“Light & Water” p:48

AyinBase / Ayin Beis with R' Paltiel

ThursdayNight 

1 Shevat 5774

Page 48

At below half from the top of the page – (line begins: "behalevushim...”) For text, click: Here.

This morning we began talking about 'light'/ohr.

Chassidus, continually refers to light.

Light and water have a certain similarity. Water settles into a vessel and so does light!

The water settles in while ignoring the vessel. It takes the shape of the vessel and ignores it. It does not reveal anything of the vessel.

Light also settles into a vessel, but it reveals something of the vessel. And it lets you understand the vessel better as a result of its presence.

This world (and the tree of knowledge) is about the tangibility of the physical world. And does not indicate any vitality (chayut).

Vitality does not exist except in the presence of the Source of life. He provides vitality on the physical level, although it is incongruous... think how air provides life and pushes into us... and you feel the vitality of the air that embraces you... 'a breath of fresh air...'

So light brings vitality. It illuminates the vessel. And shows how this vessel is also related to the source of life and does not just exist on the physical level exclusively. 

Torah reveal this vitality. This enables us to sense God in our physical orientation.

Torah is enclothed in the vessels... and at the same time it illuminates them...

The water depends on the vessel to hold it together. The light serves the vessel and shows how it can be used.

Torah is an inner, essential light. 1+1 is just 2 ones – just on the physical level, but when sechel/mind touches it, it brings a new light to it.

It says if you have 2 ones, you have the provision for it. The provision is seen to precede the 2 items...! There is a source. A makom panoi – an available space is provided to contain any number of units. This is a view that comes from the inner, essential light.

Torah purifies. If there is some impurity, Torah will force it out.

“To a garden of nuts I descended”, says the verse in the Gemara. Just as nut gets dirty, but inside the shell it remains clean. So too, Israel; if during the year they get dirty, Yom Kippur cleans them off. In essence they never change, even when found on the bottom of the heap. And their Torah never becomes impure.

And if someone goes astray in their learning it is not due to the Torah itself, but due to the vessels...