R' Ashlag Ch. 12

Rabbi Yehudah Ashlag's "Introduction to the Zohar"

-- as translated and commented on by Rabbi Yaakov Feldman

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Ch. 12

-- This chapter is a sort of quick review of much we've learned so far. All I've done has been to expand upon some of R' Ashlag's allusions in a few parenthetical remarks.

"We have thus clearly explained how the ratzon l’kabel -- which had been implanted in our souls in order to fulfill (G-d's) intentions for creation (after all) -- is to be rectified. For (as we said,) G-d purposefully prepared the aforementioned two parallel but opposite systems (i.e., holy-A.B.Y.A. and defiled-A.B.Y.A.) which all souls pass through and then become separated into two capacities, body and spirit, which become enmeshed with each other."

"But they're able to eventually transform the trait of a ratzon l’kabel into a ratzon l’kabel al m’nat l’hashpia by adhering to Torah and mitzvot, and they then become ready to accept all the good (prepared for them, as laid out) in (G-d's original) intentions for creation."

"And they also merit experiencing a strong attachment onto G-d as a consequence of their having attained an affinity with Him, which is full and absolute rectification, by adhering to Torah and mitzvot."

"(Another series of monumental events would then occur.) The impure Other Side would be eliminated from the world, since there’d no longer be a need for it, and death would be annihilated (see Isaiah 25: 8). All the Torah and mitzvah-based tasks given to the world for the duration of the six thousand years (of the universe as we know it) as well as to every individual in the course of his seventy years of life would (prove to only have existed in order to) bring them to the ultimate rectification that is the affinity of tsurot we spoke about."

"(An additional consequence of what we’ve indicated to now is that) the issue of how the husks and impurity could come about from G-d's own Holiness has been solved, (for as we’d explained) it had to exist in order to allow for bodies that would eventually be rectified by (adherence to) Torah and mitzvot."

"For if our bodies with their defiled ratzon l’kabel would not have passed through the impure system, we would never have been able to rectify ourselves, since one cannot correct something not (already) within him."

(c) 2004 Rabbi Yaakov Feldman

(Feel free to contact me at feldman@torah.org )

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