Drawing Heaven Down and Preparing the Vessel Below

במדרש אספה. הבונה בשמים מעלותיו כו'.

In the Midrash on "Asfah" (Gather to Me...): "He who builds His upper chambers in the heavens..." (Amos 9:6).

The Midrash on Moshe gathering the seventy elders cites a pasuk describing Hashem building His "chambers" in heaven while founding His "bundle" upon earth; the Sefas Emes will explain the two directions of this avodah.

כבר כתבנו במ"א.

We have already written elsewhere.

The Sefas Emes refers to his own earlier treatment of this idea and will summarize it briefly.

והענין בקצרה כי יש ב' ענינים.

And the matter, in brief, is that there are two matters.

There are two complementary aspects to drawing holiness into the world.

שצריכין להמשיך כח משמים לזה העולם וזה פעל מרע"ה שהוריד התורה מן השמים.

That one must draw power down from heaven to this world — and this Moshe Rabbeinu accomplished, for he brought the Torah down from heaven.

The first aspect is the downward flow: Moshe's role was to draw the heavenly Torah and its shefa (spiritual flow) down into the lower world.

אך צריכין ג"כ להכין עצמנו להיות כלי מוכן לקבל השפע משמים.

But one must also prepare oneself to be a vessel ready to receive the shefa (abundance) from heaven.

The second aspect is the upward preparation: we must make ourselves into fitting vessels from below, ready to receive what is drawn down.

וזה ענין הספינות קשורים שלמטה דכתיב ואגודתו.

And this is the matter of the ships bound together below, as it is written "and His bundle (agudaso)" (Amos 9:6).

Just as ships are tied together for stability, so the pasuk's "bundle founded upon the earth" represents the binding and unity that must be established below to receive the heavenly flow.

שלמטה צריכין קשרים ואגודות.

For below one needs bindings and bundlings.

The lower world requires connection and unity — the "tying together" — to be a vessel fit for receiving from above.

וזה בחי' תפילין של יד דכתיב וקשרתם.

And this is the aspect of the tefillin of the hand, as it is written "and you shall bind them" (Devarim 6:8).

The tefillin shel yad, which we "bind" onto ourselves, represents this lower avodah of binding and preparing the vessel from below.

אבל תש"ר היא הארה הבאה מלמעלה כמ"ש וראו כו' שם ה' נקרא עליך.

But the tefillin of the head (tefillin shel rosh) is an illumination that comes from above, as it is written "and they shall see... that the Name of Hashem is called upon you" (Devarim 28:10).

The tefillin shel rosh, resting visibly above, represents the downward illumination drawn from heaven — the first aspect.

ובאמת ב' אלו הם בחי' הנפש והרוח.

And in truth these two are the aspects of the nefesh and the ruach.

These two directions correspond to two levels of the soul: the nefesh (lower) and the ruach (higher).

הנפש צריך שמירה.

The nefesh requires guarding (shemirah).

The nefesh, the lower soul bound to the body, needs protection and refinement from below.

וגאולתנו ממצרים הי' בבחי' הנפש כמ"ש במ"א.

And our geulah (redemption) from Mitzrayim was in the aspect of the nefesh, as we have written elsewhere.

Yetzias Mitzrayim was a redemption on the level of the nefesh — rescuing the lower soul and making it a guarded, fit vessel.

ואח"כ זכו לבחי' הרוח בחי' התורה.

And afterward they merited the aspect of the ruach, the aspect of the Torah.

Once the nefesh was redeemed, at Matan Torah Bnei Yisrael rose to the higher level of the ruach — the soul that receives Torah from above.

אבל כשנפגם אח"כ הנפש ע"י החטאים כמ"ש נפשנו יבשה.

But when the nefesh was afterward damaged through the sins, as it is written "our nefesh is dried up" (Bamidbar 11:6).

When Bnei Yisrael sinned in the wilderness, the lower soul, the nefesh, became blemished — "our soul is dried up."

ונפשנו קצה.

And "our nefesh loathes" (Bamidbar 21:5).

This damage to the nefesh is also reflected in their later complaint that "our soul loathes" the mann.

היו צריכים תקונים ע"י בחי' שבעים נפש בחי' ואגודתו על ארץ.

They needed repairs by means of the aspect of "the seventy souls (shivim nefesh)," the aspect of "His bundle upon the earth."

To repair the damaged nefesh, the avodah of the "seventy" was needed — the binding and unity ("bundle upon earth") that rebuilds the lower vessel.

והם השבעים איש כמ"ש שם בשבעים נפש ירדו אבותיך כו'.

And these are the seventy men, corresponding to that which is written "with seventy souls your forefathers went down [to Mitzrayim]..." (Devarim 10:22).

The seventy elders appointed by Moshe parallel the original seventy souls who descended to Mitzrayim — both being the foundation of the nation's lower, "nefesh" dimension.

והרמז דכתיב זכרנו כו' הדגה כו' היינו שנתעורר בהם הרהורים מגלות מצרים.

And the hint is that which is written "we remember... the fish..." (Bamidbar 11:5), meaning that there were aroused in them stirrings from the galus of Mitzrayim.

Their craving and "remembering" of Mitzrayim shows that the wound to their nefesh had reawakened old attachments from the Egyptian exile.

וממילא לא היו מוכנים לקבל המן שהוא לחם מן השמים:

And consequently they were not prepared to receive the mann, which is "bread from heaven" (Shemos 16:4).

Because their lower nefesh was damaged and pulled toward Mitzrayim, they could no longer be fit vessels for the mann, the heavenly bread that belongs to the higher level of the ruach.

Summary: There are two directions in serving Hashem — drawing power down from heaven (Moshe bringing down the Torah, tefillin shel rosh, the ruach) and preparing oneself below as a fit, bound vessel to receive it (the "bundle upon earth," tefillin shel yad, the nefesh). Yetzias Mitzrayim redeemed the nefesh; Matan Torah raised them to the ruach. But when the nefesh was damaged by sin and drawn back toward Mitzrayim, they needed the repair of the "seventy" and could no longer be vessels for the heavenly mann.