Two Discernments in Holiness
Article No. 15, 1987
There is Kedusha [sanctity/holiness] above and there is Kedusha below, as it is written, “You will be holy.” Thus, there is Kedusha below, meaning that the creatures should be holy. Afterward it is written, “For I the Lord your God am holy.” This is the Kedusha above.
This is the reason why there should be Kedusha below. Because He is holy above, he wants below to be holy too. Our sages said (Torat Kohanim), “You will be holy; you will be chaste, for I am holy.” That is, “If you sanctify yourselves, I will regard you as though you have sanctified Me.”
This seems difficult to understand, since it implies as though there is no Kedusha above. Yet, since the Creator wants to be holy, He says, “If you sanctify yourselves, I will regard you as though you have sanctified Me.” We should understand this. The literal meaning seems to mean that since the Creator is holy, He says that the creatures should also be holy, as it is written, “You will be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy.”
The words of our sages imply that the lower ones should be holy and sanctify Him, as they said about what is written, “for I the Lord your God am holy.” That is, “If you sanctify yourselves, I will regard you as though you have sanctified Me.” It is as though the reason we should be holy is so that there will be Kedusha above.
Our sages also said (Kedoshim Rabbah 24:9), “You will be holy. Can he be like Me? The text explains, ‘for I am holy.’ My holiness is higher than your holiness.” This, too, is difficult to understand. Can you imagine that Israel will be like the Creator? Is this even conceivable?
To understand the above, we must understand the meaning of what was said about “You will be holy, you will be chaste.” That is, from what should one abstain? We should also understand why a person should abstain. The text seems to mean that a person should abstain because “I am holy.”
But that, too, we should understand. We can understand that the Creator is holy, but why is the fact that the Creator is holy a reason for a person to also be holy? Can a person resemble the Creator? Is this possible? And if it is, we must understand what it means that a person is obligated to be as holy as the Creator.
Also, it seems as though this is the main thing that a person needs to be. Otherwise, it seems that he is the opposite of Kedusha, Tuma’a [impurity], as though there is nothing in between, a middle between Kedusha and Tuma’a. And we should also understand what is Tuma’a in the work and what is Kedusha in the work.
We should interpret all those matters in one direction, meaning to return to the purpose of creation, what it is, what is the root of the corruptions, and what are the corrections that we must correct in order to fully realize the purpose of creation—for the creatures to receive the delight and pleasure that the Creator wants to give them, since His desire is to do good to His creations.
It is known that the desire to do good created a desire to receive and a yearning to receive the good that He wants to give. That desire to receive is called the “root of the creatures.” From this desire, many discernments later expanded in this will to receive. That is, when it first emerged and was revealed, and received on this discernment, that state was called the “world of Ein Sof [infinity].”
This means that this will to receive did not put a stop on the upper light, but received the delight and pleasure in this Kli [vessel]. For this reason, a correction was made not to receive the abundance in order to receive but in order to bestow. By this, they would not feel any shame upon the reception of the pleasures.
It therefore follows that in the world of Ein Sof there was only one desire. Only afterward—after the correction of the Tzimtzum [restriction] was done, that something should be received only to the extent that it is possible to aim to bestow—that desire divided into many discernments. It is so because when Malchut received with the Kli we attribute to the Creator, for He has made something new, existence from absence, called “yearning to receive pleasures,” Malchut could receive everything that the Creator wanted to give, since He has created a desire to receive to the extent that He desired to give.
Naturally, Malchut could receive all the abundance that the Creator wishes to give. This is why this is regarded as one desire. It is known that the light is indivisible, but rather all the divisions we discern in the lights are only from the perspective of the receivers. For this reason, since there was only one discernment in the receiving Kli, it was regarded as one light, since one Kli is discerned as one desire.
But after the correction of the Tzimtzum, we must place over the will to receive the aim to bestow. Since we attribute the matter of bestowal to the creatures, the Kelim that the creatures must create certainly cannot be completed at once.
For this reason, each time we should take a part of the will to receive and correct it into working in order to bestow. This is why the general will to receive that was created was divided into several pieces. According to the measure of the intention to bestow that is placed on them, to that extent the desire receives the light that befits this desire, which is corrected with the intention to bestow.
It therefore follows that when we interpret “You will be holy, you will be chaste,” we asked, From what should one abstain? We must say that one should abstain from self-love, meaning from self-reception, and engage only in bestowal because “I am holy.”
That is, it is in order for you to be able to receive the delight and pleasure. The benefit that you will receive will be without any shame if you are in the form of “desire to bestow.” This will bring you equivalence of form, as our sages said, “As He is merciful, so you are merciful.” This is the meaning of “You will be holy.” You will be as a desire to bestow. “For I am holy,” for I, too, only bestow. This is why we need equivalence of form, called Dvekut [adhesion].
Now we can understand what we asked. Here it implies that the reason for “You will be holy” is that the Creator is holy. Therefore, what does it mean that our sages said, “for I am holy,” meaning that “If you sanctify yourselves, I will regard you as though you have sanctified Me?” This implies the opposite, that you must be holy so as to seemingly sanctify Me. In general, it is difficult to grasp that the people of Israel should sanctify the Creator. What does it mean?
We always say, “Blessed are You, O Lord, who sanctifies Israel and the times,” “Blessed are You, O Lord, who sanctifies Israel and the day of remembrance.” We also say in the Kiddush [blessing in the beginning of Shabbat (the Sabbath)], “For You have chosen us and sanctified us from among all the nations.” Thus, what does it mean, “as though you have sanctified Me?”
It means that the Creator needs us to give Him something for His benefit, since He seemingly needs our Kedusha, and He cannot obtain this unless through us. Can it be said that He needs the creatures to give Him something?
As we explained, “holy” means bestowing. In order for the creatures to have Kelim to receive His abundance, there must be equivalence of form. That is, the creatures, too, must want only to bestow and not to receive. Otherwise, it will not be apparent that the Creator is bestowing upon them.
This is why the Creator said that “If you sanctify yourselves,” meaning abstain from self-reception, and engage only in work of bestowal, called Kedusha, “I will regard you as though you have sanctified Me.” That is, by engaging in bestowal, you made Me able to bestow abundance upon you.
It therefore follows that the Creator needing the creatures to sanctify Him by sanctifying themselves refers to the revelation that the Creator is the giver. Otherwise, He will have to remain concealed from the creatures. Then, He will not be able to give them abundance because by receiving the abundance they will fall into a Kli of self-reception, an excess.
In other words, previously, they received corporeal delight and pleasure into the vessels of reception. But when He bestows upon them the upper abundance, which is the real pleasure, they will certainly be real receivers, as we know that the light makes the Kli. That is, the pleasure causes coveting, as our sages said, “The eye sees and the heart covets.”
Now we can understand that the Creator needing the creatures to sanctify themselves is for the creatures’ benefit. That is, by working in order to bestow, the Creator will be able to give them abundance and they will remain in bestowal and not in self-love, which creates separation in spirituality.
This is the meaning of the words, “I will regard you as though you have sanctified Me.” In other words, by this, you have made it revealed to all that I am holy, bestowing delight and pleasure upon the entire world, for bestowing means holy.
Now we can understand what we asked about what our sages said, “You will be holy. Can he be like Me? The text explains, ‘for I am holy.’ My holiness is higher than your holiness.” We asked, Can anyone think that the sanctity of Israel is similar to the sanctity of the Creator?
And according to the above said, we should interpret that since the Creator said, “You will be holy,” it means that you will abstain from vessels of reception and work only with vessels of bestowal. “Can he be like Me?” meaning like the Creator, who does not use vessels of reception because from whom would He receive? Instead, everything we can say about the Creator is only from what we receive from Him, as it is written, “By Your actions, we know You.”
For this reason, the Creator says, “Do not think of being like Me,” that you will stay as bestowing in order to bestow, which is the meaning of “Can he be like Me?” In other words, as I give and do not receive anything, you, too, will remain bestowing in order to bestow.
He said about this, “No! you should achieve a state of receivers, actual reception! You must use your vessels of reception. It is only the intention that should be in order to bestow, since the purpose of creation was to do good to His creations, for the creatures to receive delight and pleasure.” This is the meaning of what is written, “My holiness is higher than your holiness.”
It therefore follows that we should discern between the Kedusha of above and the Kedusha of below. Although it is written, “You will be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy,” which we interpreted to mean that you will work only in order to bestow, just as I am the giver, it is as our sages wrote, “As He is merciful, so you be merciful.”
Still, there is a difference between the Kedusha of above and the Kedusha of below. The Kedusha of above is all to bestow. There is no reception there at all. But the Kedusha of below is not so. Rather, the wholeness is precisely when you do use the vessels of reception. The Kedusha is over the intention! In other words, the requirement of the creatures to be holy, meaning giving and not receiving, refers primarily to the intention that they will work in order to bestow.
However, in the order of the work we should discern between Katnut [infancy/smallness] of Kedusha and Gadlut [adulthood/greatness] of Kedusha. The order of the work is that we go from light to heavy. Therefore, we must begin with working so that the actions will be in bestowal in order to bestow. This is regarded as all the Mitzvot [commandments] he performs will be with the aim not to receive reward or anything in return for keeping Torah and Mitzvot. Rather, it will all be Lishma [for Her sake] and not for his own sake. This is called “bestowing in order to bestow.”
Afterward comes the Gadlut, when we begin to work with vessels of reception in order to bestow. This is regarded as the creatures saying, “We want to receive delight and pleasure because this is His will, for He has created the world in order to delight His creatures.” It follows that we should discern two kinds of Kedusha: 1) Kedusha of above, which is all to bestow and not to receive at all, 2) Kedusha of below, which is to receive in action, but the intention is to bestow.