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Chapter 6
Now, the name Elohim is the name of the attribute of might and of tzimtzum (a contraction of light). And therefore the name Elohim equals ha-teva (nature) in gematria, since it hides the upper light that brings the world into being and gives it life, and it appears as if the world stands and is conducted in the way of nature. And this name Elohim is a shield and a sheath for the name Havayah, to conceal the light and the life force that is drawn from the name Havayah and that brings from nothing into something, so that it not be revealed to the creatures and they be nullified in existence. And indeed this aspect of might, and this tzimtzum, is also an aspect of kindness, that the world be built by it. And this is the aspect of might that is included in kindness.
Now, from the inclusion of the attributes, this one in that one, it is apparent to the eye that He and His organs are one, and these are His attributes. For since they are in complete union with Him, therefore they are united with one another and included, each one from the other, as the saying of Elijah: “And You are He who binds them and unites them,” and so on, “and apart from You there is no union in the upper ones,” and so on.
And this is what is written (Deuteronomy 4:39): “And you shall set it back upon your heart, that Hashem (God) is Elohim.” The meaning is that these two names are actually one. For even the name Elohim, which contracts and conceals the light, is an aspect of kindness, like the name Havayah, because the attributes of the Holy One, blessed be He, are united with Him in a complete union, and He and His name are one, for His attributes are His names. If so, of itself you will know that “in the heaven from above and upon the earth from below there is nothing else” (there). The meaning is that even the material earth, which appears a complete something to every eye, is nothing and naught, actually, beside the Holy One, blessed be He. For the name Elohim conceals and contracts only for the lower ones, and not with regard to the Holy One, blessed be He, since He and His name Elohim are one.
And therefore the earth too, and what is beneath the earth, are nothing and naught, actually, beside the Holy One, blessed be He, and they are not called by a name at all, even by the name “else,” which is a term for what is secondary, as the saying of our rabbis, of blessed memory (Kiddushin 6a): “Judah, and else, to recite?” And like the body, which is secondary to the soul and the life force that is within it. [And this is what is written (Psalms 146:2): “I will praise Hashem in my life. I will sing to my Elohim while I still am.” For the life is drawn from the name Havayah, and the “else” of “while I still am,” which is the secondary body, is from the name Elohim.] For the soul does not bring the body into being from nothing into something. But the Holy One, blessed be He, who brings all into being from nothing into something, all is nullified in existence before Him, like the light of the sun in the sun.
And therefore the verse needed to warn (Deuteronomy 4:39): “And you shall know today, and you shall set it back upon your heart,” and the rest, so that it not rise in your mind that the heavens and all their host, and the earth and its fullness, are a separate thing in their own right, and that the Holy One, blessed be He, fills the whole world in the manner of the clothing of the soul in the body, and bestows the power of growth upon the earth and the power of motion upon the spheres, and moves them and leads them according to His will, as the soul moves the body and leads it according to its will.
But in truth the parable does not resemble what it pictures at all. For the soul and the body are in truth separate from one another in their root, for the coming into being of the root of the body and of its essence is not from its soul, but from the drops of its father and its mother, and also afterward its growth is not from its soul alone, but by the eating and the drinking of its mother through all the nine months, and after that by its own eating and its drinking. It is not so with the heavens and the earth, whose whole essence and whole being came into being from absolute nothing and naught, only by the word of Hashem and the breath of His mouth, blessed be He. And still the word of Hashem stands forever, and flows into them always, in every moment, and brings them into being always from nothing into something, like the coming into being of the light from the sun within the body of the globe of the sun itself, by way of a parable. If so, they are in truth nullified in existence completely, beside the word of Hashem and the breath of His mouth, blessed be He, which are united in His being and His essence, blessed be He, as will be explained further on, like the nullification of the light of the sun in the sun. Only, these are precisely His acts of might, in the attribute of might and of the tzimtzum, to hide and to conceal the life force that flows in them, so that the heavens and the earth and all their host appear as if they are a thing in their own right. But the tzimtzum and the hiding are only for the lower ones. But before the Holy One, blessed be He, all are counted before Him as actually nothing, like the light of the sun in the sun, and the attribute of might does not conceal, God spare us, before Him, blessed be He, for it is not a thing in its own right, but Hashem, He is Elohim.
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