Baal HaSulam, “The Freedom”: Moreover, even determining the type of pleasure and benefit are entirely out of one’s own free choice, but follows the will of others, as they want, and not he. For example: I sit, I dress, I speak, and I eat. I do all these not because I want to sit that way, or talk that way, or dress that way, or eat that way, but because others want me to sit, dress, talk, and eat that way. It all follows the desire and fancy of society, and not my own free will.

Society absolutely determines our free will. If you go to China, for example, and live there for 20 to 30 years, you will begin to gradually share their tastes and see things and think like them.

What is more, I do all this according to the majority.  Of course the majority has an impact on us and not unique individuals.

It is more comfortable for me to behave simply and freely, but I am enslaved in every movement I make and tied down by iron chains to the tastes and manners of others who make up the society. So where is my free will?

There is no freedom in the frameworks we speak of.

Because I am operated on, however, unknowingly and having no choice, there is no room for reward and punishment.

What can there be reward or punishment for if we are constantly forced to behave the way we do? If the Creator has created me the way I am, I cannot do anything about it. No matter how hard I try, even if I try to change myself tens of times and turn upside down, everything is still His doing and His nature.

So initially (even before I am born) and when I have completed everything, everything is His actions inside me, and I have absolutely no free will.
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From KabTV’s “Fundamentals of Kabbalah” 5/12/19

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