The Messianic Consciousness in Jewish Prophecy (XXX) Isaiah

The vision of Isaiah in Heaven is one of the transcendent messages we have in Judaism. Transcendent in many ways. It happened in a place and time where indeed there is no place and time, and this can't be grasped by our consciousness. In this sense paradox is one of the premises of transcendence. In Judaism the impossibility of conceiving our Creator is also a paradox, because the fact that we can't conceive Him does not imply that He does not exist.

Our Jewish conception of God transcends the limitations of human understanding. Hence our Sages teach that the Torah has seventy faces, that actually are endless because the Torah is infinite as its Creator. Yet He gave it in the language of humans as the door to know His Plan for the material world. This means that we must understand His messages within the frame of time and space, and the limitations of human consciousness.

The Prophet has the difficult task to communicate a vision and experience out of the context of human understanding. The dynamics between thought and language is as complex as consciousness itself. Since we are born we are forced to frame thought within the boundaries of language in order to be able to express something potentially indescribable into something describable. Our Sages make an analogy of this situation, comparing it to a blind person who has never seen something ever before and suddenly can see. He has no previous references to describe a starry night or a sunrise, so he begins to describe it with the shapes he used to touch in order to know them. The result of his description of what he "saw" is totally beyond comprehension for those who were not blind in his midst. In other words, our human thought and language lack the references needed to assimilate a heavenly vision or experience.

The Prophet has no choice but to describe his vision and experience in Heaven the way He does it to convey his message. In this paradox of describing what is indescribable we must try to perceive what Isaiah wants to tell us. For this he uses words and situations we can relate to, as an invitation to open our consciousness to a higher level of understanding. Once we enter greater dimensions beyond human comprehension, we must learn to live in them, to relate to them, and to communicate them.

We have said in other commentaries that the World to Come as well as the Messianic Era have different references than those we have in this current world. Our Prophets give us a glimpse, telling us that evil and negativity do not exist in those times and places, and are replaced by new references we only know when we get there. This is also a way to understand that heavenly visions or experiences belong to Heaven and make sense there, not here. We must take this as an invitation to remove the negative references we have in consciousness, and turn them positive in order to experience new dimensions and expressions of life. The result of this will be an entire new approach to what we conceive, perceive, think and feel, and its effect in what we speak and do.

"(...) I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne high and lifted up, and His train filled the Temple." (Isaiah 6:1)

In this sentence our Sages identify two situations and two places. The Creator in Heaven and the Temple in Earth. The Prophet describes God in our human language as someone sitting on a throne not only high but also elevated. In Judaism we can understand our undefinable and indescribable Creator as One who is indeed beyond our reach in every way. High and elevated are words to illustrate this principle. This fact doesn't imply that God does not relate to His Creation, for the rest of the sentence points this out. The edges of His mantle filled the Temple.

Mantle as well as any other garments represent two conditions. One is to cover and the other is to identify. In the sentence the Prophet is referring to a Divine attribute (a mantle) that extends down to a place, the Temple of Jerusalem. It is also the connection between the Creator and us. This attribute completely fills the Temple as the endless time and place where we are permanently connected to Him. We call this mantle His Loving kindness, for it also covers His Creation: "He loves righteousness and justice, the Earth is full of the loving kindness of the Lord." (Psalms 33:5), "Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good. His loving kindness endures forever." (136:1, 100:5, I Chronicles 16:34).

"Above Him stood the seraphim; each one had six wings: with twain he covered his face and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly. And one called unto another, and said: Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord of hosts; the whole Earth is full of His glory." (Isaiah 6:2-3)

Angels are also creatures that belong to this higher realm we call Heaven. Our Sages refer to them as messengers that perform specific tasks or missions to fulfill God's will. These missions represent ethical and moral lessons that reflect God's ways and attributes, with which He relates to His Creation. These messengers proclaim and reiterate the sacredness of the Creator as something that is also beyond conception. In this sense we understand that sacred means separated, as unreachable for our discernment. Yet the paradox persists, for His glory fills His Creation, which encompasses all we see and all we don't see.

We realize in these verses that His glory is His loving kindness, of which we must be aware. If His Love fills His Creation, we are also filled by His Love; therefore we are an emanation and extension of His Love. Hence we realize the sacredness of God and His Love.

This triple proclamation must resound in all levels of consciousness, for our Essence and identity are formed and defined by God's Love. This awareness impacts the Prophet. After hearing this proclamation, Isaiah questions his own identity. He contrasts his ways with the ways of the Essence from which God created us.

"Then said I: Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts." (6:5)

As we reach this awareness, we realize what is real and unreal, true and false, right and wrong. We make a clear distinction between ego's fantasies and illusions, and Love's ways and attributes. We become aware of the traps we have made to submit our consciousness to the opposite of who we truly are. Once we see and experience God's ways and attributes, we realize that these are our Essence and identity. This is how we return to where we belong. This is the turning point when repentance becomes the realization of who we really are: How could I have been being, having and doing something I am not? This is our first step to return to the Creator.

The Prophet recognizes himself as an undone person, someone incomplete, as long as he dwells in the fantasies, illusions and mirages of the material world. He mentions the lips as the bearers of impurity. As we indicated above, thought precedes language as the expression of what we conceive, believe or feel. What we feel is the outcome of what we think or believe, hence we must be aware of what we entertain in our mind. Lips in this sense are not only what we speak but also what we do.

"Then flew unto me one of the seraphim, with a glowing stone in his hand, which he had taken with the tongs from off the altar; and he touched my mouth with it, and said: Lo, this has touched your lips; and your iniquity is taken away, and your sin expiated." (6:6-7)

Before the Divine Presence the Prophet has the privilege to be cleansed by the heavenly fire we call here God's Love. This fire not only cleanses our negative actions but also what generates them. As long as we live in, by, from and for this fire, we live before God's Presence. This is the fire that transforms our lives, removing the negative aspects and trends in our consciousness, heralding the beginning of the Final Redemption and the Messianic Era.

"And I heard the voice of the Lord, saying: 'Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?' Then I said: 'Here am I, send me'." (6:8)

As we allow Love's ways and attributes to lead and direct all dimensions and facets of life, and to unite and harmonize the diversity and creative potentials of human consciousness towards God's ways and attributes, we are ready to be full partners in God's Plan.

"And He said: 'Go, and tell this people: you hear indeed, but understand not; and you see indeed, but perceive not. Make the heart of this people fat, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes; lest they, seeing with their eyes, and hearing with their ears, and understanding with their heart, return, and be healed'." (6:9-10)

Here the Prophet is commanded to make us aware of our stubbornness to reject the goodness of God's ways and attributes, and rather embrace ego's fantasies and illusions. We rather desire power instead of Love, control over freedom, addiction over detachment, anger over joy, lack over abundance, cruelty over compassion, indifference over solidarity. These negative states of consciousness are our own punishments, from which we have no other choice but learning from them. Here God tells the Prophet that these negative traits make our hearts heavy and hard ("fat"), our understanding (the "ears") blocked, and our knowledge (the "eyes") useless. By coming to this dead end, sooner or later we become aware that living in a negative predicament is futile. Then we return to where we really are and belong as a healing transition.

"Then said I: 'Lord, how long?' And He answered: 'Until cities be wasted without inhabitant, and houses without man, and the land become utterly waste." (6:11)

The returning process is always up to us, but there is a point when we are fed up of living in the opposite side of Love's ways and attributes. That side is where the wasted cities and desolated lands are located. We have said that cities, land, mountains and hills represent beliefs, ideologies, lifestyles, customs, habits and behavioral patterns. These can become desolated and wasted places, bad enough to compel ourselves to transform them into positive aspects and trends in our consciousness, and in our lives.

"And the Lord have removed men far away, and the forsaken places be many in the midst of the land." (6:12)

Stubbornness makes us give up our free will. We lose our higher awareness to ego's fantasies and illusions. As we put aside the awareness of our permanent connection with the Creator, we remove our consciousness far from Him to enter the many forsaken places of our negative trends and choices.

"And if there be yet a tenth in it, it shall again be eaten up; as an elm, and as an oak, whose stock remains, when they burn their leaves, so the sacred seed shall be the stock thereof'." (6:13)

Our Sages refer to this verse as the minority of Israel that remains in spite of the wickedness in their midst. The minority that is swallowed by the enemies of goodness and real freedom in humankind, yet the few whose stock remains. Their seed will blossom and fructify in the end. This is the stock and the sacred seed that will prevail forever in the Messianic Era.

This verse may sound ambiguous, but it doesn't. On the one hand God reminds us of our negative predicament as the cause of our destruction. On the other hand He tells us that in spite of that, our goodness will prevail. God wants us to be aware of what our stock and seed are about. We are also those who proclaim His sacredness from which He created us.

We are good because we come from the goodness of God, hence goodness will always prevail. This goodness endows us with free will to make choices of freedom, not control or captivity. We must not allow consciousness to lose our free will. Thus we realize that our freedom lies on Love's ways and attributes, the holy stock and seed that always prevail.

The Messianic Consciousness in Jewish Prophecy (XXII) Isaiah

Our Sages call Isaiah the Prophet of consolation, in spite of the recriminations and admonitions in most of his words. The reason appears obvious, for his words of Redemption resound and overwhelm consciousness inside out. In other words, God's Plan for His Creation endures anything we may dare to think or believe stronger than His will. "Many are the thoughts in the heart of man, but the Lord's counsel will prevail" (Proverbs 19:21) 

No matter what we desire to be, have and do in the material world -- whatever ego dictates -- that will never overcome the Creator's Plan, simply because we are His creatures. All we believe we are and have belong to Him because all that exist emanates from Him. Having this clear in all levels and dimensions of consciousness is the beginning of knowing who we really are, our Essence and true identity. The Torah is God's Plan, and our Prophets remind us this. We just have to hear and learn from it. We are the Jewish people, the inheritors of the Torah.

The Final Redemption in Judaism is the whole purpose of God's Plan, the culmination of His Creation. We could have reached out to this destiny sooner than later, for it's up to us. The premise or precondition to fulfill this destiny is free will. As we make choices moment to moment, we certainly have to choose either living in the vanities and futility of ego's fantasies and illusions, including their predicament and consequences, or living in Love's ways and attributes with their goodness that transcends the limitations of the material world. In this sense we must understand and assimilate that the Final Redemption and the Messianic Era belong to a kind of consciousness that transcends the traits and qualities imposed by the constraints of living in a dual consciousness. 

Once we overcome the limited choice between good and evil, and leave behind the "temptations" of living materialistic fantasies and illusions, we will be able to enter endless dimensions. This was presented and proposed to us by the Creator from the beginning of times. God offered us the choice, and we chose our own ego's fantasies and illusions based on a false belief or feeling of lack. The Garden of Eden was the starting point for a journey inside the endless dimensions of God's Love. Then we chose to enter the constrains of the tri-dimensional world, limited by time and space. The good news is that God gave us His Torah as the way out and the way back to where we were, where we truly belong.

We began to learn that this way back to our Essence and true identity is Love as the bond that connects us to God's Love. This is the awareness of the Oneness with our Creator, that we recite at least twice every day. We learned that God's Love is always with us, and we have to love Him back by being and doing His ways and attributes. He communicates to us through His Torah, the Divine Plan. Hence we must listen and understand what He commands us. Thus we recognize that Love is the material manifestation of God's Love. By the power and strength of Love we are born and survive the limitations of matter. We can't live without Love, neither live without God's Love. He is the Source from where all comes to exist. We can't live without Him. 

The Torah also reminds us that God is our life. Hence we must choose Love's ways and attributes as the means to know God's Love, and the endless dimensions He promised us to enter in the Final Redemption since the beginning. At some point Isaiah and other Jewish Prophets tell us this, when they say that in the Messianic Era our one and only interest will be the knowledge of the Creator. And He is Eternal. With this preamble, let's reflect on the messages God brings to us through the Prophet, who begins calling the Heaven and Earth as witnesses to God's words.        

"Hear, O Heavens, and give ear, O Earth, for the Lord has spoken: Children I have reared, and brought up, and they have rebelled against Me." (Isaiah 1:2)

These words can be easily applied to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. The minimum God expects from us is common sense after He endowed us with free will, and also with knowledge about the goodness of Love and the futility of ego's beliefs and feelings of lack. Nothing lacks in Love, for Love encompasses and comprises everything. Love is its cause and its effect. Why would we rebel against what is our fulfillment and plenitude, the source of our life from beginning to end? Here we understand that rebelling against God is separating from His Love, the Source from where all comes. Likewise, we also separate from Love's ways and attributes when we embrace ego's fantasies and illusions.

"(...) The whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint. From the sole of the foot even unto the head there is no soundness in it; but wounds, and bruises, and festering sores: they have not been pressed, neither bound up, neither mollified with oil." (1:5-6)

God calls them (our fantasies and illusions) the sickness of the head, and our discernment, beliefs, ideas, and thoughts around them. As we allow their negative and destructive trends, the feelings and emotions in our heart make it faint. We often quote our mystic Chassidic Sages saying that all levels of consciousness (discernment, intellect, mind, feelings, emotions, passions and instincts) are vessels waiting to be filled. They also teach that we must fill them with God's will, what He commands us to be and do. 

If we fill our thoughts with materialistic fantasies and illusions, they also will fill our feelings and emotions with the same, and also our passions and instincts. We end up putting in action what we believe and feel real by envy, lust, greed, pride, wrath, indolence and indifference within ourselves and our surroundings. These create the wounds, bruises and sores that are cured and relieved only by Love's ways and attributes. Thus we realize that Love's ways are the opposite of ego's agenda, and that Love does not cohabit with anything different from its ways and attributes.   

"Your land is desolate; your cities are burned with fire; your land, strangers devour it in your presence, and it is desolate, as overthrown by floods. And the daughter of Zion is left as a booth in a vineyard, as a lodge in a garden of cucumbers, as a besieged city." (1:7-8)

We have said that life is our land, cities our ethical values and moral principles, and the strangers or aliens are the fantasies and illusions we empower to take over our intellect, mind, feelings, emotions, passions and instincts. These end up desolated by ego's predicament. Obsessions, attachments, addictions and the anguish, anxiety, depressions and frustrations derived from them are the floods and agitated waters. 

This scenario is the current state of consciousness we see around the world. This is the consequence of following the false gods and idols of Consumer Society and Wild Capitalism, with their vanities imposed on ego's endless feeling of lack, leaving little room for Love in our lives. We end up submitting Love to ego's agenda. We shape Love according to our materialistic desires, fantasies and illusions. This is the captivity of Jerusalem, the siege of Zion amid a garden of cucumbers, which represent the sensuality where we are trapped by materialistic desires.

"Except the Lord of hosts had left unto us a very small remnant, we should have been as Sodom, we should have been like Gomorrah. Hear the word of the Lord, you rulers of Sodom; give ear unto the Torah of our God, you people of Gomorrah." (1:9-10)

If we choose to return to our Creator to fulfill His Final Redemption, we have to hear His voice that speaks to us every moment, for He is always with us in His Love for all His Creation. We must repeat that we go back to God's Love through our Love. We already know that Love is our sustenance and also our true identity. We love because we are Love, it is part of us. There is a greater Love, the greatest of all that is God's Love, our Essence and what we truly are. Hence the way out from ego's lustful and sensual desires, the rulers of Sodom and Gomorrah, is by returning to Love's ways as the material manifestation of God's ways, the law of our God, the Torah. God's Plan for humankind is the total and permanent Redemption in the Messianic Era.

God continues to confront us for the negative choices we have made for a long time, and even worse: we have had the nerve to offer them to Him. We have lived under the mirage that ego's fantasies and illusions please our Creator. He created the transcendental reality of Love as the cause and motivation to love Him, His ways and attributes, as what He also wants us to offer and elevate to Him. 

The goodness of who and what we are meant to be manifest in our thoughts, speech and deeds. Our good actions and the choicest of their fruits are the ways we honor Him. The goodness of His Glory, His Love, covers the Earth and all His Creation. Therefore we also have to cover our life and deeds with the same goodness. We must be aware that we neither love, honor nor glorify God with anything different from what He is and does for us and His Creation.

"Your new moons and your appointed seasons My Soul hates. They are a burden unto Me, I am weary to bear them." (1:14) "Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean, put away the evil of your doings from before My eyes, cease to do evil. Learn to do good, seek justice, relieve the oppressed, do righteousness for the fatherless, plead for the widow." (1:16-17)

We begin to return to God when we clear the negative trends in our consciousness. We know that we can't stand by ego's fantasies before God's Love, and expecting Him to be part of such illusions. We go back to Him by reclaiming and embracing Love's ways as our common bond with Him. This means being and doing goodness, making prevail what is just and fair. We bring this to life by freeing those who are captive in their misery and oppressed by their disgrace. 

In this sense we have to start with our selves individually. We can't liberate others while we are prisoners of our own misery. As we get closer to the truth of who we really are and our purpose in God's Plan, we can bring others to the common collective destiny He wants for us. These others are the ones who suffer the oppression of not having the loving direction towards our destiny, as orphans without parents and widows without husbands.

"Come now, and let us reason together, says the Lord; though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool. If you be willing and obedient, you shall eat the goodness of the land." (1:18-19)

We choose back to God's Love by choosing back to our own Love. This is the result of putting our intellect and discernment in consonance with the common sense God gave us. This is our reasoning together with Him. As we said, Love is our common bond with God. His Love and our Love together, reasoning and acting accordingly. In this one accord what doesn't belong is transformed into what does belong. Our transgressions derived from ego's false feelings of lack are transmuted into Love's attributes. We cease to be egotistic and begin to be giving from this Love endlessly connected to God's Love. Thus we begin to live in the goodness of Love, which is also the goodness of the land, the goodness of life.

The last verses of the first chapter in Isaiah's book reiterates God's unceasing call for us to awaken from the illusions and mirages we have created in the material world. He denounces time and again our stubbornness to remain attached to addictions, obsessions, false beliefs, negative feelings and lower passions. These are the sword that devours the happiness in the abundance of goodness (1:22-25). The chapter ends with God's promise to restore our consciousness as it was originally before we made the choice to separate from Him.

"And I will restore your judges as at the first, and your counselors as at the beginning. Afterward you shall be called the city of righteousness, the faithful city. Zion shall be redeemed with justice, and they that return of her with righteousness. And the destruction of the transgressors and the sinners shall be together, and they that forsake the Lord shall be consumed." (1:26-28)

This is God's promise for us when we make the choice to return to His ways: the endless dimensions we will discover in His Love. We will discover and live fully in our knowledge of Him as we elevate our Love to Him in our good deeds. These are our judges and counselors that led us when only goodness was the law of the land, the Paradise we lost once. 

Love's ways and attributes will direct and inspire what we are and do in our consciousness in its permanent connection with the Creator. This kind of consciousness is the city of righteousness and faithfulness that is redeemed in the ways and means of the goodness of Love. In this consciousness there is no room for anything different from Love's ways and attributes, for all negative trends will be consumed by the fire of God's Love.

The Messianic Consciousness in Jewish Prophecy (IV) Hosea

Hosea's message points out Ephraim's defection from God's plan for Israel. Let's recall that Ephraim represents the birthright he inherited from his father Joseph. In this context, Ephraim epitomizes the extension of the intention Israel embodies in our Covenant with the Creator. Ephraim symbolizes the rebel consciousness that rejects the unity of God with Israel, and prefers to embrace idolatry. Ephraim's rebellion antagonizes Judah's loyalty, crowned with the kingdom, which chose to remain in Jerusalem.

“Ephraim is joined to idols; let him alone.” (Hosea 4:17)

In a deeper meaning, the strength of our intention to fulfill Israel's destiny – the birthright inherited by Ephraim – has the power to dominate and control the remaining aspects, levels and dimensions of consciousness, represented by the Tribes of Israel, except for the priesthood (Levi) and the kingship (Judah) that remained in Jerusalem. Kingship is the culmination of God's will. This is why Judah carries the Messianic Consciousness, the fulfillment of God's final Redemption in the material world. The Messianic Consciousness prevails above all. Judah and Levi remained loyal to Israel's destiny, and stayed in Jerusalem while Ephraim rebelled and dragged the remaining Tribes into idol worship.

“I, even I, know Ephraim, and Israel is not hid from Me; for now, O Ephraim, you have committed harlotry, Israel is defiled.” (5:3)

If one aspect of our consciousness is defiled by ego's fantasies and negative ways, our entire consciousness is also defiled. In this sense, there is no separation because our consciousness is one despite its diverse traits, levels and dimensions. This implies that, even if Judah and Levi remained in Jerusalem, they also ended up defiled and corrupted by idol worship and wickedness.

“But the pride of Israel shall testify to his face; and Israel and Ephraim shall stumble in their iniquity, Judah also shall stumble with them.” (5:5)

Our Essence and true identity is defiled when we succumb to selfishness and self centeredness under a false belief or feeling of lack, which we satiate at the expense of our life and other people's lives. Thus we understand what the Psalmist means when he wrote that the idol makers become like their idols, the works of their hands. Hosea eloquently illustrates the fate of Ephraim and Judah with their choice to abandon God's Covenant with Israel. Hence it is up to us to return to Him because He heals the wounds left by our negative approach to life.

“I will go and return to My place, till they acknowledge their guilt, and seek My face; in their trouble they will seek Me earnestly: 'Come, and let us return unto the Lord; for He has torn and He will heal us, He has smitten and He will bind us up. After two days will He revive us, on the third day He will raise us up, that we may live in His Presence.” (5:15, 6:1-2)

Our estrangement from the Creator is not long. It may last few days or as long as we turn back to Him. Two days represent the two first temples of Jerusalem. The third day is the Third Temple where we dwell permanently with the Creator. As we yearn for God's Love, He also yearns for our Love as the common bond with Him.

“For I desire loving kindness and not sacrifices, and the knowledge of God rather than burnt-offerings.” (6:6)

The more we know our Creator, the more we love Him and become more attached to Him. The foundation of the Messianic Consciousness is the knowledge of God, and also its purpose as it is written by Isaiah. God's Covenant with us is eternal, and we must be always aware of this. In this awareness lies our true Redemption, as God promised long before our estrangement from His Love.

“And it shall be at that day, says the Lord, that you shall call Me Ishi, and shall call Me no more Baali [my idol]. For I will take away the names of the Baalim [idols] out of her mouth, and they shall no more be mentioned by their name.” (2:18-19)

In our awareness of God's Love in all dimensions of consciousness, He clears them from the darkness of ego's fantasies and illusions. Our consciousness becomes free from negative traits and tendencies, symbolized by wild beasts as passions and sensual desires; destructive thoughts and feelings represented by predatory fowls; and lower passions and instincts depicted as creeping animals.

“And in that day will I make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field, and with the fowls of the sky, and with the creeping things of the ground; and I will break the bow and the sword and the battle out of the land, and will make them to lie down safely.” (2:20)

Our conflicting, rebelling, confronting, antagonizing and potentially violent beliefs, ideas and thoughts are the bows and swords that turn life in a battleground. As we allow Love's ways, means, attributes and ends direct and guide all levels of consciousness, we begin to enter into our individual and collective Redemption. We begin to live our Redemption as we marry our consciousness with Love, as the material manifestation of God's Love.

“And I will marry you to Me forever; yea, I will marry you to Me in righteousness, and in justice, and in loving kindness, and in compassion. And I will marry you to Me in faithfulness; and you shall know the Lord.” (2:21-22)

In the knowledge of God we redeem our existence in the freedom of the ways and attributes of His Love, which are the heralds of the Messianic Consciousness. As we recognize and embrace God's Love as our Essence and true identity, and live by it as what we are, have and do, we begin to live Heaven on Earth.

Beshalach: Becoming Aware of God's Love

One of the main lessons to learn about the Exodus from Egypt, regarding the relationship between the children of Israel and the Creator, is trust. We need to trust in what freedom is in order break away from slavery. In this sense trust is the consequence of knowledge. We trust someone or something as long as we know that we can rely on it. Faith is not blind when it is preceded by trust as a result of knowledge: “In all your ways know Him, and He will straight up your paths.” (Proverbs 3:6).

As long as we know God’s ways as our ways, we know where are we going. When we are bound to harmful addictions and negative patterns, the only way out from them is the knowledge as certainty that there is something much better waiting for us. Some people don’t see a way out simply because they don’t believe that there is something better out there. This is the case when nothing we hear or even consider as a way out offers a real alternative to our current situation, no matter how negative this may be. We can identify this approach as depression. If there is no effective medication to cure it, a miracle is needed.

This was the case of most of the children of Israel at the end of their bondage in Egypt. They needed not only one but many miracles to regain the belief in something better than the meaningless lives they had under Pharaoh’s rule. God’s promise to bring them to the land He swore to their forefathers through miracles such as the Ten Plagues didn’t seem enough. They still doubted the goodness these miracles heralded for them.

The issue then wasn't belief, faith or trust, but doubt and uncertainty. In this context we can understand better why wiping out the remembrance of Amalek’s is not only a Commandment from God. We are also commanded to remember every day what Amalek did to the children of Israel in their way out from Egypt. In our commentary on Beshalach: “Love as the Meaning of Life” of January 29, 2012 we also refer to this issue.

The lesson therefore is to find the true meaning of life as God tells us in the Torah, and to live by, for and with it all the time. This meaning, as we said before, is Love as the cure for all doubts, hesitations and uncertainties. Love is what we need to believe, what we must know, what we have to live, and what we are compelled to trust. We do this just because Love is our Essence and true identity. We can’t do it if Love is not part of us.

As we start to recognize this, we also begin to realize our permanent connection with the Creator. First we must become aware of Love in order to relate to God’s Love. There is no other way. If we don’t believe, know, or trust who we really are, then how can we do it with God? In this sense, we have to seriously engage in the task to realize our identity amid ego’s fantasies and illusions. This is the dilemma our ancestors faced back in the Exodus, and so do we every day in our lives. This is why we remember daily in the Jewish prayers the transition from slavery to freedom. It's about the constant struggle for our final Redemption from the illusions in the material world.

Our ancestors time and again distrusted God, despite His miracles because the reference they had about their identity was slavery. Time and again they defied God and didn’t recognize Him, because they didn’t know God as the Source from where everything exists. The Ten Plagues and the miracles, such as the split of the sea and the Manna, were not enough because these were not acknowledged as part of their own consciousness. In other words, all the Creator does must be assimilated as part of ourselves because we all come from Him. At that moment we say, “The Lord is my strength and song, and He is my Redemption; this is my God and I will glorify Him; my father’s God, and I will exalt Him.” (Exodus 15:2).

Our Sages explain that the total destruction of Pharaoh’s army in the Red Sea was the definitive signal for the children of Israel to trust God. Once there was no real danger to die or being brought back to Egypt, there was nothing to fear. Our Sages mention this as the reason for the memorable Song of the Sea (15:1-19) we recite every day in the Jewish prayer book.

The recognizance of God's Love as the Source of our Essence and identity is the beginning to become aware our inherent connection with Him. This explains the words of this song regarding our permanent bond with God’s Love: “In Your unfailing love You will lead the people You have redeemed. In Your strength, You will guide them to Your holy dwelling.” (15:13).

As we said above, Love is our common bond with the Creator which is manifest in a time and space called the Temple of Jerusalem: “You shall bring them in, and plant them In the mountain of Your inheritance, a fixed place for Your dwelling You have made, O Lord; the Sanctuary, O Lord, Your hands have established.” (15:17). Thus we realize that our connection with the Creator is permanent: “The Lord shall reign for ever and ever.” (15:18), and the beginning of this awareness lies in our Essence and true identity.

This is also the beginning of our fundamental belief, faith and trust. King David reminds us: “O Lord of multitudes, happy is the man that trusts in You.” (Psalms 84:12) as well as the Prophet, “But blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in Him.” (Jeremiah 17:7). The context of this trust is cleaving to God’s Love in contrast to depending on ego’s fantasies and illusions. These are the idols and false gods created by arrogance: “Blessed is the man who makes the Lord his trust, who does not look to the proud, to those who turn aside to false gods.” (Psalms 40:4).

God’s Love makes us aware of the goodness of Love’s ways and attributes through which we see the Light in the darkness of ego’s fantasies and illusions. He made our ancestors aware with His miracles in their times, and He also makes us aware of them every day. The lesson is to live them as they manifest also as our common bond with Him.

Vaeira: Loving God Unconditionally

Probably the most important lesson our Patriarchs teach us regarding their relationship with the Creator is to love Him and devote our lives to Him unconditionally.

This is a fundamental principle to entirely assimilate the uncontested fact that God is the Creator of all, and that includes us. Once we fully understand that we come from Him, who also shows us the meaning of life in His Torah, we come to realize that there is no point for us to set out conditions for our relationship with Him.

The moment we fall into ego's illusion that we are our own gods, living as separate entities from the Creator, we lose the true meaning of our individual and collective existence.

Our Patriarchs were beyond the limitations of intellect, understanding and sensation to approach the Creator as conceived by Judaism, under its principle that He has no definition. Hence, this approach implies and requires an unconditional attitude towards Him in every way, starting with our love for Him.

We love God because we come from His love. This fact allows us to know that love is our common bond with Him. Therefore love is also the means to transcend the limitations of consciousness in order to bond with Him as undefined has He is. Transcendence is the result of love when it is unconditional. In other words, when we love unconditionally we transcend the limitations (as “conditions”) of human consciousness.

In this context, unconditional love is the opposite expression of an egocentric approach to life. This means that ego limits and restricts our consciousness to its fantasies and illusions. The more selfish we are, the more isolated and constrained we become in our life, to the point that everything else is meaningless.

An egotistic attitude is directly proportional to a materialistic approach to life. We are attached to bad habits, negative behavioral patterns, unhealthy addictions and obsessions in direct proportion to ego's fantasies and illusions. Thus we understand what our sages indicate when they say the Pharaoh represents an egotistic approach to life, and Egypt (as the space of of ego's domain) the constrains and limitations of such approach.

Ego indeed sets our limitations as boundaries that separate us from our surroundings. We fulfill our personal pretensions first by letting ego control every level of consciousness, and then trying to control other people's lives. This also was the case of the Pharaoh of Egypt on his people, and on the children of Israel.

God responds to Moses' frustration over Pharaoh's decision to make harder the bondage of the Israelites in Egypt. Moses knew that it was God's decision behind Pharaoh's, and complained to Him.

We read God's answer at the beginning of this weekly portion.

“I appeared [lit. I was seen] to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.” (Exodus 6:3)

Thus pointing out to Moses that the Patriarchs never questioned His decisions as God the Almighty, because their love was truly unconditional for Him.

As we said above, the lesson here is to accept God's ways and attributes (either revealed to us or not) for the simple fact that He is our Creator. As long as we maintain this awareness permanently, we enable ourselves to relate to God not only as His creatures, but as an emanation of His love. Our love for Him must be as unconditional and endless as we conceive Him.

We must not fall into the illusion of conditioning and imagining God according to ego's agenda. Should we fool ourselves creating an illusion of God the way ego imagines, desires and controls? A god according to what I want, desire or need, depending on the circumstances? And submit this illusion to ego's wishes and demands? “Give me this, such, and that”... and then I will love you, dear god?

This delusional approach, epitomized by the Pharaoh of Egypt, gets its answer from the true God that is in undisputed control of His Creation. An answer intended to reveal His ways and attributes to instruct humankind about the real purpose of life in the material world.

The ten plagues as the overwhelming manifestation of God's dominion and control over His entire creation, in contrast to ego's pretension to control human consciousness.

We referred in this blog to the meanings of the plagues in our previous commentary on Parshat Vaeira: “Love as freedom from ego's dominion”. The Plagues convey profound lessons to redirect ego's negative approach towards positive and uplifting ways and means. These allow us to assimilate life as an extension of God's love for us to relate with Him.

The plagues were not intended to destroy the king of Egypt but to teach him in particular, and human consciousness in general, that love's ways and attributes are the means through which ego (as the driving force of life), must be directed.

The restricted and constraining space in which ego limits our consciousness (represented by the land of Egypt) must be devastated in order to be abandoned and evacuated. Once we leave behind all restrictions from ego's domination, we turn into a vessel to be filled by God's ways and attributes, revealed in His Torah.

As we have said before, this vessel is humbleness. In this sense humbleness enables us to be unconditional in our love to approach every aspect of life. Our oral tradition teaches that Moses became “God's loyal servant”. Humbleness was the means that make him close to the Creator, gaining the right to be called “the humblest man who ever lived”.

In sum, the essential message of this portion is humbleness as the premise to love God unconditionally. Humbleness in direct opposition to ego's separatist agenda. We often say that love does not cohabit with anything opposed to its ways and attributes. Our sages also say that the Creator doesn't dwell with the arrogant, simply because he doesn't have space except for himself.

The prophet summarizes this essential message in the haftarah for this portion.

“Thus said the Lord God: 'behold, I am against you, Pharaoh king of Egypt, the great dragon that lies in the midst of his rivers, who has said: “My river is mine own, and I have made it for myself”'.” (Ezekiel 29:3)

Shemot: Naming our Bond with the Creator

In our previous commentary about this portion (Shemot: “Our True Identity as Redemption” of January 8, 2012 in this blog) we elaborated thoroughly on the meaning of our Jewish identity, starting with our names.

“And these are the names of the sons of Israel, who came into Egypt with Jacob (...)” (Exodus 1:1)

These names identify who we are. That's the idea for having a name.

It is also about integrating its meanings into every level of consciousness. Therefore, as Jews, the Jewish identity is our name. Being a Jew defines the references to relate to myself, to others and my surroundings; and primordially to my Creator.

God is the axis, the center, the source that shapes our identity by the mere fact that we emanate from Him. By this fundamental principle we define who we really are. This is the highest approach to our identity.

The second book of the Torah delineates the Jewish identity based on our relationship with God as individuals and as a nation. We became Jews in the book of Exodus, beginning with the names that made us the people that God knows and counts for the destiny He wants us to share with Him.

Our sages refer to the Jewish exile in Egypt as the prerequisite to assimilate the meanings of real freedom in order to fulfill a real life. In this sense, exile is the darkness we experience in order to fully experience the light.

We often say that evil and negativity exist not as choices but only as references for us to choose good and positive things in life. Exile doesn't necessarily means evil or negative, but a situation that makes us value and yearn the place where we really belong.

Throughout our Jewish history, very few have truly yearned to return to such place. Our oral tradition tells us that only 20% of the Jewish population left Egypt during the Exodus. Even fewer returned to Israel from the Babylonian exile, and most of the original Hebrews assimilated to other nations.

In this context, the Jewish identity suggests us that it is all a matter of choice regarding who we want to be, what we want to have, what we want to do, and where we want to live.

All these are referred in the book of Shemot (Names) as the starting point of our identity. Thus, exile is what makes us aware of who we truly are. Either we embrace what a life in exile offers us (good or bad) as ours, or we pursue the place where we originally belong. The choice is ours.

We said that our exile in Egypt was a necessary negative experience in order to appreciate the value of the Jewish identity as the permanent connection with God. As long as we claim our bond with Him, we indeed realize our identity. Exile makes us aware of where our home is.

The same occurs when we visit a land with different customs, language and beliefs, which push hard enough to make us aware of ours. We interact with them from our views and principles, because we are different. Exile works in the same way. It can become alienating to the point that we may lose our primordial identity.

We are compelled to either assimilate the conditions of exile, or to escape from them and return where we belong. This is the way it happens with negative thoughts, emotions and feelings derived from ego's fantasies and illusions. Once we are trapped in them, we are compelled to look for the way out. We cry out loud to be redeemed from our exile in darkness, and we know that love is the way out.

These verses comprise the identity we are referring to.

“And God heard their groaning, and God remembered His covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. And God saw the children of Israel, and God took cognizance of them.” (2:24-25)

This identity is about our connection with the Creator, and recognizing our bond with Him.

As we remember God and call out for Him, He answers because He also recognizes that we belong to Him. Our exile ends when we return to Him as The Place from where we came (The Place, HaMakom, is one of God's names in Judaism).

This happens when there is a covenant, an agreement to live by ways and attributes we share with the one who gives us life to make it significant.

What makes life meaningful is precisely the identity God gives us, starting with our forefathers.

“And He said, 'I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob'.” (3:6)

This identity is also the beginning to know our Creator as eternal as He is.

“God said to Moses, 'I will be what I will be', and He said, 'So shall you say to the children of Israel, “I will be” has sent me to you'. (…) this is My Name forever, and this is My memorial to all generations.” (3:14-15)

Our bond with God has been, is and will always be. This timeless covenant is fundamental to assimilate our Jewish identity beyond time and space.

Our life in the material world does not circumscribe or limit our relationship with God. After all, our transit in this physical level is bound to time and space as an exile from the boundlessness of God's love. His Love makes us transcend all boundaries, limitations and constraints (the meaning in Hebrew of Egypt is “constraints”) of fantasies and illusions derived from ego's negative desires, represented by the Pharaoh.

“And I know that the king of Egypt will not give you leave to go, except by a mighty hand.” (3:19)

When our love reaches out to God's love, He liberates us from captivity under the negative aspects of consciousness (complementing on this, see in this blog our commentary on Parshat Shemot: “The Awareness of God's Love” of December 19, 2010).

We need Moses as our highest knowledge of God and His love in order to ignite the fire that burns the illusions that make us believe and feel separated from Him.

Moses is also aware that the highest knowledge of God is not always the means to liberate ourselves from our own darkness.

“And he [Moses] said: 'Oh Lord, send I pray You, by the hand of him whom You will send'.” (4:13)

Our sages explain that in this verse Moses was referring to king Messiah, through whom the final redemption will be revealed. This means that, besides having the utmost awareness of God's love, we also must be willing to manifest this awareness through our own love. We achieve this by being and doing love's ways and attributes in all aspects and dimensions of life.

King Messiah is the one who leads all levels of consciousness in love's ways and attributes as ethical principles to live in this world.

This is what the messianic consciousness is about. Total and complete redemption from the negative and unnecessary illusions of the material world. A consciousness in which the only human interest is the knowledge of the Creator and His love.

“For the earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.” (Habakkuk 2:14)

Vayigash: Love as the Messianic Consciousness

Love overcomes and transforms negative expressions in human consciousness. This sounds axiomatic considering that love is its own cause and effect, which implies that love's ways and attributes are the means to reveal love when and where it is concealed.

This echoes the principle that love is present in the entire Creation as the material manifestation of God's love. Hence, love is the primordial principle that directs all aspects of life, by which we express our true identity.

We suppose to be, have and do what defines our essence and identity, that which gives meaning and transcendence to our existence. Anything different than love's ways and attributes denies who we really are. In this context we understand Joseph's prevalence among his brothers, as his dreams predicted.

We must emphasize once again that ethics, righteousness, justice and fairness are inherent to love's ways and attributes. These principles are the means through which love rectifies, transforms and straighten out the outcome of negative beliefs, ideas, thoughts, feelings and emotions.

In this sense, love is not a passive, permissive, condoning, forgiving and forgetting negative and demeaning approaches to life. Love is active, correcting, rectifying, awakening and guiding towards positive, enhancing and dignifying ways to honor life.

True love implies and demands purity, integrity and truth as the means to manifest what is right, fair, just and consequently good in order to make love's ways and attributes prevail in all dimensions of consciousness. As we said, love is to be met through what is inherent to it. See in this blog our commentary on Vayigash: “Living in God's Will” of December 25, 2011.

This is also Joseph's approach prior to finally “reveal” himself to his brothers. He must make sure that all negative traits and tendencies in consciousness are completely rectified before manifesting all the goodness that love is, as the commanding principle in God's creation.

We execute this principle when our free will is consonant with our discernment. This means that once we free our discernment from negative references, our judgment acts according to righteousness, fairness and justice as love's ways to rectify and transform anything that antagonizes them.

This directing and guiding judgment is also represented by Judah, and this fundamental quality enables him to become the redeeming principle manifest as the Messianic consciousness. This the main reason why Judah is the inheritor of Israel's royalty, not Joseph.

We have said that Joseph represents love as the material manifestation of God's love in His creation, and also the ruling principle that characterizes Israel's identity and mission to be the light for the nations. This is why Israel is the chosen one to reveal the divine presence that is God's love in the material world.

In this context, Joseph is Israel as the psalmist reminds us.

“Hear us, O Shepherd of Israel, You who lead Joseph like a flock; You who are enthroned upon the cherubim, shine forth. (…) With Your mighty arm You redeemed Your people, the descendants of Jacob and Joseph. Forever.” (Psalms 80:2, 77:16)

Hence, Joseph as the inheritor of Jacob's birthright also symbolizes Israel as the chosen to reveal God's love in the world. Joseph as love doesn't need to prove anything, except being who he is and what he represents as Israel's identity.

We Jews are Israel as the extension of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Joseph as ruling and guiding principles; and Judah is the executor of those principles as love's ways and attributes.

Judah represents our discernment and judgment cleared from anything that denies or opposes love's principles as the sovereign and regent in all aspects of life. Through our good judgment we clear and transform that which separates us from love as the goodness that redeems and sustains life in our transit on Earth.

This ability to discern and rectify directs us towards our individual and collective redemption.

Judah rectified when Tamar was summoned to explain her pregnancy, and he also rectified when he confronted Joseph over his intentions regarding Benjamin. These conviction and determination made Judah chosen to reign among the tribes of Israel, and also empowered him to bear the Messianic consciousness.

Thus we as Jews are destined to manifest our individual and collective redemption by rectifying and transforming the negative aspects of consciousness through the redeeming power of love's ways and attributes.

Thus we understand that Joseph represents love, and Judah our ability to remove ego's negative desires, fantasies and illusions in order to embrace love as our common bond with God's love.

Through Judah we enthrone love as the destined king and regent over all aspects of life. This means that we integrate the Messianic consciousness in our life through our discernment and judgment free from ego's false beliefs and feelings of lack.

The separation of Joseph's brothers from him was the result of their envy, jealousy and hatred under the belief and feeling that they lacked Joseph's qualities that made him more loved by their father.

The questions to be asked then were, what makes us apparently less loved by our father? What is that which makes Joseph allegedly better than us? What makes us believe that we are going to lose something because of someone else?

The answer then and now is that, as long as love's ways and attributes remain in every level of my consciousness, as I am aware that God's love is with me constantly, nothing and nobody could be against. In this permanent awareness, I am love as the material manifestation of God's love, from where I come. And nothing else. As long as I abide by God's will, I remain who I am truly.

The prophet also reminds us that in Israel's unity depends our redemption.

“Say to them, 'So says the Lord God: “Behold I will take the stick of Joseph, which is in the hand of Ephraim and the tribes of Israel his companions, and I will place them with him with the stick of Judah, and I will make them into one stick, and they shall become one in My hand”'.” (Ezekiel 37:21)

“And they shall no longer defile themselves with their idols [ego's fantasies and illusions], with their detestable things [negative thoughts, emotions, feelings, passions and instincts], or with all their transgressions, and I will save them from all their habitations [negative beliefs and ideas] in which they have sinned, and I will purify them, and they shall be to Me as a people, and I will be to them as a God.” (37:23)