Kabbalah Library

153. “Lord, when You went out from Seir, when You marched from the field of Edom, the earth trembled.” When the Creator returned from Seir, who did not accept the Torah, the earth trembled because it wanted to return to chaos, since this was what the Creator stipulated with the world: If they accept the law [Torah], good. If not, I will return the world to chaos.”

Since the earth saw that the Creator invited all the peoples to receive the Torah and they did not receive, and from among all the nations, only Israel remained, the earth thought that Israel, too, would not receive the Torah, as they did. Because of it, the earth trembled. When Israel said, “We will do and we will hear,” it immediately calmed, as it is written, “The earth feared and was still.” First, it feared, and then, it became still.

154. Because Israel said, “We will do,” they did not fear any doing that all the sorcerers of the world could do, or from all the charmers and sorcerers in the world, since when the Creator brought Israel out from Egypt, He broke before them every kind of sorcerer and magician so they would not be able to control them.

At the time when Balak came, he knew this. Promptly, “And he sent messengers to Balaam the son of Beor at Ptorah, which is by the River.” What is Ptorah? He set up a table to seek from there advice what to do. “By the river” should have been written “by two rivers,” since he was from Mesopotamia. What is “by the river”? Certainly, that table of the shell always stands on one river, which is Malchut of the shell. It stands on one river of the shell, which is Yesod of the shell.

155. Rabbi Elazar and Rabbi Aba went to see Rabbi Yosi son of Rabbi Shimon son of Lakunia, Rabbi Elazar’s father-in-law. They arose at midnight to learn Torah. They sat. Rabbi Elazar said, “Now is the time when the Creator enters the Garden of Eden to entertain Himself with the righteous who are there. Rabbi Aba said, “What is that entertainment, and how does He entertain Himself with them?” Rabbi Elazar said, “This matter is a hidden and concealed matter in me, which is not known to all,” and he did not want to reveal it.

Rabbi Aba said to him, “Were the great pillars of before in this world in emptiness, that you say that they did not know that secret and how to discover it? Did they not pursue to know why they were in this world and what they expect in that world? Indeed, they, too, knew that secret, which is why you should reveal it.”