Article No. 18, Tav-Shin-Mem-Het, 1987/88
The Zohar (Tazria, Item 10) asks about the verse, “When a woman inseminates and delivers a male child: “Rabbi Aha said, ‘‘And delivers a male child.’ Since she inseminates, does she also deliver? After all, this requires pregnancy. This verse should have said, ‘If a woman is impregnated, she delivers a male child.’ What is, ‘If she inseminates, she delivers’? Rabbi Yosi said, ‘Since the day of insemination and conception to the day of delivery, a woman has not a word in her mouth except her offspring, whether it will be a male. This is why it is written, ‘If a woman inseminates and delivers a male child.’’”
We should understand what it means that the woman says, “Since the day of insemination and conception to the day of delivery, a woman has not a word in her mouth except her offspring, whether it will be a male,” and that this is why the verse says, “If a woman inseminates.” What does knowing this give us?
Certainly, there are answers in the literal. But we will explain in the work, what is the importance of a woman being worried whether her child will be a male as soon as she inseminates. First, we need to know what is insemination in the work. In corporeality, we see that when we sow a seed in the soil, the seed rots in the ground, and then yields crop that sustains people. That is, the sowing brings us food. If a person did not sow a seed, he will certainly not reap, as it is written, “They who sow in tears shall reap in song.”
What is sowing in the work of the Creator? We should interpret that there are two forces in man: 1) the force of bestowal, which is what man wants to bestow upon others, and 2) the force of reception, meaning wanting to receive from others and enjoy for oneself. Whichever force he wants to annul, this is called “sowing.” He places this force in the ground, such as when placing seeds in the ground so they will rot. Then they are annulled in the earth and later yield crop for food and for nourishment and life to the world.
Likewise, in the work, when a person wants to annul the will to receive for himself, it is regarded as placing it in the ground, as wanting to annul it “as the dust of the earth,” and that a desire to bestow will grow out of it. A “woman” is called “desire to receive for oneself.” When wanting to revoke and uproot it from the world, the desire to bestow emerges from it, which yields nourishment and life and peace to the world, since through the Kli [vessel] of the desire to bestow, called “equivalence of form,” we receive the delight and pleasure that the Creator wants to bestow upon the creatures. It is as it is written, “When a woman inseminates and delivers a male child.” That is, by burying the vessels of reception, the desire to bestow emerges from it, which is regarded as a male.
However, the male is not born as soon as one sows. Rather, there are nine months of pregnancy. In the work, they are called “ascents and descents.” Sometimes a pouring rain comes down and takes all the seeds out of the soil. In the work, this is called the arrival of “evil water,” which are Mi [who] and Ma [what], and Mi and Ma together are called Mayim [water], which takes all the seeds outside.
That is, after he has thrown the will to receive for himself into the ground several times, the thoughts of “who” and “what,” where “who” is the argument of Pharaoh, who said, “Who is the Lord that I should obey His voice?” and “what” is the argument of the wicked, who asks, “What is this work for you?” These thoughts take the seeds that were already placed in the earth, in utter lowliness and degradation back up from the ground, and once again, we want to use these Kelim [vessels], which are vessels of reception. And once again, we cannot hope to have something with which to furnish ourselves with the abundance that should furnish the spiritual, but we haven’t the Kelim to receive the abundance, for there is no light without a Kli.
However, afterward, another awakening from above comes to a person and he begins once more to inseminate the “woman” in him, called “will to receive for himself.” Once again, he buries it in the ground, and once again comes a bad wind or a flood of rain, and so on and so forth. This causes many ascents and descents, and this is regarded as what is written, “They who sow in tears.” They are regarded as crying because it appears to them that they are always on the degree at which they began to come into the work of the Creator.
It follows that when they are about to inseminate once more, they sow in tears because they see that each time they begin from the same place and they never move even one step forward. On the contrary, they see that they are going backward. Hence, all their sowings are in tears.
We have already spoken about why the Creator made it so there would be many ascents and descents, meaning who gains from it. The answer is that it is in man’s benefit, since there is no light without a Kli, meaning no filling without a lack. And since the Creator wants man to need help from above, since through the help, the Creator bestows upon him illumination from above, it is considered that each time, he receives additional Kedusha. Thus, at the end of his work, after he has come to a greater lack each time, a person receives a holy soul from above. By this, he is rewarded with being permanently in Kedusha, as The Zohar says, “He who comes to purify is aided.” With what? The Zohar says, “with a holy soul,” and all this came to him through ascents and descents.
By this we will understand why specifically “They who sow in tears, reap in song.” It is because they sow in tears, meaning that each time, he sees that he must begin to sow anew, as though until now he has done nothing. He sees that time is moving forward and that he is going backward, causing him sorrow and pain. By this, he constantly becomes more needy of the Creator’s help.
This means that each time, he sees himself, how inherently incapable he is to exit self-love, except through a miracle from above. From all this suffering, a true need and Kli is created in him, meaning that now he sees what is written (Psalms 127), “Unless the Lord builds a house, they who built it worked in vain.” Only the Creator can help.
It follows that specifically through “They who sow in tears,” a person can obtain the need for the Creator’s salvation, for then “reap in song” comes true. Sowing means making the Kli, and reaping means the reception of the light. That is, the light comes into the Kli. This means that when the deficiency is filled, this is called “reaping.”
Accordingly, we should interpret what The Zohar says, “Since the day of insemination and conception to the day of delivery, a woman has not a word in her mouth except her offspring, whether it will be a male.” We asked, What does this come to teach us in the work? When a person begins the holy work, to make it pure, which means that he is working for the sake of the Creator and not for his own sake, that person is called “a woman inseminates first.”
This means that the beginning of his work is that he wants to bury in the ground the quality of Nukva [female], called “a woman.” He sows that desire in the ground the way one sows seeds in the ground. By this, food grows to furnish the created beings. Likewise, when sowing the will to receive for oneself in the ground, so it will rot, meaning so that the use of the will to receive will be cancelled if it is without an intention to bestow, and to use it only on condition that he can use it in order to bestow, then “she delivers a male child.” That is, he is rewarded with the quality of “male,” meaning that he has the power to work for the sake of the Creator and not for his own sake.
However, it does not grow at once, as soon as we plant the seed in the soil. Rather, in corporeality, sometimes there are torrential rains that flood the whole area, and all the seeds come out even before they decayed in the soil. It is likewise in the work: A person wants to grow the quality of male as soon as he plants the seed in the ground, meaning that he will be rewarded with the desire to bestow right away.
But since the order is that it is impossible to go against nature at once, since man is born with a desire to receive for himself, hence, there is always the matter of overcoming, meaning that each time, a person begins to overcome the state of descent. That is, once the winds of the world came and took the seeds out of the ground, and the “winds of the world” are thoughts that are foreign to the spirit of Kedusha, called “desire to bestow,” a person has to overcome and sow once more the will to receive for himself in the ground.
And each time, he tells himself, “Now I will certainly have a male child.” That is, Adama [ground/soil/earth] comes from the words Adame la Elyon [I will be like the Most High], meaning equivalence of form, which is the quality of male. The female, which is the will to receive, will be annulled in the “I will be like the Most High.” We should interpret what The Zohar says, “Since the day of insemination and conception to the day of delivery, a woman has not a word in her mouth except her offspring, whether it will be a male.” That is, each time a person overcomes, he must be certain that now he will be rewarded with the quality of male.
It follows that in each and every sowing, the intention is only to be a male. Otherwise, if his intention is not to be a male, it is not regarded as sowing anything. This is the meaning of what is written (Ecclesiastes 11:4), “He who guards the wind will not sow.” Sporno interprets this as follows: “‘He who guards the wind will not sow.’ Even though sometimes the seed is lost in the stormy wind, which disperses it, still, we should not avoid sowing because we are worried about it.”
We should interpret his words in the work. A person sees that he has many descents, and many times he has overcome and sowed, and did not regard the wind, meaning the alien thoughts, called “winds of the world,” dispersing them. And as he says, he should not look at the stormy wind, since she is the hardest Klipa [shell/peel], opposite the world of Assiya, as the ARI says, whose desire is to spread all the seeds that place the will to receive in the ground, since it is against her will. Therefore, the writing says that we must not look at this wind, which wants to disperse the seeds, but overcome and not avoid sowing, and we must believe in the Creator, that “the salvation of the Lord is as the blink of an eye.”
Baal HaSulam interpreted that “He who guards the wind will not sow” means that one should not say, “I cannot do anything and I am waiting for the Creator to send me the spirit from above, and then I will have the strength to work. In the meantime, I sit and wait.” The writing says about this, “guards the wind,” from the verse, “And his father kept the matter,” meaning that one who sits and waits will never sow. Rather, a person must make “an awakening from below,” and by this comes “an awakening from above.” It is as our sages said, “He who comes to purify is aided.” However, the person must begin.
Now we can interpret what is written (Malachi 2), “If you do not listen, and if you do not take it to heart to give honor to My name, I will send the curse upon you. I will rebuke your semen and I will spread feces on your faces.” The Even Ezra interprets this as follows: “I will rebuke the semen so it will not grow, since My table is empty.” The Metzudat David interprets this as “I admonish you. Because of you, I will rebuke the semen so it does not grow. ‘And I will spread feces on your faces,’ I will spread manure on your faces.” He reiterates and interprets, “Manure from beasts that you sacrifice to Me, which is the most loathsome thing in the beast, I will spread it in order to degrade you, the same way you degrade My name.”
We should interpret this that in the work, it is when we sow a seed in the ground so it will decay and annul in the ground, which is regarded as “I will be like the Most High,” so that a male will grow out of this sowing. But in the middle of the sowing, a person regrets giving “honor to My name,” to do everything to glorify His name. Rather, as soon as one sows, a person receives from the “winds of the world,” and they ask the person, “What about your own glory?”
That is, what will the person receive for himself from this work of sowing in the ground that will yield a desire to bestow? It follows that by a person degrading the glory of heaven before his own glory, saying that it is not worthwhile to annul his own glory before the glory of heaven, for this reason, the Creator says, “I will send the curse upon you,” the curse that the seed will not grow so that you will not be able to receive through this vessels of bestowal because as soon as you receive the thoughts from the “winds of the world,” you immediately say that they are right and it is not worthwhile to work for the glory of heaven.
This is the meaning of what the Even Ezra says, “I will rebuke the semen so it will not grow because My table is empty.” This means that they engage in Torah and Mitzvot [commandments/good deeds], but their intention is not for the sake of the Creator. It follows that the table of the Creator is empty, and everything that you do in Torah and Mitzvot is all for man’s table, for one’s own sake. Thus, you have no need or a Kli for me to give you the quality of “male,” called “desire to bestow,” since there is no light without a Kli.
However, the question is, If a person does not want to dedicate one hundred percent of his strength to work for the Creator, and only a small part of him understands that it is worthwhile to work for the Creator, and in that small part, the Creator places a curse that no vessels of bestowal, called “male,” will grow out of it, how can one ever be rewarded with vessels of bestowal?
We should interpret this according to the rule that everything that the Creator does is for the purpose of correction. That is, the curse not to grow seeds is also for the benefit of the creatures. This should be interpreted as we interpreted the verse, “He brings down to the netherworld and He lifts up.” That is, by seeing that each time he sows, the wind comes and disperses the seeds, a person understands that he must pray to the Creator to give him the strength to stand against the winds.
That is, the Creator should let him feel the importance of obtaining a life of service to the King of the world, since each time he overcomes and sows, the wind promptly disperses it and takes it out of the ground. By this he feels, while engaging in Torah and work, the taste of manure while he is thinking about the aim to bestow.
As the Metzudat David interprets, “I will spread manure on your faces,” I will spread it to degrade you the way you degrade My name. That is, when you do not pay attention while engaging in Torah and Mitzvot, and you do not think that they should be for My name, and do not feel the flaw that you are doing, I will make you feel the taste of manure, so you will not have the strength to do anything even in Lo Lishma [not for Her sake], since you will feel the taste of manure even when you engage in Lo Lishma. This will cause you to need vessels of bestowal, since you will have no vitality in Lo Lishma.
It follows that this curse is when you begin to sow your vessels of reception in the ground so that the will to receive for oneself will be cancelled in the ground. But you do not pay attention to regard the matter of bestowal as much as you need, and you make these sowings without any awareness that it is a key matter, and our lives, for otherwise it is impossible to achieve wholeness. Instead, you do this not so seriously. This is why it says, “I will send,” meaning that the Creator Himself has sent these thoughts and disperses the sowings so that you will walk on the path of truth, so they will understand the need for vessels of bestowal.
Now we can understand that a person must believe that all his descents, if they occur while he wants to walk on the path of truth, he must believe that they all come from the Creator. That is, all his descents are for his best; otherwise, he will remain in his current state and will never be able to reach the truth, since he will settle for what he has and will think that this is wholeness. For this reason, when a person comes to purify, specifically then he has descents, so he will not remain in his Katnut [smallness/infancy], according to his understanding.
Accordingly, we should interpret what is written in The Zohar about the verse, “For the portion of the Lord is His people.” The Creator handed the seventy nations to ministers who rule over them, and took to Himself the people of Israel, to rule over them. That is, the Creator is the ruler of Israel, which is not so with the rest of the nations, whom He has given to the rule of ministers.
But what does it mean that he seemingly does not rule over the nations of the world? Is it because it is difficult for the Creator to rule over them because of their inferiority? That is, is it beneath Him to rule over them, so He needed someone to help Him rule over them? But we should believe that “He alone does and will do all the deeds.”
In the work, we should interpret that this applies to a single person. When a person is under the rule of the seventy nations, which is generally regarded as “will to receive for himself,” because of the restriction that took place, he becomes separated from the Creator. That is, he does not have the faith that the Creator alone “does and will do all the deeds.” It follows that a person who receives vitality from the world through things that the Creator has prepared for the creatures while they are still not ready to receive their vitality from Kedusha, these people say that the Creator “has left His work” because it is “beneath Him” to tend to them.
This is as it is written in the “Introduction to The Book of Zohar” (Item 4): “I know that there are those who cast over their shoulders the burden of Torah and Mitzvot, saying the Creator has created the whole of reality, then left it alone, that because of the worthlessness of the creatures it is not fitting for the exalted Creator to watch over their mean little ways.”
It follows that before a person believes that everything comes from the Creator, he says that the whole world was given to the leadership of seventy ministers, which are seventy qualities in nature, or “the rest of the winds,” but they do not believe that the Creator oversees it. This is regarded as saying that He has given over the management of the world to seventy ministers. Conversely, one who is “Israel” and believes in the Creator, says that only the Creator is the leader of the world, that “He alone does and will do all the deeds.”
Now we can understand what we asked, When is one considered “a servant of the Creator”? Is it specifically when he can work for the sake of the Creator, or is it even in the beginning of his work? According to what Baal HaSulam explained about the verse, “will give wisdom to the wise,” the question is that it should have said, “will give wisdom to the fools,” since the wise already have wisdom. He explained that “wise” means one who desires wisdom, whereas one who is not wise has no desire for wisdom, as it is written, “The fool has no desire for intelligence.”
In the work, we should interpret that “a servant of the Creator” is one who wants to work for the sake of the Creator. Although he is not succeeding, since this requires a real prayer that the Creator will help him, if he began to walk on the right line, meaning that he already has a “left” that resists the right line, then the order of the path of the Creator begins. For this reason, he is already regarded as “a worker of the Creator,” since his goal is to come to a state where all his works are for the sake of the Creator.
And although there are many descents and ascents along the way, everything follows the plan, meaning that the descents, too, a part of the work, since by this we acquire the need for the salvation of the Creator. Through the descents, a person comes to the decision that it is impossible to do anything by himself, but that only the Creator can help. This attainment, a person achieves specifically through the descents.
This is as it is written in the book A Sage’s Fruit (Part 1, p 301): “There is no happier situation in man’s world than when he finds himself despaired with his own strength. That is, he has already labored and done all that he could possibly imagine he could do, but found no remedy. It is then that he is fit for a wholehearted prayer for His help because he knows for certain that his own work will not help him. As long as he feels some strength of his own, his prayer will not be whole. It was said about it, ‘The Lord is high and the low will see.’ Once a person has labored in all kinds of works and has become disillusioned, he comes into real lowliness, knowing that he is the lowest of all people, and there is nothing good about his body. At that time his prayer is whole, since at that time the whole of Israel came to a state of despair from the work. It is as one who pumps out in a punctured bucket. He pumps all day but does not have a drop of water to quench his thirst. So were the children of Israel in Egypt: Whatever they built was promptly swallowed in its place in the ground.Similarly, one who has not been rewarded with His love, all that he has done in his work on purifying the soul the day before is as though completely burned the next day. And each and every day he must start anew as though he hasn’t done a thing in his entire life. It follows from the above that anything, small or great, is only obtained by prayer.”
Thus, the descents are also regarded as correction, for through them a person can come to be a true “worker of the Creator,” when all his works are only in order to bestow. For this reason, as soon as one begins on the path that reaches the work in order to bestow, although there are many failures along the way that are hard for one to overcome, he is already regarded as “a servant of the Creator,” since he wants to work for the Creator and not work for himself, meaning that all his thoughts will be only about satisfying the will to receive for himself with the wealth of this world and the wealth of the next world, as it is written in The Zohar that they howl as dogs, “Give us the wealth of this world and give us the wealth of the next world.”
For this reason, a person must always overcome and believe that only the Creator can help.