The Concealed Light of the Creator
The Light of the Creator permeates all creations, including our world, even though we do not feel it.
This Light is called “the Light that invigorates the creation.” It is due to this Light that the creations and the worlds exist. Without it, all life would cease, and the material dimension of the world would disappear.
This life-giving Light displays its effect in various material “garbs” of the objects and in different phenomena of our world that take place before our eyes. Everything that surrounds us, including ourselves and the crudest of the creations, is nothing else but the Light of the Creator.
We perceive it as many objects, since we respond to the outer shells, to the garb of the Light. In reality, it is the one and only Force that acts within each one of the creations—the Light of the Creator.
The majority of people do not perceive the Light of the Creator, but only the external garb. There are the people who perceive the Light of the Creator, but only in Kabbalah.
But there are also those who see the Light of the Creator in everything that surrounds them. This latter group perceives everything surrounding us as the Divine Light, which emanates from the Creator and fills everything with Itself.
Man’s Constant Pursuit of Spiritual Light
The Creator decided to place a human being in this world so that the human being would rise spiritually from the depth of the original state to the level of the Creator, and thus become like the Creator. For this reason the Creator created the quality of egoism—the desire to receive pleasure.
In the beginning of creation, the Light (pleasure) filled the entire created expanse (egoism). It also completely filled all kinds of desires to receive pleasure. These were created as part of the conceived egoism.
Then, the Creator restricted the progression of Light and concealed it. In place of the Light, which existed in the creation, in the desire to receive pleasure, and in egoism, there came pain, emptiness, darkness, sorrow, and everything else imaginable when pleasure is absent.
In order to maintain in one a minimal desire to live, and to prevent suicide from lack of pleasure, the Creator endowed human beings with the desire to be gratified with a small portion of Light (ner dakik). This is enclosed in different objects of our world to which we aspire.
Therefore, subconsciously and automatically, we persist in the constant pursuit of the Light of the Creator, and are slaves to this natural aspiration. We must believe that the concealment of the Creator, and the feeling of hopelessness that results from the lack of pleasure, are purposely given to us by the Creator for our benefit.
Free Will and the Creator’s Concealment
If the Light of the Creator filled our egoism, we would lose the opportunity to exercise our free will, and no longer be able to act freely and independently. Instead, we would become slaves to the pleasure that fills us.
Only when separated from the Light of the Creator do we experience His concealment, causing us to perceive ourselves as entirely independent, self-sufficient beings. This allows us to make decisions with regard to our actions. But even this kind of independence demonstrates itself only in certain circumstances, because despite the fact that the Creator concealed Himself from us, we still possess egoism, which directs all of our thoughts and feelings.
Therefore, true freedom will arise only when: 1. An individual does not experience the bestowal of the Creator, and 2. An individual can act independently from the desires of the body.
An opportunity to exercise our free will exists only in the earthly life, which is precisely why we exist here.
Concealment Is Necessary for Spiritual Work
Every individual must believe that there is nothing else in the world but the Creator.
One perceives in one’s “I” a certain degree of independence only because the Creator endowed our perception with egoism. However, if we were to rid ourselves of this quality, we would once again become part of the Creator.
We must believe that the Creator is concealed only because we cannot perceive Him, and that this concealment was designed only for our benefit. Thus, until we are ready to face the truth, we must believe that the truth is very different from the way we perceive it.
The truth can only be grasped gradually and only to the degree that we have been able to attain perfection. Hence, any spiritual work is possible only as long as the pleasure of the spiritual realm is concealed from us. Only then will we be able to say that our loathing towards the spiritual was purposely sent by the Creator, and that, in fact, nothing is more perfect than the spiritual.
The Body’s Reluctance to Seek Spirituality
There are two kinds of obstacles deriving from the impure forces (Klipot) that operate in us: restraint (Ahizat Klipot) and drawing nourishment (Yenikat Klipot). When we experience no pleasure from learning or from self- improvement, and advance with great difficulty, then the Klipa demonstrates to us various shortcomings of the spiritual existence.
As a result, we feel that there is no value in the spiritual. Thus, the Klipa receives an opportunity to hold us back from our studies, since we see no greatness in the spiritual. Such a state is known as “the Revelation of the Creator in ashes” (Shchinta be Afra).
The Klipa achieves this goal by instilling in us the desire to continue to work. However, the motivation behind this work is personal pleasure, rather than the fact that this work is desired by the Creator. If we acquiesce to this tendency, then the entire pleasure is surrendered to one’s ego. This is known as “the drawing nourishment” of the Klipot. In such a case, we must ask the Creator for help in withstanding the temptation of harmful thoughts.
In order to escape the temptation, we must pretend to be blind and deaf to the calls of the body, as well as to imagine that the Upper Light exists, but is invisible. Only then will the Creator open our eyes and ears to be able to perceive His Light, and be able to hear what the Creator is telling only to us.
The efforts that we allot to every task of perceiving the spiritual gradually add up to a sufficient quantity to form the vessel (Kli)or the garment (Levush) needed to receive the Light of the Creator—our spiritual souls.
“The Process of Revealing the Creator” is based on the book, Attaining the Worlds Beyond by Dr. Michael Laitman.
