It’s clear (as we’ve seen) that rectified decision-making is a skill we must cultivate to find our way through the post-Edenic world of “good and evil” where everything is shades of gray. Success requires a low-grade prophesy called, ruach hakodesh. Yet as we’ll soon see, that requires a rectified will, which requires a pure heart, which requires equanimity, which requires an immunity to flattery and insult, which requires a mastery of our innate tendencies toward narcissism and shame.

Life is filled with crossroads that rarely have signs to mark the way.  Should I stay in kollel or acquire a trade?  Is this the person I should marry?  Do these obstacles mean I should stop and switch tracks or are they just testing my resolve?  Does God will me to leave this soul-crushing marriage, or try for the thousandth time to make things work? Should I quit my secure job and leap into my entrepreneurial life-dream, or should I stay put for the time is not right?

These questions fall outside the pale of uniform codes, for their answers vary from case to case.  Each person must find the God–serving truth that applies to this unique circumstance and this moment in time.  Guiding principles go only so far; there is no avoiding the leap.  At some point the mind must give way to the heart, for in these questions the judgment is subjective and, like it or not, the heart holds that key.

What equips us for this task?  How do we learn to orient in a sea of relative truths?  Where do we turn to acquire this expertise.  There are universities to train our brains, but how do we train our hearts to recognize truth in all its varied guises.

Mastering this (noga) layer of life is the last frontier. It’s the revolving sword that blocks our way to Gan Eden, the reward phase of history, mashiach and the World-to-Come.  Fortunately, for most of us, these major decisions are few and far between. When they do come up, we pray, search for guidance and, hopefully, receive it.

However, there’s a big difference between summoning ruach hakodesh on special occasions versus the 24/7 ruach hakodesh required to pass through the spinning, fiery sword. For that we need to internalize the lessons of life to such a degree that our instinctive and reflexive response to the moment is always in line with spiritual law. Not because we consulted the codes before responding, but because we have absorbed the principles underlying the codes into our nerve net.  We no longer need to think about what to do, because we instinctively know what to do, and that knowing is reliable.  We can only cross the finish line if we are truly (like Esther) enwrapped in ruach hakodesh.

Commentators marvel at how Esther managed to pass through all the layers of security preventing intruders from entering the king’s throne room uninvited. It’s as though Esther’s royal gown became an invisibility cloak that allowed her to slip past the guards, straight to the inner chamber, sight unseen.

In fact, the Talmud teaches:

ותלבש אסתר מלכות:

:ורבותינו אמרו שלבשתה רוח הקדש—

“Esther dressed herself in royalty (literally, malchut)”[Megilat Esther 5:1]

—The rabbis interpret this verse to mean that Esther was enclothed in ruach hakodesh.[Rashi, there]

Guided by Divine inspiration, Esther dodged the king’s security detail (i.e., his metaphoric revolving sword) and entered the inner chamber unscathed.

In her death-defying mission, Esther had nothing to rely upon except her channel of ruach hakodesh. At each step she scanned the horizon for options, waiting for her heart to whisper, “yes,” and there she would move. An extended fast?…Today’s the day?…This hallway instead of that?…a wine party for three?…another? There were no neon signs or prophetic voices (or even a battle plan). Alone with her instincts, Esther had to find God’s holy word that speaks through them as surely as He spoke at Sinai.

     If ruach hakodesh is the endgame, how do we cultivate it. Where are the tools? What is the path? They don’t seem to teach this in college…or even in yeshiva?

 

 

Stepping Stones To Ruach HaKodesh

Working backwards, the stepping stones to ruach hakodesh are: a properly aimed will, which requires a pure heart, which requires equanimity, which requires an immunity to flattery and insult, which requires a mastery of our innate tendencies toward narcissism and shame which, if left unchecked, amount to self-worship, aka idolatry. Exploring each:

(Ruach HaKodesh requires) A PROPERLY AIMED WILL (aka, PRAYER): All of the preliminaries (mentioned below)] are aimed toward one thing: to purify our will to such a degree that our whole heart (right ventricle and left) conscious and unconscious, genuinely desires only good, only truth, only to do what we’re designed to do. That single-pointed, unadulterated prayer is the arousal from below (the ataruta d’l’tata) that pulls down the ruach hakodesh (the ataruta d’l’ila) that guides the choices of each moment and steers us through the flaming sword. Nowadays we touch that place on occasion but, eventually it must become our default. Kabbalah refers to this pure will arising from our depths as “breath of the bones (hevlei d’garma),” a term which conjures the essence of a person.

…  כי החשק הוא עיקר צורת האדם וחיות שבו …  וההבל דגרמי הוא כולל כל החשקות שלו …  ונודע לו במחשבתו את השייך לאותו חשק:

Desire/will is what shapes a life and infuses it with vitality…This breath of the bones incorporates the sum-total of authentic desires that inhere in the soul … and pulls down into the mind [via ruach hakodesh] all that is relevant to that desire. [R. Tsadok HaKohen, Dover Tsedek, Acharei Mot.]

The more our will aligns with our mission (like a compass that always points north no matter how it is tilted) the more our “arousal from below” will evoke the ruach hakodesh to faithfully guide us through the blades of life’s spinning fiery sword.

There are many kinds of prayer: praise, thanksgiving, hitbodedut, etc.  Yet it is the prayer of request that fulfills the actual mitzvah of prayer which, according to Sefer HaChinuch, is to cry out to HaShem at a time of need.  A prayer of request is a statement of will and admission of lack. The inner work of prayer at this stage is to identify something (big or small) that you believe to be a soul-yearning, consistent with your life’s purpose and even essential to it.

Nature abhors a vacuum.  That prayer, in proportion to alignment, exerts a powerful suction that pulls down the lights that are exactly configured to fill its request—to narrow the gap between our present state and what we are designed to do. Ruach HaKodesh needs a specific question/challenge/need or goal to grab onto. In that regard, ruach hakodesh is different from prophesy.[1]

(But that requires) A PURE HEART: We human beings are built in such a way that our heart is unruly. We cannot just order it to want this or that. We have to demonstrate that the only thing that will make us happy is to do this or that.  And the only this or that that will truly make us happy is when it actually is what we’re designed to do. And that is the only thing HaShem wants from us anyway, for He designed us to do exactly that. We have to grasp this truth so deeply that it seeps into our heart and gently corrects its desires … without coercion. It becomes clear that only doing-what-we’re-designed-to-do can produce the full benefits that we are seeking from life and that are guaranteed not to backfire around the bend. The heart, by nature, is more short-sighted than the head.  The heart’s growing edge is to incorporate more of the right ventricle’s “big picture values” into the mix of factors that drive its desires.

(But this requires) EQUANIMITY: The problem is that we don’t generally know what it is that we are designed to do. There’s so many options and so many expectations and so many pressures to conform to this or that. True, every moment is a communication between HaShem and our soul, but how do we find its channel of transmission, and how do we distinguish between our ego’s message and our ruach hakodesh for, says R. Tsadok, both of them communicate through our inner voice.

That discernment is especially complicated since the ego makes the call. It translates the message, rules on its authenticity and then decides whether to act upon it.

A reactive ego stirs up the pot, making it nearly impossible to get a true read on these matters. Like the difference between a reflection produced on the surface of a still pond, versus one that’s disturbed by wind and rain. The latter reflection disintegrates into a fragmented hodgepodge of color with no recognizable image to be found.

Equanimity is essential to ruach hakodesh.  When our mind is like still water, it is more likely to spot the message of the moment, read it correctly and take its truths to heart.

(But this requires) IMMUNITY TO FLATTERY AND INSULT: Equanimity requires an ego that is impervious to bribes—that is not seduced by glimmers of personal gain or threatened by potential loss—an ego that is only swayed by truth. Otherwise, it can’t be trusted.  Unconscious motives will cause it to add or subtract (metaphoric) weight from the relevant factors causing the scale to tip (not coincidentally) to the side of greatest ego-gain.  And because this is happening unawares, it’s not so simple to root it out.

A story of equanimity by R. Chaim Vital:

A young scholar approached the famous mystery school that trained its students to be prophets and seers.  He asked to be initiated into their circle.  The tsadik who interviewed the petitioner praised his intentions: “Blessed are you, child of God, your goals are right.  I have one question for you.  Pray, tell me, have you attained equanimity?”

The aspirant requested an explanation of terms.

The tsadik replied, “There are two men.  One respects you and one insults you.  Are they equal in your eyes?”

The aspirant responded, “No they are not. I feel good and at peace with the one who respects me, and am pained by the insult.  I would never take revenge or hold a grudge against the latter, for the Torah forbids that.[2] Nevertheless, they do evoke different feelings inside me.”

The sage replied: “Go in peace my son. Until you have attained equanimity, until you are totally God-referenced, you are not fit to attain prophesy. Until your insides do not respond to flattery or insult, you are not ready to enter the higher states of consciousness that we teach here.  Go and work on yourself still more.  When your heart attains humility and equanimity, you may return and join our circle.[3]

One who seeks Divine guidance for life decisions is pursuing a subtle form of prophesy and the requirement of equanimity equally applies.

The ego’s vulnerability to flattery and insult is what the Torah calls “knowledge of good and evil,” (as opposed to knowledge of true and false). In the ego’s lexicon, good is all that pleases the ego and evil is what diminishes it.  We need to keep an eye on the ego’s attempts to downgrade the significance of factors that cause it discomfort regardless of their truth.  The bigger our blind spots in this regard, the more skewed our assessments and the less reliable our intuitions. The question becomes: How do we get to bottom of this? How do we embody the Baal Shem Tov’s interpretation of the mitzvah that applies from the moment of awakening till the moment of sleep:

שיוויתי השם לנגדי תמיד—I place God before me at all times.

Baal Shem Tov’s reading: Whatever life brings, I know that You, HaShem, are equally near.

(That requires) MASTERY OF NARCISISM AND SHAME: It is the ego’s intolerance to shame that underlies its hypersensitivity to flattery and insult, blame and sleight.

It is like a bruise that you completely forget about until something touches it, at which point you flinch and push it away. It’s a reflex. You don’t think about it.  Exactly so is the ego’s response to shame.

Over time the ego becomes so expert at deflecting shame that it learns to anticipate threat and to steer around it. Sometimes that’s for better, but often it’s for worse. What happens if the message of the moment—the truth that HaShem is trying to convey—is one that the ego associates with discomfort? In such a case, the ego is likely to sweep it under the rug before our conscious self can even catch wind of it. In that case, our interpretation of the situation will be warped, and our response will be ineffectual and perhaps even disastrous.

Vulnerability to flattery and affront is a universal liability that arises from the disowned shame permeating the raw materials out of which we are built. No one is immune to its sway. The ego’s refusal to forgive its insults and to face its flaws distorts its worldview and warps its decisions.

In the stepwise sequence of creating our universe, HaShem underwent a gradually intensifying series of concealments.  The ultimate effacement (and lowest layer) is idolatry, where HaShem is not just invisible, but His accomplishments are actually ascribed to an other.  And the lowest idolatry is self-worship. It lacks even the humility of acknowledging a higher power.  The ego, in its immaturity, believes itself a god and claims the perks of that position: most particularly the power to prosecute insults. The ego is vigilant and swift to punish all that endangers its godlike status.  [myth of its perfection]

The primitive ego ranks every moment as good or evil, flattering or insulting, gratifying or deflating. That is what’s happening at the subliminal base of our psyche.

It is curious to note that the most primitive layer of a computer is just 0’s and 1’s. All its sophistication of performance and nuance builds upon that binary string. Exactly so is our primitive psyche, post Eden, after imbibing knowledge of good and evil. It too grades every moment as good or evil, belittling or praising, safe or threatening, plus or minus, zero or one.

The problem is not that it’s happening.  The problem is our lack of awareness of it.  Without conscious involvement we are unable to correct its defensive, childish and (often) erroneous interpretations. And worst of all, its misreadings produce emotions and anxieties that actively impair our ability to recognize the most spiritually productive option in any given moment.

Like in the Wizard of Oz, the primitive ego is the man in the booth, behind the curtain, pulling the levers, pressing the buttons, causing the hoopla that diverts our attention from the disowned shame that’s recorded in that binary string and the anxiety, resentment and fantasies of retaliation that it has produced.

Hashem clearly set up the world with a growth curve. In katnut (our childish, narrow-minded immaturity), we are more reactive, defensive and unconscious of our ego responses. We are manipulated by our unconscious shame. But over the years, if we pay attention and work on ourselves our visual field widens and the long-term consequences of our deeds become visible; this, in turn, allows us to make wiser choices. Concurrently, our ego becomes more tolerant of truths and circumstances that cause discomfort.

The Turnabout: From Insult to Shame to Humility to Ruach HaKodesh

The ego’s response to insult—its urge to punish and its fixation on settling scores—is the most accurate barometer of where one stands in the run-up to ruach hakodesh. Ruach hakodesh is a spiritual gift that the holy One grants to those who have cultivated a pure heart and an aligned will.

Ruach HaKodesh applies to a whole continuum of inner guidance that becomes more and more accessible as the overlap between personal will and Divine will increases. Ruach HaKodesh is also a spiritual power that, if misused, carries severe consequences. A searing flash of anger—of ego-offense—directed toward a rival is like bringing an idol into the holy of holies, into the state of devekut that has produced the ruach hakodesh that one presently enjoys. The ego’s self-worship—its reflex of vengeance when it feels dishonored—is truly idolatrous.

It is right there, in that ego-fueled state of indignation that one encounters a choice point. Do you escalate the incident by insulting the offender even worse? Or perhaps you refrain from revenge on the spot but fantasize about making them regret their sleight, and replaying that scenario again and again. The ego demands homage and cannot forgive even trivial discourtesies. Overriding its demands for retribution is a truly formidable task.

Yet, if, instead, we choose to work the matter through with HaShem, accepting the insult as a humbling message from on High, then we make our priorities clear. We will gladly sacrifice a heap of ego-gratification for a jackpot/bonanza of ruach hakodesh. And if we stick to our commitment not to retaliate (or even not to harbor a grudge) we will (eventually) release ourselves from the shame of insult and our channel of ruach hakodesh will grow ever more trustworthy. That is the goal and the promise.

The problem is that some relationships really are abusive, with a litany of blame, insults and belittlements that crush our self-esteem. We try to resolve the problem through counseling and mediation, but if that fails, the right choice may very well be to step out of that configuration. How does one distinguish a decision to separate that is driven by vengeance versus one that is a healthy exit from a toxic circumstance. This is one of the most complicated decisions we make in life. There is no simple answer, but in the section of practical tools, we will suggest some approaches to this thorny question.

In summary: Unprocessed shame (especially of Insult) is the gremlin in the works. Everything else is consequent to it. In proportion to our conscious processing of shame is the extent to which we are immune to the triggers of flattery and insult, a pre-requisite to the equanimity, which produces the purity of heart, which awakens our genuine, instinctive, spontaneous will, which functions as a super-integrated prayer that pulls down the providence—the ruach hakodesh—that guides us through the fiery sword, and on to our Edenic destiny.

Any progress we make along life’s journey—any clarity we achieve or power we accrue—if it is not founded upon an equally proportionate forward step in processing shame (and, particularly, insult), then it is a spiritual bypass, a false bottom that will eventually—shamefully—appear as hypocrisy.

We now have a partial answer to our question of why HaShem would make shame an inescapable, universal though profoundly aversive part of life. It is clear that shame is intimately involved in the mechanisms of growth and transformation that drive creation toward its messianic destiny. Forward motion is an energy demanding pursuit. HaShem provides a carrot in front and a fire behind to assure that we fulfill our daily quota of progress. Shame is the fire behind.

The Shame of Failure will not lift until a person does their teshuva…until they admit their guilt, apologize sincerely, and commit to changing their ways. Like a spring compressed and released, their fall, when followed by teshuva, produces forward motion. They are humbled from acknowledging their fallibility, wisened by learning from what they did wrong, and a sliver more enlightened from choosing honesty over denial.

The Shame of Defect is, similarly, a powerful motivator of growth and achievement. We human beings are less than G-d, and consequently less than perfect, which makes us flawed in some visible or invisible way. We are all wounded children, struggling with the lurking insecurity that perhaps we are unlovable or unworthy of success. The disproving of that shame becomes a powerful incentive to succeed in whatever is our life mission. The shame of defect becomes a fire under our pants that keeps us striving for achievement and recognition.

The Shame of Insult is the most difficult to turn around, but it is also the most critical.  In part because the ego’s intolerance to criticism (which it interprets as insult) is a kind of idolatrous self-worship. In part because it instigates revenge which fuels a cycle of attack and counterattack—a feud—that can last for generations. And In part because one’s access to ruach hakodesh is determined, to a large extent, by cleaning up one’s response to insult.

[1] It’s like doing a google search. There is a nearly infinite mass of information out there including the answer to your present question. But there is no way to access that knowledge until you enter your search words. Which then, pull out from that mass, the specific information that relates to your question.

[2] Lev. 19:18.

[3] R. Chayim Vital, Ketavim Chadashim, Shaari Kedusha, P 9 (bottom), in the name of R. Avner.