Table of Contents

God <> Man

000 the ineffable. unknowable god

001 the incomprehensible. true infinite

Man <> World

002 paradox: unfolding the first petal

003 infinity: measuring singularity

004 time: entropic holiness?

Man <> Man

005 innate or circular knowledge

006 a spiraled pair, a curv'ed whole

Synthesis

007 unification

000. the ineffable. god's complete above-ness (and obvious space/time-lessness)

000605.2315 

I shall begin before the beginning. This is troublesome not only because the concepts of time and sequence had yet to be created. Before there was a moon or stars or time or matter or water or fire or concept or will, there was only HaShem in his indescribable completeness. Any adjective that phrases wholeness, cohesize nature or unity would impart but the smallest measure of the true nature of God. His name, which we refer to as "the name," reflects this nature. It symbolises his everexistence, it is however not pronounced. This lack of pronunciation does not stem from a lack of knowledge. Or rather, in a way it stems from precisely that. It is not that we do not know how to pronounce this name, but that this name has no meaningful pronunciation. It embodies those characteristics of Him that cannot be phrased or expressed. One can say that God is one, or God is all, or God is holy. These are all true, but they all fall far short of the mark, the target being an accurate description of God prior to creation. This includes, of course, the everpresence of God dwelling just beyond the infinite borders of creation. Suffice it to say that at least we can gain an inkling of understanding of this pre-creation state, in retro-active human terms. Even though a concept of one-ness or whole-ness does not yet exist, nor does, as we mentioned previously, a concept of concept, these terms would no doubt come in handy describing God at this juncture, had they been around. Simply put, God existed and there was nothing else in existence, no existence even in which other things may be thought to exist. The redundancy contained within this paragraph is my actual attempt to illumine this self-containing realm beyond wor(l)ds. 

One thing that should not be overlooked is the bias we have, as created beings. As a creation of HaShem's we were created in order to observe other such creations. Through this observation of creations we are meant to see and understand the Torah in all of it's depths. What you musn't lose track of is this: Everything we percieve is one of HaShem's creations. I highlight this point to remind us all that because we can never directly experience God, any description would apply more to another creation than to God directly. This is the nature of HaShem's indescribability. Indescribable itself is a construct that dwells below and within HaShem, as we ourselves do. Eventually any discussion of this sort will trickle into a pointless cyclic debate. 

In discussions with my brother, Namy, we arrived at disheartening results because of these things I've mentioned above. It seems disappointing that one may work all their days, in an attempt to reach the divine source of all things, towards a goal that is unattainable. There are many ways to answer this question and quell this dilemma. The most basic answer is to point out that reaching the divine is possible, our souls, our neshamoth, are fragments/aspects of the creator. When time ends, we return once more to the fold. We cease to exist as we understand existence, yet we are united once more with the source of all things. Once we take that route, it is simple to point out that our essence steps out of space and time, both before our conception and after our death. So that because of the timelessness of it all, we are never actually separated from HaShem. I won't go into this explanation further because It could go on endlessly as well. Besides, I would like to get to the next more crucial point, which is founded on this last one. 

Given that a true connection with HaShem is simultaneously both constant and unattainable, this must not be the purpose of our presence here. The Rabbis have always taught us that within the Torah HaShem is anthropomorphised so as to make things palatable to the human mind. I would like to take this a step further. God has built our purpose into nature. In effect he has not only anthropomorphised his presence, but has translated our goals into tasks that are already physically achievable in our world. The first and most basic among these is "Be fruitful and multiply." That particular goal is so closely wrought into our nature that Freud couldn't separate any of our actions from it. If one were to study any particular mitzwah in its complete depth, one would find the same results as Freud. Our actions and motivations are intimately affected by all the mitzwoth. God does not provide us with the secrets to transcend from this world to some other paradise, rather HaShem has given us this paradise and revealed to us the 613 laws upon which the nature of this place was founded. Any person who claims that these laws could or do not possibly exist in nature, would in effect be denying the truth, the emeth, of Torah. For our Rabbis teach us two crucial things: 1) Hashem looked into the Torah and from it He created the world. (the midrash tells us.) 2) The Rabbis teach us of the 613 mitzwoth contained within Torah. Socrates would berate anyone who, presented with these two points, still denied the 613 veins that dwell beneath the skin of the universe. 

I know I have wandered quite a ways, the point of this portion of my expression is that HaShem is beyond any percievable boundary, beyond the boundary of perception itself, yet everpresent in the most basic way. This wandering I have done does explain a question I've asked many times about the upcoming Festival of Shavuoth. I've answered it, as have others, in numerous ways, but there are always new answers and new perspectives, one of which I have uncovered in the text just above. Why is Shavuoth the one day of the year when Chametz is offered on the mizbeach of the Temple, the Beit HaMikdash? Chametz represents the meat of physicality, the refined essence, the cream. On a day in which we celebrate the reception of the Torah, the spiritual root of the world, why do we relish in physicality, in chametz? The answer is what I've stated above. That the physical world is a manifestation of the laws/goals which we have been given. If we live our life as proper Torah Jews then the height of spirituality and the height of physicality coincide because they are truly one and the same. In the same way, we are not separate from HaShem, though it may seem He is beyond us, we are as inseparable as the physical and the spiritual. 

000417.0541
a pointilistic circle starts it all,
the tumbling emptiness
before the fall.
a whispered wind
upon the surf
rebounded in the sphere
..once more.

at the beginning,
tomorrow's yesterday,
before it was,
not yet will be,
lost in subtelty

i swear this isn't new..
foreign voice from
my own tongue,
still within my womb,
chewing gum that's chewing me..

fall into my love, my love,
of this endless cyclic tree

carved within it's bark, a tale,
of darkest import scrawled,
of a point.
a pointilistic circle starts it all..

001. the incomprehensible. the moment of beginning that contains all (true infinite)

000531.1830
at first the void.
then sharp thrusting sparking light,
and all that is will be.

flowing from the heart, jerusalem,
this golden honey feeds the world,
and everything marches,
toward the mountain-spring,
in the desert of sinai.

where past and future meet,
bright milky light flows forth.
where future and past meet,

in the desert of sinai,
from the mountain-spring,
everything marches,
this milky light feeds the world,
flowing to the heart, jerusalem.

and all that is has been.
the silent fleeting restful dark,
at last, the void.

000605.2315 
Sometime within the infinity of no-time prior to existence, something happened. This happening is even further beyond our ken than God's nature (see 000). This something is beyond not only our understanding, but beyond the phraseology of logic or reason. It is regarding this very thing that Chazal tell us we cannot inquire. This is immediately before the first word, the first letter, before even the first touching of pen to paper of the written Torah. It is the act that makes creation possible. It is the moment HaShem changed his nature. Some people term it "Will." I believe that Will is something created far later in the chain of events that we look back on as creation. I will not term it because it was this event which threw my mind and soul into confusion for weeks. It was only upon realising the failure of all reason and the recognition that the Rabbis were aware of such failure that my fractured being was able to rediscover comfort and balance. One can look at this in the following illustration: Cosmologists and Quantum Physicists can discuss any fraction of time after the big bang, no matter how small a sliver it is, yet they do not and cannot describe the instant of it's occurrence. About the instant before, it is unclear. Lucid is the knowledge that this instantaneous something cannot be addressed. This is not to say the moment of which I speak coincides with the moment of the big bang, it could, however I do not feel that it must.*(see note @ bottom) Whether it is meaningful to ask about simultaneity at all is a separate question when time and space have not yet been created. (Once time and space are created, Einstein still greatly deters attempts to discuss simultaneity, which we may get to by 009)

Before I begin a tale that will undoubtedly seem like a sequence of events (in my future letters), I must express one more perception as well. HaShem, the very name to which this refers echoes this idea endlessly (HaShem means "the name" refferring to the tetragramaton YHVH), is beyond time or space, beyond all things created. If you believe you percieve him, it should be obvious upon reflection that you are percieving only a creation of his. In fact, it is my (as yet un-thought-out) belief that you are seeing the heart of yourself wherein his likeness resides. This complete external nature of HaShem does not preclude his interaction but does suggest an interesting dual nature(see 000) which I will address prior to addressing duality and paradox directly (see (tentative) 002) . From the aforementioned instant in which God makes it possible for the whole universe to come to be, no time passes while the universe is conceived and returned to it's unity with God at the end of days. In the momentous flash of pre-creation potential, the entire universe comes into being, fulfills it's purpose, and is extinguished. This happens in a similar fashion to an infinitesimally short thought that one has when figuring out a particularly trivial puzzle or idea. From the perspective of the universe, billions of years have passed by, yet it all happened in no time at all. The Rabbis tell us that all miracles that take place throughout all the days of the world take place via the normal ways of nature. This is not really so surprising or insightful in the simplest understanding, when one takes into account that God has perfect foresight and does not percieve time sequentially (the two may not be mutually exclusive) it becomes obvious that it should be no difficulty at all for God to construct a world in which all necessary miracles would be possible. He knew what would be required down the road, even before creation. When the Midrash discusses God looking into the Torah and from it creating the world, the midrash says simply that the chicken came before the egg. In the instant that HaShem created Torah, translated closesly as "Instruction", a student, or reciever of this instruction, was brought into being as well. We know that Torah is truth, and the Torah could not be true, unless the moment it stated that God created the world, there actually was a created world. Since there is no time yet of which to speak, it must be that the act of creating Torah and World was a single act. When the midrash says that the Torah was created first, what they have actually stated is that the purpose of the creation was Torah and not vice versa. Not that it happened first, which is meaningless prior to the creation of time.**(see note @ bottom)

Now I will expound on what I have learned around this past Shavuoth(5760). Regarding the creation of the world, time aside, I have strongly believed for a few years that past and future interact. Quantum mechanics may suggest something similar, but I know of a place in which they, past and future, do in fact interact. Someone mentioned to me some time ago, and to this day I wish I had the source, that the stones of Har Sinai all bear the image of the burning bush. Were you to split one of these rocks in two, each rock would have the complete image of the burning bush on it. What could the midrash (I believe this is mentioned in midrash..forgive me if I am wrong) have meant by such an unusual phenomenon? Until science invented the hologram there was no such construct known to man as an image which could be shattered into many complete images. In the case of the hologram, just such a situation occurs, no matter how small a sliver of the holographic film you cut, it has a complete two-dimensional un-damaged image. In order to relate this back to Har Sinai, we must first understand the process of creating a hologram, at least on the simplest level. A Hologram is a very special way of simultaneously taking many many pictures from numerous perspectives of a single object and committing them all to a single piece of film. To accomplish this task, holographers need to bounce two laser beams off of the object meant to be holographed, and allow those two lasers to interact (or in more accurate terminology: interfere). Looking at Har Sinai, in order to turn the mountain into a huge sheet/chunk/mass of three dimensional holographic film, we need at least two lasers. We know that the mountain was bathed in fire and light and sound and cloud, we can see these as the result of those lasers carving those images into the film. But where were the lasers? It is my understanding that the past and future are the two beams which record the image into the mountain.***(see note @ bottom) We have established above that the Torah was the primary reason for the creation of the world, now I suggest that the world actually first came into being at Har Sinai, at the giving over of the Torah. This can be glimpsed in the beginning and the end of Torah, the last letter, lamed, and the first letter, beth, spell the word 'lev' meaning heart. The heart of the world is the interaction of the future and past, the end and the beginning.

This falls several levels deeper. God took of his essence, and split it, through a process yet unaddressed (see later expressions, either 002 or 003 as 'duality or paradox realisation), into two counter-points: Torah and Olam; Olam being World, or Universe. HaShem's nature can be seen as akin to air, in that it is everpresent and necesary for life, yet invisible. HaShem split this nature into Water (bereshith 1: days 2 & 3, the world is described first as water.) and Fire (The torah is described by Chazal as existing of black fire on white fire prior to creation--and even afterwards). HaShem also simultaneously re-integrates these two natures into what is called Man. These two natures, these two creations, water and fire, Torah and Olam, are given to man as a communication from God, an act of True Kindness. Chazal explain that HaShem created the world in order to bestow True Kindness upon it. The World and the Torah are two halfs of this communication, this message, we are meant to make use of both halfs in responding. This response is crucial on our part, this is what prayer and service (Tefillah and Avodah) encompass. How does one respond to true kindness, true kindness by it's nature requires no response(Chesed shel Emeth is when someone acts with no expectation of gratitude, Chazal teach us.)? The key is in Pirkei Avoth (loosely: The Wisdom of Our Fathers) "The world(olam) stands on three things/words: 1) On Torah 2) On Avodah-service 3) On Gemilut Hasadim (loosely: acts of kindness)." It is my understanding that the three are as much one as they are three. The point upon which to focus is the third, Gemilut Hasadim. This is usually translated, as I said, as acts of kindness, but when one understands the etymology of the word Gemilut, we see that it is more. The word Gamel, which means Camel, is closely related to the aspect of nursing a child, L'higamel, mentioned regarding Moshe's childhood means to wean. With further contemplation I understand Gemilut Hasadim in this manner: To elicit and increase kindness. When one treats another kindly, the favor is often returned. When one treats another with kindness without any thought of the reward (ie. True Kindness), there is more chance that kindness, perhaps even greater, will be returned. Gemilut Hasadim is as much a mandate of kindness as it is a mandate to repay kindness with kindness, and finally to allow kindness to be performed. So, how do we respond to HaShem who gives us existence, the greatest kindness of all? We respond in kindness and deference, take of his kindness and offer it up to him in thanks, but there is more. A pregnant mother wants to nurse her child, she produces milk for this purpose alone, yet if the child is unwilling to nurse, not only can she not perform this kindness of providing life to her child, but it actually pains her. In the same way, Man can choose to open up the channels of kindness that HaShem waits eagerly to open. When one opens one's heart to HaShem, when one opens one's mind and soul, one makes it possible for HaShem to bestow his kindness. When one denies God's existence, or acts beligerently, it can be said that in a certain sense it pains God, as it does a lactating mother.****(see note @ bottom)

So, we see that in his infinite kindness, HaShem created the Torah and World and bestowed them upon man in an act of kindness. This happens at Har Sinai, the point (in more ways than one) of creation. I believe that this initial creation then retroactively creates both the future and the past, and the interweaving of said paths. Since there is no actual sequence until time was created, the Torah begins with the creation of Time. Once Time exists, then the Torah explains all the causal relationships in creation, eg. In order that Man has energy to act, there must be air and food, both of which require trees which first required land and water and light which first require laws of nature etc. The Torah is entirely True in that in relation to time, things happened just as the Torah states. Prior to time it was meaningless to say that anything came first. Yet I say that Har Sinai came first because it is the raison d'etre. It was for Har Sinai, the act of True Kindess, that all things came into being. It was so that Har Sinai could be, that the things happened and will happen, in the order they did.

However, Just because Har Sinai already happened historically does not mean that existence now is without a point. Remember Har Sinai is the point at which past and future are inter-twined. There are actions we must yet undertake, experiences we must yet undergo in order that Har Sinai come into being. I once questioned what it was that my Neshamah, my soul, saw at Har Sinai, since Chazal say that every soul was there to bear witness. I don't remember what I witnessed at Har Sinai which leaves me with two possible answers: 1) That Har Sinai has not happened yet--at least for me. 2) That the life I am living now, and your life as well, is the prophecy which I or you are witnessing at Har Sinai presently. I had actually never considered option number one until I wrote it just a few moments ago, it had always seemed clear to me that option number 2 is the truth. However, because of the nature of all things, it is possible to say they are both simultaneously true, I believe that both Quantum Physicists and the Maharal would agree with me here, wherever else they may disargree. I want to examine number 2 for another moment, It is not as far-fetched as it sounds, we know from Yehezkel and Moshe and many other prophets that one can interact with a Nevuah (a prophetic experience), we also know that while a Nevuah may last for days or months, it is under no obligation to coincide with normal time, if normal time can even be said to exist(?). [I'm sure these last two points will be forever termed in any context as the 'matrix-rationale', "how can you prove that the reality you believe to be real is in fact so?".]

Finally, as we see that there can be said to be four major things that exist, perhaps less, perhaps more(in no particular order other than God being first): 1) HaShem 2) Man 3) Torah 4) World. We can imagine how Torah and World were split apart and re-weaved to create Man. We can also understand the mishna in Pirkei Avoth now: Existence stands on three things: 1) recieving the torah, 2) experiencing the world in a God-pleasing way, 3) ultimately, expressing the previous two, acknowledging God's existence by interacting with Him and all of creation in a selfless and pleasing manner.

Having expressed in 000 the fundamental relationship of Man to God, and explained it further here in 001, and having explained the fundamental relationship of World and Torah here in 001, I will endeavour to discuss the relationship of Man to World in the coming expression 002.

-------------
notes:

*it should be noted that I've recently come across an article @ newscientist.com (thanks to Doni for pointing me, inadvertantly, in that direction) that offers a new explanation based on string theory that offers information about the universe prior to the big bang. This in no way finds fault in what I have said, all it has done is given some strength to my hesitation to tie what I would term the 'initial event' to the moment of the big bang. All that this new theory has a accomplished is a pushing back of the 'initial event' which will continue to be pushed back as scientists grope further and further towards infinity seeking the edges of the universe. This topic I will most likely cover in ~ Words 009. I have even assumed that this new string theory explanation of the big bang is accurate enough and found no problem with an understanding of the first 3 pesukim of Bereishith supporting such ideas.

**Chazal actually do introduce a concept of a sequential hyper-time which predates the creation of actual time.. R' Kaplan discusses this in Sefer Yetzirah, but he only touches on the topic and so I have limited information regarding this. I don't know how relevant it is to my understandings or expressions of the world at this point, and I believe it can be explained away like so: The hyper-time refers to the intents and purposes of HaShem rather than any real concept of chronology--the most important and directly relevant are viewed as coming first, and the ancillary are viewed as happening/created/concieved later.

***In fact, if you were to take a video tape of a tree being burned down, and watch it played backwards and forwards simultaneously, would it not look like a tree that burns and is not consumed? I'm not necesarily implying that this is what happened, only that it is possible to explain through the interplay (or interference.. or even ovelap) of past and future. Once one takes this step it is a short walk to simply say that the tree is simultaneously burning and not being consumed.. just as is literally the case in Torah. (So there is no need to actually try and explain how it was burning yet not consumed.. instead we can try and learn what the world is really about if such an occurrence however contrary is possible.) note that this is similar to the plague of Hail-Barad in which we are told that Fire and Ice were hurled down as one and that they partenered to destroy the egyptians.

****It is obvious that this example carries further throughout the life of both parents: when a child strays it pains them, but there is not always something they can do, to curtail his immediate or eventual suffering. This example is equally relevant to HaShem, but it is less poignant and more often used.

002. paradox: unfolding the first petal.

000614.1907

Whatever it was that HaShem truly created first, We can intuit two things for sure: 1) It was singular in it's design. This is so because it was the only thing yet created. 2) It is dual in nature. This is so because it exists in one sense but in another sense could not possibly exist. It cannot possibly truly exist because God is indivisible, so part of Him cannot become truly distinct from another part. I use the word 'truly' many times in the above descriptions because it is necesary to maintain clarity. One can better understand the meaning of 'truly' in this context by replacing it with the word 'logically'. I shy away from actually using the word 'logically' because of the underlying connotations. The two intuitions listed above arrange themselves into what one may call a duality or a paradox. (I will use these two words (paradox and duality) interchangeably) 

Since the advent of Logic people have attempted to use it (logic) to discern the nature of this experiential world in which we live. The paradox is a very important logical construct for this purpose, although by its very nature it seems illogical. To my knowledge only a few (eastern) religions truly understand the importance of paradox in an understanding of the world as it is. Modern science has also begun an understanding of just such a nature (in the last hundred years). The Maharal of prague clearly understood paradoxical existence in the interaction between the natural world and the spiritual separate ('nivdal') world. It is the very essence of paradox which allows us to exist as separate entities from HaShem. (As discussed in 000) It is also the presence of paradox which, the Maharal explains, allows for miracles to be perceived or go unnoticed. 

First I would like to suggest something: you should create a broad category or box in your mind. Label this box 'Paradox.' Anything which can be observed in two contradictory states should be left uncontemplated and placed in this box. (When one tries to see through a paradox, one falls into a train of thought patterned on a mobius strip. It is my understanding that this lies at the depth of Ben Zoma's insanity in the story of the four Rabbis who entered the Pardes.) 

Since the last two expressions (000 & 001) discussed the manner in which the world is an unfolded paradox I will go into it only minutely here. The current expression's goal is to share man's relationship to the world, we will not delve into the intricate structure of weavings which are the underbelly of this experiential world. Instead we will focus on the paradox that causes the most rational problems for any religion that believes in a truly omniscient and omnipotent God. This of course is the question of free will vs. foreknowledge of events. If God already knows what will happen, how is it that we have free will. Unlike the Maharal, I am hindered by an incomplete understanding of the nature of time and so I can hide behind at least one further satisfying answer: God is beyond time, so he sees time as if it were any other spacial dimension. In a similar way we could eliminate ourselves from the participatory experience and observe things prior to their occurrence by making use of Einstein's relativistic laws. It should be sufficient to say that we too can, by way of science (at least in theory), experience things before they occur. However we have no way to warn people of potential events due to distance and the limitations on the speed of communication put forth by Einstein. In simpler terms, while we could witness things before they occur, we wouldn't be able to tell anyone until after they have occurred. The Torah does not let us off that easily however, because we know that not only HaShem himself informed us of events prior to their occurrence, but even prophets were able to see and warn us of things before they happened. So my rational/scientific viewpoint fails to answer this question. 

Now let us examine free will and prophecy from the paradoxical perspective. I make the assumption here, and I think you will bear with me and perhaps even agree, that the world is purposeful. I do not pretend to understand the purpose, but, whatever it may be, the world was created to fulfill some purpose. To achieve some purpose, change is required, yet God is beyond change, being completely united and singular in nature. So God must allow change to occur, without the potential for change to exist. One can express this in an opposite manner as well: God must allow for the potential for change, without any change actually taking place. Without further tumbling into the pitfall of endless mental gymnastics, allow me to lay out a paradoxical structure that may perhaps make sense of this muddle. 

The purposeful world is created in paradox and broken into two contradictory states: 1) The world is structured. 2) The world is alterable. On the surface this may not seem to be a paradox, but it certainly is. The structure of the world must be total and fixed, such that foreknowledge is possible. The world must be alterable such that the outcome falls upon us to decide. A human being usually exists in a constant flux between these two states. When one looks, one percieves structure. When one acts, one affects change. The reason we look and act in near simultaneity is due to the way in which the two paradoxical states are tied to our physical bodies. We have motor neurons that act, and sensory nerves that observe. The human brain is a fine weaving of the many paradoxes that make up reality, but this paradox most of all. Because the brain is responsible for both action and observation, we cannot observe without acting, and we cannot act without observing. 

The righteous and humble person, the Tzaddik and Hasid, can remove himself from his physical body sufficiently to accomplish one without the other. This is the attainment of prophecy or the performance of miracles. These are accessible to all people, not only Jews. Miracles are an affectation of change. Prophecy is an observation of structure. When acting in the name of HaShem, Jews can take these abilities one level further. We have the potential to separate these two paradoxical states, observation and action, and reintegrate them. We can unite them, and so we see the prophet Ezekiel taking action in the midst of prophecy (Besieging Yerushalayim), and Aharon achieving prophetic state in the midst of action (When he blessed the children of Israel).

003. infinity: measuring singularity.

000628.1144 
The natural state of affairs, of observation affecting change, and change affecting observation (as described in 002), is what science has come to term "Observer Affect." While Einstein placed limitations on change and or observation, Quantum Mechanics (QM) has since broken these limitations, and in return placed new and different limitations on observation and or change. It is important, I think, to take a closer look at the limitations which observers of the quantum run into. 

Initially QM determined that all interactions between all entities occur in a quantized manner. That is to say, that on the smallest level, things exist in little packets. For example, an atom most always give off energy in the form of some number of photons. An atom may never radiate half a photon. The important thing to note is that QM is basically saying that the universe is like a huge lego construct. If you keep looking for smaller and smaller scales, eventually you will hit the smallest possible scale, which can no longer be divided. QM really goes one step further to say that one one lego sculpture would like to communicate with another lego sculpture they must exchange at least one lego piece in order to communicate. 

While these two premises are not quite so complicated, especially not here where I have oversimplified (perhaps beyond what is tolerable) , they give rise to another aspect of reality which is actually the first thing people now think of when they hear the words "Quantum Mechanics." This property of existence is called the "Uncertainty Principle." It seems that when one tries to break the world down into finite shapes and finite interactions, some element of uncertainty enters into the equation. It becomes impossible to obtain all the information that there is to know about a specific object. Or rather, the information obtained becomes increasingly inaccurate the more information you attempt to gather. Again this is a gross oversimplification of a very complex principle but this isn't a discussion of QM, it is a discussion of the inner workings of the world. 

Now it would be fairly easy for me to explain away the uncertainty principle based on what I discussed in 002 (about the way change and observation are interwoven to create the reality we know), but instead I would like to suggest that it may shed some light on another aspect of the world. I would like to focus on the oversimplification I have stated above. The information obtained becomes increasingly inaccurate the more information you attempt to gather. I think that statement is a more specific form of the more generic understanding 'less is more.' This phrase has far-reaching applicability. Efficiency can be defined by this phrase. It is certainly true of human resources and software development, and it finds expression in black holes as well. Most important though is that 'less is more' is an essential expression of a paradox of reality. 

The universe is an interrelated organic whole. It is an interwoven palace of simplicity. It is a singular design that is infinite. When we examine any one portion of the universe, no matter how small, we are looking at the universe in its entirety. When we try and understand how one microcosm of the universe interacts with another, or in reality, interacts with itself in another scale or perspective, we are bound to see results that become increasingly useless as we cause feedback. Just as two microphone+speakers will cause feedback as they try to amplify eachother's signal, so to, when we try and separate the universe into two (or more) specific entities, the identical information contained in both and related to itself causes mathematical or scientific noise. This is the measurement paradox. 

The measurement paradox is the wall between ourselves and HaShem. Measurement is very similar to aspects of the sephirah of Binah, understanding. It is understanding which hides knowledge from us. When you say that A relates to B in the manner defined as C, what you actually say is this: Everything (E) does not relate directly to A or to B. Furthermore you are implying that A relates to B only in C, and not in any other way. In actuality, everything relates to everything in every way. Definitions and formulas are the enemy of wisdom. When you define or prove an axiom, you have painted yourself into a corner, a fixed flawed view of the world. 

You might say that this line of argument serves no purpose because it in itself falls prey to flaws that it points out. There are in fact two specific points to this expression: 1) the first is a simple lesson: To attain wisdom you must open your mind to all possibilities 2) There may be a structure of which to speak: 

In my confusion about infinity in the eyes of modern mathematics I came across a perception that I believe is crucial to any understanding. But first a little mathematical background: In set theory, infinity is a property of a set. If a set contains a subset which can be put in a one-to-one correspondence with itself, it is infinite. What this really means is that: lets say I take the set of numbers greater than zero, and of this set I take a subset, all numbers divisible by two (and greater than zero). Now, if I can give you a number greater than zero and divisible by two for any number you can give me that is greater than zero, by the definition of infinity in set theory, the set of all numbers greater than zero would be infinite. And we know that this is true, for any number greater than zero that you give me, I can multiply that number by two and give it back to you as a number that fits in the specified subset. Sure enough, the set of all numbers greater than zero is infinite.

This idea sounds very nice in that it is a very specific definition of infinity. However, when one plays with this definition at length, resulting in things like Cantor's infinite levels of infinities, one loses all sense of the meaning of the word. There is one aspect of numbers that this perspective ignores and that is the idea of containment, which is fundamental to the whole idea of a set to begin with. What happens with Cantor is that he tries to talk about the size of an infinite set, something which from the onset we know to be meaningless. Somehow along the way, a meaning is attributed to the 'size' of infinity, and this is where mistakes and circular logic come in. Here is the heart of a paradox. Whenever you feel the logic of a problem as if it were a skater in a half-pipe, you know you are trying to comprehend a paradox. Let us examine this paradox: The set of all integers clearly contains the even integers, so it must be larger. The set of all integers can be put into a one-to-one correspondence with the set of even integers which seems to say they are the same size. How can two things of equal size fit within one another? There are only two answers: 1) you have mispercieved something or 2) you are witnessing a paradox. The answer is that it's meaningless to try and give a definition to the 'size' of infinity. However, infinity itself can be defined. 

This is where I believe the set theory definition of infinity is deficient, infinity bears a connotation of containment. Even though it would seem that we cannot compare the size of the set of integers to the set of even integers, we can clearly state that one dwells within the other. In the same way, even though we cannot break all of reality down into little bite-size formulas that can explain all of existence, we can speak of levels of existence. Certain levels contain other levels which contain still other levels. The paradox is a container that allows two levels to coexist, like the set of all integers is made up of the set of negative integers and the set of positive integers. 

So, even though it may seem that this expression points out the futility of understanding, it also suggests that there are entire levels we may comprehend through understanding. However, a total perception is still limited to those attained by self-negation. Of course, an ideal total perception is impossible, as the Torah promises: Lo yirani haAdam va'hai. ('Man may not percieve me because he lives.)

004. time: entropic holiness?

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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.

005. innate or circular knowledge

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My first attempt at writing this expression was extremely unsuccessful. This may be because the logic is extremely difficult to follow. In fact, I've mostly moved away from logic at this point because of the continued disappointment it has caused me, due to its inability to accurately relate to the world. A lot of the things which I will discuss in this expression relate to what is written in R' Moshe Haim Luzzato's (aka. The Ramhal) Path of God (Derech HaShem). I have begun to read it at my brother's suggestion, and was surprised to find a great similarity to my first couple of expressions. He clearly goes about his discussion in a more organized fashion, but I'm new at this. Now let us get to the matter at hand:

What is learning, what is remembering? First we will address the concept of communication, in an attempt to solve this problem. Human communication is vital to understand because it is often touted as the thing which separates us from the non-verbal creations. Speech is the highest form of action. Speech is also a way of closing the distance between two individuals. Speech brings us closer. Through much speech over a long period of time, one draws a close friend within oneself. This is the same result as the goal of prayer. Through continued discussions with HaShem we seek to achieve a closeness, a drawing-in of God.

Speech is not the communication of information. This can be done in many ways without speech, assuming it can be done at all. When we speak we establish a relationship, we acknowledge that relative position (which is what a relationship is in essence) through titles, names, language-specific conjugation and many more subtle ways. We already know that in the spiritual realm, relationships become distance. Relationships are also the only thing of value in the spiritual realm, The closer to God, the greater one is. We further know, from the Talmud, which the Ramhal references, that every action and event in this world is actually the result of the goings-on of the spiritual realm. When you complete the thought, that speech effects relationship, which effects the spiritual realm which in turn effects the physical realm, it becomes clear that speech is the highest form of action (as I've stated above).

Now, as to speech as a means of communication, we must return to learning and memory. First let us take an example. Let us assume I tell you something and you hear me say it, and you understand it to mean A. In reality I had said B. What is going on here? If speech is transmission of information, what just happened? In retrospect, if I were to assume speech is the act of transmitting information, I must not have spoken. Rather, I did speak, but I did not relate the information to you. The relationship was faulty. Psychology has spent much time analyzing how the messenger and the message and the environment etc affect communication, all of these affect the relationship which you create and either bring you closer or make you more distant. When information appears to be transferred this is what has actually happened: I have made you (momentarily) more like myself, and so you have been able to perceive the world as if you were me. In my shoes, the information I am trying to 'communicate' becomes both important and obvious to you, and so now you have 'received information.'

Why do I go to such lengths to explain away communication of information? Because it seems obvious to me that everyone, each individual, already knows everything. HaShem has placed us each in our own little glass elevator. We can go wherever we want and do whatever we want, and when we alter ourselves relative to something or someone else, we experience something new. Why do we experience something new? Because we relate to it differently now. HaShem somehow placed a veil over all our eyes and made this fabricated reality seem like the real thing. In Poe's The Purloined Letter we can learn a universal truth: there is no better way to hide something than in plain sight. Everything we perceive in this world is the totality of HaShem, but we perceive it all through relationships. It is these relationships which both blind us and offer us insight. To those who would like further basis for this reasoning, I ask what Ockham would think of any proposition in which multiple levels existed between man and God, when there was another proposition of only a single layer, when both explain the facts equally well.

To understand the point clearly I offer a second situation: (which is in fact the same situation.) I tell you A. You hear B, and you think it is brilliant, when you tell me B again, I hear something different than A, and I think you have thought this brilliant thing up on your own. In effect neither of us thought it up. If we discussed speech in terms of communication we would eventually end up saying one of two things: 1) that some chance noise was interpreted as signal (as in signal/noise ratio for those who don't understand the last statement). Or 2) that you thought of B, it was mere accident that you attributed it to me. (Mere accident? Okay it was you hearing noise and trying to make sense out of it, at which point you invented B yet thought it represented the meaning behind the noise you heard(ie. A).)

From the understanding that speech both affects and effects relationship, it becomes clear that my speech pulled us into a new relationship in which, through our combined perspectives, you could see something which was before invisible or unimportant to you. Because the speech connects us both, and alters both the hearer and the speaker, I am able as well to comprehend this new discovery. More often than not however, with people who have difficulty relating to one another, people re-modulate one another's relationships without ever finding some coincident or common-ground. In this case someone is always saying A, and someone hearing B. This also occurs when someone feels or wants no relationship with the speaker, and so the speaker's words are interpreted in the current frame in which they were never anything new or important to begin with and so the listener remains uninterested.

If one is unwilling to change or better a relationship, no real communication can occur. Now back to learning and memory, although there should be almost no need to address them at this point. People often tell me that the difference between learning something and remembering something is that when you remember it is something you already knew, and when you learn it is something you were not previously aware of. Now there is the long disproof and the short disproof, and I will stick with the short disproof. After I've explained where I am going with this, hopefully you will be able to see the long disproof. Here it is: You already knew everything. Hazal tell us that before a baby is born they know all of Torah (and I conclude-well within the realm of reason---that complete Torah knowledge implies complete knowledge of the world: Midrash: HaShem looked into the Torah and from it he created the world.) and then an angel comes and touches them on the upper lip (hence the indentation) and it is all forgotten. Since this is so, there can be no functional difference, according to the above definitions, between remembering and learning. Learning as we defined it a moment ago cannot possibly exist. Think about the difference in relationships when one learns and when one is reminded, and you will understand the difference between the two. If you really understand this difference you will understand why it says in Pirkei Avoth (the sayings of our fathers) "Who is he that is wise? He who learns from every man." This understanding will fall in the light of the association of humility and wisdom. On reaching such an understanding you realize how obvious and profound the statement and your understanding both were.

This is the essence of my writings, not to communicate knowledge, because you already know all there is to know. Rather, I'm creating a relationship with you, I'm allowing myself to be drawn into you, so that you might see the world the way I see it. In the next and second to last expression I will discuss the mechanism through which HaShem hides the world in front of our eyes: a spiraled pair.

006. a spiraled pair, a curv’ed whole

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This is the discussion of the most crucial part of everyone's lives. Not themselves, but rather their intended mate, Bashert (for lack of a better spelling). Hazal say: If Hashem never interrupts the rules of nature and miracle which he set out before the seventh day of creation, what does he do with all of his time? They answer: He spends all his time pairing people together with their perfect matches. This subtle question and subtle answer unveils the edge of existence. The phrase: "I am to my beloved, and my beloved is to me," echoes the same underlying ramifications. I have told many people of this idea I am about to share, but never delved into the depth of why or how.

Now, first I will point out that men and women are physically different. This is extremely obvious. At the end of this expression, I hope the spiritual differences between men and women will be equally obvious. Now I will step back from this a minute to talk about the universal (relative to both sexes) nature of our existence.

We all have an inner and an outer world. Normally we interact with and are more conscious of the outer world. The inner world is what we call our mind or our soul. These two worlds are parallel, all the attributes found in one are found in the other. Changes in one world directly effect changes in the other. The Ari'zl (R' Isaac Luria, teacher of Lurianic Kabbalah) said as much when he spoke of perfecting oneself in order to bring about perfection in the world at large. All this is true, yet we see one world more clearly than the other. Why does the outer world have a much stronger influence on us? This is because of the sin in the garden of Eden.

I will endeavor to explain this. The Outer world is an incarnation of the Tree of Knowledge (of Good and Evil). The inner world is an incarnation of the Tree of Life. It is actually misleading for me to use the word incarnation. It is my limited understanding that your outer world IS the Tree of Knowledge and your inner world IS the Tree of Life. The broken symmetry of the Tree of Knowledge being overwhelmingly more present than the Tree of Life is a direct result of Adam and Hava (Eve)'s sin. This is not to support the baseless notion of original sin. This is just the way things are, our outer world is perceived to be more accessible or alterable than our inner world.

Now let me explain something about the physical human body and then I will get to the heart of the matter. The human body is actually a combination of incarnations (taken with the same degree of incorrectness as above) of both the Tree of Life and Tree of Knowledge. This I learned from the R' Aryeh Kaplan sefarim (books) which I've read. Whether this is literally there or something I understood I don’t recall exactly. Our ten fingers and our tongue are the Tree of Life. Our ten toes and the sexual organ (usually this deals only with the male sexual organ to my (admittedly very limited) knowledge… but we will see how this explains the spiritual difference between men and women.) are the Tree of Knowledge. The human body as it exists today is a fusion of the two worlds. It is the flimsy barrier between both worlds. It is that which is actually you. One of the goals of prayer and mitzwoth (commandments which HaShem has given us) is to unify these two worlds, for it is through these two worlds that HaShem has hidden himself from us.

Now we will breach the subject of the title, a spiraled pair. I long ago shared with some of my friends the idea that one's Bashert feels inexplainable joy when one is on a high spiritual level (ie. in the midst of spiritual rapture). I explained that this was because one's Bashert and oneself are spiritually linked. At the time I don't believe I understood the further implications or depths of such a link, but over the time of my learning more has become clear. One of the secrets of the inner and the outer worlds is that they are actually the same world. The yet deeper understanding shows you that one's Bashert is actually one's world, and that one's Bashert's world is actually oneself. A pair of intended mates make up a paradox, the paradox of individuality, the heart of the creation of HaShem. They are a Mobius strip, spiraling endlessly. In order to make us see a disparate world with separate entities, HaShem must allow us to see objects and entities as separate from ourselves. HaShem takes half of his essence and allows it to see a lack in the other half. This other half lacks the initial half, this is the lack that the first half sees. (And if you aren't lost yet, vice versa.) It is the longing to be together of the intended mates that makes this world exist, that allows one to be blinded of the intimate and complete connection between oneself and all things. This is why it says in Bereshith (Genesis) "v'yihiyu l'bassar ehad." ("They will be as one flesh.") They will not be as one soul, because it is only their separation which allows for individuality. When intended mates are united their separation from HaShem ceases to exist, and all that is left is HaShem. This is why sex is an act of creation, at a moment of complete physical and spiritual unity, a spiraled pair basically channel HaShem’s own nature and an act of creation may take place.

Let us explain the spiritual difference now between men and women. Our meager barrier, our bodies (the only thing clearly definable as 'us', which allows the people in Tanakh to say 'I am dust,' without lying.), our bodies are what we must elevate. Our souls already reach to the heights if we let them, but when we voluntarily intertwine our souls with our bodies, our bodies are carried up as well. The Tree of Life and the Tree of Knowledge of my body, are the inner and outer worlds of my Bashert respectively. The Tree of Life and the Tree of Knowledge of her body are my soul (inner world), and world (outer world). This is the spiral. I am the flimsy film between her two worlds, and she the flimsy film between mine. Our bodies are different however. The male sexual organ’s nature is to give, and the female’s is to receive, to bound. The outer world which I provide to my Bashert is one of giving, and plenty. The outer world which she provides for me is one of boundary and reception. This is not to say that one has a negative connotation. If you are reading a negative connotation into this, rid your mind of that idea and go back and look over the two halves of the whole directly above. To assume then that only our outer worlds are different would be foolishness on my part because I have already admitted that the inner and outer worlds are intrinsically connected (and in fact, one). So, our inner worlds are different as well, and we can see this in the different acts and usages of speech between the sexes. More importantly this explains why the commandments for men are binding ones, and the commandments for women are unbinding (By binding I obviously refer to time, but that is not the only kind of boundary from which women are free). We live in different worlds, literally.

This is the heart of inter-human relationship. It is the foundation upon which individuality may exist in this world, and a metaphor used to explain God's creation (Throughout writings like Shir HaShirim, the Zohar, and other Neviim (prophets)). Hopefully this will enlighten you as to the seriousness of what one says and does. One also understands the grave nature of sexual misconduct, sinning before the face of God is something which I hope is unthinkable.

I have one more (the 8th) expression (007) left to write on the level above all of what I have conveyed. If this is metaphysics I guess that it will be meta-metaphysics. I want to thank you for taking the time (and the great investment in deciphering-energy necessary) to have read these first seven expressions. Please take whatever understandings you have gleaned from what I’ve written to heart, and do your part to reunite the Jewish people with their God and mankind with it's creator. The yearning between creator and created outweighs even the desire between two intended mates.
Notes:
in the discussion of the separation of Eve from Adam, (in bereshith) think of the depth of the word Tzela, (TzLAy) It contains the word "tzel" (shadow) referring to "b'tzelem elokim," as well as the letter Ayin, which literally means "eye", and was originally drawn as a circle. This can be understood like so (and actually be derived from a completely different direction which I wont go into more than to say Line/Curve): When God separated Adam and Eve, he separated the essence of God within man, Tzelem Elokim, "the image of God", and allowed the concept of an observer, one with eyes, to enter into the scene. When Adam and Eve were separated, the world was veiled in a film of perspective.
The words 'man' and 'woman' in Hebrew ish and isha, both have the word 'aish' meaning fire within them. Yet the man has a Yod in his name and the woman a Heh. The first thing this shows us is that women and men were created of the white and black fire of torah.. only their bodies are of dust (when they are reffered to as Adam (of the ground, or flesh and blood). Their purposes and their souls however are created of Torah itself. It is not clear to me which is white fire and which is black .. however I feel that Men are white fire for many reasons that would need a Notes: of their own. The next thing to notice is that all but one of the letters of HaShem's name exists in Man and Woman's name. The letter Vav is not present because Vav's depth is union, a connection. When Man and Woman become connected, HaShem's name is re-unified and complete.
The joining of Man and Woman has the potential to be as great as the moment of the giving of the Torah on har Sinai, very often however, it is brought low by acts akin to that of the golden calf.

007. know before whom you stand.

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This expression is the conclusion to this work in progress, Words: Ehad BaLev (Of Singular Heart). In it I would like to offer three different ideas that become a singular idea.

Purposefulness

I have a question that I think we could all think about, a question that will make us re-evaluate our world. I request one given: 'That people appreciate a reward if it is earned more so than they appreciate the same reward if it is a gift.' Take this as a rule of nature. Based on this truth, Imagine that you have any 'magical' power to bend or break the laws of nature (except the above rule). Now, make the world a better place. I don’t believe it is possible. I've thought about this a lot, and I think you should as well. If my given is assumed, anything that one changes will only negatively affect the overall outcome, if it effects the outcome at all.

Let us take an example: World hunger. I can now snap my fingers and end world hunger. Will I have changed the world for the better? Less people will die, but no one will ever appreciate food (as much) again—it is a gift. Food will be thought of as Oxygen is, no one appreciates oxygen until they've been choking, or suffocating. Instead perhaps, let me try to create a system by which all could attain food, so it would be earned pleasure and we would then appreciate it. Is not this system already in place? Is it not people who cause others to go without food?

You can try this with any kind of suffering or negativity and you will find that giving people B will only eliminate B from what everyone considers 'something worth having', or 'something necessary'. Furthermore, any system you suggest which makes the attainment of B a possibility to all, yet not a given, would only reproduce a system which already exists.

When one focuses on this question and possible solutions for some time, one finds two things:

1. That the only way to change things for the better is to do so within the jurisdiction of nature, with the sweat of one’s own brow.
2. That in HaShem’s creation everything has a purpose. If you remove one thing, other things will cease to be meaningful. Furthermore there are already things that have no (immediately perceivable) meaning, so surely anything WITH meaning, is meant to have meaning.

The idea that everything is meaningful, and everything causes some relationship to be seen and potentially understood may lead us to the understanding that everything is given a task in this world. Everyone has a job and a place, and the world continues to function, and, more importantly, can only reach its climax if everyone does his or her job. (Animals, plants, bacteria, stars, comets, and atoms (etc..) included)

the neshama and it's task
Now that we see that everything has a purpose we will attempt to begin to address one of the most direct purposes in the world. The task of the Neshama. Firstly we will try to understand the Neshama a little better. When I speak of the Neshama, I speak not of whatever clearly acknowledged concept is tied to this word already, rather a concept we are about to define. The Neshama is the spark of divinity that dwells at the center of every human being. The Neshama is not of the spiritual world.

The spiritual world is something that was created by HaShem, just as the physical world was. The spiritual world is the Torah that was separated from the physical world when they were both a united part of HaShem (even though HaShem has no actual parts) before the beginning of time. The Neshama is the union of the two, Torah and World. The Neshama is a union of the two worlds, a nullification of one another, until all that remains is the essence of HaShem. The Neshama is a glimpse of that which was never created, has always been, and will always be. The Neshama is a very tiny hole in the fabric of the world we live in, a tiny pin-prick that lets in the light of the deepest truth, HaShem.

Now this Neshama, this point of boundless divinity within each person, is very very small yet it allows people to perform actions. The actions of which I speak are not actions in the physical world, like throwing a ball. Nor are they actions in the spiritual world, like thinking a thought. They are actions which may bring the spiritual and physical worlds (Torah and Olam) closer together, or further apart. These actions encompass tying the physical world to the spiritual world, and vice versa. An example of this would be an act of kindness. When one gives charity to a needy person, one acknowledges the importance of one other than himself (a spiritual act) and one performs the act of giving something he would normally take (a physical act).

These actions have three outcomes:

1. One may act in the name of HaShem. This is the highest level of action. This is a mitzvah. The goal of such an action is primarily the joining of the physical and spiritual worlds in order to bring blessing into this world. (which I hope to explain in the next paragraph.)
2. One may act in the name of self. This is the act of the average individual, performed to obtain that which one desires.
3. One may act in the name of Others. This is the lowest and most detestable form of action. This is idol worship. By others I do not mean in the name of some other person, as a messenger, because we know that the Rabbis say that "a messenger for a person, is as the person himself." (Shlucho shel adam k'moto) Why is this act so bad? When a person acts in his own name, he at least believes in haShem in a veiled way, he believes in the spark of divinity within him, he believes in himself. When a person acts in HaShem's name he imparts a truth as great as, if not greater than, that of all the combined Torah. This person has brought blessing into this world in a way that cannot be equaled, as we will discuss in a moment. The person who acts in the name of a 'god' other than HaShem is sharing only falsehood with the world and with his peers. The world itself regrets its existence when someone acts in the name of Others.

When a Neshama is used to perform an act of the first category, it allows the Neshama to grow larger, the hole becomes clearer and through it more of HaShem is perceivable. The radiance that shines forth from this hole is what we call Beracha, blessing. The radiance shines forth and greatly multiplies the physical and spiritual worlds, allowing for more acts like the first in order to even more greatly dilate the Neshama. There is a side effect of this Beracha, as more radiance shines forth, and more torah and world are created, the benefit this immediately brings to this world, is an act of unification on its own. And so the Neshama dilates a little more, allowing a little more light through it's iris. This light causes further torah and world, causing a little more light. Each time a little less light comes forth, and a little less world is created. What this looks like is a drop of water falling into a calm reservoir. The initial waves are high and as they spread out they begin to get lower, eventually disappearing. Every mitzvah (act of category 1) causes such a wave.

The third category of act produces a wave in the opposite way. Every act of unification in the name of Others leads to a contraction of the Neshama, further closing it's iris, and letting out less brilliance than before. The lack of light causes the destruction of Torah and World. This resultant destruction causes further contraction of the Neshama in a similar wave as described above. Hashem has done a great kindness to us in that the world works this way, what it means is that eventually an evildoer's Neshama will become totally closed and he will have no ability to perform additional acts of evil (or Has v'Shalom that this should happen to anyone, no ability to perform acts of good—even then HaShem has it in his power to show mercy if he so chooses), yet a Tzaddik's, who's every action further dilates his Neshama, every act brings greater and greater amounts of Beracha into the world with no upper limit.

The middling act, acting in one's own name, creates no real waves of which to speak, but the Neshama is enlarged very slightly, because it may be that some will see HaShem's hand even in what you think are your own efforts. This act has the repercussion only of a lack of achievement. An act that could have greatly increased the Beracha in the world, instead increased the Beracha only the slightest amount, and made the physical and spiritual worlds less balanced. (because an act for self must be focused on attaining something physical or spiritual ultimately but I wont get into this here.)

When a mitzvah (act 1) and an avayrah (act 3) interact they may cancel one another out. This is not often the ultimate case as a mitzvah leads to a mitzvah and an avayrah to an avayrah (from the sayings of our fathers, Pirkei Avoth), and since there is a lower limit to avayroth but no such upper limit to mitzwoth, eventually the mitzwoth overpower the avayroth. It may take lifetimes, or generations, to witness and understand such a nature, however.

imaginable but unimageable
In the end of days (and it is called this somewhat in the spirit of my first point, not because there will be no more days, because there will be no more shortage of them.) The waves of the mitzwoth will eventually become like a standing wave. This means that the iris of the collective Neshama of mankind will continuously expand and continuously create more world (time & space) and Torah (truth & appreciation), causing further dilation of the universal Neshama ad infinitum. I will not get into the idea of a universal or collective Neshama further here, with HaShem's help perhaps I will understand and share it at some point in the future.

The idea or perhaps image I would like to focus on now is the continuous expansion and continuous creation which prod one another forever. This can be visualized in a simplistic way as similar to a black hole. There is some density of mitzwoth that, performed in a small enough amount of time (two shabbatoth?), would cause an endless implosion (like that of a new black hole who’s mass has just shrunk beyond its schwarzchild radius).

The image of a black hole falls short when you realize there is no space external to HaShem, and no space into which he may implode but himself. The image one begins to see is unexpressable. One can express a limited understanding in certain words or images, but it cannot compare to what one may experience in one's own mind when one comes across it.

I first saw/felt this shape a year ago (almost) sitting in class pondering the discussion of the class (called Systems and Structures, about systems and chaos theory) as well as all of my knowledge related to recently read passages from Sefer Yetsirah, the Book of Formation.

I came across this shape again a week ago when I tried to express my divrei torah on the tasks of the 70 nations visually. I drew many diagrams but every time I returned to the idea of the tafkid (the job or role) the Jews are meant to play I failed to illustrate it. Finally I realized it was the same shape I tried to express or draw about 10 months earlier. It was only upon running into the shape here that I knew it was part of this final expression.

Surprisingly about three months ago I ran into a discussion of this exact shape as it passed through the books of various mathematicians and philosophers throughout history. It is an essay by Jorge Luis Borges, in his book Labyrinths which my Grandmother made me read, called 'The Fearful Sphere of Pascal.'

There are many aspects of this shape that can be seen separately, but I believe it is the highest level of rational or intellectual perception of the workings of this world.

tying it all together
We have seen the relationships between God and Man, in the first two expressions I discussed these ideas in some depth. We have seen some of the relationships between Man and the World/Torah in the third, fourth, and fifth expressions. We have also seen in the last two writings, ways in which Man relates to Man. This final expression is meant to change everything around a little. Instead of examining the world in pieces, I have tried to show the world in it's entirety. At the very least I've tried to show you how to see the world on a far larger and more interrelated scale than my previous writing.

We began with an examination of the balance of structure that HaShem has based this world upon, by trying, theoretically, to change it for the better. This lead us to the understanding of how just and purposeful the world actually is. The question of purpose, which revolves heavily around Man's role, lead us into the discussion of Neshama, the means by which we may perform our allotted task. An illustrated understanding of our relationship to Neshama introduced the cyclic, self-referential nature of this world. This property viewed through much thought and imagination inevitably leads to the shape we discussed last.

When we open our minds and eyes, in an attempt to encompass everything, we ultimately hit a wall (The twice mentioned self-referential shape). There are two reasons why this is the case. The first reason can be illustrated when one holds a mirror up to another mirror. An illustration of a simplistic kind of infinity can be seen in this fashion. This is in effect, what happens when we really try to 'take in' the world. Since we have all of knowledge within us already, an awareness of all that is, when we look outward for such an awareness, the presence of the same knowledge both within you and outside you play off one another in endless reflections. This is the inexpressible self-referential shape. The second reason is more basic. When we open our eyes to look, when we use our minds to understand, we are trying to perceive truth with our inherent falsehood. Eyes are false in that we should be aware of all things everywhere, but eyes convince us we have a vantage point. Our mind does the same thing, it convinces us we are separate from all others, even though we are all the same, indivisible. When we want to approach past the shape that blocks our comprehension, we must perceive with our Neshama. Our Neshama is not separate from HaShem at all, it shares no falsehood with this creation, when we close our eyes and minds and succumb to being, we are the shape, and we can rejoice in HaShem's company virtually unhindered.

parting words..
Having arrived here, I realize that this work is partially without purpose. I cannot explain to you a world that I don’t live in. Don't be fooled into thinking your world is exactly my world, or vice versa. I cannot convey the shape which may be a universal expression of all these worlds. And lastly, I cannot even tell you any of this unless you first understand that you already know it. In truth this work is more about questioning than about answering. The answer is always HaShem is One. That is the highest and most complete answer, the only answer with no following question. (Every other answer can be followed by a 'Why?', but the question 'Why is HaShem One?' has only one answer: "HaShem is One.")

It is only my compulsive nature to always have an answer that has made answers as well as questions so prevalent here. I won't offer a question without an answer, even if the answer is wrong. That is the last thing to note in this work. I have been, am, and will be wrong from time to time. I have enlisted HaShem's aid in writing these expressions, and I have intended to write only truth, sometimes veiled slightly, but I am human and prone to error.

Acharon Acharon Haviv: It is my hope that this work opens your eyes to HaShem's everpresent hand, to the beauty of his creations, and to the amazing potential he has placed within each of you. It is my hope that you see and question, that you look and understand, and that you close your eyes and know this to be true.

Notes:
Neshama as defined by me above is probably more closely related to the Kabbalistic concept of the Yechida, than to the normative concept of Neshama.(note: this appears to be incorrect, the Yechidah is not that which I thought it was, or perhaps it may be, I am not sure, however I do know that one may come to misunderstanding if one tries to relate Neshama as used here to the Neshama of other Jewish traditions and usages (who have a far more clearly defined knowledge of precisely what Neshama entails.)
I saw the shape a third time which I haven't mentioned, while trying to understand our place in time. As well as the weaving of particles&souls through this time.
The concept of an evil person being completely cut off from HaShem, having his Neshama completely closed, can be seen in two places that I can think of: 1. the concept of Karet (cutting off) as a divine punishment, and 2. The Ramhal mentions the point of no return in his Derech HaShem.
I said "rejoice in HaShem's company virtually unhindered" because a completely unhindered view would fall under 'man shall not see me and live', furthermore since Moshe couldn’t see HaShem completely, and no one may see as clearly as he, there are at least two levels which are completely unattainable. If you take R’Haim Wittal’s comments into account regarding the limited levels of spiritual experience throughout the ages, there are now 5 major levels (complete unity, the level of moshe, atziluth (the neviim), beriyah (the tana'im I think), and yetsirah (the amoraim)) that we cannot achieve in this day. Fortunately, perhaps even for this generation, prophecy is supposed to re-emerge very shortly.
The word eye in Hebrew is Ayin, there is a letter Ayin as well. The letter was originally drawn as a circle, and it's numerical value is 70. All of this symbolism states that the Eye is a means of hiding HaShem from us. (A circle is a simple curve, a curve only has meaning when it is observed, as opposed to a line which has a constant clearly defined meaning at all levels of observation. 70 is the number of the nations, symbolizing the breaking up of mankind, and the creation of the world. 70 is also the gematria of the word Sibuv which is the best word I could find to describe curve. ..in case you are curious line, kav, has a gematriah of 106 which corresponds to the letter nun (nun vav nun = 50 + 6 + 50 = 106).
Just so you see the correspondence: UnityTheory (UT) relates to the section on Neshama. MetaLanguage(ML) relates to the first section on trying to alter the human experience. VisualMath(VM) corresponds to the discussion of the shape, which is a visual/tactile/kinesthetic representation of the world as a whole. The unification of the three tries to take place in 'tying it all together' but it really can only take place within you.