Achieving unity with the Creator is only possible by emerging from exile. Exile is the feeling of being disconnected from the Creator, a lack of unity.
But how can I know what unity is in order to feel that I am not in it now, to yearn for it, to cry, and to desire nothing else but to leave this state?
After all, my current state does not seem so bad to me. I do feel a certain lack of fulfillment in life, but I cannot say that I suffer greatly because of it. This is not what we call exile.
Exile is the state opposite to unity; it is when I suffer only from its absence and feel this lack as unbearable pain, piercing me to my very core. But how can I reach such an acute need?
This is the same question Abraham asked: “How can I be sure that my descendants will inherit the land of Israel?” The word “land” (Eretz) means desire (Ratzon). So, how can I attain such a desire that will be entirely directed toward bestowal?
After all, all my desires are aimed at egoistic reception, and there is only one small point in my heart called “Abraham,” which is the beginning of a corrected desire from which a new approach is born, a question. And the Creator answers him: “Do not worry, I will send you into exile.”
And then Abraham is at peace, because he understands that no matter what happens, he will inevitably come to such suffering from the lack of unity with the Creator that from it he will inevitably reach unity. That is, a person realizes that he has no choice; he must find the desire, the need, for unity with the upper force.
For this, he has to fall under a foreign rule, one that is opposite to the Creator. This power will gradually reveal itself to him, step by step, as something completely unbearable. At first, it will even seem good to him, not burdensome at all, like a light cobweb.
He will enter Egypt and begin working for his egoism because a famine has begun in the land of Israel (in his desires for the Creator). Joseph descends into Egypt, and then the entire house of Jacob follows—meaning the whole person, with all his desires and intentions, both good and bad, sinks into his egoism and feels comfortable in it!
This is no longer just a minor ego but the complete opposite of unity with the Creator, of spirituality, of bestowal and love.
It all begins with the hatred that flared up among the brothers and the selling of Joseph into slavery. Thus, all of a person’s desires begin to develop within his egoism, and he does not yet feel that this is bad. He is doing well—these are the seven years of abundance.
Even if I feel that I am somehow opposite to the Creator and find myself in the egoistic Egypt, I do not feel bad there at all.
And so, we naturally develop until we begin to build the cities of Pithom and Raamses. For Pharaoh, for our egoism, these cities symbolize a good life. But for our point in the heart that starts to awaken, this life becomes bitter.
I feel that these are miserable and wretched cities. I have nothing in them, only emptiness. Even if I derive some pleasure from this life, I later bitterly regret it.
Thus, I come to cry out over my meaningless existence.
I see that I am trapped in a mindset where I try to measure everything with my intellect and egoistic feeling, that is, with the impure force (Klipa), consisting of knowledge (in the mind) and reception (in the body).
I feel how it is destroying me and constantly demanding confirmation from reason that I am winning, succeeding, not failing, progressing, and that I am always gaining something! Such is the demand of my egoism.
But on the other hand, I begin to realize that this egoistic approach is simply burying me in Egypt, and I do not want to remain there. This was not the purpose of my life.
And then I begin to search for a way to break free from the rule of this Pharaoh—knowledge and reception. I seek new concepts that are above this.
Gradually, I discover that there is a quality called Israel (Yashar-Kel, straight to the Creator), which is higher than knowledge and sensation in my desire for pleasure, higher than beneficial fulfillment and egoistic reasoning.
Above this there is another state, whose “head” is called faith and whose “body” is bestowal.
This is the soul, which differs from the egoistic body based on knowledge and reception.
Thus, as a result of my work, and precisely thanks to the Pharaoh who is being revealed to me, I begin to value and elevate the desires for bestowal above the desires for reception and to prefer faith over reason.
And as soon as I begin to work in this way, an even stronger rule of Pharaoh is revealed within me.
Previously, I did not know that he was such a cruel ruler from whom I needed to flee. Moses (within me) flees from Pharaoh to the land of Midian and must hide there for 40 years, meaning that in a person, the power of bestowal grows against Pharaoh.
It is still small, unable to overcome him, but the person already understands that he must somehow fight the egoism that brings him harm.
Here he realizes that he needs the help of the Creator, and the Egyptian plagues begin.
He feels how the blows strike the Pharaoh, and through them, his Moses becomes separated from him, preparing to lead the entire nation, all the desires.
Thus, the Creator’s promise is fulfilled: that the descendants of Abraham will be exiled in a foreign land, oppressed for 400 years and will emerge from there with great wealth.
This is the very desire that has grown in Egypt thanks to Pharaoh through all this struggle.
We do not take Pharaoh himself out of Egypt, but we take from him those desires for which we have fought, and we bring them out by faith above reason.
It is in these desires that we have felt exile (Galut)—and in them, we wish to experience redemption (Geula), the revelation of the Creator.
All our work in Egypt is to discern the difference between the magnificent cities built for Pharaoh and their misery for our desire to break free from him—to distinguish Pharaoh as the “help against you,” and the helper with whom you go to Pharaoh—that is, the Creator.
You see how they stand opposite each other while the person stands in between and asks the Creator to resolve each state.
[40355]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 4/11/11, Writings of Baal HaSulam “And They Built Arei Miskenot”
Related Material:
Cut Pharaoh Off
Salvation Will Come In A Blink Of The Eye
Exile—Separation from the Creator
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