Transcript
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One Friday afternoon,
a man walks in to buy some cake for the
Friday night meal. You know, have a nice
dessert.
And as he's looking at the delicacies,
you know, seven-layer cake, strawberry
cake, he sees behind the counter a tray
with some cakes that look a bit messed
up. Now, the lady behind the counter
hearing him responds, "Oh no, sir, I'm
sorry. Those are not for sale."
And he's thinking to himself, "What?
What do you mean not for sale? Well, I
wasn't even thinking of buying those."
And she begins to explain, "Those are
the cakes that I make with my children.
You see, every Friday after school, they
get off early, so they come to the
bakery here and we bake those together,
and those are our dessert for Friday
night."
With this story, hopefully we can
appreciate a bit deeper the idea of this
so imperfect perfect world that we're in
the middle of building over here. God
certainly could have made this world
perfect. He could have made us perfect.
But it would have had nothing to do with
us
and him. It would have been all him.
Just like those cakes. You know, what's
so amazing about those cakes? Why are
they so special? Is that the mother and
children made them together. The mother
could have made on her own cakes that
were that were much better
superficially.
And we could have even had children make
cakes on their own in school, a nice
assignment. But when they make those
cakes together, it's it's personal.
Hashem said, "I want to make this world
together with you."
Why is God interested in this world?
Really, why is he interested in us?
You know, he's infinite. He he exists
eternally. What are we adding? What can
we possibly give Hashem in order that he
should have wanted to create us and and
have us in this world? So,
very complicated question one might
think, but the in truth,
the deepest, most true concepts are the
simplest. And so, there's a simple
answer. But in order to get this simple
answer, you have to go to one of the
most complex books that have ever been
written.
When we look in one of the deepest books
of Kabbalah, we find the Ari Zal, Rabbi
Isaac Luria, who lived in the 1500s,
addressing this exact question. And the
answer is going to blow you away, and at
the same time, you're going to be like,
"Of course. How did How did I not think
of that?"
So, what is the answer? The answer is
this.
God created us and this world
because he wanted to give of himself.
Because he wanted to express that
that midah, that
idea of having someone to relate to and
having something to give to.
And that's in the language of Kabbalah,
in Hebrew Hebrew books, it says, "Teva
lahav tov laheitiv." The nature of the
good is to bestow good. And so, the
reason why all of what you see around
you is here, you included, is cuz God
takes interest in you. God wants to take
care of you.
When we try to be perfect, so we're
bound for failure.
But God is perfect. And so, once he
decided that he wants to create us in
order to give us, so he also decided
that that must be the perfect best good
that's possible.
And that's why, ultimately, we do have a
complicated world, and that's where this
answer
becomes a bit more complex,
multifaceted. Because if we would just
simply say it's all based on love, love
is everything, God loves us, and let's
live happily ever after,
we're going to be left with many
questions. You know, where did suffering
come in? If God is perfect and loves us,
so why suffering? Why death?
You know, why doesn't he show us his
greatness? Why don't I get everything I
need? Why don't I get everything I ask
for? So, there's still a lot of
questions. So, let's
try to clarify more. Take it another
step further.
When we When God decided to create the
world,
so it had to
run through what we call his wisdom as
well. The first step was he he desired,
he willed
for us to exist. And the second step is
it had to follow a certain process of of
logic, of divine logic and wisdom.
And so everything must make sense to
that level of of God's understanding,
which is of infinite and perfect.
Here's where it gets a bit complicated
because God decided that in order for us
to receive this perfect good from him,
we have to deserve it. We have to earn
it. Because had we received it for free,
so we would forever be in the category
of a beggar receiving a handout. Now
imagine, we should not know from such
things, but imagine the feeling of
unfortunately
having no way to support yourself, no
way to take care of yourself. If we add
to that family members, no way to take
care of your family, you're desperate,
hurt, confused, and you're there with a
handout. Please help me sustain myself,
help me sustain the people depending on
me.
A terrible feeling.
So
think about it like this. If we would be
sitting in the world to come,
that perfect blissful world with
all of the greatest things that that are
beyond what we can imagine, and we got
it all for free, we would in somehow be
connected to that beggar, that poor
person. Because it's we would be
receiving all of this good, but we would
have not earned it. It would not have
been through our accomplishment. So we
would be be being supported.
Hashem understood that that type of
perfect world would lack the main
ingredient of perfection, which is that
it should be ours. And so he created a
world where we're challenged.
We don't see God, we see the world
running in a certain way, and we have
tremendous tests, tremendous tests tests
of faith, tests of our own integrity,
honesty,
you know, are we going to care for one
another? When push comes to shove, am I
going to think of myself and not others?
Or am I going to be willing to sacrifice
for myself for the sake of others?
Every situation we find ourselves in,
business, pleasure, personal,
it's all really designed by God himself,
the ultimate creator and designer, the
ultimate artist, to see what kind of
painting we're going to make of our
life, of this world. What are we going
to do
with our choice, with our life? And that
will ultimately determine what we
deserve and what we will ultimately get
in the end.
And the great difference that will be is
it we'll have earned it. And so we go
through everything we go through, the
ups, the downs, the dark sides, the the
good moments, the bad moments, it's all
in order for us to truly receive the
ultimate gift that Hashem wants to give
us.
So, if God is so perfect, how come this
world seems so messed up? You know, even
taking it more personally, why am I so
messed up sometimes? I think we all can
ask ourselves that question.
So,
interesting, the reason why we see an
imperfect world certainly is not
respective of God being imperfect. God
is perfect.
It's that God did not want to make a
perfect world.
He wanted us, together with him, to make
a perfect world.
And that's where the beginning of
imperfection starts.
God wants us to look around and see what
needs fixing, see what needs completing.
And when we live up to that
responsibility and challenge,
then we actually attain the highest
level of perfection, this perfection
that God designed when he created the
world. It's the partnership of creation
perfection.
Together, we become partners in God in
creating ourselves and the world by
fixing what needs to be fixed.
