R' Ashlag Ch. 61 (Parts 1 & 2)

Chapter Sixty-One:

Rabbi Yehudah Ashlag's "Introduction to the Zohar"

-- as translated and commented on by Rabbi Yaakov Feldman

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61.

1.

"That brings us to the question as to why the Zohar wasn’t revealed to the early generations, whose merits were undoubtedly greater than the later ones’ and who were more worthy (of such a revelation than they)? We’d also ask why a commentary to the Zohar wasn’t imparted before the time of the Ari (Rabbi Yitzchak Luria, who died in 1572) by one of the kabbalists who preceded him? And most of all, why weren’t explanations of the Ari’s works and of the Zohar unveiled from then to now? How did this generation ever merit such a thing?"
-- His point is that the Zohar should logically have been revealed to earlier generations, going all the way back to Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai’s own. For they would’ve delved into for their own and our benefit, yet it wasn’t. What’s also notable is the fact that the most lucid explanation of the Zohar we have, which is the Ari’s (as all his works serve to explain the Kabbalistic system laid out in the Zohar) has itself gone largely unexplained, until now thanks to Rabbi Ashlag himself. So, what is it that has allowed *us* to merit such a straightforward setting-out of the Kabbalistic system?
-- Rabbi Ashlag’s relatively lengthy response to follow will be based on a lot of the technical material we’d covered to now about the cosmic make-up things. In fact, all we’d learned to now about those things was only set out to bring us to the following.

2.

"The answer lies in the fact that the 6,000 year course of the universe functions as a single partzuf ... "
-- A partzuf is an integrated cosmic configuration (see 44:2). He’s contending that reality as we know it, or the entire second era (see ch’s 14-20, etc.), functions as a single partzuf.

" ... that’s comprised of three (main) elements: a beginning, middle, and end, (made up of the configurations known as) CHaBaD, CHaGAT, and NeHY. "
-- As we pointed out, there are ten sephirot in all: Keter, Chochma, Binah, Chessed, Gevurah, Tifferet, Netzach, Hod, Yesod, and Malchut (see 41:1). Sometimes, though, the quasi-sephira of *Da’at* replaces that of Keter, since Keter is so subtle, so G-dly that it’s said to be nullified by the Divine Presence itself. Thus Da’at serves to round-out the ten-sephira count. It sits below Binah. (There are other reasons why this configuration excludes Keter -- as well as Malchut, the last sephirah -- but that's beyond our concerns here.)
-- The first configuration, CHaBaD, is termed that because it’s comprised of *CH*ochma, *B*inah, and *D*a’at. It’s the topmost configuration of the partzuf because it contains these mind-elements.
-- The middle configuration, CHaGAT, is comprised of *CH*essed, *G*evurah, and *T*ifferet, and it’s said to be the middle configuration of the partzuf because it contains these heart-elements (much as the heart is in the middle of the body).
-- And the end configuration, NeHY, is comprised of *N*etzach, *H*od, and *Y*esod, and it’s the end because Netzach, Hod, and Yesod lie at the end of the partzuf (i.e., representing the legs and the organ of procreation).

(c) 2006 Rabbi Yaakov Feldman

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

********************************
AT LONG LAST! Rabbi Feldman's translation of "The Gates of Repentance" has been reissued at *at a discount*!
You can order it right now from here
Rabbi Yaakov Feldman has also translated and commented upon "The Path of the Just", and "The Duties of the Heart" (Jason Aronson Publishers). His new work on Maimonides' "The Eight Chapters" will soon be available.
Rabbi Feldman also offers two free e-mail classes on www.torah.org entitled
"Spiritual Excellence" and "Ramchal"

R' Ashlag Ch. 60

... has been completed and can be found at ...

Toras Rav Ashlag

Ma'amar HaGeulah (The Remembrance, Ch. 9)

Ma'amar HaGeulah

-- "The Great Redemption", a reworking of Ramchal's "Ma'amar HaGeulah"

Rabbi Yaakov Feldman's series on www.torah.org

__________________________________________________

"The Great Redemption"

The Remembrance: Ch. 9

Many people lament the fact that we don't live in "a more perfect world" where things are fairer, better, and more balanced. Well, we learn that that will have come to fruition by this next stage. For "everything that had been impaired and ... imperfect" in the course of the long exile "will come to be rectified" by this point in the redemption (see para. 46). And perfection will be on its way.

Ramchal adds, though, that not only will that be true of everyday things, but that "the Shechina itself will be even more emended and adorned than it had ever been" then. For "all of its legions will hang upon it with great honor and courage", and the "souls of the Jewish Nation will do the same" (ibid.). What that means to say is that everything associated with G-d's Presence in the world will be set aloft by then and emboldened with the flush of that Presence, ourselves included.

Whole legions of angels "will return to their posts then" in the heavens, we're told, "and stand upon their hills" in full Celestial formation, and will "take hold of their roots", and "the souls of the Jewish Nation will do the same" (ibid.). That's to say that by that point both they and we will all draw closer and closer to the Divine Presence from which we all emanated.

Ramchal then makes a very curious, seemingly tangential remark. He says that "there are many ways to emanate and to do ... things", that "nothing is exactly like anything else, and nothing is in vain". That's to say that there's nothing that doesn't draw its existence (i.e., "emanate") from G-d and play out its own vital G-d-given role in the universe. And that everything matters and is very dear in the grand scheme of things. But, where does that admittedly pithy and inspiring notion fit in with the details being offered here of the redemption?

He's apparently offering it because he follows it with the statement that the sephirot Binah, Tipheret, and Malchut "will be united and joined together" (ibid.) by that point (in keeping with the whole idea of things joining together by then and aligning with the heavens). Apparently his point is that the union won't deny the role each individual sephira played in its own right -- it's only that the time will have come when an amalgamation of individuals will prove to be stronger than the sum of its parts, despite the importance of each one.

(c) 2006 Rabbi Yaakov Feldman and Torah.org

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

********************************
AT LONG LAST! Rabbi Feldman's translation of "The Gates of Repentance" has been reissued at *at a discount*!
You can order it right now from here
Rabbi Yaakov Feldman has also translated and commented upon "The Path of the Just", and "The Duties of the Heart" (Jason Aronson Publishers). His new work on Maimonides' "The Eight Chapters" will soon be available.
Rabbi Feldman also offers two free e-mail classes on www.torah.org entitled
"Spiritual Excellence" and "Ramchal"

R' Ashlag Ch. 60 (part 1)

Chapter Sixty:

Rabbi Yehudah Ashlag's "Introduction to the Zohar"

-- as translated and commented on by Rabbi Yaakov Feldman

__________________________________________________

60.


1.

"All I can say from my own experience is that from the day that G-d’s Holy Light accorded me the merit to begin mulling over this holy book it hadn’t ever occurred to me to question its origin. And that’s for one simple reason: because its contents have always evoked the rare qualities of the Tanna Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai to my mind far more so than that of any other Tanna."
-- Though it’s not often spoken of, there’s a distinct level of tonality -- of subtle hues, cadences, and lyricism -- in Torah literature that’s unique to each author and every Torah work. Torah doesn’t sing when it’s read as prose and exposition, but it most certainly does when it’s read as mystery solved and as truth laid out whole and in full, fertile measure.
-- An excellent reader, Rabbi Ashlag affirms that he’d never adduced anyone else’s tones in the Zohar other than Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai’s. For he never found the sort of off-rhyme there or fault in meter that one might expect every once in a while in a lesser kabbalists work.

(c) 2006 Rabbi Yaakov Feldman

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

********************************
AT LONG LAST! Rabbi Feldman's translation of "The Gates of Repentance" has been reissued at *at a discount*!
You can order it right now from here
Rabbi Yaakov Feldman has also translated and commented upon "The Path of the Just", and "The Duties of the Heart" (Jason Aronson Publishers). His new work on Maimonides' "The Eight Chapters" will soon be available.
Rabbi Feldman also offers two free e-mail classes on www.torah.org entitled
"Spiritual Excellence" and "Ramchal"

R' Ashlag Ch. 59

... has been completed and can be found at ...

Toras Rav Ashlag

This shop is closed for vacation (again)

I'll be back in two weeks, please G-d.

"Eight Chapters" (Chapter Four, Part 13)

“Spiritual Excellence” with Rabbi Yaakov Feldman

Our Current Text: Moshe Maimonides's (Rambam's) “Eight Chapters”

-- Rabbi Feldman's on going series for Torah.org

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"Eight Chapters"

Chapter Four (Part 13)

Moses was the greatest of all prophets. For example we're taught that, "while the other prophets" -- who were themselves quite astounding -- "received their prophecies in a dream or vision," Moses, on the other hand, "received his while wide awake" (Yesodei HaTorah 7:6), and he spoke to G-d face-to-face "like one speaks to his friend" (Exodus 33:11). We'll revisit Moses' prophetic aptitudes later on, but for now let's discuss his humanity.

We're almost hesitant to apply the term in his case, since he was also termed a "man of G-d" (Deuteronomy 33:1) because he was so holy and so toweringly great. But he was indeed mortal and human.

In any event, at one point G-d was quite angry at Moses and said to him, "Because you did not believe in Me enough to sanctify Me in the eyes of the people of Israel, you will not bring this congregation into the land that I have given them“ (Numbers 20:12), as “you rebelled against My word at the waters of Meribah“ (Numbers 20:24) and “you did not sanctify Me in the midst of the people of Israel“ (Deuteronomy 32:51). But what exactly did he do wrong?

We learn that there had come a point in the desert, on our way from Egypt to Israel in Meribah, when there wasn't any water to drink and the people were desperate. They started to get wistful about Egypt and demanded that Moses (and Aaron, too) ask G-d for help. G-d indeed appeared to Moses and told him to speak to a huge rock sitting in the midst of the people and "order" it to gush forth with water. But rather than speak to it, Moses said indignantly to the people, "Hear now, you rebels! Must we fetch you water out of this rock?" and he struck the rock in anger -- twice. Water did indeed gush out and everyone had enough to drink (see Numbers 20:1-11).

So, what was his sin? As Rambam put it, Moses "inclined toward an extreme ... by expressing anger". But, has any of us not gotten angry? So why should Moses have been punished so seriously for what, at bottom, was just an instance of being immoderate? Rambam explains that "when someone of his caliber does something like that, he profanes G-d’s name", which is indeed a serious sin. After all, "the people studied every move he made and everything he said", so he should have been a better role model.

Rambam goes on from there to address another aspect of the nature of the harm done, but his main point is that Moses most especially should have striven for equibalance, since it's so fundamentally important for our Divine service, and he didn't.

He then ends this chapter by reiterating the point that we're to all be introspective and to try to be equibalanced, since "one who judges his actions all the time and strives for balance will be a person of the very highest caliber. And he’ll accordingly draw close to G-d, and have satisfied His wishes, which is *the* most perfect form of Divine service."

(c) 2006 Rabbi Yaakov Feldman and Torah.org

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

********************************
AT LONG LAST! Rabbi Feldman's translation of "The Gates of Repentance" has been reissued at *at a discount*!
You can order it right now from here
Rabbi Yaakov Feldman has also translated and commented upon "The Path of the Just", and "The Duties of the Heart" (Jason Aronson Publishers). His new work on Maimonides' "The Eight Chapters" will soon be available.
Rabbi Feldman also offers two free e-mail classes on www.torah.org entitled
"Spiritual Excellence" and "Ramchal"

R' Ashlag Ch. 58

... has been completed and can be found at ...

Toras Rav Ashlag

Ma'amar HaGeulah (The Remembrance, Ch. 8)

Ma'amar HaGeulah

-- "The Great Redemption", a reworking of Ramchal's "Ma'amar HaGeulah"

Rabbi Yaakov Feldman's series on www.torah.org

__________________________________________________

"The Great Redemption"

The Remembrance: Ch. 8

The very make-up of outer-space will change with the redemption, we're taught here, as well as our reckoning of time. For whole "conglomerates of Luminaries will gather ... each and every evening in order to emanate below", and the sun and moon will combine to form a single Luminary, which will itself be replaced by another one after a time, and so on. And rather than reckon time by the setting and rising of the sun and moon as we do now, we'll reckon it then by the rising and setting of those new Luminaries (see para. 43).

But since we'd already learned in the last chapter that time will implode upon itself, the above changes will apparently be instantaneous. In fact, we might even be justified in saying that those replacements will be *so* instantaneous at a certain point that they couldn't even be said to be changes so much as simultaneous events. But that's mere conjecture.

Proof for it might be found, though, in Ramchal's statement that "people will always sleep" then (see para. 43) despite the rapid change of Luminaries (which seems to be such an inconsequential statement). His point might be that despite the amazing events going on, we'd still be able to take it all in stride and fall asleep because it would all be going on simultaneously, and thus be less jarring to our senses.

Two other features of this stage stand out. We learn that utter goodness will prevail then without impediment (unlike in our day and age, when goodness is thwarted all the time), and that many non-Jews will join the Jewish Nation at that point. The latter will come about as a consequence of their root national Guardian Angels being undone. (Every nation derives its sustenance and existence from a Guardian Angel that's unique to it; ours is G-d Himself, if you will).

After all, Ramchal reasons, once "their source up above is destroyed" -- which is to say, once their roots are undone -- "no branches (will) remain below", i.e., the other nations will be undone, and many of them will convert as a result right then and there (see para. 44), much the way that leaves would have to be transplanted when their trees are uprooted, otherwise they'd wither away.

But despite the fact that they'd have attached themselves onto the Jewish Nation that way, there'd still be a fundamental distinction between the Jewish Nations and those others (see para. 45) -- until the World to Come, when they too would have been utterly assimilated into the national root and soul of the Jewish Nation (see Tikkunim Chadashim #20).

(c) 2006 Rabbi Yaakov Feldman and Torah.org

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

********************************
AT LONG LAST! Rabbi Feldman's translation of "The Gates of Repentance" has been reissued at *at a discount*!
You can order it right now from here
Rabbi Yaakov Feldman has also translated and commented upon "The Path of the Just", and "The Duties of the Heart" (Jason Aronson Publishers). His new work on Maimonides' "The Eight Chapters" will soon be available.
Rabbi Feldman also offers two free e-mail classes on www.torah.org entitled
"Spiritual Excellence" and "Ramchal"

R' Ashlag Ch. 58 (Part 1)

Chapter Fifty-Eight:

Rabbi Yehudah Ashlag's "Introduction to the Zohar"

-- as translated and commented on by Rabbi Yaakov Feldman

__________________________________________________

58.

1.

"But I know the reason (why observant people don’t delve into the esoteric side of the Torah). It’s mainly because faith has largely abated (in our day and age) over-all, especially when it comes to faith in our holy ones and sages in each generation."
-- Not having access ourselves to the holy and wise, we doubt their very existence. While we might concede to there being exceptional people who are somehow comfortable with eternity, at ease with piety, and linked to G-d, and others who are profuse in genius and able to grasp dreadfully large amounts of information, we nonetheless know the difference between them and the holy and wise. For while the former are mystical and brilliant, the latter are impelled by forces much further away and far more inward. And we don’t see them around us.
-- But the holy and wise do exist; they do. But being ... holy and wise ... , they eschew much of what we surround ourselves with and cherish, so we never get the chance to meet them. That’s to say that they’re still where they’ve always been, but we’re not. Consequently our collective paths no longer cross, and we assume that they don’t exist. As a consequence, we’ve lost faith in G-d, too; since it’s the holy and wise who best suggest Him to us.
-- The observant have their faith and they sometimes even catch sight of the holy and wise (since they and the observant visit some of the same places now and then), still and all the observant don’t delve into the esoteric side of the Torah for the following reason.

"(They don’t delve into it) also because the books of Kabbalah and the Zohar are full of bodily depictions, so people are afraid of making the mistake of lapsing into anthropomorphisms and of thus losing more than they’d gain."
-- Such books often focus not only on bodily depictions, but on Divine dimensionality as well, if you will; and on things far, far too human for angels, souls, and aspects of G-d Almighty’s own Being to be concerned with when taken literally.
-- So the thinking is that it’s much more dangerous to possibly lapse into heretical thoughts reading such things than it would be beneficial to be inspired by them, since there are other much more discreet and quite valuable works to draw upon for inspiration that don’t present such a threat.
-- (We cited another reason, though, in 57:2 -- what we termed the clash between emphasizing boundaries and denying them. For while, as we indicated, halacha postulates and sets boundaries, Kabbalah eschews it; so observant people don’t engage in Kabbalah as a rule. But rather than conflict, Rabbi Ashlag’s explanation and my own are one and the same. For the problem with bodily depictions and the like is that they seem to affix physical and mortal boundaries to the Divine, which are anathema to observant sensibilities since they’re far beyond the halachic horizon.)

(c) 2006 Rabbi Yaakov Feldman

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

********************************
AT LONG LAST! Rabbi Feldman's translation of "The Gates of Repentance" has been reissued at *at a discount*!
You can order it right now from here
Rabbi Yaakov Feldman has also translated and commented upon "The Path of the Just", and "The Duties of the Heart" (Jason Aronson Publishers). His new work on Maimonides' "The Eight Chapters" will soon be available.
Rabbi Feldman also offers two free e-mail classes on www.torah.org entitled
"Spiritual Excellence" and "Ramchal"

Tanya -- Ch. 4

... has been completed and can be found at ...

Sefer Tanya