Having made it through the first meeting of Kabbalah Group Creation, our second session of the Introduction to Kabbalah Course flowed more smoothly. This time we were focussing on the Four Worlds of Kabbalah. Preparing for the session, I found myself thinking about this model of reality and asking myself; 'What does it really mean?' and 'how has it helped me'? Looking for my answers I thought back to my youth and my
first education in 'the nature of reality'. My intellectual upbringing primarily taught me that only the material world and what can be perceived through the physical senses or conceived by the rational mind is actually 'real'. I struggled with this, even as a young person, for it seemed to leave out and dismiss a lot of my experience.
Discovering Kabbalah was like following Lewis Carroll's white rabbit or passing 'through the looking glass' into a world view which was a mirror image of what I had previously been taught (and a blessed relief!) Through the looking glass or
Ispaklaria of Kabbalah everything is the other way round... the hidden, the mysterious, the inconceivable is the primary reality. The 'First World' is the divine one, is an enlightened state of consciousness hinted at by mystics throughout millennia and rich with depth and meaning, compared to which rational materialism seems rather recent and like living on thin gruel when you could choose chocolate!
But why 'four worlds'? I've no idea! Why not? It's just a model after all, a finger pointing at the moon. It keeps me wondering though...what's the difference between divinity and spirit....between spirit and soul, between soul and matter? These are life enriching questions, ones for endless asking and endless answers...
In the group we tried coming at the Four Worlds by one way or another and firstly this was practically, through drawing our own diagrams of the Tree of Life. There was much laughter as we struggled with rulers and compasses and some very unique and individually shaped Trees emerged! We were considering this four fold model of reality primarily in terms of different kinds of consciousness.
We starting by folding a vertical centre line on our 'empty' sheets of paper...feeling like we were back at the beginning of a creation again. Next we were thinking of the 'First World' called in Hebrew
Azilut or 'nearness' to God which we imagined as an enlightened state of consciousness...something we all aspire to! This was represented by the first point we drew at the very top of our diagram, representing
Keter, the first
sefirah or 'garment of God'. Placing our compass points here we drew a circle for this first world. I imagine it like the ultimate sacred circle, a divine vessel... I like Hafiz's description
God
and I have become
like two giant fat people living
in a tiny
boat.
We
keep bumping into
each other
and
laughing.
Where the lowest part of the circle on our paper crossed the centre line, we made our second point for
Daat, that mysterious spiritual
'non-sefirah' and drew a new circle centred from here, representing the second World known as
Beriah or the world of creation. We imagined this as spiritual awareness. Perhaps this is something we know a little more about as it's full of states of being we aspire to and sometimes briefly embody...wisdom, understanding, loving kindness, courage, truth and more. Here's a poem from St Francis for the heavenly blue sky world of
Beriah
Such love does
the sky now pour,
that whenever I stand in a field
I have to wring out the light
when I get
home.
At the base of this circle, we drew our third point at Tiferet and here found a centre for our third circle of the world of soul or psyche, called in Hebrew Yetzirah. How wonderful it is when we do feel centred in our soul, when we are mindful (rather than mindless) of the circling of thoughts, feelings and sensations...when we touch that still centre within them. Don't we all know moments like this, of being somehow centred and in the flow, when for a while life really is full of truth and beauty, as Tiferet is often translated. Of course, much of our psychological experience is of not feeling centred. Instead we rise and fall on the shifting seas of inner and outer experience and yet I find it helps to have this realm affirmed as another garment of God. I wish someone had said to me as a child...'dreams are real, feelings matter, every thought is an angel'...I feel an attack of poetry for the soul coming on, courtesy of Tukaram this time
Some
planets rolled in
those openings on the side of my head.
I haven't heard anything for years.
When I see a mouth moving in front of me
I just assume someone is saying
something brilliant
and then go on about my day
feeling very
secure.
At the base of that third circle, we marked
Yesod, foundation and made this in turn the centre of our fourth and final circle with the last point, Malkhut at its base. So we focussed finally on the material world that my intellectual education never looked beyond. How different it seems as the final vessel for all that divine, spiritual and soul energy that has come before. Of course, this is how it is when we go out in the garden with our God's eyes on...everything is both beautifully down to earth and full of light and wonder. St John of the Cross knew all about this (and he could even see it while being forced to sleep and eat on his own excrement in a dark prison in the basement of a monastery, while being beaten by other monks until he was crippled...)
I was sad one day and went for a walk;
I sat in a field.
A rabbit noticed my condition and
came near.
If often does not take more than that to help at times-
to just be close to creatures who
are so full of knowing,
so full of love
that they don't
-chat,
they just gaze with
their
marvelous understanding.
ps; to finish your Tree of Life diagram...just 'join the dots' including the points where the circles intersect at each side.
pps: with deep gratitude to Daniel Ladinsky for his wondrous translations of mystical poetry from East and West. Rush out and buy his 'Love Poems from God' right away!
