אִם יִרְצֶה הַשֵּׁם
כ״ה חֶשְׁוָן תשפ״ז
From Daily Zohar #5295 of Reb Zion Nefesh, Zohar Chayei Sarah. Yesterday: Putting Tefillin (DZ 5294).
A map of the Daily Zohar, not a stenographic record. Neither this post nor these notes have been reviewed by Reb Zion Nefesh or the Daily Zohar.
Two chariots
The one who lays tefillin is a likeness of two chariots, so that Malchut comes and the Shechinah dwells on him.
Yesterday's Zohar sealed that taam: reason, in Ve-asu li mikdash ve-shachanti be-tocham: they shall make Me a sanctuary and I will dwell among them. The Mishkan was built in the pattern of the upper merkavah: chariot. The man who puts tefillin is built the same way.
Union is practiced from the chest and above, where the face of man is. Revelation of Chochmah is practiced from the chest and below, where the face of man is lacking. Completeness is the two together: the lower chariot ascends and is included in the union above, and then Chochmah is revealed below.
Today's paragraphs are the anatomy of that divide.
The Shin of three crowns
The tefillin contain upper secrets and their likenesses. From the chest and below, where Malchut is, there are three chariots, in the likeness of the holy upper ones, the secrets of three letters of the Name: Yod-Hei-Vav. Four portions rule over four. And of this is the secret of the Shin of three crowns and the Shin of four crowns.
The Daily Zohar commentary reads the chest as the cut in Zeir Anpin. From the chest down, the lower chariot has from itself only Yod-Hei-Vav. The lower Hei of Havayah is lacking. That missing letter is the face of man.
Three kings rule in the body from the chest down: Netzach, Hod, Yesod. They are called kings because that whole region belongs to Malchut. That is the Shin of three crowns.
The tefillin of HKBH above, shel rosh and shel yad, are four portions. They stand opposite the Shin of four crowns: the upper chariot, in which the four letters of Havayah are complete.
Four portions, four letters
The four parshiyot: portions in the tefillin, are Chochmah, Binah, Tiferet, Malchut. They rule over the four letters of Havayah, because those four letters are the same four.
The Shin of three crowns is the lower chariot as it stands in itself. The Shin of four crowns is the upper chariot in completeness.
The bayit of the head already wears both. One side is a Shin of three heads. The other is a Shin of four.
The heart rides
The heart rides, in the likeness of the lower chariot, and the lower one rides. This chariot of the arm is below. The heart rides in the likeness that is below. All the hosts of the heavens were delivered into its hand to gather them. So too the heart rides below, and all the members of the body were delivered into its hand.
Riding is the Zohar's word for the revelation of Chochmah. That riding belongs to Malchut. The chariot of the arm is tefillin shel yad, the Nukva, below the chest.
The heart is Malchut of the upper chariot, from the chest and above. It is called heart after the thirty-two paths of Chochmah that are revealed there. Lev is thirty-two.
The commentary gives two aspects.
Above the chest the heart rides in the likeness of the lower chariot. It bestows. It does not shine for itself. The Chassadim: kindnesses, stay covered. Actual riding belongs below the chest.
When the lower chariot ascends and is included in the upper, that same heart is drawn down with it. Then it reveals Chochmah below the chest.
Hosts and members
When Chochmah is revealed in the heart in its place, all the hosts of the heavens are delivered into its hand. From the chest and above, Zeir Anpin is called the heavens. The levels that hang there are the hosts.
When the heart rides below, all the members of the body are delivered into its hand. From the chest and below, Zeir Anpin is the aspect of the Nukva, called the body. The levels that hang there are the members.
The shining gathers every level under it.
Yesterday the kavanah of tefillin is both chariots together. Today one Shin has three crowns and one has four. When a man lays them, which Shin is he standing in, and what would it mean for the lower chariot to have already ascended?
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