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Joseph Draws
Down Divine Intuition for the Entire Jewish People The three patriarchs
Abraham, Isaac
and Jacob are referred to
as the Divine chariot.
Their relation to God is a passive one. The
patriarchs are
so in tune with Godliness that they are merely a vehicle by which God is revealed. They automatically carry
out God’s
will because they
nullify themselves to God’s will, as explained at length in Tanya. In
a certain sense, this level is above that of prophecy, it is total nullification
of self to
God, and they
thereby become a pure vehicle, a
channel, of God’s expression. The next two are Moses and Aaron, they are the two
greatest prophets. The greatest prophet of all is Moses; the prophecy
of Aaron is the
spiritual origin
of the prophecy of all the other prophets of Israel. Although
Moses’ prophecy
is unique,
“he prophesied with the word ‘zeh’ whilst all other prophets prophesy with
the word ‘coh,’” yet the word “coh” is the first
word of the Priestly Blessing, “coh tevarchu....” From this we learn that the
blessing of the Cohanim, the priests, is actually the source of prophecy of all other
prophets. Even
the word “Cohen” itself begins with “coh.” Thus, Moses and
Aaron are the
two origins of prophecy. A differentiation
made in Kabbalah
between prophecy and “ruach hakodesh” (lit. “Divine
Spirit.”) Ruach
hakodesh is
Divine
intuition.
Someone with ruach hakodesh does not hear God’s voice explicitly
telling him to do something or to convey God’s explict words to others. Ruach
hakodesh is rather a spontaneous sense of knowing what to do
next. It is a
wellspring from within that tells you that you are definitely in
tune with God. This is not the level of being a “vehicle,” rather it is true, holy
intuition. The Ba’al Shem Tov says that a righteous person
who has ruach
hakodesh, does not initially know exactly what to do
with it, or how much he can rely upon it. But he gradually learns through experience how much he can rely on
his intuition in
life situations. In other words, he learns from his
experience how
much is really Divine intuition. The soul of Joseph is that which draws Divine
intuition for
all Jewish souls from the wellsprings of Divinity. The soul who receives it is
one who experiences
a state of complete selflessness, feeling that he is worth nothing and
possesses nothing, like an empty vessel. This is King David who
receives this Divine intuition through his connection to the
righteous person,
who draws it
out and passes it on to him. The connection between these two can also
be likened to male and female, a bride and groom. The one who is the fountain
who draws out water is the concept of yesod, the male, throughout
Kabbalah. Through his great experience, Joseph was able to rely upon his intuitions and he was able to
interpret dreams. First he had his own dreams and his
intuition expressed
itself primarily in dream interpretation. However, he was gradually able to know that the
ideas that he received from his inner wellspring were true, and he
noted that by expressing the idea verbally it was realized in practice. When a person who
has Divine
intuition, expresses
the idea verbally, he actually makes it come true. The power of the righteous
person is that God even carries out what he decrees. The Zohar relates that when Joseph interpreted
the dreams of the two prisoners imprisoned with him, telling Pharaoh’s chief
wine-pourer
that he will live and the chief baker that he will be hanged, his interpretation
made it happen! He did not merely interpret the dreams objectively, he had the subjective power to
actually decree, in other words, his interpretation was a
decree. Thus, Joseph was inspired and had
intuition, but he also had the power to make a decree that
would come true. This is the power of yesod,
of the rectified covenant. The “ruach
hakodesh” that King David had was of a different
type. His primary ruach
hakodesh was Divine inspiration to truly express his soul, to pray, the ruach
hakodesh of
prayer. For instance, when a person sincerely
prays to God
from the depth of his heart, this is an expression of ruach hakodesh. When a God fearing person without this talent prays for something that
he believes he needs, then God may give him exactly what he prays for. However, once
he has received that which he prayed for, he may discover that he actually
did not need it at all and he must cry out to God once more. God then listens
and saves him from the results of his own prayers. This is an interpretation
of the verse in Psalms, “He will carry out the will of those who fear Him,
and answer their cry and will save them.” The Godfearing person receives what he
wants but it places
him in a very bad
position and then he cries out to God to save him from what he
himself asked for because he did not have the correct inspiration. Thus, King David had a different type of Divine inspiration from that
of Joseph; he had the Divine inspiration to pray and to compose music. To summarize, we stated
that there are various levels of connection to God. There is complete
self-nullification such as that of the three forefathers, there is prophecy
such as that of Moses and Aharon and there are two types of ruach hakodesh,
that of Joseph, Divine intuition and that of David, Divine inspiration. All of these levels
are holy, that is to say separate, different from normative human
psychology. What we are now in need of, this year and this
millennium and in order to bring the Messiah, is to connect to the
level of Joseph,
for he is
the one who
draws down
ruach hakodesh for the Jewish nation. This can
only come into effect if we rectify the power of yesod, the power of
the covenant. Copyright ©2003 Torah Science
Foundation - All Rights
Reserved |
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