How Creation Evolves from Above Downward in Order for Us to Attain It from Below Upward
The purpose of creation is to benefit His creations. The Creator sees this goal in terms of “the end of the act is in the initial thought,” i.e. benefit can only be in the situation where the creation reaches the level of the Creator: unification with Him and resemblance to Him. Therefore, we need to see how the Creator acts toward the creation in order to bring it to that state.
On one hand, the creation needs to be opposite to the Creator in order to feel itself as a creation. On the other hand, it needs to be like the Creator in order to feel the abundance in creation. The inclusion of two opposites is the essence of creation. The more the creation progresses from the initial point that the Creator created until the end of its correction, it always traverses two lines—right and left—which become increasingly remote from one another. The creation needs to constantly complement these two lines. It needs to relate them to the Creator and sanctify them, i.e. that the right and left lines establish the creation properly in relation to the Creator.
Therefore, the creation undergoes different states, and we start seeing, learning and understanding the system that becomes established in order to bring the creation to the goal, where it will resemble the Creator from an opposite form to the Creator. As such, we learn that the Tzimtzum (restriction) took place, and after the Tzimtzum, a Masach (screen) was made. The Masach decides, from previous discernments, that it wants to resemble the Creator, and resembling the Creator means being above the creation’s own nature—the will to receive for itself—and having a need to attain the Creator’s quality of bestowal. The creation is only a will to receive, so we speak about a will to receive that aims to bestow.
We then start seeing how these two conditions start emerging from Malchut of Ein Sof, and how they become established, one against the other, where the will to receive in Malchut of Ein Sof diminishes, and accordingly, the will to bestow in Malchut of Ein Sof also diminishes, and they both reach a state where they have neither a spiritual will to receive nor a spiritual will to bestow, but something completely detached from the Creator: the desire in this world.
Afterward, an opposite process occurs: an ascent from this world, the augmentation of the desire of the creation and of the Creator, which both rise to Malchut of Ein Sof. That process works according to the efforts of the creation. In the middle, there is the person, who is considered “a unique system” or “soul.” The person connects the positive and negative forces and then constructs himself upon them. By doing so, the person returns to Ein Sof: complete identification with the Creator.
Therefore, in the study of the “Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah (Pticha)”, we learn the above downward process, and perhaps we'll also undergo the below upward process.
Based on the opening words of Kabbalist Dr. Michael Laitman in the lesson "Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah (Pticha)" on June 16, 2019. Watch Video | Listen Audio
