Chapter 5
Everything (Even a Traffic Jam) Is for the Best
In This Chapter
Sorting out the idea that everything is for the best
Knowing what to say and when
Seeing things through the Kabbalistic lens
Participating in the repairing of the world
Students of Kabbalah often find one important assumption — that everything happens for the best — to be the most difficult to grasp. Some people never get past it and drop out of Kabbalah study as a result.
The idea that everything happens for the best sounds outrageous given all the horrific scenes on the news and family tragedies that occur every day. It doesn’t take long to formulate a great resistance to such an outrageous comment. However, this statement is one of the keys of Kabbalah.
In this chapter, I explain the basic Kabbalistic mindset that leads to the view that everything that happens is for the best, and I discuss suggestions to help accustom you to see life in this way.
How Can Everything Possibly Be for the Best?
Everything is for the best? Even the Holocaust? Even the death of an innocent child? You may be thinking, “If this is Kabbalah, I want nothing of it! It’s nuts!”
One Kabbalist teaches that Kabbalah needs to be “chewed on.” He makes the analogy that a baby eats liquid food and often resists the transition to solid food because he or she is forced to start chewing, and that’s more difficult. But fortunately, babies learn that mastering the art of chewing food brings great benefit. Similarly, chewing on an outrageous statement such as “Everything is for the best” is tough, but it just may bring some insight and spiritual reward that doesn’t show itself at first glance.
So what does it mean when the Kabbalistic sages say that everything is for the best?
Understanding how magic tricks work is a great metaphor for addressing this question. Imagine that a magician shows his hat to the audience, and it’s empty. After “proving” to the audience that there’s nothing in his hat, he reaches in and pulls out a rabbit. Needless to say, the stage magician didn’t actually produce a rabbit out of nothing, but it appears that way to the audience because they don’t see everything.
Perhaps the hat had a secret compartment that fooled the eye into thinking that the hat was entirely empty. Perhaps the rabbit was up the magician’s sleeve and he dropped it into the hat as he reached in and grabbed it. Or perhaps what he took out of the hat looked like a rabbit but was actually a cleverly disguised device that could fold up into the hat as if it weren’t there and then inflate as the magician revealed it to the audience.
Many theories can explain how it appears that a magician produces a rabbit out of nothing, but whatever the real reason, one thing is clear: The audience doesn’t see everything.
The basic assumption of the Kabbalist is that humans only have a limited capacity to see the whole of existence. That’s why there are so many unsolvable questions in the world. Kabbalists know that a paradox is one sign that they’re going along the right path, and one of the primary paradoxes for the Kabbalist is understanding that the universe is beyond human understanding and that acknowledging this fact actually increases one’s understanding.
A contemporary Kabbalist teaches that news of a knife being stuck into someone sounds horrible until you discover that the knife was in the hands of a surgeon and was being used to help cure a patient. The assumption of the Kabbalist is that even the horrible moments of life are steps in the direction of a future that will make all the suffering justified.
Getting the Words Right: Gam Zu L’Tovah
Gam zu l’tovah (gahm zoo leh-toe -vah; this too is for the best) is an Aramaic expression taught by Rabbi Akiva, a great Kabbalist who lived almost 2,000 years ago. Kabbalists have used this phrase for many centuries to express the idea that everything is for the best. This short expression contains an entire spiritual worldview that basically expresses the Kabbalistic assumption that God knows what’s happening and why, and that all that happens will work out just fine. It’s not an expression that you say lightly, and there are some important restrictions on its use. But this brief Aramaic saying sums up a philosophy of life based on faith in the eternal wisdom of God.
When bad is actually good
For centuries, Kabbalists have shared important stories that express the view that things that seem bad can, from a more complete perspective, actually be good.
Rabbi Akiva looks for lodging
For centuries, the following story has served as a reminder to Kabbalists that they don’t see or understand everything and that one of the sacred tasks in life is to constantly reframe their experiences to allow into their minds and hearts the possibility of a larger picture beyond human understanding.
While traveling, the great Kabbalist Rabbi Akiva found himself in a town one evening, and he inquired at the inn for a place to stay. When he was told that there was no room for him, he said, “Gam zu l’tovah, this is for the best.” He inquired elsewhere in the neighborhood, and each time that he was told that there was no room for him, he responded, “Gam zu l’tovah, this is for the best.”
Rabbi Akiva went to the woods on the outskirts of the town and set up a little camp for himself for the night. In the middle of the night, a wind blew out his candle, to which Rabbi Akiva responded, “Gam zu l’tovah, this is for the best.” A cat came along and killed the rooster that the rabbi had with him. Rabbi Akiva reacted by saying, “Gam zu l’tovah, this is for the best.” Then a wild beast came by and killed his donkey, and once again Rabbi Akiva said, “This is for the best.”
The next morning, when he awoke and went back into the town, he discovered that the inn and the other places where he had looked for lodging had been attacked by a band of robbers who caused physical damage to both property and people.
If any of those places of lodging had accepted Rabbi Akiva the night before, he probably would have been a victim as well. If his candle hadn’t blown out, his rooster not been killed by the cat, and his donkey not been eaten by the wild beast, he may have been detected in the woods and victimized by the robbers.
Rabbi Eliezer and Elijah the Prophet
Many times in the Talmud, Kabbalists learn that some of the great Rabbinic sages prayed with the desire to speak to Elijah the Prophet, who subsequently often appeared to them. The following story illustrates the idea that everything is for the best, even though it often doesn’t seem that way. Sometimes, all that you need is a little more information, and you can turn the incident inside out and draw a very different conclusion.
One day, Rabbi Eliezer prayed to the Almighty for a vision of Elijah. Elijah the Prophet appeared before Rabbi Eliezer and said to him, “What can I do for you?” Rabbi Eliezer said, “I’d like to follow you around. I’d like to watch you do your work, your work for the Holy One, Blessed be He, in the world. I just want to follow you around and watch you do your work.”
Elijah the Prophet said to Rabbi Eliezer, “Sorry, you can’t follow me around. You’ll have too many questions, and I don’t have time for your questions.” Rabbi Eliezer responded, “I promise I won’t ask any questions. Will you allow me the honor of watching you do your work?” Elijah the Prophet agreed to that condition, and off they went.
That night, the two were looking for lodging and saw a dilapidated shack. They approached the shack and discovered a young, poor couple, impoverished and owning little else besides one cow, living there. Elijah the Prophet and Rabbi Eliezer approached the couple and asked them for lodging, and the young couple greeted them warmly, welcomed them in, and gathered some straw to make the two strangers as comfortable as possible. They offered their guests whatever they had, and Rabbi Eliezer and Elijah the Prophet spent the night.
When he awoke the next morning, Rabbi Eliezer overheard Elijah the Prophet praying to the Almighty, asking that the Almighty kill the cow. No sooner had Elijah the Prophet expressed this prayer than the cow suddenly died.
Rabbi Eliezer was outraged and said to Elijah, “What did you do? Why did you ask the Almighty to take the life of the cow? They were such lovely people. They have next to nothing. Why did you take their cow?” Elijah the Prophet looked at Rabbi Eliezer and said, “See, you have so many questions. You have too many questions. I don’t have time for your questions.” Rabbi Eliezer, though confused, quickly responded, “Please forgive me. I want to follow you. I won’t ask you any more questions.” Elijah gave him another chance, and off they went.
The next evening they were looking for lodging and arrived at a big mansion. They knocked on the door, and the owner of the mansion came out, greeted them coldly, and agreed that they could stay down in his cellar. He offered them no human warmth, no physical warmth, and no food, and down to the cellar they went. During the night, Rabbi Eliezer awoke upon hearing a commotion. He watched as Elijah the Prophet patched up an area of the cellar wall that was unfinished and crumbling.
The next day, they continued traveling and arrived at a synagogue of wealthy congregants. The pews were made of gold and silver, and the people in the synagogue were cold and unfriendly. When Elijah the Prophet and Rabbi Eliezer entered the synagogue, nobody greeted them, and nobody performed the mitzvah of welcoming guests. In fact, they noticed people whispering about them behind their backs. Before they left the synagogue, Elijah the Prophet looked at the congregation and said, “I pray that you should all become leaders.”
They entered a neighborhood that was impoverished. The people were living in squalor, but they were very lovely, sweet, warm, gentle people. Elijah the Prophet looked at this neighborhood, looked at these people, and said, “I want to bless you that one of you should be a leader.”
It was at this point that Rabbi Eliezer couldn’t hold his questions in any longer. He said to Elijah the Prophet, “I know that you’re going to send me away. I know that you required me not to ask questions, but I beg you, please, can you give me some understanding of what you’ve been doing? I don’t understand anything that you’re doing. I beg you. Can you offer me some kind of explanation?”
Elijah the Prophet looked at Rabbi Eliezer and said, “I’ll offer you some explanation, but then you’ll have to leave. Remember the first night when we encountered that lovely yet poor couple living in their shack with their cow? And remember how outraged you were the next morning when you heard me praying to the Holy One, Blessed is He, that he should kill the cow? What you didn’t know was that it was time for the wife to die. But I pleaded with Hashem: Don’t take the wife, take the cow.”
Elijah said, “You recall the next night when we were put in that rich man’s cold cellar? And you woke up puzzled when you saw that I was repairing his walls and fixing them up beautifully? I wasn’t doing that. I knew that there was a treasure buried within the walls. The man who owned that mansion didn’t deserve the mansion, let alone the treasure buried in the walls, so I patched and finished up the walls nicely so that no one would ever discover that treasure.”
Elijah the Prophet went on. “Remember the next day, when we went to that synagogue that was so wealthy, with gold and silver pews, but all the people were so unfriendly? I noticed how confused you were when you thought that I’d offered them some big blessing by saying that they all should become great leaders. That wasn’t a blessing; it was a curse. Anyone who has ever been in an organization knows the chaos that results from everyone thinking that he or she is a leader. I prayed that they all should become leaders. And then we went to that poor neighborhood, and the people were so sweet and so lovely, and you wondered, in comparison to the earlier so-called ‘blessing,’ why I would just say, ‘I bless you that one of you should be a leader.’ You see, that indeed was a blessing. All that neighborhood really needed was one good, strong leader who could take the people out of the poverty and squalor that they lived in.”
Elijah the Prophet then said to Rabbi Eliezer, “Yes, you have to leave now, but please don’t forget that what you see in the world is not the whole picture. It’s only part of the grand picture in the mind of the Almighty.”
A 20th-century Kabbalist who found good in everything
One of the characteristics of a Kabbalist is his or her ability to see good within everything. One of my favorite stories related to this idea has to do with Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook, the first Chief Rabbi of Palestine during the British mandate. Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook, more commonly known as Rav Kook, was a brilliant scholar, a great mystic, and a renowned Kabbalist.
When he was appointed to be the first Chief Rabbi, Rav Kook had many critics, and many people protested his appointment. Rav Kook responded to his critics by saying that they were right. He said that there were so many people in the world and so many scholars in the holy city of Jerusalem who were greater than he was. He expressed his situation with an analogy of shoes that are too big. He said that the shoes of the Chief Rabbi position were bigger than he could fill and therefore he needed to fill them with straw. As he explained, when straw is put into shoes to fill them out, the hard and sharp edges of the straw often irritate the feet. Rav Kook concluded that his critics who believed that he wasn’t qualified to be Chief Rabbi were like straw in big shoes; just as the actual straw is irritating, the critics of Rav Kook were irritants to him. But they were necessary for him to be able to fill the shoes that he was asked to wear.
In other words, Rav Kook looked at the situation and found something positive and good in his harsh critics. He reframed the situation in a way that revealed the positive side of what was otherwise negative.
An important rule about saying “Everything is for the best”
The Kabbalistic sages certainly encourage Kabbalists to adopt the view that everything in life is for the best and express that view by saying “Gam zu l’tovah.” However, the sages also insist that Kabbalists never express that phrase to others; you should only say to yourself. Kabbalists are forbidden by tradition and the basis of human compassion to say “Gam zu l’tovah” to a suffering person. Even if a person is a Kabbalist or simply a person with deep faith in God, the compassionate thing to do is to resist saying that everything is for the best.
For example, if a friend falls and hurts his knee, I don’t say to him, “Gam zu l’tovah, everything is for the best.” Rather, upon seeing someone who has fallen and gotten hurt, I do what I can to help my friend and relieve his pain and suffering. But if I fall and hurt my own knee, I have the right and, in fact, the obligation to take all the suffering of my own life and use it for the best.
When I fall and hurt my knee, saying “Gam zu l’tovah” is appropriate because the fall may very well be a warning from God that I need to be careful and slow down before a much larger and more devastating accident happens. The small scrapes and bruises of life actually can be used for the positive, but although a Kabbalist tries to see things for the best, he doesn’t say that to a suffering person.
An exception to the rule of not saying “Gam zu l’tovah” to others is made if the person who’s suffering is a deep friend. Rather than cultivate lots of friends, the sages advise that each person should invest in one good, deep friendship. Two people who are friends on the deepest and most trusting levels are permitted and even encouraged to remind each other that this is the Almighty’s universe and that indeed everything is for the best.
The great sages referred to the error of saying “Gam zu l’tovah” to others who are suffering as “the sins of the friends of Job” because in the biblical book of Job, Job suffers and his friends say to him, “Don’t you have faith that everything is from God?”
Don’t Confuse Acceptance with Passivity
Belief that everything happens for the best, faith, trust in God, clinging to God, belief in God’s individual supervision of every detail of the world, and other related notions and concepts don’t mean that the Kabbalist is a passive participant in life’s drama. Faith and trust in God for the Kabbalist doesn’t prompt passivity or an inactive attitude.
Social action: The Kabbalist doesn’t look at the ills of the world and say, “Since I believe that God supervises everything, I need to leave everything just as it is.” Rather, the Kabbalist believes that his or her desire to repair the world is part of God’s intention.
Fairness in business: A Kabbalist doesn’t believe that “whatever happens, happens” or that anything that one can get away with is obviously what God has allowed to happen. Rather, Kabbalists spend a lifetime studying, and part of that study is the study of business ethics and the fair treatment of others.
Animal rights: Kabbalistic tradition has strict laws about the imperativeness of treating animals as kindly as possible, relieving their suffering, and taking steps to help animals avoid any unnecessary suffering.
Rights and responsibilities in marriage: Kabbalists set high standards for this area of human experience. Marriage isn’t simply a union between two people in love. Jewish law, which is the law that Kabbalists spend a lifetime studying, is quite concerned about the rights of both husband and wife. Couples fully explore these rights and agree to hold up their individual ends of responsibility before the Kabbalistic marriage ceremony takes place.
In so many aspects of life, Kabbalists walk an interesting path between trust in God and His supervision of the world on the one hand and the active pursuit of ethical behavior and the repairing of the world on the other. These two extremes aren’t a contradiction but rather a profound paradox within which the Kabbalist lives his or her life.
Training Oneself to See Like a Kabbalist
One of the most important things that a Kabbalist does (and something that he or she is actually doing constantly but that nobody sees) is inner activity. Inner activity refers to the constant training to perceive all of life and all of existence as created by God and, therefore, for the best. As the great Kabbalist known as the Baal Shem Tov is known to have said, “Not even a single blade of grass moves without God allowing it to happen.”
To be a Kabbalist is to be a reframer, to take a situation and cultivate the view that everything to do with that situation is for the best. For example, if I’m stuck in traffic, perhaps the traffic jam is preventing me from being involved in an accident farther down the road. If I have a cold and need to stay in bed for a day or two, the recovery may be strengthening my immune system so that I’m better able to fight an upcoming illness. Or the cold itself may be keeping me home to avoid some other unforeseen stumbling block.
Kabbalists learn and meditate on a number of key concepts, which I explain in this section, throughout their lives. Each concept overlaps or is connected with another, and taken together, they form the core theology of Kabbalah. But the terms that I explain in this section are more than abstract philosophical concepts. Kabbalists constantly remind themselves of these concepts (every day and throughout life) and ultimately use them as strategies for understanding their lives and the world.
Having faith
Emunah (eh-moo -nah; faith) is a broad and general term implying that a person, at the core of his or her being, believes in the existence of God.
A blessing for bad news
The great sages invented formulas for saying different blessings over the many joys of life. For example, there are blessings to say before enjoying food and a blessing to say upon all kinds of enjoyments and pleasures. But there’s also a blessing to say when hearing of bad news: Baruch Dayan HaEmet (bah-rukh dah-yahn hah-em-et; blessed is the true judge). This blessing implies that, from a human vantage point, the event may look and sound sad (and indeed is), but from God’s vantage point, something else is going on that humans simply can’t see.
The foundation of all foundations, and the pillar of all wisdom is to know that there is God who brought into being all of existence. All the beings of the heavens, and earth, and what is between them came into existence only from the truth of God’s being.
This primary idea is that out of which everything else grows — that God existed before existence, that God created existence, and that God is the center of all existence. The importance of getting the primary idea (a fundamental belief in God) right is much like the exactness of launching a rocket ship to the moon; if the rocket’s aim is off just a little bit here on earth, by the time it gets to the vicinity of the moon, the rocket will be a tremendous distance away from its target.
Emunah implies two things:
Faith in God
Honesty and integrity in one’s relations with others
Faith also implies a belief in the divine ownership of the world. Reminding oneself that this is God’s world is an expression of faith, and therefore, those who are conscientious about treating the earth in a healthy way are expressing their faith. The Kabbalist’s faith that the world is God’s leads to a desire to treat the natural world with respect. Loving behavior toward others reflects the same kind of faith. If each human being is a creation of God, then treating others appropriately is an acknowledgment of the creator.
Being certain that God is perfect
Bitachon (bih-tah-khone; security, trust, confidence) is an aspect of the broader concept of faith and signifies the deepest certainty that God knows what He is doing, that God is perfect, that nothing happens without God allowing it to happen, and that the Kabbalist has confidence in God’s infinite wisdom.
Kabbalists connect the notion of bitachon with the sefirah of Netzach, which I explain in detail in Chapter 4. It has been observed that Netzach, the urge to get things done, is related to bitachon because when someone is actively expressing confidence in God, he or she gets the sense that each person has a mission in life and must actively pursue that mission in order to manifest what God wants. In a sense, bitachon as confidence reflects both a confidence in God and a confidence in one’s own ability to find oneself and express oneself in the way that God intended.
Many books on the subject of faith and related concepts remind Kabbalists that faith and trust is really a form of service to God. The Kabbalist actively trusts in God and, through that trust, believes that his or her soul is transformed and purified. Profound trust in God opens the Kabbalist up to godliness and holiness.
Attaching yourself to God (and never letting go)
In the Christian world, the term is “communion.” For the Kabbalist, it’s d’veykut (dih-vey-koot; clinging), which is a similar uniting with the Holy One and not letting go. For Kabbalists, d’veykut is a high and deep stage of spiritual development where the seeker attaches himself or herself to God and exchanges individuality for a profound partnership with the Holy One. The force behind d’veykut is the love of God and desire for intimacy or closeness with God.
When a Kabbalist develops a strong sense of d’veykut, the seemingly vast number of requirements and commandments in her life transform themselves from external burdens into more and more opportunities to devote herself to God. Just as young lovers are of infinite service to their loved ones, the Kabbalist who has true d’veykut sees the requests that God makes as opportunities to express her love for the Almighty.
For example, the Kabbalist views the requirements of the Sabbath (see Chapter 10) to be part of the gift of the Sabbath, not burdensome restrictions as outsiders may see them. Similarly, Kabbalists don’t see the dos and don’ts of the Torah as oppressive but rather as opportunities throughout one’s day and life to connect with God.
The concept of d’veykut also informs the Kabbalist’s attitude toward her own death because she believes that one of death’s great rewards is the opportunity to merge with God in an even deeper and more complete way than is possible during life. D’veykut in this lifetime is fleeting and incomplete, but complete d’veykut is attainable after death.
Knowing that you’re under God’s supervision
Hashgacha pratit (hash-gah -kah prah -teet; private supervision, at Providence) is the Kabbalistic concept that every individual being is under the private supervision of God.
Some people believe that there is no God, whereas others believe that God created the world but then left it alone to its own devices. Kabbalists maintain that God rules the world by hashgacha pratit; the infinite God is constantly involved in every detail of existence, from the largest cataclysm to the tiniest movement of an insect. (Flip to Chapter 16 for more on God’s ongoing supervision of the creation as a whole.)
As I say many times in this book, Kabbalists must reconcile the following two points of a major paradox:
The highest expression of the Divine in the world is humankind, and humankind functions with free will.
Nothing happens in the world without God allowing it to happen.
Hashgacha pratit doesn’t contradict the belief in free will. Rather, it insists that God is actively involved in the supervision of everything, while at the same time allows for free will. Kabbalists may not always understand this paradox, but they know that it’s the wisdom received from tradition.
Hoping for the best
Many people are familiar with the Hebrew word mazal (mah-zal; fate) because of the popular expression “Mazal Tov.” Although the expression is commonly thought to mean “good luck,” it actually means “good fate.” Wishing a person mazal is a way of hoping that the person experiences only good things as his or her life unfolds.
Even though everything is for the best, wishing a person good fate is an expression of hope that what happens to the person is easy to recognize as “for the best” and not one of the challenging and difficult moments when thinking that what has happened may be tough.
Understanding that things happen for a reason
Bashert (bah-shairt ) is a general concept that implies that things happen for a reason. Kabbalists use it most commonly in connection with matchmaking.
Within the matchmaking world, when a Kabbalist is looking for a future spouse, he says, “I’m looking for my bashert.” What he means is that he’s looking for the one whom God has picked out for him. A story known by all serious Kabbalah students tells of a Roman who asks one of the Jewish sages “If God created the world in six days, what has He been doing since then?” The sage’s answer is that, among other things, God is making matches. To refer to somebody as your bashert is to say that you believe that this person is your partner selected by God, deliberately and for a purpose.
Picking up the Pieces: In the Beginning a Vessel Was Shattered
The 16th-century Rabbi Isaac Luria (known among Kabbalists as the Ari; see Chapter 18) caused a revolution in Kabbalistic thought and today is considered to be, without exception, the greatest Kabbalist who ever lived. His ideas, ways of thinking, and metaphors have become the standard accepted notions that Kabbalists have studied for the last five centuries.
One of the Ari’s most basic notions describes, metaphorically, the basis for the creation of the world. As the Ari explained it, God created a vessel (like a vase, cup, or container of some sort) and then poured His infinite, divine light into this vessel. The vessel couldn’t contain the infinite light and shattered. The broken pieces of the vessel scattered, and the stuff of creation — all its many bits and pieces — are actually the shards produced by that cataclysmic shattering. The shards still contained evidence of the original divine light.
Being “chosen” means greater responsibility
The Torah teaches that the Jewish people are a nation of priests. This notion, which is the basis for the too often misunderstood phrase “the chosen people,” in no way means that Jews are superior. This distorted idea has been spread far and wide but is nowhere to be found in Jewish literature or Jewish teachings. The idea that the children of Israel should see themselves as a “nation of priests” simply refers to Jewish consciousness that the entire world is holy and that the nation of priests is required to relate to all the details in the universe as though they were holy and in need of sanctification.
Everything has the potential for holiness, and therefore, everything needs to be related to with a certain degree of holiness. The notion of the chosen people refers to the idea that the Jewish people have a greater responsibility and burden to relate to the Divine than others do.
In other words, the world in which Kabbalists live, in each of its details, contains divine light. Whatever a Kabbalist relates to, whether it be solid, liquid, or gas, good or evil, physical or spiritual, contains divine light. And according to Kabbalistic tradition, each person is responsible for breaking open the pieces to release the light contained within. Because everything in the world contains divine light, all situations have good (divine light) hidden within them. The Kabbalist’s task — and everyone else’s, for that matter — is to search for or recognize that divine light and let it shine.
By integrating the shattered vessel metaphor into one’s consciousness, all life and all existence has the potential for sanctity through the release of divine sparks from the divine light inside. Kabbalists make the assumption that the world needs to be repaired (see Chapters 7 and 8 for more on this concept), that God created a world that is incomplete and flawed. By revealing the divine light that’s hidden in everything, the Kabbalist participates in the correcting of the world, leading to a time when God will be obvious and known to all people.
Within Kabbalistic literature, the sanctity of life is evident in the everyday act of eating. God created a world in which various species eat other species. One of the reasons that Kabbalistic tradition requires the Kabbalist to recite various blessings before eating various foods is to help to release the divine sparks embedded within the food.
For the Kabbalist, eating isn’t just an effort to satisfy one’s appetite. It’s a releasing of divine light contained within everything. If one eats with the proper intention, the food is the source not only of physical nutrients needed to survive but also divine light that offers spiritual nourishment and the fortitude to go on to perform acts of lovingkindness.
Seeing bread as a tribute to human creativity
The blessings that Kabbalists recite before eating various foods (see Chapter 9) are divided into categories. For example, one blessing is appropriate when eating fruit from a tree, and another blessing is recited for baked goods like cookies and cakes, but not for bread. Bread has it’s own special blessing.
However, if a Kabbalist sits down to a meal that consists of many different kinds of foods and includes bread, it’s not necessary to recite the various blessings on the different kinds of foods. Rather, the Kabbalist should begin his or her meal with the blessing to be recited before eating bread and then enjoy the meal. In a sense, the blessing for bread contains all the other blessings.
So why is bread and the blessing said before eating bread of such high status? Bread represents human creativity because it’s made through the creativity and ingenuity of the people who take various God-given ingredients, combine them, and create the staff of life. Eating a pear, string beans, milk, or chicken is merely taking the food that God gives. But when the Kabbalist eats bread, he’s acknowledging the ability of human beings to combine the elements of the world and to create something new.
Kabbalists consider this ability to create to be a divine spark within humans. Bread is the finest example within the human diet of that expression of creativity, and therefore the blessing said before eating bread is sufficient for the entire meal regardless of how many other kinds of foods are consumed.
This example also points to the Kabbalistic notion of repairing the world. Kabbalists gather the gifts that God has given and try to combine them in a way that will improve the world. By gathering the ingredients to make bread, people exercise their ability to create the tools necessary to improve, build, and raise the level of the world. Each day, Kabbalists need to be aware that the world requires rectifying and things need to be put into their proper places. Kabbalists assume that the world is mixed up; all too often, things that are small are considered big, things that are big are considered small, things that are important are considered unimportant, and things that are unimportant are considered important. The Kabbalist’s job is to put everything into its proper proportion for the sake of the health of the world.
Figuring Out Individual Divine Assignments
Kabbalistic tradition teaches that it’s each person’s responsibility to find his or her own place in the world. As I explain in Chapter 6, each human being is absolutely unique. In principle, each person has unique elements that belong to no one else. Of course many people share various qualities, but in totality, no two people are identical.
Growing out of this idea of divine individual assignments, of course, is the notion that each person has his or her own strengths and weaknesses, abilities and inclinations. Kabbalists relate divine assignments to the biblical story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. They teach that just as God put Adam and Eve in the garden to tend it, the world is the garden of existence, and each person has his or her own part of the garden to tend. The world is a large place, and there’s lots of work to do everywhere. It isn’t any individual’s job to tend the entire world but rather to find that part of the world that he or she must repair.
Another method of discovering one’s task is through prayer. Within personal prayers, Kabbalists often make a request to God to help reveal what they should be doing in life.
But nobody suggests that uncovering one’s purpose in life is easy. Each person has free will, and the expression of that free will through the choices presented all the time can be daunting. That’s where Kabbalah teachers come in. When a Kabbalah teacher is connected to his or her students in an intimate spiritual way, the teacher is often a great help in guiding his or her student. (For more on studying with a teacher, flip to Chapter 14.)
Everyone is a letter in the Torah
One of my teachers shares the metaphor that each person should see himself or herself as an individual letter in the Torah. The Torah is a scroll consisting of the Five Books of Moses, and it contains 304,805 letters. Locating oneself in the Torah is another way of saying that a person needs to find his or her place. An ancient text teaches that God looked into the Torah and created the world. The Torah is a blueprint for the world, and it’s the Kabbalist’s task in life to find his or her location in that blueprint.