Trumah: Chapter 28

An opening and a light cover over the Holy Land

Synopsis

We learn that the hard shell which encompasses the world has an opening over the Holy Land, as long as people are performing the proper service. We are told that the Klipah clogs the brain. Then the discussion moves to an analogy between the shell that covers the world and the shell that covers the brain. When the children of Yisrael were pushed away from the Holy Land, the opening was covered with a holy cover, a delicate curtain, to guard against the Klipah's incursion.The cover prevents the holy presence from descending to earth but it also prevents the strong Klipah from dominating that place. We next learn that the souls of Yisrael who expire there ascend, but the souls of other nations who expire there revolve and finally reach their own side of the impurity. If someone is buried on the day that his soul departs from him in the Holy Land, we are told, the spirit of impurity has no dominion over him at all. The sacrificial limbs and fat must be burned at night on the altar so that the smoke will roll around to the hole in the north and nourish the Other Side, to keep them there. The spirit of impurity cannot dominate the bodies of the righteous that do not take any pleasure in the world. He whose soul departs outside of the Holy Land and who had his body defiled by the impure spirit, the impure spirit is absorbed inside it, remaining there until it returns to dust. The impure spirit never dominated Joseph's body, however. Jacob did not die, and his body remained intact and was embalmed. This, we learn, is because he was the bodily vehicle for the supernal image, or in other words a Chariot for Tiferet.

Relevance

From this portion we shield ourselves from the negative forces that attempt to dominate our lives. In addition, a portal to the upper world is created, raising our consciousness. Our senses of awareness, our intuition, our mental faculties are heightened, and we see and understand, at last, all that we did not see or grasp before. The power of the ancient sacrifices is resurrected to nourish all the dark forces, keeping them at bay, while the purifying Light embodied by Jacob shines brightly, perfecting the body and refining the soul. This Light vanquishes the Angel of Death and the entire armada of the Other Side.

The Light of the land of Israel permeates our whole world, so that in addition to Jacob's Light, the Resurrection of the Dead will take place with extreme mercy and loving kindness.