the created, the seen. It also helps us to appreciate that the seen universe is within the unseen and was given life from the unseen, original essence that is pre-Creation God. We may think of it as the womb of our Mother’s mind.
What were some of the initial expressions of the infinite, universal mind of pre-Creation God? Well, at one moment there arose the will to create. This is the Divine Will motivated to create. Therefore, two of Unseen God’s qualities are Will and the Creative Forces.
The Kabbalah teaches that God had to make room for the Creation, so a portion of the pre-Creation Creator retreated into an unknowable, unreachable “place.” After this, the Creation exploded! The big bang of Life burst forth. And Kabbalah helps us understand the initial energies and original patterns through the ten emanations that reflect the nature of the invisible, infinite Creator into the visible reality. The emanations are in both the macrocosm and the microcosm. They are within us and flow through us. They are seen in the outer reality in a reflective manner, allowing us to intuit their unseen nature. And, best of all, we can awaken to them and use them to illuminate and energize our bodies, minds, and souls.
Living out here in the seen creation, we would be wiser and stronger if we opened our hearts and minds to the unseen Creative Forces and harmonized our free will with the flow of the Creator’s will.
Creation, in Kabbalah, is explained in this mystical manner: within the unbounded womb of “Infinite Nothingness,” that which is the essence of “Infinite Something” moved, expressing itself in a burst of “Light Without Limit.” This light is both consciousness and luminescence.
“Infinite Nothingness” is Ein (also spelled En and Ayn) and is comparable to Gnosticism’s “the Depth” and “Non–Being God” (ouk on theos) as well as “Unknown God” (hagnostos theos). “Infinite Something” is Ein Sof (also spelled Ein Soph, En Soph, and Ayn Sof) and is comparable to Gnosticism’s “Fullness of Being” (bythos pleroma). “Light Without Limit” is Ein Sof Aur, possibly comparable to Gnosticism’s “First Father” (propator).
The Infinite Something emanated ten aspects of itself and twenty-two channels of energy and consciousness. The Infinite’s expression flowed outward to four concentric planes of consciousness: (1) The first is concealed God, the Creator, the Infinite. It is a point in “the deep” (Genesis 1:2) that is everywhere and nowhere. It is unknowable but has emanated ten orbs of its nature, so it may be known by its emanations. These first ten emanations are known as the “Names of God,” each revealing a characteristic of the Ineffable One. This is the Plane of Emanations (Olam Azilut). (2) Around this infinite point is the second plane of consciousness and life, and in it are ten more emanations. These second ten emanations are “The Intelligences,” and are identified with the names of archangels. This is the Plane of Creation (Olam Briah). (3) Next comes the plane of consciousness and life called “The Hierarchies,” of which there are also ten emanations. It is the Plane of Formation (Olam Yetzirah). (4) Finally, we have the fourth plane of consciousness and life, the realms of matter and the material cosmos. It is the Plane of Activity (Olam Asiyah) This last plane is the visible one; all the others are invisible. (See illustration 12. We’ll cover more on these in chapter 4.)
There is a variation on this brief description, which teaches that the Infinite conceived of the Primordial Being first, and subsequently, the Primordial Being (or prototype) conceived all the beings. (See illustration 13.) This is comparable to Gnosticism’s idea that First Father conceived the central Monad (monas), an indivisible oneness that pervades all life, seen and unseen. This Monad is comparable to the Logos, the Word—as the disciple John wrote: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made through this One.” There is a First Source (proarche), which may be compared to Edgar Cayce’s “First Cause.” Humankind (anthropos) came out of the indivisible oneness of the Monad. In Kabbalah, humankind came out of the first being, Adam Kadmon.
We will learn much more about these as we continue our study.
CHAPTER 3 DIVISIONS OF OUR WHOLE BEING
As physical and earthly as we may feel, Kabbalah teaches that our true nature is not physical. We are beings of mind, soul, and spirit that are only temporarily using a physical body and living in a physical realm. And even while we are here, we live a good portion of our incarnate life beyond the body, as on average we sleep one-third of our incarnation. During sleep the nonphysical portion of our being may reach far beyond this plane of existence. Add to this that the death of the body is not the death of our nonphysical self. A major portion of our being survives death. We live on and may even return to incarnate in a new body—or not. According to Kabbalah and many other schools of thought, there is much activity on planes beyond this physical universe that we are so fully invested in.
Not only is a major portion of our being alive beyond sleep and death, it is amazingly active! We will cover more on this in chapter four.
Over the past many years, books have been published recounting hospital near-death testimonials that have contributed to our understanding of life while the body is dead. Of course, the testimonials come from those whose bodies were resuscitated, but the accounts are amazingly similar to one another. The patients each experienced existence outside their dead bodies and saw imagery of loved ones who had died previously as well as realms of light and activity. Then, when the chemistry, electricity, and physical manipulation were sufficient to revive their bodies, they felt themselves drawn back into their bodies and this world, as if traveling rapidly through a long tunnel. Bang! They awoke on the operating or emergency room table with bright lights glaring at them.
Can we imagine this nonphysical aspect of our being? Can we feel our being without a body? If so, then we are aware of our higher nature, and this is much of what Kabbalah is about.
Ancient and modern philosophies and religions acknowledge various components of our whole being; most common is the simple body, mind, and spirit or soul arrangement. The ancient Egyptians identified five distinguishable parts to us, as does Kabbalah, although most teachers focus on the three aspects that are most present with us now.
These divisions are delineations of a oneness for the benefit of understanding and awareness, not a fixed condition. Oneness is the true, eternal condition; division is a temporary measure for the purpose of assisting us. We are whole, but consciousness and energy may be more focused in certain areas at any given time. Certainly, in this realm, the physical is dominant for most people.
The ancient Bereishit Rabbah (“Great Genesis,” a midrash, or homiletic study, section 14:9, on Genesis) speaks of five levels, or qualities, of our being. A problem occurs in that the five Hebrew words for these divisions are all translated in English as the same word: soul. And it does not help that three of the Hebrew terms are similar in their meaning: breath, wind, and breathing. We simply must understand that the distinctions are subtle, because we are talking about a wholeness of being. Even so, the distinctions are helpful to our understanding.
In a wonderful metaphor and using some of the imagery in the Zohar, Kabbalists Shim’on Lavi (1492–1585, an old guy for those times, ninety-three, although Shim’on Lavi may have actually been a father-and-son team by the same name) and Moshe Cordovero (1522–1570) compared these parts of our being to a glassblower, one who creates a beautiful, projected object by blowing through a pipe with molten glass on the end until the glass object is formed and then cuts the object from the pipe so
