In the Image and Likeness of the Soul

Question: In Kabbalah and in the sources, it is clearly said: There is a city, there are gates, and there is a Temple. What are these concepts?

Answer: It is all arranged according to the system of the upper world in the image and likeness of our soul.

Remark: Once you said that if the walls do not surround the settlement, it is not a city.

My Comment: Yes. There are only a few such cities in Israel that were once surrounded by walls. These are Acre, Jerusalem, Safed, and Tiberias. Even today in Tiberias there still are remains of ancient walls.

Question: What do the walls of cities symbolize from the point of view of Kabbalah?

Answer: The wall that surrounds the city is like a Parsa. This is what separates the city from the external forces, that is, separate upper spiritual forces from the lower ones, the quality of bestowal from the quality of reception.

There is a space outside the city that is called “70 Amah” that still relates to the city.

The city gates symbolize a special entrance into the upper world where a person must correct himself in a certain way in order to be awarded the right to enter the city that is on the spiritual level. Therefore, to enter the city gates is not a simple action.

Question: Can we say that a wall is some kind of necessary condition?

Answer: A wall is a screen that separates the city from everything there is outside of it. That is, there is a quality of bestowal in the city and there is an egoistic, evil quality of reception outside the city, and therefore, the city restricts itself with the quality of bestowal.

After all, usually, there are bandits, meaning egoists wandering outside of the city. They cannot approach the wall because it pushes them away or they themselves are pushed away from it. The wall as if forces them to be bestowing, kind, and this is completely not in their nature.

Question: So, does it mean that using the language of roots and branches, Kabbalists took familiar concepts such as “city,” “wall,” and “gates,” felt their spiritual root, and used them for an explanation?

Answer: Yes, but besides that, they understood why we in our world arrange ourselves in such a way, why we build houses, huts, tents, marquees, and temples in a certain way. They felt it as a consequence of spiritual forces.

Question: Indeed, the great Kabbalists, in particular the Ari, wrote that there is a house, a yard, a field, and a desert. Was this about some specific desires that can be used for the sake of the Creator and the ones that cannot be used?

Answer: Yes, A person inside the house is the inner part of the soul, and the house itself, the yard, the field, and the desert already are the outer parts of his soul, which he must correct.
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From KabTV’s “Fundamentals of Kabbalah,” 1/28/19

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Spiritual Geography, Part 5
Spiritual Geography, Part 4

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