Intro to Quest for Avoda #1 – start here

Outline of class #1. The question: How can we achieve spiritual “enlightenment” when all we have to work with are our [very limited] physical bodies in this material world?

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A question, which turns out to be “THE question”

Is the world actually divided into two realms, the physical and the spiritual, or can we somehow fuse the two for a more fulfilling life? [Spoiler alert: The answer is, "Both."]

Tagged as: kedusha, olam hazeh / habah, shabbat

Defining “Kedusha”

To understand the word “Kedusha” we can look at “keddushei isha,” the marriage ceremony, and how “Holy Matrimony” is created by defining boundaries.

Tagged as: kedusha, separation

Sources [skip-able]

Where does Rebbe get his ideas from? Not the ba’alei mussar, that’s for sure!

Tagged as: moshe rabbeinu, rambam

“God rejoiced” part I

Day 3 of Creation was unique in two ways, and made God remarkably happy.

Tagged as: creation, evil, evolution

“And it was so” – or, it will be, eventually

How can it say “and it was so,” when it wasn’t? Because Creation is a process; a process which continues.

Tagged as: creation, rashi, time

“God rejoiced” part II

Two departures from God’s instructions on Day 3, with two very different results. But you can’t have one without the other.

Tagged as: creation, evil, evolution, rashi, separation

“And it was so” – your journey through time

Creation, Time, Resolution/Denoument, and an analogy to movies

Tagged as: creation, gan eden, olam hazeh / habah, rambam, time

Your perception of reality

“Olamcha tireh bechayecha,” as the gemorah says. That’s how talmidim used to greet each other: “You should see your Olam while you’re still in this olam.”

Tagged as: kedusha, olam hazeh / habah, ramchal, rashi, reality

Mesillat Yesharim: your job in this world

The world as an entranceway to Olam Habah is The Most Childish Way of looking at reality, even though it’s true.

Tagged as: olam hazeh / habah, ramchal

Levels I & II – arbitrary vs. intrinsic meaning

Three things you have to know in this world. Three midrashim, reflecting three levels of understanding. Here are the first two.

Tagged as: olam hazeh / habah, ramchal

Level I: God is a Cosmic Zookeeper

In level 1, it’s like we’re all trained seals, jumping through hoops. And that was the snake’s argument to Eve, back in the Garden of Eden; she was living in a Cosmic Zoo.

Tagged as: gan eden, olam hazeh / habah, ramchal, rashi

Level I – fear for your self

The Rambam says, level 1 is a low level of service, fit only for women and children and simple-folk. That’s serving God out of fear, and not in a good way.

Tagged as: olam hazeh / habah, rambam, ramchal

Level 2 – master craftsmen, not factory workers

“He who prepares on the eve of sabbath, has what to eat on the sabbath.” From a level 2 perspective, we’re all master chefs, creating the dish that is our life.

Tagged as: olam hazeh / habah, ramchal

Level 3 – life is a metaphor

“This world is like the dry land, and the next is like the sea…” In the sea, you’re stripped down to the essential you, the you that continues apart from your metaphors.

Tagged as: olam hazeh / habah, ramchal

Level 3 – differences of scale

In the third level we learn that the same elements that make up your life, the same concepts, exist in both this world and the next – though they may seem vastly different.

Tagged as: olam hazeh / habah, ramchal

You connect to the world with your “da’at”

It’s no co-incidence that kids hit puberty around the time of bar-mitzva. Only after they’re capable of deeper relationships in the physical world, are they even eligible for deeper relationship in the spiritual world.

Tagged as: connection, da'at, rambam

Day 1 – seeing infinity

The first day God created Light. With the Original Light of Creation, you could see from “the beginning of the universe until the end.” All at once, because it was all ONE.

Tagged as: creation, separation

Day 1 was different

Why the cosmic split between the Spiritual/Physical Worlds? It all started on the first day, with the separation of Light, and the HIDING of the Light, to make room for Evil.

Tagged as: creation, rashi, separation

Day 2 – the source of evil, and of metaphor

If Day 1 ALLOWED for evil, Day 2 gave birth to it. God Himself divided the physical and spiritual worlds; but then He gave us a way to re-connect them, by creating metaphor.

Tagged as: creation, evil, reality, separation

Day 2 – separation for the purpose of reconnection

The world began as One World, with no separation. The reason that you need separation is, remarkably, in order to bring the Two Worlds back together again.

Tagged as: connection, creation, rashi, separation

Just a hairsbreadth

The two worlds that we view as totally opposite and antithetical to each other, are separated by nothing! Or rather, by the distance of just a hairsbreadth.

Tagged as: connection, kedusha, separation

Conclusion – the avoda of an adam

Our question is not A question, it’s THE question, because it ends up defining the nature of all of the Avodah /work/service/purpose of a person in this world.

Tagged as: da'at, kedusha, olam hazeh / habah

Quest for Avoda #2 – essential concepts

Trying to crush your flesh with intellect went out with the Flood. Moshe Rabbeinu showed us that life is meant to be lived “bottom-up.”