Before we focus on the desire for spirituality, let’s see what Kabbalah has to say about our individual desires: The only difference between people is in the way they want to experience pleasure. Pleasure in itself, however, is amorphous, intangible. When we cover it with different “dresses,” or “coatings,” it creates an illusion that there are different kinds of pleasure, when in fact there are simply many kinds of coatings.
The fact that pleasure is essentially spiritual explains why we have an unconscious craving to replace the superficial coatings of the pleasure with the desire to feel it in its pure form: the Creator’s Light.
And because we’re unaware that the difference between people is in the coatings of pleasure they wish for, we judge them according to the coatings they prefer. We consider certain coatings of pleasure legitimate, such as love of children, while others, such as drugs, are considered unacceptable. When we feel an unacceptable coating for pleasure emerging in us, we are forced to conceal our desire for that coating. However, concealing a desire doesn’t make it go away, and certainly doesn’t correct it.
As we’ve explained above, the lower part of Phase Four is the substance of the soul of Adam ha Rishon (see Figure 6). Just as the worlds are built according to the growing desires, Adam’s soul (humanity) evolved through five phases: Zero (still) through Four (spiritual).
When each phase arises, humanity experiences it to the fullest until it exhausts itself. Then, the next level of desire appears according to the sequence of Reshimot embedded in us. Until today, we had already experienced all the Reshimot of all the desires from Still to Speaking. All that’s left for the evolution of humanity to be complete is to experience the spiritual desires to the fullest. Then, our unity with the Creator will be achieved.
Actually, the appearance of desires at the fifth level—the spiritual—began back in the 16th century, as was described by the Holy Ari. But today we are witnessing the appearance of the most intense kind within the fifth level—the spiritual within the spiritual. Moreover, we are witnessing its appearance in huge numbers, with millions of people the world over seeking spiritual answers to their questions.
Because the Reshimot that surface today are of greater desires for spirituality than ever before, the primary questions people are asking are about their origins, their roots! Although most of these seekers have a roof over their heads and sufficient income to support themselves and their families, they need to know where they came from, by whose plan, and for what purpose. When they are not satisfied with the answers religions offer, they seek them in other disciplines and teachings.
Phase Four – the Phase of Conscious Evolution
The main difference between Phase Four and all other phases is that in this phase, we must consciously evolve. In previous phases, it was always Nature that compelled us to move from one phase to the next. It did this by pressuring us enough to feel uncomfortable and seek to change our present state. This is how Nature develops all of its parts: human, animate, vegetative, and even inanimate.
Our basic desire is passive. This is because we are meant to be receivers of pleasure, not givers of it (except in our intention). Hence, we only move from one state to the next when pressure becomes intolerable. Otherwise, we prefer to stay motionless. The logic is simple: If I am fine where I am, why move?
But Nature has a different plan in store for us. Instead of allowing us to remain complacent in our present state, it wants us to evolve until we reach its own level, the level of the Creator. This, after all, is the purpose of Creation.
So we have two options: we can choose to evolve through Nature’s pressure, which might be unpleasant, or we can evolve painlessly by becoming active in developing our awareness. Remaining passive and undeveloped is not an option because it doesn’t fit into Nature’s plan when it created us.
When our spiritual level begins to evolve, it can only happen if we want it to evolve so we can reach the same condition as the Creator's. Just as in Phase Four in the Four Phases, we are now required to voluntarily change our desire.
Therefore, Nature will continue pressuring us. We will continue to be struck by hurricanes, earthquakes, epidemics, terrorism, and all kinds of natural and manmade hardships until we realize that we have to change, that we must consciously return to our Root.
As we have said, the physical world was created when the soul of Adam ha Rishon shattered. In that state, all the desires began to appear one by one from light to heavy, from still to spiritual, creating our world phase by phase.
Today, at the beginning of the 21st century, all the degrees have already been completed except for the desire for spirituality, which is surfacing now. When we correct it, we will unite with the Creator because our desire for spirituality is actually the desire for unity with Him. This will be the apex of the evolutionary process of the world and of humanity.
By consciously increasing our desire to return to our spiritual root, we build a spiritual Kli. The Surrounding Light corrects the Kli and develops it. Each new level of development evokes a new Reshimo, a record of a past state that we had already experienced when we were more corrected. Eventually, the Surrounding Light corrects the whole Kli, and the soul of Adam ha Rishon is reunited with all its parts and with the Creator.
But this process leads to a question: if the Reshimot are recorded within me, and if the states are evoked and experienced within me, too, then where is the objective reality in all of this? If another person has different Reshimot, does that mean that he or she is living in a different world than mine? And what about the spiritual worlds, where do they exist if everything I experience exists only within me? Moreover, where is the “Creator’s home”?