Nasso [Take]
1) It is written, “Time to do for the Lord; they have broken Your law.”
The days are few, and the owner of sins, the slanderer, is pressing. The herald calls each day for repentance, and the harvesters of the field—those who have been rewarded with the crop of the upper field, the attainment of the secrets of the Torah—are few. And even those who did attain are at the end of the vineyard and do not properly notice or know to which place they are going.
17) Happy is a man who has been rewarded with the Torah, to walk and to cling to His ways. When a person walks in the paths of Torah, he draws upon him a high and holy spirit, as it is written, “Until the spirit be poured upon us from on high.” And when a person strays from the path of Torah, he draws upon him another spirit, from the other side, from the side of Tuma’a, and the side of Tuma’a awakens from the side of the hole of the great deep, the abode of the evil spirits that harm people, and which are called “harm-doers of the world.”
18-19) Anyone who clings to the Creator and keeps the commandments of the Torah seemingly sustains the worlds—the world above and the world below, as it is written, “And do them.”
And anyone who breaches the commandments of the Torah seemingly blemishes above, blemishes below, blemishes himself, and blemishes all the worlds. There is an allegory about sailors who were sailing in a boat. One fool among them rose and wished to puncture the boat. His friend told him, “Why are you puncturing the boat?” He replied, “Why should you care? I am drilling under me!” He told him, “But we are both drowning in the boat together!”
90) “And the educated ones will shine as the brightness of the firmament” with this composition of yours, Rabbi Shimon, The Book of Zohar, from the brightness of upper Ima, who is called repentance.
90) Israel are destined to taste from the tree of life, which is The Book of Zohar. Through it, they will come out of exile in mercy and it will exist in them.
98-99) As the Creator divided them at Mount Sinai, He will divide them in the last redemption. This is so because it is said about Israel, “And the children of Israel went up armed out of the land of Egypt.” “Armed,” from the side of the tree of life, ZA, which are fifty [spelled like “arms” in Hebrew] years of the Yovel [fifty years’ anniversary], Bina, which ZA receives from Bina. It is said about them, “They shall come up to the mount.” And among them was “the angel of God, who went before the camp of Israel.” Also, it is they who were told, “And how I bore you on the wings of eagles,” which are clouds of glory, “And brought you unto Myself,” “And the children of Israel were going out boldly.” Thus, He will bring the disciples of the wise out with all this glory.
As it was said about the ignorant from the side of the good, “And they stood at the foot of the mountain,” so they will be in the last redemption—under the disciples of the wise, as a servant who walks by the feet of his master’s horse. At the foot of the mountain they were told, “If you accept the law, good. If not, there will be your burial place.” Similarly, they will be told in the last redemption, “If you take upon yourselves a disciple of the wise at the end of the exile, like a man who is riding a horse and his servant serves him, good. If not, there—in the exile—will be your burial.”
105) How loved are Israel before the Creator, wherever they are, the Creator is with them because He does not remove His love from them, as it is written, “And let them make Me a Temple, that I may dwell among them.”
106-107) Happy is the man who is among the first ten at the synagogue because by them is the congregation completed, when it is not less than ten. They are the ones who are sanctified by Divinity first. But there must be ten at the synagogue at the same time, and not come bit by bit, so that the wholeness of the organs is not detained, for all ten are as organs of a single body in which Divinity dwells, for the Creator has made man at once and established for him all the organs at the same time.
Once all of the man’s organs were completed at that time, each organ was properly established in itself. Likewise, since Divinity came to the synagogue first, there must be ten there together, and then it is completed because there is no congregation of less than ten, who correspond to Malchut’s ten Sefirot. As long as there are no ten together there, none of them is completed. Afterwards, the whole congregation is corrected, as it is written, “The king is glorified in the multitude of the people.” Hence, the people, who come after the first ten are all the correction of the body, the correction of the congregation, since the multiplication of the people increases the glory of the king.
109) “When a man utters a vow.” “Utters” means he retires from the rest of the people in the world to be sanctified as above and to be whole. When a person comes to be purified he is purified. A man who comes to be sanctified is sanctified and the Kedusha of above is spread over him, the Kedusha with which the Creator is sanctified.
110) Oh how should one observe and know the work of his Master, for each day the clarion calls out and says, “How long, you fools, will you love foolishness?” “Return, O backsliding children,” “I will heal your backsliding,” and there is no one to lend an ear. The Torah declares before them and there is no one to notice.
167) The Creator called Israel Adam, such as above, ZA, and He called them “beast.” It is all in one verse, as it is written, “And you are My sheep, the sheep of My pasture, you are men,” for Israel are called man and beast. This is why “Man and beast You save, O Lord.” If they are rewarded, they are called “man,” such as above. If they are not rewarded, they are called “beast.”
189) Rabbi Aba said, “I have seen the face of Divinity, and one who sees the face of Divinity must walk and run after her.” It is written, “And let us know, let us eagerly pursue to know the Lord.” It is also written, “And many peoples shall go and say, ‘Come and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord ... for out of Zion shall go forth the law [Torah].” And I wish to follow you and learn from those good things that you are tasting each day from the holy splendor of Rabbi Shimon.
299) The discernments whether there is Din or not are only with respect to the lower ones. But with respect to the Atzmut [self (Himself)], everything is Godliness, above time, place, or change. All those degrees and corrections that we discern in Godliness are but kinds of concealments and covers with regard to the lower ones because the ten Sefirot are ten kinds of covers over Himself. Similarly, all the imaginary images of time, place, and deeds are all but kinds of covers over His Godliness that seem that way in the eyes of the lower ones. It is as one who is not impressed or changed at all by the covers in which he is covered, for only his friends are impressed by his disappearance or appearance.
Likewise, Godliness does not change or is in any way affected by those degrees and corrections and names in time, place, and change of action that the lower ones discern in His covers. Rather, we should know that these covers also serve for disclosures. Moreover, by the measure of the cover in each name and correction, so is the measure of disclosure in it. One who is rewarded with receiving the measure of covers properly is later rewarded with these covers becoming measures of disclosures for him.
One who studies should remember these words during the study, and he will not fail in his thought.
329) Happy are the righteous, for all those holy words that are said in the spirit of the high and holy spirit—the spirit in which all the upper holy ones are included—have been revealed to you. These are words to which upper and lower listen.
Happy are you who sit at the throne of Midian, harvesters of the field, who know these matters and regard them. You will know your masters face to face, eye to eye, and with these words you will be rewarded with the next world, as it is written, “And you shall know this day and reply to your heart.” HaVaYaH, AtikYomin, Elokim, ZA are all one. Blessed be His name forever and for all eternity.
New Zohar, Nasso [Take]
3) Woe unto he who comes to seduce his Master with a faraway heart and an incomplete desire, as it is written, “And they deceived Him with their mouth and lied to Him with their tongue, and their heart was not steadfast with Him.”
4) The unification of the prayer and the blessing depend on the speech and the uttering of the mouth, and everything depends on the root of the deed. One who does not know the root of the deed, his work is not work. If he blemishes the deed of the speech, there is no place for the blessing to be, and his prayer is not a prayer.