One might think that all of the benefits lie in the ideal marriage of ideas when all of the inequalities are balanced out, yet this is far from the whole story. The goal would seem to formulate the terms of the relationship such that they would be identical to each other in the sense of having a common identity. Soul-mates, in the realm of ideas of this kind, would then maintain their ‘sameness.’ In the world of Emanation, the distinctions therein would be typical of the mathematical concept of an ‘identity operation’ as a transformation which maintains an object unchanged.

In Chassidic philosophy this property of the world of Emanation is compared to lighting one candle from another. If my candle is lit and you light your candle from mine, it does not alter my original flame (phenomenologically speaking). This is contrasted with the metamorphic operation within the world of Creation which resembles the pouring of water from container to container. When I pour myself out in this fashion some part of me is diminished when it is passed over to you. The transformation changes both of us on account of our ‘inequality.’ We are always asymmetrical as we ‘exchange’ back and forth in the relation of ezer (our cooperation model), k’negdo (our competition and conflict model) and levado (our exclusionary or isolationist principle with total asymmetry). All of Creation (and the subsequent worlds below of Formation and Action) begin with symmetry breaking.

The world of Emanation is all about maintaining symmetries. One powerful and concise definition of symmetry is offered by the Nobel laureate in physics, Frank Wilczek, in his book The Lightness of Being: Mass, Ether, and the Unification of Forces (p.58) where he states that: “…symmetry means you have a distinction without a difference.” He then goes on to provide a straightforward example of this (pp.58-59): “The equilateral triangle has nontrivial symmetry, because it permits distinctions (between a triangle and its rotated versions) that don’t, after all, make any difference (to rotated versions given the same shape).” Moreover, he explains how incredibly powerful the concept of symmetry is for producing new knowledge in that (pp.60-61):

“If we know that an object has symmetry, we can deduce some of its properties. If we know a set of objects has symmetry, we can infer from our knowledge of one object the existence and properties of another. And if we know that the laws of the world have symmetry, we can infer from one object the existence, properties, and behavior of new objects.”

Symmetrical marriages exist in the world of Emanation. There, relationship differences happen within the context of holographic interaction or interinclusion in such a way that ‘I can tell a lot about you from your spouse even through we’ve never met’ or when we hear someone say: ‘I don’t know her, but I know the sort of person she’s married to and that in turn informs me about her qualities.’ When our marriage pair is us (the created) and the Divine (the Creator), then we can discern symmetries between what is ‘above’ and what is ‘below.’ The same holds true for the concepts of the spiritual and the material, soul and body. Even an ‘accidental tourist’ within the annals of kabbalistic tradition will soon discover the extensive use of symmetries in the decryption of the esoteric dimensions of the Torah. It is the overarching concept that links ideas together.

Wilczek’s definition of symmetry being a ‘distinction without a difference’ aptly conveys the sense of havadalah ‘separations’ we have been using up until now in the world of Emanation. Practically, this world would seem to make us ‘indifferent’ to the distinction as to whether it is you or me because it’s all the same. Not that the manner of speaking of a ‘you’ and a ‘me’ is totalized in an ‘us’ (the all consuming relation) but that you are within me and I am within you in an interincluded sense. The bond brings us so close (etzel or proximity is once again the root of Atzilut or emanation) as to function as a distinction that makes no difference, or a difference without distinction.

Note that this world is the primary domain of kabbalistic exegesis, the practitioners thereof being called yeduai chein or those that ‘recognize symmetry.’ One of the most captivating topics in Kabbalah is that of gilgulim or reincarnation. Picking out the same soul in a different body and uncovering correlations between two lifetimes is a kind of application of symmetry thinking. Beyond souls and bodies, ideas also undergo recycling and reincarnation. Recognizing the same idea in a new form of presentation also underscores its symmetry;  it means an exchange in ‘terms’ or a trading ‘places’ without ‘absolutely’ changing identities. Given that the original meaning of Kabbalah is ‘parallel,’ it becomes a simple matter to see how symmetry plays into many forms of pattern recognition. Since the world of Emanation signifies a world of proximity, we can assert that the ‘coupling’ of ideas in this context will ‘approximate’ each other. Here better and better approximations make for enhanced marriages of ideas. Nonetheless, from this perspective, one idea always relates to other ideas. There is an underlying consilience of all knowledge. Hence, looking to marry all ideas within a unified framework is the thrust of this world.

Nothing is completely parallel in the lower worlds due to the greater degrees of divergence and increased intervals of difference. To enter into the world of Emanation would be comparable to de-differentiating the terms of the relationship (the collapse of distance would be like the entanglement of ideas–they have interdisciplinary influence on each other no matter how diverse the fields of study within which they emerge). This convergence of ideas is due to their intense attraction. Our two ideas were ‘made for each other’ (being to or for the other in the relation of ‘lo’). They were meant to be together. The union of ideas that have a common origin that precedes Creation (an a priori connection) is disclosed via the faculty of transcendental intuition or chochmah (‘my intuition tells me that you ‘two ideas’ just belong together which prompted me to suggest the match’). I caught sight of (insight is also a good rendering of chochmah) how these two were brought into being to become a ‘something,’ an ‘item,’ from out of nothing (hithavut yesh m’ayin).

The total equivalence and interchangeability of ideas would entail their having been one prior to descending into the world. The narrative of a single soul which is split into two and then travels down into the world only to seek a reunion with his or her other half, readily translates into the origins of ideas. Prior to the ‘worlding’ of these ideas–the placing them within a context–they were inseparable. Only the process of progressive contextualization, of their being in the world, differentiates them. Once they become reacquainted, they draw close and reunite. The ‘embodiment’ of these ideas is made possible by their world-context which immediately positioned them between other embodied ideas.

In her work, Body Images: Embodiment as Intercorporeality, Gail Weiss astutely observes this quality in people and we might extend it to apply to the abstract ‘body’ of one idea being co-dependent on the ‘body’ of another idea. One of her most striking and applicable formulations comes from her chapter title: “Splitting the Subject: The Interval between Immanence and Transcendence” (p.39). If we understand the “subject” as Adam (we are all called ‘Adam’) there the ‘splitting of the subject’ are the two name-identities cited in the subject’s composition in Genesis (2:7): “God [Havayah–the transcendent aspect of Divinity] God [Elokim–the immanent aspect of Divinity] formed the man [Adam–in the sense of the ‘person’ of ‘subject’] from the dust of the ground [immanent sphere] and He [God] blew into his nostrils the breath of life [transcendent sphere].”

The human subject is configured as ‘the interval between immanence [Elokim/nature] and transcendence [Havayah (the Tetragrammaton)/beyond nature]. We have to learn how to re-incorporate both sides of the subject [Adam] which once split [into Adam and Chava/Eve] need to be married. Thus, later on when Chava/Eve is re-introduced to Adam, he proclaims (Genesis 2:23): “…this at last is bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh. This shall be called Woman, for from man she was taken.” In explaining this verse, we have to add another level to our system of the four worlds.

In the world of Emanation there is a virtual separation between Adam and Chava/Eve (self and other), but as long as they remain in this world they remain married and symmetrical. The exile and separation of Adam and Chava/Eve would result in seeing the other descend further into the world of Creation. There, the other is really not-me. We are irreducibly dyadic. However, there is a stage above the four worlds called Adam Kadmon or Primordial Man. This would be the equivalent of an Emanator of the world of Emanation, a reality where the subject is not yet split. All of the distinctions therefore collapse. It makes no difference whether it’s you or me because you are me and I am you. Unlike the biunal relationship of the world of Emanation (a unity of two) here, at the level of Primordial Man, we can’t even properly speak of two. The soul level which relates to the Primordial Man is called Yichidah or ‘singularity’ for this is an utterly singular reality.

This is not to suggest that it is the same as being single in the world of Action (levado) because there our consciousness is still split. We are single amongst other singles. Multiplicity abounds. Whereas for Primordial Man, all of the multiplicity disappears. There is only a singular reality (no ‘other’ exists). Once again, transposed into the matching of ideas, the common de-contextualized root of two ideas merges them into a singular state. A = B and B = A. We can read in both directions across the equals sign.

Other couplings of ideas based on competition and cooperation models will be taken up in Part Seventeen.

http://www.interinclusion.org/inspirations/relationship-differences-fusion-and-defusion-part-17/

http://www.interinclusion.org/inspirations/relationship-differences-fusion-and-defusion-part-15/

Print PDF