He Is Everywhere. So Where Am I?

Baal HaSulam, “The Freedom”: Thus, we are at the hands of these four factors, as clay in the hands of a potter.

We are surrounded by the influence from Above from all sides. The Creator rules over us in a very harsh and absolute manner as He controls all the channels, both internal and external, in our desires, thoughts, habits, and nature. We have nothing that is ours, and even the words I am saying now are arranged by Him.

So what is our free will? After all, we cannot attribute freedom to any object, action, thought, or the smallest particle of the desire to receive. The Creator created it, He influences it absolutely, so what can be free in it?

People have come up with theories about two authorities and polytheism, about which Baal HaSulam writes in his article “The Peace.” It is hard to agree that there is only one authority that “covers” everything. If the Creator is unified, if there is none else besides Him, if everything depends on Him, then I am under His absolute control, and it is as if I don’t exist, but rather dissolve in Him. So it is preferable to have two authorities: a good one and a bad one. This is understandable; in between them there is room for me, and I can affect things.

Still, at some point I realize that behind everything that affects me there is one Source. It isn’t an image that we can picture, but a mind, a feeling, something unified. I only have to discover the reason why it affects me, what it wants from me? What I should become according to its influence?

By knowing what He wants from me, I will know Him. What for? Is it just to make an acquaintance or in order to fulfill His desire?

What was His intent in creating me? What does He want by managing me this way? If He only wants me to obey Him, then it’s better not to know anything, but to simply act according to the instructions I have received. But if He really wants me to attain, to reveal Him, then I have to do everything to attain this goal and not to act automatically.

So there is a lot of work a person has to do regarding the initial cause of everything. This is our only work: to constantly sharpen and “polish” our attitude to Him. Who is He? What does He want from me? Why did He make me react this way? I constantly climb the levels of my attitude and clarify what He wants to give me by putting demands to me. What He wants is that thanks to bestowal upon Him, I will understand Him.

I continue this chain and constantly raise the level of His demands to me. Thus I have to justify the evil just like the good since they both come from one source. I have to understand why He splits His bestowal into two—thanks to this I will be able to check myself, to adjust my course. For Him this duality doesn’t exist, but my reality is divided into bestowal and reception.

Eventually, we must constantly reveal the concept of Unified, and not more than that. If I paid attention to that, I would see that there is nothing else in my life. Even in the corporeal world everything comes down to this clarification that discovers unity and reveals the Creator.
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From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 12/22/2011, “The Freedom”