There is a principle in Jewish Halachah, Jewish law, which states: 'We rise into holiness and do not sink.' (Ma'alin B'kodesh v'ain moridin) Since we understand that the Torah and the world are intimately related (see 000 and 001) we can draw a parallel between changes in Torah and changes in the world. Changes in Torah would be, in my estimation, Halachah. The most basic change in the world is that change which makes all other change possible, namely time. In this manner it became clear to me that time is a function of holiness, of kedushah. Or rather, the forward progress of time is the result of increasing kedushah. [One thing of small note, is that Torah does not truly change through Halachah, just as the world does not truly change over time.]
This has many obvious problems, the first of which is the result of such a premise: the garden of eden would be required to be on a level below that of the modern day. It is a fairly common belief, pretty much across the spectrum of world religions, that man, over the many generations, has descended into impurity rather than ascended to holiness. In order to answer such a question I have to introduce entropy, a thermodynamic principle often borrowed and reinterpreted to describe many different systems or structures. The layman's definition of entropy is one word: chaos. Entropy is a certain amount of disorder in a system, a loss of efficiency or of substance. Thermodynamics states that entropy is always increasing in the universe. Simply, this is referring to all the heat being given off whenever interaction occurs in nature. The online Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary had this to say: "2 a : the degradation of the matter and energy in the universe to an ultimate state of inert uniformity." Can you see how this has the same theoretical problems that my statement in the introductory paragraph had? If the universe began in a big bang, initially, for however small an instant (please ignore my abuse of time in this context for a moment) the universe was ultimately entirely uniform. This would seem to say that entropy had to initially decrease (perhaps at or before the moment of the big bang) before it could increase. The perceptive eye will note that the word 'inert' is contained in the definition of entropy, yet not in my description of the big bang.
Somehow this inert nature, this interplay of potential and actual energy describes another paradox. This paradox is one-sided at least in our worldview. We have been skewed, we only see time progressing in the one direction, we exist within half of a paradox. While the 'potential' kedushah was greatest at the inception of the world, the 'actual' kedushah at the end of the world will be greatest, whereas before human action it was nonexistant. In the same way that the potential entropy or energy was highest at the moment of the big bang, while actual entropy was at an all-time low. Cosmological heat-death of the universe is the result of all potential energy being converted into actual energy.
In a similar manner, even though the generations of old had more potential to do good, it is not the individual potential that defines the flow of time, or even the potential that is actualised in a certain generation. Rather it is the universal flow of potential to actual kedusah that determines the direction and flow of time. Now one will look at this and see fairly circular logic. It may seem that I am saying time flows and so progress occurrs and so time flows. This is not what I am attempting to express. Delving into it too deeply will cause more confusion than clarity. Perhaps it would suffice to say that time and holiness are intrinsically linked. Time is the ordered perception of (actual) holiness from least to greatest.
Having said all this, it turns out that this view is still too simplistic to account for reality. Just as the day is made up of a cycle of the sun (rotation of the earth), and a cycle of the moon, and the cycle of the other planets, so, the creation must have similar cycles within cycles. This understanding stems from my as yet unanswered question of why was the Torah not given in Yerushalayim? There are at least two nodes or two cycles in the creation of the world and the progression of kedushah, Yerushalayim(and the Beit haMikdash) and Har Sinai(and the giving of the Torah). Expression 001 went into great detail regarding the interaction of these two end-points of creation. These two represent the two major paradoxes upon which existence as we know it is based: Singularity/Multiplicity and Action/Observation.
In the same way that the sun has two daily cycles from the Jewish perspective, from dawn till noon, and from noon till dusk, creation also has a dawn, a dusk, and a noon. The noon of creation was the period of the first temple till the fall of the second temple. This period relates to the halakhic time known as 'bain ha'arbayim' (between the eves). The first cycle, from the dawn of time till noon is represented by the Action/Observation or World/Torah paradox. In this manner Har Sinai is the first node or apex of time. The second cycle is represented by Singularity/Multiplicity or God/Man. This is expressed through the union of HaShem and Man in Yerushalayim at the point of closeness, the Beit HaMikdash. In this manner, Yerushalayim is the second node or apex of time. In their natural state, the two look something like the little graphic below. Red would be the Singularity/Multiplicity, blue would be Action/Observation. The peaks of the two curves represent the two nodes. Notice the overlap, this is the noontime period. Time flows in this picture from left to righ, with the right-most representing highest actualised kedushah. Parts of this simple image can be misleading, the goal here is only to show the relationship of the two major nodes/periods of the world.
At the Tower of Babel, the height of the power of the "other side," they were attempting to completely separate the two nodes of time. Through acts of complete selfishness and malice, you undo the world, unravelling the relationships and eventually uncreating the world itself. If they had succeeded in their task the nodes would have been pulled so far apart that where they ended they would not intersect and the world would be plunged into everlasting unholiness. This is the meaning of the movement towards negative infinity below.
The goal of the Jewish people, and mankind as a whole, is to unite the differences in the world. The reason why the Torah was given at Har Sinai is because we must bring it to Yerushalayim. If the Torah was given in Yerushalayim, then we wouldn't have had any work to do. We would probably not even have free will. HaShem left the world incomplete so that we could complete it and deserve the gifts he so dearly wants to bestow upon us. The Torah is just the first taste of what awaits us in Yerushalayim. In the worlds natural state, Har Sinai and Yerushalayim are two distinct places. When we do mitzvoth and re-unify all the various pieces of the world into the whole that acknowledges HaShem's existence, we bring Har Sinai to Yerushalayim, and when they are together we will rejoice forever. This is the meaning of the asymptotic rise to infinity below:
While this does not explain the true complexity of the world, it does offer insight into the overarching structure through which the world was created. I would be foolish to presume that the nature of time could be easily laid out on a piece of paper, even a piece of hyper-paper like a wwwebpage. If you open your eyes to the world and to what you read in halakha you will come to understand that the principles that govern Jewish law also govern the laws of nature. All that is needed is an understanding of how and where they apply.
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