggles of humanity culminate when “the saviors shall ascend Mount Zion to judge the mountain of Esau.”

In this context we can understand the significance of the “dust” that arose from Jacob wrestling with Esau’s angel.

Before Jacob encountered the angel, we are told that he “remained alone.” The sages explain that:

“He remained for the sake of some small jars he had left behind. From this we learn that the righteous value their money more than their bodies.” (Chulin ibid)

Money?! Why would Tzaddikim place such premium on… money?! Why would Jacob risk his life to return for nothing more than the value of some “small jars”?!

The Baal Shem Tov explains: The righteous know that their material possessions contain powerful “sparks of holiness” which are redeemed and elevated when the object or resource they inhabit is utilized to fulfill the Divine will. The righteous person sees these sparks of Divine potential as virtual extensions of his own soul, indeed, they are forces that catapult his soul to unprecedented heights, since he understands that the very fact that Divine Providence has caused them to come into his possession indicates that their redemption is integral to his mission in life. (For a lengthy discussion on the topic see Wealth and Spirituality).

Jacob knew that to fulfill the purpose of his being he needed to elevate the “sparks” of Esau that lay embedded in the material world, including the last remaining “small jars.” He therefore returned and “remained alone” to redeem those “jars.”

As Jacob “remains alone” for the sake of the “small jars” he encounters Esau’s angel who wrestles with him until the break of dawn. When we immerse in the business of money in order to extract the “sparks” within we are faced with a powerful battle: Who will prevail – the selfish temptations so common in the pursuit of wealth or the selfless sense that your wealth must be used for a higher purpose than just your needs? Who will triumph – the voice that claims “my success is due to me and me alone – it is my intelligence and strengths that brought me this wealth,” or the one that feels “it was not my own strength and personal power that brought me all this prosperity. Remember that it is G-d who gives you the power to become prosperous” (Deuteronomy 8:17-18).

This battle yields an abundance of “dust.” Indeed, in Yiddish the gematria (numerical equivalent) of “gelt” (money) is “blote” (mud) = 112. Dust does not (naturally) yield vegetation, as earth does. Yet it carries potent energy.

The Kabbalists explain that “yavok” (112) – the river which Jacob crossed with his family and possessions – is comprised of the same Hebrew letters as “avok,” with one significant difference: “Yavok” begins with a yud instead of an alef. Yud – a simple dot – signifies selflessness (bittul), whereas the alef represents selfish needs. “When the ‘other side’ wants to rob spiritual energy from the place of holiness and blessing (kedusha and brocho, whose acronym is kuf bet), it forms the words “akov” (alef kuf bet). In a healthy situation, holiness and blessing follows the yud” (Meorei Or entry on avok. Ohr HaTorah Shir Hashirim p. 719).

Jacob first elevates his family and possessions – all that he had already refined – by taking them across the river “yavok” (which also consists of the same letters as the name “Yakov”) – and joining the power of Tohu with the focus of Tikkun. But he knows that he still needs to engage the untamed Esau on his terms, in order to redeem the ultra-powerful “sparks” that still remain in “broken shards.” So he returns “alone” for the “small jars,” which leads to the inevitable night battle with the angel and the resulting “dust” (“avok”) that has yet to be transformed to “yavok” (Torah Ohr Vayishlach 25a). Indeed, the dust is so intense that “the man became covered in dust.”

This may also explain why Jacob asked the angel (when the angel pleaded that he release him: “Let me go, for the day breaks”):

“Are you a thief or a gambler, that you are afraid of the morning?”

Money on its own, with no spiritual direction, becomes corrupt, either in the form of thievery or gambling. To which the angel replied:

“I am an angel, and from the day that I was created my time to sing praises to G-d has not come until now.”

As difficult as the battle was and regardless of the clouds of dust it created, Jacob prevailed in his struggle with the tentacles of materialism. And “the dust of their feet went up to the Divine Throne:” Jacob wrestling with the purpose (the spirit) of matter (Esau), reveals the essence of the Divine, the “supra-conscious state,” which Jacob on his own could not attain.

But not without a price:

“Jacob’s hip joint became dislocated as he wrestled with him.”

Matter and spirit are not yet compatible, hence the dust and the wound.

Now, Jacob is ready to meet Esau in real time. As a result of his triumph over Esau’s angel, Esau himself has been somewhat defanged, and his heart opens up to his brother and they reconcile. The two nations and worlds, the two cosmic forces that are Esau and Jacob, have both matured to the point where they can begin to coexist with each other. The sages argue whether or not this was a complete and sincere reconciliation. The argument reflects the difficulty of integrating the two. Either way the process of resolution between matter and spirit has begun.

Yet, this was just the beginning of the process, which would now begin to manifest in the historical struggle between spirit and matter that all the dust it would create, until the dawn of redemption would break and we will prevail (see Zohar on this week’s portion, 170a).

But we do not come unprepared. Jacob’s lonely battle changed history forever. Once Jacob wrestled with the spirit of Esau, he broke the ground and pioneered a new path and the “merit of his dust” would enable us all till this very day to succeed in our “business” and “battles.”

Today, each of us has in microcosm a similar battle. After we build a strong home and family and ensure that they are protected, we still need to re-enter the “ring” – the marketplace “battleground” where we will wrestle with the powerful tug of prosperity and success. Here we are alone. That quiet place where we face some of our deepest inner challenges.

As spirit collides with matter, your battles will generate dust. Many of us are covered in dust. But know that your dust is dear and precious to G-d – because it is a result of wrestling forces which is the purpose of existence. And your dust goes directly up to heavenly throne, and generates unprecedented energies that transform the world in which we live.

Know that you have the power to prevail, the power of “Israel” – the name given to Jacob by Esau’s angel, the blessing that emerges out of the dusty wrestling – “For you have struggled with the divine and with man and you have triumphed.”

Above all, know that Jacob fought the hardest part of our war. And his battle and empowered us all to not be overcome by the greed and corruption of the money world. His triumph imbues us all with the ability to integrate the forces of matter and spirit that have been wrestling with each other for millennia.

Much to be said for a lonely battle on a dark night 3575 years ago.

Just goes to show you: Raising a little dust can go a long way.

General sources: Zohar I 170a. Torah Ohr Vayishlach 26c-d. Ohr HaTorah Vayishlach vol. 7 pp.1230. Shir HaShirim pp. 717.

Laban and Esau: Two Stages of Development

To fight and win any battle one needs training and resources. If life is a battle, when do we get trained and how do we build our arsenal?

This is the theme of our weekly Torah portion, as explained in the continuing Hemshech Samech Vov discourses.

Last week’s article discussed how Jacob’s life story related in these week’s Torah portions is actually the story of our own lives.

The battle between Jacob and Esau reflects the struggle of life resulting from the tension between matter and spirit. Esau the warrior represents the body, the material world, whose untamed elements need to be conquered. Jacob the wholesome scholar symbolizes the soul, the spiritual world. Initially these two worlds clash and fight for control.

In mystical terms the struggle between Jacob and Esau represents the process called Avodat ha’Birurim. Everything in our material existence contains Divine ‘sparks,’ i.e. spiritual energy, and we are charged with the mission to extricate, redeem and elevate these sparks, to uncover the spiritual opportunity embedded in every experience, and thereby refine the material universe and transform it into its true purpose: a vehicle for spiritual expression.

This conflict takes on many shapes: The struggle between selfish goals and the greater good; between the demands at work and home life; between survival and transcendence; between instant gratification and long term objectives. In our own psyches we often struggle with a fractured past and the wish to build a healthy life. How much time do we spend on our fears and insecurities, battling demons (real or imagined), when what we really want is the peace and calm to pursue higher aspirations?

Yet, this battle, whatever shape it takes on in your life, is precisely the purpose of existence: To redeem the spiritual opportunities (“sparks”) that lie within these struggles. And the stronger the resistance, the more powerful is the energy generated. Every moment of our lives, every act and interaction poses for us the challenge: Who will triumph – the selfish forces of matter or the selfless forces of spirit?

But what resources do we have at our disposal to wage our wars? How can we prepare to fight them? Armies spend years training, stocking supplies, developing strategies and building resources in preparation for a battle that one day may be fought. What equivalent training do we receive to face combat in our own lives?

Last week’s Torah chapter laid the ground for the overall conflict. The body and soul (Esau and Jacob) are initially adversaries; each has their unique strengths. Indeed, the body and material life has enormous power that lifts the soul to unprecedented heights. However, the soul must harness this power. Hence, Isaac’s blessings pass on to the body (Esau) via the soul (Jacob), thereby empowering the soul in its work of refining and elevating the sparks within matter.

Now that Jacob is empowered with the blessings why then does he not proceed with his work to reconcile and refine Esau, and instead escapes to his uncle Laban in Charan, and only after 22 years does he return to face Esau?

The delay is in order to allow the soul (Jacob) to reinforce itself and develop the necessary tools to face the challenges ahead.

And this is the story of this week’s portion: How Jacob – and each of us – trains and builds the strength to then go fight the primary and harsher battle with the heart of the material world (Esau).

After receiving blessings and instructions from Isaac and Rebecca to go to Charan, Jacob sets out on his way. “Jacob leaves Beer Sheba and goes toward Charan,” where Jacob works for two decades in the employ of his conniving uncle, Laban, in the midst of a corrupt and debased society. Throughout it all, Jacob remained true to G-d and man, serving Laban honestly, even as the latter repeatedly swindled him, scrupulously observing all 613 commandments of the Torah and retaining all that he had learned in his years of study. He even prospered materially, amassing considerable wealth. In Charan, Jacob also married and fathered eleven of the twelve sons who were to yield the twelve tribes of Israel.

But this stage is not devoid of battle. As in any good training, real battles, albeit smaller ones, must be fought (or at least simulated) in order to prepare for the larger battles. Laban was deceitful and difficult. And indeed, Jacob is afraid of going there, and prays that G-d be with him and protect him from harm. G-d promises Jacob to be with him and that he will return intact and complete to his father’s home back in Israel.

Jacob’s journey to Charan is the story of every soul’s descent to earth. At the outset the soul is ordered and empowered to descend into the difficult material world (“Charan” – a place of wrath). And then the actual descent begins.

But the descent itself is in stages. In the early, formative part of our lives we go through the education process and learn the “ropes” of survival. Living at home and being provided for protects us from the world at large. At this stage we also encounter battles, but they can hardly be compared to the harsh realities we face once we leave home and school and enter the “real” world and selfish marketplace.

Then comes stage two: Once we have built up our strength and resources and established a family and secure home – a solid ground base – then we are ready to enter combat with the difficult “Esau” based warrior-like world.

In Kabbalistic and Chassidic terms these are two stages in the “Avodat Ha’Birurim” process. First you refine the lesser or more subtle forms of impurities. What is then left spills over to the next stage of refinement in which you refine the coarser elements.

The first stage in the home of Laban consists of the refinement of the sparks in the world of Tikkun – in the domain of goodness and holiness, which is achieved primarily through Torah and Mitzvot. This was the primary work of Jacob in Charan, tending to the sheep, which symbolizes the three dimensions of Akudim, Nekudim and Verudim (see Cosmic Sheep).

The next stage facing Esau entails the refinement of the chaotic world of Tohu, whose fallen “broken shards” are embedded in the material universe. This stage requires us to battle the forces of darkness and evil to uncover the “sparks,” refine and elevate them. This work is achieved primarily through Teshuvah, which has the power to transform the darkest places.

And though the “birur” (refinement) of Esau is far more difficult than the “birur” of Laban, it has the power to reach the “hidden essence of the supra-conscious,” as discussed in the previous article, and infuse even the work of holiness with unprecedented dimensions.

Macrocosm microcosm. Just as our lives are divided into these two stages, we also have them both each day of our lives. Upon awakening each morning the first thing we need to do is reinforce our souls through prayer and study before taking on the challenges of the workplace. Then we can enter the coarse world and sensitize it, through our mitzvot – with virtue, integrity and ethics.

Practically speaking, parents must ask themselves: “Am I doing everything possible to provide for my children stage one – a secure and nurturing environment filled with holiness – to prepare my children to face the harsh world?”

As children we must ask ourselves whether we were adequately trained to go to battle; whether we have the necessary resources and tools. If the answer is no – which sadly is the situation may people are in today, growing up in families that did not provide the basic training, or dysfunctional homes or worse – do not despair. You always have the ability to begin at whatever stage you are in your life. True, it’s much easier do in the natural order discussed, via a healthy childhood, but even under other circumstances, there are methods to compensate for a lack of proper training. (We can learn the lesson from Rabbi Akiva who at age 40 began his studies, after seeing the effect that a persistent drop of water can have on a stone, only to become the greatest Talmudic scholar of his times – upon whom is based the entire Talmud).

One of the ways is to begin now. Whatever age you are, incorporate into your life the two elements of the “refinement” process: 1) Designate time each day for prayer and study to build up the “kedusha”-sanctity in your life. And if you lacked this in your youth, compensate now by adding a bit more. Then 2) when you enter the material world be aware that you are there not just to “make a living” but to transform your corner of the world into a Divine home, by uncovering the “sparks” in your domain and utilizing your skills and opportunities for a greater cause than just your own survival.

Always remember: Your success in battle will be only as good as you prepare for it. Once in battle you cannot begin proper battle training. Once you are engaged in conflict, you simply don’t have the time and energy, and above all, can’t afford to step back and prepare. At that point you have no choice but to fight, whether you are ready or not, equipped or not.

What is most vital is to create a peaceful oasis – a space, a moment, a corner, in which you have the ability to stock up, gather strength and reinforce yourself before you face the harsh realities around us.

Each one of us was given the power, by virtue of your soul, to find inner peace and create an environment – a home – for your soul, your family and loved ones. And this also serves as a solid base and station from which you can engage the often difficult world around us, and do what it takes to transform it and reveal its inherent unity and Divinity.

Unleashing the Infinite

— Samech Vov 100 Years – Part 5 —

How do you access the innermost recess of your soul – your deepest state of supra-consciousness? What power does human exertion wield? Is there any deeper significance to our struggles?

This week’s Torah portion, flavored by the unique Samech Vov touch, holds the answer to these any many other fundamental questions.

In the first installments of our continuing series discussing the Rebbe Rashab’s magnum opus, Hemshech Samech Vov, we reviewed the central themes of the first nine discourses of Samech Vov (see the running summary). To sum up briefly: The purpose of existence is to transform the material world into a home for the Divine, and draw down new unprecedented energy that expresses “the innermost aspect and essence of the Infinite Light” – the essence of the Divine “supra-conscious.”

We reach the Divine essence by accessing the essence of our own souls – the state of supra-conscious pleasure that lies at the core of our beings: A deep-seated reservoir of profound calm which give us an innate sense of belonging and indispensability.

After discussing the nature of the supra-consciousness, Samech Vov now begins to address – in the discourses of Chayei Sarah and Toldot 5666/1905 delivered 100 years ago this week – how we actually access the supra-conscious state?

One of the most controversial stories in the Bible is in this week’s Torah portion: How Jacob in collusion with his mother Rebecca “steals” the blessings intended for his brother Esau by deceiving Isaac into thinking that he is actually blessing Esau when in truth it was Jacob dressed up and pretending to be his brother.

How could Jacob the Tzaddik, “a wholesome man, who sat in the tents” of study, behave in such a deceitful way?! And not once, but twice:

“First he took my birthright [earlier in the chapter Jacob “buys” the famished Esau’s birthright with a stew] and now he took my blessing.”

Can blessings be won through deceit? Even if Rebecca was convinced that Jacob deserved the blessings, why did she not attempt to communicate that to Isaac? And what was Isaac thinking; is he not a tzaddik who knew what he was doing? The questions are as timeless as the story itself.

The question is really much broader: What is the significance of the struggle between the twin brothers, Jacob and Esau? Even in pregnancy, “the children clashed inside” Rebecca. When Rebecca is confused, “Why is this happening to me?” G-d replies:

“Two nations are in your womb. Two governments will separate from inside you. The upper hand will go from one nation to the other. The greater one will serve the younger.”

And so it was. The twins Esau and Jacob are born, with diametrically different characters. Esau is a “skilled hunter, a man of the field.” “Jacob was a wholesome man, who sat in the tents,” a scholar who dwelled in the tents of study. Their entire lives the two brothers fight with each other. Jacob “steals” the birthright and the blessings, and Esau swears to kill him causing Jacob to flee. And then – as foreseen – Jacob and Esau give birth to nations that have been at war for millennia: The battle between the children of Esau – father of Rome, Christianity and the Western World, and the children of Jacob – father of the Jewish people.

Why did G-d initially set up a situation in which Esau and Jacob are in perpetual battle from the moment of their conception?!

The story of Jacob and Esau reflects the struggle of life itself resulting from the tension between matter and spirit. Esau and Jacob represent two forces in each of our lives and in the world as a whole. Esau symbolizes the body, the material world, whose untamed elements need to be conquered. Jacob symbolizes the soul, the spiritual world. Initially these two worlds do not co-exist. Matter and spirit are at war with each other. “When one rises the other falls.”

In mystical terms the struggle between Jacob and Esau represents the process called Avodat habirurim (literally, the work of extrication, separation, refinement or clarity). Everything in our material existence contains Divine ‘sparks,’ i.e. spiritual energy, and we are charged with the mission to extricate, redeem and elevate these sparks, to uncover the spiritual opportunity embedded in every experience, and thereby refine the material universe and transform it into its true purpose: a vehicle for spiritual expression.

This refinement work implies a battle: The material surface of existence is a deceptive, seductive force that doesn’t allow us to see the “hand within.” We don’t much proof to support this statement. Just look around you. How often do we see spiritual transcendence prevailing over material pleasures? Where ever we turn we witness narcissism, greed and corruption dominating the scene. Thus, the process of redeeming the “Divine sparks” requires a battle: Who will triumph – the selfish forces of matter or the selfless forces of spirit? Hence, the perpetual struggle between Jacob and Esau.

But as difficult as the struggle may be, this battle yields enormous power. On a subtler level, the power released by the struggle can be understood by studying the nature of human comprehension. Who has a deeper grasp of a concept – one with a sharp mind that quickly understands an idea conveyed, or one who exerts himself and struggles to understand the idea?

Initially it would seem that the superior and swifter mind would have a better understanding of the idea. But on second thought that is not the case. The crystallization of a concept is in direct proportion to the amount of exertion applied to comprehend the thought. By exerting your mind and delving into a concept, studying it from different angles, challenging the idea with questions and counter questions, you come out with a much deeper and clearer comprehension than one who understands the concept at first glance, even if the latter has a better mind.

Indeed, the confusion and questions that present themselves at the outset of assimilating a profound concept serve as a catalyst to access its depths. The deeper you dig into a concept, the more is revealed. Just like digging a well in the ground: When you dig in shallow ground, you may discover river water; but when you dig really deep you can discover hidden wellsprings that would never be exposed had you not dug that deeply.

We thus have two forms of comprehension: Wisdom that comes through “ohr yosher,” direct light, and one that comes through the process of “ohr chozer,” reflective (or returning) light. The “ohr chozer” understanding reveals a much deeper dimension – a light that emerges from grappling with darkness, providing answers that are derived from questions.

Even though both types of understanding are rooted in the unconscious mind, nevertheless they express two different dimensions of the concealed unconscious: One called “concealment of substance,” or the “defined unconscious,” and the other “concealment of no substance,” or the “undefined unconscious.” An example of the two is the difference between a white-hot coal and a flint stone. The fire in the coal is hidden, but it exists in the coal. All you need to do is fan the coal and the flame will emerge. In a flint stone no physical fire exists. However by striking it with force, you can release its spark.

Because the fire in the coal has substance, it also is limited and finite: At some point the coal will burn out. By contrast the flint stone, no having a flame of substance, can be struck again and again and continuously release sparks.

[Another example for the “concealment of no substance” is perhaps nuclear energy that is released through intense force – fusion of fission – applied to the subatomic particles even in a strand of hair. The energy within is completely “undefined” with no substance; yet when released it is infinitely greater than any revealed source of energy. This example is obviously not mentioned in Samech Vov, which was written before the advent of nuclear energy].

The way to tap the unlimited reservoirs of intellectual energy within the “undefined unconscious” is through pressure and force (as one strikes the flint stone) – the intellectual exertion applied to comprehend the ideas. The deeper the questions and contradictions, all the more refined and clearer is the resulting comprehension. The more intense the challenge and force applied, the more profound are the ideas that come flowing out of the “hidden essence” (“helem ha’atzmi”).

An additional and even more powerful dimension to this is the fact that questions themselves are a form of “darkness.” They are compared to the impurities and particles that need to be cleansed or sieved from a product. A good mind can quickly grasp an idea, but it will retain “impurities” and “particles” if it does not go through the vigorous process of questions and counter questions. Through back-and-forth arguments and throwing the idea around from every angle, our questions get answered thereby cleansing the idea and arriving at a refined clarity. Like a wine crusher that separates the grapes from the stems, every additional time that the process is repeated more sediment is cleansed, and the resulting product is more refined. Or like the silver “refining pot” which smelts the metal in order to remove impurities.

All the above describes the refinement process in the study of Torah – the exertion and effort necessary to understand Torah, a reality that manifested with the second set of Tablets given after the sin of the Golden Calf. This refinement process is especially pronounced and in the Babylonian Talmud, whose conclusions are arrived at through questions, arguments and counter arguments.

Beyond the toil in the refinement process of Torah study is the actual refinement process of the universe itself, which requires an exertion that is far more intense than what is required in study alone. The resistance of the material world to spirituality requires a true battle be fought, to break through the impediments and release the Divine sparks embedded within all of existence.

But this battle is not an end in itself. The “sparks” within the material world are very powerful, originating from the depths of the “unconscious,” far higher than the “revealed” levels of the Divine. The hard work of redeeming these “sparks” energy and refining the material world generates the “ohr chozer” (reflective light) power that reaches deep into the “undefined unconscious” – the essential state of supra-conscious pleasure.

This is the inside story of Jacob and Esau. They are at war because they need each other; they are “twins.” For all its greatness, the soul (Jacob) can access the deepest levels above only through descending to the material universe and manifesting in a physical body (Esau), which contains the deepest “Divine sparks” and the greatest spiritual opportunities. Each of us needs to have a “warrior” dimension to protect and defend against the difficult forces of material existence, and above all – to fight the battle of the “birurim” and free the Divine energy locked within. But the body must have a soul within, and the soul must be the directing force in life.

“The greater one – the powerful body – will serve the younger [gentler] soul.”

Your body has to be a vehicle for your soul not the other way around.

Our challenge is to reconcile and integrate the two forces of Jacob and Esau – to achieve seamless harmony between body and soul.

And this is the significance of Isaac’s blessings, which came to empower the work of refining and elevating the sparks:

Recognizing the depth of Esau’s “sparks,” Isaac felt that blessing him would redeem his powerful energy. However, Esau was not ready to do the work alone. Rebecca, his mother, realized that Jacob would have to harness these blessings and be the one that refines these “sparks.”

How does the soul go about training and teaching the body to sublimate itself so that together they can both serve and fulfill their purpose on Earth? The only way to relieve the tension between them, without compromising either, is to spiritualize the material. But the body has its own agenda; it is not ready to ‘listen’ to the soul’s wisdom. It’s busy hunting, surviving in the best way it knows how. The solution is that the soul must satisfy and nourish the body on its (the body’s) terms and slowly direct and align it to a higher goal. The soul feeds the body with “stew” and gratifies the body’s immediate needs, with the intention to harness and channel the body’s powerful spirit (birthright) toward its Divine calling.

The soul must dress itself up in the “garments” of the material world in order to refine the world and channel the hidden blessings and strengths of the material world. Thus Jacob dresses in Esau’s garments to receive the blessings. The soul is not taking the blessings away from the body; it only protects them so that the body not destroy them, and the soul uses them to help train and refine the body until the time when the body can co-exist peacefully with the soul, as one seamless harmony:

“The voice is the voice of Jacob, but the hands are the hands of Esau.”

And thus, Isaac blesses Jacob:

“May G-d give you the dew of heaven and the fat of the earth, and an abundance of grain and wine. Nations shall serve you and governments bow down to you. You shall be a master over your brother.”

The Midrash explains that Isaac’s blessing refers to Torah (“the dew of heaven” is verse (the written Torah), “fat of the Earth” is Mishneh, “grain and wine” is Talmud and Agadah). Isaac’s blessing was intended to give power to toil in Torah study and refine the “sparks” concealed within, thereby enabling the refinement of Esau – and generating the undefined “supra-conscious,” which will be revealed in the end of days.

The unplugged application of this discussion can be stated as follows:

Each one of us struggles with one thing or another. The Rebbe Rashab teaches us that the struggle of life itself is the most sacred and powerful experience. It touches the essence of G-d Himself.

Usually we are told that “life is difficult,” but it’s still worth it for the benefits that life yields. Here Samech Vov tells us something much more: The difficulties themselves redeem and refine life, and generate the deepest possible experience.

A Chassid once came to the Tzemach Tzedek complaining: “What I should do, Rebbe. I have no desire to study Torah?” The Rebbe replied: “What should I do. I do have a desire to study…”

When you are concerned that you have no desire, when you struggle to understand a new concept, when you find it difficult to comprehend something you are studying, when you feel confused and full of questions – know that your sense of “darkness” is an opening to reach the “hidden essence.” The resistance you feel elicits your exertion and hard work to access your own inner essence, and the Essence of the Divine.

So next time you are faced with a challenge or find yourself under pressure, know that you carry in your hands the ability to realize the deepest recesses of your soul and reach the greatest heights.

Appreciate the power of human initiative, how your our exerted efforts, toil and labor in doing mitzvoth have the ability to transform the world and generate new energy.

May we all be blessed with only healthy forms of exertion and labor.