Weekly Torah Portion – 07.24.13
Posted on July 24th, 2013
The Book of Zohar, Weekly Torah Portion, Selected Excerpts
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The Book of Zohar, Weekly Torah Portion, Selected Excerpts
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The Torah, “Exodus,” “Mishpatim,“ 21:23 – 21:25: But if any harm follow, then thou shalt give life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.
People perceive everything that the Torah writes about, linearly and egoistically. The Torah speaks exclusively of unity among people and about establishing a general integral image that is called Adam (similar to the Creator).
Every single person, with no exception, participates in creating this image (Adam). Whether we want it or not, all of us are involved in crafting this giant. Our involvement should correspond to the instruction called the Torah (derived from Ora’ah, which translates as “the instruction”). It describes the ways of self-correction that happen when we make mistakes. As in any instruction, there is a chapter on possible errors and the ways of fixing them.
This explains why the above-mentioned misfortunes with eyes, hands, feet and other injuries are all about the liaisons among people that exist at the level of ten Sefirot. They must replenish any defects they caused since “misfortune” means an unintentional damage.
When in a downfall, if one intentionally, egoistically, and malevolently harms or inhibits a general integral system or damages a collective process of correction, then other laws come into force.
Question: What is meant by, “to give life for life, eye for eye?”
Answer: It is about the levels of correction—Nefesh, Ruach, Neshama—that we are obligated to replenish.
The world perceives the entire Torah at a corporeal level. Various beliefs, teachings, and dogmas have originated from the Torah. This has continued for thousands of years.
If we are talking about the earthly implication of the Torah, it is said that there are “no slaves, nor masters.” Everyone is absolutely equal before the law. It describes a society that has never existed yet. Corruption resolves any issues in this world. Pay enough money and do whatever you want.
If you read “The Laws of Kings” by Rambam, you’ll see that there were lots of restrictions that were imposed on kings as compared to a few limitations for commoners. In other words, according to the Torah, everyone is equal.
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The Torah “Exodus,” 22:1 – 22:2: If, while breaking in, the thief is discovered, and he is struck and dies, [it is as if] he has no blood. If the sun shone upon him, [it is as if] he has blood; he shall surely pay.
The thief is our ego. It constantly tries to dig inside the person and take from him. If it does this unconsciously, at night, meaning when all of this is not understood or clear to a person, then the person has the right to kill this thief, since in this way his correction is carried out.
But with “the shining sun,” you don’t need to kill the ego, you need to correct it. If you relate to it incorrectly then you fall from this level, meaning, you die. You are killed. Thus you have no right to kill your ego since you need to correct the thief, the egoistic act into an altruistic act, not just to kill.
There are two great periods of correction or two parts of each act:
Thus, if the person acts “at night,” when he still isn’t ready for the real correction, then he has no strength, but if he struggles with the ego, then he has the right to kill it, which means to simply neutralize it—I don’t have it. But if he operates in “the day” when the upper Light illuminates on him and gives him strength, then he needs to correct the ego and not to kill it. By this, he kills it. He doesn’t perform the same act that he could do, and by this he kills himself, which means that he falls to a lower level.
[112271]
From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 5/20/13
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The Torah, “Exodus” 22:5: If a fire goes forth and finds thorns, and a stack of grain or standing grain or the field be consumed, the one who ignited the fire shall surely pay.
There is a Light that heals and there is a Light or a fire that kills. It’s just like in our world.
A “fire” is the attribute of Din without the attribute of mercy that balances it. You balance all the forces when you hold and aim the “fire” in the right direction, until it is used correctly.
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The Torah, “Exodus,” 21:20 – 21:21: And should a man strike his manservant or his maidservant with a rod, and [that one] dies under his hand, he shall surely be avenged. But if he survives for a day or for two days, he shall not be avenged, because he is his property.
We understand what is said here in the framework of our world from an ethical, moral, democratic or any other possible point of view. In the spiritual work the desire is called a “slave” that is already under my domination and with which I can already work in order to bestow. But in that case we see that we are coping with a situation in which, for different reasons, the desire doesn’t really obey his master. Then the attribute of Din appears, which means that we have to use force.
If I use force, if I control it by using my intention, then it’s fine. But if I use the measure of Din excessively without the measure of mercy to balance the two, then I have to clarify what actually happens and whether it causes “death.” In that case it’s an improper behavior.
“Death” means that I cannot use this desire anymore. A “slave,” “man,” “woman,” “children,” and “friends,” are all desires that accompany my original desire. So a “slave” is a desire over which I have a Masach (screen).
If I manage to use this desire in order to perform a certain action and it is not annulled, it doesn’t disappear after the direct blow, but rather disappears after using it as a result of my correction, it means that it doesn’t disappear because I have killed it, thus it cannot be used anymore, but because I have already used it, it’s already dead and gone. But if it’s gone directly as a result of using the measure of Din, it means that I have not used it correctly.
In other words, if I use my desire by using force and then it disappears, it means that I kill it. This means that my actions are wrong because I have used too much force.
But if this desire is still fulfilled at least in one action and only then disappears as a result of my pressure, it’s a sign that it was the right thing to do. So we have to examine our internal work with our desires: what level they are on, and how we use them.
Eventually, all the desires have to rise in me again and I have to fully use them with the intention of in order to bestow. They don’t have to disappear, but rather to appear to their fullest and fully operate in me.
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When we examine the laws of the Torah, it is impossible to clarify their full spiritual essence at one time. We can touch a certain law a little but only from one angle out of many ways, revelations, and connections.
There lies a special great depth concealed in each law since they all belong to an integral system. So, it doesn’t matter which law we take as we draw the end of the string and begin to talk about it. Then we draw another end, and everything advances differently according to a totally different point of view.
Question: How is their integrality expressed?
Answer: It is impossible to express integrality since it is not reflected in our consciousness in a flat, linear form or in a language that we can picture in our mind at all. As Kozma Prutkov said, “It is impossible to surround infinity.”
There are no words for that. It is impossible to explain the term Ein Sof (Infinity) or wholeness, for example. How? Compared to what attributes? If you begin to take all this apart, it is merely differentiation and not integration. The moment you begin to cut different words and put them into sentences, you cannot put them into an integral afterward.
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The Torah, “Exodus,” 21:13: But one who did not stalk [him], but God brought [it] about into his hand, I will make a place for you to which he shall flee.
In the olden times described in the Torah, there were six settlements to which people who “accidentally” had injured others escaped.
Why would they run anywhere if their supreme court justified their actions by issuing legal notices (indulgences) that clearly stated, “I killed a human being unintentionally, and everyone knew about it?” Who would chase them if their actions were approved by the law accepted by their society?
What would their punishment be? They are penalized by deprivation of freedom and by living among those who tried to rectify themselves.
Why did the Creator regulate them so that through them is carried the punishment of others? Why does one unintentionally hurt one’s neighbor or inadvertently murder someone? Let’s say that I was driving my car and all of a sudden hit my neighbor’s lawn. Who inserted this program inside me?
We clearly understand that it is the Creator who does it to us. The rules of the Torah contain a special chapter that explains the Creator’s ways to use us, without our conscious participation, and to conduct His actions through us in order to impact a third party.
Is it possible to get clarification if everyone understands who the scriptwriter is? On the other hand, our attempts to elucidate these issues might help us realize the truth. How can we figure out that it is not us but the Creator who used us for His deeds? Can the upper judgment do it to us? At what level should the judge be in order to define that it was the Creator’s action?
Question: Really, who is in the position to consider our actions to be the Creator’s deeds?
Answer: Step by step, we’ll clear that up.
We should stop lying to ourselves. A person should examine oneself and figure out whether he has anything in common with others or not, and whether there are any spiritual relationships between one and one’s surroundings. If not, then why are they placed in the same system? If there are spiritual liaisons involved, one should think of ways to improve this contact.
Comment: So, it means that a person who committed an unintentional murder and who voluntarily exiled himself to the settlement should be at a very high cognitive level.
Answer: No one prosecutes him nor he is sentenced to live in a settlement where he must report to a police station every morning. There is nothing like that! He sees that the upper will direct him there, and he goes to that place in order to clear up the upper will. In a while, when the upper system to which he is connected completes its work, he is allowed to return.
[111757]
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The Torah, “Exodus,” 21:14: But if a man plots deliberately against his friend to slay him with cunning, [even] from My altar you shall take him to die.
If a person intentionally commits a murder, nothing can “buy him out.” One understands that one cannot remain on the spiritual path if one doesn’t eradicate the desire to kill. If one doesn’t cope with correcting the desire to kill by dealing with it, other than simply slaying it, then the entire system, all of one’s ten Sefirot, abandon one’s deed.
“… from My altar…” signifies that nothing is left in the Partzuf, that it is totally empty up to the level of Malchut. Thus, a person must begin working from the very beginning. No sacrifices of his are accepted at this point.
If one is unable to work with something or someone and thinks that they must be murdered, it means that one is not capable of correcting anything or anyone at all. It makes this person completely untrustworthy. There is no such desire, person, phenomenon, or action in this world that doesn’t need to be corrected or that is impossible to correct. Everything there is depends on correction, until it reaches the stage of the final correction.
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From KabTV’s “Secrets of the Eternal Book” 3/11/13
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Question: You said that when a person “spreads” over the five worlds; he “stretches” himself over them like a skin. This is a very emotional moment and you immediately feel that it isn’t just…
Answer: You should understand that if you join the Creator, then you look at who you were as if there were someone standing before you and you are at war with him. It turns out that only your point in the heart connects to the Creator and everything else is against you, against that point. Then there is only a war over detaching yourself from you. This is called “stretching towards the Creator,” towards this system.
Question: So it turns out that a descent is getting out of its sight through the point in the heart.
Answer: A fall is when your body still attracts you. An ascent, however, is when you come back and look at everything through the point in the heart, once again get closer to the Creator, and then retreat…
Thus, gradually by moving forward and stopping, you identify, connect, get closer to, and adhere more to the Creator. It takes years, but this is why we were given life.
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The Torah, “Shemot (Exodus),” “Parshat Mishpatim (Laws),” 21:16: He who kidnaps a man—whether he has sold him or is still holding him—shall be put to death.
On the spiritual level, “kidnapping someone” symbolizes that through your ego you kidnap the Adam (human) in yourself, subjugate him, and sell him to your next egoistic level. Likewise you still try to profit from this Adam in you, which is to say to include him within your ego in such a form that it will gain from the previous level of the Adam in you.
This is an activity in which we fail many times, calling it “bestowal in order to receive,” where the person is ready to act well in the right form, with a goal of benefiting egoistically. In this case there is nothing to do.
And this is called, “and he sells him,” in that you make him a servant and you profit from him. Therefore all the seeming “acts of kindness” on our physical level are realized only for the sake of personal benefit. Someone who is more ready than everyone to sell the Adam in himself, he is highest of all. We see a good example of this in politics, in which the main thing is to be emotionally detached; everything needs to be built on a clear decision.
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