Saturday, September 8, 2012

The Foundations of Relationship:6a

Based on the concept that we have previously presented, that people are vessels to receive the light of Hashem, we can understand the following:

The Torah describes the creation of Woman from Man. We need to consider this in light of the understanding that all people are receivers from Hashem. Whatever is described in the creation of Chava is equally true of any recipient in Creation.

All of the farm animals, wild animals and birds were initially created separately, male as well as female. Only man was created as one unified being - like his Creator. Subsequently Hashem stated that He would make a helpmate opposite him. He put Adam to sleep and "took one of his ribs. And God built the rib that he had taken from the Man into a Woman, and He brought her to the Man. And the Man said 'this time a bone from my bone and flesh from my flesh. She shall be referred to as אשה (woman) for she was taken from an איש (man).'"

The very rib which ultimately became an independent being was initially a bone from his bones. When they were united it was an integral part of him. Afterwards, when Hashem took it and built it, and brought her to Adam, Adam and Chava saw what was clearly true, that she was a bone from his bones and was not a separate existence (as it seemed while he was sleeping.) This is why he called her אשה, because her very being was taken from him.

The result was that in their subsequent life together it was not a joining between two disparate parts - as we would find by the other creatures that were not created as one being - but with man the one that had become two, now returned to a perfect unity as had existed prior to the initial separation.  At the time of completion there are not two entities, but only one that is now returning to it pre-separation state. The recipient is clearly not separate, as it seemed at the time of its formation, but a rib of the ribs of the one who provided for her, for from Man she was taken.

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