Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 71

What Is the Purpose of Creation: Is it “to Adhere to Him” or “to Benefit His Created Beings”?

“To benefit His created beings” is a state, while “to adhere to Him” is an action. Through “adhering to Him,” we receive the thought of creation, which is to benefit His created beings. If we progress correctly toward the goal, we follow the middle line, which is neither right nor left but a union of both. From the left, we receive desires; from the right, we correct them with the intention to bestow, and from both, we ascend in the middle line.

In Baal HaSulam’s “Letter 17,” he describes how to perform this action: “Let me explain to you the meaning of the middle pillar, which is the meaning of ‘The Torah, the Creator, and Israel are one.’”

• “Torah” – the light, the laws, and the rules of spiritual progress.
• “The Creator” – the goal.
• “Israel” – the person, the soul yearning to return to the degree of adhesion with the Creator.
• “One” – States 1 and 3 are one, and a person must, through their own efforts, ascend to this state.

“The purpose of the soul when it comes in the body.” Why in this world are we composed of body and soul? So that the soul will “be rewarded, while clothed in the body,” during our lifetime here in this world (Kabbalah never speaks of the afterlife, only of what we should attain during our lives here in this world), “will return to its root, with adhesion with Him.” In this lifetime, we need to climb all the rungs of the spiritual ladder, starting from the degree called “this world,” which is the degree opposite to goodness and the goal, and reach the end of correction. Whoever does not complete the path in one lifetime will do so in several lifetimes.

Throughout the generations, the same souls reincarnate and return to this world until, at the end of the process, they reach State 3, “as it is written, ‘To love the Lord your God, to walk in all His ways, to keep His commandments, and to adhere to Him.’” The ultimate goal is “to adhere to Him,” as it was before the soul was clothed in a body.

Related Material:
Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 70
Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 69
Talks about the Steps of the Ladder, Part 68

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