(1) Five Levels in the Partition

(2) Up to this point, we have clarified the first three principles of the wisdom of Kabbala. The first is the concept of light and vessel, how the light is drawn directly from the Creator’s essence, while the vessel is comprised of the will to receive that is necessarily encompassed by that light. Commensurate with the measure of this will to receive that was created ex nihilo, an entity emerges from the Emanator as an emanated entity. This will to receive is the Malkhut that is discerned in the supernal light. This is why Malkhut is called shemo, His name, in accordance with the mystical meaning of “He is one and His name is one,” as shemo has the same numerical value as the word for “will,” ratzon.

(3) The second principle is the explanation of the ten sefirot and the four worlds of Atzilut (Emanation), Beria (Creation), Yetzira (Formation), and Asiya (Actualization), which are four levels, one below the other, through which the will to receive must devolve until the vessel is established properly as an entity in itself.

(4) The third principle is the constriction (tzimtzum) and the partition that was formed upon this receiving vessel, which is the fourth level. This fourth level was then replaced by new receiving vessels in the form of ten sefirot called the returning light.

(5) You should understand and thoroughly review these three principles, as well as their explanations as described above, for without them there is no comprehending even a single word of this wisdom.

(1) Now we will clarify five levels that are in the partition, on the basis of which the shiurei koma (literally, “dimensions of height”) change during the fusion through collision between the partition and the supernal light. One must first thoroughly understand that although after the constriction (tzimtzum) the fourth level was disqualified from serving as a receiving vessel for the ten sefirot of the supernal light, and the returning light that rises from the partition by means of the fusion through collision became a receiving vessel in order to receive the supernal light in its stead, the fourth level must nevertheless, with its power of receiving, accompany the returning light. Otherwise, the returning light would not be fit to serve as a receiving vessel.

(2) You can understand this, too, through the aforementioned parable in section #15#. We proved there that the force of the guest’s rejection and refusal to accept a meal became a receiving vessel instead of the hunger and appetite. The hunger and appetite, which are the usual receiving vessel for eating, were disqualified here from being a receiving vessel on account of the shame and degradation the person felt at receiving a gift from his friend, and only the powers of rejection and refusal became receiving vessels in their place, because as a result of the rejection and refusal, the receiving was transformed into giving once the guest realized that he would be doing the host a favor by accepting the meal, and through them the person attained appropriate receiving vessels for accepting his friend’s meal.

(3) However, it cannot be said that now he no longer needs the usual receiving vessels, which are hunger and appetite, as it is clear that without an appetite for eating, he will be unable to fulfill his friend’s wishes and give him the satisfaction of eating with him. Rather, what happens is that the hunger and appetite, which were disqualified in their normative form, have now been altered, due to the force of the rejection and refusal, and have received a new form: receiving in order to give. Through this, the degradation is transformed into honor. Thus, the usual receiving vessels still function now as they always did, only they have received a new form.

(4) You can apply the same idea to the matter at hand. It is true that the fourth level was disqualified from serving as a receiving vessel for the ten sefirot of the supernal light due to the opacity (ovyut) within it, meaning the contrast in form as a receiver in comparison to the Giver, which separates it from the Giver, as stated above. However, through the establishment of the partition in the fourth level, which collides with the supernal light and rebuffs it, the fourth level’s previous, disqualified form was altered, and it received a new form, which is called “returning light,” similar to the alteration of the receiving form into the giving form in the aforementioned parable. The contents of the first form did not change there; also now the person will not eat without an appetite. Here too all the opacity, which is the power to receive, that was in the fourth level was altered and entered the returning light, and thus the returning light was made fit to be a receiving vessel. Understand this well.

(5) Accordingly, one must always distinguish between two forces in the partition:

(6) The first is hardness (kashyut), which constitutes the force of rejection inherent to it to be able to rebuff the supernal light.

(7) The second is opacity (ovyut), which is the measure of the will to receive that is incorporated within the partition from the fourth level. By means of the fusion through collision as a result of the force of hardness that the partition contains, the opacity is purified. That is, there is the transformation of receiving into giving.

(8) These two forces in the partition operate at five levels, which are the four aforementioned levels of Ḥokhma, Bina, Tiferet, and Malkhut and their root, which is called Keter, each level representing a different measure of will to receive.