“There was a precondition from the beginning of the reception of the Torah, but afterward, since the time of the making of the calf, the package has been taken apart.” – Kabbalist Yehuda Ashlag (Baal HaSulam), Letter 60.
What was the condition for receiving the Torah? Why was the Torah given? The Torah was given only for one purpose: to reach connection between us at the level of “love your neighbor as yourself.” Within that love between people, we then reveal “love the Lord your God,” i.e., complete adhesion.
This was the condition, and it was clear to everyone. The difficulty, however, is that we must uphold this condition each time above the growing problems between us, i.e., the increasing will to receive that demands we strengthen our connection more and more. At every moment, the broken will to receive becomes revealed more strongly, and we must maintain connection, love, and mutual work, prayer, and support above it. And we failed in doing so.
Already in the First Temple, problems appeared in maintaining connection at the level of “love your neighbor as yourself.” As it is written, the “package” that had been established at the level of Bina (a spiritual level of bestowal), upon entering the level of the Land of Israel, i.e., when we began to truly engage in love, this package began to break apart. From then on, we have been in decline.
The Kabbalists say that this process is necessary, that we had to go through it. The construction of the First Temple, its ruin, the construction of the Second Temple, and its inevitable ruin as well, despite all this, we were still required to maintain connection, to uphold “love your neighbor as yourself,” as Rabbi Akiva demanded of his students. Yet even his students, the finest of that generation, were unable to sustain it, and hatred become revealed among them.
Today, we are in a completely different stage. After the ruin of the First and Second Temples, and after the exiles, we now stand before the construction of the Third Temple, which will undoubtedly be built. The only question is to what extent we can contribute through our own effort and support. To what extent we can assist this process through a correct and willing inclination to connect and to reach a state of mutual love, i.e., “from love of others to love of the Creator.” Otherwise, suffering can also bring us to that same harmonious and peaceful state, but by a much longer path.
Based on the Daily Kabbalah Lesson with Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman on the topic “Yom HaZikaron and Yom HaAtzmaut” on May 7, 2019. Written/edited by students of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman.
