“'It Works for Me” p: 63

AyinBase with R' Paltiel Sunday 26 Shvat 5772 

Page 63 – 5 lines from the top (line starts, 'yoter...')

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Souls have a superiority over angels. This is because souls result from physical unions, but angels result from spiritual revelations. Souls have an essential quality, and can handle any revelation.

This being the case, why are the souls, longing for 'His kisses', when they have essence, which is greater than kisses?!

Kisses are in essence of a higher level than the physical. Kisses are from avah (mother and father – chochmah and binah). So the kisses, though the are chitzonius/external, they do have an advantage.

Midot have their own sense of reality. In serving Hashem, the focus is on love and awe of Him. The emotional element is validation. But the emotions/midos have the limit of the fact that they are subjective, the element of , 'it works for me'.

Sechel knows the topic in its own place. The basis of sechel/mind is the knowledge that there is a Primary Being who is the foundation. As opposed to 'my personal feeling'.

So avah (chochmah and bina) is higher than emotions. But here the midot are more pnimi/internal, because they have an authentic reality.

Gufni/body is the meaning that 'this is my truth'.

Sechel/mind is a recognition of a truth that is not related to me.

2 people recognize the truth of something and they want to be involved in it together – and they experience the topic and not each other. If they experience each other in midot then there is an actual experience of each other. Zivug elyon – higher union – is based on truth, in contrast to zivug tachnot, which is based on the experience of each other. Kisses are an expression of affection and even though it is only an expression it has great significance, because the time when the expression is sufficient is when there is a recognition of the reality of the connection.

We are dealing with 2 elements. Essence and the revelation of the essence – light. Essence per se – does not extend outward. Anything that can be disseminated is not essence – it is a ha-arah (reflection). In the ha-arah (reflection) level itself there are 2 levels. A ha-arah atzmis – a reflection of what essence is.

How can there be a reflection of essence. Take the mashal/metaphor of the sun. we get rays of light, not the essence of light here on earth. The sun stays in its place. So the ha-arah atzmis is a reflection of essence – you take something of yours and give it away. It reflects you, but it is not you.