The Gate of Love
In Mashiach consciousness,
the purpose is not the fast,
not asceticism,
and not even external Torah,
but the revelation of divine love in the human heart.
The person becomes a “vessel of love.”
There are souls that are already, right now, privileged to taste holiness for its own sake (kedushah lishma).
Not because they “have to,”
not because they “must,”
not to avoid punishment,
but because love and dvekut (cleaving to God) draw them on their own.
For them, life is not torment,
but light,
sweetness,
inner freedom.
This transition is from “service not for its own sake” to “service for its own sake.”
As long as a person serves God out of fear, affliction, and habit,
they have not yet entered the gate of love.
But when, from within that same process, the internality is revealed,
then the entire flavor of life is transformed. Life itself becomes holiness,
and not a burden.
Yom Kippur is one of the greatest days there is,
not because of the fast or the affliction within it,
but because of the opening it creates for a new soul consciousness.
The Zohar calls Yom Kippur “Yoma d’Kipurim’a”—
a day that atones and covers,
meaning, it returns a person to their root,
rectifies the fracture between them and themself, and between them and the Creator.
It is a day in which the distinction is clarified:
Is a person serving from a place of affliction and externality,
or are they entering within and touching the light of love,
the light of “there is nothing but Him.”
Yom Kippur is immense because it is not another “law” or “custom,”
but a window for the soul.
A day in which a person can choose if they will only “fast,”
or if they will be truly renewed and born again.
Reflect:
Are you approaching this day (or any spiritual practice) from a place of “have to,” or from a desire to open a gate to love?
Beyond the physical fast, how can you “atone and cover”—that is, return to your true root and heal the separation within yourself?
What would it mean for you to choose not just to “fast,” but to be truly reborn into a new consciousness today?
The conversation continues below.