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Chapter 44
Now every degree of love within these two degrees, a great love and a love of the world, divides into many aspects and degrees without end, each one according to his own measure, as they wrote in the holy Zohar (Zohar, part 1, 103b) on the verse “Her husband is known in the gates” (Proverbs 31:23): this is the Holy One, blessed be He, for He is known and He cleaves to each one according to what he measures in his heart, and so on.
Therefore fear and love are called “the hidden things belong to Hashem (God) our Elohim” (Deuteronomy 29:28), and the Torah and the mitzvot, a mitzvah (a commanded deed), are the revealed things for us and for our children to do, and so on. For there is one Torah and one law for all of us in the fulfillment of the whole Torah and the mitzvot, in the aspect of deed. It is otherwise with fear and love, for they are according to the knowledge of Hashem in the mind and in the heart, as mentioned above.
Yet there is one love that takes in every aspect and degree of great love and of love of the world, and it is the same for every nefesh (the lowest level of the soul) of Israel, an inheritance to us from our fathers. This is what the Zohar wrote (Zohar, part 3, 68a) on the verse (Isaiah 26:9) “My soul longed for You in the night,” and so on: that a man loves the Holy One, blessed be He, with the love of the nefesh and the spirit, as these cleave within the body and the body loves them, and so on. And this is what is written, “My soul longed for You.” That is to say, because You, Hashem, are my soul and my true life, therefore “I longed for You.” The meaning is that I desire and thirst for You as a man desires the life of his soul, and when he is weak and afflicted he desires and thirsts that his soul return to him. So too, when he goes to sleep, he desires and wishes that his soul return to him when he wakes from his sleep. So I desire and thirst for the light of Ein Sof (the Endless), blessed be He, the true life of all life, to draw it into me by occupation in the Torah when I wake from my sleep at night. For the Torah and the Holy One, blessed be He, are all one. As the Zohar wrote there, a man must, from love of the Holy One, blessed be He, rise every night, to occupy himself in His service until morning, and so on.
And a love much greater than this, hidden likewise in every nefesh of Israel as an inheritance from our fathers, is what is written in the Ra’aya Mehemna, the Faithful Shepherd (Zohar, part 3, 281a): like a son who busies himself after his father and his mother, and loves them more than his own body, his nefesh, and his spirit, and so on. For indeed, one Father have we all. And though, who is this, and which is he, whose heart is bold to draw near, so as to reach even one part out of a thousand of the degree of the love of the Faithful Shepherd, still a bare edge of it and a whisper of it, from the abundance of his goodness and his light, shines on Israel as a whole in every generation, as they wrote in the Tikkunim (114a), that his spreading is in every generation to give them light, and so on. Only, this ray is in a manner of great hiding and concealment in the souls of the whole house of Israel. And to bring this hidden love out of the concealment and the hiding into revelation, so that it be revealed in his heart and his mind, it is not too wondrous and it is not far, but “the thing is very near, in your mouth and in your heart” (Deuteronomy 30:14). That is, to be used to it on his tongue and in his voice, so as to arouse the intent of his heart and his mind, and to press his thought deep into the life of all life, Ein Sof, blessed be He, for He is our actual true Father and the source of our life, and to arouse toward Him the love, like the love of a son for the father.
And when he accustoms himself to this constantly, habit becomes nature. Even if it seems to him at a first look to be a power of imagination, let him not mind, since from its own side it is truth in its very truth, in the manner of a hidden love. Only, the benefit of its coming out into revelation is to bring it to deed, which is occupation in the Torah and the mitzvot. By this he learns and fulfills, so as to make a delight of spirit before Him, blessed be He, like a son who serves his father. And of this they said (Kiddushin 40a): “A good thought, the Holy One, blessed be He, joins it to the deed,” so that there be wings to fly with, as mentioned above. And the delight of spirit is like the parable of the king’s joy in his son who comes to him on going out from the prison, as mentioned above, or so that He have a dwelling in the lower worlds, as mentioned above.
Now, for the aspect of “My soul longed for You,” mentioned above, as well, the thing is very near: to bring it out from concealment into revelation by constant habit, his mouth and his heart alike. But if he cannot bring it out into revelation in his heart, even so he can occupy himself in the Torah and the mitzvot for their own sake, by picturing the matter of this love in the thought that is in his mind. And a good thought, the Holy One, blessed be He, joins it, and so on.
Now these two aspects of love, though they are an inheritance to us from our fathers and like a nature in our souls, and so too the fear included in them, which is to fear being separated, God spare us, from the source of our life and our true Father, blessed be He, even so they are called natural fear and love only when they are in his mind and his thought alone, and in the hidden places of his heart. Then their place is in the ten sefirot (divine channels) of Yetzirah (Formation), and to there they raise with them the Torah and the mitzvot that come on their account and by their cause. But when they are in the revelation of his heart, they are called in the Zohar the desire of the heart, and their place is in the ten sefirot of Beriah (Creation), and to there they raise with them the Torah and the mitzvot that come on their account. For their going out from the concealment and the hiding of the heart into a manner of revelation is by knowledge, by fixing the thought with strength, and by a mighty contemplation from the depth of the heart, more and constantly, upon Ein Sof, blessed be He: how He is actually our life, and our true Father, blessed be He.
And this is known, what is written in the Tikkunim (23a): that in the world of Beriah the Supernal Mother nests there, and she is the contemplation of the light of Ein Sof, the life of all life, blessed be He. And as the saying of Elijah: “Understanding is the heart, and with it the heart understands.” And not only this. These two aspects of love mentioned above are comprised from the aspect of great love, and they are greater and loftier than intellectual fear and love, whose love is called above by the name “love of the world.” Only, even so, a man must toil with his intellect to attain and to reach also the aspect of the love of the world mentioned above, which comes from understanding and knowledge of the greatness of Hashem, in order to enlarge the bonfire of the love, with flashes of fire and a fierce flame and a flame going up to heaven, until many waters cannot quench it, and so on, and rivers cannot sweep it away, and so on. For there is an advantage and a higher worth to the aspect of a love like flashes of fire and a fierce flame, and so on, which comes from understanding and knowledge of the greatness of Ein Sof, blessed be He, over the two aspects of love mentioned above when they are not like flashes of fire and a flame, and so on, like the advantage and the higher worth of gold over silver, and so on, as will be explained further on. And also because this is the whole of man and his purpose, so that he know the glory of Hashem and the precious splendor of His greatness, each man according to what he can bear, as it is written in the Ra’aya Mehemna, the portion Bo: “in order that they come to know Him,” and so on, and as is known.
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