Question: Why is it that all Kabbalists who were attained high spiritual degrees suffered from severe illnesses at the end of their lives?

Answer: Because they suffer for the sake of society and not for themselves.

After all, in our world, we are used to viewing a person as a solitary, separate individual, and therefore we pass such judgments on them: this one is bad, that one is good, this one is such‑and‑such, that one is so‑and‑so, and so on. We fail to take into account the system surrounding the individual that undergoes transformations alongside them that he exists within.

With ordinary people, this perspective is understandable. But a Kabbalist goes through everything not for his own sake. He operates outside of himself, within the surrounding society, and he exists “inside” it. Therefore, the calculation he carries out is a calculation of how to advance society forward.

All his sufferings are also for the sake of society. That is to say, his illnesses and his problems, all of this, does not stem from his own personal nature, but because he gathers all the desires of society within himself; He acts like Bina who gathers all the aspirations from below, from Malchut through Zeir Anpin, and begins to correct and give birth all this. Like a mother who suffers when her children are ill even more than they do and bears the burden of all of them collectively.

Therefore, we cannot interpret a Kabbalist’s sufferings as an indication of his personal problems. These are not his problems at all. Look at what happened with Rabbi Akiva and Rabbi Shimon, and at how young the ARI was when he died! However, in our time, everything is changing; we are advancing forward en masse; so everything can change.

But in past centuries, Kabbalists took a great deal of suffering upon themselves. These were sufferings not for faith, not for God, but for humanity. A Kabbalist absorbs into himself the illnesses of all the other people and corrects them within himself, and therefore, for the time being, they go through him. This must be understood. There is nothing religious here!
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From KabTV’s “I Got A Call. The Sufferings of the Kabbalists.” 10/8/10

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