"The Great Redemption"

Exile: Ch. 9

Ramchal then goes on to fill in the final details about what will ultimately happen. There will be a lot to take in, but know that this will all be expanded upon and explained in detail as we go on in the book.

"Note the fact" he says, "that the entire verse under discussion reads, 'And G-d will be as a king over all the earth; *on that day G-d will be one, and His name one*' (Zacharia 14:9)". He then goes on to question the significance of the idea of G-d and His name being one by offering the following.

"Understand," he says, "that the great reparation (involved in the redemption) hinges on the mystery of G-d's 'Yichud'". That's to say that the redemption is grounded in one thing: in the revelation of G-d's sole authority (referred to as His "Yichud" in Kabbalistic terminology, since the word Yichud is a cognate of "echad" which is Hebrew for "one" and it alludes to the fact that G-d is the one and only authority in the world).

That means to say that once the reality of G-d's sole authority becomes manifest as a result of the redemption, then "everything will (come to) be inexorably linked to everything else. All the Supernal Luminaries (that go into sustaining and supporting the world) will conjoin and attach to each other then, and all their offshoots will reattach to their roots and join together to the point where everything will be a single, tightly bound entity."

Let's try to underscore the significance of this statement, since it's a major and recondite one. It means to say that there'll be a point in time when everything will bunch together; when, as Ramchal depicts it in other writings, "The Lower and Upper (worlds) will conjoin", when "all created beings that now exist on various levels will be joined together" as well, and when "everything will ... be one".

The implications of this great adhesion of all the various elements of existence are mind-boggling and revolutionary, and needn't be spelled-out. It would be wise in fact to heed the advice of the ancient Sefer Yetzirah which would warn us to "refrain (our) mouth from speaking and (our) heart from thinking" about this (1:8), since the implications can be very ambiguous.

In any event, as a consequence of all that, Ramchal goes on to say, "light (i.e., illumination) will intensify more and more then", and "every hour will bring its own blessings along with peace and joy".

He then returns to the verse cited above that indicates that "on that day G-d will be one, and His name one" and goes on to explain its Kabbalistic implications. We won't go into great detail about it here, since it touches on quite a number of mysteries beyond our ken, but we'll explain what we can for clarity's sake.

"The truth of the matter" he says, "is that (the verse) is speaking about the sephirot Tipheret and Malchut." Let's explore that.

G-d interacts with the world by means of the ten cosmic building-blocks we spoke of earlier known as the sephirot, including the aforementioned Tipheret and Malchut. It's sufficient for our purposes here to know that Tipheret is the middle sephirah while Malchut is the lowest one of all.

So, when we're told that the phrase "on that day G-d will be one and His name one" under discussion "is speaking about the sephirot Tipheret and Malchut", that alludes to this. While "the higher sephirot (alluded to in our verse by the term "G-d") ... are concealed now, they will amend the lower ones (i.e., Tipheret and Malchut, alluded to in our verse by the term "(G-d's) Name") later on."

And "G-d" and "His name" will be amended and indeed made one.

At this point, though, Ramchal brings out the fact that a problem now exists because those lower sephirot aren't yet amended. It's that "there can be said to be 'other gods' in the world". But, what would allow for such a misperception? The fact that "the lower sephirot willfully and arrogantly act as if they were another source (of rule in the world) apart from G-d Himself". That is, the fact that Tpheret and Malchut now function on their own and seem to be dissociated from G-d allows for that illusion; but that mistaken idea will be undone with the coming of the redemption, too, we're told.

For "once everything is amended, when evil and all husks are undone, goodness will be drawn to holiness as it should", and "everyone will know that there's but one, unique, all-encompassing Source -- G-d. None other". And then, once and for all, we'll be redeemed and "G-d will be one, and His name one" overtly and on all levels.

Text Copyright © 2006 by Rabbi Yaakov Feldman and Torah.org.