RABBI ABA AND YOSI
“As the Zohar portrays him at the start of this chapter, Yosi really wants to be a magician rather than a Kabbalist. Magic, according to Kabbalah, is a formidable power. It differs from true spirituality less in terms of what it can accomplish than in the ego driven intention that lies behind it.
“Magic is always about getting something rather than giving anything. It is the mirror image of spirituality, and like a real image in a mirror, it shrinks and reverses the subject. It should come as no surprise that Egypt was the center of magical practices in the biblical world, for in the Bible Egypt is portrayed is it unrelentingly materialist society.
“It is also true, however, that ‘Egypt’ is an internal state of being that we must pass through to achieve freedom and transformation. This is what we witness in Yosi. He is by no means an evil person, but simply a spiritually undeveloped one. The experience he goes to is the same maturation process that each of us faces individually, and that all humanity must also confront. Materialism is not unequivocally bad. It is like any childishly destructive behavior. It can be expected and understood as a stage toward higher development.”
-Commentary on the Zohar Vol. 3, pp. 152-154 by Rav P. S. Berg (The Essential Zohar)
