Kabbalah Introduction

Man's death - What dies the body or the soul?

Man does not die, his biological body does. To begin with, we all feel only our body - the earthly desires. Then a desire for spirituality awakens in us.

This desire is not of this world, it belongs to the Creator. If man develops it he starts feeling not only the properties of his body, but those of the soul which is a part of the Creator's properties within himself.

If man corrects himself so that the spiritual desires suppress the desires of the body and the body completely associates itself with the soul, he perceives the death of his body as shedding a cover from the soul. The body dies but man feels detached from the body while still living in it.

The body dies, but man feels detached from the body while still living in it. If we live inside the desires of our world (sex, food, wealth, power and knowledge), we receive filling through our body, i.e. through its five senses. We may irritate our brain with electric impulses by sending signals through electrodes attached to it and feel pleasures ostensibly received through the five senses. In this case we directly influence pleasure centers by sending the same signal they receive from the sensory receptors.

This is an example of directly affecting the pleasure centers, which receive all signals.

Soul, screen and delight

We receive spiritual desires directly from above. To fill them we need a special sense called "a screen" ( Masach ). As soon as man acquires this sense, he starts feeling pleasure through it. The pleasure is called the Supreme Light. It enters our desire to enjoy it through the screen. This desire to enjoy the Supreme Light is called "soul". The light is not felt as the source of pleasure unless man acquires an additional sense capable of picking it up.

All components: the light (pleasure), the screen (means of reception) and the soul (receiver) are in no way connected to our physical body. Hence, it doesn't matter whether man has a body or not. As soon as man establishes contact with the Supreme Light, he begins to correct himself so as to be filled with it. The gradual likening of one's properties to the light and the consecutive filling with it is called spiritual ascent.

The body is only a means for the spiritual advancement in this exciting process; otherwise it is of no interest because a small pleasure cannot be felt at all in comparison with a great delight: the greater delight suppresses it. Therefore, although a Kabbalist lives in the same world as we do, he is actually already in the upper world.

Since we cannot feel his world, all his sensations are beyond our perception, on the other side of Machsom .