Even now in our world we can see that everything is leading to the fact that a person remains alone. The family is completely disappearing. Soon there will no longer be a family as such. This is taking place because egoism is increasing. The increasing egoism does not allow people to be together. Egoism becomes bigger and a person first leaves his tribe, then his family and then he begins to feel bad even with his own self. Then he begins to search for the Creator. This is a gradual process.
Question: I see many couples around me who seem to be living together but somehow separately. There is nothing connecting them besides a primitive household. How does Kabbalah explain the connection between a man and woman?
Kabbalah says that love between people can exist only through the Creator. It is said, “Husband and wife – the Shehinah (perception of the Creator) is between them.” This is the same as “Love your neighbor as yourself”. It is possible only if it is bound by the Creator’s existence and His governance from above. Otherwise there is nothing binding and nothing that evokes any feeling of bestowal.
Therefore on the primitive level in our world, family can exist only when there is a necessity to survive. However, as soon as this necessity disappears, we begin to have homes for the elderly, pensions, a woman begins to work and become equal to her husband and so on. The need for family disappears. Family will become reestablished only when man becomes commonly corrected.
Question: What is marriage?
Marriage is the interaction of two absolutely different and opposite parts of creation.
Generally, marriage is the connection of the Creator and creation, in which the Creator is the male part and creation is the female part. Although creation is initially absolutely opposite to the Creator, it must enter into full union with the Creator by gradually becoming closer to Him. This absolutely complete final union, or the state when creation fully unifies with the Upper force, is called “marriage.”
With correspondence to what we must spiritually do with our souls, the same thing occurs with us on Earth between man and woman as a result of our historical development. It takes place as an imprint or copy of spiritual events or actions.
If we knew the spiritual roots and the rules of behavior between these roots, meaning the attributes of these roots, then we would be able to really take pleasure in the earthly marriage in our world or create a perfect connection and unbound happiness.
Since people do not know the upper root, we are drowning in constant suffering. Marriage is losing its necessity in general, because people are discovering the impossibility of any connection within marriage.
However, if people knew how to create their relationships in equivalence to spiritual roots then any man and woman would have a perfect connection in the same way this exists in the upper world. They would be happy, honest and would complement each other, based on knowledge of their own spiritual root and the spiritual root of their spouse. In this case marriage would be ideal. Over the course of their lives, spouses would achieve their spiritual roots and carry out their predestination.
Question: There are not simply physical marriages?
We descend to our world in order to correctly combine in marriage and we return to this world because we find an incorrect partner for ourselves. Since humanity is close to the goal, marriages fall apart quickly in order for us to have time to become disappointed several times in one lifetime and to perceive the necessity of a higher means that will allow connection.
This means is called the attainment of our souls, because bodies do not play any role in the match of two people. If a person knows his spiritual root as well as his spouse’s, he understands how he can create a perfect match in order to completely complement each other from full opposition to each other. Kabbalah studies precisely the attainment of this state between a person and the Creator, and this is precisely what a Kabbalist aspires to accomplish.
Question: Does the opposite exist – purely spiritual marriages?
One cannot exist without the other. Perfection is possible only in equivalence to the Creator, that is, in simultaneous union with Him and others. Only the Creator’s attributes in you guarantee your union eternity, constant renewal and perfection on all levels of man – spiritual, material, psychological and physical.
In perspective, each person’s egoism and all humanity’s egoism as a whole will increase and we will not be able to find any satisfaction in marriage. Huge problems will emerge between people with regard to the connection between them. A person will find fulfillment in turning off the connection with others.
However, the pressure of the upper law of nature pushes us towards equivalence to the Creator and it will cause such suffering that man will realize his egoism to be evil.
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To the degree he realizes this he will want to correct himself.
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To the degree of his correction he will desire a connection with the Creator
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To the degree he desires a connection with the Creator, he will also desire a genuine connection with his spouse in this world.
This way, from the opposite a person will once again come to the ancient institute of marriage. However, he will no longer do this out of instinct, but rather from the realization of upper equivalence.
Question: Does a Kabbalist have to work?
A Kabbalist must be completely involved in this world (unless he receives a personal direction from the Creator to do otherwise). That is, he must work, have a wife and kids, a home, and take care of everything in the same way a regular person does. At the same time he must relate to everything around him from his spiritual level. In this case he corrects himself and the world around him. However, if he does not have a “Nukva” (female half) he does not have that for which to work. Therefore Kabbalists directed men to get married in order for them to have responsibilities with regard to family etc.
The inner changes in a person will become the basis for relating to his friends at work, his place of work and the corporation. Naturally, he becomes more closed and less social, but brief and compliant. However, it is visible that his soul and thoughts are concerned with something else, that he is inside of himself and the surrounding world is uninteresting for him. More accurately, he feels pleasure many times greater and more completely, but he derives this pleasure from a different source than others.
A person who wants to come closer to the spiritual must be like everyone else. He must work like everyone and have a family and children. The important thing is what a person does in the two-three hours he has free after work and responsibilities at home. Does he spend them in front of the television or in a restaurant, or does he make efforts in order to achieve the spiritual goal?
The difference between man and woman in our world is the consequence of the relationship between the male and female parts of the soul. In our world we can see that men and women perceive the world around them differently and they have different responsibilities and tasks. In the spiritual world the male and female parts of the Partzuf or soul complement each other. The female part gives her desires and the male part gives his screens. Ultimately there emerges a mutual revelation of the light or Creator, meaning attainment. Together they comprise perfection.
One person’s corrections do not occur on someone else’s account. It is the same in our egoistic relationships. Every person has his own path because while in the spiritual, various parts exist within one body or Partzuf, in our world they exist in different bodies. In the spiritual each part can exist only if one part completes another in order to perform common work. Therefore from Kabbalah it is clear that genuine relationships between the sexes and genuine family will emerge only with the appearance of corrected souls. According to their correction, egoistic relationships will become replaced by altruistic ones, and this will take place within the family as well.
In this case however, a husband and wife will have a different kind of interaction. It develops gradually, since the spiritual is each person’s personal matter. One cannot talk about this to another person. Rather, one should thoroughly conceal that which he feels in relation to the Creator. This is done in order to avoid ruining another person’s personal path. Every person has a different path. Everything will become revealed to everyone only upon reaching full correction, because there will be no place for problems of egoistic envy.
Question: Why does a child have to separate from his parents?
Children have to “reject” their parents or else they will not grow. Otherwise the new generation’s level will not differ from the older generation. After all, the difference between generations is their spiritual accumulation with which the souls descend down into our world. Bodies are not important; they have no significance. They are all the same, thus there is no difference between the bodies of a single living generation. However, the souls differ greatly.
In every new generation the souls enter with a new potential or new Reshimot (memories or recordings). These new Reshimot or new egoism is more apparent and coarser, compelling people to achieve greater things. Therefore, they naturally reject the past generation and are correct to do this. It is the way things should be; the new generation must look ahead. Parents who force their children to listen to them simply “preserve” them as in a jar.
Question: But why are parents unable to refrain from teaching their children?
This is regular human egoism or simply the desire to be in power. A person cannot have power over himself therefore he punishes his children. Parents do not agree with 90% of what you do.
You marry without asking them, despite the fact that they do not agree. You choose a profession, the place of marriage and you move somewhere. It is a different generation. It is always this way. The problem of fathers and sons has existed for a long time. Such is nature. Generally, a person cannot live according to his parents’ directive.
In addition, this is in accord with the nation’s laws and the laws of the world. If you have grown up, from this moment on you must act independently. You must marry and you must live your life. You have to respect your parents, but not by living according to their program. You must respect them, help them and support them exclusively in the animal form. They gave you life on the animal level rather than the human level. On the human level every generation adds to the previous.
Parents are the previous level. Therefore a person should respect them on their level, in everything that regards the animal life. The Torah obligates a person to do the same thing.
Question: Why were previous generations dynasties and people who lived with their parents?
These generations developed slowly. Look at what is happening during our century. In previous centuries the changes were literally very small from one generation to the next. We are yet to see what will happen in the next generation. Every week and every day there will be huge changes in the whole world. Right now we can see how this tempo is accelerating. Therefore a very fast acceleration is occurring towards the end of days of correction. The tempo and quality of life will be dictated by such a condition that in the evening a person will not remember what he did in the morning because he will have gone through so many inner changes over the course of a day.