Kabbalah Library

706. He went in and saw the firmament over the garden, that it was distinct from the firmament that stands over the rest of the people in the world. That firmament is bounded by a boundary and different from all the colors in the world. There are four hollowed windows in it, opened to the four directions of the world, and one in the middle.

707. One window on the east, Tifferet, four windows stand in it, embroidered with the four letters HaVaYaH, which amount to twelve, three letters to each.

The four letters HaVaYaH are three lines and Malchut who receives them. When they are incorporated in each other, there are three lines in each of them, Yod-Hey-Vav, and they are twelve letters.

708. Three times a day, corresponding to three lines, these windows connect, and all the letters connect to the holy name. This is so because when the three lines connect to each other, they make twelve letters, and they all connect in the four letters of the name. One appointee stands to that side, whose name is Yaazriel, with four keys in his hand, with which he opens four gates that are on that firmament, and there is no one who knows them.

709. The exception is on beginnings of months and on Shabbat [Sabbath], when those souls that participate with the body in the grave come to kneel and to bow before those gates before the Master of everything, as it is written, “And it shall come to pass that from one new moon to another, and from one Sabbath to another, all flesh shall come to worship before Me.” “All” includes the souls that dwell with the body in the grave, and are called “all flesh.” This is so because after the death, the spirit and the soul [Ruach and Neshama, respectively] rise up, and the Nefesh [also soul] hovers over the grave, as it is written, “And his soul will mourn over it.”

710. Six windows stand in the window on the south side, Hesed, corresponding to VAK HGT NHY, since Hesed contains all of them. Only those who say the Shema reading with desire and intention each day enter that place.

711. Rabbi Perahia said, “I swear to God, when I looked in that window, that appointee whose name is Anael, who is appointed over the gate in the south side, approached me and said to me, “Stand still,” and he saw that window, that there was no permission to enter there or see in it except for those who read the Shema reading properly.

712. All those who read the Shema reading properly, sixty appointees enter before him and crown him with holy crowns and say, “This is the crown of so and so, who read the Shema reading properly.

713. I asked him and said to him, “Sir, that proper Shema reading, what is it?” He said to me, “Oh, Hassid, it is a very high secret here; there are four portions in the Shema.

714. “The first portion of the unification is two unifications in twelve words, six words in the upper unification, and in the verse ‘Hear O Israel,’ and six words in the other unification, in ‘Blessed be the name of His kingship forever and ever.’ The second portion is ‘And you shall love,’ in which there are forty-two words, which are the meaning of the name of forty-two letters.

715. “The third portion, ‘And it shall come to pass that if you hear,’ that the right is incorporated in the left in it, and the left in the right, which is the incorporation of the two lines HG through the middle line, Tifferet, as in ‘And in the concealment of the holy Merkava [chariot/structure].’ This is so because there are seventy-two words in the portion, ‘And it shall come to pass that if you hear,’ until ‘and you shall place.’

716. “The fourth portion ‘And you shall place,’ is fifty words to the end of the portion, corresponding to the fifty gates of Bina.

“The portion Tzitzit [tassel] consists of all three lines, like the portion ‘And it shall come to pass that if you hear.’ Hence, there are seventy-two words in it, too, corresponding to the name AB in the three verses ‘and journeyed,’ ‘and came,’ ‘and pitched,’ which are three lines. All the words in the portions amount to the number of a person’s organs, which are 248.

717. “All the other places, whether in the commandments of the Torah, or in all the other places in the Torah, the male, ZA, is in himself, and the Nukva, Malchut, is in herself, meaning some of them correspond only to ZA, and some of them correspond only to the Nukva. And in the Shema reading, which is the unification that the Creator is unified in it, the male and Nukva are gathered, ZA and Malchut, as one, and ascend in one measure.

718. “The male, ZA, is completed by the Nukva, Malchut, unlike all other places in the Torah. This is the merit of the upper faith, Malchut, to know, as it is written, ‘that the Lord, He is the God.’ The male is completed through the Nukva, and they are incorporated in each other. The male is built by the Nukva, and this is the complete unification, for there is no wholeness but male and Nukva together.

“This is so because the Nukva is primarily from the left line. Hence, she is completed only in the illumination of Hochma from the left. For this reason, she needs two couplings with ZA. In the first coupling, she receives from him illumination of Hochma from the left, a coupling of VAK of Gadlut. At that time, she is ready for a second coupling, to unite with ZA in covered Hassadim, in the pure air from AVI, a coupling of GAR.

“The male, ZA, is always in Hassadim that are covered from Hochma, VAK without a Rosh, except when he unites with the Nukva, for whom he must bestow Hochma. At that time, he necessarily receives Hochma, at first, and then he is completed in GAR. This is in the first coupling, that he must bestow Hochma to the Nukva. The unification of the Shema reading is the first coupling, to bestow Hochma to the Nukva, at which time ZA is completed in GAR through Malchut.

“With the coupling that is made through the Shema reading, ZA is completed in GAR through the Nukva, for by awakening by her to bestow Hochma upon her, he, too, is incorporated in Hochma and acquires GAR, unlike all the other places in the Torah, since in the rest of the couplings, ZA bestows Hassadim upon her, and then the Nukva is completed from ZA, and ZA is not completed by her. In the unification in the Shema reading, ZA is built in GAR through his unification with the Nukva, and these GAR are only VAK of GAR.

719. Anyone who completes the unification and aims in these portions each day, is rewarded with these hollow windows and will be whole here, and there is no one who can detain him, as long as he reads properly and aims in these high secrets.”

720. He held my right hand and said to me, “Oh, Hassid, come and see the glory of those who unify the holy name properly and read the Shema reading in this manner.”

721. I entered one hall, and there were 365 halls in that hall, as the number of the days of the year. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob rule in that hall, Adam HaRishon is within them.

722. I saw several regiments of souls clothed in the embroidery of the tree of life—and in several Ophanim of the upper glory—entering the hall, and Yofiel, the greatest appointee of all, and the great appointee over the Torah, was with them.

723. He opened and said, “Awaken, holy ones of the world, for your holy sons are unifying the holy name and aim in the desire in the portions of the Shema reading.”

724. I saw that Adam HaRishon was exerting in those who were aiming in the Shema reading, for when the Shema reading that a person reads enters above, it first enters the hall where there are Adam HaRishon and the patriarchs. Adam HaRishon smells the Shema reading, and if one letter from the Shema reading is absent, he does not accept it, since man’s construction is deficient, 248 words with the three words “the Lord your God, true,” which the messengers of the public repeats, which correspond to the 248 organs in man’s structure.

725. If Adam HaRishon finds it proper, he accepts the Shema reading, and Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob take the Shema reading from him and kiss it. Who has ever seen joy, who has ever seen a commotion as it is in all those righteous in the Garden of Eden who come into that joy.

726. At the time when the one whose intention is complete comes to that world, after his passing, who will see his joy, since the patriarchs have him sit with them twice daily, and each day, dew drops on him, abundance from the head of the king.

727. With this dew, with which the appointees in the Shema reading accept him, they know and eat a dish that the high angels eat. They know what happened and what will happen, and what is destined to be until the time when the Creator raises and revives the corrupted bodies in this world, when the Creator resurrects them with a structure that is properly corrected.

728. In the window on the south side, the Shin was inscribed. It is three Vavs, Vav on each side. I asked that man and said, “What are these letters?” He said, “I do not know.”

729. Finally, that appointee came and said to me, “Oh Hassid, these letters are signs of the portions of the Shema reading. Happy is he who says them each day with a willing heart.

“There are six portions in the Shema reading. The first portion, ‘Hear,’ is two portions: ‘Hear,’ and ‘Blessed be the name of His kingship forever and ever.’ Then, there are four portions: ‘And you shall love,’ ‘And it shall come to pass that if you hear,’ until ‘and you shall place,’ and from ‘and you shall place’ to the end of the portion, and the portion ‘Tzitzit,’ thus six portions. In each portion, there are three lines, three Vavs. These letters are signs of the portions of the Shema reading, six portions with three lines in each. This is why their sign is three Vavs.

730. “In the other window, on the north side, there are two windows in it, which are from the incorporation of right and left in it, and five blazing letters glittering inside them. Two letters on the right, and two letters on the left, and one letter above them, hanging over them, and they are five letters in the name Elokim, where Aleph-Lamed are on the right, Yod-Mem are on the left, and Hey is in the middle.

“North is Gevura, Elokim. Since it consists of three lines, the five letters Elokim are divided into three phases: right, left, and middle.

731. “In the window in the north and in the two windows incorporated in it, there are two appointees in that firmament, Tzurtek and Gazriel, who are appointed over that side which does not open.

“In the beginning of the coupling, GAR of Hochma are drawn to Malchut from the left. At that time, she draws near the shell, the letter Kof, to suckle from the GAR of Hochma and draw them from above downward. This is the shape of the leg of the Kof, which is stretched out below the line. At that time, in order for the shell not to draw the Hochma from above downward, she says, ‘the upright love you.’ Then she draws a letter from the MANTZEPACH, which carries the screen of Hirik that diminishes the GAR of Hochma of the left, and unites it with the right, and then the shell runs away.

“When Malchut is in the illumination of the MANTZEPACH, with a screen of Hirik, which diminishes and cancels the GAR of Hochma, the angels who serves before her in that illumination is called Gazriel, with the letters of Gazar El [God decreed], since Gozer means cuts, as in the words, ‘To Him who cut the Red Sea in two,” after cutting the GAR of Hochma of the left in order to chase away the shells, as it is written, ‘the upright love You.’

“Tzurtek and Gazriel are appointed over that side which does not open, meaning in GAR of Hochma of the left, which do not open to shine, but rather appear at the beginning of the coupling and promptly disappear. Only VAK of Hochma are open to shine in the worlds, and these two angels operate in that side which does not open, in GAR of Hochma, since Tzurtek operates in these GAR, when they appear at the beginning of the coupling, and Gazriel operates in these GAR to cut them and cancel them with the screen of Hirik.

732. “There is a hall there, embroidered with several colors and several depictions. All those who sanctify the name of their master by saying each day are there, and after they bless Him and say, ‘Blessed is the blessed Lord forever and ever,’ they then sanctify Him with a triple Kedusha [holiness/sanctity].

733. “That hall is called ‘triangle,’ as it is written, ‘They are the hall of the Lord, the hall of the Lord, the hall of the Lord.’ ‘Triple’ means it is corrected with three lines. That hall is ready for those who never in their entire lives ate on the blood, meaning they did not eat before they prayed for their blood, meaning they did not eat before praying.

734. “Because man’s soul in this world departs from him each night, in the morning she is returned to him and stays in the person’s nose, and does not enter and does not settle herself in his intestines, in the person’s interior until he blesses the Creator and prays for his blood. Then she settles in her place.

735. “It is written about that, ‘Sever yourselves from such a man, whose soul is in his nostrils,’ since the soul descends in the morning to this world, and the Creator tells her, ‘Go and be in the person’s nose on condition that he prays his prayer. If he blesses properly, be within him. If not, she flies and goes up,’ and you find that the person is lacking that holiness of his soul.

736. “And since the soul is missing from him, what makes him count? He counts as nothing, as if he was never in the world. For this reason, it is forbidden for one to bless his friend before he blesses his Master in the beginning of the prayer.

737. “The cantor says, ‘Bless the Lord,’ and he says, ‘Blessed is the blessed Lord forever and ever.’ And once he blesses his Master, from there is the beginning of the prayer to pray. This is why the holy lines, ‘Holy! Holy! Holy!’ that he says in the prayer. Happy are they who bless and sanctify their Master each day with a willing heart.”

738. At that time, I learned that there is no permission to pray the prayer in a ten until the Creator is blessed before everything else. Once they have blessed Him, they pray their prayer.

739. That man said, “Rabbi, that blessing, ‘Blessed is the blessed Lord forever and ever,’ is only to establish praise for their Master, for returning to them their soul, which is called by five names NRNHY. This is why the blessing is in five words [in Hebrew], ‘Blessed be the blessed Lord forever and ever.’ On that blessing there is the prayer, and there is holiness only on a blessing, in order to strengthen their master from the right and from the left. For this reason, this blessing and that Kedusha [holiness, part of the prayer] are only in ten people.

740. “That hall is on the north side, since in that hall, all the evil sides surrender, which are drawn from the left side, north, so they do not rule over the world.

741. “The window on the north side is called the ‘window of Noga.’ There is no permission to look in it except for those whose dwelling place is there, who see everything and look, and can look. All those who are there, walk with clothes and forms of this world.”

742. There I saw many of the friends, but I was not given permission to approach them. They all know each other and eat the food of the high knights.

743. That firmament journeys each day to the four directions of the world. When it journeys, it drips the dew of life into the garden, and all the righteous who are there in the garden come and bathe in the dew, and shine like the brightness of the firmament, and enter before the Messiah King, and before the patriarchs, and before Adam HaRishon.

744. The window on the west side is different from all the other windows in colors and in lights. They are bounded by the four letters of the holy name, which gleam and glitter on that window. At times, they are revealed, and at times concealed. Elsewhere, he showed me sects of righteous whose degree is higher than everyone.