Parashas Ki Seitzei, Issue #2112 - By Rabbi Pinchas Winston
HAD MOSHE RABBEINU not broken the first tablets, there’d be no talk of war. The second set of tablets that he came down with eighty days later was not merely Kabbalas HaTorah, TAKE 2. It was Kabbalah HaTorah, LEVEL 2. It was the difference between Yaish and Ayin, “something” and “nothing,” because the first set of tablets was the level of Toras Atzilus and Ayin, and the second set was the level of Toras Beriyah and Yaish.
For those not familiar, there are five levels of spiritual reality between the lowest and the Ohr Ain Sof. The truth is, Ohr Ain Sof is everywhere and on all levels or the level can’t exist. But as the light becomes more distant from its Source above, it becomes encased by increasing more layers of less spiritual light and that tend to hide it. The fact that man is so atheistic today does not show how clever he has become, but how far away from the Source he is, proving that redemption is not far away.
The five levels of spiritual reality are, from top to bottom, Adam Kadmon, Atzilus, Beriyah, Yetzirah, and Asiyah. Obviously, the names tell us something important about each level, but that is a different discussion. The main point here is that the top two levels of Adam Kadmon and Atzilus are completely spiritual and called “Ayin” (nothing) compared to the physical called “Yaish” (something) from Beriyah down. Therefore, when we speak about Creation “Yaish m’Ayin—Something from Nothing,” we are talking about the light as it went from Atzilus to Yaish, a miracle of light and life.
This was the basis of the difference between the two sets of luchos, the first set being instructions on how to live life without a yetzer hara, and the second on how to live life with one. Night and day. Utopia versus a war-filled history that just won’t go away. So many people continue to answer the battle cry of the yetzer hara whose Chief-of-Staff is the Sitra Achra.
We won’t see Toras Atzilus again until the Messianic Era when the yetzer hara will be no more and mankind has been cleansed of all remnants of it. In the meantime, we have to address issues like the Yafas Toar because there are soldiers who lack the self-control to avoid them. By soldiers, we mean anyone who is a part of God’s army, either on the physical battlefield or the spiritual one. And by Yafas Toar, we mean anything that principally is illicit to a Torah Jew but for which we look for ways to kasher it anyhow.
But though you can fool yourself much of the time, other people some of the time, we can’t fool God any of the time…though some certainly do try. There will be a day of reckoning, besides the final one to decide how much Gihenom a person needs. It will happen on this side of Year 6000, on this side of the Messianic Era. It is called the War of Gog and Magog.
Nothing like an existential war to bring out a people’s true colors. Talking is easy while the walking is easy, and it has been very easy to walk as a Jew for the last fifty years or so. With the exception of a few countries in the world, most Jews have not had to run from their Judaism to stay safe. They’ve only run away from it to better fit in with the gentile world for one reason or another, none of which have included anti-Semitism.
Consequently, we have drifted as a people. Assimilation has increased disastrously, intermarriage has been a big part of that, while others have just let mitzvos go the way of ancient traditions and disappear. The more we strayed from Torah, the stranger our opinions about life and the world have become. The Erev Rav has increased its presence and put a stranglehold on Jewish communities around the world. They’ve joined up with our enemies and added pressure from the inside.
No surprises here. It was predicted long ago and scripted even further back. It’s all part of the geulah process that most people have not taken the time to understand because, hey, they didn’t feel they needed to. They didn’t see anything “broken,” so they didn’t try to fix anything. If anything, things looked like they were fixing themselves, what with the “teshuvah movement” and development of the Jewish State.
Surprise! We were only partially right. All of that is definitely part of the tikun process and instrumental to redemption. But we also should have asked, “What’s the catch?” There has always been some catch, ever since God sent Moshe Rabbeinu down to Egypt to free the Jewish People from Egyptian slavery. He didn’t see it coming, the Jewish People in Mordechai’s and Esther’s time didn’t see it coming, and we still don’t see it coming, as well as we should.
To help myself with that, I began a project called “Bridging the Gap,” a work in progress that provides the kabbalistic backdrop to current history. I did it to help myself have a better and more profound approach to what’s happening and where it is going. I’m happy to share what I already have with others, as long as you don’t mind receiving it as a PDF file. It only costs $5.00 and two boxtops…Just kidding. It’s free and on its way to you if you write me for it: [email protected].
This week’s parsha begins with the words, “When you go out to war…” We already have, and we need to know how to prepare for what’s coming up next. We don’t have a very good history of doing that in the past.
Thirtysix.org
Rabbi Pinchas Winston
Shabbat Shalom
