R' Ashlag Ch. 43 (Parts 1 & 2)

Chapter Forty-Three:

Rabbi Yehudah Ashlag's "Introduction to the Zohar"

-- as translated and commented on by Rabbi Yaakov Feldman

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43.

1.

"We each receive a holy soul as soon as we’re born. But it’s not a soul per se that we receive so much as the hindmost part of one, which is the soul’s last rung and it's termed a 'point' because it’s (so relatively) small."
-- While holy, the soul we’re each born with isn’t a whole and utterly pure one so much as the augur of one in the form of its posterior, faintest, tiny sheen.

"And it’s engarbed in our heart, which is to say, in our ratzon l’kabel, which (in fact) manifests itself in our heart for the most part."
-- We’d been told earlier on about this hindmost part of our soul that’s termed our “point in the heart” and is engarbed in our ratzon l’kabel. And we learned that it’s only operative from age 13 onward, when we’re liable for mitzvah observance (see 30:1 and our remarks there). So we now start to see the connection between the elements enunciated to the mitzvah-system.

2.

"Now, note this principle: Everything found in existence in general can also be found in each and every world, as well as in each and every one of each world’s tiniest fragments."
-- Like a colossal clan-family and regardless of whether its members are in close proximity or not, everything is in everything else by degrees; a small or large part of this is found in that, and some of that is in this. As such, each world contains facets and parts of each other one, and each facet and part contains the lot of them to degrees.

"As such, just as there are five worlds over all which are the five aforementioned (cluster) sephirot Keter, Chochma, Binah, Tifferet, and Malchut there are likewise five (cluster) sephirot of Keter, Chochma, Binah, Tifferet, and Malchut *in each and every world*, as well as five (cluster) sephirot in the smallest fragment of each world (ad infinitum)."

(c) 2005 Rabbi Yaakov Feldman

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

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