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Chayei Sarah (The Life of Sarah) Parsha – Weekly Torah Portion

Chayei Sarah2

Genesis, 23:1-25:18
This Week’s Torah Portion | October 20 – October 26, 2013 – Cheshvan 16 – Cheshvan 22, 5774

In A Nutshell

In the portion, The Life of Sarah, Abraham gives a eulogy after Sarah’s death at the age of 127. He buys a lot for the grave from Ephron the Hittite for four hundred shekels of silver and buries her in the Cave of Machpelah, in Hebron.

Abraham objects to Isaac marrying a woman from the Canaanites, and sends Eliezer, his servant, to Aram Naharaim to find a wife for his son. When Eliezer approaches a well, he meets Rebecca and asks her to give him water. She gives him water, and offers water to his camels, as well. Eliezer takes her offer as a sign that she is the right woman for Isaac, and so he brings her to Canaan.

After the death of Sarah, Abraham marries Keturah, who bears six children, which Abraham sends eastward. Abraham died at the age of 175, and inherits all that he has to Isaac.

The end of the portion elaborates on the generations of Ishmael and on his passing at the age of 175.

 Commentary by Dr. Michael Laitman

We need to remember that the Torah speaks of what happens within, as one reveals one’s soul, the innermost part. The revelation of the soul is gradual, and manifests in the stories of the Torah. Abraham is the initial force with which a person reveals the soul and opens the internality to discover the upper world. He is the first force of overcoming, the force of bestowal, along with that force’s female, Sarah, which is suitable for the degree of Abraham.

To know with which desires we can work and with which we cannot, we must sort out our self-centered desires, leaving the degrees with which we still cannot work for the next degrees, for states where the desire is stronger. To scrutinize the desire called Isaac, we must first remove the desire with which we cannot work, and sort it with another female, with Hagar, from whom comes Ishmael, the Klipa (shell/peel) of the right.

The Isaac degree within us emerges only afterward, and is an extension of the Abraham degree. It is written about Isaac, “For in Isaac will your seed be named” (Genesis, 21:12), meaning that Abraham’s rise to a higher degree is named Isaac. At the Isaac degree, one should reexamine one’s desires, and sort out with which desires it is possible to work, and with which it is impossible.

A person cannot scrutinize alone, as that person (Abraham) comes from only one force, one side, from the force of Hesed (mercy). Abraham is still without Gevura, and must first acquire the degree of Isaac, which is the foundation of Gevura. This is the point where the force of Eliezer comes to the aid. Eliezer is like the upper light—scrutinizing the desires for a person, bringing one to the degree where one can sort the next stage of correction out of all of one’s desires. That stage is called Rebecca.

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Glossary – Chayei Sarah (The Life of Sarah) Parsha – Weekly Torah Portion

Years

The words, Shanim (years) or Shanah (year), come from the word Shoneh (repeating) when we repeat the corrections but on a higher level. There is a ladder of 125 rungs. There are five worlds, with five Partzufim (faces) in each world, and five Sefirot in each Partzuf. 5x5x5 are the 125 rungs, or degrees where we need to repeat the corrections, each time on a more advanced step. This is how we go from stage to stage, from degree to degree, until the end of all the corrections, where we are included in the world of Ein Sof (infinity), in Dvekut (adhesion) with the upper force and in complete similarity with it.

The Cave of Machpelah

The Cave of Machpelah is the great Tikkun (correction) of Malchut that is included in Bina. This is how it can correct itself in equivalence of form with Bina. Malchut is the will to receive, and Bina is the desire to bestow. When Malchut and Bina equalize with one another, then we have inserted the force of Bina throughout the earth, the desire, down to the state called a “cave.”

Burial Site

A burial site is a place where we bury our ego. We do not bury the will to receive, but only the intention to receive, the qualities that work in our favor, and against others. When I bury qualities that make me feel good, such as the desire to exploit, defeat, or see others as inferior, it is a burial of the will to receive. Thus, we do not bury the desire, but only its egotistical form that manifests in us.

Marriage

Marriage is a state where I can repeatedly take various egotistical qualities from my will to receive, correct them, and thus cover them. This is the meaning of the wedding ceremony, with the Huppah (wedding canopy) being the Masach (screen). The Zohar explains it very clearly in the essay, “The Night of the Bride.”

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VaYera (The Lord Appeared) Parsha – Weekly Torah Portion

VaYera

Genesis, 18:1-22:24
This Week’s Torah Portion | October 13 – October 19, 2013 – Cheshvan 9 – Cheshvan 15, 5774

In A Nutshell

The portion, VaYera (The Lord Appeared), begins with the story of the three angels that came to Abraham and told Sarah she would have a son. Sarah laughed because she could not believe that she would have a son at her age. Yet, she did have a son, whose name was Ytzhak (Isaac) named after her Tzhok (laughter).

The angels continued on their way to destroy the cities, Sodom and Gomorrah, due to the many sins being committed there. Lot and his family were allowed to escape, but Lot’s wife did not obey the angels’ orders, turned around to look, and became a pillar of salt. Lot and his two daughters made it to a cave. Lot’s daughters were certain that they were the only survivors in the world, so they tricked their father into having children with them.

Later in the portion, following Sarah’s request, Abraham expels Hagar and Ishmael to the desert; the Creator commands Abraham to sacrifice his son, Isaac, and in the last moment, an angel stops the execution. Abraham takes a ram that he found caught in the thicket and offers it instead of his son.

 Commentary by Dr. Michael Laitman

In “A Preface to the Book of Zohar,” one of Baal HaSulam’s introductions to The Book of Zohar, he offers a special explanation of our perception of reality. The explanation details how we perceive the reality we live in, and how the place where we are is depicted in us as an image of emotions, which are portrayed as solid, as gas, as liquid, etc.

The Zohar and the wisdom of Kabbalah explain that due to the way in which we perceive reality—with our qualities and senses—we react to something outside of us, which we do not know, and which we turn into various colors and materials. However, we need to acquire additional senses and rise to a higher perception of reality, above our senses. This is how we will discover the upper world.

The Book of Zohar speaks to us in the “language of the branches,” using the terms of our world. It tells us how we can obtain and be impressed with the new form, which is higher than our world. Sometimes our concepts seem real to us, such as a pillar of salt, the upheaval of Sodom and Gomorrah, or the story of the three angels, etc., since “a verse does not extend the literal” (Masechet Yevamot, 24a). Yet, we should strive to see these concepts as relationships between us in the common soul.

The events of the portion are not merely historic tales; they are sources that deal with the connections between us. The role of these sources is to teach one who wishes to advance and rise to the new perception of reality how to scrutinize one’s desires, qualities, forces, and the connections between them, in order to design from them the perception of reality that is called, for instance, “the portion, VaYera.”

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Glossary – VaYera (The Lord Appeared) Parsha – Weekly Torah Portion

Angel

An angel is a force of Nature, such as gravity or electromagnetism. An angel is one of our soul’s forces. The forces of our soul contain right, left, and middle, Gabriel, Michael, Uriel, Raphael, and so on.

Laughter

Laughter is connection to a higher degree where we still cannot connect to it through our cognizance and understanding. We laugh at opposites, when we have no time to scrutinize the matter at that moment.

Sodom and Gomorrah

Sodom and Gomorrah are desires expressing an attitude toward others called “let mine be mine; let yours be yours.” It is an attitude that is not connecting, hence, when the next degree arrives—the beginning of my connection with others—I cannot work with them and must leave them, while committing to take the desires that belong to me out of there, meaning Lot. In the next degree, the upper light comes and begins to tend to me, to my soul, inverting these desires, which I will later use for further degrees.

Not Looking Back

It seems quite simple to not look back. Let bygones be bygones; what happened was meant to happen because “there is none else besides Him” (Deuteronomy, 4:35), “I am the first, and I am the last” (Isaiah, 44:6). The previous moment was not up to me, and should have happened as it did. What happened, happened; we must not regret it; we must look only forward.

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Lech Lecha (Go Forth) Parsha – Weekly Torah Portion

Lech Lecha2

Genesis, 12:1-17:27
This Week’s Torah Portion | October 6 – October 12, 2013 – Cheshvan 2 – Cheshvan 8, 5774

In A Nutshell

The portion, Go Forth, begins with Abraham being commanded to go to the land of Canaan. When Abraham reaches the land of Canaan, the hunger forces him to go down to Egypt, where Pharaoh’s servants take Sarai, his wife. In Pharaoh’s house, Abraham presents her as his sister, fearing for his life. The Creator punishes Pharaoh with infections and diseases, and he is forced to give Sarai back to Abraham.

When Abraham returns to the Canaan, a fight breaks out between the herdsmen of Lot’s cattle and the herdsmen of Abraham’s cattle, after which they part ways.

A war breaks out between four kings from among the rulers of Babylon, and five kings from the land of Canaan, Lot is taken captive, and Abraham sets out to save him.

The Creator makes a covenant with Abraham, “the covenant of the pieces” (or “covenant between the parts”), which is the promise of the continuation of his descendants and the promise of the land.

Sarai cannot have children, so she offers Abraham her maid, Hagar, and they have a child named Ishmael.

Abraham makes the covenant of the circumcision with the Creator and is commanded to circumcise himself and all the males in his household. His name changes from Abram to Abraham, and his wife’s name changes from Sarai to Sarah.

At the end of the portion, the Creator promises Sarah that she would have a son whose name will be Isaac.

 Commentary by Dr. Michael Laitman

All the stories of the portion before us happen within us. In the correct perception of reality, this world does not exist, and neither do history or geography, nor the story of the portion. All of them are occurrences that take place within us.

The wisdom of Kabbalah explains that perception of reality is a profound matter, relating to our innermost psychology, to our senses and to our physical structure.

The Torah speaks the truth about the way we developed, and all the people and events that it describes are our mental forces. Abraham, for instance, is the tendency to develop toward spirituality, the desire to approach and discover the Creator.

The story of Abraham in Babylon is really the revelation that only one force exists and manages the world, and the desire to discover that force. Anyone who feels the desire to discover who is managing one’s fate and why, or is asking, “What is the meaning of my life?” is at the same starting point of Abraham, and the force of Abraham is working within that person.

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